BurmaNet News, December 18, 2009

[Editor]

December 18, 2009, Issue #3863


INSIDE BURMA
AP: Lawyer: Myanmar-American weak after hunger strike
AFP: Myanmar stung by US criticism of human trafficking record
BBC News: Burma blames deadly bomb on Karen rebels
Irrawaddy: 'Happy birthday' in a prison cell
Mizzima News: Ethnic leaders welcomed NLD leadership reformation

BUSINESS / TRADE
Reuters: Thai PTT says Myanmar gas field to close for 20 days

REGIONAL
Jakarta Globe: Rohingya refugees in Aceh moved to Medan

OPINION / OTHER
Christian Science Monitor: Burma (Myanmar) military junta shows signs of
thaw before elections – Simon Montlake
DVB: Voices from Burma’s migrant path – Joseph Allchin

PRESS RELEASE
Freedom Now: Freedom Now hails call of 53 members of U.S. House of
Representatives urging immediate release of American Nyi Nyi Aung
imprisoned in Burma




____________________________________
INSIDE BURMA

December 18, Associated Press
Lawyer: Myanmar-American weak after hunger strike

Yangon, Myanmar — A jailed U.S. citizen who was on hunger strike for more
than a week in military-ruled Myanmar attended his trial Friday looking
thin and weak, his lawyer said.

Myanmar authorities accused Kyaw Zaw Lwin — also known as Nyi Nyi Aung —
of entering Myanmar to stir up protests by Buddhist monks, who led
pro-democracy demonstrations in Myanmar in 2007 that were brutally
suppressed by the junta.

Myanmar-born Kyaw Zaw Lwin was arrested on arrival at Yangon airport on
Sept. 3 and was charged with forgery and violating the foreign currency
exchange act.

Nyan Win, a lawyer for Kyaw Zaw Lwin, said he had little time to talk with
his client at Friday's court appearance but learned from him that he had
ended his hunger strike. The trial is still in the exploratory stage, with
the case subject to dismissal.

The Washington, D.C.-based law firm, Freedom Now, which has also taken up
Kyaw Zaw Lwin's case, said he initiated his hunger strike on Dec. 4 to
protest conditions of political prisoners in Myanmar. Human rights groups
estimate that there are more than 2,000 political prisoners in the
country.

Nyan Win said his client "looks thinner and a bit weak," and that two
prosecution witnesses testified at Friday's trial.

"The trial will resume on Dec. 29 when both sides will give their
arguments whether to charge him or not," said Nyan Win.

Under Myanmar's legal system, defense and prosecution spend initial
sessions presenting their case so the judges can determine whether to
formerly charge the defendant and proceed with the trial. Nine prosecution
witnesses have testified so far.

Kyaw Zaw Lwin was unable to appear in court last Friday because of poor
health.

State Department Spokesman Ian Kelly said last week that the United States
had contacted the junta to express its worry and to make sure Kyaw Zaw
Lwin is being treated well.

A U.S. Embassy spokesman, speaking on customary condition of anonymity,
said Friday the government had not yet responded to its request for
"immediate consular access to Kyaw Zaw Lwin outside the trial setting."

The U.S. Embassy was last granted consular access on Dec. 3.

The spokesman confirmed that the U.S. consul in Yangon attended Friday's
court hearing and that Kyaw Zaw Lwin has resumed eating.

____________________________________

December 18, Agence France Presse
Myanmar stung by US criticism of human trafficking record

Yangon – Myanmar's military rulers are "disappointed" by US criticism of
their efforts to combat human trafficking, a senior police colonel said
Friday.

"We are doing all we can do to address the human trafficking issue, which
is, as we all know, a complex issue," said Police Colonel Sit Aye at a
ceremony to launch a documentary raising awareness of trafficking in the
region.

Sit Aye, who heads the transnational crime unit of the Myanmar police
force, said Myanmar should no longer be placed on Washington's "Tier 3"
for trafficking.

The US State Department places on Tier 3 those countries whose governments
do not fully comply with the minimum standards on human trafficking and
are not making significant efforts to stem the problem.

"We are disappointed about the continuous placement of Myanmar in Tier
3... as we feel that our efforts, not only of the government but also of
UN agencies and international organisations, have not been well
acknowledged," he said.

Myanmar enacted the international Anti-trafficking in Persons law in 2005
and has signed two bilateral agreements -- with Thailand in April and
China in November -- to combat human trafficking, he said.

The police colonel said that more than 400 cases of human trafficking had
been identified and more than 1,100 offenders prosecuted since the law was
enacted.

