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News Related on Burma on Publications

(from Asia Week)

AND THEN THERE WERE TEN

In July, Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos will join ASEAN. 
Are they ready?

By Robin Ajello and Roger Mitton / Kuala Lumpur


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MYANMAR'S MILITARY JUNTA IS acting downright charitable these days. 
Having jailed scores of opposition politicians in recent weeks, the 
State Law & Order Restoration Council has magnanimously let many of them 
go. The regime can afford to be nice for a change. Next month, the 
so-called CLM nations -- Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar -- will sign up for 
the region's most exclusive club, the Association of Southeast Asian 
Nations. At the annual ASEAN foreign ministers' meeting in Kuala Lumpur 
on July 24, the participants are bound to be wearing big grins. Thirty 
years after its birth, the organization will at long last have fulfilled 
the dream of its founding fathers -- a strategic alliance that 
encompasses all of Southeast Asia, including Vietnam, which joined two 
years ago. ASEAN's famous logo of six rice stalks bundled together will 
morph into 10. No longer will it resemble a "fat lady," jokes a senior 
ASEAN official, but a lady who is "slim at the waist, with nice 
dimensions."

Yes, but what about the organization itself? Will it have Not everyone 
believes it will -- and many of those who feel that way are most 
definitely not Western liberals. Some, it seems, even hail from ASEAN's 
inner circles. 

No one, not even Myanmar's suppressed democrat Aung San Suu Kyi, 
disagrees with the principle that the new troika should be a part of 
ASEAN. Says Malaysian analyst K. S. Balakrishnan: "ASEAN 10 will be a 
powerful force -- a force that the superpowers will reckon with." And 
yet there has been no shortage of argument as to whether the timing and 
circumstances of admission are propitious. On May 31, when ASEAN foreign 
ministers convened in the Kuala Lumpur Regent Hotel to take the historic 
step, demonstrators outside were crying foul. One was former Malaysian 
MP Fan Yew Teng; he and eight others were held overnight for refusing to 
disperse. "We are not against the admission of Myanmar," explains Fan, 
"but not under this bunch of military gangsters. They are so blatant in 
their refusal to hand power to a duly elected group of people."

Nor is everyone bullish on Laos and Cambodia: the former is a backwater; 
the latter is the definition of unstable. "Economically all three aren't 
really ready," says Singapore academic Yeo Lay Hwee. "The decision to 
admit them wasn't made on a sound, logical and rational basis, but was 
primarily political." She might have added symbolic, for no politician 
worth his popularity polls would have missed the historic opportunity to 
complete ASEAN on its 30th birthday. Certainly not Malaysian Prime 
Minister Mahathir Mohamad, the avowed "Aseanist" who will preside over 
the expansion. 

It is also worth remembering that when Malaysia, the Philippines, 
Singapore, Thailand and Indonesia set up ASEAN in 1967, Southeast Asia 
was divided into two Cold War blocs: communist Laos, Cambodia and 
Vietnam, versus the other essentially pro-Western nations (apart from 
non-aligned Burma). ASEAN was formed to promote regional peace and 
prosperity, but also it was a bulwark thrown up against the Soviet 
"dominoes." To the likes of Singapore's Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew, 
once the region's best-known anti-communist, it must be sweet music to 
usher Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos (and Vietnam) into the ASEAN fold.

There are also new strategic considerations. Until the Cold War ended, 
the main fear was that the CLM nations would fall permanently under the 
sway of the Soviet Union. Today, the fear is of Chinese hegemony. 
Vietnam was accepted in part to provide a buffer against the People's 
Republic. The decision to admit Myanmar was partly an effort to keep the 
resource-rich nation out of the Chinese orbit. That may explain why U.S. 
officials did not act especially perturbed when ASEAN announced its 
decision on Myanmar, despite Washington's anti-SLORC rhetoric. 

