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HEADLINE -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- AP - Suu Kyi Honors Assassinated
Father
Reuters - Drugs and people trafficking top Thai ASEAN
agenda
Reuters - China coaxing Myanmar groups to drop drug trade Xinhua - Myanmar to Cooperate With Thailand in Combating
Diseases
Kyodo News - China tells Thailand to 'understand'
Myanmar on drugs
Bkk Post - Chuan asks Beijing to back war on drugs along
border
AI - Myanmar -- Exodus from Shan State to escape forced labour Wednesday July 19 2:10 PM ET
Suu Kyi Honors Assassinated Father YANGON, Myanmar (AP) - A black shawl wrapped around her shoulders, a solemn
Aung San Suu Kyi laid three baskets of red roses and white daisies Wednesday at
the tomb of her father, Myanmar's independence hero, on the anniversary of his
assassination.
The opposition leader, who won the Nobel Peace Prize for her resistance to
Myanmar's military-led government, was under house arrest from 1989-1995 and
still has her movements heavily restricted. The anniversary is the only official
ceremony in which the military allows her to participate
Suu Kyi, 55, knelt and paid respects in Buddhist fashion at the mausoleum
of Gen. Aung San, at the foot of Yangon's towering Shwedagon Pagoda.
Martyrs' Day commemorates the assassination of Aung San, six ministers and
two others who were machine-gunned during a Cabinet meeting on July 19, 1947, in
an attack orchestrated by a political rival and aided by renegade British
intelligence officers.
Aung San, the founder of Myanmar's army, is respected as a national hero by
the ruling military regime for his leading role in the struggle for independence
from Britain. Suu Kyi, however, is seen as a traitor for her opposition to army
rule.
She heads the National League for Democracy, which swept 1990 general
elections in Myanmar - also known as Burma - that the military never
honored.
Suu Kyi's brother, visiting from the United States, also laid a wreath of
white flowers at his father's grave.
None of the top generals attended the ceremony. Diplomats and family
members of the other assassinated officials were also present.
WIRE:07/19/2000 10:25:00 ET
Drugs and people trafficking top Thai ASEAN agenda BANGKOK, July 19 (Reuters) - Thailand said on Wednesday it would highlight
cross-border trafficking in drugs and people at next week"s ASEAN foreign
ministers" meeting in Bangkok. Thai Foreign Minister Surin Pitsuwan said the
problems posed by the region"s trade in illegal drugs, trafficking in women and
children, and small arms smuggling demanded attention from the Association of
South East Asian Nations. "It reflects our determination to make this meeting
comprehensive rather than one on issues of state or other areas of security
(like) economic security or economic stability," Surin told reporters. Surin
will host a two-day meeting of ASEAN foreign ministers on July 24 and 25. "I
think every member has an interest in solving these problems because it affects
all of us, it affects the entire region," he said. "Events in the last few
months have convinced everyone that trans-national crimes have become very, very
serious," he said. Drugs have long plagued Thailand, which borders fellow ASEAN
countries Malaysia, Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia and has an extensive coastline.
Myanmar is the world"s second largest producer of opium and its derivative
heroin, as well as a major source of amphetamines. The Thais have complained
frequently and loudly that drugs from Myanmar are finding their way into
Thailand and harming the younger generation. The other ASEAN members are Brunei,
Indonesia, Singapore, the Philippines and Vietnam.
WIRE:07/20/2000 00:26:00 ET
China coaxing Myanmar groups to drop drug trade BANGKOK, July 20 (Reuters) - China has encouraged Myanmar"s ethnic
groups to grow sugarcane instead of narcotic drugs, visiting Chinese Vice
President Hu Jintao told Thailand"s prime minister, a Thai official said on
Thursday. Hu, who visited Myanmar before arriving in Thailand, had told premier
Chuan Leekpai during a medeting on Wednesday that Myanmar"s military rulers had
informed him they took the drugs problem seriously but could not eradicate it
completely, the official told Reuters. The reason they gave, Hu had said, was
that ethnic groups along the Myanmar-Thai border continued to grow and trade
drugs. The Chinese leader also had said that China sponsored a crop substition
project for the ethnic groups to grow sugarcane and had pledged to buy the
sugar. "China"s border is over 2,000 km along Myanmar"s border therefore any
internal problem of our neighbour is our problem, too," Hu was quoted by the
Thai official as saying. Drug experts say Myanmar is the world"s second largest
producer of opium and its derivative heroin, as well as a major source of
amphetamines. The Thai army said last month drug production and trafficking from
Myanmar was increasing rapidly and posed a serious threat to Thailand and other
neighbouring countries. Mass relocation of ethnic minorities within Myanmar to
areas nearer the border with Thailand over the past year had increased the
incidence of drug trafficking, the army said. However, a state-run Myanmar
newspaper said last week in Yangon that Thailand was worsening its own drugs
problem by harbouring insurgents and should work together with Myanmar to combat
the problem rather than trading accusations. Thailand has said it will highlight
cross-border trafficking in drugs and people at next week"s Bangkok meeting of
foreign ministers from the 10-country Association of South East Asian
Nations.
