BurmaNet News, November 12-14, 2005

[Editor]

November 12-14, 2005 Issue #2844

INSIDE BURMA
Mizzima News: Burma's new capital named Nay Pyi Daw
AP: Rebels fire on crowd at Burmese soccer match, killing two and hurting six
Irrawaddy: Burma’s sex worker population on the rise
New York Times: Looking for the Burmese junta? Sorry, it's gone into hiding

ON THE BORDER
Irrawaddy: Youth group calls for international support

DRUGS
Kandarawady Times: Wa hand over drug traffickers to Thailand

INTERNATIONAL
LA Times: Personal tales of struggle resonate with President

OPINION / OTHER
Mizzima: Pyinmana, the road map and Aung San Suu Kyi
Boston Globe: The challenge of Burma
Irrawaddy: Why the Havel-Tutu report should succeed

INTERVIEWS
Mizzima: From the outside looking in

PRESS RELEASE
CSW: UN Security Council must act now say MEP and peer after visit to
Burma with CSW

____________________________________
INSIDE BURMA

November 12, Mizzima News
Burma's new capital named Nay Pyi Daw - Alison Hunter

Sources in Rangoon have confirmed the government plans to name the new
capital in Pyinmana 'Nay Pyi Daw' meaning 'capital' or 'place of a king'
in old-fashioned usage.

But according to sources 'Nay Pyi Daw' is less than fit for a king with
telephone lines the only modern amenity available. Government workers who
have made the move to the new capital have reported that no food, drinking
water or permanent shelter was waiting for them.

Mizzima sources reported a deputy minister told his friends he was in
shock after arriving in Pyinmana and finding that the road to his new
office was unfinished.

According to reports, dissent is growing among the government employees
who have made the move, with some complaining the relocation had separated
families and was eating up too much of Burma's national budget.

If correct, the dissent is likely to be further fuelled by reports that no
satellite dishes or mobile phones will be allowed in the new capital.

_____________________________________

November 14, Associate Press
Rebels fire on crowd at Burmese soccer match, killing two and hurting six

Ethnic rebels opened fire on spectators at a soccer match in northwestern
Chin state, killing two people, including a 7-year-old boy, and wounding
six others, state-run media reported Monday.

Two Chin insurgents fired on the crowd with small arms Saturday as awards
were presented after the game at the Myoma sports ground in Matupi, the
Myanma Ahlin newspaper reported.

The report said the army is searching for the insurgents.

There was no immediate way to confirm the report.

Myanmar has eight major ethnic groups - Myanmar, Kachin, Kayah, Kayin
(Karen), Chin, Mon, Rakhine (Arakan) and Shan - and more than 100 sub
tribes.

The junta in Myanmar, also known as Burma, has reached peace agreements
with 17 armed ethnic groups.

Matupi is about 590 kilometers (370 miles) northwest of Yangon, near the
border with Bangladesh.

_____________________________________

November 11, Irrawaddy
Burma’s sex worker population on the rise - Shah Paung

The recent economic crisis in Burma—including a drastic devaluation of the
kyat—has led more Burmese women to turn to the sex industry to support
themselves and their families, according to an aid worker in Rangoon.

The volunteer, who requested anonymity, said that the country’s increasing
economic woes have made it more difficult for families to survive. In
growing numbers, women are finding that they can augment their income by
working as prostitutes.

Prices on a variety of commodities in Rangoon have increased dramatically
in recent months. In October, the ruling junta increased gas prices in
Burma from 180 kyat (approximately 14 US cents) to 1,500 kyat
(approximately US $1.21), following previous rises in the cost of
utilities and the price of newspapers. The increase in gas prices has also
affected transportation costs for many of the country’s most impoverished
residents.

According to the aid worker, prostitution is attracting more women because
it is an easy way for them to earn extra money. Many women—often
housewives and young girls sent out by their parents—walk the streets
pretending to sell mosquito netting, when in fact they are selling sex.

 “More students have [become] sex workers [to pay] for their school fees,”
said one university student in Rangoon.

Aung Lay, a Rangoon resident and frequent patron of the city’s nightclubs
and karaoke bars, said that such places are popular among sex workers
because they offer an easy environment to solicit clients, and the number
of women working as prostitutes in the clubs has increased in recent
months.

The situation is the same in other parts of Burma. Ngwe Pyu, a resident of
Three Pagodas Pass near the Thai-Burma border, said that the number of
female sex workers along the border has also increased recently, many of
them between the ages of 14 and 16.

