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NEWS - New York Demonstration Again



Subject: NEWS - New York Demonstration Against UNOCAL

Title: New York Demonstration Against UNOCAL
Date: 11-DEC-99
Author: Ko Zaw Win
Source: thuwai@xxxxxxxxxxx (Thu Wai)
Style: Action Update
Reference: None

Today, New Yorkers, Democratic Burmese students, and various American
activist groups joined together in front of the Plaza Hotel at 5th
Avenue
and 59th Street corner, Manhattan, New York to demonstrate at the U.S
Oil
Company, UNOCAL's  share holder meeting. We are protesting UNOCAL
because
they are doing business with the Burmese military junta.

Their deal with Burmese military regime will strengthen the military
dictatorship and destroy our democracy movements, national resources,
and
environment.
  
Summary

Unocal, a California Oil corporation, is involved in a joint-venture
with
the junta to extract and transport natural gas using a pipeline from the
undersea Yadana field located off Burma's coast. The Pipeline runs for
218
miles and crosses from southern Burma's Tenasserim region to neighboring
Thailand. UNOCAL is a 28.26% shareholder in this project.

The pipeline area is the homeland of the Karan, Mon and Tavoyan peoples.
These ethnic minorities have been under attack by the junta's troops
which
are seeking to suppress rebellion and use civilians for forced labor on
army
projects. To completely control the pipeline region, thousands of people
have been forcibly relocated from their homes and farms were destroyed
by
the junta's troops. 

This project is connected to some of Burma's worst human rights
violations. 

The pipeline traverses through a variety of ecosystems including dense
tropical forest, disrupting the habitat of rare animals such as tigers,
rhinos and elephants.

This entire region is a war zone due to the ethnic peoples need to
defend
themselves against SPDC (Burmese Junta) atacks, making the region highly
unstable. The projectal also destroyed wetland areas and demolished a
wide
swath of forest. UNOCAL are accountable for this environmental
destruction,
and are showing disrespect to local people.

Unocal and others partners {France with 32.24%, the Petroleum Authority
of
Thailand with 25.5%, and the Myanmar(BURMESE)Oil and Gas Enterprise
(MOGE)
with 15%} will get $400 million annually from Thailand for the this
project.