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The BurmaNet News: August 19, 1999



------------------------ BurmaNet ------------------------
 "Appropriate Information Technologies, Practical Strategies"
----------------------------------------------------------

The BurmaNet News: August 19, 1999
Issue #1340

Noted in Passing: "The military is convinced that ethnic conflicts will not
be solved by democracy." - Professor Suchit Bungbonkarn (see SCMP: JUNTA
FOSTERS MARRIAGE OF CONVENIENCE) 

HEADLINES:
==========
REUTERS: MYANMAR STEPS UP SCHOOLS VIGILANCE 
SCMP: JUNTA FOSTERS MARRIAGE OF CONVENIENCE 
BKK POST: WA SOLDIERS CAUGHT WITH DRUGS, DEALER LIST 
FBC: AOL CHOOSES, THEN DELETES BURMA JUNTA WEB PAGE 
KHRG: ORDERS TO VILLAGES SET 99-C AVAILABLE 
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REUTERS: MYANMAR STEPS UP SCHOOLS VIGILANCE AFTER PROTEST 
18 August, 1999 

YANGON, Aug 17 (Reuters) - Military-ruled Myanmar has increased vigilance
at high schools to prevent student unrest following an incident in the
south of the country last week, Yangon residents said on Tuesday. 

In the southeast of the country, meanwhile, traders crossing to Thailand
said authorities in the Myanmar border town of Myawadi broadcast warnings
against joining an uprising that dissidents in exile had called for next
month. 

The broadcasts stressed existing rules against gatherings of more than five
people and warned of tough punishments against anyone who defied the orders. 

A Yangon resident, who did not want to be identified, said teachers at
schools in Yangon had been specially assigned to watch for agitation
following the uprising call and an incident in the southern town of Mergui. 

A Myanmar dissident group said on Monday that the ruling military had
detained 33 students, most of them of high-school age, for joining a
demonstration in Mergui last Thursday involving about 150 people. 

The government said some students were being questioned by authorities
after an incident in the town in which agitators had tried to stir up
student unrest. 

"Similarly, measures are also being taken by other townships to prevent
political extremists and unscrupulous elements from disrupting the
children's education and creating civil unrest," a government statement
said on Tuesday. 

Myanmar dissidents in exile say authorities have detained more than 150
people in the past two weeks after the call for a general uprising on four
nines day -- September 9, 1999. 

Dissidents chose the date for its numerical significance after "four-eights
day" -- August 8, 1988 -- which marked the start of a student-led
pro-democracy uprising in 1988 which the military crushed. 

Anti-government sentiment remains strong in Myanmar but the military has
kept a tight rein on dissent since ignoring the result of a 1990 election
the opposition won by a huge margin. 

It has halted most university classes for much of the past decade to
prevent a resurgence of student activism. 

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SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST: JUNTA FOSTERS MARRIAGE OF CONVENIENCE
18 August, 1999 by William Barnes 

There will be no quick or easy political settlement in Burma as long as the
military regime uses the excuse of ethnic rebels to justify its size, a
senior Thai army officer said yesterday. 

The ruling generals have repeatedly claimed that only their strong,
muscular presence holds an ethnically diverse country together. 

"The army needs a visible non-Burman enemy. It deflects attention from the
democratic claims of the opposition, keeps the public on edge and distracts
potential dissidents in the military," the officer said. 

When the ruling generals made serious and effective efforts to solve the
minorities' demands for autonomy, it would signal that they were also
serious about handing some sort of democracy to the majority Burman
population. 

"But we don't see that happening soon. From their point of view, the
current situation is probably okay," the officer said. 

The junta in Rangoon had obtained ceasefire deals from 17 ethnic minorities
during the past decade. 

These appeared to outsiders as awkward and fragile arrangements that
allowed the rebels to keep their guns and engage in legal and illegal
business, but prevented them from making political moves, he said. 

"The two sides hold each other up," he said. "The army says 'we protect you
from these terrible people'. The rebels say 'we need our guns to defend
ourselves from this terrible army'." 

The Karen National Union and the Shan State Army were exceptions in
engaging in open conflict with the regime partly because they had insisted
on some overt autonomy, he said. 

A flood of amphetamines flowing across the northern Thai border from Burma
in recent years had forced the Thai security services to examine in detail
the Burmese army's record against ethnic rebels. 

Over the past decade, the number of men and women serving the Burmese armed
forces may have grown to more than 400,000, according to one estimate. A
military traditionally based on lightly equipped infantry units has also
acquired a variety of new and secondhand weaponry. 

"We have really tried to understand why the Burmese can't get more on top
of the ethnic rebels," the Thai official said. "We think it is partly that
they do not want to - at least not yet." 

The conclusion of the officer - who said his views were his own and not
that of the Thai military - was that there was a complex, possibly
temporary, symbiotic relationship between the generals and the rebels. 

The Burmese army claims that if it tried to force the issue now, then the
ceasefires would collapse like dominoes and the development and slow
absorption of the border regions would stop. 

Rangoon has said that when a new constitution is promulgated to - in part -
formally set out arrangements to deal with minorities, the armed groups
will be expected to lay down their arms. Few analysts think this is going
to happen soon. 

Several observers have pointed out that the current arrangement also
enables drug, gem and logging profits from the armed ethnic areas to flow
into the cash-strapped Burmese economy. 

"The military is convinced that ethnic conflicts will not be solved by
democracy," said Professor Suchit Bungbonkarn, head of the Institute of
Strategic and International Studies in Bangkok. 

