BurmaNet News, March 20, 2009

[Editor]

March 20, 2009, Issue #3675

INSIDE BURMA
Aljazeera: Myanmar jails activists' lawyer
Irrawaddy: Regime stops fast-tracking visas for relief workers
Irrawaddy: Junta allows UN to continue aid to Rohingya

ON THE BORDER
Mizzima News: Political prisoners' health deteriorating: AAPP-B - Solomon

BUSINESS / TRADE
Irrawaddy: Weekly business roundup
AP: Foreign investment doubled in 2008

DRUG
Irrawaddy: Alleged Khun Sa accomplices arrested in Thailand
DVB: Food shortages force Chin locals to sell opium

REGIONAL
DVB: Singapore protestors give Thein Sein a message for Daw Suu

INTERNATIONAL
Irrawaddy: Burma is an International issue: China

OPINION / OTHER
Asia Times: Myanmar junta stubborn as ever - Nick Cumming-Bruce

____________________________________
INSIDE BURMA

March 20, Aljazeera
Myanmar jails activists' lawyer

Rights groups say the authorities have imprisoned scores of people in
recent months, including monks

Myanmar's military government has sentenced a lawyer to four years in
prison after accusing him of having links to "illegal organisations".

According to opposition and legal sources in the country, Pho Phyu
defended pro-democracy and labour activists.

He was arrested in January in central Myanmar on his way back to Yangon
after representing two labour activists, they said.

No official announcement of the sentencing has been made, but legal
sources close to the case said Pho Phyu was handed a four-year sentence on
Tuesday after a trial in which he was not represented by a lawyer.

Nyan Win, a spokesman for the opposition National League for Democracy,
told the Associated Press on Thursday that "prevalence of law in the
country has to be questioned".

"We are very sad to hear about the sentencing of Pho Phyu. It's a shame
that defence lawyers defending their clients are being imprisoned."

The two labour rights activists Pho Phyu represented were allegedly
detained for complaining to the United Nations' International Labour
Organisation about land confiscation.

Scores jailed

Rights groups say that in recent months, the Myanmar government has
imprisoned scores of student leaders, monks, and even senior lawyers
working for the opposition or pro-democracy activists.

Earlier this month, two lawyers representing activists were freed after
serving four months in prison for contempt of court.

Myanmar has been under military rule since 1962.

The current government has promised elections to be held next year, and
says it will lead the country to democracy, but critics claim the
so-called elections will only tighten the army's grip on power.

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia-pacific/2009/03/20093203720917148.html

____________________________________

March 20, Irrawaddy
Regime Stops fast-tracking visas for relief workers - Wai Moe

Foreigners involved in the Cyclone Nargis relief effort will no longer be
given preferential treatment when applying for Burmese visas, according to
diplomatic sources in Rangoon.

The sources said that shortly after agreeing to extend the mandate of the
Tripartite Core Group (TCG) in late February, the Burmese junta ended a
program to expedite visa applications for foreign aid workers involved in
Nargis-related projects.

The TCG, which consists of representatives of the regime, the United
Nations and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, is the main body
responsible for coordinating Nargis-related relief efforts.

The move means that foreign employees of international NGOs must now
follow the complicated and time-consuming visa application process that
was in place before and immediately after Cyclone Nargis struck the
Irrawaddy delta last May.

Permission for NGO staffers to work in Burma must come not only from the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but also from other key ministries, including
the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Ministry of
Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement.

Relief workers and diplomats said the visa fast-track program and other
measures to streamline the relief effort were put in place by Deputy
Foreign Minister Kyaw Thu, who was also the acting chairman of the TCG.

In early February, Kyaw Thu was reassigned to head the Civil Service
Selection and Training Board, an inactive ministerial position.

At the recent Asean Summit in Thailand, Burmese Prime Minister Gen Thein
Sein and Foreign Minister Nyan Win told delegates that the regime agreed
to extend the TCG’s mandate for one more year, to July 2010.

The announcement was welcomed as a sign of improved cooperation between
the junta and the international community. But aid workers said the
decision to tighten visa restrictions on foreign experts was a serious
setback for the relief effort.

____________________________________

March 20, Irrawaddy
Junta allows UN to continue aid to Rohingya - Marwaan Macan-Markar/IPS writer

Bangkok — For now, the United Nations’ refugee agency has been given
breathing room to operate in a western corner of military-ruled Burma,
where humanitarian programs offer some comfort to the persecuted Rohingya
Muslim minority.

