Burma Related News - April 17, 2001.

Bangkok Post - April 17, 2001.

CROSS-BORDER GAMBLING - Officials losing their fight against casinos
Present measures to stop them ineffective

Onnucha Hutasingh and Yuwadee Tunyasiri

Tough police crackdowns on gambling in the country have driven Thais to try their luck in casinos in neighbouring countries which have mushroomed along the border.

There are now more than 20 casinos operating on the Thai border with Cambodia, Burma, Laos and Malaysia.

Twelve of them are located on the Cambodian border opposite Surin's Kap Choeng district and Sa Kaew's Aranyaprathet district, four in Burma, five in Laos and one in Malaysia. Most of their customers are Thai.

Many Thais enter neighbouring countries through permanent and temporary border checkpoints for the sole purpose of gambling. Cambodian casinos appear to be most popular.

The rising number of Thais flocking to casinos in Cambodia has prompted Thai authorities to introduceseveral measures to discourage cross-border gambling excursions, but to no avail.

A senior policy-planning official said the Cambodian government did not consider the casino business a problem since it had brought a lot of earnings. However, it was the opposite for Thailand as millions of baht were flowing into Cambodia through these casinos.

The casino business has never been raised as an issue at any Thai-Cambodian border committee meeting, said the official, who declined to be named.

It would be fruitless to do so anyway since Cambodia would not want to discuss it, the official added.

The gambling business once thrived in Phnom Penh with more than 65 small and large casinos operating in the capital. However, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen had all of them closed down in 1999 after the gambling business was found to have given rise to widespread corruption and a host of social problems.

The closure of casinos in Phnom Penh was also a pre-condition for receiving financial aid from Japan.

However, since the casino business is highly lucrative, Cambodia allows gambling operations in areas at least 200km from Phnom Penh .

Sources said some 90% of Cambodia's revenue comes from foreign aid and 10% from tax collections. Of the latter, casino taxes account for 4%.

Thai authorities admitted it was an uphill task to prevent Thais from crossing the border to gamble in Cambodia. However, they still hope a Thai-Cambodian joint development plan, to be drafted in October, will force the border casinos to shut down.

Under the joint development plan, the two countries will set up an industrial estate in the border area to accommodate factories of foreign investors.

The joint development plan is expected to generate jobs for local people on both sides of the border.

Thai authorities believe the new development would encourage casino operators to switch to other businesses with higher potential for growth, such as entertainment and tourism.

But until the industrial estate comes into being, Thailand will have to continue to fight hard against cross-border gambling.

Khachadpai Burusphat, secretary-general of the National Security Council, said the Interior Ministry and other agencies should meet to discuss measures to discourage Thais from flocking to border casinos.

He rejected a proposal that gambling be legalised in Thailand, sayingthat was no way to tackle the problem at its root.

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South China Morning Post

Tuesday, April 17, 2001

American presence likely to anger junta
WILLIAM BARNES in Bangkok

The introduction of a score of US special forces soldiers into the northern Thai border is likely to rile Burma's military regime, diplomats in Rangoon said.
The highly trained team is expected to be in place by the middle of the year, after the annual Thai-US Cobra Gold exercise.

They will become part of a special anti-drug taskforce of Thai soldiers and policemen designed to provide Bangkok with a sharper punch against the traffickers who bring hundreds of millions of amphetamine tablets across the border from Burma.

Although Thailand has long had close military relations with the United States, previous Bangkok governments might have hesitated in making such a provocative move.

Thai irritation over the activities of traffickers operating out of Burma's Shan state has reached such a point that it is no longer shy about taking such bold steps.

There is little doubt that the move will be seen by the ruling generals in Rangoon as yet another scheme by the "perfidious" Thais to load the drug blame on to Burma.

One diplomat said: "This will certainly play to their habitual paranoia. It's a mistake to think they don't believe their own propaganda that they are surrounded by a lot of bad people plotting against them."

Burma habitually claims Thailand should take much of the blame for buying drugs and supplying traffickers with raw materials.

The deployment of military personnel might even be counter-productive if it irritates the Burmese so much that they are less inclined to take action against ethnic trafficking gangs like the United Wa State Army, said one military analyst. "You can't say that the Thais don't have their own highly trained special forces," he said.

Yet Bangkok-based analysts believe such fears miss the point. "The Burmese have had their chance," one observer said. "From the Thai point of view things are getting worse, not better, in the Shan state - and the Burmese are hardly doing a thing about it."

Privately, Thai drug officials expect little from a regime that has higher priorities than smashing a drug trade that - directly or indirectly - helps prop up a shattered economy.