"The opposition is equally convinced that only by introducing democracy
will you solve the problem. There is no meeting of minds here." 

The excuse obviously exists to defer democracy until the "ethnic question"
has been dealt with.

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THE BANGKOK POST: WA SOLDIERS CAUGHT WITH DRUGS AND DEALER LIST 
18 August, 1999 

A list of drug dealers has been seized from two soldiers of the United Wa
State Army who were arrested near the San Ton Du border checkpoint. 

Also found on the Wa by members of an infantry unit were 200
methamphetamine pills and two grenades. 

It was the first arrest since the closure of the San Ton Du checkpoint in
Mae Ai district early this month, said Col Chatchapat Yaem-ngarmriab,
commander of the 17th Infantry Regiment. 

The two soldiers were spotted at Chong Khao Laem, 1km from the San Ton Du
checkpoint which leads to a stronghold of Mong Yawn in Shan state, by an
infantry patrol. 

They allegedly had been ordered to collect money from Thai dealers in
payment for 40,000 speed pills. 

Col Chatchapat said the arrest confirmed reports that some members of the
ethnic Wa forces have been involved in the illicit drug trade. 

Earlier, Tatung, commander of the UWSA's East Region in Mong Yawn, had
dismissed allegations Wa soldiers were engaged in drug trafficking. Tatung
said he would pay 100,000 baht per speed pill seized from any Wa person. 

The arrest prompted the deployment of troops to stem drug smuggling in
territory opposite the Wa-controlled area, said Col Chatchapat. 

He said many stolen motorcycles had been smuggled across the border to Mong
Yawn to transport drugs. 

The closure of the checkpoint, designed to impede development of Mong Yawn,
is understood to have taken its toll on Wa money-laundering operations.
Officials have long believed the Wa used drug profits to buy building
materials and other supplies to turn Mong Yawn from a remote village into I
a bustling and prosperous town. 

About 10% of the estimated 5,000 skilled Thai workers engaged in Mong Yawn
have returned home ahead of the Aug 20 deadline. 

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

FREE BURMA COALITION: AOL CHOOSES, THEN DELETES BURMA JUNTA WEB PAGE 
18 August, 1999 

Dulles, Virginia -- August 18, 1999 -- America Online, the leading internet
Service provider in the United States, has made an abrupt about-face. 

On Friday August 13th, AOL chose the site www.myanmar.com to be linked to
AOL's Asia Forum. The problem? The site is operated by the ruling military
junta of Burma (also known as Myanmar), identified by Reporters Sans
Frontieres as one of the world's "real enemies" of the internet. 

The Burmese junta jails citizens for "unauthorized" use of fax,
photocopiers and computers with modems. Internet service, including AOL, is
unavailable to all of Burma's 46 million citizens, save a few "authorized"
friends of the regime. 

Ironically, an email message from Burma's Office of Strategic Services (the
secret police) alerted exiled Burmese democrats to AOL's gaffe. The message
copied AOL's announcement, which gushed "We think you'll notice
dramatically increased usage because of this exposure." 

Though an international pariah, the junta makes extensive use of the
internet to distribute its propaganda. The website in question,
www.myanmar.com, is mostly used to lure hard-currency-carrying tourists.
But elsewhere the page compiles vituperative articles from the
junta-controlled press. Burmese democracy leader and Nobel Peace Laureate
Aung San Suu Kyi comes in for particular scorn, often called a "sorceress"
or a "lackey of colonialists." The more than 100,000 Burmese refugees
huddled in Thailand are labelled "terrorists," though groups such as
Amnesty International say they are victims of rape, torture, forced labor
and murder. 

"We informed AOL of the fact that the junta operates this page, and gave
them some information about pervasive human rights violations in Burma,"
says Dr. Zarni, Burmese founder of the Free Burma Coalition. "It looked bad
for an 'information technology' company to be leading its users to the
propaganda page of a regime that has closed the universities and restricted
all kinds of information, including the internet. To their credit, AOL
reacted quickly," he adds. 

AOL informed the Free Burma Coalition on Tuesday, August 17 that "we have
removed the website in question from the International Country Pages."

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

KAREN HUMAN RIGHTS GROUP: ORDERS TO VILLAGES SET 99-C AVAILABLE 
17 August, 1999 from khrg@xxxxxxxxx 

SPDC & DKBA Orders to Villages: Set 99-C (Karen and Mon States) 

Karen Human Rights Group Report #99-06 

This new report is now available on the KHRG website at
http://metalab.unc.edu/freeburma/humanrights/khrg/archive and has
translations of over 100 SPDC and DKBA orders sent to villages in Karen
State and part of Mon State between November 1998 and July 1999. They
include orders announcing the commencement of a major forced labour canal
project in Mon State in April 1999, orders for forced donations by dozens
of villages to an Army-organised Buddhist temple festival, demands for
village donations to establish an SPDC-recognised school, a letter of
resignation which an NLD member in Karen State was forced or coerced to
sign, dozens of demands for forced labour of various kinds, demands for
money, food and building materials, and demands for forced labour and
materials issued by the DKBA in Pa'an District. There are also orders
summoning village elders to attend 'meetings' at which SPDC Army officers
or officials dictate demands for forced labour, money and materials and
threaten the village for any failure to comply. 

Within the next few days, KHRG will also be adding the final few photos to
complete Photo Set 99-B, also available on the website, and new reports on
Thaton District and other areas will be released soon.

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