Myanmar pro-democracy party wants offices reopened
Tue Sep 8, 8:52 am ET
YANGON, Myanmar (AP) – The pro-democracy party of detained Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi called on the ruling junta Tuesday to allow it to reopen its branch offices, which would be crucial for taking part in next year's planned national elections.
The junta has not held elections since 1990, when Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy won in a landslide but was not allowed by the military to take power.
The NLD issued a statement saying the party had sent a letter to junta chairman Senior Gen. Than Shwe on Friday noting that the party is a legally registered organization but that its local offices had been sealed and its activities restricted by the government.
The NLD has not yet decided whether to take part in next year's polls, for which an exact date has not been set. In April, the party announced it would consider participating if the junta meets demands that include Suu Kyi's release from house arrest.
The declaration also asked the military to release all political prisoners, amend undemocratic clauses in the constitution and hold free and fair elections with international supervision.
The NLD did not rule out participating even if its demands were not met.
The government plans the 2010 elections as part of its seven-step "roadmap to democracy," but has yet to introduce a political parties registration law or an election law.
Suu Kyi, 64, was returned to house arrest last month after a court found her guilty of violating the terms of her earlier detention when an uninvited American visitor stayed at her home.
She has been in detention for 14 of the last 20 years and has not been free since 2003, after a pro-junta mob attacked her and her followers as she toured northern Myanmar.
After the attack, the government launched a crackdown on the NLD, closing party offices throughout the country.
Tue Sep 8, 8:52 am ET
YANGON, Myanmar (AP) – The pro-democracy party of detained Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi called on the ruling junta Tuesday to allow it to reopen its branch offices, which would be crucial for taking part in next year's planned national elections.
The junta has not held elections since 1990, when Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy won in a landslide but was not allowed by the military to take power.
The NLD issued a statement saying the party had sent a letter to junta chairman Senior Gen. Than Shwe on Friday noting that the party is a legally registered organization but that its local offices had been sealed and its activities restricted by the government.
The NLD has not yet decided whether to take part in next year's polls, for which an exact date has not been set. In April, the party announced it would consider participating if the junta meets demands that include Suu Kyi's release from house arrest.
The declaration also asked the military to release all political prisoners, amend undemocratic clauses in the constitution and hold free and fair elections with international supervision.
The NLD did not rule out participating even if its demands were not met.
The government plans the 2010 elections as part of its seven-step "roadmap to democracy," but has yet to introduce a political parties registration law or an election law.
Suu Kyi, 64, was returned to house arrest last month after a court found her guilty of violating the terms of her earlier detention when an uninvited American visitor stayed at her home.
She has been in detention for 14 of the last 20 years and has not been free since 2003, after a pro-junta mob attacked her and her followers as she toured northern Myanmar.
After the attack, the government launched a crackdown on the NLD, closing party offices throughout the country.
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Turtle thought to be extinct spotted in Myanmar
By MICHAEL CASEY, AP Environmental Writer – Mon Sep 7, 6:33 am ET
BANGKOK (AP) – The rare Arakan forest turtle, once though to be extinct, has been rediscovered in a remote forest in Myanmar, boosting chances of saving the reptile after hunting almost destroyed its population, researchers said Monday.
Texas researcher Steven Platt and staff from the New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society discovered five of the brown-and-tan-spotted turtles in May during a survey of wildlife in the Rakhine Yoma Elephant Sanctuary.
The sanctuary contains thick stands of impenetrable bamboo forests, with the only trails made by the park's elephants, said Platt, of Sul Ross State University in Alpine, Texas.
Plat said he and his team were able to reach the area only by small boat and endured round-the-clock torrential rains and bands of leeches before finding their first Arakan turtle on May 31.
"At this moment, all of the physical hardships of the trip were forgotten," Platt said in an e-mail interview.
Native to the Arakan hills of western Myanmar, the turtles were believed extinct for close to a century until they started turning up in Asian food markets in the mid-1990s.
The local name for the turtle is "Pyant Cheezar," which translates to "turtle that eats rhinoceros feces." Sumatran rhinos were once found in the area, but vanished half a century ago due to hunting.
Scientists blame the near-disappearance of the turtle on their popularity in Asia as an ingredient in cooking and medicine. Known by its scientific name, Heosemys depressa, it is listed as critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources and has proven difficult to breed in captivity.
The discovery in May makes scientists hopeful that the species can survive.
"Throughout Asia, turtles are being wiped out by poachers for the illegal wildlife trade," Colin Poole, the Wildlife Conservation Society's director of Asia programs, said in a statement. "We are delighted and astonished that this extremely rare species is alive and well in Myanmar. Now we must do what we can to protect the remaining population."
Douglas B. Hendrie, a freshwater turtle expert from Education for Nature-Vietnam who did not take part in the research, said he was not surprised by the discovery because he had heard anecdotes of hunters and guides finding the turtle.
"That said, I think it is good to bring attention to the species," Hendrie said in an e-mail interview, adding that it is an "an important part of furthering the aims of conservation."
Platt and the conservation society recommend that guard posts be set up on roads leading in and out of the park to thwart poaching and that additional data be collected on the species to develop a conservation plan for it.
By MICHAEL CASEY, AP Environmental Writer – Mon Sep 7, 6:33 am ET
BANGKOK (AP) – The rare Arakan forest turtle, once though to be extinct, has been rediscovered in a remote forest in Myanmar, boosting chances of saving the reptile after hunting almost destroyed its population, researchers said Monday.
Texas researcher Steven Platt and staff from the New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society discovered five of the brown-and-tan-spotted turtles in May during a survey of wildlife in the Rakhine Yoma Elephant Sanctuary.
The sanctuary contains thick stands of impenetrable bamboo forests, with the only trails made by the park's elephants, said Platt, of Sul Ross State University in Alpine, Texas.
Plat said he and his team were able to reach the area only by small boat and endured round-the-clock torrential rains and bands of leeches before finding their first Arakan turtle on May 31.
"At this moment, all of the physical hardships of the trip were forgotten," Platt said in an e-mail interview.
Native to the Arakan hills of western Myanmar, the turtles were believed extinct for close to a century until they started turning up in Asian food markets in the mid-1990s.
The local name for the turtle is "Pyant Cheezar," which translates to "turtle that eats rhinoceros feces." Sumatran rhinos were once found in the area, but vanished half a century ago due to hunting.
Scientists blame the near-disappearance of the turtle on their popularity in Asia as an ingredient in cooking and medicine. Known by its scientific name, Heosemys depressa, it is listed as critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources and has proven difficult to breed in captivity.
The discovery in May makes scientists hopeful that the species can survive.
"Throughout Asia, turtles are being wiped out by poachers for the illegal wildlife trade," Colin Poole, the Wildlife Conservation Society's director of Asia programs, said in a statement. "We are delighted and astonished that this extremely rare species is alive and well in Myanmar. Now we must do what we can to protect the remaining population."
Douglas B. Hendrie, a freshwater turtle expert from Education for Nature-Vietnam who did not take part in the research, said he was not surprised by the discovery because he had heard anecdotes of hunters and guides finding the turtle.
"That said, I think it is good to bring attention to the species," Hendrie said in an e-mail interview, adding that it is an "an important part of furthering the aims of conservation."
Platt and the conservation society recommend that guard posts be set up on roads leading in and out of the park to thwart poaching and that additional data be collected on the species to develop a conservation plan for it.
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Suu Kyi's party hopeful for her release: spokesman
1 hr 51 mins ago
YANGON (AFP) – The party of Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi said on Tuesday it was hopeful that she would be unconditionally released after a court agreed to hear an appeal against her recent conviction.
Lawyers for the Nobel laureate and the country's ruling junta are due to present legal arguments on September 18, after Suu Kyi challenged last month's guilty verdict for sheltering an American man who swam to her lakeside home.
The regime has ordered her to spend another 18 months under house arrest, softening the original sentence of three years' hard labour. But the order still keeps her off the political scene during elections scheduled for 2010.
"There could be changes as the court has accepted our appeal," said Nyan Win, her lawyer and a spokesman for her National League for Democracy (NLD), referring to Yangon divisional court's decision on Friday to hear the case.
"We are hoping for her unconditional release, which is also what we wanted," he told AFP.
"We will meet with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi this week after we get permission from the authorities. We need to get last instructions from her for the final arguments," Nyan Win said. Daw is a term of respect in Burmese.
The appeal would focus on the fact that a 1974 constitution under which the 64-year-old was originally detained had been superseded by a new constitution approved last year, her lawyers have said.
The guilty verdict sparked international outrage and the imposition of further sanctions against Myanmar's powerful generals, who have already kept Suu Kyi locked up for 14 of the past 20 years.
Suu Kyi insisted on her innocence during the trial held at Yangon's notorious Insein Prison, saying that she allowed US military veteran John Yettaw to stay for two nights at her home because he was ill.
Yettaw was sentenced to seven years' hard labour for the stunt in early May, but was freed after a visit by US senator Jim Webb last month on what the regime said were compassionate grounds because of health problems.
The move raised expectations of a possible thaw in the tense relations between Myanmar and the United States, which has reviewed its policies towards the country under the administration of President Barack Obama.
But in a sign of the lingering suspicions, the government mouthpiece New Light of Myanmar newspaper noted Tuesday that US and British diplomats visited the NLD's Yangon headquarters 28 times in August alone.
The diplomats met with party leaders "and presented small and big envelopes to them," the state-run daily said.
"As National League for Democracy has kept in contact with embassies of the United States of America and Britain and has carried out their instructions, people have criticised the party for its actions and have kept a watchful eye on it," it added.
1 hr 51 mins ago
YANGON (AFP) – The party of Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi said on Tuesday it was hopeful that she would be unconditionally released after a court agreed to hear an appeal against her recent conviction.
Lawyers for the Nobel laureate and the country's ruling junta are due to present legal arguments on September 18, after Suu Kyi challenged last month's guilty verdict for sheltering an American man who swam to her lakeside home.
The regime has ordered her to spend another 18 months under house arrest, softening the original sentence of three years' hard labour. But the order still keeps her off the political scene during elections scheduled for 2010.
"There could be changes as the court has accepted our appeal," said Nyan Win, her lawyer and a spokesman for her National League for Democracy (NLD), referring to Yangon divisional court's decision on Friday to hear the case.
"We are hoping for her unconditional release, which is also what we wanted," he told AFP.
"We will meet with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi this week after we get permission from the authorities. We need to get last instructions from her for the final arguments," Nyan Win said. Daw is a term of respect in Burmese.
The appeal would focus on the fact that a 1974 constitution under which the 64-year-old was originally detained had been superseded by a new constitution approved last year, her lawyers have said.
The guilty verdict sparked international outrage and the imposition of further sanctions against Myanmar's powerful generals, who have already kept Suu Kyi locked up for 14 of the past 20 years.
Suu Kyi insisted on her innocence during the trial held at Yangon's notorious Insein Prison, saying that she allowed US military veteran John Yettaw to stay for two nights at her home because he was ill.
Yettaw was sentenced to seven years' hard labour for the stunt in early May, but was freed after a visit by US senator Jim Webb last month on what the regime said were compassionate grounds because of health problems.
The move raised expectations of a possible thaw in the tense relations between Myanmar and the United States, which has reviewed its policies towards the country under the administration of President Barack Obama.
But in a sign of the lingering suspicions, the government mouthpiece New Light of Myanmar newspaper noted Tuesday that US and British diplomats visited the NLD's Yangon headquarters 28 times in August alone.
The diplomats met with party leaders "and presented small and big envelopes to them," the state-run daily said.
"As National League for Democracy has kept in contact with embassies of the United States of America and Britain and has carried out their instructions, people have criticised the party for its actions and have kept a watchful eye on it," it added.
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Myanmar's ethnic challenges in elections: analysts
by Danny Kemp – Sat Sep 5, 11:21 pm ET
BANGKOK (AFP) – Myanmar's military junta may have taken Aung San Suu Kyi out of the picture ahead of elections next year, but it could face an even greater challenge from rising ethnic unrest, analysts said.
The regime has recently stepped up its decades-long campaign against minority groups, with offensives against ethnic Chinese rebels in the northeast in August and Christian Karen insurgents near the Thai border in June.
Civil war has wracked the country since independence in 1948, and while most rebel groups have reached ceasefire deals with the junta, analysts say the army is determined to crush the rest before the 2010 polls.
The offensives have mirrored the ruling generals' efforts to take Suu Kyi off the political stage by sentencing her to another 18 months' house arrest after a bizarre incident in which an American man swam to her lakeside home.
The Nobel Laureate's lawyers launched an appeal against her conviction last week, but with the country's pliant courts likely to do the junta's bidding, the ethnic problem is the next real hurdle for the regime, analysts said.
"This is a very complicated issue. After Aung San Suu Kyi's case, the next big issue is the issue of ethnic minorities," Aung Naing Oo, an independent Myanmar analyst based in Thailand, told AFP.
Military ruler Than Shwe has long made the struggle for the "stability of the state" the main justification for the army's continued dominance over the Southeast Asian nation.
In recent years the regime has been able to reach peace pacts with key ethnic groups, co-opting some to become junta-backed border forces that have taken on their former rebel brothers-in-arms.
But August's outbreak of fighting in Kokang, a mainly ethnic Chinese region of Myanmar's Shan state, showed the tensions near the surface and earned a rare rebuke from Beijing, usually Myanmar's closest ally.
The offensive was a warning to other minority groups thinking of causing disruption before the polls, said Win Min, a Myanmar expert at Payap University in the northern Thai city of Chaing Mai.
Critics have denounced the elections as a sham aimed at legitimising the junta's grip on power, but the influential International Crisis Group (ICG) think-tank said recently that the polls could be an opportunity for change.
"These things are happening in the context of the 2010 elections. The Burmese military are showing ceasefire groups that if they don't agree with their plans they are going to fight," Win Min said, using the country's former name.
The new constitution -- pushed through in a referendum in 2008 just days after a cyclone ravaged southern Myanmar -- does not provide the autonomy many groups had hoped for, Win Min added.
"The groups signed ceasefires but in the hope that they would get greater autonomy. But they have been mostly rejected. They would like to wait until after there is a new government to negotiate greater autonomy," he said.
Compounding the problem is the fact that many of the groups, especially the powerful Wa in northern Myanmar, are heavily involved in the drugs trade, often with the tacit assent of the government, analysts said.
"But now the government is using it (the narcotics issue) as a pretext to put pressure on the ethnic groups who don't want to join Burmese security forces," Win Min said.
The ethnic problems could end up with the effective "Balkanisation" of Myanmar, a European diplomat in the region said on condition of anonymity.
"We've never been closer to this than we are now," the diplomat said. "If no political solution is found for these ethnic groups the whole situation is going to implode."
The diplomat said it was "not at all the case" that Myanmar's political problems are just about the situation between Suu Kyi and the regime.
"There are so many questions before 2010, so much that's to be done. I'm sure Than Shwe has no clue how to tie up loose ends."
But the Brussels-based ICG said in a report last month that some ethnic groups which had made ceasefire deals were endorsing political parties that would take part in the polls.
"These groups take a negative view of the constitution but feel that there may be some limited opening of political space, particularly at the regional level, and that they should position themselves to take advantage of this," it said.
"There are increased tensions, however, as the regime is pushing these groups to transform into border guard forces partially under the command of the national army."
by Danny Kemp – Sat Sep 5, 11:21 pm ET
BANGKOK (AFP) – Myanmar's military junta may have taken Aung San Suu Kyi out of the picture ahead of elections next year, but it could face an even greater challenge from rising ethnic unrest, analysts said.
The regime has recently stepped up its decades-long campaign against minority groups, with offensives against ethnic Chinese rebels in the northeast in August and Christian Karen insurgents near the Thai border in June.
Civil war has wracked the country since independence in 1948, and while most rebel groups have reached ceasefire deals with the junta, analysts say the army is determined to crush the rest before the 2010 polls.
The offensives have mirrored the ruling generals' efforts to take Suu Kyi off the political stage by sentencing her to another 18 months' house arrest after a bizarre incident in which an American man swam to her lakeside home.
The Nobel Laureate's lawyers launched an appeal against her conviction last week, but with the country's pliant courts likely to do the junta's bidding, the ethnic problem is the next real hurdle for the regime, analysts said.
"This is a very complicated issue. After Aung San Suu Kyi's case, the next big issue is the issue of ethnic minorities," Aung Naing Oo, an independent Myanmar analyst based in Thailand, told AFP.
Military ruler Than Shwe has long made the struggle for the "stability of the state" the main justification for the army's continued dominance over the Southeast Asian nation.
In recent years the regime has been able to reach peace pacts with key ethnic groups, co-opting some to become junta-backed border forces that have taken on their former rebel brothers-in-arms.
But August's outbreak of fighting in Kokang, a mainly ethnic Chinese region of Myanmar's Shan state, showed the tensions near the surface and earned a rare rebuke from Beijing, usually Myanmar's closest ally.
The offensive was a warning to other minority groups thinking of causing disruption before the polls, said Win Min, a Myanmar expert at Payap University in the northern Thai city of Chaing Mai.
Critics have denounced the elections as a sham aimed at legitimising the junta's grip on power, but the influential International Crisis Group (ICG) think-tank said recently that the polls could be an opportunity for change.
"These things are happening in the context of the 2010 elections. The Burmese military are showing ceasefire groups that if they don't agree with their plans they are going to fight," Win Min said, using the country's former name.
The new constitution -- pushed through in a referendum in 2008 just days after a cyclone ravaged southern Myanmar -- does not provide the autonomy many groups had hoped for, Win Min added.
"The groups signed ceasefires but in the hope that they would get greater autonomy. But they have been mostly rejected. They would like to wait until after there is a new government to negotiate greater autonomy," he said.
Compounding the problem is the fact that many of the groups, especially the powerful Wa in northern Myanmar, are heavily involved in the drugs trade, often with the tacit assent of the government, analysts said.
"But now the government is using it (the narcotics issue) as a pretext to put pressure on the ethnic groups who don't want to join Burmese security forces," Win Min said.
The ethnic problems could end up with the effective "Balkanisation" of Myanmar, a European diplomat in the region said on condition of anonymity.
"We've never been closer to this than we are now," the diplomat said. "If no political solution is found for these ethnic groups the whole situation is going to implode."
The diplomat said it was "not at all the case" that Myanmar's political problems are just about the situation between Suu Kyi and the regime.
"There are so many questions before 2010, so much that's to be done. I'm sure Than Shwe has no clue how to tie up loose ends."
But the Brussels-based ICG said in a report last month that some ethnic groups which had made ceasefire deals were endorsing political parties that would take part in the polls.
