News & Articles on Burma-Tuesday, 14 December, 2010

News & Articles on Burma
Tuesday, 14 December, 2010
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Kachin Farmers Complain of Further Land Seizures
Ethnic Armed Groups Discuss Collaboration
Murder Begets Mistrust
KPC Demands Junta Officers Be Held Accountable for Killings
UN reacts to death of jailed monk
Thai-Myanmar Border Situation Returns To Normal, Says Thai Army
Myanmar: Farmers lose out in Karen conflict
Activists say Chinese dam hurts Myanmar traders
New dam in China disrupts river trade at major Burma border crossing
Suu Kyi gets a new companion
Burma Needs Inter-Ethnic and Inter-Class Solidarity
Than Shwe’s Granddaughter Celebrates 4th Birthday with Rangoon Elite
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Kachin Farmers Complain of Further Land Seizures
By KO HTWE Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Farmers in Hpakant Township in Burma's northern Kachin State complain that the Yuzana Company continues to seize and destroy their land without paying compensation.

Six hundred farmers were evicted from their land between 2006 and 2008 without full compensation and displaced to areas far from their original homes. Many complain that Yuzana continues to seize their new land.

The state granted 1,338 acres of the originally seized property to the Yuzana Company, which is reported to need the land for the cultivation of sugar cane and tapioca.

The seized land lies in the area of the Hugawng Valley, in the western part of Kachin State, near the Indian border and close to the Hugawng Valley Tiger Reserve.

A group of 148 farmers filed a lawsuit against the land seizure in August, but Yuzana persuaded them to drop the case in return for payments of 80,000 kyat ($80) per acre each to a maximum of 500 evicted farmers. However, many farmers are still waiting for the compensation.

A Myitkyina court rejected a lawsuit against the Yuzana company chairman, but said it would allow a case to be brought against the director of Yuzana, whose name was not revealed.

While the court proceedings drag on, the land seizures continue, complain the farmers. One complainant, Wineyawye, said he had visited the court sessions eight times so far and couldn't afford to attend any more. Other farmers say they also don't have the money to travel regularly to Myitkyina to attend the court proceedings.

One farmer, Andy, told The Irrawaddy that after taking seven acres of his land Yuzana destroyed a further tract he was cultivating.

“Half of my plantations have now been bulldozed,” he said. “I have trouble now making a living.”

Bauk Ja, leader of one farmers' group, said farmers would face greater problems in the future as Yuzana continued to seize their land.

Lamung Zen, who lost 50 acres, said Yuzana failed to inform farmers about the areas of land the company intended to seize.

Wineyawye said he was now reduced to taking odd jobs to support his family after Yuzana seized 13 acres of their land. “We have no grassland now for our cows,” he said.

The Yuzana company is owned by Htay Myint, who is on the US sanctions blacklist because of his close ties to the junta generals. He won his Tenasserim Division constituency for the regime-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party in last month's general election.

The Yuzana company was granted 200,000 acres in the Hugawng Valley Tiger Reserve in 2006 to establish tapioca and sugar cane plantation, according to a report by the Kachin Development Networking Group.
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=20314
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Ethnic Armed Groups Discuss Collaboration
By SAI ZOM HSENG Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Four ethnic armed groups have discussed the possibility of deepening cooperation and mutual support at a meeting in Mongla, the Burmese-Chinese border town in Eastern Shan State, which lies in the area controlled by the National Democratic Alliance Army (NDAA).

The meeting, during last week's Shan New Year, was attended by representatives from the NDAA, the Shan State Army-North, Shan State Army-South and the United Wa State Army (UWSA).

Saengjuen Sarawin, deputy editor of the Shan Herald Agency for News (SHAN), who also attended the meeting, told The Irrawaddy on Tuesday: “The representatives analyzed the country’s current situation, reviewed what they have done in the last 20 years and discussed their future plans.”

An officer based at the UWSA headquarters in Panghsang told The Irrawaddy on Tuesday the meeting had been “just a normal discussion with the other ethnic armed groups. We haven’t made any decision yet but we do intend to support each other because we all are ethnics. We have been oppressed by the same government.”

