News & Articles on Burma-Thursday, 27 January, 2011

News & Articles on Burma
Thursday, 27 January, 2011
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Security 'tight' ahead of Myanmar parliament opening
Burma gets ready to disclose its military monopolized parliament
Burmese Junta Defends Itself in Geneva
Junta Puts More State-owned Properties up for Sale
Clashes Continue in Karen State
Myanmar Lawmakers Gather for Opening of Parliament
Villages empty as fighting intensifies
Thai, Burma ministers talk migrants
Bargain basement Burma – if you have friends in high places
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Jan 27, 2011
Security 'tight' ahead of Myanmar parliament opening

YANGON - MYANMAR is 'very concerned' about its fledgling parliament, ramping up security around the building as part of preparations for a grand opening next week, an official said on Thursday.

Cameras, bags and explosives are banned and uninvited visitors risk prison under rules spelled out to lawmakers, while the Myanmar official said even senior military officers will not be able to enter without special clearance.

'The security inside and outside of the new parliament compound in (the capital) Naypyidaw is very tight as the authorities are very much concerned for it,' the source told AFP on condition of anonymity.

'No candidate will be allowed to take their mobile or any electronic devices. Even senior officers who are not responsible for parliament security cannot go inside,' he said.

The official said even security patrols will not be able to use walkie talkies in the area.

Lawmakers, who won seats in the country's controversial first election in 20 years in November, have begun to converge on the capital from across the country for the Jan 31 opening of parliament. -- AFP http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/SEAsia/Story/STIStory_628962.html
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Burma gets ready to disclose its military monopolized parliament
By Zin Linn Jan 27, 2011 11:16PM UTC

Legislators in military ruled Burma (Myanmar) are going to assemble in the capital Naypyitaw to present at the opening of the nation’s first parliamentary session in 22 years.

The state-run New Light of Myanmar reported Thursday that members of the lower house and the upper house will attend the opening in an enormous new building put up after the capital was moved from Rangoon (Yangon) in 2005.

The incumbent military junta is very worried about its new-borne parliament. Tightening up security around the parliament building as part of measures for a majestic opening on 31 January, as said by observers from media circle. According to local residents, the area around the Naypyitaw has been under serious surveillance and army units are also patrolling day and night.

There are even various restrictions directly toward the members of parliament. The newly MPs are not allowed to hold cameras, computers, electronic gadgets, hand bags and miscellaneous items. No visitors will allow into the parliamentary compound. Uninvited guests may risk prison term under rules make clear to lawmakers; whereas the authorized officials said even senior military officers will not be able to go through without special permission.

The elected People’s Parliament Representatives and National Parliament Representatives who will arrive in Nay Pyi Taw and will be attending the First Parliament Session respectively are to report to Parliamentary Office at the Office Building No. 20. To make certain smooth management of the mechanism, date and time are set for the respective regions and states.

People’s Parliament Representatives from Kachin State, Kayah State, Kayin State, Chin State and Sagaing Region are to report between 9 am and 12 noon, representatives from Taninthayi Region, Bago Region, Magway Region, Mon State and Rakhine State between 1 pm and 6 pm on 28 January, and representatives from Mandalay Region and Yangon Region between 9 am 12 noon and representatives from Shan State and Ayeyawady Region between 1 pm and 6 pm on 29 January.

similarly, National Parliament Representatives from Kachin State, Kayah State, Kayin State, Chin State, Sagaing Region, Taninthayi Region and Bago Region are to report between 9 am and 12 noon and, representatives from Magway Region, Mandalay Region, Mon State, Rakhine State, Yangon Region, Shan State and Ayeyawady Region between 1 pm and 6 pm on 28 January.

Representatives are to report to the Parliamentary Office along with the aforesaid schedule for smooth operation of the work.

Recently, Burma’s military junta has appointed 388 army officers as members of parliaments to fill the military share of the three chambers of parliament which will first assemble on January 31. The junta has appointed 110 military officers for the people’s parliament (lower house), 56 for the national parliament (upper house), and 222 for regional-and-state parliaments, The New Light of Myanmar newspaper reported on 21 January.

