Suu Kyi gets emotional reception on Myanmar holiday
By Soe Than Win | AFP News – Thu, Jul 7, 2011
Democracy champion Aung San Suu Kyi attracted hundreds of emotional supporters Wednesday during her visit to an ancient temple city in central Myanmar, proving her enduring popularity after years in detention.
The Nobel Peace Prize winner is on holiday in Bagan, famed for its temple ruins, on her first venture outside her home city of Yangon since being freed by the junta from seven years of house arrest last November.
As the 66-year-old returned to her car after a lunch-time stop with her youngest son and travel companion Kim Aris, she was greeted by a spontaneous crowd of about 150 supporters, some of them openly weeping.
"Thank you very much," a smiling Suu Kyi told her admirers, as she signed autographs, including on some T-shirts, and posed for photographs.
"I will try to come back," she added, before retiring to her hotel. Earlier, she and Aris, 33, who was born in Britain, had been sightseeing in nearby Mount Popa and toured a local museum.
She stopped for five minutes at a souvenir shop to talk with a crowd of around 500 people who had gathered to greet her and promised to make the journey again.
Suu Kyi has refrained from making political comments during her trip, which began Monday, in an apparent attempt not to antagonise government figures, who have warned they can't guarantee her safety on her travels.
Her earlier plan to launch a political tour prompted a demand from the regime for her National League for Democracy (NLD) party to stay out of politics, and a warning that "chaos and riots" could ensue if she went ahead.
That tour has been delayed until the weather conditions are right, Suu Kyi said last week. Plain-clothes police have been following her every move throughout her current trip, although it is described as a private visit.
Security is a major concern after Suu Kyi's convoy was attacked in 2003 during a political tour, in an ambush apparently organised by a regime frightened by her popularity.
Observers said that any activity that puts Suu Kyi in contact with the people of Myanmar could have repercussions.
Her NLD party won a landslide election victory in 1990 that was never recognised by the junta, and the party was disbanded by the military rulers last year because it boycotted a November election, saying rules were unfair.
The junta's political proxies claimed an overwhelming victory in the poll, which was marred by widespread complaints of cheating and intimidation.
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US civil society urges more Myanmar pressure
(AFP) – Thu, Jul 7, 2011
WASHINGTON — A coalition of US civil society called Thursday on President Barack Obama to tighten sanctions on Myanmar and push for a UN probe on human rights, saying the regime will only respond to pressure.
The letter to the president was signed by senior members from 21 groups ranging from the AFL-CIO, the top US labor union confederation, to the neo-conservative Foreign Policy Initiative and prominent rights organizations.
The groups said the military was still firmly in charge of Myanmar, also known as Burma, pointing to recent deadly clashes in ethnic minority areas. They said that villagers "have been arrested, tortured and killed."
"The Burmese government has given your administration no reason to believe that more diplomacy, absent greater internal and external pressure, will persuade it to change course," the coalition wrote.
"The time has come for the United States to use the levers of pressure at its disposal."
The United States has already slapped sanctions on Myanmar's leaders and restricted trade. The letter called on the Treasury Department to expand efforts by targeting banks that hold Myanmar's hard currency reserves.
The pressure groups also urged the Obama administration to "launch a vigorous diplomatic effort" to set up a UN-led Commission of Inquiry into alleged crimes against humanity in the Southeast Asian country.
The Obama administration in 2009 opened dialogue with Myanmar, concluding that the previous Western approach of seeking to isolate the regime had failed.
Myanmar last year released opposition icon Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest and held elections. But the United States and opposition groups consider the polls a farce and say some 2,000 more political prisoners remain locked up.
US officials have voiced disappointment with the results of engagement but say it is still the best option at a time of potential change. The administration recently named an envoy, Derek Mitchell, to spearhead diplomacy.
The United States has backed a Commission of Inquiry into alleged crimes against humanity but has not made it a priority, believing that the probe does not enjoy support among Asian nations.
Groups whose members signed the letter include Freedom House, Human Rights Watch, the Feminist Majority Foundation and the Save Darfur Coalition.
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ASEAN, Japan ministers to meet business leaders
(AFP) – Wed, Jul 6, 2011
KUALA LUMPUR — Ministers from Southeast Asia and Japan will join business leaders for the first time Friday in talks on lifting trade barriers and securing closer economic ties, Malaysia said on Thursday.
Industry leaders from Southeast Asia and the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry asked the politicians to join them at an annual two-day gathering in Kuala Lumpur aimed at addressing problems faced by Japanese investors targeting the 10-nation region.
"They are expected to deliberate on the implementation of the ASEAN Free Trade Area... as well as ways to address barriers to trade in order to boost economic cooperation," the trade ministry said in a statement.
"Other key issues include problems faced by Japan's private sector when investing in ASEAN and ways to boost their investments," it added.
Trade ministers or senior officials from most of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) -- including from Brunei, Indonesia, Singapore and Malaysia -- are participating. Myanmar is not attending.
A Malaysian official told AFP on condition of anonymity that the ministers would also discuss the economic impact of Japan's March 11 earthquake-tsunami on the region and how ASEAN could help in the country's recovery.
The Bank of Japan's keenly-watched Tankan survey of business confidence plunged in the months after the disaster, turning negative for the first time in more than a year, as factories were shuttered, power shut off and supply lines broken.
While firms expect conditions to improve by September, analysts warned that the pace of Japan's recovery was uncertain amid power shortages following the crisis at the tsunami-ravaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.
Japan has always been the top source of foreign direct investment in ASEAN, pouring in $5.2 billion in 2009.
Trade between ASEAN and Japan in 2010 is estimated at $220 billion, well up from $160.9 billion in 2009.
ASEAN comprises Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
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Bigger crowd greets vacationing Suu Kyi in Myanmar
AP – 2 hours 21 minutes ago
BAGAN, Myanmar (AP) — Myanmar democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi has drawn the biggest crowd so far of her trip to the ancient city of Bagan, as bystanders overcame their fears to approach her at a market.
Bagan resident Min Min said about 1,000 people greeted Suu Kyi on the fourth day of her private vacation Thursday. Some presented her flowers and other gifts.
The crowd was about three times as big as the largest to previously see her. Earlier, some people visibly kept their distance as plainclothes police stood by.
Suu Kyi has said she will soon travel around the country to meet her political supporters, drawing a warning in the state-controlled press that she could cause chaos.
On her last political tour in 2003, she was arrested.
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Rights groups seek tougher Myanmar sanctions, say US diplomacy has not worked
By The Associated Press | The Canadian Press – 1 hour 1 minute ago
WASHINGTON - More than 20 U.S.-based human rights and advocacy groups are urging President Barack Obama to expand financial sanctions against senior Myanmar officials because diplomacy has failed to bring democratic change.
Washington has already imposed sanctions on scores of individuals and businesses, barring them from owning property or holding bank accounts in the U.S.
The rights groups want the U.S. to take further steps allowed under 2008 legislation to prevent foreign banks that hold assets of those targeted by the sanctions from doing business with American banks.
They say in a letter Thursday that Myanmar's military-dominated government will not change course without more pressure.
The signatories included U.S. unions, pro-democracy groups and Myanmar exiles.
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Boston Globe - Myanmar says Kachin rebels attacked railway line
July 7, 2011
YANGON, Myanmar—Ethnic Kachin rebels in Myanmar have bombed a major railway line in the north of the country for the third time in less than a month, a state-run newspaper said Thursday.
The attack was the latest targeting the military-backed government since a long-standing peace deal with the Kachin forces deteriorated with an outbreak of fighting last month.
The official New Light of Myanmar said rebels attacked the train line that runs from the city of Mandalay to the Kachin state capital Myitkyina on Tuesday night. No casualties were reported, and the train track was repaired.
Fighting between the Kachin and government troops erupted last month, the first skirmishes recorded since a peace deal in 1994 broke down last year. The violence displaced
10,000 people and forced Chinese technicians working at hydropower projects in the region to flee.
The state paper said the train, which provides a vital link to Kachin state, was also attacked by rebels on June 22 and June 30.
Fighting erupted in June near the Chinese border after the army asked Kachin fighters to withdraw their camp near the Tarpein hydropower project, a joint venture between Myanmar's Electric Power Ministry and China. The rebels fought back, destroying bridges and power pylons that fed the project, but blamed the government for launching an offensive into their territory.
The 8,000-strong Kachin militia is one of several minority ethnic rebel armies in Myanmar who say they are fighting for greater autonomy that have routinely been met by military suppression.
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Asian Correspondent - ICRC resumes its tough task in unprincipled Burma
By Zin Linn Jul 07, 2011 4:53PM UTC
The state-run New Light of Myanmar newspaper says today that the Government of Myanmar (Burma) has been carrying the maintenance of prisons in cooperation with ICRC.
Water and habitat Engineer Swiss Mr Eric Weissen from ICRC and two officers were allowed to visit Mawlamyine prison on 1 July. There, they inspected site chosen for sinking tube well, tube well, storage of water and construction of toilets and septic tanks.
They were conducted round by Director Soe Soe Zaw from Myanmar Correctional Department (Mon/Kayin), prison officer in-charge and engineers. According to the preliminary survey of ICRC in Myaungmya, Hpa-an and Mawlamyine prisons, solar powered water pumping system is installed by Myanmar Correctional Department under the Ministry of Home Affairs in cooperation with ICRC.
As reported by Assistance Association for Political Prisoners – Burma [AAPP-B], at least 159 political prisoners are in poor health due to the denial of proper medical care, harsh prison conditions, torture and transfers to remote prisons where there are no doctors. Political prisoners’ right to healthcare is principally denied by the successive regimes. The prison healthcare system in Burma is totally poor, especially in far-flung jails. There are 44 prisons across Burma, and at least 50 labour camps. Some of them do not have a prison hospital as well as health assistance personnel.
AAPP-B says in its June 2011 report: “The blatant insincerity and unwillingness of the current regime to address grave human rights violations was underscored in the concluding session of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR). Throughout the dialogue, the regime made false claims as to progress made in the field of human rights while continuing to deny serious broad patterns of abuse. Burma accepts to improve relations with Special Rapporteur Quintana, but has denied him entry into the country since March 2010.”
AAPP-B also criticized the behaviors of the Burmese government in the report that if there are no widespread occurrences of human rights violations committed with impunity, as Burma claimed during the first round of the UPR in January 2011, then it should open its doors to not only the Special Rapporteur Quintana, but also to other INGOs such as the ICRC.
Burma also agreed to stop torture, but refuses to investigate allegations into torture, providing further evidence that they are only interested in providing the bare minimum so as to gain political legitimacy.
Zaw Win, Director General of the Prisons Department, brazenly lied to the international community saying there are no political prisoners in Burma. Besides, there have been no deaths in prison arising from conditions of detention, he said.
AAPP-B has documented 146 deaths as a result of ill-treatment and conditions in prison. Given the wall of secrecy surrounding prisons, the number of cases is most likely much higher. There are a total of 1,994 political prisoners in June, said AAPP Burma.
Many prisoners of conscience have been serving incredibly long prison terms in awfully ruthless conditions. Torture and ill treatment is a well known part of their incarceration and retribution.
The regime’s handling of political prisoners blatantly breaks the 1957 UN standard minimum rules for the treatment of prisoners. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) carried out its last prison visit in Burma in November 2005. In January 2006 the ICRC suspended prison visits in the country, as it was not allowed to fulfill its independent, impartial mandate.
