BurmaNet News, December 17, 2008

[Editor]

December 17, 2008, Issue #3620

INSIDE BURMA
Jakarta Post: Myanmar journalists face intimidation, pressure from junta
Mizzima: Junta bans popular Buddhist monk's sermon

HEALTH
Irrawaddy: Desperate Decisions

ENVIRONMENT
Christian Science Monitor: Mekong region ‘a biological treasure trove’

REGIONAL
Xinhua via China Daily: Myanmar, Thailand to raise momentum of cooperation

INTERNATIONAL
Irrawaddy: No Immediate Plans for Gambari to Visit Burma

OPINION / OTHER
The Korea Times: More UN Action for Myanmar - Jared Genser and Nicole Carelli
The Oregonian: Graphic Novel Review: Burma Chronicles

PRESS RELEASE
HRW: Lawyer’s Testimony Highlights Distorted Justice

____________________________________
INSIDE BURMA


December 17, The Jakarta Post
Myanmar journalists face intimidation, pressure from junta - ID Nugroho
and Lilian Budianto

Journalists working in military-ruled Myanmar continue to face
intimidation, torture and arrests in reporting on the country's corrupt
and brutal regime, despite international calls for more press freedom, a
conference on media safety heard Tuesday.

A Myanmar journalist, who asked not to be identified, told the conference
that contrary to government claims, journalists in the country were
treated as "dangerous enemies".
"There is no freedom for Burmese journalists to write about political and
social conflicts," he said while asking that pictures of him and his
colleague not be taken, out of safety concerns.

The Regional Conference on Creating a Culture of Safety in the Media in
Asia-Pacific was organized by the International News Safety Institute
(INSI) from Dec. 15-16, and brought together participants from 11
countries.

Mon Mon Myat, of the Burmese Journalist Protection Committee, said the
junta had set up rules under a 2006 law on electronic media and 1996 law
on film and computers that restricted how journalists could work.

Under the laws, journalists are not allowed to take pictures that might
"pose a threat" to the government, with offenders facing up to 59 years in
prison. Internet users are also under strict surveillance by the
government, which requires service providers to check every five minutes
websites visited by users and to immediately report suspicious or
dangerous activities.

In 2008, 12 journalists and bloggers were arrested in Myanmar, the
protection committee says. Several popular websites, including yahoo.com
and hotmail.com, have also been blocked as the junta further isolates its
people from the outside world.

"Eighty percent of Internet sites are banned by the government," said
Ronald Aung Naing of the Burmese Journalist Protection Committee.

He added the government also monitored people regularly at checkpoints for
cameras or video cameras with "dangerous" content.

Eko Maryadi, of the Indonesian Alliance of Independent Journalists, told
the forum that although media freedom in Indonesia had improved since the
fall in 1998 of former president Soeharto's 32-year regime, journalists
still faced intimidation, harassment and lawsuits in reporting on certain
issues.

"We have also seen more business groups filing complaints against
journalists, claiming the reports harmed their reputation or business.
This was rare in the past," he said.

The latest such case is the complaint filed by the Bakrie Group against
Tempo daily over its reports on the financial problems of the group's top
subsidiary, PT Bumi Resources.

The alliance recorded 43 cases of violence against journalists in 2005,
with 53 in 2006, 75 in 2007 and 52 cases as of September this year.

The conference closed with a declaration calling on all governments in the
region to take responsibility for the safety of all journalists working in
their countries and to lift impunity for groups that had endangered the
lives of journalists.

____________________________________

December 16, Mizzima News
Junta bans popular Buddhist monk's sermon - Myint Maung   

New Delhi  – The Burmese military junta authorities in Rangoon Division
have banned a sermon by abbot U Thumingla, organizers and friends said.

The ban order becomes effective when the sermon is to be held on December
18. Abbot U Thumingla became popular among religiously conscious Buddhists
recently. The abbot is from Migadarwon monastery, Mandalay.  

The abbot is 40 years old and has been into 20 years of monk hood. The
organizers of the sermon preaching ceremonies and the monk community in
Rangoon said that the authorities banned his sermons which were to be held
soon in Minglataungnyunt, Mayangon and North Okkalapa Townships in Rangoon
Division.  