Sit Aye spoke at the launch of a documentary by the US government-funded
MTV Exit campaign, a regional public awareness initiative supported
through USAID to educate people about the dangers of human trafficking.

Myanmar has been ruled by the military since 1962. Tens of thousands of
people, particularly in rural areas, are estimated to leave the country
every year in search of better jobs, unaware of the dangers of human
trafficking.

____________________________________

December 18, BBC News
Burma blames deadly bomb on Karen rebels

Burma's military rulers have said ethnic Karen rebels are responsible for
a bomb that killed at least seven people, state-run media have said.

The bomb exploded on Wednesday in a market in Karen state, near the border
with Thailand, where lunar Karen new year celebrations were taking place.

State-controlled newspapers said rebels from the Karen National Union
planted the bomb but gave no other details.

There has been no independent confirmation of the government's claim.

The government often blames ethnic minority groups or dissidents for
bombings such as this - accusations which are denied by the groups
concerned.

Failed ceasefire attempts?

The KNU has been fighting for greater autonomy for six decades.

The bomb went off in the town of Phapun, about 200km (120 miles)
north-east of Burma's main city, Rangoon.

The KNU is one of a number of minority groups which have been fighting the
central government since Burma's independence from British colonial rule
in 1948.

Many of these have reached ceasefire agreements with the government
recently, but talks with the KNU have so far failed.

Burma's junta is said to be putting pressure on the ethnic rebel groups to
join the government's "border guard forces" ahead of next year's polls.

Burma is scheduled to hold elections in 2010, but critics say there is
little chance they will be free and fair.
____________________________________

December 18, Irrawaddy
'Happy birthday' in a prison cell – Wai Moe

“We are not afraid of being arrested again. We know how to live in prison
because we have spent 14 to 15 years behind bars. But we are afraid that
we cannot work for the people of Burma,ယ” a key player in Burma's
pro-democracy movement, Ko Ko Gyi said in September 2006.

One year later, he was arrested again. On Friday, the former student
leader, of the 88 Generation Students group, turned 48 years old in Mong
Saik Prison in Shan State, where he is serving a 65-year sentence as a
political prisoner.

His family, who was unable to visit him, donated alms to monks to mark his
birthday in a traditional Buddhist ceremony.

“We just donated alms on his behalf,” his brother, Aung Tun, told The
Irrawaddy.  “We didn't do a big birthday celebration.”

His family’s last visit to Ko Ko Gyi was in February. Since the junta
transferred him from Insein Prison in Rangoon to Mong Saik Prison, 1,000
km from Rangoon, the family has been unable to visit him regularly.

When the student-led 1988 uprising occurred, Ko Ko Gyi was a graduate
student in International Relations at the University of Rangoon.

At the time, he was involved in the pro-democracy movement alongside his
close friends, Min Ko Naing, another prominent political prisoner also is
serving a 65-year sentence in Keng Tung Prison in Shan State; Moe Thee
Zon. who is exiled in the US; and Bo Kyi, the joint Secretary of the
Assistance Association for Political Prisoners-Burma.

“During the 1988 uprising, Ko Ko Gyi was like a mastermind strategist
among follow activists,” Bo Kyi told The Irrawaddy. “Even then he started
to talk about national reconciliation as the only way to resolve Burma’s
crisis peacefully.”

Ahead of the 1990 election, debates occurred among students and young
activists over whether to vote in the election. Ko Ko Gyi urged people to
vote and to use the opportunity as a way to promote a democratic
transition in the country, Bo Kyi said.

“At the time, some activists disagreed with his idea,” he said. “But it
was the right strategy if we review history.”

In 1990, Ko Ko Gyi worked with Buddhist monks during their boycott of alms
offered by the military, working with monk leaders in Rangoon, Mandalay
and other cities.

Hardcore student activists accused him of being a government agent because
of his suggestion for a dialogue with the ruling junta. Government agents’
regularly questioned him. In 1989, his close colleagues, including Min Ko
Naing, were arrested. Ko Ko Gyi was not detained.

“Sometimes the MI makes up rumors about political figures, such as Ko Ko
Gyi, saying 'he is working for the MI,' as a way to spread distrust among
pro-democracy activists,” said a former political prisoner in Rangoon, who
spoke on condition of anonymity. “It is a kind of psychological warfare.”

Ko Ko Gyi was finally arrested following the student demonstrations of
December 1991, in protests set off at the University of Rangoon after
pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi won the Nobel Peace Prize.


>From 1991 to 2005, Ko Ko Gyi was held in Insein Prison and Thayet Prison.