The UWSA, the NDAA, and the Shan State Army-North are among the armed ethnic groups which are resisting regime pressure on them to join its Border Guard Force (BGF) .

Sarawin said the BGF issue had caused the armed ethnic groups to “wake up” and understand that they had to depend on each other.

As part of its campaign of pressure on the NDAA and another armed group, the Kachin Independence Army, the regime interrupted cross-border trade at Mongla by closing the checkpoints located on the Mongla-Keng Tung highway in Shan State. This highway is the main trading route in Shan State and is an important thoroughfare for goods between Burma, China and Thailand.

A local source said that the NDAA could still derive income from casinos, rubber production, border pass fees, a magnesium mine and vehicle taxes.

The Mongla meeting also discussed last year's attack by Burmese government troops on NNDAA forces in the Kokang region of the Sino-Burmese.

NDDA leader Peng Jia Xiang said about 200 civilians had been killed in the two-day battle, three of them Chinese civilians who died in artillery fire from government troops. The clashes sent 30,000 refugees into China, where Chinese authorities spent 10 million yuan (about US $1.4 million) in providing humanitarian assistance to them. http://www.irrawaddy.org/highlight.php?art_id=20317
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NEWS ANALYSIS
Murder Begets Mistrust
By SAW YAN NAING Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Distrust between the Burmese military government and the ethnic ceasefire groups remains high after regime troops murdered six soldiers who belonged to the KNU/ KNLA Peace Council, also known as the Karen Peace Council (KPC).
The victims were captured by regime troops in a raid on Nov. 30 and were later tortured, murdered and burnt by troops from Infantry Battalion 230 led by Thant Zin. Their bodies was founded on Dec. 8 in jungle in Karen State, eastern Burma.

The KPC, an armed ethnic Karen cease-fire group, broke away from the Karen National Union (KNU) in 2007 and made peace with the regime.

Angrily responding to the murders, KPC spokesperson Timothy Laklem, said the regime troops deliberately killed the six KPC members because the group had not joined the junta’s border guard force (BGF).

“They [regime] are not a government, they are criminals. They have a warlord mentality and they killed our men because we don't want any part of their warlord mentality and BGF,” he said.

He said the KPC did not join the BGF because it did not represent the whole nation including the ethnic groups and was only a regime tool to maintain power, having nothing to do with democratization and progress for the people of Burma, said Laklem.

“This [murder] is an outrage. We will take action and bring the perpetrators to justice,” he said, urging the Burmese government to stop all brutality against the Karen people.

The KPC held a meeting on Tuesday and decided to write a letter to Maj-Gen Thet Naing Win, Chief of Bureau of Special Operations (BSO) 4 and a former commander of Southeastern Regional Command, urging him to take action against those responsible.

“They have to be accountable to the families of the murdered soldiers. They have to pay one million Thai baht [US $33,000] to each family,” said Laklem.

Some sources reportedly claimed that the government killed the Karen soldiers as they suspected them of joining in the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army's (DKBA) Brigade 5 attack on government troops.

Commenting on this accusation, Laklem said, “There is no evidence supporting this. They [regime] always come up with accusations like this. It is their mentality.”

A Karen observer close to the DKBA said the six Karen soldiers had not attacked junta troops and were not involved in the fighting. They did not run away as they reportedly thought that the junta army would not harm them.

Tension has been increasing as fighting erupted since the general election on Nov. 7 between Burmese government troops and Karen armed groups including DKBA Brigade 5 and the KNU.

The situation has became more complicated and unstable as several armed groups are involved in the border fighting. However, whether fighting escalates depends on the regime, say observers.

If the government orders further attacks on the Karen armed groups, no trust can remain and only more violence can be expected, said Poe Shan, acting director of the Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG), adding that as fighting increases, so does suffering among the civilian population.

“More protection is needed for refugees. Frequent fighting destabilizes the whole area and villagers become too afraid to return home to tend their farms ,” he said.

According to rights groups, many villagers are still hiding in the jungle, afraid to cross into Thailand and face possible forced repatriation by the Thai authorities.

