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The BurmaNet News, June 21, 1997
- Subject: The BurmaNet News, June 21, 1997
- From: strider@xxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 21 Jun 1997 03:19:00
------------------------ BurmaNet ------------------------
"Appropriate Information Technologies, Practical Strategies"
----------------------------------------------------------
The BurmaNet News: June 21, 1997
Issue #754
HEADLINES:
==========
REUTER: BURMA MILITARY DETAINS SUU KYI ASSOCIATES
FTUB REPORT:RECENT ARRESTS OF MEMBERS
FEER: SCHOOL'S IN
ASIA INC: FRONTIER OF FURY
THE NATION: ON THE FRONTIER OF AIDS TRANSMISSION
TT: SLORC LAUNCHES PROBE INTO CORRUPT
HIGH-RANKING OFFICIALS
SLORC: US POLITICS AND ITS POLITICIANS
BURMANET SUBJECT-MATTER RESOURCE LIST
-----------------------------------------------------------------
REUTER: BURMA MILITARY DETAINS SUU KYI ASSOCIATES
June 20, 1997
BANGKOK, June 20 (Reuter) - At least five close associates of Burmese
opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi have been detained by authorities for
allegedly smuggling her videotaped speeches abroad, opposition sources said
on Friday.
The ruling State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) was upset
when non-government organisations obtained and used a smuggled videotaped
speech by Suu Kyi opposing Burma's inclusion as a member of the Association
of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), they told Reuters.
ASEAN groups Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore,
Thailand and Vietnam. The block recently agreed to accept Burma as a new
member in late July, despite Suu Kyi's opposition. Cambodia and Laos are to
be admitted at the same time.
Relatives and her personal photographer were among those held, a source
from Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy Party (NLD) said.
There was no SLORC comment on the opposition's statement.
Cho Aung Than, a cousin of the Nobel Peace laureate, was picked up for
interrogation last Friday, while his sister and her husband were arrested a
few days later on the same charge, the NLD source added.
Photographer Ko Suny and Hon Myint, an ageing politician who is related
to Suu Kyi, were arrested two days ago.
"They interrogated Ko Sunny on what kind of pictures he took and how he
managed to ship some video out of the country," a close Suu Kyi aide said.
The NLD source blamed ASEAN for the new round of detentions.
"ASEAN will have to bear full responsibility for this because they
accepted Burma into the grouping that gives activists nothing but disservice
in Burma," the source said.
Suu Kyi has said that if Burma became an ASEAN member it would give the
ruling military government a licence to repress the opposition movement and
suppress human rights further in the country.
********************************************
FTUB REPORT:RECENT ARRESTS OF MEMBERS
June 20, 1997
Federation of Trade Unions - Burma
responsibilities & rights
International contact
Fax: (202) 393-7343
Fax: (61) 6-297-4801
SLORC National Intelligence Bureau, NIB, (an umbrella bureau of all the
intelligence units) has arrested KHIN KYAW son of U kyaw, and MYO AUNG
THANT, son of U Hla Thein) both executive committee members of FTUB.
MYO AUNG THANT was arrested on the 13th of June, 1997 at the Mingaladon
airport on his return from Bangkok by a NIB team. That NIB team not only
arrested MYO AUNG THANT but also his wife and children and the others who
came to welcome him.
After MYO AUNG THANT was arrested, the NIB team arrested KHIN KYAW and his
wife at their residence.
The NIB has not informed the respective families of the reason for their
arrests nor the police released any information officially of the
arrests. All those detained remain in the hands of theintellgience
bureau.
MYO AUNG THANT and KHIN KYAW are officials of the FTUB. They have been
documenting economic and social hardships of the workers and presenting
those information as well as issues concerning forced labor to the
international trade union community. On our behalf, they have been
helping the dismissed workers of the 1988 movement.
The activities that the two union executives and the FTUB had conducted
are legal, permitted in all civilized countries. But, union activities
have to be carried out clandestinely in Burma as the military has
unlawfully and unfairly banned all kinds of independent workers
associations, organizations or unions. The mitary in Burma is against
the formation of independent workers associations, organization, or
unions and consider union members as enemies.
