More News about Burma (r)

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European Parliament condemns WTO-complaint on Burma by European 
Commission 


PRESS-RELEASE
Burma Centrum Nederland

AMSTERDAM, Friday 13 June 1997 - The European Commission should not 
complain to the World Trade Organization about the Burma-law from the 
American state of Massachusetts. A resolution to this effect was adopted 
unanimously by the European Parliament Thursday-evening. Using firm 
language, the European Parliament urged the Commission "not to take 
action against the Massachusetts selective purchasing law under the 
dispute settlement procedure of the WTO". The Burma Law of 
Massachusetts, adopted on 25 June in '96, bars companies doing business 
in Burma from receiving local government contracts.

Instead of complaining at the WTO about American Burma-laws, the 
European Parliament urges the European Union to take economic sanctions 
against Burma's regime. "Burma's State Law and Order Restoration Council 
is guilty of conducting a policy of complete disregard for human life," 
the Parliament stated. The Parliament also "vigorously condemned the 
accession of Burma to ASEAN." This gives the regime further 
international recognition "despite its violations of human rights."

The European Commission pressures the US Government to invalidate the 
Massachusetts law. Failing this, the EC threatens to make a formal 
complaint to the WTO, which would rule on the dispute.The commission's 
efforts to overturn American local selective purchasing laws against 
Burma's military dictatorship have drawn a sharp response from European 
Burma supportgroups and American lawmakers and activists. Along with 
Massachusetts, New York City, twelve other American cities and one 
county have enacted selective purchasing Burma-laws.

"European Commission meddling in American legislative decisions 
interferes with the democratic process in the US," stated Thomas 
Lansner, an adjunct professor at New York's Columbia University and 
member of the New York City Burma Support Group. "We view the EC's 
activity as an arrogant dismissal of American public support for Burma's 
democrats." Spokesperson for the Burma Centre Netherlands, Gijs 
Hillenius, says that the EC threat contradicts the withdrawal in March 
of trade preferences by the EU for Burma: "The European Union should 
follow the American example, and take economic sanctions. Then a 
complaint on the Burma-law is no longer necessary." Last year, American 
papers reported that the Massachusetts' law blocked the Dutch Banks ING 
Barings and ABN AMRO from buying the Bank Boston. Also Dutch electronics 
manufacturer Philips ceased export to Burma because of the Burma Law.


Thai-Burma talks deadlocked 


June 11, 1997

Third round of talks on river's course fail 

Supamart Kasem 
Mae Sot 

There was still no progress yesterday after the third round of talks 
between Thai and Burmese authorities to settle a border dispute over 
Burma's dredging of the Moei River opposite Mae Sot district. 

Both sides refused to give ground over a change in the river's course 
near Wat Prathat Khok Chang Phuek in Tambon Tha Sai Luad. 

Representing Thailand in the talks was Treaties and Legal Affairs 
Department Director-General Somboon Sa-ngiambutr. The Burmese team was 
headed by U Aye Lwin. 

The two sides rejected each other's proposals for breaking the deadlock. 
Burma insisted that their dredging plan was correctly based on an aerial 
map and photographs taken in 1989. 

Mr Somboon said the Burmese delegates came up with nothing new and just 
proposed their dredging plan to the Thai negotiators in the third round 
yesterday afternoon. Earlier, Burma had informed that its dredging plan 
would be based on an aerial map taken in 1994, but it later changed its 
mind. 

Thai authorities could not accept Burma's latest proposal as the 
disputed area would expand from 150 rai to 300 rai. 

"The expansion of the disputed area would create more trouble in the 
future. Hence, the Joint Border Committee of the two countries will hold 
another round of talks in Rangoon to settle the problem by the end of 
this month," said Mr Somboon. 

Sources said the blame for the border dispute near Wat Prathat Khok 
Chang Phuek should fall squarely on a Thai investor wanting to build a 
10-million-dollar hotel and casino in the area. 

The investor and his three Chinese business partners had met Burma's 
Hotel and Tourist Minister Lt Gen Kyaw Ba in Rangoon on May 11 this year 
to discuss the plan, added the source.




Suspected sex slave found after 50 years
Mystery Korean woman ``Hun'', who was probably taken to Cambodia as a 
``comfort woman'' by Japanese troops during World War II. 
SEOUL: Government officials on Sunday rifled through dusty records to 
trace the roots of a South Korean woman found to be living in Cambodia 
after having been taken there probably as a wartime sex slave. 

The search followed accounts by Choo Ik Soo, a former township 
administration clerk who reportedly recognised the picture of a 
73-year-old woman found in a small village north of Phnom Penh. 

``The woman looks like the daughter of a butcher who once lived in my 
hometown in Jindong,'' Mr Choo said. Jindong is a fishing village near 
the southern port city of Masan. 

