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BurmaNet News: August 13, 2001
______________ THE BURMANET NEWS ______________
An on-line newspaper covering Burma
August 13, 2001 Issue # 1864
______________ www.burmanet.org _______________
INSIDE BURMA _______
*AFP: Myanmar junta releases two more NLD MPs
*The Times Of India: Mild quake on Indo-Myanmar border
MONEY _______
*Yonhap (S. Korea): Korean Ministry to Send Delegation to Vietnam,
Myanmar
*Xinhua: Myanmar's Rubber Export Declines in First Quarter
GUNS______
*Shan Herald Agency for News: Shan attack fails to net drugs
DRUGS______
*Shan Herald Agency for News: Chinese not Wa who are producing drugs,
said Wa leader
REGIONAL/INTERNATIONAL _______
*The Times (UK): Burmese duo cry freedom
*Bangkok Post: Thais [and Burmese] caught for illegal fishing
jailed--Imprisoned for six months in Bangladesh
*Burma Courier: Ivanhoe Declares Allegiance in Sanctions Warfare
__________________ INSIDE BURMA ____________________
AFP: Myanmar junta releases two more NLD MPs
YANGON, Aug 13 (AFP) - The Myanmar junta Monday freed two more
opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) MPs, the latest of some
150 political prisoners to be released from detention this year.
"Today at 11:00 hours two NLD MPs, Duwar Zaw Aung and Daw San San, were
being released from Insein correctional facility," said a spokesman for
the military government.
"They are both in good health and reunited with their families."
The junta said the stream of releases this year, including dozens of
opposition MPs, is a sign that the talks it started with democracy
leader Aung San Suu Kyi last October are making headway.
However, the Nobel peace laureate and her two most senior lieutenants,
Aung Shwe and Tin Oo, remain under house arrest restrictions in Yangon
while the secret dialogue continues.
International rights group Amnesty International estimates that some
1,800 political prisoners remain behind bars in Myanmar.
The junta embarked on the talks with Aung San Suu Kyi at the urging of
the United Nations and its envoy to Myanmar Razali Ismail, who has been
a regular visitor to Yangon since late last year.
The contacts, the first since 1994, are aimed at paving the way for an
official national reconciliation dialogue that some observers say could
lead to democratic reforms after four decades of absolute military rule.
___________________________________________________
The Times Of India: Mild quake on Indo-Myanmar border
Monday, August 13, 2001
HILLONG: An earthquake of mild intensity having a magnitude 4.6 on the
Richter scale shook Shillong and its neighbouring area at 0728 hours on
Sunday, according to the Seismological Observatory Centre here.
The epicentre of the quake was located at latitude 23.3 degree north and
longitude 93.1 degree east on the Indo-Myanmar border, sources said. The
tremor lasted for few seconds. No loss of life or damage to property was
reported, official sources said.
( PTI )
__________________________________________________
______________________MONEY________________________
Yonhap (S. Korea): Korean Ministry to Send Delegation to Vietnam,
Myanmar
Monday August 13, 2:42 PM
SEOUL, Aug 13 Asia Pulse - The Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Energy
said Monday it will dispatch a delegation to Vietnam and Myanmar to
consult with both the private-sector and government officials concerning
the exchange of natural resources.
The delegation comprised of both business executives and government
officials will participate in the first South Korean-Vietnamese Natural
Resources Committee session in Hanoi Tuesday to discuss the sale of
liquefied natural gas produced in Vietnam and issues related to
cooperation between South Korea and Vietnam on the advancement of South
Korean nuclear power plant construction in Southeast Asia.
The delegation will also meet Pyi Sone, Myanmar's energy minister, to
discuss the formation of a South Korean-Myanmar Resources Cooperation
Committee.
The ministry plans to send a similar delegation to Indonesia, China and
Mongolia this year.
___________________________________________________
Xinhua: Myanmar's Rubber Export Declines in First Quarter
YANGON, Aug 13, 2001 (Xinhua via COMTEX) -- Myanmar exported 4,700 tons
of raw rubber in the first quarter of this year, a 56-percent decrease
from the same period of 2000, the latest data of the official Economic
Indicators show Monday.
The earning through the export of raw rubber during the period was
registered at 2.4 million U.S. dollars, reducing by 58.4 percent
compared with the corresponding period of 2000.
