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BURMA RELATED NEWS - March 22,
2001.
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Headlines
-------------------------------------------------------------- AP - Thai, Chinese Foreign Mins To Discuss
Drugs Issue
AFP - China searching for bomb blast
suspect near Russian border
AFP - Vietnam union bosses admit drug
addiction not just bourgeois scourge
Reuters - Thai general says some
politicians involved in drug trade
Asia Pulse - Korean Govt to Send Economic
Experts to Help Developing Nations
Asia Pulse - New
Taiwan Envoy to Pitch for Closer Ties With Asean
The Star - Myanmar
family caught for illegal entry
People's Daily - Thai PM: Border Conflict with Myanmar Will End Early Next Month
Kyodo News - Thai police suspect Myanmar
monks of spying
The Nation - Politicians trading in drugs: General The Nation - THAI
TALK: Is this 'megaphone diplomacy' in the making?
The Nation - A plea
for the release of Burmese student leader in solitary
The Nation - Ex-Dictator Appears for Lunch and
Merit
Bkk Post - Shots fired at security
unit
Xinhuanet - Myanmar Leader Stresses
Importance of National Security
Thursday March 22, 1:48 PM Thai, Chinese Foreign Mins To Discuss
Drugs Issue
BANGKOK (AP)--Foreign Minister
Surakiart Sathirathai flew to China Thursday for a four-day official visit
during which he will discuss cooperation on fighting drug trafficking.
Thailand and China signed a deal last year on exchanging information on
suppression of drugs, especially methamphetamines being produced by ethnic
armies in neighboring Myanmar. Millions of tablets are smuggled from Myanmar
into Thailand and China every year.
Surakiart will ask China to formulate concrete action plans based on the
deal, Foreign Ministry spokesman Pradab Pibul- songgram said.
The new Thai government of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra recently
declared war on drugs and openly accused the United Wa State Army, a former
Myanmar rebel group that signed a cease-fire, of producing and smuggling
methamphetaminesinto Thailand.
Besides drugs, Surakiart will also discuss cooperation in developing the
northern Mekong region, Pradab said.
Thursday March 22, 5:20 PM
China searching for bomb blast suspect
near Russian border
BEIJING, March 22 (AFP) - China
has launched a frantic search near its border with Russia for the chief suspect
behind last week's deadly bomb blasts in the city of Shijiazhuang, police told
AFP Thursday.
Police in the border city of Suifenhe in the northernmost province of
Heilongjiang said they were conducting a massive manhunt for Jin Ruchao, the
fugitive suspected of carrying the blasts which killed at least 108
people.
"He definitely won't be able to get out," a border inspection official told
AFP.
The official said border guards have been on the lookout for Jin, a
skinny-faced deaf-mute, for the past three days after police received a tip that
he was sighted on a long-distance bus travelling from the neighbouring province
of Jilin to Suifenhe.
Every police station and border inspection checkpoint in Suifenhe has been
put on special alert for the 41-year-old fugitive, a convicted rapist who is
also wanted in connection with the murder of his girlfriend earlier this
month.
City police are combing railway stations, bus stations and hotels for the
fugitive, said a police official. Arrest warrants carrying a picture of Jin have
been posted throughout the city.
"People from all walks of life are looking for him," she said.
A police officer at a railroad station said his unit had been working
round-the-clock checking identification of people getting on and off trains and
raiding nearby hotels several times a day.
Residents say the bombings, which happened within the space of an hour on
March 16 at or near housing compounds for cotton mill workers, killed up to 200
people although the authorities have put the death toll at 108.
The Hong Kong-based Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy said
the government had issued a nationwide order to hunt down Jin.
Police believe he may head to Myanmar, from the bordering southern Chinese
province of Yunnan, if he does not make it to Russia.
But authorities believe Jin is most likely headed to Russia, where mafia
gangs, given enough money, can easily spirit him to safety, perhaps to a Western
European country, said the center.
Illegal immigration from China to Russia is common, with many eventually
smuggled to Western countries.
Shijiazhuang police, meanwhile, have deployed a team of investigators in
Suifenhe to help root out Jin, the center said.