 “The sex trade in Yangon [Rangoon] is rapidly growing and is
characterized by a high degree of complexity,” according to a recent
report by the Centre for International Health at Curtin University of
Technology in Perth, Australia.

“The number of female sex workers [in Rangoon] is estimated to be between
5,000 and 10,000, and there are [approximately] 100 brothels operating in
various townships around the city,” the report added.

Reliable data about the number of sex workers in Burma is difficult to find.

“UNAIDS has no means to track the number of sex workers in Myanmar
[Burma],” said one representative of the organization in Burma, “nor
whether the number is currently increasing or decreasing.” Economic
factors, however, can affect the growth of a country’s sex industry, as
“worsening poverty tends to increase women’s vulnerability and encourages
more sex work,” the representative added.

____________________________________

November 13, New York Times
Looking for the Burmese junta? Sorry, it's gone into hiding – Seth Mydans

At precisely 6:37 a.m. last Sunday, according to one account - with a
shout of "Let's go!" - a convoy of trucks began a huge, expensive and
baffling transfer of the government of Myanmar from the capital to a
secret mountain compound 200 miles to the north.

Diplomats and foreign analysts were left groping a week later for an
explanation of the unannounced move. In a country as secretive and
eccentric as Myanmar, it is a full-time job to try to tease the truth from
the swirl of rumors and guesswork, relying on few facts and many theories.
The leading theories now have to do with astrological predictions and
fears of invasion by the United States. The relocation, which the
government announced to reporters and foreign diplomats a day after it
began, but not yet to the public through the state-controlled media, had
been rumored for years.

But according to reports from the capital, Yangon, officials and civil
servants were given only a day or two to pack and say goodbye to their
families.

When they arrived at the new site, called Pyinmanaa, it was still under
construction, and there were shortages of water, telephone lines and even
sleeping quarters and food, according to family members quoted by news
agencies and exile groups that monitor Myanmar.

Foreign diplomats said they were told that if they had urgent business
with the relocated government, they could send a fax but that no number
was yet available.

According to diplomats and other unofficial sources inside Myanmar, the
vast, fortified compound is to contain military headquarters, government
ministries, huge meeting halls, residences, hotels, a hospital, an
airport, underground bunkers and, not surprisingly in this golf-mad
region, a golf course.

The minister of information, U Kyaw Hsan, told reporters in Yangon,
formerly Rangoon, that the transfer of the government had begun with 9 of
the 32 ministries. He gave no date for completing the move.

The military junta that runs the former Burma offered little explanation
for its mystery move. "Due to changed circumstances, where Myanmar is
trying to develop a modern nation, a more centrally located government
seat has become a necessity," it said in a statement.

That left plenty of room for theories, and it was difficult to find one
that seemed rational. Astrology seemed to make as much sense as anything.

Myanmar is a deeply superstitious nation that scheduled its ceremony
marking independence from the British to follow astrological dictates, at
exactly 4:20 a.m. on Jan. 4, 1948.

The 6:37 a.m. departure was reported by U Aung Zaw, the editor of
Irrawaddy Magazine, an émigré publication based in neighboring Thailand
with a network of contacts inside Myanmar. He said this strangely precise
departure time might well have been dictated by astrologers.

Astrological timing may also have been behind the abruptness of the move
to a site that was not yet complete.

One theory is that the move was prompted by astrologers who several years
ago warned the ruling generals that the dilapidated capital on the Bay of
Bengal would become a dangerous place for them.

Seen from their perspective, the notion of an American invasion might not
seem far-fetched. They are a ruling clique of soldiers whose background is
jungle warfare and who know little of the outside world.

For years they have been squeezed by economic sanctions and battered by
relentless criticism from the West over their abuses of human rights, and
they have responded by pulling further into their shells.

In January, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice included Myanmar in a list
of "outposts of tyranny," along with North Korea, Cuba, Iran, Zimbabwe and
Belarus.

Officials in Myanmar sometimes offer visitors a list of their own: Panama,
Grenada, Somalia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq - places where the United
States has sent armed forces.

Not long ago, according to one story making the rounds in Myanmar, a
military officer was asked the purpose of obligatory civil defense
training for civilian men. "You are the holding action against the
Americans until the Chinese come to our aid," the officer said, according
to David I. Steinberg, a professor at Georgetown University who is a
leading expert on Myanmar.

Mr. Steinberg said rumors of an American "rescue" circulate among
opponents of the government - a current of wishful thinking that is as
extravagant as the fears of the ruling generals.

"The joke going around is, 'After diamonds, gold,' " he said. In the
Burmese language, "sein" - as in Saddam Hussein - means diamonds. "Shwe" -
as in Gen. Than Shwe, the leader of the military junta - means gold.