All appointed MPs are military officers in commission, including one brigadier general, 19 colonels; the other 368 officers are majors and captains in ranks.

In accordance with the figures pronounced by Union Election Commission (UEC), a total of 1,148 members of parliament representing political parties and 6 independent representatives-elect will be accepted as elected parliamentary representatives at three chambers.

The junta-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), led by Prime Minister Thein Sein, won the majority of 882 parliamentary seats or 76.43 percent out of the total 1,154 seats. The USDP is followed by the National Unity Party (NUP) with 64 seats, Shan Nationalities Democratic Party (SNDP) with 57 seats, Rakhine Nationalities Development Party with 35 seats, National Democratic Force (NDF) and the All Mon Region Democracy Party (AMRDP) each with 16 at three levels of parliament.

However, some analysts believe that the foremost subject the new borne government has to face will be the question of ethnic autonomy. The ethnic parties not only representing in parliament but also from outside of the legislative body have the same desire in support of self-determination.
http://asiancorrespondent.com/47143/burma-gets-ready-to-disclose-its-military-monopolized-parliament/
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Burmese Junta Defends Itself in Geneva
By THE IRRAWADDY Thursday, January 27, 2011

Burma defended its human rights record at the Universal Periodic Review held by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCR), in Geneva on Thursday.

During a three-hour review, a number of UN member countries including Britain, France and the United States called on the Burmese military regime to end repression against ethnic minorities, free the more than 2,000 political prisoners, and stop forced labor, arbitrary arrests, and the torture of dissidents.

But Burma's delegation, led by Dr. Tun Shin, the country's Deputy Attorney General, responded that the Burma enjoys a free press, has committed no human rights violations, and cooperated with the UN Human Rights Special Envoy to Burma, Tomás Ojea Quintana.

“The Universal Periodic Review is an opportunity for the intentional community to place principled press on the government of Myanmar to comply with the universal human rights norms,” said Phil Robertson, Deputy Director of Asia Human Rights Watch, in an interview with Al Jazeera.

“But the Burmese government has been very good at making promises in these kind of forums and then forgetting them as soon as the diplomats get on the plane and head back home,” he said.

This week, Human Rights Watch released a report describing Burma's continued human rights violations. Meanwhile, the Burmese junta prepares to convene the first session of the parliament in the country in more than 22 years—a parliament which will be dominated by pro-military lawmakers of the junta's proxy Union Solidarity and Development Party.

On Thursday, elected representatives of political parties started gathering in Naypyidaw to attend the opening of Parliament on Monday.
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=20621
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Junta Puts More State-owned Properties up for Sale
By NAYEE LIN LATT Thursday, January 27, 2011

Burma's ruling regime has put another 76 state-owned premises and economic enterprises up for sale as it speeds up its privatization drive ahead of the formation of a new government sometime early this year.

According to reports in state-run newspapers, the sale includes premises belonging to 13 ministries and the offices of the attorney-general and the auditor-general.

An official from the Myanmar Privatization Commission (MPC) told The Irrawaddy on Thursday that the current sale is part of the regime's ongoing privatization process, but this time does not include any prime properties.

“If you look at most of what is available now, you will see beverage shops, theaters located in the outskirts of town, a sugar factory located outside of Rangoon, and so on. They are still available because no one wanted to buy them before,” said the official.

Many of the buildings are old and abandoned and will likely need to be demolished and rebuilt, he said.

“We don't know who got all of the best properties or what price they paid for them, but they're all gone now, so this is more like a clearance sale,” he added.

According to MPC sources, the privatization process, which started in 2008, is now 70 percent complete and will be accelerated in the coming months.

Last year, the regime sold 110 economic enterprises, 32 buildings, 246 gas stations, and jetties along the Rangoon River and in port areas to private companies.

