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-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- BURMA RELATED NEWS - SEP 26, 2000. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- HEADLINE
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Times of India - Japan to
urge Myanmar junta to lift curbs on Oppn
Southnexus - Myanmar junta lashes out
at Suu Kyi, West
BBC - Burma accused of 'cynical'
Blair ploy
AFP - Thailand wants talks in
Myanmar: minister
Reuters - Fears for Suu Kyi As Myanmar Media Hails Detention
AP - Myanmar Opposition Party Won't
Mark 12th Anniversary
AP - Myanmar Junta Lashes Out at Suu
Kyi, West - State Press
The Straits Times - Thai call for Asean to mediate in
Myanmar
The
Hindustan Times - India to import rice from
Myanmar
Xinhua - Myanmar's Bilateral Trade with ASEAN Members Up in 6 Months
SCMP - BURMA - Junta boosts venomous
attacks against 'poisonous' activists
The Times of India - Sep
26, 2000.
Japan to urge Myanmar junta to lift curbs on Oppn TOKYO:, Sept 25 (AFP) - Japan will urge Myanmar's military
junta to remove the strict controls in place on the opposition leader Aun San
Suu Kyi, a Japanese spokesman said Monday.
"We are going to urge Myanmar government to lift a measure
of restriction on the freedom of movement of Aung San Suu Kyi," said Kazuhiko
Koshikawa, deputy press secretary to Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori.
Aung San Suu Kyi and other opposition leaders were
escorted from Yangon central station by police on Friday and placed under house
arrest after being prevented from boarding a train to the northern city of
Mandalay.
"After having another incident, we are going to make
effort to convey our concern again based on a letter of Mr. (Foreign Minister
Yohei) Kono," Koshikawa told reporters.
In the letter sent to the ruling junta on September 5,
Kono said the international community cannot accept Myanmar's restrictions on
opposition activity.AFP
Southnexus - Sep 26,
2000.
Myanmar junta lashes out at Suu Kyi, West YANGON, Sep 26: Myanmar's ruling junta on Monday lashed
out at Aung San Suu Kyi and her Western supporters, saying the opposition
leader's "stop me if you dare" campaign is hurting the Government's goal to
establish a new kind of democracy.
In a written statement, the Government accused western
diplomats in Yangon of encouraging "one individual .... to destabilise and
overthrow the Government of the host country."
The statement came as the British Embassy said ambassador
John Jenkins was prevented on Monday from seeing the 1991 Nobel peace laureate
who is under apparent house arrest again after her latest defiance of the junta
last week.
Jenkins was stopped outside Suu Kyi's house by security
forces and told he would not be allowed to see her as "`a temporary measure," an
embassy spokesperson said on customary condition of anonymity.
The crackdown demonstrates the junta's resolve to silence
Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy despite the vehement Western criticism
it is facing and the brickbats it could receive in upcoming international
meetings.
Suu Kyi's latest standoff with the Government began on
August 24 when she tried to drive out of Yangon for party work.
On being stopped, she became locked in a nine-day roadside
standoff that ended when she was forcibly brought back to Yangon and kept under
virtual house arrest for two weeks. Eight other top party leaders were also
confined to their homes.
BBC - Monday, 25 September,
2000, 21:16 GMT 22:16 UK
Burma accused of 'cynical' Blair ploy The UK Government has condemned the Burmese authorities
for using a speech by Britain's prime minister to justify their detention of
opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi,
In a statement published on its web site, the Burmese
Government quoted remarks made by Tony Blair during the recent fuel protests, in
which he accused demonstrators of trying to bring the country to a halt.
Burma said it agreed with these words and drew a
comparison with the activities of the opposition leader.
But a spokesman for Mr Blair called the statement a
cynical misrepresentation and said Burma should stop harassing Aung San Suu Kyi,
who has been held under virtual house arrest since she was prevented from taking
a train out of the capital, Rangoon, last Friday.
The British move follows strong criticism of Burma from
the Australian Government. Last week, the United States and Japan also hit out
at Rangoon's crackdown on Aung San Suu Kyi.
No justification
"Legitimate protest is one thing. Trying to bring the
country to a halt is quite another, and there can be no justification for it',"
the Burmese Information Committee's web site quoted Mr Blair as saying.
