NEWS - Myanmar opposition wants Can

[TheTruth@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]

Subject: NEWS - Myanmar opposition wants Canada to pressure junta

Myanmar opposition wants Canada to pressure junta

By Mary Durran

  
MONTREAL, Dec 10 (Reuters) - The head of Myanmar's government in exile
called on Friday for Canada to step up pressure on the Southeast Asian
nation's military rulers to relinquish control of the country. 

``We think Canada could take a stronger position,'' said Sein Win,
cousin to Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi. 

Sein Win was forced to flee Myanmar, formerly called Burma, after Suu
Kyi's National League for Democracy won Myanmar's 1990 election, its
last, by a landslide. The military never allowed the party to govern and
has tried to silence it through arrests, intimidation and forced
resignations, all of which have been widely condemned internationally. 

``Ottawa could push the generals to release political prisoners and hold
a political dialogue with the opposition,'' Sein Win told Reuters while
attending the United Nations University-sponsored World Civil Societies
Conference in Montreal. 

Nobel Peace Prize laureate Suu Kyi's house remains under surveillance by
armed military guards and the military junta has refused to allow her to
leave the country or travel freely within it. 

International human rights organisations have said 800 to 1,000 people
are being held as political prisoners in Myanmar. More than 40 elected
members of parliament are still in Rangoon jails. 

Sein Win said there is overwhelming evidence the Burmese junta also has
close ties to the country's drug lords, who produce an estimated 60
percent of the heroin smuggled into North America. 

Earlier this week, the legislature of the Canadian province of Quebec
passed a motion recognising Suu Kyi and the other imprisoned Myanmar
leaders as the country's legitimate authority. But Quebec does not speak
for Canada on foreign affairs, and Sein Win, who is based in Thailand,
said he hopes Canada will follow the lead of the province. 

``The case is very clear cut,'' he said. ``A government elected by the
people is in prison and the human rights, economic and political
situation deteriorates every day. Why is Canada so reluctant to take
further action?'' 

Ottawa already prohibits Canadians from making investments in Myanmar
that would support the military government, which is led by General Than
Shwe. Ottawa has also restricted visits to Canada by high-ranking
Myanmar military officials. 

The military has maintained an authoritarian grip on Myanmar since 1988,
when it put down a public uprising in support of democracy. 

Suu Kyi, who was awarded the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize, has been under
house arrest for many years and cannot leave the country. She remains
the biggest thorn in the government's side. 

Officials with Myanmar's government in exile were in Montreal on Friday
to attend a ceremony in which human rights activists Cynthia Maung and
Min Ko Naing were to be awarded the John Humphrey Freedom prize. The
Canada-funded International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic
Development named the award for the Canadian who prepared the first
draft of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which the United
Nations adopted 51 years ago. 

Maung, a 39-year-old physician who has lived and worked in refugee camps
along Thailand's border with Myanmar, will receive the prize on behalf
of student leader Min Ko Naing, imprisoned for the last 10 years. Ko
Naing's speeches, statements and poems were an inspirational force for
the 1988 democracy uprising. In 1989, the regime sentenced him to a
20-year jail term for inciting disturbances. 

18:38 12-10-99