The BurmaNet News: August 2, 1999

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 "Appropriate Information Technologies, Practical Strategies"
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The BurmaNet News: August 2, 1999
Issue #1327

HEADLINES:
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THE NATION: CANADA ENGAGES BURMA ON DRUGS 
SCMP: JUNTA SHOCKS CRITICS WITH RIGHTS MOVE 
BKK POST: BURMA ATTACKS 
BKK POST: RANGOON ACTION MUST MATCH WORDS 
MIZZIMA: BURMESE ACTIVIST RELEASED 
ANNOUNCEMENT: JULY ISSUE OF THE IRRAWADDY 
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THE NATION: CANADA ENGAGES BURMA ON DRUGS 
1 August,1999 by Rita Pateyaseri, Kavi Chongkittavorn

MOVE BREAKS NO-CONTACT WITH RANGOON 

In a major policy shift, Canada has expressed readiness to engage Burma on
drug related issues, breaking its long-standing no-contact policy with the
Rangoon military junta. 

However, Canadian Foreign Minister Lloyd Axworthy reiterated to The Nation
in an interview on Friday that Canada would stand firm on its human rights
policy despite willingness to hold talks and work directly or indirectly
with Burma on drug cooperation. 

"Some 90 per cent of hard drugs come to Canada from that particular region,
so we have a direct interest," Axworthy said.

The minister added that it was necessary to have dialogue and cooperation
in the matter of drugs with Burma and other Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (Asean) governments. He said Canada would join the ongoing regional
effort, which Thailand was urgently involved in, on suppressing the
narcotics trade. 

He said Canada was involved in regional efforts with Latin and North
America to combat drugs and had in fact taken the lead in cooperation
involving 34 countries in the western hemisphere within the framework of
the Organisation of American States. 

Canada, Axworthy said, wants to work actively with Asean and engage in
dialogue to make the grouping's vision of establishing a drug-free zone by
2020 a reality. 

Canada has until now maintained a hard-line position against the Rangoon
military regime because of its record of human-rights violations and
suppression of democratic aspirations of the Burmese people. 

Axworthy was in Bangkok last weekend as guest of the Foreign Ministry. He
held talks with his Thai counterpart Surin Pitsuwan and paid courtesy calls
on Prime Minister Chuan Leekpai and Deputy Prime Minister Bhichai Rattakul.
Human security issues and drugs topped the agenda. 

Canada, said Axworthy, backs Surin's proposal to set up an Asean Human
Resource Development Fund, which was one of the human security issues in
the region. He said he was looking for ways to assist the programme through
a C$10-million development fund, currently frozen because of Burma's
admission to Asean. 

Thailand plans to provide places in medicine, engineering and computer
science in Thai universities to train students from neighbouring countries
to integrate them with the region. Both Thailand and Canada are part of the
11-nation group known as the Lysoen Meeting. The group comprises liberal
democracies representing all geographical locations. It is trying to raise
international awareness of serious human-security issues such as
proliferation of small arms, land-mines and trafficking in women. The group
will meet again at the upcoming United Nations General Assembly in New York. 


Axworthy said Canada had succeeded in including the issue of small arms in
the Asian Regional Forum discussion in Singapore last week and the export
of small arms would feature in intersessional discussions as small arms
were responsible for most of the victims in wars throughout the world. 

In his discussion with Surin, Axwothy said the two countries are
identifying human-security issues and wanted to do something about them. He
pointed out that the crack-down on smuggling of women and campaigns against
land-mines and small arms were concrete examples of how human-security
issues could be approached in the regional context. 

Canada will send a team of land-mine experts to Thailand to help draft a
plan of action and identify areas in which Canada can be of assistance, and
Canadian experts will help with demining operations along the
Thai-Cambodian border. 

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SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST: JUNTA SHOCKS CRITICS WITH RIGHTS MOVE
30 July, 1999 by William Barnes 

The military regime has startled its critics by moving to set up a human
rights commission with Western help.

Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer let slip on Wednesday night
that his country's commissioner for human rights, Chris Sidoti, would go to
Burma next week to discuss the creation of such a body.

It is rare for the cautious junta to accept a visit that would inevitably
result in talks on extraordinarily sensitive issues.

The Government has been widely criticised by the international community
for its intolerance of even minor flashes of dissent.