The sermons of U Thumingla entitled 'Sasana will diminish when the sermon
preaching ceremonies diminish', 'be swallowed by earth fissures shortly,'
'Khat Tine Khan' and 'Need to know how to choose a good leader' are
popular among the people.  

U Thumingla is currently away from Mandalay and is now into sojourns in
Hmawbi, Rangoon Division. His sermons are also banned in Mandalay, an
abbot said when Mizzima contacted the Masoyane monastery in Mandalay over
telephone.  

In his 'Need to know how to choose a good leader' preached in
Hlaingtharyar Township in August 2008, he told the audience that they
should choose a good and reliable leader like Lord Buddha.  

During this sermon the abbot said that now there were many Saturn like in
ancient times. In the 'Khat Tine Khan' sermon, he said that some people
wished the deadly cyclone hit them (the rulers) instead of the people. The
abbot told his audience it was only because of their doing meritorious
deeds which has protected them from suffering. When these good deeds are
exhausted they will certainly face this sort of fate.

A local resident from Sanchaung Township also said that in 'Be swallowed
by the earth fissure shortly', the abbot said that not only the higher
authorities, even the lower level authorities like judges will be
swallowed by earth fissures if they committed evil deeds by insulting the
religion and monks. Insulting a single monk means insulting the entire
order of the Sangha (monk). So I'd like to urge the 'State Sanghanaryaka
Committee not to be passive in silence, the abbot preached in his sermon,
the local resident said.  

An official from the  State Sanghamahanayaka Committee declined to say
anything regarding the ban on the sermon preaching ceremonies of U
Thumingla when Mizzima contacted his office over telephone.  

The organizers of the religious ceremonies have to submit their
applications to different levels of religious authorities from Ward,
Township, and District level Sanghamahanayaka Committees in advance for
their permission. They also have to sign a pledge not to include political
matters in the religious sermons.


____________________________________
HEALTH

December 17, Irrawaddy
Desperate Decisions – Kyi Wai

Rangoon — In a dark room in a dormitory for workers at a steel factory, a
58-year-old woman is fanning her daughter, who is moaning in agony and
covered in sweat.
“It hurts, it hurts,” the young woman groans. “Mother, it hurts.”

The woman’s voice and the sound of her mother’s fan fill the room. As she
watches her daughter suffer, the older woman’s despair deepens. Seeing no
way to end her child’s excruciating pain, she moves the fan faster,
knowing that it is all she can do to help.

Normally, it would be possible to turn to others for assistance. But this
was no normal medical emergency. If she asked for help, the mother knew
that she would have to explain what was wrong with her daughter, and that
would mean revealing her crime: having an abortion.

Abortion is a crime in Burma, but when the young woman became pregnant
with her third child, she knew that she had no other choice. Three months
into the pregnancy, she went to a back-alley abortionist.

The mother knew about her daughter’s decision, and did not object.
“My daughter already has two children, and she also has a lot of debt. I
know it’s a crime, but I had to agree when she told me what she wanted to
do,” the mother said.

“It’s all my fault,” she added, breaking into sobs.

The woman’s daughter and son-in-law were low-paid employees of the steel
factory who struggled to make ends meet. Two days after the abortion, the
daughter went to a hospital for women and was diagnosed with blood
poisoning. No longer able to work, she was threatened with dismissal from
her job. On top of that, she faced three years in prison if anybody
learned the cause of her condition.

The woman’s plight was not uncommon.
“Most women in Burma are poor and have little knowledge about birth
control. When they have an unplanned pregnancy, they worry about their
future and try to induce an abortion. Many of them end up with blood
poisoning because of this,” said a gynecologist in Rangoon.
 
“There are more and more abortion patients every year,” the doctor added.
“Seven out of 10 patients who come to this clinic want abortions. The
number has tripled since 2004, and is eight times higher than it was a
decade ago.”

Most of the women seeking abortions are poor and already have more
children than they can support. Although Buddhism proscribes the practice,
and the law treats it as a major crime, many feel it is the only way they
can deal with an unwanted pregnancy.

