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ACTION LETTER IN JAN-95 REPOSTED.
/* written 16 January 1995 by uneoo@ physics. in igc:reg.burma */
/* -------------------" Action Letter Reposting "----------------- */
To : reg.burma-list and HRNet subscribers
Note: Please do not repost to the Public networks, such as soc.culture.burma
Dear Friend:
I have sent following letter with U.N.reports described to the Burmese
community in Australia as well as people I know abroad. I particularly
wish to have all of your opinions on how to go about the Burma democracy
movements forwards. Please do contribute discussions and articles that
may also help the democratic groups to consilidate their opinions.
Your attention to these issues are much appreciated.
With best regards, U Ne Oo.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Dr U Ne Oo
48/2 Ayliffes Road
St Marys SA 5042
Adelaide Australia.
\date{January 15, 1995.}
Dear
Greetings from Adelaide Australia and
wishing you to a happy and prosperous new year of 1995.
Re: The activities at the UNGA'1994 and emerging issues
-------------------------------------------------------
Please find enclosed materials reporting the activities at the
United Nations General Assembly-1994. Reports from the Special
Rapporteur, the Secretary-General and related draft resolution for
1994 indicate that of all of our efforts are yielding good results
in promotion of human rights situation in Burma. In this connection,
I should like to thank you, in particular, for your kind attention
given to the problem of refugees and displaced people from Burma.
I also enclosed the paper ``An Operational Guideline Proposal for
United Nations' Agencies in Myanmar". That paper was prepared in April
1994 for the operation of UNHCR and other UN agencies in Arakan State
where the Rohingya refugees from Bangladesh are repatriating. As the
campaign for refugees in Thailand now closer to some conclusion, the natural
extension of such operation can be considered as the possibility.
In order to participate in this humanitarian action and also
to actively promote a peaceful solution to Burma's conflicts, there
are still much work needed to be done in the part of the pro-democracy
forces. It is apparent that the policy as well as the
action by the international actors (the U.N., U.S. and all major
democracies, and the ASEAN ) have now been consolidated. Therefore,
the strategies to participate effectively in this action needed to be
formulated by pro-democracy groups. The Burma's pro-democracy forces must
participate in such humanitarian action and to take active role in
peace building in Burma.
The following are some of the issues which I believe would be
important in promoting a peaceful solution to Burma's conflicts. I
would appreciate and valued your opinion on these issues.
1. Empowerment of the elected representatives: By way of following the
prescriptions outlined in the paper, the U.N. and international
community will be able to encourage some form of interim
administration which may be acceptable to both military and
civilians. At present, these committees should be working at the
regional level. Consideration should be made to promote to the
central level when it runs smoothly.
It is crucial for the Burmese Army and elected representatives
works smoothly in those interim committees. At present, such
operation has been in place in the Arakan State. According to the
Special Rapporteur, the Military Government of Myanmar agreed to
the operation of humanitarian agencies at the grass-roots level.
I would advocate the UN to consider sharing their evaluation
on this process. I would communicate you further when this
becomes available.
2. The release of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi: There has been a speculation
about possible release of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi as early as mid-January 94.
Concerns has also been raised for a possibility of renewing conflict
between the SLORC and her.
Although Daw Aung San Suu Kyi herself has been devoted to non-violent
methods in opposing the ruling junta, the existing laws that promulgated by
successive military governments are not permitting anyone to
express freely of their views. Therefore it'll be appropriate to
request Daw Aung San Suu Kyi to voluntarily refrain from making
comments about the role of the Burmese Army publically. However,
she should be allowed to discuss freely with the representatives of
pro-democracy forces, the elected member of parliament and
military personnels. The public should only be informed via the
press statements made by the council of these representatives, which
may avoid the possibility of her being targeted for persecutions.
There are numerous laws in Burma restricting freedom of speech and
association, and forming of peaceful assembly. When dealing with such
oppressive laws, the pro-democracy forces should avoid direct
confrontations. The usual method, which used in 1988 movement, is to
act-in-defiance of the law which inevitably promote confrontation
with military authorities. However, in present circumstances, the
pro-democracy forces should recognize that the law(s) as it is has
been repressive, and therefore seek the mediation of the U.N.
for repeal of the law. These laws will have to be revoked when
drafting the constitution. Such an approach to these oppressive
laws will be consistent with the policy of benchmarks.
3. Participation of ethnic freedom fighters in national
political process: The representatives of the ethnic freedom
fighters should be given appropriate political platform in drafting the
federal constitution. Currently, the Japanese Friendship
Association is brokering peace between last remaining groups of
DAB. As I have no further information on this and therefore please
share information about this if you know anything about this.
Although the pro-democracy forces cannot directly participate in
the operation of interim committees ( which described in 1. and
referred to as {\em Reception Committees} in the paper), the
pro-democracy forces can be transformed into
local political and social groups - such as returnees associations,
ethnic youth and cultural organizations, etc - and make influence in
decision-making process through the elected local representatives.
This move must eventually be aimed at initiating/consolidating
political parties at the regional/state level.
There has been fears felt by some freedom fighters that they
may loose their legitimacy by making peace with the SLORC. This may
be due to a belief that the respect by its own people(hence
legitimacy) is earned through fighting oppressive Burmese
military. It is essentially the problem of transforming to the real
political organizations from the freedom-fighter.
