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BURMA RELATED NEWS
- September 30, 2002.
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HEADLINES
------------------------------------------------------------------------ Reuters - U.S. attack on Iraq may
blunt Asia's war on terror
Reuters - Gesture, not reform, seen
from Downer Myanmar trip
AP - Japan extends development aid to
Myanmar
AP - Tensions rise at Myanmar border
after shelling, guerrilla attack
AFP - Rockets fired into Thailand
from Myanmar: border police
The Guardian - Burma group targets
PwC and Kuoni
The Australian - Rights on Burma's
agenda
The Australian - Editorial: Isolation won't work
with Burma
News Scotsman - Mugabe's Zimbabwe fast
becoming Africa's Burma ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Monday September 30, 8:49 PM
U.S. attack on Iraq may blunt Asia's war on terror By Dan Eaton BANGKOK (Reuters) - A U.S. attack on Iraq would fan the flames of anti-Americanism in Southeast Asia, making cooperation in the war on terror more difficult and secretive, analysts and officials say. A war with Iraq, which the United States says is gathering weapons of mass destruction, would force leaders into delicate balancing acts in a region home to Muslim militants, including al Qaeda operatives fleeing Afghanistan and Pakistan, they say. There are Muslims throughout Southeast Asia, the huge majority of them moderate. Indonesia is the world's most populous Muslim country, while Malaysia and Brunei are also mostly Muslim. Singapore, the Philippines, Thailand, Myanmar and Cambodia all have minority Islamic communities. An attack on Iraq would put many leaders in Southeast Asia, who have publicly declared solidarity with the United States in its post-September 11 war on terror, in a tight spot, says Amris Hassan, a member of parliament in secular Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri's party. "It will put President Megawati in a very difficult and delicate position regarding the Islamic movement and organisations here," Hassan, who chairs a parliamentary sub commission of foreign affairs and lectures at the University of Indonesia, told Reuters by telephone. "She has to walk a tightrope, and it's very difficult. There is now more and more so-called Islamic propaganda in Indonesia saying the U.S. is siding with Israel, the Jews, against Muslims." That has created an uncomfortable feeling among Indonesian Muslims in general, he said. Others agree, including Singapore Senior Minister Lee Kwan Yew, who said last month the United States ran the risk of radicalising Southeast Asia's moderate Muslims. "It would increase the domestic pressure in countries in Southeast Asia," said Amitav Acharya, deputy director of the Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies (IDSS) in Singapore. "It will make it most difficult for those countries to support the United States as openly in the war on terror with public displays of solidarity like arrests." But those arrests are likely to keep coming, given the economic and political influence of the United States. "The U.S. has other means of persuading those countries to continue to cooperate," said Magnus Ranstorp, an expert at the Centre for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence at St Andrews University in Scotland. And although the occasional al Qaeda suspect is dug up and handed to U.S. interrogators, "most of those arrested are from local groups seen as a threat to Southeast Asian governments", said a Western diplomat based in Bangkok. A SECRET WAR There is a large dose of domestic politics involved in recent highly publicised arrests, particularly in Malaysia and Singapore, where concerns have been raised that leaders are using the war on terror as a pretext to clamp down on dissent. "Asian governments see these elements as a threat to national security, so there will be a degree of common interest, but it will have to be done very secretly," said the IDSS's Acharya. "So far the intelligence sharing, to the extent it exists, has been very secretive, and it will become even more so." The highly publicised successes in recent weeks -- dozens of arrests of Islamic militants in Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and the Philippines -- could become a thing of the past. And with all the focus on Iraq, as the United States tries to muster support for an attack, there will be even less pressure for other countries to act in the war on terror. Countries such as Thailand -- one of Washington's oldest allies in the region, which has declared solidarity but has yet to arrest a single suspect amid fears of damaging its tourism industry -- would have less incentive to do anything. The same would go for countries less close to the United States, such as Myanmar and Vietnam. "One of the problems is it is going to obscure the necessity to fight the war on terrorism," said Ranstorp. "The war on Iraq will become the number one issue." ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Monday September 30, 3:22 PM