Laklem said the military regime has neither respected the peace agreement it made with the KPC nor the cease-fire agreements they made with the other ethnic armed groups even though the ethnic groups tried to work hamoniously toward long-term peace with them.

Seventeen ethnic ceasefire groups reached cease-fire agreements with the regime after 1989, according to a Burmese government figure, but most of the strong ethnic militias such as United Wa State Army (UWSA) and the Kachin Independence Army rejected the junta’s BGF.

“We can’t rebuild our relationship at this moment as trust cannot be one-sided. It has to come from the government as well,” said Laklem, adding that the Karen militias were deeply suspicious of the military's intentions.
Commenting on the state of relations with the ethnic minorities, an official at the headquarters of the UWSA in Panghsang on the Sino-Burmese border said, “How can we believe them [regime] when they never do the right thing.” http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=20316
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KPC Demands Junta Officers Be Held Accountable for Killings
By ALEX ELLGEEE Tuesday, December 14, 2010

MAE SOT—The KNU/KNLA Peace Council (KPC), an armed ethnic cease-fire group, has demanded that Burmese officers responsible for the killing of six KPC soldiers be held responsible for the deaths.

“I met with Gen Htein Maung [chief of the KPC] today at our headquarters and he has demanded the soldiers involved be held accountable for their actions,” KPC spokesperson Timothy Laklem told The Irrawaddy on Monday evening.

Brig-Gen Tun Nay Lin, the commander of the junta's Southeastern Regional Military Command, and Thant Zin, the commander of Infantry Battalion 230, should be tried before a “military tribunal” for ordering “the brutal torture and murder of prisoners of war,” said Laklem.

The bodies of two KNU/KNLA Peace Council Soldiers allegedly tortured and killed by the Burmese military. (Photo: Nelson Rand)
Their have been clashes recently between breakaway Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) Brigade 5 and the Burmese army in the area of Karen State where the KPC soldiers were killed, but according to Laklem the KPC soldiers were not involved in any of the fighting. He said they were just looking after their farms and living peacefully.

When the KPC soldiers saw Burmese troops arrive at their camp, a KPC officer called Thant Zin and asked what was happening, according to Laklem. Thant Zin told the KPC officer not to worry, that they were coming peacefully and to stay where they were, he said.

However, Burmese troops later shot one Karen soldier on the spot and took away the six soldiers stationed at the camp. Afterward, KPC leaders repeatedly asked local Burmese commanders where the soldiers had been taken.

“The Burmese officers kept telling us they were fine and have been released already, but from radio interceptions we knew something was up,” said Laklem.

On Dec. 8, the bodies of the KPC soldiers arrested by Burmese junta troops were found close to the Phalu village, near the border town of Myawaddy, where a KPC base is located.

“When we found the bodies, we knew what had happened. They weren’t just shot in the head, but had been tortured,” said Laklem. “We could tell they had been tied up, and the government soldiers tried to burn one of them and used knives or machetes to cut off their heads.”

The KPC is a splinter group that broke from the Karen National Union in 2007. Like DKBA Brigade 5, the group has rejected the Burmese military government's proposal of incorporating their units into a border guard force (BGF) under Burmese military command.

The skirmish with the KPC was the first time the group has been attacked since it signed a cease-fire agreement with the government in 2007. Despite the incident, the KPC said they would continue to try and maintain peace and keep to the cease-fire agreement.

“They have broken the ceasefire, but we will not take revenge against them. We will continue to work for peaceful solutions for our Karen people and to save the loss of innocent lives,” said Laklem.

The KPC, which currently has 300 soldiers, has also demanded that compensation of one million Thai baht (US $ 33,320) be paid to the families of each soldier killed and that the Burmese government pull its troops out of KPC controlled areas.

“Each victim has families—wives and children,” said Laklem. “Every day they are crying and begging for help.”
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=20315
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UN reacts to death of jailed monk
By FRANCIS WADE
Published: 14 December 2010

The death last week of an elderly monk serving his twelfth year of a 20-year sentence has prompted a top UN official to call for the release of all political prisoners in Burma.

