BurmaNet News, March 17, 2010

[Editor]

March 17, 2010, Issue #3918


INSIDE BURMA
AFP: Despite crackdown on monks, Myanmar pledges tolerance
Irrawaddy: Divisions over party registration surfacing in NLD
Irrawaddy: Gov't Ministers to contest the election
New Light of Myanmar: US Embassy Consul holds consular meeting with Nyi
Nyi Aung (a) Kyaw Zaw Lwin

ON THE BORDER
Financial Times (UK):  Burma's ethnic minority counts cost of conflict as
polls loom

DRUGS
Economist: Steady hand on the till

REGIONAL
Asia News International (India): Myanmarese demand rollback of new
electoral laws

INTERNATIONAL
Mizzima News: No change in Burma from 2010 polls: Dr Sein Win

OPINION / OTHER
Irrawaddy: Asean must speak with one voice on Burma's election – Aung Zaw
Inner City Press: UN's friends on Myanmar to meet March 25, UK's letter
catches up to Ban – Matthew Russell Lee
DVB: ‘We’ve fallen for the generals’ tricks’ – Zoya Phan

STATEMENT
HRW: Burma: UN should move on international inquiry





____________________________________
INSIDE BURMA

March 17, Agence France Presse
Despite crackdown on monks, Myanmar pledges tolerance

Manila — Myanmar on Wednesday pledged to promote a culture of tolerance,
despite international outrage over an appalling human rights record that
includes its crackdown on Buddhist monks.

"We are committed to promote and strengthen a culture of peace and
dialogue," Myanmar Foreign Minister Nyan Win told a ministerial meeting of
the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) in Manila.

"I hardly need to stress the importance of harbouring mutual respect among
people of different faiths," he stressed.

"If we fail to show respect and discriminate against other religions,
conflicts and tensions among peoples will linger on.

"We fully agree that tolerance is a fundamental value of international
relations," he said.

However, Myanmar remains an international pariah over its continuing
crackdown on Buddhist monks and opposition members.

In a report late last year, Human Rights Watch said as many as 240 monks
had been jailed in Myanmar, with thousands of others defrocked or living
in fear of arrest for their role in mass demonstrations in 2007.

The rights group said as many as 2,200 political dissidents were in
detention in Myanmar.

Myanmar also recently provoked international anger after the ruling junta
passed laws effectively preventing Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu
Kyi from taking part in elections this year.

In a meeting scheduled with Nyan Win later Wednesday, Philippine Foreign
Minister Alberto Romulo is expected to criticise the laws and call for
their repeal.

Nyan Win side-stepped the issue, saying that the discussions with Romulo
would focus only on bilateral relations.

Romulo said earlier he would urge the Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (ASEAN), to which both Myanmar and the Philippines belong, to call
for a reversal of Myanmar's decree, at the bloc's annual summit in Vietnam
next month.

ASEAN, which groups 10 nations, maintains a policy of non-interference in
its members' affairs. But that has slowly begun to erode in recent years,
with the Philippines taking the lead in criticising Myanmar's junta.

____________________________________

March 17, Irrawaddy
Divisions over party registration surfacing in NLD – Ba Kaung

Burma's main opposition party, faced with a choice of registering for this
year's election without its leader Aung San Suu Kyi or disbanding, is
showing signs of internal division, according to senior party members.

Party sources said that Aung Shwe, the 92-year-old chairman of the
National League for Democracy (NLD), told members of the party's Central
Executive Committee (CEC) on Monday that he supported party
re-registration—a move that would involve expelling Suu Kyi because of
electoral laws banning parties with members currently in detention.

“U Aung Shwe wants to register and join the election to avoid the
dissolution of the party, and many other party officials echoed his
opinion,” said a party source.

Suu Kyi, who was sentenced to house arrest last August under charges
widely dismissed as a ploy to prevent her from participating in this
year's election, said that she would “respect the decision of the party,”
said her lawyer Nyan Win, who is also a senior party official.

On March 29, more than 90 recently elected Central Committee members from
across the country are expected to meet to the 20-member CEC to decide on
whether to re-register. If the party fails to register within 60 days of
an election law announced on March 8, it will cease to exist as a legal
entity.