It has always been the practice of the military intelligence to
indiscriminately detain anyone they suspect of being an enemy and
torture them into admitting guilt or giving out false information. We
fear that the longer the union executives are detained the longer they
will be tortured.
We demand that the SLORC respect international laws and immediately
release KHIN KYAW and MYO AUNG THANT as well as all those innocent family
members now under detention.
We request our fellow international trade unions to help obtain the
release of MYO AUNG THANT and KHIN KYAW.
**************************************************
FEER: SCHOOL'S IN
June 19, 1997
Asean's peer pressure
Peer pressure at school can be a potent force, as any teacher can attest.
Now that the Association of Southeast Asian Nations has mailed its
acceptance letter to Burma, the question is whether peer pressure works in
regional blocs as well as it does in the schoolyard.
Asean, of course, has long rejected the sanctions approach favoured by the
West, arguing that its policy of constructive engagement will prove a better
vehicle for bringing Burma around to more accepted norms.
Unfortunately, right now there is little to show for either policy. Although
we ourselves agree that sanctions are not the answer, the inherent problem
with the Asean approach is that the bloc is about as diverse as a
Baskin-Robbins ice cream selection, with regimes as varied as Singapore
and Vietnam, Brunei and the Philippines, Thailand and Indonesia. If
Asean thinks it can make Burma more like itself, just which part would
that be?
Still, Asean was determined to expand. And so, like it or not, Burma, as
well as Laos and Cambodia, will join Asean this year as it celebrates its
30th anniversary, an admissions policy based less on strategy than on
sentiment. Having decided to go ahead, the onus now is on Asean to do the
job for which it claims it is the most qualified: To make us stop pinching
our noses when talking about Burma.
The varied nature of the regimes under the Asean roof suggests that it has
little standing to nudge Rangoon down a kinder and gentler political path.
But with Burma now eager for trade, economic peer pressure may be
Asean's best bet. That will mean persuading Rangoon (not to mention
Hanoi) that the wealth of more prosperous members has come with steadily
greater economic transparency and accountability. If done properly the
flowering of a private economy in Burma may gradually erode the
authoritarian grip the ruling generals now have over life, as well as
empower ordinary Burmese in ways no communique, no matter how finely
worded, could ever do. But even in the best of all worlds it looks to be a
long school term. Is Asean up to it? (FEER)
******************************************************
ASIA INC: FRONTIER OF FURY
June 20, 1997
The Thai-Burmese border could become a new gateway for economic growth ...
or remain a battle zone
On the mountaintop along Burma's border with Thailand, a Burmese army major,
a Thai special-forces captain and a white South African security guard scan
the horizon from sandbagged redoubts. One thousand meters below, clearly
visible through the early-morning mist, a large area of jungle is being
cleared by giant earthmovers. To one side is a helicopter landing pad. In
the hazy distance, a wide brown trial disappears toward the sea.
The trio are surprised at the arrival of an Asia, Inc. Reporter. When a
camera is produced, they are even more unsettled. Little wonder. This remote
spot near Ban I-Thong border village, some 400 kilometers by road northwest
of Bangkok, marks another stage in the controversial constitution of a $1.2
billion pipeline from Burma's Yadana gas field to energy-starved Thailand.
Western critics say the project is soaked in blood, and is being built with
slave labor.
Burma's military junta, the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC),
has launched a massive offensive to "annihilate" (its own chilling word)
ethnic Karen rebels who for 50 years have controlled vast tracts of the
2,400-km Thai-Burma border.
Part of the reason is to allow the gas pipeline to be built. More
ambitiously, though, it is to clear the way for Thai and Burmese businessmen
to redevelop the entire border region for industry, trade and tourism.
As the Karen flee, many with tales of murder and rape by Slorc troops, the
entrepreneurs are moving in. The question now is: Will Asian businessmen
succeed in swapping conflict for commerce, as they have done elsewhere? Or
will they end up trying to do business on the front line of a brutal local war?