Ashin Nameinda (also known as U Myo Min) died on 8 December. He had been suffering mouth ulcers and thus was unable to eat, but according to the Thailand-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners–Burma (AAPP), was not given adequate treatment.

The 50-year-old had been sentenced for distributing leaflets to encourage protests in September 1999, and becomes the 146th political prisoner to die in detention. Tomas Ojea Quintana, the UN’s special rapporteur for Burma, followed the news of Ashin Nameinda’s death and the release last month of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi with calls for the junta to release the remaining 2,200-plus political prisoners in Burma.

“One month after Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s release, I call upon the Government of Myanmar [Burma] to release the remaining prisoners of conscience, currently estimated to be at least 2,202, many of whom are right now suffering serious health problems from the harsh conditions of their detention,” he told AFP.

Around 142 of the imprisoned monks, activists, journalists, lawyers and politicians are in poor health, AAPP claim. Conditions inside Burma’s 44 prisons are notoriously poor, and inmates are regularly required to bribe prison doctors in order to receive treatment. Torture is widespread, particularly for political prisoners.

Despite recent elections that the ruling junta promised would usher in an era of civilian rule, there has been no suggestion that political prisoners will be released.

“A release would be a very strong signal that the new government of Myanmar intends to uphold these fundamental freedoms and would be welcomed by both people inside and outside the country.”

Despite the reverence with which Burma holds its monastic community, monks currently account for 256 of Burma’s 2,202 political prisoners. One monk, U Nanda Vathu, is serving a 71-year sentence, while nearly two dozen of those detained are serving sentences of 20 years or more.

Quintana, who has called for the UN to investigate possible war crimes and crimes against humanity in Burma, was denied a visa to visit the country in August. UN chief Ban Ki-moon said shortly after that he was frustrated that the junta had been “unresponsive” to his attempts to trigger dialogue and engagement.
http://www.dvb.no/news/un-reacts-to-death-of-jailed-monk/13395
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Thai-Myanmar Border Situation Returns To Normal, Says Thai Army

BANGKOK, Dec 14 (Bernama) -- The Thai-Myanmar border situations have returned to normal, Thai News Agency reported Tuesday, citing 1st Army Region Commander Lieutenant General Udomdet Seetabutr.

"The situations along the Thai-Myanmar border did not pose a concern for the time being, although there had been battles between Myanmar soldiers and ethnic troops near the Three Pagodas border pass recently," he told reporters before leaving for the 9th Infantry Division in the western Kanchanaburi province, bordering Myanmar.

He added that the situations already returned to normal, and Myanmar already re-opened its border pass for Thai people.

However, he said, the army will still monitor the situations closely, and if there is any risk, the army will issue a warning to the people who regularly use the Three Pagodas border pass.

The Commander said he would give moral support to soldiers, border patrol police and paramilitary rangers deployed in the area as the officers had worked hard to ensure security as ordered.

-- BERNAMA http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v5/newsworld.php?id=549932
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Myanmar: Farmers lose out in Karen conflict
Source: Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB)
Date: 13 Dec 2010
By HTET AUNG KYAW
Published: 13 December 2010

Farmers in eastern Karen state's Myawaddy township are complaining that heavy fighting over the past month has forced them to abandon crops and amass debts.

One village close to the border town, Hpalu, has seen regular fighting in recent weeks. While that appears to have eased over the weekend, the area remains volatile. One farmer told DVB that he had been unable to harvest acres of beans, corn and paddy around Hpalu.

As a result, many had been borrowing money from local business people, but remained reliant on a good harvest to repay the loans.

Thousands of refugees have moved back and forth across the border with Thailand since 8 November after fighting erupted between the Burmese army and a breakaway faction of Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA).

Many of the refugees returned days after fleeing, despite warnings that the area was not safe. Numbers of those who returned had said they were keen to tend to their crops, given that it is harvesting season in eastern Burma.

Meanwhile, lawyer Aye Myint, who heads the Guiding Star legal advocacy group in Burma, said that there had been an increase in extortion of farmers by local officials since the 7 November elections.