Speaking with The Irrawaddy on Wednesday, NLD Vice-Chairman Tin Oo said
that he would accept the majority decision of the party. But, he added, “a
dignified party would not accept the laws that marginalize detained
democracy leaders” like Suu Kyi and Min Ko Naing.

Aung Shwe and Khin Maung Swe (left) have expressed support for party
registration, while Win Tin and Nyan Win (right) oppose the move.

Although it appears that many party members are in favor of registration,
some senior leaders have been outspoken in their opposition. A party
source described Central Executive Committee members Win Tin, Nyan Win,
Ohn Kyaing and Han Thar Myint as being “in the opposing camp.”

Win Tin, a longtime supporter of Suu Kyi who was released in September
2008 after serving more than 19 years in prison, said he would probably
retire from the party if the majority of its officials decide to register.

“I think many people will choose to register,” he said. “If that happens,
I don't think I will continue to be a party member. I don't wish to follow
the path the military foisted on us by force. I will retire because my
health is also failing.”

One of the leading party officials who support registration and joining
the election is 67-year-old Khin Maung Swe, a former geologist.

“Our line is to try to maintain the existence of the party,” he said.
“Joining in the election is not surrendering to the regime. We are
determined to persistently strive for changes in the Constitution.”

Asked why Suu Kyi did not clearly state whether the party should register
or join the election, Win Tin said: “Daw Suu is a pro-democracy leader,
not a dictator, so she let the party make the decision.”

____________________________________

March 17, Irrawaddy
Gov't Ministers to contest the election – Kyaw Thein Kha

More than 12 ministers in Burma's junta are reportedly preparing to resign
and to run for seats in parliament in the 2010 election, according to
military sources.

“Deputy ministers who do not contest in the election will take the vacant
position of the ministers,” said a source in Rangoon.

The ministers designated to run for office in parliament are believed to
include Soe Tha, the minister of National Planning & Economic Development;
Brig-Gen Aung Thein Linn, the Rangoon mayor; and Brig-Gen Kyaw Hsan, the
Information minister, according to the source, who requested anonymity
because he was not authorized to make the information public.

Aung Thaung, the minister of Industry-1, also is expected to contest in
the election.

The ministers are expected to run in constituencies in townships in
Rangoon Division, Irrawaddy Division, Sagaing Division and Arakan and
Kachin states, according to the source.

Under the 2008 Constitution, 25 percent of the representatives in the
People's Assembly (Lower House) and National Assembly (Upper House) will
be military officials appointed by the commander-in-chief of the Tamadaw
(armed forces).

The source said there is speculation that another 18 ministers would also
either run for office or be appointed directly to serve in parliament by
the commander-in-chief. No names were available.

Current government ministers are also expected to lead the junta’s mass
organization, the Union Solidarity and Development Association, and two
proxy political parties, which have yet to register with the Election
Commission.

USDA sources said the organization would name one of the proxy parties the
“Guidance Democracy Party.” Ex-military officers are expected to lead the
parties, which will register in the near future.

State-run television on Wednesday announced that the technical regulations
on how to register as a political party will be published on Thursday.

____________________________________

March 16, New Light of Myanmar
US Embassy Consul holds consular meeting with Nyi Nyi Aung (a) Kyaw Zaw Lwin

Nay Pyi Taw, 16 March -As a gesture of taking heed of the request of the
US Embassy, Consul Mr. Colin P. Furst and a member of the US Embassy were
allowed to hold a consular meeting with prisoner Nyi Nyi Aung (a) Kyaw Zaw
Lwin who was naturalized as a US citizen at the office of the in-charge of
Pyay Jail in Pyay at 12.55 p.m. on 12 March. – MNA

____________________________________
ON THE BORDER

March 17, Financial Times (UK)
Burma's ethnic minority counts cost of conflict as polls loom – Tim Johnston

Bangkok – After surviving 60 years of war, Mu Haw is close to giving up.
"I'm too old to keep on running for my life," she says. "If no one helps
us, I will die here."

