BurmaNet News, June 10, 2004

[Editor]

June 10, 2004, Issue # 2493

“Forced labor remains a very serious problem in Burma,” Richard Horsey,
the [ILO’s] liaison officer in Burma said. “It is a practice that
continues across the country particularly on local infrastructure
projects.”
- “Forced Labor Still a Problem in Burma,” IPS via Irrawaddy, June 10, 2004


INSIDE BURMA
Xinhua: Myanmar top leader calls for efforts to successfully implement
roadmap
IPS via Irrawaddy: Forced Labor Still a Problem in Burma
Myanmar Times: MBA program provides a case study in educational innovation

ON THE BORDER
Irrawaddy: More Burmese Refugees to be Granted Asylum
Kaladan: Burmese Rohingya refugees called hunger strike at refugee camp

BUSINESS / MONEY
Myanmar Times: Israel raises intake for agricultural program

REGIONAL
New Straits Times: Lim: Suspend Myanmar

OPINION / OTHER
Mizzima: Invoking the Past: Ethnic Grievances, Democracy & Reconciliation
in Burma

ANNOUNCEMENT
ALTSEAN: On the Road to Depayin: Speeches by Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is now
available at http://altsean.org/ontheroad.html.

It features photos and excerpts of speeches made by Daw Aung San Suu Kyi
taken in the weeks before her entourage was attacked on May 30, 2003. This
is new material.


INSIDE BURMA
______________________________________

June 10, Xinhua News Service
Myanmar top leader calls for efforts to successfully implement roadmap

Yangon: Myanmar top leader Senior-General Than Shwe has called on his
people to make collective efforts to successfully implement the country's
current roadmap program to democracy with the sense of duty consciousness
and responsibility as well as loyalty.

Than Shwe, Chairman of the State Peace and Development Council, made the
call when addressing the opening of a Myanmar and international studies
course here on Wednesday which was conducted by the Union Solidarity and
Development Association (USDA), state-run newspaper The New Light of
Myanmar reported Thursday.

Noting that the first step of the seven-point roadmap of resuming the
long-suspended constitutional national convention has been in progress
since May 17, Than Shwe, who is also USDA patron, urged the trainees to
safeguard the nation against anything that may hamper the performance of
national duty to build a peaceful, modern and developed country in
accordance with the country's vision.

Than Shwe told the trainees to make studies till they clearly see the
objective conditions of the nation.

The trainees are being taught on subjects dealing with national politics,
Myanmar history, national defense and security, advancements and changes
of the state's political, economic and social affairs as well as
international relations.

USDA is a youth organization formed with government ministers as the
leading body, having a large officially-declared number of over 16 million
members among the population of 53 million in the country.

The government announced the roadmap in August last year which was
outlined as resuming the national convention, undergoing a national
referendum on the draft of the constitution, holding a general election to
produce parliament representatives and forming a new democratic
government.

_____________________________________

June 10, Inter Press Service via Irrawaddy
Forced Labor Still a Problem in Burma - Marwaan Macan-Markar

Burma’s military government is still using forced labor, despite giving
promise to the International Labor Organization, or ILO, that it would
abolish the practice, said the UN agency earlier this month.

“Forced labor remains a very serious problem in Burma,” Richard Horsey,
the agency’s liaison officer in Burma said. “It is a practice that
continues across the country particularly on local infrastructure
projects.”

The army has also continued to “routinely use forced labor for a variety
of tasks, including forcing them to be porters, particularly in the border
areas,” he said.

In June 1999 the ILO overwhelmingly approved a resolution that denounced
the Burmese government for inflicting a contemporary form of slavery upon
an estimated 800,000 of its citizens.

The move prevented Burma from receiving ILO aid or attending meetings of
the 174 nation body. Bowing to international pressure, the junta and the
labor body agreed last May on a joint plan of action to eliminate forced
labor.

The program was viewed as a pivotal end to the labor violations, said the
ILO report.

That initiative, scheduled to have commenced last July, was aborted
following the attack on opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and members of
her National League for Democracy party in northern Burma on May 30 last
year.

Gangs of thugs linked to the junta have been implicated in this assault
that took place while Suu Kyi and her party members were out campaigning.