He shared his political knowledge with other political prisons,
particularly younger ones, according to fellow prisoners, and he
respectfully listened to younger political prisoners and different
political views.

He was released in March 2005, after spy chief Gen Khin Nyunt was removed
and his powerful Military Intelligence organization dismantled in October
2004.

After his release, Ko Ko Gyi and his colleagues Min Ko Naing, Min Zeya,
Pyone Cho and Htay Kywe, founded the 88 Generation Students group. From
2005 to 2007, the group conducted nonviolent activities including group
visits to political prisoners’ homes and held Buddhist ceremonies
commemorating political prisoners at Shwedagon Pagoda in Rangoon.

In 2006, the 88 generation leaders told the National League for Democracy
that they were prepared to work together with the party to promote
democracy. The NLD leadership declined the offer.

Ko Ko Gyi was detained from September 2006 to January 2007 along with Min
Ko Naing, Min Zeya, Pyone Cho and Htay Kywe. Ko Ko Gyi and his colleagues
were arrested again in August with dozens of 88 Generation Students
members after a demonstration against the junta’s unannounced fuel hike on
Aug. 19, 2007. Most were sentenced to 65 years imprisonment and are
serving their time in prisons scattered across the country.

Many in Burma and aboard have hope that the 88 generation activists, who
are now in their 40s and 30s, will be able to work with Suu Kyi. Instead,
the 88 activists and Suu Kyi have been repeatedly imprisoned or detained
by the regime.

____________________________________

December 18, Mizzima News
Ethnic leaders welcomed NLD leadership reformation – Myint Maung

New Delhi– Ethnic political leaders in Burma on Thursday welcomed leaders
of the National League for Democracy party’s consideration reforming party
leadership.

NLD Chairman Aung Shwe, Secretary U Lwin, central executive committee
member Lun Tin and detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi on
Wednesday, during a rare meeting arranged by the government, discussed on
reforming party leadership as many of the CEC are ageing and a few ailing.

“Aung Shwe, Lun Tin and U Lwin all agreed to Daw Suu’s suggestion of
reforming party leadership, which is a good sign and we welcome it. The
party needs younger generation as we do not know how long our struggle
will continue,” Thakhin Chan Tun, a veteran politician in Rangoon, told
Mizzima.

Aye Thar Aung, secretary of the Committee for Representing People’s
Parliament’ (CRPP), a group formed with members of parliament elected in
1990 elections, said, “We welcome the meeting between the NLD CEC members.
We know that the CEC will be expanded with new members. It is a good sign
as a first step.”

Similarly, Cin Sian Thang, chairman of the Zomi National Congress (ZNC),
said, “NLD is the biggest and strongest party in Burma. Many have said
aging and inactive leaders should retire.  It is good to see Daw Suu
paying her respects to the three elderly leaders and they agreeing to her
proposal. I think it is not only for the party, it’s also good for our
country.”

The Burmese Nobel Peace Laureate on Wednesday was granted her request to
allow her to pay respect to three of the NLD’s aging leaders Seinlea Kan
Thar state guest house. The NLD leaders met for about an hour, where
detained party general secretary proposed of reforming party CEC.
Reportedly, all the three aging leaders agreed to her proposal.

For the past nearly two decades, the 1990 election winning party the NLD
is served by the 92 year-old chairman U Aung Shwe, 88 year-old CEC member
U Lun Tin and 85 year-old secretary U Lwin.

“Those ageing leaders and in frail health should retire, as they cannot
carry their duties effectively. Active and capable persons should be
inducted in the leadership and the elderly leaders should advise the new
leaders,” Thakin Chan Tun suggested.

“The leadership should be expanded by inducting capable and smart youths
replacing frail and inactive aging leaders. This is routine in any party.
We hope, in this way, the party will become dynamic and can work
effectively for democracy and Burma,” Aye Thar Aung said.

The three party leaders Aung Shwe, U Lwin, and Lun Tin are currently
joined in the CEC by General Secretary Aung San Suu Kyi, Vice-Chairman Tin
Oo, who is also currently under house arrest, members Win Tin, Than Tun,
Thakin Soe Myint, Hla Pe, Nyunt Wei and U Khin Maung Swe.

(Edited by Ye Yint Aung)

____________________________________
BUSINESS / TRADE

December 18, Reuters
Thai PTT says Myanmar gas field to close for 20 days

Bangkok - PTT PCL PTT.BK, Thailand's top energy firm, said on Friday that
operations at the Yetagun gas field in Myanmar would be stopped for
maintenance for 20 days from Dec. 22 as part its annual maintenance plan.
The shutdown at Yetagun -- also called Yetakun -- would not affect
Thailand's gas consumption or power production plans, the state-controlled
energy firm said in a statement.