Human rights agencies have repeatedly claimed that the junta acts in a
nasty manner against ethnic minority civilians in rebel areas.

Even if they tried to create a tame white-wash machine it was hard to
imagine that such a commission would not stumble into controversy, said
Debbie Stothard, the co-ordinator of the Alternative Association of
Southeast Asian Nations Network on Burma.

"Human rights violations are so overwhelmingly obvious in Burma it is going
to be difficult to try to deny that," she said.

Australian diplomatic sources described the news as "encouraging". 

The original plan had been to keep next week's scheduled visit by Mr Sidoti
secret until after the talks had been wrapped up in a bid to avoid
controversy, they said. 

Speaking at this week's Association of Southeast Asian Nations' (Asean)
meeting in Singapore, Mr Downer said: "This issue remains active, they have
a real interest in this particular proposal."

Mr Sidoti has a respected track record of human rights work, including
missions to China and Vietnam.

Burma has perhaps been forced to follow other Asean countries in moving to
set up a human rights commission after it was recommended by an association
working party.

It remains to be seen how effective commissions inspired by an organisation
often criticised for failing to address human rights will be. 

So far only the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia have set up such
councils. 

Even relatively benign Thailand has debated vigorously who will run its
commission and what teeth, if any, it might have. 


Burma's ruling generals had a history of signing conventions - like one
signed recently on women's rights - which have had no real meaning,
observers said.

The country was effectively suspended from the UN's International Labour
Organisation this year for a blatant practice of forced labour. 

In a country where the judiciary, like every facet of Government, was
subservient to the military, it would be "interesting" to see what happened
to human rights recommendations made by any future commission, said Ms
Stothard.

The judiciary refused to even entertain lawsuits alleging illegal detention
and harassment filed by opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's National
League for Democracy last year, she said. 

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THE BANGKOK POST: BURMA ATTACKS 
1 August, 1999 

A 60-man company of Burmese troops intruded into Thailand to snatch four
refugees. The Thai military demand their release, but Burma ignored it. 

The Burmese intruders beat a Thai villager with rifle butts when he tried
to intervene in the kidnapping at Mai Sa Peh village of Mae Hong Son, 3km
inside Thailand. The arrested people included three Karenni and a Burmese,
one of them a 16-year-old boy. Burma presumably wants to torture them for
information about the anti-Rangoon resistance. 

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THE BANGKOK POST: RANGOON ACTION MUST MATCH WORDS 
1 August, 1999 

OPINION AND ANALYSIS

A testy war of words erupted last week over the drug trafficking from Burma
to Thailand. Impatient Thai officials directly pointed to Rangoon as the
source of the problem. Burma claimed that it was doing all it can. Clearly,
however, that is not enough. 

It is almost possible to understand the indignation voiced by Burma in the
face of the Thai accusations. No one appreciates having their faults and
shortcomings pointed out quite as bluntly as Thai military officers
criticised Burma. As last Sunday's Bangkok Post reported, senior military
sources were outspoken in their complaint about our western neighbour. Even
our Army commander, Gen Surayud Chulanont, questioned the logic of being
nice to Burma while the methamphetamine traffic created the greatest threat
to our national security and the future of our youth. 

Burma was predictably outraged.  Statements from Rangoon and from the
Burmese embassy in Bangkok claimed that Rangoon is strongly committed to a
war against drugs. It cited drug seizures made by Burmese authorities
against narcotics dealers inside Burma. Many Burmese army troops have died
in combat against drug warlords. Rangoon even spoke of its "noble total war
against narcotic drugs." 

There are two problems with this irritable Burmese reply to the Bangkok
Post reports. The first is that, contrary to Burma's denial, there is ample
evidence that the Rangoon regime colludes with drug traffickers. The second
is that Burma did not address the actual charges made by the Thai military
officers. Even our extremely diplomatic deputy foreign minister, M.R.
Sukhumbhand Paribatra, suggested that Burma should show some spirit in the
anti- narcotics battle. 


Problem One:  The evidence of Burmese collusion is public and much of it
comes directly from Rangoon. The military junta, for the past 10 years and
for its own reasons, has made deals with several minority rebellions. These
include the so-called Red Wa, the former pro-communist group now known as
the United Wa State Army or UWSA, and its notorious leader Wei Hsueh-kang.
Wei is the leading drug trafficker of methamhetamines to Thai youths and
children. 

