4/8/99:ANU PAPER ATTACKS GOVT STANC (r)

[drunoo@xxxxxxxxxxxx]

Subject: 4/8/99:ANU PAPER ATTACKS GOVT STANCE ON BURMA'S REGIME

POSTED 11 AUG 99: 2:00PM

THE ANU REPORTER,
Vol.30, No.11 Wednesday 4 Aug 1999.
(The Campus Newsletter for Australian National University)

ANU PAPER ATTACKS GOVERNMENT STANCE ON BURMA'S REGIME

BY TANIA CUTTING

The federal government was attempting to gloss over the
involvement of the Burmese leadership in the country's drug
trade by using fine semantic distinctions, according to ANU
defense strategist, Professor DEsmond Ball.

In a paper entitled Burma and Drugs: The REgime's Complicity in
the Global Drug Trade just released, Prof Ball from the
Strategic and Defense Studies Center refuges the federal
government's claim that the military regime in Burma was not
deliberately fostering drug trafficking.

In contrast Prof Ball describes Burma's military dictatorship as
Asia's most brutal and corrupt. "A major dimension of the
corruption is the involvement of the regime-- from the most
senior members of the State Peace and Development Council(SPDC),
which rules the country down to the infantry soldiers stationed
in border areas--in drug trafficking."

"The Australian Government's position is:' Oh yeah, Burma
accounts for 60 per cent of the world's drugs' and 'Oh Yeah,
members of the government are involved in the drug trade and yes
there's no doubt that the regime benefits immensely from drug
sales, but on the other hand that doesn't mean that the
government as a whole is complicit in this'," Prof Ball said.

"They're using very fine semantic distinctions because they
don't want to disrupt the diplomatic relations with the regime
so they can't say the regime is made up of a whole lot of drug
runners and criminals which is basically what they are. they
can't deny the regime's involvement in drugs but they are trying
to give it a clean sheet."

Prof Ball asserts that Burma, already one of the world's biggest
drug suppliers, will also soon have one of the largest armed
forces in south-east Asia.

"The Burmese are up at the moment to around the 400,000 mark,
which is a massive armed force. The question is how do we deal
with a country from a defence or strategic point of view, that
has one of the largest armed forces in this part of the  world
yet at the same time a country that violates any principal of
international law and civil society whenever it wishes."

Issues such as these will also be the topics of discussion at
Australia's first ever Burma Update organised by PhD students
Emily Rudland and MOrten Pedersen from the Department of
Political and Social Change at the Research School of Pacific
and Asian Studies.

The Update, from 5-6 August, is a result of growing interest at
the ANU and around Australia in Burma studies, and an attempt to
bring together almost all of the world's leading authorities on
Burma for a substantive examination of the contemporary issues
facing the country. It is also the first step towards
establishing a Burma Studies Center at the ANU.

Ms Rudland, who had anticipated a much more low-key conference
than now appears to be the case, believes the difficulties
associated with doing research on Burma is one of the main
reasons why Update has attracted so much attention.

"It looks like we'll easily reach our aim of 100 people,"Ms
Rudland said.

"It is a pretty impressive list of speakers and we didn't expect
anything this big when the update was proposed--it's taken off.
I think there's a lot of interest mainly because people doing
Burma studies don't get too many opportunities to discuss Burma
in a forum like this."

The speakers include Bertil Lintner who is widely regarded as
the world's leading political commentator on current political
developments in Burma, David Steinberg, arguably the foremost
academic in Burmese studies and Andrew Selth, an authority on
Burma's armed forces.

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