Poor women who want to end a pregnancy usually turn to abortionists who
use traditional methods. These include administering tonics known as
saypugyi (“hot medicines”), which consist of common herbal medications
mixed with alcohol, boiled ginger water or hot water and black pepper. If
these fail to have the desired effect, more invasive means are applied.

“Local abortionists usually try to damage the embryo in the uterus by
putting strong pressure on the supra-pubic region or pounding on the
abdomen. They also insert sticks into the uterus,” said a doctor.

These methods carry a high risk that pieces of the embryo will remain in
the uterus, resulting in bleeding and infection. In extreme cases, blood
poisoning or hemorrhaging can lead to death.

Despite such risks, however, many women see no alternative.   

“For rich families, children are treasures,” said the gynecologist. “But
for the poor, they are often a burden they can afford to bear.”

“I have a son and this is my second pregnancy,” said a woman lying in a
bed and fighting against her pain. “If I have this child, I will be fired
from my job. So I had to have an abortion.”

The woman recalled being told by her boss on her first day of work at a
water-purifying plant that he wouldn’t let her stay on the job if she
became pregnant. “He knew I was married, so he told me not to expect any
time off if I was planning to have another child.”
 
Such warnings are common in Burma, where employers are obliged by law to
give married women 45 days of paid maternity leave when they become
pregnant—something that almost never happens in practice.

Poverty doesn’t only force many women to resort to abortions—it also
increases the likelihood a woman will become pregnant in the first place.

“Money is needed for birth control. If a couple can’t spare about 700 kyat
(US $0.60) per month for birth control, there will be an unplanned
pregnancy in the family. Half of the poor families I meet simply cannot
afford family planning,” said the gynecologist.
 
Birth control pills are available in Burma, and are the cheapest means of
preventing pregnancy. But at 700 kyat per month, they are still beyond the
means of most low- income families.
 
Other methods, such as progesterone hormone injections, are even more
prohibitively expensive. An injection that provides three months of
protection costs 1,500 kyat ($1.30), while a one-month shot is 3,000 kyat.

Even condoms, the most widely promoted form of birth control, are beyond
the means of many ordinary Burmese. Although they cost just 200 kyat (less
than 18 cents), this is far more than the average worker earning 1,500
kyat a day can afford.

Sterilization is also not an option for most, since it is illegal for
women under 35 years of age (most who seek abortions are between 25 and 40
years old).
 
Abortions by properly qualified medical professionals are also out of the
question for most women in Burma. If a nurse or health assistant performs
the procedure, it costs around 50-100,000 kyat ($44-88)—a small fortune
for Burma’s poor.

This leaves only back-alley abortions, which cost a mere 5-20,000 kyat
($4.40-17.80). For those who experience life-threatening complications or
find themselves facing criminal prosecution, however, there is a far
higher price to pay.



____________________________________
ENVIRONMENT


December 17, Christian Science Monitor
Report: Mekong region ‘a biological treasure trove’ – Eoin O’Carroll

A striped rabbit, a rodent thought to have gone extinct 11 million years
ago, a frog with green blood and turquoise bones, and a hot-pink millipede
that secretes cyanide are just a few of the new species that have been
discovered in the Greater Mekong Region of Southeast Asia in just the last
decade, according to a new report by the WWF.

The report, titled First Contact in the Greater Mekong details the 1,068
species newly identified by scientists between 1997 and 2007 in areas
around the Mekong River. The river, the world’s 12th longest, flows
through Cambodia, Laos, Burma, Thailand, Vietnam, and the southern Chinese
province of Yunnan.

The species identified include 519 plants, 279 fish, 88 frogs, 88 spiders,
46 lizards, 22 snakes, 15 mammals, 4 birds, 4 turtles, 2 salamanders, and
a toad.

“It doesn’t get any better than this,” said Stuart Chapman, director of
WWF’s Greater Mekong Programme, in a press release. “We thought
discoveries of this scale were confined to the history books. This
reaffirms the Greater Mekong’s place on the world map of conservation
priorities.”
The region is also a scene of thriving economic development. As MSNBC
science blogger Alan Boyle notes, more than 150 large hydroelectric dams
are being planned in the region.