Jin is the only suspect identified by police so far, but reports say police
are looking for up to eight suspects.
Police officers this week arrested two residents of a village just outside
Shijiazhuang who are believed to have sold Jin the explosives used in the
attack.
No motive has been given for the bombings, but a Chinese paper has reported
that Jin had family ties to all four buildings destroyed in the explosions. A
five-storey building reduced to rubble housed a flat belonging to his father and
stepmother, while another housed his ex-wife and her husband.
The bombings are a mystery to Chinese citizens. Few believe Jin could have
carried out the well-planned attacks alone, while locals believe the explosions
could be the work of disgruntled laid-off state orkers or organized crime gangs
linked to the ex-mayor arrested for massive corruption.
Thursday March 22, 6:38 PM
Vietnam union bosses admit drug
addiction not just bourgeois scourge
HANOI, March 22 (AFP) - Thirty
percent of Vietnam's registered drug addicts are blue-collar workers, union
bosses said Thursday in a frank admission that narcotics are not the bourgeois
scourge often depicted by communist ideologues here.
Of the 100,030 addicts registered to July last year, 30,000 of them were
state sector employees, the deputy head of the Vietnam Labour Confederation's
(VLC) drugs and social evils department, Le Van Nhien, told the Gia Dinh va Xa
Hoi (Family and Society) newspaper.
A survey carried out by unions in drugs rehabilitation units across the
country also found that 30 percent of addicts were trade union members, the
English-language Vietnam News reported.
By contrast students, regarded in most Western societies as a key risk
group, formed just 1.6 percent of addicts, while farmers, who form the huge
majority of Vietnam's 78 million population, accounted for only 0.6
percent.
Alarmingly for travellers, the transport industry proved the "most
notorious" sector for drug use, with 6,000 addicts uncovered in the
survey.
The coal industry came a distant second with some 300 addicts found.
Nhien said that the VLC had been working to persuade managers against
automatically firing staff who were found to have a drug problem.
"We have been directing those units to learn that state employees who
become addicted to drugs for a first or second time should be regarded as
victims," he told the newspaper.
"Only if they return to the habit for a third or fourth time are managers
entitled to sack them."
VLC deputy chairman Do Duc Ngo said the unions had also been urging
employers and local authorities to help recovering addicts find a job as
employment often proved the most difficult part of their rehabilitation.
The ready availability of cheap heroin has fuelled a massive increase in
addiction in Vietnam's big cities in recent years, greatly complicating the
government's fight against AIDS.
Despite the widespread use of the death penalty in a draconian campaign
against trafficking, opium and its derivatives continue to pour across the
border from neighbouring Laos and the other poppy-growing Golden Triangle
countries of Myanmar and Thailand beyond.
Needle sharing among heroin users has so far been the main factor behind
the spread of the AIDS virus here, the health ministry says.
But growing heroin use among prostitutes has seen an alarming rise in
sexual transmission, with infection rates among Ho Chi Minh City prostitutes
leaping to 15.9 percent in 1999 from just 3.1 percent the previous year.
Mounting official concern about the spread of AIDS has prompted a growing
frankness about a raft of issues that were previously regarded as bourgeois
"social evils."
Last April the social affairs ministry made the shock admission that as
many as 70 per cent of the men who use Vietnam's myriad brothels were not
decadent Westerners but communist party cadres and civil servants.
"Prostitution has developed in an alarming and fairly open manner in
Vietnam since 1997 ... largely due to the lack of firmness shown in punishing
prostitutes' customers and particularly those who are party cadres or state
officials," the head of the ministry's social evils department, Nguyen Thi Hue,
said in a frank newspaper interview.
Hue's 70 percent figure for the proportion of brothel-goers who are party
or government officials was repeated by the Ho Chi Minh City youth daily Tuoi
Tre Thursday in its report on the trade union drugs survey.
Thursday March 22, 1:49 PM
Thai general says some politicians
involved in drug trade
By Nopporn Wong-Anan BANGKOK (Reuters) - An
outspoken Thai army general responsible for defending the country's northern
border with Myanmar said on Thursday several Thai politicians and businessmen
were involved in drugs trafficking across the frontier.