Burma already has high rates of illegal land confiscation by authorities, an issue which is monitored by the UN's International Labour Organisation. One of the main catalysts of the recent increase, Aye Myint believes, is fear among low-level officials that they will lose their positions in a post-election reshuffle and thus are looking to secure land for financial stability.

Aye Myint said he had received 15 complaints from farmers over the past weekend, seven of which were over land disputes.

One Karen woman in Wakhema township complained to him that her land had been seized by village authorities, but when she refused to leave and continued to work the land was placed in detention.

Two monks that had assisted the lady were also put in jail, he added, while the village-level officials moved in on the land and harvested some of the crops. http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900sid/KHII-8C55SE?OpenDocument
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Dec 14, 6:31 AM EST
Activists say Chinese dam hurts Myanmar traders
By PANYAPAT PIYATHAMSAWAT
Associated Press

BANGKOK (AP) -- A recently built dam in southern China is hurting the livelihoods of thousands of villagers downstream in Myanmar, environmental activists said Tuesday in the latest complaint about management of Southeast Asian rivers that cross national boundaries.

Two groups associated with Myanmar's Shan ethnic minority said in a new report that the hydropower dam on the Longjiang River in China's Yunnan province causes changes in the river's level that hinder traders dependent on water transport.

Groups in several countries have criticized China's construction of dams on the Mekong River and other waterways because of their impact on downstream communities. Beijing has rejected charges that its dams are to blame.

The report, "High and Dry," by the Shan Sapawa Environmental Organization and the Shan Women's Action Network, said local trade and transport on the river in northern Myanmar near a border trade crossing with China has been severely affected by unpredictable daily changes in the water level since the completion in mid-2010 of the 360-foot- (110-meter-) tall Longjiang Dam about 19 miles (30 kilometers) upstream.

The report estimated that some 16,000 villagers - ferry operators and the traders and services that depend on them - have had their incomes decline drastically, as boats face both grounding and flooding.

"The Longjiang dam represents an example of what we are facing," said Premrudee Daoroung of the Bangkok-based, nonprofit Foundation for Ecological Recovery, speaking at a press conference. "First, the issue of the ecosystem of the river needs to be considered. What happens upstream can have an immediate affect on downstream people. "

The reports said it was encouraging that "Chinese government officials have begun to publicly state their commitment to the ecological integrity of transnational rivers and to developing the Mekong River for the 'mutual benefit' of all countries along the river."

But it also called for Chinese authorities "to investigate and mitigate the disruptive impacts of the dam" and to make cross-border impact assessments for any future dams built in China.

In April, China strongly rejected claims that its dam-building policies are environmentally harmful. It held a one-day meeting with leaders of the four Mekong Basin nations - Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam to address climate change and other challenges to the health of the Mekong River.

The meeting in Thailand of the member-nations of the Mekong River Commission, along with China and Myanmar - through which flow the upstream reaches of the river - came as the Mekong's water levels were at their lowest in nearly 20 years.

The commission's scientists said this year's low flow and consequent drought could be attributed to an early end to the 2009 wet season and low rainfall during the monsoons.
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AS_MYANMAR_CHINA_DAM?SECTION=HOME&SITE=AP&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
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New dam in China disrupts river trade at major Burma border crossing
Tuesday, 14 December 2010 10:37 Shan Sapawa/SWAN

A recently built hydropower dam on the Longjiang River in China's Yunnan Province is causing severe disruption to thousands of villagers relying on cross-border trade in Burma's northern Shan State, according to a new report by local Shan researchers.

The report "High and Dry" by the Shan Sapawa Environmental Organisation and the Shan Women's Action Network (SWAN), exposes how local trade and transport across the Shweli River (the Burmese name for the Longjiang) near Muse and Namkham has been crippled by unpredictable daily fluctuations in the water level since the completion of the 110-meter tall Longjiang Dam about 30 kilometers upstream in mid-2010.