Singh Tangcharoenchaichana, a flamboyant Thai-Chinese factory owner in
Kanchanaburi, 60 km from the Burma border and 130 km west of Bangkok, has no
doubts. Says Singh: "People realize it is better to trade business than
bullets. They are all getting sick of fighting."
That is not the view inside the sprawling refugee camps_bulging with 90,000
Karen, as well 22,500 other uprooted ethnic minorities_tucked just inside
Thailand. Grim defiance hangs in the air at Wangkha camp, 14 km north of the
Thai town of Mae Sot. Feelings have been running especially high since the
camp was torched and looted during a cross-border raid by Slorc-backed forces.
Major Mary Oh, 63, a veteran Karen fighter, declares: "Surrender is out of
the question."
At nearby Mae Hla, the largest Karen camp with 26,000 refugees, the latest
arrivals are sheltered only by blue plastic sheets donated by an aid agency.
Pastor Simon, a softly spoken Karen Baptist minister, says: "They want to
eliminate us because of the business interest. They want to wipe out all our
people there. But even if Slorc captures the whole border, the Karen will
keep fighting."
That would spell trouble, possibly disaster, for Thai and foreign investors
preparing to pump billions of dollars into a host of grandiose projects in
the region.
CROSS-BORDER HIGHWAY, PORTS, TRADE ZONES AND RAILROADS
Arguably the most ambitious plans center on a 250-km road linking Bangkok
and Kanchanaburi with the southern Burmese coastal city of Tavoy. Ital-Thai
Development PCL, one of Thailand's largest construction companies, has
signed a memorandum of understanding with Slorc to build a major of
deepwater port in Tavoy.
Presently, all Thailand's west-bound trade takes the lengthy sea route
through the Gulf of Thailand and around the bottom of the Malay peninsula,
via Singapore, to the Malacca Strait. The new road would be a shortcut to
the Indian Ocean, shrinking the distance to the Middle East and Europe by
some 3,000 km. Boasts Kanchanaburi businessman Somphob Teerasan: "It will
save 14 days' travel time and a huge amount of money." Agrees a foreign
diplomat: "It will be worth billions of dollars to business."
In the near future, developers will move into the Thai border village of Bon
Ti, mid-way between Kanchanaburi and Tavoy. On a balmy late afternoon
recently, the only signs of village life were four Karen women, white
thanaka-bark powder daubed on their faces and market produce slung on their
backs, walking along a dirt track fringed by flaming bougainvillea. The
tranquillity was deceptive. Here, weeks earlier, the Thai army forced 1,800
fleeing Karen refugees to turn back and face the guns of the advancing Slorc.
A wide, newly surfaced road from Kanchanaburi already reaches to within 7 km
of the frontier. (Outside Thailand, Kanchanaburi is best known as the
setting for the Oscar-winning movie -The Bridge of the River Kwai.)
Businessmen Singh and Somphob have just revealed plans for a 160-hectare
industrial zone on what was formerly military-owned land adjacent to the Bon
Ti border.
Singh, president of the local branch of the Federation of Thai Industry,
even talks about re-establishing a rail link following the route of the
notorious wartime Burma-Thailand "Death Railway." The line_the building of
which cost the lives of 100,000 conscripted Asian laborers and 16,000 Allied
prisoners of war_briefly linked the Southeast Asian and Burmese rail
networks via the Three Pagodas Pass. After the war, much of the track was
torn up, but a train still runs from Bangkok over the River Kwai bridge to
Nam Tok, halfway to the pass.
Is ambition running ahead of realism? Perhaps not. Burma will soon forge
closer ties with Thailand by joining the Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (Asean). And a newly published report by Thailand's National
Economic and Social Development Board outlines plans for a major
redevelopment of the border area, including a series of road and rail
corridors between Thailand and Burma. Says Manu Sattayateva, director of the
board's Central Development Center: "My dream is that we will eventually
create links like those that exist in the European Union."
