BurmaNet News, March 7, 2007

[Editor]

March 7, 2007 Issue # 3156


INSIDE BURMA
Irrawaddy: More Rangoon protesters arrested
Irrawaddy: British MP tells junta minister: “you’re a wicked regime”
AFP: Tourism grows in Myanmar, despite political woes
Xinhua: Myanmar makes efforts to replace fuel with biodiesel
Mizzima: Veteran politician calls press conference

REGIONAL
Mizzima: 'Burmese freedom fighters' are not 'gunrunners': Solidarity group
AFP: Free Myanmar migrants, rights group urges Malaysia

INTERNATIONAL
DVB: US to continue pressing Burma on human rights

OPINION / OTHER
International Herald Tribune: Myanmar's neighbors hold the key - Stanley
A. Weiss

____________________________________
INSIDE BURMA

March 7, Irrawaddy
More Rangoon protesters arrested - Khun Sam

The Burmese military regime detained eight activists on Tuesday night in
connection with last month's anti-government demonstration in Rangoon.

Of the eight persons, one was also arrested by the Burmese police special
branch following the February 22 demonstration. All eight persons were
arrested because they took part in the protests.

Htin Kyaw, who took part in the February demonstration, was released
Wednesday morning. “The authorities warned me not to hold such a protest
again in the future,” he told The Irrawaddy.

Htin Kyaw said the seven people arrested with him have yet to be released.
They are being questioned at the Aung Thabye interrogation center in
Rangoon. He said police told him they would be released after questioning.

During his interrogation, Htin Kyaw said he told police: “Our demands are
the real needs of the citizens, and we held the protest to speak out on
behalf of the citizens.”

All nine of the demonstrators arrested following the February 22 protests
were freed on February 27 without charge.

Despite the warnings, Htin Kyaw said people will continue to protest
unless their complaints are dealt with by the military government.

About 25 people took part in the February demonstration. They listed 17
issues, including lower commodity prices, better health care and education
and reliable power supplies.

Anti-government protests are rare in Burma. The February 22 protest has
attracted the attention of exile-based opposition groups and international
media.

The arrests of the demonstrators have been condemned by Burmese opposition
groups, including the National League for Democracy.

Meanwhile, on March 5 police in Thingangyun Township, Rangoon, briefly
held and interrogated a man who wrote and posted signs on his fence
complaining about high commodity prices, according to township police.

____________________________________

March 7, The Irrawaddy
British MP tells junta minister: “you’re a wicked regime”

A leading British opposition parliamentarian branded Burma a ‘pariah
state’ ruled by a “wicked” regime in the first face-to-face meeting in a
decade between the military junta and a senior politician from Britain.

In a Rangoon encounter described by his Conservative Party office as a
“heated exchange,” Andrew Mitchell, Shadow Secretary of State for
International Development, told Burma’s Deputy Foreign Minister Kyaw Thu
that his regime was “wicked and illegitimate”.

Mitchell told Kyaw Thu: “People in the West regard your government as a
pariah state. It is wicked and illegitimate. You spend only a dollar a
year per head on health and education, and people are suffering terribly
up and down the land.”

Mitchell called for the release of all political prisoners and the
beginning of meaningful tripartite talks between the junta, opposition
leaders and separatist rebel groups. He insisted on an immediate start to
the transition process to democracy.

A statement on the meeting issued on Tuesday by Mitchell’s office said:
“In the heated exchange, U Kyaw Thu denied the existence of political
prisoners in Burma, and refused to allow Mr Mitchell to visit Nobel Prize
winner Aung San Suu Kyi.”

The statement continued: “Speaking after the meeting, Mr Mitchell
condemned her continuing detention, saying that she represented a ‘beacon
of hope’ for the people of Burma.”

Mitchell’s office said that during his two days in Rangoon, the politician
had held “covert meetings” with senior members of the National League for
Democracy and other opposition figures, including leaders of the 1988
student revolt.

He also met NGO leaders who, the statement said, “called for a
reconsideration of the isolationist policies of boycotts, travel and
investment bans and trade sanctions organized by the West towards Burma.
They argued that greater trade and exposure to international influences
would help build a more prosperous, open society and eventually help
undermine the generals’ grip on power.”

Mitchell also travelled to Karen State, visiting the border refugee camp
Ei Tu Hta. “He heard fresh evidence of renewed ethnic cleansing and human
rights abuses perpetrated by the Burmese Army as part of their 50-year-old
war against separatist rebels,” the statement said. “He heard shocking
first-hand accounts of the torture and violence used by the Burmese army
in their attempts to suppress the uprising.”

