News & Articles on Burma
Friday, 12 August, 2011
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Icon Suu Kyi Joins Fight Against China Dam in Myanmar
Aung San Suu Kyi: China's dam project in Burma is dangerous
Myanmar government and opposition leader Suu Kyi to "avoid conflict"
Myanmar government urges Suu Kyi to register party
‘Emotions’ get the better of Burma minister
Myanmar opposition leader calls for reassessment of dam project
Myanmar vows ongoing Suu Kyi dialogue
Myanmar's new government vows not to harm the Irrawaddy
Jailed video journalist faces additional charge
New Myanmar government to drop foreign exchange certificates
Burma to cancel FECs
Burma forms 'spokespersons and information team' to control news leak-out
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THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: August 12, 2011, 7:08 PM HKT
Icon Suu Kyi Joins Fight Against China Dam in Myanmar
A powerful moral force is now standing in opposition to a China-funded dam project in Myanmar: icon Aung San Suu Kyi.
Ms. Suu Kyi this week released a letter calling on backers of the Myitsone hydropower project to “reassess the scheme,” citing concerns that dams on Myanmar’s Irrawaddy River degrade the environment, disrupt rice production, displace minority peoples, hurt livelihoods and risk unleashing devastating consequences during earthquakes. Her letter was distributed by a U.S. organization opposed to the project.
The Myitsone project is a 6000-megawatt cascade-style hydropower station being built as a joint venture by government-run China Power Investment Corp., Expected to come online in 2018, the project is a major symbol of China’s deepening political and economic relationship with the military regime in Myanmar.
China Power Investment Corp did not respond to requests for comment on Friday.
“We believe that, keeping in mind the interests of both countries, both governments would wish to avoid consequences which might endanger lives and homes,” Ms. Suu Kyi wrote.
By voicing opposition to widespread river damming, Myanmar’s most well-known opposition figure may boost international awareness of the project, long criticized by environmental and human rights groups. The dams, which represent a major source of foreign project finance for the government, are likewise stirring widespread discontent domestically.
Dams are also a growing political factor in China’s relations elsewhere in Southeast Asia, a region increasingly dependent on the world’s most populous nation for trade but worried its efforts to alter the flow of rivers could, among other detrimental effects, reduce their ability to irrigate rice fields.
Last month, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, while meeting regional officials in Indonesia, offered to spur a two-year-old Lower Mekong Initiative that is aimed boosting U.S.-backed development in the region, thereby countering Beijing’s influence in poorer parts of Southeast Asia. In some cases, China’s dam building is a big irritant, including Vietnam.
Analysts say China already has strong influence with Myanmar’s military leadership, a country that promises vast natural resources, a potential channel to new sea channels and geopolitical proximity to rival India.
The Myitsone hydroelectric dam and smaller projects in Myanmar also reflect Beijing’s ambitions to export technology developed at home and showcased in its own electricity producing facilities, like the giant Three Gorges Dam. But just as China’s ambitions to export high speed rail technology have been tripped up by a recent accident, its dam-building techniques have also been questioned on quality grounds.
Ms. Suu Ky’s letter, distributed by a group opposed to the dam, Berkeley, Calif.-based International Rivers, was measured in its criticism of what the Nobel Peace laureate called “the Burmese-Chinese venture” and acknowledged that the region needs power and economic development.
“While recognizing that large sums of money have already been spent on the realization of the project, we would urge that in the interests of both national and international harmony, concerned parties should reassess the scheme and cooperate to find solutions that would prevent undesirable consequences and thus allay the fears of all who are anxious to protect the Irrawaddy,” Ms. Suu Kyi said in the letter.
An op-ed published Wednesday in the state-run New Light of Myanmar defended the project, saying it had already provided more than 2,600 jobs, according to a translation by Burmanet. “State leaders will not give the green light to implement a project that is not beneficial to the nation and the people,” it added. http://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/2011/08/12/icon-suu-kyi-joins-fight-against-china-dam-in-myanmar/
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Aung San Suu Kyi: China's dam project in Burma is dangerous and divisive
Jonathan Watts, Asia environment correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Friday 12 August 2011 11.56 BST
The leader of Burma's pro-democracy opposition joins chorus of alarm over China's plan to build dams on Irrawaddy river.
Myanmar workers standing on the bank of the Irrawady river, Kachin state
Workers in Burma's Kachin state wait for river transport on the Irrawaddy, where China plans to build up to eight dams. The project will displace thousands, devastate ecosystems and stoke conflict. Photograph: STR/AFP/Getty Images
Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of Burma's pro-democracy opposition, has called for a halt to a massive Chinese hydropower project on the Irrawaddy river that has alarmed environmentalists and added to a long-running conflict between tribal militias and the government in Rangoon.
The Nobel laureate stepped into the fray on Thursday with a personal statement calling for greater protection for Burma's most important river, which is threatened by logging, pollution and the construction of a cascade of at least seven dams, a project managed by China Power Investment.
The biggest of them – the 3,600MW Myitsone Dam – is already under construction on the Irrawaddy despite fierce opposition from the Kachin Independence Organisation, which recently broke a 17-year-ceasefire after warning that it would fight to block the project.
The China Gezhouba Group is building the dam on the confluence of the Mali and N'Mai rivers in Kachin state, one of the world's most important biodiversity hotspots.
Once completed, it will flood the rainforest with a reservoir the size of New York city and displace 10,000 people, mostly Kachin people, as well as submerging cultural heritage sites central to Kachin identity, according to International Rivers.
The Burma Rivers Network, an NGO which represents communities along the river, said China's massive hydropower investments had widened the gulf between the government – which wants to benefit from cross-border electricity sales – and Kachin independence groups, which fear the dams will bring environmental, cultural and social disruption.
The environmental group has released what it says is a leaked environmental assessment jointly commissioned by the Burmese and Chinese authorities that recommends scrapping the project because it would cause immense damage to biodiverse ecosystems as local livelihoods as well as posing great risks in the event of an earthquake.
These concerns were reiterated by Aung San Sui Kyi, who said the dam was dangerous and divisive. "Since the commencement of the Myitsone project, the perception long held by the Kachin people that successive Burmese governments have neglected their interests has deepened," she said in her statement. "We would urge that in the interests of both national international harmony, concerned parties should reassess the scheme and cooperate to find solutions that would prevent undesirable consequences and thus allay the fears of all who are anxious to protect the Irrawaddy." http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/aug/12/suukyi-china-dam-irrawaddy-conflict
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Myanmar government and opposition leader Suu Kyi to "avoid conflict"
Aug 12, 2011, 10:42 GMT
Yangon - Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and the country's newly elected government have agreed to 'avoid conflicts,' Suu Kyi said in a joint statement with a government representative.
'We will avoid conflicts and will cooperate together,' Suu Kyi said in a joint statement made with Myanmar Labour Minister Aung Kyi, whom she met in Yangon for the second time since her release from house arrest on November 13. Suu Kyi last met with Aung Kyi, the government's main liaison person for the Nobel laureate, on July 25.
'We will meet frequently in the future,' Suu Kyi and Aung Kyi said after a one-hour meeting.
The international community and Myanmar's Asian allies have repeatedly called on the government to open dialogue with Suu Kyi and other opposition groups.
Suu Kyi, the daughter of Myanmar independence hero Aung San, has spent 15 of the past 21 years under house arrest. She was last released on November 13, from a seven-year detention term.
Since she was incarcerated, she could not contest the November 7 polls. Her National League for Democracy party boycotted the election and was disbanded afterwards.
'Even though the NLD is an illegal party, the government has been dealing with them patiently,' Myanmar Information Minister Kyaw Hsan said Friday.
He urged the NLD to reregister as a party if they wished to participate in politics.
Kyaw Hsan said the government's willingness to talk to Suu Kyi was in keeping with President Thein Sein's inaugural speech on March 30 when he said the government was ready to work with everyone for the development of the country.
Myanmar has been under military rule since 1962. The pro-military Union Solidarity and Development Party won the November 7 polls, which observers labelled neither free nor fair.
Myanmar ranks among the world's pariah states for its poor human rights and political reform record, but Kyaw Hsan hinted that changes were in the wind.
He noted that the ICRC had resumed prison visits and aid programmes on 1 July.
'And I can inform you now that the UN rapporteur on Myanmar's human rights situation, Tomas Ojea Quintana, is going to visit soon,' Kyaw Hsan said. http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/asiapacific/news/article_1656590.php/Myanmar-government-and-opposition-leader-Suu-Kyi-to-avoid-conflict
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Myanmar government urges Suu Kyi to register party so it can legally take part in politics
Article by: Associated Press
Updated: August 12, 2011 - 5:11 AM
NAYPYITAW, Myanmar - Myanmar's government is urging pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi to officially register her National League for Democracy as a party so it can legally take part in politics.
Information Minister Kyaw Hsan told a rare news conference Friday that the government has not cracked down on the group so far in the interests of national reconciliation.
His suggestion came two days before Suu Kyi plans to make her first political foray into the countryside since her release from seven years of house arrest last November. She was detained after her last such trip in 2003.
The government ordered the NLD's dissolution after it failed to register for last November's general election, which it called unfair and undemocratic. http://www.startribune.com/world/127576528.html
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‘Emotions’ get the better of Burma minister
By AHUNT PHONE MYAT
Published: 12 August 2011
Burma’s information minister Kyan Hsan was forced to leave a government press conference today after refusing to answer questions pitched by journalists which he said made him “emotional”.
Kyan Hsan, who effectively acts as Naypyidaw’s spokesperson, had led the first press conference of the new government in the capital this afternoon.
But he reportedly broke down in tears after being asked when the government would begin dialogue over the multiple conflicts raging in Burma’s border regions and issues regarding the woeful state of the country’s economy. The meeting was then suspended for several minutes.
“He began to have tears in his eyes and cried as he was answering questions [from a reporter] about how [the government’s] worked for the good of their country,” a source at the conference told DVB today.
A secret audio file obtained by DVB quoted Kyaw Hsan as saying, upon his return to the meeting, that “it [the breakdown] happened as I was speaking.
“I would like to tell [the journalists present] to keep this private as the media may think I did this because I didn’t want or wasn’t able to answer the questions. I want to tell you to understand me for feeling emotional as I was giving my answer.”
