BurmaNet News, September 17, 2009

[Editor]

September 17, 2009 Issue #3799

INSIDE BURMA
Bloomberg: Myanmar doubles political arrests; elections a sham, group says
AP: Myanmar announces amnesty for 7,114 prisoners
Irrawaddy: Eight democracy activists arrested
AFP: Junta defends court ban
Mizzima: Food insecurity aggravates in Chin state

ON THE BORDER
DVB: UN to resume work in northeastern Burma
Mizzima: Photographs for family registration taken in Shan State

REGIONAL
BBC: Rebels accuse Indian intelligence

OPINION / PRESS RELEASES
Press Release: Boxer speaks out for political prisoners in Burma
UPI: Pinning hope on Burma's hopeless constitution - Awzar Thi


____________________________________
INSIDE BURMA


September 17, Bloomberg
Myanmar Doubles Political Arrests; Elections a Sham, Group Says - Ed Johnson

Myanmar’s military regime has doubled the number of political prisoners in
the past two years and elections next year will have no credibility unless
they are freed, Human Rights Watch said in a report.

Buddhist monks, journalists and artists are among more than 2,200 people
held at more than 40 prisons or forced to perform hard labor at about 50
camps in the country formerly known as Burma, the New York-based group
said.

The elections “will be a sham” if political opponents remain in jail, Tom
Malinowski, the group’s advocacy director in Washington, said yesterday.
The U.S., China, India and Southeast Asian countries “should make the
release of all political prisoners a central goal of their engagement with
Burma.”

The junta, the latest in a line of generals to rule Myanmar since 1962,
triggered international condemnation last month when it extended
opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s house arrest order for 18 months. The
Nobel Peace Prize winner has spent more than 13 years in custody since her
National League for Democracy won elections in 1990, a result rejected by
the regime.

Repression increased in the country after an uprising led by Buddhist
monks two years ago was crushed by the government, Human Rights Watch
said.

More than 300 political and labor activists, monks, artists, comedians,
journalists and Internet bloggers have been sentenced to jail after trials
in closed courts, the group said. Some prison terms have been for more
than 100 years.

More than 20 activists, including the country’s most-famous comedian,
Zargana, were arrested for speaking out about obstacles to humanitarian
relief following Cyclone Nargis, which struck Myanmar in May 2008 leaving
at least 138,000 people dead or missing, according to the report.
____________________________________

September 17, Agence France Presse
Junta defends court ban

Yangon- MYANMAR'S state media on Thursday defended the ruling junta's
decision to bar opposition icon Aung San Suu Kyi from court during final
arguments in her appeal against her detention.

The Nobel laureate was convicted on August 11 of breaching security laws
after an American swam to her house. She was sentenced to three years'
hard labour but junta chief Than Shwe cut the term to 18 months' house
arrest.

Her lawyers say the regime has denied her permission to attend court on
Friday to hear closing submissions in her appeal, but government
mouthpiece newspapers said the decision was in line with the law.

'According to the practices of the courts, any defendants are not sent to
the tribunal,' a commentary in the English-language New Light of Myanmar
daily said.

'If the defendant is a prisoner, there is no need to summon him to the
court for his statements,' said the editorial, which also appeared in
state-run Burmese language newspapers.

'Courts hear criminal cases in accordance with the existing laws....
Therefore, it is fair to say that Myanmar's judicial practice meets the
judicial principles,' it said.

The article did not mention Suu Kyi's name nor her party but it was
published one day after Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy said the
decision to bar her from the appeal court was 'not justice'.

The 64-year-old appealed against the verdict earlier this month. The
guilty verdict sparked international outrage and the imposition of further
sanctions against Myanmar's powerful generals, who have already kept the
frail Suu Kyi locked up for 14 of the past 20 years.

Her extended house arrest keeps her off the scene for elections promised
by the regime some time in 2010, adding to widespread criticism that the
polls are a sham designed to legitimise the junta's grip on power.

The NLD won a landslide victory in the country's last elections in 1990
but was never allowed to take power by the military, which has ruled the
country since 1962. -- AFP
____________________________________


September 17, Associated Press
Myanmar announces amnesty for 7,114 prisoners

Yangon, Myanmar — Myanmar's junta has granted amnesty to 7,114 convicts at
prisons across the country, but it was not immediately known if they
included political detainees.