There was no way to know whether there was a connection earlier this month
when authorities in the capital reopened a road that passes by the
entrance to the United States Embassy.

Barbed wire and concrete security barriers were removed for the first time
since they were put in place after the attacks in New York and at the
Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001.

"Obviously, we are reviewing our security arrangements," an unidentified
United States Embassy official told Reuters. "We felt a lot safer with
them in place."

For now, there appear to be no schools and little housing for families at
Pyinmanaa. The move is likely to separate civil servants from their
families, as well as from the second jobs that many found necessary to
make ends meet in the country's minimal economy.

The junta's physical move into a fortified retreat reflects what many
experts on Myanmar say is a bunker mentality in the face of what it may
see as a bewildering and antagonistic world.

"I keep hearing the same thing all the time," Mr. Steinberg said of the
junta. "Look, we don't need you guys. We can go it alone. We've done it
before, and so what's new."

____________________________________
ON THE BORDER

November 14, Irrawaddy
Youth group calls for international support - Sai Silp

A Burmese youth group is urging the international community to support its
fighting for the right of ethnic groups to land ownership and
self-determination in a report released today.

The Nationalities Youth Forum, an environmental group based in Chiang Mai,
Thailand, issued a statement announcing the publication of its report “Our
Land and Natural Resources in Burma: Ethnic Youth Perspectives,” released
today.

The statement calls on Burma’s military government “
to stop massive land
confiscation in Burma and to give the ethnic peoples the freedom to live
their lives based on their culture and traditions.”

The NYF report, which contains research gathered between 2003 and 2004,
highlights the ongoing struggles facing Burma’s ethnic minority
populations: restrictions on land use; dispossession by those who take out
land-leases from the government; misuse of state projects; forced
resettlement; and expropriation of ethnic land by the army for military
use or commercial enterprises.

The international community generally concentrates on political issues in
Burma, but does not realize the importance of environmental and land
ownership issues to ethnic minorities, who depend on land for their
livelihood, Anna Malindog, a researcher and NYF consultant, told The
Irrawaddy today.

The report also “calls on the international community to be one with the
ethnic peoples of Burma in fighting for their rights to land and
self-determination, and to treat the issue of land confiscation as crucial
to the realization of genuine democracy and federalism in Burma.”

Some 42 youths from 15 different ethnic communities in Burma participated
in the production of the NYF report. The project was inspired in part by a
training workshop held in Chiang Mai last year that brought together
ethnic youth from various parts of Burma. Participants then returned to
Burma to gather research.

“It’s not easy to find information inside Burma,” said Khiang Dhu Wan, an
NYF group program officer from Arakan State in western Burma. “Some of
[our] trained participants disappeared during the research process, and we
do not know what happened to them. Maybe they [were] arrested.”

The NYF hopes to use its network of youth organizations in Burma to bring
the issue of land rights to the attention of Burma’s National Convention,
set to resume early next month, particularly the threat to land rights
posed by the military and public works projects such as dam construction
that has uprooted many ethnic communities.

“We will collect different opinions from various ethnic groups inside
Burma and exiled Burmese, and synthesize a common position that can be
presented to the state constitution-drafting process and at a future
national convention,” said Khiang Dhu Wan.

The NYF comprises ten different ethnic youth communities in Burma and
participates in an international network of youth and indigenous peoples
groups such as Children/Youth as Peacebuilders and the Asia Indigenous
Peoples Pact Foundation.

____________________________________
DRUGS

November 14, Kandarawady Times
Wa hand over drug traffickers to Thailand

The Wa National Army nabbed four drug dealers and handed them over to the
Thai authorities on the Thai-Burma border, on November 12, according to
Ban Mine Win Kyaw, Secretary of Wa National Organization.
Four Shans -- Lu Han, Ai Su, Ai Jay and San De Tant were arrested with
10,000 bills of amphetamine in Homong Township, across Mae Hong Son where
WNO is active.

"According to reliable information, they had smuggled in 100,000 bills
with them, but we seized only 10,000 bills of amphetamine. We are still
investigating where the rest are," said Ban Mine Win Kyaw.

Lu Han, one of the four arrested has been into amphetamine trafficking in
the upper reaches of Burma and it was the first time that he was operating
in WNA territory, the secretary explained to Kandarawady Times.

Thai authorities arrested the chairman of WNO, Maha Saa early this year on
money laundering charges.

The WNO had banned drug trafficking in Wa areas all this time in order to
regain the confidence of Thai authorities, said Ban Mine. It has been
cracking down on drug peddlers and handing them over to Thailand for the
same reason, said observers.

