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IHT Letters/Imle, Unocal



dawn star (Euro-Burmanet) wrote:
> 
> IHT Letters/Unocal-TOTAL Pipeline  &   Comment
> 
> One letter in today's International Herald Tribune (iht@xxxxxxx)
> "Investing in Burma"
> 
> The opinion column by John Imle, Unocal's president ("A Case for
> Investment in Burma,"Feb.6), was little more than an apologia for his
> firm's support of the military junta of Burma.
> 
> Sanctions against Burma are not "isolatist", and those who suppport
> Burma selective purchasing statutes are not "promoting isolationism".
> 
> In fact, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the general secretary of the National
> League
> for Democracy, strongly favors international investment in
> Burma. She asks only that corporations investing in Burma do so
> with the imprimatur of the legitimate, democratically elected Burmese
> legislature.
> 
> That legislature was formed by a free and fair election
> in 1990. The League is its largest parliamentary plarty, elected
> to over 80 percent of its seats. Rather than engage the
> League in a peaceful transition after the election, the junta continues
> to
> suppress the legitimate government and the people of Burma through armed
> force.
> 
> Multinational companies contracting with the hunta are aware
> that they are in business with an outlaw regime. Those
> companies have placed themselves in the shameful position of defending
> at all costs an illegitimate government.
> 
> It is unsurprising that Unocal fears the Burma sanctions movement. Mr.
> Imle claims selective purchasing statutes are ineffective. Yet consider
> the fate of the South African apartheid regime, which not so long ago
> seemed
> as impregnable as the Burma junta. Then the patient groundwork of the
> many individuals
> advocating a South Africa boycott bore fruit. Today that
> nation is ruled by the individual the dictatorship irrationally feared
> the most. His former bitter enemies consider themselves fortunate it is
> so.
> 
> It is not too late for Unocal to stave of harsh future
> judgements and do the right thing by postponing further
> investment in Burma until that nation's legitimate government
> is in place.
> 
> Ralph J. Palermo Jr. Boston
> 
> +++++++++
> 
> Question and Comment from Euro-Burmanet
> 
> In my comment yesterday, asking Clinton and policy makers to
>  "tell it like it is" before "another massacre", we all know
> there is another massacre already taking place
> with the KNU battles and destruction of life in the refugee camps
> on the Thai border.
> 
> The question has been asked why doesn't Suu Kyi mobilise
> her NLD forces in support; she has been in virtual house arrest for the
> past two months.
> 
> Zar NI raise the alarm about an assassination plot. Late last year
> her aides were hurt in an attack on her motorcade. Is she under a very
> real Slorc death threat?
> 
> Would someone please comment on what Suu Kyi and the NLD are now doing
> in Rangoon while the Karen massacre continues? What is the NLD doing
> about the Karen conflict?
> 
> What is Suu Kyi's position on the current Karen conflict, and is this
> "mopping
> up" strategy by Slorc of Karen rebels on the pipeline region going to
> spearhead
> further UNOCAL-TOTAL penetration into the area? That is, doesn't it
> appear
> that Slorc is doing the dirty work of the oil business, cut and destroy,
> what
> in Vietnam US troops called "pacification", so that the oil men can do
> their business as usual?
> 
> Good to heart, the above letter while sincere is naive. Unocal is there
> because it wants to be there, and is rapidly expanding its operations. So is TOTAL.
> Oil & gas companies aren't bad or evil, of course not. After all, 
 the oil and gas men do not wear military uniforms; instead they
wear sincere coats and sincere ties. They are sincere about doing
business.
They  want  their money, and a good return on investment and destroy
what they have
> to in order to get it. Eye-witness accounts of the destructiveness of
> the pipeline project are well documented. Oil and gas companies do not give a damn
about democracy until they are forced to by the people that do, and
sometimes those people are also shareholders and investors. 

We do not see any oil and gas company coming to the aid of Suu Kyi, the
NLD,
> or the Burmese people.  Now that they would be investing for the long term,
> if they cared for democracy at all. Why not take out an option on democracy?
It would be a good thing if they did, if  not no less naive to think so.
> 
> WORLDWIDE TOTAL BOYCOTT
> HTTP://www-uvi.eunet.fr/asia/euro-burma/