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BURMA RELATED NEWS - September
20, 2001.
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HEADLINES
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- AFP - ILO team meets with Aung San
Suu Kyi, top junta officials
Kyodo News - ILO delegation meets
Myanmar opposition leader Suu Kyi
The Daily Star - Asia's tourism
industry in tatters
San Fransisco Chronicle - Joseph Slowinski S.F. biologist, expert on snakes Bkk Post - Crackdowns on aliens hurt
bus business
Xinhuanet - Myanmar to Build
First Coal-Burning Power Station
NSTP - Terrorists
identified by FBI were in Malaysia as genuine travellers
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- Thursday September 20, 2:34
PM
ILO team meets with Aung San Suu Kyi, top junta officials YANGON, Sept 20 (AFP) - An International Labour Organisation (ILO)
team investigating the Myanmar junta's efforts to eradicate forced labour has
met with opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and been given access to every
minister concerned, sources said Thursday.
The four-member ILO team, and seven experts accompanying
it on the three-week mission, had a working lunch with Aung San Suu Kyi
Wednesday, an official source said. No details of the meeting were released to
the media.
Afterwards the ILO representatives held a meeting with
ethnic minority parties including the Shan NLD (National League for Democracy),
as part of a thorough briefing on labour conditions in Myanmar.
Talks with the Attorney General and the Chief Justice were
also on the official itinerary which the Geneva-based United Nations body is
keeping tightly under wraps.
Francis Maupain, who is accompanying the mission as a
representative of ILO director-general Juan Somavia, said the itinerary since
the trip started Monday had been "very packed".
"We are seeing everyone, including all the ministers
concerned," he told
Maupain declined to confirm reports that the team would
depart Yangon Sunday to travel to Karen and Shan states where reports of forced
labour are rife.
"We do not yet know exactly where we are going," he said.
"That depends on the information that we collect during the course of our talks
here."
Shan NLD representative Khun Tun Oo said the meeting with
the ILO team focused on whether forced labor had persisted since November last
year when the junta handed down an order banning the practice for the first
time.
They were also interested in the military regime's efforts
to enforce the ban, he told AFP.
"We generally conceded that except for the nation's
periphery where conflicts with anti-government armed groups still went on,
conditions in the rest of the country had improved," he said.
"We found the team to be very serious and open minded and
our meeting was quite satisfying."
Over the next few days the ILO mission is expected to see
non-governmental organisations and visit development projects around
Yangon.
The ILO last year made an unprecedented censure of
Myanmar, and threatened to heap more sanctions on the military-run nation if it
failed to curb forced labour.
Rights groups say nearly a million Myanmar people have
been forced into building roads, ports and tourist resorts as well as assisting
in military manoeuvres on the unstable borders.
But commentators in Yangon say that amid threats of
further sanctions the regime is highly motivated to convince the ILO that it is
sincere in its efforts to wipe out the practice.
"This is the first time that the ILO has had an
opportunity to travel around the country to make its own direct assessment of
the forced labor situation," the UN organisation said in a statement from
Bangkok.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- ILO delegation meets Myanmar
opposition leader Suu Kyi
YANGON, Sept. 19, Kyodo - A visiting high-level delegation from the
International Labor Organization (ILO) met Myanmar's pro-democracy leader Aung
San Suu Kyi at her residence Wednesday.
The meeting between the four-member delegation, led by
former Australian Governor General Ninian Stephen, and Suu Kyi, head of the
opposition National League for Democracy (NLD), lasted about an hour and a half.
The delegation arrived in the country on Monday for a
three-week visit to investigate allegations of forced labor in Myanmar.
Myanmar's ruling junta passed a degree in September 1999
declaring forced labor illegal. However, opposition groups outside the country
claim that forced labor continues in the country despite the official decree.
The delegation has been allowed to draw up its own program
for travel, visits and contacts within the country at its own discretion,
according to an agreement reached between the ruling junta and the Geneva-based
ILO.
Since they arrived in Myanmar, the delegation has also met
with Foreign Minister Win Aung, Home Minister Tin Hlaing and acting Labor
Minister Tin Win in addition to meeting senior officials of the labor
department.
The delegation held talks with senior members of the NLD
Tuesday evening at the party office.
The delegation is scheduled to meet the attorney general
Wednesday evening, according to diplomatic sources.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Daily Star - Sep
20, 2001.
Asia's tourism
industry in tatters
AFP, Bangkok Holiday and business travellers are cancelling trips to
Asia in droves after the attacks on the US, spelling disaster for the region's
tourism industry and governments who rely on revenue from the sector.
"We are getting cancellations all over the place -- Hong
Kong, Kuala Lumpur, Taipei, Yangon, Singapore, Fiji, the Philippines -- everyone
is losing their shirts," said Agnes Pacis from the Shangri-La Hotel in Bangkok.
"Everyone is likening it to the Gulf War incident when
occupancy went from 60 per cent to 20 per cent. We're not there yet but that's
the worst picture that everyone is expecting," the marketing director told AFP.
The drop-off is sending shivers down the spines of
governments who counted on tourism as a vital source of foreign exchange while
their export industries were being undercut by slowdowns in the United States
and Japan.