"We have prepared for gas fields from the Gulf of Thailand to run fully
and arranged for a certain amount of oil reserves, which should mean there
will be no effect on natural gas users in the industrial and transport
sectors," the statement said.

PTT Exploration and Production PTTE.BK, a subsidiary of PTT, operates five
blocks in Myanmar and is a minority partner in the Yetagun and Yadana gas
developments.

Myanmar natural gas accounts for about 30 percent of Thailand's
consumption, mostly in power generation. About 1.1 billion cubic feet per
day of gas from the Yetagun and nearby Yadana fields is exported to
Thailand.

PTTEP's subsidiary also owns 100 percent of offshore block M9, which is
sill under exploration in the Gulf of Martaban, south of Yangon, Myanmar's
main city.

The Thai government has said it planned to import natural gas from M9 from
late 2013. (Reporting by Khettiya Jittapong; Editing by Alan Raybould)

____________________________________
REGIONAL

December 18, Jakarta Globe
Rohingya refugees in Aceh moved to Medan – Nurdin Hasan

Banda Aceh – The 195 Rohingya refugees who have been waiting for about a
year in Aceh for the central government to decide their fate were moved to
an immigration shelter in Medan on Thursday.

The refugees consist of 182 men who have been detained at the Sabang naval
base on Weh Island, and another 13 men at a camp in Idi Rayeuk, East Aceh.

Bambang Widodo, head of Aceh’s immigration office, said the relocation,
facilitated by the International Organization for Migration, was temporary
while they await action from Jakarta.

“So far, there has been no decision made by the government, whether they
will be deported or sent to a third country. While waiting for the
decision, they will be temporarily located at an immigration shelter in
Medan,” he said, declining to give a reason for the move.

Of the 182 refugees that were held on Weh Island, 135 were found to be
from Burma while 47 were from Bangladesh. Of the refugees at Idi Rayeuk,
12 were Burmese and one was Bangladeshi.

Before being transported to Medan by bus, some of the refugees told the
Jakarta Globe that they were doing well.

“I am happy, but I don’t know where they will take us,” said one of the
refugees, Muhammad Faisal, 18, in stilted Indonesian.

Samsu Alam, 18, said that they had been treated well at the naval base,
although they did had little to do other than praying and exercising.
“We’re OK. It’s been a year since we arrived in Sabang,” he said.

Of the original Rohingyas in Sabang, who arrived in Indonesia by boat on
Jan. 7, 11 escaped immigration detention on Sept. 20.

Of the Idi Rayeuk group, which numbered 198 when found floating off East
Aceh on Feb. 3, most had already fled detention, leaving only 13 refugees.
Most are believed to have gone to Malaysia to look for work.

The Rohingya, fleeing military-ruled Burma, caused a sensation last year
when the Thai navy reportedly intercepted groups and sent them back to sea
without food or clean water.

____________________________________
OPINION / OTHER

December 18, Democratic Voice of Burma
Voices from Burma’s migrant path – Joseph Allchin

In the town where Su was born, army conscription wasn’t just for men; at a
young age, troops came calling to demand either her labour or a costly
waiver fee.

The experience of forced labour and the fact that the road she had
forcibly built had few hopes of taking her anywhere pushed her, like so
many young Burmese, to flee her country in search of prospects and hope in
a foreign land. As the world today recognises the often silent masses that
migrate for work, we talk to two who now form part of the essential
character of modern Burma.

Su made it to Thailand through a broker, a ‘trafficker’ or, to many exiled
Burmese, a ‘travel agent’. This journey led her to a duck farm in central
Thailand where she was introduced to the perils that new horizons so often
bring migrants. The long hours were nothing new but she attracted the
attentions of the farm supervisor; an ageing, married, Thai man.

His initial overtures were rejected but the pressure grew and he
eventually raped her. Her fellow workers, many of them Burmese migrant
workers themselves, at this stage demonstrated what is one of the most
disemboweling aspects of the reality of migrant labour: their collective
lack of rights and unity. This meant that they encouraged her to ‘marry’
the supervisor; in other words, submit to his advances in order to secure
all of their employment futures.

She was soon ‘married’ to the supervisor, but this brought no relief.
“There were none of the good bits of marriage; now I just had to work
harder cleaning his house,” she says, adding that she still had to work on
the farm. She explains that there was no ceremony to their marriage - he
had another wife elsewhere; this was a union of servitude as opposed to
love.

