To/
Mr. Fredrik Reinfeldt
Prime Minister
Royal Government of Sweden
Subject: :Request to lead Swedish government and European Union in order to
seek justice and criminal accountability for victims of heinous crimes in
Burma/ Myanmar
Dear Your Excellency,
I would like to request your kind attention in regard to heinous crimes being committed by the ruling military regime in Burma, SPDC, against its own people, particularly for those offenses, which constitute international crimes such as crime against humanity, genocide and war crimes, since the emergence of the International Criminal Court, July 1, 2002, inter alias, as follows:
1. The regime used about 5,000 members of its lackey organization, namely Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA) and crashed down Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, democracy icon in Burma, and members of the National League for Democracy (NLD) while making organizing trip at Depayin in upper Burma on May 30, 2003. Since that time, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi has been victim of crime and she has been under detention for almost six years. In recent month, UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention made a ruling that detention of Daw Aung Sun Suu Kyi is against the national laws as well as international laws.
2. The International Committee of the Red Cross issued a global alert on Burma, on June
29, 2007, verifying the regime's criminal violations of the Geneva Conventions, stating that such violations were personally observed by ICRC delegates, that all confidential bilateral negotiations had broken down, and that the crimes by the government were likely to be ongoing. The president of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Jakob Kellenberger, stated as follows:
"…I urge the government of Myanmar to put a stop to all violations of international humanitarian law and to ensure that they do not recur. ... I would also like to remind all States party to the Geneva Conventions of their obligation, under Article 1, to respect and to ensurerespect for the Conventions."
3. In September 2007, the military regime brutally suppressed peaceful demonstration of
several thousands of monks, and killed and tortured them. Without paying any regard to the effective Criminal Procedural Code in Burma, the military security forces of the SPDC raided the monasteries, searched the campuses, ruined the properties of Buddhist religion, and seriously tortured the monks.
4. In June 2008, the Amnesty International reported that for 2½ years a human rights
emergency has been occurring in the form of a military offensive by the SPDC army waged against ethnic Karen civilians in Kayin (Karen) State and Bago (Pagu) Division. Accordingly, an estimate of 147,800 people have been and remain internally displaced in Kayin State and Bago Division and many of these people have been subject to widespread and systematic human rights violations including unlawful killings, torture and other ill-treatment, enforced disappearances and arbitrary arrests, the imposition of forced labour including portering, the destruction of homes and villages, and the destruction or confiscation of crops and food stocks and other forms of collective punishment. The research undertaken by AI raises grave concerns that the violations of international human right and humanitarian law against the Karen have been part of a widespread and systematic pattern of crimes which may constitute a crime against humanity.
5. In the wake of the SPDC's criminal negligence after Cyclone Nargis occurred in delta
area of Burma, on May 22, 2008, European Parliament made a resolution on the tragic
situation in Burma, as follows:
Takes the view that, if the Burmese authorities continue to prevent aid from reaching those in danger, they should be held accountable for crimes against humanity and calls on EU Member States to press for a UN Security Council resolution referring the case to the ICC for investigation and prosecution.
6. On 27 February 2009, John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in the United
States and Emergency Assistance Team (Burma) jointly released a report entitled "After
the Storm; Voices from the Delta" and mention that the SPDC obstructed relief to victims
of the cyclone, arrested aid workers and severely restrained accurate information in the
wake of the worst natural disaster to befall modern Burma. The report charges these
abuses may constitute crimes against humanity through the creation of condition whereby
the basic survival needs of victims cannot be adequately met, "intentionally causing great
suffering, or serious injury to body or to mental or physical health" violating Article
7(1)(k) of the Rome Statue of the International Criminal Court.
7. Rape reports published by ethnic women in Burma including the Shan, Mon, Karen,
Palaung, and Chin (Shan Women’s Action Network, Shan Human Rights Foundation,
Human Rights Foundation of Mon land, Karen Women’s Organization, Palaung’s
Women Organization, Women League of Chin Land and Women’s League of Burma as
well as by Refugees International, document sexual and other forms of violence against
women systematically perpetrated by the junta and even identify perpetrators, give
relevant dates and the battalion numbers of the rapists. Despite that the military regime committed heinous crimes one period after another consistently, the judiciary inside Burma has been keeping silent and no legal action has been taken on the perpetrators for those heinous crimes. The military regime and its lackey perpetrators have been enjoying impunity endlessly and people in Burma lack any protection.