Some tourism authorities are putting a brave face on the
crisis, saying their destinations remain safe and that they are confident
travellers will return once airline services are normalised.
But others admit the terrifying assaults carried out by
four hijacked passenger jets have brought business and conference travel to a
standstill, and that tourists are now too afraid to leave their home countries.
The World Tourism Organization (WTO) said Tuesday the
disaster had struck "a terrible blow" to the industry, with travellers worldwide
cancelling or postponing trips in large numbers.
Increased security precautions and higher oil prices would
be additional burdens on the sector, said the Madrid-based organisation.
Amid threats of a "holy war" over demands for
Afghanistan's leaders to hand over terrorist suspect Osama bin Laden, South
Asia's tourism industry appears to be bearing the brunt of the damage.
"The impact is already being felt," said Subhash Goya,
president of the Confederation of Tourism Professionals of India, warning the
industry stood to lose 400-500 million rupees (8.5 to 10.6 million
dollars).
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- San Fransisco Chronicle
Joseph Slowinski S.F.
biologist, expert on snakes
David Perlman,
Chronicle Science Editor
Wednesday, September 19, 2001
Joseph B. Slowinski, a noted San Francisco biologist and
one of the world's leading experts on venomous snakes, died from a paralyzing
snakebite on Sept. 12 while leading an expedition in the jungles of northern
Burma. He was 38.
As associate curator of herpetology at the California
Academy of Sciences, Dr. Slowinski was known as a bold, high-spirited scientist
and a brilliant biologist whose studies of the evolutionary history of the cobra
family have proved uniquely valuable to science.
His fatal encounter with a krait, a member of the cobra
group, occurred when a member of his Burmese team brought him a sack containing
a single small reptile whose coloration resembled a familiar harmless snake.
Dr. Slowinski reached into the sack, and the snake bit him
painlessly as he grasped, according to an e-mail message from Douglas J. Long,
the acting chairman of the academy's ornithology department, who was collecting
bird specimens on the expedition.
Dr. Slowinski quickly recognized the snake as a krait, and
told his colleagues what first aid he would need quickly. But the expedition was
mired in the jungle mud of monsoon weather, 8 miles on foot from the nearest
radio and inaccessible to helicopter rescue.
Within hours Dr. Slowinski became progressively paralyzed
from the krait's neurotoxic venom, and his breathing stopped. Despite efforts to
keep his heart beating, he died the following morning, Long said in his message.
Aside from collecting, classifying and studying cobras and
discovering some 18 new species of reptiles during a dozen expeditions to Burma,
Dr. Slowinski taught graduate students at San Francisco State University and the
University of Yangon in Burma's capital, where he maintained a second home.
"For a herpetologist, finding a new species is always
exciting. For me, finding a new cobra species is the ultimate discovery," he
wrote recently in the academy's California Wild quarterly magazine.
"Joe's huge collection of reptile species at the academy
from all parts of the country are unique and priceless," said Robert Drewes,
chairman of the academy's Herpetology Department. They have added important
scientific insights into an Asian region whose wildlife is so poorly known,
Drewes said.
"He had such a knack for breaking down barriers with
everyone," recalled Rhonda Lucas, one of his graduate students at San Francisco
State, who had been on earlier expeditions to Burma with Dr. Slowinski's team.
"He'd joke with everyone, play ball with them, have a beer with them, and
invariably ask his Burmese field teams, in Burmese, 'Where do I catch snakes?'
"He could even play golf -- sort of -- with high Burmese
officials when he needed to negotiate for permits," Lucas said. "And he was a
wonderful teacher."
Dr. Slowinski was born in Kansas City, Mo., received his
doctorate from the University of Miami, and after teaching at universities in
Louisiana, he joined the California Academy of Sciences staff in 1997.
Sponsored by the National Science Foundation and the
National Geographic Society, Dr. Slowinski was engaged in a long-term,
comprehensive survey of snakes in Burma. He was also a principal researcher with
the academy's China Natural History Project, a study of biodiversity in southern
China's Yunnan Province.
During a pause in the monsoon and three days after his
death, Dr. Slowinski's body was brought by helicopter to Myitkyina, the capital
of Kochin state in northern Burma, where, at his family's request, he was
cremated in a brief ceremony accompanied by Buddhist prayers. The remains,
accompanied by other members of the expedition, will be returned to San
Francisco.
Dr. Slowinski is survived by his mother, Martha Crow of
New York; his father, Ronald Slowinski of Kansas City, and a sister, Rachel
Slowinski of Los Angeles.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bangkok Post - Sep
20, 2001.
Crackdowns on aliens hurt bus business Supamart Kasem Crackdowns on illegal Burmese immigrants are bad for
business, a bus company says.
Mae Sot Transport Co said the company was being affected
by unnecessary hold-ups at checkpoints along the Mae Sot-Tha Song Yang
route.
Officials were singling out buses but turning a blind eye
to illegal operators, it said.
Police would stop buses if they were found to be carrying
aliens, conduct searches and sometimes seize their belongings, the company said
in a letter to provincial authorities.