She soon became pregnant and then ill. Her child was born and shortly
after she noticed a twitching in her left side when she was working. She
thought nothing of it but very soon the whole left side of her body was
paralysed. She does not know or cannot describe what the ailment was, but
she was eventually taken to a hospital. Here she met other Burmese who, on
hearing her story, told her about a workers’ organisation in the border
town of Mae Sot called Yaung Chi Oo, where she fled to on recovery.

As dusk falls and her half Thai child plays with other children in the
safe house in Mae Sot, she insists on telling me the last details of a
tale I had approached with sensitivity and caution, but one that she is
determined to tell.

It is a determination that is matched in many migrants’ tales, which are
so often a testimony not just to their own drive, endeavour and hunger to
provide and succeed, but also the driving force of human economic gain.
These are the people who, through remittances, bring in vital economic
relief to families in places such as Burma, and they are the young people
who drive the gleaming economies of places such as Thailand, the UAE and
China. Yet so often all we see are the gleaming towers they build or the
fine clothes that the middle classes brought for less.

And in between the weave of these glad rags the tales of people such as Wa
Wa can just be heard in places like Mae Sot. Her family ran a small curry
shop on the streets of Rangoon. Thirteen long years ago the family income
wasn’t adding up, and they raised the fee for a broker to convey Wa Wa to
the mills of Mae Sot.

In a break from the sewing training she receives at Yaung Chi Oo workers
association she relives some of the troubles of life as a knitter in one
of Mae Sot’s many sweatshops.

“I have to work from 8am to 12 noon, then have a break, then 12pm to 5pm,
then 6pm to midnight. Then I have a half hour break when the factory gives
us rice, then we have to work again, sometimes at 3 o’clock in the morning
until 6 or 7 o’clock. Then we start all over again at 8am.”

She describes this mind boggling schedule light-heartedly. It’s a schedule
of work that comes about when there was an order in that needed urgent
action, and epitomizes the breakneck competitiveness that keeps prices low
and the global economy growing.

“We just drink coffee or something like that; the boss just said if you
don’t like it just leave,” she says. But these incredible working hours
require something perhaps stronger than coffee. Moe Swe, head of Yaung Chi
Oo says that workers are often secretly drugged with amphetamines. He
claims to have met people who had the job of applying amphetamines to
rice, soup or coffee, and also workers who claim to have felt “very fresh”
after consumption.

The pay is on a per item basis, meaning the more you do, the more money
you make. With no overnight fee, she has done this work since her early
twenties, but has stood next to workers as young as 12. She ends up with
roughly 3,000 baht ($US90) per month; roughly a dollar above the official
global poverty line.

And whilst the sweatshops keep whirring to the sounds of the sewing
machines, and the owners and business associates discuss how to increase
output without spending more, the life of the migrant worker is never
secure. The threat of being caught by the Thai police hangs over heads as
if these people are burglars in a bank.

“I have been deported three times in the last ten years” Wa Wa explains.
“After they arrest you they bring you to a cell beside the police station
where you stay for one night. The police then take us down to the border
and send us to the Burmese side by boat. When we arrive we have to pay
10,000 kyat ($US10) to the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), and
after that we get released and return to the Thai side”.

“When we arrive at the Burmese side there is one checkpoint; if you don’t
pay you have to go to a forced labour camp or they send you to Naypyidaw
[Burma’s remote capital] or somewhere like that,” she said. She suspects
that the Thai police communicate with the DKBA. “They are looking for the
workers when we turn up. At the checkpoint I met a woman who was begging
for money, but I couldn’t help because I didn’t have enough money. I don’t
know what happened to her,” she says, her voice fading.

Moe Swe confirms that he believes the Thai immigration are in
communication with the powers that be on the other side of the river; it
just so happens that they are the infamous DKBA. He states that the Thai’s
vet the migrants and provide this inventory to the DKBA so they can charge
the immigrants on the basis of where they had been working. “Ones from
Bangkok have to pay more” he explains; they are deemed to have earned
more.

Wa Wa is grateful however that she works in a factory and not as a
domestic or sex worker. “The brokers take a lot of the younger ones to be
domestic workers,” she says. “In the factory people can see what is
happening, and people are scared of domestic work. You don’t have a chance
to leave, you just stay at their house, and if something goes wrong, if
your boss abuses you, no one will see.”

