Monday, 13 April 2009
FOREIGN POLICY PARAMETERS & UNITED STATES POLICY TOWARDS BURMA
By Roland Watson
April 12, 2009
Foreign policy
April 12, 2009
Foreign policy
Foreign policy is the collection of government positions and associated actions, on international issues and parties. It is, or it should be, designed to serve national interests. Foreign policy can also be public - announced to the world; private - revealed only in diplomatic communications; or even secret - known only to a few top "policy makers."
Another characteristic is that foreign policy can be real, intended to achieve a specific goal, or for appearances only. A clear signal of the latter is if the policy is announced publicly, but there is no follow-through action. Similarly, foreign policy may be active, again, with a specific goal in mind, or passive, meaning that the situation in question is accepted as it stands, if not ignored.
To repeat, a country's foreign policy should further its national interests. The national interests in turn are the interests of the people, including:
- Freedom and democracy and an associated open society and human rights
- Security
- The satisfaction of basic needs, for food and shelter, education, health care, etc.
- A strong, sustainable economy, including good working conditions
- A high quality of life, in an attractive and healthy environment
- Cordial relations with other nations
- Cooperation with members of the International Community on important issues and projects
- The achievement of specific goals when the country is in competition, or disagrees, with other nations
The government's top officials set the nation’s foreign policy. The two main challenges such officials face are defining the people's interests - on specific issues different groups may have varying positions and objectives; and then implementing programs that actually achieve these objectives. For the latter, the basic choice in international affairs is between a soft or a hard approach, between dialogue and negotiations or confrontation ranging from public disagreement to sanctions to more aggressive action.
The top officials set foreign policy, but this does not occur in a vacuum. They receive guidance from their staffs, and, of course, the media. They - and their staffs - are also lobbied by interest groups, including corporations, social and environmental advocacy groups, religious groups, etc. In addition, the officials need to make an effort to listen to the people directly, through all of the information channels that now exist through which individuals can express their views.
In practical terms, a nation's foreign policy reflects the skill and wisdom of its political leaders, and the interests of whomever among the above groups make their voices heard. This is the reason why, while foreign policy is supposed to serve the people's interests, it often does not. Some leaders are neither skilled nor wise. Also, the financial resources and legal rights of corporations enable them to be heard in ways that ordinary people cannot duplicate.
(Note: Businesses say that their interests are the same as the people's. As the financial crisis so vividly illustrates, though, this is regularly untrue.)
We have been referring to the foreign policy of democracies, but dictatorships of course have such policy as well. In a dictatorship like Burma, foreign policy supports only the regime, to the detriment of the people. Burma's military junta, the SPDC, has established alliances with other authoritarian governments, including China, Russia, North Korea and Singapore; and it secures funding by selling multinational corporations the right to exploit the country's natural resources.
A national interest not directly listed above is that it is now accepted that free societies should support the democratic aspirations of peoples who are subject to dictatorship. In this case the interest of the people is to support the interests of people in other nations. Similarly, on environmental concerns all the peoples of the world share an interest in respecting and protecting the rights of nature, by opposing habitat destruction, by working to reverse global warming, etc. An obvious problem is that corporations habitually influence policy makers to take actions that conflict with the desire of the people to assist oppressed populations and to defend the Earth.
Current United States policy towards Burma
The Obama Administration, through Secretary of State Clinton, has announced that it is reviewing America's policy towards Burma. To put this into context, we need to understand U. S. Burma policy as it now stands.
The words of the last Administration were frequently quite strong, but it is essential to parse their exact meaning. President Bush, Secretary Rice, and other State Department officials (as well as members of Congress) regularly spoke about Burma. In almost all cases, though, their singular demand was the release of political prisoners, beginning with democracy leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. There was, until quite recently, no public recognition of the SPDC's war against the country's ethnic minorities, much less the demand for a cessation of this aggression (which demand has yet to be made). The Junta has driven upwards of one million people from their homes in Eastern Burma. One hundred and fifty thousand are now refugees in neighboring Thailand.
It is curious that this human rights atrocity, which has been accompanied by murder, rape and forced displacement on such a scale that many analysts argue it rises to the level of genocide, was basically ignored. Of course, in consideration of the above framework, there could have been an aggressive but private policy effort through diplomatic channels. The problem with reaching this conclusion, though, is that one would expect to see corresponding action. The large scale resettlement of Burmese refugees to the United States is a notable action, but what it signals is a willingness to help relieve the symptoms of the SPDC's aggression, not confront the Junta and force it to cease and desist.
From the strong words, but lack of action, we can conclude that the Bush Administration's policy was for appearances only: to put on a good face for public consumption, particularly by Burma's pro-democracy movement. The Administration was unwilling to address, with Thailand, the complexities of organizing a cross-border assistance program, nor would it act decisively on its own (or with the U.K. and France), to drop aid from helicopters to the victims of Cyclone Nargis.
Most importantly, and all of the bluster notwithstanding, the Administration clearly did not have a policy to help bring freedom and democracy to Burma. The removal of Than Shwe and the SPDC, and freedom and human rights for the long suffering Burmese, are not an active United States policy goal.
One would think that such a goal would serve the American people's interests and hence the United States' national interests. The likely reasons that the policy diverged from this goal include the Bush Administration's preoccupation with Iraq and it overall foreign affairs incompetence, as well as deference to China and also corporate interests (specifically, those of U.S. oil company Chevron).
This illustrates another basic parameter of foreign policy, that for whatever reasons one country may defer to the interests of another. Indeed, nations around the world have deferred again and again to the United States. This changed somewhat with the Bush Administration, since many countries disagreed with a variety of Bush policies, on Iraq, preemptive action, global warming, etc. There is no reason, though, that such agreement, or cooperation, cannot be resumed, provided that the Obama Administration returns the U.S. to a leadership role and a sincere American policy to promote democracy and human rights, and by adding a strong commitment to protect the environment.
On Burma, the U.S. seemingly has deferred to China. This may be a direct payoff, for China's large-scale purchase of U.S. treasury bonds, or just one piece in a large and secret geopolitical puzzle. Whatever the reason, though, such deference clearly does not reflect the principles on which United States foreign policy should be based.
Tom Lantos Block Burmese JADE (Junta's Anti-Democratic Efforts) Act of 2008
The above is not only conjecture. Surveying the enactment of the latest U.S. Burma law, the Tom Lantos JADE Act, reveals a great deal about the Bush Administration's policy towards the country. How the Obama Administration will implement the law will also give strong clues to the direction its own policy review is taking.
The impetus for the Act was the crackdown by the SPDC on protesting Buddhist monks during the "Saffron Revolution." In response to this event, which occurred in September 2007, Congress acted quickly and decisively. The draft Act was introduced in mid-October and it passed both houses with virtually unanimous support by mid-December. At this point, though, the Bill got hung up in conference. The House version included a tax provision that would have forced Chevron to divest its stake in Burma's Yadana pipeline. The Senate version, following the lead of California Senator Dianne Feinstein - Chevron is based in California - did not.
While it occurred in secret, an advocacy war clearly erupted, and Chevron lobbyists ultimately prevailed. The tax provision was stripped from the Bill, the Senate and House versions were reconciled, and the Act was signed into law, finally, by President Bush on July 29th, 2008.
The supporters of the tax provision were overpowered by Chevron's lobbyists and also the underlying pro-corporation and pro-oil policies of President Bush and Vice President Cheney. An additional factor, though, was the position of U.S. based Burma activists.
To understand foreign policy on an issue, you also need to understand the policy of the leading advocates for that issue. For Burma and the Chevron provision, a member of Earth Rights International was quoted as saying that "whether Chevron is there or not, those dollars are still going to flow to the generals..." (ERI Legal Director Marco Simons, Chevron's dilemma over its stake in Burma, San Francisco Chronicle, July 5, 2008).
ERI is clearly opposed to economic sanctions, and corporate activism, which seems odd for a group that sues companies for complicity in human rights abuses (including Chevron in Nigeria - how’s that for consistency?). Using their argument you could justify any corporate or for that matter government action, with the standard propaganda line that "if we don't do it, someone else will." This is a shameful position. The dollars may flow to the generals, but they shouldn't be American dollars, including from American corporations.
Also, for the same Chronicle article a member of the United States Campaign for Burma commented that leaving the Chevron provision in would have doomed the bill, and that having its other provisions was a worthwhile achievement. This is a more realistic argument, but it leaves open the question of why USCB doesn't pressure Chevron using other means. A boycott of the company seems an obvious choice, and which USCB's student chapters would likely take on with relish. Such a campaign would duplicate the many successes of USCB's predecessor, the Free Burma Coalition, but to date it has not been tried. One wonders why?
What the above illustrates is that it is not only government policy with which we should be concerned. Do ERI and USCB have as a fundamental goal freedom for Burma or not? Similarly, what is the policy of the NCGUB, the NCUB and even the NLD? Is the goal an uncompromising demand for the removal of Than Shwe and the SPDC or not? The reason this is important is that the desire of the people inside Burma is clearly the end of the Junta. If the policy of other nations and also advocacy groups does not mirror this, we are doing the people of Burma a disservice, and also a disservice to all the people in other countries, including the U.S., who support their aspiration for freedom.
General United States policy towards Burma
It is important for the new Administration to recognize its own inexperience in international affairs. President Obama has limited experience, and as Secretary Clinton's early actions indicate, she too has much to learn. For the Secretary, she needs to understand that every word she utters on the international stage will be dissected ad nauseum. When she commented, before her trip to China, that human rights would not be on the agenda, this signaled to China - hopefully incorrectly - that the U.S. would no longer emphasize human rights in its relations with the country.
Similarly, she publicly announced that U.S. policy towards Burma was being reevaluated, including with the implication that it would be softened, with the relaxation or even the ending of economic sanctions. This revelation caused an uproar in the Burma community, and, as with China human rights campaigners, great concern that the U.S. will go soft on the SPDC. Years and years of effort to create pressure on the Junta could easily be lost.
It is common on domestic policy to "float" ideas: to say that a change is being considered and then observe the reaction. If the supporters outweigh the dissenters, you can feel confident making the change.
This type of approach is inappropriate in international affairs. The U.S. shouldn't float an idea, and then let the rest of the world fight about it. If you are going to change policy, decide on the change beforehand with the assistance of your advisors - there are many knowledgeable staffers on Burma in the State Department, the Defense Department and the Intelligence agencies. If you still feel the need to survey opinion, this should be done privately, in meetings with diplomats from other countries and also advocacy groups.
President Obama, in his Inauguration Address, said:
"To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist."
This was a basic statement of policy, and it is interesting to see its first applications. North Korea is continuing its belligerence, with actions that contravene previous commitments, to which the President has responded with threats. The President extended a hand to Iran, but which invitation the religious leader of the country - Iran is a theocracy - snubbed. Similarly, the new Administration appears open to engagement with the SPDC.
Of course, things may be more complicated than they appear. It is impossible to know the President's real thinking. The Administration may be promoting negotiation and engagement with the expectation that such offers will fail. President Obama can then toughen policy, using the defense that he has clearly and openly tried the nonconfrontational approach.
One change that is apparent is that the President wants to end the Bush Administration's unilateralism. On issue after issue the objective will be to organize other nations and parties, and to reach consensus.
This is laudable, but it will be a challenge to implement for Burma. At the moment, Burma - meaning the people of the country - is surrounded by enemies. China, India, Thailand and Asean are all actively working with the SPDC. Internationally, all the major players - the United Nations, United States, European Union, and East Asia powers Japan and South Korea - are fence sitters, secretly deferring to corporate interests and more generally waiting to see what happens. No one is truly on the Burmese' side. No one has their freedom as an active policy goal.
It is difficult to see how organizing a collection of enemies and fence sitters is going to help the people of Burma. First, the U.S. has to change its policy to unequivocally pursue the goal of freedom. Then, it needs to persuade such other parties to have this goal as well. Only after this is accomplished would organizing a coalition - a "group of friends," or "six-party talks" - be a positive development.
With United States policy towards Burma anchored in the goal of freedom, derivative policy decisions become much easier to make. For example, sanctions should not be abandoned. Instead, they need to be completed. The U.S. needs to amend the JADE Act to reinstate the provision that would force Chevron to divest. (Since Chevron's support of the SPDC is so great, with the Yadana pipeline giving - according to the JADE Act - at least $500 million to the generals each year, this one exception outweighs all of the different restrictions that have been imposed.)
The real risk with the policy review is that it may actually be hijacked by Chevron. The company prevailed in the JADE Act battle. Now it wants to win the war. Open Burma to U.S. corporations, let the money flow to corporate and corporate executive bank accounts, and the people of Burma be dammed!
This must be prevented. It is reasonable to have a policy review, but the results must fulfill the United States' national interests, meaning the American people's interests, not Chevron's. President Obama, in his election campaign, spoke often about the negative consequences of corporate lobbying. The global financial meltdown is only the most obvious example, but there are many others, including Burma and Chevron. The President must live up to his words. His policy must serve the American people and by default the Burmese, not Chevron and other pro-SPDC corporations.
JADE Act Section 10 report on Military and Intelligence Aid
Section 10 of the JADE Act requires the State Department to prepare, and publish on its website, a report on Military and Intelligence Aid to Burma. The report should have been published by the end of January, but on the date of this article it still had not appeared.
More than the public floating of the idea to soften or remove sanctions, this is the most disturbing signal from the new Administration about the direction of its policy review. The State Department is refusing to fulfill the terms of a United State Law. While we can't know for certain why this is the case, clearly something important is happening.
Section 10 is an historic legal provision. U.S. Intelligence keeps track of the military programs of many if not all of the world's nations. But State, and by default Intelligence, has never been ordered to reveal what it knows.
President Obama in his campaign also spoke frequently about the need for openness in government. The publication of the Section 10 report would set a new and welcome precedent in this area.
The problem is that the international arms trade is the most closed environment imaginable. As mentioned earlier, foreign policy has public, private and secret dimensions. The arms trade, and the policy it represents, is one of the most secret of all.
With the dispute over the Chevron provision, Section 10 may have been overlooked. Now, the Obama Administration has to deal with it.
A conspiracy theorist might argue that this report - and the embarrassing secrets it may contain - is such a problem that it is its existence, and not a desire for a more effective approach towards the SPDC, that is driving the policy review. The review, and an ending of sanctions, may be an artifice designed to create a need to draft a new Burma law, from which Section 10 can conveniently be left out. The report would then never have to be made public.
Dictator Watch intelligence, parts of which journalists and even the SPDC have confirmed (for the Junta, the locations of some of Burma's uranium deposits, and its deal to purchase a reactor), is that the generals have active nuclear and missile proliferation programs, involving Russia, China, North Korea and Iran. The Section 10 report likely confirms this, and perhaps in a way that would make top foreign policy priorities for the Administration, on North Korea and Iran, more difficult to achieve. The solution appears to be, change Burma policy to avoid the requirement to publish the report: sacrifice the people of Burma yet again to fulfill other objectives.