Most of the transferred businesses were acquired by the Union of Myanmar Economic Holdings Ltd, a military-run conglomerate, as well as businessmen with close ties to top generals, including Tay Za of the Htoo Company, Htun Myint Naing (Steven Law) of AsiaWorld, Zaw Zaw of Max Myanmar, Htay Myint of Yuzana, Win Aung of Dagon International, and Khin Shwe of Zaygabar Co Ltd—all of whom are on US and other Western countries' sanctions lists.

Many other properties have gone to relatives of senior military leaders.

“Father and sons companies are very successful nowadays,” remarked one Rangoon-based business writer.

The regime reportedly plans to transfer 90 percent of state-owned enterprises to the private sector before a new government is formed this year.

Burmese economists dismiss suggestions that this will result in an improved economic climate.

“There will be a change in ownership, but it won't make a difference unless businessmen are willing to consider the benefit of the people,” said one Rangoon-based economist. http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=20618
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Clashes Continue in Karen State
By SAW YAN NAING Thursday, January 27, 2011

Clashes continued into a second day on Thursday in Kyauk Khet between Burmese government forces and Brigade 5, a renegade faction of the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), with light casualties on both sides, according to Karen sources.

Fighting had broken out on Wednesday morning in Kyauk Khet, which is in Myawaddy Township in southern Karen State, close to the Thai border. A Brigade 5 spokesman said that 26 Burmese soldiers were killed and 35 were injured in the clash, but could not confirm any figures from Thursdays' fighting.

Some 200 local villagers are reported to have fled their homes to escape the fighting and have taken refuge at a shelter in Phop Phra District in Thailand's Tak Province.

Brig-Gen Na Kham Mwe, the commander of DKBA Brigade 5, told The Irrawaddy that the Burmese army transferred its wounded to Myawaddy hospital on Thursday.

Some 200 soldiers from Burma's Light Infantry Battalions (LIB) 546, 548 and 549, under Tactical Operation Command (TOC) 12, and LIB 356 and 357 under TOC 9, were involved in the fighting, according to a DKBA officer, Col. Kyaw Thet.

The DKBA also claimed that about 30 Burmese soldiers were killed and injured in a clash in Palu village in Kyauk Khet area on Sunday.

Several Burmese soldiers were reportedly cut off from their battalion at the front line in eastern Karen State and could not receive supplies or food, although the Thai army had made attempts to supply them, the DKBA said.

The DKBA also accused the Thai authorities of complicity when Burmese troops crossed the border in order to launch an attack on Brigade 5 from Thai soil.

About two weeks ago, a undisclosed number of Burmese soldiers were killed when their boat was ambushed while traveling on the Salween River in eastern Karen State.

Fighting has intensified between DKBA Brigade 5 and Burmese troops since Nov. 8, one day after a general election in Burma. The fighting escalated when another Karen armed group, the Karen National Union, became involved, as did the All Burma Students’ Democratic Front.
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=20620
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Myanmar Lawmakers Gather for Opening of Parliament
Myanmar lawmakers gather for first parliamentary session in more than 2 decades
The Associated Press
YANGON, Myanmar January 27, 2011 (AP)

Lawmakers in military-dominated Myanmar have been gathering in the capital of Naypyitaw for the opening of the country's first parliamentary session in 22 years.

The state-run New Light of Myanmar reported Thursday that 435 members of the lower house and 224 of the upper house will attend the opening in a massive new building constructed after the capital was moved from Yangon in 2005.

The legislators will be sworn in on Monday after elections in November that critics decried as a sham meant to perpetuate military rule. Five lower house seats remain empty because voting was canceled in five politically unstable contituencies.

Parliament last met in 1988 in Yangon before a military crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrations installed the current junta.

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=12774903
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Villages empty as fighting intensifies
By NAW NOREEN
Published: 27 January 2011

Residents of two villages south of Karen state’s Myawaddy border town have been forced to flee after a firefight broke out yesterday morning.

Hundreds of ethnic Karen men, women and children are now hiding in the jungle around the villages of Kyaukkhet and Wawlay, which in recent months have become the focus of battles between Burmese troops and an alliance of Karen forces led by the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA).