Organisation is difficult for Burmese migrants. Their illegal status
abroad and the relative impotency of the Thai unions mean that factory
owners have a massive amount of control over their employees. Wa Wa
believes that the “employers don’t like the workers to have contact with
organisations like Yaung Chi Oo. They are worried that the workers will
know their rights.”

Wa Wa has a child back in Rangoon that she has not seen for about two
years. Her mother has not been able to take him to visit her. She hopes
that her labour will enable him to go to school and seek a brighter future
than she has. She estimates however that she will not have earned enough
until she has worked like this for another ten years.

As the sun sets on another day of life in the Burmese ‘mill town’ of Mae
Sot, Wa Wa returns to knitting training at the organisation that employers
don’t want her to be a part of, in a country where she is fined by two
armed groups just for living here. Meanwhile, Su returns to her child, a
sweet, doting girl, a product of her exile and a proverbial silver lining.
Their lives represent a human experience that, despite being very common
and despite shaping the collective existence of humanity, is all too often
overlooked whilst the products they produce are quietly enjoyed.

The names of both Su and Wa Wa have been changed to protect their identity.

____________________________________

December 18, Christian Science Monitor
Burma (Myanmar) military junta shows signs of thaw before elections –
Simon Montlake

The military junta in Burma (Myanmar) is making calculated gestures to
loosen its grip ahead of elections next year, the first since 1990. It
allowed opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi to meet publicly with
politicians and for the MTV documentary 'Traffic' to be screened.

Bangkok, Thailand — A flurry of public activity by an imprisoned
opposition leader and the screening of a US-funded anti-trafficking
documentary may signal a tentative thaw in military-ruled Burma, one month
after a high-level US diplomatic visit aimed at improving bilateral ties.

On Wednesday, opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi was allowed to meet three
senior executives in the National League for Democracy (NLD) for the first
time in several years. She also met privately with the visiting US
diplomats and has stepped up her contacts with the junta while separately
appealing her latest 18-month sentence to house arrest. The Supreme Court
hasn’t decided whether to hear the appeal.

Analysts say the Burmese military is determined to tightly control a
planned political transition next year, when the impoverished Southeast
Asian country is due to hold its first elections since 1990. This
transition is likely to trump any desire to build common ground with the
Obama administration, which has sought to engage with the regime while
sticking with economic and political sanctions.

A key question remains the role of Ms. Suu Kyi and the NLD in the
elections. The party won the 1990 poll that was later annulled. The US and
its allies have pushed for Suu Kyi’s release and participation, but
analysts and diplomats say her popularity is seen as posing a direct
threat to a military-guided process.

This balancing act may explain the air of détente in Burma, if indeed
there is room for compromise on the fate of a democracy icon who has been
in detention for much of the last two decades.

"It's hard to say there's been a real thaw, only that the junta are
interested in improving relations with Washington and realize that some
gestures towards (Suu Kyi) are essential if this is going to happen,” says
Thant Myint-U, an author on Burma’s political history and former United
Nations official.

In what may be another such gesture, authorities in Burma recently gave a
green light to the broadcast of ‘Traffic’, an MTV documentary that is part
of a regional anti-human-trafficking campaign. The 2007 film was funded by
the US Agency for International Development, whose logo is prominent in
the campaign, and has already been screened nationally and promoted at
live concerts across Asia.

The film, which includes a Burmese couple talking off-camera about being
forced to work without pay in Thailand, was screened at a ceremony Friday
at a hotel in Rangoon, Burma’s largest city. A state broadcaster has
agreed to show the film and it will also be distributed on DVD and
rebroadcast.

Approval by Burma to screen ‘Traffic’ came within the last month, says
Simon Goff, the campaign’s executive director. Censors demanded cuts to a
segment on sex trafficking in the Philippines that included graphic
descriptions. But the section on the Burmese couple, who were eventually
rescued from the Thai factory, hasn’t been changed, he said.

In its annual report on trafficking, the US State Department lists Burma
as a ‘Tier 3’ country, the lowest category, due to its failure to tackle
the flow of people sold across its international borders. Only a handful
of countries are in this category. At least one million Burmese are
estimated to live in Thailand, including those who have fled from conflict
areas and have been resettled in refugee camps, as well as those
trafficked into exploitative work.

More concrete concessions by Burma's regime, including the release of
elderly and sick political prisoners and more regular contacts between Suu
Kyi and the NLD, would show that it is serious, says Soe Aung, a spokesman
for the Forum for Democracy in Burma, a campaign group in Thailand. The
NLD hasn’t been allowed to hold a party congress in many years and its
members have suffered repeated harassment by authorities, he complains.

“We can’t tell if there’s been any progress,” he says.