The British government announced this week that it would allow aid it
gives to Burmese refugee groups in Thailand to be passed across the border
to displaced people inside Burma.

Mitchell’s visit and his meeting with Kyaw Thu went unreported in the
official Burmese press, although The New Light of Myanmar on Wednesday
accused the NLD of “making continuous contacts with [the] US and British
embassies in Yangon [Rangoon], and following the orders of the two
embassies to the detriment of the interest of the nation and the people.”

The newspaper accused the NLD of “trying to make the entire nation become
a colonialist-enslaved minion.”

____________________________________

March 7, Agence France Presse
Tourism grows in Myanmar, despite political woes - Hla Hla Htay

Yangon: Visiting Myanmar, one of the most isolated countries in the world,
makes Uledev Viadreslav feel like an explorer back in the old days before
air travel started making the world feel smaller.
"Here there are almost no tourists," the 28-year-old Russian tourist said.

"We can go everywhere without any crowds, and see only locals around us.
Here I can feel that I'm an explorer," Viadreslav said while resting with
two friends in a shady corner of Yangon's spectacular golden Shwedagon
Pagoda.

When tourists arrive here on flights from neighbouring Thailand, they set
their watches back 30 minutes to adjust to Myanmar's unique time zone.

But many say they feel they have gone back 30 years, to a time before
Asian cities were clogged with traffic and pollution, to a slow-paced town
where men still wear traditional longyis instead of trousers, and women
and children paint their faces white with sandalwood makeup.

Viadreslav said he and his friends knew little about the country, which
used to be called Burma, before they arrived.

After 45 years of military rule, Myanmar is one of the world's poorest
countries whose rulers have largely sealed it off from the outside world.

Motorcycles are banned here, leaving the roads to decades-old Nissan
Sunny's that would have long ago landed in the scrapyards of Myanmar's
better off neighbours.

Myanmar only began allowing tourists to visit in the last 20 years, and
movement outside the main cities and temple sites are still restricted.

But that's part of the appeal for travellers like Viadreslav, who have
slowly but steadily pumped more and more money into Myanmar's struggling
economy.

Last year, Myanmar's official statistics showed that the overall number of
foreign visitors here dropped by about five percent to 630,060 people,
mainly due to a fall in cross-border traffic.
But airport arrivals by big-spending international tourists were up 16
percent, so Myanmar's tourism revenue climbed by nearly eight percent to
164 million dollars.

That's a lot of money for a cash-strapped regime that is under US and
European sanctions over alleged rights abuses, which is why supporters of
detained democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi have urged foreigners not to
visit.

Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel peace prize winner who has spent most of the
last 17 years under house arrest, has urged foreigners not to come to her
country until the ruling military junta agrees to restore democracy.

A German tourist, who identified himself only as Manfred, said he believed
tourism was one way of helping Myanmar's impoverished people, but added
that he was trying to avoid spending his money with businesses controlled
by the government.

"It's better to buy from local people instead of from the government.
Everything is better if it goes to local people," he said.

Many guidebooks to Myanmar indicate which companies have strong links to
the government to help travellers avoid financing the regime.

The government still hopes that more tourists -- but not too many more --
will keep coming.
It has agreed to allow new international flights to China and Thailand by
private carrier Air Bagan, which could start in April.

Tour operators say bookings have been up for the peak travel season, which
began in October and will end in May.

"All the tour companies got more tourists during the current high season.
We also believe that more tourists will visit this year because we already
have many reservations for the next high season, even though it's still
early for booking," one tour company manager said.

She said tourists come here despite the tough political situation because
Myanmar offers an experience that few people have had, and without the
crowds that pour into destinations like Angkor Wat in Cambodia or Phuket
in Thailand.

"Some tourists just want to avoid the crowds," she said.

____________________________________

March 7, Xinhua
Myanmar makes efforts to replace fuel with biodiesel

Yangon: Myanmar is making efforts to replace fuel with biodiesel,
expecting that by the year 2008, the  country could start to replace fuel
with biodiesel to help solve  oil crisis in the wake of gradual rising
world oil prices, said a  report of the local Pyi Myanmar news journal
Wednesday.

To meet the goal, Myanmar is growing physic nut plantations extensively
throughout the country, Minister of Commerce Brigadier- General Tin Naing
Thein was quoted as saying.

