Thursday, October 23, 2008
Burma 2008 Crime & Safety Report
https://www.osac.gov/Reports/report.cfm?contentID=82712
Overall Crime and Safety Situation
Many criminal acts go unreported and/or uninvestigated in Burma, making it very difficult to assess the crime level. Police precincts routinely under-report incidents in their areas of coverage to demonstrate they are effective at curbing crime. U.S. Embassy Rangoon considers the Government of Burma (GOB) crime statistics unreliable at best. Statistics for areas outside of Rangoon are generally not available. Travelers should be aware the potential for crime against foreigners may be increased in some regions outside of Rangoon. Overland travel outside of major cities may present a problem for foreigners if they are not accompanied by Burmese speaking companions. The GOB established a Tourist Police Unit in 2006, but it is as ineffective as other branches of the police, and rampant corruption prevents any serious investigations.
Crime Threats
The most frequently reported crimes among diplomats are non-violent confrontations characterized as crimes of opportunity, like pick pocketing and theft of unaccompanied objects. Property crimes are on the rise, such as theft from unoccupied vehicles and home burglaries, but true statistics are difficult to obtain. Most reports are from other diplomatic missions and word-of-mouth reports that are less reliable. There was one reported burglary involving a member of the U.S. mission this year. A UN official based in Rangoon was attacked from behind and her money and personal belongings were taken. Criminal activity in general appears to be on the rise due to the worsening economic situation within Burma. In February 2008, down the street from the embassy, five people were shot and killed in what is being described as either a home invasion or inheritance conflict. It is very rare that weapons are used in crimes in Rangoon due to the regime’s controls and likely response by the GOB.
Road Safety
Roadways and vehicles are old and not maintained, which leads to many vehicle accidents causing major injuries. The transportation system is not well maintained and most trains and buses are frequently out of service due to mechanical problems. Taxis are the best method of transportation, but many are also unsafe due to the age and poor maintenance of the vehicle. Traffic laws are rarely enforced, and drunk drivers are generally not prosecuted. Pedestrians are a major road hazard and individuals driving must always be alert for adults, children, and animals running into the road. Pedestrians often walk in traffic without looking and believe they always have the right-of-way. Potholes and flooding during the rainy season are a constant problem. Drivers often do not use their headlights at night and traffic lights at major intersections are regularly out of service.
Political Violence
In September 2007, large anti-GOB demonstrations erupted throughout the country, followed by a violent response by the GOB. One Japanese journalist was shot and killed while covering a protest downtown. The protests began after fuel prices doubled, and developed into large, peaceful, pro-democracy marches. Although there have been no major protests since October, the government has not addressed the root cause of the grievances and the embassy believes demonstrations could re-occur at any time. The GOB continues to arrest individuals involved in the democracy movement. Ethnic groups that populate border areas of Burma have been engaged in a long-standing armed struggle with the GOB, although many insurgent groups have entered into ceasefire arrangements with the regime in the past decade. The Regional Security Officer advises all visitors to avoid large crowds and political demonstrations, since the reaction of the government could turn violent at any moment.
Historical Perspective
Pro-democracy demonstrations in 1988 resulted in a violent response by the GOB, which promised a multi-party election to end the protests. In 1990, the GOB held elections, which the main democratic opposition party won by a landslide. The GOB refused to honor the election results and instead further tightened its grip on power. Key demands of Burma’s ethnic nationalities have also gone unanswered.
Regional Terrorism and Organized Crime
All anti-GOB groups are considered terrorist organizations by the government, including peaceful political organizations. Several armed groups in border regions use criminal activities, including narcotics production and sales, gem smuggling, and timber trafficking to support their struggles against the regime.
Civil Unrest
All demonstrations by pro-democracy groups have been peaceful, but the GOB’s responses have often been violent. Such responses, coupled with poor economic conditions, could spark large-scale civil unrest in the future as well.
Post-Specific Concerns
Earthquakes and Floods
During the early part of the rainy season, street flooding is pervasive in Burmese cities due to clogged drainage systems. Low-lying villages are also often flooded, causing food shortages in some areas. Individuals visiting Burma during the rainy season should be careful when traveling on roads and in villages close to lakes, major rivers, and the ocean. Major earthquake fault lines cross Burma, so the chance of earthquakes is always present.
Industrial Accidents and Transportation
None of Burma’s domestic airlines are approved by the FAA and their safety records are not open to the public. In February 2008, an Air Bagan flight overran a runway, causing minor injuries to several passengers. Other forms of transportation inside the country, such as trains and inter-city buses, are old and under-maintained. Passengers should only ride them at their own risk. U.S. Embassy Rangoon recommends that American travelers not use Myanmar Airlines or Bagan Airways, due to safety and poor supervision concerns. There have been no reports of industrial accidents at this time.
Drugs and Narcoterrorism
Several of the ethnic groups in the border region are heavily involved in drug trafficking. Burma’s production of opium is second only to Afghanistan. Methamphetamines are quickly becoming another major narcotic produced in Burma. The ethnic groups use the funding from illegal activities to support their armed conflict with the GOB.
Police Response
Despite the creation of a Tourist Police Unit, the host country’s law enforcement services are generally ill-disciplined, poorly equipped, and poorly trained. In addition, corruption is pervasive and some police collaborate with criminals, or carry out crimes themselves under protection of their official status. Most criminal acts go unreported and/or not investigated. Response time can be extremely long, if any response occurs at all. Police often blame lack of transportation for their slow response.
Police will often signal both foreign and domestic motorists to stop to collect a “donation.” When in doubt, always comply with police instructions, identify yourself as an American, and ask to speak to a consular officer. In most instances, police do not speak English and will not pursue a bribe if language seems to be a barrier.
In Rangoon, the central police emergency number is 199. The fire emergency number is 191 or 192.
Medical Emergencies
Medical services in Rangoon are far below even the most basic Western standards. Although the embassy does not officially endorse specific medical service providers, two international-level services with limited local facilities are the SOS (AEA) International Clinic and the Pacific Kembangan Medical Center. In the event of a medical emergency, American citizens should ask to be taken to a hospital, such as Yangon General Hospital, and request that the embassy and/or the SOS Clinic be notified.
SOS is located at the Inya Lake Hotel.
T: 667-871 or 667-879
Pacific Kembangan is located on Kaba Aye Pagoda Road.
T: 542-979 or 548-022
Air ambulance services are available for arrangement through SOS.
How to Avoid Becoming a Victim
The most common crime reported in Burma is theft of unattended items. If an individual takes the simple precaution of not leaving possessions unattended, he or she should not fall victim to this crime. Visitors should obey all laws and follow any instructions given to them by local authorities.
The border regions of Burma are areas of armed conflict and major organized crime, and should be avoided if possible.
Contact Information
American citizens can contact the embassy in case of an emergency, 24 hours a day, using the embassy’s main number: 95-1-536-509, ext 4014.
The following list provides important extensions in case of an emergency:
RSO: x4333
Medical unit: x4480
Consular: x4240
Pol/Econ: x4224
Post 1: x4014
OSAC Country Council
Burma does not have an OSAC Country Council at this time.
This is a U.S. Government inter-agency Web site managed by the Bureau of Diplomatic Security, U.S. Department of State
The Overseas Security Advisory Council (OSAC) provides links to non-government websites as a public service only. The U.S. government, including OSAC, neither endorses nor guarantees in any way the external organizations, services, advice, or products included in these website links. For more information, please read our full disclaimer.
Overseas Security Advisory Council • Bureau of Diplomatic Security
U.S. Department of State • Washington, D.C. 20522-2008
Telephone: 571-345-2223 • Facsimile: 571-345-2238
Contact OSAC Webmaster
petro-politics-Letting dwindling oil, gas go cheap
http://briarpatchmagazine.com/tag/petro-politics/
Letting dwindling oil, gas go cheap
Apr 24, 2008 in the briar-wire by dave | No comments
By John W. Warnock
Leader Post
In early April, the international price for WTI crude rose to $110 per barrel. The price of gasoline was $1.23 for a litre. Both have since risen even higher. Oil corporations are reporting record profits. Land sales for exploration and development rights for oil are at an all-time high in Saskatchewan.
What’s happening?
At a recent conference in Washington sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy, experts argued that the world production of conventional crude oil peaked in May 2005 at 74 million barrels a day. The gap to the current production level of 88 million barrels a day is now being filled by much more expensive and difficult to access non-conventional sources.
Of the remaining oil reserves, 77 per cent are controlled by producing countries with state-owned national oil companies (NOCs) where the privately owned international oil companies (IOCs) are excluded. Another 11 per cent of reserves are in countries with NOCs where the private companies have some access through production sharing agreements. Russia has six per cent of the remaining reserves and is re-establishing state-ownership and control.
Only seven per cent of the remaining world reserves of crude oil are in countries like Canada, where the IOCs have full access to the resource.
Thus the large private oil corporations are having a difficult time finding new reserves. Talisman, for example, has seen the price of its stock drop due to the fact that its reserves are primarily found in mature areas with declining supply and production.
As the industry moves to non-conventional sources of oil and gas, costs rise. In the 1990s, it cost oil corporations around $6 to extract a barrel of oil in western Canada. This has now risen to around $15. The average in the Alberta tar sands is now between $20 and $25.
The Western Canada sedimentary basin is a mature area for the production of oil and gas. Conventional oil and gas production peaked around 1972 and has been declining. The average productivity of an oil well in the WCSB has dropped from 33 barrels per day in 1994 to 18 in 2003. In 2007, the average oil well in Alberta produced only only 12 barrels per day. New gas wells are much smaller and quickly depleted. This is the major reason that the oil corporations are looking elsewhere for new reserves.