Gesture, not reform, seen from Downer Myanmar trip By Chris Johnson BANGKOK, Sept 30 (Reuters) - Australia's foreign minister travels to Myanmar this week for talks with the ruling generals and opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi but diplomats do not expect a major a breakthrough in efforts to promote democracy. Alexander Downer's trip, the most senior by a Western politician for many years, is being billed as a fact-finding mission by Australia, which has long taken a more conciliatory approach to Myanmar than the United States or European countries. The October 2-3 visit may conclude with a minor bilateral announcement, perhaps on educational programmes or exchanges, and probably a carefully crafted statement from the ruling generals about their commitment to eventual democracy, they say. "We can expect some cosmetic change -- window dressing -- but we can't expect the Australian government to succeed in bringing democratic change in Myanmar when so many others have failed," said Min Zin of the Thai-based Irrawaddy magazine, run by exiles. Myanmar's opposition has welcomed Downer's visit as an attempt to open dialogue with the military that has ruled the country, formerly known as Burma, for the last four decades. But it is increasingly doubtful that the ruling generals have any intention to move towards democracy and relinquish power. Hopes for change were raised in May when Nobel Peace laureate Suu Kyi, leader of the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) was released from 19 months of house arrest. The NLD won Myanmar's last democratic elections in 1990 but has never been allowed to govern. Suu Kyi's release was brokered by United Nations special envoy Razali Ismail, who has said that meaningful talks on the country's political future could begin soon. NO TALKS But there have been no talks and even a visit by Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, who is reported to have close personal ties with some members of the ruling military, failed to produce a breakthrough. "If neither Mahathir and Razali can pull anything off, it is difficult to see anyone else being successful," said a Yangon-based Western diplomat. Australia is playing down expectations, saying meetings between Downer and Senior General Than Shwe and other members of the ruling State Peace and Development Council should at least produce warmer relations between the two countries. The visit is the first by an Australian government minister to the Southeast Asian nation since 1983. "It is more a sounding out," an Australian government spokesman said in Canberra last week. Suu Kyi, due to meet Downer on Wednesday, is desperate to begin meaningful talks with the military, NLD sources say. She last week issued a remarkably conciliatory statement to try to woo the military into dialogue and will hope Downer will put additional pressure on the military to talk to her. But her overtures appear to be falling on deaf ears. Diplomats say junta leader Than Shwe opposes any move towards democracy now and believes Myanmar can engage the outside world without committing itself to reform. Than Shwe appears to be firmly in control of the country following a trial of members of the family of former dictator Ne Win, which ended last week with death sentences for all four accused on charges of masterminding an attempted coup. "Than Shwe is consolidating his power and wants to slow down any progress towards change, at least for while," said Min Zin. "Outside pressure is not going to make a difference." ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Japan extends development aid
to Myanmar
YANGON, Myanmar (AP) _ Japan signed agreements Monday to give Myanmar 746 million yen (US$6.2 million) for scholarships and forestry projects, the Japanese Embassy announced. The agreements were signed in Yangon by Japanese Ambassador Yuji Miyamoto and Soe Tha, Myanmar's minister for national planning and economic planning. Of the total, 480 million yen (US$4 million) will be used for forestry projects in the dry zones of central Myanmar. The remaining 266 million yen (US$2.2 million) will be set aside for Myanmar nationals to obtain Masters degrees in Japan under a Human Resources Development scholarship project, the Japanese Embassy said in a statement. Japan resumed grants to Myanmar earlier this year after withholding them following the ruling military junta's violent 1988 crackdown on pro-democracy protests and its refusal to hand over power to an elected government. In April, Japan granted Myanmar 792 million yen to purchase medical equipment for hospitals in the nation's capital, Yangon. Before 1988, Japan's grants to Myanmar, then called Burma, made up 60 percent of all foreign aid and grants to the country. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Tensions rise at Myanmar