With Myanmar inside the tent, free-trade policies will continue in 
Yangon, and gradually ASEAN's influence will start to kick in. At least 
that is the theory. Another one is that military ties will strengthen 
between Myanmar and the rest of ASEAN (and the West by extension). This 
is considered a good thing because SLORC has been buying truckloads of 
Chinese arms. Not that the junta will cut its links to old friend 
Beijing anytime soon, if ever.

"There is also the fear Myanmar and Cambodia will fall into Thailand's 
sphere of influence," says Filipino political scientist Carolina 
Hernandez. Indeed, ever since Thai ex-PM Chatichai Choonhavan talked 
about turning battlefields into a marketplace, there have been 
persistent worries that Bangkok hopes to dominate Indochina and turn it 
into a "baht bloc." As for Laos, it is practically a Thai province 
already. ASEAN may dilute Thai influence.

With all the fuss about Myanmar, it was easy to overlook the other new 
members and, in particular, Cambodia. One of the key criteria of ASEAN 
membership has been stability. Myanmar may be an international pariah 
and Laos an economic underachiever, but neither seems about to erupt in 
civil war. The same cannot be said for Cambodia -- and there were 
last-minute jitters about accepting it. The Cambodian ironies are 
particularly depressing. This is the one nation where "constructive 
engagement" was abandoned for wholesale global intervention. To be sure, 
something had to be done to halt the blood-letting, but the result of 
U.N.-sponsored elections in 1993 are two premiers who distrust one 
another and are stockpiling guns.

The situation is so tense in Phnom Penh that when the ordnance left over 
from previous wars was blown up last week, residents panicked and ran 
for cover. A few days earlier someone took a shot at powerful Second 
Premier Hun Sen. He and First Premier Norodom Ranariddh agree that ASEAN 
membership must go ahead, but seem incapable of setting aside a feud 
that could pitch the country back into the bloody past.

So while the ASEAN leaders publicly congratulate each other for 
expanding their regional clout, privately they know that the bigger the 
organization the messier it can get. The first casualty may be ASEAN's 
much-hyped consensus. A Jakarta official believes "a six-four split" may 
emerge between old and new members.

Then there is the group's vow to keep out of each other's domestic 
affairs. "If Cambodia goes down due to problems between Hun Sen and 
Ranariddh, what would that mean to ASEAN?" asks Malaysian analyst Razak 
Baginda. "Would it be dragged into a domestic issue?" Mahathir argues 
that the group has weathered coups in Thailand and the Philippines. But 
ASEAN has big investments in the CLM nations. If Cambodia tanks, says 
Razak, "a lot of Malaysian hands will be burned."

The first test for the new ASEAN will be how it deals with the SLORC 
conundrum. It is notable that the new members will not be paired with 
ASEAN dialogue partners, which include Western nations. Moreover, the 
existing members have ensured that it will be at least nine years before 
Yangon hosts a meeting attended by Western powers. 

Still, North American and European officials will come face-to-face with 
a Myanmar delegation in KL next month. Says a Western diplomat: "They 
may have to give up the traditional golf games after the meetings 
because most of the dialogue partners won't play with SLORC generals."

The fact is, few ASEAN leaders have much time for the SLORCmen either. 
Nor are they completely immune to the West's stated views on the regime. 
Washington publicly says that accepting Myanmar gives the junta the 
legitimacy to continue (or even worsen) its despotic ways. This is the 
message the Europeans were pushing at the Asia-Europe meeting in 
February. That is when the Philippines, Thailand and Singapore began 
backtracking on Myanmar, though some say they were making these noises 
to please their Western allies. 

For all their clubbishness and golf-playing, the ASEAN leaders are 
strong-willed folk running nations that have not always been friends. 
The foreign ministers looked happy enough when they headed for the links 
after their epochal meeting in Kuala Lumpur last week, but then that's 
the ASEAN way: "agreeing to disagree without being disagreeable," as 
Malaysian academic Noordin Sopiee likes to put it. Behind the scenes 
more is going on than is immediately apparent. 

