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BURMA RELATED NEWS - February
02, 2002.
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HEADLINES
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- Reuters - Money laundering taskforce says makes
progress
The Nation - Burmese gunship opens fire
Xinhuanet - Chinese-Built Shipyard Delivered for
Service in Myanmar
Xinhuanet - Thai FM to Go to Myanmar for Talks
NSTP - No import duty on 639
products
AP - Nobel Prize
politicized: Mahathir
Narinjara - RICE MILLS
BARRED FROM MILLING RICE IN SOUTH-WESTERN STATE OF
MYANMAR
Narinjara - MYANMAR TROOPS COLLECT TOLLS
FROM THE MONEY GIVEN TO THE POOR BY A FRENCH NGO
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- Friday February 1, 11:03 PM
Money laundering taskforce says makes progress By Andrea Ricci HONG KONG (Reuters) - The
world's money laundering watchdog said on Friday it had made progress toward
slowing the flow of money funding terrorism in a three-day plenary meeting in
Hong Kong.
Clarie Lo, President of the Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering
(FATF), said the group had completed the first phase of a self-assessment
exercise of its members on "Eight Special Recommendations" to counter terrorism
agreed on October 30, 2001.
Moreover, she said "many countries which are not FATF members have
expressed their commitment to joining FATF's efforts to combat terrorist
financing."
The Paris-based FATF now was calling on non-members to undergo the
self-assessment exercise, Lo said. The tentative deadline was May 1.
The FATF has 29 member countries, most of them highly developed economies
with mature financial systems.
The Eight Special Recommendations urge countries to make it harder for
terrorists to get funds by, for example, criminalising the financing of
terrorism, freezing terrorist assets, imposing anti-money laundering rules on
alternative remittance systems and ensuring that charities could not be used to
funnel funds to terrorists.
Lo said it was hard to say how effective the anti-terrorism measures had
been in cutting off the flow of funds, which had taken on a new urgency after
the September 11 suicide attacks on the United States which killed 3,000 people.
But she urged patience.
"The compliance deadline for the new measures is not until June," she said.
SOME NON-COOPERATIVE COUNTRIES MAKE PROGRESS
The FATF made no change in its list of 19 "non-cooperative" countries with
poor money laundering regulations.
But Lo said Hungary and St. Kitts and Nevis had made progress toward
eliminating some of their deficiencies. They would be asked to submit
implementation plans to enable the FATF to evaluate the actual implementation of
their legislative changes.
She said the FATF would continue to recommend counterparties apply
counter-measures against the tiny Pacific island Nauru, a recommendation it made
in December.
"Nauru has not adequately addressed the deficiencies found in the process
of licensing, regulation and supervision of its offshore banking sector," Lo
said.
The atoll has a population of 10,000 - and over 400 offshore banks
registered to a single government post office box.
Counter-measures can include enhanced surveillance and reporting of
financial transactions, and go beyond the FATF's standard suggestion to
financial institutions to give special attention to business relations in
countries that do not apply FATF recommendations.
The Philippines also would stay on the non-cooperative list, despite heavy
lobbying by its government, which sent a special delegation to Hong Kong to
plead its case.
"There are still some deficiencies in the Philippines which need to be
remedied," said Lo. There were no special counter-measures against the
Philippines, however.
The other countries or territories on the FATF blacklist are Russia,
Ukraine, Egypt, Nigeria, Israel, Indonesia, Lebanon, Myanmar, Cook Islands,
Dominica, Grenada, Guatemala, Marshall Islands, Niue, and St. Vincent and the
Grenadines.
The status of the non-cooperative countries would be reviewed again at the
group's next meeting on June 19-21.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Nation
Burmese gunship opens fire Published on Feb 2, 2002 RANONG - A Burmese gunship yesterday entered Thai waters and opened fire on
a local fishing trawler, sending nine fishermen overboard, local marine
authorities said.
The fishermen abandoned their trawler for fear that they would be killed if
they remained aboard, the authorities said.
An informed source said the Burmese ship, No 447, fired four shots at the
Thai boat before towing it away, leaving the fishermen adrift at sea.
Tiwa Lohakarn, the boat's captain, said they were lucky nearby trawlers
came to their rescue.
However, he said concerned authorities should ensure patrols are conducted
in Thai water to prevent such incidents happening again.
Major Suwat Sriklor, the inspector of provincial marine police, said
conflicts often arose in the area because Burma and Thailand had conflicting
claims over the waters there.
Suwat, however, said that the area was under Thai jurisdiction but that the
Burmese were also claiming that it belonged to them.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- Chinese-Built Shipyard Delivered
for Service in Myanmar
Xinhuanet 2002-02-02 16:29:46 ã??ã??YANGON, February 2 (Xinhuanet) -- A shipyard, the Thilawa, contracted and built by the China National Constructional and Agricultural Machinery Import and Export Co (CAMC), was formally delivered to Myanmar for service on Saturday after completion of its first phase of construction in three years. ã??ã??The first phase of the Thilawa shipyard project, located 25 kilometers
south of Yangon, covers a land of 300,000 square-meters.The Chinese side was
responsible for the project design, supply of equipment, installation, technical
supervision and training, whilethe Myanmar side only undertook the civil
construction.
ã??ã??The project is the biggest and most comprehensive one in Myanmar
contracted and built by China.
ã??ã??The first phase of the Thilawa shipyard project possesses a production
capacity of manufacturing five and repairing 50 ships ayear.
ã??ã??With advanced technological process and complete accessory, theshipyard's
technological standard and degree of modernization ranked first in Myanmar.
ã??ã??The formal delivery of the project for service will greatly enhance
Myanmar's ship repairing and building capabilities.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- Thai FM to Go to Myanmar for Talks
Xinhuanet 2002-02-01 12:06:56 BANGKOK, February 1 (Xinhuanet) -- Surakiart Sathirathai, Thai Foreign Minister, is scheduled to visit Myanmar from February 6 to 8 to discuss repatriation of illegal Myanmar workers, joint fishery venture, drug controlling and trade, the Bangkok Post reported Friday. During Surakiart's two-days trip, he would give Myanmar army
chief Gen Muang Aye, vice-chairman of the State Peace and Development Council
(SPDC), a formal invitation to visit Thailand, the report said.
He and his Myanmar counterpart would sign an agreement on
avoidance of double taxation, according to the report.
A fresh round of registration of illegal labors in Thailand
will take place from February 25 to March 24, after which those unregistered
will be rounded up and repatriated.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- The New Straits Times Press
No import duty on 639
products
By Rupa Damodaran FRI: MALAYSIA, which has taken the lead in the development and integration of new Asean members, has offered 639 products for exemption from import duties to Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar. International Trade and Industry Minister Datuk Seri Rafidah Aziz said the
products offered through the Asean Integration System of Preferences (AISP)
included agricultural products, wood, plastics, ceramics, articles of iron and
steel and electric and electrical products.
The AISP was implemented from Jan 1 this year and products imported are
exempted from import duties. Other countries offering AISP are Indonesia (297
products), Thailand (165 products) and Brunei (102 products).
Rafidah also said that Malaysia's trade with Asean has been increasing,
registering an average annual growth of 20.7 per cent over the past five
years.
Records indicate it grew from RM95.1 billion in 1996 to RM173.7 billion in
2000.
Asean accounted for 33 per cent or RM4.56 billion of Malaysia's investment
overseas in 2000 totalling RM13.80 billion.
Between January and June last year, Malaysia's investment into Asean
countries amounted to RM478.7 million of which RM391.7 million was in the
manufacturing sectors and RM87 million in the non-manufacturing sector.
Exports to Asean countries fell by 14.7 per cent from RM91 billion to
RM77.6 billion for the period between January and November last year compared to
the corresponding period of 2000.
Imports also declined by 14.8 per cent from RM68.9 billion to RM58.7
billion for the same period.
"The decline is a reflection of the global trade performance last year,"
she said at her ministry in Kuala Lumpur yesterday.
Singapore was Malaysia's largest trading partner in the region in 2000,
making up 65.1 per cent of the total Asean trade (RM113.2 billion), followed by
Thailand (RM25.5 billion), Indonesia (RM15.1 billion), the Philippines (RM14.1
billion) and Vietnam (RM3.4 billion).
Since the implementation of the Common Effective Preferential Tariff Scheme
(CEPT) in 1993, intraAsean trade increased 4.5 times from RM147.06 billion to
RM666.52 billion in 2000.
She said Malaysia had eliminated tariffs on 60.3 per cent of the products
under the Asean Free Trade Area compared to Indonesia (56.4 per cent), Thailand
(1.9 per cent) and the Philippines (0.07 per cent).
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- Nobel Prize politicized:
Mahathir
KUALA LUMPUR (AP) Prime
Minister Mahathir Mohamad said Thursday that the Nobel Peace Prize no longer
honors peace but is a politically motivated award with the capability of
destabilizing nations.
â??It is a political prize,â?? Mahathir said. â??They give â?¦Nobel Prize so as to
ensure that these people can do what they like and be protected by the general
public.â??
â??Itâ??s no more a peace prize,â?? said Mahathir, Asiaâ??s longest-serving ruler.
â??There is no peace. In fact, the idea is to ensure that there is a struggle to
destabilize a country.â??
He was responding to a journalistâ??s question about a foreign news report
that speculated that Mahathirâ??s former deputy leader Anwar Ibrahim could be
nominated for the prize this year.
Mahathir, who has led Malaysia for more than 20 years, fired Anwar in 1998
amid disagreements over about how to handle a regional economic crisis. Anwarâ??s
sacking triggered Malaysiaâ??s largest street protests in decades.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- Narinjara news
RICE MILLS BARRED FROM MILLING RICE IN
SOUTH-WESTERN STATE OF MYANMAR
Sittwe, 2nd February 02 : All the privately owned rice mills in the
south-western state of Myanmar have been barred from milling rice without the
permission of Township Peace and Development Council (Mayaka) authority, our
correspondent reported.
In a move to realize arrears of
the rice target of the previous year and the new target the authority has
deliberately set this year, the Rakhine State Peace and Development
Council (Payaka) announced a ban on private milling of rice without their
written permission. Up to November 2001, the military regime
of Myanmar had not any restriction to milling of the rice left for
the consumption of the rice grower families after the state forcefully had
'recovered' the season's quota of the sale of rice to the government
corporation ' rice buying depots'. With the new order
effective since then, the rice growers in the state cannot mill their
paddy for sale in the open market. The whimsical order has left the rice
growers with two options : either to sell the paddy to the government at
deliberately lowered price which will deprive them of the reasonable price in
the open market, or have the entire season's harvest confiscated by the
junta officials.
According to a boat-owner from Pauktaw who also owns a rice mill told our
correspondent that, each owner has to pay a tax of kyat 400,000 a year for a
rice mill to the SPDC coffer, besides regularly bribing the township
administration and Military Intelligence for permission to mill rice
more than the amount fixed by the State Administration . The move
has left the rice farmers and rice mill owners in a precarious situation since
the diesel fuel to run the mills has to be bought in the black market,
too. In the last two months most of the small rice mills in the state have
been forced to shut down because of the order of the SPDC junta.
The unreasonable order of the State administration may have also been targeted at crippling the economy of the poorest undeveloped state of Myanmar mostly inhabited by the majority Rakhine people. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Narinjara news
MYANMAR TROOPS COLLECT TOLLS FROM THE MONEY GIVEN TO THE POOR BY A FRENCH NGO Buthidaung, 1st February 02: The recipients of the monetary
support from NGOs have been forced to pay back a chunk of their subsistence
allowance to the village leaders and the Myanmar troops, according to a trader
from Taungbazar market of Buthidaung in the northern part of Rakhine State in
the south-western part of Myanmar.
A Canadian official Ms Erin accompanied by three local staff of the French NGO, ACF (Action contré la Faim), went to Zidung-bedo village and Ngaraing-chhaung village by a speedboat and distributed some money to the poorest people in the area on the 16th of January, 2002. As soon as they left after their work, a platoon from Light Infantry Battalion 551 stationed at Taung-bazar battalion headquarter, Buthidaung township, and the local village headman came and collected kyat 500 from each recipient as money needed for giving security (?) to the visiting ACF officials. ACF is working in northern part of Rakhine State, drilling wells and ponds (for drinking water) and also on food security programme (micro-credit, delivery of chickens and goats, small income generating projects generally for widows or women who are head of families, elderly people and very poor families). ACF is one of a number of international NGOs engaged in the region. The trader told our correspondent that, whenever NGO officials or the State Peace and Development Council junta officials visit the area, the villagers there are forced to pay tolls to the Burmese troops accompanying those persons on security grounds, on the plea of having to spend in purchasing food and drinks for themselves. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- |