The former ``comfort woman'', identified only as Hun, told the Phnom 
Penh Post she was brought to Cambodia as one of thousands of women 
forced into sexual slavery for Japanese troops during World War II. 

She remembers only a few words of Korean and was apparently left behind 
with a daughter when the Japanese withdrew from Cambodia. She stayed on, 
surviving hand to mouth for more than 50 years. 

The report prompted a massive inquiry into her family register to find 
her relatives and friends in South Korea. 

The Seoul government also pledged subsidies and other steps for the 
woman. 

A South Korean diplomat in Phnom Penh said ``Hun'' could not remember 
her family name. - AFP

riday June 13 4:48 PM EDT 

Labor Group Says Markets Take Toll on Workers

By Robert Evans 

GENEVA (Reuter) - The world's largest labor group said Friday that 
workers' rights are under fierce assault around the world as employers 
drive to exploit free markets and economic globalization to push up 
profits. 

Although a report from the International Confederation of Free Trade 
Unions (ICFTU) pointed to China, Colombia and Indonesia as among the 
worst offenders, it also asserted that abuse was frequent in the United 
States. 

The annual survey, issued by the Brussels-based ICFTU at the conference 
of the United Nations' International Labor Organization (ILO), said 
women in particular were suffering from an assault on unions by 
governments and big companies. 

"Governments' thirst for investment is compounded by the insatiable 
appetite of employers for new markets and a 'competitive' labor force, 
by which they mean cheap and endlessly exploitable," an introduction to 
the report said. 

"This combination of governments seeking to shed their powers of 
intervention in the economy, and employers and the business world 
seeking to increase theirs, is one of the root causes of anti-union 
repression," wrote ICFTU General Secretary Bill Jordan, a former British 
union leader. 

"As governments dismantle their public services and multinational 
companies look for the cheapest workers, women are increasingly in the 
front line of anti-union repression," the ICFTU said. 

The strictures were identical to those in a similar report issued on 
Wednesday by the smaller, but also Brussels-based World Confederation of 
Labor (WCL), and were echoed in a major U.N. survey on Thursday. 

Under globalization -- trade liberalization, free investment flows and 
integration of world financial markets -- the market was the only 
regulator and "everything is sacrificed to the cause of competitiveness" 
to maximize profits, the WCL said. 

This was widening the gap between rich and poor in North and South, 
while workers were being forced to abandon rights they had won to social 
protection and decent working conditions. 

In its annual report issued on Thursday, the U.N.'s Development Program 
(UNDP) also drew a stark picture of poor countries -- and poor people in 
rich countries -- dropping deeper into poverty under globalization. 

The report by the ICFTU, which links 124 million workers in 195 
organizations across 137 countries, said the onslaught on labor rights 
took institutional as well as violent forms. 

Women especially suffered, it said, because under global market reforms 
public sector enterprises, where many employees are female, were being 
decimated "and because sweatshops and export processing zones are being 
set up in countries where multinational companies can find cheap, 
non-unionized workers." 

Hundreds of trade unionists, mainly in Latin America, "die fighting for 
union rights," it said. At least 264 were murdered last year, including 
98 in Colombia and 24 in Brazil. 

"The key statistical tool for assessing the state of industrial 
relations in Latin America is still the body count," the report 
declared. 

China, it said, "has one of the worst records of trade union 
repression," keeping its workers "on a tight rein, harassing and 
persecuting independent trade unionists with the blessing of the 
(official) All-China Federation of Trade Unions." 

Elsewhere in Asia, it said, many governments still viewed trade unions 
"as an alien institution bent on frustrating economic progress." Burma, 
Vietnam and North Korea simply placed officials in control of "fake 
unions." 

In Indonesia, an independent union federation was under constant 
harassment, and employers often used their links with police and 
military to break up strikes. 

In the United States, the report declared, "the right to strike and the 
right of workers to organize trade unions are not adequately protected 
in the labor legislation. 

"The law is unable to protect workers when the employer is determined to 
destroy or prevent trade union representation... At least one in 10 
union supporters campaigning to form a union is illegally fired by the 
employer." 

In Africa, governments still frequently repressed unions, using legal 
procedures to make it hard for them to operate. In Lesotho, 15 
construction workers were shot dead in a protest on wages and 
conditions.




"THERE WILL BE NO REAL DEMOCRACY IF WE CAN'T GURANTEE THE RIGHTS OF THE 
MINORITY ETHNIC PEOPLE.  ONLY UNDERSTANDING THEIR SUFFERING AND HELPING 
THEM TO EXERCISE THEIR RIGHTS WILL ASSIST PREVENTING FROM THE 
DISINTEGRATION AND THE SESESSION."  "WITHOUT UNDERSTANDING THEIR 
STRENGTH, WE CAN'T TOPPLE THE SLORC AND BURMA WILL NEVER BE IN PEACE."



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