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BURMA RELATED NEWS - August 07,
2001.
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HEADLINES
------------------------------------------------------------------ AP - Thai Troops Killed/Myanmar -2:Confiscated
Methamphetmines
AFP - Myanmar junta regrets flight of opposition
MP
AFP - Myanmar opposition to mark uprising
anniversary once again
AFP - UN denies that agencies in Myanmar want
sanctions lifted
Reuters - Liberalise or lose investment, US
lobby warns ASEAN
BBC - Appeal for huge Burma aid increase
Kyodo News - Myanmar
junta unlikely to go without guarantee: Mahahir
Bkk Post - Arbitration panel to be set up with
Laos
Bkk Post - Abduction of 7 linked to
assassination
Bkk Post - Ex-MP flees Rangoon to join NLD
members
The Nation - Drug-smugglers kill three soldiers
Xinhuanet - Myanmar Leader Links Development
with Education Sector
Xinhuanet - Myanmar Designates Some
Narcotic Drugs As Illegal Sale
------------------------------------------------------------------ Tuesday August 7, 12:59 PM
Thai Troops Killed/Myanmar -2:Confiscated Methamphetmines DOI KIA, Thailand (AP)--Three
Thai troops were killed and one injured in a clash with suspected drug
traffickers from Myanmar near the mountainous border between the two countries
Tuesday, Thai officials said.
Soldiers from Thai military battalion 443 confronted intruders from Myanmar
at 3 a.m. local time, or 2000 GMT Monday, about two kilometers inside Thailand's
Phop Phra district in northwestern Tak province.
A police officer in Phop Phra said Thai soldiers confiscated 536,000
tablets of methamphetmines contained in a fertilizer bag after a shootout with
the intruders.
A district official said three Thais had died in the fighting but the
bodies couldn't yet be recovered from the scene, pending the arrival of doctors
to examine them.
Officials said the intruders were thought to be from the Democratic Karen
Buddhist Army, a pro-Yangon ethnic army. It wasn't yet clear if the intruders
had suffered any casualties.
Doi Kia, the scene of the fighting, lies about 370 kilometers northwest of
Bangkok.
The police officer said that the clash occurred after nine Thai soldiers
had been deployed to wait at three locations where they had heard there would be
a handover of methamphetamines. The intruders had signaled by flash light and
when the Thais couldn't reply in code the intruders opened fire.
Military-run Myanmar, also known as Burma, is a major source of
methamphetamine drugs, which Thailand says are smuggled in vast quantities
across the border. The illicit trade has upset bilateral relations between the
two countries. Their armies clashed briefly earlier this year.
------------------------------------------------------------------ Tuesday August 7, 2:03 PM
Myanmar junta regrets flight of opposition MP YANGON, Aug 7 (AFP) - The
Myanmar junta Tuesday criticised an opposition MP who fled to the Thai border
after being released from detention, saying he had turned his back on national
reconciliation talks which began last year.
Khin Kyaw Han, who was elected as an MP in the disallowed 1990 elections,
said he had been tortured while in detention and feared further reprisals after
he was released from a government guest house on June 28.
The 48-year-old is one of dozens of National League for Democracy (NLD) MPs
released over the past few months in what the military regime has hailed as a
sign of progress in its talks with democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
"The government as well as independent observers are surprised to learn
that U Khin Kyaw Han ... fled to the Thai border to join the armed outlawed
groups," a junta spokesman said in a statement.
"It is indeed regretful that U Khin Kyaw Han not only has refused to
meaningfully participate and cooperate in the reconciliation process taking
place between the government and the NLD party but has been sidetracked by those
groups which desire to continue with the policy of confrontation and to live in
the past."
Khin Kyaw Han, who asked that his location on the Thai-Myanmar border not
be disclosed, said Monday he had been tortured during two periods of detention
between 1992 and 2001, and suffered mental problems as a result.
"After my arrest, I was tortured with beatings and electric shocks," he
said in a faxed statement. "I was forced to disclose places where other people
were hiding."
"It seriously affected my mind. My family is broken and I have to ask for
political asylum."
Myanmar's military regime says it has freed more than 150 dissidents since
the beginning of the year. Aung San Suu Kyi and her two most senior lieutenants,
Aung Shwe and Tin Oo, remain under loose house arrest restrictions, helping
ensure the contents of the dialogue remain secret.
