BurmaNet News, August 13, 2008

[Editor]

August 13, 2008 Issue #3533


INSIDE BURMA
DVB: U Win Tin tells UN’s Quintana of rights abuses
DVB: Monks given two-year prison term
DVB: Fuel price protestors face new charges
Irrawaddy: “Courage in Journalism” award for Burmese woman
Myanmar Times: Delta villagers keen to work but lack necessary resources

ON THE BORDER
Irrawaddy: Karen Martyrs’ Day marked by calls for unity

DRUGS
AFP: Myanmar arrests 385 drug traffickers in July: state media

REGIONAL
Irrawaddy: UN Human Rights Envoy cancels Press Conference
Vietnam News Agency: Vietnam, Myanmar push for stronger defence ties

OPINION / OTHER
The Guardian: West’s authority eroding
AFP: Rape wrecking communities in Darfur, Myanmar: Nobelists

____________________________________
INSIDE BURMA

August 13, Democratic Voice of Burma
U Win Tin tells UN’s Quintana of rights abuses

Long-term political prisoner U Win Tin condemned the Burmese government’s
treatment of political prisoners in a meeting with the United Nations
rights envoy, according to U Win Tin’s friend U Maung Maung Khin.

Veteran journalist U Win Tin met Tomas Ojea Quintana, the UN special
rapporteur on human rights in Burma, for 45 minutes on 4 August, U Maung
Maung Khin said.

U Maung Maung Khin said U Win Tin had thanked Quintana for UN efforts to
secure his release but said he wanted freedom for all political inmates,
not just himself.

"Apparently, he also informed Mr Quintana about the inmates who were kept
in prison after they had served their prison terms and were due for
release and that it was a violation of human rights to treat them this
way," U Maung Maung Khin said.

"He told him about [comedian and activist] Zarganar and [88 generation
student leader] Min Ko Naing too."

U Maung Maung Khin said U Win Tin had not given up on his strong political
stance during his imprisonment.

"He said he had been in prison for 19 years of his 20-year sentence and
that he was designated a criminal inmate by authorities instead of being
called a political inmate and had not had a day reduced from his term – he
said that was a violation of his rights," U Maung Maung Khin said.

"He said his political stance – which calls firmly for the release of Daw
Aung San Suu Kyi and all political prisoners and the convening of a
parliamentary meeting – had not changed yet," he said.

"He told Mr Quintana he would only want to be released on political
grounds as when he was arrested but that he would want to be released with
a favour of just being old."

____________________________________

August 13, Democratic Voice of Burma
Monks given two-year prison term

Nine monks arrested by authorities at Rangoon railway station last month
have been sentenced to two years’ imprisonment each on charges of bringing
the Sasana into disrepute.

According to family members of political inmates in Insein prison, the
monks were sentenced shortly after their arrests on 15 July.

"They were brought into a court hearing soon after they were arrested and
then given a two-year sentence each," a family member said.

"Authorities detained the monks for gathering at the railway station but
did not give any other reasons," he said.

"All the monks remained unidentified – no one knows their names, where
they were from and who their lay supporters were."

The nine monks were arrested while waiting at the railway station to
return to their monasteries for a retreat to mark Buddhist lent, according
to a witness.

Insein prison was unavailable for comment.

____________________________________

August 13, Democratic Voice of Burma
Fuel price protestors face new charges

Eight students and human rights activists arrested during protests against
fuel price hikes last year have had five further charges added to their
original charge of sedition, said their family members.

The student activists and Human Rights Defenders and Promoters network
members will now be charged under sections 143, 145, 147, 295(a) and
505(b) of the penal code.

Sections 143, 145 and 147, which relate to unlawful assembly and rioting,
carry a potential combined prison sentence of up to four and a half years,
while 295(a) on offences against religion and 505(b) on inciting offences
against public tranquility each carry a maximum two-year term.

Along with the possible three-year sentence for sedition, this means the
defendants could now face up to 11 and a half years’ imprisonment each.

Ma Thi Thi Soe, sister of HRDP member Ko Myo Thant (also known as John
Nawtha), said her brother and his co-defendants – Ko Zin Linn Aung, Ko
Sithu Maung, Ko Thein Swe, Ko Ye Myant Hein, Ko Ye Min Oo and Ko Kyi Phyu
– heard the new charges against them during a hearing at Insein prison
yesterday.

Ko Myo Thant went on a hunger strike in March to protest against
violations of inmates’ rights in Insein prison.