"These groups take a negative view of the constitution but feel that there may be some limited opening of political space, particularly at the regional level, and that they should position themselves to take advantage of this," it said.
"There are increased tensions, however, as the regime is pushing these groups to transform into border guard forces partially under the command of the national army."
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Swine flu will expose global health inequality: WHO
2 hrs 24 mins ago
KATHMANDU (AFP) – The global swine flu pandemic will expose the failure of the international community to invest in health protection in poor countries, the world's top health official warned here Tuesday.
World Health Organisation director general Margaret Chan said the pandemic would "test the world on the issue of fairness," as she delivered an address to a meeting of Southeast Asian health ministers in Kathmandu.
"I believe it will reveal in a measurable and tragic way the consequences of decades of failure to invest adequately in basic health systems and infrastructure," said Chan.
"It will show what the failure to care about equity in international policy really means in life and death terms."
At least 2,837 people around the world have died from the swine flu virus since it emerged in April, according to the latest WHO figures.
Southeast Asia, home to many of the world's poorest people, has so far been hit relatively lightly.
But Chan warned against complacency in the WHO's 11 Southeast Asian member countries -- Bangladesh, Bhutan, North Korea, India, Indonesia, Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Thailand and East Timor.
"I can assure you, the pandemic will come to all your countries, and this is not the same as seasonal influenza," Chan told the gathered ministers, adding the pandemic would be "with us for quite some months to come."
The WHO said last month the virus had become the most prevalent flu strain.
Some tropical countries were already reporting "moderate strains" on their healthcare systems amid surges in infections, the UN health agency said.
2 hrs 24 mins ago
KATHMANDU (AFP) – The global swine flu pandemic will expose the failure of the international community to invest in health protection in poor countries, the world's top health official warned here Tuesday.
World Health Organisation director general Margaret Chan said the pandemic would "test the world on the issue of fairness," as she delivered an address to a meeting of Southeast Asian health ministers in Kathmandu.
"I believe it will reveal in a measurable and tragic way the consequences of decades of failure to invest adequately in basic health systems and infrastructure," said Chan.
"It will show what the failure to care about equity in international policy really means in life and death terms."
At least 2,837 people around the world have died from the swine flu virus since it emerged in April, according to the latest WHO figures.
Southeast Asia, home to many of the world's poorest people, has so far been hit relatively lightly.
But Chan warned against complacency in the WHO's 11 Southeast Asian member countries -- Bangladesh, Bhutan, North Korea, India, Indonesia, Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Thailand and East Timor.
"I can assure you, the pandemic will come to all your countries, and this is not the same as seasonal influenza," Chan told the gathered ministers, adding the pandemic would be "with us for quite some months to come."
The WHO said last month the virus had become the most prevalent flu strain.
Some tropical countries were already reporting "moderate strains" on their healthcare systems amid surges in infections, the UN health agency said.
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India's GAIL mulling Myanmar-China pipeline-chmn
Tue Sep 8, 2009 2:22am EDT
NEW DELHI, Sept 8 (Reuters) - Indian state-run gas transporter GAIL (GAIL.BO) is exploring possibility to lay a pipeline to China from Myanmar, where it has 10 percent stake in two blocks, the Indian firm's chairman said on Tuesday.
"There is a proposal from KOGAS and Daewoo (other stakeholders) to lay a pipeline from west of Myanmar to east of China, but a final decision may take some time because we have to see return on investment also," B.C. Tripathi told reporters.
Tue Sep 8, 2009 2:22am EDT
NEW DELHI, Sept 8 (Reuters) - Indian state-run gas transporter GAIL (GAIL.BO) is exploring possibility to lay a pipeline to China from Myanmar, where it has 10 percent stake in two blocks, the Indian firm's chairman said on Tuesday.
"There is a proposal from KOGAS and Daewoo (other stakeholders) to lay a pipeline from west of Myanmar to east of China, but a final decision may take some time because we have to see return on investment also," B.C. Tripathi told reporters.
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Mynanmar activists urge China to halt pipeline project
Mon Sep 7, 2009 8:05am EDT
BANGKOK, Sept 7 (Reuters) - Activists called on Monday for China to halt construction of controversial oil and gas pipelines through Myanmar, warning of instability and civil unrest if Myanmar's ruling junta continued to starve its people of energy.
Shwe Gas Movement, a group of Myanmar exiles in Bangladesh, India and Thailand, also said the military's recent offensive against ethnic rebels near the pipeline route showed the regime had no concerns about providing stability for investors.
"People across Burma are facing severe energy shortages and this massive energy export will only fuel social unrest," Shwe Gas Movement said in a report released on Monday, referring to the country by its former name.
"These resources belong to our people and should be used for the energy needs of our country."
Chronic fuel shortages triggered a series of monk-led protests in the resource-rich country in 2007, leading to the deaths of at least 31 people in the bloodiest army crackdown since a 1988 uprising.
China's largest oil and gas producer, China National Petroleum Corporation, is due to start construction of nearly 4,000 km of duel pipelines from Myanmar's western Arakan State to China's Yunnan province.
The deal is expected to provide the military, which has ruled the country since a 1962 coup, with at least $29 billion over 30 years.
The pipelines will supply China with oil shipped from the Middle East and natural gas from Myanmar's vast offshore reserves in the Bay of Bengal. (For a Q+A on Myanmar's relationship with China click on [ID:nPEK70568])
The Shwe Gas Movement said foreign investors faced a "perfect storm" of financial and security risks by doing business with the junta and highlighted reports of forced labour, forced relocation and extortion by government troops in the construction of a much smaller pipeline to Thailand.
Last month's incursion by Myanmar's army into northeastern Shan State, which sent tens of thousands fleeing into China, has raised fears of more clashes with ethnic minority rebels that could exacerbate a refugee crisis at its border with economic and political ally China.
Mon Sep 7, 2009 8:05am EDT
BANGKOK, Sept 7 (Reuters) - Activists called on Monday for China to halt construction of controversial oil and gas pipelines through Myanmar, warning of instability and civil unrest if Myanmar's ruling junta continued to starve its people of energy.
Shwe Gas Movement, a group of Myanmar exiles in Bangladesh, India and Thailand, also said the military's recent offensive against ethnic rebels near the pipeline route showed the regime had no concerns about providing stability for investors.
"People across Burma are facing severe energy shortages and this massive energy export will only fuel social unrest," Shwe Gas Movement said in a report released on Monday, referring to the country by its former name.
"These resources belong to our people and should be used for the energy needs of our country."
Chronic fuel shortages triggered a series of monk-led protests in the resource-rich country in 2007, leading to the deaths of at least 31 people in the bloodiest army crackdown since a 1988 uprising.
China's largest oil and gas producer, China National Petroleum Corporation, is due to start construction of nearly 4,000 km of duel pipelines from Myanmar's western Arakan State to China's Yunnan province.
The deal is expected to provide the military, which has ruled the country since a 1962 coup, with at least $29 billion over 30 years.
The pipelines will supply China with oil shipped from the Middle East and natural gas from Myanmar's vast offshore reserves in the Bay of Bengal. (For a Q+A on Myanmar's relationship with China click on [ID:nPEK70568])
The Shwe Gas Movement said foreign investors faced a "perfect storm" of financial and security risks by doing business with the junta and highlighted reports of forced labour, forced relocation and extortion by government troops in the construction of a much smaller pipeline to Thailand.
Last month's incursion by Myanmar's army into northeastern Shan State, which sent tens of thousands fleeing into China, has raised fears of more clashes with ethnic minority rebels that could exacerbate a refugee crisis at its border with economic and political ally China.
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UNHCR urges China grant access to Myanmar refugees
Fri Sep 4, 2009 8:37am EDT
BEIJING, Sept 4 (Reuters) - The United Nations refugee agency on Friday urged China to grant it access to the Myanmar border, where thousands of people have fled over the past week from fighting between Myanmar's army and rebels. [ID:nSP481510]
Myanmar's successful offensive in Kokang against the rebel Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, a local ethnic Chinese group, sparked an exodus of about 37,000 refugees into China's neighbouring Yunnan province last week.
Many are believed to have returned to Myanmar.
"Following reports of refugees fleeing fighting in Myanmar in recent weeks, UNHCR has called on the Chinese authorities to allow us access to the border area and has proposed a joint needs assessment so as to offer support for any possible unmet needs," the U.N. agency said in a statement.
"We hope this request will be positively considered as additional displacement may occur in the region should the situation deteriorate in the Wa State of Myanmar," it added, referring to another tense part of the country.
While the UNHCR expressed its "deep appreciation" to China for allowing the refugees in and looking after them, it said it would still like to conduct its own survey of the area.
"As a protection agency, UNHCR wishes to visit these locations to assist the government in the provision of humanitarian assistance and to determine whether any of the people who remain there are in need of international protection."
Fri Sep 4, 2009 8:37am EDT
BEIJING, Sept 4 (Reuters) - The United Nations refugee agency on Friday urged China to grant it access to the Myanmar border, where thousands of people have fled over the past week from fighting between Myanmar's army and rebels. [ID:nSP481510]
Myanmar's successful offensive in Kokang against the rebel Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, a local ethnic Chinese group, sparked an exodus of about 37,000 refugees into China's neighbouring Yunnan province last week.
Many are believed to have returned to Myanmar.
"Following reports of refugees fleeing fighting in Myanmar in recent weeks, UNHCR has called on the Chinese authorities to allow us access to the border area and has proposed a joint needs assessment so as to offer support for any possible unmet needs," the U.N. agency said in a statement.
"We hope this request will be positively considered as additional displacement may occur in the region should the situation deteriorate in the Wa State of Myanmar," it added, referring to another tense part of the country.
While the UNHCR expressed its "deep appreciation" to China for allowing the refugees in and looking after them, it said it would still like to conduct its own survey of the area.
"As a protection agency, UNHCR wishes to visit these locations to assist the government in the provision of humanitarian assistance and to determine whether any of the people who remain there are in need of international protection."
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CNN News - Full transcript: Laura Bush speaks to CNN
From Zain Verjee, CNN
Editor's Note: The following is the full transcript of the interview between CNN's Zain Verjee and former First Lady Laura Bush.
PARIS, France (CNN) -- Zain Verjee: Bonjour!
Laura Bush: Bonjour! How are you, good to see you...
Zain: You're here in Paris, for an important event, you're going to be talking about literacy worldwide. What is your one key message?
Laura: Well, the one key message is how important it is to read and how governments really need to focus their priorities on making sure everybody in their countries can read and that's what UNESCO does. UNESCO is the big U.N. agency that has education as part of its charge and this is the decade of literacy and the decade will be over in 2012 so we've got a lot of work to do to make sure people learn to read between now and then.
Zain: How do you make governments have literacy a priority? Because if you look at Africa, you look at Asia and so many other places around the world, governments have to struggle with so many other things there's corruptions and there's.... how do you do it?
Laura: Well, what UNESCO is trying to do is focus on the 34 most illiterate countries the countries with the highest rates of illiteracy... they have two programs, one is an assessment program, so they will help governments really assess how many people are illiterate who they are, where they are and what they can do to intervene in their lives... and then the other program out of UNESCO is called LEAP and it's an adult literacy program and of course most of the people who are illiterate in the world....and they think... 700 million people who are illiterate, I think it is, it's really a lot around the world that are illiterate.... Watch the full interview with Laura Bush ( http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/09/08/laura.bush/index.html?section=cnn_latest#cnnSTCVideo )
Zain: So it's really a way to put pressure on governments?
Laura: That's right and to help them in whatever way they can, because you're right, the countries with the highest illiteracy are also the poorest, they are the countries with the least capacity to be able to build education systems.
Zain: Let's talk about Afghanistan, something that for many years that you've really cared about and you've personally talked about women in Afghanistan in particular. But right now Afghanistan is facing allegations of its election being marred, there are more civilian deaths and the Taliban seem to be getting stronger -- none of which is good for women especially. What's your reaction to the state now?
Laura: Well, I'm very concerned of course and I think that everybody who has invested anything in the lives of the people of Afghanistan are concerned for our own troops that are there and their safety and of course I'm concerned for the women that are there who are trying to really make a life, the ones who are in school.
I've just met with a group of women who were in Dallas, who were in the United States on a program where they were matched with an American business woman mentor.
These are women who are making a life for themselves and are living for themselves in Afghanistan by working, all of us are concerned and everybody as they look at Afghanistan from around the world really hope and want to whatever they can to help the government stabilize, to see that the elections were fair and to find out what the results of those elections are.
Zain: Do you think it could fall apart? Is it on the brink?
Laura: I don't know if I would say that, but I think it's worrisome and I want people, I hope that people, will redouble their efforts, both within Afghanistan and all the people that help from outside of the country.
Zain: You've been very outspoken too about Burma and the plight of Aung Sun Su Kyi the pro democracy leader. Do you think the military junta is just scared of her and don't her want to contest the election?
Laura: Sure, absolutely, that's the reason I think she's always been held under house arrest, they're afraid of her popularity, they think that undermines their regime. Her party the National League for Democracy was elected overwhelmingly and the results of that election were disregarded by the military regime and she was put under house arrest for most of the years since then and yes I think that's what they are.
But I hope that they'll see what she really wants, she wants a dialogue, she wants a way for the ethnic groups and the National League for Democracy people and the regime to come together, she wants it to be a peaceful transition to a democracy and to have the chance for Burma to really build itself as what it used to be and that is a very wealthy and educated nation.
Zain: What's your message for her?
Laura: Well I just admire her so much, I mean my message to her is how much I admire her courage and watch from afar and I hope someday I have the chance to meet her.
Zain: What's it like for you being a private citizen?
Laura: Well it's great really, it really is nice, we're enjoying our home in Texas a lot, we have a new house...
Zain: Furniture yet?
Laura: ....getting some furniture, we've had a lot of fun working on that, we're both working on our memoirs, writing our memoirs and then we're also building the Presidential Library at SMU with the institute which will be a part of it and I've been a chairmen of the design committee and that's been a lot of fun to work with Bob Stern our architect and Michael Van Bockyn Burg our landscape architect. We just had our last design meeting so now we'll go to the construction plans and get ready and I hope to break ground in sometime in a little over a year.
Zain: Give us a taste of your memoirs, give us a tease.
Laura: Well, I'm talking really about, of course a lot about the years in the White House I've done a lot on the years in the White House but also, my vantage point, the view that I had living inside the White House during, you know, these really dramatic times we lived in and interesting times...
Zain: What would surprise readers for example?
Laura: Well I think maybe parts of my background would surprise readers, I'm talking about growing up in west Texas and what that would like and I think there's maybe a stereotypical view about what that would be but I think people would be interested to hear what it was really like.
Zain: And what it was like on 9/11 or on critical moments or the war in Iraq and Afghanistan...
Laura: Exactly, so all of that will be part of it, and it's been fun and interesting to work on because you know I think there's something sort of psychological about writing your memoirs. And as you go through it you see a lot of sides of every part of it that happened to you.
Zain: How's President Bush, doing is he glad to be out of the spotlight?
Laura: He's doing very well, thank you for asking, he's riding his mountain bike a lot, he likes that and he's very disciplined about writing his memoirs, in fact I'm ashamed every day... yes a lot better than me, he's always been a lot more disciplined than I am... so he's working on those, I keep telling him that I've got to the second grade in my memoirs.
Zain: How do you think the world will remember him?
Laura: Well I think the world will remember him really for what he is and that's what they will get to see both from his memoirs and from mine and that is somebody who stood for freedom and who stood for the security of our country and I think people know that and I think the people that really know him, know what he's like and they see what he stood for and that's the freedom of 50 million people in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Zain: Many around the world would say that he stood for divisiveness and destructiveness?
Laura: Well, I would say that that's absolutely not right and I don't think they have either the right view of him or what his responsibilities are and were as President of the United States.
Zain: How do you think Michelle Obama's doing?
Laura: I think she's doing great I think she's doing very well.
Zain: What strikes you, well you've been there you've...
Laura: Well I saw her, I saw her at the funeral, Teddy Kennedy's funeral last week and asked her about the girls and how they're doing and I know what she's doing, you know, it's what every woman who moves there does and that's to try to make it a home. Both for her husband, who's the President and for her children.
Zain: President Obama is giving a back-to-school speech and there's so much controversy over that, do you think it's a good idea?
Laura: I think there is a place for the President of the United States to talk to schoolchildren and encourage schoolchildren and I think there are a lot of people that should do the same and that is encourage their own children to stay in school and to study hard and to try to achieve the dream that they have.
I also am happy that it seems that the Obama administration has not backed off the accountability part of the No Child Left Behind Act that President Bush worked with Ted Kennedy on to pass and I think that's really important. We want every American child to have the very best education possible and I think that's what that legislation really demands.
Zain: The, er, the issue that's been raised, by many conservatives that are critical of this, is that they say that, this is a dangerous socialist plot, it's indoctrinating school children, some parents say no, our kids are staying home and not going to listen to the President talk about education and schools.
Laura: Well, that's they're right, you know that certainly is the right of parents to choose what they want their children to hear in school, but I think really what people were unhappy about were the guidelines that went out with the... before the.. speech went out with the, um, and I think those have been changed and I think its also really important for everyone to respect the President of the United States.
Zain: Do you think that it is fair that Obama is criticized as a socialist?
Laura: I'd have no idea whether it is fair, do you think I thought it was fair when President Bush was criticized? Not really. So I guess not.
Zain: President Bush was criticized, he was called by many in the left a fascist. What kind of advice would you give to President Obama in how to handle the situation...
Laura: Well I wouldn't give him any advice you know, I don't think I need to give him any advice, but I think I think it's just what happens and people know it in our country is the cause of our very really safe Congressional districts everywhere in our country, we're polarized in the sense that a lot of people are on the right, a lot of people are on the left and we've seen that for the last eight years certainly and we're still seeing it and that's just a fact and I think it is important for everybody who is elected -- Republicans, Democrats and independents to really be bipartisan and to come together and its difficult.
I know that was one of the real disappointments for my husband when he moved to Washington, because in Texas when he had worked with the Democrat Speaker of the House and the Democrat governor and they had been able to come together for what's best for our state and he was disappointed that that was not the way it worked out in Washington and we're just still seeing that I think. That's just a fact of life in American politics and I'm sure President Obama didn't expect it to be that way but, you know,it is that way and all of us need to do what we can to come together on issues.
Zain: Do you think he is doing a good job -- President Obama?
Laura: I think he is, I think he has got a lot on his plate and he has tackled a lot to start with and that has probably made it more difficult.
Zain: Has it been difficult that Vice-President Cheney has been so outspoken about so many issues where President Bush deliberately decided to not speak out...