The 40-minute long conference featured questions from more than 10 journalists. It follows the recent formation of the Spokespersons and Information Team, led by Kyaw Hsan, which effectively acts as a public relations arm of the new government.
Thein Sein’s administration has gone on something of a media offensive as it has struggled to shed its reputation as a civilian extension of the military junta that ruled Burma in various guises since 1962.
Although it released opposition icon Aung San Suu Kyi shortly after the November 2010 elections and appears to be opening up somewhat towards the political opposition, critics claim that the escalation of civil wars in the border regions and continued human rights abuses show that little reform has taken place. http://www.dvb.no/news/%E2%80%98emotions%E2%80%99-get-the-better-of-burma-minister/17015
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Myanmar opposition leader calls for reassessment of dam project
Aug 12, 2011, 4:35 GMT
Yangon - Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi has called on the governments of Myanmar and China to reassess a 6,000-megawatt dam project due to safety and environmental concerns.
'We believe that, keeping in mind the interests of both countries, both governments would wish to avoid consequences which might endanger lives and homes,' Suu Kyi said in a statement made available Friday.
The dam is planned for an upper stretch of the Irrawaddy River, the longest in Myanmar, starting in the northern Kachin State and traversing the central plains before emptying into the rice-growing Irrawaddy delta and the Indian Ocean.
Given the economic, social and environmental importance of the river, Suu Kyi appealed to the international conservationist community 'to join us in a campaign to create a worldwide awareness of the dangers threatening one of the most important rivers in Asia.'
Construction on the estimated 3.6-billion-dollar Myitsone hydro-electric dam project began in 2009, as a joint venture between the Myanmar government and the state-owned China Power Investment.
'Under the current proposal, the dam will displace up to 12,000 people from 63 villages and flood critical cultural heritage sites,' said the International Rivers environmental group, adding that the project already faced 'violent opposition from the local Kachin population.'
The Kachin are one of five ethnic minority groups that are waging insurgencies against the Myanmar army, which has ruled the country since 1962 and continues to dominate the current elected government.
The project site was reportedly hit by a series of bombs in April 2010.
Suu Kyi also questioned the geological safety of the project. 'The presence of fault lines in the vicinity of the dams and the sheer immensity of the reservoir raises the spectre of horrendous devastation in the event of an earthquake.'
Suu Kyi is Myanmar's chief opposition figure, who has spent 15 of the past 21 years under house arrest. She was released from a seven-year house detention sentence on November 13.
Although she has no official position, and her National League for Democracy party has been dissolved, Suu Kyi remains a powerful political force.
The pro-military government's chief liaison officer, Labour Minister Aung Kyi, was scheduled to meet with Suu Kyi Friday afternoon, according to opposition sources.
Suu Kyi is planning a 'political tour' to Bogo, 50 kilometres north-east of Yangon on Saturday, despite government warnings against the trip. http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/asiapacific/news/article_1656521.php/Myanmar-opposition-leader-calls-for-reassessment-of-dam-project
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Myanmar vows ongoing Suu Kyi dialogue
Published on Aug 12, 2011
Myanmar's army-backed regime held out an olive branch to its critics on Friday, pledging to continue talks with democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi and to allow a visit by a UN human rights envoy. -- PHOTO: AP
NAYPYIDAW (AFP) - Myanmar's army-backed regime held out an olive branch to its critics on Friday, pledging to continue talks with democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi and to allow a visit by a UN human rights envoy.
In a rare news conference, information minister Kyaw Hsan said the nominally civilian government, which came to power after a controversial election last November, hoped to get 'successful results' from cooperating with Ms Suu Kyi.
The comments came shortly before Ms Suu Kyi and labour minister Aung Kyi began a second round of talks in Yangon.
'We will continue these kinds of meetings for the benefit of the people,' Mr Kyaw Hsan told around 50 reporters and some 250 officials invited to the new government's first media briefing in the capital Naypyidaw since taking power. http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/SEAsia/Story/STIStory_701366.html
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Myanmar's new government vows not to harm the Irrawaddy
Aug 12, 2011, 9:10 GMT
Naypyitaw, Myanmar - Myanmar's new government will conduct an environmental impact study of a dam on the Irrawaddy River before going ahead with the project, which has been criticized by opposition figures and environmentalists, officials said Friday.
'We love the Irrawaddy,' Information Minister Kyaw Hsan told a press conference in Naypyitaw, the capital. 'We will protect the Irrawaddy just like other citizens would.'
The government spokesman said a downstream environmental impact study of Myitsone dam in the Kachin State will be carried out before the hydro-power plant is put into operation.
Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi issued a statement Thursday night calling on the governments of Myanmar and China to reassess the 6,000-megawatt dam project due to safety and environmental concerns.
'We believe that, keeping in mind the interests of both countries, both governments would wish to avoid consequences which might endanger lives and homes,' Suu Kyi said.
The dam is planned for an upper stretch of the Irrawaddy River, the longest in Myanmar, starting in the northern Kachin State and traversing the central plains before emptying into the rice-growing Irrawaddy delta and the Indian Ocean.
Given the economic, social and environmental importance of the river, Suu Kyi appealed to the international conservationist community 'to join us in a campaign to create a worldwide awareness of the dangers threatening one of the most important rivers in Asia.'
Construction on the estimated 3.6-billion-dollar Myitsone hydro-electric dam project began in 2009, as a joint venture between the Myanmar government and the state-owned China Power Investment.
'Under the current proposal, the dam will displace up to 12,000 people from 63 villages and flood critical cultural heritage sites,' said the International Rivers environmental group, adding that the project already faced 'violent opposition from the local Kachin population.'
The Kachin are one of five ethnic minority groups that are waging insurgencies against the Myanmar army, which has ruled the country since 1962 and continues to dominate the current elected government.
The project site was reportedly hit by a series of bombs in April 2010.
Suu Kyi also questioned the geological safety of the project. 'The presence of fault lines in the vicinity of the dams and the sheer immensity of the reservoir raises the spectre of horrendous devastation in the event of an earthquake.'
Suu Kyi is Myanmar's chief opposition figure, who has spent 15 of the past 21 years under house arrest. She was released from a seven-year house detention sentence on November 13.
Although she has no official position, and her National League for Democracy (NLD) party has been dissolved, Suu Kyi remains a powerful political force.
'Even though the NLD is an illegal party, the government has been dealing with the them patiently,' Kyaw Hsan said. He said the treatment was in accordance with President Thein Sein's inaugural speech of March 30, in which he said he would work with everyone.
The pro-military government's chief liaison officer, Labour Minister Aung Kyi, met with Suu Kyi Friday afternoon in Yangon.
The two sides issued a joint statement to 'avoid conflicts and to cooperate together.'
Suu Kyi is planning a 'political tour' to Bogo, 50 kilometres north-east of Yangon on Sunday, despite government warnings against the trip. http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/asiapacific/news/article_1656566.php/Myanmar-s-new-government-vows-not-to-harm-the-Irrawaddy
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Jailed video journalist faces additional charge
Published on Friday 12 August 2011.
Reporters Without Borders condemns the new charge that was brought on 10 August against Sithu Zeya, a Democratic Voice of Burma video journalist who has been detained since April 2010 and who is already serving an eight-year sentence for filming the damage caused by a grenade explosion in Rangoon.
Aged 21, Sithu Zeya could now receive an additional sentence of 7 to 15 years in prison on a charge of circulating material online “that can damage tranquillity and unity in the government” under the Electronic Act.
“They gave him the [first] sentence based on the confession he gave to the police under torture,” his mother told Democratic Voice of Burma. “They will use the same confession to sentence him this time. [The judicial system] now is no different from the previous one.”
Reporters Without Borders fears that any changes to the Burmese judicial system since the end of military rule are no more than window dressing and urges the international community to step up pressure on Burma for a real political opening, one that guarantees basic freedoms for its citizens including media freedom.
Reporters Without Borders also hopes that the pro-democracy opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi raises the case of imprisoned journalists and bloggers when she has a second round of talks with the government today.
An Oslo-based exile radio and TV station, Democratic Voice of Burma launched a campaign in May for the release of its 17 video reporters who are currently imprisoned in Burma. As well as Sithu Seya, they include his father, Maung Maung Zeya, who is serving a 13-year jail sentence.
More than 15 journalists and three netizens are detained in Burma, which is on the Reporters Without Borders list of Enemies of the Internet and is ranked 174th out of 178 countries in the Reporters Without Borders press freedom index. http://en.rsf.org/burma-jailed-video-reporter-faces-12-08-2011,40770.html
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New Myanmar government to drop foreign exchange certificates
Aug 12, 2011, 10:10 GMT
Naypyitaw, Myanmar - Myanmar's new government is planning to withdraw foreign exchange certificates (FECs) from the market, after imposing them on foreigners for almost two decades, officials said Friday.
'In the near future there will be no more FECs, just kyat and foreign currencies,' Information Minister Kyaw Hsan told a press conference, one of the first held by Myanmar's new elected government since it took office in April.
The FECs were first introduced in 1993 as a means of keeping foreign currency under government control.
Visiting foreign tourists were required to purchase 200 US dollars worth of FECs at the airport on arrival and foreign businessmen and aid workers were required to use the FEC for official transactions, often at an exchange rate loss.
The FEC was intended to prevent all foreign exchange from being traded on the black market, which offered rates of about 1,000 kyat to the dollar compared with the government's official rate of 6 kyat to the dollar and 450 kyat for one FEC.
'Burma's multiple exchange rates make conversion and repatriation of foreign exchange very complex, and ripe for corruption,' one US State Department report said of the system.
In recent months, the local kyat currency has strengthened against the dollar and FEC, apparently on account of a huge influx of dollars into the economy.
Kyaw Hsan said holders of FECs should not worry, because the government will buy back the currency from them with dollars or kyat, although he did not specify at what rates.
http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/business/news/article_1656582.php/New-Myanmar-government-to-drop-foreign-exchange-certificates
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Burma to cancel FECs
By Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Naypyitaw, Myanmar
Published on August 12, 2011
Myanmar's new government is planning to withdraw foreign exchange certificates (FECs) from the market, after imposing them on foreigners for almost two decades, officials said Friday.