All around the world, oil-producing countries are raising royalties and taxes in an effort to capture more of the economic rent (monopoly profit) that is accruing to the industry. Even in libertarian Republican Alaska, the government is raising the basic royalty on oil from 22.5 per cent to 25 per cent and eliminating many of the key deductions and subsidies.
In Newfoundland and Labrador, in the offshore Hibernia field, the federal government gets 32 per cent of revenues and the provincial government eight per cent. In the White Rose field the federal government gets 33 per cent and the province 11 per cent. Under Danny Williams’ new royalty system for White Rose, the federal government will get 37.5 per cent and the province 25 per cent. Husky Oil and Petro Canada are rushing to invest there, hiring a new offshore rig which will cost them $1 million per day.
Petro-Canada complained when the government of Alberta decided to raise its royalties back to the 20-25 per cent range required under provincial legislation. It is moving its capital to Libya. It will pay a $1-billion “signature bonus” to the Libyan National Oil Company. All new developments will be 50-50 partnerships with the NOC. But, when it comes to sharing the oil produced, 88 per cent will go to Libya and only 12 per cent to Petro Canada.
In contrast to the general worldwide trend, recent governments in Saskatchewan have emphasized maximizing the return to the private corporations and minimizing the return to the people of the province. Between 1991 and 2007, the province collected only 17 per cent of the revenues from the sale of our oil. This is a dramatic change in policy since the 1970s and early 1980s, when our government collected over 50 per cent of the revenues.
The second basic policy is that Saskatchewan should export our oil and natural gas to the United States as fast as possible. In contrast to Alberta, there is no public debate or discussion in this province. We can thank the NDP for that.
Warnock is author of Selling the Family Silver published by the Parkland Institute and CCPA-SK.
© The Leader-Post (Regina) 2008
Advice from six Nobel laureates on fixing the economy.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/165189
Dear Mr. President
Advice from six Nobel laureates on fixing the economy.
Katie Paul
NEWSWEEK
As grim financial predictions dominate the news, it seems everyone is scrambling to become an expert on the economy. With the presidential election right around the corner, the pressure to craft a coherent narrative on the country's financial woes is especially high in Washington. It's been called a perfect storm; the combination of volatile markets, looming energy crises and high-stakes politics has delivered a moment of national focus, with more than 89 percent of the country believing that a fundamental shift is needed in how America runs itself.
But a shift to what? Both John McCain and Barack Obama have presented a series of ambitious economic packages that have further polarized both sides of the aisle, as well as Wall Street and Main Street. Perhaps the only matter universally agreed upon is that the next president—whoever he may be—will face a daunting set of fiscal challenges and a dramatically reduced set of resources with which to confront them.
To make sense of those challenges, NEWSWEEK invited winners of the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences to explain how they would advise the next president in crafting and prioritizing his economic-recovery efforts. Excerpts:
Paul Krugman, a professor of economics at Princeton University since 2000, was awarded the Nobel Prize in 2008 for his work on international trade patterns. A twice-weekly columnist in The New York Times and former columnist in Fortune Magazine and Slate, he served on the U.S. Council of Economic Advisers from 1982 to 1983.
The idea that a new president should emulate Franklin Delano Roosevelt's first 100 days—a blizzard of activity to address a national crisis—has become a cliché. But this time it's exactly right. Assuming that this election goes the way almost all projections say it will, with Barack Obama taking the White House and Democrats greatly reinforcing their control of Congress, there should be rapid and radical action on at least three fronts.
First, the economy will almost surely be in a nasty recession by January. As soon as possible, the administration and Congress should fight this recession by putting in place a major fiscal-stimulus plan, this time centered on spending rather than tax cuts—aid to stressed state and local governments, expanded and extended unemployment benefits, and some serious public-works spending. The goal is to do well while doing good—to provide much needed help to individuals and help repair our frayed infrastructure, while at the same time supporting demand and employment.
Second, the administration should press rapidly forward on financial regulation. I hope—hope—that by January the financial rescue efforts already underway will have relieved the worst of the credit crunch. But even if they have, that's only the first step. We need much-expanded regulation to protect against a return of the financial crisis; if financial institutions need to be rescued like banks, they need to be regulated like banks, with the key things being capital requirements and oversight.
Third, now is the time for health-care reform. Some people say that the health-care issue should wait, but I disagree. The economic crisis has driven home the insecurity created by our current system, under which the misery of Americans who lose their jobs is often compounded by the loss of health insurance, as well. If elected, Obama should try to emulate LBJ, who signed Medicare into law less than 10 months after his 1964 victory.
Is this a wildly ambitious agenda? Yes—but these are wild times, and the country is ready for change. I'll give Obama a bit more than a 100 days—say, six months—but he should move fast. Like the crisis of the 1930s, the current crisis offers an opportunity to reform our system in fundamental ways.
A. Michael Spence, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and professor emeritus at Stanford University's business school, was awarded the Nobel Prize in 2001 for his work on markets with asymmetric information. From 1991 to 1997, he was chairman of the National Research Council Board on Science, Technology and Economic Policy.
The next administration will have a full plate. It will need to continue to inject capital into the financial system and take measures to ensure the functioning of the payments system and short-term credit markets. It will also need to return to the mortgages and reset terms, avoid a flood of foreclosures, all of this for efficiency, equity and political reasons. It will then need to inject a fiscal stimulus while communicating a plan to return the budget deficit to more sustainable levels in the medium run. It will need to coordinate policies with other major economies to avoid unintended and unwanted volatility in capital flows searching for the safest haven. It will need to structure its ownership and substantial control of the financial sector in such a way as to make it possible for private capital to reenter as the [industry's] damaged balance sheets get better and the visibility/transparency improves. Postcrisis it will need to thoroughly examine the systemic failures with a view to redesigning the regulatory oversight of the sector.
Priorities will have to be set on the fly as conditions shift, often rapidly as we have seen, in the economy and the financial sector. The overriding priority should be to have a top-flight team in Treasury, led by a secretary who, like Secretary Henry Paulson, has experience and stature in the financial sector.
Joseph E. Stiglitz, a professor at Columbia University, was also awarded the Nobel Prize in 2001 for his work on the economics of information. He was chief economist of the World Bank and chair of President Clinton ' s Council of Economic Advisers.
The next president takes office at a challenging time (to put it mildly) for the economy. He will inherit an economy in recession, a country facing a growing divide between rich and poor, a health-care system in which we spend more money to get poorer results than any other advanced economy and a society with an oil addiction that has only grown worse over time. The massive debt and deficit he will inherit will mean that the resources to attack these problems will be very limited.
We will almost surely be going into a deep recession—the longest since the Great Depression. The immediate focus will be how to prevent it from getting worse. Inevitably, unemployment will grow, but more and more will find their benefits expire before they find another job—some 700,000 or so are likely to be in this position in the next few weeks. Pumping money into the banks was critical, but trickle-down economics doesn't work; by itself it's not enough. States are facing massive shortfall in revenues, and without aid, they have to start laying off workers. Foreclosures are likely to continue apace, as house prices continue to fall as a result of the bursting of the bubble.
To recover, however, we need more; investments in infrastructure and technology. Green investments on alternative-energy sources and public-transport systems can help wean us off our oil dependence. But recovery is not enough: we need to prevent a recurrence. We need new regulations and a new regulatory framework—one that can not only protect us against risks of bad lending, but against the risk of a president who doesn't understand the role of regulation in a modern economy.
To get the resources to attack these daunting problems means that we will have to raise taxes, at least on upper-income Americans, and use all of our resources wisely. There are two major sources of waste in our economy: the first is in the military, where spending has been unbridled—including on weapons that don't work designed to fight enemies that don't exist. We could have more security with a smaller military budget. The second is in health care. We have been aware of the problems for years, but vested interests have resisted change. Matters have become worse in the last eight years—the paradox of more uninsured and more spending. Reforming the health care system is essential to the health of our society, but also to the health of our economy.
This is, admittedly, an ambitious agenda. But we have no choice, if we wish to preserve and enhance our standard of living. Such a program will both increase output in the short run and help growth in the long run.
Edward C. Prescott is a senior monetary adviser at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis and a professor of economics at the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in 2004 for his work on dynamic macroeconomics.
No matter who wins office, the temptation will be to change as many rules as possible, as quickly as possible. This is usually the inclination of an incoming president, but this will be especially true given the current financial turmoil and the perceived urgency to "do something!" However, I would remind the next president that changing the rules of the game too dramatically can have unintended consequences, which are often suboptimal. Indeed, even hinting that rules will be changed can alter expectations and change behavior.
This is especially true on the issue of taxes. There is no more important issue on which a president can affect the economy than the question of taxation. Recent research has revealed that tax rates are the key factor in determining the economic health of developed nations. Ingenuity, risk-taking and productivity are the engines of economic growth, and all are dependent on properly aligned incentives. High tax rates are the surest way to squash those incentives and stall that engine.
Another key issue that the next president will face is the call for health-care reform. Again, I would caution the next president to consider measures that will help unleash Americans' creativity and make the system more efficient. We've already developed less expensive walk-in clinics, and a market is developing for cheaper and better home health care for the elderly. And we've done these things without government directives. More regulations, price controls and too much government oversight will result in less efficient outcomes.
Third, I would advise the next president not to equate the current financial turmoil with the onset of another Great Depression. Yes, credit markets matter: firms need ready funds, banks need to trust each other, and investors need the confidence on which all capital markets depend. But that's why we have a central bank, and that's why the Federal Reserve—along with the Treasury Department and central banks around the world—has taken its extraordinary measures. This is what lenders of last resort are supposed to do. Let them do their job. The real economy will survive this episode.