The democracy leader and other party members are still under house arrest
following that assault.

But Debbie Stothard of the regional rights lobby Alternative ASEAN Network
on Burma argued that Burma only knew the language of international
pressure, failing which the human rights abuses would continue.

“There is something positive in having the ILO closely monitor forced
labor in Burma,” she said. “For one, the ILO can see what the reality is
to work in Burma.”

“And it will also realize that the regime will only concede to change when
under pressure and that it [the junta] backs off when a noise is made,”
added Stothard.

“Otherwise, the military government does not bother. Even if it pledges to
change it will not implement it thoroughly,” she warned.

But the ILO’s Horsey said labor rights violations have dropped since the
1990s. “There have been improvements in the forced labor situation. In
particular, forced labor is no longer routinely used on national
infrastructure projects,” he said.

According to human rights organizations monitoring Burma, there are over
50 known camps across the country where prisoners, including women and
young girls, are subject to involuntary work.

The forced labor in these camps is for agriculture projects and local
infrastructure projects. Yet, the ILO appears hardly impressed with some
of the efforts that Rangoon has implemented, given the scale of abuses
committed on the junta’s watch.

The junta, according to the report, has failed to implement a countrywide
program to inform communities that forced labor was forbidden and to
create a mechanism to prosecute wrongdoers.

“It is a great pity that the conditions have not been met for the credible
implementation of the (2003) Plan of Action, because I believe this plan
could start to have an impact on forced labor used on the ground,” said
Horsey.

As disturbing for the UN agency was another development that undermined
Rangoon’s commitment to eradicate forced labor. Three Burmese men were
convicted last November for “high treason” and sentenced to death by the
junta for having contacts with the ILO.

The “crime” committed by one of the men was possessing Horsey’s business
card, while the other was faulted for having an ILO document. These men
told human rights monitors that they were beaten by military intelligence
officials and deprived of food and sleep for several days while being held
at Insein Prison in Rangoon.

“The discovery of a court judgement against certain persons in relation to
contacts or exchange of information with the ILO had undermined the
credibility and prospects for future cooperation,” the ILO report states.

The agency’s presence in Burma has served as a useful gauge to assess how
far the junta would bow to pressure from a UN agency to address its long
list of human rights violations—in this case labor rights violations.

In 1999, just after the passing of the ILO resolution, Burma’s Foreign
Ministry said in a statement that the country had already brought local
laws in line with the ILO’s Forced Labor Convention and Convention on the
Freedom of Association.

“Deliberately turning a blind eye to these positive developments, a number
of Western nations...pushed through the resolution accusing Myanmar
[Burma] of widespread use of forced labor,” it added.

“Myanmar finds it impossible to accept such deplorable and unscrupulous
action. Myanmar has therefore dissociated herself from this unfair and
biased resolution.”

But Horsey believes the Burmese regime will ultimately bow to
international pressure.

“The government knows that it is under constant scrutiny,” he said. “The
ILO’s presence serves to remind the authorities that the international
community is watching the situation closely and expects them to live up to
their obligations.”

_____________________________________

June 10, Myanmar Times
MBA program provides a case study in educational innovation - Kerry Howley

WHEN a group of foreign-educated professors began the country’s first
Master of Business Administration program almost 10 years ago, they
weren’t only thinking of the 60 students they would admit each year. They
were also thinking in terms of transforming the national economy.

“For 30 years we had a socialist economy,” said Dr Nu Nu Yin, the head of
the Department of Management Studies at Yangon University.

“Then we started to have a market-oriented economy, but people didn’t know
how to conduct business privately. They didn’t know the procedures.”

A success story in Myanmar’s educational system, the two-year MBA course
at Yangon University, was founded by Daw Yi Yi Myint, who based the
program on the MBA offered at California’s Stanford University.

Using American business materials and conducting classes in English,
professors say they emphasise critical thinking and problem solving skills
rather than memorisation and rote learning.

The program requires students to have prior business experience and
includes a mandatory internship in the public or private sectors.

“At the undergraduate level, students just learn by heart and pass the
exam. We cannot do that here,” said Dr Nu Nu Yin.

The admission process for the program is rigorous, and only about 10 per
cent of applicants are successful. Selection is based on standardised test
scores, interviews and professional experience.

Two years ago, the program was expanded to include an evening MBA course
aimed at working executives. Participants are required to have eight years
business experience at the management level and be aged at least 30.

A recent Tuesday evening class in marketing was attended by about 50
students. Some seemed tired; most were in high spirits. The 90-minute
class ends at 7.30pm, by which time most students will have put in a
12-hour day.

The evening class represents a diverse range of professionals, from a
civil engineer who does consulting work for a non-government organisation
to the owner of a shipping company.

Professor Dr Khin San Yee leads the 50 students through a review of the
marketing principles they have been discussing for the previous nine
weeks.

The students are attentive, although shy about participating in discussions.

Dr Khin San Yee asks class members what they learned in their last course,
general management, and calls on U Hla Myint, a 65-year-old retired
insurance executive, to answer.

“People from the top to the bottom must always be learning and changing,”
he says.

Daw Khin Thandar Than, a sales executive at a distributing company, said
one of the strengths of the program was that all students have business
experience and can learn from each other.

“In the exams, we have to take our own experiences and apply them. Our
teachers just teach us concepts,” she said.

Dr Nu Nu Yin says that work experience plays an important role in the
success of the program.

The curriculum is based on case-studies and solving real problems, which
are not emphasised at the undergraduate level.

“Undergraduates cannot directly adapt to the curriculum,” she said. “They
must have business experience to be able to contribute to case studies.”

She says her biggest challenge as a teacher is convincing her students to
tackle difficult issues directly.

“There are so many challenges doing business; we have to train them not to
be afraid of the problems. Many of our students joke that after having the
MBA program, they don’t fit in with the other executives in the company,”
she said.

“Their way of thinking is quite changed.”

While the students seem to appreciate the international curriculum, they
say it’s not always practical. Ma Winn Minn Khine, a sales executive at
Myanmar Airways International, graduated from the program in 2002. She
says that while the marketing classes helped her career, some subjects
were not applicable in Myanmar.

“There are some classes, like capital markets, that are not suitable for
our country’s economic situation,” she said.

Dr Nu Nu Yin also worries about a lack of human resources for the program,
which depends on “co-operating faculty” rather than full-time teachers.

The faculty, which is overwhelmingly female and largely foreign educated,
is comprised of 14 professors.

At K15,000 a month, the course is expensive for Myanmar, but a bargain
compared to other MBA courses in the region.

So far, 324 students have graduated from the program.


ON THE BORDER
_____________________________________

June 10, Irrawaddy
More Burmese refugees to be granted asylum - Aung Lwin Oo

Burmese refugees in urban areas of Thailand are to be granted asylum in
the first world countries. Embassies of the US, Norway and Australia are
in the process of resettling them.

“We have been interviewing round-about thirteen hundred persons so far
approximately and we are prepared to take something around that number,”
an official from the US Embassy in Bangkok told The Irrawaddy by telephone
on Thursday.

The American government started the program last February after Thailand
reduced the scope of the activities of the United Nations High
Commissioner for Refugees, or UNHCR, for determining refugee status.

“However, there are other cases which UNHCR may provide to us and we are
prepared to consider those cases as well. We don't know what the file
numbers will be that they will provide to us. It’s likely to be another
sixteen hundred,” the embassy official added.

Meanwhile, on Tuesday a Norwegian delegation began interviewing around one
hundred Burmese refugees at the UNHCR office in Bangkok and the Australian
Embassy in Bangkok recently resumed its resettlement program for pending
refugees with relatives in Australia.

But the status of more than 140,000 other Burmese refugees, mainly in
camps dotted along the border, remain in limbo.

The Thai government's policy on Burmese refugees has been subject to some
criticism by human rights groups recently. “Thai government has reportedly
restricted Burmese refugees’ freedom of movement, expression and assembly
closing several offices of Burmese activist organizations and threatening
additional closures” stated the US Committee for Refugees’ 2004 annual
survey, an independent refugee rights monitoring organization.

Despite the fact that Bangkok has made it more difficult to qualify for
refugee status, approximately 2,500 Burmese refugees flee from fear of
persecution at home every year, mostly to Thailand, according to the
report.

