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ေတာ္လွန္ေရးသီခ်င္းမ်ား(Politics Song)
Wednesday, 30 June 2010
Saturday, 26 June 2010
Thursday, 24 June 2010
BURMA RELATED NEWS - JUNE 22, 2010
PTI - Suu Kyi gets Benazir Bhutto Shaheed Award for democracy
AP - Child mortality rates up in Africa despite UN push
The Washington Times - Shut-out activists in Burma seek Obama's help
IRIN - MYANMAR: Eyewitness recounts hours-long trudge through landslide sludge
Scoop.co.nz - Aung San Suu Kyi Must be Released
Edinburgh Evening News - City MSP backs project to end Burmese radio silence
VOA News - Burmese Migrants in Thailand Facing Increased Scrutiny
Globe and Mail - Aung San Suu Kyi’s unhappy birthday
ANN - Dhaka readies for legal battle on maritime dispute with India-Myanmar
Asia News Network - Suu Kyi needs more than just tributes
Bangkok Post - Opinion: Democracy icon turns 65, still riling 'the beast'
The Irrawaddy - Are Kachin Parties Being Excluded?
The Irrawaddy - The Junta's New Look
The Irrawaddy - Mon Leaders Refuse Meeting with Junta
Mizzima News - NLD top leaders take roadshow to grass roots
DVB News - Burmese courts ‘breaching domestic law’
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Suu Kyi gets Benazir Bhutto Shaheed Award for democracy
STAFF WRITER 12:48 HRS IST
Islamabad, Jun 22 (PTI) Myanmar's dissident political leader Aung San Suu Kyi has become the first recipient of the new Benazir Bhutto Shaheed Award for democracy instituted by the Pakistan People's Party in the memory of the slain former premier.
The award was instituted by the ruling PPP to mark Bhutto's birth anniversary, which was observed yesterday.
It pays tribute to Bhutto's life-long struggle for democracy, human rights, improvement of the status of women and social causes.
The recipients of the award in four categories ? democracy, human rights, philanthropy and women's empowerment ? were chosen by a committee chaired by PPP chief and President Asif Ali Zardari, an official statement said.
The statement said Suu Kyi was being honoured for challenging the dictatorship in Myanmar despite remaining in detention and house arrest for many years.
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Child mortality rates up in Africa despite UN push
By JASON STRAZIUSO, Associated Press Writer – 2 hrs 53 mins ago
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) – Ten African countries have halved their poverty rates over the last two decades, but child mortality rates have increased in six sub-Saharan nations, a report on the U.N.'s Millennium Development Goals released Tuesday found.
The countries that halved their poverty rates since 1990 include relatively populous countries such as Ethiopia and Egypt and post-conflict countries such as Angola, the report said. However, in Nigeria and Zimbabwe, the proportion of the population living in extreme poverty has risen.
Sub-Saharan Africa is the only region in the world registering an increase in the under age 5 mortality rate, which has risen in Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, Kenya and Zambia. Thirty-four of the world's 36 countries with child mortality rates above 100 per 1,000 births are in sub-Saharan Africa. The others are Afghanistan and Myanmar.
The Millennium Development Goals Report Card, which was sponsored in part by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, was released Tuesday to coincide with meetings of G-8 and G-20 countries in Canada beginning Friday.
The report said that the key message concerning the millennium goals is that progress is possible.
The conditions that help a country make progress include open trade policies, an openness to technology, consistent leadership committed to reducing poverty, and reform aimed at making the public sector accountable, the report said.
The Millennium Development Goals, adopted by 189 world leaders in 2000, include cutting extreme poverty by half, ensuring universal primary school education for all children, reducing child and maternal deaths, halting and reversing the HIV/AIDS pandemic, and cutting in half the proportion of people without access to safe water and basic sanitation, all by 2015.
Tuesday's report said that progress was mixed on the goal of halving the number of people who suffer from hunger. Just over half of countries have made progress in reducing undernourishment. Progress has varied greatly. In Ghana, hunger levels were cut 75 percent between 1990 and 2004. But in the Democratic Republic of Congo, hunger levels more than doubled to 76 percent during the same period.
Ahead of the World Cup earlier this month, the U.N. tried to underscore some of the vast differences between countries by noting that life expectancy in Nigeria is 48 years compared with 75 years in Argentina, and that women in Ivory Coast are eight times more likely to die in child birth than women in Brazil.
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The Washington Times - Shut-out activists in Burma seek Obama's help
Ask him to reject closed elections
By Ashish Kumar Sen
6:15 p.m., Monday, June 21, 2010
Pro-democracy activists in Burma want the Obama administration to reject the military junta's plans to hold elections from which they have been shut out this year.
In a series of e-mail interviews with The Washington Times, members of democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi's political party — National League for Democracy (NLD) — said the Obama administration must tell the junta it considers illegitimate a vote that excludes the pro-democracy opposition.
Following an extensive review of U.S. policy, the Obama administration has opted to use engagement and sanctions to deal with Burma's reclusive military leaders.
