--------------------------------------------------------------
Myanmar residents in Bangladesh protest junta minister's
visit
Sat Jul 5, 6:34 AM ET
DHAKA (AFP) - Around 50 Myanmar nationals living in
Bangladesh held a demonstration here urging the release of Aung San Suu Kyi
ahead of the arrival of Foreign Minister Win Aung, witnesses said.
The
protestors said Saturday the May 30 violence in Myanmar, which pitted Aung San
Suu Kyi's supporters against thousands of pro-junta thugs and led to her fresh
confinement, was an attempt to kill her.
They chanted slogans and
carried placards saying "Release, release Aung San Suu Kyi."
The
Bangladesh government has said the issue is an internal matter for Myanmar.
The Myanmar military junta's move to confine Aung San Suu Kyi once again
has drawn intense international criticism.
She has spent two long spells
under house arrest including a 19-month stint that ended in May 2002.
Bangladeshi officials said Win Aung was coming on a three-day visit
carrying a letter from junta leader Than Shwe for Prime Minister Khaleda Zia.
Zia toured Myanmar in March, after Than Shwe became in December the
first leader of Myanmar's junta to visit Bangladesh since the 1988 coup in
Yangon.
Dhaka has warming ties with neighbouring Myanmar as it pursues a
"Look East policy" to boost the cash-strapped country's economy.
--------------------------------------------------------------
Myanmar Papers Run Photos of Suu Kyi with
Junta
Sat Jul 5, 3:58 AM ET
YANGON (Reuters) - State-run newspapers in military-ruled
Myanmar ran a photograph on Saturday of detained pro-democracy leader Aung San
Suu Kyi shaking hands with the junta's leader, but also carried a commentary
criticizing her.
The newspapers, which have not run a photograph
focusing on Suu Kyi since the mid-1990s, ran the picture on their front pages
but gave no indication when the photograph was taken.
Myanmar's ruling
generals have detained Suu Kyi since a May 30 clash between her supporters and a
pro-junta group.
The papers also published an editorial criticizing Suu
Kyi and other National League for Democracy (NLD) leaders for the way they dealt
with the junta.
"Auntie Suu is a willful and hard-headed person liable
to rash judgments followed by blind action in her relations with the present
government," the piece read.
"They (Suu Kyi and NLD leaders) had started
to furtively plot mischief and make plans to hit below the belt."
Two
other photographs of Suu Kyi dining with Senior General Than Shwe and other
junta leaders also appeared.
International anger with the regime has
mounted in recent weeks, with the European Union and the United States
threatening harsher sanctions and key donor Japan suspending new aid.
The junta has responded by sending its foreign minister and deputy
foreign minister on a charm offensive to Asian capitals, showing leaders
photographs of Suu Kyi in detention in a bid to allay their concerns.
Myanmar exiles and some Yangon-based diplomats say the May 30 clash
occurred when hundreds of pro-junta youths wielding bamboo and iron rods set
upon Suu Kyi's convoy and local villagers, killing at least 70. Myanmar's ruling
generals say four people were killed in the clash.
--------------------------------------------------------------
Sri Lankan women's group asks for release of Suu Kyi
Sat
Jul 5, 5:05 AM ET
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP) - A group of prominent Sri Lankan women
has urged Myanmar's military government to release pro-democracy leader Aung San
Suu Syi, a newspaper reported Saturday.
``We, the undersigned women of
Sri Lanka, express our deep shock at the detention of Aung San Suu Kyi,'' the
Island newspaper quoted a statement by the women's group as saying.
``We
are also concerned about the reports of the conditions of her detention and the
deteriorating state of her health. We urge that she be released immediately,''
the statement said.
Thirty women social workers, lawyers, university
teachers and other professionals signed the letter, which was sent to the
Myanmar Embassy here. They also requested permission to visit Suu Kyi.
Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, has been detained since May 30
following a clash between members of her pro-democracy party and government
supporters in northern Myanmar.
Suu Kyi's detention has sparked an
international outcry and the United States, Britain and the European Union have
moved to re-impose economic sanctions on the impoverished Southeast Asian
nation.