4. The role of student freedom fighters: Present political
situation appeals re-assessment of the role of students within the
democracy movement. The students had fled to the border areas and joined with
ethnic freedom fighters in 1988 in the hope that they may be able to topple
the central government by armed struggle.
One difference between student army (the All Burma Student
Democratic Front) and ethnic rebels is that students do not have an
aspiration for political power. All they want to do is to dismantle the
military dictatorship in Burma. Since present trend of the movement
is the one leading to non-violent struggle, it may be appropriate
for student army to consider phased-out their armed-wing.
It must be aware, however, the sensitivity of this issue. Recent internal
conflict within KNU has caused distress to the leadership of last
remaining pro-democracy forces. A gesture of withdrawal of students
will be detrimental to the morale of these remaining forces.
One possible solution may be to consider the option of gradually
phasing-out student's armed-wing after the cease-fire is implemented
between remaining ethnic rebels (NMSP and KNU) and the Burmese Army.
5. Institutionalizing Human Rights: The success in human
rights movement this year is much attributed to various non-partisan
human rights organizations' efforts in documentations and reports
provided to the international community. As the non-violent struggle
in Burma must continue, there is a need to encourage the continued
operation and expansion of non-partisan human rights organizations.
Efforts should be made to expand the network to a national level
and training in human rights documentation and reportings.
Continuation of reports to international human rights organizations
such as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the U.N.
Special Rapporteur are essential.
The establishment of such non-partisan human rights organization
will be beneficial to the population in longer term, even beyond
the democratic government came into power. Human being's strife for
greater respect for human rights is necessary to continue even in
the well-established democratic societies.
Although the governments in the Asian countries tend to label the
human rights as an alien concept, the universal values such as
social justice, observance to just rule of law, respect for human
being and the humanity are not. It then is as a matter of
interpreting these values in terms of human rights. Such non-partisan
organizations can be popular amongst Burmese populace once it
established, since these values are not an alien, particularly,
to the Burmese.
6. Controlling the business community: There has been a renewed
interests from the international business community to go into
Burma as the political tension eased. The UN initiated
economic embargo will unlikely be implemented as long as things
going smoothly. It might not be quite necessary to advocate the
Business community to withdraw entirely or to discourage entering
Burma. However, it will certainly be necessary to inform the illegal
status of SLORC and therefore not to invest with large financial
sums within Burma. Businesses must be ready to pull out if things
are not going smoothly. Nontheless, any genuine business will
need the time to study the situation in Burma and will wish
to make contact with the people of Burma, it may be reasonable to
allow them to open official contacts.
7. The operation of UN humanitarian agencies and NGOs: There has
been a difficult task of advocating the governments for financial
supports to the repatriation program. The community groups should advocate
their respective governments to lend financial support in this humanitarian
operation. Especially, we would need the information regarding who to
ask for such financial support.
Present operation will particularly suited for the NGOs who have
already working in collaboration with UNHCR. In Australia, there is an
inter-governmental agency - known as AUSTCARE which already working
in co-ordination with UNHCR. The community groups should advocate
support to such organizations wherever possible.
Some NGOs might wish to have more freedom in supporting a
particular targeted group. It is also natural for NGOs in showing
their significance and to claim a success in their work. However,
present situation in Burma need NGOs' coordination with the U.N.
humanitarian agencies - such as UNICEF and WHO - in order to avoid
duplications in efforts and to show that all NGOs are
operating in a cohesive fashion in promoting the humanitarian
situation in Burma.
8. The contingency measures and the role of NCGUB: According
to the Memorandum issued by the Burmese Embassy at the UNGA,
{\em ``Myanmar is fully committed to the voluntary and safe repatriation
of returnees and will be faithful scrupulously in implementing the
agreement and arrangement made between the concerned parties...."}.
In spite of such an assurance, a contingency plans must be made
in order to ensure the democratization process be not deviate from
its final objective. The analogy of situation may be seen in Haiti,
where the withdrawal of civilian peace-keeping mission in 1993 has
led to a stronger U.N. intervention. Therefore, we should appeal the
National Coalition Government of Union of Burma to maintain its
high-profile status until democratically elected government came
into power in Burma.
9. Participating in political action: There has been some differing
opinions on how to unite such groups and organizations of
diverse in background and interests to reach a unified political action.
One of the solution may be to encourage these groups to communicate
more frequently, and if possible, discuss the issues. Formalizing
the relations between groups, and hence the national political
consolidation, should be made at a much later stages. Participation
to any political action by various groups - large or small - must be
based on the fundamental understanding, mutual trusts and co-operations.
This process may boil down to even to the level of individual
co-operations.
As in any political process, the success or failure of a political
organization will depend on the understanding of general trend and
its ability to participate in the general action. Therefore, all
pro-democracy organizations needs to open-up their views to others
and cooperate each other with an open-mind. In this way, Burma's
pro-democracy groups can achieve the "Unity in Action".
I shall be grateful for you to give your views on these matters.
I would be able to send your message and views to various groups,
which may help the other make known of your views. Those who have
computer account can send their messages to following e-mail address,
a place where discussions about Burma are usually held.
Once again, I should like to thank you for your kind attention to
Burma's democracy movement and, in particular, the refugees and
displaced people from Burma.
\closing{Yours sincerely,}
e-mail: reg.burma@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (or) strider@xxxxxxxxxxx
snail-mail: Dr U Ne Oo, 48/2 Ayliffes Road, St Marys Adelaide,
AUSTRALIA SA 5042.
\end{document}