Japan Presses Burma on Democratization, Shooting of Journalist

Text of report in English by Japan's largest news agency Kyodo
Singapore, 22 July: Japanese Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura met Myanmar Foreign Minister Nyan Win bilaterally on Tuesday [22 July] to press for thorough investigations into the September shooting of a Japanese journalist in Yangon and urge the junta to move forward with democratization.



The talks in Singapore came on the heels of a joint communique by ASEAN foreign ministers on Monday [21 July] that urged Myanmar [Burma] to free all political detainees and explicitly named detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi for the first time since 2003.

Meeting on the sidelines of a series of ASEAN-hosted ministerial talks, Komura is also likely to repeat calls for the junta to open access for foreign aid personnel to assist reconstruction efforts after the May cyclone devastation and improve transparency for aid received.

Japan and Myanmar remain far apart over the circumstances in which Japanese video journalist Kenji Nagai was shot when he was filming the junta's crackdown on pro-democracy protests in Yangon in September. Myanmar insists he was shot by a stray bullet and not from close range, as Japan claims.

Myanmar has repeatedly said that while the death was regrettable, the incident was "accidental." Japan has continued to press for the return of Nagai's video camera and other belongings but to no avail.

On Monday, Nyan Win said Suu Kyi's detention will expire towards the end of next year and that his fellow ASEAN ministers had earlier misunderstood that she could actually be released in six months, according to Singaporean Foreign Minister George Yeo.

Yeo had told reporters Sunday that Nyan Win indicated to other ministers of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations over a working dinner that his government could release Suu Kyi in about six months' time.

Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy won the 1990 general election by a landslide but the junta refused to honour the results. Suu Kyi has been detained for more than 12 of the past 18 years.

Komura is also scheduled to meet bilaterally with Yeo and hold a separate meeting with his counterparts from the Mekong nations of Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam later on Tuesday.

Originally published by Kyodo News Service, Tokyo, in English 0158 22 Jul 08.

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Story Source: BBC Monitoring Newsfile