The talks are the first between the junta and the opposition since 1994,
and may be paving the way for a fully-fledged national reconciliation process
that could introduce some measure of democratic reform to Myanmar.
While the international community and dissident groups have welcomed the
prisoner releases, they note that many dissidents remain behind bars in Myanmar.
International rights group Amnesty International recently put the number
detained at 1,800.
------------------------------------------------------------------ Tuesday August 7, 4:28 PM
Myanmar opposition to mark uprising anniversary once again YANGON, Aug 7 (AFP) - Aung San
Suu Kyi's opposition party is planning to mark the anniversary of Myanmar's
bloody 1988 student uprising for the first time in several years, sources said
Tuesday.
The National League for Democracy (NLD) will hold a discreet ceremony on
Wednesday at its Shwegonedine Road headquarters in Yangon, to be attended by
some 100-150 members of the party whose 1990 election victory was never
recognised by the junta.
Aung San Suu Kyi and her two most senior lieutenants, Aung Shwe and Tin Oo,
who remain under house arrest restrictions in Yangon, will not be present, NLD
sources told AFP.
Annual events to mark the bloody protests on August 8, 1988 petered out
during the late 1990s crackdown on the opposition party, which came close to
collapse in the face of a brutal campaign of repression and arrests.
However, since the military regime embarked on landmark talks with Aung San
Suu Kyi in October its members have been given a degree more freedom of
movement, and dozens of elected MPs have been released from detention.
This year's low-key commemoration of the anniversary is seen as a gesture
from the party that it is still alive and kicking, while being careful not to
provoke the military government.
U Lwin, the party's most senior leader at large, will preside over the
ceremony and represent Aung San Suu Kyi, as he did at last month's commemoration
of her father's assassination on Martyrs' Day.
The party elder, one of the few people permitted to see "The Lady" at her
lakeside residence on a regular basis, made an unscheduled visit early Tuesday,
apparently to inform her about Wednesday's event.
Hundreds of democracy demonstrators were gunned down in the August 1988
Yangon student uprising, paving the way for a junta to take power from longtime
military strongman Ne Win the following month.
The junta allowed free elections in 1990, which the NLD won convincingly,
but the military regime has always refused to recognised the result.
The resulting decade-long stand-off showed the first signs of cracking late
last year when, at the urging of United Nations envoy Razali Ismail, the two
sides began their first dialogue since 1994.
Little is known of the contents of the talks, but the release of some 150
political prisoners this year has been hailed by the international community as
a sign that the dialogue is making progress.
Razali is to make his fifth visit to Yangon later this month. Aung San Suu
Kyi has also received some other high-profile visitors recently, including US
deputy assistant secretary of state Ralph Boyce on Thursday.
Robert Cooper, the former Asia-Pacific director of the British Foreign
Office and now appointed to the cabinet office, also paid a call on the lakeside
compound late last month, sources said.
------------------------------------------------------------------ Tuesday August 7, 8:59 PM
UN denies that agencies in Myanmar want sanctions lifted YANGON, Aug 7 (AFP) - The
United Nations Tuesday denied a report that its relief agencies in Myanmar had
made a collective request to their leaderships and foreign governments to lift
sanctions against the military regime.
The Nation newspaper in Bangkok reported that the nine heads of
Yangon-based UN agencies, including UNICEF and the World Health Organisation,
issued the plea on humanitarian grounds in a joint letter.
However, a senior UN official in Yangon said the letter was an internal
assessment of the humanitarian situation in Myanmar and did not mention the
lifting of sanctions.
"This is merely a technical internal letter on the conditions for
distributing humanitarian aid in Myanmar," he told AFP.
"It's absolutely not a political appeal for the lifting or not lifting of
sanctions, but rather an assessment of the humanitarian situation," the official
said, requesting anonymity.
"It's meant to establish how we can best help the population of Myanmar,
particularly in fields like HIV-AIDS prevention and infant mortality."
The prospect of foreign governments lifting their sanctions has been
floated in recent months after the junta embarked on talks with opposition
leader Aung San Suu Kyi last October.
The release of some 150 political prisoners since the start of the year has
also fuelled suggestions that the international community may be reviewing its
hardline stance against the junta.
But while welcoming the political developments, the United States and the
European Union have both said they will keep sanctions in place until more
concrete progress is made towards democratic reform.
"My own judgement is until there is significant progress on the political
front in Burma/Myanmar, the common position of the European Union will stay the
same," EU External Affairs Commissioner Chris Patten said last month.