In April, Thai Prime Minister Chavalit Yongchaiyudh threw his weight behind
the development of the border region when he officially opened a $40 million
industrial estate in Kanchanaburi created by Singh, Somphob and their
partners. The businessmen claim that 40 percent of the 14-hectare site has
already been snapped up. Among the investors are textile and shoe factories
relocating from Bangkok, as well as Iron Classic, a Singapore-based
steel-plate manufacturer, and companies from Japan and Italy.
Apart from proximity to the border, the region boasts another advantage:
abundant, very cheap labor from Burma. Last June, to ease a chronic labor
shortage, Thailand allowed Burmese immigrants to work in more than half the
country's provinces, including Kanchanaburi. Says Singh, who operates a
canned-and frozen-food factory: "The minimum wage for Thai workers is 128
baht [about $5.10] a day, but you can get immigrants for 60 baht [$2.40] or
less." Now he plans to develop two more industrial estates in Tavoy and Rangoon.
Other entrepreneurs see vast tourism opportunities along Burma's pristine
and picturesque Tenasserim coast, which could soon be just a few hours'
drive from central Thailand's major population centers.
In January, Phuket-based South East Asia Liveaboards Co was licensed by
Burma to offer trips through the formerly off-limits Mergui Archipelago.
Such plans, however, depend on security forces being able to guarantee safe
passage into and out of Burma. At Bon Ti and the nearby Karen camp at Phu
Muang, where 2,500 refugees huddle at night under plastic sheeting,
machine-gun fire can sometimes be heard from across the border.
Last year, a Kanchanaburi businessman, Patana Sinkanchanamalai, attempted to
mediate between Slorc and the Karen. The talks failed.
THE FRIENDSHIP BRIDGE
Mae Sot is a brash, freewheeling Thai border town in Tak province, 500 km
northwest of Bangkok. For years, it was an unofficial base in Thailand for
Karen rebels, whose "capital," Manerplaw, was just four hours by road and
river to the north. Rangoon's forces controlled only three border posts
along the entire border, one of which was Myawaddy, across the Moei River
from Mae Sot.
In those days, Thailand tolerated the Karen and other insurgent ethnic
groups, regarding them as a buffer against Burma, its old enemy. (In 1767,
the Burmese sacked the former Thai capital of Autthaya.) Thai soldiers and
businessmen also could profit from the black-market border trade and the
teak forests under Karen control. Now, as Burmese opens for business, those
priorities have changed- and, at the same time, the Karen have been in retreat.
After gradually losing ground to the Burmese, the Karen lost Manerplaw in
1995. This year, they have lost the rest of their fixed positions. Now, the
area on both sides of the border around Mae Sot and Myawaddy seems likely to
develop rapidly following the opening, scheduled for this month, of the
"Friendship Bridge" carrying a highway from Bangkok to Rangoon and on,
eventually, to Europe.
The road is a long-awaited section of the so-called Pan-Asia Highway that
will eventually link every major Asian city on a direct route from Singapore
to Istanbul, as well as connecting with an east-west road joining Vietnam,
Laos and Central Thailand. Already road improvements within Thailand have
cut traveling time between Bangkok and Mae Sot to five hours.
As in Kanchanaburi province, Mae Sot businessmen operate their
food-processing and textile factories with low-cost Karen, Burmese and Mon
labor. Even before the bridge opens, hotels, resorts and shopping centers
are rising along the banks of the Moei River on the Thai side. Plans also
have been mooted for a 100-hectare industrial park and free-trade zone.
At Mae Sot Central Hills resort, Paniti Tungphati, 47, vice president of the
Tak Chamber of Commerce, relaxes in the lobby and talks with cautious
enthusiasm about Mae Sot's new role as a major business and tourism gateway
to Burma.