____________________________________
INTERNATIONAL

November 13, Los Angeles Times
Personal tales of struggle resonate with President - Warren Vieth

It was an activist's dream come true: an unexpected call to the White
House, a private audience with the president, an opportunity to influence
U.S. policy, maybe even alter the course of world events.

For Charm Tong, it happened two weeks ago. For about an hour, President
Bush listened as the 24-year-old refugee told the story of her life as a
Burmese exile in Thailand — and as she described the systematic abuse of
ethnic minority women by the military regime in Myanmar, formerly known as
Burma.

"The president was very interested in what is going on inside the country,
to the people, to the women, how rape is used as a weapon of war," Charm
Tong later told a reporter, as she unwound on a park bench not far from
the White House. "He asked many questions."

Among them, she said, was the biggest question of all: What could the
United States do to help? She urged Bush to use his trip this week to Asia
to persuade other countries, particularly Japan, to bring more pressure to
bear on the military dictatorship in Rangoon.

Bush leaves Monday for Japan, China, Mongolia and South Korea, where he
will attend an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting. "He said he
would raise the issue with the countries," Charm Tong said.

It was not the first time a personal story has influenced Bush's foreign
policy or prompted the president to act.

After meeting in the Oval Office with former Soviet dissident Natan
Sharansky a year ago, Bush began incorporating into his own public remarks
some of the muscular rhetoric expressed in Sharansky's book "The Case for
Democracy," which called on the Western powers to confront, rather than
accommodate, autocratic regimes.

Similarly, the president's antipathy toward North Korea's communist regime
seemed to intensify after he read a book by North Korean defector Kang
Chol Hwan, who got his own 40-minute Oval Office meeting in June. Two
months later, Bush named a special envoy on human rights for North Korea,
an action that human rights groups had long advocated.

Last year, Bush hugged 21-year-old Liberian refugee Veronica Braewell, who
broke down in tears while telling the president how, at age 13, she was
left for dead on a pile of bodies by marauding militants. Bush later
intervened personally to increase the number of refugees admitted to the
United States.

Last week the doors of the West Wing opened again for the Dalai Lama, the
exiled Tibetan spiritual leader who had met with Bush twice before. He
urged the president to push for a truly autonomous Tibet when he pays a
visit next Sunday to Chinese President Hu Jintao in Beijing.

In Bush's White House, foreign policy sometimes gets up close and personal.

"This president seems to be profoundly affected by individuals with strong
personal stories," said Tom Malinowski of the advocacy group Human Rights
Watch and a National Security Council official in the Clinton
administration.
"When the president puts himself in a meeting like that, he is in effect
committing himself to take action, which is one reason why politicians
often don't put themselves in such situations," said Malinowski, who
praised Bush for such behavior, even though he is critical of him on other
issues.

There is potential risk inherent in such anecdote-rich encounters — a
captivating story and forceful personality could drown out competing but
less compelling voices. The person who pushed for Charm Tong's access to
the White House was Carl Gershman, president of the nonprofit National
Endowment for Democracy. Gershman's group arranged an earlier Oval Office
session between Bush and Afghan democracy activists, and the White House
had encouraged him to propose candidates for future meetings.

Several weeks ago, Gershman contacted Tim Goeglein, Bush's liaison with
outside advocacy groups, and told him Charm Tong was coming to Washington
for a conference. The president might find her story compelling, he said.
The White House said it would try to set something up.

Charm Tong met with Bush and several senior officials, including National
Security Advisor Stephen J. Hadley, in the Oval Office.

A native of Shan state, home of Myanmar's largest ethnic minority, Charm
Tong was 6 when her parents had her smuggled out of the country to an
orphanage in Thailand. She began working with other Burmese refugees in
Thailand as a teenager and helped found the Shan Women's Action Network.

Three years ago, Charm Tong co-wrote a report, "License to Rape," that
detailed incidents of sexual violence by Burmese troops against hundreds
of ethnic Shan women and girls.

Myanmar's military regime has denied the report's findings, claiming the
violence in Shan state is the work of insurgents.

The regime has also been accused of killing, imprisoning and torturing
civilians to suppress an ongoing civil war, as well as driving minorities
from their homelands and forcing them into slave labor. The government has
denied those charges as well.

As Bush and the others questioned her during their White House meeting,
Charm Tong felt "a lot of pressure," she said afterward. "But I am very
happy 
 to break the silence of what is happening to the people of Burma."

Rep. Tom Lantos (D-Burlingame), co-founder of the Congressional Human
Rights Caucus, said Charm Tong's 50 minutes with Bush would reverberate
around the world.