State television, which announced the amnesty Thursday evening, said the
prisoners would be released for good behavior and on humanitarian grounds.

Myanmar held more than 65,000 prisoners in mid-2007, according to the most
recent figures available from the Asian and Pacific Conference of
Correctional Administrators.

Those to be released were not identified. Previous mass releases have
usually included a handful of political detainees. They are usually
identified when they report to opposition groups, which then announce
their release.

The country's best-known political prisoner is Nobel Peace Prize laureate
Aung San Suu Kyi, who is under house arrest.

The United Nations and independent human rights groups estimate that the
military regime holds more than 2,200 political prisoners, though the
government insists that all detainees have been convicted of criminal
offenses.

The government generally grants amnesties to mark important national days,
but most of the recipients are petty criminals. The last release was in
February this year when 6,313 prisoners were freed, including less than
two dozen political prisoners.

It was not clear if the releases started Thursday. Friday is the 21st
anniversary of the 1988 seizure of power by the current junta to quash
vast pro-democracy demonstrations.

An amnesty had been expected since July, when Myanmar's envoy to the
United Nations told the Security Council that the government was preparing
such a move to allow prisoners to participate in elections next year, the
first in two decades.

The amnesty comes just ahead of the opening of this year's U.N. General
Assembly session, which will be attended by Prime Minister Gen. Thein
Sein, the highest-ranking government leader in recent years to
participate.

The junta's powerful deputy chairman, Senior Gen. Maung Aye, attended the
50th anniversary General Assembly session in 1995, but the occasion is
usually left to the foreign minister.

Human Rights Watch launched a campaign Wednesday for Myanmar's military
government to release all political prisoners before the elections.

The New York-based rights group said the number of political prisoners has
more than doubled in the past two years, and more than 100 have been
jailed in recent months.

Among those imprisoned in the past two years include people involved in
peaceful pro-democracy demonstrations in 2007 and in assisting the victims
of a devastating cyclone in 2008. The group said some were handed
decades-long sentences.

It said the country has 43 known prisons holding political activists and
more than 50 labor camps.

____________________________________


September 17, Irrawaddy
Eight Democracy Activists Arrested

Eight democracy activists including one Buddhist monk in Myingyan Township
in Mandalay were detained by Burmese military authorities on Wednesday,
according to local sources.

A friend of a detainee said that the authorities appeared at the homes of
those arrested about 3 am and took them into custody.

The source said Myo Han, Wint Thu, Hla Myo Kyaw, Aung Myo Lat, Soe Ya Zar
Phyo, Kyi Soe, one unidentified civilian and one unidentified monk were
arrested.

The mother of Wint Thu said, “They came and searched our home about 2:30
am. My son wasn’t here, but later I heard he had been arrested.”

The detainees were taken to Mandalay, sources said. Sources believe the
authorities made the arrests in an effort to disrupt planned
demonstrations.

Special Police have been mobilized at various Myingyan monasteries and at
youth gatherings in the township in recent days, sources said.

Burmese authorities have also increased security in Mandalay and Rangoon,
and several other cities, as the Saffron Revolution’s two-year anniversary
nears in September. Security forces have been deployed at strategic road
locations and near monasteries and pagodas.

Last week in Pokokku, a journalist and two unidentified civilians were
detained by the authorities while they attempted to interview monks in a
monastery. Pokokku was a center of monk-led demonstrations in 2007.

The regime continues to regard monks with suspicion, and they have been
restricted from traveling abroad and inside Burma without special
permission.

Meanwhile, the Thailand-based Assistance Association for Political
Prisoners-Burma (AAPP) reported that one monk from Rangoon and three from
Magway Division were arrested in August.

According to the AAPP, of Burma’s 2,211 political prisoners, 237 are
monks. According to official data, there are more than 400,000 monks in
Burma. The monastic community has always played an important role in
social and political affairs, often in opposition to oppressive regimes.

Ashin Gambira, one of the prominent Buddhist monk leaders of the 2007
demonstrations, is currently serving a 63-year prison sentence in Kalay
Prison, located in a remote area of Sagaing Division.