According to the WWF report, the Greater Mekong is also threatened by
mining, overfishing, poaching, and illegal logging. In addition, the
region is thought to be among those most vulnerable to climate change.

To alleviate the pressure on the region’s biodiversity, the report calls
for a formal cross-border agreement by the governments of the six
countries to conserve about 230,000 square miles of forests and freshwater
habitats. The report also argues that governments around the world should
introduce legislation making it illegal to import wood from illegal
sources, and for banks and lending institutions to implement environmental
reporting, management, and risk-evaluation systems.

“Economic development and environmental protection must be mutually
supportive to provide for human security needs, reduce poverty, and ensure
the survival of the Greater Mekong’s astonishing array of species and
natural habitats,” the report says.

[Editor’s note: The original version referred to the organization that
prepared the report as “The World Wildlife Fund,” which is no longer the
official name of the organization.]


____________________________________
REGIONAL


December 17, Xinhua (via China Daily)
Myanmar, Thailand to raise momentum of cooperation next year

Yangon - Myanmar and Thailand will continue to work for raising the
momentum of mutually-beneficial economic cooperation between the two
countries next year, the local weekly journal Yangon Times quoted
Myanmar's biggest business organization as reporting Wednesday.

It was pledged at a recent meeting of the Union of Myanmar Federation of
Chambers of Commerce and Industry and the Thai Embassy.

These cooperation covers holding of Thai international trade fair in
Myanmar and enhancement of reciprocal trade next February, the report
said.
Myanmar-Thailand bilateral cooperative ties have maintained a good
momentum in recent years with Thailand playing a key role in Myanmar's
economic development as Thailand has become Myanmar's biggest foreign
investor and trading partner.

With huge investment of $6.311 billion pouring in Myanmar's electric power
sector alone, Thailand's investment has accounted for $7.3 billion or over
53 percent of Myanmar's total foreign investment received.  

The Thai investment prompted Myanmar's contracted foreign investment to
hit $14.736 billion  in 19 years as of the end of 2007 since the country
opened to such investment in late 1988.

Thailand also stood as Myanmar's top trading partner as well as top
exporting country during the fiscal year 2007-08, which ended in March,
with a bilateral trade volume of $3.205 billion  of which Myanmar's export
to Thailand amounted to $2.823 billion , while its import from Thailand
$382 million, according to Myanmar official statistics.

Myanmar gained a trade surplus with Thailand for exporting natural gas
during the year.

____________________________________
INTERNATIONAL

December 17, Irrawaddy
No Immediate Plans for Gambari to Visit Burma – Lalit K Jha

New York — The United Nations said on Tuesday that there is no immediate
plan for its special envoy to Burma, Ibrahim Gambari, to visit the
country.

Gambari has a standing invitation from Burma’s ruling junta to visit the
country, but he has shown reluctance to return in view of the regime’s
recent crackdown on the pro-democracy leadership, ignoring appeals from
the international community.

“He has no plans immediately to go to Myanmar [Burma],” Michele Montas,
spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, told reporters at the
UN headquarters in New York.

“We don’t know when he is going. At this point, what he is doing is
keeping in touch with a number of actors in the region,” Montas said in
response to a question.

When asked about requests made by several pro-democracy leaders in Burma
that the UN chief personally visit the country even if he is not assured
of a positive result, Montas said that Ban’s views on the proposed visit
have not changed.

“I think his position was made very clear when he spoke last time. I think
he’s still observing the situation, and he has said that, before he goes
there, he has to have some indication that it would be a fruitful meeting,
a fruitful visit,” Montas said.

During his last interaction with UN correspondents, Ban said he would go
to Burma only when he is sure that his visit would yield tangible results
in terms of achieving his goal of establishing democracy in Burma, release
of all political prisoners including Aung San Suu Kyi and protection of
the human rights of its people.

Ban, who was earlier scheduled to visit Burma in December, cancelled his
trip after the Burmese military junta went back on its words and
intensified its crackdown on pro-democracy activists.

“He [Ban] is not going to go there just for the sake of going. He has to
have some indications that his visit will mean something,” Montas said.


