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Contents:
(1) Junta 'takes tough line' on border sites
(2) Letters attack 'unlawful acts'
(3)  S-E ASIA Notebook
(4)  WASHBIZ
(5)  Dissidents lobby Asean

(from South China Morning Post)

Junta 'takes tough line' on border sites 



BURMA by Ben Barber 
Thai officials say the Burmese military is using tough tactics to claim 
disputed border areas, breaching bilateral accords.

Burmese workers had been building an observation tower on a disputed 
site bordering Burma's Myawaddy and Thailand's Mae Sot province, they 
said.

The move had instilled fear in border officials that a planned 
Friendship Bridge might again be delayed or come under threat should 
violence ensue.

The site has seen hostile conflict since May, when Burma sent in armed 
troops to dredge the Moei River.

Early this month, army representatives on both sides agreed to demarcate 
the area into nine divisions, with plans to open the border to trade at 
a later date.

A Thai-Burma Friendship Bridge is planned for the crossing, but Burmese 
sources claim the border is not ready to be opened, and have ignored 
requests from Thai-Burmese Border Committee deputy chairman Colonel 
Chainarong Thanaroon to stop building on the site.

Border sources said Burmese troops had been sent in to guard the 
observation tower site at night.

They feared further combat, despite rumours that Thailand would not 
protest because it wanted "too badly" for the Friendship Bridge to go 
ahead.

United States Secretary of State Madeleine Albright plans to take up the 
"central issue" of Burma in talks with Association of Southeast Asian 
Nations foreign ministers in Kuala Lumpur at their annual meeting 
starting next Thursday, Sandra Kristoff, a special assistant to US 
President Bill Clinton, said.



Letters attack 'unlawful acts' 
LAOS by Agence France-Presse 
A collection of letters from Burmese pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu 
Kyi's National League of Democracy to the ruling junta which were 
smuggled into Thailand were released yesterday.

The 33 "Letters to a Dictator" document the "dignified response" of the 
party to the junta's efforts to "destroy" it.

The letters, written by party president Aung Shwe, were sent to junta 
chief General Than Shwe to inform him of the "unlawful acts" committed 
against the party.

(from Business Time)
S-E ASIA Notebook

Thai Maritime gets nod to privatise

[BANGKOK] Thailand's cabinet yesterday approved the privatisation of 
Thai Maritime Navigation and authorised incentives for the first five 
years of its operations. Thai-registered shippers with Thai vessels will 
also be exempted from corporate income tax. -- AFP

6 ministers under graft probe since '90

[KUALA LUMPUR] Six ministers were under investigation by the Anti 
Corruption Agency from 1990 until now, Deputy Minister in the Prime 
Minister's Department Nazri Aziz said. During the same period, two 
deputy ministers and a parliamentary secretary were also under 
investigation. -- Bernama

US to take up Myanmar issue

[KUALA LUMPUR] US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright plans to take up 
the "central issue" of Myanmar in talks with Asean foreign ministers 
here next week. Sandra Kristoff, a special assistant to President Bill 
Clinton, warned that Myanmar's entry would affect Asean's image. Myanmar 
is to be inducted together with Laos into Asean on the eve of Asean's 
annual meeting starting July 24. ? AFP

(from Washington Post)
WASHBIZ



Monday, July 14, 1997; Page F03
The Washington Post 

ROAD SHOW

Call it a return of a sign of the times.

Burma Shave, after a 30-year absence from the American advertising 
landscape, is back, thanks in part to the District-based advertising 
agency Abramson Ehrlich Manes.

The ad campaign for the line of razors, shaving cream and other 
skin-care products recalls the series of roadside signs that touted the 
products from 1926 through the 1960s. The ad agency discovered that 90 
percent of men older than 42 remembered the signs from family vacations 
of their youth. And that was the market targeted by Burma Shave's parent 
company, American Safety Razor of Verona, Va.

"We really did want to build off the Burma Shave heritage but reposition 
it as a product for the man of today," said Joe Moscati, creative 
director at Abramson Ehrlich.