One final note: we expect too much of our presidents when it comes to the economy, and they are often too happy to oblige that expectation. The American people don't need a president to manage their business but rather to manage the rules. Here's hoping for a steady hand.
Eric Maskin has been a professor of social science at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, N.J., since 2000. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in 2007 for his work on mechanism design theory.
I'd advise the next president to learn to distinguish between markets that do not call for government intervention and those that do. Many markets work best with little or no outside interference. But others—especially those subject to big "externalities"—need a helping hand. The credit market is in this second category.
When a bank calls in a loan, it obviously hurts the customer in question. But it also adversely affects other banks that have lent to this borrower. They are now less likely to be repaid, and so can't as readily lend to their own customers. We say the original bank exerts an externality—a secondary effect that it doesn't take account of—on these other banks. As long as everyone continues lending, all is well. But if some banks stop doing so—perhaps because a number of customers have defaulted—they may force other banks to call in their loans, too. The chain reaction so generated could end up paralyzing the credit market altogether. Sound familiar?
Yet, government can save the day. By infusing money into some banks, it allows them to begin lending again. With a big enough infusion, the chain reaction reverses, and ultimately the market is restored to health—at which point the government presumably gets its investment back.
Such intervention comes, however, with an attendant risk. If banks anticipate government will come to the rescue should the credit market go badly awry, they may make loans that would otherwise be imprudent, e.g. subprime loans with little prospect of repayment. So a contingent bailout policy—implicit or explicit—must be coupled with some regulation of what banks can and cannot do. For example, a ban on lending to uncreditworthy customers might well make sense.
Our new president should not forget that unrestrained markets are remarkably successful at delivering many of our most-needed goods and services. But he must also understand the logic of externalities and why in markets like credit—where externalities are significant—a well-planned activist role for government could be vitally important.
Edmund Phelps was awarded the Nobel Prize in 2006 for his work on the tradeoffs between economic objectives. He currently directs the Center on Capitalism and Society at Columbia University.
There are good booms. For example, the Internet boom of the late '90s was a happy time and left lasting benefits. The latest housing boom was different. It buoyed employment, but it proved to be a massive malinvestment that left near-insolvent banks, a credit crunch and an emerging business slump. The debacle has revealed serious flaws in the banking and finance system, which the next president will have to confront head-on.
The absence of owner control over management in the big banks was costly. Bank heads were locked in a competition in which each one "reached for return" as needed to keep profits and share price on a par with rivals—no matter what the risk. Nowhere was there a way for shareowners to say "stop." To prevent that from happening, stronger corporate governance is needed. I would advise the next president to press Congress to legislate that the proposed base pay of CEOs be submitted to a shareholder vote and that bonuses be geared to long-term performance.
The lack of vision in bank management was another flaw. Bankers seemed unwilling to acknowledge and allow for the possibility that interest rates might rise back to more familiar levels and that housing prices (in real terms) were about 40 percent over historical norms. That unwillingness helped create the subprime crisis that's consumed much of the industry. True, the next president cannot legislate "strategic vision." But financial players, instead of communicating and analyzing in terms of a single future, could be required to work with two or three future hypotheticals that include best- and worst-case scenarios.
Finally, the great investment banks ceased to be an instrument of capitalism for the finance of business investment and innovation, and became agencies for "wealth management." It was economic policy that drew banks to mortgages, of course. The American dream became "home ownership" rather than a successful career. To redress the balance, the next president should press Congress to provide businesses with additional subsidies to help them invest, comparable to the subsidies it provides households—through Fanny Mae and Freddie Mac—to buy homes.
If America is to continue to be the place where ordinary people find stimulation, challenge, novelty and fulfillment, our business sector will need more dynamism and inclusion than it has shown lately. This will require a restructuring of the financial sector to serve business innovation. The tiny band of "angel investors" and venture capitalists can't do it all. Also, the next administration must act to stimulate jobs for the disadvantaged, many of whom are now in prison. I have long advocated that a subsidy be paid to each firm employing low-wage workers as a way of raising their pay and stimulating their employment. Barack Obama's planned hiring subsidy is a step in that direction. But we have miles to go to get back on the track for dynamism and inclusion.
URL: http://www.newsweek.com/id/165189© 2008
EU gives rights prize to Chinese dissident Hu
http://asia.news.yahoo.com/081023/afp/081023122208asiapacificnews.html
STRASBOURG (AFP) - The European Parliament on Thursday awarded a prestigious rights prize to jailed Chinese dissident Hu Jia, on the eve of a key Beijing summit and amid allegations of Chinese pressure not to honour him.
China had warned that giving the Sakharov Prize to the civil rights campaigner could damage ties with Europe.
But to widespread applause, parliament president Hans-Gert Poettering told the assembly that "by awarding the Sakharov Prize to Hu Jia, the European Parliament is sending out a clear signal of support to all those who defend human rights in China."
He said Hu had "spoken out against oppression in Tibet", and described him as "one of the real defenders of human rights in the People's Republic of China".
EU lawmakers accused Chinese government officials of trying to pressure the parliament not to give the award to Hu.
"By letter, by email, and they've even tried by telephone," the head of the parliament's liberal group, Graham Watson, told AFP.
A spokesman for Poettering said China's ambassador had written the assembly president a letter "in which Beijing applies pressure". The spokesman said the effort was "more counter-productive".
"This prize is awarded in Strasbourg, not in Beijing," Poettering said on the sidelines of the session.
The letter, from Ambassador Song Zhe, read: "The Chinese government is seriously concerned over the Sakharov prize."
"If the European Parliament should award this prize to Hu Jia, that would inevitably hurt the Chinese peoples once again and bring serious damage to China-EU relations.
"Not recognising China's progress on human rights and insisting on confrontation will only deepen the misunderstanding between the two sides and is not conducive to the promotion of the cause of world human rights."
Hu, 35, is known for his campaign for civil rights, environmental protection and AIDS victims but is serving a three-and-a-half year prison sentence for "inciting subversion of state power".
He was arrested last year after giving testimony on human rights in China to the European Parliaments's human rights subcommittee by video-conference.
China angrily called Hu a "criminal" when he was considered a top candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize earlier this month.
The Sakharov Prize -- named after Soviet dissident Andrei Sakharov -- is in its 20th year.
Previous winners will be invited to attend the presentation of the 50,000-euro (64,000-dollar) award on December 17.
EU leaders are to hold a summit in Beijing on Friday with Chinese and other Asian leaders. Rights in China are a continual problem at the summits but this time Europe is trying to get China to back international efforts to end the financial crisis.
The head of the conservative group in parliament -- the assembly's biggest bloc -- Joseph Daul, also received a letter from the Chinese ambassador, one of his spokesman confirmed.
"Awarding the Sakharov to Hu Jia is a reflection of this very spirit of this prize, which supports free thought and honours human rights defenders fighting repression," Greens leaders Daniel Cohn-Bendit and Monica Frassoni said.
"The commitments made by China before the Olympic Games to improve the human rights situation have not been respected," they added in a statement.
In New York, rights group Human Rights watch called on Beijing to immediately exonerate or grant medical parole to Hu.
"Hu Jia was incarcerated for doing nothing more than exercising rights expressly guaranteed by China's constitution," said Sophie Richardson, the group's advocacy director.
"If the government won't exonerate Hu, it should at least release him to get proper medical care."
Others short-listed for the prize were Belarus opposition leader Alexandr Kozulin and Congolese abbot Apollinaire Malu Malu.
Past winners include former South African leader Nelson Mandela, detained Myanmar democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi and former UN secretary general Kofi Annan.
Australia targets Burmese officials in new sanctions
http://au.news.yahoo.com/a/-/latest/5096668/australia-targets-burmese-officials-in-new-sanctions/
ABC - October 22, 2008, 8:07 pm
Australia has expanded financial sanctions against Burma , targeting more of the nation's top officials, ministers and military leaders.
Sanctions were first imposed after the military junta's crackdown on protests led by Buddhist monks in September last year.
Foreign Affairs Minister Stephen Smith says the sanctions need to be extended to keep pressure on the regime to reform.
He has criticised the ongoing detention of democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi and described the recent referendum process as a sham.