--------------------------------------------------------------
Telegraph(UK)
Mob attack on Suu Kyi 'was plan to
murder'
By Alex Spillius in
Bangkok
(Filed: 05/07/2003)
Two survivors of a vicious attack
on a convoy carrying Aung San Suu Kyi told yesterday how her car was surrounded
by a drunken mob that smashed its windows with sharpened sticks before it was
able to speed off.
The first direct account of the attack on May 30,
which sparked international outrage, was given by two activists from Ms Suu
Kyi's National League for Democracy who have escaped to neighbouring Thailand
and applied for refugee status.
Their testimony implicates the military
government in what appears to have been a planned attack. A Thai senator who
received the two exiles at his Bangkok office yesterday said the assault might
well have been an attempt to assassinate the NLD leadership.
Kraisak
Choonhavan, chairman of the senate foreign affairs committee, said: "If it's not
an assassination attempt, it is very close to one. It was planned so the
military would not be directly implicated. Whether it was condoned by the entire
regime or not is open to question but the fact it took place on such a scale
suggests directions from very high up."
The witnesses said that at about
8.30pm a crowd of some 2,000 men armed with iron bars, wooden clubs and
sharpened bamboo sticks attacked villagers who had emerged from their homes to
welcome Ms Suu Kyi. Some then set upon her car.
Wunna Maung, an NLD youth
wing member from the northern city of Mandalay, said: "The attackers smashed the
windows of the car. When they were broken, they jabbed inside it with the sticks
they were carrying. Daw Suu [an NLD activist] escaped a beating because she did
not get out of the car.
"If she had done, the attackers would have beaten
her to death because they were totally drunk.
"They also pulled out the
NLD deputy leader, Tin Oo, who suffered a head wound. Women in a third vehicle
were dragged out, stripped and beaten.
"I saw the attackers jump on them
and pound their heads against the road with all their force. I still cannot get
out of my mind the sight of people covered in blood, being beaten mercilessly
and inhumanly."
A press conference at the Foreign Correspondents' Club
with the two NLD members was cancelled after pressure from the Thai government.
Thaksin Shinawatra, the prime minister, has repeatedly tried to curb the
activities of Burmese exile groups in Thailand.
The violence sparked a
crackdown on the opposition that has left Miss Suu Kyi detained at an
undisclosed location and the NLD leadership under house arrest in
Rangoon.
Tin Oo is reported to be in jail near the Indian border but an
International Committee for the Red Cross team that visited him last month said
he was in good health.
Ms Suu Kyi's abduction, just a year after she was
freed from 18 months' house arrest, has dashed any lingering hopes of democratic
progress. The hard line advocated by Than Shwe, the leader of the junta, the
State Peace and Development Council, seems to have prevailed.
--------------------------------------------------------------
Suu Kyi assault was carried out by hired thugs
Democracy League leaders in hiding after giving eyewitness account to Thai
senate committee
John Aglionby
in Bangkok
Saturday July 5, 2003
The Guardian
More than 2,000 thugs backed by the army were responsible for the
assault on the Burmese democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi's motorcade in May
which killed scores of people, eyewitnesses said yesterday.
People's
skulls were crushed with wooden clubs and metal spikes, defenceless women
stripped and beaten and people were pulled off motorbikes and hit repeatedly
with bamboo poles in the premeditated assault on May 30, Wunna Maung and Khin
Zaw said.
"I saw with my own eyes the attackers striking down the
victims with all their force and stabbing viciously with pointed iron rods," Mr
Khin Zaw, 50, a senior executive of Ms Suu Kyi's party, the National League for
Democracy, told the Thai senate foreign relations committee.
"Truly, it
was a murderous attack. The beating was done until the victims died."
By
the end of the two-hour attack near the village of Depayin in northern Burma the
road was clogged with hundreds of bodies interspersed with pools of blood and
scraps of clothing, said the two men, who entered Thailand illegally.
After the hearing they gave more details to journalists as they fled to
the UN compound in Bangkok after being told that the Thai prime minister,
Thaksin Shinawatra, wanted them arrested.
Yesterday they were in hiding
with friends.
They could not say if Ms Suu Kyi, who escaped the scene
but was detained a few miles down the road, was injured.