Myanmar to Cooperate With Thailand in
Combating Diseases
YANGON (July 19) XINHUA - Myanmar is preparing to work in cooperation with Thailand to implement a bilateral project of combating and controlling three communicable diseases in border areas of the two countries worked out at a meeting of health ministers in Thailand earlier this month. Wednesday's official newspaper The New Light of Myanmar quoted First
Secretary of the Myanmar State Peace and Development Council Lieutenant-General
Khin Nyunt as stressing that priority should be given to implementing control
and treatment programs concerning the three communicable diseases -- malaria,
HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis (TB) with the participation of international
organizations and humanitarian associations as well.
Khin Nyunt, also chairman of the Myanmar National Health Committee, called
for efficient use of funds financed by the government as well as by donor
nations and humanitarian associations.
Myanmar's disease control program is one of the six extensive programs
under the country's five-year national health plan (1996- 2001) and out of the
17 projects under the program, 11 are prevention of the three communicable
diseases which are regarded as those of national concern.
China tells Thailand to 'understand'
Myanmar on drugs
BANGKOK, July 19 (Kyodo) -- Chinese Vice President Hu Jintao told Thai Prime Minister Chuan Leekpai on Wednesday that Myanmar, which supplies illegal narcotics to both countries, is in a difficult position to fight against illicit drugs. Hu, who arrived in Bangkok from Myanmar on Tuesday for a five-day visit to
mark the 25th anniversary of Sino-Thai diplomatic relations, urged Chuan to
''understand'' Myanmar's military junta has to keep a balance between internal
security and fighting drugs.
Thailand accuses Myanmar's junta of supporting ethnic minorities along
border areas with Thailand in producing narcotics, particularly amphetamines,
for Thai markets.
Several rebellious minorities, which signed peace pacts with the junta, are
''rewarded'' by being allowed to remain armed and produce drugs.
China, however, provided assistance for crop substitution in Myanmar in an
attempt to reduce narcotics production in border areas with China, Hu was quoted
by a Thai spokesman as telling Chuan.
Beijing supports sugar-cane growing in Myanmar and imports sugar products
made from the cane as well, the Chinese vice president said.
But Chuan urged more efforts from China to bar chemical precursor resources
for narcotics production from entering areas believed locations of illicit drug
refineries.
Bilaterally, China and Thailand marked the 25th anniversary of diplomatic
ties on July 1 this year.
The Thai government reaffirmed to Hu its support of the ''one-China''
policy that it adopted in 1975 in recognition of Chinese influence in the
region.
AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL:
Myanmar -- Exodus from Shan State
to escape forced labour
JUL 18, 2000, M2 Communications - Killings, torture and forced labour of
civilians from the Shan State at the hands of the Myanmar army are detailed by
Amnesty International in its report released today: Exodus from the Shan State.
Shan civilians have suffered the consequences of internal armed conflict
for over four years, when the army of Myanmar began a massive forcible
relocation program as part of their counter-insurgency measures against the Shan
State Army-South (SSA-South), the main armed opposition group in the state.
"Civilians are most often the victims of the army's brutal
counter-insurgency tactics as fighting between the army and the SSA-South
continues," Amnesty International said. "Regretfully, despite extensive
documentation of abuses and widespread calls from the international community,
no improvements in the Shan State or in any other area of Myanmar are apparent."
Shan civilians have suffered the consequences of internal armed conflict
for over four years, when the Myanmar army began a massive forcible relocation
program. Yet despite extensive documentation of abuses and widespread calls from
the international community, no improvements in the Shan State or in any other
area of Myanmar are apparent.
"At the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) annual ministerial
meeting in Bangkok beginning next week all ASEAN members should raise the
ongoing human rights crisis with the Myanmar government, also an ASEAN member,"
Amnesty International said.
Earlier this year Amnesty International interviewed refugees in Thailand
from the central Shan State, every one of whom was forced to work for the army
without pay. They said that forced labour, relocations and extrajudicial
killings had caused them to flee their homeland. A Shan man said "They didn't
give us anything and we were treated just like dogs or pigs" when describing
typical forced labour.
Many refugees had worked alongside children as young as 10. Children were
forced to split smaller stones, and to carry rocks and sticks on road-building
projects. One man told Amnesty International:"They don't let anyone stay idle."
The vast majority of these victims of forced labour and other abuses are
Shan rice farmers who have been deprived of their lands and their livelihoods as
a result of the State Peace and Development Council's (SPDC, Myanmar's military
government) counter-insurgency tactics. A Shan woman explained how killings take
place:"The soldiers won't allow us to farm. They said if we find anyone in the
forest we will shoot them on sight because there are only rebels in the forest."