The uncertainty stems from the predicament the United Nations High
Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) faced as 2008 drew to a close. The junta
in the predominantly Buddhist country "appeared reluctant to renew UNHCR’s
contract to work in Burma," a diplomatic source revealed.

The problem arose with the immigration department, the local counterpart
that the UN agency was assigned to work with. "The immigration department
had said that they will not sign the new agreement to work with UNHCR,"
the source added. "This meant that UNHCR could not continue with its
operations."

A search for other government agencies to serve as local counterparts for
the refugee agency ensued. The bureaucratic hurdle placed in the way of
the UNHCR was dismantled this month, enabling what outwardly appeared to
be a smooth visit to Burma by Antonio Guterres, the head of UNHCR.

"The whole point of Guterres’ visit to Burma in March was to find a local
partner to continue UNHCR’s operations in the country," a source, who
spoke with IPS on condition of anonymity, said. "The government approved a
new agreement between the immigration department and UNHCR."

But the diplomatic muscle that Guterres had to flex during his visit, from
March 7-12, resulting in an about-turn by the junta, was not ordinary.

All humanitarian agencies working in Burma, or Myanmar, as the junta calls
the country, are held hostage by the tough rules that have been imposed
since February 2006, adding to limitations in an already difficulty
environment.

"Under the new guidelines, foreign agencies must draft a memorandum of
understanding with any concerned ministries before opening offices in
Burma," states ALTSEAN, a regional human rights body, in a study of the
restrictions humanitarian agencies face in the oppressive Southeast Asian
nation.

"The Ministry of National Planning and Economic Development released the
so-called ‘Green Book’ of guidelines to a meeting of international aid
organizations in Rangoon,'' ALTSEAN stated.

"These guidelines set up complicated approval processes, restricted travel
to and within the country, established new regulating bodies as well as
empowered existing ones and altogether hindered the work of aid
organizations in Burma, both foreign and domestic," adds ALTSEAN.

UNHCR’s work in the Arakan state, where the persecuted Rohingyas live,
goes back nearly 15 years. It established a presence to monitor and aid
the over 230,000 Muslim refugees returning to Burma from neighbouring
Bangladesh, where the Rohingyas had fled in 1991 to escape a wave of
oppression unleashed by the Burmese military.

The Rohingyas had fled in massive numbers earlier, too. In 1978, some
200,000 sought safety in Bangladesh to escape a form of ethnic cleansing
mounted by the military. There were reports then of widespread killing,
rape and the destruction of mosques, according to human rights groups.

Currently, six UN agencies have humanitarian programs in Arakan to assist
an estimated 750,000 Rohingyas who are victims of harsh policies that show
no signs of easing up.

The junta-imposed restrictions deny the Rohingyas free movement from
village to village, they cannot get married freely, they are victims of
rape and torture, are subject to forced labour and have to endure land
confiscation and extortion.

The Rohingyas, who grabbed the headlines in recent months, after the boats
they were fleeing in to Malaysia washed ashore in southern Thailand, also
endure another form of discrimination not experienced by Burma’s other 135
ethnic minorities. They have been stripped of their citizenship rights
since 1982.

Little wonder why the World Food Programme (WFP), which has been helping
the Rohingyas since 1994, has barely felt a drop in the numbers of people
they have been feeding, currently some 350,000. "The numbers have remained
the same," says Paul Risley, spokesperson for the Asia office of the UN
food relief agency.

The plight of Rohingya children adds another grim detail. "Malnutrition
rates have remained very high among the most vulnerable section of the
population," Risley told IPS. ‘’Thirty percent of children under five
years show stunting.’’

In fact, the area where the Rohingyas have been boxed in, in the Arakan
state, was described as a "hunger hot spot" in WFP’s most recent food
security survey of Burma, done in November last year. The survey also
revealed that WFP was reaching only half the number of Rohingyas who need
food for their survival.

This shortfall in assisting this discriminated minority was also
highlighted by the UNHCR. The agencies current level of activity to help
the Rohingyas "does not correspond to the actual needs," Guterres had
noted, a statement revealed.

Guterres also singled out areas of concern to the UNHCR: "from prevention
of displacement, to voluntary return, registration and legal status, and
the improvements to economic and social conditions."