The letter was also signed by Thanin Thanomwattana, Mae
Sot transport co-operative president and Worasak Porncharoenrot, of Umphang Tak
Co.
Mr Thanin said many people had stopped using the bus
services, and passengers were being stolen by "illegal" operators using private,
unlicensed vehicles.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- Myanmar to Build
First Coal-Burning Power Station
Xinhuanet 2001.09.20 10:29:45 YANGON, September 20 (Xinhuanet) -- Myanmar will build its first
coal-burning electric power station in the country's northeastern Shan
state to help fulfill the nation's power requirement, according to sources
at the state-run Myanma Electric Power Enterprise (MEPE) Thursday.
The 120-megawatt (mw) coal-burning power project is to
be implemented by the MEPE with the cooperation of the state-run
Myanma Mining Enterprise in Pinlaung township of the state with the use of
coal mined in the township's Tikyit area, it said.
It added that Myanmar will import the main equipment
from abroad for the project.
Meanwhile, the MEPE is also implementing five
hydro-power plants in the country, namely Paunglaung, Zaungtu, Mone,
Thaphanseik and Maipan. Three of them are being built by China.
Official statistics show that in 2000, electric power
generated by the MEPE went to 5.028 billion kilowatt-hours, 17 percent
more than 1999.
The statistics also reveal that since 1988, Myanmar's
electric power installed generating capacity (IGC) has increased by 509
mw, of which that of natural gas power plants rose by 255 mw, while that
of steam power ones by 143 mw and that of hydropower ones by 111
mw.
The IGC of the MEPE remained at 1,172 mw at the end of
June this year, according to the statistics.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- The New Straits Times
Press - Sep 20, 2001.
Terrorists identified
by FBI were in Malaysia as genuine travellers
Police knew of their presence but Norian declines to elaborate Several men accused by the United States as being involved
in the Sept 11 terrorist attacks had entered Malaysia as genuine travellers,
Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Norian Mai said today. And police knew of
their presence on Malaysian soil even before the tragedy.
"As far as that particular time was concerned, they were
bona fide travellers," he told reporters after a courtesy call on him by
Australian Federal Police Commissioner Mick Keelty at Bukit Aman.
Asked how many suspects had been here, he said a few but
declined to give names, numbers or dates.
Norian also confirmed that the travellers made up part of
the suspects' list provided by the US on the attacks.
"We also depend on their (US) list," he said.
The names of the suspects released by the US Government
are Khalid Al-Midhar, Majed Moqed, Nawaq Alhamzi, Salem Alhamzi, Hani Hanjour,
Satam Al Suqami, Waleed M. Alshehri, Wail Alshehri, Mohamed Atta and Abdulaziz
Alomari.
All are presumed dead. They were believed to have been on
the four hijacked planes that crashed into the World Trade Center, Pentagon and
in rural Pennsylvania.
Norian denied that there had been an official request by
the US Government that Malaysia assist in their investigations after the
attacks.
Utusan Malaysia today quoted Norian as saying that the US
had contacted police, seeking information on a man suspected of having secret
meetings with an acquaintance in Malaysia prior to the attack.
The daily said Khalid was now being hunted down by the
Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) for allegedly hijacking the commercial
airliner that slammed into the Pentagon in Washington.
"I did not say such a thing," Norian said. "What I said
was that we have been co-operating and exchange of intelligence have been going
on between the two countries for some time. Such co-operation was a continuous
process."
Norian reiterated Malaysia's stand in dealing with
terrorism, saying that the Government and the police would co-operate in such
efforts.
"Our stand is very clear....we will give our utmost
co-operation in this area as Malaysia itself is facing the same problem," he
said in reference to local militant group, Kumpulan Militan
Malaysia.
Asked whether KMM members were linked to the terrorists in
the US attacks, Norian said police were investigating the possibility.
Norian was also asked whether the police were
investigating allegations that the prime suspect behind the attacks, Osama bin
Laden had accounts in Malaysian banks.
To this, he said: "I think we should let other agencies
look into it...Bank Negara can do it and respond if they want to."
The New Straits Times, however, learnt from police sources
that investigations into the allegation have been started.
Osama's links with militants in South-East Asia have been
noted in news reports and in on-going investigations. He is believed to have
bank accounts in Malaysia and Hong Kong.
This was revealed in February by a witness testifying
against Osama who was tried (in absentia) on charges of masterminding the bomb
attacks on US embassies in Tanzania and Kenya in August 1998.
Britian's The Sunday Times reported on Sunday (Sept 16)
that Osama, in a 1996 interview, named Malaysia among a list of countries which
had groups receiving aid from him.
The Abu Sayyaf in the southern Philippines, are said to
have publicly announced that they were being supported by Osama, according to
CNN reports.
Jane's Information Group, which studies defence,
aerospace, transportation and security information, has identified the presence
of Osama`s global network Al-Qaeda (The Base) in Malaysia, Myanmar, Indonesia
and Mindanao.
The network also includes Middle Eastern and African
countries, and the Xinjiang province in China.
Osama is on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List and has a US$5
million (RM19 million) bounty on his head.
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