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WIRE:06/02/2000 10:05:00 ET
UPDATE 1-U.S. names 12 alleged drug kingpins worldwide WASHINGTON, June 2 (Reuters) -
The United States on Friday named 12 suspected drug kingpins, including
six Mexicans, who will be put on a new government blacklist that aims to
punish financially drug dealers and their associates.
The list, sent by the White House to Congress on Thursday night and issued by the Treasury Department on Friday, included two sets of Mexican brothers: Ramon and Benjamin Arrellano-Felix and Jose de Jesus and Luis Ignacio Amexcua-Contreras. The United States also named two other Mexicans, Rafael Caro-Quintero and Vicente Carrillo-Fuentes. Other alleged drug dealers named on the list were: Chang Chi Fu, said
to be from Myanmar, formerly Burma; Noel Timothy Heath; Glenroy Vingrove
Matthews; Abeni O. Ogungbuyi and Oluwole A. Ogungbuyi; and Wei Hsueh Kang.
The department did not state the nationalities of those named to the
list.
The people named on the list will have any financial assets that they
have in the United States frozen and Americans will be forbidden from
doing any business with them.
The White House sent the list to Congress in order to meet a June 1
deadline set in a new law passed last year that obliges the U.S.
government annually to name the world's top suspected drug dealers.
In a statement issued in Aachen, Germany, where President Bill
Clinton was travelling, White House spokesman Joe Lockhart said naming the
suspected drug dealers under the Kingpin Act showed U.S. determination to
counter the damage caused by illegal drugs.
"This action underscores our determination to do everything possible
to fight drug traffickers, undermine their operations, and end the
suffering that trade in illegal drugs inflicts on Americans and people
around the world," the statement said..
Bangkok Post - June 2, 2000.
DRUGS Flood of speed pills from Burma tipped to reach 200
million
Production plant starts
operations on border with Laos
Supamart Kasem and
Yuwadee Tunyasiri The number of methamphetamine pills
forecast to be smuggled into Thailand from Burma this year is expected to double
from the 100 million brought in last year, said the Third Army commander. Lt-Gen Watanachai Chaimuenwong, who heads the northern anti-drug centre, said
reports by the Narcotics Control Board's northern bureau and associated agencies
predicted a total 200 million speed pills would be smuggled in this year. Officials are also investigating reports a methamphetamine factory has been
set up on the Thai-Lao border opposite Uttaradit. Lt-Gen Watanachai rated drug officials' suppression work in Chiang Mai,
Chiang Rai, Mae Hong Son and Tak as 20% successful. He said 632 suspects were arrested, along with a total of 5.3 million speed
pills, 36.5kg of heroin, 22.5kg of opium, and 15kg of marijuana during the
period between October 1999 to March 2000 in the four provinces. "We found that
each agency has worked its best. But the reason why we have been passive is that
most drug production bases are located in neighbouring countries and we have
limited personnel, apparatus and budget." Lt-Gen Watanachai said. The Third Army commander also noted that Burma had no plan to combat drugs
along the Thai-Burmese border. Under its 15-year anti-drug plan, Rangoon will carry out drug suppression
operations along its northern border with China in the first five years, in the
Central Region in the second five years, and in the South in the last five
years. According to Lt-Gen Wattanachai, 100,000 more Wa and Kokang ethnic people
living along the Burmese-Chinese border will be moved to border areas opposite
Chiang Rai and Chiang Mai in a programme designed to stop them growing drug
crops. Meanwhile, PM's Office Minister Jurin Laksanavisit, who oversees the Office
of the Narcotics Control Board, yesterday praised the military's role in drugs
suppression.
Tak-A villager was killed and another seriously
wounded by three members of the pro-Rangoon Democratic Karen Buddhist Army in
Mae Sot district yesterday. Three Karen renegades from Myawaddy hired a minibus to take them to Ban Huay
Muang, a border village. On arrival, one of the three shot Somchai Sanitphan,
40, the driver of a minibus plying the Mae Sot-Rim Moei road, in the head. Kachornsak Kaewyai, 34, Somchai's friend, was shot in the back of the neck
and wounded while running away for his life. He later informed the police,
saying the Karen renegades had taken away the minibus, which was later found
abandoned. The NATION - June 2, 2000. FROM THE EDGE: Decision time on forced
labour in Burma
AN historic event is in the making in Geneva. This week, the 174member
International Labour Organisation begins debating whether to punish Burma for
the use of forced or compulsory labour and what penalties it would impose
against the junta if it decides to punish it.
It was the first time in the ILO’s 80year history when its governing body
decided in March to introduce a Burma motion this month to discuss punitive
actions against the regime, which has refused to comply with ILO recommendations
on improving labour standards.
