PRESS RELEASES of International Com

[mg_myanmar@xxxxxxxxx]

Subject: PRESS RELEASES of International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)

SOURCE: Myanmar Information - http://www.myanmar.com/

PRESS RELEASES of International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)


Excerpt from International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)  Homepage
http://www.icrc.org/

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3 September 1999

Press Release 99/48

Myanmar: ICRC visits to detainees -- interim assessment

Geneva (ICRC) -- For the first time in Myanmar teams of the
International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) have visited more than
18,000 detainees and registered over 600 security detainees. Since the
ICRC visits began last May, delegates have been to nine places of
detention, including Yangon's Insein Prison and the central prison in
Mandalay, and to three places of administrative internment.

Each visit was conducted according to the ICRC's standard working
procedures, and included an initial discussion with the authorities
administering the facility, a complete inspection of the premises,
access to all the detainees, and private interviews with security
detainees, who were given the opportunity to write Red Cross messages
to their families.

The delegates had a meeting after each visit with the authorities in
charge, putting forward recommendations regarding the situation they
had observed. Confidential written reports were then handed over to
the relevant Myanmar authorities.

The ICRC and the country's authorities have agreed that delegates
would be able to return on a regular basis to all the places visited.
The programme will gradually be extended to all detention facilities
in Myanmar.

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1 June 1999
Annual Report 1998
Jakarta Regional delegation 
(Brunei Darussalam, Indonesia/East Timor, Malaysia, Myanmar,
Singapore)

Medical survey in Myanmar's border region

The ICRC conducted medical surveys in the provinces of Myanmar
bordering on China, Laos and Thailand. Tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS and
malaria were among the conditions found to affect large sectors of the
population. After having received the authorities' approval, the ICRC,
together with the Myanmar Red Cross Society, began drawing up a health
promotion programme which should be implemented in Shan state in early
1999. Assistance for the war-disabled in Myanmar continued to be
monitored regularly by the ICRC's prosthetic/orthotic coordinator
based in Cambodia.
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6 May 1999
Press Release 99/26
ICRC begins visits to detainees and prisoners in Myanmar

ICRC (Geneva) - The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)
today began visiting detainees and prisoners held at Insein Prison
near Yangon, the capital of the Union of Myanmar.

Under the terms of a verbal agreement with the State Peace and
Development Council (SPDC), the ICRC has access to all places of
detention in the country. The visits are to take place in accordance
with the ICRC's standard procedures.

In October 1998 the SPDC invited the ICRC to open an office in Yangon
and to set up a health promotion programme in Shan State. 

The SPDC has also authorized the ICRC to maintain a permanent presence
in various border States, and a first mission to Kayin (Karen) and Mon
States will take place in the coming month.
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Mg Myanmar
A Myanmar citizen who loves Myanmar

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