border after shelling, guerrilla attack
MAE SOT, Thailand (AP) _ Shelling from Myanmar damaged three houses in a Thai village near the border between the Southeast Asian neighbors, injuring one man, Thai officials said Monday. The incident threatened to bring simmering tensions between Thailand and Myanmar to a boil. Thai officials said they were lodging a protest with Myanmar's Embassy in Bangkok. It was unclear why the mortar shells were fired Sunday night into Mae Kokkin village in Thailand's Tak Province. The shelling took place same area where ethnic minority guerrillas in Myanmar on attacked a government-held base on Friday. Five mortar shells landed in the village, slightly damaging a car in addition to the houses. The injured villager was identified as Nau Mar Meikun, a 47-year-old man. The border was closed by Myanmar authorities in May amid accusations that the Thai army was assisting anti-government guerrillas in Myanmar. Guerrillas belonging to Myanmar's Karen ethnic minority on Friday attacked a base they said was shared by the Myanmar army and its ethnic guerrilla ally, the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army, or DKBA. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Rockets fired into Thailand
from Myanmar: border police
MAE SOT, Thailand, Sept 30 (AFP) - Several rockets were fired into Thailand from Myanmar, injuring at least one Thai villager and forcing the evacuation of homes and temples, police and rebel sources said Monday. The shells were fired into Ban Mae Kokine village in western Tak province around 9:30pm (1430GMT) Sunday, leaving one man injured by flying shrapnel and damaging seven houses, a border police officer told AFP. The officer said the attack was likely a salvo from the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), a militant group aligned with Myanmar's ruling military junta, aimed at intimidating Thai forces who had been firing on drug smugglers. "We were monitoring the situation on drugs and then we met up with some members of a drug gang. We exchange fire for 10 minutes before heavy fire from the DKBA with rockets and bullets went on to the Thai side," he said. "Drug smugglers know that we have teams hiding near the border waiting to make drug arrests, so they ask for help from the DKBA to fire into Thailand to make Thai officials run out the area," he added. However, a spokesman for the Karen National Union (KNU), which regularly clashes with Myanmar troops in the area, said government forces had fired the shells during a battle with the ethnic army. KNU secretary Mahn Nyine Maung said they engaged in a 20-minute firefight with Myanmar troops before the Thai village was attacked. One government soldier was killed during the confrontation, he said. "Usually when the Burmese and Karen fight, the Burmese soldiers open fire on the Thai side," he said, adding that this was designed to create misunderstandings between Thai authorities and ethnic groups. Thai border task force commander Colonel Saksin Klansanoh said some 60 Thai army commandos secured the area and continued to patrol there on Monday. Some 130 villagers and monks were evacuated from their homes and temples Sunday but were allowed to return to their homes early Monday under army protection. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Burma group targets PwC and
Kuoni
Terry Macalister Monday September 30, 2002 The Guardian Human rights campaigners, fresh from their apparent success in forcing Premier Oil to withdraw from Burma, are targeting accountancy firm PricewaterhouseCoopers and the Kuoni Travel business in Britain. The Burma Campaign said these were two of a number of companies that would be put on a "dirty list" to be published this autumn as part of a wider campaign against those who do business with the military-run country. PwC is said by the Burma Campaign to be offering advice through a local accountancy firm to companies setting up in Burma. The accountancy group does not have a subsidiary in the country but activists believe the work it does encourages links with Burma. The company said last night that it would "look into these claims" but could make no further comment. Kuoni is based in Switzerland and has holiday business interests in Britain including Kuoni Travel in Dorking, plus House of Specialists and Voyages Jules Verne in London. It also controls Alp Air Holdings in Jersey but its main involvement in Burma comes through a Pandaw and Pagodas cruise operation it runs to Rangoon and Mandalay. The Burma Campaign said it had called on Kuoni to halt its connections with the country but the company denied it had received any such correspondence. "If they do contact us we will listen to what they have to say," a Kuoni spokeswoman said. "We have operated there for a number of years but we do not push it or promote it as a destination." Mark Farmaner, a spokesman for the Burma Campaign in Britain, said he was confident of bringing Kuoni out of Burma. "So far we have a 100% success rate with our campaigns." ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Australian Rights on Burma's