Paniti, whose company, Chaipatana Ltd. Partnership, exports car parts to
Burma, spent his early living and trading in one of Thailand's largest
cities, Hat Yai (pop. 157,700), center of the booming border trade with
Malaysia. He has waited a long time for the Friendship Bridge, construction
of which began in 1994 but was frequently delayed because of border
disputes. "Today, Mae Sot has a population of only 25,000," says Paniti.
"But soon it will become another Hat Yai."
THE GAS PIPELINE
By far the largest foreign investments in Burma are in two 700-km-long
pipelines that will carry natural gas from Burma's Yadana and Yetagun gas
fields in the Gulf of Martaban to a 4,600-megawatt power station in the Thai
city of Ratchaburi, 100 km west of Bangkok. Yadana's gas will come on stream
next year; Yetagun's by 1999.
Both fields are being mainly developed by Western resource companies: Yadana
by the U.S's Unocal Corp and France's Total SA, and the $600 million Yetagun
field by a consortium led by the U.S.'s Texaco Corp. In the U.S. and Europe,
however, Slorc's human rights abuses have made it a pariah regime. In April,
the U.S. government slapped a ban on new investment in Burma in response to
what it called "large-scale repression" there. According to a U.S. report,
for instance, slave and child labor, which is often used on infrastructure
projects, accounts for 3 percent of Burma's GDP.
As existing rather than new Burma investors, Unocal and Texaco are exempt
from the sanctions, but pressure groups in the U.S. have launched boycott
campaigns and lawsuits against them.
So far, though, the companies are standing firm, denying complicity in human
rights abuses and contending that the gas projects are in the long-term
interests of the region's people.
Their resolve has been severely tested: In 1995, five Total workers were
killed and 11 injured in a Karen ambush. At Ban I-Thong, the Slorc major
interviewed by Asia, Inc. acknowledges a Karen base is only 8 km away.
And despite 10,000 Slorc troops saturating the pipeline corridor, Texaco has
hired a private security outfit, Ordsafe, to protect its Western employees
surveying the route. Six of the Ordsafe security team are ex-South African
military; on the clifftop at Ban I-Thong, one of them introduces himself as
Philip Smith.
"Our job is purely to get the expats out," he explains. "And get them out
fast before anything happens."
Turning battlefields into marketplaces, as former Thai Prime Minister
Chatichai Choonhavan once put it, has become relatively commonplace in
post-Cold War Asia.
The difference on the Burma-Thailand border is that Slorc's generals are
trying to create that marketplace at the point of a gun.(AI)
It looks like being a bloody business.
_William Mellor, with additional reporting by Vissuta Pothong, Thomas
Crampton and John Clewley
**************************************************
THE NATION: ON THE FRONTIER OF AIDS TRANSMISSION
June 16, 1997 [abridged]
Mukdawan Sakboon
Border barriers to trade and migrant movements are coming down but old
prejudices about disease remain in place, imperilling the potential
economic gains.
Yet, even now, with more than 22 million people around the world
estimated to be infected with HIV, misconceptions about the disease
continue to thrive, particularly in Southeast Asia.
In much the same way as Europeans once argued over the origins of
syphilis the Aids virus remains the disease of the "outsider" in the region.
In the context of migration, the conventional thinking is that it is "the
migrant who brings in the disease".
Migrant populations - whose definitions often overlap and change to
include asylum seekers, refugees, clandestine groups, workers and ethnic
minority groups are often considered by many governments as the main
transmission route for the disease into their countries.
Immigrants are rather vulnerable to HIV but this often has more to do with
their precarious social and legal statuses and their inferior living
conditions than the fact that they are foreigners.
Transnational migration and HIV/Aids was the focus of a recent technical
consultation among Aids programme directors and academics from eight
Southeast Asian countries, and Hong Kong and China, which was co-
organised by the Asian Research Centre for Migration in Chiang Rai
recently.
While information about migration and HIV patterns is either non-existent
or inadequate and few education programmes exist for migrants in most
countries, the increasing rate of HIV incidence in border areas, ports and
markets is a great cause of concern.
