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BURMA RELATED NEWS
- September 10, 2002.
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HEADLINES
------------------------------------------------------------------------ Reuters - EU team meets Myanmar
opposition leader Suu Kyi
AFP - ASEAN-India to hold first
economic meeting
AFP - Suu Kyi tells EU she's neutral
on Myanmar sanctions
AFP - ASEAN military chiefs meet to
discuss security threats
Dow Jones - Scale of Daewoo's Myanmar
Gas Block To Be Known Late '03
Dow Jones - FTA To Be Proposed At
ASEAN Plus 3 Summit - Report
AP - EU mission continues Myanmar
meetings
Platts - Daewoo to conduct seismic
work on offshore Myanmar block
The Irrawaddy - Myanmar crime wave
linked to hunger
The Nation - 3 Burmese held for theft
of jewellery
BBC - EU delegates meet Burma's Suu
Kyi
Xinhuanet - Small portion of
people use banks in Myanmar
Xinhuanet - Chinese state
councilor meets Myanmar guests
------------------------------------------------------------------------ Tuesday September 10, 4:31 PM
EU team meets Myanmar opposition leader Suu Kyi By Aung Hla Tun YANGON (Reuters) - A European Union delegation visiting Myanmar to assess the extent of political progress met pro-democracy opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi on Tuesday and said it hoped to meet a top military leader later in the day. The four-man team, which arrived in Myanmar on Sunday, aims to press for the release of more political prisoners and for the start of substantive talks between the junta and Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) party. The diplomats met Suu Kyi and other senior NLD leaders at the party's ramshackle Yangon headquarters on Tuesday afternoon. The EU has said it needs to see significant political progress before it reviews its common position on Myanmar -- the bloc imposes sanctions on Myanmar including an arms embargo, a visa ban on senior Myanmar officials, and a ban on all bilateral aid other than strictly humanitarian assistance. Suu Kyi, winner of the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize, was released from 19 months of house arrest in May, raising expectations of political progress. Senior members of the ruling junta have also been holding sporadic meetings with Suu Kyi over the past two years. But the talks have yet to even start addressing substantive political issues, and the junta has held no meetings with Suu Kyi since she was freed from house arrest. Last month, the United Nations special envoy to Myanmar, Razali Ismail, said meaningful talks would begin soon. But since then, hopes of an imminent breakthrough have faded. The EU delegation has also held talks with representatives of major ethnic groups and with government officials, but there have been no meetings yet with senior government leaders. EU sources said the team hoped to meet Lieutenant-General Khin Nyunt, number three in the ruling junta, later on Tuesday, but it was not yet clear whether he would be available. The delegation was due to leave Myanmar in the evening. The visit is the fourth by a EU delegation since 1999. The previous visit, in March, shed little light on the country's murky political machinations. Some senior members of the ruling junta said they were too busy to meet the delegation, and members of the EU team were unable to reveal any fresh insights into Myanmar's political future. Diplomats say the main reason the junta has eased its stance towards Suu Kyi is the dismal state of the economy -- the ruling generals want to get crippling international sanctions lifted. But they say the junta hopes to avoid making any further concessions to Suu Kyi and the NLD. The NLD won Myanmar's last elections, in 1990, by a landslide, but the military refused to hand over power. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Tuesday September 10, 2:45 PM
ASEAN-India to hold first economic meeting KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 10 (AFP) - An inaugural economic meeting between Southeast Asian countries and India in Brunei will explore areas for cooperation in promoting trade and investment, Malaysia's trade minister said. The talks with India will be held on Sunday on the sidelines of a meeting of economic ministers from the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) from September 11 to 15, Rafidah Aziz, minister of international trade and industry, told reporters Tuesday. ASEAN ministers would also hold dialogue meetings with their counterparts from China, Japan, Korea, Australia and New Zealand. Rafidah, who will lead Malaysia's delegation to the talks, said India wants to be part of Southeast Asia's economic dynamism. "We would like to lay down the road map where we are heading. We would like to invite Indian investors to optimise what ASEAN can offer," she said. "The dialogue will allow ASEAN to identify economic potentials in India. Once we start the consultations it will be permanent. We hope it will progress into effective economic collaborations." ASEAN, formed in 1967, groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Suu Kyi tells EU she's neutral
on Myanmar sanctions