“There is no one left in the village; not even monks,” said a Kyaukkhet man yesterday evening. “We have to go into hiding and not everyone has eaten yet. We have kids crying.

“Seeing this makes me sad. There are over 100 people here and they have no vehicle for transportation or food to eat…We don’t know how to escape.”

Some who had managed to flee to Thailand have been left stranded on the banks of the Moei river that separates the two countries, with Thai police blocking the refugees from entering nearby villages.

Thailand was criticised days after fighting first erupted on 8 November last year when it encouraged refugees to return to Karen state, despite stability there being highly questionable.

A soldier from the DKBA told DVB yesterday evening that the fighting had lasted all day. “[The Burmese army] is advancing in about three or four columns from different routes [towards Kyaukkhet] – one of the columns is pushing forward into our position on a hill and we are crushing them.”

No gunfire was heard today, but tensions remain high. Since early November the border region has experienced near-continuous fighting that has fluctuated in intensity.

Around 30 Burmese soldiers were reportedly injured in a battle on 23 January which forced some 150 refugees into Thailand’s Mawli Chai village. The varying levels of Karen refugees in recent months add to the nearly 150,000 sided in camps along the border, some of whom have been there for decades.

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Thai, Burma ministers talk migrants
By JOSEPH ALLCHIN
Published: 27 January 2011

Government ministers from Thailand and Burma met in Shan state on Wednesday as a stand-off between Burmese migrant factory workers and their Thai employers was underway.

The annual talks between Maung Myint, Burma’s deputy foreign minister, and the Thai labour minister Chalernchai Sri-On that focus on Burmese migrant workers in Thailand were “fruitful”, according to state media.

Up to three million Burmese migrants are estimated to live in Thailand, many of whom work in low-skilled industries where exploitation is rife and access to healthcare and legal aid difficult.

The nationality verification scheme promoted by Bangkok, which attempts to categorise foreign workers in Thailand and supposedly allow them to enjoy equal rights with their local counterparts, was also covered in the bilateral talks, which took place in Pyin Oo Lwin, near Mandalay.

Maung Myint had also “proposed dispatching fresh migrant workers to work legally in Thailand”, Chinese news agency Xinhua said.

The issue of Burmese migrants working in Thailand again came to a head this week after employees in the V&K Pineapple Canning Co fruit factory in Ratchaburi province, west of Bangkok, went on strike amid growing anger at the conduct of the management and poor working conditions.

The head of the Thailand-based Migrant Assistance Program (MAP), Jackie Pollock, said that the protest was the “last straw” in their attempts to push for adequate treatment.

On Sunday last week a Burmese worker at V&K was beaten after an altercation with his Thai foreman in the local market place, as was an interpreter who tried to intervene in the dispute. This led to some 700 workers calling primarily for better conditions.

MAP reported that several days later, on 25 January, as many as 200 police arrived to subdue the situation, causing considerable concern. Pollock reported however that “thankfully there was no violence”.

The factory owners eventually said they would meet the workers’ demands, which included raising overtime payment from 20 Thai baht ($US0.65) per hour to 31 Thai baht ($US1) per hour. They also agreed to build an extra 10 toilets – Pollock said there had only been four toilets for around 1000 workers.

“Now workers are waiting this month to see whether that comes to fruition or not,” she said. Asked what sort of official protection there was for migrants, she replied: “There is almost zero protection of Burmese migrant workers by there embassy. There have only been two cases where they’ve actually done something, and those were very high profile.”
http://www.dvb.no/news/thai-burma-ministers-talk-migrants/13908
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Bargain basement Burma – if you have friends in high places

Up to 90% of Burma's state-owned industry will be transferred to the private sector. But who will benefit?

Burmese monks defy army warning Burma's junta leaders, from left to right: Thura Shwe Mahn, General Thein Sein and General Kyaw Win. Photograph: Str/EPA

As an "official" parliament will sit on 31 January for the first time since Burma's original dictator, Ne Win, abolished the last, more legitimate one in March 1962, Burma's minister of industry, Khin Maung Kyaw has concocted a bold economic move.