Lieutenant-General Wattanachai Chaimuanwong, commander of Thailand's third
army, told Thai radio he could not take legal action against the culprits
because he did not have any authority or evidence to do so.
"I can't arrest them because we are not authorised to, even though we know
what they are doing," Wattanachai said. "Narcotics trafficking is a
multi-billion baht business involving hundreds of people and networks...
Politicians need money from them to buy votes."
Wattanachai has been extremely critical of Myanmar following clashes at the
border last month.
He says Myanmar's government is encouraging the activities of the United Wa
State Army (UWSA), the source of most of the methamphetamine pills flooding
Thailand.
Myanmar insists that it is clamping down on drugs and says the UWSA, an
ethnic Wa militia group, should not be made a scapegoat for the problem.
Wattanachai's comments have often contradicted Defence Minister Chavalit
Yongchaiyudh, who boasts good personal connections with Yangon's ruling
generals, fuelling speculation in the Thai media that Wattanachai could be
transferred to a higher but inactive post later this year.
The two countries, which share a 2,400 km (1,490 mile) border, have waged a
war of words since their troops exchanged fire in February clashes that left
several dead.
Thai and Myanmar officials plan to hold their first border talks in two
years on April 2-4 in the northeastern Myanmar town of Kengtung in a bid to
soothe simmering tensions.
Among the issues Thailand wants to discuss at the meeting are cooperation
to fight drugs, problems with refugees and illegal immigrant workers, and
disagreements over some sections of the border.
General Sampao Choosri, supreme commander of the Armed Forces, told
reporters on Wednesday the resumption of a healthy bilateral relationship would
emerge only after talks at a national level.
The last regional border meeting was held in Thailand's southern resort of
Phuket in March 1999.
Thursday March 22, 4:10 PM
Korean Govt to Send Economic Experts to
Help Developing Nations
SEOUL, March 22 Asia Pulse -
The Korean government said it will dispatch economic experts to developing
countries this year, to transfer knowledge about economic development and how to
overcome financial crises in cooperation with the International Bank for
Reconstruction and Development [IBRD].
The government will select the nations and support agenda through meetings
amongst related ministries. These will include the Finance an Economy, Planning
and Budget, and Foreign Affairs and Trade ministries.
State-run institutes, the Korea Development Institute [KDI], and the Korea
International Cooperation Agency will also be included.
The government has already sent out a research team to eight Asian nations
within the last two months. Those countries include Mongolia, Indonesia, the
Philippines, Thailand, Laos, Myanmar, Cambodia, and Vietnam.
The government will start dispatching advisory teams to selected nations in
May, after completing field research next month.
Thursday March 22, 10:10 AM
New Taiwan Envoy to Pitch for Closer
Ties With Asean
TAIPEI, March 22 Asia Pulse -
New Taiwan representative to Malaysia Huang Yen-chao said Wednesday he will do
his utmost to push for closer relations with the Association for Southeast Asian
Nations [ASEAN] after assuming his new post.
Huang, who served as Taiwan representative to Belgium for six years before
receiving his Malaysian assignment, made the pledge in a report to the
Legislative Yuan's Foreign and Overseas Chinese Affairs Committee on the outlook
for ROC-Malaysia ties.
Noting that ASEAN is a very important regional organization in Asia, Huang
said Taiwan's exclusion from its activities is unreasonable.
Huang further said that if the proposal to establish a new "ASEAN plus
three" (mainland China, Japan and South Korea) organization is realized,
Taiwan's diplomatic situation in the Asia-Pacific region will become even more
difficult.
In the past few years, Huang said, the Taiwan government has expressed
through various channels its desire to become an ASEAN dialogue partner.
Given the fact that all ASEAN countries recognize mainland China and none
of them maintain formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan, Huang said, it will not be
easy for Taiwan to become an ASEAN member.
He said it might be easier and more feasible to seek to become an ASEAN
dialogue partner.
As Malaysia plays a critical role in ASEAN, Huang said he will take
advantage of his new post to forge closer ties with ASEAN.