High HIV prevalence along with rising sexually transmitted disease (STD)
rates are being reported in the border areas of many countries where
internal movement and cross-border migration is a common practise, either
through official border checkpoints or centuries-old trade (and migration)
routes.
The twin border towns of Tachileik in Burma's eastern Shan state and Mae
Sai in Chiang Rai have in the past few years experienced a sharp rise in
HIV among commercial sex workers and intravenous drug users.
HIV prevalence among pregnant women in Tachileik is the highest in
Burma at 7.5 per cent, said Dr Rai Mra, deputy director for Aids/STD at
Burma's Health Ministry's Department of Health.
While on average, HIV prevalence among pregnant women in Thailand
is less than two per cent, the incidence among the same group at Chiang
Rai's Mae Sai hospital is reportedly 14 per cent.
Burmese and Chinese ethnic minorities and Thai women are also recruited
for "entertainment places" in Yunnan, said Dr Rai Mra of Burma's Health
Ministry.
Cultural sexual practices which facilitate the rapid spread of Aids exist in
many countries.
Why are border towns so different and dangerous as springboards for HIV
transmission?
Don Douglas, country director of Programme for Appropriate Technology
in Health (Path) in Indonesia said it is partly because of the wider
availability of drugs at lower prices and the thriving sex industry thrives
and exploitation of young girls and people from rural area is rife,"
He cited two border areas where this twin attraction has made them hot
spots for HIV transmission - Mae Sai/Tachileik and Indonesia's Jayapura
and Papua New Guinea's Vammo.
The promise of earning relatively good money in Mae Sai attracts
thousands of Burmese girls while cheap sex and ethnic variety attracts
Thai clients, said Douglas.
However, not all the border points are vulnerable to infection, said Tony
Bennett of Bangkok-based Aidscap.
There are other factors such as social disruption and peer pressure which
are important in creating a dangerous HIV/Aids environment, he said.
DISCRIMINATORY STRATEGY
Though countries have thus far been unable to harmonise policies towards
immigrant populations, particularly workers, many have developed
preventative strategies aimed at containing the spread of HIV/Aids which
go far beyond the principle of "minimum interference with international
traffic" as laid down by the International Health Regulations.
The regulations were adopted in 1951 under the auspices of the World
Health Organisation to ensure the maximum security against the
international spread of disease.
Many Asian countries have adopted a "send-back" policy on foreign
migrant workers found to be infected with HIV.
Countries often cite the high incidence of the disease in neighbouring
countries as justification for the restrictions.
Such strategies as mandatory testing are deemed "impractical" and
"discriminatory" by experts who warn that they could create a false sense
of security and lead to the abandonment of safe sex practises.
For many infected migrants, the situation back home may be even worse,
with many facing the prospect of being arrested, detained or simply
disappearing.
As more borders open to economic cooperation, a condition which will
ensure more mobility of people, it's important that national programmes
which are culturally appropriate be developed for migrants.
Vulnerable migrant groups needed to be empowered to enable them to
assess their own risks and needs, said Dr Naing of the UK-based NGO
World Vision, who is involved in planning intervention programmes for
Burmese migrants in Tachileik and Kawthaung.
Different type of migrants need different types of strategies, said Dr Usa
Duangsa of the Northern Thai-Australia Aids prevention and Care
Programme (Napac).
There is an urgent need to set up a network to monitor migration and
HIV/Aids in the region and for information and education programme to
be launched in both the sending and receiving countries.
Asian governments must make greater efforts to collaborate in addressing
the issue of migration and HIV/Aids, while respecting the rights of the
migrants.
Adequate health care should be made accessible to migrant populations,
the experts urged.
Preventative measures such as condom promotion should be made visible
and there must be no HIV-testing zone, said Jon Ungpakorn of the non-
governmental organisation Aids Counselling Centre Education and
Support Services (Access).
But the most important thing is for the governments of this region, where
HIV/Aids could bring disaster- socially, economically and medically - to
realise and accept the existence of the problems and the conditions which
fuel the spread of HIV in the countries, without pointing fingers at each
other.
