The BurmaNet News: September 28, 19 (r)

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Subject: The BurmaNet News: September 28, 1999

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The BurmaNet News: September 28, 1999
Issue #1367

HEADLINES:
==========
SPDC: SPEECH TO UNGA BY CHAIRMAN OF DELEGATION
NCGUB: IT IS TIME FOR ACTION
BBC: BURMESE AUTHORITIES BLOCK OPPOSITION HQ
AFP: AUTHORITIES RAID MONEY SELLERS AS CURRENCY FALLS
FAR EASTERN ECONOMIC REVIEW: JUSTICE JITTERS
TIME: SEX, DRUGS, AND THE ROLL OF DICE
*****************************************************

SPDC: SPEECH TO UNGA BY CHAIRMAN OF MYANMAR DELEGATION
24 September, 1999 by Win Aung

[BurmaNet Editor's Note: Win Aung's speech will appear is being presented in
two parts.]

The following is the Statement by U Win Aung, Minister for Foreign Affairs
and Chairman of the Delegation of the Union of Myanmar in the General Debate
of the Fifty Fourth Session of the United Nations General Assembly, New
York, on 24 September 1999.

Mr President,

Allow me to begin by extending to you the warmest congratulations of the
delegation of the Union of Myanmar on your unanimous election as the
President of the fifty fourth session of the United Nations General
Assembly. Heavy and onerous are indeed the duties and responsibilities that
befall upon you at this particular session. The task before the President of
the General Assembly in any year is by no means easy. It is even more so
this year, as this session has the additional task of undertaking the
preparatory work for the Millennium Session next year. But we are fully
confident that your great wealth of experience and outstanding diplomatic
skills will stand you in good stead in the discharge of your
responsibilities and that you will bring this session to a successful
conclusion. I pledge the fullest cooperation of my delegation for the
advancement of the work of this Assembly under your able leadership. I also
wish to pay our tribute to your predecessor His Excellency Mr Opertti, for
his invaluable contribution to the successful conclusion of the previous
session of the General Assembly. Our tribute also goes to the
Secretary-General, Mr Kofi Annan, for his untiring efforts in leading the
World Organization so effectively through these extremely challenging and
difficult years.

Mr President,

Myanmar consistently supports the principle of the universality of
membership of this world organization. We are, therefore, most delighted to
see in our midst three new members this year. On behalf of the delegation of
the Union of Myanmar, I should like to extend our warmest congratulations to
the delegations of the Republic of Kiribati Nauru and the Kingdom of Tonga
who have taken their rightful places in this august Assembly.

Mr President,

We live in a rapidly changing world. With the end of the Cold War, the old
era of bipolar world has been a thing of the past. The world is in
transition from the old to the new world order, which has not fully taken
shape. At this critical juncture, the world is faced with uncertainties and
unsettling situation. Sometimes the world had even fallen victim to these
turbulences and chaos. In dealing with such situations, it is our view that
any solutions sought or measures taken even with the best of intention
should be strictly in conformity with the purposes and principles of the
United Nations Charter. Furthermore, universally recognized principles
governing international relations and the principle of respect for state
sovereignty should be taken into account before resorting to measures of
extreme nature in connection with a particular situation.

Mr President,

One outstanding question relating to the reform of the United Nations is the
reform of the structure and working methods of the Security Council. We are
encouraged to see that the General Assembly has taken a significant
procedural step by adopting a resolution on the requirement of two-thirds
majority in taking decisions and resolutions on these questions. With regard
to the core issue of enlargement of the Security Council, there are various
proposals on the table regarding the possible size of the Council. As a
member state of Non-Aligned Movement, our preference is for enlargement of
the Security Council up to 26. We favour the expansion of the membership of
the Council in both categories, permanent and non-permanent. In order to
overcome the current impasse on the question of permanent seats in the
Security Council, a compromise formula, acceptable to all parties, should be
worked out through enhanced consultations and discussions among the Member
States. We are of the view that in the event of other options having failed
to command enough support the idea of rotating permanent seats should also
be considered as one of the options in the permanent membership category.