Better technique for producing the physic nut oil has been obtained, Tin
Naing Thein disclosed at a recent function with domestic industrial
producers, said the weekly.

Myanmar has eyed physic nut oil as fuel since late 2005, advocating the
use of it as fuel in the country and urging the country's people to grow
such nut plantations on a wide scale to help find a way out of the oil
crisis.

The authorities also stressed the need for the country to use such
biodiesel to avoid spending millions of foreign exchange on fuel in the
wake of such hike of oil prices, pointing out that the use of biodiesel as
an alternative fuel for petrol, kerosene and diesel would also enable
rural people to avoid searching fuelwood and help protect forests from
depletion and conserve trees.

Cultivation of an acre (0.405 hectare) of land with 1,200 physic nut
plants can produce up to 100 gallons (454.6 liters) of biodiesel, Myanmar
experts said.

There are two physic nut species in Myanmar -- Castor and  Jatropha. Crude
oil derived from milled Jatropha can be directly  used as fuel only after
filtering it with cloth. Experimental use  of the Jatropha crude oil in
running machines and cars has shown  promising results, experts added.

Since October 2005, Myanmar has raised its official fuel prices under
limited supply quota to a record high by nearly nine times  to 1,500 kyats
(1.22 U.S. dollars) from the previous 180 kyats (14 US cents) per gallon
for petrol and 160 kyats (13 cents) per  gallon for diesel.

The government held that despite the fuel price hike, which is  still
comparatively lower than the regional and the world market  prices, the
government still remains subsidized with the fuel  supply.

In addition to the official fuel prices, there exists a market  prices at
3,800 Kyats (about 3 dollars) per gallon for petrol and  4,800 Kyats
(about 3.84 dollars) for diesel.

Myanmar produces about 6 million barrels (798,000 tons) of  crude oil
annually at home, yet it can not meet the demand and the country has to
import over 200 million dollars worth of diesel and crude oil per year.

Meanwhile, in a bid to cut the cost of oil imports as well as  under an
ambitious plan to modify all vehicles in the country in  terms of fuel
operation, the government introduced a program in  August 2004 to
substitute fuel with gas for transportation purpose, targeting to convert
all diesel and petrol vehicles operating in  the country to run on
compressed natural gas (CNG) partly because  of having abundance of
natural gas domestically.

____________________________________

March 7, Mizzima News
Veteran politician calls press conference - Mungpi

To elaborate on the rapidly deteriorating administrative system in Burma ,
veteran Burmese politician U Win Naing has invited journalists and media
persons to a press conference tomorrow at his residence in Rangoon.

The press conference will also be addressed by Htin Kyaw and group, who
were rearrested late Tuesday, said U Win Naing. Authorities this morning
released Htin Kyaw but kept his friends in detention saying they would
also be released soon.

For the second time, Burma is facing the era of "Fascist Japanese" rule
with local officials and administrators randomly abusing the citizen's
rights and exploiting them as they please, said U Win Naing.

Citing a recent incident, where an old and poor woman, who was selling
bird food at a Hindu temple in downtown Rangoon, was slapped and
physically assaulted by municipal officials, U Win Naing in his press
statement released today said local officials by referring to 'the order
from higher authorities' are behaving obnoxiously towards citizens.

"I do not believe that every humiliating action that the local authorities
are carrying out is ordered from above," U Win Naing told Mizzima over
telephone.

Despite the deteriorating economic situation, local authorities continue
to harass citizens and forcibly collect money, which makes the lives of
the citizens a living hell, said U Win Naing.

"I want to point out that there is something seriously wrong in the
current administrative set up," said U Win Naing.

While U Win Naing will highlight the deteriorating administrative system
in Burma, Htin Kyaw, who was released this morning after being taken away
for questioning last night along with seven of his colleagues, and his
friends will explain their situation, where the authorities arrested him
twice in recent weeks.

Though Htin Kyaw was told this morning by officials that following his
release his friends would also be sent home, U win Naing said, "I have not
heard of the release of Htin Kyaw's friends as yet."

Htin Kyaw and his friends staged a rare demonstration on February 22
against Burma's military government in downtown Rangoon , demanding that
the authorities lower prices of essential commodities, improve health care
and education, and provide better pension benefits.

Following the agitation on February 22, Htin Kyaw and eight friends were
arrested but were released later without any charges being framed.