ေယာနိေသာ မနသိကာရ နဲ ့ ငါ
By Ye Yint Thet Zwe
နိဒါန္း
သူငယ္ခ်င္းက မၾကာခဏ ေျပာတယ္
"ေယာနိေသာ မနသိကာရ"
အသင့္အတင့္ႏွင့္
ႏွလံုးသြင္းတတ္ဖို ့လိုသည္ တဲ့ ။
၁။
အာဏာရူးေတြကမ္းကုန္ေအာင္မိုက္မဲပံုမ်ား
ခေလးသူငယ္ေတြရဲ့ အနာဂတ္ကို
သံုးစားမရတဲ့ေခ်ာက္တဲ့ ပစ္ပစ္ခ်ေနမွေတာ့
"ေယာနိေသာ မနသိကာရ" ကို
ငါက ဘယ္လိုလုပ္ၿပီး
ႏွလံုးသြင္းႏုိင္ မွာတဲ့တုန္း။
သိကၡာအျပည့္နဲ့စီးေမ်ာ
ဧရာ၀တီျမစ္တေက်ာအေပၚမွာ
ၾကယ္ေတြေႁကြၿပီးရင္း ေႁကြေနတာကို
ရင္နာစြာျမင္ေတြ ့ေနရေတာ့
ငါက ဘယ္လိုလုပ္ၿပီး
"ေယာနိေသာ မနသိကာရ"ကို
ႏွလံုးသြင္းႏုိင္ မွာတဲ့တုန္း။
၂။
ေနရာေတြလြဲမွား
စာသင္ခန္းေတြထဲက ေက်ာင္းသားမ်ား
နယ္နမိတ္မ်ဥ္းမ်ားအေပၚမွာ
ေတာ္လွန္ေရး သႏၱိသုခကိုစားသံုး
အာဏာရွင္ကို တြန္းလွန္ေနတာျမင္ေနရမွေတာ့
ငါက ဘယ္လိုလုပ္ၿပီး
"ေယာနိေသာ မနသိကာရ"ကို
ႏွလံုးသြင္းႏိုင္ မွာတဲ့တုန္း ။
ရုပ္သြင္သ႑န္က
ေဖါ့ဖေယာင္းလို ေပ်ာ့ ေပ်ာင္းေပမယ့္
ုယံုၾကည္ခ်က္နဲ့စိတ္ဓာတ္မ်ား
သံမဏိသံဆိုင္ခဲလိုမာေက်ာ
(အမည္နဲ ့လိုက္ဖက္စြာ)
ေလးစားရေသာ ကိုသံခဲေရ
ေဆးထိုးအပ္ကိုင္ရမယ့္ ခင္ဗ်ားလက္ထဲ
ေသနတ္ကိုင္ဆြဲ တရားေသာစစ္ကို ဆင္ႏဲႊေနတာျမင္္ေနရေတာ့
ငါကဘယ္လိုလုပ္ၿပီး
"ေယာနိေသာ မနသိကာရ"ကို
ႏွလံုးသြင္းႏိုင္ မွာတဲ့တုန္း။
၃။
ငယ္စဥ္ခေလးဘ၀ထဲကစ
ခ်စ္ခင္ျမတ္ႏုိးရတဲ့ အကိုေရ
ျပည္တြင္းကေန တိုက္ပြဲ၀င္ရင္း
ၾကယ္ေရာင္ လေရာင္မျမင္ရေအာင္မဲေမွာင္
(ႏွစ္ဆယ့္ေျခာက္ႏွစ္တာကာလ)
နအဖ အက်ဥ္းေထာင္ထဲေရာက္တာေတာင္မွ
အေမကေန တဆင့္မွာၾကား
"မင္းတို ့ငါတို ့ေခတ္မွာ
စစ္အာဏာရွင္စနစ္ အဆံုးသတ္ဘို ့ႀကိဳစား"
အဲဒီစကား ျပန္ၾကားရေတာ့
ငါက ဘယ္လိုလုပ္ၿပီး
"ေယာနိေသာ မနသိကာရ"ကို
ႏွလံုးသြင္ႏိုင္ မွာတဲ့တုန္း။
ေခတ္ဆိုး စနစ္ဆိုးရဲ့ သားေကာင္ျဖစ္ခဲ့ရ
လူငယ္မ်ားစြာ တိုင္းျပည္မွထြက္ခြာ
ေရၾကည္ရာ ျမက္ႏုရာရွာေဖြရင္းနဲ့
(တိုးတက္ပါတယ္ဆိုတဲ့ ဖုန္းဆိုးေျမမ်ားမွာ)
ေရေမ်ာကမ္းတင္ ျဖစ္အင္ေတြ ျမင္ေတြ ့ေနရေတာ့
ငါက ဘယ္လိုလုပ္ၿပီးး
"ေယာနိေသာ မနသိကာရ"ကို
ႏွလံုးသြင္းႏုိင္ မွာတဲ့တုန္း။
နိဂံုး။
သူငယ္ခ်င္းေရ
ေက်းဇူးလဲတင္ ခင္လဲခင္တယ္
မေ၀းေတာ့တဲ့ အနာဂတ္မွာ
အာဏာရွင္စနစ္ ဘံုးဘံုးလဲက်သြားတဲ့အခါ
မင္း မၾကာခဏ ေျပာျပေနတဲ့
"ေယာနိေသာ မနသိကာရ"ကို
ငါ ႏွလံုးသြင္းလို ့ရမွာပါ ။
-
Posted By Ye Yint Thet Zwe to Ye Yint Thet Zwe at 10/22/2008 04:39:00 PM
The death of the dollar?
The dollar is becoming more of a problem for the US, Prof Woods argues.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7684397.stm
By Professor Ngaire Woods
Presenter, Analysis, BBC Radio 4
We are living in economic chaos. Banks, homes, jobs, and businesses are at risk.
Yet curiously, the one thing that seems stable is the dollar.
It is a symbol - and a lever - of American power and leadership, itis the standard unit of account for much of the world's economic activity. And in times of crisis, it has often seemed a safe haven.
But in the longer term, some experts believe this crisis could mark a turning point in the dollar's fortunes, hastening a fall from power which has seen its value decline over several years before its recent rally.
"I think today's financial crisis is going to hasten the end of the dollar as the world's reserve currency", says Avinash Persaud, chairman of Intelligence Capital Limited.
"For the first time ever we're now seeing that in the financial markets it costs money to guarantee you against a US government default."
'Exorbitant privilege'
For the American government there is simply no such thing as living beyond its means. With the rest of the world demanding dollars, all the US has to do is to keep printing them
Prof Ngaire Woods
He wonders whether the combined cost of foreign wars and domestic bail-outs is being seen as "a burden too far" for the US.
But for the dollar to lose reserve currency status would end what has been in many ways a huge bonus for the US.
It is sometimes described as the ability to write cheques that no-one ever cashes.
So for the American government there is simply no such thing as living beyond its means. With the rest of the world demanding dollars, all the US has to do is to keep printing them.
This makes possible things that no other government could imagine - a power that America's rivals have historically denounced as an "exorbitant privilege".
In the early 1970s, US Treasury Secretary John Connally even told the outside world, brutally, that the dollar was "our currency, but your problem".
Euro reluctance 
Chinese exports have helped it build up huge dollar reserves
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7684397.stm
Since then, Europe has developed its own currency, the euro, which has taken on a global role.
As it grew in strength against the dollar it challenged some of the dollar's glamorous reputation. Supermodels in New York started asking for contracts in euros rather than dollars.
But European leaders are far from keen on seeing their currency become the world's reserve money.
"Europe has got a much less vast set of ambitions than America has ever had", says David Marsh, a banker who is just finishing a book charting the birth of the euro. Adopting the currency, he adds, was a "flight into a lack of ambition".
Potential to undermine
So might a rising economic power like China supply the dollar's eventual global successor?
At present, China lacks the open markets or institutions to support that role. But Avinash Persaud points out that similarly dismissive things were said about the US a century ago.
We are emerging into is this very hazy and slightly worrying state of affairs where there isn't going to be any single country leading the world in the way the US has done and with it no single currency either
Jim O'Neill
Goldman Sachs
The US did not have a Central Bank until 1913, yet within a few decades the dollar was challenging sterling for world domination.
For now, China has a huge stake in what happens to the dollar, as it has built up well over a trillion dollars' worth of assets in the US currency thanks to its recent export boom.
That gives China a vested interest in a strong dollar. But it also gives Beijing the power to undermine the US currency should it choose to move its money.
This has been called by one former US Treasury Secretary the "balance of financial terror".
"It's like the idea of mutually assured deterrence" says leading US political scientist Barry Eichengreen. "We hope that everybody becomes respectful of the financial power of the other side, but that such destructive power won't be deployed."
Balancing act 
A strong dollar makes US exports expensive
So a new kind of American economic diplomacy has to emerge, particularly with the Gulf States. They're not only holding dollars, but pricing their oil in "petrodollars".
The US government is torn. Dollar-rich foreign states may demand a strong US currency, but that is bad for American exporters.
It makes every American car or computer sold abroad more expensive. That is why the dollar has been quietly let slide over the last six years - and the weaker dollar has boosted American exports.
Jim O'Neill, Head of Global Economic Research at Goldman Sachs, believes "we are emerging into is this very hazy and slightly worrying state of affairs where there isn't going to be any single country leading the world in the way the US has done and with it no single currency either".
So the next American President has a delicate balancing act ahead.
If dollar-rich foreign countries don't like what's happening to the US currency, they may look for alternatives. And everyone knows that, down the line, the power of the dollar has to decline as the global balance of economic power changes.
So the dollar is no longer their currency and everyone else's problem. It is now the world's currency - and mostly America's problem.
Ngaire Woods presents 'Analysis: The Dollar and Dominance' on BBC Radio 4 on Thursday October 23rd at 20.30 BST and Sunday October 26th at 21.30 GMT. Or listen via the BBC iPlayer
Remember the China lesson
http://chellaney.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!4913C7C8A2EA4A30!839.entry
If engagement has helped create a more-open China, does it make sense to apply different standards to Russia?
By BRAHMA CHELLANEY
The Japan Times
Each visit to China is a reminder of the power of global liberalizing influences. China has come a long way since the Tiananmen Square massacre of prodemocracy activists nearly two decades ago. It has opened up to the extent that it hosted this month an Asia-Europe conference of nongovernmental organizations and scholars that focused in several of its sessions on the global challenges of democratization and human rights.
The old mind-set and suspicion of outsiders, of course, haven't disappeared. After all, power rests with the same party and system responsible for the death of tens of millions of Chinese during the so-called Great Leap Forward, Cultural Revolution and other state-induced disasters and political witch hunts.