Yet such disclosure has failed to impress rights advocates who have
monitored the plight of the Rohingyas for years. "I am worried that the
issues which are really causing the Rohingyas to flee, like the lack of
legal status and the human rights violations, were not openly discussed,"
says Chris Lewa, lead researcher of the Arakan Project.

"The key root causes behind Rohingya displacement have not been openly
acknowledged," she said in an interview. "There are concerns that the
UNHCR’s recent statement was a bit soft."

____________________________________
ON THE BORDER

March 20, Mizzima News
Political prisoners' health deteriorating: AAPP-B - Solomon

New Delhi– Lack of proper medical treatment, is one of the major reasons
for the deteriorating health conditions of political prisoners in Burma,
an activists group said on Friday.

Bo Kyi, Joint Secretary of the Assistant Association of Political
Prisoners in Burma (AAPP-B), said deplorable prison conditions, lack of
proper medical treatment was causing alarming health situations for
prisoners of conscience, in Burma.

“All political prisoners are struggling with health concerns and food
security after the junta sent them to prisons in remote areas, which were
far away from their families,” said Bo Kyi.

He said, most of the political prisoners in Burma, mainly depend on their
family members for support such as food and medicines, and sending them to
remote prisons, cuts off their supplies.

Bo Kyi said, he had recently received information that an 88 Generation
students’ leader Hla Myo Naung was facing the danger of losing another
eye, after he had already lost one earlier, while in detention, and
another students’ leader Ko Ko Gyi was suffering from a liver problem.

Min Ko Naing, the prominent 88 Generation student leader, who is also
suffering from an eye problem, is apprehensive that he might be paralyzed
as a result of being detained in a dark-cell, which is small and cold, Bo
Kyi added.

“They need immediate medical attention by specialists, otherwise their
health is in danger and they would probably suffer strokes,” said Bo Kyi.

The family members of political prisoners also said, they found it
difficult to pay frequent visits to prisons because of the distances and
the need to spend extra time and money, which often posed a problem.

“Denying medical attention to those, who are really in need is murder,
they [junta] are slowly murdering the political prisoners,” said Bo Kyi.

According to the AAPP-B list, at least 2,128 political prisoners were
still languishing in prisons across Burma.

Meanwhile, activists across the globe have begun a signature campaign,
demanding the release of detained political prisoners, including
pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi.

In Tokyo, more than 50 activists from various Burmese political
organizations, on Friday, began collecting signatures from both Burmese as
well as other supporters, including Japanese people for the release of
political prisoners in Burma.

Zaw Min Tun, joint secretary - 1 of the Japan branch of the National
League for Democracy-Liberated Area (NLD-LA) told Mizzima, they would send
a petition along with signatures of supporters to the United Nations’
General Secretary and also to the Japanese Foreign Minister.

“We will send the letter including those signatures to Ban Ki-moon and the
Japanese Foreign Minister,” said Zaw Min Tun.

“We are planning to send the petition because they [the UN and Japan]
seems to believe that the junta’s proposed 2010 general elections is the
solution to Burma’s political crisis,” he added.

He said in the petition they had argued that the 2010 elections is not a
solution to the political crisis in Burma, but the release of all
political prisoners, including Daw Aung San Suu Kyi would mean the first
step towards resolution of the problems.

Activists said they are targeting 888,888 signatures around the globe.

In support of the campaign, UK-based Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW),
urged people to support the petition by signing on their new online
petition, which aims for the release of all political prisoners in Burma.

Benedict Rogers, CSW’s East Asia Team Leader in a statement on Thursday
said, “We strongly urge UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, to make it an
immediate personal priority to secure the release of all political
prisoners in Burma, including Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.”

“Increased international pressure on Burma’s military regime is urgently
needed. Action should be taken to put an end to the crimes against
humanity, those committed against the Burmese people every single day,”
Rogers added.

____________________________________
BUSINESS / TRADE

March 20, Irrawaddy
Weekly business roundup - William Boot

China Invests Heavily in Burma’s Mining Operations

Amid reports swirling that Burma’s precious stones industry is contracting
sharply because of US economic sanctions, the Chinese official news agency
says that China has pumped US $850 million into Burmese mining operations
in 2008.

The Xinhua agency said last week that Chinese companies contributed
virtually all of last year’s foreign money invested in the industry, with
the only other investor, Singapore, spending a mere US $5 million.