agenda
By Kimina Lyall, Southeast Asia correspondent September 30, 2002 FOREIGN Minister Alexander Downer could use his visit to Burma this week to persuade the ruling junta to expand Australia's human rights workshops to military officers and National League for Democracy members. The move would help to increase the controversial program's credibility among Burmese human rights activists. Efforts already have begun to convince NLD leader Aung San Suu Kyi ? a critic of the workshops ? to support such a plan. The proposal is one in a series of options about the next phase of the program, formally presented to the regime recently, The Australian has learned. It is not set down for any discussions between Mr Downer and the officials he will meet in Rangoon on Wednesday, including a possible meeting with the top brass, General Than Shwe. But it has been Australia's longstanding ? and, so far, not public ? aim to train "both sides" of the military-NLD divide, and Mr Downer would undoubtedly welcome any opportunity to put that case. The proposal is unlikely to be implemented in the near future, as it requires not only the support of Aung San Suu Kyi, whom Mr Downer will also meet, but also the junta, which is reluctant to take further steps to empower the NLD. A more likely immediate expansion is an agreement to design highly specialised training targeted at specific bureaucrats. Aung San Suu Kyi has long been opposed to the workshops, arguing that as they only involve mid-ranking civil servants, they do not target perpetrators of human rights abuses. After the completion of the most recent workshop, the ninth since they were introduced in 2000, she lunched with Australian ambassador Trevor Wilson and the two workshop conveners, Sydney barrister Kate Eastman and Melbourne academic Sarah Joseph, at the ambassador's residence. She is understood to have retained her objections, but was open to the expansion idea as a hypothetical ? provided it included the military. The current course has introduced international law to 250 people, who, during the workshop, identify and commit to implementing a project in their workplace. The designer of the workshops, former Human Rights and Equal Opportunity commissioner Chris Sidoti, said his initial concern was that the regime would use them as an excuse to do nothing more on human rights. "But there is no indication that has happened," he said. The human rights workshops are the most controversial face of Australia's "limited engagement" policy towards Burma. That policy will enter a stronger phase on Wednesday when Mr Downer lands in Rangoon. It will be his first visit to Burma since he was a seven-year-old accompanying his father, Sir Alexander, then immigration minister, on an official visit. It will also be the first visit of an Australian foreign affairs minister since Bill Hayden included Burma on a sweep of southeast Asia in 1983. He spoke then of establishing "goodwill" with Burma to build a "productive political association". Since then, the ruling generals have backed themselves into an isolationist corner when an outraged world responded to their decision not to recognise 1990 elections that should have swept the NLD to power. European Union and US foreign policy since has imposed crippling economic sanctions, with the US even refusing to appoint an ambassador in Rangoon. "I've never thought that the Anglo-American policy of freezing them out was workable," Mr Downer told The Australian. "I never thought isolating them and having no contact with them was likely to lead anywhere and I don't think it has led anywhere. "I will tell them: 'We wish the best for the Burmese people, but without political reform, there's not much anyone can do,' " he said. Australia's policy is unique in the West, but aligned with Japan and ASEAN countries' attitudes to the ruling State Peace and Development Council. There is at least one, perhaps coincidental, sign that Australia has some sway. In July, when local human rights groups revealed 625 instances of rapes by Burmese army officers in the eastern Shan state, the junta reacted with typically angry denials. At their briefing of diplomats about the report, ambassador Wilson rose to his feet and suggested they invite UN human rights rapporteur Paulo Pinheiro to conduct an independent investigation. Last week, the SPDC announced it would do just that. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The
Australian