____________________________________

August 13, Irrawaddy
“Courage in Journalism” award for Burmese woman - Min Lwin

A Burmese woman journalist, Aye Aye Win, has been awarded the
International Women’s Media Foundation “Courage in Journalism” prize for
2008.

The Foundation said it had chosen Aye Aye Win, 54, for the award because
of her coverage of such events as last September’s demonstrations, in the
face of great danger to herself. Aye Aye Win reports for the international
news agency Associated Press.

In a telephone interview with The Irrawaddy on Wednesday, Aye Aye Win said
she thought the Foundation had chosen her for the award because “they
regard me as hard-working,” rather than for courage.

The Foundation said in a press release that Aye Aye Win worked under
constant surveillance by the authorities. Police or military intelligence
agents kept a watch on her home and her telephone was often tapped.

Often, to elude the authorities, Aye Aye Win disguises herself, changing
her hairstyle and even wearing men’s clothes.

She had accompanied opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi until being barred
by the authorities. She also followed closely details of the arrest of
activists and members of Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy.

The Foundation’s “Courage in Journalism” award is presented annually to
women journalists who “showed extraordinary strength of character and
integrity while reporting the news under dangerous or difficult
circumstances.”

Two other women journalists were selected for the 2008 award—Fraida Nekzad
from Afghanistan and Sevgul Uludag from Cyprus.

____________________________________

August 10, Myanmar Times
Delta villagers keen to work but lack necessary resources - Thet Khaing

Shwe Pyi Aye village, located deep in the southern Ayeyarwady delta, was
devastated by cyclone Nargis. Virtually all structures on the ground were
destroyed and half the population were killed.

Despite the massive loss of life and property, three months after the
disaster most of the village’s 473 survivors are either back at work or
are seeking sufficient financial support to resume their pre-cyclone
economic activities.

As in many parts of the delta, the scale of destruction in Shwe Pyi Aye
has not dampened the residents’ enthusiasm for returning to work and
getting on with their lives as quickly as possible. The only thing
stopping many of them is lack of resources.

When a team of senior experts from the United Nations Development Program
(UNDP) visited the village on July 29, residents had no shortage of ideas
on how aid could best be used to restore livelihoods.

Among the ideas expressed at a meeting between villagers and UN experts
was a suggestion to provide more assistance to large-scale farmers so that
landless workers could earn daily wages.

Others said that locals should be supplied with boats and nets because
fishing was the easiest way to earn a living in the area, and many were
also keen for UNDP to resume a micro-credit scheme it had sponsored in the
past.
“I don’t want to live on assistance. I can still work to earn my living,”
said U Kyin Maung, 65, the lone survivor of a family of eight. His adult
children had been running a grocery store in the village before the
cyclone struck.

As an elderly person and the sole survivor of his family, U Kyin Maung was
classified by UNDP as one of the most vulnerable of the village’s
survivors. He was granted K40,000 when the organisation started its
assistance project in Shwe Pyi Aye six weeks after the cyclone.

U Kyin Maung used the money to open his own grocery store in a hut built
on the site of his former house.

He said he buys food for his shop in Bogale, the nearest town to the
village, but business has been slow because most locals have been left
destitute by cyclone and therefore have little money to spend at his shop.

For now U Kyin Maung sells on credit to lure customers, most of whom live
on small daily wages they get from their involvement in UNDP-sponsored
cash-for-work schemes. He said he now earns about K500 a day, which he
uses to pay living expenses.

“I feel lucky just to be alive,” U Kyin Maung told The Myanmar Times last
week. “I’m thankful to the government and aid agencies for providing
emergency supplies of food and other relief items after the cyclone,
otherwise we would all be dead of starvation.”

“But we can’t expect that to continue forever. We’re not living in the
desert. We have sufficient food resources all around us. We just need the
tools to resume our work,” he said.

Another Shwe Pyi Aye resident, 39-year-old U Kyaw Htoo, was also the sole
survivor of a family of eight.

“I have tried to overcome the loss of my young children and elderly
parents so I can resume my work,” he said. “I’ve already finished planting
paddy on 6 of the 9 acres on my farm.”

A local social group called Ayeyarwady Thitsar helped U Kyaw Htoo plough
his fields, and he used seeds and a power tiller provided by the
government and UNDP for paddy growing.

“But a lack of sufficient fertilisers and the salinity conditions of the
farmland could lead to lower paddy production than in previous years,” he
said, adding that he normally earns K2 million a year from his fields.