We hope this explanation is incorrect, and that there is some other reason the report has been delayed. To know this is the case, though, it needs to be published, now. We need its information not only to understand the SPDC's proliferation programs, and to advocate appropriate U.S. policy, but also to honor and fulfill the wishes of Tom Lantos, the human rights pioneer who cared so much for Burma, and for whom the Act is named.
(The report is also, under the terms of the law, to be prepared annually. Publication can only be put off for so long.)
Specific policy provisions
We can't speculate on the appropriate U.S. response to SPDC proliferation, without knowing the details, including the specific involvement of such other countries. Suffice it to say, though, that the proliferation must be stopped, and on this issue United States policy should be active, public and firm.
On sanctions, as mentioned above, they should be strengthened, not relaxed. Chevron should be forced to divest. Also, President Obama should use his new friendships in Europe to push for the same for Total, and to present a strong united front to the Security Council in calling for a comprehensive arms embargo.
In addition, yet another aspect of foreign policy is that it should be consistent (recall the case with ERI). The United States backs Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. Daw Suu has called for sanctions. It would be incongruous to support her yet reject her policy, particularly since she is the leading spokesperson for the people of Burma.
Similarly, it is essential that the U.S. reject publicly the SPDC's upcoming 2010 "election," and in no uncertain terms. The election, if it is held, will be based on the fraudulent 2008 constitutional referendum. It has no legitimacy whatsoever. It is important to recognize that dictatorships regularly hold staged elections. North Korea's recent poll is a case in point. These sham elections are ignored and soon forgotten. The same will occur with the SPDC's outcome, if the U.S. remains firm.
It is disturbing, therefore, that some U.S. proxies reportedly have expressed positive views about 2010, suggesting that the pro-democracy parties might want to participate. This is bad policy, and it needs to be abandoned. The basic policy goal is freedom for Burma, and for this to be achieved there can be no support for the 2010 vote.
The greatest specific policy challenge is the humanitarian crisis: in the border areas, from Cyclone Nargis, and also from the suppression of the Saffron uprising and more generally the large-scale imprisonment of pro-democracy activists. The U.S. needs to develop policy on all of these issues, and which policy involves action, not only words.
For the residual impact of the cyclone, the recent rice donation is a positive step, but helicopter aid drops would have been better. (When President Bush refused to drop the aid, this was a wholly unwarranted sign of respect for Burma's criminal military regime.) For the political prisoners, the appropriate policy response is a strategy to free Burma, since only through this event will the prisoners be released permanently.
Relieving the crisis in the border areas is more complex, and can take two different approaches: a large-scale cross-border assistance program (ideally this would cover both Eastern Burma through Thailand and Western Burma through Bangladesh and India); and, once again, a plan to trigger the end of the SPDC, perhaps in combination with such assistance.
For Eastern Burma, an assistance program would of course require Thailand's cooperation, and this raises the question of its own policy towards Burma. In recent years Thai policy has been wholly supportive of the SPDC. Now that the Democrats are in power - one hopes they will not yield to the demands of Thaksin Shinawatra’s paid thugs - this may change. Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya has said that human rights would be a factor in Thailand's relations with the Junta. Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva recently called the Burmese regime "a hideous blight on Asia's map of expanding freedoms and growing economies."
This is a welcome change. During Thaksin's rule, Thai policy did not reflect the interests of the Thai public. Instead, it served his personal business interests with the Junta and also the interests of Thai businesspeople involved in resource exploitation and human and narcotics trafficking.
Thailand's interests are clearly that Burma become democratic, in the near term to eliminate the effects on the country of the humanitarian crisis and also to reduce the drug trade. But Thailand would also benefit considerably over the long-term from an end to the regime. The two nations would likely develop close economic ties. Border locations such as Three Pagodas Pass and Mae Sot would grow at an exponential rate, as Burma recovered from fifty years of economic neglect.
Thailand's examination of its own policy creates an opening for the U.S. to promote cross-border assistance programs and also more aggressive action. For the first, the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Susan Rice, said that America intended to work "to strengthen protections for civilians in conflict zones." Eastern Burma is the perfect location to turn this talk into action.
A humanitarian responsibility to protect program would have many elements and complexities, but it is squarely within the competence of USAID. One can envision the large-scale provision of rice, medicine, and educational materials. A related element would be supplying a communications network and electrical equipment, including solar panels, generators and batteries. For security, the U.S. could lead the way in organizing an international peace-keeping force, and also assist with training and intelligence. The nations of Asean should be asked to supply troops for the peace-keeping force.
This type of program is feasible, and it would have a dramatic positive impact. All it requires is political will from the new Administration to live up to Ambassador Rice's words.
A responsibility to protect program for Eastern Burma would also correct the already noted deficiency in U.S. policy that while it has a proper and strong emphasis on Daw Suu and Burma's political prisoners, it fails to take into account much less address the problems of the country's ethnic minorities.
The United States has traditionally been unwilling to recognize the ethnic organizations, such as the Karen National Union, as legitimate and legal entities and stakeholders. At the recent meeting between the KNU and Thailand’s Foreign Minister, though, they were accorded this status. If the U.S. will liaise with the SPDC on the rice donation, it certainly should do the same with the KNU to help internally displaced persons in Eastern Burma.
Power-sharing and top-down policy
For the Obama Administration to make these changes, it will have to counteract the significant momentum that already exists to accept the 2010 result and its corollary that Than Shwe will remain in power. This is the idea that power-sharing is both acceptable and inevitable. However, it is important to understand the history of the position. Daw Suu and the NLD have said that the military - the Burma Army - has a legitimate role in the affairs of the country. What they were clearly referring to was the role of the military in a post-SPDC, free Burma: what responsibilities, and scale and composition, the Army should have.
SPDC cronies and international backers, though, have surreptitiously restated this as the idea that power-sharing with Than Shwe himself and the other SPDC generals is acceptable. It is not. Any party that supports the idea of power-sharing with Than Shwe is in opposition to the basic policy goal of freedom for the Burmese people.
It is essential to grasp the implications of this version of the idea. The International Community, beginning with the United Nations Secretariat, which supports the 2010 vote, is offering Than Shwe and his fellow generals the opportunity not to be prosecuted for their crimes against humanity; to keep their ill-gotten riches; and even to continue their regime and its mass murder and plunder.
This is terrible policy. It denies justice to four and one half decades of victims - to tens of millions of people - and it is a rubber stamp permission for the Junta to keep committing its crimes.
The power-sharing idea is an example of "top-down policy," meaning policy that is created without the input or approval of the people. It is undemocratic. The only people who have the right to accept this type of "solution" are the people of Burma, and since they are unable to verifiably grant their consent, it is completely unacceptable. Just because the International Community, expressing the desires of international corporations, is impatient and wants to move, does not mean that it has the right to do so. Only the people have the right to decide their destiny.
We should not forget the backgrounds of the people who are promoting power-sharing with the SPDC. Ban Ki-moon, as South Korea's Foreign Minister, fully supported the interests of Daewoo, one of the most active corporations in Burma. Ibrahim Gambari was not only Nigerian dictator Sani Abacha's representative at the U.N., he is so placid with Burma's generals that you could easily grant him the title, SPDC Secretary Designate. Ban Ki-moon also just accepted, on April 8th, the credentials of the Junta’s new U.N. Ambassador, war criminal Colonel Than Swe.
The U.N. press notice says that Than Swe rose from Second Lieutenant to Colonel while serving in the Burma Army from 1975 to 2000. Our information is that he was attached to Light Infantry Division 44, based in Thaton, Karen State, and that he reached the level of Tactical Commander, responsible for three battalions. LID 44 was formed in 1979, and commenced large-scale offensives against Karen villagers beginning in 1982, which offensives continue today. The United States should protest the appointment, and force it to be reversed, just as Australia did in 2007 when it refused to accept as envoy from the SPDC Brigadier General Thet Oo Maung.
The U.S. should further organize other nations to expel the Junta from the General Assembly.
In addition to its backing from the U.N., Japan is helping the Junta arrange the 2010 charade. Many nations in Europe are also openly supporting the dictatorship's Roadmap.
Burma is now an industry, as any visitor to a press conference at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand will see. The members of this industry want it to grow. There is no time to wait for freedom and democracy, much less do what is required to bring them about.
Conclusion
This is the environment that the Obama Administration faces. It appears almost impossible to manage, but only if you forget one thing. President Obama must serve the people of America, and the people of America are definitely on the side of the people of Burma. The only logical policy, therefore, is to work with determination for freedom for Burma, whatever it takes.
If the Administration wants to begin with talk, then by all means talk, but have a backup plan in place if it fails, and remember that just because you want something to work, doesn't mean that it will.
1. Never forget that the goal - the only real goal - is freedom.
2. Organize multilateral support: in public to oppose the SPDC's nuclear and missile proliferation, and to extend and make uniform both economic and weapons sanctions; and in private, with China, Russia and India, to get them to drop their support for the SPDC, and with Thailand, to organize cross-border assistance.
Another characteristic is that foreign policy can be real, intended to achieve a specific goal, or for appearances only. A clear signal of the latter is if the policy is announced publicly, but there is no follow-through action. Similarly, foreign policy may be active, again, with a specific goal in mind, or passive, meaning that the situation in question is accepted as it stands, if not ignored.
To repeat, a country's foreign policy should further its national interests. The national interests in turn are the interests of the people, including:
- Freedom and democracy and an associated open society and human rights
- Security
- The satisfaction of basic needs, for food and shelter, education, health care, etc.
- A strong, sustainable economy, including good working conditions
- A high quality of life, in an attractive and healthy environment
- Cordial relations with other nations
- Cooperation with members of the International Community on important issues and projects
- The achievement of specific goals when the country is in competition, or disagrees, with other nations
The government's top officials set the nation’s foreign policy. The two main challenges such officials face are defining the people's interests - on specific issues different groups may have varying positions and objectives; and then implementing programs that actually achieve these objectives. For the latter, the basic choice in international affairs is between a soft or a hard approach, between dialogue and negotiations or confrontation ranging from public disagreement to sanctions to more aggressive action.
The top officials set foreign policy, but this does not occur in a vacuum. They receive guidance from their staffs, and, of course, the media. They - and their staffs - are also lobbied by interest groups, including corporations, social and environmental advocacy groups, religious groups, etc. In addition, the officials need to make an effort to listen to the people directly, through all of the information channels that now exist through which individuals can express their views.
In practical terms, a nation's foreign policy reflects the skill and wisdom of its political leaders, and the interests of whomever among the above groups make their voices heard. This is the reason why, while foreign policy is supposed to serve the people's interests, it often does not. Some leaders are neither skilled nor wise. Also, the financial resources and legal rights of corporations enable them to be heard in ways that ordinary people cannot duplicate.
(Note: Businesses say that their interests are the same as the people's. As the financial crisis so vividly illustrates, though, this is regularly untrue.)
We have been referring to the foreign policy of democracies, but dictatorships of course have such policy as well. In a dictatorship like Burma, foreign policy supports only the regime, to the detriment of the people. Burma's military junta, the SPDC, has established alliances with other authoritarian governments, including China, Russia, North Korea and Singapore; and it secures funding by selling multinational corporations the right to exploit the country's natural resources.
A national interest not directly listed above is that it is now accepted that free societies should support the democratic aspirations of peoples who are subject to dictatorship. In this case the interest of the people is to support the interests of people in other nations. Similarly, on environmental concerns all the peoples of the world share an interest in respecting and protecting the rights of nature, by opposing habitat destruction, by working to reverse global warming, etc. An obvious problem is that corporations habitually influence policy makers to take actions that conflict with the desire of the people to assist oppressed populations and to defend the Earth.
Current United States policy towards Burma
The Obama Administration, through Secretary of State Clinton, has announced that it is reviewing America's policy towards Burma. To put this into context, we need to understand U. S. Burma policy as it now stands.
The words of the last Administration were frequently quite strong, but it is essential to parse their exact meaning. President Bush, Secretary Rice, and other State Department officials (as well as members of Congress) regularly spoke about Burma. In almost all cases, though, their singular demand was the release of political prisoners, beginning with democracy leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. There was, until quite recently, no public recognition of the SPDC's war against the country's ethnic minorities, much less the demand for a cessation of this aggression (which demand has yet to be made). The Junta has driven upwards of one million people from their homes in Eastern Burma. One hundred and fifty thousand are now refugees in neighboring Thailand.
It is curious that this human rights atrocity, which has been accompanied by murder, rape and forced displacement on such a scale that many analysts argue it rises to the level of genocide, was basically ignored. Of course, in consideration of the above framework, there could have been an aggressive but private policy effort through diplomatic channels. The problem with reaching this conclusion, though, is that one would expect to see corresponding action. The large scale resettlement of Burmese refugees to the United States is a notable action, but what it signals is a willingness to help relieve the symptoms of the SPDC's aggression, not confront the Junta and force it to cease and desist.
From the strong words, but lack of action, we can conclude that the Bush Administration's policy was for appearances only: to put on a good face for public consumption, particularly by Burma's pro-democracy movement. The Administration was unwilling to address, with Thailand, the complexities of organizing a cross-border assistance program, nor would it act decisively on its own (or with the U.K. and France), to drop aid from helicopters to the victims of Cyclone Nargis.
Most importantly, and all of the bluster notwithstanding, the Administration clearly did not have a policy to help bring freedom and democracy to Burma. The removal of Than Shwe and the SPDC, and freedom and human rights for the long suffering Burmese, are not an active United States policy goal.
One would think that such a goal would serve the American people's interests and hence the United States' national interests. The likely reasons that the policy diverged from this goal include the Bush Administration's preoccupation with Iraq and it overall foreign affairs incompetence, as well as deference to China and also corporate interests (specifically, those of U.S. oil company Chevron).
This illustrates another basic parameter of foreign policy, that for whatever reasons one country may defer to the interests of another. Indeed, nations around the world have deferred again and again to the United States. This changed somewhat with the Bush Administration, since many countries disagreed with a variety of Bush policies, on Iraq, preemptive action, global warming, etc. There is no reason, though, that such agreement, or cooperation, cannot be resumed, provided that the Obama Administration returns the U.S. to a leadership role and a sincere American policy to promote democracy and human rights, and by adding a strong commitment to protect the environment.
On Burma, the U.S. seemingly has deferred to China. This may be a direct payoff, for China's large-scale purchase of U.S. treasury bonds, or just one piece in a large and secret geopolitical puzzle. Whatever the reason, though, such deference clearly does not reflect the principles on which United States foreign policy should be based.
Tom Lantos Block Burmese JADE (Junta's Anti-Democratic Efforts) Act of 2008
The above is not only conjecture. Surveying the enactment of the latest U.S. Burma law, the Tom Lantos JADE Act, reveals a great deal about the Bush Administration's policy towards the country. How the Obama Administration will implement the law will also give strong clues to the direction its own policy review is taking.
The impetus for the Act was the crackdown by the SPDC on protesting Buddhist monks during the "Saffron Revolution." In response to this event, which occurred in September 2007, Congress acted quickly and decisively. The draft Act was introduced in mid-October and it passed both houses with virtually unanimous support by mid-December. At this point, though, the Bill got hung up in conference. The House version included a tax provision that would have forced Chevron to divest its stake in Burma's Yadana pipeline. The Senate version, following the lead of California Senator Dianne Feinstein - Chevron is based in California - did not.
