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ICFTU/ETUC SUBMISSION TO EU-GSP (4/



Subject: ICFTU/ETUC SUBMISSION TO EU-GSP (4/4)

/* posted 18 Aug 6:00am 1996 by DRUNOO@xxxxxxxxxxxx in igc:reg.burma */
/* -------------" ICFTU &ETUC Report on Forced Labour (4/4) "----------- */
[ Reproduced from the submission by Australian Council of Trade Unions to
Australian Human Rights Sub-Committee, Vol 6, pp.1010-1032 -- U Ne Oo.]
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Burma: SLORC's Private Slave Camp

Submission to the European Union Generalised System of Preferences

ICFTU. International Confederation of Free Trade Unions
       155, Boulevard Emile Jacqmain, B-1210 Brussels
       Tel.:224.02.11  Fax:201.58.18

ETUC.  European Trade Union Confederation
       155, Boulevard Emile Jacqmain, B - 1210 Brussels
       Tel.:224.04.11  Fax:224.04.54

4. OTHER TYPES OF FORCED LABOUR OCCURRING IN BURMA
4.3 Tourism development projects.

The big tourist push which SLORC has planned for 1996 under the title "Visit
Myanmar  Year"  has  been presented as one of the - or even the single most
important  factor  provoking  forced  labour  in  Burma  today.  Aiming  at
convincing  half  a  million tourists to visit the country, the campaign is
designed to end years of isolation, revamp the  regime's  tarnished  image,
and obviously, attract considerable hard-currency volumes. Forced labour is
used  all over the country in this process, on roads, airports and possibly
hotel construction. Foreign investors are reported to be  involved  in  the
tourism  drive,  e.g. Novotel, in the Novotel Mandalay construction project
[41].

4.3.1 Mandalay: the Moat of the Gold Palace

"You find gangs working everywhere, egged  on  by  soldiers,  to  build  and
repair  the  infrastructure  the  country  needs  for  its launch into mass
tourism", said the BBC  reporter  quoted  above  (see  section  4.2.2)  and
according  to  whom  such giant schemes as the Mandalay highway - which she
had visited - were " turning Burma  into  one  vast  slave  labour  camp."
Pictures  smuggled  out  by  refugees and shown on television showed people
being forcibly evicted, villages  being  burned,  and  bloated  corpses  of
people  beaten  to  death,  floating  down  a river. In Mandalay itself, Ms
Roberts reported, gangs of men and women, each being guarded by a  soldier,
were  forced  to clear up the city's roads and historic buildings [42]. The
dredging of the moat around the 19th Century Gold Palace,  which  has  been
reported  for  over  two years, is continuing; SLORC commanders in Mandalay
have previously have been accused in the French press of forcing  thousands
of civilians to dredge the moats with their bare hands, while pocketing the
funds  released  by  the  central  government  for the purchase of dredging
equipment earmarked for this work.

4.3.2 The New Dam at Inlay Lake

Forced labour is used extensively around Inlay lake, a tourist  destination
which  the  SLORC is reportedly eager to develop. The aim of the project is
to build a new dam o the Biluchaung river in Moebye; the purpose thereof is
to prevent the water level of Inlay lake from reflux in the summer, thereby
preserving the attractive green shores for the tourists.  Measures  against
those  refusing to work "voluntarily" include keeping them for hours in the
hot sun, fines, beatings, etc.. Work also includes pushing  back  the  algae
into  the  depths  of  the lake with long bamboo poles, in order to keep it
clean for tourists. Local residents say the work is useless,  as  it  makes
the  algae  grow faster, but that SLORC refuses to heed their complaint and
orders the work to continue.

4.3.3 Construction of Airports

Airports are being developed rapidly throughout the country, allegedly with
the use of forced labour. "At Putao airport, I saw forced labour being used
to extend a runaway so tourists could arrive in large  jets",  said  English
guidebook  author  Nicholas  Greenwood,  who  has visited Burma 16 times in
recent years he had "countless times (...) seen what look  forced  labour,
including people working in chains"[44].

According  to  Another  report, cholera had broken out on the forced labour
construction site of Bassein Airport, In Irrawaddy State, and  no  one  had
received adequate medical treatment [45]. On 12 July 1994, the London-based
Guardian  newspaper reported that 30,000 labourers working on the airport's
extension project had not been paid.