UNDP said it has given K7.1 million in cash assistance since the cyclone,
including grants for rebuilding destroyed houses, daily wages for
community work and fuel to operate power tillers.

Many locals have said they are afraid of similar disasters in the future
and want at least one sturdy concrete building in the village where people
can take shelter during storms.

The only building that survived the storm was the village monastery, where
110 people took refuge during the cyclone and survived.

UNDP categorised the work of rebuilding the infrastructure in Shwe Pyi Aye
and other parts of the delta as a long-term initiative that will help
locals build a better life than they had before the storm.

Mr Bishow Parajuli, the UNDP resident representative in Myanmar, pointed
out in an interview with The Myanmar Times last week that his organisation
has been involved for the past 14 years in human development initiatives
supporting the improvement of life for rural residents.

“We have offices in many parts of the country and these have been our
strength. We are applying that strength to the post-Nargis situation,
principally by helping people regain their livelihoods and stand on their
own feet, and by helping them increase their incomes and maintain their
human dignity,” he said.

He said UNDP also wants to resume offering micro-credit for poor rural
residents in the delta, a project that was disrupted by the cyclone.
UNDP intends to write off nearly US$3 million in loans taken out by 50,000
borrowers, and refund US$1.25 million to the surviving 75,000 participants
in the scheme living in cyclone-affected areas.

“All these efforts require extra resources,” Mr Parajuli said, adding that
his agency is seeking $52 million to help cyclone victims through next
April.
The funding requirement – which is part of the appeal made by the UN last
month for $482 million to help cyclone survivors – includes $8 million to
restore the micro-credit scheme and expand it to increase the numbers of
beneficiaries, he said.

“In the past several years UNDP has put $23 million into its micro-credit
scheme and an very large number of these programs in the delta were
affected by Nargis, so we are trying to renew that support by injecting
additional money,” Mr Parajuli said.

“Micro-credit is important because it helps individuals start small-scale
activities and employment-generating schemes, whether they involve trade,
land cultivation, animal husbandry or poultry,” he said, adding that the
expended micro-credit scheme in the delta will directly benefit 500,000
people.
“This will obviously have a big impact in terms of food security, families
being able to get their kids back to school and establishing health
facilities,” Mr Parajuli said.

“Our goal is to complement various efforts by the government, the many
national players and other UN agencies,” he added.

Mr Parajuli, who is also the UN’s resident coordinator in Myanmar, said he
guaranteed that donor money would be put to the best possible use by
providing benefits to the intended beneficiaries.

“The good part of the UNDP program is that our agency works directly with
the communities, our resources are directly delivered to communities and
we have a good understanding and cooperation with the government,” he said
“We have full accountability of resources and we help communities to help
themselves,” he said.

____________________________________
ON THE BORDER

August 13, Irrawaddy
Karen Martyrs’ Day marked by calls for unity - Saw Yan Naing

As Karen people around the world observed Karen Martyrs’ Day on Tuesday,
leaders of Burma’s largest and longest-running ethnic resistance movement
called for unity among their people.

David Htaw, a spokesperson for the Karen National Union (KNU), used the
occasion, which commemorates the assassination of KNU founding president
Saw Ba U Gyi and eight of his colleagues 58 years ago, to highlight the
dangers of disunity.

“If we look at the assassinations of our President Ba U Gyi and our
General Secretary Padoh Mahn Sha, we can see that they were the result of
plots by the Burmese government and some opportunists to divide our Karen
people,” he said.

Mahn Sha was shot to death at his home in the Thai border town of Mae Sot
on February 14, 2008. His murder by two Karen gunmen, believed to have
been sent by a breakaway group that has joined forces with Burma’s
military regime, shocked the Karen community.

David Htaw also pointed to the formation of the Democratic Karen Buddhist
Army (DKBA)—the largest Karen splinter group—in 1995 as further evidence
of the Burmese regime’s divide-and-rule tactics.

The KNU, one of the oldest surviving rebel groups in Southeast Asia, has
been struggling for autonomy since 1949. Although it has taken part in
peace talks with the Burmese junta on several occasions, it has never
signed a ceasefire agreement.

In 2004, Gen Bo Mya, the former KNU chairman, visited Rangoon for peace
talks with then Prime Minister Khin Nyunt. The resulting “gentlemen’s
agreement” technically stayed in force until Bo Mya’s death in December
2006, even after Burmese military offensives in the early part of the year
forced an estimated 30,000 Karen villagers to flee.