An estimated 16,000 villagers relying on ferrying of goods near Muse, the main China-Burma border trade crossing, have seen their income cut drastically by the continual drops and surges in the water level, which have caused both grounding and flooding of the ferry boats.

"The people of our village live, eat and work with the river. People cannot work when the water suddenly rises and falls like this," said an impacted villager.

The villagers are calling urgently for the Chinese authorities to investigate and mitigate the disruptive impacts of the dam, while the authors of the report are requesting that trans-boundary impact assessments are carried out for any future dams built in China.

"Impact assessments for dams should be carried out for the entire length of the river, regardless of national boundaries. Whether for the Longjiang, Mekong or Salween,
China should consider the health of our shared rivers and all the communities that rely on them,” said Sapawa spokesperson Sai Sai.

There has been increasing international debate about the downstream impacts of China’s dams on the Mekong River. There are also 13 dams planned on the Salween River in China.

The full report can be viewed on www.shanwomen.org http://www.shanland.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=3364:-new-dam-in-china-disrupts-river-trade-at-major-burma-border-crossing&catid=102:mailbox&Itemid=279
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Suu Kyi gets a new companion

Tuesday, 14 December 2010

There have been many adjustments for Burmese democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi to make since she was released from house arrest.

She has been able to hold meetings with colleagues, speak to foreign diplomats and oversee renovations to her party's crumbling offices.

Now she is also getting used to being a pet owner. Kim Aris, the younger of Ms Suu Kyi's two sons, bought her a small brown puppy before he left Burma after a two-week visit to see his mother for the first time in a decade. He told reporters it was "May May's pet", using the Burmese word for mother.

One of Ms Suu Kyi's lawyers, Kyi Win, said he had been at her lakeside house in Rangoon when he had seen the new pet. "It's a nice little dog," he said. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/suu-kyi-gets-a-new-companion-2159594.html
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CONTRIBUTOR
Burma Needs Inter-Ethnic and Inter-Class Solidarity
By DR. ZARNI Tuesday, December 14, 2010

The world knows plenty about Aung San Suu Kyi and what she represents. But it knows almost nothing about the generals beyond their international pariah status.

Self-styled Burma experts attest to this general ignorance of the essence of military rule and the psyche of those in power in Naypyidaw.

In private policy circles and public forums, many of these tea-leaf-readers continue to discuss a myriad of the country’s problems, still without putting their finger on the single most fundamental issue which most broadly accounts for the people’s daily misery and country’s bleak future.

Is it “bad governance?” Is it Snr-Gen Than Shwe’s callous leadership with its characteristic total disregard for public welfare? Is it the military’s persecution of ethnic nationalities (or minorities)? Is it widespread human rights violations? Is it the war crimes, which the Tatmataw, Burma's armed forces, are allegedly committing, especially in ethnic conflict zones? Or is it the country’s kleptocratic, repressive, and pathological state? Is it the predatory neighbors?

Of course, one would be tempted to tick the box “all of the above” and argue that specific problems – the regime’s failure, for example, to provide public services in health, education and social security or to set up an adequate and functioning system of agricultural credits for the country’s farmers, who make up the bulk of the population—need to be addressed, while waiting for the revolution to deliver.
However, Burma’s fundamental problem is not just about leadership, policy failure, dysfunctional institutions, rights abuses or fractured opposition movements.

Categorically speaking, Burma is confronted with nothing less than a full-scale pathological process of internal colonization, this time by its own military. This is an evolutionary process which was set in motion within the past 50 years, at least since the coup of 1962 decisively established one-party military rule, where the military and the State became coterminous or two-sides of a coin.
Indeed, Burma’s problems can best be understood as those of a colonial order.

Sixty-two years after independence from Britain, Burma has evolved into a dual-colony in which the population of more than 50 million citizens is being herded into a political space via the Orwellian “7-steps road map for democracy.” The ruling military clique backed by its 400,000-strong military will continue to make all decisions with massive societal and ecological consequences for the whole population; only this time their decisions are going to be made to sound constitutionally mandated, and in accord with the laws of the land.