Mr President,

In the coming year, we are going to convene a landmark assembly -- the
Millennium Assembly and the Millennium Summit. It is crucially important
that the Millennium Assembly Summit should not be mere ceremonial events but
should come up with concrete ideas and results. As it is clearly evident
that the greatest challenge facing mankind well into the next Millennium
will be economic development and poverty eradication for the vast majority
of people in the world, it is our view that particular attention should be
given to these issues.

Mr President,

Globalization can cut both positive and negative ways. It can bring us new
opportunities as well as additional problems. It is true that the process of
globalization can facilitate the economic development and enhance the living
standards of the people. But at the same time, it can make smaller and less
developed States vulnerable to the undesirable negative effects of this
process. One such problem, caused by the process of globalization is
transnational crimes, including illicit trafficking in narcotic drugs, money
laundering, trafficking in persons, arms smuggling, piracy and terrorism.
These crimes pose serious threats to the peace and stability of mankind at
both national and regional levels. The nature of this problem is such that
it requires national, regional and global responses. I am pleased to inform
this esteemed Assembly that in a bid to strengthen cooperation in the
regional grouping, Myanmar hosted the Second ASEAN Ministerial Meeting on
Transnational Crime in June this year. The meeting was a success, and it
constituted a significant step in advancing regional cooperation in
combating this menace in the South East Asia region. Let me also dwell on
the fight against narcotic drugs in Myanmar. My government is greatly
concerned about the drug menace, and the fight against narcotic drugs is
regarded as a national task and the top priority. A master plan had been
adopted to totally eradicate poppy cultivation within 15 years in
cooperation with ethnic leaders who signed peace agreements with the
government. In accord with the Master Plan, many areas have been declared
Opium Free Zones and farmers are now turning to alternative crops. Law
enforcement had been stepped up in the border areas resulting in increased
seizures of narcotic drugs. While we are quite successful in the suppression
of opium and heroin production, though only scanty international assistance
was received, another tide of danger has emerged in the form of new
synthetic drugs such as Methamphetamine. The new drugs were produced around
our porous borders with percussor chemicals such as Ephedrine, unavailable
locally, and drug-making equipment illegally smuggled in from neighbouring
countries. We are redirecting our efforts to deal with the new problem with
the cooperation of the countries concerned.

Mr. President,

Allow me to take this opportunity to apprise this august Assembly briefly of
the recent developments and trends taking place in my country. My government
is against neither democracy nor human rights. As a matter of fact, we are
taking necessary steps towards the establishment of a democratic nation.  We
have a vision of establishing a modern, peaceful and development democratic
state. In order to bring this vision into reality, we are reconsolidating
the national unity as number one priority. Necessary foundation being laid
for the emergence of a nation where a disciplined and multi-party democratic
system fully functions and justice, liberty and equality prevail.

We fully subscribe to the human rights norms enshrined in the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights. Here, I wish to underscore that the government
does not condone any violations of human rights, and the type of democracy
we envision will guarantee the protection and promotion of human rights,
particularly the rights to basic human needs such as clothing , food and
shelter. If there is an imperative need for improvement in areas of human
rights, we are willing and ready to receive sensible suggestions and take
whatever action we possibly could. For instance, in the middle of this year,
we received a delegation from the International Committee of the Red Cross
(ICRC) and made detailed arrangements for them to visit the prisons in
Myanmar as a measure of confidence-building and to interview the inmates in
accordance with the ICRC standard procedures. As a result of the full
cooperation we extended to the ICRC delegation, those visits were successful
and productive, enabling both sides to build mutual trust and goodwill. I
consider it pertinent to state here that ICRC delegation expressed their
satisfaction with the overall situation regarding the relationship between
the prison authorities and the inmates.

Also in August of this year, Mr, Chris Sidoti, Australian Human Rights
Commissioner, visited Myanmar and held discussions with the authorities
concerned, including myself, on the possibility of establishing a national
human rights institution in Myanmar and exchanged views on cooperation
between the two countries on human rights matters. As a result of this
visit, we were able to identify certain areas of cooperation between the two
countries.

Mr. President,

In conformity with our consistent policy of establishing friendly and
amicable relations with all the countries of the world, we accepted the
proposal for the visit of the Troika Mission of the European Union of
Myanmar in July this year. The mission was a fact-finding one in nature, and
both sides expressed their satisfaction with the result. It is our hope that
this mission will further strengthen our relations with the European Union
and pave the way for enhancing our contacts and dialogue with the EU to a
more meaningful and substantive stage in the future. Likewise, we would also
like to seek better relations with the United States of America.
Furthermore, I would like to confirm our willingness to receive Mr de Soto,
the Special Representative of United Nations Secretary-General, to visit my
country in the near future.