The KNU broke off all communications with the junta in February 2007, when
Brig-Gen Htain Maung, the former head of KNU Brigade 7, and some 300 KNU
soldiers defected to the Burmese army. Since then, the KNU hasn’t resumed
talks with the Burmese generals.

Zoya Phan, the international coordinator for Burma Campaign UK, also
attributed the failure of the Karen to achieve their political goals in
part to their lack of unity. But she also blamed the Burmese regime for
perpetuating the decades-old conflict.

“The Burmese generals don’t want to solve the conflict in Burma through
political dialogue. They are stubborn. So peace hasn’t yet prevailed in
our country,” said Zoya Phan, who is also the daughter of slain KNU leader
Mahn Sha.

She added that the Karen people should continue to firmly follow the four
guiding principles of Saw Ba U Gyi. These principles are: There shall be
no surrender; the recognition of the Karen State must be complete; we
shall retain our arms; and we shall decide our own political destiny.

Meanwhile, Eh Htoo, joint secretary of the Karen Youth Organization, said
the Karen struggle has taken so long because Karen people are uninterested
in politics and do not participate enough in the political movement.

“Our Karen people have very little knowledge about politics,” said Eh
Htoo. “Some who live in the mountains never have a chance to study. Even
some leaders have insufficient knowledge about politics.”

Educated Karen youth, including those who study abroad, should participate
in the political movement and help Karen people to reach their goal, said
Eh Htoo.

Zipporah Sein, general secretary of the Karen Women’s Organization, said
Karen women also needed to be encouraged to play a more prominent role in
political decision making.

“We have to finish the work of our heroes who sacrificed their lives. It
is our duty and every Karen is responsible for the freedom of Karen
people. More Karen women should participate in politics as well,” said
Zipporah Sein.

“In order to achieve our aim, it is very important for Karen people to
realize that they are Karen nationals and speed up the movement for peace
by working together,” she added.

____________________________________
DRUGS

August 13, Agence France Presse
Myanmar arrests 385 drug traffickers in July: state media

Myanmar arrested 385 drug traffickers last month, state media said
Wednesday, as the world's second-largest opium producer sought to show it
was cracking down on the narcotics trade.

The United Nations anti-drugs body has said opium production in Myanmar
shot up 46 percent from 2006 to 2007, but the military-ruled nation
continues to insist that it is on track to be drugs-free by 2014.

"Action was taken against 385 persons -- 317 men and 68 women in 236
cases," the junta-run New Light of Myanmar newspaper said.

Police, customs and the military also seized 105 kilograms (231 pounds) of
opium, 1.6 kilograms of heroin, 138,550 stimulant tablets and smaller
quantities of other narcotics and chemicals in July, it added.

Myanmar's mountainous and lawless border regions once hid swathes of poppy
fields which fed most of the world's opium habit well into the 1990s.

Under pressure from governments including close ally China, Myanmar
eventually began a campaign in the 1990s to eradicate the crop, and soon
Afghanistan took its mantle as the world's top opium producer.

But after a few years of steep decline, opium production in Myanmar has
risen once again.

A UN Office on Drugs and Crime report last year blamed high-level
collusion and corruption for the rise, while activists across the border
in Thailand say the crop substitution programmes for poor farmers have not
been successful.

The military-ruled nation, meanwhile, has become a hub for methamphetamine
production, with convoys of high-tech trucks ferrying chemicals and mobile
laboratories under the cover of Myanmar's dense jungle, experts says.

____________________________________
REGIONAL

August 13, Irrawaddy
UN Human Rights Envoy cancels Press Conference - Violet Cho

The new UN Human Rights Special Rapporteur on Burma canceled a press
conference in Bangkok on Wednesday, a sign that his first trip to Burma
yielded little practical results, say activists.

Tomas Ojea Quintana arrived in Rangoon on August 3 on his mission to Burma
and scheduled a press conference after he left Burma on August 7. No
reason was given for the cancellation of the press conference.

During his trip in Burma, Quintana was not allowed to visit detained
democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who is under house arrest. He was
allowed short talks of about 10 minutes each with members of the National
League of Democracy and Labour Minister Aung Kyi, the government’s liaison
coordinator with Suu Kyi.

Earlier, Quintana told the media he had received "good signs" that the
Burmese junta accepted the need for his mandate to investigate widespread
claims of human rights abuses in the country.