Further, this small group of men subscribe to an irredeemably myopic and toxic version of ethno-nationalism which refashions Burma along the old feudal lines where the majority “Burmese and Buddhists,” as defined by these men in generals’ uniform, will be more equal in their Union of Republic of Myanmar.

Needless to say, the generals will pay lip service to ethnic unity and create nominal space for the ethnic people while pursuing “divide and rule” as the overarching strategy. Substantial numbers of electoral seats won by the Shan and Arakanese parties which some analysts have hailed as “symbolic victories” look rather fishy in light of the looming “counterinsurgency” operations against the Karen, the Kachin, the Karenni and others.

It is worth stressing that the ruling generals have rejected the federal spirit of ethnic equality and violently opposed any struggle towards a genuine federated Union. They have declared dead the Panglong Agreement of 1947, the founding document of a modern, post-colonial Burma, wherein ethnic equality was enshrined as an inviolable pillar of multi-ethnic Burma.

In Burma’s new colonial rule under its own military, anything and anyone that doesn’t bend to the generals’ will is to be controlled, subjugated or crushed.

Suu Kyi and ethnic minority leaders, whether armed or not, are heading on an inevitable collision course with Burma’s military junta. For they have made repeated calls for national and ethnic reconciliation as well as genuine public expressions of inter-ethnic solidarity,

The last thing any colonial power would want and would tolerate is social and ethnic solidarity across communities, regions and classes.

For those who have viewed the emerging parliamentary and formal political processes as the only space in which the people’s voices can be heard, policies debated and public welfare advanced, it is time for a serious rethinking and soul-searching. In a polity where those in power in effect accept nothing but total surrender, where politics are regarded as an extension of war and everything is viewed through Zero-Sum lens, choosing sides becomes necessary.

There are no shades of gray in any colonial phenomenon. Battle lines are clearly drawn. The colonized are to be exploited, crushed, subjugated or co-opted.

The generals, of course, don’t see themselves as “native colonialists.” They feel no need for reconciliation along ethnic or political lines with any person, organization or community. In short, they have done nothing wrong, and they can do no wrong. For they perceive themselves as the country’s sole national guardian, untainted by partisan politics.

They are committed to the abstract idea of a multi-ethnic nation while trampling on the very idea in reality. And they embrace an absolutist notion of sovereignty where the military, not the people in whose name it exists, is sovereign. They love the country, but they can’t stand the people, especially the kind who refuse to go along with their design for the rest of the country. Political, defiant ethnic communities and 2,100 political prisoners spring to mind.

Their politics is all about resuming and completing the process of re-consolidation of the power of the ethnic Burmese majority, most specifically the soldiering class, over the rest of the ethnic minorities –a process only interrupted by the old kingdom’s 19th century defeat by Great Britain. Sixty years after independence, the military has built its own version of local colonial rule serving as the constitutionally-mandated ruling class and where the rest of the civilian society, ethnic majority and minorities alike, are second class citizens.

Twenty years ago, when the generals launched a ceasefire strategy with nearly 20 disparate ethnic armed resistance organizations, they weren’t acting out of genuine desire for reconciliation, but following a strategy to preempt the inter-ethnic solidarity between the Suu Kyi-led majority and rebellious minorities. Now that some of the most crucial ceasefires are likely to unravel, the highest strategic priority of the regime has become preventing inter-ethnic unity.

Throughout modern history, no colonialism is ever known to have offered the colonized political processes or institutions which would undo, or even undermine, such broad colonial objectives as economic exploitation of land, labor and natural resource, political domination and subjugation of populations under colonial rule, and control over the cultural and intellectual life of colonies.

Whether one has in mind the formal and classical version, which dissolved, thanks in no small part to colonialists slaughtering one another during the two 20th century world wars, or the subsequent and newer versions characteristic of the Cold War, the essence, objectives and nature of colonial rules remain virtually the same.

Words such as political, ethnic and international solidarity have been used too often and too lightly.
Humanitarian assistance, developmental aid, foreign direct investment, increased trade or commerce may be needed in any systemic efforts to rebuild poverty-stricken Third World nations emerging from decades of war and conflicts. But they are no substitute for forging an inter-ethnic and class solidarity, on which an inter-generational political resistance, armed and non-violent, depending on one’s own location, needs to be built.