____________________________________

December 18, Asia Times
Myanmar's generals plow a rich furrow – Brian McCartan

Bangkok – Joseph Stiglitz, the American Nobel economics laureate, advised
Myanmar's military-run regime this week that political reform is necessary
if the generals hope to revitalize the country's stagnant, mostly
agriculture-based economy. Any reform of the rural sector, which employs
70% of the workforce and accounts for nearly half of gross domestic
product (GDP), will run up against the widespread and largely
institutionalized corruption of the military.

Stiglitz, a former chief economist at the World Bank and Nobel Prize
winner in 2001, is renowned for his sharp critiques of conventional
free-market development policies, including those espoused by the World
Bank and the International Monetary Fund. His comments came in the context
of a forum arranged by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission
for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) at the invitation of the government of
Myanmar.

The forum in the capital, Naypyidaw, was attended by Myanmar Minister for
Agriculture and Irrigation Major General Htay Oo and Minister for National
Planning and Economic Development U Soe Tha and was aimed at exploring
strategies for poverty alleviation and rural development. Both ministers
are known to be close to Senior General Than Shwe, the reclusive
authoritarian leader who is known to have the final say on all policy
decisions.

The dialogue was the second in a planned series of events initiated with a
visit to Myanmar in July by United Nations under secretary general and
executive secretary of ESCAP, Noeleen Hezyer. The previous visit was at
the invitation of Oo and, according to an ESCAP press release, was the
"first step in a development partnership with the government of Myanmar to
discuss its agriculture economy and policy".

The Myanmar government has also requested the UN agency to assist in
conducting an economic and social assessment of the country's rural
economy in 2010. Talks during the UN visit explored the need for farmers
to gain greater access to credit and UN concerns over state-mandated low
prices for agricultural products that contribute to rural poverty.

When Myanmar achieved independence from colonial rule in 1948, its
economic prospects looked good as the world's leading rice exporter. Years
of civil war and gross economic mismanagement, magnified after the country
came under military rule in 1962, have instead left the country stuck on
the UN's list of least-developed countries since 1987.

Despite its abundance of arable land and once storied reputation as the
"rice bowl of Asia", malnutrition is now rampant, affecting over one-third
of the country's children and ranking the country by the UN as one of the
world's "hunger hotspots". The situation is aggravated by widespread
corruption by local military commanders and civil servants. Transparency
International ranked Myanmar 178th, or third from the bottom, of all
surveyed countries in its most recent corruption perception listing.

Economists and exiled activists point to government policies that favor
the military over other sectors. That includes government-imposed crop
quotas, which require farmers to hand over without compensation a
percentage of their yields. Although the policy was officially
discontinued in 2004, it is still effectively implemented by military
officers in rural areas that confiscate through the threat of force a
share of farmers' crops.

The extortion and confiscation of crops by corrupt military officials is
the upshot of a 1998 Ministry of Defense directive that required military
units to be self-sufficient for their food and other supplies. The order
to effectively live off the land has never been rescinded, despite the
extraordinary outlays that go towards the military, estimated by some as
high as 40% of the national budget.

Crop extortion
Since 2005, there has been an upsurge in demands by the military for
farmers to produce cash crops such as rubber, corn and jatropha. Portions
of the harvest, independent researchers say, must be handed over to the
military and are then sold for a profit. The Karen Human Rights Group, a
Thailand-based rights advocacy, has documented the widespread use of
forced labor by military officers to grow and harvest crops, often on
fields confiscated from villagers.

Human-rights researchers who spoke to Asia Times Online say the practice
means many Myanmar farmers are left with little time to work their own
crops, which results in poor harvests. This is especially the case in the
border areas with Thailand, where the army expropriates whatever it needs
in terms of food and land in the name of counter-insurgency operations. It
is also prevalent in the Irrawaddy Delta and the central plains.

Researchers in Myanmar's northern Shan State told Asia Times Online about
a recent military scheme that forces local farmers to purchase genetically
altered rice seeds from China as a part of a crop substitution program to
reduce the cultivation of opium poppies. According to the researchers,
yields have fallen because farmers cannot afford the high costs of the
fertilizers necessary to grow the rice. The policy has raised uncertainty
among agrarians and undermined what were already low local yields.

During his address, Stiglitz urged the government to promote greater
access to financing, improve access to seeds and fertilizers and boost
spending on public health and education. The economist also advocated
stimulating local development and job creation through spending on rural
infrastructure.