Staff writer Tyler Marshall contributed to this report.

____________________________________
OPINION / OTHER

November 13, Boston Globe
The challenge of Burma

President Bush embarks this Tuesday on a trip to Asia that will include
visits to Japan, China, Mongolia, and South Korea. In his travels and his
encounters with Asian-Pacific leaders he will have a rare chance to
demonstrate that his oft-declared preference for democracy in the greater
Middle East is not merely a geopolitical ploy limited to one area of the
world.

If Bush wishes to show he is as concerned with fostering democracy in Asia
as he has been in Lebanon, Iraq, or Egypt, he will lobby the 21 members of
the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Leaders' Meeting he will be
attending to back a move at the United Nations to have the Security
Council take up the issue of Burma and the depradations of that country's
military dictatorship.

This is a cause that Asia's democracies, particularly Japan and the
Philippines -- currently rotating Security Council members -- ought to
embrace. Those that are reluctant to do so, whether because of trade ties
with Burma's junta, rivalry with China, or a self-deluding belief that
stability is synonymous with the status quo, need to be shamed into acting
in solidarity with the people of Burma.

In a 1990 election, the party of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu
Kyi won 82 percent of the seats in Burma's parliament. The junta refused
to honor the results of that election, and the generals unleashed a wave
of repression that has caused hundreds of thousands of refugees to flee
into neighboring countries. The ruling military is responsible for
extra-judicial executions, torture, rape, the destruction of thousands of
villages of ethnic minorities, and extensive use of forced labor.
Moreover, the junta continues to hold Suu Kyi under house arrest and more
than a thousand political prisoners in harsh conditions.

If nine of the Security Council's 15 members vote to place Burma on its
provisional agenda, the United Nations can press for democracy and
national reconciliation in Burma, as it has done in many other countries
-- most of which are less repressive than Burma and less injurious to
their neighbors. For refugees are not the only export flowing across
Burma's borders. Heroin, methamphetamine, and HIV/AIDS spread along the
heroin trails also emanate from this enormous prison-state created by the
Burmese junta.

It may be understandable that China, a trading partner and military
supplier of the junta, does not want the United Nations to be hectoring
the generals to release Suu Kyi and allow a genuine democratic evolution.
China, not being a democracy, maintains cozy relations with some of the
world's worst regimes. But Japan has no excuse, and neither does the
Philippines. Bush should not miss this chance to show Asians that the
United States is not selective in its backing for democracy and democrats.

____________________________________

November 10, Mizzima News
Pyinmana, the road map and Aung San Suu Kyi - Aung Naing Oo

What is the connection between Pyinmana, the end of the transitional 'road
map' for democracy and the release of Aung San Suu Kyi? As all three are
military junta creations there must be a link.

Perhaps, the Burmese junta need to ensure the construction of facilities
in Pyinmana and the relocation of government offices are completed by the
time the road map is finished in order to augment a comfortable
transition. Perhaps, Aung San Suu Kyi may see her freedom by this time.

Of late, there have been so many analyses as to why the regime is moving
the capital to Pyinmana. It does not make sense to anyone. Some say the
generals are acting under the advices of the astrologers. Some argue the
move is an escape from a possible US naval.

Others reckon Senior General Than Shwe is imitating the habits of Burmese
kings who built new capitals and pagodas while in power. The junta said
the relocation was to ensure smooth government operations.

No matter what analysts and onlookers say are the reasons for the move,
one thing is for sure. The relocation to Pyinmana is designed to implement
the sixth guideline of the proposed constitution – continued military
leadership over affairs of the state.
The Burmese junta has demanded the army's leading role in politics be
enshrined in the constitution. Because they have the power to make things
happen, it surely will. However, having the role enshrined in the charter
is not enough for the junta as constitutions can be amended and rewritten.
In order to make sure their role is preserved the junta needs to take
physical precautionary measures.

Of course, these will primarily include the relocation of the government
and legislatures to one huge compound in Pyinmana under the watchful eyes
of the military. The move will also effectively keep grassroots political
activities away from key policy-making arenas and contain, if the need
arises, political revolts in large population centers such as Rangoon.

In this way, a dual strategy of keeping the advancement of democracy and
ethnic freedom in check and of preserving the constitutional prerogative
for the armed forces can be achieved, leaving the government in peace to
continue to function. If the armed forces need to declare state of
emergency, as stipulated in the new constitution, it will be clean and
simple. The task could be achieved as easily as "catching chickens in
their house" as the Burmese saying goes.