[See tomorrow's issue for Part 2 of this speech.]

*****************************************************

NATIONAL COALITION GOVERNMENT OF THE UNION OF BURMA
24 September, 1999 by Bo Hla Tint

[The Permanent Mission of Denmark to the United Nations and the World
Federation of United Nations Associations cosponsored a press conference of
NCGUB officials on 24 September for the opening week of the 54th session of
the UN General Assembly.]

Remarks of U Bo Hla Tint at the opening of the 54th Session of the UNGA.

First of all, let me express our gratitude to the Permanent Mission of
Denmark and the World Federation of United Nations Associations for
sponsoring this press conference at this critical juncture.

Anyone familiar with the situation in Burma knows that the human rights
situation is terrible and getting worse. The increase in the cases of human
rights abuses is due to the intensification of suppression of the democracy
movement and the non-Burman ethnic nationalities struggling for
self-determination. The list of abuses almost defines the possible range of
ways a human being's rights can be abused: extrajudicial murder, torture,
rape, forced labor, ethnic cleansing, illegal arrest, repression of
political and religious expression, freedom of association and speech. These
are all listed in the just published 1999 edition of the NCGUB Burma Human
Rights Yearbook, which exhaustively details the regime's abuses over the
last year.

The right to an education is being denied to the entire nation because the
universities remain closed yet another year. To put things in some
perspective, consider this -- there are both more refugees and more forced
laborers in Burma than there are people in East Timor.

The findings of UN agencies and others is consistent with what we have
found. The International Labor Organization continues to find forced labor
on a massive scale. The UN Special Rapporteur, despite the regime's
continued refusal to allow him entry, has documented gross abuses especially
in non-Burman ethnic nationality areas. Just this month the US State
Department published a report documenting the much-neglected abuse of
religious freedom in Burma, which is targeted on the Buddhist sangha --
monks -- and Muslim and Christian minorities.

While we appreciate the international community's documentation of the
problems in Burma, it is time to move beyond documenting problems. It is
time to begin solving the problems.

Since the inception of the NCGUB, we have worked through UN mechanisms,
anticipating a UN mediated political settlement in Burma and peaceful
transition to democracy through a substantive political dialogue. Today
after eight consecutive UNGA resolutions passed by consensus at the UNGA,
the military regime, which calls itself the State Peace and Development
Council (SPDC), continues to hold onto state power by means of terror in
defiance of the people of Burma and the world.

In his speech at the opening of the General Assembly, Kofi Annan warned of
the consequences of ignoring the early warning signs of humanitarian
disasters. Kosovo, Rwanda and East Timor illustrate the cost of failure to
act before a crisis becomes a disaster. These lessons should be applied to
Burma - now.

The grave situation in Burma deserves immediate attention from the
international community before it becomes another East Timor in Southeast
Asia. It is questionable whether the UN, regional organizations, and friends
of Burma can afford another costly intervention in the event that Burma's
situation grows spirals down to disaster. Therefore, the most cost effective
means to prevent, contain or resolve conflict in Burma is to act NOW.

We are aware that many countries are sympathetic to our situation and we are
grateful for the help extended to us from the part of the international
community. We hope very much that at the current session of the UNGA, a firm
resolution on Burma will come out which demands protection for the human
rights of the people of Burma.

But as Daw Aung San Suu Kyi said in her message to the last session on UN
Commission on Human Rights, "What we need now is more than just mere words.
We need concrete action because our people are suffering not just from an
onslaught of words but from the deprivation of basic justice in our
country."

What we want is for the international community, through the UN, to speak
with one voice and act with one purpose. It is not enough for the ILO and
the UN Special Rapporteur on Burma to decry wide-scale forced labor in
Burma, including the construction of tourist facilities, while UN agencies
engage in convention tourism-benefiting from the very infrastructure built
with our people's forced labor. The UN and international agencies should not
hold annual meetings in Burma as if nothing were out of the ordinary.