Bo Kyi, the AAPP joint-secretary, said an estimated 100 political
prisoners are in poor health and receive inadequate medical treatment.
____________________________________


September 17, Mizzima
Food insecurity aggravates in Chin state - Salai Pi Pi

New Delhi – Unabated rat infestation continues to create acute food
shortage for people in Chin state and northwest part of Burma, a new
report said.

The Canada-based Chin Human Rights Organization (CHRO), in its new report
‘On the edge of Survival’ released on Thursday said, the ongoing rat
infestation, which began in 2007 had aggravated food insecurity in seven
townships in Chin state as well as some areas of Sagaing division in
north-western Burma.

“Rats continue to destroy the crops in fields. In some areas, the people
face shortage of food, while others survive with little rice and other
crops in hand. But it will be just enough for a short period,” Terah
Thantluang, Field Coordinator of CHRO told Mizzima on Thursday.

“Some villagers survive merely on wild yams dug up from the forests,” he
added.

According to the previous report of the United Nation Development Program
(UNDP), a total of 34,764 farmers in three townships in Chin state faced
shortage of food while CHRO’s report last year claimed around 100,000
people were in ‘hunger condition’ from food insecurity related to bamboo
flowering causing rat infestation.

Now, CHRO says the rat infestation has spread to Hakha, Falam, Matupi,
Paletwa, Thantlang, Tiddim, and Tongzang in Chin state and some parts of
Sagaing Division where the pests had already damaged about 82 percent of
farmlands.

Adding the condition is worsening, the CHRO report said not only rats but
also crop-eating insects, such as locusts or grasshoppers, destroyed
rat-left crops in the fields.

“The insects reportedly not only eat the fruit and grain, but all the
leaves and stalks, turning entire fields and farms into barren wastelands
in a short time,” the report said.

Meanwhile, Win Hlaing Oo, director of Rangoon based Country Agency for
Rural Development in Myanmar (CAD) said, the late monsoon and low rainfall
this year in Chin state resulted in some farmers abandoning crop
cultivation in some areas of Thangtlang and Matupi and Hakha Township.

“In my village [Hnaring village in Thangtlang], there are about 300 acres
of farmlands but only 50 acres are cultivated because of low rainfall and
late monsoons,” he told Mizzima.

Win Hlaing Oo also said food insecurity in the future is imminent as the
people are just surviving on recently harvested few crops such as maize
and millet which were left by rats.

“However, they are not in the condition where they are getting nothing to
eat but are surviving on rat-leftover crops. It won’t be sustainable in
the long run,” he explained.

Limited international aid

World Food Program (WFP) led International Non-governmental Organizations
(INGOs) and National NGOs started implementing emergency food assistance
for the first three month in the hardest hit townships in Chin state in
early 2009.

Eighty five percent (85%) of households in Chin state were in debt and
needed to repay the loan which they took for purchasing food, according to
WFP’s recent report.

CHRO said the aid from WFP led aid groups is limited and could not cover
the entire affected areas.

Each person just received about 7 to 10 kilograms of rice over a
three-month period, while the people in some areas such as Thantlang,
Hakha, Tonzang and Tedim Townships, were helped under the
food-for-work/cash programmes, the CHRO report said.

Moreover, Win Hlaing Oo from CAD said the first four-month assistance
programme was halted last month as no more relief aid remained.

“The food and cash distributing programmes were suspended for the time
being as there is no more assistance remaining,” said Win Hlaing Oo from
CAD.

But Win Hlaing Oo said, the aid work will possibly be resumed next month
after the next batch of rice of an estimated 300 metric tons from WFP
arrives in Chin state for another four-month assistance programme in his
organization projected areas in Thangtlang, Matupi and Hakha.

Ban on cross-border aid

Recently, the commander of Military Tactical Command (1) of Chin state
Brig-Gen Hung Ngai, who is also the chairman of the State Peace and
Development Council, warned the people not to accept relief aid from
overseas except from WFP, said a relief worker from the community based
Relief group known as Chin Mautam Relief Committee (CMRC).

“He told the people not to receive any foreign aid or they will face
reprisal,” a relief worker told Mizzima on condition of anonymity.

Terah from CHRO said, the exile based Chin community, had been providing
relief to the villagers through the India-Burma border. The aid was for
people facing shortage of food in the areas which WFP led aids groups
could not reach.