While it occurred in secret, an advocacy war clearly erupted, and Chevron lobbyists ultimately prevailed. The tax provision was stripped from the Bill, the Senate and House versions were reconciled, and the Act was signed into law, finally, by President Bush on July 29th, 2008.
The supporters of the tax provision were overpowered by Chevron's lobbyists and also the underlying pro-corporation and pro-oil policies of President Bush and Vice President Cheney. An additional factor, though, was the position of U.S. based Burma activists.
To understand foreign policy on an issue, you also need to understand the policy of the leading advocates for that issue. For Burma and the Chevron provision, a member of Earth Rights International was quoted as saying that "whether Chevron is there or not, those dollars are still going to flow to the generals..." (ERI Legal Director Marco Simons, Chevron's dilemma over its stake in Burma, San Francisco Chronicle, July 5, 2008).
ERI is clearly opposed to economic sanctions, and corporate activism, which seems odd for a group that sues companies for complicity in human rights abuses (including Chevron in Nigeria - how’s that for consistency?). Using their argument you could justify any corporate or for that matter government action, with the standard propaganda line that "if we don't do it, someone else will." This is a shameful position. The dollars may flow to the generals, but they shouldn't be American dollars, including from American corporations.
Also, for the same Chronicle article a member of the United States Campaign for Burma commented that leaving the Chevron provision in would have doomed the bill, and that having its other provisions was a worthwhile achievement. This is a more realistic argument, but it leaves open the question of why USCB doesn't pressure Chevron using other means. A boycott of the company seems an obvious choice, and which USCB's student chapters would likely take on with relish. Such a campaign would duplicate the many successes of USCB's predecessor, the Free Burma Coalition, but to date it has not been tried. One wonders why?
What the above illustrates is that it is not only government policy with which we should be concerned. Do ERI and USCB have as a fundamental goal freedom for Burma or not? Similarly, what is the policy of the NCGUB, the NCUB and even the NLD? Is the goal an uncompromising demand for the removal of Than Shwe and the SPDC or not? The reason this is important is that the desire of the people inside Burma is clearly the end of the Junta. If the policy of other nations and also advocacy groups does not mirror this, we are doing the people of Burma a disservice, and also a disservice to all the people in other countries, including the U.S., who support their aspiration for freedom.
General United States policy towards Burma
It is important for the new Administration to recognize its own inexperience in international affairs. President Obama has limited experience, and as Secretary Clinton's early actions indicate, she too has much to learn. For the Secretary, she needs to understand that every word she utters on the international stage will be dissected ad nauseum. When she commented, before her trip to China, that human rights would not be on the agenda, this signaled to China - hopefully incorrectly - that the U.S. would no longer emphasize human rights in its relations with the country.
Similarly, she publicly announced that U.S. policy towards Burma was being reevaluated, including with the implication that it would be softened, with the relaxation or even the ending of economic sanctions. This revelation caused an uproar in the Burma community, and, as with China human rights campaigners, great concern that the U.S. will go soft on the SPDC. Years and years of effort to create pressure on the Junta could easily be lost.
It is common on domestic policy to "float" ideas: to say that a change is being considered and then observe the reaction. If the supporters outweigh the dissenters, you can feel confident making the change.
This type of approach is inappropriate in international affairs. The U.S. shouldn't float an idea, and then let the rest of the world fight about it. If you are going to change policy, decide on the change beforehand with the assistance of your advisors - there are many knowledgeable staffers on Burma in the State Department, the Defense Department and the Intelligence agencies. If you still feel the need to survey opinion, this should be done privately, in meetings with diplomats from other countries and also advocacy groups.
President Obama, in his Inauguration Address, said:
"To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist."
This was a basic statement of policy, and it is interesting to see its first applications. North Korea is continuing its belligerence, with actions that contravene previous commitments, to which the President has responded with threats. The President extended a hand to Iran, but which invitation the religious leader of the country - Iran is a theocracy - snubbed. Similarly, the new Administration appears open to engagement with the SPDC.
Of course, things may be more complicated than they appear. It is impossible to know the President's real thinking. The Administration may be promoting negotiation and engagement with the expectation that such offers will fail. President Obama can then toughen policy, using the defense that he has clearly and openly tried the nonconfrontational approach.
One change that is apparent is that the President wants to end the Bush Administration's unilateralism. On issue after issue the objective will be to organize other nations and parties, and to reach consensus.
This is laudable, but it will be a challenge to implement for Burma. At the moment, Burma - meaning the people of the country - is surrounded by enemies. China, India, Thailand and Asean are all actively working with the SPDC. Internationally, all the major players - the United Nations, United States, European Union, and East Asia powers Japan and South Korea - are fence sitters, secretly deferring to corporate interests and more generally waiting to see what happens. No one is truly on the Burmese' side. No one has their freedom as an active policy goal.
It is difficult to see how organizing a collection of enemies and fence sitters is going to help the people of Burma. First, the U.S. has to change its policy to unequivocally pursue the goal of freedom. Then, it needs to persuade such other parties to have this goal as well. Only after this is accomplished would organizing a coalition - a "group of friends," or "six-party talks" - be a positive development.
With United States policy towards Burma anchored in the goal of freedom, derivative policy decisions become much easier to make. For example, sanctions should not be abandoned. Instead, they need to be completed. The U.S. needs to amend the JADE Act to reinstate the provision that would force Chevron to divest. (Since Chevron's support of the SPDC is so great, with the Yadana pipeline giving - according to the JADE Act - at least $500 million to the generals each year, this one exception outweighs all of the different restrictions that have been imposed.)
The real risk with the policy review is that it may actually be hijacked by Chevron. The company prevailed in the JADE Act battle. Now it wants to win the war. Open Burma to U.S. corporations, let the money flow to corporate and corporate executive bank accounts, and the people of Burma be dammed!
This must be prevented. It is reasonable to have a policy review, but the results must fulfill the United States' national interests, meaning the American people's interests, not Chevron's. President Obama, in his election campaign, spoke often about the negative consequences of corporate lobbying. The global financial meltdown is only the most obvious example, but there are many others, including Burma and Chevron. The President must live up to his words. His policy must serve the American people and by default the Burmese, not Chevron and other pro-SPDC corporations.
JADE Act Section 10 report on Military and Intelligence Aid
Section 10 of the JADE Act requires the State Department to prepare, and publish on its website, a report on Military and Intelligence Aid to Burma. The report should have been published by the end of January, but on the date of this article it still had not appeared.
More than the public floating of the idea to soften or remove sanctions, this is the most disturbing signal from the new Administration about the direction of its policy review. The State Department is refusing to fulfill the terms of a United State Law. While we can't know for certain why this is the case, clearly something important is happening.
Section 10 is an historic legal provision. U.S. Intelligence keeps track of the military programs of many if not all of the world's nations. But State, and by default Intelligence, has never been ordered to reveal what it knows.
President Obama in his campaign also spoke frequently about the need for openness in government. The publication of the Section 10 report would set a new and welcome precedent in this area.
The problem is that the international arms trade is the most closed environment imaginable. As mentioned earlier, foreign policy has public, private and secret dimensions. The arms trade, and the policy it represents, is one of the most secret of all.
With the dispute over the Chevron provision, Section 10 may have been overlooked. Now, the Obama Administration has to deal with it.
A conspiracy theorist might argue that this report - and the embarrassing secrets it may contain - is such a problem that it is its existence, and not a desire for a more effective approach towards the SPDC, that is driving the policy review. The review, and an ending of sanctions, may be an artifice designed to create a need to draft a new Burma law, from which Section 10 can conveniently be left out. The report would then never have to be made public.
Dictator Watch intelligence, parts of which journalists and even the SPDC have confirmed (for the Junta, the locations of some of Burma's uranium deposits, and its deal to purchase a reactor), is that the generals have active nuclear and missile proliferation programs, involving Russia, China, North Korea and Iran. The Section 10 report likely confirms this, and perhaps in a way that would make top foreign policy priorities for the Administration, on North Korea and Iran, more difficult to achieve. The solution appears to be, change Burma policy to avoid the requirement to publish the report: sacrifice the people of Burma yet again to fulfill other objectives.
We hope this explanation is incorrect, and that there is some other reason the report has been delayed. To know this is the case, though, it needs to be published, now. We need its information not only to understand the SPDC's proliferation programs, and to advocate appropriate U.S. policy, but also to honor and fulfill the wishes of Tom Lantos, the human rights pioneer who cared so much for Burma, and for whom the Act is named.
(The report is also, under the terms of the law, to be prepared annually. Publication can only be put off for so long.)
Specific policy provisions
We can't speculate on the appropriate U.S. response to SPDC proliferation, without knowing the details, including the specific involvement of such other countries. Suffice it to say, though, that the proliferation must be stopped, and on this issue United States policy should be active, public and firm.
On sanctions, as mentioned above, they should be strengthened, not relaxed. Chevron should be forced to divest. Also, President Obama should use his new friendships in Europe to push for the same for Total, and to present a strong united front to the Security Council in calling for a comprehensive arms embargo.
In addition, yet another aspect of foreign policy is that it should be consistent (recall the case with ERI). The United States backs Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. Daw Suu has called for sanctions. It would be incongruous to support her yet reject her policy, particularly since she is the leading spokesperson for the people of Burma.
Similarly, it is essential that the U.S. reject publicly the SPDC's upcoming 2010 "election," and in no uncertain terms. The election, if it is held, will be based on the fraudulent 2008 constitutional referendum. It has no legitimacy whatsoever. It is important to recognize that dictatorships regularly hold staged elections. North Korea's recent poll is a case in point. These sham elections are ignored and soon forgotten. The same will occur with the SPDC's outcome, if the U.S. remains firm.
It is disturbing, therefore, that some U.S. proxies reportedly have expressed positive views about 2010, suggesting that the pro-democracy parties might want to participate. This is bad policy, and it needs to be abandoned. The basic policy goal is freedom for Burma, and for this to be achieved there can be no support for the 2010 vote.
The greatest specific policy challenge is the humanitarian crisis: in the border areas, from Cyclone Nargis, and also from the suppression of the Saffron uprising and more generally the large-scale imprisonment of pro-democracy activists. The U.S. needs to develop policy on all of these issues, and which policy involves action, not only words.
For the residual impact of the cyclone, the recent rice donation is a positive step, but helicopter aid drops would have been better. (When President Bush refused to drop the aid, this was a wholly unwarranted sign of respect for Burma's criminal military regime.) For the political prisoners, the appropriate policy response is a strategy to free Burma, since only through this event will the prisoners be released permanently.
Relieving the crisis in the border areas is more complex, and can take two different approaches: a large-scale cross-border assistance program (ideally this would cover both Eastern Burma through Thailand and Western Burma through Bangladesh and India); and, once again, a plan to trigger the end of the SPDC, perhaps in combination with such assistance.
For Eastern Burma, an assistance program would of course require Thailand's cooperation, and this raises the question of its own policy towards Burma. In recent years Thai policy has been wholly supportive of the SPDC. Now that the Democrats are in power - one hopes they will not yield to the demands of Thaksin Shinawatra’s paid thugs - this may change. Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya has said that human rights would be a factor in Thailand's relations with the Junta. Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva recently called the Burmese regime "a hideous blight on Asia's map of expanding freedoms and growing economies."
This is a welcome change. During Thaksin's rule, Thai policy did not reflect the interests of the Thai public. Instead, it served his personal business interests with the Junta and also the interests of Thai businesspeople involved in resource exploitation and human and narcotics trafficking.
Thailand's interests are clearly that Burma become democratic, in the near term to eliminate the effects on the country of the humanitarian crisis and also to reduce the drug trade. But Thailand would also benefit considerably over the long-term from an end to the regime. The two nations would likely develop close economic ties. Border locations such as Three Pagodas Pass and Mae Sot would grow at an exponential rate, as Burma recovered from fifty years of economic neglect.
Thailand's examination of its own policy creates an opening for the U.S. to promote cross-border assistance programs and also more aggressive action. For the first, the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Susan Rice, said that America intended to work "to strengthen protections for civilians in conflict zones." Eastern Burma is the perfect location to turn this talk into action.
A humanitarian responsibility to protect program would have many elements and complexities, but it is squarely within the competence of USAID. One can envision the large-scale provision of rice, medicine, and educational materials. A related element would be supplying a communications network and electrical equipment, including solar panels, generators and batteries. For security, the U.S. could lead the way in organizing an international peace-keeping force, and also assist with training and intelligence. The nations of Asean should be asked to supply troops for the peace-keeping force.
This type of program is feasible, and it would have a dramatic positive impact. All it requires is political will from the new Administration to live up to Ambassador Rice's words.
A responsibility to protect program for Eastern Burma would also correct the already noted deficiency in U.S. policy that while it has a proper and strong emphasis on Daw Suu and Burma's political prisoners, it fails to take into account much less address the problems of the country's ethnic minorities.
The United States has traditionally been unwilling to recognize the ethnic organizations, such as the Karen National Union, as legitimate and legal entities and stakeholders. At the recent meeting between the KNU and Thailand’s Foreign Minister, though, they were accorded this status. If the U.S. will liaise with the SPDC on the rice donation, it certainly should do the same with the KNU to help internally displaced persons in Eastern Burma.
Power-sharing and top-down policy
For the Obama Administration to make these changes, it will have to counteract the significant momentum that already exists to accept the 2010 result and its corollary that Than Shwe will remain in power. This is the idea that power-sharing is both acceptable and inevitable. However, it is important to understand the history of the position. Daw Suu and the NLD have said that the military - the Burma Army - has a legitimate role in the affairs of the country. What they were clearly referring to was the role of the military in a post-SPDC, free Burma: what responsibilities, and scale and composition, the Army should have.
SPDC cronies and international backers, though, have surreptitiously restated this as the idea that power-sharing with Than Shwe himself and the other SPDC generals is acceptable. It is not. Any party that supports the idea of power-sharing with Than Shwe is in opposition to the basic policy goal of freedom for the Burmese people.
It is essential to grasp the implications of this version of the idea. The International Community, beginning with the United Nations Secretariat, which supports the 2010 vote, is offering Than Shwe and his fellow generals the opportunity not to be prosecuted for their crimes against humanity; to keep their ill-gotten riches; and even to continue their regime and its mass murder and plunder.
This is terrible policy. It denies justice to four and one half decades of victims - to tens of millions of people - and it is a rubber stamp permission for the Junta to keep committing its crimes.
The power-sharing idea is an example of "top-down policy," meaning policy that is created without the input or approval of the people. It is undemocratic. The only people who have the right to accept this type of "solution" are the people of Burma, and since they are unable to verifiably grant their consent, it is completely unacceptable. Just because the International Community, expressing the desires of international corporations, is impatient and wants to move, does not mean that it has the right to do so. Only the people have the right to decide their destiny.