The Responsibility to Protect Doctrine or R2P is a catalyst in transforming the meaning of UN membership and participation in the international community by affirming that with state sovereignty comes the “obligation of a State to protect the welfare of its own people.” It makes clear that in exceptional cases where a State cannot or will not protect civilians the international community has a right to act, and a responsibility to do so. The legal import of UNSCR 1325 to Security Council Actions is that when the council is confronted with evidence of systematic crimes including rape in the context of conflict there should exist a presumption of a threat to international peace and security. In this case such presumption should require a UN Charter Chapter VII referral to the ICC.
In conclusion, I would like to request your Excellency to lead Swedish government and, if possible, European Union to press for a UN Security Council resolution referring the situation of Burma/Myanmar to the ICC for investigation and prosecution in order to seek justice and criminal accountability for victims of heinous crimes there. Only then, repeated crimes will be prevented; the rule of law will be restored; a genuine stability will be established; and a peaceful democratization process will also be facilitated in Burma.
Respectfully,
Download here ( Letter to Prime Minister | English | Burmese language )
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Monday, May 11, 2009
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ေရႊဂံုတိုင္ေၾကျငာစာတမ္းအား ဂ်ပန္ရွိျမန္မာတို႔ေထာက္ခံ
တိုက်ိဳ၊ ေမ(၁ဝ)
၂ဝ၁ဝ ေရႊးေကာက္ပြဲႏွင့္ပါတ္သတ္၍ အန္အယ္လ္ဒီအဖြဲ႕ခ်ဳပ္(ဗဟုိ)မွ ႏိုင္ငံေရးအက်ဥ္းသားမ်ားလြတ္ေပးရန္၊ ၂ဝဝ၈ ခုႏွစ္အေျခခံဥပေဒကိုျပင္ဆင္ရန္ႏွင့္ ေရႊးေကာက္ပြဲတြင္အလႊာအသီးသီးပါဝင္ျပီး ႏိုင္ငံတကာကေစာင့္ၾကည့္ခြင့္ေပးရန္ စသည့္ခြၽင္းခ်က္(၃)ခုပါရွိသည့္ ေရႊဂံုတုိင္ေၾကျငာခ်က္စာတမ္းကို ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံရွိ ျမန္မာ့ဒီမိုကေရစီအင္အင္းစုမ်ားမွ ေထာက္ခံႀကိဳဆိုေၾကာင္း ျပသသည့္အခမ္းအနားတရပ္ကို ယေန႔နံနက္မနက္ပိုင္းတြင္ တိုက်ိဳျမိဳ႔၊ အီကဲဘူးကူးရိုးရွိ ခန္းကိုးပလာဇာခန္းမ ၇ ထပ္၌ က်င္းပျပဳလုပ္ခဲ့ၾကသည္။
''ေရႊဂံုတိုင္ေၾကျငာစာတမ္းက လက္ရွိျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံရဲ႔ႏိုင္ငံေရးအက်ပ္အတည္းေတြ၊ ထြက္ေပါက္အေနနဲ႔ေရာ ေနာက္ အနာဂါတ္ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံကို ေကာင္းမြန္တဲ့လမ္းေၾကာင္းေပၚေရာက္ရွိေရးအတြက္ အျပဳသေဘာေဆာင္တဲ့ေၾကျငာစာတမ္းတခု ျဖစ္သလို ဒီပါတီရဲ႔အေျခခံမႈဝါဒေတြ၊ သေဘာထားေတြကို ထင္ဟပ္တယ္၊ ေနာက္ျပည္သူ႔ဆႏၵကိုေဖာ္ေဆာင္ေပးတဲ့အတြက္ ေထာက္ခံတာပါ''ဟု အန္အယ္လ္ဒီ(ဂ်ပန္)၏ ဒု-ဥကၠ႒ဦးလွဟန္မွ ေထာက္ခံရျခင္းအေၾကာင္းကိုေျပာျပသည္။