Xinhua quoted Burma’s Central Statistical Organization for the figures.

The investment contradicts a report by the BBC this week that said tens of
thousands of mine workers have lost their jobs in the ruby and jade
production industries in the Mogok region.

The BBC quoted ex-miners saying foreign demand for rubies, especially from
dealers in neighboring Thailand, had virtually dried up.

The report said the industry’s slump is in part due to US import embargoes
imposed while George W. Bush was president. But the general global
financial crisis, especially in Europe, has added to the problem.

Precious stones have been one of the biggest sources of foreign income for
the Burmese military regime.


Oil, Gas Cloud Claims by Burma, India, Bangladesh

Talks have resumed between India and Bangladesh on disputed territorial
waters in the Bay of Bengal while a similar dispute on Bangladesh’s border
with Burma remains in deadlock.

At issue between the three countries are 28 sea blocks which potentially
hold lucrative oil and gas deposits.

India lays claim to nine of those blocks while Burma insists that 11 are
inside its sea borders.

The dispute has simmered for years but is now more pressing for two urgent
reasons: one, United Nations pressure for submissions on boundary
recognition under the Law of the Sea Convention; and two, all three
countries are intensifying their search for hydrocarbon energy.

India and Burma are supposed to file claims this year, while Bangladesh
has until 2011 but has recently upset its neighbors by attempting to issue
eight offshore exploration licenses to foreign companies.

India has until the end of June to file a claim with the U.N.

According to Bangladesh’s Daily Star, Burma has ignored Dhaka’s request
for a resumption of negotiations that were briefly opened in October and
already lodged a unilateral boundaries claim to the U.N.

The two countries’ navies engaged in a high seas confrontation before last
October’s talks after the state Myanmar Oil and Gas Enterprise issued an
exploration license to South Korea’s Daewoo International in waters
claimed by the Bangladeshis.

Meanwhile, land border tensions between the two countries increased this
week as Burma moved more troops into the border area.


Norway Bans Chinese Firm for Selling Trucks to Burma

Norway has taken the unusual step of banning all state investment in one
of China’s biggest vehicle manufacturers, because the Chinese sell
military trucks to Burma.

The Norwegian government’s Council on Ethics has forced the
state-controlled sovereign fund to sell off a US $5 million stake in
China’s Dongfeng Motors Group.

“We can’t finance companies that support the military dictatorship in
Burma through the sale of military materials,” Finance Minister Kristin
Halvorsen said in a statement.

The ministry has oversight of the fund. He cited support for European
Union and US sanctions against Burma’s military regime, including a
weapons embargo.

Norway is not a member of the EU, but often adheres to its rules and
standards voluntarily.

Norway’s sovereign fund, run by its central bank is one of the world’s
largest and has strict ethical codes of operation. It has also put the
giant German electronics company Siemens on “watch” because of allegations
against it of corruption.


Ban Trip to Burma after Asean Meeting?

An UN-based human rights lobby group is linking a US reconsideration on
economic sanctions against Burma with what it says will be an April visit
to Naypyidaw by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

The NGO Inner City Press reported that a senior UN official told it this
week that Ban would like to visit Burma “just after the April 12 Asean
meeting, most probably on April 18.”

Inner City Press, which also investigates issues such as transparency and
corporate accountability, said Ban’s plan to visit Burma follows a meeting
he had last week at the White House with President Barack Obama.

They discussed sanctions and what Ban termed a “softening” by junta leader
Snr-Gen Than Shwe, said Inner City Press spokesman Matthew Russell Lee.

“Sources in the White House say that lobbying by the US oil and gas
industries has played a role in the administration's signals that economic
sanctions haven't been working in Myanmar, that it's time for more
engagement,” said Lee in a commentary on recent events. “For that, read US
business entry,” he said.

____________________________________

March 20, Associated Press
Foreign investment doubled in 2008

Yangon: Foreign investment in military-ruled Myanmar nearly doubled in the
first 11 months of 2008 to $974.9 million, with China pouring the bulk of
it into mining, a government statistics report said.

The total investment from Jan to Nov 2008 was a 93% increase from the $505
million registered during the same period of 2007, the Ministry of
National Planning and Development said in latest statistical report
obtained Thursday (19 March).

The report said that the mining industry drew more than 88% of the foreign
investment in 2008, a new record for that sector. It did not specify which
mining industries benefited most.