We should not forget the backgrounds of the people who are promoting power-sharing with the SPDC. Ban Ki-moon, as South Korea's Foreign Minister, fully supported the interests of Daewoo, one of the most active corporations in Burma. Ibrahim Gambari was not only Nigerian dictator Sani Abacha's representative at the U.N., he is so placid with Burma's generals that you could easily grant him the title, SPDC Secretary Designate. Ban Ki-moon also just accepted, on April 8th, the credentials of the Junta’s new U.N. Ambassador, war criminal Colonel Than Swe.
The U.N. press notice says that Than Swe rose from Second Lieutenant to Colonel while serving in the Burma Army from 1975 to 2000. Our information is that he was attached to Light Infantry Division 44, based in Thaton, Karen State, and that he reached the level of Tactical Commander, responsible for three battalions. LID 44 was formed in 1979, and commenced large-scale offensives against Karen villagers beginning in 1982, which offensives continue today. The United States should protest the appointment, and force it to be reversed, just as Australia did in 2007 when it refused to accept as envoy from the SPDC Brigadier General Thet Oo Maung.
The U.S. should further organize other nations to expel the Junta from the General Assembly.
In addition to its backing from the U.N., Japan is helping the Junta arrange the 2010 charade. Many nations in Europe are also openly supporting the dictatorship's Roadmap.
Burma is now an industry, as any visitor to a press conference at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand will see. The members of this industry want it to grow. There is no time to wait for freedom and democracy, much less do what is required to bring them about.
Conclusion
This is the environment that the Obama Administration faces. It appears almost impossible to manage, but only if you forget one thing. President Obama must serve the people of America, and the people of America are definitely on the side of the people of Burma. The only logical policy, therefore, is to work with determination for freedom for Burma, whatever it takes.
If the Administration wants to begin with talk, then by all means talk, but have a backup plan in place if it fails, and remember that just because you want something to work, doesn't mean that it will.
1. Never forget that the goal - the only real goal - is freedom.
2. Organize multilateral support: in public to oppose the SPDC's nuclear and missile proliferation, and to extend and make uniform both economic and weapons sanctions; and in private, with China, Russia and India, to get them to drop their support for the SPDC, and with Thailand, to organize cross-border assistance.
NLD youth coordinator from inside Burma speech
NLD youth coordinator from inside Burma had made a speech on how people under military regime can use the different democratic ways in order to restore the democracy in Burma.
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Sunday, 12 April 2009
Friday, 10 April 2009
ထုတ္ျပန္ေၾကျငာခ်က္ အမွတ္ ၅/၀၉
စာအမွတ္- စကလ/လစဖ/၀၅/၀၉
ေန႕စြဲ - ၉-၄-၀၉
ကၽြႏ္ုပ္တို႔ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံတြင္ စစ္အာဏာရွင္စနစ္ အျမစ္ျပတ္ ခ်ဳပ္ၿငိမ္းေစေရး၊ စစ္မွန္ေသာ ဒီမိုကေရစီ ေပၚထြန္းလာေရး၊ မဲလိမ္၍ တဖက္သတ္ အတည္ျပဳထားေသာ ၂၀၀၈ ဖဲြ႔စည္းပံု အေျခခံဥပေဒကို ဖယ္ရွားပစ္ေရး၊ တရားမဝင္ စစ္အာဏာ သိမ္း ထားသူမ်ားက တရားဝင္ အစိုးရအျဖစ္ လိမ္ညာ အတည္ျပဳမည့္ ၂၀၁၀ အတု အေယာင္ ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြ ကို တားဆီး တိုက္ဖ်က္ေရး ဆိုသည့္ အေၾကာင္းရင္းခံမ်ားျဖင့္ ကၽြႏု္ပ္တို႔၏ ၂၀၀၉ စုစည္းလႈပ္ရွားမႈ ေကာ္မတီကို ႏိုင္ငံေရး လိုအပ္ခ်က္ အရ ဖဲြ႔စည္းခဲ့ျခင္း ျဖစ္ပါသည္။
စစ္အုပ္စုႏွင့္ ယွဥ္ၿပိဳင္ရင္ဆိုင္ ေအာင္ပြဲဆင္ႏိုင္ရန္ စုစည္းညီညြတ္ေသာ ဒီမိုကေရစီ အင္အားစုႀကီး တရပ္ ေပၚထြန္း လာေရး ဆိုသည့္ လုပ္ငန္းစဥ္ကိုလည္း ကၽြႏု္ပ္တို႔၏ ပင္မ လုပ္ငန္းစဥ္အျဖစ္ ခ်မွတ္အေကာင္ အထည္ေဖၚလွ်က္ ရွိပါ သည္။
၂၀၀၉ ခုႏွစ္ ဧၿပီလ ၆ ရက္ေန႔က NCGUB, NCUB အပါအဝင္ ေတာ္လွန္ေရး အင္အားစုႀကီး ၇ ဖြဲ႔ မွ စုစည္းညီညြတ္ေသာ တပ္ေပါင္းစုႀကီး ဖြဲ႔စည္းသြားမည္ ျဖစ္ေၾကာင္းႏွင့္ ၂၀၀၈ ဖြဲ႔စည္းပံု အေျခခံဥပေဒကို ဖ်က္သိမ္းႏိုင္ေရးအတြက္ ေဆာင္ရြက္ သြားမည္ ျဖစ္သလို၊ ထိုဖဲြ႕စည္းပံုျဖင့္ ေဆာင္ရြက္မည့္ ၂၀၁၀ ေရြးေကာက္ပြဲကိုလည္း ဆန္႔က်င္သြားမည္ ျဖစ္ေၾကာင္း ထုတ္ျပန္ေၾကျငာခဲ့ပါသည္။
ထိုေၾကျငာခ်က္ပါ အခ်က္မ်ားသည္ ကၽြႏု္ပ္တို႔ ၂၀၀၉ စုစည္းလႈပ္ရွားမႈ ေကာ္မတီမွ ခ်မွတ္ထားေသာ လုပ္ငန္းစဥ္ မ်ားႏွင့္ ထပ္တူနီးပါး တူညီမႈရွိပါသျဖင့္ ဝမ္းေျမာက္ဝမ္းသာ ေထာက္ခံ ႀကိဳဆိုပါေၾကာင္းႏွင့္ ေတာ္လွန္ေရးအင္အားစုႀကီး မ်ား၏ စုစည္းညီညြတ္မႈ အေပၚ ႏွစ္ေထာင္းအားရ ျဖစ္ရပါေၾကာင္း အေလးအနက္ ေဖၚျပအပ္ပါသည္။
ထိုစုစည္းညီညြတ္ေသာ အင္အားစုမ်ား၏ စုစည္းမႈအင္အားျဖင့္ ျပည္သူ႔အေရးေတာ္ပံုႀကီးတရပ္ ဆက္လက္ဆင္ႏြဲေရး ဆိုသည့္ ဒုတိယ ေျခလွမ္းတရပ္ကိုလည္း ျပည္သူလူထုတို႔၏ အက်ိဳးစီးပြါးကို ေရွးရႈ၍ ဆက္လက္ေဖၚေဆာင္ ဦးေဆာင္မႈ ေပးပါရန္ ကိုလည္း အေလးအနက္တိုက္တြန္း ေတာင္းဆိုအပ္ပါသည္။
ဒီမိုကေရစီ က်င့္စဥ္အရ လြတ္လပ္စြာ သေဘာထားကြဲလြဲခြင့္ ရွိသည္ဟုဆိုလွ်င္ လြတ္လပ္စြာစုစည္း ညီညြတ္ ေဆာင္ရြက္ ခြင့္လည္း ရွိပါသည္။ ကၽြႏ္ုပ္တို႔ အေနျဖင့္ ထိုလႈပ္ရွားေဆာင္ရြက္မႈမ်ားတြင္ မည္သည့္ အခန္းက႑မွမဆို အေလးအနက္ ပူးေပါင္းပါဝင္ ေဆာင္ရြက္သြားမည္ျဖစ္ေၾကာင္း ထုတ္ျပန္ေၾကျငာအပ္ပါသည္။
အလုပ္အမႈေဆာင္အဖြဲ႕
၂၀၀၉ စုစည္းလႈပ္ရွားမႈ ေကာ္မတီ
Announcement 05/09
Date April,9 ,2009
The 2009 Collective Action Committee (CAC) has been set up to end the dictatorship in Burma and to work for democracy. We reject the bogus, fraudulent 2008 referendum – held amidst one of the worst humanitarian crises the world has seen - and will work to ensure that the planned, sham 2010 election, that is merely an attempt to legitimate military control of the country, is successfully opposed.
One of our main aims at the 2009 CAC is to facilitate unity and cooperation between opposition groups working towards the same goal – the end of military rule in Burma and the restoration of democracy.
On April 6th, 2009, the NCGUB, the NCUB and other opposition groups working for democratic change in Burma, announced that they do not recognize the 2008 referendum, and that they will not participate in the bogus 2010 election.
We warmly welcome these announcements and support the stated aims. We believe that we are all working toward the same goal, and that by working together we can achieve these stated aims. We believe that by maintaining unity between opposition groups we can successfully work towards ending military rule in Burma. Together we can work towards restoring democracy in Burma.
In accordance with democratic principles, there is plenty of room for free thought, and difference of opinion. But we must remain steadfast in the ideals that unite us all and work together for a free and democratic Burma.
We at the 2009 CAC strongly believe in these principles and will work together with other opposition groups to see our mutual aims achieved.
Working Committee
2009 Collective Action Committee (BURMA)
စာအမွတ္- စကလ/လစဖ/၀၅/၀၉
ေန႕စြဲ - ၉-၄-၀၉
ကၽြႏ္ုပ္တို႔ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံတြင္ စစ္အာဏာရွင္စနစ္ အျမစ္ျပတ္ ခ်ဳပ္ၿငိမ္းေစေရး၊ စစ္မွန္ေသာ ဒီမိုကေရစီ ေပၚထြန္းလာေရး၊ မဲလိမ္၍ တဖက္သတ္ အတည္ျပဳထားေသာ ၂၀၀၈ ဖဲြ႔စည္းပံု အေျခခံဥပေဒကို ဖယ္ရွားပစ္ေရး၊ တရားမဝင္ စစ္အာဏာ သိမ္း ထားသူမ်ားက တရားဝင္ အစိုးရအျဖစ္ လိမ္ညာ အတည္ျပဳမည့္ ၂၀၁၀ အတု အေယာင္ ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြ ကို တားဆီး တိုက္ဖ်က္ေရး ဆိုသည့္ အေၾကာင္းရင္းခံမ်ားျဖင့္ ကၽြႏု္ပ္တို႔၏ ၂၀၀၉ စုစည္းလႈပ္ရွားမႈ ေကာ္မတီကို ႏိုင္ငံေရး လိုအပ္ခ်က္ အရ ဖဲြ႔စည္းခဲ့ျခင္း ျဖစ္ပါသည္။
စစ္အုပ္စုႏွင့္ ယွဥ္ၿပိဳင္ရင္ဆိုင္ ေအာင္ပြဲဆင္ႏိုင္ရန္ စုစည္းညီညြတ္ေသာ ဒီမိုကေရစီ အင္အားစုႀကီး တရပ္ ေပၚထြန္း လာေရး ဆိုသည့္ လုပ္ငန္းစဥ္ကိုလည္း ကၽြႏု္ပ္တို႔၏ ပင္မ လုပ္ငန္းစဥ္အျဖစ္ ခ်မွတ္အေကာင္ အထည္ေဖၚလွ်က္ ရွိပါ သည္။
၂၀၀၉ ခုႏွစ္ ဧၿပီလ ၆ ရက္ေန႔က NCGUB, NCUB အပါအဝင္ ေတာ္လွန္ေရး အင္အားစုႀကီး ၇ ဖြဲ႔ မွ စုစည္းညီညြတ္ေသာ တပ္ေပါင္းစုႀကီး ဖြဲ႔စည္းသြားမည္ ျဖစ္ေၾကာင္းႏွင့္ ၂၀၀၈ ဖြဲ႔စည္းပံု အေျခခံဥပေဒကို ဖ်က္သိမ္းႏိုင္ေရးအတြက္ ေဆာင္ရြက္ သြားမည္ ျဖစ္သလို၊ ထိုဖဲြ႕စည္းပံုျဖင့္ ေဆာင္ရြက္မည့္ ၂၀၁၀ ေရြးေကာက္ပြဲကိုလည္း ဆန္႔က်င္သြားမည္ ျဖစ္ေၾကာင္း ထုတ္ျပန္ေၾကျငာခဲ့ပါသည္။
ထိုေၾကျငာခ်က္ပါ အခ်က္မ်ားသည္ ကၽြႏု္ပ္တို႔ ၂၀၀၉ စုစည္းလႈပ္ရွားမႈ ေကာ္မတီမွ ခ်မွတ္ထားေသာ လုပ္ငန္းစဥ္ မ်ားႏွင့္ ထပ္တူနီးပါး တူညီမႈရွိပါသျဖင့္ ဝမ္းေျမာက္ဝမ္းသာ ေထာက္ခံ ႀကိဳဆိုပါေၾကာင္းႏွင့္ ေတာ္လွန္ေရးအင္အားစုႀကီး မ်ား၏ စုစည္းညီညြတ္မႈ အေပၚ ႏွစ္ေထာင္းအားရ ျဖစ္ရပါေၾကာင္း အေလးအနက္ ေဖၚျပအပ္ပါသည္။
ထိုစုစည္းညီညြတ္ေသာ အင္အားစုမ်ား၏ စုစည္းမႈအင္အားျဖင့္ ျပည္သူ႔အေရးေတာ္ပံုႀကီးတရပ္ ဆက္လက္ဆင္ႏြဲေရး ဆိုသည့္ ဒုတိယ ေျခလွမ္းတရပ္ကိုလည္း ျပည္သူလူထုတို႔၏ အက်ိဳးစီးပြါးကို ေရွးရႈ၍ ဆက္လက္ေဖၚေဆာင္ ဦးေဆာင္မႈ ေပးပါရန္ ကိုလည္း အေလးအနက္တိုက္တြန္း ေတာင္းဆိုအပ္ပါသည္။
ဒီမိုကေရစီ က်င့္စဥ္အရ လြတ္လပ္စြာ သေဘာထားကြဲလြဲခြင့္ ရွိသည္ဟုဆိုလွ်င္ လြတ္လပ္စြာစုစည္း ညီညြတ္ ေဆာင္ရြက္ ခြင့္လည္း ရွိပါသည္။ ကၽြႏ္ုပ္တို႔ အေနျဖင့္ ထိုလႈပ္ရွားေဆာင္ရြက္မႈမ်ားတြင္ မည္သည့္ အခန္းက႑မွမဆို အေလးအနက္ ပူးေပါင္းပါဝင္ ေဆာင္ရြက္သြားမည္ျဖစ္ေၾကာင္း ထုတ္ျပန္ေၾကျငာအပ္ပါသည္။
အလုပ္အမႈေဆာင္အဖြဲ႕
၂၀၀၉ စုစည္းလႈပ္ရွားမႈ ေကာ္မတီ
Announcement 05/09
Date April,9 ,2009
The 2009 Collective Action Committee (CAC) has been set up to end the dictatorship in Burma and to work for democracy. We reject the bogus, fraudulent 2008 referendum – held amidst one of the worst humanitarian crises the world has seen - and will work to ensure that the planned, sham 2010 election, that is merely an attempt to legitimate military control of the country, is successfully opposed.