"Here" is a refugee camp on a barren hilltop in western Thailand. From her
hut, with its raised floor of split bamboo and thatch of leaves, she can
look back over the Moei river to the thickly forested mountains of Burma's
Karen state, where separatists are fighting the world's longestrunning
insurgency.

For people like Mu Haw, the danger has ebbed and flowed over the years,
but the stakes have been raised recently as Burma's military government
has pushed hard to defeat the Karen before elections due later this year.

The local pro-government militia, the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army, or
DKBA, has widened its offensive against Karen guerrillas and villagers,
pushing thousands over the border with Thailand into camps such as Nong
Bua, where they live unwanted and in misery.

Burma's ethnic minorities, who make up 30 per cent of the country's 58m
people, have never been comfortable with the rule of the ethnic Burman
majority. Karen guerrillas have been battling for a separate homeland
since 1949, the year Mu Haw was born. Some of her earliest memories are of
watching her family's cows in their fields while keeping an eye on the rim
of the jungle in case the army attacked.

The human cost of the war has been horrific. There are no accurate
estimates of how many have died, but there are 103,000 UN-recognised
Burmese refugees in Thailand, and aid groups say hundreds of thousands
more are not registered, including Mu Haw and the other residents of the
Nong Bua camp.

By some estimates there are 2m Burmese in Thailand, some driven out of
Burma by the constant fighting, others by the catastrophic economic
mismanagement of the ruling generals.

For Mu Haw, this has meant a life of constant upheaval. She lists the
villages she has been forced to leave, sometimes because they were caught
in the middle of the fighting but often because militias used their
inhabitants as porters or forced labour.

For years, the Thai authorities allowed the Karen to operate across the
border with little interference, using them as a foil against the erratic
generals who govern Burma, but there are signs that Thailand's strategic
interests are shifting. "They have been moving away from their buffer
policy and they tend to crack down more on the Karen," said one European
diplomat.

The Thai government says it has maintained a consistent policy of
supporting reconciliation between the Burmese government and the country's
ethnicminority groups and that this has not changed.

The Burmese government and its militia proxies have become more active as
the country prepares for the elections. Even if the ballot is conducted
freely, it is likely to yield only limited democratic dividends - a
constitution passed by the generals two years ago guarantees the military
25 per cent of the seats in parliament.

But it has given new impetus to the Burmese authorities to try to extend
their control over the country's fractious borderlands.

The 550 or so residents of Nong Bua fled the village of Ler Ber Her, just
across the river that forms the border, last June after government forces
attacked, but the Thai authorities want them to go back. An attempt to
repatriate the refugees last month was stopped after an international
outcry. The Thai authorities said the Karen were moving back of their own
volition, but it is clear that the residents of Nong Bua have no desire to
return.

"There are landmines there, and we are afraid of the DKBA," says Kyep Sie,
a maths teacher. A woman who was eight months pregnant returned to the
village of her own volition in January and immediately had part of her
foot blown off by a landmine.

But camp residents say the Thai authorities are keeping up the pressure.
"They tell us 'you can't stay here, you have to go back'," says Naw Paw
Lay, a 40-year-old mother of eight.

She earns Bt10 ($0.31, €0.22, £0.20) to Bt15 a week selling betel nuts in
the camp, but it is tightly guarded and its residents are not allowed to
leave to work in the surrounding villages. The UN refugee agency has
restricted access, and even the Thai government's Human Rights Commission
has been forced to carry out interviews in the presence of soldiers.

Mu Haw says there were originally 225 families at Nong Bua, but about half
have melted away into the surrounding countryside because of the pressure
and uncertainty. "All our life is fear," she says.

____________________________________
DRUGS

March 17, Economist
Steady hand on the till

Chaing Rai – In the mountains of Myanmar's strife-torn Shan state, the
colourful blossom of opium poppies has become a more frequent sight of
late. A businessman based in the Shan state notes that the flowers now
bloom more freely in areas under the control of the ruling junta than in
the shrinking zones held by local rebels.

Increased opium cultivation and Myanmar’s unceasing export of heroin
suggests that the army and their proxy militias are becoming more involved
in the “Golden Triangle” drug trade.