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ABC online - April 17, 2001.

Amnesty International steps up Burma rights campaigan

Amnesty International says it's stepping up its campaign against human rights violations in Burma amid signs military rulers there were responding to international pressure.

The human rights group said recent contacts between the junta and Aung San Suu Kyi's opposition National League for Democracy were among a number of positive signs international pressure was working.

In a statement, Amnesty said although the situation in Burma remains grave, recent signs that international pressure may be having some effect was an opporunity to heighten the campaign for human rights.

Amnesty said it had published its first ever list of political prisoners in the country, detailing 458 cases, to boost its campaign.

Amnesty said the junta allowing the International Committee for the Red Cross to visit prisons was also a good sign, as was the recent visit to the country by the UN's new human rights envoy Paulo Sergio Pinheiro.

The group said 30 imprisoned activists were released prior to that visit earlier this month

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Tuesday April 17, 9:07 PM

Norwegian MP ordered out of Vietnam over rights trip
By David Brunnstrom

HANOI (Reuters) - A Norwegian member of parliament was detained and asked to leave Vietnam last week after visiting dissident religious leaders under house arrest, a Norwegian embassy official said on Tuesday.

The politician, Lars Rise of the opposition Christian People's Party, said in a statement on the dissident Free Viet Web site he was arrested in the central city of Hue on April 9 and "sent out of the country" after lengthy interrogation.

"He was taken in for questioning," a Norwegian embassy official said. Asked if he was expelled, the diplomat said: "Shall we say he was asked to shorten his visit."

Rise's departure from Vietnam followed meetings with 73-year-old dissident Buddhist monk and Nobel Peace Prize nominee Thich Quang Do in Ho Chi Minh City and with dissident Catholic priest Nguyen Van Ly in Hue.

Both men are under restriction at their places of worship after criticising religious restrictions imposed by the communist authorities.

POLITICIAN ON TOURIST VISA

The diplomat said Rise had come to Vietnam on a tourist visa, not with an official parliamentary delegation.

"In Vietnam's view he violated the law by coming as a tourist then going to see persons under arrest," the diplomat said, adding she had no statement yet from her ministry in Olso.

Vietnam's Foreign Ministry did not comment, but released late on Tuesday a statement from a tourist company which arranged Rise's tourist visa.

Nguyen Xuan Hien, director of Hoa Binh Province Tourism Co's branch in Hanoi, said Rise had violated Vietnam's immigration regulations and was "forced to leave Vietnam" on April 11.

Rise's statement included pictures of himself and the two religious leaders.

Rise said Ly had reported he was under house arrest at his church, watched by police, with his phone disconnected and with no access to email or ordinary mail.

The statement said that during the meeting the church was surrounded by about 100 policemen and Rise was arrested and taken in for two interrogation sessions, one lasting six-and-a-half hours and the other for five hours.

It said the first interrogation lasted until 3 a.m. and resumed at 8 a.m. and that in Ho Chi Minh City, Rise "and company" were "locked into a prison and then a hotel and from there sent out of the country".

Rise himself could not be reached for comment.

Last week, Hanoi slammed a call by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom for Washington to withhold support for hundreds of millions of dollars of World Bank and International Monetary Fund loans because of rights abuses.

Norway's aid programme to Vietnam is worth about $6 million a year and goes to fisheries, energy and administrative reform projects.

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Tuesday April 17, 9:02 PM

Mahathir denounces "absolute" freedom of Internet

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad denounced the principle of absolute press freedom on the Internet on Tuesday, saying he had seen messages posted that urged people to kill him.

"I just read messages on the Internet urging people to kill me," Mahathir told a news conference. "So next of course, they will ask people to throw bombs and all that."

On Monday Mahathir said the government planned to tighten existing media laws to make them relevant to the high-tech world.

Malaysia's Printing Presses and Publications Act basically prohibits the printing or publication of news deemed to be untrue and offenders can be jailed and fined. But Mahathir said penalties under that law were inadequate.

"Press freedom means you do anything that you like ... you abuse people, you urge people to kill each other, that's press freedom. We don't like that kind of freedom."

Mahathir has spoken before of apparent conspiracies by people wanting him dead.

But the prime minister, in office for the 20th year and with arguably more political enemies than his three predecessors, maintains a very thin security cover in public, mingling freely with the public.

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Tuesday April 17, 7:39 PM

Vietnam communists fought behind-the-scenes leadership battle

HANOI, April 17 (AFP) - Vietnam's secretive communist party created confusion over the succession to its top post to prevent any last-ditch fightback by ousted incumbent Le Kha Phieu, officials said Tuesday.