Meanwhile, during the three-month period, the country imported rubber
goods worth 7.3 million dollars.
According to official statistics, Myanmar exports 26,300 tons of raw
rubber annually, earning 22 million dollars of foreign exchange.
Myanmar has been striving to extend the cultivation areas of rubber
which is one of its major industrial crops and one of its major foreign
exchange earners.
A latest report said the country has extended the rubber plantation area
from two divisions and states to four with the increase of the hectarage
from 81,000 in 1994 to 182,250 at present.
In Myanmar, 2.62 million hectares are reportedly suitable for rubber
growing.
Of the country's present rubber plantations, 13 percent is owned by the
state and 87 percent by the private sector, while of the rubber
production, 15 percent is by the state and 85 percent by the private
enterprises.
_______________________GUNS________________________
Shan Herald Agency for News: Shan attack fails to net drugs
August 10, 2001
Shan attack fails to net drugs
A recent ambush staged by the Shan State Army fell short of capturing
drugs though it managed to kill 4 security guards, reported S.H.A.N.
reporter from the border yesterday.
The ambush that took place east of Namyoom, 5 km north of BP-1 (Border
Pass-1), opposite Chiangdao District, Chiangmai Province, between 06:30
- 06:45 on 6 August killed 4 militiamen who were escorting a quantity
of speed (methamphetamine) pills to the Thai border. The 15-men
attackers, led by Second Lieutenant Yawdkham from Headquarters Security
Force, also captured 2 automatic rifles: 1 M-16 with 24-rounds of
cartridges and 1 AK-47 with 36 rounds of catridges. One Shan fighter
was slightly wounded in the arm.
The rest of the 28-Lahu militiamen however escaped with their "goods",
said the source. It was later learned that there were 340,000 pills of
methamphetamine with them to be delivered to an ethnic Chinese buyer in
Thailand. They were purchased from Nakawngmu, 25 miles further north.
"One of us was nervous and pulled the trigger before the drug smugglers
got inside the killing zone," explained one of the fighters to the
S.H.A.N..
The drugs were purchased at B. 11 per pill from the Nakawngmu militia
force.
________________________DRUGS______________________
Shan Herald Agency for News: Chinese not Wa who are producing drugs,
said Wa leader
August 10, 2001
A non-ceasefire Wa leader said yesterday the general assumption that Wa
equals drugs is untrue.
During a meeting of non-Burman leaders, Mahasang, former prince of
Wiang-ngern, a Wa principality near the Chinese border and leader of the
Wa National Organization, said, "It is the ethnic Chinese not Wa who
are causing all the trouble. Only a handful of Wa benefits from the
drug business."
The notorious Wei brothers: Hsiao-long, Hsiao-kang and Hsiao-ying all
came from China, he said. The three are wanted in Thailand and Wei
Hsiaokang, the second brother, has a $ 2 million prince offered by the
United States "for information leading to his capture."
"It was also the same with Shans. The Chinese got rich but the Shans
were left with a bad name," he commented. "Look who's going to inherit
that name when the Wa are gone, because whoever comes up strong, the
Chinese will move there"
Mahasang, 54, is also Vice President of the National Democratic Front,
an umbrella organization of non-Burman armed movements.
___________________ REGIONAL/INTERNATIONAL___________________
The Times (UK): Burmese duo cry freedom
MONDAY AUGUST 13 2001
BY OUR ARTS CORRESPONDENT
COMEDIANS at the Edinburgh Festival are celebrating the release of two
Burmese comics who were sentenced to seven years? hard labour for
telling jokes about the military regime. For five years Amnesty
International campaigned for the release of U Pa Pa Lay and U Lu Zaw
with events at the Festival.
Amnesty had planned to highlight their case again with a benefit
performance tonight. But news of the comics? release filtered through
from sources in Burma and the Stand Up for Freedom event at the Assembly
Rooms will now be a celebration.
Andy Hackman, of Amnesty UK, said he had been contacted by a former
Burmese prisoner of conscience who works for the BBC World Service. She
told him that comedians at the Edinburgh Festival, and others worldwide,
had had a definite impact on the prisoners? release.
Through the Red Cross, Amnesty was told that Lay?s spirits had been
raised in jail when he heard of an Eddie Izzard show for Amnesty.