This coincides with the army’s renewed efforts to force the rebels in this
part of the country, who signed a series of ceasefire agreements in the
early 1990s, to surrender—or, alternatively, to be integrated into
official border units under the junta’s control. These rebels tend to be
organised according to ethnicity. Both the Kachin Independent Army and the
United Wa State Army (the UWSA), two of the groups with ceasefire accords,
are insisting on keeping some degree of autonomy. Unless a new agreement
can be reached, the ceasefires are in danger of failing—an outcome that
China, which shares a long border with the Shan state, would like to
avert.

The UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) publishes an annual survey on
opium in Myanmar as part of its larger “Opium Poppy Cultivation in
South-East Asia” report. The most recent, from December 2009, shows that
cultivation has increased dramatically: by nearly 50% since 2006. This
despite the free-for-all in Afghanistan which has turned that country into
a market giant, driving down global prices and making it harder for
producers elsewhere to compete. Yet more than 1m people in Myanmar are now
involved in producing opium, up 27% from the year before.

The Palaung Women’s Organisation (PWO), an NGO that conducted an
undercover survey in the Shan state, has published a report with a
different emphasis. Theirs describes the role played by the pro-government
militias who have, it says, displaced the rebel groups from the intensive
cultivation of opium poppies. The poorly paid regular army and its
militias count on drug money to boost their salaries, just as the warlords
of the Wa had long done.

The UNODC has it instead “that opium-poppy cultivation took place in areas
controlled by insurgency and by ceasefire groups”. While launching the
most recent annual report, the UNODC’s executive director, Antonio Maria
Costa, seemed to attribute the surge in opium cultivation exclusively to
“the ceasefire groups—the autonomous ethnic militias like the Wa and the
Kachin—[who] are selling drugs to buy weapons.”

The UN agency’s conclusion is at odds with other reports from NGOs and
independent observers. Tom Kramer, a researcher who studies the opium
trade in the Golden Triangle for the Transnational Institute, says he is
sceptical of any report that assigns blame to a single side of the
political conflict. Under strong pressure from China, various bans on
opium-growing have been established in areas under the control of the Wa
and Kokang ethnic armies.

The PWO’s report questions several of the UNODC’s findings. It cites the
opium survey’s use of a map which shows two ethnic armed groups, including
the PSLA (Palaung State Liberation Army), which signed a ceasefire,
enjoying control of a major opium-growing area around the Mantong and
Namkham townships of the Shan state. The map, which was supplied by
Myanmar’s authorities, ignores the fact that the PSLA in fact surrendered
to the army back in 2005.

The UNODC admits to relying on Myanmar’s authorities for data and
information on narcotics, and especially drug eradication. As Gary Lewis,
the UNODC’s regional director based in Bangkok, acknowledges: “We can’t
rule out that the map is out of date or contains an error.”

The UNODC’s report also fails to mention the activity of a pro-government
militia group from Monghsat township. Operating out of Punako village,
just over the border from Chiang Rai, in northern Thailand, this militia
exerts complete control over local opium fields. The Burmese army’s Light
Infantry Battalions 553 and 554 are reported to be stationed just outside
Punako.

Academics have cast doubt on the UNODC’s research; Mr Kramer says that
their crop-monitoring data are inherently unreliable. Others have asked
whether the agency actually tries to verify any of the information
supplied by Myanmar’s police and army—which are, after all, the security
apparatus of one of the world’s least transparent regimes.

Lway Aye Nang of the PWO says that “the Burmese militias set up by local
authorities loyal to the junta are in full control. I don’t think the UN
has ever been to our area.” The armed groups that profit by opium-farming
there are, in her eyes, proxies of the state and have been for years.

Not that the Chinese-brokered ban on the cultivation of poppies has
prevented the UWSA from maintaining a lucrative stake in the drug trade.
Rebel Wa continue to manufacture and export heroin and methamphetamines to
neighbouring countries, including China, Thailand and Laos.

As for the fields from which most of the raw material of this trade grows,
a former UN drug-monitoring expert in Yangon remarked that “there is no
possibility of eradicating opium-poppy cultivation unless there is peace
and security.” Perversely, with a steady flow of drug money financing
militias on all sides of the Shan state’s stalemate, there seems little
chance of forging a peace.