YANGON, Sept 10 (AFP) - Myanmar pro-democracy opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi told a visiting European Union delegation Tuesday she was "neutral" towards the crippling economic sanctions imposed on her country. The National League for Democracy leader held more than two hours of "comprehensive talks" with the EU delegation at her party's headquarters, NLD deputies said. Party spokesman U Lwin said the Nobel peace laureate, for years viewed as a key advocate of economic sanctions, believed it was up to outside governments and institutions to formulate their economic policy on Yangon. "Countries do what they feel they have to do," U Lwin quoted Aung San Suu Kyi as saying. "She made no comment for or against the sanctions. She has taken a neutral position in this respect," he added. The EU's first mission to Myanmar since the ruling military junta released Aung San Suu Kyi in May from 19 months of house arrest was aimed at assessing the country's political reform. But when asked if the EU delegation had made any significant progress, U Lwin said: "The EU has only been meeting with salesmen and not with the manager. "So far, the meetings have been with low-level people. How can you consider this to be significant?" The NLD meeting was to be followed by separate EU talks with number three in the Myanmar troika, Lieutenant General Khin Nyunt, a source close to the junta said, but bad weather was preventing Khin Nyunt from returning from an excursion outside the capital and the meeting was facing cancellation. Europe has been among the staunchest advocates of political reconciliation in military-ruled Myanmar, which is subject to crippling sanctions by Brussels and the United States. Experts have said a meeting with Aung San Suu Kyi would help the EU assess whether or not a change in sanctions status should be considered and under what conditions. The popular leader signalled a softening in her position last month when she told visiting Japanese Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi that she would no longer oppose foreign aid to the impoverished country, so long as it clearly benefits the Myanmar people and falls within strict guidelines that ensure its transparency. The delegates were expected to raise the issue of human rights, following allegations by Thai-based Shan ethnic groups that Myanmar's military committed systematic rape and murder. Yangon has dismissed the allegations as "preposterous accusations". The delegation, led by Danish foreign ministry regional director Carsten Nilaus Pederson, lunched Tuesday with diplomats from several embassies, diplomats said. But an afternoon meeting with the Japanese ambassador and other diplomats was scrapped as it conflicted with the possible talks with Khin Nyunt, they said. The three-day visit is the fourth official EU trip to the military-ruled state since 1999. On Monday the delegation met with deputy foreign minister Khin Maung Win, representatives of various ethnic minority groups, and non-government organisations. During the previous EU mission in March, the delegation pushed hard for prisoner releases, including that of Aung San Suu Kyi herself. But that visit ended on a flat note as a meeting with Khin Nyunt was cancelled. The current delegation includes representatives from Denmark, which holds the EU revolving presidency, incoming presidency holders Greece, the European Commission, and the Council Secretariat which services the Council of Ministers. They were due to depart Yangon for Bangkok Tuesday evening. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ASEAN military chiefs meet to
discuss security threats
SINGAPORE, Sept 10 (AFP) - Southeast Asian army chiefs met in Singapore Tuesday to address security challenges emerging in a region where nests of extremists allegedly allied to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network are holed up. Transnational cooperation is more crucial than ever in the post-September 11 period, Singapore's Minister of State for Defence Cedric Foo said in an opening address. The effects of the September 11 strikes in the United States have been far-reaching "and the threat of catastrophic terrorism is a very real one," he said. Foo told the army chiefs from the 10 Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) new approaches were needed to deal with security threats in a region where the Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore have all uncovered cells of militants allegedly linked to al-Qaeda. "The nature of the new terrorism is global in scope and organisation. It requires a re-examination of old approaches and responses," he said. "The events of September 11 have provided an impetus for countries to cooperate more closely." In addition to global terrorism, the region continued to face other security concerns with potential flashpoints in South Asia, the Taiwan Strait and the Korean Peninsula Foo said defense forces now have to also address non-conventional threats, which is "not an area which military forces have traditionally been involved in to any large extent. "The challenge is to re-examine the military's traditional modus operandi, adapt existing doctrines to cope with the new threats, develop new capabilities where needed, and improve coordination with other government agencies to respond effectively." More than 100 delegates from the armies of the 10 ASEAN countries are attending the conference. ASEAN groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Monday September 9, 6:39 PM