A new party secretary-general was finally voted in at a closed-door meeting Monday just three days before the formal opening of the party's five-yearly congress, officials said.

But the apparent victor -- the head of the party's powerful organising committee, Nguyen Van An -- was the least talked-about of the three rival candidates in the run-up to the meeting.

Votes were taken on the other two candidates -- President Tran Duc Luong and National Assembly speaker Nong Duc Manh, officials said.

But Luong failed to garner enough support among delegates and, even though Manh won majority backing, he immediately turned down the post with the approval and advance knowledge of party elders.

An now appears to have been the favoured candidate all along of the party's powerful advisors -- elder statesmen Do Muoi, Le Duc Anh and Vo Van Kiet -- who have been campaigning for months to oust the party chief, officials said.

Phieu won the abiding hatred of the trio by pressing for the suppression of their posts as party advisors early last year.

But the three powerbrokers played their cards close to their chest to confuse Phieu's supporters over the identity of his principal rival, the officials from both sides of the power struggle said.

In the event the party chief gave in gracefully and the feared fightback did not materialise.

Phieu's name was not even put foward as a candidate when congress delegates voted in a new slimmed-down 150-member central committee Monday, the officials said.

But Phieu does appear to have extracted some concessions for bowing out without an unseemly last-ditch fight.

He is now likely to be recognized as an elder statesman and join his three leading detractors on an enlarged council of party advisors, officials said.

He also appears to have saved the career of one of his leading proteges, Defence Minister Phan Van Tra, who is thought likely to retain his cabinet post despite being disciplined by the party's central committee last month.

The unprecedented pair of reprimands delivered against Tra and army chief of staff Le Van Dung now appear to have been the final nail in the coffin for the party chief's battle to stay in power.

The wounding of his close allies left the party chief fatally exposed at the central committee's final preparatory meeting last week, enabling his opponents to exclude him from the shortlist of candidates put forward to the new central committee.

Delegates were finally due to wrap up their six days of closed-door deliberations Tuesday with elections for a new elite politburo of 15 members, reduced from the current 18.

Four new members were due to be elected to replace seven who are stepping down, including Phieu and veteran troubleshooter Pham The Duyet.

Party ideology chief Huu Tho was due to hold a briefing Wednesday morning ahead of the following day's public opening of the congress.

But officials said it was unlikely he would publicly confirm any of the leadership changes thrashed out behind closed doors until they have been rubber-stamped after Thursday's opening.

The vote at the open session will have one major difference from this week's closed-door debate.

Delegates will be called upon to vote by secret ballot rather than a show of hands.

The officials insisted delegates were far too well-schooled in the disciplines of party unity for that to lead to any last-minute change of heart on the new leader.

But given the scale of manipulation during the leadership battle of the past six months, few analysts are prepared to entirely rule out fresh surprises.

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Tuesday April 17, 7:00 PM

Detained Malaysians suffer legal setback

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Five opposition activists held under Malaysia's draconian security laws suffered an early setback on Tuesday in efforts to secure their release.

Lawyers for the detained -- among seven supporters of jailed former Malaysian finance minister Anwar Ibrahim arrested by police last week -- failed to have the judge replaced or have the men brought to court.

Defence lawyer Sivarasa Rasiah said those arrested should be present in court to allow their physical condition to be assessed, citing previous cases of torture against people detained under the Internal Security Act (ISA).

He also suggested High Court Judge Augustine Paul disqualify himself from hearing applications for the detainees' release, saying the judge had sat in the case leading to Anwar's conviction for corruption in April 1999.

But the judge dismissed both arguments, saying it would be frivolous to step aside on the grounds suggested and adding it was highly unusual to order detainees' presence in court for such cases.

Police have accused the seven of having explosives and planning riots ahead of a procession in central Kuala Lumpur at the weekend to mark the second anniversary of Anwar's conviction.

Six are members of the Parti Keadilan Nasional, led by Anwar's wife Wan Azizah Wan Ismail.

Opposition groups have dismissed the allegations and demanded the police show evidence, while the Malaysian Bar Council -- representing the country's lawyers -- and the Human Rights Commission have both criticised the use of the ISA.

"We think the allegations are baseless and a pack of lies," Zainur Zakaria, another defence lawyer, told the court.

Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said on Monday that police had nipped in the bud a violent street protest planned by the detainees, adding that there was even evidence of them having sought help from Indonesian nationals.

Zainur disagreed. "The detention has nothing here to do with security. It was political and done in bad faith," he told the hearing, which is set to continue on Wednesday.