Editorial: Isolation won't work with Burma September 30, 2002 WHILE Australia's engagement with Burma has been less intense than that of many other countries, we have, nonetheless, remained in contact with a regime others refuse even to talk to. It is true the junta that overwhelmed the election of the National League for Democracy in 1990 has been consistently authoritarian and often brutal in its treatment of those with opposing political opinions. Aung San Suu Kyi, however, in spite of being under house arrest for much of the past decade, and seeing her democratic movement hobbled by the junta, has taken a similar line to our own Government. She has been ready to parley but without compromise. Her high profile has not only gained her the Nobel Peace prize in 1991, but the resolute loyalty of her supporters. Some have even paid the supreme sacrifice for their faith in eventual freedom, losing their lives in the democratic struggle. So it is both appropriate and encouraging that Alexander Downer should be visiting the torchbearer of freedom in Burma, as well as the ruling generals. As the first visit by an Australian foreign minister for almost 20 years, it carries real significance. The Government's "limited engagement" policy, much criticised as a form of weakness by diehard critics, leaves a way open for the sort of dialogue that offers some hope of compromise and reconciliation. After all, the isolation of Aung San Suu Kyi has been deleterious to progress, but so has the rejection of any dialogue with the generals. Painted into a corner by their own actions, a more open path offers some hope of accommodation. If the junta has often been intransigent, it has also sought to legitimise its position with the ASEAN powers, with some measure of success. After all, these countries have their own fears of instability and disorder, compounded by the threats and complexities of the war against terrorism. The junta has been able to use such fears to justify draconian law and order policies. If the effectiveness of UN interventions are often in question, this is one situation where the UN has been instrumental in forwarding the possibility of reconciliation and the return of real democratic norms. The hopeful signs are the apparent readiness of the ruling Peace and Development Council to embrace talks with the opposition as a signal of the need for change. There is a long way to go. It takes some time for the leopard to change its spots, and it is unlikely the generals, having tasted and exercised power for more than a decade, will suddenly embrace reform. Nonetheless, it is in their collective interest to come to terms with the widespread demand for the introduction of real democracy. Aung San Suu Kyi can also act as some sort of guarantee of the generals' own safety, as they are inevitably the targets of future retaliation. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ News Scotsman
Mugabe's Zimbabwe fast becoming Africa's Burma Benedict Rogers THIS week the Australian prime minister, John Howard, was unsuccessful in his efforts to have Zimbabwe suspended from the Commonwealth at the so-called Troika meeting at Abuja in Nigeria. The other two Troika leaders present - from South Africa and Nigeria - said the panel should give Mugabe another six months to improve human rights, promote political reconciliation and cooperate with a UN land reform programme - before considering suspending Zimbabwe. We have seen the results of such prevarication before. Robert Mugabe?s Zimbabwe is rapidly becoming Africa?s Burma. The parallels are uncanny. Both regimes came unstuck after they cast aside the old colonial names for their nations, with Burma becoming Myanmar and Rhodesia becoming Zimbabwe. Along with their names, both jettisoned a tradition of efficient government under an apolitical civil service in favour of a version of bureaucratic socialism. Now both countries are run by paranoid dictators whose madness has wrecked their economies and killed thousands of people. Just as Burma was once Asia?s rice bowl, Zimbabwe was the bread basket of Africa. In 1980, the year Mugabe overthrew white rule, inflation stood at 3 per cent, while the economy was growing by 10 per cent. Now, inflation is rapidly spiralling upwards and food prices have risen by 150 per cent in the past year. Most economists predict a fall in gross domestic product of 12 per cent this year - the largest in Zimbabwe?s history. In the last three years, Zimbabwe has moved from being a net exporter of food to a situation where today most of all food consumed has to be imported. Burma, under a similarly megalomaniac leader, Ne Win, went through a comparable economic collapse. In 1947, when the British gave Burma its independence, the country was the greatest exporter of rice in the world. By 1988, it was one of the ten poorest countries in the world and a net importer of rice. Mugabe?s violent onslaught against the white farmers is akin to the Burmese junta?s persecution of the ethnic minorities. Compare the white farmers in Zimbabwe with, for example, the Karen in Burma. Both were prosperous minority groups that valued education highly. According to Pascal Khoo Thwe, from the Kayan Padaung ethnic minority in Burma, in his recent book From the Land of Green Ghosts, Ne Win?s regime