____________________________________
OPINION / OTHER


December 17, The Korea Times
More UN Action for Myanmar - Jared Genser and Nicole Carelli

Last month, U Gambira, a leader of the All Burma Monks Alliance, received
a 68-year sentence for his role in organizing last year's Saffron
Revolution, when tens of thousands of Buddhist monks and political
activists peacefully protested the junta's brutal regime. Myanmar comedian
Zarganar was sentenced to 59 years in jail by one of the military junta's
secret courts. His crime? Publicly criticizing the regime's slow response
to Cyclone Nargis. And poet Saw Wai received a lighter sentence: a "mere"
two years. His crime? Penning an eight-line Valentine's Day poem that
contained a hidden message. Putting the first letters of each line of the
poem together read "Power Crazy Than Shwe" in Burmese, mocking the junta's
leader. Two years in prison. That's three months per line. 9.4 days per
word.

Zarganar, U Gambira, and Saw Wai are three of the approximately 2,100
political prisoners currently held in Myanmar jails, formerly known as
Burma. Nearly half of these prisoners were arrested in the past year
alone. Recently, the junta's courts have begun sentencing these protesters
and even some of their lawyers who have been courageously defending them
in closed-door hearings. More than 20 members of the 88 Generation
Students Group received 65 years apiece. That's 65 years spent in jails
described by survivors as filled with rats, filth, and disease; where many
of the protesting monks are stripped of their religious garb and kept in
solitary confinement; where prisoners are commonly tortured and allowed a
few sips of water each day.

Meanwhile, a woman known affectionately by her people as "The Lady" is
held in isolation, cut off from virtually all communication. This year,
Aung San Suu Kyi, leader of Myanmar's National League for Democracy and
the world's only imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, begins her 14th
year under house arrest.

Earlier this month, 112 former presidents and prime ministers from more
than 50 countries around the world - including former South Korean
Presidents Kim Dae-Jung and Roh Moo-hyun as well as former Prime Ministers
Lee Hae-chan and Lee Hong-koo – united in sending an unprecedented letter
to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urging him to personally
visit Myanmar by the end of 2008 to secure the release of the junta's
political prisoners. This historic outpouring of global support reflects
deep international frustration with the failure of UN engagement to secure
democratization - or indeed, any substantive reforms at all -
since Myanmar's democratic elections 18 years ago. A few days later, a
similar letter was sent to the Secretary-General by 241 Asian legislators.

Since the military junta seized control of Burma in 1962, the regime has
accumulated a terrible human rights record. Despite the country's rich
natural resources, Burma's 48 million inhabitants are among the most
impoverished in the world, with virtually no access to healthcare and
other basic services. More than 3,300 villages have been destroyed since
1996 as the military wages a relentless campaign of murder, torture and
rape against ethnic minorities. More than one million refugees have fled
the country, and 600,000 internally displaced people struggle to subsist
in primitive jungle conditions. In the month following Cyclone Nargis,
which left 130,000 dead, the junta refused access to international
humanitarian organizations, depriving thousands of Burmese of essential
emergency assistance.
In response to recent requests for him to travel to Burma,
Secretary-General Ban convened a meeting of the so-called Group of Friends
of Burma and later responded publicly by saying "At this time, I do not
think that the atmosphere is ripe for me to undertake my own visit there .
. . But I’m committed and I’m ready to visit any time whenever I can have
reasonable expectations of my visit to be productive and meaningful."
We hope that this does not mean that Mr. Ban intends to wait for the junta
to inform him that it intends to take constructive action. Indeed, only
the vigorous exercise of leadership by the Secretary-General has the
potential to make something possible out of what appears to be an
impossible situation.
Should the junta continue to defy the international community, decisive
steps need to be taken. Since Than Shwe's regime has refused to respond to
the UN Security Council's call for change, the Council should, at the very
least, discuss a binding resolution that bans global arms shipments to
Burma's military regime. Such an arms embargo would significantly
disempower the military regime while in no way hurting the Burmese people.

"Please use your liberty to promote ours," Aung San Suu Kyi has often
said. It's past time the world listened.