_____________________________________

June 10, Kaladan News
Burmese Rohingya refugees called hunger strike at refugee camp

Cox’s Bazar, June 10: Burmese refugees called an indefinite hunger strike
at Khutu Palong refugee camp from yesterday morning till now, following a
meeting among the refugees yesterday, said a refugee who preferred not to
mention his name.

On the 7th June 2004, while the refugees were sleeping at 12:00 pm, some
police entered the refugee camp to arrest one Mr. Qurban Ali of Khutu
Palong refugee camp, with the permission of Abu Hurirah, the
camp-in-charge of the Khutu Palong refugee camp. However, Qurban Ali
managed to escape. But, his wife and his (12) year old son were severely
injured by the police and even some valuable belongings of him were also
looted. This incites the refugees to against the government, he further
added.

On June 8, 2004, the refugees of Khutu Palong camp held a meeting at the
football ground of refugee camp for the cause of harassment of Bangladeshi
authorities for forced repatriation. At about 3,500 refugee men, 1,500
refugee women and 1,000 children, in total, 6,000 refugees were
participated in the meeting. The aforesaid Qurban Ali and other refugee
leaders contributed speech in the gathering. They focus in the meeting
that how to protect the harassment of Bangladeshi authorities and the
current political situation of Burma, said another refugee who is declined
to mention his name.

According to the decision of the meeting, the refugees didn’t purchase
their daily ration from the Bangladesh Red Crescent Society (BDRCS) though
the Bangladesh authorities tried all their best to pursue them to receive
the ration. The refugees claimed that until and unless their demands to be
reached, they didn’t receive any ration. They cried and cried---slogans
such as--- stop---stop ---stop--- the arbitrary arrest and unlawful
harassment, he further added.

The refugees also claimed the following demands:

 1)  To get full rights of refugee status and the camps will be
transferred to a suitable place from existence where refugees’ safety is
granted. 2)  To allow forming a refugee committee, which will conduct the
entire refugee matters and the candidates of the committee have to
participate at the international meetings, seminars and others concerning
the refugees. These will be arranged by UNHCR.3)  To elect their refugee
leaders, free and fair election to be held in the refugee camps. 4)  The
safety of the refugees will be granted, said a refugee leader.

Yesterday, while the refugees called hunger strike, the Bangladesh
authorities said, “ It is suitable to give you (refugees) punishment like
as SPDC (State Peace and Development Council) of Burma gives to their
countrymen. It will be good for the refugees.” It made refugees very
angry. So, the refugees again added some demands. These are as follows:

 1.  All the political prisoners including Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and U Tin
Oo are to be released immediately without any condition. 2. To condemn
the SPDC’s sponsored sham National Convention. 3. To allow all the ethnic
nationalities including Rohingya people, all the MPs who were elected in
1990 election, all the other democratic organizations’ candidates
including Daw Suu and U Tin Oo of National League for Democracy (NLD) to
be participated at the National Convention.4.To get fully grantee of
human rights and equality for Rohingyas as per other nationalities in
Burma. 5.To solve the Burmese refugee problem immediately, he further
added.

Mr. Sha Jahan of WFP, Agadjan Kurban Ali of UNHCR try to their best to
stop the hunger strike, but in vain. The authorities remarked that it was
very difficult to stop the strike.

Similarly, on June1997 and in 1992, there were two strikes called by
refugees and also asked some demands, but those times the refugees failed
to reach their demands. So, this time they determine to continue their
hunger strike until and unless to reach their demands.


BUSINESS / MONEY
_____________________________________

June 7-13, Myanmar Times
Israel raises intake for agricultural program - Myo Lwin

Israel is expanding an agricultural co-operation program under which it
provides training to Myanmar government employees.

The Israeli embassy said last week that 170 employees of the Ministry of
Agriculture and Irrigation would begin the training later this year, the
highest number accepted under the program since it began 10 years ago with
15 trainees.

Israel accepted 150 trainees last year and 115 in 2002.

“We have increased the number of trainees for two reasons,” the Israeli
ambassador, Mr Yaacov Abrahamy, told Myanmar Times.

