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PRESS RELEASE (r)



October 9, 1998

NCGUB CONDEMNS ONGOING ARRESTS
RIDICULES "BIZARRE" CONSPIRACY ALLEGATIONS

The NCGUB today condemned Burma's military regime for continuing arrests
of democratic political leaders and students.  Prime Minister Sein Win
also ridiculed the regime's bizarre allegations of a vast conspiracy,
saying "This regime is so Orwellian that it seems to be reading Animal
Farm as an instruction manual."  U Bo Hla Tint, NCGUB Minister for
American Affairs added that The regime is basically accusing the NLD of
engaging in politics, the NCGUB of supporting the NLD and the democracy
movement of using non-violent struggle to pressure the regime to
transfer power to the elected parliament.  If these are crimes, we are
guilty."

On October 7, 1998, Burma's secret police staged a press conference to
publicize what it claims is evidence of a vast conspiracy supposedly
initiated by Dr. Sein Win, the Prime Minister of the NCGUB, who the
regime also accuses of "manipulating the string behind the scenes."
Specifically, the regime accuses the NCGUB of organizing 52 individuals,
groups, organizations and countries of "subversive and treasonous plots"
against the regime.  Among those involved in the purported conspiracy
are "western bloc countries," an undetermined number of foreign
newspapers, radio and television stations including the British
Broadcasting Company and the Voice of America, financier George Soros,
the National Endowment for Democracy which is funded by the U.S.
Congress, three "literary circles" in Burma, an unspecified number of
"malcontent" students and perhaps most bizarrely, the Jesuit Refugee
Service, which is allegedly operating from Thailand to support
insurgents and "lending them a hand in committing violence and creating
unrest."

The regime alleges that the object of the NCGUB-led conspiracy is to
support Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and the National League for Democracy in
their efforts to convene the legitimately elected Parliament.

Statement of U Bo Hla Tint:

These most recent allegations are almost as bizarre as similar
allegations last year by the regime that the U.S. Government was funding
the American Refugee Committee, the International Rescue Committee, and
the American Federation of Labor-Congress of Industrial Organizations
(AFL-CIO) to carry out terrorism in Burma.

Once the more delusional accusations are stripped away-such as the
specter of an armed Jesuit invasion from Thailand--three basic charges
remain.  The regime accuses the National League for Democracy of
"pursuing a course?to realize their expressed goal of convening
parliament."  In short, they are accusing elected politicians of
engaging in politics.   If this is a crime, we are all guilty.  They
accuse the NCGUB of seeking international support for the National
League for Democracy and the Parliament elected in 1990.  If this is a
crime, we are guilty.  They accuse those of us in Burma's democracy
movement of advocating Political Defiance, which is based on the
non-violent teachings of teachers such as Mahatma Gandhi and Dr. Martin
Luther King, Jr.  We endorse Political Defiance because we believe that
the solution to Burma's problems must come through political struggle,
not armed struggle-that we must talk with our opponents, not shoot
them.  If this is a crime, we are guilty.

Because the regime has made itself a pariah in international community
and is condemned by the media and people around the world, they accuse
us of orchestrating an international campaign.  In doing this, they both
overstate our role and overlook the reasons they are isolated and
reviled.  The regime has made Burma a place where it is a crime to win
an election, where the schools are closed because the generals are
afraid of the nation's children, where the government depends for its
revenue on the heroin trade it fosters, where millions toil in slave
labor and where millions more will die because the regime spends half
the nation's resources on guns and none on medicine.   These are the
real crimes in Burma and it is the generals who are guilty.

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