Lay, 49, and Zaw, 45, were arrested during the 48th Independence Day
commemorative ceremony in 1996. The Government accused them of spreading
?false news?.
___________________________________________________
Bangkok Post: Thais [and Burmese] caught for illegal fishing
jailed--Imprisoned for six months in Bangladesh
August 13, 2001.
Over 190 Thai and Burmese nationals have been jailed in Bangladesh for
fishing illegally in the Bay of Bengal close to the southern Bangladeshi
coast.
Home (interior) ministry sources yesterday said a court in the coastal
town of Bagerhat convicted 72 Thai fishermen for unlawful fishing in
Bangladeshi waters and sentenced them to six months in prison in a
verdict handed down at the weekend.
Another court in the same town, 270km south of the capital Dhaka,
sentenced 121 Thai and Burmese nationals to a maximum of seven months in
prison last Tuesday on identical charges of poaching fish.
The judges ordered the prison authorities to deport all the 193
fishermen after the completion of their sentences.
The convicted fishermen were arrested and their trawlers seized by the
Bangladesh navy from the Bay of Bengal last year.
The fishermen, who were also fined, were reportedly fishing in
Bangladeshi territorial waters when they were detained after a chase by
naval boats.
___________________________________________________
Burma Courier: Ivanhoe Declares Allegiance in Sanctions Warfare
Courier News Service: August 9, 2001
VANCOUVER - A statement issued by Ivanhoe Mines, posted this week on a
Myanmar government website, refers to sanctions as "a form of war" and
declares that the company will not "become a casualty of external
political confrontation that has no certain outcome".
An Ivanhoe spokesperson told the Burma Courier that the statement had
been issued at the time of the company's annual meeting in Vancouver in
June, but would not say who was responsible for it. Pictures of both
Robert Friedland, Ivanhoe board chairman, and Daniel Kunz, company
president, accompany the statement on the Myanmar government site.
The Ivanhoe statement also says that delay or cancellation of a proposed
$US 400 million expansion project at the mine the company operates in
partnership with Myanmar's military government would affect the lives of
thousands of people who would benefit from the effects of the expansion.
The company says allegations that substantial profits from the mine are
a major source of revenue for the government of Myanmar and its military
budgets are false.
Mining analysts have cast doubts on the viability of Ivanhoe's
investment in Myanmar because of its association with the military
government which is being targeted for international sanctions over its
refusal to respect the basic human and civil rights of millions of its
citizens.
A "values" statement issued by Ivanhoe says the company is committed to
"enterprise that demonstrates its support for human rights and social
justice", but according to the company statement posted on the Myanmar
website, its "social priorities" will not be "controlled by those with
the megaphones whose motives approve of the publication of false and
defamatory claims . slated to mislead and influence decision makers in
Western societies".
A peaceful sidewalk picket, staged outside Ivanhoe company headquarters
in Vancouver this week by Burma exiles and their supporters to mark the
13th anniversary of the bloody suppression of demonstrations against
military rule in Myanmar, was under close surveillance by security
personnel and civic police forces.
Canadian poet and journalist Karen Connelly told a couple of dozen
demonstrators and passers-by who stopped to listen: "We are here to
commemorate the lives of the people who died in the 1988 democracy
uprising. We are here to stand behind the people of Burma as they
continue working against the violence and degradation that is a daily
part of their lives. . There is a direct link between military violence
in Burma and the money-making ventures of companies like Ivanhoe Mines.
. By its presence in Burma, Ivanhoe Mines and other Canadian and
international companies prop up a savage military regime and make money
on the backs of impoverished and oppressed Burmese citizens.
"We are here to remind ourselves that Burma is not so far away. Most of
the heroin that circulates on the streets and in the veins of this city
comes from Burma. The billions of dollars Canadians taxpayers pay to
manage the social and medical costs of heroin addiction are a direct
result of the Burmese military's engagement in the opium trade. . By
investing in Burma, Ivanhoe Mines and other businesses are also
investing in the international heroin trade.
"Everything is connected. That is what we are here to remember: the
present is connected to the past, and to the future. Tomorrow, August 8,
Burmese exiles and refugees everywhere in the world, as well as 50
million people in Burma, will remember the atrocities that were
committed thirteen years ago, when Burmese people cried out for
political change. We are here to add our voices to their voices."
________________
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