(၁၉၉ဝ)ခုႏွစ္ေရြးေကာက္ပြဲအျပီးတြင္ ''ဂႏၶီေၾကျငာစာတမ္း''ကိုထုတ္ျပန္ခဲ့ဖူးျပီး ေတာင္းဆိုခ်က္အျပင္ ထူးျခားစြာျဖင့္ ႏိုင္ငံေရးလမ္းညြန္ခ်က္မ်ားပါ ပါဝင္သည့္ ယခုထုတ္ျပန္သည့္''ေရႊဂံုတိုင္ေၾကျငာစာတမ္း''ျဖင့္ ေၾကျငာစာတမ္း(၂)ခုကို အန္အယ္လ္ဒီအဖြဲ႔ခ်ဳပ္အေနႏွင့္ သမိုင္းဝင္ထင္ထင္ရွားရွားထုတ္ျပန္ခဲ့ျခင္းျဖစ္သည္။
''ေရႊးေကာက္ပြဲဘဲျဖစ္ျဖစ္၊ ဘာပဲျဖစ္ျဖစ္ က်ေနာ္တို႔လိုခ်င္တဲ့ Multi-Democratic System ကိုသြားတဲ့အခါ Democratic Principleကင္းမဲ့တဲ့ Conditionေအာက္မွာဘယ္လိုမွလြတ္လပ္တဲ့အလုပ္မျဖစ္ႏိုင္ဘူး၊ အလားတူပါဘဲ Constitutionအမွားအယြင္းရဲ႔ေနာက္မွာ ေရႊးေကာက္ပြဲနဲ႔Democratic Principleကို မေဖာက္ေဆာင္ႏိုင္ပါဘူး''ဟု ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံသို႔ ေရာက္ရွိေနသည့္ ေက်ာင္းသားတပ္မေတာ္ဥကၠ႒ရဲေဘာ္သံခဲမွတက္ေရာက္ေျပာၾကားသည္။ ဂ်ပန္ရွိျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံသားအလုပ္သမားသမဂၢ၏ဥကၠ႒ျဖစ္သူဦးတင္ဝင္းမွလည္း ''ဒီသမိုင္းဝင္ေၾကျငာစာတမ္းတခုဟာ က်ေနာ္တို႔ တကယ္ဘဲ ေထာက္ခံဖို႔သင့္သလားဆိုတာ ျပန္စဥ္းစားရေအာင္၊ ဒီေနရာမွာက်ေနာ္ထင္ပါတယ္၊ ဒီေၾကျငာခ်က္ဟာ ျပည္သူလူထုႏွင့္တကြ အမ်ဳိးသားဒီမိုကေရစီအဖြဲ႔ခ်ဳပ္ရဲ႔ခံယူခ်က္၊ သေဘာထားျဖစ္ခ်င္တဲ့ဆႏၵကိုေရာက္ေအာင္ ပို႔ေပးႏိုင္သလားဆိုတာစဥ္းစားရမယ္၊ အဲ့လိုသြားတဲ့ေနရာမွာ လက္ေတြ႔မပါတဲ့ ဆႏၵသက္သက္လားဆိုတာဆိုတာ စဥ္းစားရမယ္''၄င္း၏အျမင္ကိုရွင္းလင္ေျပာျပသည္။
အဆိုပါေထာက္ခံႀကိဳဆိုသည့္အခမ္းအနားကို ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံအေျခစိုက္ NLD(LA-JB) မွ ဦးစီးျပဳလုပ္ခဲ့ျခင္းျဖစ္ၿပီး အဖဲြ႔အစည္းအသီးသီးမွ ဒီမိုကေရစီအင္အားစု အစံုအလင္တက္ေရာက္ေထာက္ခံခဲ့ၾကသည္။ ဂ်ပန္အစိုးရအပါအဝင္ႏိုင္ငံတကာရိွ အစိုးရမ်ားမွ နအဖစစ္အစိုးရအား လိုက္ေလ်ာပူးေပါင္းပါဝင္လာေစေရး ဖိအားေပးႏိုင္ရန္အတြက္ အလုပ္သေဘာပါသည့္ ေၾကျငာစာတမ္းအခုကို ဂ်ပန္ရွိတိုင္းရင္းသားအဖြဲ႔အစည္းမ်ားမွေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ားႏွင့္အတူ ယခုေၾကျငာစာတမ္းေထာက္ခံပြဲအျပီး၌ ပူတြဲထုတ္ျပန္ခဲ့ၾကေၾကာင္းလည္း သိရွိရသည္။
Reported by: Thant Myo Htway(Moe Thauk Kye)
Ethnic Groups in Myanmar Hope for Peace, but Gird for Fight
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/11/world/asia/11iht-myanmar.html?_r=1&em=&pagewanted=all
By THOMAS FULLER
Published: May 10, 2009
LAIZA, Myanmar — The Kachin tribesmen who inhabit the hills along Myanmar’s border with China have a reputation as stealthy jungle warriors, famous for repelling Japanese attacks in the Second World War with booby traps and instilling terror by slicing off ears to tally their kills.