4.4 Army-owned Commercial Ventures

The  army,  and  especially  top  SLORC-commanders  are  reported   to   be
conspicuously  present  in  most,  if not all, profit-making sectors of the
economy. Civilians are routinely forced to  work  for  free  in  army-owned
commercial  enterprises,  such  as  paddy-and  fishpond  and  tree-planting
operations, which local farmers have to build up and maintain. Needless  to
add, the required land is also confiscated without compensation.

One  43-year old refugee Karen farmer, interviewed by Burma Issues, said he
saw a fellow forced labourer being brutally interrogated and beaten for tow
hours, before being stabbed to death by soldiers. They were forced to  work
on  a  rubber  plantation,  at least 10,000 acres (approx. 5,500 ha) large,
owned by military. Pay was never handed out, and it was suspected  that  it
was  being diverted by the military. They were also forced to dig ponds for
shrimp firming and erect an 8 foot-high dike to keep the  sea  away  (which
eventually  broke  away under a high tide, owing to bad planning, according
to the source ), 13,000 people were reported  to  be  forcibly  working  in
these area [46].

5. CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS

5.1 A record of violations

The  facts  described above are representative of comprehensive source file
on forced labour in Burma, which comprises over  1,500  pages  of  evidence
gathered   by   intergovernmental   and   non-governmental   human   rights
organizations. Hundreds  of  witnesses  (some  openly,  others  with  their
identities disguised, for fear of retribution) provide countless details of
the  most  severe  breaches  of  fundamental  human rights occurring in the
process, including arbitrary detention, beatings, torture, rape and murder.
As practised in Burma today, forced labour constitutes a clear violation of
the  country's  international  obligations:  as  this  report  conclusively
demonstrates,  the  SLORC  stands  in grave and constant breach of multiple
key-standards of international human rights law, international  labour  law
(in  particular  ILO  convention no 29 on Forced Labour), and international
customary law, i.e. Geneva Conventions of 1949.

The number and, especially, the consistency - also  over  time  [47]  -  of
these problems make it impossible to avoid the conclusion that the recourse
to  forced  labour  in  Burma  today  represents the central feature of the
regime's infrastructure development policy. Forced  labour  is  being  used
systematically,   in   all   regions,   in   both   military  and  civilian
infrastructure  projects,  as  well   as   commercial,   often   army-owned
enterprises and tourism projects.

5.2 The economic and political impact of forced labour

Meanwhile,  combined  with  what  is  portrayed at its notorious corruption
(which occasionally  pushes  foreign  companies  to  disinvest,  e.g.  Levi
Strauss,  Liz Claribourne and others), the huge profits reaped by the SLORC
leadership from unpaid, forced labour enable the regime  to  purchase  vast
quantities  of  military  hardware,  used to suppress ethnic insurgents and
political opponents alike. In view of the present trend of growing  foreign
investments  in  the  country,  it  must  be  assumed  that this pattern of
exploitation  by  the  country's  ruling  circles  will  continue  for  the
foreseeable  future,  as long as the international community remains unable
to influence the country's military regime.

Another factor take into account by human rights sources is the likely huge
impact of gas-generated income on SLORC'S  ruling  position.  The  combined
financial  profits  (production  stakes,  tax  and royalties) that SLORC is
likely to obtain from the  Yetagun  and  other  projects  in  the  Gulf  of
Martaban  "could  amount to several hundred million dollars a year worth of
gas", according to the authors of the TEXACO minority  shareholders'  proxy
proposal   examined  above.  In  the  view  of  these  shareholders,  "some
governments are so incorrectably repressive that claims such as  those  made
by  Texaco  that  positive  engagement helps open otherwise closed socities
simply do not apply.In their view, the presence of corporations only serves
to help the illegitimate regimes remain inpower". They quote  a  former  US
ambassador   to  Burma,  Mr.  Burton  Levin,  according  to  whom  "foreign
investment in most countries acts as a catalyst for change, but the Burmese
regime is so single-minded that whatever money  they  obtain  from  foreign
sources,  they pour straight into the army while the rest of the country is
collapsing".