____________________________________
REGIONAL

March 6, Mizzima News
'Burmese freedom fighters' are not 'gunrunners': Solidarity group - Mungpi

The 34 ethnic Burmese rebels, currently lodged in Presidency jail,
Kolkata, should not be wrongly termed 'gunrunners' but should receive a
fair trial under the Indian judicial system, said a solidarity group
today.

Members of the Solidarity Committee for Burma's Freedom Fighters, at a
press conference held at the Indian Women's Press Corps (IWPC), New Delhi
today said that the arrested 34 ethnic Burmese rebels were betrayed by
Indian military intelligence and were allegedly accused of being
'gunrunners' having links with India's northeastern insurgent groups.

"If there are charges against them [the Burmese rebels], then bring
forward the charges. Just to call them gunrunners is not correct," said
Sumit Chakravartty, Editor of 'Mainstream', who is also a member of the
Solidarity Committee.

The 34 rebels, whose trial was shifted from a Port Blair court in
Andaman-Nicobar archipelago to the City Sessions Court in Kolkata on the
orders of the Supreme Court in October 2006, have three charges framed
against them.

The City Sessions Court in Kolkata has charged the rebels with the Arms
Act, the Explosive Substances Act and the Foreigners Act and they would
face the next trial of witnesses on March 21.

The rebels, identified as members of the National Unity Party of Arakan
and the Karen National Union, both ethnic armed rebel groups fighting
against the Burmese military dictators, were arrested in February 1998 in
Landfall Island of Nicobar.

Following the arrest, the Indian Defence Ministry announced that during a
joint military exercise codenamed "Operation Leech", Indian security
forces comprising the Army, Navy, Air Force and Coast Guards, had nabbed a
gang of international gunrunners, allegedly supplying weapons to Indian
insurgent groups in the northeast.

The Ministry of Defence also claimed that a huge cache of arms and
ammunition were seized from the gunrunners and six of them were killed
during a fierce encounter.

The Solidarity Committee, during the press conference released a booklet
titled "Why Are Burma's Freedom Fighters Imprisoned in India?" which
details the whole situation of the arrest of the rebels and questions the
authenticity of the Indian defence establishment's claim.

The booklet reveals that the rebels, who are members of the Arakan Army,
the armed wing of NUPA and KNU, had a close relationship with the Indian
defence establishment through an Indian military intelligence officer
named Colonel V. S "Gary" Grewal who liaised with them.

Colonel V. S "Gary" Grewal, who is known to speak Burmese fluently, had
been in contact with the Arakan Army since 1997, and through him the
Indian security forces had provided the Arakan Army with logistic support.

The rebels on 9 February 1998 arrived at Landfall Island , Nicobar on an
assurance by the Indian military intelligence to allow the group to set up
base on the Island. But the Indian military intelligence had never planned
to keep its promise and arrested their long time friends calling the
betrayal "Operation Leech", and killed six of their leaders in cold blood.

Col Grewal, who had planned and carried out "Operation Leech", was alleged
to have betrayed the rebels, after taking thousands of dollars, at the
behest of the Burmese military junta.

Nandita Haksar, a human rights lawyer and member of the Solidarity
Committee said it is still unclear whether "Operation Leech" was one or a
few Indian intelligence officers taking advantage of the growing
relationship between the Burmese junta and India.

"Whatever the government of India's policy is towards the Burmese junta,
these prisoners should be treated with dignity," said Haksar.

The Solidarity Committee chaired by Dr. Colonel Lakshmi Sehgal of the
former Indian National Army, said while it would want the rebels, who are
freedom fighters, to be set free as solidarity to the Burmese struggle for
democracy, it urges the Indian judicial system to conduct a fair trial of
the rebels.

"According to us, they are not criminals, they are not gunrunners. We
would like these people to be set free. But that depends on the course of
the trial... I can't pressurise the judge," Chakravartty said.

____________________________________

March 7, Agence France Presse
Free Myanmar migrants, rights group urges Malaysia

Kuala Lumpur: A rights group on Wednesday pressed Malaysia to free 108
Myanmar nationals held by police, saying that the minority Rohingya
Muslims were escaping persecution by the military junta in their country.

"They are not illegal immigrants. They are refugees seeking protection in
Malaysia," Zafar Ahmed, president of the Rohingya Human Rights
Organisation in Malaysia told AFP.

"We urge the government to free and provide them temporary shelter in
Malaysia."

Malaysian maritime authorities Monday detained the group for entering the
country illegally after they were found on a fishing boat with no food or
water.