The fact is the colonial state in the Union of the Republic of Myanmar stands in between public welfare and international assistance and increased foreign direct investment, which has been in the billions thanks to Burma’s economically predatory regional friends such as China, Thailand, India, Malaysia, South Korea and Singapore.

Precisely because this ethno-nationalist bond between the Burmese junta and the majority Buddhist Burmese has been irreparably broken down, the recent call by Suu Kyi and minority leaders for reconciliation and inter-ethnic solidarity against oppression poses the greatest threat to the ruling junta.

While Burma’s issues are complex, as far as the regime’s strategy is concerned it is a simple, time-tested “divide-and-rule.” The only way the opposition movements in particular and multi-ethnic communities in general can defeat these native colonizers is through inter-ethnic—and inter-class—solidarity. It’s high time the international community, as well as ordinary citizens of Burma, address this strategic need and respond to the calls from Suu Kyi and the leaders of ethnic nationalities.

Dr Zarni is research fellow on Burma at the London School of Economics and Political Economics.
Copyright © 2008 Irrawaddy Publishing Group | www.irrawaddy.org
http://www.irrawaddy.org/opinion_story.php?art_id=20312
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Than Shwe’s Granddaughter Celebrates 4th Birthday with Rangoon Elite
By WAI MOE Wednesday, December 8, 2010

Burmese junta supremo Than Shwe’s daughter Thandar Shwe held a birthday party for her 4 year-old daughter on Saturday in Rangoon which was attended by several leading figures from the city's high society and military elite. Than Shwe and his wife Kyaing Kyaing did not attend.

Thandar Shwe achieved notoriety in 2006 when a video clip of her wedding to Maj. Zaw Phyo Win surfaced on the Internet showing an ostentatious wedding reception and lavish wedding gifts of diamonds and other jewels.

Sources in Naypyidaw said that the birthday party for Than Shwe’s granddaughter was held at Zayar Thiri Baikman, an exclusive hall in the former capital, and was paid for by US-sanctioned crony Khin Shwe who is an elected representative of the junta-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party for the Upper House.

(Left to right): Kyel Phyo Thandar Shwe, Thandar Shwe, Than Shwe and Kyaing Kyaing in 2008
“Kyel Phyo Thandar Shwe’s fourth birthday party was a pretty big event with about 160 relatives and associates attending,” said one source who was at the party. “Family members of other top generals also made appearances.”

He said that Khin Shwe, who runs Zay Gabar Co Ltd, provided the catering. Notable military cronies such as Tay Za of the Htoo Group of Companies, Zaw Zaw of the Max Myanmar Group of Companies, and Nay Win Tun of Ruby Dragon Jade & Gems Co Ltd presented gifts to the child.

Burma observers have frequently said that the ruling generals' family celebrations are more than just society events, but are avenues for them to accept large bribes in the form of “gifts.”

Thandar Shwe is Than Shwe’s youngest daughter. She was married in 2006 at the same venue, the Zayar Thiri Baikman. At the time, the BBC reported: “The newly-weds were reportedly given [US] $50 million-worth of wedding gifts, including cars, jewels and houses.”

Currently, Thandar Shwe and her husband are attachés at the Burmese consulate in Kunming, the capital of China’s southwest province of Yunnan.

Although no more than an infant, Kyel Phyo Thandar Shwe is said to be the Burmese dictator's second favorite grandchild after Nay Shwe Thway Aung ,also known as Phoe La Pyae Thwe, who many say is being groomed to succeed his grandfather.

Kyel Phyo Thandar Shwe has been nicknamed “Moe Paw Ka Kyel Ka Lay,” meaning “small star from the sky,” according to sources close to military officials in Naypyidaw.

Close connections to the ruling generals are necessary for doing business in Burma. A relationship with Than Shwe’s family is seen as the most important stepping stone toward concessions and favorable contracts for lackeys and cronies.
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=20273