"In the near future there will be no more FECs, just kyat and foreign currencies," Information Minister Kyaw Hsan told a press conference, one of the first held by Myanmar's new elected government since it took office in April.
The FECs were first introduced in 1993 as a means of keeping foreign currency under government control. Visiting foreign tourists were required to purchase 200 US dollars worth of FECs at the airport on arrival and foreign businessmen and aid workers were required to use the FEC for official transactions, often at an exchange rate loss.
The FEC was intended to prevent all foreign exchange from being traded on the black market, which offered rates of about 1,000 kyat to the dollar compared with the government's official rate of 6 kyat
to the dollar and 450 kyat for one FEC.
"Burma's multiple exchange rates make conversion and repatriation of foreign exchange very complex, and ripe for corruption," one US State Department report said of the system.
In recent months, the local kyat currency has strengthened against the dollar and FEC, apparently on account of a huge influx of dollars into the economy. Kyaw Hsan said holders of FECs should not worry, because the
government will buy back the currency from them with dollars or kyat, although he did not specify at what rates. http://www.nationmultimedia.com/2011/08/12/business/Burma-to-cancel-FECs-30162631.html
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Burma forms 'spokespersons and information team' to control news leak-out
Fri, 2011-08-12 03:31 — editor
By - Zin Linn
The President Office of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar (Burma) issued Notification No.75/2011 - “Formation of Spokespersons and Information Team” - dated 10 August 2011, the state media announced today.
In accord with Section 24, Subsection (a) of the Union Government Law, Spokespersons and Information Team has been formed with the following persons in order that it can assume the duties of releasing news and information and holding press conferences occasionally regarding the political, economic, security, military and natural disaster affairs of the State, the state newspapers said.
Spokespersons and Information Team has been formed with 11 members and the team leader is Kyaw Hsan, Union Minister, Ministry of Information.
The purpose of the info team seems to bar other government officers and staff engaging the public communication activities. They are already warned not to leak out information to the media especially to exile media. So, the government information team will act as an info filter mechanism which will prevent government confidential facts and statistics from leaking out.
Burma's parliament nominated Thein Sein as the country's eighth president on 4 February 2011. The same day, a Rangoon court sentenced Maung Maung Zeya, a journalist working for Democratic Voice of Burma, an independent exile radio and TV station, to a total of 13 years in prison for violating the Unlawful Association Act, Immigration Act and Electronics Act.
Three journalists - Zarganar, Zaw Thet Htwe and Thant Zin Aung - who were given long prison terms by a kangaroo-court in November 2008, are still in prison.
An information ministry statement to exempt sports and entertainment periodicals from prior censorship by the notorious Press Scrutiny and Registration Department (PSRD) is just a showcase tactic to deceive the international media watchdogs.
In his inaugural address on 30 March, President Thein Sein portrayed the new cabinet as a constructive body.
"We must also respect the role of the media as a fourth estate," he said. But, in spite of a rhetoric, address was measured to provide the military-backed government a more trustworthy image, as journalists remain under constant close watch. Those suspected of sending video footages or reports on day-to-day situation to exile media are always under close watch by the special branch of the intelligence units.
For instance, during 10 May press conference by the Rangoon regional government, Nyan Tun Oo, regional minister for education, health, foreign affairs and immigration, hinted journalists of the government’s intention that government will not allow media coverage, which they think probably be sensitive to national security.
“On the subject of freedom of press, reporters can record stories if they are not sensitive to the state. If media coverage causes danger to the state or our citizens’ security, no one can cover it,” Nyan Tun Oo said during a press conference at the city’s parliament building.
The press conference was the first official meeting of regional government ministers and the media personnel held by the Rangoon administration since the USDP regime was sworn in on March 30.
According to then “Irrawaddy” news report, when the editor of Snap Shot Journal, Myat Khaing, questioned the minister, he responded by saying that he would stop the press conference immediately if journalists cross-examined him or asked “colored” questions.
The President Thein Sein oversees a cabinet whose 30 members are mostly former army officers and has inherited the "directed democracy" system created by his predecessor, Gen Than Shwe, head of the previous military junta.
Freedom of expression, information and association is controlled by more than half a dozen laws, the violation of which, may be, and in fact is, widely sanctioned by 3 to 20 years in prison.
Burmese People are suspicious on this Formation of Spokespersons and Information Team as the information minister who controlled the PSRD becomes team-leader. This information team will take responsibility to answer the media including private journals through press conference. The team certainly will pay attention to cut questions made by journalists so as to avoid secrets of the government.
It looks like a kind of limitation to the press freedom plus freedom of expression since the hardliner information minister Kyaw San, who also took the same post in previous junta, takes charge of the team.
The Paris-based watchdog, Reporters Without Borders ranked Burma 174 out of 178 countries on its latest Press Freedom Index. More than 25 media workers are in jail, including 17 video journalists for DVB. Burma is "Asia's biggest prison for journalists and bloggers after China," says the watchdog.
- Asian Tribune - http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2011/08/11/burma-forms-spokespersons-and-information-team-control-news-leak-out
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Saturday, August 13, 2011
News & Articles on Burma-Friday, 12 August, 2011
Friday, August 12, 2011
News & Articles on Burma-Thursday, 11 August, 2011
News & Articles on Burma
Thursday, 11 August, 2011
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Suu Kyi to meet Myanmar minister again: Spokesman
Myanmar's Suu Kyi urges reassessment of dam
Myanmar Forms Government Spokespersons, Information Team
The Long Wait for a Ceasefire
Remembering a Karen Leader
Clinton Urged to Push for End of Use of Rape as a Weapon in Burma
Mon Leader Says Govt Wants Peace Talks
Shan State Fighting Displaces 30,000 People This Year
The Military Ties That Bind
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Published: Thursday August 11, 2011 MYT 9:33:00 PM
Myanmar's Suu Kyi urges reassessment of dam
YANGON, Myanmar (AP) - Myanmar pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi joined forces with environmentalists and minority groups with an appeal Thursday for the reassessment of a large dam project on the country's main river.
Suu Kyi urged the Myanmar and Chinese governments to re-examine the project on the Irrawaddy River in the interest of national and international harmony.
She called the waterway "the most significant geographical feature of our country."
Environmental groups, members of the Kachin ethnic minority and other people living along the river say the Myanmar-China Myitsone Hydroelectric Project in northern Kachin state will displace villagers and upset the ecology of the important food source.
The $3.6 billion dam being built by China in the Kachin heartland is expected to flood an area the size of Singapore. The Myanmar government has not said how much of the energy will be sold to China.
In her appeal, Suu Kyi said some 12,000 people from 63 villages have been relocated and it is not clear whether they will be fairly compensated. A commentary Wednesday in the government-run New Light of Myanmar newspaper, however, said only 2,146 people from five villages had been relocated.
"Since the commencement of the Myitsone project, the perception, long held by the Kachin people, that successive Burmese governments have neglected their interests has deepened," Suu Kyi wrote. Burma is another name for Myanmar.
"We therefore appeal to environmental experts, to conservationists and to lovers of nature, peace and harmony everywhere to join us in a campaign to create a worldwide awareness of the dangers threatening one of the most important rivers of Asia," the appeal said.
For decades, several ethnic groups have waged guerrilla wars for greater autonomy, including more control over resources in their regions. In March, fighting broke out between the 8,000-strong Kachin militia and the government.
That fighting was related to dams and other large projects being built by China, the Environmental Working Group, a coalition of 10 exile groups, said in a report last month.
Two months before the fighting erupted, the Kachin Independence Organization issued a strong protest against the Myitsone dam. http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2011/8/11/apworld/20110811214523&sec=apworld
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Suu Kyi to meet Myanmar minister again: Spokesman
Published on Aug 11, 2011
Myanmar's democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi (left) is to hold a second round of talks with the country's nominally-civilian government, her spokesman said on Thursday, amid tentative signs of a thaw in relations. -- PHOTO: AFP
YANGON (AFP) - MYANMAR'S democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi is to hold a second round of talks with the country's nominally-civilian government, her spokesman said on Thursday, amid tentative signs of a thaw in relations.
Friday's meeting with labour minister Aung Kyi will come two days before Ms Suu Kyi is due to make her first overtly political trip outside Yangon since she was freed from house arrest in November.
'We do not know more details yet,' Nyan Win, a spokesman for the Nobel Peace Prize winner and her National League for Democracy (NLD) party, told AFP.
Ms Suu Kyi's talks with the same minister last month raised hopes for an ongoing dialogue between the two sides. http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/SEAsia/Story/STIStory_700988.html
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August 11, 2011 11:09 AM
Myanmar Forms Government Spokespersons, Information Team
YANGON, Aug 11 (Bernama) -- Myanmar has formed an 11-member Government Spokespersons and Information Team, led by Union Minister of Information U Kyaw Hsan, all official media reported quoting a notification issued by the President's Office Thursday.
With Managing Director of the News and Periodicals Enterprise U Zaw Min Oo as secretary, the team was set up to undertake news and information release, holding of press conference occasionally regarding the country's political, economic, security, military and natural disaster affairs,Xinhua news agency reported.
The team also includes some deputy ministers of home affairs, foreign affairs, information and labour as well as Police Chief Kyaw Kyaw Tun, the notification said.
The formation of the team was done along with a minor reshuffle of two union ministers, reassigning Union Minister of Industry-1 U Kyaw Swa Khaing as Union Minister at the President's Office and appointing Union Minister of Industry-2 U Soe Thein concurrently as Union Minister of Industry-1.
-- BERNAMA http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v5/newsworld.php?id=607441
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The Long Wait for a Ceasefire
By WAI MOE Thursday, August 11, 2011
Despite three meetings over the last two months between Burmese army representatives and the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO), no agreement has been hatched that would end hostilities and bring about a ceasefire.
The government’s negotiation team is led by Col. Than Aung, a Burman national who is Minister for Security and Border Affairs in the Kachin State assembly. On the other side of the table Brig-Gen Sumlut Gun Maw, the vice-chief of staff in the KIO's military wing, the Kachin Independence Army (KIA).
Both sides agreed on the town of Lajayang—some two hours drive from state capital Myitkyina—as a venue for negotiations, strategically situated as it is at the invisible border where government territory meets the KIO-controlled zone.
The first meeting was held on June 30. Constructive talks were held, and both delegations retired from the two-hour meeting with an agenda to consider, and they pledged to sit around the negotiation table again in the near future.