One of our main aims at the 2009 CAC is to facilitate unity and cooperation between opposition groups working towards the same goal – the end of military rule in Burma and the restoration of democracy.
On April 6th, 2009, the NCGUB, the NCUB and other opposition groups working for democratic change in Burma, announced that they do not recognize the 2008 referendum, and that they will not participate in the bogus 2010 election.
We warmly welcome these announcements and support the stated aims. We believe that we are all working toward the same goal, and that by working together we can achieve these stated aims. We believe that by maintaining unity between opposition groups we can successfully work towards ending military rule in Burma. Together we can work towards restoring democracy in Burma.
In accordance with democratic principles, there is plenty of room for free thought, and difference of opinion. But we must remain steadfast in the ideals that unite us all and work together for a free and democratic Burma.
We at the 2009 CAC strongly believe in these principles and will work together with other opposition groups to see our mutual aims achieved.
Working Committee
2009 Collective Action Committee (BURMA)
Burma’s Roadmap to Nowhere
Here we go again; more talks and feel good plans that only buy more time for Than Shwe. In all reality there is no dialogue that is valid until Aung San Suu Kyi and her cabinet are included in these meetings. Inviting every nation in the world is meaningless unless the duly elected officials of Burma are there to discuss the real issues. Without the NLD leadership at the table all the talk in the world is just a lot of hot air.
For any nation to condone or except the notion the 2010 election has any validity at all is purely ludicrous. The people have spoken and no matter how many people Than Shwe and his criminal regime toss into prisons, tortures and murders, the election results will remain the same. And for any nation to consider anything less makes them a partner in Burma’s holocaust and wholesale human rights violations. It is sad enough to realize international corporations that fill store shelves in the United States of America and the free world are partners with Than Shwe.
With South Asia poised for war on many fronts it is only a matter of time before the landscape of many nations explodes into bloodshed. Unrest breeds unrest and the unchecked crimes against humanity perpetrated by Than Shwe has become a cancer to all of Asia and democracy as a whole. Even China is primed for revolution since they wandered away from the core tenets of communism in favor of fascist corporatism. Thailand has already exchanged gun fire on several borders and like the domino effect Asia will soon be engulfed in many secular wars.
Ibrahim Gambari proved beyond a shadow of a doubt the United Nations is as impotent as they are corrupt. Their inability to do anything other than deliver cereal, milk and imposed worthless sanctions makes them a non entity. It would appear the UN is nothing more than a worthless plutocracy that only buys time for the perpetrators of crimes against humanity.
88 Generations Students Group spokesperson Tun Myint Aung was quoted in an open letter to the junta by *The Irrawaddy;
“The Western democracies have placed economic and social sanctions on Burma to protest against human rights violations by the Burmese junta, so the junta should show its respect for human rights and for the Burmese people”
They also endorsed the four basic requests that would foster true reconciliation.
Release Aung San Suu Kyi and all political prisoners
The convening of parliament
Establish true political dialogue
Review the 2008 Constitution
The world should take notice that the people of Burma are still very active in their struggle for democracy. Regardless of what the junta’s propaganda machine may publish, the people of Burma still yearn for freedom and democracy.
On another note, I’ve seen the demise of Than Shwe in several dreams for what its worth. I’ve seen the two options he had to choose from. One would give his family peace whence he departed this Earth. The other choice had a much darker consequence. Now the traditional **Thingyansar predicts major change and an end to feudalism among other things as we enter the Burmese New Year. Than Shwe moved the nation’s capital into the jungle on the advice of his soothsayer. I believe it was sound advice but his soothsayer should have told him this maneuver only bought a little time. Like the ole saying goes, “you can run but you can’t hide”. Building a Pagoda was another interesting piece of Burmese tradition that bore ominous fruit for the regime. In short this tradition marks the collapse of a kingdom whence a ruler builds a Pagoda. Than Shwe’s Peace Pagoda should suffice don’t you think? It was consecrated in blood when 20 people got killed on the Ferris wheel at opening day. Is this another omen or just bad luck? Only time will tell.
The tangible aspects of his government also points to major changes within the regime regardless of his attempts to keep his generals at odds with one another. The moment he blinks an eye the war for his throne will begin. Than Shwe’s reality is death and it will be this year according to the signs. At some point his soothsayers should inform him of his options or are they waiting for his end like everyone else?
There is no question outsiders from the industrial world who’ve sided with Than Shwe will feel the wrath of the people they subjugated over the years. I’ve seen the list of name, many westerners as well as Asians. Quietly the people of Burma have been taking notes and these corporate thugs are known in many circles around the world. Some will stand trial for their participation in Than Shwe’s holocaust. Others will try to hide or face the scorn of the world. Their days are numbered as well. With millions of witnesses to the atrocities that were committed over the years, convictions will not be hard to come by. The Khmer Rouge once thought they were invincible but they were betrayed by the magic they though would protect them forever. Now they stand trial for genocide and crimes against humanity. Than Shwe may die but his generals will face a jury for his sins, that is a given.
Dare I mention the series of natural disasters that will plague Asia and the world? I also see disaster after disaster that will cripple the empires of greed that has engulfed the globe as well. In any event, Than Shwe’s road map will soon have obstacles from both the tangible and intangible worlds he betrayed. They will be insurmountable and will fall within the context of the dogma he perverted and blasphemed. Though I’m not a Buddhist I do enjoy reading their books and can appreciate their doctrine. I just can’t seem to find the part where it’s condoned and accepted to rape, imprison and ghoulishly torture people to death. It seems as though Than Shwe was more a conscript of Kali fore he is a Thug of the highest order. His reign of terror and bloodshed will not go unrewarded and death will not shroud him from his destiny.
* http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=15449
** http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=15465
Your Devil’s Advocate
Buffalohair
Thursday, 9 April 2009
Wednesday, 8 April 2009
NLD reviews finer points of Special Announcement No. 18
NLD reviews finer points of Special Announcement No. 18
by Ko Wild
Wednesday, 08 April 2009 21:47
Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – In a bid to explore a political strategy, the National League for Democracy (NLD), is currently reviewing the finer points expressed in its Special Announcement (18/09/08).
The NLD has said that convening Parliament, as mentioned in this statement does not imply seizing power, but amendment and approval of the Constitution.
For this process to be successful, dialogue between the two top leaders, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and Snr. Gen. Than Shwe should be initiated, without any preconditions, NLD CEC member, U Khin Maung Swe told Mizzima.
"If Daw Suu and Snr. Gen. Than Shwe accept the amendment of the Constitution, everything will be fine. Then we can consider other options rather than forming a committee in Parliament. In the last stage, there must be a Parliament, as we must recognize the results of the 1990 general elections. After reaching an agreement, there will be the option of forming a committee, amending the Constitution and getting it approved by the Parliament. It depends on mutual trust," he said.
In the Special Announcement No. 18, the NLD says that the 2008 Constitution was forcibly approved by the SPDC, against the will of the people. And it also urges the junta to convene Parliament at the earliest with the elected MPs, in accordance with Section 3 of the 1990 General Election Law.
This Parliament should be formed with a 'Constitution Review Committee', with representatives of the 1990 election winning parties, elected MPs, army representatives, ethnic representatives, representatives of ceasefire groups and constitutional legal experts.
U Khin Maung Swe said that NLD had first focused on transferring power from the junta just after general elections and it could accept the changing situation later.
"We initially thought the junta would really transfer all three pillars of power to the winning party, as there was no clear provision and explanation before the elections. So we thought in a normal manner. Now, we have called for convening the Parliament as recognition of the 1990 election results. However, it has nothing to do with the three pillars of power, just amendment of the Constitution, and its adoption," he said.
Meanwhile, at the last 64th Anti-Fascist Resistance Day, Snr. Gen. Than Shwe warned not to undermine the Constitution, which had already been approved by the people.
"There is provision for amendment in the 2008 Constitution. It is not undermining of the Constitution, but demanding a review, as we have the right to do so, in accordance with the law. In every country in the world, no law is perfect and needs to be amended. Calling for amending an amendable Constitution does not mean undermining it," he said.
After releasing this special announcement, the Police Chief met NLD party CEC members at the office of the Home Ministry and warned they could be prosecuted, unless they withdrew this statement. But, the NLD replied that they could not accept what he had said.
The United Nations has urged successive military regimes to recognize the 1990 general election results for over 10 years.
Copy from Mizzima.
by Ko Wild
Wednesday, 08 April 2009 21:47
Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – In a bid to explore a political strategy, the National League for Democracy (NLD), is currently reviewing the finer points expressed in its Special Announcement (18/09/08).
The NLD has said that convening Parliament, as mentioned in this statement does not imply seizing power, but amendment and approval of the Constitution.
For this process to be successful, dialogue between the two top leaders, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and Snr. Gen. Than Shwe should be initiated, without any preconditions, NLD CEC member, U Khin Maung Swe told Mizzima.
"If Daw Suu and Snr. Gen. Than Shwe accept the amendment of the Constitution, everything will be fine. Then we can consider other options rather than forming a committee in Parliament. In the last stage, there must be a Parliament, as we must recognize the results of the 1990 general elections. After reaching an agreement, there will be the option of forming a committee, amending the Constitution and getting it approved by the Parliament. It depends on mutual trust," he said.
In the Special Announcement No. 18, the NLD says that the 2008 Constitution was forcibly approved by the SPDC, against the will of the people. And it also urges the junta to convene Parliament at the earliest with the elected MPs, in accordance with Section 3 of the 1990 General Election Law.
This Parliament should be formed with a 'Constitution Review Committee', with representatives of the 1990 election winning parties, elected MPs, army representatives, ethnic representatives, representatives of ceasefire groups and constitutional legal experts.
U Khin Maung Swe said that NLD had first focused on transferring power from the junta just after general elections and it could accept the changing situation later.
"We initially thought the junta would really transfer all three pillars of power to the winning party, as there was no clear provision and explanation before the elections. So we thought in a normal manner. Now, we have called for convening the Parliament as recognition of the 1990 election results. However, it has nothing to do with the three pillars of power, just amendment of the Constitution, and its adoption," he said.
Meanwhile, at the last 64th Anti-Fascist Resistance Day, Snr. Gen. Than Shwe warned not to undermine the Constitution, which had already been approved by the people.
"There is provision for amendment in the 2008 Constitution. It is not undermining of the Constitution, but demanding a review, as we have the right to do so, in accordance with the law. In every country in the world, no law is perfect and needs to be amended. Calling for amending an amendable Constitution does not mean undermining it," he said.
After releasing this special announcement, the Police Chief met NLD party CEC members at the office of the Home Ministry and warned they could be prosecuted, unless they withdrew this statement. But, the NLD replied that they could not accept what he had said.
The United Nations has urged successive military regimes to recognize the 1990 general election results for over 10 years.
Copy from Mizzima.
Tuesday, 7 April 2009
Tata Motors to Build Trucks in Burma
The company who built the world’s cheapest car, the Nano or the People’s Car, will soon be manufacturing heavy military vehicles for Burma’s killing machine. Following the axiom of economics over humanity *Tata Motor Company entered into an agreement to build a manufacturing facility in Burma by December 2009. Sadly this turn of events will have direct consequences in sales of the Nano to the free world as news of this reprehensible partnership spreads.
Sanctions imposed on the criminal regime of Burma will surely hamper sales. Norway already dumped China’s Dongfeng Motor Group for its sales of 900 trucks to Burma’s military. Other auto manufacturers will soon feel the heat as nations take a stand for humanity over profits. In the sights are other auto manufacturers such as Toyota, Mitsubishi and Suzuki just to name a few. As the world economies falter, these companies will feel the brunt of the financial collapse. This immoral alliance is destined to failure for a host of reasons. It will sever them right as well as the other corporations who’ve chosen to finance Than Shwe and his murderous regime.
The fact Tata will be building heavy trucks for the cursed Than Shwe will mark the beginning of the end for them since Than Shwe’s military dictatorship is on the verge of a coop. Resentment and betrayal are rampant within his inner circle of hand picked generals. Than Shwe’s impending death has them hovering around him like vultures. Than’s paranoia has him positioning his closest allies around him for protection from other generals who might pose a threat to his life. The fact soldiers are ill paid and left to fend for themselves whence they are injured while generals languish in the lap of luxury is a dire indicator as well.
Unwitting investors will soon find themselves in a crossfire as this volatile situation explodes into an internal struggle for power and control. Than Shwe’s paranoid fears are truly misdirected fore his fate is not in the hands of the opposition. His destiny lies in the hands of those he betrayed within his own inner circle. For those who invest in his criminal regime there is no security. As soon as pandemonium breaks out within Burma they will be the first casualty. When Than Shwe dies or is murdered blood will soon cover the ground at Naypyidaw. And there is no doubt some of the blood will be from the greedy investors.
*http://www.domain-b.com/companies/companies_t/Tata_Motors/20090330_heavy_trucks_unit.html
Your Devil’s Advocate
Buffalohair
Copy from
Buffalohair Gazette International
http://buffalohair-jage.com/WP-BGI/2009/04/05/tata-motors-to-build-trucks-in-burma/
Sanctions imposed on the criminal regime of Burma will surely hamper sales. Norway already dumped China’s Dongfeng Motor Group for its sales of 900 trucks to Burma’s military. Other auto manufacturers will soon feel the heat as nations take a stand for humanity over profits. In the sights are other auto manufacturers such as Toyota, Mitsubishi and Suzuki just to name a few. As the world economies falter, these companies will feel the brunt of the financial collapse. This immoral alliance is destined to failure for a host of reasons. It will sever them right as well as the other corporations who’ve chosen to finance Than Shwe and his murderous regime.
The fact Tata will be building heavy trucks for the cursed Than Shwe will mark the beginning of the end for them since Than Shwe’s military dictatorship is on the verge of a coop. Resentment and betrayal are rampant within his inner circle of hand picked generals. Than Shwe’s impending death has them hovering around him like vultures. Than’s paranoia has him positioning his closest allies around him for protection from other generals who might pose a threat to his life. The fact soldiers are ill paid and left to fend for themselves whence they are injured while generals languish in the lap of luxury is a dire indicator as well.
Unwitting investors will soon find themselves in a crossfire as this volatile situation explodes into an internal struggle for power and control. Than Shwe’s paranoid fears are truly misdirected fore his fate is not in the hands of the opposition. His destiny lies in the hands of those he betrayed within his own inner circle. For those who invest in his criminal regime there is no security. As soon as pandemonium breaks out within Burma they will be the first casualty. When Than Shwe dies or is murdered blood will soon cover the ground at Naypyidaw. And there is no doubt some of the blood will be from the greedy investors.