In addition, Huang said he will also endeavor to upgrade bilateral
Taiwan-Malaysian relations by using the clout of the Chinese community and
Taiwanese investors there. Malaysia is a traditional destination for major
overseas investment by Taiwan entrepreneurs.
ASEAN groups 10 countries -- including Thailand, the Philippines,
Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, Vietnam, Laos, Myanmar and Cambodia. It
now has many dialogue partners, inclduing the United States, Canada, mainland
China, Japan and South Korea.
The Star - March 22,
2001.
Myanmar family caught for illegal
entry
SUNGAI GOLOK: A Myanmar family of six who tried to enter Kelantan illegally
were nabbed as they arrived in a sampan at Pos Azizah here on Tuesday.
Commanding officer of the 8th General Operations Force Supt Wenceslaus Dana
said the couple, Mohd Amin Mokhtar and Mariam Sukur, tried to enter the country
along with their four children aged between four and 11.
The family was being detained at the Pasir Mas district police station
before being deported.
Supt Dana said that the force also seized more than five tonnes of smuggled
rice at five different locations along the border during routine patrol in the
last two days.
No arrest was made as the bags of rice were found abandoned in
bushes.
People's Daily
Thursday, March 22, 2001, updated at
11:09(GMT+8)
Thai PM: Border Conflict with Myanmar Will End Early Next Month Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra has expressed optimism the
Thai-Myanmar border conflict would be settled by early next month, saying the
two neighboring countries should give priority to common interests, according to
a report of the Thai News Agency (TNA) Thursday.
The Myanmar government had recently agreed to host the joint Regional
Border Committee (RBC) meeting April 2-4 to discuss ways to end the months-long
border problem, Thaksin was quoted as saying on Wednesday.
The premier refused to comment on the Rangoon statement that the Thai
government had a name-list of some politicians who are blacklisted for
involvement in drug trafficking, but ignored to take decisive action against
them.
He said he did not want to make any retaliatory remarks because his
administration had clearly declared war against narcotics.
He believed Myanmar leaders are aware of Thailand's strong determination to
suppress drug trafficking.
Thaksin also played down mounting concerns from the Rangoon statement the
country's prestige would be raised for discussion at the RBC meeting.
He said he believed officials concerned in the talks would try their best
to settle the conflict as soon as possible.
Thai police suspect Myanmar monks of
spying
MAE HONG SON, Thailand March 21 Kyodo - Thai police said Wednesday they have put
more than 200 Buddhist monks from Myanmar in the northern border province of Mae
Hong Son on a watch list over suspicions they are military spies.
Most of the monks belong to Myanmar's ethnic Shan minority and have been in
Thailand for years trying to win followers, they said.
Many of them are closely watched since they often cross the border between
the two countries, according to the chief of a Mae Hong Son district police
station, Col. Tinnapat Pumarin.
''Some monks are moving around the border areas seeking to make friends
with Thai military officers guarding the areas,'' he said.
The Thai Royal Police ordered all stations in border areas to beef up their
control of the movement of Buddhist monks from neighboring Myanmar following
border disputes between the two countries last month.
Some 40 Myanmar people suspected of spying have been detained by Thai
authorities since the February clash.
The Thai military estimated earlier that hundreds of people from Myanmar
are spying in Thailand and mix in all sorts of groups, such as migrant laborers,
businessmen and fortune tellers.
Monks and fortune tellers are difficult to control since some senior Thai
officials and their wives are followers, Tinnapat said.
Sour relations between Thailand and Myanmar intensified last month when
both sides clashed in several border areas. At least four Myanmar soldiers died
and many Thai soldiers were wounded, while five civilians were also killed and
more than a dozen wounded.
The Nation - March 22,
2001.
Politicians trading in drugs:
General
THIRD Army Region Commander General Watanachai Chaimuanwong yesterday said
more than 10 Thai politicians and businessmen were involved in narcotics
trafficking and production in Burma and Thailand's northern region.
He was responding to a news report suggesting Burma had a list of 10 Thai
politicians who had prominent roles in the production and trafficking of drugs,
particularly methamphetamines.