However, members of human rights groups said the special envoy may have
cancelled the press conference because he achieved little progress in
brief discussions with the military regime during his four-day visit to
Rangoon.

“He probably cancelled his meeting with the press because he lacked real
information about human right violations in Burma that he can share it
with the public,” said Maung Maung Lay, a member of Rangoon-based Human
Rights Defenders and Promoters (HRDP).

In future visits, Quintana must be allowed to meet with more human rights
groups and activists and not be confined to discussions with the military
government, said Maung Maung Lay.

Bo Kyi, the joint secretary of the Assistance Association of Political
Prisoners—Burma, who met with Quintana in Thailand, said, “As a new human
rights envoy, Quintana must be very careful with everything he says. An
opportunity to be able to enter Burma again depends a lot on what he says
about the military regime.”

Quintana replaced former UN Human Rights Special Rapporteur on Burma Paulo
Sergio Pinheiro, whose appointment ended in April.

A few days after Quintana left the country, Burmese authorities seized
prominent human rights activist Myint Aye of the HRDP and members of the
National League for Democracy (NLD).

NLD spokesperson Nyan Win confirmed that Nyi Pu, chairman of the NLD
Taunggok branch in Arakan State, and Dr Tin Min Htut, an elected member of
parliament from Panthanaw constituency in Irrawaddy Division, were
arrested on Tuesday morning. No reason for their arrests was given.

Recently, Nyi Pu and Dr Tin Min Htut had signed a public letter, along
with other NLD members, to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urging the UN
to reject the junta’s constitution as illegitimate.

Nyi Pu's arrest came four days after the anniversary of the 1988 uprising.
On Friday, authorities arrested 48 demonstrators who took part in a 1988
commemoration march in Rangoon. Forty-three marchers were released the
same day. The remaining five are still in custody.

____________________________________

August 13, Vietnam News Agency
Vietnam, Myanmar push for stronger defence ties

Vietnam’s Defence Minister General Phung Quang Thanh and General Thura
Shwe Man of Myanmar have discussed measures to bolster the two countries’
defence cooperation during their talks in Myanmar.

The talks, which also touched upon the current situation in each country,
was part of Defence Minister Thanh’s four-day visit to Myanmar from Aug.
10 with the aim of strengthening the friendship between the two countries’
armies and people.

Later, Defence Minister Thanh was received by Chairman of the State Peace
and Development Council (SPDC) Senior General Than Shwe, who appreciated
the Vietnamese people’s support for Myanmar in its national building and
development, especially in surmounting the consequences of Cyclone Nargis.

Myanmar Senior General Than Shwe said he believed the traditional
friendship and cooperation between the two countries will be further
cemented and growing in the time to come.

For his part, Defence Minister Thanh thanked the Myanmar people for
valuable assistance given to the Vietnamese people in the latter’s
struggle for national reunification and said he believed the Myanmar
people and army will overcome all difficulties to make their country
prosperous and their army modern.

While in Myanmar , the Vietnamese Defence Minister and his entourage
visited several military units, historical relics and sites of interests.

____________________________________
OPINION / OTHER

August 13, The Guardian
West’s authority eroding


>From Burma to Zimbabwe, the West can no longer impose its will on the

increasingly powerful and self-confident nations of the developing world,
writes Martin Jacques.

We are but halfway through 2008, yet it has already born witness to a
sizeable shift in global power.

The default Western mindset remains that the Western writ rules.

That is hardly surprising; it has been true for so long there has been
little reason foranyone to question it, least of all the West.

The assumption is that might and right are invariably on its side, that it
always knows best and that, if necessary, it will enforce its political
wisdom and moral rectitude on others.

There is, however, a hitch: the authority of the self-appointed global
sheriff is remorselessly eroding.

There have been two outstanding examples so far this year. The first was
Burma (or Myanmar as it should be known). We may all agree that the regime
is odious.

The question facing the rest of the world in the aftermath of the cyclone,
however, was how to assist the millions of victims of a humanitarian
disaster.

True to form, it was not long before the West, including Britain’s foreign
secretary, was talking up the idea of military intervention; warships were
deployed off Burma’s coast, talk was rife of helicopter landings and
amphibious craft making their way up the Irrawaddy delta.

The idea, of course, was patently absurd. Burma’s closest ally is China,
with whom it shares a long border, while it is also a member of Asean (the
Association of South East Asian Nations). China, India and Asean — who
largely make up the region — were irrevocably opposed to the use of
military force.