Myanmar's economy has been crippled by a combination of the wide-ranging
sanctions and gross economic mismanagement by the generals in Yangon, who are
also accused of rampant human rights abuses.
The appalling state of the nation's finances is one factor credited with
the regime's decision to begin a dialogue with Aung San Suu Kyi -- the first
official contact between the two sides since 1994.
The Nation report said the UN letter outlined a looming humanitarian crisis
in Myanmar, with more than 500,000 HIV positive citizens and high infant
mortality rates.
About 25 percent of newborn babies were underweight and one in three
Myanmar children would be malnourished by the time they reached the age of five,
it added.
The letter reportedly called for a dramatic overhaul of budget allocation
to Myanmar as well as better coordination between UN organisations.
------------------------------------------------------------------ Tuesday August 7, 1:24 PM
Liberalise or lose investment, US lobby warns ASEAN KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 7 (Reuters) -
A leading U.S. business lobby urged southeast Asian countries on Tuesday to
stick to regional liberalisation plans or risk seeing the further flight of
foreign direct investment (FDI) to northern neighbour China.
"We believe that unless Malaysia leads and ASEAN implements the AFTA, we're
afraid that there will be a continuation of foreign direct investment flows
going to China rather than coming to southeast Asia," Ernest Bower, President of
the US-ASEAN Business Council told a news conference.
Bower spoke after a meeting between Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir
Mohamad and a group of U.S. executives whose firms invest and operate in the
10-country Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN).
Malaysia, Thailand, Brunei, Indonesia, the Philippines and Singapore have
an ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) agreement to slash import tariffs on a range of
products to a maximum five percent by the end of 2002.
Bower said in most sectors there had been a reverse in the situation of the
early 1990s when more than 70 percent of east Asia's FDI went to southeast Asian
countries and less than 30 percent to China.
"Today, China receives over 70 percent and southeast Asia receives less
than 30 percent," he added.
Lionel Lim, managing director Asia South for Sun Microsystems Inc , said
ASEAN risked irrelevance if it failed to revitalise what he said was not a very
compelling story.
"Individually, these countries aren't very exciting but collectively, a
half-a-billion-people market is exciting," he told the same news conference.
Washington and Kuala Lumpur are at odds on several issues, though the
United States is the biggest investor in Malaysia and its largest trading
partner.
Malaysia belongs to a group of developing nations complaining richer states
have weighted the agenda for a new round of World Trade Organisation talks in
their favour.
The United States has raised privately its concerns over the jailing of
former deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim, the detention without trial of his
supporters and circulation delays imposed on two foreign news magazines after
they printed critical stories about Malaysia.
The Association of South East Asian Nations groups the countries of Brunei,
Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore,
Thailand, and Vietnam.
------------------------------------------------------------------ BBC - Tuesday, 7 August, 2001, 16:20
GMT 17:20 UK
Appeal for huge Burma aid increase The heads of UN agencies operating in Burma have called for a massive
injection of foreign aid if the country is to avoid a "humanitarian crisis."
The officials say sanctions imposed against Burma's military rulers have left the country's poor receiving only a fraction of the aid given to other Asian nations. More than half a million Burmese are HIV positive and one in three children
malnourished by the age of five, the officials - who represent Unicef and eight
other agencies - told their respective headquarters in a letter.
"Under these critical circumstances, humanitarian assistance is a moral and
ethical necessity, as well as an obligation of the international community,"
said the letter, a copy of which was seen by the Associated Press.
The officials called for a dramatic overhaul of the way the United Nations
allocates money to Burma to alleviate suffering and ensure a basic level of
care.
"The nature and magnitude of the humanitarian situation does not permit
delaying until the political situation evolves," they said.
They compared Burma's total annual foreign aid - equivalent to about $1 per
capita - with $35 for Cambodia and $68 for Laos.
A senior official in Rangoon later denied reports that the letter had
called for sanctions against the military to be lifted.
"It's absolutely not a political appeal... but rather an assessment of the
humanitarian situation," he told the French news agency AFP.
Uprising anniversary
Burma, renamed Myanmar, has faced informal sanctions on most aid from donor
nations since martial rule began in 1988 after a bloody military crackdown
against a nationwide democracy movement.
The country is deeply unpopular for being the world's leading producer of
opium, the raw material of heroin.
The opposition National League for Democracy won elections in 1990, but the
military authorities have never allowed it to take power, and have long kept its
leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, under house arrest.