The men were found crammed into a boat meant for 10 people.

State Bernama news agency quoted officials saying that everyone on board
was male, aged between 12 and 52 years. They will be charged with entering
the country illegally.

One of the illegal migrants was quoted by a local daily as saying the men
hoped to secure jobs in Malaysia.

Zafar said there were an estimated 19,000 Rohingyas in Malaysia and many
were registered with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees here.

Malaysia is one of Asia's largest importers of foreign labour.

Foreign workers, both legal and illegal, account for about 2.6 million of
its 10.5-million workforce, supplying much-needed labour, especially in
the country's construction and plantation sectors.

But they are widely blamed for crime and other social ills, and the
government is mulling a controversial bill that proposes 24-hour
surveillance of foreign workers, including on their days off.

_____________________________________
INTERNATIONAL

March 7, Democratic Voice of Burma
US to continue pressing Burma on human rights

The US State Department named Burma as one of the world’s worst rights
violators yesterday and said it would continue to use multilateral avenues
to pressure the Burmese military for change.

The US State Department’s 2006 human rights report, released yesterday
said the Burmese military continued to execute, rape and torture its own
citizens and that rights violations in the country worsened over the
course of last year.

“Prisoners and detainees were subjected to abuse and held in harsh,
life-threatening conditions. Surveillance, harassment, and imprisonment of
political activists continued,” the State Department report said.

“The use of forced labor, trafficking in persons, conscription of child
soldiers, and religious discrimination remained widespread . . . The
regime's cruel and destructive misrule also resulted in refugee outflows,
the spread of infectious diseases, and the trafficking of drugs and human
beings into neighboring countries.”

Several US officials said yesterday the Bush administration would continue
to use multilateral international tools to pressure the Burmese government
over rights abuses but failed to say which international mechanisms they
were referring to.

Press reports emerged early this week claiming the US had ‘informally’
called for a week-long United Nations Human Rights Council special session
on Burma in early April to address the deteriorating conditions in the
country.

But both the US Mission to the UN’s spokesperson Richard Grenell and
assistant secretary of state for democracy, human rights and labor Barry
Lowenkron refused yesterday to confirm or deny the reports.

“We are constantly looking for ways to talk about Burma and if there’s an
opportunity to bring it up at the human rights council we would. We’ve
tried in the past and obviously there’s opposition, but whether it’s at
the Security Council or at the Human Rights Commission, we think that the
issue of Burma needs to be on all of our agendas,” Grenell told DVB in an
exclusive interview.

Grenell also said the US would continue to press for discussion on Burma
in the Security Council, despite China and Russia handing down a joint
veto in January against the first US-backed resolution on the country.

“We’re not convinced that we are done with Burma at the Security Council.
We are looking for every possible way to bring up Burma in every possible
venue . . . We are working internally to figure out a way forward,”
Grenell told DVB.

Several members of the Security Council that did not support the
resolution on Burma said that the UNHRC was a more appropriate mechanism
to tackle Burma’s military junta.

But while speculation spread that the US was planning to push for a UNHRC
move on the issue, several EU diplomats were quoted in press reports as
saying such a move would be premature. Some were quoted as saying the
situation in Burma was not serious enough to warrant international action.

A spokesperson from the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office told DVB
yesterday any moves for a UNHRC action on Burma would have to wait until
the council completed its institution-building phase sometime this year.

“We are keen to bring Burma to the forefront of the international stage .
. . but it is still very early days for the Human Rights Council,” the
spokesperson said.

The US also announced yesterday that it had decided for a second time not
to run for a seat on the UNHRC, saying it still did not consider the
council to be a credible international organ.

State Department spokesperson Sean McCormack told reporters in Washington
yesterday, “We believe that the Human Rights Council has thus far not
proved itself to be a credible body in the mission that it has been
charged with. There has been a nearly singular focus on issues related to
Israel . . . to the exclusion of examining issues of real concern . . .
whether that's in Cuba or Burma or in North Korea.”

But Human Rights Watch said that the US decision not to take seek a seat
on the council was counterproductive and that the UN organ was weak
because of poor efforts by countries such as the US to make it stronger.

Dave Mathieson, a Burma consultant for HRW, also said it was the UNHRC’s
perceived weaknesses that led some countries to express doubt over the
possibility of it tackling Burma.

“(Placing) Burma as a prominent issue in the Human Rights Council could
actually embolden and strengthen the [UNHRC],” Mathieson said.