"The government of Myanmar [Burma] agrees with his
statement," it said, adding that critics should "care for the welfare of whole
48 million population of Myanmar and not just one single individual's
interests."
A spokesman for No 10 Downing Street, Mr Blair's office,
said: "Rather than cynically misrepresent the discourse of democratic
governments, the military junta in Burma should heed the exhortation of those
same governments to cease forthwith their harassment of Aung San Suu Kyi and her
supporters."
In remarks also released on Monday, Australia's Foreign
Minister, Alexander Downer, described the crackdown on Aung San Suu Kyi and her
supporters in the National League for Democracy as "unacceptable".
Blatant interference
Burma's Government has hit out at what it calls "blatant
interference" in Burma's internal affairs "under the pretext of human rights and
democracy".
The military authorities have maintained strict controls
on Aung San Suu Kyi's travel outside the capital since freeing her from six
years of house arrest in 1995.
Last month she was involved in a nine-day stand-off with
police, after leaving her home and attempting to drive to a party meeting
outside the capital.
Tuesday, September 26 6:37 AM SGT
Thailand wants talks in Myanmar:
minister
WASHINGTON, Sept 25 (AFP) -
Thailand's deputy foreign minister said Monday he hoped Myanmar's junta would
talk to its bitter political adversaries, but admitted neighboring governments
had little power to influence the generals.
Sukhumbhand Paribatra warned on a visit to the US capital that political
antagonism between the government and opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi could
boil over and cause problems throughout the region.
"Problems in Myanmar have a way of affecting neighbouring countries,
especially Thailand," Sukhumbhand said at a press conference.
"It is important that problems of political transition in Myanmar must be
managed in ways that does not have political problems for the rest of the
region."
Sukhumbhand admitted that Thailand had little leverage with the junta and
could do little more than use the "sweet words" of diplomacy in its contacts
with its neighbor.
Thailand has largely confined itself to indirect observations about the
political situation in Yangon.
But it has shown signs of increasing frustration with the junta, since
exiled dissidents from Myanmar mounted hostage dramas in Myanmar's Bangkok
embassy and a hospital in western Thailand over the last year.
Sukhumband was talking to reporters hours after officials in Bangkok called
on Myanmar to allow an Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) mediation
team into the country.
But he said that any such move would depend on Vietnam, which currently
heads the so-called ASEAN troika.
Thailand would like to "encourage a dialogue without any preconditions" in
Myanmar, Sukhumbhand said, but admitted it had little power to influence the
situation.
"We only have our own sweet words to fall back upon, in relations with
neighbours one should not use any stick and in the case of Myanmar we don't have
any stick to use," he said.
"What we rely on is diplomacy, sweet words and hope for the best."
After several years of statemate, Myanmar's political battle has once again
burst to global prominence, after Aung San Suu Kyi twice tried to test a ban on
her leaving the capital.
As well as hosting political dissidents, Thailand is also home to tens of
thousands of Myanmar refugees, who have crossed its borders looking for
protection from political persecution or to look for work.
It also encounters problems from Myanmar-based drugs production, with the
latest wave of metamphetamines already creating problems in Thai society.
The junta has refused to recognise the 1990 election win of Aung San Suu
Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD), and has set about systematically
dismantling her party.
Tuesday September 26 6:59 AM ET
Fears for Suu Kyi As Myanmar Media Hails Detention By Aung Hla Tun YANGON, Myanmar (Reuters) -
Diplomats said Tuesday they were concerned the de facto house arrest of Myanmar
opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi could be made official after newspapers said
the country had benefited by locking her up during the 1990s.
Suu Kyi has been confined to her residence, with her telephone cut and
diplomatic access barred, since the early hours of Friday when police forcibly
removed her from Yangon's main railway station to foil her latest bid to travel
outside the capital.
The 55-year-old Nobel laureate spent six years under house arrest until
1995.
A commentary published Tuesday in the Myanma Alin and Kyemon newspapers,
official mouthpieces of the military regime, said Suu Kyi's house arrest was
necessary because she had incited unrest.