was "marked by hostility to educated people". The same could be said of Mugabe. Ne Win adopted an isolationist, anti-colonialist stance, and associated the ethnic minorities with being pro-British. That is precisely Mugabe?s language against the white farmers. Ne Win?s stated ideal was to "end the exploitation of man by man." There are echoes of this in Mugabe?s programme of forcibly removing the white farmers and redistributing farmland to Zimbabwe?s black majority. The only problem, in both cases, is that however equitable the theory sounds, in practice the only beneficiaries are the leaders? cronies. In Burma, Pascal Khoo Thwe writes, the result was "a sort of voodoo socialism, composed of little more than slogans". Senior Burmese army officers "embarked on a campaign of national plunder", profiting from the jade mines and opium trade. The news that Mugabe?s wife has appropriated a farm and ordered its elderly owners off is yet more confirmation that he and his thugs, too, have embarked on a campaign of national plunder. Like Burma, Zimbabwe is now a country in which one is likely to go to jail for speaking out against the regime. The former leader of Zimbabwe?s civil service union, Ephraim Tapa, now in exile in Britain, said last month: "If I go back, I would be dead within hours." Most Burmese in exile and Karen and Karenni refugees in camps along the Thai-Burma border know that feeling only too well. Yet another parallel is the fact that even given the oppression of minorities, the majority peoples still suffer. In Zimbabwe, more than 150,000 black farm workers have already lost their livelihoods and possessions. Some have lost their lives. Last month, Mugabe ordered the eviction of a further 2,900 farmers, out of 4,500 remaining - which, when farm workers and families are taken into account, will involve up to 1.2 million people. There is cause for concern about the use of international aid to both countries. In both Zimbabwe and Burma, distribution of food supplies risks being hijacked and siphoned off to the armed forces and supporters of the regime. Both Mugabe and the Burmese junta are illegitimate regimes. In Burma, the seizure of power was unashamedly blatant. Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy won over 80 per cent of the parliamentary seats in 1990, yet the military refused to recognise the result. She has been in and out of house arrest ever since. In Zimbabwe, Mugabe stands accused of rigging the presidential elections earlier this year. He subjected his principal opponent, Morgan Tsvangirai, of the Movement for Democratic Change, to constant harassment and, on occasion, arrest. The biggest point that Zimbabwe and Burma have in common is the impotence of the international community. In both cases, economic sanctions and boycotts have been piling up. But these actions are token and involve little effort or sacrifice. It is time for the democratic world to take a stand and take bold, even risky, action to end the murderers? reign of terror. Such action should not just involve the West. The neighbours of these two tyrannies need to end their complicity. Zimbabwe?s African neighbours have been at best weak and at worst supportive of Mugabe?s thuggish behaviour. There are fears that his land redistribution policy will be copied in Namibia. South Africa so far has been unwilling to act, despite having considerable leverage over Zimbabwe, because it provides most of the country?s energy supplies. Similarly with Burma, instead of being sidelined it has been welcomed into the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and has even been able to bully its smaller neighbours, as in the case of its veto of newly independent East Timor?s application for observer status. Thailand, while providing shelter for refugees from Burma, is too nervous to do anything to upset the junta; China arms Rangoon to the teeth; Indonesia and the Philippines stay silent. Opposition groups in Zimbabwe have demanded armed UN intervention to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe. Ethnic minorities in Burma ask for the same. Ephraim Tapa said recently that "there is not much Zimbabweans can do. We need outside help now." So do the Karen and Karenni, and indeed the pro-democracy movement in Burma. "Governments talk openly about overthrowing Saddam Hussein. Why not Mugabe?" says Mr Tapa. And why not the Burmese junta? Do Burma and Zimbabwe not merit inclusion in the "axis of evil"? They may not be a direct threat to the West in the way Iran, Iraq and North Korea are, but they are no less evil in their slaughter of their own people and may spread instability to their neighbours. So, on the road to Baghdad, Mr Bush, don?t forget about Rangoon and Harare. (Benedict Rogers is a director of the human-rights organisation Christian Solidarity Worldwide. A version of this article appeared in the Wall Street Journal.) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ |