BurmaNet News, June 30, 2010

[Editor]

June 30, 2010 Issue #3993

INSIDE BURMA
DVB via BBC: Burma: North Korean-provided missile, radar base said set up
in Kachin state
DVB: Rodent ‘migration’ sparks disaster fears
Irrawaddy: Than Shwe angry about Kelley report
Mizzima: Publishers fear delays by new censor board

ON THE BORDER
SHAN: Mongla: China wants a negotiated settlement

BUSINESS / TRADE
Irrawaddy: USDP offers loans to victims of market fire
Xinhua: Myanmar-Singapore bilateral trade reaches 1.86 bln USD
Xinhua: Myanmar-India bilateral trade up sharply in 2009-10

REGIONAL
Mizzima: Put Burmese regime on trial at ICC, People’s Court urges

INTERNATIONAL
Irrawaddy: EPCB sponsors Suu Kyi Play on birthday

OPINION / OTHER
Irrawaddy: The EC eyes a Kachin angle -Htet Aung
Huffington Post: The Burmese elections: Prolonging the misery and
postponing the inevitable - Cynthia Boaz

____________________________________
INSIDE BURMA

June 30, Democratic Voice of Burma via BBC Worldwide Monitoring
Burma: North Korean-provided missile, radar base said set up in Kachin state

Work has been completed on a new radar and missile base in northern Burma
as army trucks reportedly travel the length of the country to deliver
stockpiles of weaponry.

An army source close to the Northern Regional Military Command told DVB
that missile launchers, including North Korean-made 122mm Multiple Launch
Rocket Systems vehicles, have been moved into place at the Moe Hnyin
[Mohnyin] base in Kachin state.

The base is operated by Rocket Battalion 603, and lies around 80 miles
southwest of the Kachin state capital, Myitkyina, and equidistant between
the Chinese and Indian border. Munitions, including trucks mounted with
radar systems known as Fire Control Vehicles, were reportedly delivered
from Rangoon over the course several month's prior to the opening of the
base in May.

Another radar base known as Duwun (Pole Star) has been opened on a hill
close to Moe Hnyin. Two Russian technicians arrived at the base in early
May via Myitkyina for a final installation and inspection of the
equipment, the source said.

It is the fourth such base to be opened in Burma this year; two others are
operational in Shan state's Nawnghkio and Kengtung districts, while one
was recently opened close to Mandalay division's Kyaukpadaung town.

The reports will likely stoke suspicions about the contents of a cargo
delivered by a North Korean ship, the Jong Gen, in April this year. Two
months later, DVB released the findings of an investigation that had
unearthered evidence of high-level military cooperation between the two
pariahs, but this is the first time that North Korean weaponry has been
sighted in Burma.

"When it [the Jong Gen] docked at Thilawa port [near Rangoon], electricity
around the whole area was cut. It was dark and there was tight security
when they offloaded the material," said Burma and North Korean expert,
Bertil Lintner.

"What I heard was that there was definitely a radar system in the cargo -
whether there were missiles too I don't know, but it's quite possible."
Leaked photographs taken of a visit to North Korea by the Burmese junta's
third-in-command, Shwe Mann, showed that he had visited a missile factory
and air defence radar base.

Lintner said also that two weeks ago reports emerged that a group of North
Koreans crossed into Burma from China "disguised as Chinese tourists
travelling in a tour bus. There were about 30 or 40 of them and they went
straight to a kind of missile development centre west of Mandalay".

The location of the Moe Hnyin is also odd, Lintner said, because it's "not
near any border. It's in the middle of the northern tip of Burma so maybe
they don't want to offend the Indians or the Chinese".

Despite the junta's myopic focus on its military, Burma faces no external
threat, adding weight to claims that the army's expansion has been done
with the country's various armed opposition groups in mind. The alleged
development of a nuclear programme, however, appears to confuse this
focus.

"Although the military is pointing to 'external threats', they also intend
to threaten the ethnic minority groups with the weapons," said Aung Kyaw
Zaw, a military analyst on the China-Burma border." The Burmese army wants
people to be scared just upon catching sight of the missiles."

Source: Democratic Voice of Burma website, Oslo, in English 0000 gmt 24
Jun 10

____________________________________

June 30, Democratic Voice of Burma
Rodent ‘migration’ sparks disaster fears - Naw Noreen

An apparent mass migration of mice away from waterways in central Burma
has caused locals to question whether a natural disaster is looming.

Mice are moving “in their thousands” away from lakes and reservoirs in
central Burma’s Bago and Mandalay division and towards urban areas. One
man reporting seeing fleets of mice on the Mandalay-to-Naypyidaw highway.

A local in Bago division’s Dike Oo township said that outlying villages
had witnessed terns of thousands of mice leave the areas close to Kawliya
and Bawni reservoirs and head towards villages.

“They looked like they were migrating. They have white fur on their chest
and are running with their tails straight; they looked as if they were
running for their lives,” he said.

“We don’t know whether this [is a sign of] a weather disaster, natural
disaster or damaged reservoir. But elderly people are saying the mice are
fleeing from a disaster of some sort. Now is not yet [the time of the
year] for disasters but the mice were running for their lives.”

Migration of animals is closely tied to weather patterns, but evidence of
mass movement being a forewarning of natural disasters is less clear.
Famously, a freak migration of hundreds of thousands of frogs in central
China in early May 2008 pre-empted the country’s worst earthquake in a
generation.

Dike Oo residents said the arrival of mice would have little impact on
farming as late rains have delayed the growing of crops, although there
had been some damage to bean plants.

Locals also expressed concern about the possible spread of diseases, with
one man claiming that Burmese authorities had done little to tackle the
problem.

An ongoing famine in Burma’s northwestern Chin state has been exacerbated
in recent years by the bi-centurial flowering of bamboo plants, which
attracts rats in their millions.

Thousands of acres of crops have been lost in Chin state since the
flowering began in 2007. The Canada-based Chin Human Rights Organisation
(CHRO) said that the fallout from the last mass bamboo flowering in Burma
reportedly caused the deaths of 10,000 to 15,000 in India’s neighbouring
Mizoram state. The UN claims that Chin state needs around 23,000 tons of
food aid to counter the famine.

Similarly, in September last year the UN warned of the potential damage to
crop harvests in Burma’s southern Irrawaddy delta from a rodent
infestation. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of
Humanitarian Affairs, the Burmese government had instructed farmers to
kill up to 15 rats per day, and submit their tails to local authorities,
or risk being fined.

____________________________________

June 30, Irrawaddy
Than Shwe angry about Kelley report - Wai Moe

The Burmese junta supremo, Snr-Gen Than Shwe, is reported to be angry at
government officials who are responsible for the junta’s nuclear program
after he read the report of Robert Kelley, the former director of the
International Atomic Energy Agency, who described Naypyidaw's nuclear
program as “unprofessional” and “quite primitive.”

Snr-Gen Than Shwe wipes his head as an aide fans him in the museum
attached to the Buddhist Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic, in Kandy, last
year. (Photo: Reuters)
According to military sources in Naypyidaw, Than Shwe’s vented his anger
after he read the report—which was published by Oslo-based Democratic
Voice of Burma—and assumed he had been lied to by officials such as U
Thaung, the minister of Science and Technology, who had reported that
Burma’s nuclear goal was close to fruition, a claim that Kelley dismissed
categorically.

Citing evidence by a defector, Maj Sai Thein Win, Kelley said in his
report, “Nuclear Related Activities in Burma,” that the location of the
nuclear program is “primarily a headquarters site, and probably does not
conduct experiments, at least with nuclear materials or explosives.”

Kelley said Burma's military generals had little hope of success in
establishing the country as a nuclear power. “It is clear that this is a
very difficult task for Burma to successfully accomplish. Much of what STW
[Sai Thein Win] is providing suggests Burma has little chance of
succeeding in its quest, but that does not change the fact that even
trying to build a bomb is a serious violation of its international
agreements,” he wrote in the report.

“It would also seem that the very act of trying to build nuclear weapons
is a sign of desperation and fear, no matter how unlikely it is to
succeed,” he said.

“The source himself noted that the drawings from the Nuclear Battalion
were very unprofessional,” he reported, adding: “This factors into our
assessment that the Burmese nuclear program is quite primitive.”

During early days of the Burmese Socialist Programme Party (BSPP) rule,
headed by dictator Gen Ne Win from 1962 to 1988, government officials
regularly failed to report bad news or errors in calculation to the regime
chief.

____________________________________

June 30, Mizzima
Publishers fear delays by new censor board - Phanida

Chiang Mai– Publishers in Burma have expressed concern over the formation
of new censorship teams under the junta’s tough media watchdog fearing
even further difficulties for their publications under a regime already
infamous for its stranglehold on the press.

The media is concerned over potential publishing delays after system
changes at the Press Scrutiny and Registration Division (censor board) –
under the Ministry of Information – at Bahan Township, Rangoon.
Publications were censored by five teams comprising three members each but
a 12-member single team was established last week, and publishers are
worried about the team’s ability to finish their work as quickly.

“We are worrying about timely completion of their censorship work as they
[team members] have to scrutinise more than 20 journals,” a Rangoon-based
weekly journal’s editor said. “We are concerned over delays in our
publications and possibly more complications in the process.”

The current board director is Major Tint Swe and additional director
Lieutenant Colonel Myo Myint Maung from the navy, who took office at the
end of last month.

Tint Swe will be promoted to deputy director general of a department under
the Information Ministry soon, and Myo Myint Maung will assume the
directorship.

The latter has already been working in news censorship, tightening rules
on political reports. Journals used to be able to submit supplementary
news or breaking news a day later when the office was under the control of
Tint Swe. Myo Myint Maung has changed this system, however,  and ordered
that journals submit work during office hours, the editor of another
journal said.

“According to this new system, we have to complete our draft copies on
time and early. Previously we were exempted from their rules and had an
understanding with them,” he told Mizzima. “Now 
 we cannot do this. We
must present our draft copies before 3 p.m. while their censorship
workshop is in progress. We cannot submit the breaking news we get in the
evening.”

The censor board consists of one director, two additional directors, two
assistant directors and four officers.
Media outlets can publish only after the censorship teams have read their
draft copies, forwarded them to higher authorities and obtained final
approval from the director. Draft copies must be submitted three days in
advance. The board takes two days to read them and printing takes another
two days, which means it takes a week to publishing journals.

“They [the board has] tightened on political news, political educational
articles and opinions,” a journal editor said. “They do not give approval
on political party movements, and their election campaigns. We must submit
political news in our first draft copy. They do not accept submitting them
in supplementary copies.”

The journals have to submit draft copies in two parts. First they have to
submit news copies and then three more pages on A4 paper as a second
draft. The office has reduced it to only two more pages on A4 paper, a
journal editor said.

The additional political news shall not be included in these extra two
pages on A4 paper, Myo Myint Maung reportedly told a journal editor
yesterday.

____________________________________
ON THE BORDER

June 30, Shan Herald Agency for News
Mongla: China wants a negotiated settlement

Chinese officials had urged ceasefire groups opposing the Border Guard
Force (BGF) program to continue negotiating Naypyitaw-drawn with junta
authorities until an agreement acceptable to all is reached, according to
a source close to the Mongla-based National Democratic Alliance Army
(NDAA).

“It could not be an agreement as dictated by one side as Lt-Gen Ye Myint
(junta chief negotiator) has been trying to achieve,” a Chinese official
was quoted as saying.

During several meetings held between the Burma Army and the ceasefire
groups, the latter, while accepting the “One country one military”
principle, had resisted Naypyitaw’s insistence on having junta officers at
the battalion levels. On the Burma Army’s side, it had stood fast on
acceptance by the ceasefire groups of its program to the last detail.

The meeting with the Chinese officials had taken place before 15 April,
when 4 ceasefire groups: NDAA, Kachin Independence Organization, Shan
State Army “North” and United Wa State Army, met in the Wa territory for a
joint “No” resolution to the BGF.

Apart from the Shan State Army “North,” all are based along the Sino-Burma
border. The only non-ceasefire group active along the border is the Shan
State Army “South”’s Force 701.

China stands to lose if hostilities breaks out on its border, according to
him. “It is therefore doing its utmost to prevent another Kokang-like
incident,” he said.

Kokang, tucked away in the northeastern corner of Shan State, was attacked
and occupied by the Burma Army in August 2009, after the group’s leader
Peng Jiasheng turned down the BGF program proposed by Naypyitaw 4 months
earlier.

To head off a renewal of war, China, “as I see it,” has formulated the
following policy, he added:

    * China will recognize the new government formed after the planned
elections
    * She will not be instigating one Burma group against another
    * She will not support any insurrection against the central government
    * She also will not encourage any splittist (meaning secession) movements
    * She will instead urge all stakeholders to continue working toward a
solution acceptable to all

Since last month, the overall situation along the front lines between the
Burma Army and the ceasefire groups appears to have calmed down though war
preparations and security measures on both sides are continuing.

“The junta’s first priority now seems to be victory in the upcoming
polls,” one Chinese official was said to have told the ceasefire groups.

“Our position,” he said, “is 4-fold”:

    * We will not surrender
    * We will not become BGFs
    * We will continue to observe the ceasefire agreement and not shoot first
    * All those concerned about Burma must urge the generals to honor the
1947 Panglong Agreement that promised self rule for the non-Burman
states

“China is our friend,” he concluded. “But in the end our survival depends
on our own vigilance and efforts.”

____________________________________
BUSINESS / TRADE

June 30, Irrawaddy
USDP offers loans to victims of market fire - Ko Htwe

Stallholders who lost their businesses when Rangoon's Mingalar Market was
destroyed by fire last month have been invited to apply for loans from the
Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), according to sources.

The market, located in Mingalar Taungnyunt Township, was one of Rangoon's
largest until it burned to the ground on May 24. The cost in damages from
the fire is expected to reach about 1 billion kyat (US $1 million).

Vendors say that the USDP has recently begun distributing loan application
forms to anyone affected by the fire. Applicants are also required to
agree to 11 conditions, including one that stipulates that they
acknowledge the loans are being “offered by the USDP out of sympathy for
victims of the fire.”

The forms are addressed to Rangoon Mayor Brig-Gen Aung Thein Lin and the
USDP, a junta-backed party formed on April 29 by the current prime
minister, Gen Thein Sein, and 26 other ministers and senior regime
officials. The party was recognized by the Election Commission on June 8.

“We think the loans are part of the USDP's campaign for this year's
election, because the application forms are addressed to them,” said a
drugstore owner who spoke to The Irrawaddy on Wednesday. “It's the USDP
that's offering the loan, not the government.”

According to the Rangoon-based Weekly Eleven Journal, the loans will be
disbursed by the state-run Yangon [Rangoon] City Development Committee
(YCDC) Bank. It was not clear, however, if the USDP would be providing the
funding for the loans or merely acting as a guarantor.

“The government and the USDP are becoming completely indistinguishable,”
said Phyo Min Thein, the chairman of the Union Democratic Party (UDP). “I
think there needs to be a clear distinction between the two.”

Under the Political Parties Registration Law Chapter, parties have no
legal right to exist if they are found to have “obtained and used directly
or indirectly money, land, house, building, vehicle, property owned by the
State.”

____________________________________

June 30, Xinhua General News Service
Myanmar-Singapore bilateral trade reaches 1.86 bln USD

Myanmar-Singapore bilateral trade reached 1.86 billion U.S. dollars in
2009-10 fiscal year which ended in March, according to the latest figures
of the government' s Central Statistical Organization.

Of the total, Myanmar's export to Singapore amounted to 671 million
dollars, while its import from the Southeast Asian member stood at 1.198
billion dollars, suffering a trade deficit of 4 million dollars.

Singapore rose to the second position from the fifth in Myanmar 's
exporting countries line-up after Thailand to replace India, which
declined to the third in 2008-09.

Singapore used to export to Myanmar electronic goods, construction
materials, fertilizer and steel products.

In 2008-09 fiscal year, the two countries' bilateral trade hit 1.91
billion U.S. dollars, of which Myanmar's export to Singapore took 858.95
million dollars, while its import from Singapore stood 1.05 billion
dollar, suffering a trade deficit of 198.96 million dollars.

Myanmar's foreign trade is mainly with Asian countries, which account for
90 percent of the total. The trade with other member countries of the
Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) represents 51.3 percent.
The remaining are with European countries with 4.8 percent and American
countries 1.5 percent.

Myanmar's main export goods are natural gas, agricultural, marine and
forestry products, while its key import goods are machinery, crude oil,
edible oil, pharmaceutical products, cement, fertilizer and consumers
goods.

____________________________________

June 30, Xinhua General News Service
Myanmar-India bilateral trade up sharply in 2009-10

Myanmar-India bilateral trade reached 1.19 billion U.S. dollars in the
fiscal year of 2009-10, increasing by 26.1 percent from the previous year,
and India stands as Myanmar's fourth largest trading partner after
Thailand, China and Singapore, according to the latest official figures
available on Wednesday.

Of the total, Myanmar's export to India amounted to 1 billion U. S.
dollars, while its import from India was valued at 194 million dollars,
the Central Statistical Organization said.

In 2008-09, the two countries' bilateral trade was registered at 943
million U.S. dollars, of which Myanmar's export to India took 144 million
U.S. dollars, while its import from the country stood at 797 million U.S.
dollars.

Agricultural produces and forestry products led Myanmar's exports to India
whereas medicines and pharmaceutical products topped its imports from
India.

Meanwhile, India's contracted investment in Myanmar reached 189 million
U.S. dollars as of March 2010 since the government opened to foreign
investment in 1988, of which 137 million were drawn into the oil and gas
sector in September 2007, the statistics show.

____________________________________
REGIONAL

June 30, Mizzima News
Put Burmese regime on trial at ICC, People’s Court urges - Salai Han Thar San

New Delhi  – A “People’s Court” in Japan passed its verdict on Monday to
put the Burmese military regime on trial at the International Criminal
Court for its crimes against women in Burma.

The verdict was reached during a mock trial at Aoyama Gakuin University,
Tokyo, after a five-member panel of experienced judges heard the testimony
of four victims from Burma and arguments from prosecution and defence
counsels.

“The judges passed eight verdicts during the court’s session, including
their finding that the [Burmese] military regime was guilty of committing
crimes against women based on the testimonies given by victims and that it
should be put on trial at the ICC,” Women’s League of Burma presidium
board member Thin Thin Aung told Mizzima.

The panel comprised Japanese former Supreme Court justice Kunio Hamada,
Chiba University law professor Hiroko Goto, Aoyama Gakuin University law
professor Osamu Niikura, International Association of Democratic Lawyers
secretary-general Miho Shikita, Japan Federation of Bar Associations
former vice-president Hideaki Kobori.

The United Nations was urged to form a commission to investigate the
junta’s crimes and said the international community including Japan should
make concerted efforts to stop their heinous acts, the verdicts say Kyi
Kyi Khin, Pu Sein, Tin Tin Nyo from WLB on behalf of Naw Sunset and WLB
representative Mra Yar Zar Lin testified during proceedings between 1 p.m.
to 5:30 p.m. on Sunday. Eight lawyers acted for the prosecution and three
conducted the junta’s defence.

“I testified 
  telling them [the judges] how I was put in a dark cell
during interrogation by intelligence officers and of the other gross human
rights violations in prison I experienced while serving my sentence”,
former political prisoner Kyi Kyi Khin said.