Consider Mahathir's quiet approach to SLORC. He sent trusted chum, 
tycoon Ananda Krishnan, to Yangon to try to talk sense to leader Khin 
Nyunt. Ananda told him there would be less rancor about joining ASEAN if 
his regime made a show of talking to Suu Kyi or appeared less 
repressive. It didn't work, but such efforts may continue. 

"We know we are going to get clobbered by the international media," says 
Jakarta strategist Jusuf Wanandi. "We think it is worth it because it is 
easier to deal with them if they're inside." That said, it would be 
naive to expect ASEAN to wield much more influence over Myanmar. Many 
members are in no position to do so. This is especially true of the 
Indonesians, who will be wary of interfering, says activist Chandra 
Muzaffar because they "don't want people to say things about East Timor 
and so on."

There are other problems: few Lao and Cambodian officials speak English, 
the working language of ASEAN, and Lao officials may not be able to 
afford plane tickets to attend meetings. The socio-economic gulf between 
the old and new members is wide. "Probably we'll end up with first- and 
second-class citizens of ASEAN," says Razak. But the long-term economic 
pluses are huge. Malaysia, Thailand and Singapore are moving into 
high-tech manufacturing. In recent years they have built infrastructure 
in the CLM nations. Once complete, their labor-intensive industry can 
shift there. Analyst Prasun Sengupta calls the investment drive a "new 
form of economic colonialism." Maybe so, but Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar 
can use the jobs.

All this will take time, and the new members will not have to lower 
trade barriers for several years in line with ASEAN's free-trade agenda. 
Yet bringing together Southeast Asia's 500 million people under one 
umbrella in just 30 years is a remarkable achievement. Though the 
expansion of ASEAN is largely symbolic, the European Union started much 
the same way. 

In December, the ASEAN 10 will hold an informal summit in Kuala Lumpur 
to which the leaders of China, South Korea and Japan are invited. This 
is precisely the APEC-alternative Mahathir had in mind when he floated 
the notion of an East Asian Economic Caucus several years ago. Last 
week, Malaysian Foreign Minister Abdullah Badawi played down the 
significance of the conclave, saying "it is just a meeting we want to 
have." He may not wish to talk about it, but most everyone else does. 
>From small beginnings great things grow. -- With reporting by Keith 
Loveard / Jakarta, Antonio Lopez / Manila, Santha Oorjitham / Singapore, 
Julian Gearing / Bankok and Dominic Faulder / Phnom Penh




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How the New Troika Scores 




CAMBODIA
Strengths
A democracy (of sorts)
Already boasts significant ASEAN investment



Weaknesses
Two premiers who distrust one another
Extremely unstable
Few officials speak English, ASEAN's working language





MYANMAR
Strengths
Relatively stable owing to the authoritarian regime
High literacy
A well-trained civil service
Good English ability



Weaknesses
An international pariah 
Close military and economic links with China
An intractable regime
Narco-state



LAOS
Strengths
Politically stable
Market reforms well-established
Big hydropower potential
Internationally acceptable



Weaknesses
Under Thailand's thumb
Limited financial resources
Low English ability
Creaky bureaucracy
Small population

Refugees from the SLORC occupation 


An Independent Report by the Karen Human Rights Group 

May 25, 1997
KHRG #97-07





"THERE WILL BE NO REAL DEMOCRACY IF WE CAN'T GURANTEE THE RIGHTS OF THE 
MINORITY ETHNIC PEOPLE.  ONLY UNDERSTANDING THEIR SUFFERING AND HELPING 
THEM TO EXERCISE THEIR RIGHTS WILL ASSIST PREVENTING FROM THE 
DISINTEGRATION AND THE SESESSION."  "WITHOUT UNDERSTANDING THEIR 
STRENGTH, WE CAN'T TOPPLE THE SLORC AND BURMA WILL NEVER BE IN PEACE."



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