Lawyers have yet to file applications for the two other detainees, who are being held outside the capital Kuala Lumpur.

Under the ISA, a relic of British colonial rule designed to quell communist revolutionaries, police can detain without trial for up to 60 days anyone suspected of posing a security risk.

A few thousand people joined the weekend procession, dispersing peacefully after a delegation headed by Anwar's wife Wan Azizah Wan Ismail delivered a memorandum to the Human Rights Commission demanding civil rights reforms.

Anwar, who was sacked in 1998 by Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, is serving 15 years for sex and graft crimes he says were made up to stop any leadership challenge.

Mahathir has described Anwar as immoral and unfit to rule.

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Myanmar Exports More Rice in 2000
2001.04.17 11:02:27

YANGON, April 17 (Xinhuanet) -- Myanmar exported a total of 141, 600 tons of rice in 2000, earning a foreign exchange of 141.5 million U.S. dollars, the country's Central Statistical Organization said in its latest data.

The export volume and foreign exchange earning were respectively up 122 percent and 84.2 percent compared with 1999.

To meet its food demand and to export more rice, Myanmar has since 1999 reclaimed 467,370 hectares of vacant, virgin, fallow and wetlands in the country for cultivation by private entrepreneurs.

At the same time, it has also exempted the import customs duties levied on agricultural implements including pesticide, fertilizer, improved variety and machinery.

Myanmar's cultivable land stretches 18.22 million hectares, of which 9.31 million are utilized, while 8.91 million remain to be reclaimed.

The country's agriculture accounts for 37 percent of the gross domestic product and 25 percent of the export value.

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Foreign Investment in Myanmar Reaches Over 152 Mln Dollars in 2000
2001.04.17 09:59:33

YANGON, April 17 (Xinhuanet) -- Foreign investment in Myanmar, which came from nine countries and regions, amounted to 152.8 million U.S. dollars in 2000, according to the latest figures issued by the country's Central Statistical Organization.

These foreign investment during the year were mainly injected into the sectors of manufacturing with 66.8 million dollars, oil and gas with 52.8 million dollars and agriculture with 20 million dollars. Other sectors into which the foreign investment was brought covered mining and transport.

Leading foreign investors were lined up as Republic of Korea with 44.51 million dollars, Britain with 30.6 million dollars, China with 28.98 million dollars and Canada with 21.45 million dollars, followed by Malaysia, China's Hong Kong, Cyprus, China's Macao and Indonesia.

The statistics show that since opening to foreign investment in late 1988, Myanmar had drawn a total of 7.312 billion dollars as of the end of 2000.

Meanwhile, due to the outbreak of the Asian financial crisis in mid-1997, there emerged a trend of down sliding in Myanmar's annual foreign investment.

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New Straits Times - April 17, 2001.

Concerns over Thai pipeline
Petronas considering alternative way to deliver gas on schedule
By Zuraimi Abdullah

TUES: WHILE Petronas is very concerned about the delay of its massive gas pipeline project with the Petroleum Authority of Thailand, it has an alternative to ensure that it meets its gas delivery requirements under the project.

A purchase deal was signed in November 1999 for the sale of gas to Petronas and PTT for use in Thailand and Myanmar. But the national oil company faces the possibility of being slapped with a penalty if it breaches the gas delivery requirements.

Petronas president and CEO Tan Sri Mohd Hassan Marican said it could use an alternative route from its existing infrastucture in the Gulf of Thailand to the east coast of Peninsular Malaysia to enable it to deliver the gas on schedule.

"The pipeline project is delayed as a result of the yet-to-be-approved EIAs (enviromental impact assessments) by the Thai authorities. We are very concerned about it because the first phase (involving the gas delivery) is due by July 2002.

"We are now looking at other options and one of them is using our present evacuation offshore system ... at least to cater for the first phase," said Mohd Hassan in Kuala Lumpur yesterday after signing a sale and purchase agreement with Tohoku Electric Power Co Ltd for the supply of liquefied natural gas.

He explained that the possible interim solution would involve offshore pipelines from a gas field laid by a 50:50 joint venture of Petronas Carigali and Triton Energy Ltd of Dallas at the gulf to its infrastructure at the Terengganu coast.

Mohd Hassan made it clear that, on the Malaysian side, Trans Thai-Malaysia (Thailand) Ltd - Petronas-PTT's 50:50 joint-venture company - had obtained the EIA approval from the authorities.

"It is difficult for me to say. Let's wait for the Thai authorities to decide," Mohd Hassan said in response to whether the EIA approval could be expected in the next few months.