Some say the discovery and exploitation of offshore natural gas deposits
has contributed to the official neglect of the agriculture sector, which
in the past was heavily relied on for export earnings. The junta has in
recent years reaped multi-billion dollar profits from deals running gas
pipelines to Thailand

Those revenues will flow stronger when gas fields off the country's
western Arakan coast come on line for sale to China. Stiglitz called on
the government to use oil and gas sale profits to stimulate other sectors
of the economy, including agriculture. "Revenues from oil and gas can open
up a new era, if used well," said Stiglitz. "If not, then valuable
opportunities will be squandered."

Analysts believe that without significant political change there is little
hope for Myanmar's rural economy. In a UN press release following
Tuesday's forum, Stiglitz warned the generals that economics and politics
cannot be separated if the country wishes to boost agricultural yields
again.

"For Myanmar to take a role on the world stage - and to achieve true
stability and security - there must be widespread participation and
inclusive processes," he said. "This is the only way forward for Myanmar."

Sean Turnell, an economist who specializes in Myanmar's economy, concurs.
"This is because the principal problems stem directly from the nature of
the regime itself - its insatiable demands, its turning loose of the
Tatmadaw [Myanmar armed forces] in the countryside, the lack of property
rights - both in a formal sense in terms of the ability to pledge land as
collateral and in a more visceral sense that there are no rights to
property - even over one's body - in a place where an army expropriates
what it needs."

Few believe that the general elections slated for next year will change
the situation, as the new constitution reserves a role for the military in
government. As long as the army remains a powerful political actor, it
will maintain influence over agricultural policies. Changing the system
would entail a market-based system in which military officers would be
required to pay for what they consume.

Myanmar maintains the second-largest standing army in Southeast Asia,
after Vietnam, with about 350,000 foot soldiers. The majority of them are
known to live off the land and the power of their station rather than from
state-paid salaries. Although a high percentage of Myanmar's gross
domestic product is annually dedicated to the military, security analysts
say much of that goes towards buying frivolous new weapons systems rather
than food and equipment for soldiers.

Calls by the UN and other multilateral organizations for reform and change
in Myanmar's failed agricultural policies are well-intentioned and
well-timed. But as long as agriculture and politics remain so tightly
intertwined in Myanmar, and the military dominates government, even
prescriptions from a Nobel Prize winning economist will likely go
unheeded.

Brian McCartan is a Bangkok-based freelance journalist. He may be reached
at brianpm at comcast.net.

____________________________________
PRESS RELEASE

December 18, Freedom Now
Freedom Now hails call of 53 members of U.S. House of Representatives
urging immediate release of American Nyi Nyi Aung imprisoned in Burma

Washington: A bipartisan group of 53 members of the United States House of
Representatives, led by Chairman Howard Berman (D-CA) of the House Foreign
Affairs Committee and Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA), Co-Chair of the Tom Lantos
Human Rights Commission, has urged Burma’s junta leader Than Shwe to
immediately release American and Gaithersburg, Maryland resident Nyi Nyi
Aung.

In the letter, dated yesterday and attached, the Congressmen declared:

“The detention of an American citizen under these circumstances has caused
alarm among many Members of the United States Congress, and raises serious
doubts about your government’s willingness to improve relations with the
United States . . . We urge you in the strongest possible terms to
immediately and unconditionally release Mr. Aung and allow him to return
to the United States.”

Other signatories to the letter include House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer
(D-MD), Assistant to the Speaker Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), and Rep.
Dan Rohrabacher (R-CA), ranking member on the House Foreign Affairs
Subcommittee on International Organizations, Human Rights, and Oversight.

Freedom Now President Jared Genser stated: “We hope that this important
intervention by such a prominent group of Members of Congress will make
clear to the Burmese junta that the United States will first look to the
treatment of one of its own citizens in assessing the junta’s willingness
to engage in dialogue.”

Mr. Aung, a democracy activist, was arrested by Burmese authorities on
September 3, 2009. He was attempting to visit his mother, also an
imprisoned democracy activist, who has cancer. Mr. Aung is falsely accused
of using a forged Burmese identity card and illegally importing currencies
into the country. He is on trial for these alleged violations and is
detained in Burma’s notorious Insein prison.

The Burmese junta has deprived Mr. Aung of his right to U.S. consular
access since December 3, 2009. He was also deprived of this right during
the first 17 days of his detention. In addition to this violation of
international law, Burmese authorities tortured Mr. Aung. He was deprived
of food and sleep, beaten, and denied medical treatment. He is also being
denied his rights under Burmese law to a public trial and access to
counsel.

Contact: Beth Schwanke
+1 (202) 617-0744