The ICRC offices were ordered to be closed in 2006. Then, ICRC released a press statement on this issue dated 29 June 2007. The statement denounced the military regime for committing human rights violations against detainees and civilians. ”The repeated abuses committed against men, women and children living along the Thai-Myanmar border violate many provisions of international humanitarian law,” said Mr. Jakob Kellenberger, ICRC president.
In addition, ICRC also demanded the Burmese government to end urgently of its abuses: “We urged the government of Myanmar to put a stop to all violations of international humanitarian law and to ensure that they do not recur”.
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Asian Correspondent - Twelve media organizations call on the release of Video Journalists
By Zin Linn Jul 07, 2011 8:32PM UTC
Twelve media organizations fighting for freedom of expression and freedom of the press all around the world cosigned, today, a joint statement calling on the Burmese government to put a stop to its harassment and prosecution of journalists and calling on the release of the Democratic Voice of Burma’s Video Journalists.
An alliance of 12 media organizations on Thursday called on Government of Myanmar (Burma) to end its harsh restrictions upon journalists and to release 17 video journalists serving long prison term in military-controlled country.
The joint statement says: “Despite pledges by Burma’s new government that it has begun the transition to civilian rule, 17 video journalists (VJs) for the Oslo-based exiled media organization, the Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), remain imprisoned. They are among nearly 2,100 political prisoners in Burma, a testament to the lingering hold of dictatorial rule on the country.”
Twelve media organizations call on the Burmese government to put a stop to its harassment and prosecution of journalists, who are forced to operate under strict control and surveillance. The media alliance points out evidence in the statement that despite government’s promises to freedom of the press and freedom of expression, situations continue to deteriorate in Burma on the contrary. Regulations over the Internet users are more and more rigid and journalists are forced to self-censor with greater intensity. they said in a joint
statement.
Twelve media alliance urged the United Nations, the ASEAN regional bloc and the European Union to press on Myanmar to release all journalists in prison.
The DVB was tipped as one of the top nominees for the Nobel Peace Prize last year due to its documentaries secretly made by the courageous video-journalists most of them in prison.
According to Norway-based Democratic Voice of Burma, which has broadcast different news video from Burma for years, its video reporters have been apprehended since 2007, when the military junta launched a bloody crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Saffron Revolution.
For example, DVB reporter Hla Hla Win, for example, was jailed in 2009 and is serving a 27-year sentence after interviewing Buddhist monks near the anniversary of the 2007 uprising. Two more DVB video-journalists have been jailed. Sithu Zeya, 21, received and eight-year sentence in December last year after police caught him taking photos of grenade attack at a stage during water-throwing festival in April 2010. Later, his father Maung Maung Zeya was also arrested and sentenced 13 years imprisonment.
The joint-statement said a number of the jailed DVB journalists were under various torture techniques during the interrogation phase to extract information about DVB’s operation and its network of undercover reporters.
The signatories of the joint statement are Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), Reporters Without Borders (RWB), Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), Irrawaddy, Mizzima, Southeast Asian Press Alliance (SEAPA), Article 19, International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), Burma Media Association (BMA), Index of Censorship, Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (CJFE) and International Press Institute (IPI).
The Burmese government has been practicing unnecessary restrictions on media and journalists and also extra restrictions on Internet users since the information minister is unmoved from the days of the former junta.
Although the optimistic politicians and media personnel hoped for better free-press environment after the election, the scenario remains unchanged.
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Catholic News Philippines - 4 Myanmar dioceses banned from World Youth Day affair
Published Date: July 7, 2011
THE Church has slapped a ban on four dioceses in Myanmar from sending delegates to upcoming World Youth Day celebrations in Madrid after several youths sought political asylum at the last gathering in Australia in 2008.
The decision to impose the ban was made by the bishops, said Father Gerald Pho Khwa, youth director of the National Catholic Youth Commission.
Five young people from Hakha, Kalay, and Banmaw dioceses failed to return from Australia, while another from Myitkyina diocese initially claimed asylum but later changed his mind and returned to Myanmar, according to Church sources.
This year, the bishops and youth directors in each diocese are being asked to guarantee that their youth delegates do not abscond at the August 12-16 Madrid celebrations.
“I hope those delegates affected can understand our decision.” But the reputation of the Church and our young people are at stake, Father Pho Khwa said.
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Catholic News Philippines - Lack of resources hinders Myanmar refugee efforts
Published Date: July 7, 2011
CHURCHES in Banmaw Diocese in Kachin State have been providing rice and medicine to sick and hungry refugees displaced by ongoing armed clashes between Burmese soldiers and troops from the opposition Kachin Independence Army but say their ability to help is limited.
More than 6,500 people have sought refuge in five parishes near the Chinese border, according to data collected by a disaster relief and response team from Karuna Banmaw.
Many of them have gathered in makeshift camps, while others have fled into the jungle to escape the fighting.
“We are supporting the refugees as much as we can with the Lenten contribution and other donations from the faithful in the diocese,” said Bishop Raymond Sumlut Gam, who added that heavy rains in the area have added to the difficulties facing refugees.
The needs of the refugees, he said, were far greater than the parishes’ limited resources.
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July 07, 2011 18:58 PM
Myanmar To Send Labour Abroad Legally Through Government-to-government Channel
YANGON, July 7 (Bernama) -- Myanmar labour authorities are planning to send workers to foreign countries through government- to-government channel, Xinhua news agency quoted the local Biweekly Eleven News' report Thursday.
As part of the move, Minister for Labour and for Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement U Aung Kyi had discussions with his Qatar counterpart over the labour affairs recently.
Myanmar workers turned to seek jobs mostly in Dubai, Qatar and South Korea when the country stopped dispatching workers to work in Malaysia for six months starting July 1.
At present, Myanmar workers have much interest in working in South Korea especially in the manufacturing sector at a time when South Korean government sends for over 51,000 Myanmar workers this year.
According to official statistics, the number of Myanmar workers, legally employed to work in 15 foreign countries, reached 330,311 as of 2010 since 1990 and such overseas workers had fetched for the country over US$17 million.
Myanmar citizens seeking overseas jobs are mostly destined to such countries as Singapore, Malaysia, South Korea, Libya, Thailand, Cambodia, Japan, Switzerland, Brunei Darussalam, United Arab Emirates, America, France, Germany, Qatar and Kuwait.
As part of its bid to ease domestic employment problem, Myanmar's Ministry of Labour has sought job opportunities for Myanmar workers since 1990.
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Jul 7, 2011
Straits Times - Call for release of jailed Myanmar reporters
BANGKOK - A COALITION of media groups on Thursday called on Myanmar to end the harassment of journalists and to release 17 video reporters serving long prison sentences in the military-dominated country.
A dozen organisations, including the Democratic Voice of Burma and Reporters Without Borders, urged the United Nations, the Asean regional bloc and the European Union to press Myanmar to release all jailed journalists.
'There is evidence that despite pledges to the contrary, freedom of the press and freedom of expression continue to deteriorate in Burma, with regulations over access to the Internet tightened and journalists now forced to self-censor with greater intensity,' they said in a joint statement.
The DVB, which last year was tipped as one of the top contenders for the Nobel Peace Prize, says that since December, two of its video journalists have been jailed for up to 13 years.
They have joined the other 15 DVB reporters in detention including Hla Hla Win, who was sentenced to 27 years in jail in Myanmar, for interviewing a monk during the 2007 'Saffron Revolution' failed uprising.
The statement said some of the jailed DVB journalists may have been tortured during interrogation.
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Last updated: July 6, 2011 3:56 p.m.
Fort Wayne Journal Gazette - Stabbing kills 1; suspect arrested
Fort Wayne police are investigating a stabbing death early Wednesday, and one person has been arrested.
Police got a call using the Burmese translation line about 2 a.m., reporting a disturbance and possible stabbing, according to a written statement from police.
The male with wounds was found at 6000 Bunt Drive in southeast Fort Wayne and medics confirmed he died at the scene.
The Fort Wayne Investigative Bureau worked with Burmese translators and took Aung Kyaw Thu, 38, of Fort Wayne, into custody on a charge of aggravated battery.
The statement said there was some kind of disturbance about 1:45 a.m. between the victim and the suspect when the stabbing occurred.
There will be an autopsy today to determine the exact cause and nature of death, police said.
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Thursday, July 7, 2011
China Digital Times - China Urged to Halt Myanmar Dams
Burmese dissident groups have appealed to China to stop work on a number of dam projects which have been fuelling conflict in the north of the country. From The Wall Street Journal:
Dissidents had been stepping up their complaints about Chinese investment amid signs it is increasing rapidly. Foreign direct investment commitments from China in the year that ended in March totaled $8.27 billion, or 41% of the total in Myanmar, compared with total Chinese investment of less than $2 billion by the end of the prior financial year, according to the Associated Press and local media reports. Major projects include a multibillion-dollar oil-and-gas pipeline built in part by Chinese investors across the country. It also includes an estimated 60 hydropower projects involving at least 45 companies, according to International Rivers, a California-based advocacy group.
Activists say the investments harm the environment and help support Myanmar’s harsh military-backed government, which is accused of a wide range of human-rights abuses, including forced labor and rape, while failing to boost living standards for average citizens. Western governments, including the U.S., maintain tough economic sanctions against Myanmar that block investment in such projects, but a growing number of dissidents are beginning to question the sanctions, in part because Chinese investment has undermined their effectiveness ….
The latest call was distributed by a U.S.-based advocacy group, the U.S. Campaign for Burma, and signed by more than a half-dozen other dissident groups, including the All Burma Monks’ Alliance and the All Burma Federation of Student Unions. In the statement released Monday and circulated in some areas on Tuesday, they accused the Chinese government of “completely disregarding Burmese people’s life and property” and collaborating with the Myanmar government to stop the flow of rivers in Kachin areas with megadam projects.
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New Statesman - The Reith Lectures: Securing Freedom (Radio 4)
Antonia Quirke
Published 04 July 2011
How Aung San Suu Kyi draws lessons from the Gulag.
Aung San Suu Kyi's two Reith Lectures (28 June, and forthcoming on 9 July) are an important coup for the new controller of Radio 4, Gwyneth Williams, who managed to push the request through to all the right people in Burma specifically because of her World Service connections (Williams joined the WS in 1976 as a trainee). Further proof, if it were needed, of the high worth of those with a hands-on background at that miraculous station.
Three weeks after the invitation went in, word came back that, yes, ASSK would do it if she could have access to certain reference books - she has few books even though now officially not under house arrest; she asked in particular for Max Weber's Politics As a Vocation and Nadezhda Mandelstam's Hope Against Hope. The wife of the poet Osip Mandelstam, who died in 1938 in a transit camp in Siberia, Nadezhda has been an inspiration to ASSK, along with the Odessa-born poet Irina Ratushinskaya, who spent four years in a camp before being released on the eve of the 1986 summit between Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev.
At a screening of the first lecture at Broadcasting House, it was mesmerising to sit and watch ASSK speaking at length (the footage had been recently smuggled out of Burma). Traditional peach silk top. Blue flowers in her hair. A slash of orange lipstick. She is resolutely not a spin-doctored, slick operator. Two things stood out: her use of the old-fashioned word gallantry, and her repeated use of the word passion.
Though ASSK is clearly unbowed, at one point during the live Q&A down the line from Rangoon she admitted that the lights had been switched off by the authorities and she was sitting at the telephone in the dark. How fitting that she had, just minutes earlier, quoted from Ratushinskaya's prison poem that ends: "It isn't true, I am afraid, my darling!/But make it look as though you haven't noticed."
There is to ASSK an air of unrelenting affection. It reminded me of something the actress Debra Winger - who quit Hollywood before it dried her up completely - said about passion: it is the thing that keeps you soft.
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The Spectator- The inspirational Suu Kyi
July 2011 | by: Kate Chisholm |
‘To be speaking to you through the BBC has a very special meaning for me. It means that once again I am officially a free person,’ says Aung San Suu Kyi at the beginning of the first of her Reith Lectures on Radio 4 (Tuesday mornings). That connection between the BBC and the powerful, emotive word ‘freedom’, made by one of the most influential figures of the 21st century, has finally broken through to the politicians who are deciding on the fate of the World Service. Last week the Foreign Office, coincidentally maybe, but probably reactively, decided not to cut three of the foreign-language services previously threatened with budget-slashing abolition — the Hindi service, the Arabic service and the Somali service. But the threat to the World Service is still not over, and Suu Kyi pointed out how damaging the cuts have already been.
In an interview she declared that what had helped her most through the early years of her house arrest (when she was still allowed the ‘freedom’ to listen to the radio) was not, as you might expect, the news bulletins, the information branch, the serious reportage, but the inane chatter of Dave Lee Travis — or rather the conversation of his ‘listeners’ who wrote in to his request programme, A Jolly Good Show, on the World Service. What she enjoyed was not just the weird variety of music but also hearing about the ‘ordinary lives’ of others. How people manage day-by-day, coping with their own private griefs and tribulations. Or even just how they shop, cook, argue, find solace, chat, joke and above all laugh. As her mother used to tell her, who needs to watch sad films when there is so much sadness in your own life? (Suu Kyi’s father was assassinated by the Burmese authorities when she was just two years old. The Burmese uprising was brutally suppressed by the army in 1988, killing many friends of the family.)
DLT was axed some years ago, along with most of the World Service’s light-entertainment programmes. Yet, as Suu Kyi reminded us, for a campaign to be effective, justified, and to reach out to all people, it needs to be three-dimensional, tackling big questions but also that basic need of people to communicate freely and without fear of reprisal. Keeping fit is one of the first duties of the political prisoner, she told us; not, as you might expect, ideological values or political nous.
In her lecture, she focused not on the philosophical nature of ‘freedom’ but on the practicalities of dissent. She told us about her fellow freedom-fighters in Rangoon, members of the National League for Democracy (NLD) who meet together in what they affectionately call ‘the cowshed’. Many of them still wear their prison-blue shirts, not as a badge of honour but as a constant reminder of how many dissenters are still in jail, suffering who knows what for their beliefs.
She also brought together a surprising collection of writers who had inspired her, both those who had suffered for their beliefs under cruel authoritarian regimes, such as Vaclav Havel, Irina Ratushinskaya and Anna Akhmatova, but also W.E. Henley, the Victorian poet. His most famous poem, the rallying call ‘Invictus’, contains the lines, ‘I am the master of my fate:/ I am the captain of my soul’. This, says Suu Kyi, is what we all need to remember: my mind, she told us, was always free during those 15 years when she was unable to wander beyond the four walls of her home.
Most movingly, though, she ended with lines from Kipling, a doubly effective conclusion because he is so unexpected a mentor for Suu Kyi. ‘He’s the Lord of us all,/ The Dreamer whose dream came true,’ she quoted. As she spoke, it was as if her dream had come true. Here she was speaking on the BBC to an audience of millions through the World Service. What she said was an inspiring call not to arms but to dignity, self-belief and that ability to listen to others.
Her lectures had to be recorded in secret and smuggled out of Burma, as the authorities there would not allow her to travel to London to deliver them. They were broadcast to an invited audience in the radio theatre, where Suu Kyi appeared to us on a huge video screen before answering questions via telephone. Her poise, her calm, her clarity, yet the richness of her talk, every sentence carrying meaning, purpose, intent, meant that even though she was not with us in person she was very much in the room. The force of her spirit is beyond compare.
This season of lectures promises to be one of the most significant since the inaugural series delivered by Bertrand Russell in 1948. After the first two by Suu Kyi, giving us insights into what democracy means for those living under brutal authoritarian regimes, the former head of MI5, Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller will talk in September, on the tenth anniversary of 9/11, about the struggle to maintain a nation’s freedom in this age of terrorism.
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The Irrawaddy - ICRC Returns to Burmese Prisons, but Doesn't Meet Prisoners
By SAW YAN NAING Thursday, July 7, 2011
For the first time in nearly six years, officials from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) have been allowed back into Burma's prisons. Their mission, however, was to carry out technical inspections, and did not involve meeting prisoners.
The state-run newspaper, The New Light of Myanmar, reported on Thursday that three officials from the ICRC's water and habitat engineering department visited three prisons—Myaungmya Prison in Irrawaddy Division, Moulmein Prison in Mon State and Pa-an Prison in Karen State—on July 1-2.
Philippe Marc Stoll, a regional spokesperson for the ICRC, told the BBC that the organization welcomed the opportunity to resume its work in Burma. The ICRC had been denied permission to enter the country's prisons since late 2005.
Stoll added, however, that the visits were limited to observing water distribution and hygiene in the prisons, and did not include meetings with prisoners.
Despite the limited scope of the ICRC's activities on this occasion, the news was greeted as a positive development.
“We are happy to hear that the ICRC has been permitted to resume its work. Health conditions in the prison will likely improve as a result,” said Kyi Kyi Nyunt, the elder sister of well-known political prisoner Min Ko Naing, speaking to The Irrawaddy on Thursday.
“But it would be better if they could meet the political prisoners,” she added.
Bo Kyi, the joint-secretary of Thailand-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, said that the move was due to pressure on the Burmese regime.
“If there hadn't been any pressure, the ICRC would not have been allowed to reenter. Even now, it still hasn’t been allowed to do its work effectively,” he said, adding that it was too early to call this a sign of improving conditions for prisoners under the new nominally civilian government formed in March.
The ICRC started its work in Burma in 1986, providing physical rehabilitation for mine victims and other disabled people. ICRC delegates carried out regular visits to detainees in prisons and labor camps until the end of 2005. However, since 2006 the authorities have not permitted the organization to continue this activity according to its standard procedures applied worldwide.
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The Irrawaddy - Burma's Octopus Strangles Reform
By LARRY JAGAN Thursday, July 7, 2011
BANGKOK — Burma’s new quasi-civilian government is under threat from within—and a military coup may be brewing as inertia has replaced the old junta. The newly elected President Thein Sein is embroiled in a power struggle that is paralysing any progress toward political or economic change.
It has emerged that Vice-president Tin Aung Myint Oo is deliberately trying to undermine the new president and assert his influence over the new army chief, Gen Min Aung Hlaing.
“He’s trying to control everything,” a Burmese businessman told The Irrawaddy on condition of anonymity. As a result, the president’s planned economic reforms and the release of thousands of political prisoners have been put on hold.
The vice-president represents the old guard—and their hard-line attitudes—and he wants to make sure everything stays unchanged. His mentor, the former top junta leader, Snr-Gen
Than Shwe has withdrawn from the day-to-day activities of government, leaving a power vacuum which Tin Aung Myint Oo is trying to fill at the expense of the more reform-minded president.
The vice-president (commonly known in Burma as “Shid-lone,” meaning “eight words,” because his full name is Thi Ha Thu Ra Tin Aung Myint Oo) is trying to establish himself as the new dictator—or the most powerful man in the country. Everywhere he turns he tries to establish his authority, according to sources in Naypyidaw who say he uses every opportunity to usurp the president’s authority.
He has been left with few avenues of formal influence now that the trade council he headed has been dissolved, but that has not dampened his efforts to monopolize the economy. “He’s a spoiler,” said a senior government official. And if he comes out on top, the country will be returned to the Dark Ages, he added.
After every Cabinet meeting, which usually takes once a week, the ministers are summoned into his room—without Thein Sein—for tea and an ear-bashing. Sources in Naypyidaw say he tries to exert influence on government decisions behind the scenes, especially on economic matters—especially import and export licences and company registration, which he previously controlled as head of the trade council.
The commerce minister has to report to him twice a day, according to sources in the capital. Ministers were shocked recently when their budgets were arbitrarily cut by 20 to 40 percent—except Defence, of course—by Tin Aung Myint Oo. Some ministers are reportedly so upset that they are using their own personal funds to pay for new schools and health centres, a Burmese businessman recently told The Irrawaddy.
There is a major battle for control going on between the president and his vice president—one which will determine whether the government’s plans and vision set out in Thein Sein’s speech to the parliament more than three months ago will be implemented. After the president ordered the export tax to be reduced to 5 percent, the vice president intervened—with the support of the finance minister—and had it reduced to only 7 percent.
Perhaps the most critical tussle is over the role the army is to play under the new regime. Under the new army chief, it seems clear that the army is no longer involved in politics. They are very much back in the barracks. Interestingly, the military MPs in both the national houses of parliament were virtually silent during the discussions in parliament during its first session earlier this year.
Min Aung Hlaing told the military MPs—who occupy 25 percent of parliamentary seats—before the parliament started its session that their duty was to rebuild the tarnished reputation of the army through their political work. “It’s your duty to become seasoned politicians,” he reportedly said, “as you represent the future Burma.” He virtually blamed the old guard for the current mess, said one of the military MPs.
But Burma's new “Octopus,” Tin Aung Myint Oo, is unhappy with this current state of affairs. He wants the army to exert pressure on the executive and legislature in his favour.
Several weeks ago, the vice-president summoned the army chief to see him and lectured him on the power structure, telling the general that he was the boss, as militarily he outranked Thein Sein. A silent Min Aung Hlaing was then reportedly assaulted with an ashtray.
But for the present, it seems the army chief remains his own man, intent on reforming the military machine, making it more professional. He is after all, according to several military sources, part of the army’s 88 generation. He definitely supports Thein Sein—at least for the moment, according to senior military sources.
This new generation of army commanders are close to Vice Snr-Gen Maung Aye, according to a Western intelligence source.
They dislike but respect Than Shwe, said the source, but they completely despise the vice-president.
But the Octopus is marshalling his forces. Information and Culture Minister Kyaw Hsan has emerged as one of his main allies. He recently tried to get him co-opted to the National Security Council, which is emerging as one of the most important institutions in the post-junta framework. This was unconstitutional and resisted, according to military sources in the capital.
For the moment these layers of political intrigue are dogging Burma’s movement forward—albeit to a unique form of guided democracy. With the Octopus tentacles tightly controlling business in Burma, he is slowly transforming the new hierarchies.
Even trusted old business friends of Than Shwe, such as Tay Za, are finding themselves shut out as control of the economy is being handed over to the new business leaders—criminals such as Stephen Law (aka Tun Myint Naing) of AsiaWorld and Ko Ko Gyi (who now owns Shwe Myin).
They are the new breed of Chinese mafia businessmen—and they are currently making vast profits with the Octopus’s blessing and support. After all, Tin Aung Myint Oo is himself reportedly very close to Beijing, and has profited enormously as a result. This is going to have very significant consequences for the future Burma.
But the real danger to Burma’s political future—while the power struggle between the two politicians is unresolved—is the possibility of a military coup, led by the army chief, at Than Shwe’s bidding.
Vice-president Shid-lone and his cronies remain the villain of the peace, and seem intent on continuing to paralyse any political and economic reforms that would benefit the country and the people.
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The Irrawaddy - Rangoon Commander Dismissed
By WAI MOE Thursday, July 7, 2011
The former commander of the Rangoon Regional Military Command, Brig-Gen Tun Than, has reportedly been sacked for corruption, just one week after being reassigned as commander of the Southern Regional Military Command, military sources said.
Tun Than, who was expected to be promoted to the rank of major general next month, was forced to retire on Tuesday, the sources said. Maj-Gen Hla Min, the chief of the Bureau of Special Operations-3, has reportedly been acting as the commander of the Southern Regional Command since Tun Than's dismissal.
Tun Than was commander of Light Infantry Division 77 based in Pegu before he was promoted to commander of the Rangoon Regional Military Command last August as part of a major military reshuffle.
There has been no official confirmation of Tun Than's dismissal.
Recently, a general staff officer serving under Tun Than was reportedly killed in car accident in Rangoon. Two others were injured.
Tun Than was one of at least half a dozen regional military commanders who were reshuffled last week.
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The Irrawaddy - Karen BGF Talks Break Down; Tensions Remain High
By SAW YAN NAING Thursday, July 7, 2011
Attempted negotiations aimed at resolving a conflict between a pro-government Border Guard Force (BGF) in Karen State and a faction that broke away from the BGF several months after it was formed last year have failed, according to Karen sources.
The talks were initiated in early July by government loyalist Chit Thu, a leading figure in the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), which was officially disbanded late last year to form the BGF. They were held at the headquarters of the breakaway BGF faction in Myaing Gyi Nyu, in southern Karen State's Hlaing Bwe Township.
The talks were aimed at easing tensions between government forces and former BGF troops led by Lt-Col Po Bi. Around 1,000 soldiers under Po Bi's command broke away from the BGF in May after deciding to remain as members of the DKBA. Po Bi now leads four battalions.
Several days ago, Chit Thu traveled to Myaing Gyi Nyu accompanied by at least 20 pickup trucks carrying BGF troops to meet with Po Bi and attempt to persuade him to rejoin the pro-government force, according to Brig-Gen Johnny, the commander of Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) Brigade 7.
The talks failed, however, because Po Bi rejected Chit Thu’s offers, said Johnny.
The move came after military officials in Naypyidaw ordered Chit Thu to conduct a meeting with the renegade Karen BGF faction led by Po Bi, said DKBA sources.
Htee Moo, a DKBA source, reported that local villagers in Myaing Gyi Nyu fear the breakdown of the talks could result in major fighting between the two Karen armed groups led by Chit Thu and Po Bi. Some villagers have already moved to villages or towns nearby Myaing Gyi Nyu, he added.
However, Po Bi and his troops have since left Myaing Gyi Nyu and taken up positions near the town, according to Johnny.
“He [Po Bi] doesn’t want to open the front line in Myaing Gyi Nyu as temples and religious halls could be destroyed if major fighting breaks out,” said Johnny.
The KNLA has also vowed to assist the Po Bi-led renegade Karen group if the government and its ally, the Chit Thu-led Karen BGF battalions, launch a major attack against them. Chit Thu still has influence over four remaining Karen BGF Battalions.
“The Burmese government wants Karens to fight against Karens, so they asked Chit Thu to negotiate with Po Bi,” said Johnny.
The DKBA split from its mother organization, the Karen National Union—the political wing of the KNLA—in 1995 and signed a ceasefire agreement with the government. The DKBA was formed into BGF battalions under Burmese army command in 2010. However, a DKBA brigade under the command of Brig-Gen Saw Lah Pwe rejected the move and has since allied itself with the KNLA.
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RNDP party objects to Election Commission verdict
Thursday, 07 July 2011 21:50 Phanida
Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – The Burmese Election Commission disqualified three elected MPs and a legislator from the Rakhine National Democratic Party (RNDP) on Thursday for their alleged election malpractices in favour of plaintiff legislators from the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP).
RNDP General-Secretary Oo Hla Saw objected to the verdict, calling it unjust.
“It is really upsetting to see our three elected legislators disqualified. Our party is just a local ethnic party, and we are not challenging them politically. The verdict shows their ill-will to us. It’s suspicious too,” Oo Hla Saw told Mizzima.
The legislators who lost their seats are Pauktaw constituency Upper House MP Kyaw Tun Aung, Lower House MP Aung Kyaw Zan and Rakhine State assembly legislator Maung Kyaw Thein.
“They said the election is free and fair. Our candidates won by a big margin in the tens of thousands of votes. Moreover these legislators and MPs who lost must pay 1.5 million kyat (US$ 1,868) each as costs for the trial. This is totally unjust. I see this case as a political conspiracy,” said Oo Hla Saw.
In their complaint, the USDP candidates claimed that the defendants committed electoral malpractices by disparaging the government during the election campaign and strongly advocated Rakhine nationalism, Oo Hla Saw said. He said there was no evidence presented, such as recordings or videos, to establish the claim.
The party has one month to appeal the verdicts, but no decision has been made yet to appeal. A non-refundable deposit of 1 million kyat (US$ 1,245) is required for an appeal.
Oo Hla Saw said he was suspicious regarding the influence of former Union Home Minister Maung Oo in the case.
“During his recent tour of Rakhine State, he scolded local officials for the defeat of their USDP candidates in Rakhine State. He even ordered them not to give agricultural loans to farmers where our Rakhine candidates won. And then we got these verdicts. It looks like it could be a pre-meditated conspiracy,” he said.
The RNDP won a total of 35 seats in the 2010 election.
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Remembering July 7
Thursday, 07 July 2011 17:51 Mizzima News
(Feature) – Rangoon University had a history of incidents of student discontent from British colonial times. But it is 7 July, 1962, that is remembered in Burma.
U Myo recalls when he was growing up, 7 July was like a religious holiday for school kids—no classes. Now a lawyer and member of the Thailand-based Burma Lawyer Council, Myo said he was young when he first heard of the traumatic events that befell students a few years before at the prestigious Rangoon University.
July 7 provided Myo and other students a story and inspiration that has been passed down through generations.
Myo said he and his two friends were model school kids, never missing a day at school. And so he and his friends were initially put out when told by a young relative there was no school.
“Please don’t go to school, my younger brothers,” he recalls the brother of his cousin shouting. “Today is 7 July, on that day our brethren university students were killed by Ne Win’s army. Over 100 students were killed on that day. Please come with us.”
Myo remembers passing the high school on the way from his primary school to his home. “Many people from our village were assembled in front of this school, not only the students but also the people. I went to see what was happening out of curiosity. Soon after I arrived, I heard a loud voice singing.”
Myo said he was surprised to see his elder sister Mi Nge. “She was prettier than any film actress and her voice was so sweet. She sang a song with the first stanza—‘The rubble of our university at the place of our campus’.”
Myo said his elder brother standing beside him started to cry. And then other students followed suit. Elder university students with roses pinned in their chests were crying too.
Myo said he was transformed—“This was the beginning of my life.”
In 1970, Myo, now an adult student, recalled how he sat beneath the Thitpope tree on the Rangoon University campus and talked with other students about the tragic incident that happened there on July 7 just eight years before.
“That day was the second day of the celebration of golden jubilee of our university. We asked ourselves should we sit as mute spectators. What should we do?”
Myo and his colleagues discussed the troubles that had wrecked the calm of their campus. After General Ne Win’s military coup in March 1962, Rangoon University had been wrested from the hands of professors and academics and put directly under the control of the Directorate of Higher Education, a junta agency.
On July 7, students rose up in peaceful protest against “unjust university rules” that had been imposed by the new directorate.
General Ne Win sent troops to disperse the uprising, at which they shot dozens of students dead and dynamited the historic Student Union building the next morning with students still inside. According to official figures, 16 students died and 70 were injured at the university, but other sources put the toll at over 100 dead.
The crackdown proved the birth of the All Burma Federation of Student Unions that carried on its revolution against dictatorship underground as successive Burmese dictators continued to ban student unions.
As Myo found, July 7 was the first of a number of incidents to disrupt the Rangoon University campus. There were periodic protests and clashes over the years, and the university was subject to closure.
On 5 December, 1974, the day of the funeral of former UN Secretary- General U Thant, Rangoon University students stole the coffin and erected a temporary mausoleum in the grounds of the university to protest against the government not honouring their famous countryman with a state funeral. The army stormed the campus, killing several students, and recovered the coffin, burying it at the foot of Shwedagon pagoda.
Myo remembers seeing photos of the July 7, 1962, incident shown to him by former students who had taken part in the protest.
He said he met with former Rangoon Student Union leader Ko Nyan Win.
“Then I heard both of these duo brothers Nyan Win and Tim Maung Win were killed in action in the revolution. They have performed their tasks. I cried when I heard this news …They are no more.”
Another friend was murdered in prison. “Many of our elder brothers have died. Their images are lingering in my mind. They have not yet died in my mind.”
Myo himself was unable to evade the control of the state. “I was sentenced to seven years’ imprisonment for my involvement in the June 6, 1975 labour protest day first anniversary,” he said.
After being released from prison, he said encouragement from his father saw him return to school to earn a law degree.
‘Reminiscences of my student life reappeared whenever I visited my university campus,” he said.
“I went back to my campus again in 1988 during the climax of the 1988 uprising,” Myo said, recounting the student-led protests that resulted in the deaths of thousands of demonstrators. “I found myself still feeling fresh and young. I called the junior students at the campus who were the age of my nephews and nieces brother and sister.”
Myo knows about the sacrifices of student activists. Hence, for the exiled lawyer, July 7 is a day to remember.
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DVB News - Boy, 9, hospitalised after ‘severe torture’
By NAW NOREEN
Published: 7 July 2011
A nine-year-old orphaned boy from southern Burma was admitted to hospital 10 days ago after being found with signs of severe torture. Unable to pay his medical bills, however, the Irrawaddy division hospital ejected him.
Htake Kwat, who was working as a waiter in Henzada town in Irrawaddy division, arrived at the local hospital in late June. Images of the boy obtained by DVB show evidence of extensive burning; local sources say hot irons were applied to his stomach, back and thighs, and burning plastic poured on his forearm. He also recounted how he had been fed animal faeces.
The son-in-law of the owner of the You & Me Teashop in Henzada, where the nine-year-old was employed, has been arrested in connection with the abuse. It appears the series of assaults took place after Htake Kwat kicked a dog belonging to the son-in-law, identified only as Mr Snow.
A local man in the town, who asked for anonymity, told DVB that despite his wounds not yet healing, doctors at the hospital dismissed Htake Kwat on 3 July. “The hospital would not treat him for free, and it seemed like they couldn’t afford to keep him there.”
The teashop owners had reportedly been paying the medical fees but stopped after Snow’s arrest.
Henzada court held a hearing into the case yesterday, with the prosecution presenting statements. Aye Aye Soe, who first brought the child to hospital after he had escaped from the teashop, recounted how she had spotted him on 27 June “shivering from his injuries”.
“He said Snow stuck an iron on his thighs – we saw the wound – as well as on his back. We also saw some burn marks on his forearm and he said the man dropped burning plastic on him,” said Aye Aye Soe.
“The child said he begged for some water at one point and [Snow] said, ‘No water, I’ll give you piss’ and urinated into his mouth – the child said he had to swallow anyway as he was very thirsty.
“In the evening, when he was very hungry and asked for food, the man wrapped some dried dog faeces in a plastic bag and stuck it into his mouth and shut it with a piece of cloth. He said Snow’s wife was also involved; she tied him up and beat him.”
The child is yet to receive any legal assistance, locals say. During the trial yesterday, no lawyer was present to represent him, although help is being requested of the National League for Democracy-run Lawyers’ Network.
Snow was first charged by the police for causing injury, but following local anger the charge was changed to torture. Snow’s family are reportedly trying to get the child to drop the case by offering 500,000 kyat ($US660) compensation, although the lack of legal representation for Htake Kwat means he may have to settle for this.
The Heznada police station refused to comment when contacted by DVB.
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By Soe Than Win | AFP News – Thu, Jul 7, 2011
Democracy champion Aung San Suu Kyi attracted hundreds of emotional supporters Wednesday during her visit to an ancient temple city in central Myanmar, proving her enduring popularity after years in detention.
The Nobel Peace Prize winner is on holiday in Bagan, famed for its temple ruins, on her first venture outside her home city of Yangon since being freed by the junta from seven years of house arrest last November.
As the 66-year-old returned to her car after a lunch-time stop with her youngest son and travel companion Kim Aris, she was greeted by a spontaneous crowd of about 150 supporters, some of them openly weeping.
"Thank you very much," a smiling Suu Kyi told her admirers, as she signed autographs, including on some T-shirts, and posed for photographs.
"I will try to come back," she added, before retiring to her hotel. Earlier, she and Aris, 33, who was born in Britain, had been sightseeing in nearby Mount Popa and toured a local museum.
She stopped for five minutes at a souvenir shop to talk with a crowd of around 500 people who had gathered to greet her and promised to make the journey again.
Suu Kyi has refrained from making political comments during her trip, which began Monday, in an apparent attempt not to antagonise government figures, who have warned they can't guarantee her safety on her travels.
Her earlier plan to launch a political tour prompted a demand from the regime for her National League for Democracy (NLD) party to stay out of politics, and a warning that "chaos and riots" could ensue if she went ahead.
That tour has been delayed until the weather conditions are right, Suu Kyi said last week. Plain-clothes police have been following her every move throughout her current trip, although it is described as a private visit.
Security is a major concern after Suu Kyi's convoy was attacked in 2003 during a political tour, in an ambush apparently organised by a regime frightened by her popularity.
Observers said that any activity that puts Suu Kyi in contact with the people of Myanmar could have repercussions.
Her NLD party won a landslide election victory in 1990 that was never recognised by the junta, and the party was disbanded by the military rulers last year because it boycotted a November election, saying rules were unfair.
The junta's political proxies claimed an overwhelming victory in the poll, which was marred by widespread complaints of cheating and intimidation.
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US civil society urges more Myanmar pressure
(AFP) – Thu, Jul 7, 2011
WASHINGTON — A coalition of US civil society called Thursday on President Barack Obama to tighten sanctions on Myanmar and push for a UN probe on human rights, saying the regime will only respond to pressure.
The letter to the president was signed by senior members from 21 groups ranging from the AFL-CIO, the top US labor union confederation, to the neo-conservative Foreign Policy Initiative and prominent rights organizations.
The groups said the military was still firmly in charge of Myanmar, also known as Burma, pointing to recent deadly clashes in ethnic minority areas. They said that villagers "have been arrested, tortured and killed."
"The Burmese government has given your administration no reason to believe that more diplomacy, absent greater internal and external pressure, will persuade it to change course," the coalition wrote.
"The time has come for the United States to use the levers of pressure at its disposal."
The United States has already slapped sanctions on Myanmar's leaders and restricted trade. The letter called on the Treasury Department to expand efforts by targeting banks that hold Myanmar's hard currency reserves.
The pressure groups also urged the Obama administration to "launch a vigorous diplomatic effort" to set up a UN-led Commission of Inquiry into alleged crimes against humanity in the Southeast Asian country.
The Obama administration in 2009 opened dialogue with Myanmar, concluding that the previous Western approach of seeking to isolate the regime had failed.
Myanmar last year released opposition icon Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest and held elections. But the United States and opposition groups consider the polls a farce and say some 2,000 more political prisoners remain locked up.
US officials have voiced disappointment with the results of engagement but say it is still the best option at a time of potential change. The administration recently named an envoy, Derek Mitchell, to spearhead diplomacy.
The United States has backed a Commission of Inquiry into alleged crimes against humanity but has not made it a priority, believing that the probe does not enjoy support among Asian nations.
Groups whose members signed the letter include Freedom House, Human Rights Watch, the Feminist Majority Foundation and the Save Darfur Coalition.
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ASEAN, Japan ministers to meet business leaders
(AFP) – Wed, Jul 6, 2011
KUALA LUMPUR — Ministers from Southeast Asia and Japan will join business leaders for the first time Friday in talks on lifting trade barriers and securing closer economic ties, Malaysia said on Thursday.
Industry leaders from Southeast Asia and the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry asked the politicians to join them at an annual two-day gathering in Kuala Lumpur aimed at addressing problems faced by Japanese investors targeting the 10-nation region.
"They are expected to deliberate on the implementation of the ASEAN Free Trade Area... as well as ways to address barriers to trade in order to boost economic cooperation," the trade ministry said in a statement.
"Other key issues include problems faced by Japan's private sector when investing in ASEAN and ways to boost their investments," it added.
Trade ministers or senior officials from most of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) -- including from Brunei, Indonesia, Singapore and Malaysia -- are participating. Myanmar is not attending.
A Malaysian official told AFP on condition of anonymity that the ministers would also discuss the economic impact of Japan's March 11 earthquake-tsunami on the region and how ASEAN could help in the country's recovery.
The Bank of Japan's keenly-watched Tankan survey of business confidence plunged in the months after the disaster, turning negative for the first time in more than a year, as factories were shuttered, power shut off and supply lines broken.
While firms expect conditions to improve by September, analysts warned that the pace of Japan's recovery was uncertain amid power shortages following the crisis at the tsunami-ravaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.
Japan has always been the top source of foreign direct investment in ASEAN, pouring in $5.2 billion in 2009.
Trade between ASEAN and Japan in 2010 is estimated at $220 billion, well up from $160.9 billion in 2009.
ASEAN comprises Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
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Bigger crowd greets vacationing Suu Kyi in Myanmar
AP – 2 hours 21 minutes ago
BAGAN, Myanmar (AP) — Myanmar democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi has drawn the biggest crowd so far of her trip to the ancient city of Bagan, as bystanders overcame their fears to approach her at a market.
Bagan resident Min Min said about 1,000 people greeted Suu Kyi on the fourth day of her private vacation Thursday. Some presented her flowers and other gifts.
The crowd was about three times as big as the largest to previously see her. Earlier, some people visibly kept their distance as plainclothes police stood by.
Suu Kyi has said she will soon travel around the country to meet her political supporters, drawing a warning in the state-controlled press that she could cause chaos.
On her last political tour in 2003, she was arrested.
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Rights groups seek tougher Myanmar sanctions, say US diplomacy has not worked
By The Associated Press | The Canadian Press – 1 hour 1 minute ago
WASHINGTON - More than 20 U.S.-based human rights and advocacy groups are urging President Barack Obama to expand financial sanctions against senior Myanmar officials because diplomacy has failed to bring democratic change.
Washington has already imposed sanctions on scores of individuals and businesses, barring them from owning property or holding bank accounts in the U.S.
The rights groups want the U.S. to take further steps allowed under 2008 legislation to prevent foreign banks that hold assets of those targeted by the sanctions from doing business with American banks.
They say in a letter Thursday that Myanmar's military-dominated government will not change course without more pressure.
The signatories included U.S. unions, pro-democracy groups and Myanmar exiles.
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Boston Globe - Myanmar says Kachin rebels attacked railway line
July 7, 2011
YANGON, Myanmar—Ethnic Kachin rebels in Myanmar have bombed a major railway line in the north of the country for the third time in less than a month, a state-run newspaper said Thursday.
The attack was the latest targeting the military-backed government since a long-standing peace deal with the Kachin forces deteriorated with an outbreak of fighting last month.
The official New Light of Myanmar said rebels attacked the train line that runs from the city of Mandalay to the Kachin state capital Myitkyina on Tuesday night. No casualties were reported, and the train track was repaired.
Fighting between the Kachin and government troops erupted last month, the first skirmishes recorded since a peace deal in 1994 broke down last year. The violence displaced
10,000 people and forced Chinese technicians working at hydropower projects in the region to flee.
The state paper said the train, which provides a vital link to Kachin state, was also attacked by rebels on June 22 and June 30.
Fighting erupted in June near the Chinese border after the army asked Kachin fighters to withdraw their camp near the Tarpein hydropower project, a joint venture between Myanmar's Electric Power Ministry and China. The rebels fought back, destroying bridges and power pylons that fed the project, but blamed the government for launching an offensive into their territory.
The 8,000-strong Kachin militia is one of several minority ethnic rebel armies in Myanmar who say they are fighting for greater autonomy that have routinely been met by military suppression.
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Asian Correspondent - ICRC resumes its tough task in unprincipled Burma
By Zin Linn Jul 07, 2011 4:53PM UTC
The state-run New Light of Myanmar newspaper says today that the Government of Myanmar (Burma) has been carrying the maintenance of prisons in cooperation with ICRC.
Water and habitat Engineer Swiss Mr Eric Weissen from ICRC and two officers were allowed to visit Mawlamyine prison on 1 July. There, they inspected site chosen for sinking tube well, tube well, storage of water and construction of toilets and septic tanks.
They were conducted round by Director Soe Soe Zaw from Myanmar Correctional Department (Mon/Kayin), prison officer in-charge and engineers. According to the preliminary survey of ICRC in Myaungmya, Hpa-an and Mawlamyine prisons, solar powered water pumping system is installed by Myanmar Correctional Department under the Ministry of Home Affairs in cooperation with ICRC.
As reported by Assistance Association for Political Prisoners – Burma [AAPP-B], at least 159 political prisoners are in poor health due to the denial of proper medical care, harsh prison conditions, torture and transfers to remote prisons where there are no doctors. Political prisoners’ right to healthcare is principally denied by the successive regimes. The prison healthcare system in Burma is totally poor, especially in far-flung jails. There are 44 prisons across Burma, and at least 50 labour camps. Some of them do not have a prison hospital as well as health assistance personnel.
AAPP-B says in its June 2011 report: “The blatant insincerity and unwillingness of the current regime to address grave human rights violations was underscored in the concluding session of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR). Throughout the dialogue, the regime made false claims as to progress made in the field of human rights while continuing to deny serious broad patterns of abuse. Burma accepts to improve relations with Special Rapporteur Quintana, but has denied him entry into the country since March 2010.”
AAPP-B also criticized the behaviors of the Burmese government in the report that if there are no widespread occurrences of human rights violations committed with impunity, as Burma claimed during the first round of the UPR in January 2011, then it should open its doors to not only the Special Rapporteur Quintana, but also to other INGOs such as the ICRC.
Burma also agreed to stop torture, but refuses to investigate allegations into torture, providing further evidence that they are only interested in providing the bare minimum so as to gain political legitimacy.
Zaw Win, Director General of the Prisons Department, brazenly lied to the international community saying there are no political prisoners in Burma. Besides, there have been no deaths in prison arising from conditions of detention, he said.
AAPP-B has documented 146 deaths as a result of ill-treatment and conditions in prison. Given the wall of secrecy surrounding prisons, the number of cases is most likely much higher. There are a total of 1,994 political prisoners in June, said AAPP Burma.
Many prisoners of conscience have been serving incredibly long prison terms in awfully ruthless conditions. Torture and ill treatment is a well known part of their incarceration and retribution.
The regime’s handling of political prisoners blatantly breaks the 1957 UN standard minimum rules for the treatment of prisoners. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) carried out its last prison visit in Burma in November 2005. In January 2006 the ICRC suspended prison visits in the country, as it was not allowed to fulfill its independent, impartial mandate.
The ICRC offices were ordered to be closed in 2006. Then, ICRC released a press statement on this issue dated 29 June 2007. The statement denounced the military regime for committing human rights violations against detainees and civilians. ”The repeated abuses committed against men, women and children living along the Thai-Myanmar border violate many provisions of international humanitarian law,” said Mr. Jakob Kellenberger, ICRC president.
In addition, ICRC also demanded the Burmese government to end urgently of its abuses: “We urged the government of Myanmar to put a stop to all violations of international humanitarian law and to ensure that they do not recur”.
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Asian Correspondent - Twelve media organizations call on the release of Video Journalists
By Zin Linn Jul 07, 2011 8:32PM UTC
Twelve media organizations fighting for freedom of expression and freedom of the press all around the world cosigned, today, a joint statement calling on the Burmese government to put a stop to its harassment and prosecution of journalists and calling on the release of the Democratic Voice of Burma’s Video Journalists.
An alliance of 12 media organizations on Thursday called on Government of Myanmar (Burma) to end its harsh restrictions upon journalists and to release 17 video journalists serving long prison term in military-controlled country.
The joint statement says: “Despite pledges by Burma’s new government that it has begun the transition to civilian rule, 17 video journalists (VJs) for the Oslo-based exiled media organization, the Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), remain imprisoned. They are among nearly 2,100 political prisoners in Burma, a testament to the lingering hold of dictatorial rule on the country.”
Twelve media organizations call on the Burmese government to put a stop to its harassment and prosecution of journalists, who are forced to operate under strict control and surveillance. The media alliance points out evidence in the statement that despite government’s promises to freedom of the press and freedom of expression, situations continue to deteriorate in Burma on the contrary. Regulations over the Internet users are more and more rigid and journalists are forced to self-censor with greater intensity. they said in a joint
statement.
Twelve media alliance urged the United Nations, the ASEAN regional bloc and the European Union to press on Myanmar to release all journalists in prison.
The DVB was tipped as one of the top nominees for the Nobel Peace Prize last year due to its documentaries secretly made by the courageous video-journalists most of them in prison.
According to Norway-based Democratic Voice of Burma, which has broadcast different news video from Burma for years, its video reporters have been apprehended since 2007, when the military junta launched a bloody crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Saffron Revolution.
For example, DVB reporter Hla Hla Win, for example, was jailed in 2009 and is serving a 27-year sentence after interviewing Buddhist monks near the anniversary of the 2007 uprising. Two more DVB video-journalists have been jailed. Sithu Zeya, 21, received and eight-year sentence in December last year after police caught him taking photos of grenade attack at a stage during water-throwing festival in April 2010. Later, his father Maung Maung Zeya was also arrested and sentenced 13 years imprisonment.
The joint-statement said a number of the jailed DVB journalists were under various torture techniques during the interrogation phase to extract information about DVB’s operation and its network of undercover reporters.
The signatories of the joint statement are Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), Reporters Without Borders (RWB), Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), Irrawaddy, Mizzima, Southeast Asian Press Alliance (SEAPA), Article 19, International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), Burma Media Association (BMA), Index of Censorship, Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (CJFE) and International Press Institute (IPI).
The Burmese government has been practicing unnecessary restrictions on media and journalists and also extra restrictions on Internet users since the information minister is unmoved from the days of the former junta.
Although the optimistic politicians and media personnel hoped for better free-press environment after the election, the scenario remains unchanged.
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Catholic News Philippines - 4 Myanmar dioceses banned from World Youth Day affair
Published Date: July 7, 2011
THE Church has slapped a ban on four dioceses in Myanmar from sending delegates to upcoming World Youth Day celebrations in Madrid after several youths sought political asylum at the last gathering in Australia in 2008.
The decision to impose the ban was made by the bishops, said Father Gerald Pho Khwa, youth director of the National Catholic Youth Commission.
Five young people from Hakha, Kalay, and Banmaw dioceses failed to return from Australia, while another from Myitkyina diocese initially claimed asylum but later changed his mind and returned to Myanmar, according to Church sources.
This year, the bishops and youth directors in each diocese are being asked to guarantee that their youth delegates do not abscond at the August 12-16 Madrid celebrations.
“I hope those delegates affected can understand our decision.” But the reputation of the Church and our young people are at stake, Father Pho Khwa said.
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Catholic News Philippines - Lack of resources hinders Myanmar refugee efforts
Published Date: July 7, 2011
CHURCHES in Banmaw Diocese in Kachin State have been providing rice and medicine to sick and hungry refugees displaced by ongoing armed clashes between Burmese soldiers and troops from the opposition Kachin Independence Army but say their ability to help is limited.
More than 6,500 people have sought refuge in five parishes near the Chinese border, according to data collected by a disaster relief and response team from Karuna Banmaw.
Many of them have gathered in makeshift camps, while others have fled into the jungle to escape the fighting.
“We are supporting the refugees as much as we can with the Lenten contribution and other donations from the faithful in the diocese,” said Bishop Raymond Sumlut Gam, who added that heavy rains in the area have added to the difficulties facing refugees.
The needs of the refugees, he said, were far greater than the parishes’ limited resources.
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July 07, 2011 18:58 PM
Myanmar To Send Labour Abroad Legally Through Government-to-government Channel
YANGON, July 7 (Bernama) -- Myanmar labour authorities are planning to send workers to foreign countries through government- to-government channel, Xinhua news agency quoted the local Biweekly Eleven News' report Thursday.
As part of the move, Minister for Labour and for Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement U Aung Kyi had discussions with his Qatar counterpart over the labour affairs recently.
Myanmar workers turned to seek jobs mostly in Dubai, Qatar and South Korea when the country stopped dispatching workers to work in Malaysia for six months starting July 1.
At present, Myanmar workers have much interest in working in South Korea especially in the manufacturing sector at a time when South Korean government sends for over 51,000 Myanmar workers this year.
According to official statistics, the number of Myanmar workers, legally employed to work in 15 foreign countries, reached 330,311 as of 2010 since 1990 and such overseas workers had fetched for the country over US$17 million.
Myanmar citizens seeking overseas jobs are mostly destined to such countries as Singapore, Malaysia, South Korea, Libya, Thailand, Cambodia, Japan, Switzerland, Brunei Darussalam, United Arab Emirates, America, France, Germany, Qatar and Kuwait.
As part of its bid to ease domestic employment problem, Myanmar's Ministry of Labour has sought job opportunities for Myanmar workers since 1990.
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Jul 7, 2011
Straits Times - Call for release of jailed Myanmar reporters
BANGKOK - A COALITION of media groups on Thursday called on Myanmar to end the harassment of journalists and to release 17 video reporters serving long prison sentences in the military-dominated country.
A dozen organisations, including the Democratic Voice of Burma and Reporters Without Borders, urged the United Nations, the Asean regional bloc and the European Union to press Myanmar to release all jailed journalists.
'There is evidence that despite pledges to the contrary, freedom of the press and freedom of expression continue to deteriorate in Burma, with regulations over access to the Internet tightened and journalists now forced to self-censor with greater intensity,' they said in a joint statement.
The DVB, which last year was tipped as one of the top contenders for the Nobel Peace Prize, says that since December, two of its video journalists have been jailed for up to 13 years.
They have joined the other 15 DVB reporters in detention including Hla Hla Win, who was sentenced to 27 years in jail in Myanmar, for interviewing a monk during the 2007 'Saffron Revolution' failed uprising.
The statement said some of the jailed DVB journalists may have been tortured during interrogation.
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Last updated: July 6, 2011 3:56 p.m.
Fort Wayne Journal Gazette - Stabbing kills 1; suspect arrested
Fort Wayne police are investigating a stabbing death early Wednesday, and one person has been arrested.
Police got a call using the Burmese translation line about 2 a.m., reporting a disturbance and possible stabbing, according to a written statement from police.
The male with wounds was found at 6000 Bunt Drive in southeast Fort Wayne and medics confirmed he died at the scene.
The Fort Wayne Investigative Bureau worked with Burmese translators and took Aung Kyaw Thu, 38, of Fort Wayne, into custody on a charge of aggravated battery.
The statement said there was some kind of disturbance about 1:45 a.m. between the victim and the suspect when the stabbing occurred.
There will be an autopsy today to determine the exact cause and nature of death, police said.
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Thursday, July 7, 2011
China Digital Times - China Urged to Halt Myanmar Dams
Burmese dissident groups have appealed to China to stop work on a number of dam projects which have been fuelling conflict in the north of the country. From The Wall Street Journal:
Dissidents had been stepping up their complaints about Chinese investment amid signs it is increasing rapidly. Foreign direct investment commitments from China in the year that ended in March totaled $8.27 billion, or 41% of the total in Myanmar, compared with total Chinese investment of less than $2 billion by the end of the prior financial year, according to the Associated Press and local media reports. Major projects include a multibillion-dollar oil-and-gas pipeline built in part by Chinese investors across the country. It also includes an estimated 60 hydropower projects involving at least 45 companies, according to International Rivers, a California-based advocacy group.
Activists say the investments harm the environment and help support Myanmar’s harsh military-backed government, which is accused of a wide range of human-rights abuses, including forced labor and rape, while failing to boost living standards for average citizens. Western governments, including the U.S., maintain tough economic sanctions against Myanmar that block investment in such projects, but a growing number of dissidents are beginning to question the sanctions, in part because Chinese investment has undermined their effectiveness ….
The latest call was distributed by a U.S.-based advocacy group, the U.S. Campaign for Burma, and signed by more than a half-dozen other dissident groups, including the All Burma Monks’ Alliance and the All Burma Federation of Student Unions. In the statement released Monday and circulated in some areas on Tuesday, they accused the Chinese government of “completely disregarding Burmese people’s life and property” and collaborating with the Myanmar government to stop the flow of rivers in Kachin areas with megadam projects.
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New Statesman - The Reith Lectures: Securing Freedom (Radio 4)
Antonia Quirke
Published 04 July 2011
How Aung San Suu Kyi draws lessons from the Gulag.
Aung San Suu Kyi's two Reith Lectures (28 June, and forthcoming on 9 July) are an important coup for the new controller of Radio 4, Gwyneth Williams, who managed to push the request through to all the right people in Burma specifically because of her World Service connections (Williams joined the WS in 1976 as a trainee). Further proof, if it were needed, of the high worth of those with a hands-on background at that miraculous station.
Three weeks after the invitation went in, word came back that, yes, ASSK would do it if she could have access to certain reference books - she has few books even though now officially not under house arrest; she asked in particular for Max Weber's Politics As a Vocation and Nadezhda Mandelstam's Hope Against Hope. The wife of the poet Osip Mandelstam, who died in 1938 in a transit camp in Siberia, Nadezhda has been an inspiration to ASSK, along with the Odessa-born poet Irina Ratushinskaya, who spent four years in a camp before being released on the eve of the 1986 summit between Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev.
At a screening of the first lecture at Broadcasting House, it was mesmerising to sit and watch ASSK speaking at length (the footage had been recently smuggled out of Burma). Traditional peach silk top. Blue flowers in her hair. A slash of orange lipstick. She is resolutely not a spin-doctored, slick operator. Two things stood out: her use of the old-fashioned word gallantry, and her repeated use of the word passion.
Though ASSK is clearly unbowed, at one point during the live Q&A down the line from Rangoon she admitted that the lights had been switched off by the authorities and she was sitting at the telephone in the dark. How fitting that she had, just minutes earlier, quoted from Ratushinskaya's prison poem that ends: "It isn't true, I am afraid, my darling!/But make it look as though you haven't noticed."
There is to ASSK an air of unrelenting affection. It reminded me of something the actress Debra Winger - who quit Hollywood before it dried her up completely - said about passion: it is the thing that keeps you soft.
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The Spectator- The inspirational Suu Kyi
July 2011 | by: Kate Chisholm |
‘To be speaking to you through the BBC has a very special meaning for me. It means that once again I am officially a free person,’ says Aung San Suu Kyi at the beginning of the first of her Reith Lectures on Radio 4 (Tuesday mornings). That connection between the BBC and the powerful, emotive word ‘freedom’, made by one of the most influential figures of the 21st century, has finally broken through to the politicians who are deciding on the fate of the World Service. Last week the Foreign Office, coincidentally maybe, but probably reactively, decided not to cut three of the foreign-language services previously threatened with budget-slashing abolition — the Hindi service, the Arabic service and the Somali service. But the threat to the World Service is still not over, and Suu Kyi pointed out how damaging the cuts have already been.
In an interview she declared that what had helped her most through the early years of her house arrest (when she was still allowed the ‘freedom’ to listen to the radio) was not, as you might expect, the news bulletins, the information branch, the serious reportage, but the inane chatter of Dave Lee Travis — or rather the conversation of his ‘listeners’ who wrote in to his request programme, A Jolly Good Show, on the World Service. What she enjoyed was not just the weird variety of music but also hearing about the ‘ordinary lives’ of others. How people manage day-by-day, coping with their own private griefs and tribulations. Or even just how they shop, cook, argue, find solace, chat, joke and above all laugh. As her mother used to tell her, who needs to watch sad films when there is so much sadness in your own life? (Suu Kyi’s father was assassinated by the Burmese authorities when she was just two years old. The Burmese uprising was brutally suppressed by the army in 1988, killing many friends of the family.)
DLT was axed some years ago, along with most of the World Service’s light-entertainment programmes. Yet, as Suu Kyi reminded us, for a campaign to be effective, justified, and to reach out to all people, it needs to be three-dimensional, tackling big questions but also that basic need of people to communicate freely and without fear of reprisal. Keeping fit is one of the first duties of the political prisoner, she told us; not, as you might expect, ideological values or political nous.
In her lecture, she focused not on the philosophical nature of ‘freedom’ but on the practicalities of dissent. She told us about her fellow freedom-fighters in Rangoon, members of the National League for Democracy (NLD) who meet together in what they affectionately call ‘the cowshed’. Many of them still wear their prison-blue shirts, not as a badge of honour but as a constant reminder of how many dissenters are still in jail, suffering who knows what for their beliefs.
She also brought together a surprising collection of writers who had inspired her, both those who had suffered for their beliefs under cruel authoritarian regimes, such as Vaclav Havel, Irina Ratushinskaya and Anna Akhmatova, but also W.E. Henley, the Victorian poet. His most famous poem, the rallying call ‘Invictus’, contains the lines, ‘I am the master of my fate:/ I am the captain of my soul’. This, says Suu Kyi, is what we all need to remember: my mind, she told us, was always free during those 15 years when she was unable to wander beyond the four walls of her home.
Most movingly, though, she ended with lines from Kipling, a doubly effective conclusion because he is so unexpected a mentor for Suu Kyi. ‘He’s the Lord of us all,/ The Dreamer whose dream came true,’ she quoted. As she spoke, it was as if her dream had come true. Here she was speaking on the BBC to an audience of millions through the World Service. What she said was an inspiring call not to arms but to dignity, self-belief and that ability to listen to others.
Her lectures had to be recorded in secret and smuggled out of Burma, as the authorities there would not allow her to travel to London to deliver them. They were broadcast to an invited audience in the radio theatre, where Suu Kyi appeared to us on a huge video screen before answering questions via telephone. Her poise, her calm, her clarity, yet the richness of her talk, every sentence carrying meaning, purpose, intent, meant that even though she was not with us in person she was very much in the room. The force of her spirit is beyond compare.
This season of lectures promises to be one of the most significant since the inaugural series delivered by Bertrand Russell in 1948. After the first two by Suu Kyi, giving us insights into what democracy means for those living under brutal authoritarian regimes, the former head of MI5, Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller will talk in September, on the tenth anniversary of 9/11, about the struggle to maintain a nation’s freedom in this age of terrorism.
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The Irrawaddy - ICRC Returns to Burmese Prisons, but Doesn't Meet Prisoners
By SAW YAN NAING Thursday, July 7, 2011
For the first time in nearly six years, officials from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) have been allowed back into Burma's prisons. Their mission, however, was to carry out technical inspections, and did not involve meeting prisoners.
The state-run newspaper, The New Light of Myanmar, reported on Thursday that three officials from the ICRC's water and habitat engineering department visited three prisons—Myaungmya Prison in Irrawaddy Division, Moulmein Prison in Mon State and Pa-an Prison in Karen State—on July 1-2.
Philippe Marc Stoll, a regional spokesperson for the ICRC, told the BBC that the organization welcomed the opportunity to resume its work in Burma. The ICRC had been denied permission to enter the country's prisons since late 2005.
Stoll added, however, that the visits were limited to observing water distribution and hygiene in the prisons, and did not include meetings with prisoners.
Despite the limited scope of the ICRC's activities on this occasion, the news was greeted as a positive development.
“We are happy to hear that the ICRC has been permitted to resume its work. Health conditions in the prison will likely improve as a result,” said Kyi Kyi Nyunt, the elder sister of well-known political prisoner Min Ko Naing, speaking to The Irrawaddy on Thursday.
“But it would be better if they could meet the political prisoners,” she added.
Bo Kyi, the joint-secretary of Thailand-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, said that the move was due to pressure on the Burmese regime.
“If there hadn't been any pressure, the ICRC would not have been allowed to reenter. Even now, it still hasn’t been allowed to do its work effectively,” he said, adding that it was too early to call this a sign of improving conditions for prisoners under the new nominally civilian government formed in March.
The ICRC started its work in Burma in 1986, providing physical rehabilitation for mine victims and other disabled people. ICRC delegates carried out regular visits to detainees in prisons and labor camps until the end of 2005. However, since 2006 the authorities have not permitted the organization to continue this activity according to its standard procedures applied worldwide.
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The Irrawaddy - Burma's Octopus Strangles Reform
By LARRY JAGAN Thursday, July 7, 2011
BANGKOK — Burma’s new quasi-civilian government is under threat from within—and a military coup may be brewing as inertia has replaced the old junta. The newly elected President Thein Sein is embroiled in a power struggle that is paralysing any progress toward political or economic change.
It has emerged that Vice-president Tin Aung Myint Oo is deliberately trying to undermine the new president and assert his influence over the new army chief, Gen Min Aung Hlaing.
“He’s trying to control everything,” a Burmese businessman told The Irrawaddy on condition of anonymity. As a result, the president’s planned economic reforms and the release of thousands of political prisoners have been put on hold.
The vice-president represents the old guard—and their hard-line attitudes—and he wants to make sure everything stays unchanged. His mentor, the former top junta leader, Snr-Gen
Than Shwe has withdrawn from the day-to-day activities of government, leaving a power vacuum which Tin Aung Myint Oo is trying to fill at the expense of the more reform-minded president.
The vice-president (commonly known in Burma as “Shid-lone,” meaning “eight words,” because his full name is Thi Ha Thu Ra Tin Aung Myint Oo) is trying to establish himself as the new dictator—or the most powerful man in the country. Everywhere he turns he tries to establish his authority, according to sources in Naypyidaw who say he uses every opportunity to usurp the president’s authority.
He has been left with few avenues of formal influence now that the trade council he headed has been dissolved, but that has not dampened his efforts to monopolize the economy. “He’s a spoiler,” said a senior government official. And if he comes out on top, the country will be returned to the Dark Ages, he added.
After every Cabinet meeting, which usually takes once a week, the ministers are summoned into his room—without Thein Sein—for tea and an ear-bashing. Sources in Naypyidaw say he tries to exert influence on government decisions behind the scenes, especially on economic matters—especially import and export licences and company registration, which he previously controlled as head of the trade council.
The commerce minister has to report to him twice a day, according to sources in the capital. Ministers were shocked recently when their budgets were arbitrarily cut by 20 to 40 percent—except Defence, of course—by Tin Aung Myint Oo. Some ministers are reportedly so upset that they are using their own personal funds to pay for new schools and health centres, a Burmese businessman recently told The Irrawaddy.
There is a major battle for control going on between the president and his vice president—one which will determine whether the government’s plans and vision set out in Thein Sein’s speech to the parliament more than three months ago will be implemented. After the president ordered the export tax to be reduced to 5 percent, the vice president intervened—with the support of the finance minister—and had it reduced to only 7 percent.
Perhaps the most critical tussle is over the role the army is to play under the new regime. Under the new army chief, it seems clear that the army is no longer involved in politics. They are very much back in the barracks. Interestingly, the military MPs in both the national houses of parliament were virtually silent during the discussions in parliament during its first session earlier this year.
Min Aung Hlaing told the military MPs—who occupy 25 percent of parliamentary seats—before the parliament started its session that their duty was to rebuild the tarnished reputation of the army through their political work. “It’s your duty to become seasoned politicians,” he reportedly said, “as you represent the future Burma.” He virtually blamed the old guard for the current mess, said one of the military MPs.
But Burma's new “Octopus,” Tin Aung Myint Oo, is unhappy with this current state of affairs. He wants the army to exert pressure on the executive and legislature in his favour.
Several weeks ago, the vice-president summoned the army chief to see him and lectured him on the power structure, telling the general that he was the boss, as militarily he outranked Thein Sein. A silent Min Aung Hlaing was then reportedly assaulted with an ashtray.
But for the present, it seems the army chief remains his own man, intent on reforming the military machine, making it more professional. He is after all, according to several military sources, part of the army’s 88 generation. He definitely supports Thein Sein—at least for the moment, according to senior military sources.
This new generation of army commanders are close to Vice Snr-Gen Maung Aye, according to a Western intelligence source.
They dislike but respect Than Shwe, said the source, but they completely despise the vice-president.
But the Octopus is marshalling his forces. Information and Culture Minister Kyaw Hsan has emerged as one of his main allies. He recently tried to get him co-opted to the National Security Council, which is emerging as one of the most important institutions in the post-junta framework. This was unconstitutional and resisted, according to military sources in the capital.
For the moment these layers of political intrigue are dogging Burma’s movement forward—albeit to a unique form of guided democracy. With the Octopus tentacles tightly controlling business in Burma, he is slowly transforming the new hierarchies.
Even trusted old business friends of Than Shwe, such as Tay Za, are finding themselves shut out as control of the economy is being handed over to the new business leaders—criminals such as Stephen Law (aka Tun Myint Naing) of AsiaWorld and Ko Ko Gyi (who now owns Shwe Myin).
They are the new breed of Chinese mafia businessmen—and they are currently making vast profits with the Octopus’s blessing and support. After all, Tin Aung Myint Oo is himself reportedly very close to Beijing, and has profited enormously as a result. This is going to have very significant consequences for the future Burma.
But the real danger to Burma’s political future—while the power struggle between the two politicians is unresolved—is the possibility of a military coup, led by the army chief, at Than Shwe’s bidding.
Vice-president Shid-lone and his cronies remain the villain of the peace, and seem intent on continuing to paralyse any political and economic reforms that would benefit the country and the people.
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The Irrawaddy - Rangoon Commander Dismissed
By WAI MOE Thursday, July 7, 2011
The former commander of the Rangoon Regional Military Command, Brig-Gen Tun Than, has reportedly been sacked for corruption, just one week after being reassigned as commander of the Southern Regional Military Command, military sources said.
Tun Than, who was expected to be promoted to the rank of major general next month, was forced to retire on Tuesday, the sources said. Maj-Gen Hla Min, the chief of the Bureau of Special Operations-3, has reportedly been acting as the commander of the Southern Regional Command since Tun Than's dismissal.
Tun Than was commander of Light Infantry Division 77 based in Pegu before he was promoted to commander of the Rangoon Regional Military Command last August as part of a major military reshuffle.
There has been no official confirmation of Tun Than's dismissal.
Recently, a general staff officer serving under Tun Than was reportedly killed in car accident in Rangoon. Two others were injured.
Tun Than was one of at least half a dozen regional military commanders who were reshuffled last week.
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The Irrawaddy - Karen BGF Talks Break Down; Tensions Remain High
By SAW YAN NAING Thursday, July 7, 2011
Attempted negotiations aimed at resolving a conflict between a pro-government Border Guard Force (BGF) in Karen State and a faction that broke away from the BGF several months after it was formed last year have failed, according to Karen sources.
The talks were initiated in early July by government loyalist Chit Thu, a leading figure in the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), which was officially disbanded late last year to form the BGF. They were held at the headquarters of the breakaway BGF faction in Myaing Gyi Nyu, in southern Karen State's Hlaing Bwe Township.
The talks were aimed at easing tensions between government forces and former BGF troops led by Lt-Col Po Bi. Around 1,000 soldiers under Po Bi's command broke away from the BGF in May after deciding to remain as members of the DKBA. Po Bi now leads four battalions.
Several days ago, Chit Thu traveled to Myaing Gyi Nyu accompanied by at least 20 pickup trucks carrying BGF troops to meet with Po Bi and attempt to persuade him to rejoin the pro-government force, according to Brig-Gen Johnny, the commander of Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) Brigade 7.
The talks failed, however, because Po Bi rejected Chit Thu’s offers, said Johnny.
The move came after military officials in Naypyidaw ordered Chit Thu to conduct a meeting with the renegade Karen BGF faction led by Po Bi, said DKBA sources.
Htee Moo, a DKBA source, reported that local villagers in Myaing Gyi Nyu fear the breakdown of the talks could result in major fighting between the two Karen armed groups led by Chit Thu and Po Bi. Some villagers have already moved to villages or towns nearby Myaing Gyi Nyu, he added.
However, Po Bi and his troops have since left Myaing Gyi Nyu and taken up positions near the town, according to Johnny.
“He [Po Bi] doesn’t want to open the front line in Myaing Gyi Nyu as temples and religious halls could be destroyed if major fighting breaks out,” said Johnny.
The KNLA has also vowed to assist the Po Bi-led renegade Karen group if the government and its ally, the Chit Thu-led Karen BGF battalions, launch a major attack against them. Chit Thu still has influence over four remaining Karen BGF Battalions.
“The Burmese government wants Karens to fight against Karens, so they asked Chit Thu to negotiate with Po Bi,” said Johnny.
The DKBA split from its mother organization, the Karen National Union—the political wing of the KNLA—in 1995 and signed a ceasefire agreement with the government. The DKBA was formed into BGF battalions under Burmese army command in 2010. However, a DKBA brigade under the command of Brig-Gen Saw Lah Pwe rejected the move and has since allied itself with the KNLA.
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RNDP party objects to Election Commission verdict
Thursday, 07 July 2011 21:50 Phanida
Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – The Burmese Election Commission disqualified three elected MPs and a legislator from the Rakhine National Democratic Party (RNDP) on Thursday for their alleged election malpractices in favour of plaintiff legislators from the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP).
RNDP General-Secretary Oo Hla Saw objected to the verdict, calling it unjust.
“It is really upsetting to see our three elected legislators disqualified. Our party is just a local ethnic party, and we are not challenging them politically. The verdict shows their ill-will to us. It’s suspicious too,” Oo Hla Saw told Mizzima.
The legislators who lost their seats are Pauktaw constituency Upper House MP Kyaw Tun Aung, Lower House MP Aung Kyaw Zan and Rakhine State assembly legislator Maung Kyaw Thein.
“They said the election is free and fair. Our candidates won by a big margin in the tens of thousands of votes. Moreover these legislators and MPs who lost must pay 1.5 million kyat (US$ 1,868) each as costs for the trial. This is totally unjust. I see this case as a political conspiracy,” said Oo Hla Saw.
In their complaint, the USDP candidates claimed that the defendants committed electoral malpractices by disparaging the government during the election campaign and strongly advocated Rakhine nationalism, Oo Hla Saw said. He said there was no evidence presented, such as recordings or videos, to establish the claim.
The party has one month to appeal the verdicts, but no decision has been made yet to appeal. A non-refundable deposit of 1 million kyat (US$ 1,245) is required for an appeal.
Oo Hla Saw said he was suspicious regarding the influence of former Union Home Minister Maung Oo in the case.
“During his recent tour of Rakhine State, he scolded local officials for the defeat of their USDP candidates in Rakhine State. He even ordered them not to give agricultural loans to farmers where our Rakhine candidates won. And then we got these verdicts. It looks like it could be a pre-meditated conspiracy,” he said.
The RNDP won a total of 35 seats in the 2010 election.
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Remembering July 7
Thursday, 07 July 2011 17:51 Mizzima News
(Feature) – Rangoon University had a history of incidents of student discontent from British colonial times. But it is 7 July, 1962, that is remembered in Burma.
U Myo recalls when he was growing up, 7 July was like a religious holiday for school kids—no classes. Now a lawyer and member of the Thailand-based Burma Lawyer Council, Myo said he was young when he first heard of the traumatic events that befell students a few years before at the prestigious Rangoon University.
July 7 provided Myo and other students a story and inspiration that has been passed down through generations.
Myo said he and his two friends were model school kids, never missing a day at school. And so he and his friends were initially put out when told by a young relative there was no school.
“Please don’t go to school, my younger brothers,” he recalls the brother of his cousin shouting. “Today is 7 July, on that day our brethren university students were killed by Ne Win’s army. Over 100 students were killed on that day. Please come with us.”
Myo remembers passing the high school on the way from his primary school to his home. “Many people from our village were assembled in front of this school, not only the students but also the people. I went to see what was happening out of curiosity. Soon after I arrived, I heard a loud voice singing.”
Myo said he was surprised to see his elder sister Mi Nge. “She was prettier than any film actress and her voice was so sweet. She sang a song with the first stanza—‘The rubble of our university at the place of our campus’.”
Myo said his elder brother standing beside him started to cry. And then other students followed suit. Elder university students with roses pinned in their chests were crying too.
Myo said he was transformed—“This was the beginning of my life.”
In 1970, Myo, now an adult student, recalled how he sat beneath the Thitpope tree on the Rangoon University campus and talked with other students about the tragic incident that happened there on July 7 just eight years before.
“That day was the second day of the celebration of golden jubilee of our university. We asked ourselves should we sit as mute spectators. What should we do?”
Myo and his colleagues discussed the troubles that had wrecked the calm of their campus. After General Ne Win’s military coup in March 1962, Rangoon University had been wrested from the hands of professors and academics and put directly under the control of the Directorate of Higher Education, a junta agency.
On July 7, students rose up in peaceful protest against “unjust university rules” that had been imposed by the new directorate.
General Ne Win sent troops to disperse the uprising, at which they shot dozens of students dead and dynamited the historic Student Union building the next morning with students still inside. According to official figures, 16 students died and 70 were injured at the university, but other sources put the toll at over 100 dead.
The crackdown proved the birth of the All Burma Federation of Student Unions that carried on its revolution against dictatorship underground as successive Burmese dictators continued to ban student unions.
As Myo found, July 7 was the first of a number of incidents to disrupt the Rangoon University campus. There were periodic protests and clashes over the years, and the university was subject to closure.
On 5 December, 1974, the day of the funeral of former UN Secretary- General U Thant, Rangoon University students stole the coffin and erected a temporary mausoleum in the grounds of the university to protest against the government not honouring their famous countryman with a state funeral. The army stormed the campus, killing several students, and recovered the coffin, burying it at the foot of Shwedagon pagoda.
Myo remembers seeing photos of the July 7, 1962, incident shown to him by former students who had taken part in the protest.
He said he met with former Rangoon Student Union leader Ko Nyan Win.
“Then I heard both of these duo brothers Nyan Win and Tim Maung Win were killed in action in the revolution. They have performed their tasks. I cried when I heard this news …They are no more.”
Another friend was murdered in prison. “Many of our elder brothers have died. Their images are lingering in my mind. They have not yet died in my mind.”
Myo himself was unable to evade the control of the state. “I was sentenced to seven years’ imprisonment for my involvement in the June 6, 1975 labour protest day first anniversary,” he said.
After being released from prison, he said encouragement from his father saw him return to school to earn a law degree.
‘Reminiscences of my student life reappeared whenever I visited my university campus,” he said.
“I went back to my campus again in 1988 during the climax of the 1988 uprising,” Myo said, recounting the student-led protests that resulted in the deaths of thousands of demonstrators. “I found myself still feeling fresh and young. I called the junior students at the campus who were the age of my nephews and nieces brother and sister.”
Myo knows about the sacrifices of student activists. Hence, for the exiled lawyer, July 7 is a day to remember.
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DVB News - Boy, 9, hospitalised after ‘severe torture’
By NAW NOREEN
Published: 7 July 2011
A nine-year-old orphaned boy from southern Burma was admitted to hospital 10 days ago after being found with signs of severe torture. Unable to pay his medical bills, however, the Irrawaddy division hospital ejected him.
Htake Kwat, who was working as a waiter in Henzada town in Irrawaddy division, arrived at the local hospital in late June. Images of the boy obtained by DVB show evidence of extensive burning; local sources say hot irons were applied to his stomach, back and thighs, and burning plastic poured on his forearm. He also recounted how he had been fed animal faeces.
The son-in-law of the owner of the You & Me Teashop in Henzada, where the nine-year-old was employed, has been arrested in connection with the abuse. It appears the series of assaults took place after Htake Kwat kicked a dog belonging to the son-in-law, identified only as Mr Snow.
A local man in the town, who asked for anonymity, told DVB that despite his wounds not yet healing, doctors at the hospital dismissed Htake Kwat on 3 July. “The hospital would not treat him for free, and it seemed like they couldn’t afford to keep him there.”
The teashop owners had reportedly been paying the medical fees but stopped after Snow’s arrest.
Henzada court held a hearing into the case yesterday, with the prosecution presenting statements. Aye Aye Soe, who first brought the child to hospital after he had escaped from the teashop, recounted how she had spotted him on 27 June “shivering from his injuries”.
“He said Snow stuck an iron on his thighs – we saw the wound – as well as on his back. We also saw some burn marks on his forearm and he said the man dropped burning plastic on him,” said Aye Aye Soe.
“The child said he begged for some water at one point and [Snow] said, ‘No water, I’ll give you piss’ and urinated into his mouth – the child said he had to swallow anyway as he was very thirsty.
“In the evening, when he was very hungry and asked for food, the man wrapped some dried dog faeces in a plastic bag and stuck it into his mouth and shut it with a piece of cloth. He said Snow’s wife was also involved; she tied him up and beat him.”
The child is yet to receive any legal assistance, locals say. During the trial yesterday, no lawyer was present to represent him, although help is being requested of the National League for Democracy-run Lawyers’ Network.
Snow was first charged by the police for causing injury, but following local anger the charge was changed to torture. Snow’s family are reportedly trying to get the child to drop the case by offering 500,000 kyat ($US660) compensation, although the lack of legal representation for Htake Kwat means he may have to settle for this.
The Heznada police station refused to comment when contacted by DVB.
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