Since 1996 over 300,000 civilians have been displaced by the army in an effort
to break up any alleged links with the SSA-South.
One woman told Amnesty International about the killings in January 2000 of
a 40-year-old man, his ll-year-old son and his 18-year-old daughter, her friends
from the same village in Nanzing township. The three had initially been forcibly
relocated but sneaked back to their farms to grow rice and were shot dead in
their field hut.
"Security issues, including refugee outflows to Thailand, caused by endemic
human rights violations in Myanmar should be discussed at meetings between ASEAN
and its dialogue partners," Amnesty International said in advance of meetings at
the end of July, which will include the European Union and other Western
nations, and Japan and China.
Background
Unpaid forced labour of civilians by the army is endemic in Myanmar and has
occurred over the past several decades. The practice is particularly acute in
the seven states where most of Myanmar's ethnic minorities live. Forced labour
duties include road-building and carrying heavy loads of equipment for the army
for days or weeks at a time.
For more than 50 years armed opposition groups representing various ethnic
minorities have engaged in insurgency activities against the Burman-dominated
central government in an effort to gain greater autonomy or complete
independence. Although a reported 17 cease-fires have been agreed between the
SPDC and armed groups, three ethnic minority opposition groups are still
fighting with the Myanmar army, including the SSA-South.
Ethnic minorities in Myanmar run a greater risk of being subjected to a
wide variety of human rights violations simply because they are a member of a
particular group. They are frequently seized for forced labour duties, and those
living in areas of armed conflict are at risk of extrajudicial killings and
torture by the Myanmar military, who suspect them of supporting armed opposition
groups
In the context of the massive forcible relocations of the past four years,
hundreds of Shan civilians have been killed when they attempted to return to
their farms, and thousands have been seized by the army to work without pay on
roads and other projects.
During the first five months of 2000, over 5,300 Shan civilians fled to one
area of Thailand alone. The Thai authorities do not permit Shan refugees to live
in camps, so they seek employment in agriculture and other low paying jobs. Over
100,000 Shan civilians have sought refuge there in the last four years.
In spite of widespread documentation by Amnesty International and calls by
United Nations bodies and other intergovernmental organizations to put an end to
such practices, the SPDC still allows the army to act with impunity. Flows of
Shan refugees into Thailand remain at a high level and demonstrate most
eloquently the need for an immediate improvement in the human rights situation
in Myanmar.
Amnesty International, International Secretariat, 1 Easton Street, WC1X
8DJ, London, United Kingdom
Bangkok Post - July 20,
2000.
SINO-THAI RELATIONS Chuan asks Beijing to back war on drugs along border Hu says trafficking a regional threat Prime Minister Chuan Leekpai asked for China's support yesterday to end
widespread drug trafficking along the border with Burma.
Mr Chuan raised the issue during an hour of talks with Chinese
Vice-President Hu Jintao and asked for collaboration from Beijing, which
maintains strong relations with Rangoon.
Government spokesman Akapol Sorasuchart said Mr Hu told the premier China
regarded drug trafficking as a grave threat to regional security. He had earlier
discussed the issue with Burmese leaders and pledged financial support for crop
substitution projects among ethnic minorities in border areas as a long-lasting
solution.
The Burmese government asked Beijing to support sugar cane planting in
border areas and to buy sugar from Burma, Mr Hu was quoted as saying. China was
willing to help despite a domestic sugar surplus.
The Chinese vice-president is in Thailand to celebrate the 25th anniversary
of diplomatic relations. Burma was his first stop on a trip which also takes him
to Indonesia, Belarus and Kazakhstan.
Mr Akapol said border drug problems would be discussed during the meeting
of foreign ministers from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations next week
in Bangkok.
On other matters, the two leaders agreed to encourage more bilateral
investment. Thai investments in China already total US$4.5 billion (180 billion
baht).
Mr Hu told Mr Chuan that preparations are being made for the royal visit by
Her Majesty the Queen to China in October, taking in Beijing, Xi-an, Zhengzhou,
Shanghai, Suzhou and Guilin. In a luncheon speech, the prime minister looked
forward to closer and active co-operation between the two countries.
Collaboration would be expanded to cover development schemes in the Mekong
sub-region.
The Chinese vice-president met separately with New Aspiration Party leader
Chavalit Yongchaiyudh and Chart Thai Party leader Banharn Silpa-archa yesterday
before leaving for Government House.
Gen Chavalit reiterated the NAP's one-China policy, and explained about the
Pak Moon dam protest in front of Government House and assured him that the rally
would not affect his visit.
Mr Banharn said he expected closer co-operation between the two countries
in international forums, including Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation and the
World Trade Organisation, of which China will probably be granted membership
this year.
Mr Hu was granted an audience with Their Majesties the King and Queen at
Klai Kangwol Palace in Hua Hin yesterday, and will wrap up his visit with a trip
to Chiang Mai
tomorrow. |