“One is we would like to have more cooperation and the other is that it
has been very successful on both sides,” Mr Abrahamy said.

“The trainees are very happy with the program,” he said.

The trainees spend nearly a year at the Arava International Centre for
Agricultural Training where they have the option of on-the-job training
alongside Israeli farmers or enrolling in a diploma course.

Mr Abrahamy said 90 of the 170 trainees had opted for the diploma course,
which covers modern agricultural practices, irrigation, animal husbandry,
pest control, economics, marketing and post-harvest technology.

All of the trainees will be introduced to the modern methods used to grow
vegetables, fruits and flowers in the Arava region, near the border with
Jordan.

The 170 trainees will be selected by the ministry.

Those who have participated in the program include a deputy director of
the Myanma Farms Enterprise, who said she had been interested to learn how
cherry tomatoes were grown using a computerised drip watering system.

She said such a system would be suitable for Myanmar’s central dry zone,
though it would require a big investment.

Another former trainee, Daw Aye Myint Oo, said she had appreciated the
opportunity to study post-harvest technology.

“The program is very useful as I am able to apply here what I learned
there,” said Daw Aye Myint Oo, a manager at the Post-Harvest Technology
Application Centre at Hlegu, about 25 miles north of Yangon.

Nearly 690 Myanmar have so far received training at the Arava centre,
where other trainees are from such countries as India, Vietnam, Thailand
and the Philippines.


REGIONAL
_____________________________________

June 10, New Straits Times (Malaysia)
Lim: Suspend Myanmar

Myanmar should be expelled or suspended from Asean if no general election
is held by 2006 to avoid a diplomatic disaster when it hosts the 2006
Asean Summit. Opposition leader Lim Kit Siang claimed that the present
National Convention, Myanmar's military junta's "seven step road map to
democracy", was a farce as opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi was still
under house arrest. He supported the move that an Asean
Inter-Parliamentary Caucus on democracy in Myanmar be formed.


OPINION / OTHER
___________________________________

June 8, Mizzima News

Invoking the Past: Ethnic Grievances, Democracy & Reconciliation in Burma
- Aung Naing Oo

In his book, Balkan Ghosts, Robert Kaplan wrote about a conversation he'd
had with a Serbian nun. She said, "Things will get worse between us and
the Albanians - you'll see. There can be no reconciliation."

Albanians are not responsible for calamities that Serbians have
experienced in the past. They themselves have fallen victim to numerous
invasions by neighboring countries over time and tasted the ruthlessness
of a communist dictator. Nonetheless, half a millennium of Turkish
occupation of Serbian territory has led to a widespread belief that for
Serbians, Albanian Muslims are to blame for many regressions in their
lives.

I may be simplifying the Serbian-Albanian conflict. However, it highlights
the stereotypical scapegoating that occurs in inter-racial conflicts. It
also demonstrates the critical role understanding the troubled past plays
in reconciling divided societies. In many cases, it is a collective trauma
of a tragic past that becomes instilled in our minds that can foster an
extreme and antagonized mental state. In other cases, it is a past glory
that is invoked to repel injustice or fight a cause, often with
devastating effects.

Blocking the possibility of solving the problems arising out of
inter-ethnic conflict only fuels further antagonism and aggression, as has
occurred under communism and totalitarianism. The only possible remedy for
such a potentially explosive political situation is democracy with its
participatory aspect and culture of dialogue.

We may not, in Burma, have experienced the scale of mass murders and
ethnic cleansing that the Balkans experienced. But more than half a
century of military rule and abuse of ethnic nationalities in our country
has had a similar impact on the collective mentality. The repressive
policies of the Burmese kings on ethnic groups probably added to this, but
that discussion is for another time.

To demonstrate my point, let me tell you what I have experienced since I
left Burma in 1988.

In the early 1990s, I met a young Karen soldier who had a permanent tattoo
on his hand that said, "I am of the Karen blood and (I) will kill the
Burmese if I capture them." I have heard of a Kachin nationalist who
preferred to go to hell "if the Burmese went to heaven."