Given the mentality of the military rulers and their fastidiousness over
long-term security, such thinking is plausible. One may recall General Ne
Win enacted the all encompassing 'State Protection Act' in 1975, in
addition to existing draconian laws such as the 1950 Emergency Provisions
Act and other internal security penal codes, to ensure that the regime was
absolutely untouchable.

The relocation of Pyinmana last week was met with surprise. But the regime
needs to strike while the iron is hot. Time is still on their side but
once the road map is finished all government and legislative facilities
must be completed.

This raises the question of Pyinmana's connection with the road map.

I have argued since the National Convention went into recess in March this
year that the junta has no intention of concluding constitutional talks or
the road map for that matter. There is no official time line for the
project, which was first conceived in 1990.

The answer may lie in the relocation to Pyinmana. Because the whole
government apparatus and parliaments will be relocated to the new capital,
constitutional deliberations cannot end while construction continues. It
may take one or two more years before the junta puts the finishing touches
on the capital.

So it is likely the junta has timed the conclusion of the convention and
the remainder of the road map to coincide with the completion of the
capital. The new government and legislatures cannot sit without seats.

As to when Aung San Suu Kyi will be released, it seems probable that she
will have to wait until the move to Pyinmana is completed and new
elections held. She might be released just before the military junta
transfers power to the new government.

At times, the junta is at a loss as to how they should deal with her.
However, given the need to release her, the junta may have thought the
best way to set her free was under a new constitution. Undoubtedly, it
would restrict her political activities and she may not be able to venture
beyond what will constitutionally be allowed.

The move to Pyinmana could be considered a strategic retreat with a
long-term plan to maintain military leadership over civilians. It is a
military defensive line that civilians must not cross. And any attempt to
amend the constitution will be successfully resisted. Indeed, it is the
best-laid plan the military has ever devised.

But even the best-laid plans can be derailed.

____________________________________

November, Irrawaddy
Why the Havel-Tutu report should succeed - Arnold Corso

China and Russia have previously blocked a US move to put Burma to the UN
Security Council, but there is little reason for them to block a similar
attempt this time around.

Much of the attention surrounding the September report by former Czech
president Vaclav Havel and 1984 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Desmond Tutu
concern its labelling Burma as a greater threat to regional peace than
past cases in which the UN Security Council has intervened. While this is
an interesting assertion, Burma watchers will find few surprises in the
report’s litany of abuses in Burma.  We should instead focus on whether
the UNSC would actually accept the report’s recommendations.  In this
respect, the Tutu-Havel report presents a reasonable compromise that could
potentially attract sufficient support at least to place Burma on the UNSC
agenda and possibly lead to a new consensus on how to handle the
recalcitrant generals in Rangoon.

Some Burma watchers have concluded that China and Russia would veto any
move to place Burma on the UNSC agenda. They did it in June, when the US
wanted the Council to address the issue of the detention of opposition
icon Aung San Suu Kyi and other political prisoners in Burma. Yet, this is
a misconception. In order to place an issue on the Security Council
agenda, nine of the 15 members must vote in favor of doing so. As a
procedural matter, the veto of the five permanent members, or P-5, does
not actually apply. Once on the agenda, member states debate the issue and
may propose a resolution.  It is only during a vote on a substantive
matter such as a resolution itself that any of the P-5 members could use
its veto effectively to block it.

Skeptics may consider placing Burma on the UNSC agenda a futile gesture,
given China’s and Russia’s opposition to a substantive resolution. 
However, debate on Burma in the Council would oblige China and Russia to
defend their positions.  Neither country wishes to be identified with an
“outpost of tyranny,” so forcing them to choose between the Burmese
military regime  and the international community may compel them to soften
their support for the junta in other ways, such as by reducing their arms
sales to Rangoon or applying more backchannel pressure to reform.
Furthermore, a full debate would allow for some much-needed dialogue,
perhaps opening unconsidered venues for compromise.

Should the Council place Burma on its agenda, the Tutu-Havel report
proposes a moderate resolution that could conceivably gain the support of
member states.  It would require Rangoon to work with the UN secretariat
in implementing a plan for national reconciliation and restoration of a
democratically elected government; provide safe and unhindered access
across the country for UN agencies and staff; and free Suu Kyi and all
political prisoners. A broad array of countries, including China, already
supports freeing Suu Kyi. Likewise, most countries wish to see
humanitarian UN aid allowed into Burma. All parties claim, privately or
publicly, to want Burma to achieve national reconciliation and
democratization.  Finally, the report avoids recommending any
controversial or highly intrusive measures.