That the Communist Party continues to monopolize power despite its past gory excesses indeed is remarkable, if not unprecedented in modern world history. This is now the oldest autocracy in the world. Yet, the China of today is a far cry from the Mao Zedong era or even the Deng Xiaoping period when reforms coincided with brutal political suppression that Tiananmen Square came to symbolize.
What this country has achieved in the last generation in terms of economic modernization and the opening of minds is truly exceptional.
The state's continuing repressive impulse, however, is mirrored in the tightly controlled domestic media (which, for example, was ordered not to deviate from official accounts in reporting the recent scandal over contaminated infant formula), the pervasive security apparatus and the brutal crackdown of the monk-led uprising across the vast Tibetan plateau.
Since the Tibet unrest flared in March, Beijing has allowed only a small group of foreign journalists to visit the plateau — that too on a Foreign Ministry-guided tour. China also remains highly intolerant of Han dissent, especially of any attempt to challenge the one-party rule.
This shows that although China has moved from being a totalitarian state to an authoritarian state, some things haven't changed since the Mao years. Some other things have changed for the worse, such as the whipping up of nationalism and turning it into the legitimating credo of the communist rule.
In fact, relentless attempts to bend reality to the illusions that the state blithely propagates risk turning China into a modern-day Potemkin state.
Still, with the wearing away of the hukou system that tied citizens to their place of birth, Chinese can now relocate within the country, enjoy property rights, travel overseas, make use of the latest communications technologies and do other things that were unthinkable a generation ago. Indeed, the biggest change has been in the people's thinking, reflected in a greater readiness to express oneself freely and shape one's own destiny.
China's opening up owes a lot to the West's decision not to sustain trade sanctions after Tiananmen Square but instead to try to integrate Beijing with global institutions through the liberalizing influence of foreign investment and trade.
That the choice made was wise can be seen from the baneful impact of the opposite decision that was taken on Burma — to pursue a penal approach centered on sanctions — in the period following the ruthless suppression of prodemocracy Burmese protests 10 months before the Tiananmen Square killings.
Had the Burma-type approach been applied against China internationally, the result would not only have been a less-prosperous and less-open China, but also a more-paranoid and destabilizing China. Of course, the contradictory approaches were driven by the West's commercial interests.
Yet, with a new chill setting in on relations between the West and Russia, the lesson from the correct choice made on China is in danger of getting lost. The rhetoric in some quarters in America and Europe for a tougher stance against Moscow is becoming shriller.
Little thought has been given to how the West lost Russia, a now-resurgent power that had during its period of decline in the 1990s eagerly sought to cozy up to the U.S. and Europe. Instead, turning a blind eye to the way the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is being expanded right up to Russia's front yard and the U.S.-led action in engineering Kosovo's self-proclamation of independence last February, the new focus is on how to punish Moscow for recently intervening in Georgia and sponsoring the self-declaration of independence by South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
The foreign policy-centered first debate between Barack Obama and John McCain stood out for the way each of the two U.S. presidential candidates spit fire on Russia, with not a single question being asked about an increasingly assertive China. It is as if the U.S., not content with setting up military bases and a missile-defense system in Russia's periphery and seeking to encroach on Russia's historical dependencies and protectorates, seems intent on rediscovering Moscow as an adversary.
A self-fulfilling prophesy that ushers in a second cold war can only damage long-term U.S. interests. Europe, whose interests are closely tied to peace and cooperation with Moscow, is sadly split and adrift on Russia.
If today there is a push for a policy of containment, it is not against China but against Russia. Even on the democracy issue, it is Russia, not China, that is the target of constant hectoring.
U.S. President George W. Bush, in fact, is leaving the White House in his father's footsteps — with a China-friendly legacy. Nothing illustrates this better than the way he ignored the bloody suppression of the most-powerful Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule since 1959 and showed up at the Beijing Olympics. It is thus little surprise that President Hu Jintao, in a telephonic conversation with Bush this month, praised the "good momentum" in U.S.-China relations established during the Bush presidency.
China's rise has been aided by good fortune on multiple strategic fronts. First, Beijing's reform process benefited from good timing, coming as it did at the start of globalization. Second, the Soviet Union's sudden collapse delivered an immense strategic boon, eliminating a menacing empire and opening the way for Beijing to rapidly increase strategic space globally. Russia's decline in the 1990s was China's gain. And third, there has been a succession of China-friendly U.S. presidents in the past two decades — a period that significantly has coincided with China's ascension.
Whether Obama or McCain wins next month's presidential election, America will continue to have closer economic and political engagement with China than with, say, India, the latest Indo-U.S. nuclear deal notwithstanding.
Today, the American economy is inextricably linked with China. The financial meltdown has only increased U.S. reliance on Chinese capital inflows, thus adding to China's leverage, even if a possible American recession hits Chinese exports. With Chinese foreign-exchange reserves swelling by one-third in the past year to a world record $1.906 trillion at the end of September, China is better positioned than any other major economy to weather the current global financial crisis.
Any U.S.-led attempt to contain Russia may mesh well with China's ambitions but can hardly contribute to international security. If engagement has helped create a more-open China, does it make sense to apply different standards to Russia, with Moscow's 13-year effort to join the World Trade Organization now in jeopardy and the U.S.-Russian nuclear deal put on indefinite hold by Washington?
Brahma Chellaney, professor of strategic studies at the privately funded Center for Policy Research in New Delhi, is the author, most recently, of "Asian Juggernaut: The Rise of China, India and Japan."
The Japan Times: Thursday, Oct. 23, 2008
(C) All rights reserved
Roundtable: Khin Nyunt legacy-DVB
http://english.dvb.no/news.php?id=1890
Oct 22, 2008 (DVB)It has been four years since general Khin Nyunt, the State Peace and Development Council's most powerful military intelligence chief and prime minister, was arrested and put under house arrest.
Although it is not certain whether he is a true reformer, Khin Nyunt is seen by some diplomats and political analysts as more broadminded than the current military leaders, as someone who preferred dialogue to confrontation and sought international cooperation.
Is this reputation deserved? What impact did he have on Burmese politics and the military, and how have things changed since his downfall?
DVB discussed Khin Nyunt impact and legacy with major Aung Lin Htut, a former Military Intelligence agent under Khin Nyunt who is now based in Washington, Htay Aung, a Thailand-based military analyst and David Htaw, a Karen National Union member who took part in peace talks with the army.
While the State Peace and Development Council gave corruption as the reason for general Khin Nyunt arrest, former military intelligence agent major Aung Lin Htut said many political factors also played a part.
Aung Lin Htut: "The main reason for the downfall of general Khin Nyunt was political. Even when I was working in 1999, he would tell us, I want to quit・ After 2001 he would say, If I quit you will be in trouble, that's why I am not quitting・ What I知 trying to say is that there were internal problems.
The National League for Democracy, including Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, played a crucial role in these political matters. In Burmese politics, if we don't do things together we can't achieve anything. We believed that by working with armed ceasefire groups, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's NLD and other political groups and the Tatmadaw [armed forces], would we be able to find a way out for the country, for the good of the country. But later, there were problems in political affairs, ethnic national affairs and personal wealth issues.
For example, there were divisions between the educated and uneducated people. Senior general Than Shwe's wife Daw Kyaing Kyaing is not educated. What she said was, I don't care if I am uneducated; I can force you educated people to do things for me at any time・ On the other hand, general Khin Nyunt's wife Daw Khin Win Shwe was a doctor. In Daw Kyaing Kyaing's group, there were people like general Shwe Mann's wife who were not educated. The clashes between the wives were also relevant.
Within their families, general Khin Nyunt's sons had interests in Bagan Cybertech, and worked as managing directors. On the other side, general Than Shwe's daughters were not educated but all four daughters worked as secretaries in the Foreign Ministry. And they would demand this or that permit and sell them on. There were scandals on this side too."
Aung Lin Htut: "The main thing I learned was that in 2004, after general Khin Nyunt returned from medical treatment in Singapore, he and general Than Shwe had a big row. While general Khin Nyunt was away, major Myint Naing and his group had seized the Na-Sa-Ka [border control forces under Khin Nyunt's control] at Muse. And foreign minister U Win Aung and deputy minister U Khin Maung had been fired without his knowledge.
(Khin Nyunt) met with general Than Shwe and insisted that as he was prime minister and as military intelligence was under his command, he should have been informed. General Khin Nyunt reportedly asked for permission to quit, but general Than Shwe did not allow him to go. He placated him by telling him he had many more duties to fulfil.
Prior to this, many people said he had told general Khin Nyunt to stop working as intelligence chief and hand over to Myint Swe, who was 15 years his junior. The nature of intelligence is you can't just put any leader there. You need experience. There was another argument over that. Then, he was told a second time to hand over to major Yeh Myint. General Khin Nyunt refused. Then he was told that as prime minister he should stay away from intelligence. And the roadmap was created again. Before that, as you know, in the Depayin incident, he repaired things. Even at that time, we could tell that the situation was not good."
Military analyst Htay Aung said that general Khin Nyunt was not seen by most people to be any different from the other generals, but had followed a different approach on some issues.
Htay Aung: "The general public will regard general Khin Nyunt as a pea from the same pod [as the ruling military]. There were many examples of the intelligence organisation systematically planning and leading the actions to cause instability and violence during the 1988 nationwide uprising. We can't assume that general Khin Nyunt sincerely wanted dialogue and national reconciliation. Nevertheless, general Khin Nyunt was not the same type of thuggish, warmongering generals, as his duty demanded that he looked at the whole situation to carry out his work.