I was told of a fight in 1990 between two Wa officers: one born and raised
in the mountains and the other educated at Lashio College. They fought
over the latter's invitation to a Burmese to come to the frontline area
where the Wa were waging a fierce turf war against drug kingpin, Khun Sa.
I was only two hours away from the frontline at the time of the argument.
According to the Burmese at the center of the dispute, the two Wa officers
almost drew their guns, but were separated thanks to the intervention of
other Wa soldiers and officers present at the time.

I read a few years ago about the tragic outcome for survivors of a plane
crash in Burma in Thailand's newspaper, the Bangkok Post. A Burmese
Airways plane carrying several military officers crash-landed due to bad
weather on a hillside not far away from Tachilak, near the Thai-Burma
border. Shan villagers who lived near the crash site 'finished off' the
half-dead officers and raped the airhostess before killing her as well.

The Burmese junta denied the incident had occurred, including the
detention of the culprits. But for the Shan, it was sweet revenge.

A former medical student, (Ko) Zaw Htun, who was killed while traveling in
Karen controlled area in the early 1990s, once told me about his visit to
a Lahu village. He said, as he entered the village, a Lahu elder announced
that he had brought a Burmese visitor with him. In no time, a young boy,
about 11 years old, suddenly ran and grabbed the gun in the hut, shouting
"Makalu! Makalu!", "The Burmese are coming!" The village elder had to calm
him down, explaining to him that the visitor was a good Burmese and not a
Burmese soldier.

One may consider these stories as isolated anecdotes. But they are just
the tip of the iceberg in Burma's conflict. There are countless stories
one often hears involving ethnic grievances; of abuses, of rapes, ruthless
killings and of repressive policies. How are we going to solve them?

"Communism poured acid in this wound," wrote Kaplan in Balkan Ghosts,
referring to the policy Marshall Tito implemented to fuel further ethnic
tension in the former Yugoslavia. In all fairness, communism might not
have been ultimately responsible for the bloodshed caused by racial
tensions that had existed in the Balkans long before the communists. But
it closed all avenues for defusing tensions under the pretense of
"socialist equality." Thus, it set the tone for eventual showdown.

In the same way, the military regime in Burma must be held accountable for
aggravating ethnic grievances. Indeed, the Burmese kings and the British
before them. The former implemented repressive policies and the latter,
divide and rule strategies. Thus they created an ethnic time bomb. But the
military apartheid policy implemented over the past four decades has
created so much more ethnic inequality and repression. These have
generated constant hatred towards the military rulers themselves and the
Burmans, who form the majority of the population.

Just as the fall of communism opened the lid off mounting tension
fermenting underneath in the former Yugoslavia setting off endless
bloodletting, Burma may uncover what is brewing beneath the present
military rule. These days may not be far off simple because the incumbent
Burmese junta has continued its repressive policies and has not allowed
for any appropriate outlet to manage such issues.

For now, the Burmese junta cannot get out of the quagmire created by
crimes committed in the past as they continue to unfold. Nor has it
realized that democracy can help solve these problems. But the price the
country will have to pay will be high when things explode someday.

Essentially, the Burmese regime must know that aspects of democracy such
as respect for human rights, equality, accountability, participation,
representation, commitment to dialogue and a system to address legitimate
grievances are the key deterrents to violent conflict arising from
inter-racial conflicts.

"Democracy and reconciliation are intertwined, indeed, interdependent,"
according to a handbook published by Sweden's International Institute for
Democracy and Electoral Assistance entitled "Reconciliation after Violent
Conflict." It says, "Democracy is a system for managing difference without
recourse to violence."

It is not too late for the generals in Rangoon to change the course of the
nation and avert the looming disaster. Otherwise, not only will
reconciliation become a distant objective but also the ghosts of the past
will wake up and haunt Burma, which has already had a lion's share of
violence and bloodshed.

If the leaders of the Burmese junta do not believe in this eventuality,
they should put themselves in the shoes of ethnic nationalities, who with
their ingrained grievances in the back of their minds, have tried to come
to terms with pragmatic realities out of immediate necessity. And they
will find bitterness and distrust behind the ethnic smiles.

The current political transition process in Burma has not begun with a
democratic compromise. For this reason, as the Serbian nun said, "There
can be no reconciliation."

Aung Naing Oo is the research associate with the Washington-based Burma Fund.