*http://www.domain-b.com/companies/companies_t/Tata_Motors/20090330_heavy_trucks_unit.html
Your Devil’s Advocate
Buffalohair
Copy from
Buffalohair Gazette International
http://buffalohair-jage.com/WP-BGI/2009/04/05/tata-motors-to-build-trucks-in-burma/
Chin Human Rights Organisation: Chins In Delhi Need Fair Humanitarian Support
Chin Human Rights Organisation: Chins In Delhi Need Fair Humanitarian Support
Van Biak Thang
Chinland Guardian
06 April, 2009
The Chin people stranded as refugees in India’s Delhi are in ‘extremely poor’ conditions with very limited access to humanitarian relief and in serious need of effective protection and services, a report released by Chin Human Rights Organisation (CHRO) said today.
The report Waiting on the margins: An assessment of the situation of Chin refugees in Delhi documented the ‘vulnerable’ living conditions of the Chin refugees with limited protections available to them and also highlighted the long awaited-and-delayed process of refugee issues handled by the UNHCR in India.
Salai Bawi Lian Mang, executive director of CHRO, said: “So many Chins in Delhi live in deplorable conditions - without jobs, without basic amenities, and without access to social services. In fact, the Chins are refugees in desperate need of protection, but it takes years to gain protection by the UNHCR. Meanwhile, the Chins are living on the bare margins of society in Delhi.” The report said: “Due to long processing delays at UNHCR, it takes on average more than two years to receive refugee recognition - four times longer than mandated by UNHCR guidelines. As a result, more than half of the Chin population in Delhi have cases pending with UNHCR and are not yet recognized as refugees. Without UNHCR-recognition, Chins are not eligible for essential social services and humanitarian relief provided by UNHCR-partner organizations.”
There are, according to CHRO’s report, currently some 75,000 to 100,000 ethnic Chins from Burma living on the India-Burma border in India’s north-eastern state of Mizoram and an estimated 4,200 living in Delhi, making it the largest asylum-seeking population from Burma in the second-largest metropolis of India.
Sixty-six percent of the Chin population in Delhi are, the report added, unemployed and even those employed earn only Rs. 70 (US$1.35) for 10 to 12 hours per day.
The report, while acknowledging, said of the programmes and services provided and supported by the UNHCR as ‘inadequate and ineffective’ so as to meeting the needs of Chin community. Access to such programmes is still limited to UNHCR-recognised refugees and more than half of the Chin population in Delhi are not even eligible to benefit from the programmes, it added.
CHRO urged the Indian government and the UNHCR to make sure the Chin people get unhindered access to effective protection and services including healthcare, education, accommodation and employment opportunities, and to minimize processing delays and corruption from obtaining protection. It also called for improving the current ‘inadequate’ humanitarian programs for the Chin community.
Since late 2006, the Chin people have been facing SPDC-neglected food crisis caused by a plague of rats that destroy food and crops following a once-in-fifty-year cycle of bamboo flowering phenomenon.
Due to an ongoing severe ethnic and religious persecution, and human rights abuses committed by Burma’s long-standing military regime, hundreds of thousands of Chin people have been forced to leave their homes in Chin State into neighbouring countries and beyond.
Chin Human Rights Organisation has produced a series of documentary reports including Religious Persecution: A Campaign of Ethnocide against Chin Christians in Burma in 2004, The Chin People of Burma: A Struggle for Survival in 2006, and Critical Point: Food Scarcity and Hunger in Burma’s Chin State in 2008.
Van Biak Thang
Chinland Guardian
06 April, 2009
The Chin people stranded as refugees in India’s Delhi are in ‘extremely poor’ conditions with very limited access to humanitarian relief and in serious need of effective protection and services, a report released by Chin Human Rights Organisation (CHRO) said today.
The report Waiting on the margins: An assessment of the situation of Chin refugees in Delhi documented the ‘vulnerable’ living conditions of the Chin refugees with limited protections available to them and also highlighted the long awaited-and-delayed process of refugee issues handled by the UNHCR in India.
Salai Bawi Lian Mang, executive director of CHRO, said: “So many Chins in Delhi live in deplorable conditions - without jobs, without basic amenities, and without access to social services. In fact, the Chins are refugees in desperate need of protection, but it takes years to gain protection by the UNHCR. Meanwhile, the Chins are living on the bare margins of society in Delhi.” The report said: “Due to long processing delays at UNHCR, it takes on average more than two years to receive refugee recognition - four times longer than mandated by UNHCR guidelines. As a result, more than half of the Chin population in Delhi have cases pending with UNHCR and are not yet recognized as refugees. Without UNHCR-recognition, Chins are not eligible for essential social services and humanitarian relief provided by UNHCR-partner organizations.”
There are, according to CHRO’s report, currently some 75,000 to 100,000 ethnic Chins from Burma living on the India-Burma border in India’s north-eastern state of Mizoram and an estimated 4,200 living in Delhi, making it the largest asylum-seeking population from Burma in the second-largest metropolis of India.
Sixty-six percent of the Chin population in Delhi are, the report added, unemployed and even those employed earn only Rs. 70 (US$1.35) for 10 to 12 hours per day.
The report, while acknowledging, said of the programmes and services provided and supported by the UNHCR as ‘inadequate and ineffective’ so as to meeting the needs of Chin community. Access to such programmes is still limited to UNHCR-recognised refugees and more than half of the Chin population in Delhi are not even eligible to benefit from the programmes, it added.
CHRO urged the Indian government and the UNHCR to make sure the Chin people get unhindered access to effective protection and services including healthcare, education, accommodation and employment opportunities, and to minimize processing delays and corruption from obtaining protection. It also called for improving the current ‘inadequate’ humanitarian programs for the Chin community.
Since late 2006, the Chin people have been facing SPDC-neglected food crisis caused by a plague of rats that destroy food and crops following a once-in-fifty-year cycle of bamboo flowering phenomenon.
Due to an ongoing severe ethnic and religious persecution, and human rights abuses committed by Burma’s long-standing military regime, hundreds of thousands of Chin people have been forced to leave their homes in Chin State into neighbouring countries and beyond.
Chin Human Rights Organisation has produced a series of documentary reports including Religious Persecution: A Campaign of Ethnocide against Chin Christians in Burma in 2004, The Chin People of Burma: A Struggle for Survival in 2006, and Critical Point: Food Scarcity and Hunger in Burma’s Chin State in 2008.
Sunday, 5 April 2009
Poem 1
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Saturday, 4 April 2009
‘Resistance Day’ demonstration, 27/3/2009, UK: A few thoughts for consideration about 2010 elections
By Christopher Dowling
It has been a little while since I attended a pro-democracy demonstration for
Burma and I was glad to be able to support this event organised by Burma Democratic Concern (BDC) held outside the Burmese embassy and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London on the 27th March 2009.
The UK based event was synchronised with activities inside Burma, drawing together the Burmese Diaspora democracy movements to those that are struggling inside Burma, an important connection to always maintain. Inside Burma the BDC commemorated Resistance Day by distributing pamphlets and postcards calling for all Burmese people to work in order to restore democracy and to free all political prisoners. They also sent an open letter to Burmese soldiers calling for them to stand with the people if they are genuinely patriotic. The postcards had on them portraits of Aung San Suu Kyi, Khun Htun Oo, Myo Yan Naung Thein, Min Ko Naing, Ko Ko Gyi, Htay Kyawe and Aung Than. The synchronising of activities inside and outside of Burma sends an incredibly strong message to the people inside Burma and to the world, and it is also a sign of how the Burmese democracy movement is developing and expanding within an increasingly globalising world. At the UK Resistance Day demonstration it was good to see some familiar faces standing together: Dr Win Naing (Chairman of the National League for Democracy Liberated Area – UK branch), Myo Thein (Director of Burma Democratic Concern), Nurul Islam (President of the Rohingya Organisation in the UK), Thant Zin Htike (Unit 2 Victory) Zin Zin Myo Thant (BDC Campaigner Officer) amongst various others from Burman and ethnic minority groups.
The resistance day that is being remembered refers to the start of General Aung San’s resistance to the WWII Imperial Japanese forces in Burma, actions that led to Burma’s eventual independence. The focus of the UK demonstration was to highlight that the political figures who conclusively won the only general election that has been held for many decades, i.e. the 1990 election, should have a say in Burma’s imminent constitutional and overall development, representing as they do the voice of the Burmese people. The imminent development in question and a crucial rallying cry for the pro-democracy movement at the moment is to reject or significantly revise the constitution of the junta’s sham 2010 election and thus reject the sham 2010 election. Sham because the result is already constitutionally predetermined to strongly favour the military establishment no matter how Burmese people vote. The appearance of elections is a very striking gesture for the junta to present to the world and they hope to use this gesture to gain a lot for themselves as the world reshuffles its geopolitical agendas in the wake of the global financial crisis and the beginning of the Obama administration. However, what the Burmese democracy movement is trying to point out is that it is just a gesture with no substance, the problems that the SPDC present to the Burmese people, to the development of ASEAN and to the stability of the broader region in relation to Chinese, Indian, Thai etc interests is still largely unchanged by the 2010 election. Furthermore, before the 2010 elections take place represents a good opportunity to improve the situation in Burma through confronting the junta about revising the constitution. Since these elections represent a greater degree of international legitimacy that the junta craves, they also represent an opportunity to pressure the junta to make these elections more genuine. The demonstration in front of the FCO, part of the Europe-wide day of action for Burma was also highlighting about the sham nature of the 2010 elections and was calling for governments within the EU to strengthen sanctions on Burma. On this front I think the democracy movement is feeling a bit more pessimistic because the Obama administration seems to be in the process of revising its current policy towards Burma and we have yet to see what will come of this. More about this below but it may be that we are looking at the prospect of a post sanctions policy of some sort from Obama’s administration. Whatever happens the Burmese people have already shown that they can adapt quickly to new situations, whether this is internationalising their cause (not unlike the Dalai Lama), quickly harnessing new technology like in the 2007 Saffron Revolution, or taking every opportunity that is presented to them to improve the lives of Burmese people inside Burma. Obama may yet provide many opportunities if the US is to play a larger role in Southeast Asia once again, just when the junta has again shown it’s true colours to the international community through it’s reaction to Cyclone Nargis.
It has taken the SPDC military junta more then sixteen years to complete their constitution, whereas General Aung San, it is instructive to note, managed to complete an earlier Burmese constitution in roughly three to four months under much more trying conditions during WWII. Where there was a will, developments followed swiftly. General Aung San is remembered on Resistance Day by the democracy movement for a number of reasons. Not only did he liberate Burma from the British and the Japanese, he created the modern Burmese army which has developed into that which is now ruling Burma and, importantly for the democracy movement, he had very definite views as to what role the army should play in politics, i.e. that the army should stay in the barracks. Thus the democracy movement like to remind the SPDC of where they came from and the advice of the general who brought them to prominence while commemorating Resistance Day, not least through evoking that general’s daughter, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and her call for a second independence struggle.
This military constitution leading towards an imitation democracy was ratified without most Burmese people having read it and the referendum for which was held a mere week after Cyclone Nargis, Burma’s worst recorded natural disaster killing up to c.146, 000 people, displacing millions, and to which the military were very slow to offer humanitarian help. They withheld aid from those who were in immediate desperate need while insisting to continue with a constitutional referendum that took several years to reach. It seems most peculiar for the ruling junta to try to declare that it is looking after the people’s constitutional welfare while simultaneously causing a second tragedy of untold death and suffering through their withholding of aid, on top of the horrendous tragedy of Cyclone Nargis itself. It is the opinion of many Burmese people that the SPDC used the devastation of Cyclone Nargis to weaken the ethnic minorities that were in the areas affected, in particular the predominantly Christian ethnic Karen. The SPDC is currently negotiating a peace treaty with the Karen KNLA (the armed wing of the KNU), which has the distinction of having been engaged in the world’s longest running civil war with the Burmese army. The KNLA’s position is further weakened because Thailand has closed down important Thai based Karen support networks, while simultaneously mediating the peace treaty between the SPDC and the KNLA; thus making Thailand’s contribution to peace in Burma something that has a sting in its tail. While the prospect of cessation of war, especially such a long fought one, is always good in that it means loss of life and destruction will lessen and peaceful reconciliation can begin, if the Karen have been forced into a capitulation because of a natural disaster used against them and they are still refused a legitimate voice in the up and coming parliament, how can the potential peace last? And very recently the KNU has demanded that the international community take a role in rescuing Burma, once again another effort to internationalise Burma’s problems.
“Saw David Takapaw, vice-president of the Karen National Union (KNU), which is waging the world's longest running civil war against the Burmese regime, on Thursday said the international community’s concerted and timely action against the junta is needed in order to address the political deadlock inside the country.”
According to official Burmese news sources, the military constitution apparently achieved an incredible approval rating from more then 92% of the Burmese population, even though it excludes Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, allows the Senior General to directly appoint 25% of the parliament with military personnel, requires the newly appointed civilian president to have military experience and gives this president the power to dissolve parliament whenever ‘necessary’. The Burmese people apparently wanted to give legitimate constitutional power to a military junta that was simultaneously withholding humanitarian aid from them. I think that instead of this military propaganda, the real referendum regarding the Burmese people’s desires for their constitution and their future were expressed during the September 2007 Saffron Revolution. It was expressed loud and clear for the world to hear and it was not a call for imitation democracy but real democracy. Therefore, standing on the shoulders of this people’s referendum in September 2007, there was a call on Resistance Day 27/3/2009 to transform the current military constitution into a genuinely inclusive one, to include all major political groups in Burma to better ensure the future prospect of stability within the Burmese state.
Proximity to the new emerging Asian economic centres of power and the current global financial crisis may work to the juntas favour at the moment but it also must be kept in mind that any success that they achieve will probably further expose weaknesses within the Burmese military’s fickle political structure. The military will need to evolve, that is, it will need to develop a more stable political culture to ensure it can benefit from regional developments and for this it will increasingly need the participation of the Burmese people. Sitting between India and China gives Burma a renewed geo-political significance but also places Burma under a more scrutinising international eye. Burma offers China a land-route connection to the trading networks of the Bay of Bengal and Indian Ocean, without exposing Chinese interests to the more precarious and longer route through the straits of Malacca, Indonesia. The EU is a large trading partner with China and so the EU may end up gaining their future Chinese goods through Burma, which is to say the EU has a voice that China may listen to concerning Burma. The Burmese military and people seem, however, not to be so happy about an increased Chinese presence within Burma. There are accounts of xenophobic reactions to an increasing Chinese presence in Burma, which again will place more pressure on the fickle political structure within the military, especially on generals who are increasingly relying upon Chinese trade to build up their personal fortunes.