____________________________________
REGIONAL

March 17, Asia News International (India)
Myanmarese demand rollback of new electoral laws

Hundreds of Myanmarese activists took out a rally in New Delhi on
Wednesday to protest against the military junta's new election laws in
Myanmar.

The military regime in Myanmar introduced the new election laws barring
opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi from contesting in national polls.

Along with Suu Kyi, over 2200 political prisoners would be prevented from
participating in the elections.

While demanding the participation of Suu Kyi in general elections, the
protesters also shouted slogans against the military junta.

"We are having demonstration today, because we are against the military
government announced lateral law and 2008 constitution, because this law
and constitution bans Aung San Suu Kyi and other politicians," said Thin
Thin Aung, member, Women's League of Burma.

The protesters demanded an intervention by Indian Government to restore
democracy in Myanmar.

"I have been agitating for the restoration of democracy in Burma. We try
to spread information about the situation in Burma among the Indian
people. We also agitate the Indian politicians and government regarding
the situation in Burma. We are requesting them to intervene in the first
place for the release of Aung San Suu Kyi," said Sharad Joshi, Rajya Sabha
member.

On March 8, the ruling State Peace and Development Council of Burma had
released the five sets of new electoral laws for the general election in
the country, expected to be held later this year.

Nobel laureate Suu Kyi has been locked up for 14 of the past 20 years
since her National League for Democracy (NLD) won the country's last
elections in 1990.

____________________________________
INTERNATIONAL

March 17, Mizzima News
No change in Burma from 2010 polls: Dr Sein Win – Htet Win

The Burmese junta is using the 2010 elections to smother the opposition
and its democratic activities to cement and legitimize military rule in
the guise of elections and democracy, said Dr Sein Win, Prime Minister of
the National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma in  exile.

“We will not accept it, and our struggle for democracy in Burma might be
long,” he said.
dr-sein-win1

Dr Sein Win said this at a function on March 13 at Berkeley, California in
the United States, to mark Burma's Human Rights Day.

March 13 has been earmarked as Burma's Human Rights Day by activists when
a Rangoon Institute of Technology student Phone Maw was brutally killed in
1988 by Burmese soldiers, which eventually led to a nationwide uprising
against military rule.

“This year’s elections, in my opinion, will not usher in any change in
Burma,” Dr Sein Win said. He added that all the democratic alliances
believe the constitution will not lead to any kind of democracy.

Controversy has erupted between the regime and opposition political
parties over the new electoral laws and the 2008 constitution. For
instance, the President must be from a military background and a
registered party has to support and defend the 2008 constitution.

Nyunt Than, the President of the San Francisco-based NGO the Burmese
American Democratic Alliance, said the regime had now closed all doors to
possible negotiation and the process of democratization.

“We Burmese people will never give up, even though it seems hopeless,”
Nyunt Than said.

“Democracy icon Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and more than 2000 political
prisoners are our role models, and the oppressive regime will be
defeated,” he said.

Toe Lwin, a former political prisoner now living in the United States told
Mizzima that the election laws were a clear example of lawlessness by the
junta in ensuring that there was no effective opposition.

“The election laws are designed to simply crush opposition parties,” Toe
Lwin said.

The 2008 constitution does not protect the rights of the people, and the
vicious circle of arbitrary arrests and torture will continue, he said.

____________________________________
OPINION / OTHER

March 17, Irrawaddy
Asean must speak with one voice on Burma's election – Aung Zaw

The Burmese regime announced its anticipated election laws last week and
will definitely hold its promised election this year.

The election laws confirmed fears that that the election won’t be free,
fair and inclusive, meaning that the Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (Asean) will have more trouble with its miscreant member,
military-ruled Burma.

Although Asean withheld comment on Burma’s election laws, some member
countries have expressed uneasiness.

In Singapore, while government officials remained silent, The Straits
Times newspaper took a critical stance, saying: “One of the election laws
seems aimed specifically at opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi. It
requires her party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), to expel her
as she is serving a suspended sentence under house arrest. Without her
participation, the vote cannot have much credibility.”