``If such restrictions had not been imposed, the nation-building tasks in
progress in the country today would not have been smooth,'' it said.
``The people do not accept Suu Ky's activities to incite unrest as they
understand unrest is not democracy. The government had to put a brake on her
unruliness in accord with the desire of the people.''
It added that since 1998 Suu Kyi had also been ``carrying out a number of
activities to destroy the nation.''
Western diplomats in Yangon said they were concerned the statement hinted
that the current restrictions on Suu Kyi would be made more permanent and
official.
``There is a concern that she will be placed under house arrest. Of course,
she is already effectively under house arrest, but now the concern is that it
will be formalized and that it could be lengthy,'' one diplomat in Yangon told
Reuters by telephone.
Seven other leaders of Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) are
also being confined to their homes, and NLD Vice Chairman U Tin Oo has been held
by the authorities since accompanying Suu Kyi on her bid to travel outside
Yangon by rail.
Suu Kyi was also kept locked in her home from September 2 to 14, after a
nine-day roadside stand-off sparked by her attempt to leave Yangon by car was
forcibly brought to an end.
The NLD won national elections in 1990 by a huge margin but has never been
allowed to govern.
A government spokesman Tuesday insisted the current restrictions on Suu Kyi
and her colleagues were temporary, but could not say how long they would
last.
The government's treatment of Suu Kyi has provoked widespread international
condemnation. Myanmar accuses its critics of meddling in its internal affairs
and has told them to mind their own business.
Tuesday, September 26 6:00 PM SGT
Myanmar Opposition Party Won't Mark 12th Anniversary YANGON (AP)--The opposition
National League for Democracy won't mark the 12th anniversary of its founding in
protest against the forced confinement of its top leaders including Aung San Suu
Kyi by the military junta, an NLD official said.
"Since all the NLD leaders are under restriction, we have no plan to hold
the party founding ceremony on Wednesday," said the official, speaking on
condition of anonymity.
But the NLD headquarters will open as usual, the official said.
The NLD headquarters was crowded Tuesday as it observed the weekly
Children's Day. Every Tuesday, NLD workers hand out medicine and food to
children.
Suu Kyi and eight other central executive committee members of the NLD have
been under virtual house arrest since Sept. 22 in the latest crackdown on the
pro-democracy movement by the iron-fisted junta.
The restrictions were imposed after security forces hauled Suu Kyi and
deputy party leader Tin Oo out of the Yangon railway station when they tried to
travel to Myanmar's second biggest city for party work. Officials say Tin Oo is
being kept at a government guest house.
The NLD was officially registered by the Election Commission Sept. 27,
1988, nine days after the current crop of generals took power amid hopes of a
new future for Myanmar, which has been under military rule since 1962. The junta
held elections in 1990, but refused to give up power when the NLD won
overwhelmingly. -0- 26/09/00 10-00G
Monday, September 25 11:35 PM SGT
Myanmar Junta Lashes Out at Suu Kyi, West - State Press YANGON (AP)--Myanmar's
state-controlled press Monday likened the country's beleaguered opposition to "a
snake," while the military government said the confrontational stance of
pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi sidetracks efforts at re-establishing
democracy.
The diatribes against Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy came in the wake of a harsh crackdown on their movement for stepping up its challenges to military rule. A commentary in the Myanmar-language daily Kyemon said NLD members "are
snakes who would sit on a broken chair and spend the whole day arguing over
nothing or say negative things about the government.
"People from all parts of the country regard them as dangerous creatures
and are ready to wipe them out," it said.
The authorities last week detained the NLD's 73-year-old deputy leader, Tin
Oo, along with scores of other party members after barring Suu Kyi from taking a
train to do political work outside the capital.
The junta has also reinstituted restrictions keeping members of the NLD's
central executive committee at their homes and barring most visitors.
Such restrictions were in place earlier this month, after a confrontation
with Suu Kyi which caused the government international political embarrassment.
Monday's government statement said "The so-called `war of endurance' and
`stop me if you dare' campaigns orchestrated by NLD ... need to be looked into."
It is unfortunate that every government step "has been challenged,
ridiculed and impeded," delaying Myanmar's "orderly transition to a multiparty
democracy," it said.