What we need is for the international community to speak with one voice in
developing a road map for action leading to dialogue and a political
solution in Burma. UN member states should support, not undercut, the
efforts of the Special Rapporteur and Secretary General to protect human
rights and foster dialogue.

While we very much appreciate sympathy for the people of Burma, our people
are not suffering and dying because of a lack of sympathy. They suffer
because of a lack of action. We do not want more sympathy. We want more
action.


*****************************************************

BBC: BURMESE AUTHORITIES BLOCK OPPOSITION HQ
27 September, 1999

The authorities in Burma have blocked roads leading to the headquarters of
the opposition National League for Democracy as the party prepares to mark
its eleventh anniversary.

Witnesses said riot police had set up a blockade to divert traffic and limit
attendance at a low-key ceremony to mark the anniversary.

It's the third time in less than a month that the authorities have tried to
restrict access to the party's headquarters. The National League for
Democracy won a landslide victory in general elections in 1990, but the
military has never allowed it to take power.

*****************************************************

AFP: MYANMAR AUTHORITIES RAID MONEY SELLERS AS CURRENCY FALLS
24 September, 1999

Myanmar authorities have launched a crackdown on money traders as the local
currency slides to new lows against the US dollar, sources said Friday.

Witnesses said authorities mounted a raid on informal currency traders in
downtown Yangon as the black market rate rose to 360 kyats to the dollar,
from about 330 in May.

The official rate is around six kyats to the greenback.

The few currency traders prepared to risk another raid were Friday
exchanging dollars for 363-364 kyats.

Sources in Yangon said foreign exchange certificates (FECs), a defacto
currency which foreigners are required to buy at Yangon's international
airport, are gaining wider use within the military ruled country.

Yangon requires visitors to change a minimum of 300 US dollars into FECs.
But tourists and business people have complained that some traders were
reluctant to accept the certificates or exchanged them at a significantly
discounted rate.

However, the 10-12 kyat gap between FECs and the black market value of US
dollars has narrowed to just a couple of kyats.

The source said FECs had become more popular after authorities ruled in
August that all international phone bills must be paid in dollars or FECs.

Meanwhile, Myanmar's economic problems appear to be worsening, with the
usually busy Yangon market of Bogyoke virtually devoid of shoppers.

"We're mostly sitting down and twiddling our thumbs," said one shop owner in
the market.

"This has never happened before."

The regional crisis has exacerbated problems in Myanmar's economy, which
labours under international sanctions imposed to punish alleged gross human
rights abuses and the suppression of the democratic opposition of Nobel
laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

*****************************************************

FAR EASTERN ECONOMIC REVIEW: JUSTICE JITTERS
27 September, 1999

Burma's military leaders may be listening hard to United Nations Human
Rights Commissioner Mary Robinson. Her suggestion that those guilty of
atrocities in East Timor should be brought before an international war
crimes tribunal touches a particularly raw nerve in Rangoon. For years,
several international human rights organizations and Burma support groups
have been collecting detailed information about alleged human rights
violations.

Now, opposition sources say many feel the time is ripe to present the
evidence in an international court of justice. Most of the material is
published annually by the National Coalition Government of the Union of
Burma, the opposition's government in exile.

These are 700 to 800 page volumes that detail alleged atrocities, the names
of the army officers allegedly involved and the names of victims. Given that
Burmese military intelligence sources have infiltrated many of these groups,
the junta almost certainly knows what is in the wind.

*****************************************************

TIME: SEX, DRUGS, AND THE ROLL OF DICE
27 September, 1999 by Anthony Spaeth

You can't get to the town of Ruili by plane or train. There is only the
road. Or, to place Ruili more precisely, two roads. One winds down through
the rolling hills of Yunnan province's far west. The other comes up from
hermetic Burma. Ruili is where the roads meet, and much else besides, two
countries, one expanding in all directions, the other penetrated only at
soft spots such as Ruili. More than two ethnicities intermingle: Han
Chinese, Burmese and local ethnic peoples -- the Dais, Jingpos (or Kachins)
and others.

