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Brown-Roth : failure of a diplomati
- Subject: Brown-Roth : failure of a diplomati
- From: cd@xxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 20 Jun 1996 01:51:00
Subject: Brown-Roth : failure of a diplomatic mission : Opinion Euro-Burmanet
Opinion : The Failure of the Brown-Roth mission
The Clinton backed Brown-Roth fact-finding mission appears now to have
been more of a diplomatic effort to assure ASEAN solidarity behind the "
constructive engagement " plan in direct talks with the Asean
authorities while sending two vital messages home to Rangoon, and to
Washington. Brown and Roth have indicated that the White House will not
push for sanctions, as long as Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is not arrested.
Therefore, Slorc has been cautioned to ease its repressive actions of the
May and June crackdown, while prisoners of the NLD remain in jail. For
Slorc, the message from the US diplomatic mission is clear -Business as
usual.
Brown has not talked to rebel groups, nor evidently has he read the
SAIN/ERI report Total Denial, nor he report released Monday by the Karen
National Union (KNU), which has been fighting the Burmese
government for autonomy for the ethnic Karen people since 1948.
William Brown, a former U.S. ambassador to Thailand, touring Asia at the
behest of President Clinton to try to forge consensus among nations on
how to get a dialogue going between the Burmese military government and
democracy advocates led by Aung San Suu Kyi, said in a news conference in
Bangkok Saturday, that one positive development in Burma has been that
" the use of forced labor in the economy, and particularly in projects
that involve American firms, has been significantly addressed. "
Brown added that as the Burmese military has gained control of ethnic
areas, 'the issue of forced labor for porterage diminished.'
All evidence by the NLD, the KNU and other rebel groups indicates that
the contrary is true. It is a dangerous omen, indeed, and a tragic sign
of approval at this time, in a spirit of compromise by the US government
of the gross atrocities committed by Slorc and their partners TOTAL,
UNOCAL, ARCO, PEPSICO and other investors, and should be left unchecked
by reason and ignorance or denial. Much worse, we see the White House
backing itself into a corner by recognizing still further the illegal
Slorc junta in its effort to gain its cooperation, thus playing further
into Slorc's bloody hands at the cost of the life of Slorc's tragic
victims - the Burmese people.
It appears that the prejudiced mindset of Ambassador Brown had already
been set before the mission left Washington. It remains to be seen what
Stanley Roth, coming out of the National Security Agency meeetings, will
say on the subject of progress towards democratic reform, a release of
all political prisoners, and recognition of the NLD as the only
legitimate authority in the country.
Dawn Star
Euro-Burmanet
http://www-uvi.eunet.fr/asia/euro-burma
The writer graduated from Yale, and studied at Johns Hopkins Nitze School
of Advanced International Studies under former Secretary of State Harold
Brown, and Paul Nitze