It's for the ethnic ceasefire groups, the absence of general Khin Nyunt has made their situation worse. From 1989, the person who led the peace negotiations was general Khin Nyunt. Another thing is that the relationship with the NLD was quite unusual [under Khin Nyunt]. The secret talks with the NLD started during general Khin Nyunt's time. This might have been due to international pressure on him, but talks with the NLD took place under his leadership. After his removal, the talks stopped and have not restarted to this day."
Although the presence or absence of general Khin Nyunt and group hasn't made much difference to the lives of the majority of the Burmese people, his departure severely affected ethnic national groups who were still engaged in talks with the army, particularly the KNU.
Khin Nyunt told KNU leader general Mya during a meeting in January 2004 that fifty years of fighting had brought no benefit to the Karen people, the government army or the wider Burmese people and he and general Mya pledged to make life better for both sides.
But as general Mya said at the meeting, generals Than Shwe and Maung Aye were on one side and general Khin Nyunt on the other and the talks with ethnic groups collapsed.
Later, talks were not negotiations but demands for surrender and the fighting continues to this day with no progress towards a settlement.
The KNU David Htaw, who took part in the peace talks, said the situation had deteriorated since Khin Nyunt resignation.
David Htaw: "In January 2004, you could say that we had reached a gentleman agreement. In February, we met again. When we met [on 18] October, general Khin Nyunt had resigned from his duties. During that time, we lost contact for a while. In March 2005, we met with the new group for discussions and on 5 May, we met again.
The difficulty was, when we were dealing with general Khin Nyunt, he and the people in his group understood the nature of negotiation, but the groups we met in March and May [2005] just carried out the orders from the top. What I mean is, they had a 'take it or leave it' attitude. Since then, there has been no face to face meeting.
By analysis is that this is one of the reasons for the downfall of general Khin Nyunt. He started the initiative for ceasefire ・number one, he allowed the ceasefire groups to set up businesses; number two, he allowed them to legally carry weapons; number three, he gave them permission to attend the national convention and discuss political matters.
This is one of the things that caused problems between general Khin Nyunt and his colleagues. Hardliners who had been prepared to fight to the death saw this as giving in to deadly foes. In my view, this was a policy shift."
Looking to the future, Htay Aung said the military would continue to cling to power for as long as it is able.
Htay Aung: "This military government can continue to hold onto power. As long as the army obeys their order, they are still in a position to carry out what they want to do by any means. So they will continue until they reach the last step of their roadmap, the [2010] election. But that won't be the end of it.
If we look at the existing constitution, the people will not have the opportunity, democratic rights and guarantees to build a stable and peaceful country. Without these, the public will not be satisfied. [The regime] can only govern by the sword. As the situation changes gradually, opposition will keep coming from the people."
Aung Lin Htut said the opposition needed a strategy to bring concerted pressure to bear on the military leadership.
Aung Lin Htut: In my experience, general Than Shwe is unable to endure pressure. Although we are applying pressure, we are not in a position to do it effectively. I once said that you can't give general Than Shwe a carrot, you have to give him the stick.
Don't leave out the UN. Matters such as child soldiers and rape are very alarming for general Than Shwe, as is the [forced labour] issue. They prefer it if these issues fade into the background. But they are happening all the time. We need to submit reports and photographs to the UN.
Apart from you media people, it is very rare for the opposition to publicise news from inside of the army or the government activities themselves. When I was working for government intelligence, we had to find out a lot what the opposition were doing. Based on what we found out, we would think about how to counter their activities. The opposition needs a strategy and contingency plans. We have to work out what to do. In order to do that, we all need to be united.・p>
Reporting by Htet Aung Kyaw
Printer Friendly Version | Send to a Friend
Japan opposition pushes Indian PM on nukes
http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/Indian-Prime-Minister-Manmohan-Singh-Taro-Aso-Japanese-Prime-Minister-Manmohan-Singh/photo//081023/photos_wl_sa_afp/ed17cdeceb395e13c4c5a261144dfdf1//s:/afp/20081023/wl_sthasia_afp/japanindianucleardiplomacy_081023083547
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh (right) listens to Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso during a press conference in Tokyo on October 22, 2008. Japan's main opposition party on Thursday pressed Manmohan Singh to work to eliminate nuclear weapons as New Delhi seeks cooperation on civilian atomic energy.
(AFP/Pool/Koichi Kamoshida)
Thu Oct 23, 4:35 am ET AFP/Pool – Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh (right) listens to Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso during a press … TOKYO (AFP) – Japan's main opposition party on Thursday pressed Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to work to eliminate nuclear weapons as New Delhi seeks cooperation on civilian atomic energy.
Singh was wrapping up a three-day visit to Tokyo where he signed a major loan agreement and pledged to expand military links in a sign of growing cooperation between the two Asian nations.
However, Japan has been hesitant about cooperating with India on nuclear energy.
As the only nation to have suffered nuclear attack Japan only reluctantly backed India's landmark nuclear technology deal with the United States earlier this month.
"We hope that India maintains transparency of its nuclear sector and contributes to efforts towards an elimination of nuclear weapons," Yukio Hatoyama, secretary general of the main opposition Democratic Party, told Singh.
India refuses to sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, arguing it is unfairly excluded.
Singh replied that India hoped to develop nuclear power to cut the greenhouse gas emissions blamed for global warming, according to an opposition official who attended the talks. Japan also champions nuclear power.
Singh, speaking Wednesday at a joint news conference with Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso, said it was India's "sincere desire to strengthen and develop our cooperation with Japan in civilian nuclear energy."
"But I do recognise the sensitivity of this issue in Japan and therefore ... we will move at a pace at which the Japanese government and people are comfortable with," Singh said.
Aso has advocated building relations with the fellow democracy to offset frequent tensions with China. Both Aso and Singh were heading later Thursday to Beijing for an Asia-Europe summit.
Hatoyama met Singh after a cancellation by Japan's chief opposition leader Ichiro Ozawa, who for the second time this month said he was too ill for public events.
Ozawa's health has increasingly become a concern for the opposition, as it makes gains in its goal of ousting Aso's conservative Liberal Democratic Party, which has been in power for all but 10 months since 1955.
Japan's September trade surplus dives
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/BUSINESS/10/23/japan.trade.ap/index.html?section=cnn_latest
TOKYO, Japan (AP) -- Japan's trade surplus shrank sharply in September, as the rising cost of importing energy and raw materials exacerbated the impact of limp overseas demand, the government said Thursday.
The data underscore that while fuel prices may be starting to moderate, Japan's export-driven economy is likely to hit more turbulence ahead as fallout from the global financial crisis intensifies.
Japan's surplus tumbled a more-than-expected 94.1 percent to 95.111 billion yen ($965.7 million) in September, far worse than the 1.609 trillion yen ($16.34 billion) surplus it posted in the same month last year, according to the Ministry of Finance.
Don't Miss
Asia-Pacific markets extend global slide
Japan world trade barometer shrinks
The resource-poor country was saddled with high costs for oil, coal and natural gas, sending its imports up 28.8 percent to 7.272 trillion yen ($73.8 billion). Meanwhile, total exports inched up just 1.5 percent to 7.368 trillion yen ($74.8 billion) as shipments of cars and consumer electronics to North America and Europe fell.
Still, September's figures represent a turnaround from the previous month, when the world's No. 2 economy posted a rare trade deficit. The country spent slightly less on energy imports in September than it did in August, reflecting recent declines in crude oil prices.
For the April-September period, Japan's trade surplus shrank 85.6 percent to 801.97 billion yen ($8.14 billion).
Japan leader under fire over pricey nightlife
Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso has a light moment prior to the start of lower house budget committee at parliament in Tokyo Monday, Oct. 6, 2008. Aso is coming under fire for his frequent nighttime visits to high-end bars and restaurants. Aso, the nattily dressed scion of a wealthy family, has dined at posh Tokyo bars and restaurants nearly every night since he took office on Sept. 24, going straight home from work only four times, according to newspaper tallies Thursday, Oct. 23, 2008.
(AP Photo/Katsumi Kasahara)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081023/ap_on_re_as/as_japan_pricey_premier_2
By SHINO YUASA,
Associated Press Writer –
Thu Oct 23, 4:47 am ET AP –
Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso has a light moment prior to the start of lower house budget committee … TOKYO – While much of Japan is grappling with deepening economic turmoil, the country's dapper prime minister has come under fire for enjoying a lavish nightlife.
Since taking the helm a month ago, Taro Aso has spent all but four nights out on the town at posh bars and eateries, according to tallies in leading newspapers.
Aso's haunts include an upscale hotel bar where coffee is poured out at $15 a cup, and a ritzy restaurant where the plates of grilled eel start at $175 a serving.
The opposition has seized on Aso's nights on the town, claiming the 68-year-old political blueblood and scion of a wealthy family is out of touch with the people.
"He won't understand the real concerns of people by going to such places," Susumu Yanase, a lawmaker from Japan's largest opposition party, the Democratic Party of Japan, said Wednesday.
Aso, who is well-known for favoring cigars and meticulously tailored suits, has defended his nocturnal habits, saying visits to less exclusive places would be a security headache for others.
Besides, he said, he's not charging the government for his fun.
"Don't you know bars at hotels are not so expensive?" Aso told reporters on Wednesday night. "Fortunately, I've got money, so I'm paying the bills myself."
Still, he's making efforts to develop a common touch. He visited a supermarket in downtown Tokyo on Sunday to see how shoppers were being affected by price increases.
Since taking office Sept. 24, Aso has been under pressure to boost the popularity of the ailing ruling party before he calls snap parliamentary elections.