However, he said, “The aid is very little. Not enough to solve the problem.”

The Burmese junta, instead of helping is committing human right abuses
including forced labour against the people in rat plagued areas, CHRO
said.

“Constant demand for labourers has forced people to leave their farms and
fields in order to work on SPDC projects without compensation,” the report
added.

____________________________________
ON THE BORDER

September 17, Democratic Voice of Burma
UN to resume work in northeastern Burma - Nan Kham Kaew

A United Nations relief agency is to resume work in the Kokang region of
northeastern Burma after fierce fighting last month caused dozens of aid
workers to flee.

All non-local staff of the World Food Programme (WFP) were withdrawn from
Kokang in Shan state following fighting between Burmese troops and an
armed Kokang ceasefire group.

“We cannot fully run our operation with the number of our local staff
there, but we are aiming to go fully operational again next week,” said
WFP official Swe Swe Win told DVB yesterday.

The WFP have been distributing aid in Kokang since 2003 in collaboration
with partner organisations such as World Vision and the Asia Medical
Doctor Association.

Around 20 staff from WFP and partner organisations had been temporarily
blocked by Burmese troops from leaving Laogai.

Roads had been shut and the aid workers were being kept in a UN compound
in the town. WFP staff had been distributing food and helping Laogai
locals in a poppy substitution programme.

State-run media in Burma has said that the situation has returned to
normal in the region, with fighting brought to a halt. Around 37,000
refugees had fled across the border into China, but many were reportedly
returning.

A local from the regional capital Laogai said however that the town is
deserted and shops remain closed, despite local authorities urging people
to return.

“Teachers are urging students to come back to school. People from the
mainland Burma, who ran businesses in town, have gone back to their
regions,” he said, adding that businesses were suffering considerably.

“It’s going to take time before everything is up and running again.
Because the town is so empty, there has been looting taking place in
unattended houses and shops.”

The fighting pushed China to issue a rare rebuke to Burma, urging it to
"properly deal with its domestic issue to safeguard the regional stability
in the China-Myanmar [Burma] border area".

Reporting by Nan Kham Kaew

____________________________________


September 17, Mizzima
Photographs for family registration taken in Shan State - Myo Gyi

Ruili – Authorities on the Sino-Burma border towns of Muse and Nam Hkam in
northern Shan State, have started taking photographs of families for
registration.

A joint team of Immigration and Police officials as of September 10, has
visited villages of Naung Hkam, Man Kat, Kaung Wein, Kaung Sa, Sei Hai,
Man Kham and Man Naung in Nam Kham Township and taken photographs of
families.

The officials took a total of three photographs of each family - one to be
pasted in front of the house, while the other two copies are to be kept in
the office of the Village tract Peace and Development Council and at the
police station, local villagers said.

"The officials told all family members to be included in the registration
to stand in front of their house in a group and took three photographs.
Each family has to pay Kyat 2,000 [US$ 2] for the photographs. For those
who are out of station, the recommendation letter given by the local
authority was taken along with photographs of other family members," a
local villager from Nam Hkam said.

The police said that this was being done for security reasons as there is
heightened military tension in the region.

“They ordered us to inform them about the movement of strangers if any
when they photographed us. They will check the family members with the
photographs when military skirmishes and clashes take place,” another
local resident said.

Three bombs exploded in Muse on August 28 while gun battles between the
Kokang Army and the Burmese Army was on. Moreover an armed group crossed
some villages in Nam Kham Township at the end of last month. Following
these incidents, the authorities carried out these security measures.

The household registration was carried out recently in Tone Khan, Nam
Khone, Wein Mai, Nam Pan and other villages in Muse Township also.

The authorities instructed the villagers living in Nam Kham Township last
year to paste their household registrations in front of their houses for
checks. But photo registration like this one is the first ever in these
villages.

____________________________________
REGIONAL


September 17, BBC
Rebels accuse Indian intelligence

Thirty-four Burmese separatists facing trial in India on gun-running
charges have accused Indian military intelligence of double-crossing them.

The Burmese - all members of the National Unity Party of Arakan (NUPA) -
have submitted signed judicial statements in support of their case.

The statements say that six NUPA leaders were shot in the remote Andamans
islands in 1998.

They allege that the the men were killed after being framed.

The Indian military says that the rebels were in fact arrested for
gun-running and some of their leaders were killed in a clash with the
security forces.

The rebels say that Indian intelligence maintained close relations with
them until Delhi's relations with the military government in Burma began
to improve.

"All the rebels have signed statements giving graphic details about
working for Indian military intelligence for nearly 10 years, after which
were asked to come to Landfall islands in the Andamans and then framed on
false charges of gun-running, while six of their leaders were killed in
cold blood by the Indian army," said Siddharth Agarwal, one of the defence
lawyers for the rebels.

The rebels say that they went to Landfall islands after an intelligence
official promised NUPA leaders a sanctuary and training facilities in
their fight against the Burmese military government.

They said that on reaching the islands, six of their leaders including
their "Commander-in-Chief" Khaing Raza were blindfolded and taken away by
the Indian soldiers. The remainder were imprisoned.

____________________________________
OPINION / OTHER

Press Release: Boxer Speaks Out for Political Prisoners in Burma

Wednesday, September 16, 2009
http://boxer.senate.gov/news/releases/record.cfm?id=317846

Washington, DC – U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA) today joined Tom
Malinowski, Washington advocacy director of Human Rights Watch, at a
Capitol Hill press conference to discuss a new Human Rights Watch report
that highlights the surge of political prisoners in Burma.

Senator Boxer’s prepared remarks follow:

Good morning, and thank you all for coming today. I’d like to say a
special hello to Tom Malinowski—the Washington Director of Human Rights
Watch. Thank you for all you do to advance the cause of justice in the
world.

I’d also like to welcome U Pyinya Zawta, a monk and Burmese democracy
leader who spent 10 years in a Burmese prison for his pro-democracy
activities. Thank you for your courage.

I am so pleased to be here to speak out on an issue that is near and dear
to my heart—the struggle for democracy and human rights in Burma.

Tragically, the Human Rights Watch report being released today on Burmese
political prisoners confirms what many of us have long known — that the
Burmese junta, which calls itself the State Peace and Development Council
— is intent on continuing to rule Burma with an iron fist and with
complete disregard for the basic human rights of its people, maintaining
its place on the list of the world’s worst human rights offenders.

By gathering today to release this report, we are sending a strong message
to the roughly 2,100 political prisoners who are languishing in Burmese
jails:

You have not been forgotten. Your struggle for freedom has not gone
unnoticed. We stand here together in solidarity with you and vow to help
continue your fight.

We have all seen what this military dictatorship is capable of: we have
heard the stories and seen too many images of bloody crackdowns in the
streets, of protestors being beaten, of prisoners being tortured, of basic
necessities being denied to the Burmese people in the face of natural
disaster and tragedy.

I hope that this report sends an unequivocal message to the international
community that the dire situation in Burma demands immediate and sustained
attention.

I also hope this report appeals to the conscience of those countries that
continue to have a close relationship with the Burmese junta.

The Burmese government should not be rewarded for its behavior.

I would also like to say a few words about the icon of freedom and
democracy, Aung San Suu Kyi.  Like you, I watched last month with dismay
as Suu Kyi was sentenced to three years in prison with hard labor for
simply allowing an American man who swam to her home uninvited to stay
overnight.

Although the sentence was reduced to 18 months of house arrest, this
conviction is grossly unjust. As you all know, Suu Kyi has already served
14 of the past 20 years under house arrest.

She has done nothing wrong. She has committed no crime. She simply led her
party — the National League for Democracy — to victory in a democratic
election in 1990 and the Burmese junta refused to relinquish power.

I hope that the international community will call out in unison for a fair
appeal, which a Burmese court has agreed to hear this Friday.

Let me be clear – we all want to see Burma thrive, with its population
able to express its views.

This report is an important step in helping to document the Burmese
junta’s long and reprehensible history. Now is the time to speak out
firmly and strongly. Thank you for your time.

____________________________________


September 17, United Press International - Asia
Pinning hope on Burma's hopeless Constitution - Awzar Thi
Column: Rule of Lords

Hong Kong, China — Last year, amid the death and debris in the wake of
Cyclone Nargis, Burma got a new Constitution. Now people inside and
outside the country are readying themselves for a general election of some
sort, followed by the opening of a new Parliament, which is when the
charter will take effect.