Thomas Fuller/International Herald Tribune
The town of Laiza, near the border with China, is the home of the Kachin Independence Army. The region wants to keep a degree of autonomy.
Now, as they have many times in their war-scarred history, the Kachin are hoping for peace but are prepared for battle with Myanmar’s central government.
“Whether or not there will be war again, we have to be ready,” Maj. Zauja Nhkri, the head of an officer’s training school that is part of the Kachin Independence Army, which has around 4,000 men under arms.
“If our army is strong, we can maintain the peace.”
As Myanmar’s military government prepares to adopt a new and disputed Constitution next year, a fragile patchwork of cease-fire agreements between the central government and more than a dozen armed ethnic groups is fraying.
The new Constitution would nominally return the country to civilian rule after four and a half decades of military government and, in theory, could formally end the now dormant civil war that has plagued the country since it gained independence from Britain in 1948. But as a precondition for what they portray as a fresh start, Myanmar’s ruling generals are ordering the Kachin and other groups to disarm and disband their substantial armies.
So far, the answer is no.
“There is no good road map for the future of Burma,” said Gen. Gam Shawng Gunhtang, the chief of staff of the Kachin Independence Army, which has fought the government on and off since its founding in 1961. Myanmar used to be known as Burma.
The ethnic groups control large pockets of territory in the northern and eastern borderland areas, and, if they disarm, they risk losing control over their lucrative trade in timber, jade, gems and, in some cases, heroin and methamphetamines. They are loath to give up their hard-won autonomy to the Myanmar military, which is dominated by the Burman ethnic group they have long resented.
“We ethnic peoples are trying to form a federal union,” Gen. Gam Shawng Gunhtang said. “They don’t want to hear about it.”
The demands to disarm are “not acceptable,” he said.
The volatile and remote northern reaches of Myanmar are rarely reported on in the Western news media because of the difficulty accessing the armed groups. The visit by this reporter to Laiza was the first by a foreign newspaper correspondent in several years.
By the tumultuous standards of Myanmar’s six decades of independence, the country has been relatively peaceful over the past decade and a half, thanks to the cease-fire agreements.
Myanmar captured the world’s attention when the government quashed the uprising of Buddhist monks in September 2007 and when it refused to allow some international assistance after a deadly cyclone last May.
But those events only served to underline the firm grip that the generals have over the low-lying parts of the country, where the majority Burman population is concentrated.
It is a very different picture in the upland regions, where the government’s control has always been tenuous. A resumption of civil war in the north and east is by no means a foregone conclusion — the generals could back down from their demands to disarm, or the ethnic groups might relent and decide to fully adopt the new Constitution.
But if the conflicts re-ignite, which some analysts say is likely, it could resonate well beyond Myanmar’s borders, resulting in outflows of refugees into neighboring countries like Thailand and China and a resurgence of the heroin business, which in the past has thrived under the cover of war.
“I think you will hear a lot of gunfire next year,” said Aung Kyaw Zaw, a former soldier in the now defunct Burmese Communist Party who is in contact with leaders of the ethnic groups. “The Burmese government is unwilling to give autonomy.”