Scale of Daewoo's Myanmar Gas Block To Be Known Late '03 SINGAPORE (Dow Jones)--The size of the gas prospect in Daewoo International's exploration block in Myanmar will only be known late next year, after a test well is drilled, a company official said Monday. According to a report in the Myanmar Times last week, the block, near Sittway in Rakhine state, has an estimated reserve of 13.4 trillion to 47.3 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. The report said the block had the potential to be larger than Myanmar's two other producing gas fields at Yadana and Yetagun. "While the amount we expect to discover may be larger than Yadana and Yetagun, the block is still very much in the exploration stage," said an official with the South Korean company. "We are still trying to find the gas. We've already done the seismic survey, and the prospect is quite big," he said. "Until we drill a test well, we won't know how much gas will be there," he added. Daewoo holds a majority stake in the exploration block, also known as Block A1. ONGC Videsh, a unit of India's Oil & Natural Gas Corp. (P.ONG), has a 20% stake, Gas Authority of India holds a 10% stake, while Korea Gas, or KOGAS, has 10%. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Tuesday September 10, 12:33 AM
FTA To Be Proposed At ASEAN Plus 3 Summit - Report WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- Working-level officials of South East Asian Nation (ASEAN) group, China, South Korea and Japan will propose establishing a free trade area that encompasses these countries at their November summit meeting, the daily JoongAng Ilbo reported on its Web site Monday. Quoting an anonymous South Korean government official, the report said ASEAN and the three countries agreed that setting up a free trade zone would be the mid- to long-term goal at their working-level officials' meeting, held in Seoul August 30. The officials also agreed to develop the leaders' forum of the ASEAN plus 3 countries into the "East Asia Summit," the report added. 15 other proposals that include setting up a new regional financial organization were also confirmed by the officials and will be reported to their leaders when they meet in Cambodia at the beginning of November, the report said. "The three countries and ASEAN members finalized these proposals and they will be included in the report to leaders," the official was quoted as saying. Since these proposals have been made after the extensive discussions at working levels, the possibility of their endorsement at the summit and realization is significant, the report said. ASEAN comprises Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ EU mission continues Myanmar
meetings
Mon Sep 9,12:04 PM ET By AYE AYE WIN, Associated Press Writer YANGON, Myanmar - A European Union delegation on a mission to study political developments in Myanmar pursued a whirlwind schedule of meetings with government officials and other organizations Monday. The EU has been one of the strongest critics of the junta, which came to power in 1988 after crushing a pro-democracy movement, and has sent regular missions to Myanmar in an effort to promote democratic reforms. The four-member EU team that arrived Sunday has already met with Deputy Foreign Minister Khin Maung Win, international non-governmental organizations and representatives of ethnic minority political parties and groups, officials said. On Tuesday, it is expected to hold talks with Myanmar's third-ranking leader, Lt. Gen. Khin Nyunt, and separately with Aung San Suu Kyi, who was released in May after 19 months of house arrest. In recent months, the government has eased restrictions on her party, the National League for Democracy, and freed about 300 political prisoners, but the two sides have yet to hold substantive discussions about the country's political future. The EU mission said its visit was intended to speed up the dialogue between the government and Suu Kyi and to press for the release of all political prisoners, according to a representative of an ethnic minority party which met the delegation. The mission is led by Carsten Nilaus Pederson, regional director at the Danish Foreign Ministry. The other members are two EU officials and the first secretary of the Greek Embassy in Bangkok. Greece will take over the EU presidency in January. Their visit will end Tuesday evening. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Daewoo to conduct seismic work
on offshore Myanmar block
Hong Kong (Platts)--10Sep2002 South Korea's Daewoo International is to carry out seismic interpretation, geological survey and prospect evaluation in October or November this year at the A1 block off northwest Myanmar, a company official said Tuesday. "We plan to drill one well in the block in November 2003 so the work we are beginning this October/November will help us decide the best location for the well," he said. Daewoo has "estimated the block's gas potential to be anything in the range of 13.4 to 47.3 Tcf," he said. If the estimated range proves accurate, the field will be larger than Myanmar's two other producing gas fields of Yadana and Yetagun, each of which holds gas reserves of over 5 Tcf. The block, which lies near the Myanmar-Bangladesh border, covers an area of 3,800 sq km, and is Daewoo's only prospect in Myanmar. "We may consider transporting the gas by ship [as LNG] or
through a direct pipeline to India, depending on how much gas is found," the
company official said. "Construction of an LNG plant is possible depending on
how much gas we ultimately produce, but it is too premature to speculate now,"
he added. Daewoo signed a production sharing agreement for the block with
Myanmar's Ministry of Energy in August 2000. Daewoo holds 60% of the block,
while India's Oil and Natural Gas Corp has 20%, and the Gas Authority of India
Ltd and Korea's Kogas each holds a 10% stake.