However, most of all I think the SPDC is hoping to gain from the fallout of the current global financial crisis and realignment of US foreign policy under Obama and Clinton. The fear generated by this global financial crisis has offered Obama the opportunity to renegotiate US foreign policy with just about everyone that was off of Bush’s list, whether Iran and Syria or Cuba, and so, it seems from Clinton’s Asia tour comments, with the Union of Myanmar as well. The effect of placing Afghanistan and Pakistan at the centre stage of US foreign policy will also dramatically impact upon how the US views Burma. The AfPak initiative is trying to bring more stability to the region and Obama is calling for political and as well as military efforts to be made region wide. Obama does not use language like ‘War on Terror’ and ‘Islamofascist’ and is e.g. trying to negotiate with moderate Taliban groups, i.e. all options are on the table. India and the US have finally agreed to trade nuclear technology, throwing the NPT treaty out the window, which is currently being revived with Russia at the moment probably because of the effect of US/India actions. The US clearly wants to be a greater part of South and Southeast Asia again, although hopefully not following the Vietnam War model. There has been a recent report that the Obama administration “wants to forge a common strategy with Asia to coax military-run Myanmar out of isolation, a senior official said Wednesday, suggesting six-way talks with North Korea (to end it’s nuclear program) could be a model”, thus with ASEAN, China, India, Japan. http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hNFsFTOzY4WNkOA3rcRkDIHJVN3Q
The Asian strategy is different from that of the US and EU, which uses sanctions. So, it would seem that the ground is being prepared to lift sanctions at some point in the future and that this will represent US re-entering Southeast Asia to a greater degree. Burma may be the opportunity that the US wish to use to re-enter Southeast Asia so they will want to make a real impact in order to maintain their renewed post Guantanamo Bay international reputation, and they know there is a democracy movement that wishes to breath freer air in Burma. India has allowed Sri Lanka to pursue its war with the Tamil Tigers to its bloody conclusion without causing the Sri Lankans any extra international pressure, even offering commando training to the Sri Lankan army according to the Guardian. India would seem to be trying to gain favour and strengthen the countries on its periphery, what during the British colonial age was called the Great Game, and which is what in the above weblink article is probably referred to when the Obama administration declares that “nations with sway over the junta should avoid "recreating a mini version of the Great Game."”. Taking all this in mind, it is with curiosity that I discover that Robert Blake, the US Ambassador to Sri Lanka, is visiting Burma and has upped diplomatic relations between the US and the Union of Myanmar. What did he learn from the recent Sri Lankan experience that he wants to apply to Burma or for that matter to US involvement in Southeast Asia? Watch this space…
If the US is trying to re-enter Southeast Asia, the status of Burma will be a real concern, as it is for ASEAN, and Obama’s route into ASEAN looks like it will travel through Indonesia. It was the only, but largest of, ASEAN country that Hillary Clinton visited on her Asia tour and it holds a special place for Obama because he went to school there for four years, he has a personal connection to the country which Indonesia seems to be proud of. It also has the experience of transforming from a military dictatorship to a democracy, experience that a reforming Burmese military will most likely trust. Being a largely Muslim country and seeing that Obama made an explicit call to the Muslim world, it means that if Indonesia does play a larger role in connection with reforming Burma, the current Burmese Rohingya issue may act as a lightening rod bringing world attention to how the Burmese military state will need to reform to become more democratic. The Rohingya issue may also bring about a means through which Indonesia can comment upon what is happening in Burma, perhaps. In this respect it is heartening to see Nurul Islam speak on behalf of the Rohingya outside the Burmese Embassy for this year’s Resistance Day, standing with the National League for Democracy, Burma Democratic Concern, and Unit 2 Victory.
Creating regional financial stability within ASEAN has never been more important with the current global financial crisis upon us and in 2015 ASEAN is set to negotiate creating a stronger regional economic community, following the example of the European Union that led to the creation of the Eurozone. The British Foreign and Commonwealth Office are very interested in this development indeed according to their website.
"The UK is watching with interest the developments that are already underway for ASEAN to develop into an economic community by 2015. ASEAN is at an important juncture and I hope that the new Charter will be a good basis for further ASEAN integration.”
I think that the SPDC also has its eye on this 2015 economic goal and that that is why it stopped at nothing, not even Cyclone Nargis, to get an imitation democracy in place so that it can benefit financially from this new proposed Southeast Asian economic community. This means, however, that once/if the credit crunch subsides before 2015 and the fear driving the current global effort to fix the world economy has reached safer and saner ground, there can be renewed efforts from US, China, India, UK, ASEAN etc to withhold the full financial benefits of the 2015 ASEAN economic community from Burma until it lives up to its promise of guaranteeing democracy to the Burmese people. The opportunities that the global financial crisis may create to increase links between Burma and ASEAN and with the international community, in addition to the increased links that were established through the disaster relief for Cyclone Nargis, may force the SPDC to reform even further. This reform may happen more quickly still if Burmese discontent peacefully boils over again in 2010 or leading up to 2015 like it did in 2007 and in 1988 and as ever, the world is ever watching.
There is another reason that was mentioned as I was walking from the Burmese Embassy to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office about how Burma has become more significant. The Burmese military may have been able to influence the Chinese government through their disaster (mis)management, i.e. comparing the response of the Chinese government to the Sichuan Earthquake disaster with that of the Burmese junta to Cyclone Nargis. These two horrendous disasters happened very close to one another, with the Sichuan Earthquake following Cyclone Nargis. The Chinese government responded to the Sichuan Earthquake in a very different manner to how it usually responds to natural disasters within China. Usually, the Chinese government acts very much like the Burmese junta in not allowing foreign NGO assistance and not allowing international media coverage of a Chinese disaster relief operation. This pattern changed totally with the response to the Sichuan earthquake. The Chinese government dramatically opened up to foreign assistance and foreign media coverage, it let the world in, in a way it had never done before. I think this had something to do with the fact that not only was this disaster so terrible that it was of international concern, not just Chinese, but also because the Chinese government did not wish to be compared in any way with the Burmese junta’s response to Cyclone Nargis. Any comparison to the shameful response of the Burmese junta to the desperate needs of the Burmese people, especially leading up to China’s big coming out party to the world at the Beijing Olympics, would have ruined China’s international reputation. If the Burmese junta influenced the Chinese government to be much more open and transparent in relation to disaster relief then they normally would because of the shamefulness of Than Shwe’s actions, then maybe it is in the interests of the Hu Jintao to make sure Burma dose not embarrass China in the future by supporting a more acceptable and stable Burmese government. An additional reverse argument is that Than Shwe’s shameful behaviour presented an opportunity to the Chinese government to be even more open and transparent to the world, demonstrating an example of when the international community was wholeheartedly supporting the Chinese people in a time of great need, and that having experienced the benefit of this Hu Jintao may wish to encourage Burma to be more open and transparent.
Continuing our discussions, we looked at some of the differences between Burma in 1988 and 2007-09. During the 8-8-88 demonstrations, the world found out about the killing of c.3000 pro-democracy demonstrators after the event. The world media would never again have the excuse of not having heard of or knowing where Burma was after such a harsh response by the Burmese military. By the 2007 Saffron Revolution, the internet was established and it was possible to see technology such as YouTube used to promote democracy. The Burmese people were able to tell the world as and before events happened. It was amazing and heartening to see the internet used for such egalitarian purposes. There was another difference that I thought was striking. In 1988 most Burmese still lived in Burma. By 2007 it was possible to speak of large Burmese Diaspora communities around the world, in Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, USA, UK, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Germany, France etc. I could not help but think that while the World Wide Web had been put to amazing use by the Burmese people to inform the world about what was happening in Burma, the Burmese people themselves acted in tandem with the internet forming a human network around the world. This is a significant development, I think. The Burmese people have become much more internationalised and just by keeping in contact with relatives in Burma, they are breaking Burma’s isolation from the world and breaking down the wall of silence that the military rely upon to continue the abuse of their own people. This development alone must mean that the SPDC must reform in some way to take account of this Burmese Diaspora. Thus on all fronts, whether through ASEAN’s regional development and consolidation between the major emerging economic centres of China and India and through international disaster relief efforts, as well as through the movement of Burma’s own peoples around the world, Burma is slowing opening up to the world. I brought up the point that the Burmese people were internationalising themselves at a Burma discussion panel held by the BBC World Service and UK parliamentarians within the Houses of Parliament, Portcullis House, January 2008. I was answering a statement proposing that the military junta was the only effective institution to negotiate with in Burma and that the military was producing more cadets out of their military academies then the beleaguered democracy movement was producing activists. My contention was that we have to take into account the increasing Burmese Diaspora who are educating and training themselves to be the next generation’s professionals within Burma, balancing out the military academy’s achievements. When I retold this story to those at the Resistance Day demonstration they countered my argument as follows. While there may indeed be more formally accredited military cadets then there are formally declared democracy activists inside Burma, the direct experience that most Burmese people go through to organise resistance and for their own everyday existence within the difficult conditions of Burma, as well as creating networks of mutual support for each other, are worth a million lesser quality certificates from a military educational institution that relies more upon loyalty to Than Shwe then it does upon finding effective answers to Burma’s problems. The Burmese people may be learning within a severe school of bitter experience but their experience of what it takes to survive and organise themselves, especially in a way that informs the whole world, is a skill that no academy can offer a degree certificate for. The Burmese Diaspora can play an important role in supporting them. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the UN Secretary General U Thant and many Burmese Buddhist monks are the forerunners of this Burmese Diaspora because they have been able to gain the benefit of a more open education, a wide range of professional training and a global perspective of Burma, and they have struggled hard to improve life in Burma. While Than Shwe tries to ignore and sideline Daw Suu, and the military tried to refuse an official Burmese recognition of U Thant’s achievements, they may find it more difficult still to keep quiet the thousands of Burmese who have now lived and worked outside Burma. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s efforts to improve Burmese society and to start a second struggle for independence may be multiplied by many thousands and tens of thousands as the Burmese Diaspora returns to Burma, and because of the global financial crisis many of this Burmese Diaspora are indeed just now returning home. By 2010 they will have joined those that are angry in Burma about how the junta reacted to Cyclone Nargis and the Saffron Revolution will still be fresh in all their minds. Than Shwe is very aware of this new and increasing demographic within Burmese society and has made recent public statements in order to discourage Burmese people from being influenced by ‘foreign’ ideas. I believe this is precisely because such a large proportion of Burmese people have now seen Burma from the outside. However, while Than Shwe may try to contain this new demographic by comparing the outside world to an abstract mode of thinking to be rejected, it is less easy to take away the effect of Burmese people’s direct experience of viewing Burma from the outside and from seeing what it is like to live in other countries for other peoples. To what degree will this Burmese Diaspora follow in Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s footsteps and try to support the Burmese people in Burma and help make Burma a better country for everyone? I like to think this Burmese Diaspora, which will include people that will become military figures and civilian professionals, will act in such a way as to resolve the differences between the military establishment and the Burmese people and build upon the foundations of hard work that the Burmese people within Burma have planted into Burmese soil.
These were just a few thoughts after joining the Resistance Day demonstration 27/3/2009.
Copy from,
http://ashin-mettacara.com/burma/articles/432-resistance-day-demonstration-2732009-uk-a-few-thoughts-for-consideration-about-2010-elections
It has been a little while since I attended a pro-democracy demonstration for
Burma and I was glad to be able to support this event organised by Burma Democratic Concern (BDC) held outside the Burmese embassy and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London on the 27th March 2009.
The UK based event was synchronised with activities inside Burma, drawing together the Burmese Diaspora democracy movements to those that are struggling inside Burma, an important connection to always maintain. Inside Burma the BDC commemorated Resistance Day by distributing pamphlets and postcards calling for all Burmese people to work in order to restore democracy and to free all political prisoners. They also sent an open letter to Burmese soldiers calling for them to stand with the people if they are genuinely patriotic. The postcards had on them portraits of Aung San Suu Kyi, Khun Htun Oo, Myo Yan Naung Thein, Min Ko Naing, Ko Ko Gyi, Htay Kyawe and Aung Than. The synchronising of activities inside and outside of Burma sends an incredibly strong message to the people inside Burma and to the world, and it is also a sign of how the Burmese democracy movement is developing and expanding within an increasingly globalising world. At the UK Resistance Day demonstration it was good to see some familiar faces standing together: Dr Win Naing (Chairman of the National League for Democracy Liberated Area – UK branch), Myo Thein (Director of Burma Democratic Concern), Nurul Islam (President of the Rohingya Organisation in the UK), Thant Zin Htike (Unit 2 Victory) Zin Zin Myo Thant (BDC Campaigner Officer) amongst various others from Burman and ethnic minority groups.
The resistance day that is being remembered refers to the start of General Aung San’s resistance to the WWII Imperial Japanese forces in Burma, actions that led to Burma’s eventual independence. The focus of the UK demonstration was to highlight that the political figures who conclusively won the only general election that has been held for many decades, i.e. the 1990 election, should have a say in Burma’s imminent constitutional and overall development, representing as they do the voice of the Burmese people. The imminent development in question and a crucial rallying cry for the pro-democracy movement at the moment is to reject or significantly revise the constitution of the junta’s sham 2010 election and thus reject the sham 2010 election. Sham because the result is already constitutionally predetermined to strongly favour the military establishment no matter how Burmese people vote. The appearance of elections is a very striking gesture for the junta to present to the world and they hope to use this gesture to gain a lot for themselves as the world reshuffles its geopolitical agendas in the wake of the global financial crisis and the beginning of the Obama administration. However, what the Burmese democracy movement is trying to point out is that it is just a gesture with no substance, the problems that the SPDC present to the Burmese people, to the development of ASEAN and to the stability of the broader region in relation to Chinese, Indian, Thai etc interests is still largely unchanged by the 2010 election. Furthermore, before the 2010 elections take place represents a good opportunity to improve the situation in Burma through confronting the junta about revising the constitution. Since these elections represent a greater degree of international legitimacy that the junta craves, they also represent an opportunity to pressure the junta to make these elections more genuine. The demonstration in front of the FCO, part of the Europe-wide day of action for Burma was also highlighting about the sham nature of the 2010 elections and was calling for governments within the EU to strengthen sanctions on Burma. On this front I think the democracy movement is feeling a bit more pessimistic because the Obama administration seems to be in the process of revising its current policy towards Burma and we have yet to see what will come of this. More about this below but it may be that we are looking at the prospect of a post sanctions policy of some sort from Obama’s administration. Whatever happens the Burmese people have already shown that they can adapt quickly to new situations, whether this is internationalising their cause (not unlike the Dalai Lama), quickly harnessing new technology like in the 2007 Saffron Revolution, or taking every opportunity that is presented to them to improve the lives of Burmese people inside Burma. Obama may yet provide many opportunities if the US is to play a larger role in Southeast Asia once again, just when the junta has again shown it’s true colours to the international community through it’s reaction to Cyclone Nargis.
It has taken the SPDC military junta more then sixteen years to complete their constitution, whereas General Aung San, it is instructive to note, managed to complete an earlier Burmese constitution in roughly three to four months under much more trying conditions during WWII. Where there was a will, developments followed swiftly. General Aung San is remembered on Resistance Day by the democracy movement for a number of reasons. Not only did he liberate Burma from the British and the Japanese, he created the modern Burmese army which has developed into that which is now ruling Burma and, importantly for the democracy movement, he had very definite views as to what role the army should play in politics, i.e. that the army should stay in the barracks. Thus the democracy movement like to remind the SPDC of where they came from and the advice of the general who brought them to prominence while commemorating Resistance Day, not least through evoking that general’s daughter, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and her call for a second independence struggle.