The largest borderland groups, drawn from ethnic groups like the Wa, Shan and Kokang, are united in their bitterness over their historical domination by the Burman.
During the Cold War, China, Thailand and the United States supplied arms and other assistance to some borderland groups. Now commercial interests, including many shady businesses, have replaced ideological ones.
The Kachin hills are home to the world’s most lucrative jade mines. The area inhabited by the Shan has the largest and best-quality rubies found anywhere. All the territory controlled by the ethnic groups has prized varieties of tropical hardwood.
And drug syndicates, many of them with ties to the ethnic groups, profit handsomely from the trafficking of both illegal and counterfeit drugs.
Adding to the complexity of the situation, Myanmar, by the nature of its location between India and China, is now the focus of a geopolitical contest for influence by the region’s big powers increasingly hungry for natural resources.
Chinese companies are building a series of hydroelectric dams on northern tributaries of the Irrawaddy River (despite Kachin objections) and have helped finance and build roads inside Myanmar, facilitating both the sale of Chinese electronics and clothing in Myanmar and the export of timber and other commodities into China.
China recently beat India in securing a 30-year concession on natural gas from Myanmar, and construction will reportedly start soon on twin pipelines crossing Myanmar from the Bay of Bengal and connecting to the southern Chinese city of Kunming.
In March, China and Myanmar signed a “cooperation agreement” on the oil and gas pipelines, but key details are vague.
The strategic objective for China is access to the Bay of Bengal, thus avoiding having to ship oil through the Strait of Malacca, a costly detour and a security threat if that choke point is ever blocked. But the project is seen by many as a risky venture.
“Burma is not a stable place when you get out into these remote areas that the pipeline is going to have to traverse,” said Priscilla A. Clapp, a former American diplomat who spent three years as the chief of the U.S. mission in Myanmar. “It’s going to have to go over mountains and through remote areas of the country that are barely controlled by the military. It could very easily be blown up, and then you’re out of luck.”
Gam Shawng Gunhtang, the Kachin general, is worried that the pipeline will marginalize the borderland ethnic groups and give the upper hand to Myanmar’s junta, also known as the State Peace and Development Council, or S.P.D.C.
“The S.P.D.C. is trying to convince the Chinese government that the borderland armed groups are not political groups — just insurgents or terrorists,” the general said. “The pipeline will be a tool and an opportunity for the S.P.D.C. to eliminate the armed groups.”
The Constitution, which Myanmar’s generals say was adopted by more than 90 percent of voters in a referendum last year and will take effect after elections next year, prescribes “genuine multi-party democracy” and recognizes what it calls “self-administered” areas. But ethnic leaders say this falls short of the autonomy they want.
They also point out that the document preserves a dominant role for the military, including the right of the commander in chief of the armed forces to appoint a quarter of the Parliament and to remove the president.
And because the Constitution mandates that only the national armed forces provide defense and security, the junta is demanding that all other groups disarm.
The most heavily armed group along the Chinese border is the United Wa State Army, which has about 20,000 soldiers and new armaments including field artillery and anti-tank missiles, according to Bertil Lintner, an expert on Myanmar’s ethnic groups and co-author of the book “Merchants of Madness,” which deals with the drug trade among ethnic groups.
Very few of the armed groups will accede to the government’s demands to disarm, Mr. Lintner believes.
“Some of the smaller groups might hand in their weapons, but they don’t matter anyway,” he said.
In Laiza, it is easy to see why the Kachin want to maintain their autonomy.
Residents escape many of the deprivations so common in other parts of Myanmar, one of the world’s poorest countries: Electricity from a nearby hydroelectric dam is reliable, cellphone service provided by Chinese communications towers across the border is cheap (obtaining a cellphone number inside Myanmar typically costs $2,000), and the local administration even stamps out its own vehicle license plates, skirting Myanmar’s highly restrictive car ownership policies.
In addition to its own army, the Kachin have a police force, schools, a teacher’s training college and their own customs agents, who monitor the border crossing with China.