The same statement accused Western diplomats in Yangon of encouraging "one
individual .... to destabilize and overthrow the government of the host
country."
Diplomats have also been barred access to NLD leaders.
The British Embassy said ambassador John Jenkins was prevented Monday from
seeing Suu Kyi, the 1991 Nobel peace laureate.
Jenkins was stopped outside Suu Kyi's house by security forces and told he
wouldn't be allowed to see her as "a temporary measure," an embassy spokeswoman
said on customary condition of anonymity.
She said British diplomats will continue to try to see her.
In Canberra, Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer condemned the
junta and said Australian diplomats in Yangon were trying to meet Suu Kyi to
check her welfare and that of her supporters.
Myanmar soldiers, allies clash with
rebels near Thai border
BANGKOK, Sept. 25 (Kyodo) -- At
least five people were killed and four wounded in a clash over the weekend
between ethnic Shan rebels and government soldiers and their ethnic Wa allies, a
Thai military officer said Monday.
A joint force comprising government soldiers and members of the United Wa
State Army (UWSA) attacked the Shan State Army (SSA) at about 4 p.m. Saturday in
an area located 2 kilometers west of the Thai-Myanmar border adjacent to
Thailand's Chiang Mai Province, the officer said.
The clash lasted more than four hours before the Shan fighters retreated to
positions closer to the Thai border, the officer said.
The SSA put its casualties at one killed and four injured, and those of the
government-UWSA force at four dead. The figures could not be independently
verified.
The SSA said the clash was over narcotics. It said the government-UWSA
launched the attack to take revenge for the SSA's seizure last week of
amphetamines bound for Thailand.
The UWSA is labeled by the Thai military as a major producer of
amphetamines for the Thai market. Formerly a rebel group, it signed a cease-fire
with the government in 1989, but continues to hold arms.
The SSA, formerly led by drug lord Khun Sa, who defected to the junta
several years ago, has been fighting for an independent Shan state since
1964. Myanmar's ruling military, which kept Suu Kyi under formal house arrest
from 1989 to 1995, refused to hand over power to the NLD after it overwhelmingly
won a general election in 1990. In the wake of the polls, it has harassed and
arrested hundreds of NLD members.
Suu Kyi's latest standoff with the government began Aug. 24 when she tried
to drive out of Yangon for party work. On being stopped, she became locked in a
nine-day roadside standoff that ended when she was forcibly brought back to
Yangon and kept under virtual house arrest for two weeks. Eight other top party
leaders were also confined to their homes.
When the restrictions were lifted, Suu Kyi and deputy party leader Tin Oo
tried to travel outside Yangon by train last Thursday. They were forcibly
evicted from the station after being told no tickets were available.
The Straits Times - Sep 26,
2000.
Thai call for Asean to mediate in Myanmar BANGKOK -- Thailand called on Myanmar yesterday to allow an Asean mediation
team to help solve the political impasse between the ruling military junta and
the National League for Democracy of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
""Thailand has long supported reconciliation among the opposing parties in
Myanmar and activating the troika would be in line with Myanmar's policy,'' said
Thai Deputy Foreign Ministry spokesman Suphat Chitranukroh.
The move would also improve Asean's image, he said. The members of the
troika would be Thailand, Vietnam and Brunei.
Asean's image had been sullied by the long-running political confrontation
in Myanmar and it must work to restore its credibility in the eyes of the
international community, he added.
While Britain and the United States have condemned the junta for
human-rights abuses and placing opposition leaders under house arrest, Asean has
remained silent.
Meanwhile, Yangon lashed out at Ms Suu Kyi and her Western supporters on
Monday, and said her ""stop me if you dare'' campaign was hurting its bid to
establish a new kind of democracy.
It accused Western diplomats in the capital of encouraging ""one
individual... to destabilise and overthrow the government of the host country''.
The statement came as the British Embassy said Ambassador John Jenkins was
prevented from seeing Ms Suu Kyi.
He was stopped outside her house by security forces.--AFP, AP
The Hindustan Times
India to import rice from Myanmar By Our Special Correspondent GUWAHATI, SEPT. 25. India will import 50,000 tonnes of rice from Myanmar
through Moreh in Manipur as part of the effort to boost border trade between the
States of the North-East region and the neighbouring countries. Besides, 10 more
items would be permitted to be imported from Myanmar on concessional basis.