The military regime arrested former NLD party and All Burma Federation of
Student Unions (ABFSU) members in 1990 for distributing pamphlets
commemorating the July 7 massacre at Rangoon University in 1962. For 28
days Kyi Kyi Khin suffered brutality under questioning at the Military
Intelligence No. 4 detention centre, where she was held in darkness and
subjected to a variety of cruel and unusual torture methods. She was then
sentenced to two years’ imprisonment and was released in May 1992.

The mock trial’s organiser, Cho Cho Aye, said Japanese lawyers
representing the military regime presented their arguments for their
clients’ defence. Cho Cho Aye is representative of the Burmese Women’s
Union (BWU) Japanese branch.

“The defence counsels questioned the testimony, evidence and exhibits
presented in court [by the prosecution,” she said. “In cross-examination,
they also questioned whether [junta chief Senior General] Than Shwe was
responsible for the crimes committed by the army’s rank and file.”

The proceedings were the first mock trial in a People’s Court conducted in
Japan, which was also organised by Japan-based Human Rights Now. More than
300 Japanese and Burmese attended.

A similar trial was organised by the WLB and female Nobel laureates of the
Nobel Women’s Initiative in New York in early March. At that trial, 12
Burmese victims of human rights violations testified to crimes visited
upon them by the military junta.

“We shall continue our campaign in the international community until we
can put the Burmese regime on trial at the ICC,” Thin Thin Aung said.
“This campaign can 
 warn the junta leaders against committing their
crimes against humanity in fear of facing trial at the ICC in future.”

ICC, founded in July 1998 and based in the Netherlands, is funded by
states’ parties, international governments and organisations, and
individuals. It is the main independent international legal body
“established to help end impunity for the perpetrators of the most serious
crimes of concern to the international community”.

The court usually indicts and presents verdicts on genocide committed
across the world, along with serious international crimes, crimes against
humanity and war crimes, by exercising powers granted it under the Rome
Statute, the treaty signed by the parties that established the court.

The trial’s organisers will present the panel’s verdicts to the Japanese
government and will urge it to shun the Burmese general election results
unless the regime releases all political prisoners, including
pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who is being held under house
arrest by the junta on spurious charges. She has been held in various
forms of detention for 15 of the past 21 years.

The trial follows UN special rapporteur for human rights in Burma Tomas
Ojea Quintana’s report to the UN Security Council, which similarly called
for the UN to form a commission of inquiry to investigate the gross
violations of human rights committed by the junta.

____________________________________
INTERNATIONAL

June 30, Irrawaddy
EPCB sponsors Suu Kyi Play on birthday

The European Parliamentary Caucus on Burma (EPCB) has sponsored
performances of “The Lady of Burma” in honor of Aung San Suu Kyi, Burma's
detained Noble Peace Prize winner, on her 65th birthday, which was June
19.

The play, an inspirational story of Suu Kyi and her struggle to bring
freedom and democracy to Burma, will be performed on Wednesday at the
Edinburgh Festival and the Old Vic theater in London.

An EPCB statement on Wednesday said that the performance will raise
awareness about Suu Kyi and her struggle for democracy and freedom in
Burma and increase support among European Parliament (EU) members.

Raul Romeva, an executive member of the EPCB, said,“As members of the
European Parliament, we will continue our support for Daw Aung San Suu Kyi
in her struggle for her country's freedom and do whatever we can to make
sure the world does not forget about her and Burma.”

The event will be hosted by Raul Romeva, a EU member, EPCB executive
committee members, the vice-chair of the Group of the Greens/European Free
Alliance and Libor Roucke, vice president of the EU.

Meanwhile an EU mission reportedly canceled its scheduled trip to Burma
this week after the military junta denied its request to meet with Suu
Kyi.

In May, EU officials said that they had plans to send a mission to Burma
following the passage of a resolution by the Council of the European Union
to undertake a dialogue with the junta.