The result is a series of 30-second spots that began airing last week on 
CNN, Headline News and ESPN. The spots feature a fiftysomething man, 
riding with his wife along the Florida coast in his restored 1958 
Corvette. And that older -- but not old -- successful, self-confident 
man is just whom the campaign is aimed at.

Jennifer White, account supervisor at Abramson Ehrlich, said research 
found a market opportunity. "Older men felt . . . ignored by the other 
competitors -- Schick or Gillette -- whose advertising is geared more at 
men who are 25. Men [in the Burma Shave demographic] feel that major 
advertisers are . . . not speaking to them." 

The campaign for American Safety Razor is "a top 10 account" for the 
agency, which also handles advertising for WHUR Radio, the Fashion 
Centre at Pentagon City and American Service Center, White said. -- 
Tracy Grant

DINING AT HOME

District-based Black Entertainment Television took a couple of knocks 
from the hometown folks when it located its first restaurant, BET 
Soundstage, in Prince George's County. But a BET restaurant may be 
coming to the city after all.

The company has an option to lease a building at 11th and E streets NW, 
and is considering putting a 6,500-square-foot restaurant on the site. 
CEO Robert L. Johnson wants a jazz theme, much like BET on Jazz, BET's 
all-music cable channel. In fact, the proposed restaurant may carry that 
name.

The project still has a couple of "ifs". Johnson wants to make sure he 
can bring the rehab of the building in on budget; BET is also looking 
for the right chef (it is in negotiations with a candidate in Miami). 
Says Johnson, "If we miss on the food, the rest fails. The food has got 
to be there and the [jazz] theme will push it over the top."

The place won't be a performance club a la Blues Alley, he says, 
although musicians taping at BET will be asked to drop in for an 
impromptu set or two. For clientele, Johnson is eyeing not just 
tourists, business people and convention-goers, but the late-night crowd 
spilling out of the MCI Center after construction is completed. -- Paul 
Farhi

@CAPTION: Some scenes from a new series of TV commercials for Burma 
Shave that began airing last week. 


© Copyright 1997 The Washington Post Company


Dissidents lobby Asean 


(The Nation)
YINDEE LERTCHAROENCHOK 
EXILED Burmese dissidents yesterday urged Asean members to use the same 
''logic and standards" adopted to help resolve the current political 
situation in Cambodia with Burma. 

They called on the grouping to persuade the Burmese junta to start 
dialogue with pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi and her National 
League for Democracy (NLD), as well as end all human rights' abuses and 
atrocities. 

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations was also called on to delay 
Burma's membership into the regional bloc and to urge the ruling Burmese 
State Law and Order Restoration Council (Slorc) to transfer power to the 
NLD, which won a landslide victory in the May 1990 general election. The 
National Council of the Union of Burma's Tin Maung Win told a press 
conference yesterday that the Burmese opposition welcomed Asean's 
decision to help find a peaceful solution to the Cambodian conflict and 
its call for talks between the two premiers. 

''These [Asean] actions are right and just. For this very reason, we 
would like to ask Asean to apply the same logic, the same standards and 
the same pressure when dealing with Burma, including deferring its Asean 
membership," he said. 

''The atrocities committed by the Slorc army are far more numerous than 
those committed by Hun Sen's forces," he added. 

Asean countries decided last week to delay indefinitely Cambodia's 
membership into the grouping after Second Prime Minister Hun Sen 
launched a violent coup to oust his political rival First Prime Minister 
Prince Norodom Ranariddh. 

Aung Naing Oo from the All Burma Students' Democratic Front yesterday 
urged Asean, which earlier told Slorc to initiate dialogue with the NLD, 
to seriously push for the talks to take place. ''They [Asean] should 
really push for dialogue, which we all want. It should not just be 
publicity or lip service," he said. 

Teddy Buri, an elected NLD MP and a minister to the exiled NLD 
government, said a delay in Burma's admission would save Asean from any 
future embarrassment.


"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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