Then, on July 28, just a few days before the second round of talks, the KIO presented the government negotiators with their draft of a ceasefire.
However, by the time the follow-up meetings concluded on Aug. 1 and Aug. 2, it was clear that the chasm of mistrust and doubt was too wide to bridge.
An apparent hurdle was the questionable choice of Than Aung as a government negotiator.
A KIO video of the Aug. 2 meeting was released to The Irrawaddy. Sitting morosely at the table, Than Aung is seen to read a prepared statement from a notebook. He drones monotonously, and when discussions begin, appears at a loss for words. He repeats the line that he will pass on suggestions to his superiors.
The Kachins despaired, believing that their counterpart had no authority to make meaningful decisions.
At one point, he referred to ex Brig-Gen Thein Zaw, a MP from Myitkyina and a secretary of the ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) as ahba, meaning “father,” a common title that juniors use for senior officers in the Burmese military.
Than Aung then called for Thein Zaw and another senior USDP member, Aung Thaung, to act as third party witnesses for the “Gentlemen's Agreement” that was proposed. KIO officials thought this was a joke, as both men were staunchly pro-government.
Than Aung left the Kachin delegation with the impression that Naypyidaw were insincere in their negotiations, and were offended that the government would send someone so unqualified to deal with them.
“We also argued repeatedly on the definition of the government’s words “Forever Peace.” said Gun Maw. “In 2009, Lt-Gen Ye Myint [ former Chief of Military Affairs Security] also used that expression when he came to announce the government proposal for a BGF [Border Guard Force].”
The KIO and other ethnic armed groups believed the BGF proposal was no more than a thinly veiled plan to disarm them.
At the Aug. 2 meeting, Than Aung also told his Kachin counterparts that the parliament might form a committee headed by Thein Zaw to deal with the issue of ethnic conflicts during the upcoming sessions on August 22.
“We will wait for tomorrow with the best of hopes,” Than Aung told the Kachin delegation, leaving them with the impression that a ceasefire could be signed the following day.
But, for the KIO leaders, it's a case of “Tomorrow Never Comes” as the government negotiating team has still failed to respond to the KIO's draft.
Another question is the new alliance of ethnic armed groups, the United Nationalities Federal Council (UNFC), founded in February, which includes the KIO, the Karen National Union, the Shan State Army, the Karenni National Progressive Party and the New Mon State Party.
The KIO negotiation team asked the government team what the common stance would be toward a national ceasefire as they [the KIO] were but one of several members of the UNFC, said Gun Maw, adding that after breaking 16 years of ceasefire, the alliance would require a common stance regarding peace talks.
“Despite numerous differences between the ethnic-minority groups, and a failure to act together in the past, the formation of the UNFC in February 2011 marks a new attempt by these organizations to show a united front, supporting each other in an effort to gain greater autonomy and bring an end to human-rights abuses by the military,” the Economist Intelligence Unit said in its August report on Burma.
“As part of this strategy, the UNFC has called on the government to negotiate ceasefires with all armed groups, rather than on a case-by-case basis,” the Economist Intelligence Unit reported. http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=21885
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Remembering a Karen Leader
By SAW YAN NAING Thursday, August 11, 2011
“Our president who we love so much, our precious leader—sadly, he has left us.
At Hto Kaw Koe, in a bamboo hut in paddy field, he withstood the enemy's attacks until the very end.
Oh, our beloved president.
He speaks to us in spirit, even though he's dead. He did his duty for his people, and now he rests forever.”
This is a song that describes the death of Saw Ba U Gyi, the father of the Karen resistance, who was killed along with eight of his comrades in a remote village Karen village on Aug 12, 1950—a event commemorated every year as Karen Martyrs' Day.
As the song recounts, the death of Saw Ba U Gyi and his fellow Karen freedom fighters occurred in a bamboo hut in the middle of a paddy field in the village of Hto Kaw Koe in Kawkareik Township, Karen State.
It happened just before dawn: the gunfire of automatic rifle blasted away at the hut, instantly killing the nine men inside.
It was a carefully planned assassination by the Burmese army against the founder of the Karen National Union, Burma's longest-running ethnic resistance group, formed in 1947. To this day it is remembered by Karen people around the world as one of the key events in their long struggle for autonomy.
But Karen Martyrs' Day doesn't just mark a single incident. According to Gen Mutu Say Poe, the military chief of the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), the KNU's armed wing, it also honors all of the Karen leaders, soldiers and civilians who have lost their lives because of their resistance to Burmese rule.
“This is a day that we have to commemorate because it was the day our leaders sacrificed their lives for our liberation,” said Mutu Say Poe.
The KNU first took up arms against Burma's government in 1949, when the KNLA was founded because of the government's refusal to recognize the equality of ethnic minorities in the newly independent country.
Saw Tamla Baw, the current chairman of the KNU, noted that even after more than six decades of armed resistance, the original goals of the group's founders remain beyond reach.
“Though we have struggled for liberation from the oppressive rule of the military dictatorships, we still haven't reached our goal, up to this day,” said Saw Tamla Baw in a statement. “Like martyr Saw Ba U Gyi, many leaders, comrades and common people have sacrificed their lives. We must continue to walk on our path of revolutionary resistance, which is paved with the blood and sweat of the martyrs.”
Born in 1905 in a village in Irrawaddy Division, Saw Ba U Gyi studied and practiced law in England for several years before returning to Burma and becoming involved in the Karen Central Organization in 1942. He also became a cabinet minister in the Burmese government, led by the Anti-Fascist People’s Freedom League, in 1946.
He was later involved in the Battle of Insein—a major outbreak of hostilities between Karen rebels and the Burmese government that lasted more than 100 days.
Tamla Baw said that despite the many difficulties the KNU has faced, including oppression and internal divisions created by the Burmese government, it still stands firmly because it upholds the “Four Principles of Saw Ba U Gyi,” the pillars of the KNU revolutionary movement.
The four principles are: surrender is out of the question; the recognition of the Karen State must be completed; we shall retain our arms; we shall decide our own political destiny.
These four principles guide not only the KNU, but also the breakaway Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), which split from the KNU in 1995.
The DKBA's decision to go its own way and sign a ceasefire with the Burmese regime was a major blow to the KNU. However, in November 2010, DKBA Brigade 5 rejoined the KNU under the leadership of Brig-Gen Saw Lah Pwe, ending a 16-year-old ceasefire agreement with the government.
“We will uphold the four principles of our Karen resistance leader Saw Ba U Gyi until we win,” said Saw Lah Pwe, whose troops will also celebrate Karen Martyrs’ Day in their bases in the countryside.
The KNU chairman said that as the new government elected in the 2010 election governs according to the Constitution written under the direction of the military dictatorship, there is not a single benefit for the ethnic nationalities.
Even after more than 60 years without reaching its stated goals, the KNU remains convinced that it will eventually achieve victory.
Brig-Gen Saw Johnny, the commander of the KNLA Brigade 7, said the KNU armed resistance will never collapse if it doesn’t give up.
Quoting the words of Saw Ba U Gyi, he said: “If we don’t go to Rangoon and let our heads get chopped off by the Burmese army, we will never lose.”
“Due to [Saw Ba U Gyi’s] great sacrifices, we have to commemorate him and all Karen revolutionaries who have died during the past 61 years of the Karen resistance,” said Johnny.
Although Saw Ba U Gyi enjoys a larger than life stature among Karen today, in his lifetime he was known as a humble man dedicated to advancing the interests of his people.
“Even when he was a lawyer in England and a cabinet minister in the Burmese government, he was not proud of his position and wealth. He sacrificed all of it and fought for his people until he died,” said Johnny.
“He didn’t think of his own interest, but only about the interests of his Karen people. He died for our Karen people to liberate them from slavery,” added Johnny.
Although it has taken part in peace talks with the Burmese junta on several occasions, the KNU has never signed a ceasefire agreement.
“We want equality, peace and freedom. We don’t want hostilities and racist riots. We don’t go to Burma cities and kill Burmans. Our armed struggle is a right one. We will win one day,” said Johnny.
If the government keeps its troops in Karen State in eastern Burma and conducts armed attacks against the Karen people, the KNLA will keep practicing its guerrilla warfare against the government troops, said Mutu Say Poe.
“If the oppression continues, our armed resistance will not end. If there is no oppression, there is no need for armed resistance. Our aim is to get our own independent state and equality,” said Mutu Say Poe. http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=21882
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Clinton Urged to Push for End of Use of Rape as a Weapon in Burma
By LALIT K JHA Thursday, August 11, 2011
WASHINGTON — A bipartisan group of more than a dozen powerful women senators has urged US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to call on the new Burmese regime to end the practice of using rape as a weapon of war.
In a letter to Clinton released to the press on Wednesday, the senators also urged her to pursue the establishment of an international Commission of Inquiry (CoI) into war crimes and crimes against humanity in Burma.
Led by Senators Diane Feinstein and Key Bailey Hutchison, these powerful women lawmakers expressed their concern about recent reports of the use of rape as a weapon of war in the renewed armed conflict between the Burmese military and ethnic armed groups.
“Given the Burmese regime’s unabated use of rape as a weapon of war, we urge you to call on the regime to end this practice and pursue our shared goal of establishing an international Commission of Inquiry into war crimes and crimes against humanity,” the senators wrote.
“We must not allow this regime to continue to commit such dire crimes while the people of Burma continue to suffer. As members of the Senate Women’s Caucus on Burma, we express our solidarity with our friend and sister, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, and express our deep commitment to the struggle for freedom and justice in Burma,” the letter said.
Other signatories to the letter include Patty Murray, Barbara Boxer, Kay Hagan, Mary Landrieu, Jeanne Shaheen, Kelly Ayotte, Amy Klobuchar, Lisa Murkowski, Barbara Mikulski, Olympia J. Snowe, Susan Collins and Patty Murray. There was no immediate reaction from the State Department.
The senators said that according to the Kachin Women’s Association Thailand, 18 Kachin women and girls were gang-raped by Burmese soldiers during the first eight days of renewed fighting between the Burmese army and the Kachin Independence Army after the end of a 17-year ceasefire. Four of these victims were also killed.