The island state's daily said Suu Kyi remains a symbol of resistance and
“a political force whose exclusion cannot be justified.”

It continued: “Neither can elections be seen as inclusive if the other
2,000 political prisoners are unable to contest the polls. With her and
them off the ballot, voters’ choice will be drastically limited, if not
largely pre-determined. An election commission will have 'final and
conclusive' say on all electoral matters, according to the authorities,
but its five members have to be approved by the junta. So much for
fairness and transparency.”

Alberto Romulo, foreign secretary of the Philippines, went further and
commented: “Unless they release Suu Kyi and allow her and her party to
participate in the elections, it’s a complete farce and therefore contrary
to their road map to democracy.”

Romulo had already, before the announcement of the election laws, called
on the junta to ensure that the election is “free, fair, credible and
all-inclusive.”

Teuku Faizasyah, a spokesman of Indonesia’s foreign ministry, predicted
that the laws may undermine the election because its result will not be
inclusive.

Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is scheduled to send his
foreign minister, Marty Natalegawa, this month to Burma, where he is
expected to speak out for democratic reform there, including an inclusive
election.

The election in Burma will again test Asean’s waning influence and the
controversial policy of “constructive engagement” in its dealings with
Burma.

Senior officials from Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia have also told the
Burmese regime that the release of Suu Kyi and other political prisoners
is key to winning international credibility and to achieving much-needed
national reconciliation. However, there has been no sign that the regime
is prepared to heed their advice.

In February, Surin Pitsuwan, Asean’s secretary-general and former foreign
minister of Thailand, told the BBC’s “Hardtalk” program that Asean
expected a credible and transparent election in Burma, but added that the
organization cannot interfere in the details of the poll.

Without mentioning Burma’s dire political situation, the prevailing
climate of fear and the country's 2,000 political prisoners, Surin
Pitsuwan spoke as if he were a spokesman of the regime.

“No election is perfect,” he said. “It has to begin. That's why they [the
Burmese regime] are beginning. They promise [to hold an election] at the
end of this year.”  And he said the Burmese generals' commitment to the
election should be seen as a positive factor.

In the past, Asean support for the Burmese regime was tied to a belief
that engagement will change its repressive behavior and bring more
openness. Asean leaders also insisted that the organization has to counter
China’s sphere of influence in Burma.

So far, however, Asean’s engagement policy has proven to be ineffective.

Since Burma became a member of Asean in 1997, the regime has incarcerated
ever more political prisoners, driven hundreds of thousands of ethnic
minority refugees to seek safety in jungle hideouts, in neighboring
Thailand and, recently, even in China. It brazenly massacred activists and
monks in full view of the world in the September 2007 demonstrations.
Today, Burma is a satellite state of China.

More worryingly, Burma has forged closer military ties with North Korea.
Reports of purchases of short-range ballistic missiles have been confirmed
and there have been persistent reports of nuclear cooperation between the
two nations.

Senior US State Department officials have publicly expressed concern about
the shady relationship between Burma and North Korea.

So, where does Asean stand now? Unfortunately, not all in the bloc agree
that it is important for Burma to move toward a genuine democracy rather
than “disciplinary democracy.”

Not surprisingly, the governments that have been most silent on the need
for a free and fair election—Laos, Cambodia, Brunei and Vietnam—are the
ones that share the Burmese junta’s penchant for authoritarian rule.

Vietnam, currently chair of Asean, is particularly shaping up as a bulwark
against pressure from within Asean and from the outside world.

The Vietnamese Foreign Ministry has said on its Web site that Hanoi
supports Burma’s regional and international integration. As a member of
the UN Security Council in 2008-09, Vietnam maintained that engagement
with Naypyidaw should be based on a policy of non-interference in Burma’s
domestic affairs.

In recent months, Burmese and Vietnamese leaders and senior officials have
met repeatedly to strengthen bilateral and regional ties.

Last October, Gen Shwe Mann, the joint chief of staff of the Burmese armed
forces, traveled to Hanoi to meet with Vietnamese President Nguyen Minh
Triet and sign an agreement on increasing military cooperation.