This is also where the traders converge, some to ply new businesses like
buying and selling Chinese-made appliances, laundering money and smuggling
Burmese heroin into China's fast and loose metropolises. Others deal in more
traditional commodities, like Burmese jade ("Green Gold") or that time
honored currency, female flesh. Ruili is China's great border town, and what
a border it is: between new and old, controlled and unrestrained, a tidy but
tawdry town China considers both a dirty little secret -- and also a
promising new tourist destination.

As can happen in fast changing contemporary China, looks are deceiving in
Ruili (pronounced raylee). The cement mixers have been here in a big way.
The local government has laid down spacious avenues with bicycle lanes.
Private money has erected blocks of downtown buildings with stereo stores
and no fewer than six Internet centers. The top-end hotel is modern and
atriumed; around the corner a much larger one is under construction. (Two
more are going up at the border itself, 7 km from downtown, one with a
revolving restaurant.)

The hegemony of apartment buildings is almost complete, creating a modern
looking town of white tiles with smoked or mirrored windows, topped by blue
or orange tiled roofs. By day, Ruili doesn't overly distinguish itself from
the rest of China's new urban scene or, for that matter, from a city in
provincial Japan or Thailand.

One should notice, however, that there are no smokestacks outside Ruili, no
cultural treasures in easy reach, no vital river or port. Like border towns
everywhere, Ruili's is a purely service economy and its more important
services aren't available during the day. The garbage trucks don't make
their lazy rounds until noon. The daytime taxi shift is for losers. Only at
dusk do the streets suddenly fill with food stands, vendors with heavy
baskets balanced on poles over their shoulders, pedalcabs on the glide.

The lights come on and Ruili becomes its real self. Off-pitch howls emanate
from a surfeit of sidewalk karaoke bars. The patter of casino dealers is
broadcast onto the streets to lure gamblers up doubtful flights of stairs.
The doxies are sleekly groomed and ready for work: within faux beauty salons
with names like The Grape Garden and The Red House sometimes there's no name
at all, just a phone number -- they stare languorously from plateglass
shopfronts in search of passing trade. Local toughs loiter outside, big
bellies hanging over their sarongs. In Ruili, the banks stay open until 10
p.m., the hotel pool until 2 a.m., cafes and discos 'til 4:00. Beauty salons
shutter at sunrise. The only real night town in the People's Republic of
China is open and ready for business.

A micro Bangkok it may be, but Ruili maintains an atmosphere that is relaxed
and smalltown -- perhaps a little too slow these days. (Real estate prices
have slumped; the prostitutes complain of receiving only one gentleman
caller per night.) But Ruili is not exactly open. Its bilingual tourist
brochure invites visitors to enjoy "the tenderness of Dai madams and the
smile of Jingpo girls" -- neglecting the more numerous women from Burma and
impoverished Sichuan province to the northeast -- but whether a visitor
indulges or not, he's not encouraged to ask too many questions. China isn't
eager to publicize its raunchier fringe. Wild Man, the town's hottest disco,
is still grinding out the Macarena and Ricky Martin hits each evening, and
shirtless guys on the dance floor have earrings, tattoos and attitude. But
the authorities objected to the Wild Man moniker, and currently it's
nameless. A Mr. Huang, a foreign affairs administrative official, spends his
days tracking down each and every foreigner in town to record passport
details and ask questions such as, "Why did you go to the market today?"
(Huang, who declines to give his full name, is polite, enjoys using English
and says he meets lots of Australians.) The private sector can be even
pricklier. Bring a camera into a casino and you may find yourself surrounded
by stern hoods silently menacing you off the premises.

Ruili is typical of the mushroom effect of modern China: whatever existed in
the slower days before Deng Xiaoping's liberalizations has simply been
allowed to multiply. Ruili's lifeblood, border trade, expanded as the
Chinese market needed more Burmese raw materials, such as lumber, and as it
produced more manufactured goods to send back across. The bedrock business,
jade extracted from Burmese mines, got bigger and bigger with mainland
prosperity. "Jade can be more profitable than heroin:" exults Zhang, a
trader in Ruili's jade market whose shop is jammed with uncut boulders of up
to 500 kg. (Zhang, too, prefers not to be fully identified.) Ruili's jade
market is one of the busiest in the world: in small, open front shops,
workers sort polished pieces, filling the lanes with the sound of stone
clicking upon stone. An intense buyer wearing a sarong and gold bracelets
paws through pieces, sorting them with overgrown fingernails, in search of
stones that can be sold elsewhere in China for markups of 100% or more.