Laura: I think that Vice-President Cheney has every right to speak out and I appreciate that he is defending the Bush administration and his administration, I think that is important. I think there is a place for that.
George, as a former president, chose not to speak out... He thinks the president deserves the respect and the no second-guessing on the part of the former president... He didn't like it when he was criticized by former presidents and that is what he has chosen to do but it is certainly Vice-President Cheney's right to say whatever he wants to say, that's one of the really great things about the U.S.
Zain: But it doesn't bother the president that he's out there being critical...
Laura: No not at all.
Zain: And is he still in contact with Vice-President Cheney?
Laura: Sure, they talk occasionally.
Zain: One thing that you have been doing that you care tremendously about is healthcare. Tell us a little bit about the institute that you've set up and the breast cancer awareness work that you have done.
Laura: Well I did one big women's healthcare event when I came back to Texas. It included the foundation for breast cancer which is partnered with the U.S. State Department and Anderson Cancer Center from Houston, with a number of countries to get the word out from women everywhere about what they can do for early detection. I had a really very memorable trip to the Middle East and Saudi Arabia... What was that like? It was very interesting and it was really a very intimate way to talk to women, I didn't really know it would be that way.
Zain: What did they tell you that you were struck by?
Laura: I mean, well, obviously when people get sick humans are all alike, we especially women fear breast cancer and I think it really gave me a chance to talk in a much more personal way with Saudi women than I would have if I had another topic that I was talking about but also I'm proud that cancer detection centers went up in Saudi Arabia and that many many Saudi women are taking the opportunity now.
Women in the Middle East, for some reason that we don't know, are presented earlier with breast cancer, so once it is diagnosed they are a lot of times in too late of a stage for the cancer to be treated successfully. So it is important to get that word out. And then the other two women's health centers that I work with, I worked with the heart truth, letting American women know that heart disease is the leading cause of death among American women because a lot of women think that heart disease is a man's disease and they don't get to the hospital fast enough if they are having symptoms of a heart attack. And then the third is the Laura Bush Institute for Women's Health At Texas Tech University which was my father's university and they have clinics -- they're a medical school -- all over West Texas, which is where I'm from, so that has been fun to partner with them.
Zain: So you've been busy. What about your daughter Jenna, she's going to be a correspondent and contributor to the Today Show. What do you think of that?
Laura: I'm proud of her for that. I think she'll have a lot of fun with that, she wants to bring stories about education because she's a teacher and she's continuing to teach as well to the attention of the American people.
Zain: Maybe she'll get to interview you and be in my spot at some point?
Laura: Yeah that'll be fun.
Zain: Couple quick things: what are you reading right now? We always want to know what's Laura reading. We always want to know what Laura is reading.
Laura: I've just read two memoirs by Nuala O'Faolain, who is an Irish writer, she is no longer living. I've been reading a lot of memoirs since I've been writing a memoir, it's sort of a genre that I hadn't read much before.
I like to read literature, but those have been very interesting and they are very interesting for me and particularly women my age, because she wrote them when she was my age and just like I'm writing a memoir now, it's a time in life for me now that I am retired to look back and look forward to those years that come next, so I love both of her memoirs. I just read "Are You Somebody?" and then the newest one.
From Zain Verjee, CNN
Editor's Note: The following is the full transcript of the interview between CNN's Zain Verjee and former First Lady Laura Bush.
PARIS, France (CNN) -- Zain Verjee: Bonjour!
Laura Bush: Bonjour! How are you, good to see you...
Zain: You're here in Paris, for an important event, you're going to be talking about literacy worldwide. What is your one key message?
Laura: Well, the one key message is how important it is to read and how governments really need to focus their priorities on making sure everybody in their countries can read and that's what UNESCO does. UNESCO is the big U.N. agency that has education as part of its charge and this is the decade of literacy and the decade will be over in 2012 so we've got a lot of work to do to make sure people learn to read between now and then.
Zain: How do you make governments have literacy a priority? Because if you look at Africa, you look at Asia and so many other places around the world, governments have to struggle with so many other things there's corruptions and there's.... how do you do it?
Laura: Well, what UNESCO is trying to do is focus on the 34 most illiterate countries the countries with the highest rates of illiteracy... they have two programs, one is an assessment program, so they will help governments really assess how many people are illiterate who they are, where they are and what they can do to intervene in their lives... and then the other program out of UNESCO is called LEAP and it's an adult literacy program and of course most of the people who are illiterate in the world....and they think... 700 million people who are illiterate, I think it is, it's really a lot around the world that are illiterate.... Watch the full interview with Laura Bush ( http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/09/08/laura.bush/index.html?section=cnn_latest#cnnSTCVideo )
Zain: So it's really a way to put pressure on governments?
Laura: That's right and to help them in whatever way they can, because you're right, the countries with the highest illiteracy are also the poorest, they are the countries with the least capacity to be able to build education systems.
Zain: Let's talk about Afghanistan, something that for many years that you've really cared about and you've personally talked about women in Afghanistan in particular. But right now Afghanistan is facing allegations of its election being marred, there are more civilian deaths and the Taliban seem to be getting stronger -- none of which is good for women especially. What's your reaction to the state now?
Laura: Well, I'm very concerned of course and I think that everybody who has invested anything in the lives of the people of Afghanistan are concerned for our own troops that are there and their safety and of course I'm concerned for the women that are there who are trying to really make a life, the ones who are in school.
I've just met with a group of women who were in Dallas, who were in the United States on a program where they were matched with an American business woman mentor.
These are women who are making a life for themselves and are living for themselves in Afghanistan by working, all of us are concerned and everybody as they look at Afghanistan from around the world really hope and want to whatever they can to help the government stabilize, to see that the elections were fair and to find out what the results of those elections are.
Zain: Do you think it could fall apart? Is it on the brink?
Laura: I don't know if I would say that, but I think it's worrisome and I want people, I hope that people, will redouble their efforts, both within Afghanistan and all the people that help from outside of the country.
Zain: You've been very outspoken too about Burma and the plight of Aung Sun Su Kyi the pro democracy leader. Do you think the military junta is just scared of her and don't her want to contest the election?
Laura: Sure, absolutely, that's the reason I think she's always been held under house arrest, they're afraid of her popularity, they think that undermines their regime. Her party the National League for Democracy was elected overwhelmingly and the results of that election were disregarded by the military regime and she was put under house arrest for most of the years since then and yes I think that's what they are.
But I hope that they'll see what she really wants, she wants a dialogue, she wants a way for the ethnic groups and the National League for Democracy people and the regime to come together, she wants it to be a peaceful transition to a democracy and to have the chance for Burma to really build itself as what it used to be and that is a very wealthy and educated nation.
Zain: What's your message for her?
Laura: Well I just admire her so much, I mean my message to her is how much I admire her courage and watch from afar and I hope someday I have the chance to meet her.
Zain: What's it like for you being a private citizen?
Laura: Well it's great really, it really is nice, we're enjoying our home in Texas a lot, we have a new house...
Zain: Furniture yet?
Laura: ....getting some furniture, we've had a lot of fun working on that, we're both working on our memoirs, writing our memoirs and then we're also building the Presidential Library at SMU with the institute which will be a part of it and I've been a chairmen of the design committee and that's been a lot of fun to work with Bob Stern our architect and Michael Van Bockyn Burg our landscape architect. We just had our last design meeting so now we'll go to the construction plans and get ready and I hope to break ground in sometime in a little over a year.
Zain: Give us a taste of your memoirs, give us a tease.
Laura: Well, I'm talking really about, of course a lot about the years in the White House I've done a lot on the years in the White House but also, my vantage point, the view that I had living inside the White House during, you know, these really dramatic times we lived in and interesting times...
Zain: What would surprise readers for example?
Laura: Well I think maybe parts of my background would surprise readers, I'm talking about growing up in west Texas and what that would like and I think there's maybe a stereotypical view about what that would be but I think people would be interested to hear what it was really like.
Zain: And what it was like on 9/11 or on critical moments or the war in Iraq and Afghanistan...
Laura: Exactly, so all of that will be part of it, and it's been fun and interesting to work on because you know I think there's something sort of psychological about writing your memoirs. And as you go through it you see a lot of sides of every part of it that happened to you.
Zain: How's President Bush, doing is he glad to be out of the spotlight?
Laura: He's doing very well, thank you for asking, he's riding his mountain bike a lot, he likes that and he's very disciplined about writing his memoirs, in fact I'm ashamed every day... yes a lot better than me, he's always been a lot more disciplined than I am... so he's working on those, I keep telling him that I've got to the second grade in my memoirs.
Zain: How do you think the world will remember him?
Laura: Well I think the world will remember him really for what he is and that's what they will get to see both from his memoirs and from mine and that is somebody who stood for freedom and who stood for the security of our country and I think people know that and I think the people that really know him, know what he's like and they see what he stood for and that's the freedom of 50 million people in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Zain: Many around the world would say that he stood for divisiveness and destructiveness?
Laura: Well, I would say that that's absolutely not right and I don't think they have either the right view of him or what his responsibilities are and were as President of the United States.
Zain: How do you think Michelle Obama's doing?
Laura: I think she's doing great I think she's doing very well.
Zain: What strikes you, well you've been there you've...
Laura: Well I saw her, I saw her at the funeral, Teddy Kennedy's funeral last week and asked her about the girls and how they're doing and I know what she's doing, you know, it's what every woman who moves there does and that's to try to make it a home. Both for her husband, who's the President and for her children.
Zain: President Obama is giving a back-to-school speech and there's so much controversy over that, do you think it's a good idea?
Laura: I think there is a place for the President of the United States to talk to schoolchildren and encourage schoolchildren and I think there are a lot of people that should do the same and that is encourage their own children to stay in school and to study hard and to try to achieve the dream that they have.
I also am happy that it seems that the Obama administration has not backed off the accountability part of the No Child Left Behind Act that President Bush worked with Ted Kennedy on to pass and I think that's really important. We want every American child to have the very best education possible and I think that's what that legislation really demands.
Zain: The, er, the issue that's been raised, by many conservatives that are critical of this, is that they say that, this is a dangerous socialist plot, it's indoctrinating school children, some parents say no, our kids are staying home and not going to listen to the President talk about education and schools.
Laura: Well, that's they're right, you know that certainly is the right of parents to choose what they want their children to hear in school, but I think really what people were unhappy about were the guidelines that went out with the... before the.. speech went out with the, um, and I think those have been changed and I think its also really important for everyone to respect the President of the United States.
Zain: Do you think that it is fair that Obama is criticized as a socialist?
Laura: I'd have no idea whether it is fair, do you think I thought it was fair when President Bush was criticized? Not really. So I guess not.
Zain: President Bush was criticized, he was called by many in the left a fascist. What kind of advice would you give to President Obama in how to handle the situation...
Laura: Well I wouldn't give him any advice you know, I don't think I need to give him any advice, but I think I think it's just what happens and people know it in our country is the cause of our very really safe Congressional districts everywhere in our country, we're polarized in the sense that a lot of people are on the right, a lot of people are on the left and we've seen that for the last eight years certainly and we're still seeing it and that's just a fact and I think it is important for everybody who is elected -- Republicans, Democrats and independents to really be bipartisan and to come together and its difficult.
I know that was one of the real disappointments for my husband when he moved to Washington, because in Texas when he had worked with the Democrat Speaker of the House and the Democrat governor and they had been able to come together for what's best for our state and he was disappointed that that was not the way it worked out in Washington and we're just still seeing that I think. That's just a fact of life in American politics and I'm sure President Obama didn't expect it to be that way but, you know,it is that way and all of us need to do what we can to come together on issues.
Zain: Do you think he is doing a good job -- President Obama?
Laura: I think he is, I think he has got a lot on his plate and he has tackled a lot to start with and that has probably made it more difficult.
Zain: Has it been difficult that Vice-President Cheney has been so outspoken about so many issues where President Bush deliberately decided to not speak out...
Laura: I think that Vice-President Cheney has every right to speak out and I appreciate that he is defending the Bush administration and his administration, I think that is important. I think there is a place for that.
George, as a former president, chose not to speak out... He thinks the president deserves the respect and the no second-guessing on the part of the former president... He didn't like it when he was criticized by former presidents and that is what he has chosen to do but it is certainly Vice-President Cheney's right to say whatever he wants to say, that's one of the really great things about the U.S.
Zain: But it doesn't bother the president that he's out there being critical...
Laura: No not at all.
Zain: And is he still in contact with Vice-President Cheney?
Laura: Sure, they talk occasionally.
Zain: One thing that you have been doing that you care tremendously about is healthcare. Tell us a little bit about the institute that you've set up and the breast cancer awareness work that you have done.
Laura: Well I did one big women's healthcare event when I came back to Texas. It included the foundation for breast cancer which is partnered with the U.S. State Department and Anderson Cancer Center from Houston, with a number of countries to get the word out from women everywhere about what they can do for early detection. I had a really very memorable trip to the Middle East and Saudi Arabia... What was that like? It was very interesting and it was really a very intimate way to talk to women, I didn't really know it would be that way.
Zain: What did they tell you that you were struck by?
Laura: I mean, well, obviously when people get sick humans are all alike, we especially women fear breast cancer and I think it really gave me a chance to talk in a much more personal way with Saudi women than I would have if I had another topic that I was talking about but also I'm proud that cancer detection centers went up in Saudi Arabia and that many many Saudi women are taking the opportunity now.
Women in the Middle East, for some reason that we don't know, are presented earlier with breast cancer, so once it is diagnosed they are a lot of times in too late of a stage for the cancer to be treated successfully. So it is important to get that word out. And then the other two women's health centers that I work with, I worked with the heart truth, letting American women know that heart disease is the leading cause of death among American women because a lot of women think that heart disease is a man's disease and they don't get to the hospital fast enough if they are having symptoms of a heart attack. And then the third is the Laura Bush Institute for Women's Health At Texas Tech University which was my father's university and they have clinics -- they're a medical school -- all over West Texas, which is where I'm from, so that has been fun to partner with them.
Zain: So you've been busy. What about your daughter Jenna, she's going to be a correspondent and contributor to the Today Show. What do you think of that?
Laura: I'm proud of her for that. I think she'll have a lot of fun with that, she wants to bring stories about education because she's a teacher and she's continuing to teach as well to the attention of the American people.
Zain: Maybe she'll get to interview you and be in my spot at some point?
Laura: Yeah that'll be fun.
Zain: Couple quick things: what are you reading right now? We always want to know what's Laura reading. We always want to know what Laura is reading.
Laura: I've just read two memoirs by Nuala O'Faolain, who is an Irish writer, she is no longer living. I've been reading a lot of memoirs since I've been writing a memoir, it's sort of a genre that I hadn't read much before.
I like to read literature, but those have been very interesting and they are very interesting for me and particularly women my age, because she wrote them when she was my age and just like I'm writing a memoir now, it's a time in life for me now that I am retired to look back and look forward to those years that come next, so I love both of her memoirs. I just read "Are You Somebody?" and then the newest one.
********************************************************************
Boston Globe - Refugees from Myanmar arriving in Maine
September 8, 2009
PORTLAND, Maine—The latest newcomers to begin settling in Maine's largest city are Kayah refugees from a mountainous state in Myanmar.
The Portland Press Herald says a 12-member family from Kayah is among the newest refugees to call Maine home, and Catholic Charities Maine says an additional 16 refugees are expected in the next month or two.
Kayah is a mountainous state of about 200,000 people on Myanmar's eastern border with Thailand. Its people have been struggling for independence since the 1950s.
The Kayah people become part of a recent increase in refugees coming to Maine, including people from Somalia, Sudan, Iraq, Afghanistan, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
September 8, 2009
PORTLAND, Maine—The latest newcomers to begin settling in Maine's largest city are Kayah refugees from a mountainous state in Myanmar.
The Portland Press Herald says a 12-member family from Kayah is among the newest refugees to call Maine home, and Catholic Charities Maine says an additional 16 refugees are expected in the next month or two.
Kayah is a mountainous state of about 200,000 people on Myanmar's eastern border with Thailand. Its people have been struggling for independence since the 1950s.
The Kayah people become part of a recent increase in refugees coming to Maine, including people from Somalia, Sudan, Iraq, Afghanistan, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
********************************************************************
Myanmar Fighting May Harm China Oil Plans, Exiles Say
By Daniel Ten Kate
Sept. 7 (Bloomberg) -- China’s plans to pipe oil and gas across Myanmar may be threatened by renewed fighting between the ruling junta and ethnic minorities along the proposed route, an exile group said.
The 4,000 kilometers (2,486 miles) of pipes would stretch from the Indian Ocean to China’s southern Yunnan province, reducing the need to ship fuel through the Strait of Malacca. China National Petroleum Corp., the country’s largest oil company, planned to start construction on the lines this month.
“The companies, governments and investors involved in these projects are vulnerable to financial losses from re- ignition of fighting along the pipeline route, public relations disasters and costly litigation,” the Shwe Gas Movement, an alliance of exiled activist groups based in Chiang Mai, Thailand, said in a report today. The group urged the immediate suspension of the project.
Eighty percent of China’s oil imports pass through the waterway between Malaysia and Indonesia, which is 1.7 miles wide at its narrowest point and vulnerable to pirate attacks.
Myanmar has Asia’s seventh-largest natural gas reserves, or 17.5 trillion cubic feet, according to BP Plc estimates, which China is keen to tap to help fuel economic growth.
South Korea’s Daewoo International Corp. said Aug. 25 it would invest 2.1 trillion won ($1.68 billion) in a Myanmar gas project to supply China National Petroleum Corp.
Foreign Reserves
The gas pipeline will supply 500 million cubic feet a day, according to Daewoo. That’s equivalent to 6.4 percent of the 7.8 billion cubic feet a day China consumed last year.
The oil pipeline would be able to carry 22 million tons of crude per year, China National Petroleum said on June 19. That’s equivalent to 12 percent of the 178.9 million metric tons China imported last year.
Myanmar has increased its foreign currency holdings fourfold since 2004 to $3.6 billion, mostly on oil and gas sales to China and Thailand. Talks continue on how construction costs for the gas pipeline may be split, Daewoo International said.
As many as 37,000 ethnic Kokang living near the pipeline route fled into China since Aug. 8 to escape fighting between the junta and a local militia, threatening to end a 20-year ceasefire agreement. More than 12,000 have now returned, Xinhua reported yesterday, citing Myanmar state-run media.
The Kokang are one of the ethnic groups on Myanmar’s borders that agreed to join the state in 1947 in return for autonomy. They formed the backbone of the Communist resistance supported by China in the 1980s.
“China has so many economic interests in Burma,” said Aung Naing Oo, a Thailand-based political analyst, referring to the country by its former name. “It must decide whether its support for ethnic minorities will help its long-term relationship in the country.”
Myanmar’s military rulers have tried to persuade the Kokang and other armed ethnic groups to become border guards partially under their control ahead of elections planned for next year, a move they have resisted.
“We hope Myanmar could properly handle its domestic issues and take every measure necessary to restore stability along the border and guarantee the safety and property of Chinese citizens in Myanmar,” Jiang Yu, spokeswoman for China’s foreign ministry, said Sept. 3.
By Daniel Ten Kate
Sept. 7 (Bloomberg) -- China’s plans to pipe oil and gas across Myanmar may be threatened by renewed fighting between the ruling junta and ethnic minorities along the proposed route, an exile group said.
The 4,000 kilometers (2,486 miles) of pipes would stretch from the Indian Ocean to China’s southern Yunnan province, reducing the need to ship fuel through the Strait of Malacca. China National Petroleum Corp., the country’s largest oil company, planned to start construction on the lines this month.
“The companies, governments and investors involved in these projects are vulnerable to financial losses from re- ignition of fighting along the pipeline route, public relations disasters and costly litigation,” the Shwe Gas Movement, an alliance of exiled activist groups based in Chiang Mai, Thailand, said in a report today. The group urged the immediate suspension of the project.
Eighty percent of China’s oil imports pass through the waterway between Malaysia and Indonesia, which is 1.7 miles wide at its narrowest point and vulnerable to pirate attacks.
Myanmar has Asia’s seventh-largest natural gas reserves, or 17.5 trillion cubic feet, according to BP Plc estimates, which China is keen to tap to help fuel economic growth.
South Korea’s Daewoo International Corp. said Aug. 25 it would invest 2.1 trillion won ($1.68 billion) in a Myanmar gas project to supply China National Petroleum Corp.
Foreign Reserves
The gas pipeline will supply 500 million cubic feet a day, according to Daewoo. That’s equivalent to 6.4 percent of the 7.8 billion cubic feet a day China consumed last year.
The oil pipeline would be able to carry 22 million tons of crude per year, China National Petroleum said on June 19. That’s equivalent to 12 percent of the 178.9 million metric tons China imported last year.
Myanmar has increased its foreign currency holdings fourfold since 2004 to $3.6 billion, mostly on oil and gas sales to China and Thailand. Talks continue on how construction costs for the gas pipeline may be split, Daewoo International said.
As many as 37,000 ethnic Kokang living near the pipeline route fled into China since Aug. 8 to escape fighting between the junta and a local militia, threatening to end a 20-year ceasefire agreement. More than 12,000 have now returned, Xinhua reported yesterday, citing Myanmar state-run media.
The Kokang are one of the ethnic groups on Myanmar’s borders that agreed to join the state in 1947 in return for autonomy. They formed the backbone of the Communist resistance supported by China in the 1980s.
“China has so many economic interests in Burma,” said Aung Naing Oo, a Thailand-based political analyst, referring to the country by its former name. “It must decide whether its support for ethnic minorities will help its long-term relationship in the country.”
Myanmar’s military rulers have tried to persuade the Kokang and other armed ethnic groups to become border guards partially under their control ahead of elections planned for next year, a move they have resisted.
“We hope Myanmar could properly handle its domestic issues and take every measure necessary to restore stability along the border and guarantee the safety and property of Chinese citizens in Myanmar,” Jiang Yu, spokeswoman for China’s foreign ministry, said Sept. 3.
********************************************************************
MYANMAR: Doing good in the Ayeyarwady River Delta
AYEYARWADY DELTA, 8 September 2009 (IRIN) - Cyclone Nargis redrew the coastline of Myanmar in May 2008, wiping out hundreds of villages and ruining thousands of lives. Yet it also opened up a space for local NGOs and private initiatives to provide desperately needed help when the military rulers of Myanmar - highly suspicious of foreign aid and NGOs - were slow to grant outsiders permission to deliver assistance. IRIN spent two days in the Ayeyarwady River Delta with one such home-grown initiative.
Day 1:
It is hot and humid. Maung Sein, once a school drop-out, now a successful businessman in Yangon, former capital of Myanmar (Burma), has been wading barefoot through thigh-high water in the flooded paddy fields for almost an hour.
The soft mud underfoot is often ankle deep. Could that something strange in the murky water be a crab, a harmless fish, or perhaps a snake? "Isn't this very interesting?" Maung Sein says, grinning as he turns around now and again to encourage the band of volunteers following him.
They are here to help the residents of Boe Ba Gone and Thai Kone build a connecting road between the two villages as part of a UN World Food Programme (WFP) food-for-work project. The road is not finished yet, so everyone still has to go through the paddy fields.
Maung Sein breaks into a Burmese version of the American folk song, "Coming 'Round the Mountain", to keep spirits up. "We used to do this from morning to night when we were helping people after [Cyclone] Nargis," he grins, struggling his way through the slush.
He formed the Noble Compassionate Volunteer Group (NCV) just days after Cyclone Nargis struck the Ayeyarwady and Yangon divisions of southern Myanmar on 2 and 3 May 2008; nearly 140,000 people were declared dead or missing.
"When I saw all those people who had lost their homes, their families - I knew I had to help them," he says. There was no aid coming in, so he raided his own coffers and raised money from private and business donors in Myanmar.
NCV started with two volunteers but now has over a hundred; it is one of the largest local NGOs and has the biggest reach in the delta. "Besides the 100-odd volunteers we also have five to seven volunteers in each village," he says.
The volunteers - mostly 20-something - offer a huge variety of skills: there are farmers, engineers, film production assistants and young graduates, united by their willingness to help.
They have built helipads for aid choppers to land amid the paddy fields, houses and toilets, roads and wells - the cyclone destroyed almost all the infrastructure, and then the salt water carried by the storm surge made the water in many open sources undrinkable.
"When I saw the scale of devastation I just wanted to do something; I wanted to be able to tell my grandchildren one day that I was there and I helped," says Thet Thet Zaw, a former film production assistant.
Villagers wave and shout greetings as they recognize the approaching blue NCV T-shirts. They have an animated discussion with the volunteers about the road - the completed section has made it easier for them to reach the local market and school children no longer have to plod through the paddy fields.
The food they receive from WFP for their work is "very welcome", one villager says. It is rice-planting season and everyone looks forward to harvesting the staple food.
Wading becomes more arduous as the water becomes deeper and turns into a stream. Soaking, everyone piles into a traditional boat that takes them back to the Bogale River, part of the Ayeyarwady River system.
We stop at a monastery for the night. After a quick bowl of rice and fish for dinner, Maung Sein discusses the day.
"I am trying to get them [volunteers] to question and express their opinion," he says. The discussion lasts until midnight. Everyone at last falls asleep on mats spread out on the monastery floor while mosquitoes buzz around; frogs hop across the mats during the night.
Day 2:
Everyone is up at 5 a.m. The sleeping mats are rolled up, mosquito nets are squeezed into bags. Outside over an open fire two volunteers are mixing fried eggs into a big pan of rice for breakfast. Rainwater collected in a container allows everyone to have a quick wash in the bathing tent.
After a short briefing on the day's programme and breakfast, the volunteers board two boats headed for Gaw Du, the southernmost village in the delta, on the shore of the Andaman Sea.
The team stops at two more villages on the way to review food aid distribution and check on a new well they have dug before making another trek through more paddy fields. Maung Sein demonstrates how to use a tarpaulin to collect rain water.
In the next village the volunteers learn that some beneficiaries of the WFP feeding programme have been selling their identity cards. In a meeting Maung Sein pleads with them, "The donors love you and have sent this food only for you - don't abuse that love." Some of the villagers look embarrassed.
The villagers of Gaw Du are mostly poor fishermen. The children have recognised the T-shirts and line up near the jetty, waving wildly in welcome because Maung Sein always plays with them on the beach.
Everyone dashes to the beach. Maung Sein challenges the children to see "who can stand the longest on one foot". The children respond eagerly. Many of them saw hundreds of bodies washed up on the shore after Nargis. One little girl says she still has nightmares; none of them have had counselling.
Some volunteers use the time to get to know the parents and discuss what they need. The NCV has distributed fishing nets and containers for collecting rainwater to almost all the households.
Nargis destroyed most of the tree cover in the village, which lies right on the edge of the delta, leaving it exposed to the sea and vulnerable to the wind and water in the Bay of Bengal. "We have to build a cyclone shelter here - the people have nowhere to run to when the next cyclone comes," says Maung Sein. "That is my next project."
He returns to Yangon now and then to keep an eye on his business, which covers some of the operational costs of the NGO. But "home" is now Bogale, the main town in the delta. "My life at the moment is for the beneficiaries."
Do the volunteers miss their homes, jobs and friends? "This work gives me lot of satisfaction," says May Thinn Thinn Soe, 25, a graduate from the Yangon Institute of Economics, one of the first volunteers to join NCV.
"After I saw the destruction caused by Nargis, I didn't really care about anything any more - I just hope one day my parents will understand."
Navigating a way back to Bogale through the fishing nets spread out for the night is tricky, we stop at another monastery for the night.
AYEYARWADY DELTA, 8 September 2009 (IRIN) - Cyclone Nargis redrew the coastline of Myanmar in May 2008, wiping out hundreds of villages and ruining thousands of lives. Yet it also opened up a space for local NGOs and private initiatives to provide desperately needed help when the military rulers of Myanmar - highly suspicious of foreign aid and NGOs - were slow to grant outsiders permission to deliver assistance. IRIN spent two days in the Ayeyarwady River Delta with one such home-grown initiative.
Day 1:
It is hot and humid. Maung Sein, once a school drop-out, now a successful businessman in Yangon, former capital of Myanmar (Burma), has been wading barefoot through thigh-high water in the flooded paddy fields for almost an hour.
The soft mud underfoot is often ankle deep. Could that something strange in the murky water be a crab, a harmless fish, or perhaps a snake? "Isn't this very interesting?" Maung Sein says, grinning as he turns around now and again to encourage the band of volunteers following him.
They are here to help the residents of Boe Ba Gone and Thai Kone build a connecting road between the two villages as part of a UN World Food Programme (WFP) food-for-work project. The road is not finished yet, so everyone still has to go through the paddy fields.
Maung Sein breaks into a Burmese version of the American folk song, "Coming 'Round the Mountain", to keep spirits up. "We used to do this from morning to night when we were helping people after [Cyclone] Nargis," he grins, struggling his way through the slush.
He formed the Noble Compassionate Volunteer Group (NCV) just days after Cyclone Nargis struck the Ayeyarwady and Yangon divisions of southern Myanmar on 2 and 3 May 2008; nearly 140,000 people were declared dead or missing.
"When I saw all those people who had lost their homes, their families - I knew I had to help them," he says. There was no aid coming in, so he raided his own coffers and raised money from private and business donors in Myanmar.
NCV started with two volunteers but now has over a hundred; it is one of the largest local NGOs and has the biggest reach in the delta. "Besides the 100-odd volunteers we also have five to seven volunteers in each village," he says.
The volunteers - mostly 20-something - offer a huge variety of skills: there are farmers, engineers, film production assistants and young graduates, united by their willingness to help.
They have built helipads for aid choppers to land amid the paddy fields, houses and toilets, roads and wells - the cyclone destroyed almost all the infrastructure, and then the salt water carried by the storm surge made the water in many open sources undrinkable.
"When I saw the scale of devastation I just wanted to do something; I wanted to be able to tell my grandchildren one day that I was there and I helped," says Thet Thet Zaw, a former film production assistant.
Villagers wave and shout greetings as they recognize the approaching blue NCV T-shirts. They have an animated discussion with the volunteers about the road - the completed section has made it easier for them to reach the local market and school children no longer have to plod through the paddy fields.
The food they receive from WFP for their work is "very welcome", one villager says. It is rice-planting season and everyone looks forward to harvesting the staple food.
Wading becomes more arduous as the water becomes deeper and turns into a stream. Soaking, everyone piles into a traditional boat that takes them back to the Bogale River, part of the Ayeyarwady River system.
We stop at a monastery for the night. After a quick bowl of rice and fish for dinner, Maung Sein discusses the day.
"I am trying to get them [volunteers] to question and express their opinion," he says. The discussion lasts until midnight. Everyone at last falls asleep on mats spread out on the monastery floor while mosquitoes buzz around; frogs hop across the mats during the night.
Day 2:
Everyone is up at 5 a.m. The sleeping mats are rolled up, mosquito nets are squeezed into bags. Outside over an open fire two volunteers are mixing fried eggs into a big pan of rice for breakfast. Rainwater collected in a container allows everyone to have a quick wash in the bathing tent.
After a short briefing on the day's programme and breakfast, the volunteers board two boats headed for Gaw Du, the southernmost village in the delta, on the shore of the Andaman Sea.
The team stops at two more villages on the way to review food aid distribution and check on a new well they have dug before making another trek through more paddy fields. Maung Sein demonstrates how to use a tarpaulin to collect rain water.
In the next village the volunteers learn that some beneficiaries of the WFP feeding programme have been selling their identity cards. In a meeting Maung Sein pleads with them, "The donors love you and have sent this food only for you - don't abuse that love." Some of the villagers look embarrassed.
The villagers of Gaw Du are mostly poor fishermen. The children have recognised the T-shirts and line up near the jetty, waving wildly in welcome because Maung Sein always plays with them on the beach.
Everyone dashes to the beach. Maung Sein challenges the children to see "who can stand the longest on one foot". The children respond eagerly. Many of them saw hundreds of bodies washed up on the shore after Nargis. One little girl says she still has nightmares; none of them have had counselling.
Some volunteers use the time to get to know the parents and discuss what they need. The NCV has distributed fishing nets and containers for collecting rainwater to almost all the households.
Nargis destroyed most of the tree cover in the village, which lies right on the edge of the delta, leaving it exposed to the sea and vulnerable to the wind and water in the Bay of Bengal. "We have to build a cyclone shelter here - the people have nowhere to run to when the next cyclone comes," says Maung Sein. "That is my next project."
He returns to Yangon now and then to keep an eye on his business, which covers some of the operational costs of the NGO. But "home" is now Bogale, the main town in the delta. "My life at the moment is for the beneficiaries."
Do the volunteers miss their homes, jobs and friends? "This work gives me lot of satisfaction," says May Thinn Thinn Soe, 25, a graduate from the Yangon Institute of Economics, one of the first volunteers to join NCV.
"After I saw the destruction caused by Nargis, I didn't really care about anything any more - I just hope one day my parents will understand."
Navigating a way back to Bogale through the fishing nets spread out for the night is tricky, we stop at another monastery for the night.
********************************************************************
New York Times - The Art and Craft of the Political Game of Renaming
By CLYDE HABERMAN
Published: September 7, 2009
It would seem only a matter of time before someone proposes that a New York street or highway or building be rechristened in honor of the late Senator Edward M. Kennedy.
For one thing, few pastimes appeal to politicians more than naming sites after one another. They love it so much that they sometimes honor their own at places that don’t even exist.
Moynihan Station, for example. That’s the name of an elegant rail gateway that is supposed to supplant Pennsylvania Station, the grim terminus that makes travelers feel like tunnel rats. The project was championed by Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, and a splendid idea it was. But astronauts may return to the moon before Moynihan Station comes into being.
Back to Mr. Kennedy. His name is bound to pop up because he was widely admired in a city where Democrats outnumber everyone else by roughly a zillion to one. Honoring him would also complete a place-name trifecta for Kennedy brothers. New York is already home to an airport named for President John F. Kennedy and a bridge, the former Triborough, rededicated last year in honor of Senator Robert F. Kennedy.
No doubt, some will object that Edward Kennedy didn’t have much to do with New York. They have a point, even if he did spend part of his boyhood in Bronxville, just across the city line in Westchester, and attended the Riverdale Country School in the northwestern Bronx. But as provincial as New Yorkers can be, they don’t necessarily hold outlander status against people. They recognize that no one is perfect.
If a name change does come about, perhaps the politicians could step out of character and be a bit fanciful. The Kennedys were not without whimsy, after all.
In that spirit, the Grand Central Parkway could come into play. There is nothing notably grand or central about it. That name belongs more deservingly to the train station that is indeed grand and central.
How about making it the Edward M. Kennedy Parkway? It runs past La Guardia Airport, where the senator undoubtedly took the shuttle to Washington many times. More to the point, it would be kind of neat to tell people that they should take the R.F.K. to the E.M.K. and follow it to the road that leads into J.F.K.
Inevitably, the politicians will ask what’s in it for them. Name changes, especially when non-New Yorkers are involved, often have as much to do with political exigencies as with merit.
That helps explain why, when the issue arose in a debate two weeks ago, the Democratic candidates for mayor, William C. Thompson Jr. and Tony Avella, both said: Sure, let’s rename the Hoyt-Schermerhorn subway station in Brooklyn for Michael Jackson. That’s where Mr. Jackson’s “Bad” video was shot.
The notion of a possible name change originated with Councilwoman Letitia James. But Ms. James insists that she was “just thinking out loud,” not offering a firm proposal. All the same, the candidates ran with the idea. There are a lot of Michael Jackson fans among the voters.
Consider, too, how the southeast corner of Madison Avenue and East 37th Street was renamed last spring in honor of Jan Karski, a Polish diplomat who tried to alert the West to the horrors of the Holocaust. It in no way diminishes Mr. Karski’s heroics to point out that Poles and Jews are important forces in New York life and politics.
No less heroic is Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel Peace Prize winner long kept under house arrest by the military thugs who rule Myanmar, as Burma is now called. Yet you don’t see New York officials standing up for her pro-democracy fight, not even through the simple means of affixing her name to the block on East 77th Street where Myanmar diplomats have offices.
It is not being unduly cynical to note that few New Yorkers come from Myanmar — about 5,000, according to census figures supplied by the Department of City Planning.
At least once in a while, politicians’ names appear exactly where they belong.
Timothy Frasca, who lives in Inwood, wrote to say how struck he was by the many garbage cans along West 207th Street that bear signs saying, “Sponsored by Council Member Miguel Martinez.”
Two months ago, Mr. Martinez resigned from the City Council and pleaded guilty to stealing more than $100,000 in public and private funds. He faces time in a federal prison.
Perhaps, Mr. Frasca decided, there is justice in keeping Mr. Martinez on the garbage cans and let that be “how his name will be remembered through the ages.”
By CLYDE HABERMAN
Published: September 7, 2009
It would seem only a matter of time before someone proposes that a New York street or highway or building be rechristened in honor of the late Senator Edward M. Kennedy.
For one thing, few pastimes appeal to politicians more than naming sites after one another. They love it so much that they sometimes honor their own at places that don’t even exist.
Moynihan Station, for example. That’s the name of an elegant rail gateway that is supposed to supplant Pennsylvania Station, the grim terminus that makes travelers feel like tunnel rats. The project was championed by Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, and a splendid idea it was. But astronauts may return to the moon before Moynihan Station comes into being.
Back to Mr. Kennedy. His name is bound to pop up because he was widely admired in a city where Democrats outnumber everyone else by roughly a zillion to one. Honoring him would also complete a place-name trifecta for Kennedy brothers. New York is already home to an airport named for President John F. Kennedy and a bridge, the former Triborough, rededicated last year in honor of Senator Robert F. Kennedy.
No doubt, some will object that Edward Kennedy didn’t have much to do with New York. They have a point, even if he did spend part of his boyhood in Bronxville, just across the city line in Westchester, and attended the Riverdale Country School in the northwestern Bronx. But as provincial as New Yorkers can be, they don’t necessarily hold outlander status against people. They recognize that no one is perfect.
If a name change does come about, perhaps the politicians could step out of character and be a bit fanciful. The Kennedys were not without whimsy, after all.
In that spirit, the Grand Central Parkway could come into play. There is nothing notably grand or central about it. That name belongs more deservingly to the train station that is indeed grand and central.
How about making it the Edward M. Kennedy Parkway? It runs past La Guardia Airport, where the senator undoubtedly took the shuttle to Washington many times. More to the point, it would be kind of neat to tell people that they should take the R.F.K. to the E.M.K. and follow it to the road that leads into J.F.K.
Inevitably, the politicians will ask what’s in it for them. Name changes, especially when non-New Yorkers are involved, often have as much to do with political exigencies as with merit.
That helps explain why, when the issue arose in a debate two weeks ago, the Democratic candidates for mayor, William C. Thompson Jr. and Tony Avella, both said: Sure, let’s rename the Hoyt-Schermerhorn subway station in Brooklyn for Michael Jackson. That’s where Mr. Jackson’s “Bad” video was shot.
The notion of a possible name change originated with Councilwoman Letitia James. But Ms. James insists that she was “just thinking out loud,” not offering a firm proposal. All the same, the candidates ran with the idea. There are a lot of Michael Jackson fans among the voters.
Consider, too, how the southeast corner of Madison Avenue and East 37th Street was renamed last spring in honor of Jan Karski, a Polish diplomat who tried to alert the West to the horrors of the Holocaust. It in no way diminishes Mr. Karski’s heroics to point out that Poles and Jews are important forces in New York life and politics.
No less heroic is Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel Peace Prize winner long kept under house arrest by the military thugs who rule Myanmar, as Burma is now called. Yet you don’t see New York officials standing up for her pro-democracy fight, not even through the simple means of affixing her name to the block on East 77th Street where Myanmar diplomats have offices.
It is not being unduly cynical to note that few New Yorkers come from Myanmar — about 5,000, according to census figures supplied by the Department of City Planning.
At least once in a while, politicians’ names appear exactly where they belong.
Timothy Frasca, who lives in Inwood, wrote to say how struck he was by the many garbage cans along West 207th Street that bear signs saying, “Sponsored by Council Member Miguel Martinez.”
Two months ago, Mr. Martinez resigned from the City Council and pleaded guilty to stealing more than $100,000 in public and private funds. He faces time in a federal prison.
Perhaps, Mr. Frasca decided, there is justice in keeping Mr. Martinez on the garbage cans and let that be “how his name will be remembered through the ages.”
********************************************************************
Italy to provide over $5 mln aid to Myanmar cyclone-hit areas
www.chinaview.cn 2009-09-06 11:25:30
YANGON, Sept. 6 (Xinhua) -- The Italian government has agreed to provide 5.28 million U.S. dollars for use in rehabilitation work and paddy cultivation work in Myanmar's cyclone-hit areas through the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), sources with the Ministry of Livestock and Fisheries said on Sunday.
The aid will be used in implementing three projects on sustainable small-scale fisheries and aquaculture livelihood in coastal mangrove ecosystem, support to special rice production and support to the immediate rehabilitation of farming, coastal fisheries and aquaculture livelihood in the Nargis-affected areas.
A total of over 32,000 poor fishermen in cyclone-hit Ayeyawaddy division will be benefited, the sources said.
Meanwhile, with the support of the Japanese government, the FAO has recently donated 800 more draught cattle and poultry to the cyclone survivors in the division for agricultural re-cultivation.
The cattle were distributed to 400 farmers in Bogalay, Laputta, Mawlamyaing Gyun and Ngaputaw, while other chickens, ducks and pigs were brought to the 2,800 farmless households in the regions, according to earlier local report.
In February this year, FAO had also donated 15,000 chickens, ducks and pigs to 16 villages in Laputta township as well as 600 cows and cattle and 80,000 chickens and ducks in December last year to seven storm-hit areas.
Deadly tropical cyclone Nargis, which occurred over the Bay of Bengal, hit five divisions and states -- Ayeyawaddy, Yangon, Bago, Mon and Kayin on May 2 and 3 last year, of which Ayeyawaddy and Yangon inflicted the heaviest casualties and massive infra structural damage.
The storm has killed 84,537 people, leaving 53,836 missing and 19,359 injured according to official death toll.
Altogether 300,000 cows and cattle died and 323,246 chickens and 1.247 million ducks were lost in the cyclone-hard-hit Ayeyawaddy and Yangon divisions, statistics showed.
www.chinaview.cn 2009-09-06 11:25:30
YANGON, Sept. 6 (Xinhua) -- The Italian government has agreed to provide 5.28 million U.S. dollars for use in rehabilitation work and paddy cultivation work in Myanmar's cyclone-hit areas through the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), sources with the Ministry of Livestock and Fisheries said on Sunday.
The aid will be used in implementing three projects on sustainable small-scale fisheries and aquaculture livelihood in coastal mangrove ecosystem, support to special rice production and support to the immediate rehabilitation of farming, coastal fisheries and aquaculture livelihood in the Nargis-affected areas.
A total of over 32,000 poor fishermen in cyclone-hit Ayeyawaddy division will be benefited, the sources said.
Meanwhile, with the support of the Japanese government, the FAO has recently donated 800 more draught cattle and poultry to the cyclone survivors in the division for agricultural re-cultivation.
The cattle were distributed to 400 farmers in Bogalay, Laputta, Mawlamyaing Gyun and Ngaputaw, while other chickens, ducks and pigs were brought to the 2,800 farmless households in the regions, according to earlier local report.
In February this year, FAO had also donated 15,000 chickens, ducks and pigs to 16 villages in Laputta township as well as 600 cows and cattle and 80,000 chickens and ducks in December last year to seven storm-hit areas.
Deadly tropical cyclone Nargis, which occurred over the Bay of Bengal, hit five divisions and states -- Ayeyawaddy, Yangon, Bago, Mon and Kayin on May 2 and 3 last year, of which Ayeyawaddy and Yangon inflicted the heaviest casualties and massive infra structural damage.
The storm has killed 84,537 people, leaving 53,836 missing and 19,359 injured according to official death toll.
Altogether 300,000 cows and cattle died and 323,246 chickens and 1.247 million ducks were lost in the cyclone-hard-hit Ayeyawaddy and Yangon divisions, statistics showed.
********************************************************************
7 killed in fire cases in Yangon in August
www.chinaview.cn 2009-09-08 18:34:10
YANGON, Sept. 8 (Xinhua) -- A total of seven people were killed in nine fire cases in Myanmar's former capital of Yangon in Augustthis year, the Fire Department said on Tuesday.
These fires caused a loss of over 9 billion Kyats (8.2 million U.S. dollars), the sources said, adding that of the fires, the one that occurred at a distillery in Hlegu township alone had caused a loss of over 7 million dollars.
The over-eight-hour distillery fire, resulting from the explosion of a 1,000-gallon-capacity boiler, left three people dead and six injured, earlier reports said.
Over 200 fire fighters and 47 fire engines and 10 supervisory vehicles were used to put out the fire.
According to the Fire Department, a total of 32 fires broke out in the whole of Myanmar last month, killing one people and injuring another.
The fire, mostly due to negligence and electric short-circuit, destroyed 46 houses and buildings, leaving 202 people homeless and causing a total loss of over 13.68 million kyats (over 120,000 U.S. dollars).
www.chinaview.cn 2009-09-08 18:34:10
YANGON, Sept. 8 (Xinhua) -- A total of seven people were killed in nine fire cases in Myanmar's former capital of Yangon in Augustthis year, the Fire Department said on Tuesday.
These fires caused a loss of over 9 billion Kyats (8.2 million U.S. dollars), the sources said, adding that of the fires, the one that occurred at a distillery in Hlegu township alone had caused a loss of over 7 million dollars.
The over-eight-hour distillery fire, resulting from the explosion of a 1,000-gallon-capacity boiler, left three people dead and six injured, earlier reports said.
Over 200 fire fighters and 47 fire engines and 10 supervisory vehicles were used to put out the fire.
According to the Fire Department, a total of 32 fires broke out in the whole of Myanmar last month, killing one people and injuring another.
The fire, mostly due to negligence and electric short-circuit, destroyed 46 houses and buildings, leaving 202 people homeless and causing a total loss of over 13.68 million kyats (over 120,000 U.S. dollars).
********************************************************************
The Los Angeles Times - Opinion: Foreign reporters and the risks they run
Journalists sometimes need to make dangerous decisions in order to cover events in repressive regimes that fear independent voices threaten their rule and reputations.
By Jean-Francois Julliard
September 4, 2009
The arrest and eventual release of Current TV journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee by North Korea, and recent reports of North Korean and Chinese authorities cracking down on refugee networks, have renewed the public debate over how far foreign journalists should go in covering repressive nations.
The leaders of countries such as Myanmar (formerly known as Burma), China, North Korea and Zimbabwe restrict foreign media access, fearing that independent interpretations of their policies and actions will threaten their rule at home and damage their reputations abroad.
In order to suppress news that reflects poorly on their regimes, these nations create elaborate surveillance networks to monitor foreign journalists as well as local dissidents who might assist reporters in gathering information. Journalists who travel to these countries essentially become unofficial international representatives to the local population, openly presenting and discussing views that government officials have attempted to forcibly silence.
Needless to say, challenging a regime's control over information in such a manner is extremely dangerous for both journalists and their local contacts. They must balance the safety concerns for reporters and the dissidents assisting them with the need for public awareness on issues suppressed by authoritarian governments. Unfortunately, these are risks that reporters and the citizens of repressive regimes have to take on a regular basis if there is to be any chance of creating dialogue that can foster significant change.
The alternative is to remain complacent and content to ignore important realities of human suffering in the world. Ling and Lee chose to take a risk to expose the human smuggling issue at the Chinese-North Korean border, and to show the work of agencies working on the spot to help the victims. The issue is not that they were reckless in their work but that they were up against possibly corrupt local interests and a repressive regime intent on seeing that the story does not get out.
The circumstances surrounding their arrest raise serious questions as to what extent Chinese provincial authorities and North Korean border security guards may have colluded to prevent Lee and Ling from getting a story that reflects poorly on local authorities on both sides of the border.
North Korea is in a class of its own when it comes to controlling access to information. It is a place where listening to a foreign radio station can land you in a labor camp for several years, and trying to make a phone call to the outside world can reportedly lead to execution. Visas for foreign journalists and tourists are seldom issued, and when they are, visitors are taken on government tours where they are not allowed to leave the sight of their escorts or to speak to the local people.
Most people will agree that, in its most idealized form, the role of a journalist is to be a neutral observer of the events that mark our times. While this might be a naive view of the media, it is difficult to argue against the fact that, in one way or another, journalists play a substantial role in developing our understanding of the world.
In the United States and Europe, we automatically expect access to information, no matter how mundane or important it might be. We have put this ideal in our constitutions and laws, and we constantly try to ensure that it is upheld in order to preserve transparency and accountability. But our dependence on the media also underscores the importance of having a variety of perspectives that are not necessarily those of the ruling classes. This, of course, is the very issue at stake when discussing whether or not journalists need to take the risks involved in covering repressive countries.
When New York Times reporter Barry Bearak entered Zimbabwe on a tourist visa in 2008, he did so because it was the only way he could cover an election that turned out to be an astounding example of political corruption and intimidation. Bearak was discovered and jailed for five days for entering without proper accreditation.
Andrew Marshall, a freelancer for Time magazine, entered Myanmar in 2008 on a tourist visa in order to report on the destruction caused by Cyclone Nargis and the state of the relief effort. At the time, Myanmar had closed its border to journalists and aid workers, fearing that news of its inadequate response to the humanitarian crisis would further embolden a population that had already begun challenging the state. Marshall was able to cover some of the hardest-hit areas before being detained and deported.
By entering Zimbabwe and Myanmar under false pretenses, both journalists were able to offer us insight that would never have been available otherwise. Taking those risks in order to raise awareness and hold governments accountable for their actions is something journalists have to do if we, the public, hope to have any real knowledge about the day-to-day lives of millions of people around the globe.
Jean-Francois Julliard is secretary-general of Reporters Without Borders, a Paris-based media advocacy group.
Journalists sometimes need to make dangerous decisions in order to cover events in repressive regimes that fear independent voices threaten their rule and reputations.
By Jean-Francois Julliard
September 4, 2009
The arrest and eventual release of Current TV journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee by North Korea, and recent reports of North Korean and Chinese authorities cracking down on refugee networks, have renewed the public debate over how far foreign journalists should go in covering repressive nations.
The leaders of countries such as Myanmar (formerly known as Burma), China, North Korea and Zimbabwe restrict foreign media access, fearing that independent interpretations of their policies and actions will threaten their rule at home and damage their reputations abroad.
In order to suppress news that reflects poorly on their regimes, these nations create elaborate surveillance networks to monitor foreign journalists as well as local dissidents who might assist reporters in gathering information. Journalists who travel to these countries essentially become unofficial international representatives to the local population, openly presenting and discussing views that government officials have attempted to forcibly silence.
Needless to say, challenging a regime's control over information in such a manner is extremely dangerous for both journalists and their local contacts. They must balance the safety concerns for reporters and the dissidents assisting them with the need for public awareness on issues suppressed by authoritarian governments. Unfortunately, these are risks that reporters and the citizens of repressive regimes have to take on a regular basis if there is to be any chance of creating dialogue that can foster significant change.
The alternative is to remain complacent and content to ignore important realities of human suffering in the world. Ling and Lee chose to take a risk to expose the human smuggling issue at the Chinese-North Korean border, and to show the work of agencies working on the spot to help the victims. The issue is not that they were reckless in their work but that they were up against possibly corrupt local interests and a repressive regime intent on seeing that the story does not get out.
The circumstances surrounding their arrest raise serious questions as to what extent Chinese provincial authorities and North Korean border security guards may have colluded to prevent Lee and Ling from getting a story that reflects poorly on local authorities on both sides of the border.
North Korea is in a class of its own when it comes to controlling access to information. It is a place where listening to a foreign radio station can land you in a labor camp for several years, and trying to make a phone call to the outside world can reportedly lead to execution. Visas for foreign journalists and tourists are seldom issued, and when they are, visitors are taken on government tours where they are not allowed to leave the sight of their escorts or to speak to the local people.
Most people will agree that, in its most idealized form, the role of a journalist is to be a neutral observer of the events that mark our times. While this might be a naive view of the media, it is difficult to argue against the fact that, in one way or another, journalists play a substantial role in developing our understanding of the world.
In the United States and Europe, we automatically expect access to information, no matter how mundane or important it might be. We have put this ideal in our constitutions and laws, and we constantly try to ensure that it is upheld in order to preserve transparency and accountability. But our dependence on the media also underscores the importance of having a variety of perspectives that are not necessarily those of the ruling classes. This, of course, is the very issue at stake when discussing whether or not journalists need to take the risks involved in covering repressive countries.
When New York Times reporter Barry Bearak entered Zimbabwe on a tourist visa in 2008, he did so because it was the only way he could cover an election that turned out to be an astounding example of political corruption and intimidation. Bearak was discovered and jailed for five days for entering without proper accreditation.
Andrew Marshall, a freelancer for Time magazine, entered Myanmar in 2008 on a tourist visa in order to report on the destruction caused by Cyclone Nargis and the state of the relief effort. At the time, Myanmar had closed its border to journalists and aid workers, fearing that news of its inadequate response to the humanitarian crisis would further embolden a population that had already begun challenging the state. Marshall was able to cover some of the hardest-hit areas before being detained and deported.
By entering Zimbabwe and Myanmar under false pretenses, both journalists were able to offer us insight that would never have been available otherwise. Taking those risks in order to raise awareness and hold governments accountable for their actions is something journalists have to do if we, the public, hope to have any real knowledge about the day-to-day lives of millions of people around the globe.
Jean-Francois Julliard is secretary-general of Reporters Without Borders, a Paris-based media advocacy group.
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The Nation - EDITORIAL: Danger of border skirmishes escalating
Published on September 8, 2009
Burmese military action against Chinese-backed ethnic armies could explode into wider conflict on its northern border
It has always been said that China is Burma's closest ally. Given the fact that the junta doesn't have many friends, one like China will always stand out. But the not-so-honorific label of "closest ally" should be understood in its proper context. For the Burmese, Chinese friendship doesn't mean the world.
Nonetheless, such a friend could very well come in handy, especially when the international community and the United Nations are constantly looking to clobber the generals with sanctions and criticism.
For the Burmese regime, survival is everything. Where it positions its troops and weapons, and the type of legislation and reconciliation process that it proposes, reinforce the very idea that it is here to stay whether the world likes it or not.
For as long as anybody can remember, China has been a factor whenever a Burma policy and strategy is drafted by the international community. Over a decade ago, when Rangoon's membership of Asean was on the table, members of the regional grouping whispered among themselves about the Chinese factor. Keeping the Burmese out of the regional loop would push the junta further into the arms of the Chinese, they said.
But for the Burmese, Asean membership was not seen as a privilege but a right - simply because the country happens to be in the same geographical region. There was no "thank you" to Asean for letting the country become a member.
A handful of Thai diplomats thought a free ride for Burma in Asean would deny the regional grouping the only card it had to play against the junta. Their concerns were largely ignored by most of the other Asean members, who really didn't give a hoot about the atrocities committed by the junta, or the political baggage that comes with Burma's membership. And when Asean came under an unwanted spotlight or was at loggerheads with the international community, such as the European Union, over Burma's participation, all the Burmese generals could do was shrug their shoulders. They just couldn't care less.
And so when the Burmese unleashed their troops against one of the minority cease-fire groups within the country, namely the Kokang, forcing tens of thousands people - including Yunnanese Chinese who have more or less seized northern Burma over the last few years - to flee for China, Beijing was jolted.
