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(1) 10 houses gutted by frie
in Arakan (in Burmese)
(2)
(3)
(4) Shan party seeks release of its arrested leaders
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Note: For Burmese story please read in web www.bnionline.net
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Reporter: Hawkeye
February 15
Lieutenant-General Thein Sein, chairman of the National Convention
Convening Commission, and Colonel Sao Gaifah,
general secretary of the
Shan State Peace Council, were at loggerheads with each
other yesterday
in
ceasefire sources from northern
When Sao Gaifah informed Thein Sein, in no uncertain
terms, that the
SSPC's two principal member
groups, Shan State Army "North" and Shan
State National Army, were boycotting the next round of the
National
Convention due on Thursday, Feb.17, the latter's response
was reportedly
blunt. "We'll manage without
you," he was reported as saying. "Remember,
if we could do it to our Gen Khin
Nyunt, so could we to your Hkun Htun
Oo and Hso Ten.
What matters is you toe our line, when you're with us."
General Khin Nyunt, former prime minister and spy chief, was
incarcerated on Oct. 18. "The
SPDC (State Peace and Development Council,
the Burmese military's highest
group) will be held responsible for
whatever is going to happen,"
said the highly-placed source from the
Sino-Burma border.
A joint statement on the latest political developments by
several
ceasefire groups that arrived in
Convention is expected
sometime today.
Both junta and Shan forces in northern
alert since the arrest Feb. 9 of Maj-Gen Hso Ten, chairman of the
Shan
State Peace Council; Hkun Htun Oo, president of the Shan Nationalities
League for Democracy; and others.
There are seven brigades under the command of the SSPC. The
First
Brigade, under the command of Col. Panghfah,
with 2,800 men fully armed,
is regarded as the strongest.
Meanwhile,
Htun Oo has been its technical
representative since 1984, has been
ordered to suspend its operations.
The order came from the
Communications, Postal and Telegraph
Ministry yesterday.
"We are worried," said a family source. "Both
Hkun Htun Oo and Sai
Nood his secretry,
also known as Sai Nyunt Lwin)
have not been heard
since they were taken."
++++++++++
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Mungpi
Mizzima News (www.mizzima.com)
Indian intellectuals demanded today that
movement.
"
junta. So, reverse the policy again
in favor of the restoration of
democracy," Bibhuti Bhushan Nandy, a former Government of India
additional minister told Mizzima at the end of a one-day seminar on
Problems of Restoration of Democracy and Human Rights in
Kolkata.
The seminar, jointly organized by the Centre for Research in
Indo-Bangladesh Relations (CRIBR), Kolkata ,and the Mizzima News, New
both the Indian government and
people in helping restore democracy in
Speaking at the seminar, editor-in-chief
of The Statesman newspaper.
C. R. Irani condemned the Burmese
military junta for detaining Nobel
laureate Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and
other political prisoners in
Other speakers in the seminar also highlighted the failure
of Indian
government attempt to deal with the
Burmese Military generals in terms
of trade and commerce, and how
business investments by multinational
companies in
Citing past Yadana gas pipeline
projects of Unocal in the
Total in
violations, Nai Kasauh
Mon, director of the Human Rights Foundation of
Monland, said
extraction of natural gas from
consequences of human rights
violations in
areas where ethnic minorities live.
"We want the people of
right time to buy natural gas from
only strengthen the military junta
and will not benefit the people.
Therefore,
from
Kasauh Mon said.
Held at the Indian Institute of Chemical Engineers, Jadavpur
University Campus, Kolkata, the
seminar unanimously agreed to form an
India-Burma people's friendship society in Kolkata to promote good
relations between people of the two
countries and to work for the cause
of restoration of democracy and
human rights in
It is also further recommended that Indian parliamentarians
and
legislators, cutting across
political lines, should form an all
parliamentary caucus to pressure
the Indian government to back democracy
and human rights in
proposed caucus should create
awareness about developments in
closely interact with similar
parliamentary caucuses on
and
and western countries.
A ministerial meeting between
security issues was held at
+++++++
Shan party seeks
release of its arrested leaders
================================================
Reporter: Hawkeye
February 15
Members of the Shan Nationalities League for Democracy
(SNLD), who were
in
meeting, have jointly requested
freedom for their leaders arrested last
week, a member reported from the
border.
The petition, signed by SNLD vice president Sao Moe Kyi, MP
of
Mongpan, was sent by "special
mail" to Senior General Than Shwe
yesterday, said the source, who
asked to remain unnamed. However, he was
not yet able to provide a copy of
the letter.
All of the participants left
Meanwhile, more than 20 staff members of
Service in
they need not return to their
office on
Kyauktada township
anymore. It had been managed by Hkun Htoon Oo's son,
Hkun Oo Lwin,
26, since his father's arrest last week.
***End***
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