Mr Wunna Maung,
26, an NLD regional youth leader, said he saw the windows of her car smashed and
bamboo poles thrown into the vehicle.
Ms Suu Kyi and dozens of her
followers remain in detention despite protests by the international community.
The military junta, who say Ms Suu Kyi instigated the incident, refuses
to release her until "the situation returns to normal".
The generals say
only four people were killed but the witnesses' accounts tally with the findings
of two American diplomats who visited the scene a few days after the attack.
Mr Khin Zaw said there were about 700 attackers initially but they were
reinforced by about 2,000 more.
"They mainly aimed and struck on the
head," he said. "Even when I was at a 100 yards I heard with anguishing pain,
the popping sounds of heads being broken by savage blows."
Mr Wunna said
he escaped uninjured because he was at the front of the convoy and the attack
began at the rear, at about 8pm."They beat so severely it was as if people were
crushed into pieces," he said.
"The women's shirts and earrings were
stripped off them. I saw a young woman whose shirt and sarong was stripped off.
They pulled their hair and crushed their heads on the road and beat them so
severely.
"Scarcely no one was uninjured. I saw bloodstained people fall
down and they were continued to be beaten after that."
At about 10pm he saw
soldiers arrive.
"I heard about 10 shots and our vehicles were set on
fire," he said.
After hiding for two nights in paddy fields he was
helped by some villagers to meet about 100 of his NLD colleagues.
He
said the villagers told him they saw soldiers take away about 80 corpses on
trucks the day after the ambush.
The fleeing NLD members were joined by
some of the attackers, who said they had been forced to join in and had been
paid less than 50 pence a day.
Burma has opened a diplomatic offensive
to stem international protests.
Khin Maung Win, the deputy foreign
minister, went to Tokyo yesterday with photographs of a healthy looking Ms Suu
Kyi to appeal to the Japanese government not to carry out its threat to freeze
aid if she is not released.
The Japanese foreign minister, Yoriko
Kawaguchi, rejected the request.
Members of the Burmese government in
exile, which won the 1990 election but was not allowed to take office, are
urging the UN security council to act.
They released a report yesterday
on the May 30 incident, describing it as a "premeditated attack" which became a
massacre, and said that the situation was worse now than in 1988, when the
current junta seized power.
--------------------------------------------------------------
Bangkok Post - Saturday 05 July 2003
NLD exiles permitted to stay after testifying to senate panel
Pair free to remain if they keep low profiles
Achara Ashayagachat and Apiradee
Treerutkuarkul
Two Burmese opposition members who fled to
Thailand after witnessing the May 30 attack on pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu
Kyi have been permitted to stay here, as long as they refrain from criticising
Rangoon.
National League for Democracy executive Khin Zaw, 50, and
youth-wing member Wunna Maung, 26, appeared yesterday before the senate
committee on foreign affairs, to which they testified on the events preceding
Mrs Suu Kyi's arrest.
Wunna Maung said he was guarding the right side of
Mrs Suu Kyi's car as her entourage was travelling in a convoy to the northern
state of Sagaing with about 2,000 supporters.
After passing through one
village, two men dressed as monks blocked the convoy and asked Mrs Suu Kyi to
get out of her car and deliver a speech.
When she refused, about 2,000
people ran out of a nearby forest and began attacking the entourage with
sharpened bamboo sticks and iron bars.
Wunna Maung said he witnessed the
murders of at least two party members during the melee.
``I saw attackers
break car mirrors as they tried to get at Mrs Suu Kyi,'' he said.``I've never
seen such violence.''
Wunna Maung and U Khin Zaw said the ambush was
planned by the Union, Solidarity and Development Association, under the
patronage of Burmese premier Gen Than Shwe.
After the attack, the pair
sought protection from the United Nations' High Commissioner for
Refugees.
``Their lives are at risk and the government must help them on
humanitarian grounds,'' said senate panel chairman Kriangsak
Choonhavan.
It was agreed the two would not be arrested if they agreed
not to speak out against the Burmese junta.
--------------------------------------------------------------
Bangkok Post - Saturday 05 July 2003
Settlement looks close in knitting factory pay dispute
Supamart Kasem
A dispute between a
knitting factory in Mae Sot district and 34 underpaid Burmese workers is almost
cleared as both sides have accepted new terms settled by the court for
consideration.
The 34 Burmese workers led by Kyaw Oo are suing Nut
Knitting Partnership Limited demanding 4.6 million baht as unpaid wages. They
said they were paid 77 baht each a day during Oct-Dec 2000 and Jan 2001-Oct 2002
while the minimum wage rates were 130 baht and 133 baht.
Earlier, the
firm refused to pay the workers as ordered by the Labour Ministry's welfare
office, and sought a court ruling to revoke the order.
A hearing on
Thursday at the Mae Sot Provincial Court began with the plaintiffs telling the
court about Kyaw Oo's out-of-court agreement to get money from the firm and
withdraw from the case.
After the firm asked the court to consider
revoking the ministry's back-wages payment order, the court invited both sides
to open talks, which ended in failure.
In the afternoon, the court
mediated the talks in which the company was asked to pay 25% of the first
100,000 baht and 40% of the remaining sum of 120,000-150,000-baht in
compensation for each worker.
Both parties agreed to consider the new
condition. The court set July 11 for the next hearing.
--------------------------------------------------------------
THE NATION
AUNG SAN SUU KYI: Senators
told of May 30 clash
Rungrawee C
Pinyorat
Published on Jul 5, 2003
NLD
'witnesses' describe 'inhumane' attack, seek asylum with UN office
Two
members of the National League for Democracy (NLD) who claim to have witnessed
the May 30 clash that led to Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's
detention shared their stories yesterday and sought political asylum through the
UN.
Wunna Maung, a member of the NLD's Youth Wing who was guarding the
right side of Suu Kyi's car on May 30, told a Bangkok seminar organised by the
Senate committee on foreign affairs that the government supporters who attacked
the car were drunk and appeared to be high on drugs. That, he said, was why they
behaved "inhumanely".
He saw Tin Oo, a key NLD member who was wounded in
the head, taken away. Suu Kyi escaped injury because she did not get out of the
car, he said.
Khin Zaw, a member of the NLD's executive committee, said
the attackers had been specifically trained to take aim at and strike victims on
the head.
"Even from a hundred metres I heard with anguish the popping
sounds of heads being broken by savage blows," he said.
The two said 40
to 50 people might have been kill-ed during the attack, not four, as Bur-ma's
ruling junta has claimed.
The pro-opposition National Council of the
Union of Burma and the Burma Lawyers' Council have set up a commission on "the
Depayin massacre" to determine the truth about the incident, they said.
The pair said it took them three days and nights to reach the Thai
border from Depayin township. Bo Hla Tint, an elected NLD MP living in exile who
accompanied the two to Bangkok, yesterday helped them request political asylum
from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
Senate Committee
on Foreign Affairs chairman Kraisak Choon-havan said the pair should not be
arrested while in Thailand and urged authorities to review national policy
toward Burma.
Committee vice chairman Likhit Deravekhin called the
situation in Burma "critical".
Likhit said there was a possibility that
it would get out of control and that Thailand would be directly affected.
Panithan Wathanaka-korn, a lecturer at Chulalongkorn University, told the
seminar that the Thai government should have a "dual-track" policy toward Burma,
balancing support for democracy with good relations.
--------------------------------------------------------------
SATURDAY, JULY 5, 2003
THE TIMES OF
INDIA
7 Myanmar men seek asylum in Malaysia
UNHCR
AP[ SATURDAY, JULY 05, 2003 10:41:09 AM ]
KUALA
LUMPUR: Seven men from Myanmar forced their way into the office of the UN High
Commissioner for Refugees in Malaysia seeking asylum, police said
Saturday.
The men, aged between 19 and 34, arrived outside the UNHCR
office in downtown Kuala Lumpur late Friday and forced their way through the
gate, watched by two security guards, a police spokesman said on condition of
anonymity.
The group said they were members of the Rohinga Muslim
minority in military-ruled Myanmar and were subject to persecution in their home
country, previously known as Burma.
Some claimed to be activists of the
National League for Democracy, Myanmar's embattled opposition party.