Thai military officials with direct experience of the Chinese often called them "masters of two-track diplomacy". They pointed to China's relations with the bloody Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, up until that regime's dying days, and its historical ties with the ethnic armies that operate independently along Burma's northern border.
Attacking the Kokang and turning their guns towards the 20,000-strong United Wa State Army (UWSA) afterwards was a rude awakening for the Chinese. If anything, the junta was telling its so-called "closest ally" that it is charting its own course. One could say that the Chinese finally got a taste of their own medicine.
For decades, Burma has given China access to its ample natural resources, and the Indian Ocean, in exchange for political support. Moreover, Chinese companies are set to start construction on a US$2.5 billion (Bt85.2billion) oil-and-natural-gas pipeline project that will run from the Indian Ocean to Yunnan's capital of Kunming. But if one thinks that Burma is a Chinese lackey, think again.
It is clear that the two-decade-old ceasefire with the ethnic armies no longer serves Burmese purposes. From the generals' perspective, a normal country shouldn't have small armies operating independently on its soil, especially if those armies are proxies of a powerful neighbour.
Beijing expressed its concern back in June, and the ruling Burmese State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) said that it did not want to see disturbances along the Sino-Burmese border. But in the end, for the junta, domestic matters overtook any diplomatic concerns.
For too long Beijing turned a blind eye to the atrocities committed inside Burma, telling the world to stay out of Burma's domestic matters. Self-serving interest has always been China's political attitude towards Burma.
It's different now, however, as China is directly affected by this so-called domestic matter.
If Beijing thinks it has a big headache with the 30,000 refugees fleeing the Burmese attack against the Kokang, then wait until the junta turns its guns on the UWSA. It could very well have a ripple effect, turning Burma's entire northern border into a full-blown war zone if other cease-fire groups like the Chin, Kachin and Shan join the fight to keep their patches of real estate given to them two decades ago.
Published on September 8, 2009
Burmese military action against Chinese-backed ethnic armies could explode into wider conflict on its northern border
It has always been said that China is Burma's closest ally. Given the fact that the junta doesn't have many friends, one like China will always stand out. But the not-so-honorific label of "closest ally" should be understood in its proper context. For the Burmese, Chinese friendship doesn't mean the world.
Nonetheless, such a friend could very well come in handy, especially when the international community and the United Nations are constantly looking to clobber the generals with sanctions and criticism.
For the Burmese regime, survival is everything. Where it positions its troops and weapons, and the type of legislation and reconciliation process that it proposes, reinforce the very idea that it is here to stay whether the world likes it or not.
For as long as anybody can remember, China has been a factor whenever a Burma policy and strategy is drafted by the international community. Over a decade ago, when Rangoon's membership of Asean was on the table, members of the regional grouping whispered among themselves about the Chinese factor. Keeping the Burmese out of the regional loop would push the junta further into the arms of the Chinese, they said.
But for the Burmese, Asean membership was not seen as a privilege but a right - simply because the country happens to be in the same geographical region. There was no "thank you" to Asean for letting the country become a member.
A handful of Thai diplomats thought a free ride for Burma in Asean would deny the regional grouping the only card it had to play against the junta. Their concerns were largely ignored by most of the other Asean members, who really didn't give a hoot about the atrocities committed by the junta, or the political baggage that comes with Burma's membership. And when Asean came under an unwanted spotlight or was at loggerheads with the international community, such as the European Union, over Burma's participation, all the Burmese generals could do was shrug their shoulders. They just couldn't care less.
And so when the Burmese unleashed their troops against one of the minority cease-fire groups within the country, namely the Kokang, forcing tens of thousands people - including Yunnanese Chinese who have more or less seized northern Burma over the last few years - to flee for China, Beijing was jolted.
Thai military officials with direct experience of the Chinese often called them "masters of two-track diplomacy". They pointed to China's relations with the bloody Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, up until that regime's dying days, and its historical ties with the ethnic armies that operate independently along Burma's northern border.
Attacking the Kokang and turning their guns towards the 20,000-strong United Wa State Army (UWSA) afterwards was a rude awakening for the Chinese. If anything, the junta was telling its so-called "closest ally" that it is charting its own course. One could say that the Chinese finally got a taste of their own medicine.
For decades, Burma has given China access to its ample natural resources, and the Indian Ocean, in exchange for political support. Moreover, Chinese companies are set to start construction on a US$2.5 billion (Bt85.2billion) oil-and-natural-gas pipeline project that will run from the Indian Ocean to Yunnan's capital of Kunming. But if one thinks that Burma is a Chinese lackey, think again.
It is clear that the two-decade-old ceasefire with the ethnic armies no longer serves Burmese purposes. From the generals' perspective, a normal country shouldn't have small armies operating independently on its soil, especially if those armies are proxies of a powerful neighbour.
Beijing expressed its concern back in June, and the ruling Burmese State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) said that it did not want to see disturbances along the Sino-Burmese border. But in the end, for the junta, domestic matters overtook any diplomatic concerns.
For too long Beijing turned a blind eye to the atrocities committed inside Burma, telling the world to stay out of Burma's domestic matters. Self-serving interest has always been China's political attitude towards Burma.
It's different now, however, as China is directly affected by this so-called domestic matter.
If Beijing thinks it has a big headache with the 30,000 refugees fleeing the Burmese attack against the Kokang, then wait until the junta turns its guns on the UWSA. It could very well have a ripple effect, turning Burma's entire northern border into a full-blown war zone if other cease-fire groups like the Chin, Kachin and Shan join the fight to keep their patches of real estate given to them two decades ago.
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Sep 8, 2009
The Straits Times - Suu Kyi to be released?
YANGON- THE party of Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi said on Tuesday it was hopeful that she would be unconditionally released after a court agreed to hear an appeal against her recent conviction.
Lawyers for the Nobel laureate and the country's ruling junta are due to present legal arguments on September 18, after Suu Kyi challenged last month's guilty verdict for sheltering an American man who swam to her lakeside home.
The regime has ordered her to spend another 18 months under house arrest, softening the original sentence of three years' hard labour. However, the house arrest is still long enough to keep Myanmar's opposition leader away from the political scene during elections scheduled for 2010.
'There could be changes as the court has accepted our appeal,' said Nyan Win, her lawyer and a spokesman for her National League for Democracy (NLD), referring to Yangon divisional court's decision on Friday to hear the case. 'We are hoping for her unconditional release, which is also what we wanted.'
'We will meet with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi this week after we got permission from the authorities. We need to get last instructions from her for the final arguments,' Nyan Win said. Daw is a term of respect in Burmese.
The appeal would focus on the fact that a 1974 constitution under which the 64-year-old was originally detained had been superseded by a new constitution approved last year, her lawyers have said.
The guilty verdict sparked international outrage and the imposition of further sanctions against Myanmar's powerful generals, who have already kept Suu Kyi locked up for 14 of the past 20 years.
Suu Kyi insisted on her innocence during the trial held at Yangon's notorious Insein Prison, saying that she allowed US military veteran John Yettaw to stay for two nights at her home because he was ill.
Mr Yettaw was sentenced to seven years' hard labour for the stunt in early May, but was freed after a visit by US senator Jim Webb last month on what the regime said were compassionate grounds because of health problems.
The Straits Times - Suu Kyi to be released?
YANGON- THE party of Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi said on Tuesday it was hopeful that she would be unconditionally released after a court agreed to hear an appeal against her recent conviction.
Lawyers for the Nobel laureate and the country's ruling junta are due to present legal arguments on September 18, after Suu Kyi challenged last month's guilty verdict for sheltering an American man who swam to her lakeside home.
The regime has ordered her to spend another 18 months under house arrest, softening the original sentence of three years' hard labour. However, the house arrest is still long enough to keep Myanmar's opposition leader away from the political scene during elections scheduled for 2010.
'There could be changes as the court has accepted our appeal,' said Nyan Win, her lawyer and a spokesman for her National League for Democracy (NLD), referring to Yangon divisional court's decision on Friday to hear the case. 'We are hoping for her unconditional release, which is also what we wanted.'
'We will meet with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi this week after we got permission from the authorities. We need to get last instructions from her for the final arguments,' Nyan Win said. Daw is a term of respect in Burmese.
The appeal would focus on the fact that a 1974 constitution under which the 64-year-old was originally detained had been superseded by a new constitution approved last year, her lawyers have said.
The guilty verdict sparked international outrage and the imposition of further sanctions against Myanmar's powerful generals, who have already kept Suu Kyi locked up for 14 of the past 20 years.
Suu Kyi insisted on her innocence during the trial held at Yangon's notorious Insein Prison, saying that she allowed US military veteran John Yettaw to stay for two nights at her home because he was ill.
Mr Yettaw was sentenced to seven years' hard labour for the stunt in early May, but was freed after a visit by US senator Jim Webb last month on what the regime said were compassionate grounds because of health problems.
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StrategyPage - The Golden Triangle Syndrome
September 8, 2009: In the last decade, Afghanistan became the source of most of the planets heroin. This happened largely because the previous supplier, tribes in the Golden Triangle (technically an area encompassing mountainous portions of Burma, China, Laos and Thailand), were forced to largely abandon heroin production. The two main heroin producers, the 50,000 Kokang (an ethnic Chinese group) and half a million Wa (a local group, with a language similar to Cambodian), came under pressure from the Chinese and Burmese (Myanmar) government. The Kokang, who have a lot of economic and family connections across the border in China (where another 40,000 Kokang live), gave in and halted nearly all heroin production. With the loss of heroin income (the Afghan dope was also cheaper, which played a large role in killing the market for the "Golden Triangle" product), the Kokang were more vulnerable to attack.
Recently, Burma sent the army into Kokang territory, and destroyed the 1,500 man Kokang militia. For decades, the Kokang had plenty of drug profits to buy weapons, hire lots of gunmen and bribe Burmese officials. No more, and most of the Kokang people appear to be fleeing into China. The Chinese government isn't happy with this, but at least Kokang is no longer a source of heroin, and other drugs, for southern China (where addiction and drug related crime was long a problem.)
The other two rebel groups near the Chinese border, the Wa and the Kachin (a large local tribe that was never into the drug trade in a big way), had a mutual defense (against Burma) agreement with the Kokang. But the Burmese offensive cleverly cut off the routes into Kokang territory, and forced thousands of Wa and Kachin gunmen to retreat.
Now the Wa are the next target for the Burmese army. The Wa are likely to be defeated and largely disarmed. This will end the heroin trade in the Golden Triangle. Well, at least the domination of the world market for heroin, which began in the 1950s, and ended only in the last decade, with the arrival of more government military pressure, and the growth of the cheaper Afghan product.
Afghan leaders know about the Golden Triangle history with heroin. The drugs (opium and heroin) made the drug gangs powerful enough, in their remote homelands, to resist military efforts to stop the trade. Even before heroin was invented in 1874 (via a chemical process that turned opium into the more powerful new drug), opium had been coming out of the Golden Triangle for centuries. But this was an expensive drug selling into pre-industrial cultures (where most people just got by). But as economies grew, worldwide, after World War II, opium and heroin addiction became a growing problem in the nations adjacent to the Golden Triangle. This gave rise to more and more vigorous efforts to shut down the drug trade.
Afghanistan is already suffering from a growing population of addicts, who tend to steal to support their habit. Similar addiction problems are growing in Pakistan and Iran. Afghanistan will have to deal with the heroin trade, or their neighbors will do it for them. What is now Afghanistan has been partitioned and pacified before, by empires based in Iran and Pakistan (and North India in general). It can happen again, if there is a great enough perceived need.
September 8, 2009: In the last decade, Afghanistan became the source of most of the planets heroin. This happened largely because the previous supplier, tribes in the Golden Triangle (technically an area encompassing mountainous portions of Burma, China, Laos and Thailand), were forced to largely abandon heroin production. The two main heroin producers, the 50,000 Kokang (an ethnic Chinese group) and half a million Wa (a local group, with a language similar to Cambodian), came under pressure from the Chinese and Burmese (Myanmar) government. The Kokang, who have a lot of economic and family connections across the border in China (where another 40,000 Kokang live), gave in and halted nearly all heroin production. With the loss of heroin income (the Afghan dope was also cheaper, which played a large role in killing the market for the "Golden Triangle" product), the Kokang were more vulnerable to attack.
Recently, Burma sent the army into Kokang territory, and destroyed the 1,500 man Kokang militia. For decades, the Kokang had plenty of drug profits to buy weapons, hire lots of gunmen and bribe Burmese officials. No more, and most of the Kokang people appear to be fleeing into China. The Chinese government isn't happy with this, but at least Kokang is no longer a source of heroin, and other drugs, for southern China (where addiction and drug related crime was long a problem.)
The other two rebel groups near the Chinese border, the Wa and the Kachin (a large local tribe that was never into the drug trade in a big way), had a mutual defense (against Burma) agreement with the Kokang. But the Burmese offensive cleverly cut off the routes into Kokang territory, and forced thousands of Wa and Kachin gunmen to retreat.
Now the Wa are the next target for the Burmese army. The Wa are likely to be defeated and largely disarmed. This will end the heroin trade in the Golden Triangle. Well, at least the domination of the world market for heroin, which began in the 1950s, and ended only in the last decade, with the arrival of more government military pressure, and the growth of the cheaper Afghan product.
Afghan leaders know about the Golden Triangle history with heroin. The drugs (opium and heroin) made the drug gangs powerful enough, in their remote homelands, to resist military efforts to stop the trade. Even before heroin was invented in 1874 (via a chemical process that turned opium into the more powerful new drug), opium had been coming out of the Golden Triangle for centuries. But this was an expensive drug selling into pre-industrial cultures (where most people just got by). But as economies grew, worldwide, after World War II, opium and heroin addiction became a growing problem in the nations adjacent to the Golden Triangle. This gave rise to more and more vigorous efforts to shut down the drug trade.
Afghanistan is already suffering from a growing population of addicts, who tend to steal to support their habit. Similar addiction problems are growing in Pakistan and Iran. Afghanistan will have to deal with the heroin trade, or their neighbors will do it for them. What is now Afghanistan has been partitioned and pacified before, by empires based in Iran and Pakistan (and North India in general). It can happen again, if there is a great enough perceived need.
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Mizzima News - Abbot returning from Taiwan arrested
by May Kyaw
Tuesday, 08 September 2009 21:31
Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – U Gaw Thita, an abbot belonging to the Leik Pyar Kan monastery, Nga Htat Gyi pagoda was arrested at the Rangoon airport on his way back from Taiwan.
He was arrested by intelligence personnel and police on August 29.
“He is a native of Kungyangon. He’s over 30 years old and sojourns at the Leik Pyar Kan monastery. The abbot graduated from Dhama Siriya and is a teaching monk in the monastery,” a monk who is close to the abbot said.
There are 24 buildings in the Leik Pyar Kan monastery in Nga Htat Gyi pagoda, Bahan Township, Rangoon. It is learnt that the arrested abbot has been teaching about 30 student monks.
Other monks staying in the monastery do not know his current whereabouts. U Gaw Thita was taking part in reconstruction and rehabilitation work in Cyclone Nargis hit areas.
“He went to Taiwan legally. We heard he is in custody and have been unable to contact him. Inquiries are on about him,” a lay devotee close to the abbot said.
As the second anniversary of the 2007 September Saffron Revolution draws close, security has been beefed up in major pagodas and monasteries in Rangoon since the end of last month. Police personnel are deployed at Ward level Peace and Development Council offices at night.
According to the Thai-Burma border based ‘Association of Assistance to Political prisoners’ – Burma (AAPPB), the junta arrested 158 monks after the 2007 September Saffron Revolution and they were sentenced to various terms in prison with a maximum punishment of 65 years.
by May Kyaw
Tuesday, 08 September 2009 21:31
Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – U Gaw Thita, an abbot belonging to the Leik Pyar Kan monastery, Nga Htat Gyi pagoda was arrested at the Rangoon airport on his way back from Taiwan.
He was arrested by intelligence personnel and police on August 29.
“He is a native of Kungyangon. He’s over 30 years old and sojourns at the Leik Pyar Kan monastery. The abbot graduated from Dhama Siriya and is a teaching monk in the monastery,” a monk who is close to the abbot said.
There are 24 buildings in the Leik Pyar Kan monastery in Nga Htat Gyi pagoda, Bahan Township, Rangoon. It is learnt that the arrested abbot has been teaching about 30 student monks.
Other monks staying in the monastery do not know his current whereabouts. U Gaw Thita was taking part in reconstruction and rehabilitation work in Cyclone Nargis hit areas.
“He went to Taiwan legally. We heard he is in custody and have been unable to contact him. Inquiries are on about him,” a lay devotee close to the abbot said.
As the second anniversary of the 2007 September Saffron Revolution draws close, security has been beefed up in major pagodas and monasteries in Rangoon since the end of last month. Police personnel are deployed at Ward level Peace and Development Council offices at night.
According to the Thai-Burma border based ‘Association of Assistance to Political prisoners’ – Burma (AAPPB), the junta arrested 158 monks after the 2007 September Saffron Revolution and they were sentenced to various terms in prison with a maximum punishment of 65 years.
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Mizzima News - Junta, China fleece Burmese populace: Campaigners
by Mungpi
Tuesday, 08 September 2009 20:30
New Delhi (Mizzima)- If China is protecting the Burmese military junta, calling Burma’s problems “its internal affair” and blocking a United Nations Security Council resolution, it is because China is making a two-way profit in its deals with the generals, campaigners said.
According to a new report released by campaigners, China is all set to begin construction of a dual gas and oil pipeline that will connect China’s Northwestern Province of Yunnan with Burma’s western coast of Kyuak Phyu in Arakan State.
The pipeline will transfer gas from the offshore Shwe gas fields in western Arakan state. Besides, it will also be used to transfer oil shipped from the Middle East and Africa.
“This will help China immensely as most of its oil imports are from the Middle East and Africa,” Wong Aung, spokesperson of the Shwe Gas Movement, a coalition of campaigners based in Thailand said.
The Shwe Gas Movement on Monday released a new report titled ‘Corridor of Power’ detailing the planned pipeline project, which will also be used to transfer natural gas extracted from the Shwe Gas Fields in Burma, which is estimated to be one of the largest natural gas reserves in Southeast Asia.
The nearly 4,000 km pipeline, construction for which is set to begin this month, will provide China access to the Bay of Bengal, a strategic advantage in its attempts to control the Indian Ocean.
But in order to beat India in its pursuit for gas from Burma, China has to exercise its veto power in the United Nations Security Council. In January 2007 it blocked a resolution, when the US, UK and France proposed a resolution aimed at condemning the Burmese generals.
