13 Baron Close

2 April 2005

Mme. Benita Ferrero-Waldner

Commissioner

External Relations and European Neighbourhood Policy

European Commission

Rue de la Loi 170

1049 Brussels

Fax: +32-2-20-81-299

Re: Burma Day 2005

Dear Commissioner Ferrero-Waldner,

It has been drawn to my attention that a letter to you from the General-Secretaries of the IFTUC, the ETUC and the WCL, dated 31 March 2005, concerning the report that I wrote with Mr. Morten Pedersen for the Commission, has been posted on the IFTUC website. While normally I do not become involved in verbal exchanges over my writings, allowing them to stand or fall on their merits, and seeing no advantage in using invective in place of reason, I feel that perhaps I should explain to you in this instance my understanding of what is at issue.

Though I have never previously been invited to a European Union function, I assume the same principles of open and fair exchange of views are the norm as in any serious public policy forum. There are sincerely held and passionately expressed views on the question of how to achieve political reconciliation and democratisation in Burma. My views, which I believe are based on an informed analysis of South East Asian politics over a forty year career as a student of the subject, are by no means in the majority of those normally expressed most vehemently in the media. I am not seeking popularity; I am seeking the end of military rule and civil strife in Burma. Indeed, the complexities of the situation in Burma are such as to make intelligent discussion of them impossible by sound bite.

The letter to which I refer accuses me of being an “apologist” for the Burmese military regime. This arises from my efforts to attempt to understand and explain what motivates the military in Burma, a subject on which I was writing and publishing long before Burma became an international political issue following the tragedies of 1988 and 1990. The army officer corps’ understanding of their country’s post-independence history, including the experience of both democratic and authoritarian governments in confronting ethnically and Communist motivated insurgencies and various foreign interventions starting from the 1950s, has created a strongly nationalist worldview. I have always felt that unless one tries to understand the position of the army, or any political actor, one can not understand what motivates them to behave as they do. Without understanding what motivates them, it is possible to approach them with inappropriate, if not counter-productive, policies.

Attention is drawn in the letter to an alleged interview I am said to have given presumably in mid-March to the BBC, although it may have been last year sometime, and then cited in The New Light of Myanmar on 22 March 2005. I was in Japan the previous week participating in a conference on Burma at the Hiroshima Peace University and prior to then in Singapore where I have been for the past months a Senior Visiting Research Fellow of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies. I do not recall having spoken to anyone at the BBC since 2004 when I was last in London. Having now looked at the article in question, and assuming it is based on an interview I gave to the Burmese service, translated into Burmese, and then back into English, I find that I am not quoted but the author writes that “as much as I remember” these were Professor Taylor’s views. Hardly a reliable source for what I may have said. I would note, however, that the subject of the 1990 election has become one of the least fully understood, but emotionally charged, historical events in recent Burmese history. The 60 per cent majority which the NLD received in the election was a clear indication of public opinion at that time.

Our report does not, as alleged, call for the removal of EU sanctions. Such an act at this time would indeed be counter-productive. We do suggest, however, that the EU Common Position on Burma/Myanmar would be more effective if the sanctions were refined, given clear benchmarks, and directed at what hurts the regime and not the people.

I enclose an abridged CV for your information.

Yours sincerely,

Robert H. Taylor

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Curriculum Vitae

Prof. ROBERT H. TAYLOR

South East Asian Affairs Consultant,

Member, Immigration Appeals Tribunal, Department of Constitutional Affairs,

Associate Senior Fellow, Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (Singapore)

Address: E-mail: [email protected]

Personal: Date of birth: 15 March l943

Marital status: Married, two adult children

Citizenship: British

Education: PhD in Government, June, l974, Cornell University

MA in Social Sciences, June, l967, Antioch College

BA in Government, June, l965, Ohio University

Academic Career:

2004-2005 Visiting Senior Research Fellow, Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore

2003-2004 Visiting Senior Research Fellow, Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore

2002-2005 Professorial Research Associate, Centre of South East Asian Studies, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London

1997-2000 Vice-Chancellor and Professor of International Studies, University of Buckingham

1980-1996 School of Oriental and African Studies, Professor of Politics in the University of London, from October, l989; Senior Lecturer in Politics with reference to South East Asia, October, l988 to September, l989; Lecturer in Politics with reference to South East Asia, January, l980 to October, l988

1974-1979 University of Sydney, New South Wales, Lecturer in Government, March, l974 to December, l979

1967-1969 Wilberforce University, Wilberforce, Ohio, Instructor in Political Science, September, l967 to August, l969

1965-1967 Cardozo High School, Washington, D. C., social studies teacher, September, l965 to June, l967

Management Experience and Consultancies:

Immigration Appeals Tribunal, Department of Constitutional Affairs, HMG, Part-time Lay Member, 2003—

Premier Oil, Consultant on Myanmar affairs, 2001-2003

Melveney and Myers llp¸Expert witness on Myanmar

University of Buckingham, Vice-Chancellor and Chief Executive Officer, 1997--2000

School of Oriental and African Studies, Pro-Director, 1992 -- 1996

Major Publications:

Monographs:

1. The State in Burma. London: C. Hurst; Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press; Hyderabad: Orient Longman, l987.

2. Marxism and Resistance in Burma, l942-l945: Thein Pe Myint's 'Wartime Traveler'. Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, Southeast Asia Translation Series No. IV, l984.

3. An Undeveloped State: The Study of Burma's Politics. Melbourne: Monash University Centre of Southeast Asian Studies Working Paper No. 28, April l983.

4. The Foreign and Domestic Consequences of the KMT Intervention in Burma. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Southeast Asia Program Data Paper No. 93, July l973.

Joint Author:

1. Norman Owen, et al., The Emergence of Modern Southeast Asia: A New History. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2005

2. David Joel Steinberg, et al., In Search of Southeast Asia: A Modern History. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, revised edition, l987.

Editor:

1. The Idea of Freedom in Asia and Africa. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002.

2. Burma: Political Economy under Military Rule. London: Hurst, 2001.

3. The Politics of Elections in Southeast Asia. New York and Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996.

4. Handbooks of the Modern World: Asia and the Pacific. Two volumes, New York and Oxford: Facts on File, l991.

Joint Editor:

1. (with Kyaw Yin Hlaing and Tin Maung Maung Than) Myanmar: Beyond Politics to Social Imperatives. Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, forthcoming, 2005.

2. (with Mark Hobart) Context, Meaning and Power in Southeast Asia. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Southeast Asia Program, l986.

3. (with P. C. I. Ayre) ASEAN-EC Economic and Political Relations. London: External Services Division, School of Oriental and African Studies, l986.