The party is planning to mark the anniversary of the quashed uprising on
Wednesday for the first time in several years.
Annual events remembering 8 August 1988 petered out in the late 1990s, when
the NLD came close to collapse in the face of a campaign of repression and
arrests.
------------------------------------------------------------------ Myanmar junta unlikely to go without
guarantee: Mahahir
KUALA LUMPUR, Aug. 6, Kyodo -
Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad on Monday told former Japanese Prime
Minister Yoshiro Mori that he believes the Myanmar military is unlikely to hand
power to a civilian government unless there is guarantee there would not be
reprisals in the future.
Japan's former Chief Cabinet Secretary Hidenao Nakagawa, who attended the
meeting, said Mahathir emphasized that there must be reconciliation between
Myanmar's military junta and the opposition camp for a peaceful transfer of
power.
Noting that the Myanmar military has already released many political
prisoners, Mahathir told Mori that he has urged Myanmar opposition leader Aung
San Suu Kyi to respond to the gesture.
Mahathir, who has personal ties to the Myanmar junta as well as Suu Kyi's
National League for Democracy, paid a visit to Myanmar in January and met with
top Myanmar junta officials.
Mahathir told Mori that Suu Kyi is unlikely to get everything she wants
from the military junta and that it is important both sides get something out of
a rapprochement.
Members of the ruling junta would have to be included in a future civilian
government, Mahathir said.
In the meantime, Japan should make efforts to urge Europe and the United
States to relax sanctions against Myanmar, the Malaysian prime minister
said.
------------------------------------------------------------------ Bangkok Post - August 07,
2001.
Arbitration panel to be set up
with Laos
Neighbours to solve bilateral disputes Bhanravee Tansubhapol
Thailand and Laos will set up a sub-committee to oversee the arbitration of
disputes in business and investment areas during a ministerial meeting in Chiang
Rai this week, an informed source said yesterday.
Foreign Minister Surakiart Sathirathai will co-chair the 10th Joint
Commission meeting with his Lao counterpart, Somsavat Lengsavad, on Thursday.
They will preside over the first meeting of the disputes arbitration committee
on Friday.
The sub-committee would set measures to solve bilateral disputes on a
case-by-case basis and seek ways to compromise, the source said. The results
would be reported to the two foreign ministers every six months.
"This is the first time the committee heads will discuss the cases. In the
past, nobody dared touch the problems for fear of raising a quarrel, and Laos
was not ready," the source said.
The arbitration committee was set up in 1997 to protect Thai, Lao and other
businessmen engaged in joint ventures in Laos. In four years, 50 cases were
filed through respective embassies, foreign and commerce ministries, but none
were raised for arbitration.
The cases, 30 of which were filed by Thais, did not involve big projects,
the source said.
Most concerned minor damage, such as the fall into the Mekong river of a
truck transporting goods to Laos and the seizure of a sawmill.
The source said some of the problems took place in 1992, or five years
before the arbitration panel was set up. The panel was expected to hold annual
meetings, back-to-back with the JC.
To pave the way for ministerial meetings opening on Thursday, senior
officials will begin preparatory talks this afternoon. They will split into
three groups, to deal with co-operation in security and political affairs, in
economics, and in technical, social, cultural and tourism matters.
Mr Somsavat will call on Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra in Bangkok
before flying to Chiang Rai. He is expected to inform Mr Thaksin of the Aug
17-18 visit to Bangkok of Lao Prime Minister Bounnyang Vorachit.
Mr Bounnyang will also visit Cambodia and Burma as part of his first tour
of neighbouring states since assuming the premiership in March.
Mr Surakiart and Mr Somsavat are due to have lunch with Win Aung, their
Burmese counterpart, in Tachilek on Friday, when drug suppression co-operation
is expected to be the main topic. The three countries and China agreed to step
up co-operation against drugs, and Beijing offered to host a summit late this
year.
------------------------------------------------------------------ Bangkok Post - August 07,
2001.
Abduction of 7 linked to
assassination
Wa's killing blamed on Fang district chief Sermsuk Kasitipradit and Cheewin Satthra
The recent assassination of a Wa man, with Thai nationality and close ties
with key members of the United Wa State Army, was thought to be a crucial factor
behind the July 27 abduction of seven Thai officials in Burma's Thachilek town,
security sources said yesterday.
Thawatchai sae Tieo, locally known as Wangli, was believed by local
officials to be a key drug trafficker. The man was reportedly lured by a local
Thai official to travel from the Wa's Mong Yawn town to Chiang Mai's Fang
district, where he was shot to death in front of the district office on June
20.
"The incident angered the UWSA leaders who saw it as a premeditated murder
by local Thai officials who had reportedly lured him from Mong Yawn," said one
security source.
The source said the UWSA was convinced Fang district chief Kritsada Boonrat
was directly involved in the plot to have Wangli killed.
Mr Kritsada yesterday denied he had anything to do with the death of
Wangli.
"I did not lure him here. Nor was I directly involved in his killing," the
Fang district chief said.
Police found methamphetamines and a shot gun next to the bullet-riddled
body of Wangli.
He was shot seven times at point-blank range by two unidentified gunmen
armed with 9mm pistols, police said.
"The circumstances of the killing were quite unusual," said the source, a
senior military officer who has closely monitored developments at the
Thai-Burmese border.
Seven Thai officials, led by Col Duangkamol Sukhonthasap, director of
Division 12 of the Supreme Command's Armed Forces Security Centre, were captured
by Wa guerrillas on July 27 after crossing the border into Thachilek, opposite
Mae Sai border town in Chiang Rai.
Ten UWSA soldiers took them at gunpoint from a local temple where they paid
a visit to a revered Burmese monk.
They were blindfolded and taken to Mong Hsat, another Wa town, where they
were detained for several days before their release on Thursday last week after
a direct intervention by the Burmese military junta.
Maj-Gen Kyaw Win, Rangoon's intelligence deputy chief, told Thai military
officers led by Gen Vichit Yathip, chief of the defence minister's staff
officers, that it was possible the abduction of the Thai officials might be
related to the killing of Wangli.
Gen Vichit then had a meeting with Burma's intelligence chief, Lt-Gen Khin
Nyunt, who sent a senior Burmese military officer to mediate with the UWSA for
the release of the seven Thais.
During their detention, the Wa made it known that they were not happy with
Thailand's allegations that the Wa were deeply involved in the drug trade.
The UWSA said the allegations were unfair since a lot of Wa people were
engaged in lawful undertakings including longan cultivation.
The seven Thai hostages were taken on a tour of the UWSA's longan
plantations, which the Wa claimed to be their main source of income.
------------------------------------------------------------------ Bangkok Post - August 07,
2001.
Ex-MP flees Rangoon to join NLD members
Activist fresh out of jail vows to fight on Supamart Kasem - Tak
A recently released Burmese member of parliament has fled Rangoon to join a
pro-democracy group at a base opposite Tak province.
Khin Kyaw Han on Sunday went south to Myawaddy where he joined fellow
members of the National League for Democracy.
At a press conference yesterday, he insisted he would not leave the country
and vowed to fight with pro-democracy movements in Burma.
The meeting was organised by Maung Maung Aye, minister for information of
the National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma, and Pado Mahn Sha
Lapan, general secretary of the Karen National Union.
The ex-MP said democracy activists in Burma were under tremendous pressure
from the ruling regime, the State Peace and Development Council.
While welcoming a dialogue between Aung San Suu Kyi and the ruling junta,
he criticised the Burmese military for its lack of sincerity.
The junta should tell the public how the talks were progressing and release
all political prisoners, he said.
The activist claimed 38 MPs elected in May 1990 have died, while another 30
were being held prisoner.
Most of them were under house arrest, including Aung San Suu Kyi, NLD
chairman Aung Swe and vice-chairman Tin Oo.
Khin Kyaw Han was the first to be arrested.
He was charged with destroying state property in September 1990, convicted
and condemned to three years of hard labour at Tae Yae prison, in Magwe.
Khin Kyaw Han was released in February 1995, but was arrested again in July
1998. He was released again this year on June 28.
------------------------------------------------------------------ The Nation - August 07,
2001.
Drug-smugglers kill three soldiers
Thai troops yesterday clashed with a drug caravan from Burma in a gun
battle that left three Thai soldiers dead and one wounded, Army spokesman
Colonel Somkuan Saengpataranet said yesterday.
Confiscated from the scene after the drug-runners retreated to Burmese soil
were 536,000 amphetamines tablets packed in plastic bags, Somkuan said.
The slain soldiers were Sergeant Theerachai Duangfu, Private Pollawat Kaja
and Private Kwanchai Kruefu.
Naraesuan Task Force Commander Lt-General Thomorn Kittisopol said the clash
had started at about 5am when the Thai troops, acting on a tip-off, ambushed the
drug caravan, believed to have been sent by the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army
(DKBA) and the United Wa State Army (UWSA).
Thailand believes the DKBA and UWSA are major drug-traders.
The drug gang refused to surrender to Thai troops and opened fire, killing
three soldiers and injuring another. The Thai unit found only traces of blood
and the bags of amphetamines at the scene after the group fled over the Burmese
border.
In a separate anti-drug operation yesterday, three suspected
methamphetamine dealers were shot dead under a bridge spanning the Chao Phya
river in Bangkok's Dao Khanong neighbourhood, police said.
The dead men were identified as Somsak Khanaphan, 38, of Samut Prakan's
Phra Pradaeng district, who was shot close to his Mercedes with a .38 Colt
revolver dropped close to his body; an unidentified male aged 25, 1.65 metre in
height, wearing a T-shirt, drab-coloured trousers and brown rubber sandals, with
a .38 Smith & Wesson revolver and two Bt1,000 bank notes dropped close to
his body; and an unidentified man aged between 35 and 40, 1.65 metre in height,
wearing a brown short-sleeved shirt, blue jeans and grey leather shoes, with a
9mm home-made gun found close to his body.
On the body of the 35- to 40-year-old was found a chit listing amounts of
money and methamphetamines, names and bank accounts.
The killings took place during a police sting operation. Police said Somsak
had agreed to supply plainclothes officers masquerading as buyers with 10,000
speed tablets for Bt300,000.
------------------------------------------------------------------ Myanmar Leader Links Development
with Education Sector
Xinhuanet 2001.08.07 11:18:43 YANGON, August 7 (Xinhuanet）--
Myanmar leader Lieutenant-General Khin Nyunt said Monday that advances in
science and technology accelerate globalization, playing a key factor that
affects the development of the education sector.
Meeting with the country's basic education teachers here, Khin Nyunt, first
secretary of the Myanmar State Peace and Development Council, noted that
rapid advances in science and technology have brought about the gap of
technology among the nations of the world，which in turn leads to the
widening gap of wealth and development among them , official newspaper The
New Light of Myanmar reported Tuesday.
He stressed the importance under these circumstances to lay down
plans in his country's education sector with national awareness.
He told the teachers that the government is systematically
implementing the education reform programs, designed to produce
highly-qualified human resources in an effort to enable the nation to keep
abreast with other nations in the international community and effectively
use its own national forces.
Myanmar started planning its education reform in 1997 and has drawn
up a four-year special national education promotion plan（2000-04 ) which
aims at offering all round education， raising the level of studies to be
equal to international standards and abolishing as much as possible the
disparity between education available in the urban and rural areas.
Meanwhile, the Myanmar government allotted 2.252 billion Kyats (5.9 million
U.S. dollars) plus 4.5 million dollars in implementing the country's
education program in the fiscal year 2000-01 which ended in March，
according to the Myanmar Education Ministry.
The ministry's figures also show that over 200，000 teachers are
teaching over 7 million students at over 39,000 basic education schools.
------------------------------------------------------------------ Myanmar Designates Some Narcotic
Drugs As Illegal Sale
Xinhuanet 2001.08.07 10:35:44 YANGON, August 7 (Xinhuanet) --
Myanmar has designated some six kinds of narcotic drugs and psychotropic
substances as illegal sale if they are possessed or transported or
transferred with the weight specified or more than it, official newspaper
The New Light of Myanmar quoted a recent order issued by the Ministry of
Health as reporting.
The specifications cover 3 grams (gm) of Amphetamine, 2 liters of
Codeine liquid, 5 gm of Codeine tablets, 0.25 gm of Diphenoxylate, 10 gm
of Pethidine injection and 10 gm of Pethidine tablets.
Myanmar enacted a new Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Law
in January 1993, declaring 126 drugs as narcotic, 34 substances as psychotropic,
3 plants as narcotic and 8 chemicals as precursors.
Since then 14 death sentences, 84 sentences for unlimited number of
years, 35 life sentences and 7 above-20-year sentences have been passed on
drug offenders, according to Myanmar's Central Committee for Drug
Abuse Control.
Meanwhile, during the first five months of this year, the Myanmar
drug control authorities exposed a total of 1,251 drug- related cases, seizing
419 kilograms (kg) of opium and 25.25 kg of heroin, and punishing 1,781 drug
offenders.
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