Two months later, Maung Myint, Burma’s minister for religious affairs,
also visited Vietnam, where he signed the first bilateral agreement ever
reached between Asean members on religious matters.

The visit was followed in January by a meeting between Burmese Prime
Minister Gen Thein Sein and Vietnam’s deputy ministers of foreign affairs
and defense in Naypyidaw. Then, later in the month, Burmese Foreign
Minister Nyan Win attended a ministerial meeting of the Asean Political
Security Community, which Vietnam hosted as the Asean chair for 2010.

In view of these developments, there can be no doubt that the Burmese
regime leaders are counting on Vietnam.

There is nothing especially untoward in any of this, but as long as Asean
remains divided along political lines, there is a very real danger of its
less democratic members reinforcing the Burmese junta’s stubborn refusal
to acknowledge the need for change.

Asean should tell the regime leaders unequivocally that the organization
is in favor of a genuinely democratic election and that the bloc cannot be
seen as defending the right of dictators to rule as they please.

Aung Zaw is founder and editor of the Irrawaddy magazine. He can be
reached at aungzaw at irrawaddy.org

____________________________________

March 17, Inner City Press
UN's friends on Myanmar to meet March 25, UK's letter catches up to Ban –
Matthew Russell Lee

United Nations – Amid criticism of the election laws propounded by Burmese
military leader Than Shwe, at the UN on March 25 the Group of Friends of
the Secretary General on Myanmar will meet, Inner City Press has learned.

On March 16, after UK prime minister Gordon Brown had been quoted in a
government press release that he had sent a letter to S-G Ban Ki-moon
requesting an emergency meeting in New York, Inner City Press asked Mr.
Ban if he had gotten the letter, and if there would be a meeting of his
Group of Friends.

No, Mr. Ban replied, he had not gotten any UK letter. But he said there
might be a meeting of the Group of Friends.

UK Permanent Representative to the UN Mark Lyall Grant, who had
no-commented a Press question about Myanmar on his way into the Security
Council Tuesday morning, did not come to Wednesday's Council meeting.

His Deputy Philip Parham came, but split off from Austria's Ambassador and
entered the chamber without passing by the press. Austria's Ambassador
told Inner City Press that on Myanmar, he had no more information than the
day before.

But later on Wednesday morning, not from the UK mission, Inner City Press
learned that Mr. Ban has requested a meeting of his Group of Friend on
March 25. China cannot block it, the source said. The Friends meet when
Mr. Ban requests it.

A question is whether Ban will claim that he was already planning to
convene his Group of Friends on Myanmar before getting -- or even hearing
about -- Gordon Brown's letter.

Timing is everything, especially in the absence of action.

The Press has been told that Tuesday following Mr. Ban's noon press
conference at the conclusion of which he told Inner City Press he had no
letter from Brown but there might be a meeting of the Friends, the UK's
Lyall Grant finally hand delivered Brown's letter to Ban.

Had Ban heard of Brown's letter, and decided to get out in front of it? Or
do great or at least Friendly minds think alike?

____________________________________

March 17, Democratic Voice of Burma
‘We’ve fallen for the generals’ tricks’ – Zoya Phan

So far, March has been a bad month for those countries and so-called Burma
experts who advocate for a softer line with Burma’s generals.  First were
the admissions by the US that its engagement policy was going nowhere;
then came the publication of election laws in Burma that don’t give the
slightest concession to calls that elections this year be free and fair;
and finally the recommendations by the UN special rapporteur on Burma that
there be a UN Commission of Inquiry into war crimes and crimes against
humanity being committed by the dictatorship. The true nature of Than Shwe
and the general’s around him has been revealed again.

The argument over what the international community should do about the
situation in our country has grown in recent years. What has surprised me
is how badly informed that debate has been, and how willing some people
and countries are to turn a blind eye to the reality of what is going in
my country. Some people are even worse, playing down the human rights
abuses and trying to put a positive spin on the actions of the generals.

What governments and the UN have consistently failed to do is to look at
the true nature of the people ruling Burma. Only when you understand them
and what they do can you work out how to deal with them.