"It is for sure that a number of Thais - politicians and businessmen - are
involved in the syndicates," said Watanchai.
"Our Office of Narcotics Control Board has a list of them, more than 10 of
course," he added.
Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said he would make no statement relating
to the Burmese claims this time.
"I have my own way to check and deal with this case," he said. "Burma is
aware already of my strong efforts to tackle the drug problem."
Meanwhile former prime minister Chuan Leekpai said he had never been shown
the list. "It would be good if Burma gave the list to the Thai side, however we
have to check the facts first," he said.
"During my premiership, Rangoon never gave such a list to me."
Thailand and Burma have exchanged verbal barbs since last month, when
Burmese troops encroached on Thai territory in pursuit of ethnic Shan rebels.
Watanachai was the first to come out and criticise Burma's actions, and
allege its involvement in drug trafficking.
His criticisms are considered to have broken Thailand's traditional
diplomatic approach - to avoid making direct criticisms of other countries,
particularly neighbours. The situation became tense after Thaksin lashed out at
Burma and the Burmese affiliated United Wa State Army.
The conflict resulted in the closure of the Thai-Burma checkpoint linking
Chiang Rai with Burma's Tachilek. Thailand recently re-opened its side of the
checkpoint, but Burma has not. Watanachai yesterday said raw materials and the
equipment used to produce narcotics were imported illegally into Burma from
Thailand.
"It is a fact that chemicals and materials used in the production of speed
pills and other narcotics come from the Thai side," the general said. "The
ingredients are also produced in China and sent to Burma through Thailand," he
said.
Thailand and Burma agreed to convene their Regional Boundary Committee
(RBC) in Keng Tung on the Burmese side from April 2 to 4. The committee has not
met for two years, because of the countries' shaky relationship.
Watanachai said the main talking points in the meeting would be old
bilateral problems that had never been seriously tackled, such as border
demarcation, illegal immigration, fishing and narcotics.
The Thai side would also raise Burma's intrusion into Chiang Rai province
last month, Watanachai said.
"We consider the upcoming RBC meeting as a proactive approach from the Thai
side," he said.
"The meeting is expected to help ease the tension."
The Nation - March 22,
2001.
THAI TALK: Is this 'megaphone diplomacy'
in the making?
BY SUTHICHAI YOON
THERE is nothing wrong with resorting to "megaphone diplomacy" if it gets
two neighbours to move on to the next stage of "personal diplomacy". And there
is nothing wrong with "personal diplomacy" if it doesn't end up in the form of
logging concessions, hotel construction contracts or fishing permits granted to
individuals from our side of the border.
Foreign Minister Surakiart Sathirathai's "forward engagement" policy can
certainly replace his predecessor Surin Pitsuwan's "flexible engagement" if it
allows both Thailand and the military government of Burma to tell each other to
"put your own house in order" to avoid creating unnecessary trouble on the
border for your neighbour.
The military junta of Burma has obviously taken note of the new style of
Thai diplomacy through Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra's "cross-border
diplomacy" expounded almost off-the-cuff two weeks ago in the border town of
Chiang Rai. His was a typically populist approach which went down well with many
a Thai seeking an end to the drug flow from the Burmese side of the border.
Thaksin was apparently bent on showing that he was changing the game of Thai
diplomacy by talking straight and getting tough.
The new premier, after launching the high-profile and widely-publicised
"workshop" on drugs, caused a stir by deliberately delivering a stern message to
the other side of the border. He departed from the old "good neighbours"
tradition of not posing embarrassing questions in public by saying that he would
demand explanations from Burma's generals over the deadly flow of drugs from
jungle refineries controlled by Wa minority groups. Thaksin, the no-nonsense
CEO, was getting down to business. The previous undeclared
"don't-ask-because-you-won't-get-an-answer" policy was unceremoniously thrown
out the window.