Laiza is no Shangri-La — the town struggles with drug addiction and other social ills common to many border areas — but it feels more free than the military-controlled areas in Myanmar, where dissidents are repeatedly rounded up and sentenced to long jail terms.
“The S.P.D.C. has one last chance to win the hearts of the people,” said Thar Kyaw, a jade dealer now based in the southern Chinese city of Ruili. “But we are not very hopeful.”
Detained Myanmar opposition leader Suu Kyi on IV drip
05/10/2009 | 10:12 PM
YANGON, Myanmar – Myanmar's detained opposition leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, has difficulty eating and has been taking fluids intravenously, her party said Sunday, calling for the military government to allow a doctor to see the Nobel laureate.
Suu Kyi's primary physician was detained for questioning by the authorities Thursday after an American was arrested after allegedly sneaking into her closely guarded home and staying there for more than two days. Another doctor was permitted Friday to see the 63-year-old Suu Kyi, who is rarely allowed to leave the compound where she is under house arrest.
But the doctor's request for a follow-up visit on Saturday was rejected, said a spokesman for Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy.
"We are worried about Daw Suu's health. Authorities should allow free access of her doctor to give Daw Suu the required medical treatment," said the spokesman, Nyan Win. "Daw" is an honorific used for older women.
Nyan Win said that according to the doctor, Suu Kyi had lost her appetite and had not eaten properly for three or four days. He did not specify her illness.
Suu Kyi, whose nonviolent advocacy for democracy won her the Nobel Peace Prize, is one of the world's most prominent political prisoners, and her release has long been sought by the United Nations and many Western nations.
Her party won Myanmar's last elections in 1990, but the result was not recognized by the military, which has ruled the country since 1962.
Suu Kyi's primary doctor, Tin Myo Win, was detained for questioning by the authorities Thursday evening after an American man was arrested after allegedly swimming across a lake to reach Suu Kyi's compound and sneaking inside.
Tin Myo Win had gone to Suu Kyi's home earlier that day to give her a routine monthly check up but was barred from entering by the police, who increased security there after the intrusion.
State-run media said the American confessed that he swam 1¼ miles (2 kilometers) across Inya Lake to Suu Kyi's compound and "secretly entered the house," where he stayed from Sunday night to Tuesday night. He was arrested when authorities spotted him swimming back.
The US Embassy – which said the man's name is John William Yettaw – has been asking the government for access to the arrested man, but communications have been complicated because Friday through Sunday were public holidays.
Suu Kyi – who has spent more than 13 of the last 19 years, including the past six, in detention without trial – is allowed virtually no visitors aside from her doctor. Her home is tightly guarded by police checkpoints and barbed-wire barricades. On infrequent occasions she is allowed to leave under tight guard to meet with fellow party leaders and visiting UN representatives. - AP
Update: Dr Tin Myo Win was reportedly charged with 5/J and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi would be linked
BDD
Informed source said Dr Tin Myo Win is believed to be taken to the judge for two weeks detention by the regime. The SPDC intended to frame him up that connection with the American swimmer who entered Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's resident last week. Dr Tin is believed to be charged with 5/J emergency provision act for more investigation, said sources.
According to the informed source, Dr Tin informed authorities about American man who had approached him last year, but that could not confirmed that this time American Swimmer had approached him or not.
"The intension is clear; the SPDC needed more jail term for Daw Aung Suu Kyi. She could be charged by the regime for American swimmer, whether she was not a person who did invite or not. The SPDC goal is not to free her before 2010 election." said informed source.
Japan opposition leader quits ahead of election
http://uk.reuters.com/article/marketsNewsUS/idUKT4193720090511
UPDATE 5-
Mon May 11, 2009 11:02am BST
(For more stories on Japanese politics click [ID:nPOLJP])
* Main opposition party leader resigns to help party
* Scandal had eaten into opposition Democratic Party's lead
* Move to improve election chances, but not all damage undone
By Chisa Fujioka
TOKYO, May 11 (Reuters) - Japanese opposition leader Ichiro Ozawa resigned on Monday in a move that is likely to improve his party's prospects in a looming election, after a fundraising scandal dampened its hopes for victory.