This was announced here today by the Union Commerce Secretary, Mr. Prabir
Sengupta, after a meeting of the high-power committee to review the steps taken
for promotion of trade and exports in the North-East region.
The Centre also constituted an Export Development Fund with a corpus of Rs.
5 crores for supporting projects for direct or indirect promotion of exports
from the region as part of the Prime Minister's Action Plan for the North-East.
Mr. Sengupta said the Commerce Department had also sanctioned Rs. 41 crores
for creating export promotion infrastructure in the region.
Seven border towns have been selected which will be developed as centres of
border trade. These are: Sutarkandi in Assam, Agartala in Tripura, Dawki in
Meghalaya and Zowkhathar, Muhurighat, Demagiri and Raghanbazar in Mizoram. To
facilitate border trade from the region, the office of the Joint Director of
Foreign Trade at Guwahati was being upgraded to that of a Development
Commissioner, he said.
Myanmar's Bilateral Trade with ASEAN
Members Up in 6 Months
YANGON (Sept. 25) XINHUA -
Myanmar's bilateral trade with five other member countries of the Association of
Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) -- Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and
the Philippines -- totaled 851.54 million U.S. dollars in the first six months
of this year, rising by 7 percent over the same period of 1999, according to the
latest figures published by the country's Central Statistical
Organization.
These trade accounted for 42 percent of Myanmar's total foreign trade
during the period with its import from these five ASEAN countries amounting to
724.92 million dollars, while its export to them valued at 126.62 million
dollars.
In 1999, bilateral trade between Myanmar and other ASEAN member countries
reached 1.508 billion dollars, representing 42 percent of the country's total
foreign trade in the year.
Meanwhile, during the six-month period, there were no investment coming
into Myanmar from these ASEAN member countries as shown in the figures except
Malaysia with 9.832 million dollars although such investment took up 42.65
percent in 1999.
South China Morning Post
Tuesday, September 26, 2000 BURMA - Junta boosts venomous attacks against 'poisonous' activists AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE in Rangoon In a bizarre attack, official media yesterday compared opposition leader
Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) to poisonous snakes which
had to be locked up for their own and the community's good.
The comparison was made in the Burmese-language Mirror daily after Aung San Suu Kyi, NLD vice-chairman Tin Oo and party colleagues were taken from Rangoon central station by police when they were prevented from taking a train to the northern city of Mandalay on Thursday night. Aung San Suu Kyi was returned to her Rangoon compound, and the others were
detained in a government "guest house". Only a week earlier the junta had ended
a fortnight of virtual house arrest for her imposed after a nine-day roadside
showdown after she and fellow party members tried to attend a meeting outside
the capital.
The Mirror commentary began by saying about 2,500 snakes - most of them
adult cobras - were being stored by a foreigner for export in a house in
Thingankyun, east of the capital. When three escaped, upsetting neighbours
already unhappy at having a house writhing with poisonous serpents nearby, the
authorities moved in to clear the snakes out.
"If the angry community, already up in arms, had taken matters into their
own hands and burnt down the house to get rid of the snakes, they would have
been committing a crime and all the snakes would have been killed," it
continued. "Thanks to the timely intervention of the authorities, the snakes
were moved away and the threat removed from the community."
It then compared the NLD leadership to the snakes. "You can imagine how
much public hatred the NLD leadership is inviting upon itself by its antics at
ferry-crossings, railway stations and on the wayside," it said. Had it not been
for the authorities' timely intervention, they would have felt the wrath of
angry crowds, who were "totally fed up with their despicable acts blindly
carried out at the behest of foreign powers".
Yesterday, Britain's ambassador to Burma was prevented by security forces
from seeing Ms Aung San Suu Kyi. He was told it was "a temporary measure".
The junta yesterday also used a September 12 speech by British Prime
Minister Tony Blair against fuel tax protesters to criticise the NLD.
"Legitimate protest is one thing. Trying to bring the country to a halt is quite
another, and there can be no justification for it," it said.
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