Similar reports have also emerged from northern Shan State, where the Burmese army has attacked the Shan State Army-North, ending a 22-year ceasefire. The Shan Women’s Action Network continues to document the ongoing sexual violence against civilians, including a recent horrific account of four women being raped in one village in a single day, the senators noted.
The senators also referred to the recent speeches of Suu Kyi, in which she says that rape is used in her country as a weapon against those who only want to live in peace and assert their basic human rights, especially in the areas of the ethnic nationalities.
Last month in her testimony before the House Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific, Suu Kyi called upon the US government to do everything it can to aid in the establishment of a CoI, the senators said.
Meanwhile, Senator Jim Webb, chairman of Senate Foreign Relations Committee's Subcommittee on East Asian and Pacific Affairs, announced he will visit Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia and Vietnam from Aug 12 to 25.
Besides regional and bilateral issues and the increasing influence of China in the region, Burma would be a major topic of discussion when Webb holds meetings with the heads of state of each country on his itinerary, as well as top officials responsible for foreign affairs, commerce and defense and US diplomats, leading academics and businesspeople.
In Thailand, Webb will become one of the first American officials to meet with the leadership of the newly elected government of Yingluck Shinawatra. He is also slated to meet former Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva for discussions about the outcome of last month’s national elections and the status of US-Thai relations.
In Singapore, Webb will discuss US-Singapore relations, maritime sovereignty issues and regional efforts to combat human trafficking. Last month, he introduced legislation to address major inconsistencies in the annual US State Department Trafficking-in-Persons Report which threaten to undermine the anti-trafficking efforts of countries such as Singapore. He will also meet with Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew.
In Indonesia and Vietnam, Webb will discuss the advancement of economic relations between the US and these two nations, as well as territorial disputes in the South China Sea and other regional security issues.
He was the original sponsor of a resolution, unanimously approved by the Senate in June, deploring the use of force by China in the South China Sea and calling for a peaceful, multilateral resolution to maritime territorial disputes in Southeast Asia. http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=21878
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Mon Leader Says Govt Wants Peace Talks
By LAWI WENG Thursday, August 11, 2011
The chairman of the New Mon State Party (NMSP), Nai Htaw Mon, has claimed that Mon State Chief Minister Ohn Myint has requested peace talks with his party, according to Mon sources.
“Nai Htaw Mon told us that Ohn Myint sent ethnic Mon Buddhist monks as peace brokers to negotiate the offer,” said a source who attended a meeting at the weekend near the Thai-Burmese border where the MNSP chairman reportedly made the remark.
However, sources say, Nai Htaw Mon believes the offer of peace talks is an attempt by Ohn Myint to divide his party as the latter has tried to lure the MNSP—an ethnic armed group that rejected the government's border guard force proposal in 2009—into negotiations several times before.
This time, they say, Ohn Myint used his supporters, two monks from Kamarwet village in Mudon Township, which is also the native village of the NMSP chairman.
Chairman of the Thailand-based Mon Unity League Nai Sunthorn, a participant at the meeting, said, “I advised Nai Htaw Mon not to accept the offer of peace talks from Ohn Myint. Let the UNFC [United Nationalities Federal Council] lead the peace talks.”
The UNFC is an umbrella group representing 12 of the largest ethnic parties in Burma.
“If only the NMSP are invited, they should not go alone to any peace talks,” he said.
According to Nai Ngwe Thein, the chairman of the All Mon Regions Democracy Party, (AMRDP), Ohn Myint has also told some members of his party that he wished to engage in peace talks with the NMSP leaders.
“Why they are staying in the jungle? Tell them to come back and stay in the city. I will provide them properties if they come,”Ohn Myint is alleged to have told the AMRDP members.
The NMSP leaders said last week that they will not attend peace talks alone, and that they would only consider attending as a member of the UNFC.
Several ethnic leaders have said they would like Burma’s pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi to act as lead peace broker in any negotiations between the Burmese government and the ethnic armed groups.
The NMSP leadership has stated its intention to make contact with Suu Kyi, saying they wish to discuss with her ways to solve the political crisis in Burma.
However, they say that the previous ruling military junta did not allow them to contact Suu Kyi or her party, the National League for Democracy, during the years they maintained a ceasefire agreement with the government.
“This could be a great opportunity for the ethnic leaders to get in contact with Suu Kyi and build a pact,” said Nai Wona, a member of the Mon Literature and Culture Committee in Moulmein.
Meanwhile, Burma's Vice-President Tin Aung Myint Oo claimed while he visited Mon State last weekend that his government always welcomes peace talks with ethnic minorities. http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=21879
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Shan State Fighting Displaces 30,000 People This Year
By TODD PITMAN / AP WRITER Thursday, August 11, 2011
BANGKOK — More than 30,000 people have been displaced by fighting in eastern Burma this year despite the army handing power over to a nominally civilian government, activist groups said Wednesday.
Civilians traumatized by atrocities by troops including rape and mutilation now face "a dire humanitarian crisis" as many have fled into forests near their villages in Shan state, according to the Shan Human Rights Foundation and the Shan Women's Action Network.
The groups called for international donors to help with aid, saying many were enduring chronic shortages of food, water, shelter and medicine, and noting 24 people had died of diarrhea and malaria in the past month.
"With the regime keeping tight control on all aid in Burma, cross-border aid is the only way to reach war-affected populations," said Shan Women's Action Network coordinator Nang Hseng Moon. "We urge international donors to respond to this humanitarian crisis before further lives are lost."
The skirmishes—which broke a 22-year cease-fire—began in March just weeks before the new civilian-led administration took over after years of rule by a military junta.
The change was supposed to herald a new democratic era in the repressive nation, but critics say little has changed and the new government has become a proxy for continued army rule.
More than 100,000 refugees remain outside the country, and hundreds of thousands more are displaced within Burma from past violence.
Fighting intensified in July, when 4,000 government troops backed by fighter jets moved to seize the northern Shan rebel group's headquarters in Wan Hai, the groups' statement said.
"Advancing through surrounding villages, troops have been scaling up atrocities against civilians, including killing, rape and mutilation," the statement said. "One dead villager was found with his leg and hand cut off."
Similar fighting further north in Kachin state has displaced 20,000 people since June. In Shan state, the groups say 31,700 people have been displaced since March. http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=21876
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CONTRIBUTOR
The Military Ties That Bind
By MAHN AUNG LWIN Thursday, August 11, 2011
Geisenheim is a small town in the State of Hessen of the Federal Republic of Germany that hosts a plush old spa of sumptuous beauty, where since Roman times people have bathed amidst lush forests beneath the Taunus Mountains. To the surprise of all visitors, in the middle of a vineyard near the town is a grand, Burmese style house.
The Myitta Paungku Beikman (Love Connection Monument), was built by former Burmese dictator Gen Ne Win and donated to the Fritz Werner GmbH Company (FWG) on Jan. 1, 1971 as a sign of appreciation for the company's assistance in preserving him and his much-hated military regime in power.
FWG is a Berlin-based company which since 1896 has specialized in machinery for the production of small arms and ammunition. The company, which played a vital role in Germany's WW I efforts, has cultivated a unique relationship with the Burmese ruling elite over the years. There is a great deal of mutual trust between FWG and the Burmese regime, whose military-minded leaders look for characteristics such as reliability and discretion in a business partner.
After WW II, FWG was wholly-owned by the West German government, falling under the jurisdiction of the government’s Ministry of Economy. The company was bought with money from the Marshall Fund which was meant to rebuild industries that were destroyed during WW II, a war which FWG helped fuel with its machinery for the production of weapons and ammunition.
In 1948, Burma gained independence from Great Britain, and FWG struck up its partnership with the new Burmese government in 1953. The German company's first project was the production of the BA52 submachine gun—aka the Ne Win sten.
Beginning at the time of this original contract, Ne Win cultivated friendly relations with FWG, both diplomatically and personally. Fritz Werner technical advisors posted in Rangoon had continuous access to the dictator, a rare privilege not extended to the representatives of other foreign firms. The fact that FWG was owed by the West German government itself created a close personal relationship between the two governments, causing some to say that Burma was the friendliest nation toward West Germany in Asia.
FWG’s secretive Burmese operations, which have often been shrouded under a veil of mystery, got into full swing in 1960 when the West German Ministry of Defence gave the company permission to produce G3 rifles in Burma and it later established its first weapons factory on the outskirts of Rangoon with the assistance of the West Germany arms company Heckler & Koch.
The factory was supervised by German engineers from the German Technical Corporation Agency (GTZ). Until the production of that plant started, the Burmese regime used FWG as the middleman to purchase G3 rifles through Düsseldorf based arms producer Rheinmetall, which shared production with Heckler & Koch.
In 1961, West Germany’s Foreign Office in Bonn granted permission to export 10.000 G3 rifles as well as four million rounds of ammunition manufactured by Metallwerk Elisenhütte Nassau (MEN), an FWG subsidiary, to Burma. The West German government had “no reservations” about authorizing further transfers, even when Ne Win toppled the democratic government of U Nu in 1962—Rheinmetall received permission from Bonn to sell 12.000 G3 rifles and 800 MG42 machine guns, and MEN received permission to export 18 million rounds of ammunition. Then in 1969, the West German Foreign Office permitted FWG to export machinery for the production of explosives, as well as a complete rolling mill for sheet brass.
With the assistance from West Germany, the self-sufficiency of the Burmese armed forces increased continuously, and the Burmese military often used German-produced weapons to oppress the Burmese people and various ethnic minority groups, especially after Ne Win and the military seized power in 1962.
For example, on July 7, 1962, just three days after the military’s Burma Socialist Programme Party (BSPP) was formed, the students of Rangoon University organized a peaceful demonstration inside the Campus. The Burmese military— equipped with G3 automatic rifles—fired into the crowd of thousands of students, killing over 100 and injuring many more. The next morning, the military blew up the Rangoon University Student Union building, which was a treasured historical monument of the Burmese struggle to gain independence from Great Britain. The building was blasted to pieces by heavy explosives, and every trace of it removed.
During the 1988 democratic uprising, over 3,000 people were once again killed by Burmese troops using German-produced weapons. Despite this, the West German government welcomed Ne Win as a guest of FWG in March 1988.
In addition, after the military coup by Burmese Gen Saw Maung in Sept. 1988, the West German Federal Ministry of Economics gave permission for FWG to export machinery for the production of ammunition.
Not only did FWG set up three plants in Rangoon and Prome to produce the vast majority of armaments required by the Burmese military, they also served as a conduit for all importation of raw materials, machine parts and chemicals used in explosives production.
The cozy relationship between the West Germans and the Burmese military was something of a closely kept secret until 1988, when the democracy uprising and surrounding political crisis blew the lid off the Burmese situation and drew the attention of the whole world. Due to international pressure brought upon the West German government by the horror of the Sept. 1988 coup, it suddenly became one of the outspoken critics of the Burmese regime, as if it didn’t know before how many Burmese had died at the hands of Burmese troops firing West German weapons.
The German government did, however, suspend development co-operation activities with Burma, including negotiations regarding Burmese debt cancellation, and ceased authorization of arms shipments to Burma. But regardless of assertions made by the Germans that FWG was no longer participating in the production of weapons and explosives inside Burma, and that technical co-operation had been reduced to a minimum, the manufacture of explosives and weapons continues to date, and German employees of GTZ remain in the country, disguising their true field of expertise.
Despite Germany’s hasty withdrawal of economic support from Burma after the 1988 crackdown, it didn’t take long before FWG found an opportunity for renewed investment. In 1990, FWG formed a joint venture with the Burmese military, a partnership that was made possible thanks to an old US $500 million loan that the West German government had made to Burma in the 1960’s.
FWG stands by itself in Burma, and the joint venture grew out of a very personal relationship between the company and the Burmese generals. This personal relationship has helped preserve the Burmese military regime in power, despite the various insurgencies and unrest in the country.
Following the uprising in 1988, the European Community and the US began imposing economic sanctions on Burma, identifying the high incidence of human rights abuses by the military regime as the primary reason for imposing sanctions. However, the annual reports of the German Federal Office for Export and Trade proves that licences for the export of dual-use-goods were authorized-nearly every year, despite an EU arms embargo established in 1991.
In 1999, Germany even allowed the Burmese regime to renovate the notorious “Myitta Paungku Beitman” in Geisenheim.
On May4, 2011, during a Burma Conference in Berlin, Dr. Markus Löning, Germany’s Federal Government commissioner for human rights policy and humanitarian aid, pushed for more engagement with the Burmese military regime and for the modification of sanctions on Burma.
For many Burmese activists, Germany is just paying a lip service to the human rights situation in Burma. A cable revealed in a 2009 Wikileaks report indicated that Germany exported sophisticated equipment to Burma, which was followed by a visit of German diplomats to the factories where the machinery was installed. In 2009-10, Germany was the biggest trade partner of Burma in the European Union.
The suffering of the Burmese people at the hands of their military rulers is undeniable. The irresponsible investments by foreign firms and others are not benefitting the people of Burma, but only contributing to the torture, persecution and killing of the many ethnic nationals, monks, students and activists who are struggling for democracy inside Burma.
For the Burmese people, FWG’s cooperation and partnership with the Burmese regime has been extremely discouraging. It is time for Germany to start listening to the cry of the Burmese people for democracy, and start building a real, people to people, Myitta friendship that will live forever.
The author is a former student activist and chairman of Camp Thaybawboe run by the ABSDF. At present, he is a member of the KNU Foreign Affairs Relations efforts. http://www.irrawaddy.org/opinion_story.php?art_id=21877
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Wednesday, August 10, 2011
News & Articles on Burma-Tuesday, 09 August, 2011
News & Articles on Burma
Tuesday, 09 August, 2011
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Burma's Largest Dam Project Will Have No Negative Impact: State Media
Mon State CM Takes His Ministers to Task
Ethnic Doubt Over Govt. Peace Offer
Another Military General Gets the Sack
Burma Army fast closing the gap with Mongla
Burma: CSW Renews Call For Inquiry Into Crimes Against Humanity
Kyat on a hot tin roof
Systematic torture in Burma as EU seeks closer ties
Thailand holds 55 Myanmar migrants
Parliament Members In Myanmar Voice Support For Gov't Peace Efforts
IMF to help Myanmar unify multiple exchange rates
Burma Army requests return of seized supplies
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Burma's Largest Dam Project Will Have No Negative Impact: State Media
By BA KAUNG Tuesday, August 9, 2011
The construction of the Myitsone dam by a Chinese company in Kachin State in northern Burma will have no negative impact on the flow of the Burma's largest river, the Irrawaddy, nor on the lives and livelihoods of the local population, Burma's state-run claimed on Tuesday.
The comment came amid mounting criticism by environmental rights groups that the dam project located at the source of the Irrawaddy River will cause serious social and environmental problems for local people living both upstream and also far downstream, even as far away as the coastal areas of Burma.
Started in 2009, the 6,000 megawatt Irrawaddy Myitsone dam will only utilize 7.6 percent of the flow waters of the Irrawaddy; hence the dam project will have “no adverse effects whatever on the agriculture, businesses and social work,”a commentary in Myanma Alin newspaper claimed, adding that the project will create job opportunities for locals.
Environmental groups say the project will not only disrupt transportation of nutrients to the Irrawaddy delta, the provider of nearly 60 percent of Burma’s rice, but will also submerge historical churches, temples and cultural heritage sites that are central to Kachin identity and history.
But the state media countered that the river's water flow would not be significantly affected, and that the water storage by the dam will only cause the water level to increase “1.5 feet higher than normal downstream the river in the dry season.”
Under contract to China Power Investment Corporation (CPI) in partnership with Burma's Electricity Ministry of Electric Power-1 and private firm AsiaWorld, the dam will create a reservoir the size of New York and is expected to be completed by 2019. It has already displaced thousands of people in Kachin State.
The dam site is located within the Mizoram-Manipur-Kachin rainforest region, which is recognized as one of the world’s top biodiversity hotspots and a global conservation priority. If completed, the project is expected to inundate approximately 766 square kilometers of this pristine rainforest.
According to Burma Rivers Network, CPI has ignored its own environmental assessment, conducted in 2009 by Burmese and Chinese scientists who warned that the majority of local people oppose construction of the dams and have called for the consultation and consent of affected peoples. The findings of the environmental assessment were never made public.
The armed ethnic minority group Kachin Independence Army (KIA) has expressed its objection to the project to both the Burmese and Chinese governments. The KIA is currently engaged in armed clashes with Burmese government forces, which started in June near another Chinese-built hydropower plant in Kachin State.
The power plant—which generates electricity for China's Yunnan Province—has ceased to operate since the armed clashes. In an interview with The Irrawaddy, the KIA's deputy military chief Gun Maw said that the KIA is completely against the Myitsone dam project although it is open to negotiations with Chinese and Burmese governments over other dam projects in Kachin State.
Asked if the KIA will attack the ongoing dam project in the future, Gun Maw said, “We will not attack it. But just as China's hydropower plants near the fighting have been forced to a halt, so also will the same happen to the Myitsone dam project.” http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=21864
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Mon State CM Takes His Ministers to Task
By LAWI WENG Tuesday, August 9, 2011
At every weekly Sunday meeting of the new Mon State ministers, Chief Minister Ohn Myint scolds his team for not implementing their assigned state development projects, according to sources close the state ministers.
“Ohn Myint is very disappointed in his ministers for not carrying out their projects,” said one source. “He still acts like a military general at the meeting. He blames them for not being active.”
Ohn Myint promised the Mon people that after he was elected chief minister, he would bring development to the people.
However, observers say that many Mon State residents now question this promise because they have not seen any development in their area even though the new government has been in place for five months. The observers said that the new government is not active because Ohn Myint did not appoint the right people to important positions.
For example, he only appointed two Mon ministers, Min Nwe Soe and Nai Lawi Oung, among his 9 ministers. Min Nwe Soe is a doctor, but he was appointed minister of social affairs and culture. And Nai Lawi Oung is a veterinarian, but he is serving as minister of energy and electronic power.
Meanwhile, members of the All Mon Regions Democracy Party (AMDP) alleged that Ohn Myint attempted to influence the AMDP, pressuring the two Mon ministries to stop the chairman of AMDP, Nai Ngwe Thein, from talking to the Burmese exile media, which has criticized the new government.
Ohn Myint also put pressure on the two ministers to force the AMDP to resign from the five member ethnic alliance because the chief minister did not like the ethnic parties talking about the release of political prisoners.
“If you guys cannot persuade him [Nai Ngwe Thein] to stop talking to the media, take him and throw him in the river,” Ohn Myin reportedly told the two Mon ministers.
According to members of the AMDP, party secretary Min Nwe Soe and party chairman Nai Ngwe Thein fought each other at a meeting held in early July during a disagreement about the pressure from Ohn Myint.
Min Nwe Soe told Nai Ngwe Then to stop talking to the exile media and resign from the ethnic alliance, and when Nai Ngwe Thein refused, the two leaders fought.
“It was a shame to see elder persons fight each other,” said a participant at the meeting.
The Mon State ministers meet every Sunday at Mawyawatty Garden in Moulmein, the capital of Mon State. http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=21860
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Ethnic Doubt Over Govt. Peace Offer
By SAW YAN NAING Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Leaders of ethnic armed groups remain doubtful after Burma Vice-President Tin Aung Myint Oo claimed Naypyidaw would welcome peace talks with minorities fighting the government.
During his visit to see flood victims in Mon State capital Moulmein, southern Burma, Tin Aung Myint Oo—one of two vice-presidents of Burma—said the government would always try to make peace with ethnic armed groups who were willing to cooperate, according to state-run newspaper The New Light of Myanmar on Monday.
But ethnic armed leaders claim that fighting in the countryside between government troops and minority groups happens almost every day, especially in Karen, Kachin and Shan states despite Naypyidaw’s statement.
Zipporah Sein, general secretary of the Karen National Union (KNU), said, “If the government really offers talks to solve the political deadlock, it is the right thing. And it is what we always wanted.”
“But if the talks do not aim to solve political problems, it is not going to happen,” she added.
However, ethnic armed groups will currently talk with the government under the leadership of an ethnic armed alliance, the United Nationalities Federation Council, rather than group-by-group as in the past.
The remaining ethnic armed groups that have not reached a peace agreement with the government are the KNU, Shan State Army (SSA), Karenni National Progressive Party and New Mon State Party.