Win Tin, an adviser to Mrs. Suu Kyi and a founder of NLD, said from Burma that while the NLD welcomes direct engagement between the Obama administration and the junta, "I believe that a more assertive policy is needed."
Win Tin was a political prisoner in his country from 1989 to 2008.
"The military will not move toward a dialogue with the NLD and the [ethnic] nationalities unless the forthcoming elections are opposed by the international communities, " Win Tin said.
Burma's military rulers have enacted election laws that force parties to expel members with criminal records, including political prisoners such as Mrs. Suu Kyi, who has been kept under house arrest for 14 of the past 20 years. There are more than 2,100 political prisoners in Burma, according to Human Rights Watch.
Parties also are required to swear allegiance to the 2008 constitution, under which the military is guaranteed a quarter of the seats in the lower house of parliament and one-third in the upper house regardless of the outcome of the vote.
The laws forced NLD to choose to expel its senior leaders or disband. The party decided to boycott the vote, and the country's ruler, Senior Gen. Than Shwe, dissolved the NLD in May for refusing to register under the laws.
The government has yet to announce a date for the elections, but it is widely expected that they will be held Oct. 10 — 10/10/10 — given the junta's obsession with numbers.
Tin Oo, vice chairman of NLD, said from Burma that he is worried "the junta's plans to hold elections are a way of legitimizing the military rulers of Burma."
"I do believe that [President] Obama's administration should engage the junta with the strongest pressure," said Tin Oo, who was released by the junta in February after spending nearly seven years in prison and under house arrest.
Nyo Ohn Myint, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the NLD (Liberated Area), said from Thailand that the junta's first priority is "exclusion of potential opposition regardless of international condemnation. "
He accused the Obama administration of having "very little interest" in Burma. "Burma is too complicated, and no politicians in the U.S. want to take a lead," he added.
A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity in order to freely discuss developments in Burma, said the Obama administration is "extremely disappointed by the recently announced election laws in Burma that have effectively excluded important political parties, including the NLD, from the political process and prohibited Aung San Suu Kyi from participating. "
The official said while the Obama administration has initiated "a senior-level diplomatic dialogue with the Burmese authorities, U.S. sanctions remain in place." The sanctions continue to be an important element of U.S. policy and an "important source of leverage for influencing the regime's behavior," the official said.
Burmese opposition leaders also want the Obama administration to enforce financial and banking sanctions against the generals and call on the United Nations to investigate crimes against humanity committed by the regime.
Aung Din was one of the student leaders who organized a nationwide pro-democracy uprising in Burma in 1988. He was arrested by military intelligence in April 1989 and sentenced by a military court to four years in prison. After his release, he was terrorized by military intelligence and local authorities, who frequently knocked on his door in the middle of the night and scared off potential employers.
"I have had enough experiences about the brutalities of the military thugs who rule the country against the will of citizens of Burma throughout my life," said Aung Din, who is the executive director of the U.S. Campaign for Burma in Washington.
Aung Din said had the NLD participated in the election, it would have helped the regime in its attempt to gain legitimacy.
"To our disappointment, the international community is divided on Burma, and even some democratic countries in [the] European Union are inclined to support the election although they know that it is not free, fair, democratic or inclusive," he said. "The most important thing we want is strong U.S. leadership on Burma."
Mr. Myint said Mrs. Suu Kyi sees the U.S. "playing good cop and bad cop … she clearly says that if U.S. accepts the current political development, no one can have any achievements. "
"Washington should have a road map so that all parties can enjoy their future," Mr. Myint said.
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MYANMAR: Eyewitness recounts hours-long trudge through landslide sludge
BANGKOK, 22 June 2010 (IRIN) - A week ago, Liselott Agerlid, a political counsellor for the Swedish government in Bangkok, set off on a routine trip to Myanmar's Northern Rakhine State to visit projects co-financed by Sweden.
But when three days of monsoon rains caused the worst flooding and landslides in memory in the townships of Maungdaw and Buthidaung, home to thousands of stateless ethnic Rohingyas, Agerlid found herself stranded and with no choice but to hike back along the crumbling remnants of the area’s main roads and footpaths.
“We had been told there would be no point in waiting for better weather as landslides had completely destroyed the road and any repairs would take months,” Agerlid told IRIN after returning to Bangkok. “We set off on foot. The road - or what was left of it - was covered in mud, sometimes [knee-deep].”
The floods and landslides led to at least 63 deaths and affected thousands of families, according to the state-owned New Light of Myanmar newspaper.
“The road between Maungdaw and Buthidaung that we'd travelled with such ease two days earlier could on Wednesday [16 June] only be passed on foot,” she said.
Landslides left the route between Maungdaw and Buthidaung covered in rocks, soil and trees, forcing Agerlid and her colleagues to haul themselves up and down ravines, through mud and creeks, for five-and-a-half hours.
"The people we met and passed were extremely kind and helpful. I don't think I've ever taken so many strangers' hands in one day. Helping hands were reaching out everywhere, as locals constantly assisted us and each other in getting out of the deeper mud areas and climbing up slippery paths.