A political stalemate and voter frustrations with Prime Minister Taro Aso had raised the chances Ozawa would lead his Democratic Party to victory in an election that must be held by October, ending more than 50 years of nearly unbroken rule by Aso's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP).
But the Democratic Party's lead in polls has narrowed after the scandal, clouding the outlook for the solid opposition victory that would break a deadlock that is stalling policy decisions as Japan struggles with a deep recession. [ID:nT75082]
"I have decided to sacrifice myself and resign as party leader to strengthen the unity of the party towards a clear victory in the next election and achieve a change in government," Ozawa told a news conference.
The Democrats have vowed to reduce bureaucrats' meddling in policy-making, stress the rights of consumers and workers over corporate interests, and adopt a diplomatic policy less subservient to security ally the United States.
Those positions were unlikely to be altered by Ozawa's departure, although a rejuvenated opposition might encourage the LDP to come up with extra stimulus plans to attract voters.
A 15 trillion yen ($153 billion) spending package is already on its way through parliament. [ID:nT56332]
Ozawa's resignation had little impact on financial markets, with the yen
Aso, who has threatened to call an early election if the Democrats obstruct debate in parliament on the massive extra budget to fight the recession, told reporters Ozawa's resignation would have no direct impact on the election timing.
Recent speculation has focused on an August vote.
"Now that (Ozawa) is gone, Prime Minister Aso might become more aggressive in economic stimulus to woo voters, rather than dissolving parliament now," said Hidenori Suezawa, chief strategist at Daiwa Securities SMBC.
SUCCESSOR QUESTION
While replacing Ozawa is likely to improve the Democrats' chances at the polls, not all the damage will be so easily undone, analysts said. [ID:nT53405]
"Things had gotten very tough. People were complaining about Ozawa," said independent political commentator Minoru Morita. "This improves the outlook for the Democrats quite a lot."
Ozawa's exit could open the way for a younger leader, with possible candidates including former party leaders Katsuya Okada, an advocate of tougher climate policies seen as the frontrunner, and Seiji Maehara, a conservative security policy expert.
Two other ex-leaders who are Ozawa's deputies, Yukio Hatoyama and Naoto Kan, are also possible successors. [ID:nT56552]
Ozawa, a skilled campaign strategist, has been shaking up Japanese politics for almost two decades since bolting the LDP and helping to briefly replace it with a pro-reform coalition.
How far his resignation improves the Democrats' chances depends at least in part on who replaces him, and how smoothly.
"It is a necessary step toward fixing the image problem. Now the question is whom do they chose, how do they chose him and how does he perform," said Gerry Curtis, a Columbia University professor and expert in Japanese politics.
A Democratic Party source said the next leader would likely be chosen by a vote among party lawmakers, possibly within a week or 10 days.
A survey by the daily Yomiuri newspaper before Ozawa's announcement and published on Monday showed the Democrats still had a razor-thin lead over the LDP, but that more than two-thirds of respondents questioned his earlier decision to stay on.
"If Ozawa had stayed, I was going to submit a blank paper when I cast my vote," said Yukihiro Nakagawa, 44, an executive at a precision machinery company. "I would like to make up my mind after seeing what kind of policies the Democrats will promise after this, but I am leaning towards voting for the Democrats."
(For a graphic showing the trend in Japanese polls, click:
here)
The poll by the Yomiuri newspaper conducted before Ozawa's announcement showed 30 percent of respondents would vote for the Democrats in the next election against 27 percent for the LDP.
Some experts have said Ozawa's resignation would revive calls in the LDP to replace the unpopular Aso, but others said there is no obvious successor and Aso would do his best to hang on. (Additional reporting by Isabel Reynolds, Yoko Nishikawa, Yoko Kubota, Writing by Linda Sieg, Editing by Dean Yates)
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Yet another Gandhi rises in Indian politics
http://asia.news.yahoo.com/ap/20090511/tap-as-india-heir-apparent-510daa6.html
By MUNEEZA NAQVI,Associated Press Writer -
SULTANPUR, India – For hundreds of thousands of people in this largely rural swathe of north India, Rahul Gandhi is their prince.
Huge crowds wait for hours under a scorching sun to watch his motorcade and maybe catch a glimpse as he makes his way to file his nomination papers for the national election.
