corporate withrawal from burma

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Subject: corporate withrawal from burma

Subject: corporate withrawal from burma

The following press release is from Burmese Relief Center-Japan; 266-27
Ozuku-cho, Kashihara-shi, nara-ken 634, Japan (tel: 07442-2-8236;
fax: 07442-4-6254)

January 31, 1994

        Burmese Relief Center-Japan announces that AMOCO shareholders in
Japan are also joining the COALITION FOR CORPORATE WITHDRAWAL FROM BURMA as
it intensifies a shareholder campaign to press the American oil giant Amoco
to end all its operations in Burma.  Amoco shareholders here in Japan
strongly support the shareholder resolution filed by socially responsible
investors opposed to Amoco's deals with SLORC, the Burmese military junta,
one of the most repressive and brutal regimes in the world.
        In addition, Burmese Relief Center-Japan is joining the growing
international boycott of those companies doing business with the SLORC,
including PEPSICO INTERNATIONAL, parent company of KENTUCKY FRIED CHICKEN
and PIZZA HUT.  Burmese Relief Center-Japan is particularly interested in
targeting the Japanese corporation, NIPPON OIL, which is actively pursuing
its investments in oil exploration in Burma.  Nippon Oil, together with
Texaco, purchased shares in Premier Petroleum's offshore concessions in
Burma, owning about 20% of Premier's concessions, Blocks M12, M13, and M14
in the Gulf of Martaban, which have estimated gas reserves of 2-4 trillion
cu.ft.
        It is of particular concern that Nippon Oil, by doing business with
the SLORC, is lending legitimacy to this illegal regime, which refuses to
surrender power to the National League for Democracy, the party of Nobel
Peace Prize Laureate Aung San Soo Kyi, now well into her fifth year of
house arrest.  The SLORC has managed to stay in power solely because of
revenues generated by foreign investment and trade.  Since the economy is
fully controlled by the military, a company such as Nippon Oil, by doing
business in Burma, is providing financial support for SLORC and thereby
condoning the military government's well-documented and pervasive abuses of
human rights.
        Further, there is great concern over an impending pipeline project
to move natural gas from fields being developed by Nippon Oil and other
companies in the Gulf of Martaban to energy-hungry Thailand.  This
multi-million dollar pipeline threatens Burma's last big rainforest and its
wildlife, as well as putting vast numbers of ethnic minority civilians and
their way of life in jeopardy.
        Finally, it is very likely that oil companies, including NIPPON
OIL, are directly benefitting from SLORC's regular and persistent use of
slave labor.  It is morally unacceptable for an international corporation
to be facilitated by the barbarous use of manacled and chained civilians
compelled by the threat of violence to provide the manual labor to build
the infrastructure needed for such oil exploration work and development
projects.

For more information on these international campaigns and on boycotts of
companies doing business in Burma, pleaase contact Ken and Visakha
Kawasaki, BURMESE RELIEF CENTER-JAPAN