The economy, however, is sputtering. Automakers are cutting production and stocks are nose-diving. The benchmark Nikkei 225 stock average fell 2.46 percent on Thursday
Asia, Europe urged to exert pressure on Myanmar
http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/world.aspx?ID=BD4A869283
Reuters
BEIJING — Asian and European leaders gathering for a summit in Beijing should put pressure on military-ruled Myanmar to improve human rights and embark upon real political reform, a rights group said.
Leaders from countries including China, Japan, Germany, France, Denmark and much of Southeast Asia will be at the Asia Europe Meeting (ASEM) Summit, an ideal venue to tackle the former Burma’s problems, Human Rights Watch said in a statement.
“ASEM members have a chance to challenge Burma to make political reforms and start respecting basic freedoms,” the group’s Asia director, Brad Adams said. “Silence over the human rights abuses in today’s Burma isn’t an option anymore for ASEM leaders.”
Myanmar has been pursuing its own “roadmap” to democracy, which included a referendum on an army-drafted constitution that Western nations condemned as a sham. Myanmar drew international condemnation last year for a bloody crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators led by monks and is still keeping the opposition leader, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, under house arrest.
The European Union should also put pressure on the summit’s host, China, and other Asian countries that have close ties with Myanmar, including India and members of the Association of South East Asia Nations, the group said.
“China and India in particular have forged close relations with (Myanmar),” it said. “Both countries are major arms suppliers to and significant investors in Burma, and have vied for rights to import natural gas from Burma.
“The EU has tried to press Burma at past ASEM meetings, but as long as other key Asian countries fail to pick up the torch, improvements are highly unlikely.”
One woman's literary mission -Actor-turned-author shines light on world's dark places
Toronto-born Mia Kirshner, who stars in 'The L Word,' paid an impressive roster of contributors out of her own pocket to produce the “paper documentary” 'I Live Here,' which she will present on Saturday, Oct. 25, 2008, as part of the International Festival of Authors.
http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/article/521600
Why one rising star turned her attention away from Hollywood to focus on the plight of the world's oppressed
Oct 23, 2008 04:30 AM
Be the first to comment on this article...
Bruce DeMara
Entertainment Report
Mia Kirshner isn't your typical self-absorbed Hollywood celebrity.
While her competition was busy blitzing the L.A. circuit for coveted roles over the past several years, the Toronto-born actor was travelling to some of the darkest corners of the world to shine light on the plight of child soldiers and prisoners, war refugees and women struggling against long odds for survival.
The result is I Live Here, a harrowing, moving and memorable book, chronicling in four volumes the lives of refugee families living in troubled Ingushetia and war-torn Chechnya as a result of Russian military intervention; the struggles of Karen refugees and child soldiers pressed into military service by the Burmese military junta; the ongoing devastation in Malawi as a result of AIDS; and Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, where more than 400 young women have been tortured and murdered over the past decade while the government and a corrupt police force turn a blind eye.
Kirshner will present this "paper documentary" on Saturday, along with fellow contributors Karen Connelly and Lauren Kirshner, Mia's younger sister, as part of the 10-day International Festival of Authors, which kicked off yesterday.
The actor-turned-author called her decision to create the project "a light-bulb moment."
"I felt like, creatively, I was just not inspired. I was also becoming frustrated ... that I knew very little about how most of the world lived," said Kirshner, 33, a regular on the cable series The L Word who began her career in 1993 playing a dominatrix in Love and Human Remains and has had a steady stream of film and television roles since.
The idea for the project came in the aftermath of the 9-11 terrorist attacks in the U.S. in 2001, she said, as she struggled to make sense of the world.
"Sept. 11 happened and I was, as most people were and are, just very frightened about the direction of the world and the ways things appeared to be going. I became quite frightened at the level of my own ignorance," she added.
After a year of research, Kirshner brought together a range of collaborators, including writers J.B. McKinnon and Ann-Marie McDonald, comic-book author Joe Sacco and numerous other artists to create a book that, using first-person accounts, original art and prose, is uniquely evocative in its presentation of the life-and-death struggles of marginalized people.
She bankrolled the entire book, paying for the travel and the salaries of co-writers Paul Shoebridge and Michael Simons, even having to take out a bank loan.
"The real reason I didn't ask for money is I just felt like it's my first book, I didn't really know if it was going to work and I didn't want to take someone's money and not be proud of the result," Kirshner said.
Fortunately, she's pleased with the final package.
"I feel I've never done anything very well in my life and I'm really proud of this and I'm proud of the fact so many artists came together for this. It's the best thing I've done with my life, for sure," she said.
Among the greatest dangers she faced: crossing the jungle border from Thailand back and forth into Burma (a.k.a. Myanmar), where she documented stories of women forced into brothels and boys stolen from families to become soldiers.
"Please print this: a massive f--- you to the Burmese government," she said defiantly.
Kirshner and her fellow travellers encountered deprivation, fear, horror and, too often, great sorrow.
"There were moments of like, `What am I doing? This is nuts.' There were times ... when I was deeply devastated. There were levels of grief," she said.
"Juarez was the worst, it was awful. The Mexican government has done nothing and it's been over 10 years," she said.
But along with grief came, surprisingly, inspiration and hope.
"I thought at the end of it, there would be this hole inside of me. But actually what I found with most people that I met was they ... weren't complaining and were making the very best of what they have. That to me was really incredible," Kirshner said.
"You can look at it two ways; you can either be crushed by it or you can look at ... these people, who are actually incredibly positive and inspiring to me and giving me a kick in the butt to get my own life together. That's the way I look at it."
While royalties for the book will go to Amnesty International, the experience also prompted Kirshner to create the I Live Here Foundation. Its first project will be to fund a literacy/writing program for orphaned children living in a Malawi prison whose sole request was for a soccer ball.
Kirshner also plans future books to look at other dark places in the world – Pakistan, Iran, Colombia are on the short list – and to bring the stories of oppressed people to a worldwide audience.
"I'm passionate and much more directed and much more sure of why I did (the book) and what I want to do now," she added.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Just the facts
WHAT: Mia Kirshner, Karen
Wanted monk flees to Thailand border-MIZZIMA
by Mizzima News
Wednesday, 22 October 2008 23:05
A Buddhist monk featuring in the wanted list of the Burmese military regime fled to the Thai-Burma border yesterday.
U Ein Thariya (33) a monk of 14 years standing changed into civilian clothes, temporarily, while fleeing to a neighbouring country. He was under surveillance of Burmese intelligence agencies.
He was wanted by the Burmese military junta for his involvement in street demonstrations against the regime in Pakkoku Township.
He had written vehement protest letters under the pen name "Min Thonenya" against the junta's atrocities and sent it to foreign news broadcasting radio stations.
"They didn't know me directly. They knew only my pen name and they had no idea whose name it actually was. They made inquires but my relatives and friends kept it a secret. I was not arrested because they did not know who exactly I was," he told Mizzima over telephone.
U Ein Thariya was a student monk (studying Buddha's sermon) in Kyilin monastery, Chanmyatharzi Township, Mandalay.
On October 15, 2007, military junta officials arrested and beat up some monks who took part in the monk-led march spreading their love to countrymen by singing sermons. Although monks had demanded the regime apologize to them for the assault, the junta ignored the demand in what is a Buddhist majority country.
Who isn’t bombing Rangoon
http://www.upiasia.com/Human_Rights/2008/10/23/who_isnt_bombing_rangoon/4672/
By Awzar Thi
Column: Rule of LordsPublished: October 23, 2008TOOLBAR
Hong Kong, China — When news spread that in the early hours of Oct. 13 a passenger vehicle had exploded in suburban Rangoon killing seven, the first response of some people was that it must have been another in the latest series of bombings to rock the former Burmese capital.
It turned out that the blast was the result of a natural gas cylinder crammed between the driver and tray in the manner of most fuel-converted trucks and vans in Burma, to the dismay of those squeezed in alongside.
But it was not long before the bombs started again. On Saturday, a small one went off at a football ground in Yankin, causing minor damage. On Sunday, another in Shwepyithar killed a man who, according to the state media, was building the device.
These followed a number of other incidents in September that left at least seven persons wounded. Bombs also earlier exploded at the main railway station, and near the high-class Traders Hotel and the town hall.
There is a lot of talk going around about who might be behind this new campaign. Some exiled opponents of the regime suggest, as in previous years, that it could be elements of the security forces. Others suspect renegade activists who have lost patience with both nonviolent resistance and the jungle-based insurgencies of old.
One person who wasn’t involved is U Myint Aye. That’s because he’s in jail accused of planting a bomb at the branch office of a government organizing body in July. It’s an odd turn of events for the 57-year-old chairman of Burma’s only out-and-out domestic rights group, Human Rights Defenders and Promoters.
Myint Aye is used to being detained, questioned and attacked. There’s no other way for someone openly wearing a human rights label in Burma. This March, an unidentified man hit him on the street while he was campaigning for a “No vote” in the referendum on a new Constitution. Last year he was held for a while after the monk-led protests.
So when police came for Myint Aye on Aug. 8, it was nothing unusual. His family expected them to interrogate him about the relief work he had done since Cyclone Nargis struck in May, and the interviews he had given with overseas media, like those that had got comedian and fellow humanist Zarganar into trouble.
Although the officers behaved politely and gave reassurances that he’d be back soon, a month later the government held its first press conference of the year to denounce Myint Aye as a saboteur. According to the police chief, he had been acting as a conduit for money and explosives from abroad and had “committed terrorist acts in the name of human rights.”
Up to now the chief’s men haven’t produced any evidence in court to support these dramatic claims. None of the stuff collected from Myint Aye’s house strengthens the case, and all that’s been proven so far is how, as usual, the judicial system in Burma has been skewed to deny defendants their basic rights, and its police force bent to coerce and harass well-meaning people.