Jared Genser and Nicole Carelli serve as pro bono counsel to Aung San Suu
Kyi with Freedom Now. The views expressed here are their own.
____________________________________

December 16, The Oregonian
Graphic Novel Review: Burma Chronicles – Steve Duin

When I finally picked up Guy Delisle's Burma Chronicles earlier this week,
I arrived with a unique array of biases:

I have not read either Pyongyang or Shenzhen, Delisle's previous two
travelogues from Drawn & Quarterly. I was, however, fresh off Secret
Invasion Dark Reign.

I was in transit, in other words, from a primitive world in which the
Marvel Illuminati -- in this case Harry Osborn, Dr. Doom, Emma Frost and
Loki, among others -- sit around large board-room tables in "secret"
meetings" (what is this, 1963?) ... to a Third World country where the
deceased are quickly cremated because their heirs are afraid of ghosts.

A country where you can find Marilyn Manson t-shirts, even if you must go
to Thailand to hear his music.

A country that features a "Water Festival" in which you wash away your
misdeeds by letting others pour water down your back, an exercise that
quickly evolves into the world's greatest water fight ("In principle,"
Delisle tells us, "you're not supposed to spray monks and cops.")

A country where "crime is virtually nonexistent" ... other than the
occasional bomb, of course. A country where each house must have an odd
number of steps.

A country that keeps its Nobel Prize winner -- Aung San Suu Kyi -- under
house arrest.
("Actually, the Burmese don't refer to her by name," Delisle tells us.
"They just call her 'The Lady.' It's like Voldemort in Harry Potter, 'He
who must not be named.'")

Let me put it this way: After spending 10 minutes with Brian Michael
Bendis in the ol' Marvel Hovel of Ideas, spending 263 pages with Guy
Delisle in Burma felt like quite the holiday.

For 14 months in 2005-06, Delisle hung out in Yangon, the former capital
of Burma -- now known as Myanmar by the counties that take the current
junta seriously -- while his wife, Nadege, worked with Medecins Sans
Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders).

The Canadian cartoonist's primary responsibility is taking his infant son,
Louis, for walks in his baby stroller, and teaching the occasional
animation class. But Delisle has a sharp eye and a caustic,
self-deprecating wit ("That's Karen Carpenter," he notes as the Muzak
blares in the City Mart, "the musical equivalent of the laughing cow"),
both of which serve him well in a country where the powers that be wield
the same "xenophobic, paranoid and hawkish rhetoric that all dictatorships
use."

A country where the bills come in denominations of 15, 45 and 90 kyat --
which, Delisle notes, drives people nuts or turns them into math wizards.

A country that will throw any motorist who hits a monk into prison without
a trial, but one in which the military gunned down monks on the streets of
Yangon only 15 months ago.

A country where 86 percent of the population in some tiny villages are
opium addicts ... and yet one that Doctors Without Borders chooses to
abandon at book's end. ("At some point," an MSF administrator explains to
Delisle, "if we agree to stay, we end up abetting the government's
actions, and in the process, we become an instrument of discrimination.")

Because I've never been to Burma, I don't know that Burma Chronicles is
the perfect travel guide to this land of sweltering heat and monsoons. But
it is a marvelous graphic memoir of a year in the life in a remote world
that is beyond the ability of most readers to grasp. Just as Secret
Invasion Dark Reign betrays the medium's prolonged, even terminal
adolescence, Burma Chronicles presents an ever-maturing format to an adult
audience.

____________________________________
PRESS RELEASE


December 16, Human Rights Watch
Burma: Lawyer’s Testimony Highlights Distorted Justice

ASEAN Should Monitor Jailed Activists

New York - Burma's military government has used the country's legal
mechanisms to intimidate political prisoners and to deny them access to
justice, Human Rights Watch said today, citing new testimony from a
defense lawyer who has just fled the country. In a crackdown that started
in October 2008, Burma's courts have sentenced over 200 political and
labor activists, internet bloggers, journalists, and Buddhist monks and
nuns to lengthy jail terms.

With the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Charter having
entered into force on December 15, Human Rights Watch urged ASEAN to
dispatch an eminent independent legal team to monitor the trials and
conditions of activists held in isolated prisons.

"The government locks up peaceful activists, sends them to remote prisons,
and then intimidates or imprisons the lawyers who try to represent them,"
said Elaine Pearson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch. "This
abuse of the legal system shows the sorry state of the rule of law in
Burma."

Saw Kyaw Kyaw Min, a 28-year-old lawyer from Rangoon, fled to Thailand
several days ago after weeks in hiding. In late October 2008, a Rangoon
court sentenced him to six months in prison under Section 228 of the
Burmese Penal Code for contempt of court. He failed to intervene, on the
judge's order, after his clients turned their backs on the judge to
protest the way they were being questioned.

Saw Kyaw Kyaw Min had been defending 11 clients, all members of the
National League for Democracy (NLD). Three other lawyers - Nyi Nyi Htwe, U
Aung Thein, and U Khin Maung Shein - were arrested and sentenced to terms
of four to six months in prison on the same charges. Saw Kyaw Kyaw Min
learned of the charges in advance and went underground.

He described to Human Rights Watch the secretive workings of the Burmese
legal system and the way in which political prisoners are denied access to
fair trials. He said political activists awaiting sentencing in prison can
meet with their defense lawyers only at police custody centers with police
and intelligence officers present. Trials are often shrouded in secrecy,
with lawyers not informed when their clients are to appear in court.
Lawyers representing political prisoners face arbitrary delays when
requesting assistance from authorities or documents such as case files, he
said.

Human Rights Watch has already documented problems with the current unfair
trials, including lack of legal representation for political prisoners.
Among the hundreds sentenced in recent months, in late November a Rangoon
court sentenced prominent comedian and social activist Zargana to 59 years
in jail for disbursing relief aid and talking to the international media
about his frustrations in assisting victims of Burma's devastating Cyclone
Nargis.

Many political prisoners have recently been transferred to isolated
regional prisons where medical assistance is poor or nonexistent and food
is scarce. During the past few weeks, authorities sent Zargana to Mytkyina
Prison, in the far-north Kachin State; the '88 Generation Students leader,
Min Ko Naing, was transferred to the northeast Kentung jail of Shan State;
and internet blogger Nay Phone Latt, who was sentenced to 20 years in
prison for posting anti-government material on his website, was sent to
the far-south prison at Kawthaung, across from Ranong in Thailand.

The newly-in-force ASEAN Charter sets out principles such as adhering to
the rule of law and protecting and promoting human rights to which all
members states, including Burma, should adhere. But compliance provisions
are weak. ASEAN faces a considerable challenge in addressing Burma's lack
of respect for human rights in the lead-up to multiparty elections in
2010.

Human Rights Watch urges Secretary-General Surin Pitsuwan of ASEAN to
dispatch an independent legal assessment team to monitor the treatment of
political prisoners in Burma's courts and prisons. Human Rights Watch said
ASEAN should also address Burma's lack of respect for the rule of law when
it holds its rescheduled ASEAN summit meeting in early 2009.

"This is a test for ASEAN," said Pearson. "If ASEAN lets Burma get away
with this farce of justice, the ASEAN Charter really is worthless."

Saw Kyaw Kyaw Min's account to Human Rights Watch

Saw Kyaw Kyaw Min was admitted to the Burmese Bar earlier in 2008. Since
2007, he has played a lead role in trying to represent activists charged
under a raft of spurious laws, and he has been arrested several times for
his political activities.

On October 23, he and another lawyer were defending 11 clients, members of
the NLD, in Hlaingtharya Court, Rangoon on a range of charges related to
peaceful political activities in 2007. Some of the defendants turned their
back on the judge, U Thaung Nyunt of the Rangoon Northern District Court,
to protest the unfair way defendants were being questioned by the
prosecution. The judge instructed the lawyers to stop the defendants'
behavior. According to Saw Kyaw Kyaw Min: "We both said to the judge, ‘We
don't want to forbid our clients from doing anything, because we are
defense lawyers and we act according to our clients' instructions.' The
judge stopped the proceedings and set another court hearing date."

The next day, court officials informed Saw Kyaw Kyaw Min that his
contempt-of-court hearing was set for October 30. Days later, at the
courthouse, he saw and overheard a police officer and an assistant judge
conspiring to arrest him. He fled and went into hiding.