Western leaders were living in a time warp: the knee-jerk responses of
old, freshened up by the short-lived era of liberal interventionism, have
become a stock response. It was not long before the bellicose talk
subsided and the West was obliged to channel its aid via Asean — which,
from the outset, was the obvious and desirable course of action.

The fact that the West could not understand the geopolitical realities of
East Asia — now the largest economic region in the world — and adapt its
policies accordingly, revealed that old assumptions and attitudes run very
deep indeed.

Even when the very thought is ridiculous and utterly impractical, the call
for military intervention, on the part of political leaders and media
commentators alike, is seemingly the invariable reflex action.

In fact, what Burma demonstrated were the limits of Western power, the
need for the West to understand those limits, and to respect and work with
a region rather than seeking to intervene over its head like some kind of
imperial overlord.

The second example is Zimbabwe.

This hurts the British psyche.

Because we suffer from an acute case of colonial amnesia, we seem to think
that we have some unalienable right to lecture Zimbabwe on its iniquities.

Yet Britain’s culpability for the country’s plight — from tolerating Ian
Smith’s declaration of independence to the disgraceful land deal that
guaranteed the privileged position of white settlers — is second to none.
Notwithstanding all of this, the British feel they enjoy incomparable
moral virtue on Zimbabwe.

Yet this episode too has revealed British — and Western — impotence in its
starkest form. After much grandstanding at the G8 summit, the
Anglo-American attempt to toughen up sanctions foundered in the United
Nations Security Council, where it was vetoed by Russia and China and
opposed by South Africa and two others.

Meanwhile, President Thabo Mbeki, whose efforts to broker some kind of
deal have been widely and patronisingly scorned, has scored a major
diplomatic triumph.

The Southern Africa Development Community’s appointed mediator for
Zimbabwe, President Mbeki managed to bring both Robert Mugabe’s Zanu-PF
and Morgan Tsvangirai’s MDC to the negotiating table.

All the Western bluster and invective now look just that: the route to a
possible solution has been the work of South Africa, Sadc and the African
Union alone.

This is yet a further illustration of a shift in global authority.

Western power can no longer deliver in

the face of the growing power, competence and self-confidence of
developing countries.

Instead of universal Western power, we are witnessing the rise of
regionalisation and regional solutions.

This reflects broader changes in the global economy. Economic power is
fast ebbing away from the old G7 countries towards the so-called Bric
economies (Brazil, Russia, India and China), or, rather more accurately, a
growing number of developing economies.
The G7 now account for less than half of global GDP and that share is
steadily falling.

Such economic shifts are the irresistible prelude to parallel changes in
political power.

The two examples discussed are classic instances of this process: Burma
involved China and India, together with the Asean countries, while
Zimbabwe featured South Africa, with Russia and especially China,
emboldened in this instance to play a more assertive role on the global
stage.

They illustrate what might be described as the growing "Bricisation" of
global politics.

They also underline the comprehensive failure of Anglo-American foreign
policy.

At the time of the invasion of Iraq, no thought was given to the idea that
Western economic power was on the wane; on the contrary, the likes of Bush
and Blair seemed to believe that we were seeing the dawning of an era of
new and overwhelming Western power.

Never underestimate the ability of political leaders to misread history on
a monumental scale.

The invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan have both served to hasten Western
decline: they have both failed to achieve their objectives and, in the
process, demonstrated an underlying Western impotence.

In contrast, those other "rogue" states, namely North Korea, Zimbabwe, and
perhaps even Iran, show strong signs of responding in a positive manner to
a very different kind of treatment.

Liberal interventionism has failed. But as yet the West shows no sign of
either understanding the New World or being able to live according to its
terms.

It remains in denial, refusing to recognise the diminution in its own
authority and, as a result, seemingly incapable of adapting to the new
circumstances and coming up with an innovative response.

This is certainly true of Britain. The foreign secretary only seems able
to utter the platitudes and cliches of the discredited Blairite era: he
has yet to come up with a single idea, suggestion or insight that
indicates he understands the nature of this New World.

British foreign policy is mired in its own past and in its relationship
with the United States.

In such circumstances, we will find ourselves dragged kicking and
screaming into the new era, constantly shunned and disappointed, a
spectator rather than an architect, cast in the role of Mr Grumpy.

l Martin Jacques is a visiting research fellow at the London School of
Economics Asia Research Centre. This article was originally published in
The Guardian.