HIV PREVALENCE IN COUNTRIES WHERE DATA ARE AVAILABLE, 1996
--------------------------------------------------------------
Country Pregnant Woman Sex Workers Drug Injectors
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Cambodia 1.7% 41% Not available
Indonesia 0.0% 0.04% Not available
Malaysia 0.2% Not available Not available
Burma 2.0% 21% 63%
Thailand 1.7% 16.7% 46.7&
Vietnam 0.04% 0.7% 11%
-----------------------------------------------------------------
NOTE: These rates are measured at sentinel sites. However it should be
noted that the sample populations and testing practices differ from country,
so they may not be directly comparable.
*In 1996, Thailand combined data for brothel-based sex workers and those
working out of restaurants, bars and other locations. These two groups,
classified as "direct" and "indirect" sex workers, were until 1995 reported
separately.
Nation graphic: P. Buranasiri Source : UNAIDS
*********************************************************
THAILAND TIMES: SLORC LAUNCHES PROBE INTO CORRUPT
HIGH-RANKING OFFICIALS
June 19, 19997
By Kachorn Boonpath
MAE HONG SON: The Burmese military junta has stepped up anti-
corruption measures by calling an investigation into high-ranking officials
who were reportedly receiving bribes from Thai loggers .
A source from Ho Mong township said the State Law and Order
Restoration Council (SLORC) has initiated an investigation into Brigadier
General Chit Maung and 17 other officials who were in charge of the
township since February last year.
The inquiry was made following a complaint from Cham Moung, son of
opium warlord Khun Sa, that the Burmese officials accepted bribes from
Thai loggers who illegally ran logging operations in Ho Mong and Nam
Rin townships and helped them transport the logs into Thailand via Mae
Hong Son's Huay Pheung passage.
The source said there was an intensive activity of illegal hauling of logs
into Thailand last year and Chit Maung was allegedly paid about five
million kyat by Thai merchants for facilitating it.
Some of these officials were also accused of tax evasion and taking bribes
from Thai cattle traders, said the source .
The source said the corruption rumor began last year in Ho Mong township
after Khun Sa surrendered to the military junta. Ho-Mong was once a
military base of Khun Sa's Mong Tai Army (MTA).
********************************************
SLORC: US POLITICS AND ITS POLITICIANS
June 18, 1997
by Min Aung Min
I had the opportunity to meet MS Madeleine Albright when was in
Myanmar, in her capacity as the U S Ambassador to the UN. I watched her
carefully at a reception, and observed that she never had serious dialogue
as such with any one but was literally wandering around picking at tit-bits
from the tables. Members of her staff were huddled in nooks and corners
with the anti-elements, whilst government officials were representative of
the UN and various international organizations were ignored. At the end
of her tour made far reaching statements on matters she knew little or
nothing about. In other words, like all politicians she delivered those
statements as tutored.
It was apparent that her visit was a deliberate exercise to be able to
meddle more in Myanmar. Even before her appointment to the State
department, MS. Albright was the most vocal advocate for sanctions. I
often wonder if Ms. Albright and her cronies are aware of the implications
their actions will have on millions of lives? Surely they have seen it in
Cuba, Iran, Iraq, and are witnessing it vividly in North Korea?
Sanctions deprive a nation and its people access to investment capital
from the international community. It places severe constraint on social,
economic and human resources development. It denies millions of people
the right to job opportunities, income generation, enhanced standards of
living, uplifted morale and morals; in other words, a chance to a healthy,
happy, productive life. Health and eduction standards effected;
environmental conservation concerns shelved. The work force being denied
accessibility to modern technology, market expertise market expertise,
market familiarization make modernization nigh on impossible. The
ultimate objective of sanctions is to force a nation and its people to their
knees.
Once achieve, it puts them at the mercy of their so-called benefactors
upon whom they become totally dependent and who are in a position to call
all the cards.
Applying of sanctions is the cruelest form of Human Rights abuse,
for it is intended to force whole nations and their people into dire straits.