“A lot of the dissenters and countries that didn’t think Burma was worthy
to be on the Security Council, referred to Burma as being a human rights
concern and should actually be on the Human Rights Council—well that’s the
next logical step.”

Mathieson also slammed suggestions by some countries and politicians that
the situation in Burma did not warrant UNHRC or Security Council action.

“Anyone who says that the human rights situation in Burma is not serious
enough to be included on the council is speaking from a position of deep
ignorance and stupidity,” Mathieson said.

_____________________________________

_____________________________________
OPINION / OTHER

March 7, International Herald Tribune
Myanmar's neighbors hold the key - Stanley A. Weiss

Yangon: In this reclusive, war-ravaged nation that Kipling once said is
"quite unlike any land you know," one fact is quite clear — Western
efforts to bring Burma's brutal military dictatorship to its knees have
failed.

Despite a decade of American and European trade sanctions, Burma (which
the junta renamed Myanmar) reported record-high foreign investment last
year of $6 billion, mostly from a single hydropower project backed by
Thailand, now the largest investor.

And despite a parade of foreign envoys preaching "constructive
engagement," the military that has ruled for 45 years remains defiant.
Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel peace laureate and democracy activist, has now
spent 11 of the past 17 years under house arrest.

What's the secret to the generals' staying power?

Thank the neighbors. The junta has deftly played them off one another,
notably China and India, as they compete for regional influence and
natural resources, including Myanmar's natural gas reserves, the world's
10th largest.

Like the strategic Burma Road of World War II, Myanmar remains a critical
link in China's security thinking. In addition to billion-dollar bilateral
trade deals and major Chinese weapons sales to the junta, a new
trans-Myanmar pipeline will carry Middle East oil from the Bay of Bengal
to China's southern Yunnan province.

Not to be outflanked, India has made Myanmar a lynchpin of its "Look East"
foreign policy and has dampened its support for Burmese democracy
activists. In return, New Delhi has won the junta's military cooperation
against long-running insurgencies in India's northeast border states and
its blessing for a new gas pipeline to India.

Myanmar's generals have become masters at turning energy deals into
protection money.

In September, Russia — also a major arms supplier to the regime — voted
against formally putting Myanmar on the UN Security Council agenda. The
very same day, Russia's state-owned Zarubezhneft oil company was awarded
Moscow's first contract to explore Myanmar's offshore oil and gas
reserves.

In January, China and Russia vetoed a U.S-backed Security Council
resolution condemning the junta. Days later, Myanmar awarded major
contracts to China's National Petroleum Corp. Indonesia, the self-styled
leader of Southeast Asia with growing military ties of its own with
Myanmar, abstained.

So how to avoid the carrot of Chinese, Indian and Russian trade canceling
out the stick of U.S. and European sanctions? Consider a key ingredient of
the six-party talks on North Korea that produced last month's tentative
agreement — a united international front that coordinates both sticks and
carrots.

To be sure, Burma doesn't present the same galvanizing threat as North
Korean nuclear weapons. But Myanmar's neighbors — especially China, India
and Thailand — increasingly worry about Myanmar's destabilizing exports:
HIV/AIDS, huge quantities of heroin and opium and refugees from the
junta's latest onslaught against ethnic rebels.

New Delhi has an interest in showing that its ties with Myanmar can
promote reform instead of simply tarnishing India's image as the world's
largest democracy. And Beijing surely wants to avoid yet another case of
disenchanted Asians targeting Chinese minorities. Meanwhile, Myanmar's
fear of Chinese domination gives New Delhi some leverage.

Tying future Chinese, Indian and Thai trade to economic and political
liberalization could be the one stick to which the junta might respond.

Simultaneously, just as the Bush administration showed new flexibility
toward Pyongyang — lifting financial sanctions and offering economic
assistance — Washington could offer Myanmar specific incentives, such as
the gradual easing of sanctions, if the junta met certain benchmarks, such
as releasing political prisoners like Suu Kyi and undertaking certain
reforms.

Of course, there's no guarantee that the junta would ever relinquish its
rule. But "there are examples of the regime responding to specific
incentives and disincentives," says Thant Myint-U, author of a new history
of Burma, "The River of Lost Footsteps."

After years of Asian and Russian trade negating Western sanctions, it's
time to try something else.

"The younger generation of upcoming generals needs to know what they can
gain by being more open, with the world laying out specific incentives and
disincentives," said Myint-U. "No one has attempted that, so it's worth a
try."