China accounted for $855.99 million of the foreign investment, the report
said. Newspapers last year reported that China Nonferrous Metal Group, a
state-owned company, signed an agreement with Myanmar to mine nickel. The
deal that was described as the largest ever mining deal between the
countries but newspapers did not detail figures.

Russia invested $94 million and Vietnam $20 million, both in the oil and
gas sector, while Singapore invested $5 million in the mining sector, the
report said.

Since Myanmar liberalized its investment code in late 1988, it has
attracted large investments in the hydroelectric power and oil and gas
sectors.

China is one of Myanmar's biggest trading partners and closest diplomatic
allies. Western countries have repeatedly expressed hopes that Beijing
will leverage those ties to press the junta to open a dialogue with the
opposition.

The United States and European Union have imposed economic sanctions on
Myanmar to pressure the military government to improve human rights and
release detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi. (AP)

http://www.mysinchew.com/node/22353

____________________________________
DRUG

March 20, Irrawaddy
Alleged Khun Sa accomplices arrested in Thailand

Three alleged members of the network operated by late drug kingpin Khun Sa
have been arrested in Thailand and assets worth more than 117 million baht
(US $3.3 million) seized, the English language Bangkok Post reported in
its online news service on Friday.

Quoting Thai Justice Minister Pirapan Salirathavibhaga, the newspaper said
the arrests were carried out on Thursday by officers of Thailand’s DSI
special investigations unit at the request of the US Drug Enforcement
Administration. It identified the three as Peerayuth Patsakon, who was
arrested in Chiang Rai province, Charnnarong Muser, apprehended in Chiang
Mai, and Vicharn Suthipan, who was caught in Bangkok.

Pirapan said Charnnarong and Vicharn denied drug trafficking charges, but
Peerayuth confessed to having sold a total of 750 kilograms of heroin and
'ice' methamphetamine in the last year.

Charnnarong, who is a relative of Khun Sa, had only recently been released
in the US after serving a sentence there for smuggling heroin into the
country, DSI deputy chief Dusadee Arayawut said.

Dusadee said the fathers of Vicharn and Charnnarong had been arrested on
drug charges 19 years ago.

Khun Sa, who died in Rangoon in October 2007, was the son of a Chinese
father and Shan mother.

He founded in 1963 a local militia in Shan State loyal to the Burmese
government, which provided him with money and weapons to help the Burmese
army fight Shan rebels.

Khun Sa later renamed his militia the Shan United Army and turned to opium
smuggling, setting up a base inside northern Thailand in the village of
Ban Hin Taek. He joined forces with the Tai Revolutionary Council of Moh
Heng and controlled the whole Thailand-Burma border area from Mae Hong Son
to Mae Sai and became one of the key figures in opium smuggling in the
Golden Triangle.

Khun Sa surrendered to the Burmese army in 1996 to avoid facing drug
smuggling charges brought by the US, which had offered a US $2 million
reward for his arrest. He was held under house arrest in Rangoon, where he
died at the age of 73.

____________________________________

March 20, Democratic Voice of Burma
Food shortages force Chin locals to sell opium – Khin Maung Soe Min

Chin state locals who suffered food shortages last year due to mass
flowering of bamboo have been forced to grow and sell opium to generate
income, said a researcher who visited the region recently.

Last month, Chin ethnic researcher Pu Be Jong visited the areas in Chin
state, including Plattwa township, affected by the food crisis. The mass
flowering of bamboo occurs about once in every 50 years, and attracts
hordes of rodents which destroy food crops.

Pu Be Jong said that local people from villages in Plattawa township,
alongside the Kaladan River, were growing poppy crops to earn money for
food.

“The villagers have been secretly growing poppy in nearby forests since
September last year,” he said.

“The locals said they didn’t really want to make money through such a
business but they had no other choice.”

The opium produced after the harvest earlier this year was sold in
Bangladeshi and Indian towns across the border.

Burma is the world’s second biggest exporter of opium after Afghanistan,
according to the United States.

____________________________________
REGIONAL

March 20, Democratic Voice of Burma
Singapore protestors give Thein Sein a message for Daw Suu

Three protestors who tried to hand flowers to the Burmese Prime Minister
for imprisoned opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi during a ceremony to
honour his visit to Singapore have labeled the ceremony an “insult”.