Problem Two: Burma has seized drugs and fought drug gangs, no one disputes
this. It has wasted the lives of many soldiers as cannon fodder in
up-country battles. 

It even has won ill-advised and premature praise from Thai diplomats for
such actions. But Burma has not seized drugs from the UWSA. It has not
arrested Khun Sa. 

It is true that we only can speculate that the members of the Burmese junta
profit directly from the drugs trade. But after 11 years in power, there is
a huge collection of evidence against the junta, and against several
individual members. The carefully fuming statements of Burma against this
newspaper and Thai military officers simply failed to address why Burma
allows -- encourages -- cross-border drug trafficking by an internationally
wanted criminal from known areas of its country. 

M.R. Sukhumbhand, Gen Surayud and Thai security officials have all made the
same point, and Burma has refused to address it, let alone correct it.
Everyone knows -- this newspaper, Thai officials, the Burmese junta -- the
source of millions of methamphetamine tablets and kilograms of heroin every
week. It is not secret; Burma has even bragged who is responsible. 

The deals that Burma make with its Burmese devils is that country's
business. It claims that those deals have ended minority rebellions. But
when those devils work to subvert our nation and our children, it is
decidedly Thailand's business. The Rangoon regime has done nothing, for
years, about ending the open, harmful drug trafficking which begins in
Burma and ends in Thailand. 

Burma continues to encourage drug-dealing by the regional warlords, it has
created. This trade has created the greatest threat to our national
security. Burmese action against it will be welcome. Refusal to act can
only be taken as unfriendly arrogance.

*****************************************************

MIZZIMA: BURMESE ACTIVIST RELEASED 
31 July, 1999 

Ko Nyo, a Burmese activist who was arrested by Indian Police on 29th July
in Moreh, Manipur State of India, was released this morning. He was
initially released from the police detention around 3 p.m. yesterday but
verbally asked by the police not to leave Moreh till further notice. The
police finally allowed him to leave Moreh this morning. 

According to sources from Ministry of Home Affairs in Manipur, the
directive to arrest Ko Nyo comes from the Central Government, Home Ministry
in New Delhi. The warrant to arrest was issued based on the complaint of
the Burmese government that Ko Nyo is sending "malicious information" to
Radio Free Asia against the government of Burma. In the interview with
MIZZIMA after his release, Ko Nyo denied of sending "malicious information". 


"I am now working as a journalist. What I have been doing is what a
journalist should do and will be doing the same in future too," said Ko Nyo. 

Ko Nyo has been living in India since 1988 as a recognized refugee of
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).  He is currently
working as an India-based stringer for Radio Free Asia (Burmese Language
Service) which is based in Washington D.C.

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ANNOUNCEMENT: JULY ISSUE OF THE IRRAWADDY 
31 July, 1999 

In the July issue of the Irrawaddy:

An editorial on the martyrs of Burma-past, present and future;

Special coverage of the AIDS crisis in Burma, including an article on the
consequences of a decade of denial, a look at the relation between AIDS and
migration, and a Burmese physician's perspective on the difficulties of
preventing and treating the disease in a repressive political environment;

An article on Canada's heroin problem and the SPDC connection;

A special report from Malaysia, where alternative media and the Internet
are rising to the challenge of government restrictions on the free flow of
information;

An encounter with one of Burma's best-known writers, Maung Tha Ya, soon
after his surprise flight from the country that has been his literary
inspiration for nearly four decades;

A look at life in the Tatmadaw, Burma's armed forces, through the eyes of
recent defectors;

An interview with Aung Myo Min, director of the Human Rights Documentation
Unit of the National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma;

Pro and contra: Aung San Suu Kyi and Thai Deputy Foreign Minister
Sukhumbhand Paribatra on Asean's role in Burma's political deadlock;

An article on Thailand's Princess Phra Suphankalaya and her place in the
history of Thai-Burmese relations in our Culture, Society and Arts page;

And regular features, including Quotes, News in Brief, Business,
Intelligence, and Regional Briefing.

The Irrawaddy is published by the Burma Information Group (BIG). BIG was
established in 1992 by Burmese citizens living in exile and is not
affiliated with any political party or organization.

The Irrawaddy seeks to promote press freedom and access to unbiased
information.

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