As a Karen woman growing up in eastern Burma I know this true nature
first-hand. I have seen the bodies of villagers and farmers, met the women
who have been raped and the orphans whose parents were killed. Like
thousands of others I have had to flee for my life as mortar bombs
exploded in my village, fired at civilians without warning. Now, finally,
the UN’s own Burma expert has described these as possible war crimes and
crimes against humanity.

The international community, especially the UN, prefers to ignore what is
happening to ethnic people in eastern Burma. Instead they focus on Rangoon
and Naypyidaw, and on topics like who gets to meet Aung San Suu Kyi, or
can someone repair the roof of her house; but what political significance
does that have? When decisions on what to do about the crisis in Burma
descend to such ridiculous things, I sometimes feel despair.

And even when the abuses happen right in front of them, how short their
memories are. The massacre of thousands in 1988, the crushing of student
protests in the mid-1990s, and the firing on monks in 2007, all seem
forgotten. The generals defy the UN, draft a constitution that legalises
dictatorship, and still the UN and others tell us to wait and see: perhaps
they’ll change their mind so let’s wait for election laws, they say.

Now the election laws have been published and of course they are not fair.
Did they forget that these are the generals who refused to accept the
results of elections in 1990? Have the generals given any indication that
they are genuinely interested in reform of the welfare of the people? None
at all. It is less than two years since they were prepared to let
thousands die in the delta after cyclone Nargis, rather than accept
international aid. It is only three weeks since they fired a mortar bomb
at a school in Karen state, killing one child and injuring two more.

They still have more than 2,100 political prisoners in jail, and arrest
more daily. How clear do the generals have to make it before the
international community understands that they are not interested in
reform? The nature of these generals is to stay in power. They were
brought up under the Tatmadaw [Burmese army] slogan: One Blood, One Voice,
One Command. They gained their rank fighting ethnic people, and using the
Four Cuts policy where civilians are deliberately targeted, where babies
were put in rice pounders and crushed to death, and where women and
children were raped as part of official government policy. Even girls as
young as five have been raped.

When diplomats and so-called experts sit down with those generals in
Rangoon and Naypyidaw and think that somehow they will be the one who will
negotiate a breakthrough, remember the true nature of the people you are
dealing with. Don’t be fooled by the smiles and plush buildings. The
generals you shake hands with are brutal killers. Even the UN’s own expert
says responsibility for the abuses in Burma go right to the top. They are
not diplomats or politicians, they are soldiers. The generals will never,
ever, negotiate themselves out of power unless they are forced to do so.

They are, however, good at playing games with an international community
that seems desperate to believe their lies. So within the next few days or
weeks we can expect some new so-called concessions from the generals,
perhaps letting opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) party
leaders meet Aung San Suu Kyi, or the release of a high profile political
prisoner. Once again we will see governments and others attach imaginary
significance to this, still ignoring the true nature of the people they
are dealing with.

Zoya Phan is international coordinator at Burma Campaign UK. Her
autobiography, ‘Undaunted’, will be published in hardback in the US in
May, and published as ‘Little Daughter’ in paperback in the UK in May.

____________________________________
STATEMENT

March 16, Human Rights Watch
Burma: UN should move on international inquiry

New York – The United Nations should not delay the setting up of an
international inquiry to address possible war crimes and crimes against
humanity in Burma, Human Rights Watch said today. On March 15, the UN
special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar, Tomas Ojea
Quintana, presented his progress report on human rights in Burma for
debate at the Human Rights Council in Geneva.

In a statement at the Council, Human Rights Watch welcomed the
recommendation by the UN special rapporteur to consider establishing a
commission of inquiry with a specific fact-finding mandate to investigate
possible war crimes and crimes against humanity in Burma.

"The United Nations should establish this commission without delay as a
vital first step towards justice for the many victims of serious abuses in
Burma," said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch.
"Failing to act on the Rapporteur's recommendation for accountability in
Burma will only embolden rights abusers and further postpone long-overdue
justice."

During the Human Rights Council's debate, the Australian government stated
it would support "investigating possible options for a United Nations
commission of inquiry" on Burma. The United States government said the
call for accountability serves "to underscore the seriousness of the human
rights problems in the country, and the pressing need for the
international community to find an effective way to address challenges
there."