Maung Kyaw told local press earlier this month: "Up to 90% of state-owned industry will be transferred to the private sector as the country makes its transformation to democracy," adding: "This doesn't happen only in Myanmar [Burma]; other democratic countries also use the same practice."

The last sentence is perhaps the most telling and rich with deceit, for few economic schemes anywhere are shrouded in as much secrecy, or lack what the World Bank would term "conditionalities".

Maung Kyaw is a military man, but one would assume that he knows, as Burmese economist Aung Thu Nyein told the Guardian, the largest recipient of state-owned assets is the Union of Myanmar Economic Holdings (UMEH).

Which, the economist adds, is a "parastatal" company "run by the military's quartermaster general".

So as the official dynamic of Burmese politics shifts and the military changes its clothes, it has not forgotten to empty the pockets first.

As Burmese economist Professor Sean Turnell notes: "This demonstrates how Burma is not a normal developing south-east Asian nation."

The military, however, will not be the only beneficiaries. In their capacity as power-brokers they have developed a circle of business cronies. Business families who have built empires in the middle of an economy that was once the envy of the region and where now the UNDP estimates that Burma has a GDP in terms of purchasing power parity of around $881, compared with impoverished Cambodia's $1,619.

Among these cronies, perhaps the most notorious is Lo Hsing Han, a former CIA ally from northern Burma.

Han's empire was, according to Burma scholar and author, Bertil Lintne, built on heroin. "There is no other way," the author notes in his seminal work on the drug trade in Burma, Merchants of Madness.

Han's family owns the Asia World conglomerate, which has taken ownership of lucrative wharves along the crumbling Rangoon riverfront, where the remnants of this colonial city melt into the tropical air and the apathy of military rule.

Their other operations read like a Chinese state shopping list. From giant dams in the foothills of the Himalayas to a pipeline that will traverse the country, carrying Burma's natural gas to China.

Such projects will light and power that country's transformation, while Burma's cities bathe in a darkness inspired by decades of mismanagement; Asia World are the prescribed sub-contractors.

This bold "privatisation" experiment, however, is not without its discontents, even within the military junta. In true Burmese fashion, a whisper has emerged that the energy minister, Brigadier General Lun Thi is not happy. From under his feet the crucial business of distributing fuel to the populace has been transferred to the junta's cronies.

A handful of companies now run some 246 official, privatised filling stations in major cities.

Turnell points out that fuel prices are always politically sensitive, and were believed to be partly responsible for the popular uprisings in 2007 and 1988. As a result fuel prices were capped at roughly $2.50 a gallon for sale to the public while retailers buy the fuel at roughly $2.30.

Such margins provide little if any incentive to expand distribution and increase the number of stations in remote areas, resulting in rationing and long queues at official pumps and a flourishing black market petrol priceshave roughly doubled in some areas.

In all probability the companies themselves are involved in the black market, just to make ends meet.

Lun Thi, it is therefore believed, is waiting for the mess of fuel privatisation to blow up in the faces of the cronies and their military sponsor, Than Shwe, so that Lun Thi can then reclaimthe politically powerful role of fuel distribution.

Not only is the bidding for ownership of state-owned enterprises a closed process, but there is also a strong likelihood that such cronies would simply be told by the military what to do.

Such a modus operandi was elaborated in a WikiLeak. The cable not only showed the world the general's desire to buy Manchester United but also speculated that he simply told this gang of businessmen to open football clubs, and in return gave them mining concessions.

While Burma's state-owned enterprises are in a decrepit state, few apart from the state-run mining partnerships break even, and the natural gas revenues (the country's most lucrative export) are alleged by the Turnell and others to be held in Singaporean bank accounts to be spent on one of Asia's largest standing armies and murky weapons programmes.

And so in the middle of this economic upheaval, little seems to have changed on the streets, where a disgruntled black-market money-changer wades through Burma's dual exchange rates. He mimes a noose around his neck to describe the economic tragedy of this mineral-rich country.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/jan/27/burma-privatisation-military-junta