"But we will do our best with our partner PTT to see that the project is implemented soon."

Saksit Tridech, secretary-general of Thailand's Office of Environmental Policy and Planning, was reported as saying that it declined to approve the EIAs because of "unconvincing data and model simulation".

Construction of the estimated RM3 billion pipeline project which includes two gas separation plants in southern Songkhla province, should have started on March 1 to meet the gas delivery date of mid-2002. The EIA approval is needed for the operator to apply for construction permits.

The pipeline project, which would move gas from the offshore Malaysia-Thai Joint Development Area, faces continued opposition in Songkhla.

Under the deal signed with Tohoku Electric, Japan's fourth largest electricity provider, Petronas through 60 per cent-owned subsidiary Malaysia LNG Tiga Sdn Bhd, will supply Tohoku Electric with up to 900,000 tonnes of liquefied natural gas every year for 20 years from 2005.

The LNG will be supplied from MLNG Tiga's plant in Bintulu, Sarawak, and will be delivered by LNG tankers owned by another subsidiary, Malaysia International Shipping Corporation Bhd.

Yesterday's agreement is Petronas' second LNG purchase deal with Tohoku. The first, also for a 20-year period, was signed in 1994.

Mohd Hassan said MLNG Tiga is currently in the final stages of concluding the sales and purchase agreements with several buyers.

They include JAPEX of Japan (for the supply of 500,000 tonnes annually), Metgas of India (2.6 million tonnes annually) and the Japanese Gas Consortium consisting of Tokyo Gas Co Ltd, Toho Gas Co Ltd and Osaka Gas Co Ltd (1.6 million tonnes annually).

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Free Burma Coalition Press Release

91 Universities/Schools Demand Release of Burmese Dissident Move Follows Sodexo Marriott's Multi-Million Dollar Loss Over Burma Ties

April 17, 2001

In one of the largest displays of international student solidarity since the anti-apartheid struggle, students at 91 schools and universities from ten countries will fast for 24 hours on April 17th to call for the immediate the release of Burma's student political prisoner Min Ko Naing and demand that colleges and universities refuse contracts with multinational corporations operating in Burma.

The fast comes on the heels of a major victory for the students, one week after Sodexo Marriott Dining Services was denied a multi-million dollar contract with American University due in large part to a University Senate resolution condemning Marriott's licensing of a Renaissance Hotel in Burma's capital city of Rangoon.

"We demand that Burma's military junta release Min Ko Naing immediately," says American University student Kevin Owen, an organizer of the effort to deny Marriott's contract. "Until the junta shows it is serious about human rights by releasing our fellow student Min Ko Naing and all political prisoners, companies such as Marriott, Warner Bros, and UNOCAL only prolong the suffering of the Burmese people."

Marriott licenses the Renaissance Inya Lake hotel in Burma, that rights activists say contributes to forced labor in Burma.

"The International Labor Organization acknowledges that there are over 8,000,000 forced laborers per year in Burma," said Owen, and "much of this is a direct result of the tourism industry. Burma's 1991 Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi has stated 'the bulk of the money from tourism goes straight into the pockets of the generals."

During the past month, student governments at the University of Virginia and Peace College in North Carolina passed resolutions by overwhelming majority calling for their universities to divest from companies operating in Burma.

The University of Virginia student newspaper's lead editorial last week demanded that University Rector John Ackerly implement the resolution, stating that he should "lead by example."

"We won't stop until these greedy corporations stop seeking profits at the expense of Burma's freedom," echoes Abbie Melton of Leeds University in the United Kingdom, who led a "die-in" on Leeds campus to symbolize how Leeds' investments in Burma results in Burmese deaths. "University students who have the right to stand up for their beliefs and principles have a moral obligation to call for change and an end to the brutal military dictatorship that is currently suppressing millions of Burmese students and people." says University of Michigan student William Ho, who will debate a similar measure in UM's student government this week.

Min Ko Naing was a student at Rangoon Arts and Sciences University in the mid 1980s when he organized a nationwide uprising calling for the end of dictatorship in Burma. The junta responded to the uprising by shooting thousands of protestors and arresting torturing, and imprisoning Min Ko Naing and nearly 1,300 other political prisoners, many of who are students.

Then-Congressman Bill Richardson was the last U.S. citizen to see Min Ko Naing in 1995.

In addition to intensifying pressure on companies to leave Burma, students have pledged to take stronger action if the junta doesn't respond to the demand to free Min Ko Naing: "We are ready to take even more direct action if Min Ko Naing isn't freed promptly" said Erin Brennand of the University of Alberta.

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