Singapore’s traditional ‘Orchid Naming Ceremony’ was held on Wednesday to
mark the Burmese Prime Minister’s visit to the city-state.

Three Singaporean protestors handed Thein Sein a bouquet of orchids to
pass on to National League for Democracy leader Daw Suu, and called for
her release.

“We are angry with the fact that the flower is going to be named after him
because he is a dictator,” said one of the protestors.

"We feel it would be more fitting for the orchid flower to be honoured in
the name of Miss Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the rightful leader of Burma.”

Protests are rare in Singapore and gatherings of five or more people are
illegal without a police permit.

“Other people that have been named after this flower in Singapore are
people like Nelson Mandela and Kofi Annan so we found this to be a big
insult to our national flower and also to all the people that have gotten
this.”

“The NLD won the democratic election but the junta continues to murder and
kill and torture people in Burma with no respect for human rights,” he
said.

Thein Sein was in Singapore to discuss bilateral relations and regional
issues, following a visit to Indonesia.

National League for Democracy spokesperson Nyan Win said that Singapore’s
urging of “bolder steps” towards democratic reform in Burma were “a good
sign”.

____________________________________
INTERNATIONAL

March 20, Irrawaddy
Burma is an International issue: China - Wai Moe

China’s representative in Geneva has said at the United Nations Human
Rights Council that issues of development and national reconciliation in
Burma are difficulties and challenges that are in the interests of the
entire international community.

“We understand the difficulties and challenges that Myanmar [Burma] is
confronted with in domestic development and in promoting national
reconciliation, especially in the current rampant financial crisis,” said
Yan Jiarong on March 16.

“The stability and development of Myanmar is not only in the interest of
the region, [but it is] also the interest of the whole international
community,” she added.

The statement was in response to a recent report on Burma’s human rights
record by UN Human Rights Rapporteur Tomas Ojea Quintana who visited Burma
in February.

China hoped the world would foster a conducive environment for gradually
achieving democracy and development in the country, Yan said.

In the past, Beijing regularly refused to be drawn into debate on the
Burmese crisis, referring to the matter an internal issue. In a 2007 UN
Security Council meeting, China and Russia vetoed a draft resolution on
the release of political prisoners in Burma.

However, China appears to be shifting its policy on Burma. It has
cooperated on Burmese issues with other countries, such as the United
States and the European Union, as well as India and Southeast Asian
nations.

China has been the Burmese junta’s closest ally, particularly since 1988.
It also sells arms, warships and aircraft to the Burmese regime despite
international condemnation.

Chinese officials have visited Burma recently and met with high-ranking
generals, including the head of the junta, Snr-Gen Than Shwe. On Wednesday
in Naypyidaw, Than Shwe met Chen Bingde, chief of the general staff of the
Chinese People's Liberation Army.
Li Changchun, a senior official of the ruling Communist Party of China,
left on Friday for a four-country trip of the Asia-Pacific region, where
he will also visit Burma.


____________________________________
OPINION / OTHER

March 20, Asia Times
Myanmar junta stubborn as ever - Nick Cumming-Bruce

Geneva - Once again, a United Nations (UN) investigator of human rights in
Myanmar has urged its ruling generals to release all political prisoners.
And once again the junta has brusquely brushed off the demand. Myanmar has
no prisoners of conscience, only law breakers, its ambassador to the UN in
Geneva, Wunna Maung Win, brazenly asserted.

So nothing has changed? Well, not quite.

In a report to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on Tuesday, special
rapporteur Tomas Ojea Quintana painted a grim picture of conditions in the
country: 400 political prisoners sentenced in the last quarter of 2008 to
jail terms ranging from 25 to 64 years; a total of more than 2,100
political prisoners in the country (twice the figure of two years ago);
and a 20-year-old student union member jailed for 104 years in January.

There was more: opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi detained for the last
six years under a law that permits detention for no more than five years;
multiple abuses of the rights of Rohingya Muslims in North Rakhine state;
continuing recruitment of child soldiers; prevalent rape of ethnic
minority women by soldiers; forced labor; use of landmines; and, in a
country which should have a food surplus if properly run, acute food
shortages in five states.

Quintana also noted that the junta did not accede to his request to meet
political party leaders because "all the leaders were held in detention,
either under house arrest or in prisons in remote areas". And yet six
months into his job as special rapporteur, Quintana is trying to make it
as easy as possible for Myanmar's ruling junta to grasp the nettle of
human rights issues that have made it an international pariah.