This military constitution leading towards an imitation democracy was ratified without most Burmese people having read it and the referendum for which was held a mere week after Cyclone Nargis, Burma’s worst recorded natural disaster killing up to c.146, 000 people, displacing millions, and to which the military were very slow to offer humanitarian help. They withheld aid from those who were in immediate desperate need while insisting to continue with a constitutional referendum that took several years to reach. It seems most peculiar for the ruling junta to try to declare that it is looking after the people’s constitutional welfare while simultaneously causing a second tragedy of untold death and suffering through their withholding of aid, on top of the horrendous tragedy of Cyclone Nargis itself. It is the opinion of many Burmese people that the SPDC used the devastation of Cyclone Nargis to weaken the ethnic minorities that were in the areas affected, in particular the predominantly Christian ethnic Karen. The SPDC is currently negotiating a peace treaty with the Karen KNLA (the armed wing of the KNU), which has the distinction of having been engaged in the world’s longest running civil war with the Burmese army. The KNLA’s position is further weakened because Thailand has closed down important Thai based Karen support networks, while simultaneously mediating the peace treaty between the SPDC and the KNLA; thus making Thailand’s contribution to peace in Burma something that has a sting in its tail. While the prospect of cessation of war, especially such a long fought one, is always good in that it means loss of life and destruction will lessen and peaceful reconciliation can begin, if the Karen have been forced into a capitulation because of a natural disaster used against them and they are still refused a legitimate voice in the up and coming parliament, how can the potential peace last? And very recently the KNU has demanded that the international community take a role in rescuing Burma, once again another effort to internationalise Burma’s problems.
“Saw David Takapaw, vice-president of the Karen National Union (KNU), which is waging the world's longest running civil war against the Burmese regime, on Thursday said the international community’s concerted and timely action against the junta is needed in order to address the political deadlock inside the country.”
According to official Burmese news sources, the military constitution apparently achieved an incredible approval rating from more then 92% of the Burmese population, even though it excludes Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, allows the Senior General to directly appoint 25% of the parliament with military personnel, requires the newly appointed civilian president to have military experience and gives this president the power to dissolve parliament whenever ‘necessary’. The Burmese people apparently wanted to give legitimate constitutional power to a military junta that was simultaneously withholding humanitarian aid from them. I think that instead of this military propaganda, the real referendum regarding the Burmese people’s desires for their constitution and their future were expressed during the September 2007 Saffron Revolution. It was expressed loud and clear for the world to hear and it was not a call for imitation democracy but real democracy. Therefore, standing on the shoulders of this people’s referendum in September 2007, there was a call on Resistance Day 27/3/2009 to transform the current military constitution into a genuinely inclusive one, to include all major political groups in Burma to better ensure the future prospect of stability within the Burmese state.
Proximity to the new emerging Asian economic centres of power and the current global financial crisis may work to the juntas favour at the moment but it also must be kept in mind that any success that they achieve will probably further expose weaknesses within the Burmese military’s fickle political structure. The military will need to evolve, that is, it will need to develop a more stable political culture to ensure it can benefit from regional developments and for this it will increasingly need the participation of the Burmese people. Sitting between India and China gives Burma a renewed geo-political significance but also places Burma under a more scrutinising international eye. Burma offers China a land-route connection to the trading networks of the Bay of Bengal and Indian Ocean, without exposing Chinese interests to the more precarious and longer route through the straits of Malacca, Indonesia. The EU is a large trading partner with China and so the EU may end up gaining their future Chinese goods through Burma, which is to say the EU has a voice that China may listen to concerning Burma. The Burmese military and people seem, however, not to be so happy about an increased Chinese presence within Burma. There are accounts of xenophobic reactions to an increasing Chinese presence in Burma, which again will place more pressure on the fickle political structure within the military, especially on generals who are increasingly relying upon Chinese trade to build up their personal fortunes.
However, most of all I think the SPDC is hoping to gain from the fallout of the current global financial crisis and realignment of US foreign policy under Obama and Clinton. The fear generated by this global financial crisis has offered Obama the opportunity to renegotiate US foreign policy with just about everyone that was off of Bush’s list, whether Iran and Syria or Cuba, and so, it seems from Clinton’s Asia tour comments, with the Union of Myanmar as well. The effect of placing Afghanistan and Pakistan at the centre stage of US foreign policy will also dramatically impact upon how the US views Burma. The AfPak initiative is trying to bring more stability to the region and Obama is calling for political and as well as military efforts to be made region wide. Obama does not use language like ‘War on Terror’ and ‘Islamofascist’ and is e.g. trying to negotiate with moderate Taliban groups, i.e. all options are on the table. India and the US have finally agreed to trade nuclear technology, throwing the NPT treaty out the window, which is currently being revived with Russia at the moment probably because of the effect of US/India actions. The US clearly wants to be a greater part of South and Southeast Asia again, although hopefully not following the Vietnam War model. There has been a recent report that the Obama administration “wants to forge a common strategy with Asia to coax military-run Myanmar out of isolation, a senior official said Wednesday, suggesting six-way talks with North Korea (to end it’s nuclear program) could be a model”, thus with ASEAN, China, India, Japan. http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hNFsFTOzY4WNkOA3rcRkDIHJVN3Q
The Asian strategy is different from that of the US and EU, which uses sanctions. So, it would seem that the ground is being prepared to lift sanctions at some point in the future and that this will represent US re-entering Southeast Asia to a greater degree. Burma may be the opportunity that the US wish to use to re-enter Southeast Asia so they will want to make a real impact in order to maintain their renewed post Guantanamo Bay international reputation, and they know there is a democracy movement that wishes to breath freer air in Burma. India has allowed Sri Lanka to pursue its war with the Tamil Tigers to its bloody conclusion without causing the Sri Lankans any extra international pressure, even offering commando training to the Sri Lankan army according to the Guardian. India would seem to be trying to gain favour and strengthen the countries on its periphery, what during the British colonial age was called the Great Game, and which is what in the above weblink article is probably referred to when the Obama administration declares that “nations with sway over the junta should avoid "recreating a mini version of the Great Game."”. Taking all this in mind, it is with curiosity that I discover that Robert Blake, the US Ambassador to Sri Lanka, is visiting Burma and has upped diplomatic relations between the US and the Union of Myanmar. What did he learn from the recent Sri Lankan experience that he wants to apply to Burma or for that matter to US involvement in Southeast Asia? Watch this space…
If the US is trying to re-enter Southeast Asia, the status of Burma will be a real concern, as it is for ASEAN, and Obama’s route into ASEAN looks like it will travel through Indonesia. It was the only, but largest of, ASEAN country that Hillary Clinton visited on her Asia tour and it holds a special place for Obama because he went to school there for four years, he has a personal connection to the country which Indonesia seems to be proud of. It also has the experience of transforming from a military dictatorship to a democracy, experience that a reforming Burmese military will most likely trust. Being a largely Muslim country and seeing that Obama made an explicit call to the Muslim world, it means that if Indonesia does play a larger role in connection with reforming Burma, the current Burmese Rohingya issue may act as a lightening rod bringing world attention to how the Burmese military state will need to reform to become more democratic. The Rohingya issue may also bring about a means through which Indonesia can comment upon what is happening in Burma, perhaps. In this respect it is heartening to see Nurul Islam speak on behalf of the Rohingya outside the Burmese Embassy for this year’s Resistance Day, standing with the National League for Democracy, Burma Democratic Concern, and Unit 2 Victory.
Creating regional financial stability within ASEAN has never been more important with the current global financial crisis upon us and in 2015 ASEAN is set to negotiate creating a stronger regional economic community, following the example of the European Union that led to the creation of the Eurozone. The British Foreign and Commonwealth Office are very interested in this development indeed according to their website.
"The UK is watching with interest the developments that are already underway for ASEAN to develop into an economic community by 2015. ASEAN is at an important juncture and I hope that the new Charter will be a good basis for further ASEAN integration.”
I think that the SPDC also has its eye on this 2015 economic goal and that that is why it stopped at nothing, not even Cyclone Nargis, to get an imitation democracy in place so that it can benefit financially from this new proposed Southeast Asian economic community. This means, however, that once/if the credit crunch subsides before 2015 and the fear driving the current global effort to fix the world economy has reached safer and saner ground, there can be renewed efforts from US, China, India, UK, ASEAN etc to withhold the full financial benefits of the 2015 ASEAN economic community from Burma until it lives up to its promise of guaranteeing democracy to the Burmese people. The opportunities that the global financial crisis may create to increase links between Burma and ASEAN and with the international community, in addition to the increased links that were established through the disaster relief for Cyclone Nargis, may force the SPDC to reform even further. This reform may happen more quickly still if Burmese discontent peacefully boils over again in 2010 or leading up to 2015 like it did in 2007 and in 1988 and as ever, the world is ever watching.
There is another reason that was mentioned as I was walking from the Burmese Embassy to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office about how Burma has become more significant. The Burmese military may have been able to influence the Chinese government through their disaster (mis)management, i.e. comparing the response of the Chinese government to the Sichuan Earthquake disaster with that of the Burmese junta to Cyclone Nargis. These two horrendous disasters happened very close to one another, with the Sichuan Earthquake following Cyclone Nargis. The Chinese government responded to the Sichuan Earthquake in a very different manner to how it usually responds to natural disasters within China. Usually, the Chinese government acts very much like the Burmese junta in not allowing foreign NGO assistance and not allowing international media coverage of a Chinese disaster relief operation. This pattern changed totally with the response to the Sichuan earthquake. The Chinese government dramatically opened up to foreign assistance and foreign media coverage, it let the world in, in a way it had never done before. I think this had something to do with the fact that not only was this disaster so terrible that it was of international concern, not just Chinese, but also because the Chinese government did not wish to be compared in any way with the Burmese junta’s response to Cyclone Nargis. Any comparison to the shameful response of the Burmese junta to the desperate needs of the Burmese people, especially leading up to China’s big coming out party to the world at the Beijing Olympics, would have ruined China’s international reputation. If the Burmese junta influenced the Chinese government to be much more open and transparent in relation to disaster relief then they normally would because of the shamefulness of Than Shwe’s actions, then maybe it is in the interests of the Hu Jintao to make sure Burma dose not embarrass China in the future by supporting a more acceptable and stable Burmese government. An additional reverse argument is that Than Shwe’s shameful behaviour presented an opportunity to the Chinese government to be even more open and transparent to the world, demonstrating an example of when the international community was wholeheartedly supporting the Chinese people in a time of great need, and that having experienced the benefit of this Hu Jintao may wish to encourage Burma to be more open and transparent.
Continuing our discussions, we looked at some of the differences between Burma in 1988 and 2007-09. During the 8-8-88 demonstrations, the world found out about the killing of c.3000 pro-democracy demonstrators after the event. The world media would never again have the excuse of not having heard of or knowing where Burma was after such a harsh response by the Burmese military. By the 2007 Saffron Revolution, the internet was established and it was possible to see technology such as YouTube used to promote democracy. The Burmese people were able to tell the world as and before events happened. It was amazing and heartening to see the internet used for such egalitarian purposes. There was another difference that I thought was striking. In 1988 most Burmese still lived in Burma. By 2007 it was possible to speak of large Burmese Diaspora communities around the world, in Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, USA, UK, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Germany, France etc. I could not help but think that while the World Wide Web had been put to amazing use by the Burmese people to inform the world about what was happening in Burma, the Burmese people themselves acted in tandem with the internet forming a human network around the world. This is a significant development, I think. The Burmese people have become much more internationalised and just by keeping in contact with relatives in Burma, they are breaking Burma’s isolation from the world and breaking down the wall of silence that the military rely upon to continue the abuse of their own people. This development alone must mean that the SPDC must reform in some way to take account of this Burmese Diaspora. Thus on all fronts, whether through ASEAN’s regional development and consolidation between the major emerging economic centres of China and India and through international disaster relief efforts, as well as through the movement of Burma’s own peoples around the world, Burma is slowing opening up to the world. I brought up the point that the Burmese people were internationalising themselves at a Burma discussion panel held by the BBC World Service and UK parliamentarians within the Houses of Parliament, Portcullis House, January 2008. I was answering a statement proposing that the military junta was the only effective institution to negotiate with in Burma and that the military was producing more cadets out of their military academies then the beleaguered democracy movement was producing activists. My contention was that we have to take into account the increasing Burmese Diaspora who are educating and training themselves to be the next generation’s professionals within Burma, balancing out the military academy’s achievements. When I retold this story to those at the Resistance Day demonstration they countered my argument as follows. While there may indeed be more formally accredited military cadets then there are formally declared democracy activists inside Burma, the direct experience that most Burmese people go through to organise resistance and for their own everyday existence within the difficult conditions of Burma, as well as creating networks of mutual support for each other, are worth a million lesser quality certificates from a military educational institution that relies more upon loyalty to Than Shwe then it does upon finding effective answers to Burma’s problems. The Burmese people may be learning within a severe school of bitter experience but their experience of what it takes to survive and organise themselves, especially in a way that informs the whole world, is a skill that no academy can offer a degree certificate for. The Burmese Diaspora can play an important role in supporting them. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the UN Secretary General U Thant and many Burmese Buddhist monks are the forerunners of this Burmese Diaspora because they have been able to gain the benefit of a more open education, a wide range of professional training and a global perspective of Burma, and they have struggled hard to improve life in Burma. While Than Shwe tries to ignore and sideline Daw Suu, and the military tried to refuse an official Burmese recognition of U Thant’s achievements, they may find it more difficult still to keep quiet the thousands of Burmese who have now lived and worked outside Burma. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s efforts to improve Burmese society and to start a second struggle for independence may be multiplied by many thousands and tens of thousands as the Burmese Diaspora returns to Burma, and because of the global financial crisis many of this Burmese Diaspora are indeed just now returning home. By 2010 they will have joined those that are angry in Burma about how the junta reacted to Cyclone Nargis and the Saffron Revolution will still be fresh in all their minds. Than Shwe is very aware of this new and increasing demographic within Burmese society and has made recent public statements in order to discourage Burmese people from being influenced by ‘foreign’ ideas. I believe this is precisely because such a large proportion of Burmese people have now seen Burma from the outside. However, while Than Shwe may try to contain this new demographic by comparing the outside world to an abstract mode of thinking to be rejected, it is less easy to take away the effect of Burmese people’s direct experience of viewing Burma from the outside and from seeing what it is like to live in other countries for other peoples. To what degree will this Burmese Diaspora follow in Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s footsteps and try to support the Burmese people in Burma and help make Burma a better country for everyone? I like to think this Burmese Diaspora, which will include people that will become military figures and civilian professionals, will act in such a way as to resolve the differences between the military establishment and the Burmese people and build upon the foundations of hard work that the Burmese people within Burma have planted into Burmese soil.
These were just a few thoughts after joining the Resistance Day demonstration 27/3/2009.
Copy from,
http://ashin-mettacara.com/burma/articles/432-resistance-day-demonstration-2732009-uk-a-few-thoughts-for-consideration-about-2010-elections
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