The heroin trade has also flourished in Ruili, along with all the ancillary
businesses of border towns: casinos, gin joints, a glitzy bowling alley,
"beauty parlors" and garish short-time hotels catering to bigger spending
debauchers. A lot of those are cash businesses, including jade, and Ruili
(population 100,000) has a greater density of bank branches than most cities
east of Zurich. "We had only three banks in 1987," recalls Zhang. Today, you
can't throw a stone without hitting a branch of the Bank of China, the
Agricultural Bank of China, the Industrial & Commercial Bank of China, the
Construction Bank of China -- some have two branches on a single block.
You're just as likely to hit one of the venereal disease clinics dotting the
town. (One displays a sidewalk sign with technicolor snapshots of the
infections the careless can catch and, presumably, cure.)

An old Chinese bromide goes, "The sky is high, and the emperor is far away,"
and it's easy to conclude that puritanical China has lost control at the
outer reach of its empire. The greater evidence is that Beijing likes Ruili
just the way it is. Those bank branches pull in lots of money from
cross-border trade. (The Burmese view the remninbi as a more stable currency
than their own kyat.) The government has cracked down on drug trafficking:
there are three police checkpoints on the road leading away from Ruili to
inland China, although cars going toward it aren't stopped. That's because
the problem of drugs going through Ruili becomes one for China as a whole.
"It ruins entire families," says one resident of Kunming, the capital of
Yunnan, whose 18 year old brother died from heroin addiction. "Families lose
fathers, mothers and sons to drugs coming from border towns like Ruili". But
prematurely aged addicts can be seen staggering Ruili's streets, and
prostitutes are quick to tell visitors how to spot a drug-addicted
competitor. (Look for smokers, or girls with unusually thin legs.)

The spread of HIV is harder to gauge. Yunnan is one of China's most
worrisome situations, and Ruili, with its access to drugs and proliferation
of prostitutes, is as close to an HIV laboratory as one can find in Asia.
ALian ("Lotus") says she insists that customers use condoms during a $43
"massage". She also emits a laugh when asked if any government agency comes
by to provide education or condoms. ALian, wearing a deepcut violet blouse,
claims she is 20 years old. (So, implausibly, do both of her fellow
workers.) She's originally from a peasant family in Sichuan. "People usually
do this work for three years or less;" she says. "I'm going to do it for
only one year more." The customers are mostly walk-ins, men from other parts
of China en route to the gambling joints. The massage rooms are upstairs,
above the equipmentless beauty parlor. On a good night, she and her two
colleagues attract a total of 10 customers. ALian's parlor is one in a long
row of identical establishments. A parallel street has the same array; there
are more a few blocks away. Ruili residents scoff when asked if the lanes of
cathouses are evidence of official slackness. "If they weren't controlled,"
says one recent migrant to Ruili, "there would be many more."

There is one line that China doesn't like crossed: when too much of the
boomtown spoils are siphoned over the Burmese side of the border. Last
November, a grand casino opened in the underdeveloped Burmese town of Muse,
a short walk from the border checkpoint. Muse is but a shadow of Ruili: its
hotels are nastier, its prostitutes far cheaper. Muse's main claim to fame
is a half-hour transvestite show offered to daytrippers each afternoon at 3
p.m.

The casino was going to change that situation. Its Chinese name was Sunbird;
in Burmese it was known as Hua Ke, which incorporated the name of the
Burmese group that owned it. Some $3.5 million was invested and three
trainers came from Macau to coach the staff. Sunbird offered a greater range
of games than other casinos, including wagering on dogfights, plus 10 table
dancers to round out the experience. The owners even spent $122,000 on
gaming chips embedded with integrated circuits to prevent a counterfeit
racket from springing up. Customers came across from Ruili. The border had
never seen anything like it.

But after a month of operation, revelers crossing back to their hotel one
night were held by Chinese police in a lockup and Sunbird quickly shut down.
Some say it was the table dancers that did it in, and that operations may
someday resume. The better guess is that in today's China, a little all
night sleaze and Wild West atmosphere is allowable as long as it's a bit
distant, not too publicized, profitable -- and the moolah stays on China's
side of the border.

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