In another act in his unusual push for policy transparency, the prime
minister even de-classified Army intelligence on the dramatic expansion of the
once sleepy town of Mong Yawn on the other side of the border. It was the first
time that Thai authorities, in the presence of the prime minister, had publicly
hurled charges of possible connivance between the Wa warlords and the
authorities in Rangoon. Reporters were even told of pictures taken of several
Burmese generals inspecting Mong Yawn's vast expansion - a gesture of condoning
what Thai officials consider to be inexcusable.
The junta's angry reaction wasn't unexpected, although its call for
Thailand to put its own house in order instead of trying to make Rangoon a
"scapegoat" for its drug problems was more rhetorical than substantive.
Thaksin's immediate response obviously didn't help pacify the junta. "Of course,
we have been trying to put our house in order, but dust keeps blowing in from
the North." That's as diplomatic as the new Thai CEO can get in suggesting that
you can't live in peace if things aren't settled next door.
Blunt talk isn't necessarily bad or counterproductive if the objective is
clear. Tough political talk should be aimed at bringing the neighbour to the
negotiation table where real substantial bilateral issues, and not "personal
grievances" or "vested interests", are ironed out. Personal diplomacy, of
course, should be employed if familiarity among senior officials on both sides
paves the way for candour and dispenses with deep-rooted mutual suspicion.
The convening of the Regional Border Committee won't resolve what basically
constitute national-level conflicts. It's not just border disagreement over
demarcation. Nor is it purely a case of Thailand being flooded with illegal
Burmese migrants - which has in itself become a problem of growing magnitude in
political, economic and social terms here.
The paramount sticking point is the drugs issue, which goes beyond the
Thai-Burmese context. It's a worldwide problem and Premier Thaksin, with no
skeletons in the closet on this particular issue, should engage the world
community in this highly critical problem. Burma has to convince not only
Thailand but the international community that it's serious about tackling the
drugs issue. In other words, the new Thai government has to perform where the
previous administration failed. To be effective in the long term, any Thai
strategy towards our western neighbour has to be based on the concept that it's
Burma against the world - and not just one of those normal irritants two
neighbouring countries usually encounter.
Thai authorities, of course, aren't innocent of any shenanigans along the
border. But if the new premier is determined to get a fresh start on this front,
he will have to embark on a major overhaul of the security and foreign policy
establishment to ensure consistency and clear direction to achieve national
goals.
"Personal diplomacy" in this particular case got a bad name in the past
because it was seen to be a case of "you-scratch-my-back-and-I-scratch-yours"
for certain Thai senior officials and their Burmese counterparts.
Taking the cue from Rangoon and, in the name of good neighbourliness,
Thailand should take up the gauntlet and adopt a new, constructive policy
towards Burma: I clean up my house and you clean yours.
The Nation - March 22,
2001.
Letters to the Editor
A plea for the release of Burmese
student leader in solitary
Lia Korrel
After Burma was admitted to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations
(Asean), I hoped that there would be some concrete improvements in the human
rights situation, for example, the release of prisoners of conscience and
improvements in prison conditions. Unfortunately, this does not seem to be the
case.
I am referring in particular to the case of Min Ko Naing, a student leader
and prisoner of conscience who was arrested and sentenced to 20 years
imprisonment, a sentence that was commuted to ten years in January 1993.
Although Min Ko Naing should have been released in March 1999 on completion of
his sentence, he is still held at Sittway Prison, Rakhine State.
For most of his imprisonment Min Ko Naing has been held in complete
solitary confinement. In 1993 he was visited in Insein Prision by a United
States Congressman. He was said to be in poor health and appeared disoriented.
In November 1994, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Burma was also
allowed to visit him briefly in prison and described him as being nervous and
thin. Subsequent reports on his health stated that he suffers from a nervous
tremor and may have suffered emotionally as a result of his ill treatment and
prolonged solitary confinement. He is believed to suffer from a gastric ulcer.
Since his prison term is over and moreover since he was imprisoned for
non-violently exercising his rights of freedom of _expression_, as guaranteed
under international law, I would ask for his immediate and unconditional
release.
The Nation - Thursday, March 22,
2001
Ex-Dictator Appears for
Lunch and Merit
Deutsche Presse-Agentur
RANGOON - Burma's former military strongman General Ne Win, who urled the
country between 1962 and 1988, appeared in public yesterday for the first time
in years to host a lunch for 99 senior Buddhist monks, eyewitnesses said.