Nor is Myint Aye the only one of his group who is currently in prison on concocted charges. In the delta, six of his people were imprisoned in 2007 under the catch-all offence of upsetting public tranquility. Another in Pegu is doing time for illegal tuition. And there are still more who have been inside since the rallies of a year back. Any charge will do, although in the chairman’s case it seems that the more outlandish it is, the better.
While supposed bombers are locked up, bombs keep going off. Irrespective of who’s behind them, the inability and unwillingness of the police to hunt for the real perpetrators is indicative of how the government of Burma promotes insecurity for its millions, rather than, as it never tires of claiming, protecting them.
For years the authorities have responded to bombings not through credible inquiries or arrests of genuine suspects but through the same sort of finger pointing and jailing of troublemakers as in recent months, perhaps according to some plan, perhaps just opportunistically.
The blasts in January were blamed on an insurgent army, one bomber again supposedly dying while planting a device. The year before, another rebel group was accused of posting a series of letter bombs.
Three big explosions in supermarkets in May 2005 killed dozens and injured hundreds. Although the police then offered rewards and asked for witnesses, the case remains unsolved. Not even the true number of casualties has been confirmed. At least one suspect died in custody. The official line ended up, as usual, with the blame going to a Thailand-based political group.
The arrest and charging of U Myint Aye only reveals yet again who isn’t bombing Rangoon. Whoever it is continues to enjoy a license to blast away, free from the concerns of being hunted down that are shared by bombers in countries with working police forces and truly professional investigators. As for the uninformed and rightfully distrustful public, they can only wonder when and where the next bombs will blast.
--
(Awzar Thi is the pen name of a member of the Asian Human Rights Commission with over 15 years of experience as an advocate of human rights and the rule of law in Thailand and Burma. His Rule of Lords blog can be read at http://ratchasima.net)
Democracies losing battle for press freedom abroad -MIZZIMA
http://www.mizzima.com/news/world/1183-democracies-losing-battle-for-press-freedom-abroad.html
by Mizzima News
Thursday, 23 October 2008 14:35
Authoritarian governments are successfully able to suppress domestic media in the face of a fractured and ineffective campaign by the international community to combat the denial of press freedom abroad, according to the 2008 Press Freedom Index.
Reporters Without Borders (RSF), in their annual report released yesterday, signaled growing corruption within democracies in conjunction with ineffective patterns of dialogue and an increasingly irrelevant United Nations as leading causes for the international community's inability to reign in the world's worst violators of press freedom.
"Destabilised and on the defensive, the leading democracies are gradually eroding the space for freedoms," says RSF. "The economically most powerful dictatorships arrogantly proclaim their authoritarianism, exploiting the international community's divisions."
The reports authors maintain that the current disjointed response by democratic countries has proven insufficient to pressure the leaders of closed societies to rescind diktats suppressing press freedom.
"The world's closed countries, governed by the worst press freedom predators, continue to muzzle their media at will, with complete impunity, while organisations such as the UN lose all authority over their members," argues RSF.
For 2008, Burma ranks 170th out of the 173 countries in the study, placing it just behind China, Vietnam and Cuba in the rankings and just ahead of bottom feeders Turkmenistan, North Korea and Eritrea.
RSF describes Burma as a country "run by a xenophobic and inflexible junta" in which "journalists and intellectuals, even foreign ones, have for years been viewed as enemies by the regime, and they pay the price."
During the period of the study, from September 2007 to September 2008, numerous journalists were detained by Burma's military regime, notes the report.
Similar to prevalent analyses to date of the impact of the U.N.'s attempts to kick-start a substantive dialogue between Burma's ruling generals and opposition parties, RSF proceeds to conclude: "[D]ialogue has clearly had little success and even the most authoritarian governments are still able to ignore remonstrations without risking any repercussions other than the inconsequential displeasure of the occasional diplomat."
A wider look at the table also reveals that Burma is situated in a region of the world in which press freedom is not typically honored.
Including every neighbor of Burma and all members of ASEAN (with the exclusion of Brunei due to its not being ranked), the country earning the highest score from RSF for press freedom is Indonesia, occupying the 111th slot in the table. Indonesia, further, is the only member of the above to avoid the bottom 33 percentile of all countries with respect to press freedom.
This year's top honors go to the European triumvirate of Iceland, Luxembourg and Norway. In last year's report, Burma placed 164th out of 169 countries surveyed.
Myanmar-Chinese artists donate for cyclone-hit region
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-10/22/content_10235081.htm
2008-10-22 20:08:01 Print
YANGON, Oct. 22 (Xinhua) -- Myanmar-Chinese artists from the local music circle in Yangon donated 18 million kyats (15,000 U.S. dollars) in cash to the Myanmar education authorities Wednesday to help rebuild education infrastructure in a cyclone-hard-hit area in the country's southwestern Ayeyawaddy delta.
Obtained from a recent fund-raising charity live music show, sponsored by the amateur Myanmar-Guangdong Music Band and involving eight other music groups, the fund is to be used for building a primary school in Dedaye Township's Thegonelay village.
The donation ceremony held at the State Basic Education Department-1. And over a dozen representatives of the Myanmar-Chinese artists involved in the performance attended it.
The charity music show was the first ever of its kind held in the Myanmar-Chinese community in Yangon to extend loving kindness and compassion to storm victims.
The music show, performed by over a hundred artists including musicians, vocalists and dancers and attended by the community dignatries, drew nearly 1,000 audiences, winning a huge wave of applause.
Not long after cyclone Nargis struck Myanmar, several overseas Chinese associations, big and small, had made respective donationsto the cyclone-hit areas through the Ministry of Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement.
These organizations include Overseas Chinese Charity Association, Overseas Chinese Chamber of Commerce, Fujian Native Association, and Guangdong Native Association as well as Mutai Temple and Qingfu Temple.
Meanwhile, popular Myanmar musicians and vocalists have also been holding a series of live shows in the country, mainly in Yangon and Mandalay, in the post-Nargis period to help raise relief funds for cyclone survivors and for reconstruction of the storm-ravaged regions.
Deadly cyclone Nargis, which occurred over the Bay of Bengal, hit five divisions and states -- Ayeyawaddy, Yangon, Bago, Mon andKayin on last May 2 and 3, of which Ayeyawaddy and Yangon inflicted the heaviest casualties and massive infrastructure damage.
Official death toll showed the storm has killed 84,537 people and left 53,836 missing and 19,359 injured.
Basic education schools, destroyed in the Ayeyawaddy delta's seven townships, amounted to 1,785 in number, of which 550 have been repaired, according to the education authorities.
Editor: Zheng E
Situation deteriorating inside Burma
http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/programguide/stories/200810/s2399134.htm
Burma's military has again been accused of human rights abuses, this time, by stepping up its militarisation of the country's eastern states forcing tens of thousands of civilians to flee over the past year.
The accusation was contained in a report by the Bangkok-based Burma refugee aid organization Thailand Burma Border Consortium.
Presenter: Ron Corben
Speaker: Sally Thompson from the aid organisation Thailand Burma Border Consortium
Listen: Windows Media
THOMPSON: We have to say it's an ongoing deterioration in Burma and what the report highlights is that violations of humanitarian and human rights law in the conflict affected areas of eastern Burma are as systematic as ever and on-going. This means that over the past year we've seen a further 66,000 people displaced - partly in the conflict affected areas of Northern Karen state Eastern Pegu division - but also in other areas of Eastern Burma because of forced coercion from such things as forced labour, portering, taxation, land confiscation, agricultural quotas -such that the people had to move out of the areas.
CORBEN: And has this been taking place because of intensified military operations?
THOMPSON: I think what's happening now with military operations is that they are sustained throughout the year. Whereas traditionally the rainy season came the military would retreat. Now the army's they have made sufficient inroads into these areas to guarantee their supply lines that it's a sustained operation throughout the year. Actual military attacks have decreased but harassment of villages is still on the increase as we still see this ongoing effective militarization of Eastern Burma.
CORBEN: What sorts of things are happening to the villages? What is the report talking about?
THOMPSON: If we look at it aside from the conflict areas where the army is specifically going in trying to move any support for the remaining resistance movements - in other areas the human rights abuses are linked to more development projects. So you've got the hydro-electric projects in Shan State - we're seeing increased mining in Shan and Karen states and therefore villages are being expected to work for the military to set up - help them set up their bases - provide labour for the different development projects going on in the area. If people are suspected of having any relationship with the resistance movement with the insurgents then they are often brought in for questioning, they're interrogated and it's not known when they are released ...and if they are suspected of having a relationship it can go as far as torture leading to death in detention.
CORBEN: As a result of this campaign how has it affected the numbers of people coming across the border?
THOMPSON: We are still seeing new arrivals coming into Thailand coming into Thailand -for both reasons coming from conflict affected areas and coming because of displacement. The rate of people crossing into Thailand certainly suggests that the situation inside Burma is not getting any better - if anything it's getting harder for people.
CORBEN: The report comes as the United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, who was expected to travel to Burma in December, this week expressed frustration over the military's failure to move forward on efforts towards political reform. He also warned he may drop plans to travel to Burma unless he was confident the visit, focused on political reform, led to tangible results. I asked Ms Thompson what she hoped Mr. Ban's visit may achieve.
THOMPSON: What we have to hope for is that they pursue the dialogue form some kind of political reform its not at the expense of humanitarian protection so that these ongoing violations that we're seeing are not forgotten that they are actually brought into the discussion.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