------------------------------------------------------------------------ Myanmar crime wave linked to
hunger
Ko Thet(The Irrawaddy) Tuesday, September 10, 2002 at 09:30 JST CHIANG MAI, Thailand ? A wave of violent crime appears to be spreading across Myanmar, as the country's crumbling economy continues to drive its poorest citizens to increasingly bold acts of desperation. Sources report that robbery and looting have become rampant in the impoverished satellite towns of Yangon and Mandalay, Myanmar's two largest cities. Elsewhere in the country, there have been reports of travellers being confronted by local people demanding food and money. "A bus on the Rangoon-Mandalay highway was stopped and robbed by hungry-looking villagers near Pyinmana last week," confirmed the assistant manager of a tour agency in Yangon Monday. "Company vehicles have also been targeted," he added. "In some cases, the villagers, including children, stopped vehicles and begged for food and money from bus passengers and private car owners. They didn't steal anything, but they looked so desperate that the motorists were afraid to refuse," he said. The crime wave has even hit relatively prosperous areas of the Myanmar capital, where there have been a rash of reports of daytime looting and break-ins. "In our neighborhood alone, there have been five break-ins since last week," said Myo Lwin, a resident of Yangon's Tamwe township. "In most cases, a group of people knocked on the apartment door and then rushed in when the tenant answered." Similar incidents have occured in nearby Yankin township, he added. News of skyrocketing crime rates comes amid evidence that Myanmar's poor have been hard hit by the recent plunge of the kyat and a concomitant rise in food prices. The kyat was valued at 1,100 kyat to the U.S. dollar Monday, up from all-time lows of 1,200 to the dollar last week. Reliable sources report that in many rural areas, some villagers have nothing to eat except bamboo shoots. Meanwhile, in the Yangon satellite townships of Shwe Pyithar and Hlaing Tharyar, many families have been reduced to eating just a thin rice gruel, or in some cases, just water used in cooking rice. Myanmar's strictly controlled media has been instructed not to report on the recent dramatic rise in hunger-related crimes. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Nation
3 Burmese held for theft of jewellery Published on Sep 10, 2002 Police arrested three Burmese maids on Sunday on suspicion of stealing Bt490,000 worth of valuables from a jeweller just one month after he hired them. The suspects were arrested separately on charges relating to the theft, which occurred on August 21, police said at a press conference yesterday. The three were identified only as Yi, 21, Ra, 26 and Aye, 25. The suspects allegedly stole the valuables, including a Rolex watch worth Bt240,000 and a platinum necklace, from jeweller Songwit Pakdiwuththam. Songwit hired them to do household chores from 6am to 6pm every day for Bt2,000 a month each. In less than two months, according to police, the maids had learned where the valuables were kept in the house and stole them. Following the theft, they sold a gold necklace for Bt24,000 and shared the money among themselves. Later, they split up and went into hiding, police said. Police charged the three with theft and were investigating whether they had entered the country legally. If they had not, police said, they would also face charges of illegal entry. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ BBC - Tuesday, 10
September, 2002, 11:57 GMT 12:57 UK
EU delegates meet Burma's Suu Kyi A delegation from the European Union has met opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi on the final day of a mission aimed at promoting political reconciliation within Burma. It is the first EU visit since Aung San Suu Kyi was released from house arrest in May, and it provides the senior European diplomats with an opportunity to assess what political progress, if any, has been made. No details of the talks with Aung San Suu Kyi, held at her party headquarters in Rangoon, are available. The EU team, which arrived in the Burmese capital on Sunday, is expected to meet the ruling junta's third-ranking leader, Lieutenant-General Khin Nyunt, later on Tuesday. It hopes to speed up the dialogue between the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) and the military regime and to press for prisoner releases. The junta has not held substantive talks with Aung San Suu Kyi since her release. Reviewing restrictions The BBC's Burma analyst, Larry Jagan, says the fact that the EU group will meet the powerful Khin Nyunt shows how seriously the junta is taking this visit. Last time the EU delegates were in Burma, the military leader said he was too busy to meet them. They have already met Deputy Foreign Minister Khin Maung Win, international non-governmental organisations and representatives of ethnic minority parties in Burma. But our correspondent says that the EU officials are not optimistic that this latest mission will produce any serious concessions from the junta. A senior EU official told the BBC that the minimum movement required for the Union to ease its stringent restrictions on Burma would be a meeting between Aung San Suu Kyi and a senior general to discuss a tentative agenda for political talks. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Small portion of people use
banks in Myanmar
YANGON, Sept. 10 (Xinhuanet) - Only one million people, or 2 percent of the population of 50 million in Myanmar, use banks, the local Myanmar Times reported in its latest weekly issue. The report quoted a major private bank official, U Aik Htun, as saying that there is still a major portion of people who are yet to use the banking institutions. There are 20 private and five state-owned banks in Myanmar, offering 10 percent annual interest rate on deposits and charging 15 percent on loans under the government regulations. Meanwhile, under Myanmar's Control of Money laundering Law enacted last June, banks are given rights to inspect financial records, make copies, and seize money and property allegedly obtained by illegal means. At the same time, the banks can not, without the approval of the Central Control Board, release or transfer money and property allegedly obtained by illegal means during investigations, according to the law. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Chinese state councilor meets Myanmar
guests
BEIJING, Sept. 9 (Xinhuanet) - Chinese State Councilor and Secretary-General of the State Council Wang Zhongyu met in Beijing on Monday with Than Nyun, chairman of the Myanmar Civil Service Selection and Training Board, and his party. The Myanmar guests are here at the invitation of the Ministry of Personnel. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ |