Friday, 26 February 2010
Discussion Forum about Burmese Regime's 2010 Election by Famous Burmese Monk U Kawwida, Professor Dr Salai Tun Than (Patron of Burma Democratic Concern), Poet Maung Swan Yee, Artist Win Pe, Elected Parliament Member (1990) U Peter Linpin, and Politician U Myint Soe (Secretary, National League for Democracy (Liberated Area) discuss and share their perspective about planned Burmese Regime's Election on January 29, 2010
Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi loses appeal
The Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi failed in her latest bid to end more than a decade of house arrest today after the country's highest court threw out an appeal against her sentence.
The supreme court's decision was widely expected but her lawyer said he would launch a final special appeal to the supreme court after establishing the reasons why the latest attempt had been rejected. "The court order did not mention any reasons," he said.
The British ambassador Andrew Heyn attended the court session along with diplomats from Australia, France and the US.
"Although the decision comes as no surprise, it is deeply disappointing," he said. "We continue to believe that [Aung San Suu Kyi] should be released immediately, along with the other 2,000 and more prisoners of conscience." The French ambassador Jean-Pierre Lafosse said the 64-year-old democracy leader was "the victim of a sham trial".
Aung San Suu Kyi's lawyers appealed to the court last November, a month after a lower court upheld a decision to sentence her to 18 months of house arrest. She was convicted last August of violating the terms of her previous detention by briefly sheltering an American, John Yettaw who swam uninvited to her lakeside compound.
She was initially sentenced to three years in prison with hard labour in a trial that drew global condemnation, but the sentence was immediately commuted to 18 months of house arrest by junta chief Senior General Than Shwe.
Aung San Suu Kyi has been detained for 14 years. Her National League for Democracy won elections in 1990 by a landslide, but the military, which has ruled Burma since 1962, refused to cede power.
The junta has announced it would hold elections some time this year under a constitution that would allow the military to maintain substantial power. Aung San Suu Kyi's party has not announced whether it will contest the elections.
The court ruling also denied freedom to two female companions who share Suu Kyi's house arrest.
Burma has been widely criticised for its continued violation of human rights, including atrocities committed by its military against minority ethnic groups. Human rights campaigners say the junta holds 2,100 political prisoners.
Tin Oo, the 82-year-old deputy leader of Aung San Suu Kyi's party was released less than two weeks ago after nearly seven years in detention. On his release he said he was very hopeful Aung San Suu Kyi would also soon be freed.
Aung Din, executive director of the US Campaign for Burma lobby group condemned the Burmese judiciary system as "part of the regime's oppressive mechanism". "The only way to make the release [of Aung San Suu Kyi] and all political prisoners in Burma is to keep putting maximum pressure on Than Shwe and his cronies until they feel the heat," he said.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/feb/26/aung-san-suu-kyi-loses-appeal
The supreme court's decision was widely expected but her lawyer said he would launch a final special appeal to the supreme court after establishing the reasons why the latest attempt had been rejected. "The court order did not mention any reasons," he said.
The British ambassador Andrew Heyn attended the court session along with diplomats from Australia, France and the US.
"Although the decision comes as no surprise, it is deeply disappointing," he said. "We continue to believe that [Aung San Suu Kyi] should be released immediately, along with the other 2,000 and more prisoners of conscience." The French ambassador Jean-Pierre Lafosse said the 64-year-old democracy leader was "the victim of a sham trial".
Aung San Suu Kyi's lawyers appealed to the court last November, a month after a lower court upheld a decision to sentence her to 18 months of house arrest. She was convicted last August of violating the terms of her previous detention by briefly sheltering an American, John Yettaw who swam uninvited to her lakeside compound.
She was initially sentenced to three years in prison with hard labour in a trial that drew global condemnation, but the sentence was immediately commuted to 18 months of house arrest by junta chief Senior General Than Shwe.
Aung San Suu Kyi has been detained for 14 years. Her National League for Democracy won elections in 1990 by a landslide, but the military, which has ruled Burma since 1962, refused to cede power.
The junta has announced it would hold elections some time this year under a constitution that would allow the military to maintain substantial power. Aung San Suu Kyi's party has not announced whether it will contest the elections.
The court ruling also denied freedom to two female companions who share Suu Kyi's house arrest.
Burma has been widely criticised for its continued violation of human rights, including atrocities committed by its military against minority ethnic groups. Human rights campaigners say the junta holds 2,100 political prisoners.
Tin Oo, the 82-year-old deputy leader of Aung San Suu Kyi's party was released less than two weeks ago after nearly seven years in detention. On his release he said he was very hopeful Aung San Suu Kyi would also soon be freed.
Aung Din, executive director of the US Campaign for Burma lobby group condemned the Burmese judiciary system as "part of the regime's oppressive mechanism". "The only way to make the release [of Aung San Suu Kyi] and all political prisoners in Burma is to keep putting maximum pressure on Than Shwe and his cronies until they feel the heat," he said.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/feb/26/aung-san-suu-kyi-loses-appeal
Famous Burmese Monk U Kawwida, Professor Dr Salai Tun Than, Poet Maung Swan Yee, Artist Win Pe, Elected Parliament Member (1990) U Peter Linpin, and Politician U Myint Soe (Secretary, National League for Democracy (Liberated Area) discuss and share their perspective about planned Burmese Regime's Election on January 29, 2010
Thursday, 25 February 2010
Media persona urged to join pro-democracy movement
Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – Media persona both at home and abroad, have been exhorted to join the pro-democracy struggle in Burma, by veteran journalist Ludu Sein Win and film director Win Pe.
In a video communiqué sent to the Burma Media Conference being held in northern Thailand from February 24, Ludu Sein Win said, "The media’s objective is interlaced with the cause of democracy and freedom of our country. So I would like to ask all of you to join hands and be of mutual assistance and cooperation until you reach your goal".
Ludu Sein Win hailed media persons under attack by those opposing and resisting the right cause and truth, because they are on the side of the people and the country.
Famous writer and film director Win Pe said in his message that the military regime had not only seized the executive, legislative and judicial pillars by military might but had also seized the fourth pillar - the media.
"The most important is the fourth pillar - the media. It is not just interfering and poking its nose in the media, the fact remains the media does not exist in Burma at all," he said.
"I wish today on this occasion that you can do your utmost being members of the media for progress, goodwill, safety and freedom of our country - the Union of Burma," Win Pe said.
The Burma Media Conference is for three days and is being attended by news agencies at home and abroad, politicians, bloggers and NGOs, accounting for over 100 people.
http://ping.fm/84113
Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – Media persona both at home and abroad, have been exhorted to join the pro-democracy struggle in Burma, by veteran journalist Ludu Sein Win and film director Win Pe.
In a video communiqué sent to the Burma Media Conference being held in northern Thailand from February 24, Ludu Sein Win said, "The media’s objective is interlaced with the cause of democracy and freedom of our country. So I would like to ask all of you to join hands and be of mutual assistance and cooperation until you reach your goal".
Ludu Sein Win hailed media persons under attack by those opposing and resisting the right cause and truth, because they are on the side of the people and the country.
Famous writer and film director Win Pe said in his message that the military regime had not only seized the executive, legislative and judicial pillars by military might but had also seized the fourth pillar - the media.
"The most important is the fourth pillar - the media. It is not just interfering and poking its nose in the media, the fact remains the media does not exist in Burma at all," he said.
"I wish today on this occasion that you can do your utmost being members of the media for progress, goodwill, safety and freedom of our country - the Union of Burma," Win Pe said.
The Burma Media Conference is for three days and is being attended by news agencies at home and abroad, politicians, bloggers and NGOs, accounting for over 100 people.
http://ping.fm/84113
Wednesday, 24 February 2010
The Burmese military government proposes to raise the salaries of its employees and make it at par with ASEAN countries. It is believed that the move is to woo voters for the forthcoming 2010 general elections.
“Prime Minister Thein Sein announced that a government employee will get eight times his current salary, when he visited Chin state,” said a secretary of the Township general administration.
A report said that the Finance Department is chalking out the new budget and the final draft will be completed in April 2010. The Finance Department will soon review the 2009 budget.
“Very senior employees nearing retirement will be paid compensation and made to retire from service. Employees above 45 years will also be paid compensation and pension. The rest of the employees will have their salaries increased by about eight times the current salary,” he added.
The Finance Minister General Hla Thun announced on 3 December 2009 that Ministers will get salaries on the scale of Kyat 15000-1000-200000 and Kyat 19000-2000-100000 in 2010.
“The increase in salary is welcome but the price of commodities will escalate immediately and the consequences for ordinary people will be bad,” said a government employee.
Most government employees are of the opinion that the salaries are being increased by the military junta to woo voters for the forthcoming 2010 general elections.- Khonumthung News
http://ping.fm/Znaks
“Prime Minister Thein Sein announced that a government employee will get eight times his current salary, when he visited Chin state,” said a secretary of the Township general administration.
A report said that the Finance Department is chalking out the new budget and the final draft will be completed in April 2010. The Finance Department will soon review the 2009 budget.
“Very senior employees nearing retirement will be paid compensation and made to retire from service. Employees above 45 years will also be paid compensation and pension. The rest of the employees will have their salaries increased by about eight times the current salary,” he added.
The Finance Minister General Hla Thun announced on 3 December 2009 that Ministers will get salaries on the scale of Kyat 15000-1000-200000 and Kyat 19000-2000-100000 in 2010.
“The increase in salary is welcome but the price of commodities will escalate immediately and the consequences for ordinary people will be bad,” said a government employee.
Most government employees are of the opinion that the salaries are being increased by the military junta to woo voters for the forthcoming 2010 general elections.- Khonumthung News
http://ping.fm/Znaks
Thailand to deport 1.3m
BANGKOK - MORE than 1.3 million mostly Myanmar migrant workers in Thailand are scrambling to file papers by end of this month to register for an exercise to verify their nationality, failing which they may face deportation.
The 'nationality verification' exercise theoretically will help the workers get additional social security benefits in Thailand. The workers need to register by Sunday to begin the process, which could take up to two years to complete.
One problem for many though is that the Myanmar authorities have been dragging their feet over the process, and even extracting money in some instances, leaving many in limbo just days before the Feb 28 deadline. Many Myanmar workers are fearful of giving their personal information to the authorities back home.
The Thai authorities have refused to extend the deadline despite increasing calls from international rights organisations to do so.
Thai officials say they are fully aware of the issues of human rights. And given the logistics of deporting more than a million people - and the disruption to the Thai economy - it is likely that the deportation may be deferred.
In a written response on Monday to a letter from the New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) and other organisations, Thailand's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said: 'We are certainly well aware that the question of deportation needs to take into account both the enforcement of immigration law and respect for human rights.
http://ping.fm/b3KcZ
BANGKOK - MORE than 1.3 million mostly Myanmar migrant workers in Thailand are scrambling to file papers by end of this month to register for an exercise to verify their nationality, failing which they may face deportation.
The 'nationality verification' exercise theoretically will help the workers get additional social security benefits in Thailand. The workers need to register by Sunday to begin the process, which could take up to two years to complete.
One problem for many though is that the Myanmar authorities have been dragging their feet over the process, and even extracting money in some instances, leaving many in limbo just days before the Feb 28 deadline. Many Myanmar workers are fearful of giving their personal information to the authorities back home.
The Thai authorities have refused to extend the deadline despite increasing calls from international rights organisations to do so.
Thai officials say they are fully aware of the issues of human rights. And given the logistics of deporting more than a million people - and the disruption to the Thai economy - it is likely that the deportation may be deferred.
In a written response on Monday to a letter from the New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) and other organisations, Thailand's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said: 'We are certainly well aware that the question of deportation needs to take into account both the enforcement of immigration law and respect for human rights.
http://ping.fm/b3KcZ
Myanmar: Government claims destruction of poppy plantations figures hits 13139.09 acres
Source: Government of Myanmar - During the poppy cultivation season for 2009-10, a total of 13139.09 acres of poppy plantation - 12705.65 acres from 1 September 2009 to 13 February 2010 and 433.33 acres from 14 to 20 February 2010 - have been destroyed.
The total acres of poppy plantation that have been destroyed from 14 to 20 February 2010 were 149.85 acres in Tangyan, Namhkam, Kutkai and Mongyan Townships of Shan State (North), 25. 5 acres in Phekhon and Kunhing Townships of Shan State (South), 134.3 acres in Mongton, Mongping and Monghsat Townships of Shan State (East) and 123.79 acres in Tanai, Waingmaw and Phakant Townships of Kachin State.
http://ping.fm/oOJxx
Source: Government of Myanmar - During the poppy cultivation season for 2009-10, a total of 13139.09 acres of poppy plantation - 12705.65 acres from 1 September 2009 to 13 February 2010 and 433.33 acres from 14 to 20 February 2010 - have been destroyed.
The total acres of poppy plantation that have been destroyed from 14 to 20 February 2010 were 149.85 acres in Tangyan, Namhkam, Kutkai and Mongyan Townships of Shan State (North), 25. 5 acres in Phekhon and Kunhing Townships of Shan State (South), 134.3 acres in Mongton, Mongping and Monghsat Townships of Shan State (East) and 123.79 acres in Tanai, Waingmaw and Phakant Townships of Kachin State.
http://ping.fm/oOJxx
Tuesday, 23 February 2010
The 2010 General Election: A discourse on civil and constitutional rights in BurmaShare
The 2010 General Election: A discourse on civil and constitutional rights in BurmaShare
Today at 14:58
Mon 15 Feb 2010, Banya Hong Sar, Canberra
Governmental elections are the foundation of democracy and government in modern world politics. The foundation of a nation is in its upholding of a constitution that guarantees civil and political rights for its citizens. Each clause of the constitution must guarantee these rights to all citizens. Burma’s 2010 new general elections will test these perspectives. The 12th of February is marked as “Union Day” in Burma, symbolizing unity among ethnicities or unity in diversity. This symbolization does not yet match with reality in the country of Burma, where civil wars and political conflicts between ethnic groups are deeply rooted in the history of the past sixty years.
Burma has failed to uphold the constitutional, civil, and political rights of its people, and thus its foundation as a nation, since the day after the country received independence in 1948. Imbalances of power between the central government and ethnic-based state authorities have been the seed of conflicts for over half the 20th century. The Mon, Karen, Shan, Chin, Kachin, Kayeh and other ethnic people fought for constitutional rights until 1960 but the Burman-dominated government denied them “State Constitutional Rights” in both the 1947 and 1973 new constitutions. The ethnic leaders have had no other means to gain rights besides forming armed military units, to wage civil war for the right of self determination under the Burmese constitution since that time. The battle is not yet over.
The new constitution amended by a forced referendum in May 2008 was another attempt by the government of Burma, led by the military junta, to control all constitutional power over Burma’s seven ethnic States. A 194 paged document containing all the clauses in the articles of the constitution left little space for ethnic people and states to hold constitutional power. In fact, the new constitution was based on a “unitary union” desired by the military junta, rather than the “federal union” demanded by the ethnic political leaders.
The New Mon State Party (NMSP), the principal ethnic political organization of Mon State and its people, has repeatedly urged the State Peace and Development Council, the current military junta, to redraft and have a proper debate about new constitution on several occasions. However, the military junta has rejected having a public debate on redrafting the new constitution. The Mon leaders finally rejected the constitution, and also refused to form a “Border Guard Force” of its military battalions. Tension between the SPDC and NMSP leaders both politically and militarily, has been intense for some months in Mon State. Consequently, the military junta used its power to charge a young Mon monk Buddhist teacher, and democracy activist, for possessing a laptop that contained some files protesting the new 2010 elections. The police detained and tortured him last month, and he is now in a prison cell without legal access.
Unless the military junta agrees to allow opposition parties, non-Burman State leaders’ demand for a public debate and redrafting of the constitution, the new election will be a joke. If the military junta forces all of Burma’s citizens to vote for its handpicked candidates in the upcoming elections, and the world accepts the outcome, Burma will continue to be dominated by a military government. The Burmese military junta is using every avenue and all its power to force all ethnic groups’ military battalions to form “Border Guard Forces” under the legal framework and control of the Burma Armed Force. Many ethnic leaders have rejected this invitation.
Mon State’s principle ethnic political party, the New Mon State Party, and its armed wing, the Mon National Liberation Army, have been asking Mon people at home and around the world to review the new constitution, seeking to know whether it contains the Mon peoples’ interests. Over thirty civil society groups in Mon State ran an anti- election campaign by releasing traditional “Fire Balloons” in mid 2009. The military junta got angry about the campaign, and cracked down on all leading civil rights groups in Mon State. Consequently, the Mon music and language groups are under a surveillance.
Burma has been moving down the road to democracy for over twenty years. However, the new constitution does not guarantee civil and constitutional rights for the country’s citizens. Burma’s citizens call for support from the world’s democratic leaders, asking them to pressure the current military junta to grant greater political dialogue and participation within the country. This call has been ignored for years.
Burma’s “Union Day” is meaningless unless “unity in diversity” is truly accepted by Burma’s society. The survival of Burma rests on a guarantee of constitutional rights for all its citizens, and especially for the rights of Burma’s seven ethnic states. Either pro-engagement or anti- engagement with Burma’s junta will not made any difference unless the new 2008 constitution publicly debated by all citizens. The world’s leaders must support Burma’s citizens at home and around the world by encouraging public debate on the new constitution, for the best interests of the Burmese nation. Members of democratic nations like Australia, British and USA should train constitutional lawyers in Burma.
Elections are the foundation of a modern democratic government. But, the new election sponsored by the military junta is but a bandage placed atop the political injuries of the last half century. The forcibly amended new constitution must be destroyed, and a “Federal Union” model must be drafted with allowances for equal representation for all the country’s citizens in 2010. This new model should be examined by constitutional experts from the UN, USA and other nations, with collaboration from a “Burmese Constitutional Drafting Committee that can be set up at the National Convention.
Burma is heading down a long road to democracy. Drafting the best model of a constitution, with equal representation from all ethnic representatives, the National League for Democracy, including Aung San Suu Kyi, and even representation from the current military junta, is a correct approach to solving Burma’s political crisis. A sixty day long National Convention should be held, to debate this new model of the constitution. Burma’s citizens and a constitutional technical assistance group must be given at least one hundred days for comments and debate. The new federal election should be held in late 2011 or early 2012, and then afterwards state elections should be held in due time.
Civil war is not the way to achieve political goals. Placing military rule over the nation is wrong. Neither civil war nor military rule can change Burma into a democratic nation. Constitutional reform, that guarantees constitutional rights to all citizens and all of Burma’s ethnic sates, is the best approach to the crisis. Union Day is about both unity in diversity and unity in purpose.
Today at 14:58
Mon 15 Feb 2010, Banya Hong Sar, Canberra
Governmental elections are the foundation of democracy and government in modern world politics. The foundation of a nation is in its upholding of a constitution that guarantees civil and political rights for its citizens. Each clause of the constitution must guarantee these rights to all citizens. Burma’s 2010 new general elections will test these perspectives. The 12th of February is marked as “Union Day” in Burma, symbolizing unity among ethnicities or unity in diversity. This symbolization does not yet match with reality in the country of Burma, where civil wars and political conflicts between ethnic groups are deeply rooted in the history of the past sixty years.
Burma has failed to uphold the constitutional, civil, and political rights of its people, and thus its foundation as a nation, since the day after the country received independence in 1948. Imbalances of power between the central government and ethnic-based state authorities have been the seed of conflicts for over half the 20th century. The Mon, Karen, Shan, Chin, Kachin, Kayeh and other ethnic people fought for constitutional rights until 1960 but the Burman-dominated government denied them “State Constitutional Rights” in both the 1947 and 1973 new constitutions. The ethnic leaders have had no other means to gain rights besides forming armed military units, to wage civil war for the right of self determination under the Burmese constitution since that time. The battle is not yet over.
The new constitution amended by a forced referendum in May 2008 was another attempt by the government of Burma, led by the military junta, to control all constitutional power over Burma’s seven ethnic States. A 194 paged document containing all the clauses in the articles of the constitution left little space for ethnic people and states to hold constitutional power. In fact, the new constitution was based on a “unitary union” desired by the military junta, rather than the “federal union” demanded by the ethnic political leaders.
The New Mon State Party (NMSP), the principal ethnic political organization of Mon State and its people, has repeatedly urged the State Peace and Development Council, the current military junta, to redraft and have a proper debate about new constitution on several occasions. However, the military junta has rejected having a public debate on redrafting the new constitution. The Mon leaders finally rejected the constitution, and also refused to form a “Border Guard Force” of its military battalions. Tension between the SPDC and NMSP leaders both politically and militarily, has been intense for some months in Mon State. Consequently, the military junta used its power to charge a young Mon monk Buddhist teacher, and democracy activist, for possessing a laptop that contained some files protesting the new 2010 elections. The police detained and tortured him last month, and he is now in a prison cell without legal access.
Unless the military junta agrees to allow opposition parties, non-Burman State leaders’ demand for a public debate and redrafting of the constitution, the new election will be a joke. If the military junta forces all of Burma’s citizens to vote for its handpicked candidates in the upcoming elections, and the world accepts the outcome, Burma will continue to be dominated by a military government. The Burmese military junta is using every avenue and all its power to force all ethnic groups’ military battalions to form “Border Guard Forces” under the legal framework and control of the Burma Armed Force. Many ethnic leaders have rejected this invitation.
Mon State’s principle ethnic political party, the New Mon State Party, and its armed wing, the Mon National Liberation Army, have been asking Mon people at home and around the world to review the new constitution, seeking to know whether it contains the Mon peoples’ interests. Over thirty civil society groups in Mon State ran an anti- election campaign by releasing traditional “Fire Balloons” in mid 2009. The military junta got angry about the campaign, and cracked down on all leading civil rights groups in Mon State. Consequently, the Mon music and language groups are under a surveillance.
Burma has been moving down the road to democracy for over twenty years. However, the new constitution does not guarantee civil and constitutional rights for the country’s citizens. Burma’s citizens call for support from the world’s democratic leaders, asking them to pressure the current military junta to grant greater political dialogue and participation within the country. This call has been ignored for years.
Burma’s “Union Day” is meaningless unless “unity in diversity” is truly accepted by Burma’s society. The survival of Burma rests on a guarantee of constitutional rights for all its citizens, and especially for the rights of Burma’s seven ethnic states. Either pro-engagement or anti- engagement with Burma’s junta will not made any difference unless the new 2008 constitution publicly debated by all citizens. The world’s leaders must support Burma’s citizens at home and around the world by encouraging public debate on the new constitution, for the best interests of the Burmese nation. Members of democratic nations like Australia, British and USA should train constitutional lawyers in Burma.
Elections are the foundation of a modern democratic government. But, the new election sponsored by the military junta is but a bandage placed atop the political injuries of the last half century. The forcibly amended new constitution must be destroyed, and a “Federal Union” model must be drafted with allowances for equal representation for all the country’s citizens in 2010. This new model should be examined by constitutional experts from the UN, USA and other nations, with collaboration from a “Burmese Constitutional Drafting Committee that can be set up at the National Convention.
Burma is heading down a long road to democracy. Drafting the best model of a constitution, with equal representation from all ethnic representatives, the National League for Democracy, including Aung San Suu Kyi, and even representation from the current military junta, is a correct approach to solving Burma’s political crisis. A sixty day long National Convention should be held, to debate this new model of the constitution. Burma’s citizens and a constitutional technical assistance group must be given at least one hundred days for comments and debate. The new federal election should be held in late 2011 or early 2012, and then afterwards state elections should be held in due time.
Civil war is not the way to achieve political goals. Placing military rule over the nation is wrong. Neither civil war nor military rule can change Burma into a democratic nation. Constitutional reform, that guarantees constitutional rights to all citizens and all of Burma’s ethnic sates, is the best approach to the crisis. Union Day is about both unity in diversity and unity in purpose.
Obama got the DEAF EARS on the Burmese American Imprisonment In Burma
Nyi Nyi Aung, a Burmese American has been framed and imprisoned in Burma by military regime.
Unlike the case of crazy John Yettaw who swam across the lake to the villa of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's residence because of which our precious National Leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi has been put under house arrest again, there seem to be no one hearing the outcries of the Nyi Nyi Aung's wife as well as from Burma Democracy Movement calling for US Government to put pressure on Burmese junta to release him.
American government showed serious concerns for the release of John Yettaw and Jim Webb was swift to fly Burma securing the release of the White American, John Yettaw.
If Obama administration doesn't take timely action, it would give the impression that since Nyi Nyi Aung is a Burmese Asian American, Obama’s administration pays little attention on his freedom. One would bet that Obama will take action seriously if Nyi Nyi Aung were the White American like John Yettaw or Black American like himself, if necessary; he would rage war with junta.
The Burma Democratic Concern (BDC)'s media coordinator Buffalohair wrote that "It is sad to note that Burma’s struggle for democracy was kicked in the teeth by the very country they wanted to emulate in democracy."1
According to the letter of wife of Nyi Nyi Aung which appears in “The Strait Times”, she said – “to the President Obama and Secretary Clinton, my message is simple. Neither your words nor your actions show that you take my fiancé’s imprisonment seriously,” she wrote. “I beg you to stop ignoring his plight, and to help secure his release from this illegal and unjust imprisonment. Just as Nyi Nyi continues to live up to the oath we took to defend America, please, live up to the promise America made to defend us.”2
It is a sad story for a heart-breaking wife Wa Wa Kyaw and also it is true to say that she felt betrayed by the US government. We are very concerned that why Obama administration is so slow and so low in taking action to secure the release of the Burmese American citizen.
One might pray that there shouldn't be any discrimination in the United Sates or above all in the world at large.
In the letter sent to Aung San Suu Kyi's 63rd birthday, Obama'd stated that "If the junta continues its failure to protect the dignity, health and well-being of the Burmese people, the international community must be prepared to work harder toward effective coordinated action, including but not limited to action through the United Nations Security Council."
But, Obama has been so silence on Burma crisis since he came to power and I would like Obama to be aware that Burma crisis is in very critical situation. Military junta is planning to hold sham elections in 2010 in order to legitimise military rule in Burma. This is the time to translate words into actions for the Obama administration.
Obama you must speak up for Nyi Nyi Aung and you must speak up for Burma NOW!
NOW is the time.
Myo Thein
Director
Burma democratic Concern (BDC)
http://ping.fm/eWT4J
1. http://ping.fm/0846J
2. http://ping.fm/JiKiz
Unlike the case of crazy John Yettaw who swam across the lake to the villa of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's residence because of which our precious National Leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi has been put under house arrest again, there seem to be no one hearing the outcries of the Nyi Nyi Aung's wife as well as from Burma Democracy Movement calling for US Government to put pressure on Burmese junta to release him.
American government showed serious concerns for the release of John Yettaw and Jim Webb was swift to fly Burma securing the release of the White American, John Yettaw.
If Obama administration doesn't take timely action, it would give the impression that since Nyi Nyi Aung is a Burmese Asian American, Obama’s administration pays little attention on his freedom. One would bet that Obama will take action seriously if Nyi Nyi Aung were the White American like John Yettaw or Black American like himself, if necessary; he would rage war with junta.
The Burma Democratic Concern (BDC)'s media coordinator Buffalohair wrote that "It is sad to note that Burma’s struggle for democracy was kicked in the teeth by the very country they wanted to emulate in democracy."1
According to the letter of wife of Nyi Nyi Aung which appears in “The Strait Times”, she said – “to the President Obama and Secretary Clinton, my message is simple. Neither your words nor your actions show that you take my fiancé’s imprisonment seriously,” she wrote. “I beg you to stop ignoring his plight, and to help secure his release from this illegal and unjust imprisonment. Just as Nyi Nyi continues to live up to the oath we took to defend America, please, live up to the promise America made to defend us.”2
It is a sad story for a heart-breaking wife Wa Wa Kyaw and also it is true to say that she felt betrayed by the US government. We are very concerned that why Obama administration is so slow and so low in taking action to secure the release of the Burmese American citizen.
One might pray that there shouldn't be any discrimination in the United Sates or above all in the world at large.
In the letter sent to Aung San Suu Kyi's 63rd birthday, Obama'd stated that "If the junta continues its failure to protect the dignity, health and well-being of the Burmese people, the international community must be prepared to work harder toward effective coordinated action, including but not limited to action through the United Nations Security Council."
But, Obama has been so silence on Burma crisis since he came to power and I would like Obama to be aware that Burma crisis is in very critical situation. Military junta is planning to hold sham elections in 2010 in order to legitimise military rule in Burma. This is the time to translate words into actions for the Obama administration.
Obama you must speak up for Nyi Nyi Aung and you must speak up for Burma NOW!
NOW is the time.
Myo Thein
Director
Burma democratic Concern (BDC)
http://ping.fm/eWT4J
1. http://ping.fm/0846J
2. http://ping.fm/JiKiz
Monday, 22 February 2010
Burma: Is It A Real Progress?
Is It A Real Progress?
By Htun Aung Gyaw
NLD Vice Chairman U Tin Oo was released from house arrest but releasing him from house arrest does not mean progress toward democracy and it is not a progress toward positive change. But his colleague Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is still under house arrest that she’d never committed a single crime.
On 30 May, 2003 leaders of Burma’s opposition political party, National League for Democracy (NLD) made an upper Burma organizational tour with its party members and supporters. The team was led by 1991 Nobel Peace Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi and the Party Vice Chairman Tin Oo.
Their car convoy was ambushed on May 30th, 2003 by the junta dead squads which killed as many as one hundred and was known as “Depeyin Massacre”.
The SPDC regime did not captured the culprits who killed innocent supporters of NLD party, but the regime captured NLD party Vice Chairman Tin Oo and Secretary General Aung San Suu Kyi saying that their lives were in danger and they need protection.
The real protection is detention and house arrest, this kind of act proved that criminals are at large and the victims are in custody. This is the reality of today lawlessness. After seven years under house arrest U Tin Oo was finally released not because of the regime kindness, because his house arrest term was up.
We all should know the regime released U Tin Oo for not a good gesture; they released him because the house arrest term is up. The regime tactic is if there is pressure on them and it is mounting bigger and bigger, they suddenly released some political prisoners for diverting the pressure. They use to release rumors that some significant change has come soon, many more will release within a month, so people waited for another month, wasted their precious time and forgot to fight back.
The regime use to give false hope to control the unrest, prison’s strikes and people movement. The significant tactic of the regime is using political prisoners as baits or as hostages to get some benefit from international actors. It is enough time for Burmese scholars and international actors not to fall into the regime’s trap.
PS: Htun Aung Gyaw is the one of the most prominent leaders of 1988 uprising which successfully toppled the General Ne Win led totalitarian regime. He is the patron of Burma Democratic Concern (BDC).
By Htun Aung Gyaw
NLD Vice Chairman U Tin Oo was released from house arrest but releasing him from house arrest does not mean progress toward democracy and it is not a progress toward positive change. But his colleague Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is still under house arrest that she’d never committed a single crime.
On 30 May, 2003 leaders of Burma’s opposition political party, National League for Democracy (NLD) made an upper Burma organizational tour with its party members and supporters. The team was led by 1991 Nobel Peace Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi and the Party Vice Chairman Tin Oo.
Their car convoy was ambushed on May 30th, 2003 by the junta dead squads which killed as many as one hundred and was known as “Depeyin Massacre”.
The SPDC regime did not captured the culprits who killed innocent supporters of NLD party, but the regime captured NLD party Vice Chairman Tin Oo and Secretary General Aung San Suu Kyi saying that their lives were in danger and they need protection.
The real protection is detention and house arrest, this kind of act proved that criminals are at large and the victims are in custody. This is the reality of today lawlessness. After seven years under house arrest U Tin Oo was finally released not because of the regime kindness, because his house arrest term was up.
We all should know the regime released U Tin Oo for not a good gesture; they released him because the house arrest term is up. The regime tactic is if there is pressure on them and it is mounting bigger and bigger, they suddenly released some political prisoners for diverting the pressure. They use to release rumors that some significant change has come soon, many more will release within a month, so people waited for another month, wasted their precious time and forgot to fight back.
The regime use to give false hope to control the unrest, prison’s strikes and people movement. The significant tactic of the regime is using political prisoners as baits or as hostages to get some benefit from international actors. It is enough time for Burmese scholars and international actors not to fall into the regime’s trap.
PS: Htun Aung Gyaw is the one of the most prominent leaders of 1988 uprising which successfully toppled the General Ne Win led totalitarian regime. He is the patron of Burma Democratic Concern (BDC).
Dear Friends, Please follow Burma Democratic Concern (BDC) at http://ping.fm/kNjOg
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Prisoner's fiancee 'betrayed'
'President Obama and Secretary Clinton, my message is simple. Neither your words nor your actions show that you take my fiance's imprisonment seriously,' she wrote. 'I beg you to stop ignoring his plight, and to help secure his release from this illegal and unjust imprisonment. Just as Nyi Nyi continues to live up to the oath we took to defend America, please, live up to the promise America made to defend us.'
http://ping.fm/nY1OW
'President Obama and Secretary Clinton, my message is simple. Neither your words nor your actions show that you take my fiance's imprisonment seriously,' she wrote. 'I beg you to stop ignoring his plight, and to help secure his release from this illegal and unjust imprisonment. Just as Nyi Nyi continues to live up to the oath we took to defend America, please, live up to the promise America made to defend us.'
http://ping.fm/nY1OW
Mass Burmese hunger strike in Malaysian camp
Up to one thousand detained migrants, mainly Burmese, in a Malaysian camp are on hunger strike and demanding access to the UN refugee agency amidst severe overcrowding.
The predominantly Burmese inmates in the Lenggeng camp have for a long time been living in “terrible conditions”, according to Mie Ye Tun from the Arakan Refugee Relief Committee (ARRC).
“It is very difficult to continue their life; they are ready to [hunger] strike until whenever,” Mie Ye Tun told DVB after contacting detainees too afraid to speak to the press.
The camp is said to have a capacity of 1,250; but as of August 2009 it had a population of 1,430. Exact figures of the current population are difficult to attain.
Aegile Fernandez, head of Tenaganita, a migrant NGO based in Kuala Lumpur, said: “They have transferred detainees from other camps so it’s really full to the brim. I think this is one of the reasons they are on this hunger strike, because there is lack of water and it is so uncomfortable being crushed into one place like that.”
She added that “we are asking Suharkam [the Malaysian human rights commission] to go in immediately and get feedback”.
Fernandez also suggested that the protest had come amidst a crackdown by Malaysian authorities on undocumented foreigners in the country.
“They have started the operations for nabbing the undocumented workers after the Chinese New Year [last week] so the camps now will get even more full up; they will just dump them in with or without water.”
Malaysia’s home minister last week was quoted in the press as saying that the government intended to create an environment where foreigners without legal status would feel “afraid and threatened”.
If there was any doubt therefore about the chain of command in Malaysian policing, Mie Ye Tun relayed that: “One of the captains [elected detainees] from the camp was beaten badly because he made a report to the outside”. Another captain was “told to eat the food or [the police] will become violent. They threatened them”.
The crackdown comes after Malaysia was reclassified as a Tier 3 country for human trafficking by the US state department; the worst possible classification on its scale.
The situation has been called into question by Tenaganita as the Malaysian government looks set to register around 10,000 new migrant workers, despite the large numbers of undocumented migrants already in the country.
“Our call is that they stop the intake of new migrant workers; we have asked the government to register the ones who are already here,” she said.
“The ones who are here have not all come here illegally, [but] have become undocumented as a result of the employers or agents”.
http://ping.fm/ijgWI
Up to one thousand detained migrants, mainly Burmese, in a Malaysian camp are on hunger strike and demanding access to the UN refugee agency amidst severe overcrowding.
The predominantly Burmese inmates in the Lenggeng camp have for a long time been living in “terrible conditions”, according to Mie Ye Tun from the Arakan Refugee Relief Committee (ARRC).
“It is very difficult to continue their life; they are ready to [hunger] strike until whenever,” Mie Ye Tun told DVB after contacting detainees too afraid to speak to the press.
The camp is said to have a capacity of 1,250; but as of August 2009 it had a population of 1,430. Exact figures of the current population are difficult to attain.
Aegile Fernandez, head of Tenaganita, a migrant NGO based in Kuala Lumpur, said: “They have transferred detainees from other camps so it’s really full to the brim. I think this is one of the reasons they are on this hunger strike, because there is lack of water and it is so uncomfortable being crushed into one place like that.”
She added that “we are asking Suharkam [the Malaysian human rights commission] to go in immediately and get feedback”.
Fernandez also suggested that the protest had come amidst a crackdown by Malaysian authorities on undocumented foreigners in the country.
“They have started the operations for nabbing the undocumented workers after the Chinese New Year [last week] so the camps now will get even more full up; they will just dump them in with or without water.”
Malaysia’s home minister last week was quoted in the press as saying that the government intended to create an environment where foreigners without legal status would feel “afraid and threatened”.
If there was any doubt therefore about the chain of command in Malaysian policing, Mie Ye Tun relayed that: “One of the captains [elected detainees] from the camp was beaten badly because he made a report to the outside”. Another captain was “told to eat the food or [the police] will become violent. They threatened them”.
The crackdown comes after Malaysia was reclassified as a Tier 3 country for human trafficking by the US state department; the worst possible classification on its scale.
The situation has been called into question by Tenaganita as the Malaysian government looks set to register around 10,000 new migrant workers, despite the large numbers of undocumented migrants already in the country.
“Our call is that they stop the intake of new migrant workers; we have asked the government to register the ones who are already here,” she said.
“The ones who are here have not all come here illegally, [but] have become undocumented as a result of the employers or agents”.
http://ping.fm/ijgWI
Over 260 households being forcibly relocated
In yet another instance of high handedness by the Burmese military junta, over 260 households in Mudita Street, Ward No. 2 in North Okkalapa, Rangoon have been ordered to move from their current location, local residents alleged.
Most of the residents on Mudita Street, Ward No. 2 are slum dwellers.
The North Okklapa Township Peace and Development Council (TPDC) Chairman and Ward No. 2 PDC Chairman issued the order on February 16. The order entails shifting from their places. The reason cited was the outbreak of cholera in the locality last year.
"We were told to shift in January as well. We were to move to Buthidaung under the supervision and arrangement of the authorities and would be given Kyat 300,000 per household or else sign on a paper. We signed on the paper refusing the offer," a local resident from Mudita Street told Mizzima.
"We have lived here for 35 years and pay municipal taxes. We were told to go back to the place from where we came. Now they want us to demolish our houses but we don't want to move to another place at a bad time like now." another local resident said.
Rumours doing the rounds suggest the local authorities will also forcibly shift 1,500 other households in Metta, Marga, Neikban, Thitsa, Aung Bawga and Aung Chan Tha Streets from Ward No.
http://ping.fm/dSR5c
In yet another instance of high handedness by the Burmese military junta, over 260 households in Mudita Street, Ward No. 2 in North Okkalapa, Rangoon have been ordered to move from their current location, local residents alleged.
Most of the residents on Mudita Street, Ward No. 2 are slum dwellers.
The North Okklapa Township Peace and Development Council (TPDC) Chairman and Ward No. 2 PDC Chairman issued the order on February 16. The order entails shifting from their places. The reason cited was the outbreak of cholera in the locality last year.
"We were told to shift in January as well. We were to move to Buthidaung under the supervision and arrangement of the authorities and would be given Kyat 300,000 per household or else sign on a paper. We signed on the paper refusing the offer," a local resident from Mudita Street told Mizzima.
"We have lived here for 35 years and pay municipal taxes. We were told to go back to the place from where we came. Now they want us to demolish our houses but we don't want to move to another place at a bad time like now." another local resident said.
Rumours doing the rounds suggest the local authorities will also forcibly shift 1,500 other households in Metta, Marga, Neikban, Thitsa, Aung Bawga and Aung Chan Tha Streets from Ward No.
http://ping.fm/dSR5c
Burma's political prosecution of dissidents undermines legitimacy of planned elections
Min Myat Kyaw [Member, Asian Human Rights Commission]: "The sentencing of four supporters of democracy party leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi to two years' imprisonment last week is the latest instance of how courts in Burma (Myanmar) operate under the military regime there to defeat civil and political rights, without regard to the terms of the very laws that they purport to uphold.
The imprisonment of Naw Ohn Hla and three others attracted some interest abroad partly because it coincided with a visit to Burma by the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in the country, Tomas Ojea Quintana. The envoy has rightly emphasized that an election scheduled for late in the year will not be taken seriously abroad unless all prisoners of conscience are freed.
But the manner in which cases of political imprisonment are conducted in Burma underscores the difficulties that the global community faces in documenting and addressing their incidence. The same week that Naw Ohn Hla was jailed, the Asian Human Rights Commission issued an appeal on new charges against Ma Sandar, who was released just last September after serving a sentence that was instigated by her complaints about corrupt councilors. The new case against her is under the same sections of law and before the same judge; the outcome too will probably be the same. The week before, the Commission issued an appeal for Dr. Wint Thu and eight others, whom Special Branch police illegally arrested and held incommunicado for nearly three months. In December a court handed them jail terms of up to 71 years for allegedly planning to commemorate the monk-led uprising of 2007. The prosecutor's evidence consisted of confessions that were extracted through police torture.
The constant movement of detainees to and from Burma's jails on charges that have little or nothing to do with the real reasons for their custody and even less to do with the standards of law that the courts pretend to enforce makes tracking their cases and understanding their mechanics a full time job. No sooner are persons like Ma Sandar or Naw Ohn Hla let out than they or others are rearrested and charged with new offences. There are no sweeps netting hundreds or thousands of dissidents that might grab headlines overseas. Nor are there any mass releases: amnesties free up space for new inmates, and typically include few political prisoners, many of whom are near to the end of their terms anyhow. Instead there is only a daily passing back and forth through the penal turnstiles. There is only the pointless inflicting of meaningless punishments on people like Naw Ohn Hla, Ma Sandar and Dr. Wint Thu, who are condemned for mundane acts that in most other parts of the world would not excite official interest, let alone attract criminal sanctions. There is only the cruel banality of a dictatorship whose institutions for political and social control are not going to go away on account of an election."
http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/hotline/2010/02/burmas-political-prosecution-of.php
The imprisonment of Naw Ohn Hla and three others attracted some interest abroad partly because it coincided with a visit to Burma by the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in the country, Tomas Ojea Quintana. The envoy has rightly emphasized that an election scheduled for late in the year will not be taken seriously abroad unless all prisoners of conscience are freed.
But the manner in which cases of political imprisonment are conducted in Burma underscores the difficulties that the global community faces in documenting and addressing their incidence. The same week that Naw Ohn Hla was jailed, the Asian Human Rights Commission issued an appeal on new charges against Ma Sandar, who was released just last September after serving a sentence that was instigated by her complaints about corrupt councilors. The new case against her is under the same sections of law and before the same judge; the outcome too will probably be the same. The week before, the Commission issued an appeal for Dr. Wint Thu and eight others, whom Special Branch police illegally arrested and held incommunicado for nearly three months. In December a court handed them jail terms of up to 71 years for allegedly planning to commemorate the monk-led uprising of 2007. The prosecutor's evidence consisted of confessions that were extracted through police torture.
The constant movement of detainees to and from Burma's jails on charges that have little or nothing to do with the real reasons for their custody and even less to do with the standards of law that the courts pretend to enforce makes tracking their cases and understanding their mechanics a full time job. No sooner are persons like Ma Sandar or Naw Ohn Hla let out than they or others are rearrested and charged with new offences. There are no sweeps netting hundreds or thousands of dissidents that might grab headlines overseas. Nor are there any mass releases: amnesties free up space for new inmates, and typically include few political prisoners, many of whom are near to the end of their terms anyhow. Instead there is only a daily passing back and forth through the penal turnstiles. There is only the pointless inflicting of meaningless punishments on people like Naw Ohn Hla, Ma Sandar and Dr. Wint Thu, who are condemned for mundane acts that in most other parts of the world would not excite official interest, let alone attract criminal sanctions. There is only the cruel banality of a dictatorship whose institutions for political and social control are not going to go away on account of an election."
http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/hotline/2010/02/burmas-political-prosecution-of.php
Sunday, 21 February 2010
Burma Democratic Concern (BDC) on You Tube
Dear friends,
Please visit Burma Democratic Concern (BDC) on You Tube at http://ping.fm/jfKu5
Thank you very much for your unwavering support.
Best regards,
Burma Democratic Concern (BDC)
Please visit Burma Democratic Concern (BDC) on You Tube at http://ping.fm/jfKu5
Thank you very much for your unwavering support.
Best regards,
Burma Democratic Concern (BDC)
http://www.mizzima.com/news/inside-burma/3558-nld-presents-aung-san-suu-kyi-case-to-un-rights-envoy-.html
Chiang Mai, New Delhi (Mizzima) – The National League for Democracy's (NLD) Central Executive Committee (CEC) told UN rights envoy Tomas Ojea Quintana yesterday that Aung San Suu Kyi must to be released.
Her release is vital for Burma's national reconciliation; the five NLD CEC members told Quintana during their one hour meeting at Rangoon's Mya Yeik Nyo Royal Hotel.
“We talked with him about Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. We told him that she must be released. He also said that he wanted to meet with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi”, said U Win Tin an NLD CEC member present at the meeting.
Leading the NLD delegation was NLD Vice-Chairman Tin Oo the eighty-four year decorated soldier released last weekend after serving 6 years of house arrest.
“Mr. Quintana said to us that he was very glad to see all of our CEC members here and he was encouraged seeing us altogether. And he would note down what we presented here to him and report to his superiors”, Khin Maung Swe told Mizzima.
At the meeting the NLD brought up the junta's rejection of the NLD's 1990 election victory, the NLD's demand for the immediate release of all of Burma's more than 2000 and the urgent need to amend the widely reviled 2008 constitution which permanently enshrines the military's domination of national affairs.
The NLD team also made clear to the UN envoy that they were still adhering to the points outlined in the Shwe Gong Daing Declaration and therefore the party will not contest the upcoming national elections supposedly set to take place at some point this year. The Shwe Gong Daing Declaration was adopted last year and approved at plenary meeting attended by delegates from State and Division NLD branches, MPs and the party's central leadership.
“Human rights issues are important and they cannot be considered separate from basic politics. We have no plan to join the upcoming election. We will stand on the Shwe Gong Daing Declaration.”, Win Tin said.
In the Shwe Gong Daing Declaration, the NLD party called for amending the 2008 constitution, releasing all political prisoners, the resumption of real dialogue between the opposition and the military for national reconciliation and the need for some kind of official recognition of the NLD's 1990 election landslide victory.
During the meeting the NLD informed the UN rights envoy about the regimes numerous attacks on the NLD, including the forcible closing of NLD party offices, the removal of party signboards from NLD offices and the regime's various restrictions which prevent the NLD from working with the party's grassroots supporters.
Unclear if Envoy will be allowed to meet Aung San Suu Kyi
The envoy told the NLD representatives that he would leave for Naypyidaw on Friday and hoped that upon his return from the capital the generals would allow him to see Aung San Suu Kyi. It appears Quintana will only find out if he will be able to meet the Nobel Peace Prize Winner when he returns from the military regime's sparsely populated new capital.
Following the meeting the NLD expressed their satisfaction with the UN envoy and his visit to Burma.
“We are satisfied with his visit as he will present the human rights situation in Burma to the relevant UN authorities. With regards to Burma, it is not only a human rights issue, there are also political issues which must be presented too. We hope he understands about our political situation. We hope he also presents these political issues to the UN”, Win Tin said.
During his 5-days fact finding trip which began on the February 15th, Qunitana also visited Sittwe and Buthidaung prisons in Rakhine State. While in Rakhine State, the International Labour Organization (ILO) Resident Representative in Burma Steve Marshall also accompanied him. In Rakhine they met with over 20 NGOs and Muslim leaders.
According to the UN's Rangoon spokesperson at Buthidaung prison, Quintana met with prominent 88 Generation Student activist Htay Kywe and other political prisoners including Tun Nyo, Myat Tun, Ahmed and Kyaw Min. Kyaw Min, a member of the Rohingya minority and an elected MP member is presently serving a 47 year prison sentence following his 2005 arrest and subsequent nullification of his Burmese citizenship.
At Sittwe prison the envoys met with political prisoners Than Tin, Pyae Phyo Hlaing, Aung Tun Myint and U Sandar Thiri. After arriving back in Rangoon on Thursday, Quintana met with political prisoners at the infamous Insein prison. This group included Naw Ohn Hla, Ma Than Than Htay, Kyaw San, Kyi Than, Myo Win and Khai Kyaw Moe.
Although the Information Department of the UN's Rangoon office claimed their envoy would meet with ethnic leaders during his trip, the respected United Nationalities Alliance (UNA) told Mizzima they did not receive a request for a meeting from the UN.
The UNA spokesperson Pu Cing TsianThang.told Mizzima that “the SPDC (junta) interprets ethnic leaders as those having cordial relationship with them and non opposition parties. As we have not yet received any information from UN office until today, there is almost no hope for us to meet with him”.
http://www.mizzima.com/news/inside-burma/3558-nld-presents-aung-san-suu-kyi-case-to-un-rights-envoy-.html
Her release is vital for Burma's national reconciliation; the five NLD CEC members told Quintana during their one hour meeting at Rangoon's Mya Yeik Nyo Royal Hotel.
“We talked with him about Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. We told him that she must be released. He also said that he wanted to meet with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi”, said U Win Tin an NLD CEC member present at the meeting.
Leading the NLD delegation was NLD Vice-Chairman Tin Oo the eighty-four year decorated soldier released last weekend after serving 6 years of house arrest.
“Mr. Quintana said to us that he was very glad to see all of our CEC members here and he was encouraged seeing us altogether. And he would note down what we presented here to him and report to his superiors”, Khin Maung Swe told Mizzima.
At the meeting the NLD brought up the junta's rejection of the NLD's 1990 election victory, the NLD's demand for the immediate release of all of Burma's more than 2000 and the urgent need to amend the widely reviled 2008 constitution which permanently enshrines the military's domination of national affairs.
The NLD team also made clear to the UN envoy that they were still adhering to the points outlined in the Shwe Gong Daing Declaration and therefore the party will not contest the upcoming national elections supposedly set to take place at some point this year. The Shwe Gong Daing Declaration was adopted last year and approved at plenary meeting attended by delegates from State and Division NLD branches, MPs and the party's central leadership.
“Human rights issues are important and they cannot be considered separate from basic politics. We have no plan to join the upcoming election. We will stand on the Shwe Gong Daing Declaration.”, Win Tin said.
In the Shwe Gong Daing Declaration, the NLD party called for amending the 2008 constitution, releasing all political prisoners, the resumption of real dialogue between the opposition and the military for national reconciliation and the need for some kind of official recognition of the NLD's 1990 election landslide victory.
During the meeting the NLD informed the UN rights envoy about the regimes numerous attacks on the NLD, including the forcible closing of NLD party offices, the removal of party signboards from NLD offices and the regime's various restrictions which prevent the NLD from working with the party's grassroots supporters.
Unclear if Envoy will be allowed to meet Aung San Suu Kyi
The envoy told the NLD representatives that he would leave for Naypyidaw on Friday and hoped that upon his return from the capital the generals would allow him to see Aung San Suu Kyi. It appears Quintana will only find out if he will be able to meet the Nobel Peace Prize Winner when he returns from the military regime's sparsely populated new capital.
Following the meeting the NLD expressed their satisfaction with the UN envoy and his visit to Burma.
“We are satisfied with his visit as he will present the human rights situation in Burma to the relevant UN authorities. With regards to Burma, it is not only a human rights issue, there are also political issues which must be presented too. We hope he understands about our political situation. We hope he also presents these political issues to the UN”, Win Tin said.
During his 5-days fact finding trip which began on the February 15th, Qunitana also visited Sittwe and Buthidaung prisons in Rakhine State. While in Rakhine State, the International Labour Organization (ILO) Resident Representative in Burma Steve Marshall also accompanied him. In Rakhine they met with over 20 NGOs and Muslim leaders.
According to the UN's Rangoon spokesperson at Buthidaung prison, Quintana met with prominent 88 Generation Student activist Htay Kywe and other political prisoners including Tun Nyo, Myat Tun, Ahmed and Kyaw Min. Kyaw Min, a member of the Rohingya minority and an elected MP member is presently serving a 47 year prison sentence following his 2005 arrest and subsequent nullification of his Burmese citizenship.
At Sittwe prison the envoys met with political prisoners Than Tin, Pyae Phyo Hlaing, Aung Tun Myint and U Sandar Thiri. After arriving back in Rangoon on Thursday, Quintana met with political prisoners at the infamous Insein prison. This group included Naw Ohn Hla, Ma Than Than Htay, Kyaw San, Kyi Than, Myo Win and Khai Kyaw Moe.
Although the Information Department of the UN's Rangoon office claimed their envoy would meet with ethnic leaders during his trip, the respected United Nationalities Alliance (UNA) told Mizzima they did not receive a request for a meeting from the UN.
The UNA spokesperson Pu Cing TsianThang.told Mizzima that “the SPDC (junta) interprets ethnic leaders as those having cordial relationship with them and non opposition parties. As we have not yet received any information from UN office until today, there is almost no hope for us to meet with him”.
http://www.mizzima.com/news/inside-burma/3558-nld-presents-aung-san-suu-kyi-case-to-un-rights-envoy-.html
Friday, 19 February 2010
Trailer 4:30 trt. Burma Soldier feature documentary, directed by Nic Dunlop, Annie Sundberg, Ricki Stern
A LeBrocquy Fraser / Break Thru Films production
contact +1 212 675 6568 annie@breakthrufilms.org
http://ping.fm/CCWw3
A LeBrocquy Fraser / Break Thru Films production
contact +1 212 675 6568 annie@breakthrufilms.org
http://ping.fm/CCWw3
Burma Democratic Concern (BDC) Launches “Yes We Can” Campaign
4th January 2010
Burma Democratic Concern (BDC) is launching “Yes We Can” Campaign in order to speed up democratisation process in Burma.
1. Implement 1990 election result in Burma (HOPE)
This is the HOPE which we can defeat injustice system in Burma, this is the HOPE we can defeat military dictatorship in Burma, and this is the HOPE we can restore democracy and human rights in Burma under the leadership of Aung San Suu Kyi, the democratically elected legitimate leader of Burma.
2. Review junta’s sham 2008 constitution (CHANGE)
This is the sham constitution drawn unilaterally by junta’s handpicked delegation -- which we must CHANGE. This is the sham constitution adopted unilaterally in rigged referendum – which we must CHANGE. This is the sham constitution designed to legitimise military rule in Burma -- which we must CHANGE.
3. Boycott junta’s planned sham 2010 election (NOW)
Boycott junta’s planned sham 2010 election NOW because it is designed to nullify 1990 election result. Boycott junta’s planned sham 2010 election NOW because election will be held in accord with 2008 sham constitution. Boycott junta’s planned sham 2010 election NOW because junta is setting up everything to win its own proxy party.
We would like to invite all the justice loving people around the world to join with us working to restore democracy, human rights and rule of law in Burma where everyone can enjoy the freedom of speech, press, beliefs, assembly and rule of law that emphasizes the protection of individual rights.
For more information please contact:
Burma Democratic Concern (BDC)
00-44-208 4939 137
00-44-787 7882 386
info@bdcburma.org
myothein19@gmail.com
http://www.bdcburma.org
http://ping.fm/cx1Dh
http://ping.fm/cC5Nu
http://ping.fm/W8wmj
http://ping.fm/4Jqvz
http://ping.fm/qObLX?gid=30683651648&ref=ts
4th January 2010
Burma Democratic Concern (BDC) is launching “Yes We Can” Campaign in order to speed up democratisation process in Burma.
1. Implement 1990 election result in Burma (HOPE)
This is the HOPE which we can defeat injustice system in Burma, this is the HOPE we can defeat military dictatorship in Burma, and this is the HOPE we can restore democracy and human rights in Burma under the leadership of Aung San Suu Kyi, the democratically elected legitimate leader of Burma.
2. Review junta’s sham 2008 constitution (CHANGE)
This is the sham constitution drawn unilaterally by junta’s handpicked delegation -- which we must CHANGE. This is the sham constitution adopted unilaterally in rigged referendum – which we must CHANGE. This is the sham constitution designed to legitimise military rule in Burma -- which we must CHANGE.
3. Boycott junta’s planned sham 2010 election (NOW)
Boycott junta’s planned sham 2010 election NOW because it is designed to nullify 1990 election result. Boycott junta’s planned sham 2010 election NOW because election will be held in accord with 2008 sham constitution. Boycott junta’s planned sham 2010 election NOW because junta is setting up everything to win its own proxy party.
We would like to invite all the justice loving people around the world to join with us working to restore democracy, human rights and rule of law in Burma where everyone can enjoy the freedom of speech, press, beliefs, assembly and rule of law that emphasizes the protection of individual rights.
For more information please contact:
Burma Democratic Concern (BDC)
00-44-208 4939 137
00-44-787 7882 386
info@bdcburma.org
myothein19@gmail.com
http://www.bdcburma.org
http://ping.fm/cx1Dh
http://ping.fm/cC5Nu
http://ping.fm/W8wmj
http://ping.fm/4Jqvz
http://ping.fm/qObLX?gid=30683651648&ref=ts
Burma Democratic Concern (BDC): to restore democracy, human rights and rule of law in Burma. http://ping.fm/ihODn
Thursday, 18 February 2010
Burmese Soldier who became Democracy Activist
Burma Soldier Trailer 11/2009 from Anne Sundberg on Vimeo.
Trailer 4:30 trt. Burma Soldier feature documentary, directed by Nic Dunlop, Annie Sundberg, Ricki Stern
A LeBrocquy Fraser / Break Thru Films production
contact +1 212 675 6568 annie@breakthrufilms.org
Burmese Soldier who became Democracy Activist
Burma Soldier Trailer 11/2009 from Anne Sundberg on Vimeo.
Trailer 4:30 trt. Burma Soldier feature documentary, directed by Nic Dunlop, Annie Sundberg, Ricki Stern
A LeBrocquy Fraser / Break Thru Films production
contact +1 212 675 6568 annie@breakthrufilms.org
story of a former junta member and Burmese soldier
Burma Soldier - excerpt from feature documentary from Anne Sundberg on Vimeo.
The powerful story of a former junta member and Burmese soldier who risks everything to become a pro-democracy activist.
A LeBrocquy Fraser / Break Thru Films Production
Thanks to Dr Lun Swe Blogspot
NLD-Ethnic Groups Share Common Center
BANGKOK — The perceived divide between the “mainstream” Burmese opposition led by the National League for Democracy (NLD) on the one hand, and groups representing ethnic minorities on the other, is “artificial and contrived,” according to an Amnesty International researcher.
Noting that the 2007 protests known as the “Saffron Revolution” were started by monks in Rakhine, Benjamin Zawacki, a researcher on Amnesty's Southeast Asia team, said that the presence of a substantial number of ethnic minorities in the NLD suggests that the ethnic groups share many common grievances with the Burmese opposition, and see common ground in addressing these issues.
Ethnic Karen women leave a refugee camp on the Thai-Burma border to return to Burma. About 30,000 Karen entered Thailand in June 2009 to flee fighting between rebel groups and the government. (Photo: Reuters)
“While ethnic minorities have their own issues with the Myanmar [Burma] government, a shared experience of oppression infuses links between the opposition and ethnic groups,” Zawacki said.
Zawacki spoke at a press conference in Bangkok on Tuesday, to launcha new Amnesty report “The Repression of Ethnic Minority Activists in Myanmar.” The document is based on interviews with more than 700 representatives of ethnic groups, with interviews taking place in Bangladesh, China, Thailand and other countries neighboring Burma.
It focuses on the seven main ethnic groups in Burma, those identified as making up a majority in their eponymous state, namely the Arakan, Chin, Kachin, Shan, Karenni, Karen and Mon. Ethnic minorities make up between 35 to 40 percent of the country's population, with at least 135 ethnic groups living inside Burma. Burmese make up the majority of the country's people.
Ten political parties have registered to participate in the upcoming election in Burma, according to a junta. However, the NLD and the major parties representing ethnic minorities have not indicated that they will take part.
The junta has ordered that ethnic militias, many of which are linked to political parties, stand down and become part of the state border force prior to the elections.
Burma recently marked its Union Day, commemorating the signing of the Panglong Agreement in 1947. Gen Aung San and leaders of some of the ethnic minorities agreed to establish a form of federal union in which the non-Burmese minorities would have substantial local autonomy. When the military seized power in 1962, it justified the coup by dismissing the Panglong agreement and the federation principle as code for ethnic groups trying to separate from Burma.
The report also discussed the reaction by the Burmese regime to people caught working with media groups. It recounted the 2008 shooting of a 17- year-old Mon boy accused of passing information to exile media groups, saying this type of draconian reaction affected both Burmese opposition and minority groups.
Recalling the lack of information that characterized the 2008 Constitution referendum, with the document published a mere weeks before the vote, without any minority language translation, Zawacki said he doubted that the 2010 elections would be free and fair: “International media and observers must be given access, and the election laws and dates must be published and disseminated widely, well in advance of the polling date,” he said.
However, a lack of international will and monitoring mechanism could stymie any hopes that the upcoming elections will be credible, or will lead to a better relationship between the government and minority groups.
“The Asean Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights has no investigative power, but we request that it do everything within its mandate to address violations of international human rights law in Myanmar,” said Zawacki.
Southeast Asia and China should frame ethnic relations in Burma with regard to regional stability. After six decades of on-off war between the mainly military governments of Burma and ethnic groups, millions of migrant workers and refugees have flooded into neighboring countries and unless the internal conflicts are resolved, more of the same can be expected.
After recent attempts by the Thai government to repatriate Karen refugees who fled an attack by the junta backed-DKBA last June, Amnesty International urged Bangkok to respect international human rights norms, particularly the principle of non-refoulement.
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=17826
Noting that the 2007 protests known as the “Saffron Revolution” were started by monks in Rakhine, Benjamin Zawacki, a researcher on Amnesty's Southeast Asia team, said that the presence of a substantial number of ethnic minorities in the NLD suggests that the ethnic groups share many common grievances with the Burmese opposition, and see common ground in addressing these issues.
Ethnic Karen women leave a refugee camp on the Thai-Burma border to return to Burma. About 30,000 Karen entered Thailand in June 2009 to flee fighting between rebel groups and the government. (Photo: Reuters)
“While ethnic minorities have their own issues with the Myanmar [Burma] government, a shared experience of oppression infuses links between the opposition and ethnic groups,” Zawacki said.
Zawacki spoke at a press conference in Bangkok on Tuesday, to launcha new Amnesty report “The Repression of Ethnic Minority Activists in Myanmar.” The document is based on interviews with more than 700 representatives of ethnic groups, with interviews taking place in Bangladesh, China, Thailand and other countries neighboring Burma.
It focuses on the seven main ethnic groups in Burma, those identified as making up a majority in their eponymous state, namely the Arakan, Chin, Kachin, Shan, Karenni, Karen and Mon. Ethnic minorities make up between 35 to 40 percent of the country's population, with at least 135 ethnic groups living inside Burma. Burmese make up the majority of the country's people.
Ten political parties have registered to participate in the upcoming election in Burma, according to a junta. However, the NLD and the major parties representing ethnic minorities have not indicated that they will take part.
The junta has ordered that ethnic militias, many of which are linked to political parties, stand down and become part of the state border force prior to the elections.
Burma recently marked its Union Day, commemorating the signing of the Panglong Agreement in 1947. Gen Aung San and leaders of some of the ethnic minorities agreed to establish a form of federal union in which the non-Burmese minorities would have substantial local autonomy. When the military seized power in 1962, it justified the coup by dismissing the Panglong agreement and the federation principle as code for ethnic groups trying to separate from Burma.
The report also discussed the reaction by the Burmese regime to people caught working with media groups. It recounted the 2008 shooting of a 17- year-old Mon boy accused of passing information to exile media groups, saying this type of draconian reaction affected both Burmese opposition and minority groups.
Recalling the lack of information that characterized the 2008 Constitution referendum, with the document published a mere weeks before the vote, without any minority language translation, Zawacki said he doubted that the 2010 elections would be free and fair: “International media and observers must be given access, and the election laws and dates must be published and disseminated widely, well in advance of the polling date,” he said.
However, a lack of international will and monitoring mechanism could stymie any hopes that the upcoming elections will be credible, or will lead to a better relationship between the government and minority groups.
“The Asean Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights has no investigative power, but we request that it do everything within its mandate to address violations of international human rights law in Myanmar,” said Zawacki.
Southeast Asia and China should frame ethnic relations in Burma with regard to regional stability. After six decades of on-off war between the mainly military governments of Burma and ethnic groups, millions of migrant workers and refugees have flooded into neighboring countries and unless the internal conflicts are resolved, more of the same can be expected.
After recent attempts by the Thai government to repatriate Karen refugees who fled an attack by the junta backed-DKBA last June, Amnesty International urged Bangkok to respect international human rights norms, particularly the principle of non-refoulement.
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=17826
ပုဆိုးအစိမ္း၀တ္ထားတဲ့ သူေတြက ဘယ္သူေတြလဲ ဟင္"
"အဲဒါ ၾကံ႕ဖြံ႔အဖြဲ႔၀င္ေတြကြဲ႕"
"ဟို ... အက်ႌအ၀ါ၊ ထမီအ၀ါ၀တ္ထားတဲ့ အမ်ဳိးသမီးေတြကေကာ ဘယ္သူေတြလဲ ေဖေဖ"
"အဲဒါက အမ်ဳိးသမီးေရးရာ အဖြဲ႔၀င္ေတြလို႔ ေခၚတယ္သားရဲ႕"
"ဟို ... အက်ႌနက္ျပာ၊ ေဘာင္းဘီနက္ျပာနဲ႔ လူေတြကေကာ"
"သူတို႔က အရန္မီးသတ္အဖြဲ႔၀င္ေတြကြဲ႔"
"ဟို ... အက်ႌအျဖဴ၊ ေဘာင္းဘီနက္ျပာ၊ ဦးထုပ္အျဖဴနဲ႔ လူေတြကေကာ ဘယ္သူေတြလဲ
ေဖေဖ"
"လမ္းျပပုလိပ္ေတြေပါ့ သားရဲ႕"
"အက်ႌအစိမ္း၊ ေဘာင္းဘီအစိမ္း၊ ဦးထုပ္အစိမ္းနဲ႔ လူေတြကေတာ့ စစ္သားေတြေနာ္
ေဖေဖ၊ ဟုတ္လား"
"ဟုတ္တယ္ကြဲ႔"
"အက်ႌအညိဳေရာင္၊ ေဘာင္းဘီအညိဳေရာင္၊ ဦးထုပ္အညိဳေရာင္နဲ႔ လူေတြက ရဲေတြလား
ေဖေဖ"
"ဟုတ္တယ္ေလ သားရဲ႕၊ ဘာျဖစ္လို႔ ဒီေလာက္ေတာင္ အေမးအျမန္း ထူေနရတာလဲ"
အဲဒီအခါမွာ သားျဖစ္သူ ေျပာလိုက္တဲ့စကားေၾကာင့္ အေဖျဖစ္တဲ့
သူေတာင္းစားႀကီးဟာ အံ့ၾသမွင္သက္မိသြား သတဲ့။ သားျဖစ္သူ ေျပာလိုက္တဲ့
စကားကေတာ့ …
"ေဖေဖ့ကို ၾကည့္ရတာ ပင္ပန္းလို႔ပါ ေဖေဖ၊ ေဖေဖလည္း
သူတို႔လို၀တ္စံုေတြ၀တ္ၿပီး ေတာင္းပါလား၊ အဲဒါဆို ပိုက္ဆံပိုရမွာ၊
သူတို႔ေတြ ပိုက္ဆံေတာင္းရင္ လူေတြက အမ်ားႀကီးထည့္တာ သားေတြ႔တယ္ ေဖေဖရဲ႕"
တဲ့။
"အဲဒါ ၾကံ႕ဖြံ႔အဖြဲ႔၀င္ေတြကြဲ႕"
"ဟို ... အက်ႌအ၀ါ၊ ထမီအ၀ါ၀တ္ထားတဲ့ အမ်ဳိးသမီးေတြကေကာ ဘယ္သူေတြလဲ ေဖေဖ"
"အဲဒါက အမ်ဳိးသမီးေရးရာ အဖြဲ႔၀င္ေတြလို႔ ေခၚတယ္သားရဲ႕"
"ဟို ... အက်ႌနက္ျပာ၊ ေဘာင္းဘီနက္ျပာနဲ႔ လူေတြကေကာ"
"သူတို႔က အရန္မီးသတ္အဖြဲ႔၀င္ေတြကြဲ႔"
"ဟို ... အက်ႌအျဖဴ၊ ေဘာင္းဘီနက္ျပာ၊ ဦးထုပ္အျဖဴနဲ႔ လူေတြကေကာ ဘယ္သူေတြလဲ
ေဖေဖ"
"လမ္းျပပုလိပ္ေတြေပါ့ သားရဲ႕"
"အက်ႌအစိမ္း၊ ေဘာင္းဘီအစိမ္း၊ ဦးထုပ္အစိမ္းနဲ႔ လူေတြကေတာ့ စစ္သားေတြေနာ္
ေဖေဖ၊ ဟုတ္လား"
"ဟုတ္တယ္ကြဲ႔"
"အက်ႌအညိဳေရာင္၊ ေဘာင္းဘီအညိဳေရာင္၊ ဦးထုပ္အညိဳေရာင္နဲ႔ လူေတြက ရဲေတြလား
ေဖေဖ"
"ဟုတ္တယ္ေလ သားရဲ႕၊ ဘာျဖစ္လို႔ ဒီေလာက္ေတာင္ အေမးအျမန္း ထူေနရတာလဲ"
အဲဒီအခါမွာ သားျဖစ္သူ ေျပာလိုက္တဲ့စကားေၾကာင့္ အေဖျဖစ္တဲ့
သူေတာင္းစားႀကီးဟာ အံ့ၾသမွင္သက္မိသြား သတဲ့။ သားျဖစ္သူ ေျပာလိုက္တဲ့
စကားကေတာ့ …
"ေဖေဖ့ကို ၾကည့္ရတာ ပင္ပန္းလို႔ပါ ေဖေဖ၊ ေဖေဖလည္း
သူတို႔လို၀တ္စံုေတြ၀တ္ၿပီး ေတာင္းပါလား၊ အဲဒါဆို ပိုက္ဆံပိုရမွာ၊
သူတို႔ေတြ ပိုက္ဆံေတာင္းရင္ လူေတြက အမ်ားႀကီးထည့္တာ သားေတြ႔တယ္ ေဖေဖရဲ႕"
တဲ့။
Wednesday, 17 February 2010
Tuesday, 16 February 2010
AUNG SAN SUU KYI, Burma's Legitimate Leader
“If this country is to achieve genuine democracy, the result of the elections of 1990 must be recognized. It must be recognized by the military regime, as it has been recognized by the people, and by the world at large. It is through this recognition that we will be able to make genuine progress in Burma. The results of the 1990 General Elections must be implemented is a resolution already taken by the United Nations. We already know that the General Assembly of the United Nations has accepted the notion that the will of the people has been expressed in the 1990 General Elections. This is something we can not abandon. It will be to the detriment of our country if after an election has been held the results are not honoured and we do not resist attempts to trivialise it”, Aung San Suu Kyi insists.
UN envoy meets lawyers for Burmese opposition NLD
A special UN Human Rights envoy has met lawyers for Burma's opposition party on the first day of a five-day visit to the country.
Tomas Ojea Quintana has said that with elections due sometime in 2010, Burma is facing a critical year.
Opposition groups welcomed the UN visit, with one activist saying human rights in Burma were "at the abyss".
It comes two days after pro-democracy leader Tin Oo was released following seven years in prison.
A lawyer for the National League for Democracy party (NLD) told the BBC Mr Quintana had spoken with them in Rangoon for about an hour.
The lawyer said the group had discussed Burma's legal system and the detention of their party leader, Aung San Suu Kyi.
Senior NLD member Win Tin called on Mr Quintana to "be decisive and perform his duties in the strictest manner without falling prey to the lies of the government".
"Myanmar's human rights conditions are at the abyss. The government continues to violate human rights and they don't have the will to alleviate human rights conditions," the Associated Press news agency quoted him as saying.
Mr Quintana is also expected to meet several ministers in the military government and to visit Rangoon's notorious Insein prison.
Election question
But he has not been granted an audience with the man who makes all key decisions in Burma - General Than Shwe.
Mr Quintana has also asked for permission to visit Ms Suu Kyi in detention, but on Monday said that he had not yet received a response to his request.
Tin Oo, vice-president of the NLD was released from prison on Saturday, having been in prison since 2003.
As he visited NLD headquarters on Monday, he said he was optimistic that "things can be resolved" through Mr Quintana's visit.
Gen Than Shwe said Burma's elections would be held 'soon'
He said he thought Ms Suu Kyi could be freed soon as she had shown good behaviour under house arrest, a condition of her release.
On Friday, Gen Than Shwe said elections - the first in two decades - would be held "soon".
But Tin Oo has not yet said whether the party will take part.
There are some 1,200 such political prisoners in Burma and their release will be one of the main items on Mr Quintana's agenda, says the BBC's South East Asia correspondent Rachel Harvey.
It is perhaps no coincidence that a high profile detainee such as Tin Oo won his freedom just ahead of the UN envoy's arrival, says our correspondent.
But the Burmese leadership is adept at giving hints of progress on reform when international attention is focused in its direction, she adds.
Tin Oo was at the end of his latest period of detention, so his release does not represent a major concession on the part of the government.
http://ping.fm/KX564
Tomas Ojea Quintana has said that with elections due sometime in 2010, Burma is facing a critical year.
Opposition groups welcomed the UN visit, with one activist saying human rights in Burma were "at the abyss".
It comes two days after pro-democracy leader Tin Oo was released following seven years in prison.
A lawyer for the National League for Democracy party (NLD) told the BBC Mr Quintana had spoken with them in Rangoon for about an hour.
The lawyer said the group had discussed Burma's legal system and the detention of their party leader, Aung San Suu Kyi.
Senior NLD member Win Tin called on Mr Quintana to "be decisive and perform his duties in the strictest manner without falling prey to the lies of the government".
"Myanmar's human rights conditions are at the abyss. The government continues to violate human rights and they don't have the will to alleviate human rights conditions," the Associated Press news agency quoted him as saying.
Mr Quintana is also expected to meet several ministers in the military government and to visit Rangoon's notorious Insein prison.
Election question
But he has not been granted an audience with the man who makes all key decisions in Burma - General Than Shwe.
Mr Quintana has also asked for permission to visit Ms Suu Kyi in detention, but on Monday said that he had not yet received a response to his request.
Tin Oo, vice-president of the NLD was released from prison on Saturday, having been in prison since 2003.
As he visited NLD headquarters on Monday, he said he was optimistic that "things can be resolved" through Mr Quintana's visit.
Gen Than Shwe said Burma's elections would be held 'soon'
He said he thought Ms Suu Kyi could be freed soon as she had shown good behaviour under house arrest, a condition of her release.
On Friday, Gen Than Shwe said elections - the first in two decades - would be held "soon".
But Tin Oo has not yet said whether the party will take part.
There are some 1,200 such political prisoners in Burma and their release will be one of the main items on Mr Quintana's agenda, says the BBC's South East Asia correspondent Rachel Harvey.
It is perhaps no coincidence that a high profile detainee such as Tin Oo won his freedom just ahead of the UN envoy's arrival, says our correspondent.
But the Burmese leadership is adept at giving hints of progress on reform when international attention is focused in its direction, she adds.
Tin Oo was at the end of his latest period of detention, so his release does not represent a major concession on the part of the government.
http://ping.fm/KX564
Monday, 15 February 2010
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: MONDAY 15 FEBRUARY, 2010
UNISON APPEAL FOR UN COMMISSION OF INQUIRY ON CRIMES AGAINST THE BURMESE PEOPLE
UNISON, the UK’s leading public sector trade union with 1.4 million members, has written to MPs in the UK, asking them to support an Early Day Motion* calling for a UN Commission of Inquiry to be set up into crimes committed by the Burmese Government, against its own people.
The union, a long time supporter of Aung San Suu Kyi, an honorary member of UNISON, supports trade union and labour activists who are among Burma’s 2000 political prisoners.
Dave Prentis, UNISON General Secretary, said:
“The Burmese government has no respect for democracy and basic human rights. The only way to force the dictatorship to stop committing crimes against humanity, is to impose strict economic sanctions, and for the UN to take a tougher stance.
“A Commission of Inquiry, looking into crimes the Burmese government have committed against its own people is a vital first step. UNISON is appealing to MPs to show their support for the people of Burma, and for Aung San Suu Kyi, by signing the Early Day Motion and setting up the inquiry.”
UNISON APPEAL FOR UN COMMISSION OF INQUIRY ON CRIMES AGAINST THE BURMESE PEOPLE
UNISON, the UK’s leading public sector trade union with 1.4 million members, has written to MPs in the UK, asking them to support an Early Day Motion* calling for a UN Commission of Inquiry to be set up into crimes committed by the Burmese Government, against its own people.
The union, a long time supporter of Aung San Suu Kyi, an honorary member of UNISON, supports trade union and labour activists who are among Burma’s 2000 political prisoners.
Dave Prentis, UNISON General Secretary, said:
“The Burmese government has no respect for democracy and basic human rights. The only way to force the dictatorship to stop committing crimes against humanity, is to impose strict economic sanctions, and for the UN to take a tougher stance.
“A Commission of Inquiry, looking into crimes the Burmese government have committed against its own people is a vital first step. UNISON is appealing to MPs to show their support for the people of Burma, and for Aung San Suu Kyi, by signing the Early Day Motion and setting up the inquiry.”
Parliament Questions
Burma: Arms Trade
Dr. Pugh: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether his Department has had discussions with the government of (a) Canada, (b) New Zealand and (c) Brazil on an arms embargo against Burma. [316244]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: The Government maintains a dialogue with a wide range of international partners on Burma, including the governments of Canada and New Zealand. In recent weeks we have also shared details of our position on Burma with Brazil, which became a non-permanent member of the Security Council in January.
In August 2009, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister wrote to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon and his fellow UN Security Council members underlining that no one should be selling arms to a military regime with an appalling human rights record. A global arms embargo remains a priority for this Government, and we will continue to press for progress in our bilateral contacts and in relevant multi-lateral fora.
Mr. Crabb: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what reports he has received of arms trading with Burma, with particular reference to arms from (a) India, (b) Russia and (c) China; and what assessment he has made of the effects of such trade on the situation in Burma. [316582]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: The Government believe that no one should be selling arms to the Burmese regime in view of their appalling human rights record and the high likelihood arms supplied will be use for internal repression. An EU arms embargo has been in place since 1996, and we are working to build support for a global arms embargo. To this end, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister wrote to the UN Secretary General and all members of the Security Council in August 2009.
Reports suggest that India, China and Russia have all supplied arms to Burma. China is believed to be the leading arms supplier and in early January 2010, media reports suggested Russia had agreed to supply $600 million of combat aircraft and arms to the Burma regime. In response to these reports, our embassy in Moscow raised our concerns with the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
10 Feb 2010 : Column 979W
The ability of Burma to continue to purchase arms from a wide range of suppliers has helped to reduce their defence and security costs and modernise an army responsible for widespread and systematic human rights abuses.
Burma: Human Rights
Dr. Pugh: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what discussions he has had in the United Nations Human Rights Council and the United Nations General Assembly on reports of crimes against humanity and war crimes in Burma. [316245]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: The Government remain deeply concerned at the human rights situation in Burma and we regularly raise the issue with EU and other international partners, and in the UN's human rights bodies. At the last session of the Human Rights Council in September 2009, and at the UN General Assembly in November 2009, we helped to secure strong resolutions condemning the Burmese regime for ongoing and systematic human rights abuses. We will be looking to raise the issue again, and secure a further resolution, at the next session of the Human Rights Council in March 2010. In addition, we continue to give our full support to the efforts of the Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in Burma-Thomas Ojea Quintana, who is due to visit the country soon.
Mr. Carmichael: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he has had discussions with (a) his EU counterparts, (b) the United Nations Human Rights Council and (c) the United Nations General Assembly on reports of crimes against humanity in Burma. [316378]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: The Government remain deeply concerned at the human rights situation in Burma and we regularly raise the issue with EU and other international partners, and in the UN's human rights bodies. At the last session of the Human Rights Council in September 2009, and at the UN General Assembly in November 2009, we helped to secure strong resolutions condemning the Burmese regime for ongoing and systematic human rights abuses. We will be looking to raise the issue again, and secure a further resolution, at the next session of the Human Rights Council in March 2010. In addition, we continue to give our full support to the efforts of the Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in Burma, Thomas Ojea Quintana, who is due to visit the country soon.
Mr. Carmichael: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what aims and objectives he has set for the outcome of the United Nations Human Rights Council meeting on Burma. [316380]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: At the 13th session of the Human Rights Council in March 2010 we will work to secure a further, strong resolution condemning the continuing human right abuses in Burma. In our national intervention, and in the resolution text, we will seek to emphasise that the dire human rights situation, including the continued detention of 2100 political prisoners, child labour and the treatment of displaced people remain cause of significant concern. Burma's treatment of political leaders and suppression of freedom of expression undermine the credibility of elections planned for later this year.
10 Feb 2010 : Column 980W
Mr. Crabb: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will seek to secure EU targeted sanctions against the government of Burma until the human rights situation in Burma improves. [316581]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: The Government continue to believe that targeted EU sanctions against the military regime in Burma are an important means of maintaining pressure for political reform and respect for human rights. Sanctions introduced in 1996 have been strengthened over time, notably after the Saffron Revolution in 2007, and in August 2009 in response to the guilty verdict in Aung San Suu Kyi's trial. They are now among the EU's toughest autonomous measures against any country. The UK will not support any easing of sanctions in the absence of tangible progress on the ground.
Burma: Political Prisoners
Dr. Pugh: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he has had discussions in the United Nations Human Rights Council on the arrest of pro-democracy activist Nyi Nyi Aung in Burma in September 2009. [316241]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: We are deeply concerned at the arrest and imprisonment of Nyi Nyi Aung and are monitoring his case closely.
We continue to take every opportunity to raise the detention of Burma's 2100 political prisoners in the UN's Human Rights bodies. At the last session of the Human Rights Council in September 2009, and at the UN General Assembly in November 2009, we helped to secure strong resolutions calling for the release of all of political prisoners. We will be looking to raise the issue again, and secure a further resolution, at the next session of the Human Rights Council in March 2010.
Dr. Pugh: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he has made representations to the Burmese authorities on permitting the International Committee of the Red Cross to resume its inspection of prisons in Burma. [316242]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: The refusal of the Burmese authorities to allow the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) independent and unsupervised access to political prisoners remains a grave concern, particularly as the number of prisoners of conscience has doubled to over 2100 since the 'Saffron revolution' in autumn 2007. We continue to urge the military government to co-operate fully with the ICRC and allow an immediate resumption of prison visits.
The UN General Assembly highlighted their concern at the condition of prisons and urged the regime to comply with human rights law in a resolution passed in November 2009. Our Ambassador in Rangoon last raised the issue of independent prison access for the ICRC to the Burmese government in August 2009 during the last visit of the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Burma. Our Ambassador regularly raises the plight of political prisoners with Burmese ministers, and we remain in close contact with the ICRC on this issue.
10 Feb 2010 : Column 981W
Dr. Pugh: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he has received reports on the recent sentencing and imprisonment of a journalist who worked with the Democratic Voice of Burma. [316243]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: We are aware that Democratic Voice of Burma journalist Ngwe Soe Lin was sentenced to 13 years in prison on 27 January 2010 by a Burmese military court for offences under the Electronic and Immigration Emergency Provisions Acts. This case follows the recent sentencing of two other journalists from the Democratic Voice of Burma to 20 and 26 years imprisonment respectively. At least 13 journalists and bloggers are currently detained in Burma, as the Burmese authorities seek to prevent the free flow of information in advance of elections planned for later this year.
The Government have consistently called on the military authorities to release all of Burma's over 2100 prisoners of conscience. Without their release, elections planned for later this year can have no international credibility.
Burma: Politics and Government
Mr. Carmichael: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will request the United Nations Security Council to undertake a review of the 2008 Burmese constitution together with representatives of (a) pro-democracy, (b) ethnic and (c) other groups in Burma. [316379]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: In November 2009 the UK helped to secure a UN General Assembly Resolution on the human rights situation in Burma, which called on the Burmese authorities to undertake a transparent, inclusive and comprehensive review of the Constitution while fully engaging with the democratic opposition and ethnic groups. We believe that a process of dialogue involving all actors in Burma will ensure a sustainable transition to democracy. This view is shared by other members of the EU and the United States of America.
In the UN Security Council, we regularly test the level of consensus for action on Burma, and have succeeded in securing discussion and a number of important Presidential Statements since autumn 2007. We do not judge, however, that an attempt to secure a Security Council review on the 2008 Constitution now would be successful. A resolution on Burma tabled in January 2007 was vetoed by two Permanent Members of the Council and any attempt to invalidate the Constitution will suffer the same fate.
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/cmhansrd/cm100210/text/100210w0003.htm#10021071000485
Dr. Pugh: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether his Department has had discussions with the government of (a) Canada, (b) New Zealand and (c) Brazil on an arms embargo against Burma. [316244]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: The Government maintains a dialogue with a wide range of international partners on Burma, including the governments of Canada and New Zealand. In recent weeks we have also shared details of our position on Burma with Brazil, which became a non-permanent member of the Security Council in January.
In August 2009, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister wrote to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon and his fellow UN Security Council members underlining that no one should be selling arms to a military regime with an appalling human rights record. A global arms embargo remains a priority for this Government, and we will continue to press for progress in our bilateral contacts and in relevant multi-lateral fora.
Mr. Crabb: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what reports he has received of arms trading with Burma, with particular reference to arms from (a) India, (b) Russia and (c) China; and what assessment he has made of the effects of such trade on the situation in Burma. [316582]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: The Government believe that no one should be selling arms to the Burmese regime in view of their appalling human rights record and the high likelihood arms supplied will be use for internal repression. An EU arms embargo has been in place since 1996, and we are working to build support for a global arms embargo. To this end, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister wrote to the UN Secretary General and all members of the Security Council in August 2009.
Reports suggest that India, China and Russia have all supplied arms to Burma. China is believed to be the leading arms supplier and in early January 2010, media reports suggested Russia had agreed to supply $600 million of combat aircraft and arms to the Burma regime. In response to these reports, our embassy in Moscow raised our concerns with the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
10 Feb 2010 : Column 979W
The ability of Burma to continue to purchase arms from a wide range of suppliers has helped to reduce their defence and security costs and modernise an army responsible for widespread and systematic human rights abuses.
Burma: Human Rights
Dr. Pugh: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what discussions he has had in the United Nations Human Rights Council and the United Nations General Assembly on reports of crimes against humanity and war crimes in Burma. [316245]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: The Government remain deeply concerned at the human rights situation in Burma and we regularly raise the issue with EU and other international partners, and in the UN's human rights bodies. At the last session of the Human Rights Council in September 2009, and at the UN General Assembly in November 2009, we helped to secure strong resolutions condemning the Burmese regime for ongoing and systematic human rights abuses. We will be looking to raise the issue again, and secure a further resolution, at the next session of the Human Rights Council in March 2010. In addition, we continue to give our full support to the efforts of the Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in Burma-Thomas Ojea Quintana, who is due to visit the country soon.
Mr. Carmichael: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he has had discussions with (a) his EU counterparts, (b) the United Nations Human Rights Council and (c) the United Nations General Assembly on reports of crimes against humanity in Burma. [316378]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: The Government remain deeply concerned at the human rights situation in Burma and we regularly raise the issue with EU and other international partners, and in the UN's human rights bodies. At the last session of the Human Rights Council in September 2009, and at the UN General Assembly in November 2009, we helped to secure strong resolutions condemning the Burmese regime for ongoing and systematic human rights abuses. We will be looking to raise the issue again, and secure a further resolution, at the next session of the Human Rights Council in March 2010. In addition, we continue to give our full support to the efforts of the Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in Burma, Thomas Ojea Quintana, who is due to visit the country soon.
Mr. Carmichael: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what aims and objectives he has set for the outcome of the United Nations Human Rights Council meeting on Burma. [316380]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: At the 13th session of the Human Rights Council in March 2010 we will work to secure a further, strong resolution condemning the continuing human right abuses in Burma. In our national intervention, and in the resolution text, we will seek to emphasise that the dire human rights situation, including the continued detention of 2100 political prisoners, child labour and the treatment of displaced people remain cause of significant concern. Burma's treatment of political leaders and suppression of freedom of expression undermine the credibility of elections planned for later this year.
10 Feb 2010 : Column 980W
Mr. Crabb: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will seek to secure EU targeted sanctions against the government of Burma until the human rights situation in Burma improves. [316581]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: The Government continue to believe that targeted EU sanctions against the military regime in Burma are an important means of maintaining pressure for political reform and respect for human rights. Sanctions introduced in 1996 have been strengthened over time, notably after the Saffron Revolution in 2007, and in August 2009 in response to the guilty verdict in Aung San Suu Kyi's trial. They are now among the EU's toughest autonomous measures against any country. The UK will not support any easing of sanctions in the absence of tangible progress on the ground.
Burma: Political Prisoners
Dr. Pugh: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he has had discussions in the United Nations Human Rights Council on the arrest of pro-democracy activist Nyi Nyi Aung in Burma in September 2009. [316241]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: We are deeply concerned at the arrest and imprisonment of Nyi Nyi Aung and are monitoring his case closely.
We continue to take every opportunity to raise the detention of Burma's 2100 political prisoners in the UN's Human Rights bodies. At the last session of the Human Rights Council in September 2009, and at the UN General Assembly in November 2009, we helped to secure strong resolutions calling for the release of all of political prisoners. We will be looking to raise the issue again, and secure a further resolution, at the next session of the Human Rights Council in March 2010.
Dr. Pugh: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he has made representations to the Burmese authorities on permitting the International Committee of the Red Cross to resume its inspection of prisons in Burma. [316242]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: The refusal of the Burmese authorities to allow the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) independent and unsupervised access to political prisoners remains a grave concern, particularly as the number of prisoners of conscience has doubled to over 2100 since the 'Saffron revolution' in autumn 2007. We continue to urge the military government to co-operate fully with the ICRC and allow an immediate resumption of prison visits.
The UN General Assembly highlighted their concern at the condition of prisons and urged the regime to comply with human rights law in a resolution passed in November 2009. Our Ambassador in Rangoon last raised the issue of independent prison access for the ICRC to the Burmese government in August 2009 during the last visit of the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Burma. Our Ambassador regularly raises the plight of political prisoners with Burmese ministers, and we remain in close contact with the ICRC on this issue.
10 Feb 2010 : Column 981W
Dr. Pugh: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he has received reports on the recent sentencing and imprisonment of a journalist who worked with the Democratic Voice of Burma. [316243]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: We are aware that Democratic Voice of Burma journalist Ngwe Soe Lin was sentenced to 13 years in prison on 27 January 2010 by a Burmese military court for offences under the Electronic and Immigration Emergency Provisions Acts. This case follows the recent sentencing of two other journalists from the Democratic Voice of Burma to 20 and 26 years imprisonment respectively. At least 13 journalists and bloggers are currently detained in Burma, as the Burmese authorities seek to prevent the free flow of information in advance of elections planned for later this year.
The Government have consistently called on the military authorities to release all of Burma's over 2100 prisoners of conscience. Without their release, elections planned for later this year can have no international credibility.
Burma: Politics and Government
Mr. Carmichael: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will request the United Nations Security Council to undertake a review of the 2008 Burmese constitution together with representatives of (a) pro-democracy, (b) ethnic and (c) other groups in Burma. [316379]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: In November 2009 the UK helped to secure a UN General Assembly Resolution on the human rights situation in Burma, which called on the Burmese authorities to undertake a transparent, inclusive and comprehensive review of the Constitution while fully engaging with the democratic opposition and ethnic groups. We believe that a process of dialogue involving all actors in Burma will ensure a sustainable transition to democracy. This view is shared by other members of the EU and the United States of America.
In the UN Security Council, we regularly test the level of consensus for action on Burma, and have succeeded in securing discussion and a number of important Presidential Statements since autumn 2007. We do not judge, however, that an attempt to secure a Security Council review on the 2008 Constitution now would be successful. A resolution on Burma tabled in January 2007 was vetoed by two Permanent Members of the Council and any attempt to invalidate the Constitution will suffer the same fate.
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/cmhansrd/cm100210/text/100210w0003.htm#10021071000485
Ministerial Statement on Burma
MINISTER FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS
STEPHEN SMITH
8 February 2010
Ministerial Statement on Burma
Mr Deputy Speaker.
I wish to update the House on developments in Burma.
On 4 January, Burma’s Independence Day, Burmese Senior General Than Shwe announced that plans were under way to conduct elections in Burma this year.
Elections have long been foreshadowed under the Burmese military’s so-called ‘Roadmap to Democracy’.
If elections do take place, they will be the first in Burma in 20 years.
This year will, therefore, be an important one for Burma, and an important one for the international community’s engagement with Burma.
Australia has long been appalled both by the Burmese military’s suppression of the democratic aspirations of the Burmese people and by its disrespect for their human rights.
It is worthwhile recalling some important events in this longstanding suppression.
A military regime, in some form, has ruled Burma since 1962, nearly 50 years.
We recall the bloody put down of pro-democracy protests in 1988, just over 20 years ago.
Since 1988 Australia has had in place visa restrictions against senior members of the Burmese regime and their associates and supporters.
Following the failure to implement the outcome of the 1990 elections, in 1991 Australia introduced a ban on defence exports to Burma.
This is a ban on the export to Burma of controlled goods as listed on the Defence and Strategic Goods List.
In October 2007, financial sanctions were introduced in response to the violent crackdown on democracy protesters.
These various sanctions – travel sanctions, defence sanctions and financial sanctions – have the common purpose of exerting pressure on Burma’s military regime.
At the same time, Australia has recognised that engaging the Burmese authorities serves important national, regional and international interests.
We live in the same region. Through regional forums like the ASEAN Post-Ministerial Conference, the ASEAN Regional Forum and the Bali Process on People Smuggling, Human Trafficking and Transnational Crime, Australia has had the opportunity to engage Burma on challenges like counter-narcotics, trafficking in people, disaster relief and pandemic disease.
As well, Australia has for many years sought to help the Burmese people through a program of humanitarian assistance targeting the most vulnerable.
This program, now worth nearly $30 million in 2009-10, assists with fighting infectious diseases such as avian influenza, HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis; provides food aid and agricultural expertise to alleviate rural poverty; protects displaced people; and supports children to attend and remain in primary school.
ASEAN, through its humanitarian work in Burma after Cyclone Nargis, has been vital in facilitating assistance from Australia and members of the international community to the Burmese people.
Common membership of regional organisations also allows us at Ministerial level to directly advocate democratic reform and national reconciliation – as I did when I met my counterpart Burmese Foreign Minister Nyan Win during the ASEAN-related meetings in Thailand in July 2009.
Mr Deputy Speaker.
On 12 August 2009 I addressed the House on Burma after Aung San Suu Kyi’s conviction on spurious charges, leading to her ongoing house arrest.
I set out then that Aung San Suu Kyi’s sentence effectively removed the prospect of her participation in any proposed 2010 elections and would detract from the credibility of those elections.
Since that time, there have been a number of important developments both within Burma and in the international community’s approach to Burma.
On 17 September 2009 the Burmese authorities released 128 political prisoners in an amnesty. This was a welcome, tentative step in the right direction.
Repression however continues.
On 31 December, 15 activists were sentenced to up to 71 years imprisonment each. There regrettably remain close to 2000 political prisoners in Burma, including Aung San Suu Kyi.
Australia again calls on Burma’s authorities to release them and allow them to participate fully and freely in the upcoming elections.
In September 2009, in the margins of the United Nations General Assembly, I joined ten other Foreign Ministers and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in a Ministerial-level meeting of the Secretary-General’s Group of Friends of Myanmar.
The participation in this meeting was evidence both of the international community’s desire to see progress in Burma and of its willingness to both work together and with the Secretary General towards this end.
At the meeting, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon identified three areas for future unity of purpose and action:
First, to urge Burma to work with the United Nations to ensure an inclusive process of dialogue and create the conditions for credible elections.
Second, to uphold the role of the United Nations in Burma.
And third, to signal the international community’s willingness to help the people of Burma, but noting that Burma’s military regime needed to respond to international concerns in order for this to occur.
My visit to New York for the General Assembly coincided with the announcement of the United States policy review on Burma.
The United States Administration concluded that a sanctions-only policy to isolate Burma’s military has not worked and that future US policy would combine engagement, appropriate sanctions and humanitarian assistance.
US Secretary of State Clinton said that any debate that pits sanctions against engagement created a false choice, and that the international community would need to employ both of these tools.
Australia has welcomed this approach, as has the international community generally.
As to developments within Burma, on 25 September 2009 Aung San Suu Kyi wrote to Senior General Than Shwe offering to work with the Burmese authorities on the withdrawal of international sanctions, and asking to meet representatives of the European Union, the United States and Australia.
The fact that Australia was one of these three was significant and reflects the longstanding interest Australians have in Burma.
The authorities agreed to this request.
On 9 October 2009 Australia’s Chargé d’Affaires, together with the UK Ambassador and the US Chargé d’Affaires, met Aung San Suu Kyi in Rangoon.
The meeting was the first opportunity for a substantive discussion between an Australian representative and Aung San Suu Kyi since February 2003.
Australia’s Chargé conveyed a message from the Prime Minister which expressed the support of the Australian Government and the people of Australia for Aung San Suu Kyi and her struggle for democracy in Burma.
This was warmly welcomed by Aung San Suu Kyi.
Australia welcomed the subsequent visit to Burma in early November by United States Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell and the meetings he held with the Burmese authorities, with Aung San Suu Kyi and with representatives of a number of ethnic minorities.
Aung San Suu Kyi wrote further to Senior General Than Shwe on 11 November 2009 requesting contact with her party’s Central Executive Committee.
In response to her request, she was permitted to meet three of the Central Executive Committee’s elders, including Chairman U Aung Shwe, on 16 December 2009.
Australia hopes that a meeting with the full Executive will take place soon.
This is the first substantial contact which Aung San Suu Kyi has had with the leadership of the National League for Democracy since 2007, and is warmly welcomed by the Australian Government as essential to democratic and political progress in Burma.
Australia hopes these initial engagements between Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese authorities and the international community are the beginning of a process of genuine dialogue.
Elections
Mr Deputy Speaker.
The Burmese authorities have embarked on the so-called “Roadmap to Democracy”, a strictly controlled process of potential political change.
It was a matter of great regret that they pushed ahead with a constitutional referendum, the fourth step in their Roadmap, in the midst of the disaster of Cyclone Nargis in May 2008.
That referendum was a regrettable sham.
Not surprisingly, political parties in Burma, including the National League for Democracy, and parties representing ethnic groups, are carefully considering whether to participate in the 2010 elections.
Burma’s authorities have an opportunity to engage the people, to ensure the full and free participation in the elections of the Burmese opposition, nascent political parties, and ethnic groups.
For Burma’s longer-term stability and security, the coming political process needs to address the concerns of the country’s diverse ethnic minority groups.
While, of course, given the history of these matters, there are long standing reservations, Australia will not pre-judge the process and the outcome of these elections.
Australia urges Burma’s authorities to seize this opportunity to genuinely move their country forward.
Development Assistance
Mr Deputy Speaker.
Australia has long provided humanitarian assistance to Burma.
In the 2009-10 Budget, the Government allocated nearly $30 million in humanitarian assistance, a significant increase in base funding over the previous year.
This will help address the pressing needs of the Burmese people.
Half of Burma’s almost 50 million people live in extreme poverty.
Child mortality rates are among the highest in the world.
Decades of military rule have eroded civil society and civilian institutions.
Skills have been lost and infrastructure has deteriorated.
At some stage into the future, Burma will have a civilian Government, which will face great challenges.
At some stage into the future, the regional and international community will be asked to help in the rebuilding of Burma’s economic and social structures.
Australia’s view therefore is that the international community help prepare Burma for the future.
Burma’s capacity cannot be allowed to completely atrophy to the ultimate disadvantage and cost of its people.
The international community needs to start the rebuilding now.
This is not a reward for Burma’s military, but a recognition of the immense task faced by current and future generations of Burmese.
At around $4 per head per annum, international aid to Burma is less than a tenth of that received by Cambodia and a sixteenth of that received by Laos.
Australia will accordingly increase its assistance to Burma over the next three years to around $50 million annually, a 67 per cent increase.
Alleviating humanitarian needs will remain an important goal and focus of this expenditure.
But the Government has decided that Australia’s program will also include capacity building elements, addressing the long-term challenges facing the Burmese people.
This will involve carefully targeted interaction in areas of great need like health, education and agriculture.
Our assistance will continue to be delivered in partnership with international organisations, such as UN agencies, ASEAN, other donor nations and non-government organisations.
We will expand existing initiatives in basic health care, including child and maternal health. We will work to improve the delivery of basic health services by equipping health clinics, training nurses, health care staff and administrators and providing better community health education and information.
At the village level, we will assist primary health care workers, including midwives, with critical training and medical supplies to help arrest the decline in health outcomes for vulnerable and isolated people.
We will continue to support the delivery of vital treatment, prevention and screening services for HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, including through the Three Diseases Fund supported by Australia, the European Commission, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and the United Kingdom. The Fund aims to reduce these three diseases in Burma.
We will also address critical water, sanitation and hygiene needs through:
1. the construction and rehabilitation of ponds and wells;
2. building latrines for community schools and rural health centres; and
3. working to provide equitable access to clean water.
In 2008-09 Australia’s assistance contributed to the basic education of over 400,000 children in Burma. We will increase our support to enable more poor and disadvantaged children to go to primary school.
Australian assistance will improve teaching and mentoring skills, both in the classroom and at home. Working closely with United Nations agencies, Non Government Organisations (NGOs) and other donors, we will support training programs for early childhood development workers, primary teachers and township education officials.
We will also continue to support vulnerable communities in the Irrawaddy Delta to restore their crop and fishing businesses, and in other areas of protracted need such as northern Rakhine State where the situation of the Rohingyas is very dire.
Australia will provide $20 million over the next four years to assist poor communities in Burma to:
1. improve access to credit, seeds, and tools;
2. provide training in small enterprise;
3. help farmers diversify their production and gain access to markets.
I have also asked the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and AusAID to explore a scholarship scheme for Burma.
Australia will liaise with partners such as the European Union, Germany, Japan, New Zealand, the Republic of Korea, Singapore, the United Kingdom and the United States, all of whom have scholarship schemes for Burma, to learn from their experience.
It is proposed that a new scholarship scheme will target Burmese with the potential to build civil society and improve service delivery, including in health, education and agriculture.
As a start, 10 postgraduate scholarships and short term professional development placements will be made available, beginning in 2010-11.
We will work with the UN to carefully identify suitable candidates.
This assistance will be in addition to Australia’s significant contribution for relief and recovery efforts following Cyclone Nargis in May 2008.
Australia’s post-Nargis assistance continues to be delivered through effective and trusted aid partners such as the United Nations and Australian NGOs and includes:
1. agricultural inputs to help farmers restore their crops and livestock;
2. helping fishermen by providing nets and repairing boats;
3. repairing over 1,200 damaged schools and providing books and materials for over 360,000 children;
4. reducing disease risk by constructing 50,000 latrines and providing one million mosquito nets; and
5. supplies and shelter for vulnerable communities.
Burma is a difficult operating environment, but the collective experience in Burma over many years shows we can deliver assistance effectively to improve the lives of ordinary Burmese without benefiting the military authorities.
Sanctions
Mr Deputy Speaker.
Australia urges Burma’s military to respond positively to Aung San Suu Kyi’s recent offer to work towards the lifting of international sanctions.
Such a positive response would help make meaningful progress towards democratic reform, respect for human rights, and national dialogue and reconciliation.
Until we see significant change from Burma’s authorities, the Australian Government will maintain a policy of targeted financial sanctions.
We agree with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s observation that to lift sanctions now would send the wrong signal.
However, an expansion of sanctions at this time would send a confusing signal.
In view of the nascent discussions between the authorities and Aung San Suu Kyi, I have decided that sanctions should not be expanded at this time.
As a result, the sanctions list I announced in October 2008 will remain in operation for the present.
Diplomacy
Mr Speaker.
I earlier referred to my discussions on Burma in New York in September 2009.
These discussions again revealed the region’s and the international community’s great frustration with the Burmese authorities’ treatment of the political opposition, their self-imposed isolation, and the circumstances of the Burmese people.
My discussions also revealed that the international community is increasingly prepared to draw on a wide range of diplomatic tools, including both sanctions and engagement, to press for change in Burma.
Neither Australia nor the international community should however have any illusions that progress in Burma will be quick or easy.
Australia will continue to work closely with ASEAN and its member countries, including by continuing to support ASEAN’s much-needed humanitarian efforts in Burma.
We will cooperate closely with the United States as it pursues greater engagement with Burma, and with other major donors like the United Kingdom, to ensure our combined assistance does the greatest amount of good for the Burmese people.
We will also continue to support the work of the United Nations and the Secretary General.
We endorse UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s call for the international community to support UN efforts to promote respect for human rights, inclusive political dialogue and development in Burma.
Australia strongly supported the role of Ibrahim Gambari as the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative on Burma. His term concluded at the beginning of this year, and we look forward to working closely with his successor.
Conclusion
Mr Deputy Speaker.
Australia and the international community stand ready to assist Burma.
But it is not a one way street.
Australia urges the Burmese authorities to respond in good faith both to international engagement and to Aung San Suu Kyi’s recent approach to it on sanctions and on dialogue.
In moving towards dialogue and genuine national reconciliation, Burma’s authorities can end their isolation.
Australia has always considered the Burmese people our friends.
When Cyclone Nargis struck, Australia responded generously, despite our political differences with the Burmese authorities.
That was the right decision then, and it is the right decision now, together with the international community, to do more for the long-term future of Burma’s people.
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Asean MPs requests Thailand to halt plans to return Burma asylum seekers
February 11 2010
The ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Myanmar Caucus (AIPMC) is gravely concerned for the well being of unregistered Karen refugees currently residing in displacement sites in Tha Song Yang District, Tak. Announcements last month from the Thai government relating to the planned forced repatriation of the refugees beginning in February 2010 have caused renewed concern for their safety. AIPMC welcomes the Thai government’s decision to halt the repatriation of the estimated 3,000 refugees until their safety can be assured. AIPMC furthermore calls on the Thai government to make public and implement a clear policy regarding refugees fleeing from conflict zones across the border in Myanmar. Province
The flow of refugees from Myanmar’s Karen has been increasing since June 2009 when renewed fighting between the Karen National Union (KNU) and the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), supported by the SPDC, put villagers in danger, causing them to flee across the border. These refugees have temporarily been permitted to reside in Thailand under the care of the Thai Military. State
Despite the victory of the DKBA, the situation in Karen remains unstable and unsafe for villagers. The area from which the refugees fled is heavily landmined and numerous injuries and deaths among people returning to their villages have been reported by organizations working in the areas concerned and with the refugees. State
Though the precariousness of the situation in Karen State is well known, a group of 13 refugees from Nong Bua, mostly women and children, and a group of 26 families from Usu Tha were recently repatriated to Myanmar. These refugees were sent back without witnesses or evidence to certify that their return was voluntary. Additionally, reports have surfaced of the Thai military using threats and coercion to force refugees’ return to Myanmar.
This use of threats and coercion to pressure refugees into returning to an area that is clearly not safe is unacceptable. AIPMC urges the Thai government to fully investigate these charges and to closely monitor the situation of the refugees currently under the care of the Thai Military. Furthermore, AIPMC calls on the Thai government to cooperate with UNHCR and other appropriate agencies to allow for the registration and proper care of the refugees until it is safe for them to return home.
The flow of refugees fleeing the dangerous and repressive situation in Myanmar is not a new problem. Widespread human rights violations and armed offensives by Myanmar’s military government against its own citizens have caused massive refugees flows in the region for many years. The underlying source of the refugee problem is the continued violence and oppression perpetrated by Myanmar’s government. To permanently end the flow of refugees from Myanmar a concerted effort to end human rights abuses and begin a dialogue of national reconciliation is necessary.
AIPMC requests ASEAN to use its Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights to investigate all claims of human rights abuses in Myanmar. Furthermore, the Commission should seek to ensure that Myanmar is held accountable for its past abuses and prevented from committing further violence against its citizens. Additionally, AIPMC urges ASEAN to develop and implement a regional policy concerning the member states’ responsibilities regarding refugees.
Finally, AIPMC calls on the government of Myanmar to begin the process of national reconciliation through genuine dialogue with Aung San Suu Kyi, the National League for Democracy and ethnic nationalities. As a first step in this process AIPMC urges the government of Myanmar to release Aung San Suu Kyi and all other political prisoners currently in detention.
STEPHEN SMITH
8 February 2010
Ministerial Statement on Burma
Mr Deputy Speaker.
I wish to update the House on developments in Burma.
On 4 January, Burma’s Independence Day, Burmese Senior General Than Shwe announced that plans were under way to conduct elections in Burma this year.
Elections have long been foreshadowed under the Burmese military’s so-called ‘Roadmap to Democracy’.
If elections do take place, they will be the first in Burma in 20 years.
This year will, therefore, be an important one for Burma, and an important one for the international community’s engagement with Burma.
Australia has long been appalled both by the Burmese military’s suppression of the democratic aspirations of the Burmese people and by its disrespect for their human rights.
It is worthwhile recalling some important events in this longstanding suppression.
A military regime, in some form, has ruled Burma since 1962, nearly 50 years.
We recall the bloody put down of pro-democracy protests in 1988, just over 20 years ago.
Since 1988 Australia has had in place visa restrictions against senior members of the Burmese regime and their associates and supporters.
Following the failure to implement the outcome of the 1990 elections, in 1991 Australia introduced a ban on defence exports to Burma.
This is a ban on the export to Burma of controlled goods as listed on the Defence and Strategic Goods List.
In October 2007, financial sanctions were introduced in response to the violent crackdown on democracy protesters.
These various sanctions – travel sanctions, defence sanctions and financial sanctions – have the common purpose of exerting pressure on Burma’s military regime.
At the same time, Australia has recognised that engaging the Burmese authorities serves important national, regional and international interests.
We live in the same region. Through regional forums like the ASEAN Post-Ministerial Conference, the ASEAN Regional Forum and the Bali Process on People Smuggling, Human Trafficking and Transnational Crime, Australia has had the opportunity to engage Burma on challenges like counter-narcotics, trafficking in people, disaster relief and pandemic disease.
As well, Australia has for many years sought to help the Burmese people through a program of humanitarian assistance targeting the most vulnerable.
This program, now worth nearly $30 million in 2009-10, assists with fighting infectious diseases such as avian influenza, HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis; provides food aid and agricultural expertise to alleviate rural poverty; protects displaced people; and supports children to attend and remain in primary school.
ASEAN, through its humanitarian work in Burma after Cyclone Nargis, has been vital in facilitating assistance from Australia and members of the international community to the Burmese people.
Common membership of regional organisations also allows us at Ministerial level to directly advocate democratic reform and national reconciliation – as I did when I met my counterpart Burmese Foreign Minister Nyan Win during the ASEAN-related meetings in Thailand in July 2009.
Mr Deputy Speaker.
On 12 August 2009 I addressed the House on Burma after Aung San Suu Kyi’s conviction on spurious charges, leading to her ongoing house arrest.
I set out then that Aung San Suu Kyi’s sentence effectively removed the prospect of her participation in any proposed 2010 elections and would detract from the credibility of those elections.
Since that time, there have been a number of important developments both within Burma and in the international community’s approach to Burma.
On 17 September 2009 the Burmese authorities released 128 political prisoners in an amnesty. This was a welcome, tentative step in the right direction.
Repression however continues.
On 31 December, 15 activists were sentenced to up to 71 years imprisonment each. There regrettably remain close to 2000 political prisoners in Burma, including Aung San Suu Kyi.
Australia again calls on Burma’s authorities to release them and allow them to participate fully and freely in the upcoming elections.
In September 2009, in the margins of the United Nations General Assembly, I joined ten other Foreign Ministers and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in a Ministerial-level meeting of the Secretary-General’s Group of Friends of Myanmar.
The participation in this meeting was evidence both of the international community’s desire to see progress in Burma and of its willingness to both work together and with the Secretary General towards this end.
At the meeting, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon identified three areas for future unity of purpose and action:
First, to urge Burma to work with the United Nations to ensure an inclusive process of dialogue and create the conditions for credible elections.
Second, to uphold the role of the United Nations in Burma.
And third, to signal the international community’s willingness to help the people of Burma, but noting that Burma’s military regime needed to respond to international concerns in order for this to occur.
My visit to New York for the General Assembly coincided with the announcement of the United States policy review on Burma.
The United States Administration concluded that a sanctions-only policy to isolate Burma’s military has not worked and that future US policy would combine engagement, appropriate sanctions and humanitarian assistance.
US Secretary of State Clinton said that any debate that pits sanctions against engagement created a false choice, and that the international community would need to employ both of these tools.
Australia has welcomed this approach, as has the international community generally.
As to developments within Burma, on 25 September 2009 Aung San Suu Kyi wrote to Senior General Than Shwe offering to work with the Burmese authorities on the withdrawal of international sanctions, and asking to meet representatives of the European Union, the United States and Australia.
The fact that Australia was one of these three was significant and reflects the longstanding interest Australians have in Burma.
The authorities agreed to this request.
On 9 October 2009 Australia’s Chargé d’Affaires, together with the UK Ambassador and the US Chargé d’Affaires, met Aung San Suu Kyi in Rangoon.
The meeting was the first opportunity for a substantive discussion between an Australian representative and Aung San Suu Kyi since February 2003.
Australia’s Chargé conveyed a message from the Prime Minister which expressed the support of the Australian Government and the people of Australia for Aung San Suu Kyi and her struggle for democracy in Burma.
This was warmly welcomed by Aung San Suu Kyi.
Australia welcomed the subsequent visit to Burma in early November by United States Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell and the meetings he held with the Burmese authorities, with Aung San Suu Kyi and with representatives of a number of ethnic minorities.
Aung San Suu Kyi wrote further to Senior General Than Shwe on 11 November 2009 requesting contact with her party’s Central Executive Committee.
In response to her request, she was permitted to meet three of the Central Executive Committee’s elders, including Chairman U Aung Shwe, on 16 December 2009.
Australia hopes that a meeting with the full Executive will take place soon.
This is the first substantial contact which Aung San Suu Kyi has had with the leadership of the National League for Democracy since 2007, and is warmly welcomed by the Australian Government as essential to democratic and political progress in Burma.
Australia hopes these initial engagements between Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese authorities and the international community are the beginning of a process of genuine dialogue.
Elections
Mr Deputy Speaker.
The Burmese authorities have embarked on the so-called “Roadmap to Democracy”, a strictly controlled process of potential political change.
It was a matter of great regret that they pushed ahead with a constitutional referendum, the fourth step in their Roadmap, in the midst of the disaster of Cyclone Nargis in May 2008.
That referendum was a regrettable sham.
Not surprisingly, political parties in Burma, including the National League for Democracy, and parties representing ethnic groups, are carefully considering whether to participate in the 2010 elections.
Burma’s authorities have an opportunity to engage the people, to ensure the full and free participation in the elections of the Burmese opposition, nascent political parties, and ethnic groups.
For Burma’s longer-term stability and security, the coming political process needs to address the concerns of the country’s diverse ethnic minority groups.
While, of course, given the history of these matters, there are long standing reservations, Australia will not pre-judge the process and the outcome of these elections.
Australia urges Burma’s authorities to seize this opportunity to genuinely move their country forward.
Development Assistance
Mr Deputy Speaker.
Australia has long provided humanitarian assistance to Burma.
In the 2009-10 Budget, the Government allocated nearly $30 million in humanitarian assistance, a significant increase in base funding over the previous year.
This will help address the pressing needs of the Burmese people.
Half of Burma’s almost 50 million people live in extreme poverty.
Child mortality rates are among the highest in the world.
Decades of military rule have eroded civil society and civilian institutions.
Skills have been lost and infrastructure has deteriorated.
At some stage into the future, Burma will have a civilian Government, which will face great challenges.
At some stage into the future, the regional and international community will be asked to help in the rebuilding of Burma’s economic and social structures.
Australia’s view therefore is that the international community help prepare Burma for the future.
Burma’s capacity cannot be allowed to completely atrophy to the ultimate disadvantage and cost of its people.
The international community needs to start the rebuilding now.
This is not a reward for Burma’s military, but a recognition of the immense task faced by current and future generations of Burmese.
At around $4 per head per annum, international aid to Burma is less than a tenth of that received by Cambodia and a sixteenth of that received by Laos.
Australia will accordingly increase its assistance to Burma over the next three years to around $50 million annually, a 67 per cent increase.
Alleviating humanitarian needs will remain an important goal and focus of this expenditure.
But the Government has decided that Australia’s program will also include capacity building elements, addressing the long-term challenges facing the Burmese people.
This will involve carefully targeted interaction in areas of great need like health, education and agriculture.
Our assistance will continue to be delivered in partnership with international organisations, such as UN agencies, ASEAN, other donor nations and non-government organisations.
We will expand existing initiatives in basic health care, including child and maternal health. We will work to improve the delivery of basic health services by equipping health clinics, training nurses, health care staff and administrators and providing better community health education and information.
At the village level, we will assist primary health care workers, including midwives, with critical training and medical supplies to help arrest the decline in health outcomes for vulnerable and isolated people.
We will continue to support the delivery of vital treatment, prevention and screening services for HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, including through the Three Diseases Fund supported by Australia, the European Commission, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and the United Kingdom. The Fund aims to reduce these three diseases in Burma.
We will also address critical water, sanitation and hygiene needs through:
1. the construction and rehabilitation of ponds and wells;
2. building latrines for community schools and rural health centres; and
3. working to provide equitable access to clean water.
In 2008-09 Australia’s assistance contributed to the basic education of over 400,000 children in Burma. We will increase our support to enable more poor and disadvantaged children to go to primary school.
Australian assistance will improve teaching and mentoring skills, both in the classroom and at home. Working closely with United Nations agencies, Non Government Organisations (NGOs) and other donors, we will support training programs for early childhood development workers, primary teachers and township education officials.
We will also continue to support vulnerable communities in the Irrawaddy Delta to restore their crop and fishing businesses, and in other areas of protracted need such as northern Rakhine State where the situation of the Rohingyas is very dire.
Australia will provide $20 million over the next four years to assist poor communities in Burma to:
1. improve access to credit, seeds, and tools;
2. provide training in small enterprise;
3. help farmers diversify their production and gain access to markets.
I have also asked the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and AusAID to explore a scholarship scheme for Burma.
Australia will liaise with partners such as the European Union, Germany, Japan, New Zealand, the Republic of Korea, Singapore, the United Kingdom and the United States, all of whom have scholarship schemes for Burma, to learn from their experience.
It is proposed that a new scholarship scheme will target Burmese with the potential to build civil society and improve service delivery, including in health, education and agriculture.
As a start, 10 postgraduate scholarships and short term professional development placements will be made available, beginning in 2010-11.
We will work with the UN to carefully identify suitable candidates.
This assistance will be in addition to Australia’s significant contribution for relief and recovery efforts following Cyclone Nargis in May 2008.
Australia’s post-Nargis assistance continues to be delivered through effective and trusted aid partners such as the United Nations and Australian NGOs and includes:
1. agricultural inputs to help farmers restore their crops and livestock;
2. helping fishermen by providing nets and repairing boats;
3. repairing over 1,200 damaged schools and providing books and materials for over 360,000 children;
4. reducing disease risk by constructing 50,000 latrines and providing one million mosquito nets; and
5. supplies and shelter for vulnerable communities.
Burma is a difficult operating environment, but the collective experience in Burma over many years shows we can deliver assistance effectively to improve the lives of ordinary Burmese without benefiting the military authorities.
Sanctions
Mr Deputy Speaker.
Australia urges Burma’s military to respond positively to Aung San Suu Kyi’s recent offer to work towards the lifting of international sanctions.
Such a positive response would help make meaningful progress towards democratic reform, respect for human rights, and national dialogue and reconciliation.
Until we see significant change from Burma’s authorities, the Australian Government will maintain a policy of targeted financial sanctions.
We agree with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s observation that to lift sanctions now would send the wrong signal.
However, an expansion of sanctions at this time would send a confusing signal.
In view of the nascent discussions between the authorities and Aung San Suu Kyi, I have decided that sanctions should not be expanded at this time.
As a result, the sanctions list I announced in October 2008 will remain in operation for the present.
Diplomacy
Mr Speaker.
I earlier referred to my discussions on Burma in New York in September 2009.
These discussions again revealed the region’s and the international community’s great frustration with the Burmese authorities’ treatment of the political opposition, their self-imposed isolation, and the circumstances of the Burmese people.
My discussions also revealed that the international community is increasingly prepared to draw on a wide range of diplomatic tools, including both sanctions and engagement, to press for change in Burma.
Neither Australia nor the international community should however have any illusions that progress in Burma will be quick or easy.
Australia will continue to work closely with ASEAN and its member countries, including by continuing to support ASEAN’s much-needed humanitarian efforts in Burma.
We will cooperate closely with the United States as it pursues greater engagement with Burma, and with other major donors like the United Kingdom, to ensure our combined assistance does the greatest amount of good for the Burmese people.
We will also continue to support the work of the United Nations and the Secretary General.
We endorse UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s call for the international community to support UN efforts to promote respect for human rights, inclusive political dialogue and development in Burma.
Australia strongly supported the role of Ibrahim Gambari as the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative on Burma. His term concluded at the beginning of this year, and we look forward to working closely with his successor.
Conclusion
Mr Deputy Speaker.
Australia and the international community stand ready to assist Burma.
But it is not a one way street.
Australia urges the Burmese authorities to respond in good faith both to international engagement and to Aung San Suu Kyi’s recent approach to it on sanctions and on dialogue.
In moving towards dialogue and genuine national reconciliation, Burma’s authorities can end their isolation.
Australia has always considered the Burmese people our friends.
When Cyclone Nargis struck, Australia responded generously, despite our political differences with the Burmese authorities.
That was the right decision then, and it is the right decision now, together with the international community, to do more for the long-term future of Burma’s people.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Asean MPs requests Thailand to halt plans to return Burma asylum seekers
February 11 2010
The ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Myanmar Caucus (AIPMC) is gravely concerned for the well being of unregistered Karen refugees currently residing in displacement sites in Tha Song Yang District, Tak. Announcements last month from the Thai government relating to the planned forced repatriation of the refugees beginning in February 2010 have caused renewed concern for their safety. AIPMC welcomes the Thai government’s decision to halt the repatriation of the estimated 3,000 refugees until their safety can be assured. AIPMC furthermore calls on the Thai government to make public and implement a clear policy regarding refugees fleeing from conflict zones across the border in Myanmar. Province
The flow of refugees from Myanmar’s Karen has been increasing since June 2009 when renewed fighting between the Karen National Union (KNU) and the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), supported by the SPDC, put villagers in danger, causing them to flee across the border. These refugees have temporarily been permitted to reside in Thailand under the care of the Thai Military. State
Despite the victory of the DKBA, the situation in Karen remains unstable and unsafe for villagers. The area from which the refugees fled is heavily landmined and numerous injuries and deaths among people returning to their villages have been reported by organizations working in the areas concerned and with the refugees. State
Though the precariousness of the situation in Karen State is well known, a group of 13 refugees from Nong Bua, mostly women and children, and a group of 26 families from Usu Tha were recently repatriated to Myanmar. These refugees were sent back without witnesses or evidence to certify that their return was voluntary. Additionally, reports have surfaced of the Thai military using threats and coercion to force refugees’ return to Myanmar.
This use of threats and coercion to pressure refugees into returning to an area that is clearly not safe is unacceptable. AIPMC urges the Thai government to fully investigate these charges and to closely monitor the situation of the refugees currently under the care of the Thai Military. Furthermore, AIPMC calls on the Thai government to cooperate with UNHCR and other appropriate agencies to allow for the registration and proper care of the refugees until it is safe for them to return home.
The flow of refugees fleeing the dangerous and repressive situation in Myanmar is not a new problem. Widespread human rights violations and armed offensives by Myanmar’s military government against its own citizens have caused massive refugees flows in the region for many years. The underlying source of the refugee problem is the continued violence and oppression perpetrated by Myanmar’s government. To permanently end the flow of refugees from Myanmar a concerted effort to end human rights abuses and begin a dialogue of national reconciliation is necessary.
AIPMC requests ASEAN to use its Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights to investigate all claims of human rights abuses in Myanmar. Furthermore, the Commission should seek to ensure that Myanmar is held accountable for its past abuses and prevented from committing further violence against its citizens. Additionally, AIPMC urges ASEAN to develop and implement a regional policy concerning the member states’ responsibilities regarding refugees.
Finally, AIPMC calls on the government of Myanmar to begin the process of national reconciliation through genuine dialogue with Aung San Suu Kyi, the National League for Democracy and ethnic nationalities. As a first step in this process AIPMC urges the government of Myanmar to release Aung San Suu Kyi and all other political prisoners currently in detention.
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