Besides, the Burmese generals will earn at least US $ 29 billion over 30 years from the sale of natural gas to China.
“The contract will mean that China will provide more arms and military hardware to the Burmese regime and would do anything to protect the Burmese generals to remain in power,” Wong Aung said.
According to EarthRights International, a non-governmental organisation advocating human and environmental rights, there are over 40 Chinese companies investing in more than 200 projects including oil and gas exploration, mining and hydroelectricity projects.
China values its business involvements and wants to see Burma stable in order to allow it to engage further with the country, Wong Aung said.
“It is like tunnelling Burma’s resources to China,” Wong Aung said, referring to the imbalance in returns of Chinese companies investing in Burma.
While bilateral relations between countries should be based on mutual interest and benefits, the Sino-Burmese relationship is typically one-sided where the benefit goes to the Chinese and the Burmese generals, while the Burmese people make sacrifices and bear the consequences, Wong Aung said.
As a measure of security, at least 44 military battalions have been stationed along the planned dual pipelines that will cross the western coast of Arakan State to North-eastern Shan State of Burma.
“Once the pipeline construction begins, I think there will be more soldiers stationed along the pipelines,” Wong Aung added.
The report by the Shwe Gas Movement said, the increased militarisation along the pipeline has caused severe human rights violations committed by the soldiers including raping ethnic women, relocating villages, forced labour and extra-judicial killings.
“There are 22 towns and cities along the pipeline and these will have to be removed. So, the rights abuses will increase,” Wong Aung added.
While China, which needs large quantities of energy to fuel its developing economy, might feel it is a fair bargain to give the Burmese generals the protection and to supply the money they need, the people of Burma, who are rightfully the owners of the natural resources are bearing the consequences, Wong Aung said.
Calling for the immediate suspension of the project, the report said that China would be in a better position to trade with Burma under a stable government. It also argues that the current military rulers’ political roadmap does not aim at bringing peace and political stability to the country.
The recent fighting in north-eastern Shan State between the Burmese Army and Kokang rebels is only the tip of the iceberg and indicates that there will be further unrest along the border as well as in other parts of the country, Wong Aung said.
“With such instability, China should rethink its position and reconsider its plan to construct the pipelines,” he added.
by Mungpi
Tuesday, 08 September 2009 20:30
New Delhi (Mizzima)- If China is protecting the Burmese military junta, calling Burma’s problems “its internal affair” and blocking a United Nations Security Council resolution, it is because China is making a two-way profit in its deals with the generals, campaigners said.
According to a new report released by campaigners, China is all set to begin construction of a dual gas and oil pipeline that will connect China’s Northwestern Province of Yunnan with Burma’s western coast of Kyuak Phyu in Arakan State.
The pipeline will transfer gas from the offshore Shwe gas fields in western Arakan state. Besides, it will also be used to transfer oil shipped from the Middle East and Africa.
“This will help China immensely as most of its oil imports are from the Middle East and Africa,” Wong Aung, spokesperson of the Shwe Gas Movement, a coalition of campaigners based in Thailand said.
The Shwe Gas Movement on Monday released a new report titled ‘Corridor of Power’ detailing the planned pipeline project, which will also be used to transfer natural gas extracted from the Shwe Gas Fields in Burma, which is estimated to be one of the largest natural gas reserves in Southeast Asia.
The nearly 4,000 km pipeline, construction for which is set to begin this month, will provide China access to the Bay of Bengal, a strategic advantage in its attempts to control the Indian Ocean.
But in order to beat India in its pursuit for gas from Burma, China has to exercise its veto power in the United Nations Security Council. In January 2007 it blocked a resolution, when the US, UK and France proposed a resolution aimed at condemning the Burmese generals.
Besides, the Burmese generals will earn at least US $ 29 billion over 30 years from the sale of natural gas to China.
“The contract will mean that China will provide more arms and military hardware to the Burmese regime and would do anything to protect the Burmese generals to remain in power,” Wong Aung said.
According to EarthRights International, a non-governmental organisation advocating human and environmental rights, there are over 40 Chinese companies investing in more than 200 projects including oil and gas exploration, mining and hydroelectricity projects.
China values its business involvements and wants to see Burma stable in order to allow it to engage further with the country, Wong Aung said.
“It is like tunnelling Burma’s resources to China,” Wong Aung said, referring to the imbalance in returns of Chinese companies investing in Burma.
While bilateral relations between countries should be based on mutual interest and benefits, the Sino-Burmese relationship is typically one-sided where the benefit goes to the Chinese and the Burmese generals, while the Burmese people make sacrifices and bear the consequences, Wong Aung said.
As a measure of security, at least 44 military battalions have been stationed along the planned dual pipelines that will cross the western coast of Arakan State to North-eastern Shan State of Burma.
“Once the pipeline construction begins, I think there will be more soldiers stationed along the pipelines,” Wong Aung added.
The report by the Shwe Gas Movement said, the increased militarisation along the pipeline has caused severe human rights violations committed by the soldiers including raping ethnic women, relocating villages, forced labour and extra-judicial killings.
“There are 22 towns and cities along the pipeline and these will have to be removed. So, the rights abuses will increase,” Wong Aung added.
While China, which needs large quantities of energy to fuel its developing economy, might feel it is a fair bargain to give the Burmese generals the protection and to supply the money they need, the people of Burma, who are rightfully the owners of the natural resources are bearing the consequences, Wong Aung said.
Calling for the immediate suspension of the project, the report said that China would be in a better position to trade with Burma under a stable government. It also argues that the current military rulers’ political roadmap does not aim at bringing peace and political stability to the country.
The recent fighting in north-eastern Shan State between the Burmese Army and Kokang rebels is only the tip of the iceberg and indicates that there will be further unrest along the border as well as in other parts of the country, Wong Aung said.
“With such instability, China should rethink its position and reconsider its plan to construct the pipelines,” he added.
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Mizzima News - Kachin rejects ‘Border Guard Force’ proposal
by Phanida
Monday, 07 September 2009 19:19
Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – The Burmese military junta’s pressure notwithstanding, the Kachin people have rejected the regime’s proposal of transforming the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) troops to a Border Guard Force (BGF).
The mass meeting held in Myitkyina, Kachin State on September 5 and 6, attended by 324 representatives including KIO leaders adopted a resolution to accept their troops being transformed into an autonomous ‘Kachin Regional Guard Force’ (KRGF).
“The meeting decided to continue the peaceful negotiation for ethnic rights demanded by the Kachin people. We decided to negotiate again with the government on the transformation issue,” a KIO delegate, told Mizzima.
The meeting also decided to maintain the current ceasefire status and the desire to participate in the forthcoming Kachin State Government by transforming the KIO.
KIO responded to Naypyitdaw in July saying that they did not want convert to the BGF which would be under the complete control of the Tatmadaw (junta’s armed forces). But the junta seems to be rigid and gave the KIO a deadline till the end of October.
After the junta attacked the Kokang ceasefire group, which had also refused to accept the proposal of transforming the BGF on the pretext of drug eradication, speculation is rife that wars along the Sino-Burma border is imminent.
But Naypyidaw War Office sources said that the junta is cautious in its approach to the KIO because it has stronger forces than the Shan State Special Region (1) (Kokang).
Meanwhile the KIO took another step by accepting the resignation of six high ranking leaders in preparation for their contesting the 2010 general election.
KIO sources said that the six high ranking officers including KIO Vice-Chairman Dr. Tuja were permitted to resign from their posts on September 2.
“We paved the way for Dr. Tuja and his colleagues to form a political party which will represent the Kachin people. They were allowed to resign from their posts with the consent of the KIO,” he said.
KIO Vice-Chairman Dr. Tuja, General Secretary (2) Inja Nawrus, Foreign Affairs in-charge Nat Le, Eastern Command Commander Chaboung Karan, Economics Department official U Mong Khaung and an official from Interim Committee U Zau Phan resigned from their posts..
Kachin political sources said that they would contest the forthcoming general election mainly in Kachin State under the aegis of the ‘Kachin State Progressive Party’ (KSPP).
Dr. Tuja will be Chairman of the KSPP while the others are from other Kachin ceasefire groups. They are Maj. Thein Saung, Second in-charge of Liaison Department of the New Democratic Alliance Army – Kachin (NDA-K) and Maj. Phon Ran from the KIO breakaway faction led by Lasan Awng Wah.
The Kachin Independence Army (KIA) was established in February 1961 and reached a ceasefire agreement with the junta in February 1994.
by Phanida
Monday, 07 September 2009 19:19
Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – The Burmese military junta’s pressure notwithstanding, the Kachin people have rejected the regime’s proposal of transforming the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) troops to a Border Guard Force (BGF).
The mass meeting held in Myitkyina, Kachin State on September 5 and 6, attended by 324 representatives including KIO leaders adopted a resolution to accept their troops being transformed into an autonomous ‘Kachin Regional Guard Force’ (KRGF).
“The meeting decided to continue the peaceful negotiation for ethnic rights demanded by the Kachin people. We decided to negotiate again with the government on the transformation issue,” a KIO delegate, told Mizzima.
The meeting also decided to maintain the current ceasefire status and the desire to participate in the forthcoming Kachin State Government by transforming the KIO.
KIO responded to Naypyitdaw in July saying that they did not want convert to the BGF which would be under the complete control of the Tatmadaw (junta’s armed forces). But the junta seems to be rigid and gave the KIO a deadline till the end of October.
After the junta attacked the Kokang ceasefire group, which had also refused to accept the proposal of transforming the BGF on the pretext of drug eradication, speculation is rife that wars along the Sino-Burma border is imminent.
But Naypyidaw War Office sources said that the junta is cautious in its approach to the KIO because it has stronger forces than the Shan State Special Region (1) (Kokang).
Meanwhile the KIO took another step by accepting the resignation of six high ranking leaders in preparation for their contesting the 2010 general election.
KIO sources said that the six high ranking officers including KIO Vice-Chairman Dr. Tuja were permitted to resign from their posts on September 2.
“We paved the way for Dr. Tuja and his colleagues to form a political party which will represent the Kachin people. They were allowed to resign from their posts with the consent of the KIO,” he said.
KIO Vice-Chairman Dr. Tuja, General Secretary (2) Inja Nawrus, Foreign Affairs in-charge Nat Le, Eastern Command Commander Chaboung Karan, Economics Department official U Mong Khaung and an official from Interim Committee U Zau Phan resigned from their posts..
Kachin political sources said that they would contest the forthcoming general election mainly in Kachin State under the aegis of the ‘Kachin State Progressive Party’ (KSPP).
Dr. Tuja will be Chairman of the KSPP while the others are from other Kachin ceasefire groups. They are Maj. Thein Saung, Second in-charge of Liaison Department of the New Democratic Alliance Army – Kachin (NDA-K) and Maj. Phon Ran from the KIO breakaway faction led by Lasan Awng Wah.
The Kachin Independence Army (KIA) was established in February 1961 and reached a ceasefire agreement with the junta in February 1994.
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The Irrawaddy - New Mon Party Forming for Election
By LAWI WENG, Tuesday, September 8, 2009
At least 14 Mon community leaders have put together plans to launch a new political party representing the interests of Mon people in Burma in preparation for the 2010 general election, according to a source close to the group.
Calling themselves an “election working committee,” the group currently comprises four former central committee members of the New Mon State Party (NMSP)—Nai Myint Swe, Nai Lyi Gakao, Nai Tin Aung and Nai Soe Myint—as well as 10 other respected community leaders in Mon State.
The source said the Mon leaders have been meeting at the NMSP office in Moulmein in recent months, but have made no official announcement yet about their new political party because they are waiting for an announcement from the military government with regard to party registration and the conditions for running in next year’s elections.
More NMSP leaders are prepared to resign their positions within the party to join the new election working committee, said the source; however, they are waiting for Naypyidaw to release details of the regulations governing the upcoming election.
The NMSP announced earlier this year that it will not participate in the election; however sources close to the party said it would allow its members to resign to join the election working committee if they wish.
Sources in Moulmein said that the election working committee and some NMSP leaders are currently working together by mobilizing youths in Mon State for the election in 2010.
A leading member of the election working committee said, “Many people come and ask me about our future plans and about our working committee. They are interested in it. But, I can’t tell them very much because we are waiting for the election draft.”
A source close to Nai Tin Aung said that the current strategy is on the right track for the people of Mon State because the NMSP will keep on fighting for liberty with arms, while on the one hand, the election working committee is going to fight on the democratic stage.
Some observers have said that there appears to be a growing tension among members of the NMSP as to whether the party should compete in next year’s election.
Some members reportedly believe the election offers an opportunity while others view the process as a sham and say the election will not be free and fair.
Nai Hang Tha, a secretary of the NMSP, told The Irrawaddy that the new constitution denies fundamental ethnic rights and will allow the military to hold onto power.
In June, the party ordered its judicial offices, which are based in Burmese government-controlled areas, to move their offices to within the NMSP-administered zone. The move came soon after the junta’s southeast regional command in Moulmein told NMSP leaders to accept the deadline for integrating their soldiers into the regime’s border guard force.
Sources say the majority of the party’s members don’t want to revoke the ceasefire agreement which they signed with the junta in 1995; however, they also don’t want to transform their troops into border guards.
The NMSP’s military wing, the Mon National Liberation Army, is estimated to have about 700 troops.
By LAWI WENG, Tuesday, September 8, 2009
At least 14 Mon community leaders have put together plans to launch a new political party representing the interests of Mon people in Burma in preparation for the 2010 general election, according to a source close to the group.
Calling themselves an “election working committee,” the group currently comprises four former central committee members of the New Mon State Party (NMSP)—Nai Myint Swe, Nai Lyi Gakao, Nai Tin Aung and Nai Soe Myint—as well as 10 other respected community leaders in Mon State.
The source said the Mon leaders have been meeting at the NMSP office in Moulmein in recent months, but have made no official announcement yet about their new political party because they are waiting for an announcement from the military government with regard to party registration and the conditions for running in next year’s elections.
More NMSP leaders are prepared to resign their positions within the party to join the new election working committee, said the source; however, they are waiting for Naypyidaw to release details of the regulations governing the upcoming election.
The NMSP announced earlier this year that it will not participate in the election; however sources close to the party said it would allow its members to resign to join the election working committee if they wish.
Sources in Moulmein said that the election working committee and some NMSP leaders are currently working together by mobilizing youths in Mon State for the election in 2010.
A leading member of the election working committee said, “Many people come and ask me about our future plans and about our working committee. They are interested in it. But, I can’t tell them very much because we are waiting for the election draft.”
A source close to Nai Tin Aung said that the current strategy is on the right track for the people of Mon State because the NMSP will keep on fighting for liberty with arms, while on the one hand, the election working committee is going to fight on the democratic stage.
Some observers have said that there appears to be a growing tension among members of the NMSP as to whether the party should compete in next year’s election.
Some members reportedly believe the election offers an opportunity while others view the process as a sham and say the election will not be free and fair.
Nai Hang Tha, a secretary of the NMSP, told The Irrawaddy that the new constitution denies fundamental ethnic rights and will allow the military to hold onto power.
In June, the party ordered its judicial offices, which are based in Burmese government-controlled areas, to move their offices to within the NMSP-administered zone. The move came soon after the junta’s southeast regional command in Moulmein told NMSP leaders to accept the deadline for integrating their soldiers into the regime’s border guard force.
Sources say the majority of the party’s members don’t want to revoke the ceasefire agreement which they signed with the junta in 1995; however, they also don’t want to transform their troops into border guards.
The NMSP’s military wing, the Mon National Liberation Army, is estimated to have about 700 troops.
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The Irrawaddy - Peng Jiasheng’s Fall from Grace
By AUNG ZAW, Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Kokang leader Peng Jiasheng, who is now on the run from his former friends in the military regime, was one of the ethnic national leaders the Burmese government showcased in meetings with visiting foreign officials or UN officers.
But he is now a fugitive hiding from the military government that two weeks ago launched a search for illegal arms and drugs in his stronghold of Laogai.
A state-run newspaper declared that Peng Jiasheng cannot escape from the “rule of law” and recommended that he surrender.
Now believed to be hiding in Wa territory, Peng Jiasheng and his group of associates and militia will not easily surrender to the regime.
A Kokang Chinese, he was born in 1931 in Hong Seu Htoo village in Kokang territory and served in the Kokang Revolutionary Force in 1960s. He was in touch with members of the Communist Party of Burma who were active along the China-Burma border.
Peng Jiasheng spent time in Beijing and upon his return, he entered Kokang territory in January 1968 as a commander of the Kokang People’s Liberation Army, a group that officially merged with the Burmese communists. He was first involved in the heroin and drug trade during the 1970s.
In 1989, Peng Jiasheng took a bold step and his group led a mutiny within the CPB and formed a Kokang armed group known as the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDDA). Three years later, Peng Jiasheng group was outmaneuvered by the Yang clan, Yang Molian and Yang Muxian, two Kokang Chinese brothers who supported the CPB. Yang Muxian was executed in Kunming in 1994 on drug trafficking charges. In later years, Peng Jiasheng and the Yang group joined forces.
In any case, by 1989 Peng Jiasheng and his brother Peng Jiafu had reunited with Asia’s renowned former drug trafficker Lo Hsing-han, who acted as a go-between for the regime to negotiate with CPB mutineers.
The drug lord, Lo Hsing-han, who is a Kokang-Chinese, was arrested in 1973 in Thailand and deported to Burma, where he received a death sentence in 1976. He was released during an amnesty in 1980.
Settled in Rangoon, Lo Hsing-han and his son Tun Myint Naing (aka Steven Law) set up Asia World Company—a company involved in the construction of homes and hotels, Rangoon port development and highway construction. Both father and son are now on the US sanction list.
Since Peng Jiasheng reached a ceasefire deal with the regime, the Kokang Chinese leader was often seen meeting with senior military leaders and visiting UN officials.
In the international press, Peng Jiasheng, like Wa leaders, is described as one of Burma’s most prominent drug traffickers and is widely linked to Chinese criminal gangs.
However, the regime has protected him and all other drug traffickers.
Over the years, this meant the illegal drug business boomed, and Peng Jiasheng, Peng Jiafu and Lo Hsing-han controlled a large amount of the illegal drug trade, enjoying their new status as government-recognized militia commanders.
The Burma expert, Bertil Lintner, who has written several books on Burmese drug trafficking and the ethnic insurgency, notes that under the blanket amnesty, Peng and other Wa and Kokang Chinese leaders were involved in laundering drug money into the local economy.
The Peace Myanmar Group, one of the companies on the US sanction list, is connected to the Yang clan in Kokang.
It is believed that Peng Jiasheng has invested money through many Kokang channels into businesses in Burma and China.