The
men said they would be killed if they returned to the predominantly Buddhist
nation, whose military regime is often criticized for its harsh treatment of
ethnic minorities.
One of the group, Abdul Aziz Abu Bakar, said that he
and his friends were among 19 illegal immigrants detained in Kuala Lumpur after
they staged a weeklong sit-in at the UNCHR office in June last
year.
Abdul Aziz said the Malaysian authorities did not deport them to
Myanmar, but had left them near the Malaysian-Thai border about one month after
their arrest.
He said that after staying illegally in Thailand for a
while, seven of them decided to slip back into Malaysia and seek refugee status
from the UNHCR and residency papers for a country other than
Myanmar.
``We are grateful to Malaysia for not sending us back to
Myanmar... the Myanmar military would have killed us,'' Abdul Aziz told the
media, speaking through the fence of the UNHCR building.
``We won't leave
until we get a decision from UNHCR.''
Two policemen stood guard outside
the UNHCR compound but did not attempt to arrest the seven. A UNHCR spokesman
was not immediately available to comment.
Malaysia is predominantly
Muslim and there are an estimated 10,000 Rohingas illegally living here.
--------------------------------------------------------------
The Independent (UK)
UK travel companies urged to sever links with
Burma
By Rachel Stevenson
04 July 2003
British travel companies that operate in Burma are the next in
line to be targeted by the Foreign Office, which has already forced British
American Tobacco to consider pulling its £10m investment in the country that is
rife with human rights abuses.
The Foreign Office minister Mike O'Brien
yesterday began drawing up a list of travel companies that operate tours to
Burma. He said he would write to, "all travel organisations with any links with
tourism in Burma. If any are involved, we will target them."
There are
about 30 travel companies that operate tours and holiday packages to Burma,
including the cruise company Carnival. The threat of renewed Government pressure
has already begun to take effect as Travelsphere Holidays said it would end
tours to Burma from 2004 for "commercial and moral" reasons.
Abercrombie
& Kent said, in light of Government calls: "We will review our position [on
Burma] once we receive the letter from the Government," and Kuoni has already
pulled its Burmese holiday packages, citing a falling off in demand. Orient
Express, however, one of the largest tour operators in Burma, yesterday refused
to comment on whether it would bow to Government demands.
Mr O'Brien's
decision to target travel companies came after BAT said it would consider
withdrawing from Burma where it has a cigarette factory. "In light of the formal
request by the Government, we are now considering what we are going to do, and
we will be looking at all the options available to us," a spokeswoman for BAT
said but Burma Campaign UK said: "We believe there is no way BAT can not pull
out of Burma. They are under so much pressure, they can not continue to try to
justify their actions there."
The pressure on BAT to withdraw has
increased following the decision of Premier Oil to exit the country this week.
The Conservative Party said that it would support moves to sanction companies
that trade or invest in the regime.
--------------------------------------------------------------
The Straits Times
Tokyo
rejects Yangon envoy's aid appeal
JULY 5, 2003
SAT
TOKYO - Japan has rebuffed a last-ditch appeal from a top
Myanmar envoy, saying new aid to the country's military government will remain
frozen until detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi is
released.
Yesterday's rebuke - from one of the few states still engaged
in dialogue with the junta - deepens Yangon's isolation amid mounting global
pressure to free the Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
Deputy Foreign Minister
Khin Maung Win was sent to Japan - Myanmar's biggest aid donor - after Tokyo
declared last month that it would suspend assistance.
He told Japanese
officials that Ms Suu Kyi's detention was only temporary and that she was being
treated humanely. He presented a photo of her as evidence.
But Deputy
Foreign Minister Tetsuro Yano dismissed his words as 'unconvincing' and demanded
that Myanmar's junta set a 'concrete date' for her release, a Foreign Ministry
official said on condition of anonymity.
Ms Suu Kyi has been detained
since a May 30 clash between her party members and government supporters. --
Reuters, AFP
--------------------------------------------------------------
Asian Tribune
Date :
2003-07-05
NLD members urge Senate committee to push for Suu Kyi?s
release
Bangkok, July 05, (TNA): Members of the
Myanmar?s National League for Democracy yesterday called on the chair of the
Senate foreign affairs committee to urge Thailand to put pressure on the
Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to push for the release of NLD
leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been held in detention since her calvacade was
attacked on May 30.