The EU maintains sanctions on the junta in an effort to influence it to
stop human rights abuses and to promote democracy in Burma. The EU has
called on the Burmese regime to release all political prisoners including
Suu Kyi before the country holds elections this year.

____________________________________
OPINION / OTHER

June 29, Irrawaddy
The EC eyes a Kachin angle -Htet Aung

Burma's Union Election Commission (EC) has given the green light to 38 out
of 42 political parties to contest the general election later this year.

The EC now needs only approve the applications of the four remaining
parties in order to fulfill its obligation under the party registration
law and move the faltering process along. However, it is worth noting that
of the four parties awaiting confirmation, three are ethnic Kachin
parties: the Kachin State Progressive Party (KSPP); the Northern Shan
State Progressive Party; and the United Democracy Party (Kachin State).
These parties submitted their applications on April 5, 23 and 30
respectively.

The EC has neither approved the applications of these parties nor has it
rejected them. The EC has simply delayed making a decision.

So, why would the EC delay the entire electoral process over some
relatively insignificant regional parties? The reason lies in the gray
shade of the relationships between the Kachin parties and the armed Kachin
groups.

The KSPP was formed by former leaders of the rebel Kachin Independence
Organization (KIO), which signed a cease-fire agreement with the military
junta in 1994. One of those leaders is Dr. Tu Ja, a prominent figure in
Kachin State who was once vice chairman of the KIO and who now leads the
KSPP.

Similarly, the Northern Shan State Progressive Party was formed by a
handful of Kachin leaders under the influence of the KIO.

The United Democracy Party (Kachin State) was formed by former leaders of
the New Democratic Army–Kachin (NDA-K), another Kachin cease-fire group.

Just as the regime's Prime Minister Thein Sein and other cabinet ministers
resigned their military positions to form a political party called the
Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), Tu Ja and some senior
leaders resigned from their positions in the KIO to form the KSPP.

The KSPP leaders' move to sever ties with the KIO is an overt statement
that they no longer belong to the KIO, and clears the way for them to form
a political party in accordance with the law. But although the KSPP and
the USDP share this distinction, the KSPP will not share the same
advantages as the USDP during the election process.

When the KSPP leaders went to Naypyidaw in May to meet the EC members and
to ask why the approval of their party had been delayed, the answer given
was reportedly: “Because of the KSPP's ties with the KIO,” said Lahpai
Nawdin, the editor of the Thailand-based Kachin News Group, who
interviewed the party leaders.

If that were the case, the EC would have to specify which article of the
Political Party Registration Law was broken by the KSPP.

Article 12 (A-3) of the law reads: “Contacting or abetting directly or
indirectly an insurgent organization and individuals in revolt with arms
against the State, organization and individuals designated by the State as
committing terrorist acts or organization declared as unlawful association
or members of the said organization.”

Did the EC categorize the KIO as a insurgent organization or an unlawful
association? If so, does that indicate that the cease-fire agreement
between the KIO and the junta has expired or has been annulled?

Looking back over the years at the post-cease-fire relationship between
the KIO and the junta, it is clear the junta treated the organization
neither as an insurgent organization nor as an unlawful association.

In fact, the KIO has enjoyed a strong status both economically and
politically. They have benefited from trade links and business deals,
albeit mainly in Kachin State. They joined the junta's National Convention
in 2004 and participated in drawing up the Constitution.

When the junta introduced its program of transforming the armed cease-fire
groups into border guard forces (BGF) in April 2009, the relationship
intensified due to the junta's transparent attempt to incorporate the
ethnic groups under the command of the Burmese military.

Although the Burmese negotiators used a number of carrots to persuade the
KIO to accept the BGF plan, they failed to convince the KIO leaders to
alter their deep-seated distrust of the military regime.

When Tu Ja and his colleagues cut ties with the KIO and formed their
political party, the junta took revenge by using the EC mechanism to slap
the KSPP down a peg or two.

However, at the end of the day, Naypyidaw wants at least one Kachin party
contesting the election in order to show the inclusiveness of the ethnic
parties in the electoral process.