____________________________________

August 13, Agence France Presse
Rape wrecking communities in Darfur, Myanmar: Nobelists

Rape is increasingly being used as a tool of war in ethnic conflicts in
Darfur and Myanmar, wrecking families and communities, two women Nobel
peace laureates warned Tuesday.

Jody Williams, who spearheaded a campaign banning antipersonnel landmines,
and Wangari Maathai, an outspoken advocate for greater democracy in
Africa, said women were paying "the highest price" in the violent
conflicts.

The duo, accompanied by actress-activist Mia Farrow and other rights
campaigners, visited clinics and refugee camps to hear first-hand the
plight of women affected by the violence in the two areas.

"Unfortunately, in the ethnic cleansing being carried out by the Burmese
military junta in eastern Burma, rape is being used as a tool of war, as
it is in Darfur," Williams said, using Myanmar's former name Burma.

"The obvious purpose, in my view, is to destroy the fabric of the
community. If the women are raped, they are obviously shamed in the eyes
of their community. Often times the husbands divorce the women, who are
left alone," she said.

Maathai said women were the first to be "victimised" in conflicts --
"victimised by the fighters and then be victimised by the men that you
love.

"It is very, very painful and for the women, it is pain you live with all
your life.

"As for the girls, you can imagine the trauma and sometimes, I would look
at the eyes of the women in the camp and just wonder whether she is one of
those who was raped and what is going on in her heart and mind," Maathai
said.

Within a camp in Chad sheltering refugees who fled the Darfur conflict in
neighboring Sudan, Williams said she met with a group of about 30 to 40
women and "within the space of the hour that I had with them, I've heard
of seven tell the stories of their gang rape.

"One woman was 35 years old and she had been raped by several of the
Janjaweed (Arab militia in Sudan) and by the time she saw her husband, he
already knew she was raped and he divorced her on the spot, leaving her
with eight children," she said.

"Obviously, if you do this to enough communities, you destroy the family,
you destroy the fabric of a community and if you do it throughout enough
villages, you can shred the fabric of an ethnic group, which is what they
are doing in Darfur and which is what they have done in the eastern part
of Burma," she said.

According to the United Nations, up to 300,000 people have died and more
than 2.2 million have fled their homes since the conflict erupted in
Sudan's western Darfur region in February 2003.

It began when African ethnic minority rebels took up arms against the
Arab-led Khartoum regime and state-backed Arab militias, fighting for
resources and power in one of the most remote and deprived places on
earth.

In Myanmar, rights groups charge the soldiers from the country's ruling
military junta raped women in ethnic minority areas in an apparent bid to
punish populations suspected of supporting insurgency groups.

Williams said a sister of a rape victim from Myanmar she spoke to in
Thailand along the border with the military-run country was eager to
complete her education so that she could return to help her people.

"This young woman was going to stand up and struggle for her sister, for
her community, showing again the resilience in the face of such brutality
which amazes me," she said.

____________________________________

August 13, Mizzima News
Remembering our heroes and rethinking the revolution - Saw Kapi

August 12th is a solemn day in the history of the Karen people. On this
day we mourn the deaths of our national heroes, or martyrs if you will,
and remember their sacrifices. It has been almost 60 years since the
glorious Karen armed resistance commenced in 1949, and our dead heroes –
San C. Poe, Saw Pay Thar, Synedy Loo Ne, Saw Ba U Gyi, Saw San Kay, Mahn
Ba Zan,  Skaw Ler Taw, Gen. Bo Mya and countless others – have indeed
persisted in our collective memory. The persistence of our memories for
them, however, may not be in exactly the way they anticipated.

Most of those who claim to admire Saw Ba U Gyi and are vehemently against
reviewing his principles have only the sketchiest knowledge of his life
and goals. Somewhat surprisingly, the apotheosis of Saw Ba U Gyi's four
principles is accompanied by a parallel disappearance of the real
understanding of his intellectual insights and the unmatched sacrifices he
made. Gone is the educated, intellectual and selfless Saw Ba U Gyi, who
sold thousands of acres of his inherited land to compensate the government
for money stolen from a government bank by his unruly followers. Gone is
the confident warrior who trusted his people, refusing to accept a platoon
of personal bodyguards offered to him and as a result ambushed and killed
by enemy troops. To date, the principles he laid down and the future he
wanted for his people have not been realized. Confined mainly in the
Thai-Burma border area, the movement has been gradually losing its
strength and consequently, to some extent, its relevancy.