The ballot is expected in 2010, although so far no details have emerged of
how it will be run. The regime could yet give any number of excuses to
postpone it if Senior General Than Shwe or his astrologers decide the time
is not right.

Some analysts – including former diplomats and others who move in their
circles – see hope for change in the 2008 Constitution and the anticipated
elections. Their argument is that even though the parliamentary system
will be under military control, it will still provide space for people
that have not had a chance to participate in government for the last few
decades.

One way or another, they say, power will be more diffused and that will
create opportunities. And like it or not, they figure, the junta’s
electoral circus is the only one in town.

But, in a statement to the U.N. Human Rights Council this month, the Asian
Legal Resource Center has given a starkly different opinion. The Hong
Kong-based group has argued that in its current form the 2008 charter
cannot be called a constitution at all, let alone one that will permit
people in Burma to shape their future.

The center makes its point by highlighting five aspects of the
Constitution. First, the document commits to separating the branches of
government “to the extent possible.” The group observes that this is not a
qualified guarantee of judicial independence, as some persons have
misunderstood it, but exactly the opposite. It is a promise of
non-independence. It is the inverting of a norm into a statement of fact:
that Burma’s courts are not and will not operate other than as appendages
of the executive.

Second, the army, not the judiciary, is assigned primary responsibility
for defense of the Constitution. Just how it is supposed to do this is not
explained anywhere. Its relationship with a new constitutional tribunal,
which has the role of interpreting the charter, also is not explained.

Third, the center notes that the armed forces, not the judiciary, are also
assigned responsibility for upholding the rule of law in the country.
Proponents of the Constitution appear to have overlooked or ignored the
absurdity of this clause and what it implies.

Fourth, the Constitution sets up an executive president with power over
the appointment and dismissal of senior judges, rather than an independent
judicial body for that purpose, again with obvious consequences.

Fifth, not only are the statements of rights in the charter farcical and
at every point qualified, but they also undermine rights established in
the ordinary criminal law. For instance, the right to come before a judge
within 24 hours of arrest is in the new Constitution perverted through a
clause that this right does not apply in matters “on precautionary
measures taken for the security of the Union or prevalence of law and
order, peace and tranquility in accord with the law in the interest of the
public.”

This type of ridiculous caveat again completely negates the supposed right
to which it is attached.

The center concludes that the so-called 2008 Constitution fails as a
supreme law because it neither provides the normative grounds for a
coherent legal system nor protects the rights of citizens, let alone
outlining the means to ensure that the charter’s terms are effected.

Sri Lankan lawyer Basil Fernando has written that the passing in 1978 of a
new Constitution in his country moved the state completely outside the
orbit of constitutionalism and into a legal black hole in which anything
became possible, and in which the conflicts that gripped the island for
the last decades thrived.

Burma has been in its own black hole for even longer, most of the time
without a constitution at all. In searching for a way out, some
commentators have misled themselves into thinking that the mere existence
of one will pull the country back into a constitutional orbit of some
sort, no matter how distant. This is a mistake.

Whereas the charter’s authors have allotted legislative seats to the army
in mimicry of Soeharto’s Indonesia, perhaps they copied its executive
presidency from Sri Lanka, where since 1978 the dictatorial powers
conferred upon the president have worked very well to destroy
parliamentary democracy and undermine the courts.

In Burma democracy was destroyed and the courts defeated long ago, and so
the Constitution’s concern is not with how to achieve what has already
been done but with how to set in place arrangements to keep things as they
are while giving some appearance to the contrary.

This will require a certain amount of juggling and the making of some
compromises. But there is little point in nursing naive hopes that within
the Constitution’s frame for the new government there will be some genuine
opportunities for change. People with hope for Burma’s future should go
pin it elsewhere.

(The full text of the ALRC statement is available online at:
http://www.alrc.net/doc/mainfile.php/alrc_st2009/575)

(Awzar Thi is the pen name of a member of the Asian Human Rights
Commission with over 15 years of experience as an advocate of human rights
and the rule of law in Thailand and Burma. His Rule of Lords blog can be
read at http://ratchasima.net)