The junta's solution will be to urge local Kachin leaders from the Union
Solidarity and Development Association (USDA) to form a nationalist Kachin
party that is allied to Naypyidaw, and instruct the EC to let the KSPP and
the other Kachin parties crash and burn.

____________________________________

June 30, Huffington Post
The Burmese elections: Prolonging the misery and postponing the inevitable
- Cynthia Boaz

Burma (aka Myanmar) is of the world's most brutal regimes, and
unfortunately, it is also amongst the least well understood. In terms of
trade and communications, the country is as closed as North Korea and
nearly as isolated as Afghanistan under Taliban rule. Its human rights
abuses are widespread and increasing. The junta has one of the worst
images in the world. It has very few friends, and even it's powerful
regional allies (China and India) keep a safe public distance so as not to
catch any of the generals' political cooties.

Although the monk-led, nonviolent Saffron Revolution, which hit a peak of
public activity in the fall of 2007, has failed thus far to bring an end
to the repression, the movement (which was a continuation of the
student-led uprising from 1988) still persists. Brave activists risk their
lives every day to move information in and out of the country, hoping to
give global audiences a glimpse of the horrifying truth behind the veil.

The junta is holding elections sometime later in the year (best
guesstimates are for October 10 -- which would make the date 10/10/10, a
date consistent with the paranoid generals' fixation on numerology and
superstition), but Nobel Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of the
National League for Democracy party, which won 81% of the seats in the
1990 parliamentary elections (before the junta declared the victory
fraudulent), has been imprisoned or under house arrest for most of the
past 22 years and has been banned by the junta from participating in the
elections. In protest, the NLD has also withdrawn from the elections.
Which means that the people will have very little means constructive means
through which to channel their discontent and hope for a free and
democratic Burma unless the pro-democracy movement can organize an
opposition force within the next three months, a feat that would be
daunting even in an open society that permitted freedom of speech,
association and movement.

So the conventional wisdom is that the junta will "win" the election and
that this will "reinforce their power." This is a dangerous presumption,
based on a common and deeply-embedded misconception that violence equals
power. The generals will probably win the election because they have
beaten, killed, imprisoned and otherwise bullied their competition out of
the running. And where the process is corrupted, the result can not be
legitimate. So the election will not reinforce the junta's power. It will
simply reinforce the lie that the junta has real power.

Political legitimacy can be understood as the situation where the regime
still stands even when the threat of force is removed. If the junta in
Burma allowed for a fair and competitive election, they would lose.
Resoundingly. Which means that the election is nothing more than a farce,
designed to placate the increasingly global community with a show of
"legitimacy." Because these particular tyrants seem even more removed from
reality than many of their counterparts around the world, it is likely
that their margin of victory will be enormous (in a healthy democratic
election, it is very unusual to get a margin of victory of more than 10
percentage points, and where the incumbent party gets more than 70% in a
national election, more times than not it is an indicator of corruption or
fraud).

The purpose of a democratic election is to 1) ascertain the best social
choice, and 2) bestow legitimacy on the legislative/executive authority.
If the process is manipulated so that neither of these things can happen,
the outcome is meaningless. Understanding this, it is disappointing to
think that any legitimate media observers take this farce of an election
to be anything but a pathetic demonstration to the world that the generals
can still repress their own people with the worst of them.

With their brutality against Buddhist monks -- the soul of Burma -- the
junta gave away their last bits of moral authority. And this farce
election is evidence that their last shreds of political legitimacy have
evaporated. The international community has an obligation, at the very
least, to recognize this inevitable "victory" for what it is -- the last
gasp of a decaying system. Sadly, the generals have demonstrated that they
do not intend to go down alone. They'll spread the misery as far and wide
as possible. But each act of brutality girds the people's will to resist
them, and while the junta may again stretch out their tenure, these
elections should be viewed not as a beginning, but as the beginning of the
end.

Follow Cynthia Boaz on Twitter: www.twitter.com/cynthiaboaz