Mr. Wanna Mong and Mr. Khin So, who were in Aung San
Suu Kyi?s calvacade when it was attacked, together with fellow NLD member Mr. Bo
Ha Thin, met Mr. Kraisak Choonhavan to explain what had happened immediately
prior to Suu Kyi?s detention.
The NLD members said that the members of
the Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA), a political group
established by the Rangoon regime, had followed Suu Kyi during her tour of the
country and had continually made trouble for the Opposition leader and her
delegation.
On the night of May 30, they said, around 40 USDA members in
cars and on motorcycles had followed the calvacade to Sakai district, where Suu
Kyi was scheduled to speak to over 4,000 members of the public.
However,
when the calvacade reached its destination it became apparent that the
authorities had ordered the local people to switch their lights off, making it
too dark for Suu Kyi to speak. According to the NLD witnesses, the violence was
sparked off when two men dressed as monks approached Suu Kyi, requesting that
she took the stage to give her speech as planned. Suu Kyi had refused, pleading
the dark and the lateness of the hour. Apparently unsatisfied with this
explanation, the monks had started arguing with Suu Kyi and her
delegation.
Soon afterwards, they said, a group of around 40 young men
who had been making trouble for the calvacade revealed themselves, running in
with wooden and iron poles to beat the local people gathered to hear Suu Kyi. A
number of them had made for Suu Kyi?s vehicle, hitting the windows and obviously
intending to injure Suu Kyi.
Mr. Wanna noted that despite the violence,
Suu Kyi had urged her supporters to remain calm and to refrain from any violent
confrontation. However, almost before the words had left her mouth the sound of
gunfire could be heard. At least 40 people had been killed in the incident, he
said, adding that after the event he had travelled for three days to escape
across the Thai border.
?My intention here is to give a testimony to the
committee in my capacity as a witness. I hope that this information which we are
both giving will serve as facts which will enable members of the ASEAN grouping
to know the true situation in Myanmar, and which will encourage ASEAN to attach
greater importance to the problems in Myanmar than at present. We also hope that
it will lead to the release of Suu Kyi as soon as possible. I feel extremely
hurt at this event, as there has never been this level of violence?, Mr. Wanna
said, adding that he was still unable to contact his family back in
Myanmar.
Mr. Kraisak, who acknowledged that the two witnesses could face
an uncertain fate after giving their testimony, expressed hope that the
testimony would force the Thai government to change its policy towards Myanmar
by turning towards the ASEAN arena to solve Myanmar?s problems.
Accusing
the Rangoon regime of failing to take any serious interest in national
reconciliation within Myanmar, he said that the Rangoon regime had never spoken
the truth or shown any intention of engaging in democratic
discussions.
Making veiled references to Prime Minister Thaksin
Shinawatra?s recent calls for a new system to control Myanmar refugees in
Thailand, he also gave tentative assusarances that as long as refugees obeyed
Thai laws they would be granted leave to remain in Thailand.
His comments
were backed by Mr. Somchai Homla-or, president of Forum Asia, who said that the
government would be breaking international law by arresting Myanmar refugees for
their political involvement.
The two NLD witnesses signed their testimony
in English yesterday, and were scheduled to eat lunch with Mr. Kraisak at the
Parliament Club. However, as their visit to Parliament coincided with a seminar
on Thai-Myanmar relations, attended by a large number of soldiers and police
officers, the meal took place in the committee room instead.
The two
witnesses were due to speak at the Reporters Association of Thailand, but the
National Security Council requested that the event be cancelled.
Speaking
at the seminar, Mr. Panithan Wattanakorn, a political science lecturer at
Chulalongkorn University, said that the most appropriate policy for Thailand to
adopt towards Myanmar was one of neutrality. However, he conceded that this was
a difficult path to take.
He warned that if Thailand acted as a friend
towards Myanmar it would lose its standing in the international community, and
could possibly even face sanctions in the future.
The Thai government had
to find a way to ensure that Myanmar was not reliant on Thailand, but at the
same time not suspicious of it, he said.
--------------------------------------------------------------