Despite their desire for a stabilized Burma, China and Russia do not wish
to set a precedent for UN intervention in domestic disputes. However, they
should not infer that intervention in Burma could lead to intervention in
Tibet (China) or Chechnya (Russia).  A country’s domestic problems must
deteriorate so markedly that they constitute a threat to the peace,
setting a high bar for UN intervention.  All of the past cases of UN
intervention occurred in response to extreme problems such as genocide,
mass exodus, or the collapse of functioning government. Furthermore, no
country could reasonably believe that the UN could or would ever intervene
in the affairs of a large military power.

A democratic Burma would not necessarily revoke China’s ability to use
Burma’s ports, invest in its markets, or utilize its natural resources. 
States often form alliances through geography and economic interest, not
ideology. Under both the Khmer Rouge and current Cambodian Prime Minister
Hun Sen, Cambodia looked to China as an ally because of its removed
geography and protective support. A democratic Burma would have much to
gain by increasing trade with China and relying on it as a counterbalance
to neighbouring India and Thailand. Therefore, Burma would probably still
allow China significant access to its ports, markets, and natural
resources. On the other hand, Burma’s generals are not safe long-term
investments, as seen with Khin Nyunt’s ouster last October, and may decide
to cancel Chinese contracts or shift toward India on a whim.

In short, the Tutu-Havel report proposes a practical alternative between
inaction and sanctions. The Council can place Burma on its agenda and then
draft a minimally intrusive resolution palatable to all parties.  Rather
than obstruct this process, China and Russia should embrace the
opportunity to shape a resolution that protects their interests.  China
has much to gain from a stable Burma, and should use the cover of the UN
to invest in Burma’s future rather than transient military leaders. The
member states could produce an outcome that meets all of their interests
in Burma, from human rights to economic trade, while helping the Burmese
people achieve a free and peaceful future.

____________________________________
INTERVIEWS

November 13, Mizzima News

>From the outside looking in: Interview with Pinheiro - Alison Hunter


Paulo Sergio Pinheiro, the UN's Special Rapporteur to Burma, is nearing
the end of his term and is in Thailand on a fact-finding mission as he
prepares a final report on the situation in Burma.

Having again had a visa application for Burma rejected, he is meeting with
activists, organisations and officials in Thailand to try to paint an
accurate picture of Burma while remaining, as he has done for the past two
years, an outsider.

Pinheiro met with Mizzima for a fleeting interview today on the National
Convention, the International Labour Organization and the generals'
bizarre Pyinmana move.

Can you describe the purpose of your current trip to Thailand?

Every time I came to Myanmar in the last six years, I pass through Bangkok
and it is very useful to have contact with the Royal Thai government and
it is very much a part of my mandate.

And I take this opportunity to have contact with the government, with the
diplomatic community and my friends from Burma - I cannot go into the
country but some can meet me here, it is very close. Also the regional
offices of the UN are based in Bangkok.

And did you again apply for a visa to go to Burma?

Ah, yes. And we continue as the government say to try to find mutually
convenient dates (for a visit). I have been trying to find these mutually
convenient dates for the past two years. But the government doesn't refuse
me but it says - in the last letter I received - that this moment was not
very convenient.

The National Convention is reconvening in December. What are your
expectations?

I think that in any circumstance it's positive that the new session will
open. I am very much expecting to know what the results of the convention
will be and also to know how the constitution will be drafted. As I have
said in the past the convention is something the Myanmar government
decided it was not my suggestion.

And of course what I do is to follow and at certain moments to suggest
some elements or components that I think will be useful for the success of
the process like in many other countries - the release of political
prisoners, the realisation of some basic political freedoms.
But my position at the moment is waiting to see what will come from the
National Convention and continue the dialogue on the constitution and what
will be the procedural definitions for the referendum and for elections.

And of course the UN is very happy to come on board and cooperate for the
success of this phase in terms of advancing the political transition
process.

What are your views on attempts to get Burma onto the Security Council
agenda?

I think, as I have said in the General Assembly, I just follow this
discussion because this is very much the responsibility of the member
states. I have had a very consistent position in these six years that
decisions concerning the foreign policies of member states are not in my
mandate.

I just take note that there is a proposition or a project that Myanmar
will be taken to the Security Council. I just follow the situation.

What is your reaction to official confirmation of the government's move to
Pyinmana, given that UN staff in Rangoon are worried the move will isolate
them?

As you know, countries cannot really change capitals. My own country,
against my expectations, changed the capital from Rio de Janeiro, my city,
to the interior of Brazil, which at that time was a desert. Of course I
don't have anything to say about the decision of a sovereign country to
change its capital.