5.3 The withdrawal of European GSP benefits

Given its status as a  least  developed  country,  Burma/Myanmar  presently
benefits  from  the  entire  suspension  of  common custom tariff duties on
products covered by the Generalised System  of  Preferences  (GSP)  of  the
European  Union  (see  Article  3  and Annex IV of EU Council Regulation no
3281/94 of 19 December 1994 applying  a  four-year  scheme  of  generalized
tariff preferences (1995 to 1998) in respect of certain industrial products
originating in developing countries.


The EU is a significant trading partner for Burma. Of Burma's total exports
to OECD countries of $US 133.3 million in 1992, $41.2 million were received
by  the  European  Union (30.9%). this has to be seen in the context of the
SLORC junta's ambition to expand the  export  vocation  of  Burma  and  the
existence  already  of  various  joint  ventures involving EU multinational
companies including Total and Novotel (France),  and  Premier  Consolidated
Oilfields  (UK).  As  long  as  Burma continues to received GSP access, the
SLORC will be encouraged in its view that it can  continue  to  use  forced
labour  in  the  various  ways  described  above. As has been noted in this
report, there is little evidence that the benefits of any growth could lead
to enhanced standards of living among the population as a whole; rather, it
will serve mainly to fuel the continued purchase of military  equipment  to
repress  the  Burma population and to maintain the lifestyles of senior the
SLORC leaders. Conversely, if the EU were to  remove  Burma  from  its  GSP
scheme,  it  would  send  a  clear  signal to the SLORC junta that they can
expect only international isolation as long as they continue to  engage  in
practices  which  so  clearly  violate  internally agreed standards for the
respect of basic human rights.

We  therefore  consider  that  the  EU  should  undertake  the   "temporary
withdrawal, in whole or in part, of the scheme of generalized preferences",
due  to  the practice of any form of forced labour as defined in the Geneva
Slavery Conventions of 24 September 1926  and  7  September  1956  and  the
International   Labour   Organizations  Conventions  No  29  and  105",  in
accordance with the provisions of  Title  III,  Article  9  and  10  of  EU
Regulation No 3281/94 (cf.supra).
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List of Appendices

Appendix A:  Human  rights  violations  in  the  context of forced portering:
summary victims' accounts, compiled by ICFTU, 1995.

Appendix B: UN Commission on Human Rights: Resolution on  Myanmar,  1993  &
1994.

Appendix C: Human Rights in Burma(MYanmar)", Asia Watch, May 1990, pp21-31.

Appendix  D:  Report of the Committee set up to consider the representation
made by the ICFTU  under  article  24  of  the  ILO  constitution  alleging
non-observance  by  Myanmar  of the Forced Labour Convention, 1930 (n0 29),
ILO Governing Body,  261  Session,  Geneva,  November  1994,  ILO  doc.  no
GB.261/13/7.

Appendix  E:  Maps  of  the  Ye-Tavoy  railway  link  and connected Gulf of
Martaban pipeline projects.

Appendix F: "Texaco Inc, US Business and HUman  Rights  Guidelines",  Proxy
Statement  Proposal no6, by INvestor Responsibility Research Center (IRRC),
Washington, DC, April 1995.

Appendix G: Introduction to  "forced  labour  in  Burma,  A  Collection  of
Documents, 1987-1995", Burma Peace Foundation, N.Y. NY, June 1995.
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Footnotes:

[41]  one source stated that NOvotel had to pay 10% of the contract's value
as bribe to the SLORC's Tourism Minister, Mr Kyaw Ba, who had just approved
10 new hotel projects in the ancient city.(see:  "Letter  from  Burma",  31
January 1995, in "Supporting Documents", 4/13.

[42] see: Burma uses forced labour to build tourism projects, Bangkok Post,
22 January, 1995, in : "Supporting Documents", 4/12.

[43] see: The Plight of the People in Shan State, In Dawn, October-November
1993, see "Supporting Documents", 4/1

[44]  see:  Burma  Boycott ? New tourist drive uses forced labour", by Gary
Stoller, Conde New Traveller, undated, in "Supporting Documents", 4/23.

[45] see "Supporting Documents", 4/11, op. cit.

[46] see: A culture of Coercion, by N. Chan, in Burma Issues, January 1995,
in: Supporting Document 3/37.

[47] As seen above, the ILO Committee of Experts has been requesting  Burma
to adapt its legislation and practice of forced labour since.. 1967.

/* Endpart 4/4 */