In April 2009, a report “Burma and Transactional Crime” by the US Congressional Research Service stated that the regime has reportedly allowed and encouraged traffickers to invest in an array of domestic businesses, including infrastructure and transportation enterprises, receiving start-up fees and taxes from these enterprises in the process.
The report said, “The traffickers usually deposit the earnings from these enterprises into banks controlled by the military, and military officers reportedly deposit much of their crime-related money in foreign bank accounts in places like Bangkok and Singapore.
“In 2003, the Secretary of the Treasury reported that some Burmese financial institutions were controlled by, or used to facilitate money laundering for, organized drug trafficking organizations.
In the same report, the Secretary of the Treasury also stated that Burmese government officials were suspected of being involved in the counterfeiting of U.S. currency.”
The report said that though there is little direct evidence of top-level regime members’ involvement in drug trafficking related corruption, “There is evidence that high-level officials and Burmese military officers have benefited financially from the earnings of transnational crime organizations. In the case of the drug trade, reports indicate Burmese military officials at various levels have several means to gain substantial shares of narcotics trafficking earnings.”
With such a past, the recent regime accusations labeling Peng Jiasheng a leader in the drug trade and illegal arms are nothing new.
However, it is interesting to note that the regime is singling out only Peng Jiasheng’s notorious past.
The rest of the current and former ethnic drug traffickers including Lo Hsing-han and the Wa leaders are still at-large, enjoying the benefits of the ceasefire “peace” in Burma. At least, for now.
By AUNG ZAW, Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Kokang leader Peng Jiasheng, who is now on the run from his former friends in the military regime, was one of the ethnic national leaders the Burmese government showcased in meetings with visiting foreign officials or UN officers.
But he is now a fugitive hiding from the military government that two weeks ago launched a search for illegal arms and drugs in his stronghold of Laogai.
A state-run newspaper declared that Peng Jiasheng cannot escape from the “rule of law” and recommended that he surrender.
Now believed to be hiding in Wa territory, Peng Jiasheng and his group of associates and militia will not easily surrender to the regime.
A Kokang Chinese, he was born in 1931 in Hong Seu Htoo village in Kokang territory and served in the Kokang Revolutionary Force in 1960s. He was in touch with members of the Communist Party of Burma who were active along the China-Burma border.
Peng Jiasheng spent time in Beijing and upon his return, he entered Kokang territory in January 1968 as a commander of the Kokang People’s Liberation Army, a group that officially merged with the Burmese communists. He was first involved in the heroin and drug trade during the 1970s.
In 1989, Peng Jiasheng took a bold step and his group led a mutiny within the CPB and formed a Kokang armed group known as the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDDA). Three years later, Peng Jiasheng group was outmaneuvered by the Yang clan, Yang Molian and Yang Muxian, two Kokang Chinese brothers who supported the CPB. Yang Muxian was executed in Kunming in 1994 on drug trafficking charges. In later years, Peng Jiasheng and the Yang group joined forces.
In any case, by 1989 Peng Jiasheng and his brother Peng Jiafu had reunited with Asia’s renowned former drug trafficker Lo Hsing-han, who acted as a go-between for the regime to negotiate with CPB mutineers.
The drug lord, Lo Hsing-han, who is a Kokang-Chinese, was arrested in 1973 in Thailand and deported to Burma, where he received a death sentence in 1976. He was released during an amnesty in 1980.
Settled in Rangoon, Lo Hsing-han and his son Tun Myint Naing (aka Steven Law) set up Asia World Company—a company involved in the construction of homes and hotels, Rangoon port development and highway construction. Both father and son are now on the US sanction list.
Since Peng Jiasheng reached a ceasefire deal with the regime, the Kokang Chinese leader was often seen meeting with senior military leaders and visiting UN officials.
In the international press, Peng Jiasheng, like Wa leaders, is described as one of Burma’s most prominent drug traffickers and is widely linked to Chinese criminal gangs.
However, the regime has protected him and all other drug traffickers.
Over the years, this meant the illegal drug business boomed, and Peng Jiasheng, Peng Jiafu and Lo Hsing-han controlled a large amount of the illegal drug trade, enjoying their new status as government-recognized militia commanders.
The Burma expert, Bertil Lintner, who has written several books on Burmese drug trafficking and the ethnic insurgency, notes that under the blanket amnesty, Peng and other Wa and Kokang Chinese leaders were involved in laundering drug money into the local economy.
The Peace Myanmar Group, one of the companies on the US sanction list, is connected to the Yang clan in Kokang.
It is believed that Peng Jiasheng has invested money through many Kokang channels into businesses in Burma and China.
In April 2009, a report “Burma and Transactional Crime” by the US Congressional Research Service stated that the regime has reportedly allowed and encouraged traffickers to invest in an array of domestic businesses, including infrastructure and transportation enterprises, receiving start-up fees and taxes from these enterprises in the process.
The report said, “The traffickers usually deposit the earnings from these enterprises into banks controlled by the military, and military officers reportedly deposit much of their crime-related money in foreign bank accounts in places like Bangkok and Singapore.
“In 2003, the Secretary of the Treasury reported that some Burmese financial institutions were controlled by, or used to facilitate money laundering for, organized drug trafficking organizations.
In the same report, the Secretary of the Treasury also stated that Burmese government officials were suspected of being involved in the counterfeiting of U.S. currency.”
The report said that though there is little direct evidence of top-level regime members’ involvement in drug trafficking related corruption, “There is evidence that high-level officials and Burmese military officers have benefited financially from the earnings of transnational crime organizations. In the case of the drug trade, reports indicate Burmese military officials at various levels have several means to gain substantial shares of narcotics trafficking earnings.”
With such a past, the recent regime accusations labeling Peng Jiasheng a leader in the drug trade and illegal arms are nothing new.
However, it is interesting to note that the regime is singling out only Peng Jiasheng’s notorious past.
The rest of the current and former ethnic drug traffickers including Lo Hsing-han and the Wa leaders are still at-large, enjoying the benefits of the ceasefire “peace” in Burma. At least, for now.
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The Irrawaddy - Lawyers Request Permission to Meet Suu Kyi
By KO HTWE
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Lawyers for Aung San Suu Kyi said they have sought permission to meet with the detained Burmese democracy leader ahead of an appeal hearing scheduled for September 18.
“We asked the authorities for permission to discuss the appeal and receive further instructions from her, but so far we have not received a reply,” Nyan Win, a lawyer for Suu Kyi, told The Irrawaddy on Tuesday.
The Rangoon Division court agreed last week to hear an appeal against an August 11 judgment that found Suu Kyi guilty of violating the terms of her house arrest.
The appeal was submitted on September 3 and was accepted by the court the next day.
Meanwhile, diplomats in Rangoon and Bangkok have asked Burma’s ruling junta to allow Suu Kyi to receive visitors, according to diplomatic sources.
When Suu Kyi was sentenced to a further 18 months of house for allowing an American intruder to shelter at her home, the regime said she would be permitted to meet guests at the discretion of the relevant authorities.
Suu Kyi has been detained for more than 14 of the past 20 years.
By KO HTWE
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Lawyers for Aung San Suu Kyi said they have sought permission to meet with the detained Burmese democracy leader ahead of an appeal hearing scheduled for September 18.
“We asked the authorities for permission to discuss the appeal and receive further instructions from her, but so far we have not received a reply,” Nyan Win, a lawyer for Suu Kyi, told The Irrawaddy on Tuesday.
The Rangoon Division court agreed last week to hear an appeal against an August 11 judgment that found Suu Kyi guilty of violating the terms of her house arrest.
The appeal was submitted on September 3 and was accepted by the court the next day.
Meanwhile, diplomats in Rangoon and Bangkok have asked Burma’s ruling junta to allow Suu Kyi to receive visitors, according to diplomatic sources.
When Suu Kyi was sentenced to a further 18 months of house for allowing an American intruder to shelter at her home, the regime said she would be permitted to meet guests at the discretion of the relevant authorities.
Suu Kyi has been detained for more than 14 of the past 20 years.
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Wa army evade Burmese troops
Sept 7, 2009 (DVB)–Officials from Burma’s largest ceasefire group have gone into hiding in eastern Burma due to increased tension in recent days between the group and the ruling military government.
Troops from the United Wa State Army (UWSA), based in the Wa region of Burma’s northeastern Shan state, have been preparing for possible conflict with the Burmese army following its recent offensive against an allied ceasefire group.
A number of UWSA officials and business owners based in the Burmese border town of Tachilek and have reportedly gone into hiding after fellow officials faced threats of arrest.
A Tachilek resident told DVB that a number of UWSA officials and people in connection with them were arrested by authorities and evicted from the town in recent days.
“Previously, the Wa used to be influential in this region and a lot of people claimed to have a connection with them to gain special privileges,” he said. “Now they are being chased down and deported.”
The leader of the 30,000-strong UWSA is said to be close to Peng Jiasheng, whose Kokang ceasefire group last month was engaged in heavy fighting with the Burmese army.
The eruption of violence forced around 37,000 refugees across the border into Thailand. Peng Jiasheng is now reportedly in hiding somewhere in the Wa region.
Sein Kyi, deputy of Thailand-based Shan Herald Agency for News (SHAN) said that senior Wa officials based in other border towns have also gone into hiding.
“The Wa are only keeping one or two officials – non-important personnel – in the offices in towns such as Tachilek, Keng Tung and Mong Hsat,” said Sein Kyi.
“This is more like a precaution to prevent similar circumstances to the recent Kokang conflict where people closed to Peng Jiasheng were detained by government authorities.”
He said the UWSA has been increasing troop numbers in southern Shan state, but the tension in the region was low compared the town of Panghsang where the group has its headquarters.
The Kokang group was reportedly joined by around 500 troops from the UWSA during fighting, which marked the end of a 20-year ceasefire with the Burmese government.
Reporting by Min Lwin
Sept 7, 2009 (DVB)–Officials from Burma’s largest ceasefire group have gone into hiding in eastern Burma due to increased tension in recent days between the group and the ruling military government.
Troops from the United Wa State Army (UWSA), based in the Wa region of Burma’s northeastern Shan state, have been preparing for possible conflict with the Burmese army following its recent offensive against an allied ceasefire group.
A number of UWSA officials and business owners based in the Burmese border town of Tachilek and have reportedly gone into hiding after fellow officials faced threats of arrest.
A Tachilek resident told DVB that a number of UWSA officials and people in connection with them were arrested by authorities and evicted from the town in recent days.
“Previously, the Wa used to be influential in this region and a lot of people claimed to have a connection with them to gain special privileges,” he said. “Now they are being chased down and deported.”
The leader of the 30,000-strong UWSA is said to be close to Peng Jiasheng, whose Kokang ceasefire group last month was engaged in heavy fighting with the Burmese army.
The eruption of violence forced around 37,000 refugees across the border into Thailand. Peng Jiasheng is now reportedly in hiding somewhere in the Wa region.
Sein Kyi, deputy of Thailand-based Shan Herald Agency for News (SHAN) said that senior Wa officials based in other border towns have also gone into hiding.
“The Wa are only keeping one or two officials – non-important personnel – in the offices in towns such as Tachilek, Keng Tung and Mong Hsat,” said Sein Kyi.
“This is more like a precaution to prevent similar circumstances to the recent Kokang conflict where people closed to Peng Jiasheng were detained by government authorities.”
He said the UWSA has been increasing troop numbers in southern Shan state, but the tension in the region was low compared the town of Panghsang where the group has its headquarters.
The Kokang group was reportedly joined by around 500 troops from the UWSA during fighting, which marked the end of a 20-year ceasefire with the Burmese government.
Reporting by Min Lwin
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UN fears violence in Wa region
Sept 4, 2009 (DVB)–The United Nations refugee agency today called on China to allow it access to Burmese refugees in the country’s southern border region fearing additional displacement from northern Burma.
Nearly 10,000 of the estimated 37,000 refugees who fled last week’s fighting in northeastern Burma between Burmese troops and an armed ethnic group have returned from China.
A spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) today asked for access to those remaining in China, and expressed concern that refugee numbers could swell in the event of fighting in Shan state’s Wa region.
“UNHCR has called on the Chinese authorities to allow us access to the border area and has proposed a joint needs assessment so as to offer support for any possible unmet needs,” said spokesperson Andrej Mahecic.
“We hope this request will be positively considered as additional displacement may occur in the region should the situation deteriorate in the Wa State of Myanmar [Burma].”
Burmese army troops have moved into the Wa region near Kokang, where last week’s fighting erupted.
The region is home to the 30,000-strong United Wa State Army (UWSA), Burma’s largest ceasefire group.
“Our people and the Kokang are on alert because they are right at our doorstep, perhaps, to set up temporary camps. People are afraid and some have fled,” said a UWSA officer.
The leader of the Kokang ceasefire group, whose clash with Burmese troops last week ended a 20-year truce with the government, has reportedly fled to the Wa region.
He is said to be close be close to UWSA leader Bai Youxiang, Around 500 UWSA troops supported the Kokang group during the fighting.
According to the UNHCR, at least 13,000 people remain in seven camps on the Chinese side of the border and are being supported by the Chinese government.
“Although we have not been able to visit these locations, the reports we have been receiving have been consistent” said Mahecic.
The Chinese government, Burma’s strongest ally, issued a rare rebuke to the ruling junta last week following the exodus of refugees across its border, urging it to "properly deal with its domestic issue”.
A subsequent statement from the foreign ministry appeared to placate growing tension between the Beijing and Naypyidaw, stressing that border issues were the joint responsibility of the two countries.
Reporting by Francis Wade
Sept 4, 2009 (DVB)–The United Nations refugee agency today called on China to allow it access to Burmese refugees in the country’s southern border region fearing additional displacement from northern Burma.
Nearly 10,000 of the estimated 37,000 refugees who fled last week’s fighting in northeastern Burma between Burmese troops and an armed ethnic group have returned from China.
A spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) today asked for access to those remaining in China, and expressed concern that refugee numbers could swell in the event of fighting in Shan state’s Wa region.
“UNHCR has called on the Chinese authorities to allow us access to the border area and has proposed a joint needs assessment so as to offer support for any possible unmet needs,” said spokesperson Andrej Mahecic.
“We hope this request will be positively considered as additional displacement may occur in the region should the situation deteriorate in the Wa State of Myanmar [Burma].”
Burmese army troops have moved into the Wa region near Kokang, where last week’s fighting erupted.
The region is home to the 30,000-strong United Wa State Army (UWSA), Burma’s largest ceasefire group.
“Our people and the Kokang are on alert because they are right at our doorstep, perhaps, to set up temporary camps. People are afraid and some have fled,” said a UWSA officer.
The leader of the Kokang ceasefire group, whose clash with Burmese troops last week ended a 20-year truce with the government, has reportedly fled to the Wa region.
He is said to be close be close to UWSA leader Bai Youxiang, Around 500 UWSA troops supported the Kokang group during the fighting.
According to the UNHCR, at least 13,000 people remain in seven camps on the Chinese side of the border and are being supported by the Chinese government.
“Although we have not been able to visit these locations, the reports we have been receiving have been consistent” said Mahecic.
The Chinese government, Burma’s strongest ally, issued a rare rebuke to the ruling junta last week following the exodus of refugees across its border, urging it to "properly deal with its domestic issue”.
A subsequent statement from the foreign ministry appeared to placate growing tension between the Beijing and Naypyidaw, stressing that border issues were the joint responsibility of the two countries.
Reporting by Francis Wade
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DVB News - Army abuse still rife in Karen state
Sept 8, 2009 (DVB)–Abuse of civilians by Burmese troops and a proxy militia that forced 5000 into Thailand in June continue to occur in Karen state, according to a local human rights group.
Although fighting has calmed between Burmese troops, backed by the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), and the opposition Karen National Union (KNU), stability in the area remains fragile.
A report released today by the Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG) says that government and DKBA troops “continue to subject villagers to exploitative abuse and attempt to consolidate control of territory”.
“DKBA and [government] soldiers have been demanding that villagers work as porters, carrying supplies including rations and ammunition, as well as to walk in front of military columns where they serve as human minesweepers,” the report said.
The DKBA, who split from the KNU in 1994, are reportedly looking to wrestle control of Karen state from the KNU in order to create a trading zone.
Both DKBA and Burmese army units now occupy former KNU positions, many of which have been taken in recent months. During the June offensive, the KNU lost its strategically important Battalion 7 headquarters.
One of the focal points of the fighting was the Ler Per Har camp for internally displaced people. Many of the refugees who arrived in Thailand fled from the camp.
“Villagers continue to be forcibly recruited by the DKBA, which has been undertaking a consistent push for new recruits since August 2008,” said the report.
Reports have also emerged of the execution of a Karen village headman on 27 August, following which DKBA troops threatened his family.
"I think the DKBA doesn't have rules for their soldiers,” the report quoted a male villager as saying.
“They think the villagers are only animals. They kill people like killing animals. They killed this man for no reason and without asking any questions."
The conflict between the KNU and Burmese government has stretched over 60 years, and is thought to be one of the world’s longest running.
Reporting by Francis Wade
Sept 8, 2009 (DVB)–Abuse of civilians by Burmese troops and a proxy militia that forced 5000 into Thailand in June continue to occur in Karen state, according to a local human rights group.
Although fighting has calmed between Burmese troops, backed by the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), and the opposition Karen National Union (KNU), stability in the area remains fragile.
A report released today by the Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG) says that government and DKBA troops “continue to subject villagers to exploitative abuse and attempt to consolidate control of territory”.
“DKBA and [government] soldiers have been demanding that villagers work as porters, carrying supplies including rations and ammunition, as well as to walk in front of military columns where they serve as human minesweepers,” the report said.
The DKBA, who split from the KNU in 1994, are reportedly looking to wrestle control of Karen state from the KNU in order to create a trading zone.
Both DKBA and Burmese army units now occupy former KNU positions, many of which have been taken in recent months. During the June offensive, the KNU lost its strategically important Battalion 7 headquarters.
One of the focal points of the fighting was the Ler Per Har camp for internally displaced people. Many of the refugees who arrived in Thailand fled from the camp.
“Villagers continue to be forcibly recruited by the DKBA, which has been undertaking a consistent push for new recruits since August 2008,” said the report.
Reports have also emerged of the execution of a Karen village headman on 27 August, following which DKBA troops threatened his family.
"I think the DKBA doesn't have rules for their soldiers,” the report quoted a male villager as saying.
“They think the villagers are only animals. They kill people like killing animals. They killed this man for no reason and without asking any questions."
The conflict between the KNU and Burmese government has stretched over 60 years, and is thought to be one of the world’s longest running.
Reporting by Francis Wade
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