The worst part of it all, is that it is undertaken not for the love of anyone
but as a coercive political tool. No respectable responsible nation or
politician aspiring to a leadership role should stoop to such depths;
especially if they or their kin are not going to suffer with the people, or
their children are not going to lose out in education and career
opportunities like the rest of the nation's youth. It is utterly immoral.
I can cite hundreds of incidents of human rights violations in the
U.S.A alone. John M.Broder's article in the 3rd March 1997 issue of the
New York Times, gives a vivid account of the crimes committed against
humanity by generations of American politicians under the dictatorship
of the C.I.A and F.B.I. President Clinton's early 1996 address to the nation
about the rise in violent crime and under age violent drug addiction and
drug related crime, increase in broken marriages, unwed teenage mothers,
rising abortion wife abuse, child abuse, loss of family values etc. all profess
severe depravation and inequities that have led to a frayed social fabric;
and present a bleak future for the U.S.
Poverty in America used to involve mostly Black American; they were
later joined by the Hispanics; now a large number of Whites, including war
veterans have joined the army of lost souls. These deprived
underpriveleged people have become so disillusioned with their political
system and their politicians, that armed and trained militia groups are
growing. Their aim? To defend themselves against the Federal
government. And now the independent statehood movement has started in
Texas. How would Mr Albright explain this? Does she feel that these
groups are within their legitimate democratic right? If not, why are they
making a big issue of the Myanmar military subueing their insurgents they
have had on their hands for over 50 years?
Recent post election revelations have exposed the American political
system for what it is. Big money is the game; and no individual can be
elected to high political posts without limitless funds. As such-principled
honourable, well intentioned and qualified people are automatically
excluded from the political process, resulting in a leadership crisis.
But may be worse is the trade off deals which have made the pursuit of self
interests standard norm in American politics.
Many nations have learn from bitter experiences that U.S national
self interest was too often used to justify ignoble means. The U.S has long
interfered in other nations' inter affairs, toppling or installing leaders in
every continent. The congress appropriates tens of millions of dollars
yearly for covert and overt operations to influence domestic politics abroad,
and the C.I.A arrogantly exercises power to intervene in the internal affairs
of others.
When Ms. Albright was asked why it was that the U.S did not apply
the same standards and norms it did to Myanmar to other similar but much
worse off censorious'? She replied not so brightly - that it was " due to
national interest". It is clear-that these people are willing to play
zeallously
with the izal:e of nations and their peoples as a gambit, as though they
were pawns in a chess game.
The world needs to understand that the ultimate aim of all their
machinations is the containment of China, why else would they be
pressuring for the expansion of NATO to the east; to the extent of
including Russia? Myanmar because of its strategic geographical location
has historically been known as the back door to China. Being wedged
between India and China, the two most populous nations in the world, any
super power that gained a foot hold in Myanmar could do a lot to
destabilize the region.
Many positive things are happening in Myanmar today.
Infrastructural development is taking place at a phenomenal pace with
little or no external support. But all this is being ignored. They have not
stopped to think sensibly as to why it is that 15 major insurgent groups that
have been up in arms against successive governments for half a century
would choose to seek a peaceful settlement at a time when a military
government is in power. Would these groups have done so if SLORC were
as repressive as it is being made out to be? Certainly not. They have sought
peace because they respect and trust SLORC's goodwill and sincerity. For
once in its history, Myanmar is in a very good position to achieve peace
and prosperity If not for this bizzare malady.
All this posturing about propping Suu Kyi up in the guise of
defending democracy and hum right is merely a ruse to attain their selfish
evil means.
Their imposition of sanctions have misfired; for the world at large is
disgusted with their bully-bouncing. We need to be grateful for the wisdom
and far steadiness of the leaders of the Southeast Asia Region in particular;
together with Japan and Australia who have come out on the side of right
against might. We anticipate that the EU and Canada will follow suit and
make a " Hands off Myanmar " stand as they did valiantly for Cuba.
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