The two ethnic groups of the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) and Democratic Karen Buddhist Army recently broke their ceasefire agreement with the government and are currently involved in violent clashes.
Tensions between the government and KIO’s military wing, the Kachin Independence Army, remain ever since serious battles broke down its ceasefire agreement on June 9.
La Nan, joint-secretary of the KIO, said that he thinks Tin Aung Myint Oo’s comment is just a propaganda statement which has arisen due to international pressure on Burma.
“[The Burmese government] wants to show that they are trying to hold peace talks with ethnic armed groups. They want to show that they are in the process [of getting a ceasefire],“ said La Nan.
Burma is currently being urged by opposition groups and the international community to make tangible progress countering human rights abuses and ethnic violence.
Some 23 Burmese parliament representatives have voiced support for the government's peace efforts, calling on people who want a ceasefire to work with goodwill in the interest of the nation and stay away from actions that may break up the nation.
In June, the US raised concerns over Burma's bid to chair the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) bloc, citing the renewed violence in Kachin State and other regions of the country. The US State Department called on Naypyidaw to bring an end to hostilities.
Maj Sai Lao Hseng, a spokesperson for the SSA, said that he welcomed the statement made by Tin Aung Myint Oo, but still maintained deep doubts.
“The government should contact ethnic armed groups officially if it really wants to open peace talks,” added Sai Lao Hseng.
The KNU also said that members of Asean, especially Thailand, should persuade Burma to talk with minority groups to solve political problems and maintain a nationwide peace.
Since 1989, under an initiative by former junta spy chief Gen Khin Nyunt, the regime held separate talks with many ethnic armed groups and signed individual ceasefire agreements with 17 of them. http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=21863
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Another Military General Gets the Sack
By THE IRRAWADDY Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Military sources in Burma have told The Irrawaddy that the inspector and auditor-general of the country's armed forces, Maj-Gen Kyaw Phyo, has been forced to retire following an investigation into allegations of corruption aimed at several high-ranking military officers.
If confirmed, Kyaw Phyo becomes the fourth general to be sacked since February, following the removal of Lt-Gen “Thura” Myint Aung who was adjutant-general, Brig-Gen Tun Than, the former commander of Rangoon Regional Military Command, and Maj-Gen Tin Ngwe, the former chief of the Bureau of Special Operations-5.
Kyaw Phyo, formerly the commander of the Triangle Regional Military Command, is believed to have been accused of smuggling cars via Burma's porous border with Thailand.
Kyaw Phyo was promoted to the position of “Inspector and Auditor-General of the Armed Forces” in late August 2010 during a massive military reshuffle. He was previously commander-in-chief of the Triangle Regional Military Command based in Kengtung in eastern Shan State, an area known for trade routes and smuggling syndicates.
In late July, media reports suggested five generals were being investigated for corruption: Kyaw Phyo; Maj-Gen Myint Soe, the chief of BSO-1; Maj-Gen Khin Zaw Oo, the adjutant general and chair of the military-run Union of Myanmar Economic Holdings Ltd; Brig-Gen Thein Tun Oo, the commander of the Triangle RMC; and Brig-Gen Khin Maung Htay, the commander of the Coastal RMC.
Meanwhile, rumors abound in Naypyidaw that further forced retirements are on the cards. Some military families have voiced the opinion that the investigation focuses on certain military officers because they had been outspoken in calling for better conditions for soldiers. http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=21861
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Burma Army fast closing the gap with Mongla
Tuesday, 09 August 2011 11:40 S.H.A.N.
5 days after withdrawing from the No Man’s Land between it and Mongla-based National Democratic Alliance Army (NDAA)’s frontline outposts, the Burma Army is returning with a likelihood of remaining there for a long haul, according to local and Mongla sources.
The sudden return of Infantry Battalion 279, based in Mongyang, the township seat to Monglwe, lying southwest of it on 6 August, was somewhat a surprise. “Troops from Hsaleu-based Brigade 369 (of NDAA) had already decided to return to their main base when the Burmese soldiers turned up,” an informed local told SHAN.
The 50-strong advance force told the local people in 5 villages: Hwe Mu, Hwe Pon, Mark Lawd Kao, Mark Lawd Mai and Ma Nai, all in Monglwe tract, Mongyang township, they were there to assist the villagers in obtaining their long awaited citizenship papers. “Uncharacteristically, they were also throwing money around, from K 50,000-K 100,000 ($62.5-125) each village,” he said. “It caused sort of a pleasant astonishment to the people. In the past, the appearance of a Burmese force in the village meant it was going to ask for something, not giving it.”
The same reaction by the populace was reported recently in Kehsi township, where the Burma Army is launching an operation against the Shan State Army. When villagers received bags of rice from the Burma Army that had been looting them for as long as they could remember, “we couldn’t believe what was happening,” according to a local source.
It was also apparent that a pure silver lode has been discovered between Hwe Mu and Hwe Pon, contrary to the report that came out after a week’s exploration late last month. “The Burmese troops went back after floating around the news of their failure to find anything,” said an NDAA officer. “It was in fact designed to keep us off our vigil.”
The next obvious step is for the Burma Army to employ the local villagers as People’s Militia Force, otherwise becoming their eyes and ears against the NDAA and its closest ally, the United Wa State Army (UWSA), he predicted.
It is not known which company the Burma Army is going to contract for silver extraction. “Without share and share alike, it is going to become another bone of contention, adding fuel to the fire,” the informed local said.
The Burma Army’s relationship with armed groups that had concluded ceasefire pacts with it since 1989 had taken a downswing since 2009 when Naypyitaw demanded they become part of its armed forces. It is already fighting against 3 former ceasefire groups: Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), Shan State Army (SSA) North and Kachin Independence Army (KIA).
Further information
15:00 A source close to the NDAA leadership quoted one of the senior officers saying: We wanted peace, that’s why we had made peace. We withdrew from Wankho, Pong Hiet and Kiang Kok (on the Mekong) in May, because we wanted peace. But for the Burmese military, they keep asking for more land from us. So we would like to ask: Is land more important than peace?” According to him, the NDAA had lost not just 5 villages, but 7 including Mwe Nawng and Wankay, all south of the Lwe, a tributary of the Mekong. (SHAN) http://shanland.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=3926:burma-army-fast-closing-the-gap-with-mongla&catid=86:war&Itemid=284
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Burma: CSW Renews Call For Inquiry Into Crimes Against Humanity On 23rd Anniversary Of 1988 Massacre
Tue, 2011-08-09 00:41 — editor/ News
London, 09 August, (Asiantribune.com):
Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) today renews its call for the establishment of a UN Commission of Inquiry into war crimes and crimes against humanity in Burma, as the people of Burma mark the twenty-third anniversary of the brutal crackdown on pro-democracy protestors on 8 August, 1988 in which at least 3,000 people were killed.
CSW has written to European Union (EU) Foreign Ministers, urging them to work to secure the establishment of a Commission of Inquiry in this year’s UN General Assembly resolution on Burma, as recommended by UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Burma, Tomas Ojea Quintana. In particular, CSW joins other campaign groups in calling on Germany not to oppose this initiative. A protest will be taking place at the German Embassy in London today.
In 1988 a major movement for democracy developed in which Aung San Suu Kyi emerged as the leader, although thousands were killed in several massacres unleashed by Ne Win’s military regime. Since 1988, the situation in Burma has deteriorated further.
In 1990, elections were overwhelmingly won by Aung San Suu Kyi's party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), but the junta refused to recognise the results, and most of those elected were imprisoned or exiled.
Twenty years later, in November, 2010, the regime held a new round of heavily rigged sham elections, and in the past nine months the human rights and humanitarian crisis has continued.
On 9 June the regime ended a 17-year cease-fire agreement with the Kachin Independence Army (KIA), resulting in the displacement of over 20,000 civilians, and the rape of at least 32 women and girls. Of the cases of rape, at least 13 victims were then killed.
At least 16 countries have expressed support for a Commission of Inquiry, including 12 EU member states as well as the United States, Canada and Australia. Democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi has repeatedly expressed her support, particularly when she addressed the US Congress by video link in June, and it has been recommended by the UN Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in Burma.
In its letter to EU Foreign Ministers, CSW writes, “Since 1992, the UN General Assembly has been calling on the regime in Burma to respect the Geneva Conventions. Since 1997, the UN General Assembly has made 18 calls for inquiries. In its 20 resolutions, the General Assembly has detailed at least 15 possible categories of war crimes and crimes against humanity perpetrated by the regime in Burma. Recent resolutions have described the regime’s human rights abuses as “major and repeated violations of international humanitarian law … As the UN Special Rapporteur has concluded, ‘failing to act on accountability in Myanmar will embolden the perpetrators of international crimes and further postpone long-overdue justice.’ A Commission of Inquiry is not only necessary if the UN General Assembly’s authority and credibility are to be upheld, it may also serve to prevent future human rights violations in Burma, and may well contribute towards establishing a meaningful dialogue between the regime, the democracy movement, the ethnic nationalities and the international community. It is a vital step towards national reconciliation.”
CSW’s East Asia Team Leader Benedict Rogers said, “For over half a century Burma has been ruled by brutal military regimes, and for the past twenty-three years the suffering of the people of Burma has intensified further. The UN General Assembly has called for an end to the culture of impunity in Burma on numerous occasions. If the regime is allowed to continue violating international law with no consequence, what message does that send to dictators around the world? The European Union has a responsibility to abide by its own principles and ensure that an inquiry is carried out. As an influential member of the EU, Germany has a special responsibility to ensure that war crimes and crimes against humanity carried out by a brutal military dictatorship are not allowed to go unchecked. Today’s focus on Germany in particular, and our call for EU member states to support a Commission of Inquiry, is particularly appropriate as we remember the massacre of 3,000 civilians twenty-three years ago. It is surely now time to investigate the regime’s crimes.”
- Asian Tribune - http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2011/08/08/burma-csw-renews-call-inquiry-crimes-against-humanity-23rd-anniversary-1988-massacre
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The Economist
Myanmar's currency
Kyat on a hot tin roof
Aug 9th 2011, 11:38 by S.M. | BANGKOK
IN MOST global indices, Myanmar languishes near the bottom. Not so its currency: the kyat (pronounced “chat”) is Asia’s best-performing currency, up 20% over the past year. A flood of hot money chasing property, gems and state assets, coupled with buoyant oil and gas prices, has seen the once-lowly kyat rocket. On the streets of Yangon a dollar now fetches 790 kyat, down from 1,000 or so a year ago.
