WHY SPDC SHOULD ACCEPT THE WORLD BA

[moe@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]

Subject: WHY SPDC SHOULD ACCEPT THE WORLD BANK  OFFER

The following article reflects the opinions of the US intelligence analysts
with whom I've been working.

WHY SPDC SHOULD ACCEPT THE WORLD BANK OFFER
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It has been 10 years that the generals of Burma have held on to power
without the will and consent of the Burmese people and without the
international support. Despite arduous efforts by the military regime to
save itself from drowning in the economic crises, today the country is in
shattered economy and there has been almost no more sanction to be imposed
on the regime. The regime is desperately in need of hard currency. The US
and the West have been rebuking the hardliners' regime again and again for
its increasing rights abuses: extrajudicial and arbitrary executions, rape,
torture, inhuman treatment, mass arrests,forced labor, forced relocation and
denial of freedom of expression,assembly, association and movement.

Since September, according to Ambassador Betty King, the U.S. representative
to the U.N. Economic and Social Council,nearly 1,000 opposition figures from
Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy and other parties have been
detained. Signs of the regime's ongoing human rights violations are
unequivocal. Opposition groups, the international community and the UN have
been  urging the regime to start  peace talks with the NLD, Aung San Suu
Kyi's party that won a landslide victory in the 1990 elections. The regime
have refused to talk with NLD until now.

In late November the World Bank and the UN laid down an aid package for
Burma to defuse the political and economic crises. The plan was formulated
at a secretive meeting held
weeks earlier in southern England between the World Bank, the United Nations
and five Rangoon-based ambassadors who attended in an unofficial capacity.

The deal  was supposed to be $1.6 billion in the forms of humanitarian aid
and technical assistance. In return , the regime must o release political
prisoners, allow Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's freedom of movement and permit her
National League for Democracy to function as a political party. In exchange,
the National League for Democracy must  agree to rescind
its calls to convene  the Parliament.If such conditions are met ,
international funding would be opened to Burma for the first time in more
than a decade.

Recent reports by AFP and Reuter say that General Khin Nyunt is not keen on
the plan. Fact is the regime is bankrupt and the conscientious 46 million
Burmese are trapped in the political gridlock that can be diffused by SPDC
by saving face to itself in time. general Khin Nyunt should be enthusiastic
about the World Bank/UN deal to save not only the regime's face but to show
that the people come first. If the deal is accepted and terms and conditions
are met, both sides will reap what has been sown for so long. Sanctions will
be later lifted and Burma once known as the rice bowl of Asia will rise again.


By Julien Moe