He defines his task as "to cooperate with the government of Myanmar and
assist in its efforts in the field of promotion and protection of human
rights". Within that framework, he has decided to focus attention on four
"core elements" of human rights: a review of national legislation to
ensure its compliance with the constitution and international obligations,
progressive release of political prisoners, training for the armed forces
in international humanitarian law and establishing an independent,
impartial judiciary.

Reporting on his second and latest mission to Myanmar in mid-February,
Quintana was at pains to find the positives. His three meetings with the
junta's human-rights body, not the most conspicuously effective group,
were "constructive". He met senior mandarins, including the chief justice,
the attorney general, the minister of home affairs, the chief of police
and the army's judge advocate general, which yielded "substantive and
fruitful discussions". The junta allowed him to visit a number of prisons
and to talk to prisoners, as well as a visit to the usually off-limits
Kayin state.

The minister of home affairs promised to consider his recommendations for
the progressive release of all political prisoners, Quintana reported. The
attorney general told him that ministries were checking 380 laws for
compliance with the new constitution, passed last year in a national
referendum. And the chief justice insisted Myanmar's judiciary was
independent, but accepted a suggestion that Myanmar should engage with the
UN's rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers.

Weak assurances
Such assurances cost the junta little, but Quintana is also pressing for
tangible results within a specific timeframe. Release of all political
prisoners should be completed before elections scheduled for next year, he
said, "If not, it's going to be difficult to talk of real participation in
the elections." British ambassador to the UN Peter Gooderham set out the
issue more bluntly: unless all political prisoners were released and
political parties and ethnic minorities were able to participate freely in
the election the outcome would have no international credibility.

In the Orwellian state the generals have created, it is difficult to
imagine circumstances in which elections could win international respect.
The junta's mindset and approach to the elections is all too clear from
its brutal intimidation of the opposition, the hammering of any dissent
and the political party machinery apparatus it has established to ensure
elections do not allow the opposition a repeat of the democratic victory
they won in 1990.

Still, Quintana's role arguably is not to second-guess the outcome of the
election, but to exploit what little space he has to try to achieve or
create conditions for measurable improvement of human rights and the
position of those within the country still active in trying to defend
them.

To do that, Quintana is seeking to widen the agenda of discussions with
the junta. In addition to pursuing issues such as the incarceration of
political prisoners, where progress is locked into the junta's rigid
mindset on political reform he has turned attention to the functioning of
the judicial system.

"It's important to open different channels of communication, we need to
start working on the rule of law," Quintana said in an interview. "This is
the first time we found space to have discussion with lawyers" regarding
the functioning of the judicial system.

"From our perspective it's one of the better ways to address the
situation," said Michael Anthony of the Hong Kong-based Asian Legal
Resource Center, a human-rights watchdog that has exhaustively documented
the regime's abuse of its own legal and criminal justice system to crush
dissent. The human-rights debate "has focused too long on the list of
violations without addressing the system of injustice".

Quintana also emphasizes there will be little progress on human rights
unless the international community and particularly Myanmar's Southeast
Asian neighbors in the Association of South East Asian Nations - now
establishing its own human-rights body - are willing to push them. Legal
reform and adherence to international humanitarian law provides an avenue
some observers think Myanmar's politically-reticent Asian neighbors may
find easier to support.

Quintana can have few illusions about the uphill nature of his task. At
the Human Rights Council in Geneva, non-governmental organizations were
quick to spotlight potential limitations in his dialogue with the junta.
Myanmar's constitution, tainted by the coercion and intimidation invested
in winning its approval, hardly presented a sound benchmark for assessing
judicial and legislative reforms, the Asian Forum for Human Rights and
Development noted. Was he confident, the UK asked, that training the
judiciary, civil servants and police would be effective given the dominant
position in those sectors of people close to the regime?

Moreover, Myanmar's ruling generals never seem to miss an opportunity to
live down to the lowest expectations of their conduct, and Tuesday was no
exception. Just as Quintana delivered his statement to the council, news
broke that the junta had arrested five more members of the opposition
National League for Democracy in Yangon. Among them was a party member
reportedly inactive for more than a year after suffering a stroke.

Nick Cumming-Bruce is a Geneva-based journalist with decades of experience
reporting from Southeast Asia.

http://atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/KC20Ae01.html