As his SUV slows to a crawl, mobs of supporters shower it with rose petals and try to peer through the tinted windows.
When he opens the door and steps onto the running board to wave, a roar rises across this dusty town, in an area where his family has long had its political base: "What should the leader of this country be like?" shouts one group. "Like Rahul Gandhi!" another group shouts back.
The boyish-looking 38-year-old, running for re-election to parliament, is the latest political incarnation of a dynasty that stretches back well over 60 years: his father, Rajiv Gandhi, was prime minister. So was his grandmother, Indira Gandhi. His mother, Sonia Gandhi, leads the Congress party, which heads the ruling coalition. His great-grandfather, Jawaharlal Nehru, was India's first prime minister and the faithful lieutenant of independence leader Mahatma Gandhi (no relation).
It all adds up to a family that has run India for 37 of its 62 years of independence.
Now, as a monthlong national election unfolds, Rahul Gandhi has become a force in Indian politics and the buzz around him as the eventual candidate for the country's top post has turned into a roar.
With just five years of political experience, he is not an obvious political star: He's an awkward public speaker who has said little of substance about many key policy issues. He won a seat in Parliament by a landslide in 2004, only to flunk another test three years later, when the election campaign he headed in India's largest state, Uttar Pradesh, failed to win any gains for his party.
But he has the right last name _ and in a country in thrall to celebrity and the ideals of family, he has become the party's star campaigner, drawing huge crowds to a dizzying number of electioneering stops. On giant Congress party billboards, it's Rahul _ so well known that he's commonly referred to by just his first name _ who shares space with his mother and the prime minister.
It makes for good campaigning, but it highlights the dynastic quality of Indian politics, Congress' opponents complain.
"This is a party where the top slot is reserved for a single family," said Nalin Kohli, a spokesman for the main opposition, the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party.
It's a charge that Gandhi can't ignore _ and even he says it's time for family dynasties to fade into political history. To that end, he's encouraging young people who are not from powerful families to work for the Congress party.
"Just because I'm the outcome of a system doesn't mean I cannot change the system," he told a rare news conference.
But in the 2009 election, the big question is whether this Gandhi's celebrity will translate into more votes.
He faces a global economic slowdown, which has shifted the focus from Congress' main achievement, India's rapid growth in the last few years. And the government has been criticized for its bungled handling of the Mumbai terror attack in November in which 166 people died.
The election results will be announced May 16, and polls indicate no party will get enough votes to rule except in a shaky coalition, possibly including dozens of parties.
Gandhi himself has remained vague about his future plans _ never rejecting the idea outright of being prime minister but accusing the media of prematurely projecting him into the job.
To supporters who want him to play a more prominent role, he urges patience, saying leadership must be developed gradually.
A graduate of Rollins College in Florida and Cambridge University in England, he often looks uncomfortable when surrounded by crowds of poor villagers, but tells a crowd on a recent campaign stop: "I entered politics to help the poor. Irrespective of caste, religion and region, I will always work to empower the poor who are the real strength of the nation."
His critics sniff at such talk. "The unfortunate fact is that we know remarkably little about him. He has said very little of consequence," said political commentator Mahesh Rangarajan.
"It's also important to remember that he's the first person in this family in politics who has grown up in a security cocoon," Rangarajan added.
That cocoon is the result of the tragedies that have beset the Gandhis.
Rahul was only 14 when his grandmother, Indira Gandhi, was shot to death in 1984 by her own bodyguards. His father, Rajiv Gandhi, was blown up by a Tamil suicide bomber in 1991.
The family stayed away from politics until 1998, when Rajiv Gandhi's Italian-born widow, Sonia, reluctantly accepted the leadership of the Congress party. She was elected to parliament a year later.
Now her son and fellow lawmaker has to figure out where he goes next.
"The party would like him to be quick about it. The party would like him to, you know, wave the magic wand and get them votes, which has become the character of the Congress. People have got so used to the Nehru-Gandhi family getting them votes," said political commentator Neerja Chowdhury.
"Rahul Gandhi is taking his time in discovering India, trying to work out his own role."
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