On the other hand, I hope that this change will not confirm these fears of
greater isolation and increased difficulty for the UN agencies or
international NGOs or other organisations to operate. I am observing and
expecting that there will be fluid contact between the authorities in the
new capital and the international community.

What was your reaction to the ILO report released recently detailing the
death threats received by their representative in Rangoon?

I was very shocked by this information. First because the ILO is very
professional, very objective. It is the oldest, international
organisation, it was founded before the United Nations in 1919 and I have
followed very closely the constructive approach by the director general
and all of his colleagues in these different missions that I have met in
the country.

And I have shared with the Myanmar authorities through several ambassadors
that I think it would be very important that the Myanmar government
investigate these threats because this is completely unacceptable. And I
hope that there will be no decision to leave the ILO. I think the Myanmar
government would send the wrong signal to the world in terms of this
decision.

Some countries have, in the past, left the ILO but they all return. There
is no single member state (of the UN) that is not a member of the ILO and
I don't think it would be convenient for Myanmar to be the only country in
the world that is out of the ILO. I have expressed this with assistance to
the authorities and I hope they will not give up the ILO.

Your term finishes in April next year. Is there any news on who will
replace you?

As you know the General Assembly is discussing the reform of the UN and of
the human rights mechanism. At this point nobody knows. What I know is
that most certainly these special procedures, the so-called mechanism, my
mandate will continue and I think that most probably there will be a
resolution on Myanmar because there has not been any change.

And I think the resolution will focus on renewal and I think in the text
of the resolution there will be an appointment of a special rapporteur but
at this moment nobody knows how the special rapporteur will be selected.

____________________________________
PRESS RELEASE

November 11, Christian Solidarity Worldwide
UN Security Council must act now say MEP and peer after visit to Burma
with CSW

Two European politicians have recently visited Burmese refugees on the
Thai-Burma border, and call on the United Nations Security Council to
intervene in the growing humanitarian crisis in Burma.

Simon Coveney MEP, an Irish Member of the European Parliament’s Foreign
Affairs Committee and Baroness Cox, a Deputy Speaker of the British House
of Lords travelled to the Thai-Burmese border within a week of each other,
as part of a fact-finding visit organized by Christian Solidarity
Worldwide (CSW).

Mr Coveney, the European People’s Party spokesman on Human Rights,
returned last week after gathering evidence of the continued use of forced
labour, forced conscription of child soldiers, rape, destruction of
villages and crops, torture and other violations. He visited Karen and
Karenni refugees in Thailand, and Internally Displaced People in Karen
State, Burma.

“This was my first visit to the Thai-Burmese border areas, and what I
heard and saw confirms everything I had read in reports previously,” said
Mr Coveney. “Gross violations of human rights continue to be perpetrated
by the Burmese junta. I met people who had fled their villages because
they faced constant forced labour, torture, rape and abuse at the hands of
the Burma Army. This has gone on for too long and the world has turned a
blind eye. It is time now for the international community to act.”

Baroness Cox, Honorary President of CSW-UK and Chief Executive of the
Humanitarian Aid Relief Trust (HART), has visited the Karen, Karenni and
Shan people in eastern Burma many times. On October 27, a day after
returning from her latest visit to the Thai-Burmese border, she raised the
issue in the House of Lords and urged the British Government to support
initiatives to put the issue of Burma on the UN Security Council agenda,
as proposed in a new report, Threat to the Peace, commissioned by former
Czech President Vaclav Havel and Nobel Laureate Bishop Desmond Tutu.

“I returned from the region yesterday, and can confirm from first-hand
evidence that the suffering of the people of Burma caused by human rights
violations by the [Burmese regime] is as grave as ever, and certainly as
grave as that outlined in the compelling report [Threat to the Peace],”
she told the House of Lords.

In addition to visiting refugees, the two Parliamentarians met Thai
politicians, including the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign
Relations, Senator Kraisak Choonhavan, and members of the ASEAN
Inter-Parliamentary Myanmar Caucus. The Caucus was established earlier
this year and brings together Parliamentarians from South-East Asia to
promote democracy and human rights in Burma.

CSW’s report of the visit, released today, details evidence of continuing
human rights violations in Burma. It quotes a Karen refugee who said: “The
situation is getting worse day by day. If people stay in Burma, how can
they get rice?”

For further information and a copy of CSW’s full report, please contact
Richard Chilvers, Communications Manager at Christian Solidarity Worldwide
on 020 8329 0045 or email richard.chilvers at csw.org.uk or visit
www.csw.org.uk