The lunch, presided over by Ne Win, 91, was held at he posh Sedona Hotel in
downtown Rangoon.
Altogether 99 members of the Buddhist Sangha, -essentially the Buddhist
priesthood - and about 500 lower ranking monks, atended the merit-making event,
observers said.
It was the first time Ne Win has appeared in public since 1988.
Political observers in Rangoon, many of whom lived under Ne Win's
iron-fisted rule for 26 years, took note that 99 Sangha members were invited by
the strongman, who believes in numerology.
The speculation was that Ne Win was hoping to add another eight years to
his life with the auspicious number of 99 monks, compared with his 91 years.
General Ne Win seized political power with a military coup d'etat in 1962, when
he introduced the economically disastrous "Burmese Way to Socialism". Over the
years it reduced the once-prosperous Burma to nation
with 'least developed country' status by 1988. He officially retired from politics in mid-1988, after anti-military
demon-strations rocked Rangoon, pitting soldiers against students and resulting
in a brutal crackdown.
Although Ne Win has distanced himself from government affairs, he is widely
believed to be a powerful behind-the-scenes player in the military clique that
has ruled Burma since 1988.
Ne Win was member of the "30 comrades", a group of Burmese nationalists who
first sided with the Japanese in World War II and later formed the core of a
resistance movement against them.
General Aung San, leader of the comrades, was his superior in rank. Aung
San Suu Kyi, Aung San's daughter, now leads Burma's opposition party.
Bangkok Post - March 22,
2001.
Shots fired at security
unit
Chiang Rai An unidentified force fired machine guns at a Thai patrol from across the
Burmese border yesterday but there were no reports of casualties.
Boonchob Suthamanaswong, an assistant chief of Mae Chan district, said the
attack took place at about 11am, when 10 paramilitary rangers were on patrol on
a road between Ban Hua Mae Kham and Ban San Makhet.
The assault ceased after soldiers of Pha Muang Force fired two warning
mortar rounds back across the border.
Troops were later reinforced there.
Villagers along the border with Burma have been told to be prepared for
border clashes as the anti-Rangoon Shan State Army will celebrate its national
day on March 25, while Burmese soldiers will celebrate Burmese national day on
March 27.
- About 15,000 Burmese troops are heading towards Kengtung in Shan state,
where a new offensive is expected against minority rebels, said a high-level
Shan State Army source. The column was heading towards Kengtung, the venue of
the Thai-Burmese Regional Border Committee meeting scheduled for early next
month.
Myanmar Leader Stresses Importance
of National Security
2001.03.22 11:06:25 YANGON, March 22 (Xinhuanet) --
Myanmar top leader Senior-General Than Shwe has stressed the importance of
security, peace and stability in the country, especially in regions
which lagged behind in development even after Myanmar regained its
independence in 1948.
Than Shwe, Chairman of the Myanmar State Peace and Development
Council, made the remarks here on Wednesday at the opening ceremony of an
international relation course conducted by the Union Solidarity and
Development Association (USDA), official newspaper The New Light of
Myanmar reported Thursday.
Than Shwe, who is also patron of the USDA, urged the people to take
lessons from the "divide-and-rule" policy of the colonialists, and their
"instigations" and "driving of wedge" among Myanmar's 135 national
races.
"Only if all the national races defend the union, would they be able to
enjoy peace and development for a long time," he said, warning otherwise
that Myanmar will again be faced with bitter experiences it underwent 50
years ago.
On Myanmar's international relations policy, Than Shwe maintained
that his country has been always adhering to the policy without fail.
He said the country is also launching regional and international
cooperation with full confidence, valuing the regional stability and its
own sovereignty as well as that of all nations.
He cited a Myanmar saying -- "Enhance amity, diminish enmity" and "
Say it seldom, make it stick" -- which he said the country has been
practised as its code of conduct in handling international
relations.
He believed that if the code of conduct receives equal response, a better
environment of relations can be attained.
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