A weak dollar is partly to blame. But that is scant consolation to traders priced out of overseas markets. They have been reduced to dumping products on the local market. As a result, agricultural prices have nosedived, forcing farmers to take on more debt, while Myanmar’s tiny industrial sector slashes jobs as fast as it can. Tour agencies are struggling to stay afloat. Even some military cronies are complaining about their bottom line. “Everybody is getting hammered,” says an aid worker.
For Myanmar’s semi-civilian government, which formally succeeded a military junta in April, the mighty kyat has become a major test. So far, it appears to be failing. A recent cut in export tariffs from 10% to 7% is merely palliative. Business lobbies have called for more aggressive action by Myanmar’s central bank to manage the kyat. But the bank is hamstrung by a dual-currency system in which the kyat’s official exchange rate is fixed at six to the dollar. Other exchange rates apply for government and state-enterprise financing. Private companies, and everyone else, rely on the black market. Reformers argue that doing away with this convoluted system would make it easier to manage the currency.
Economic advisers to the new general-turned-president, Thein Sein, have made the case for currency reform. But the president appears increasingly consumed by a turf war in Nyapyidaw, the capital, with the vice-president, Tin Aung Myint Oo, who is widely seen as a spoiler for political and economic reforms. In recent months, Thein Sein has raised state pensions and brainstormed ways to tackle poverty. Pushing for bold action on the currency, however, is likely to run afoul of “conservative interests”, says Thant Myint-U, a historian. Some generals may even be smitten by the idea of a strong currency.
The price of inaction on the exchange rate could be high, if economic hardship leads to unrest. But a dash to fix a sclerotic monetary system carries its own risks, made worse by an opaque economy with iffy banks. Central banks frequently turn to the IMF and other multilateral lenders for help with such technical tasks and for standby liquidity support. But Western sanctions on Myanmar rule out that option. So the speculators may reckon that the kyat’s bull run has further to go. And then, warns a foreign businessman, “it could all collapse.” http://www.economist.com/blogs/banyan/2011/08/myanmars-currency
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Systematic torture in Burma as EU seeks closer ties
08.08.11 @ 09:22
By Andrew Rettman
BRUSSELS - Burmese dissidents say authorities are routinely torturing political prisoners at a time when EU diplomats and companies are exploring ways to build closer relations with the regime.
Buddhist statues in Burma. Many 8888 activists are serving lengthy prison sentences (Zero-X)
Bo Kyi, who now lives in neighbouring Thailand and who runs an NGO called Assistance Association for Political Prisoners in Burma, told EUobserver that people fleeing the country continue to tell stories of atrocities in the country's detention centres.
Methods employed by Burmese security to extract information include: sexual abuse of men, such as inserting rubber batons into their anus; rape of women; electric shocks; burning with cigarettes; withholding medication; sleep deprivation; and prolonged solitary confinement in tiny cells.
"This is happening now," Kyi said. "Such things are getting worse - this is the kind of 'progress' we have with the new regime. I do not see any positive changes in the future."
Kyi spoke out on the 23rd anniversary of the so-called 8888 revolution in 8 August 1988. Authorities killed "at least" 3,000 people in the failed uprising, he noted. Some of its leaders are still serving 30-to-60-year-long sentences. Authorities killed "more than" 100 people in the failed so-called Saffron Revolution in 2007. He said there are currently 1,194 prisoners of conscience in Burma.
Kyi himself took part in the 1988 events and spent seven years and three months in a Burmese prison.
The Burmese junta in recent months transferred power to a group of retired military officers and gave limited new freedoms to opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi (no relation to Bo Kyi).
The EU reacted in April by lifting a visa ban and asset freeze on Burmese foreign minister Wunna Maung Lwin and by ending its embargo on high-level visits. But it renewed for a year its sanctions on more than 500 Burmese officials and family members, as well as over 1,000 government-linked firms.
A delegation led by EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton's special advisor Robert Cooper met with regime officials and Suu Kyi in Burma in June.
"The message of our visit was that we are also open to change ourselves in the relationship in response to developments here. We are also ready to change ... We see that something is happening in this country," Cooper said at the time.
Bo Kyi believes the authorities are making cosmetic changes in order to gain international support for their bid to chair the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) in 2014.
He said that until they release political prisoners the EU should harden its line by stopping Singaporean banks from acting as middlemen for Burmese interests in Europe and by supporting the creation of a UN commission of enquiry into crimes against humanity. He also alleged the EU is not honouring its existing sanctions.
"After coming in, the new administration, they want to help their pride. They want to be respected by the international community," he said. "The sanctions don't work because they are not being implemented. Severeal EU countries do not implement them. Especially with Germany, it is very clear Germany dislikes the sanctions," he added.
Igor Blazevic, a director in the Czech NGO People in Need who is currently in Thailand, corroborated Kyi's statement.
"When I was talking with one east European businessmen who is based in Burma, he was telling me how sanctions do not stop anything because sanctioned timber gets papers and stamps from Malaysia and then can easy go to Europe," he told this website.
Independent reports say German arms firm Fritz Werner sent a delegation to Burma in July. German engineering and insurance companies Deckel Maho Gildemeister, FOSCE-Lorentzenstr and Hannover Re are also active in the country.
Austria's ambassador to Thailand and Burma in March led a delegation of some 20 Austrian firms to meet top officials. The group included Bank Austria, Die Oesterreichische Kontrollbank, forestry company Roxel and gemstone buyer Swarowski. French energy firm Total is helping the regime to exploit the Yadana gas field.
Norway's Statoil is not active in Burma. But a Statoil executive shed light on industry thinking when asked if there is any country in the world where it would not invest for ethical reasons if there was a major oil find. "Maybe Burma. But then, that just means the Chinese would get the oil," the contact, who did want to be named, said. http://euobserver.com/9/32690
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August 09, 2011 11:29 AM
Parliament Members In Myanmar Voice Support For Gov't Peace Efforts
YANGON, Aug 9 (Bernama) -- Some 23 parliament representatives in Myanmar have voiced support for the government's peace efforts, calling on the people who want peace to work with goodwill in the interest of the nation and stay away from acts that may break up the nation.
In their open letter for peace proposal published in all official media Tuesday, the 23 representatives of the House of Representatives and ethnic minorities expressed acknowledgment of the endeavors of President U Thein Sein's government, Xinhua news agency reported.
The letter also expressed shock over a recent gunfire incident in Kachin state in which the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) killed seven people, condemning the act as a menace to the peace process.
However, the letter said the government on its part continues to work in the interest of the people and peace with great benevolence.
-- BERNAMA http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v5/newsworld.php?id=606905
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IMF to help Myanmar unify multiple exchange rates
WASHINGTON | Mon Aug 8, 2011 1:09pm EDT
Aug 8 (Reuters) - IMF officials will travel to Myanmar in the second half of October to help unify its foreign exchange system and lift restrictions on international transactions, an IMF spokeswoman said on Monday.
"We have received a request from the authorities to help them prepare to modernize their exchange rate system and lift restrictions on the making of payments and transfers for current international transactions," IMF spokeswoman Gita Bhatt said.
The country's new civilian government has promised economic development and pro-business reforms. Dollars are pouring into Myanmar's largely opaque economy as foreign investors try to tap its vast resources, with gas by far its most lucrative export commodity.
The country has a multiple exchange rate system, which consists of an official exchange rate and several informal parallel rates. Different rates are used for different types of transactions.
A paper by IMF economists in 2008 said the system created distortions, was opaque and costly. It argued that unifying the different rates would help Myanmar benefit from a more efficient allocation of resources. (Reporting by Lesley Wroughton; Editing by Andrew Hay) http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/08/imf-myanmar-idUSN1E7770QZ20110808?rpc=401
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Thailand holds 55 Myanmar migrants
Posted: 09 August 2011 1907 hrs
BANGKOK: Thai authorities on Tuesday said over 50 Myanmar nationals were arrested on suspicion of illegal entry after they were picked up on a boat in waters off the country's south coast.
Two children and nine women were among 55 people intercepted in the Andaman Sea near Ranong province, around 600 kilometers (375 miles) south of Bangkok, a Ranong immigration police official said.
All 53 adults would be charged with illegal entry, he said.
The driver of the boat escaped and is being sought on trafficking charges.
"They were in a large longtail boat from Myanmar and are already in the custody of immigration police in Ranong," a navy official said. There are an estimated two million migrant workers in Thailand from Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos.
- AFP/ck http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_asiapacific/view/1146014/1/.html
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Burma Army requests return of seized supplies
Monday, 08 August 2011 17:13 S.H.A.N.
Due to continual attacks by the Shan State Army (SSA), Burma Army units on the frontline are facing morale and disciplinary problems rising out of the shortage of rations, according to local and SSA sources.
Among those seized by the SSA included rice, onions, eggplants, fish paste, partially rotted fish, dry fish and condensed milk.
The Burmese units dispatched a village headman to ask for the supplies back, saying they had nothing to eat. “We asked the village headman to tell them we were sorry, but we were also facing the same trouble because of their offensive,” an SSA officer wrote to SHAN. “We had nothing to return even if we wanted to, because they were already eaten by our fighters.”
According to the latest information, 6 infantry battalions have been deployed at 2 junctions around Wanhai, the SSA HQ in Kehsi township:
Light Infantry Battalion 513 and another infantry battalion, together 179 strong at the Pakhee junction, southeast of Wanhai
Light Infantry Battalion (108 strong), Infantry Battalion 287 (83 strong) and two unidentified battalions (105 and 122 strong respectively), totaling 418 strong, at Nampook junction, northwest of Wanhai .
Pakhee can be reached from Monghsu in the east and Mongnawng from the south, while Nampook from Mongyai in the north and Kehsi from the south.
The Burma Army has been deploying several units to provide security for the roads. But so far, they have been producing mixed results, as the SSA, both North and South, have been carrying out typical guerrilla tactics: ambushes, raids, snipings and interdictions. http://shanland.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=3923:burma-army-requests-return-of-seized-supplies&catid=86:war&Itemid=284
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