Burmese and international human rights and labour activists have been
lobbying for the passage of a tough ILO resolution that incorporates measures
such as international economic sanctions and the downgrading of trade and
diplomatic relations with Rangoon. But the junta, its Asian supporters and other
developing economies, have tried to oppose, or at least delay, the imposition of
penalties for fear of “a dangerous precedent”.
The ILO debates on Burma are the result of joint action and complaints filed
by worker and employer organisations within the ILO as well as the ILO
Commission of Inquiry in August 1998. The inquiry concluded that the junta
continued “to inflict the practice of forced labour, nothing but a contemporary
form of slavery, on the people of Burma”.
Despite the junta’s denial that forced labour occurs in Burma, the ILO
Commission of Inquiry produced a report of more than 6,000 pages, describing
“widespread and systematic” use of forced labour “with total disregard for the
human dignity, safety and health and the basic needs of the people”.
Subsequently, the International Labour Conference last June passed an
unprecedented resolution that constituted a de facto expulsion of Burma and a
refusal of all technical assistance until it helped end forced labour. The
resolution received 333 votes in support, 27 against and 47 abstentions. Each of
the 174 ILO member states has four votes – two for the government, one each for
employers and workers.
In the past weeks, Asian governments have praised Burma’s ruling State Peace
and Development Council for its decision to allow an ILO technical team to visit
the country. To them, the visit was “a positive sign” that the regime was
willing to cooperate to gradually end the use of forced labour.
But Western labour unionists and Burma activists do not support that view.
They see Rangoon’s lastminute decision to welcome the threemember ILO delegation
as a mere attempt to avoid a strong ILO penalty or to delay it, and not a
genuine effort toward stopping the use of forced or compulsory labour.
It is not yet certain whether punishment will be immediately imposed and what
form it will take. The decision rests on the findings of the ILO technical team
whose report was made public yesterday. The ILO Selection Committee will meet on
Thursday to discuss the report and work out recommendations and a resolution
before passing it to the plenary International Labour Conference for final
voting.
One interesting element in yesterday’s report was that during the meeting
with ILO delegates, top Burmese leader Lt Gen Khin Nyunt reiterated the junta’s
denial that forced labour occurred in Burma. However, the ILO team was sent to
Burma not to investigate if forced labour existed, but to help bring the
practice to an end.
“The sole purpose of the visit of the team is to establish with the
Government a credible plan of action to ensure the full implementation of the
Commission [of Inquiry] recommendations”, ILO directorgeneral Juan Somavia said
before the departure of the ILO mission.
Before the showdown this coming Thursday, several Asean members, along with
China and Japan, are said to have been lobbying hard for ILO members to be
lenient with the Burmese junta. Japan’s Foreign Minister Yohei Kono was quoted
by The Japan Times as saying that the ILO “should not move to take drastic
measures at a time when it lacks information” and that “Asia’s position is
slightly different from that of the United States and Europe”.
Supporting the Japanese stance, several Asian government officials told The
Nation in separate interviews that they believed a “softer” resolution would be
passed giving Rangoon more time to comply with the ILO plan of action to stop
forced labour.
One ambassador to Geneva noted that invoking punishment is “a double edged
sword” as many developing countries including China, Laos and Vietnam are
concerned that it would set a “dangerous precedent” for their labour practices.
Although the junta has tried to urge Asean members to vote against the
resolution, several Thai government officials said the grouping would not take a
bloc vote. Thailand’s vote depends on the finding of the ILO report and
recommendations from the Selection Committee.
One senior official said Thailand wanted to see a “balanced and constructive”
resolution, which does not aim at only condemning and punishing but incorporates
positive elements to encourage the regime to introduce labour reforms. “Now that
ILO and Burma have dialogue, the process should continue,” he added. “A good
resolution should continue to urge both sides to have a cooperative approach in
resolving the problem.”
But Western labour activists and Burmese opposition groups have argued that
exacting forced or compulsory labour remains an integral part of the junta’s
policy and that there has been no sign that the practice has stopped. Speaking
from Geneva, U Maung Maung, general secretary of the Federation of Trade Unions
in Burma, said the federation had compiled and submitted to the ILO extensive
documentation on forced labour in border areas between last September and March.
The report supplements an earlier one submitted to the ILO by the opposition
National League for Democracy last June, outlining forced and compulsory labour
in urban areas across Burma.
As employers and workers joined Western countries to vote last June in
support of the resolution on Forced Labour in Burma, the next two weeks will be
a crucial time as supporters and opponents of the Burmese junta work hard to win
support for their arguments. Let’s not blink.
BY YINDEE LERTCHAROENCHOK
The Nation
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