In fact, it is troubling to note that there is a huge gap between the
magnitude of our challenges and the smallness of our politics - our
chronic avoidance of answering tough questions, our remarkable inability
to build a viable consensus to tackle the critical problems confronting
our people and our singular lack of confidence and skills in engaging the
international community in an increasingly interconnected world.

The first step to solving our people's predicament and advancing our cause
is to confront the naked realities before us as they really are, not as we
fancy them to be. Imperative is the need for us to recognize the gap
between our professed ideals as a people – the imagined Karen community –
and the reality we witness everyday. The Karen as we would like to imagine
ourselves is a homogeneous assembly, concentrated in one geographic area,
speaking the same language, and subscribing to one religion. But such is
not the case. The reality, whether we like it or not, is that there are
three major Karen sub-groups, each with its own distinctive spoken and
written language. While almost 35 percent of Sqaw Karen subscribe to
Christianity, a large percentage of Pwo Karen remain faithful to Buddhism.
And a small percentage of both Pwo and Sqaw still practice animism.

Having settled in a wide range of geographic areas with notable
concentrations in the Mergui/Tavoy region, Irrawaddy delta, Toungoo hill
tracks and Pa-pun district, Karen people within and beyond Burma
intermingle with other ethnic nationalities. Although there are some
exclusively Karen enclaves in different parts of Burma, it is hard to
point to a single geographic region inhabited only by Karen. This
demographic reality demands that we seriously rethink the issue of how we
define a Karen state. How can the recognition of a Karen state be
completed, until and unless we establish a consensus on what a Karen state
should constitute?

Equally important, and no less complex and sensitive, is the question of
what should be the official Karen language. Of course we must have the
right to speak, read, write and be educated in our own language. But in
actuality, we have three distinctive Karen languages, belonging to three
different Karen sub-groups. Which one do we want to use for official
communication? These are fundamental questions that need to be addressed
in the broader national context with utmost rationality and sensitivity.

Establishing a collective consent of Karen people in response to these
questions will be a crucial step toward deciding our own political
destiny. Only this critical process of questioning and reviewing our
movement will allow us to see that there is an urgent need to restructure
the increasingly fragmented Karen national identity and for a realistic
and articulate Karen voice in national and international politics.

Undoubtedly, the Karen need a new generation of political leadership that
can articulate a national strategy that goes beyond the same voices
recycled from the old framework. The new and younger political leadership
must be able to grasp the complex dynamics of ethnicity and yet be attuned
to the regional political situation of an increasingly interconnected
world. After more than half a century, there is no doubt about the Karen
determination to fight militarily. But on this long and painful path that
the Karen people were and still are compelled to tread, it takes more than
a strong will to reach our goal. As part of our struggle, we will need to
come up with a strategy that goes beyond regular press releases that
simply expose atrocities committed by the Burmese military regime against
the Karen.

If the Karen struggle is to gain national and international support,
intellectuals, few though they may be among the Karen, will have to look
beyond their narrowly specialized disciplines, and play their own role
within the struggle. Many western-trained Karen intellectuals – such as
Dr. San C. Poe, Saw Ba U Gyi, Saw Pay Thar and Saw Sydney Loo Ni –
participated at the forefront of the struggle when the Karen began their
movement.  It is now time for the Karen to gather their strength from all
walks of life, including the exiles and the urban intellectuals – whose
voices must play a critical role in promoting awareness and raising the
profile of the Karen in general – and the rural populace and internally
displaced, whose steadfast resistance to forced relocation and cultural
assimilation has always been crucial to the very existence of the Karen.
In order to accomplish this task, the Karen need a leadership that is not
only committed but also skillfully creative in policymaking and
competently attuned to international political dynamics.

As much as the Karen quest for their collective right to
self-determination is theoretically justified, the practicality of having
such a right can be complicated at best, but not impossible. The salience
of ethnicity in Burmese politics, after all, is a reality imposed by
history that must be confronted with the consideration of appropriate
political and cultural measures that are at least recognizable and
responsive to the basic human needs of identity, security and equal
participation. Inasmuch as the Karen are resolved in armed resistance,
they must also learn to compete, compromise and cooperate with their
adversary at the political table. It is hoped that the Karen, if and when
opportunity presents itself, will be ready to engage in a national
political dialogue not only with the Burman but also with the other ethnic
nationalities in mapping out the details of both a future Karen state and
our country of Burma.