"When my colleagues lost their flip-flops in the mud, strangers would run up and dig them out. Nowhere on our walk did we witness people in distress or despair, adding to my growing perception of an extremely strong and resilient people.”
But while there were smiles along the way, on her journey she was struck by the devastation caused to the region.
“Many houses were completely crushed by earth and mud, others flooded with mud and water. Whole families had died, some people [were] severely injured. Thousands were forced to leave their homes. Water ponds were full of mud and some of the rice was [ruined].
“I tried to hold back tears and rage at the unfairness of it all as we spoke to villagers about how to rebuild their homes [and restore] access to food and water.”
Aid workers in the region have been mobilizing to get aid to those most affected. A boat carrying humanitarian assistance left from Yangon on 20 June, while another is slated to depart on 24 June, said Vincent Hubin, deputy head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
“The government is well in the driving seat, which is a good thing. They’ve shared a first list of needs, and they are refining it,” Hubin said by telephone from Yangon.
Government officials have said they are repairing the road between Maungdaw and Buthidaung, as well as providing logistical support for humanitarian agencies, he said.
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Scoop.co.nz - Aung San Suu Kyi Must be Released
Tuesday, 22 June 2010, 3:54 pm
Press Release: Amnesty International
Aucklanders demand the release of Aung San Suu Kyi and Myanmar’s prisoners of conscience
Aucklanders joined with Amnesty International, members of Myanmar’s multi-ethnic community and New Zealand MPs in lighting 2,200 candles demanding freedom in Myanmar on Saturday, at a vigil to commemorate the 65th birthday of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.
Myanmar’s pro-democracy icon and Nobel Peace Prize winner is one of more than 2,200 political prisoners, most of them prisoners of conscience, currently detained and prevented from participating in Myanmar’s first election in two decades, planned for later this year.
“Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s very existence challenges the Myanmar Government’s authority because she has inspired the people of Myanmar’s hope for freedom,” says Patrick Holmes, CEO of Amnesty International.
“In honour of her birthday, we have called for New Zealand’s support in shining a light on the more than 2,200 people languishing behind bars in Myanmar because of their political beliefs.”
In the lead up to Myanmar’s elections, Amnesty International has launched a campaign demanding the release of Myanmar’s Prisoners of Conscience, and the guarantee of the “Three Freedoms” associated with the elections – freedoms of expression, assembly and association for all people in Myanmar.
“The repression of political repression is ongoing in Myanmar and those who show any dissent are increasingly under attack.”
“We are calling on Myanmar’s neighbours in the Association of South East Asian Nations to push the authorities to ensure that the people of Myanmar will be able to freely express their opinions, gather peacefully, and participate openly in the political process,” says Holmes.
See more about Amnesty’s Myanmar ‘Freedom’ campaign at http://www.amnesty. org.nz/our- work/myanmar- freedom-campaign
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Edinburgh Evening News - City MSP backs project to end Burmese radio silence
Published Date: 22 June 2010
EDINBURGH Central Labour MSP Sarah Boyack has backed an Amnesty International campaign to buy radios for people in Burma ahead of the country's first election in two decades.
Amnesty hopes its "Break the Silence" campaign will collect enough donations to buy 4,000 radios, 60 walkie-talkie kits and six satellite kits, which it says would mean 50,000 more people could hear independent news broadcasts.
Ms Boyack, who has tabled a motion in the Scottish Parliament supporting the campaign, said: "
"Access to a radio could help a family or community learn about their rights and let them hear of the international solidarity that Burma's military regime works so hard to block."
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VOA News - Burmese Migrants in Thailand Facing Increased Scrutiny
Daniel Schearf | Bangkok 22 June 2010
A rights group in Thailand says a government crackdown on unregistered migrant workers, most of them from Burma, could encourage rights abuses.
The Human Rights and Development Foundation says Thai authorities are targeting for arrest migrant workers who failed to take part in a nationality verification program.
The HRDF says the government this month set up a special center to manage a crackdown on about 300,000 migrant workers who missed a February deadline to begin the verification process.
The rights group says hundreds of migrants have already been arrested and more arrests are expected.
Somchai Homlaor is a human rights lawyer and secretary general of the HRDF. He says the crackdown and high demand for cheap migrant labor will only encourage bribes and other criminal activities that the registration program was meant to prevent. He says the deadline to apply for nationality verification should be extended.
"The Thai government should open for the registering of these illegal migrant workers and allow them to become workers who work in Thailand legally, that they will not [be] subject to the exploitation and abuse of the power of the authority," he said.
The nationality verification program is part of the government's effort to give migrant workers legal protections and better access to public services.
There are more than two million migrant workers in Thailand, many of them illegally or without proper documentation. More than 80 percent are from Burma.
Their access to education and health care is limited and they are often taken advantage of by crooked employers, but have few legal remedies.
Only legal migrants were allowed to participate in the verification process. About 800,000 from Burma applied while an estimated one million unregistered were excluded and are subject to arrest and deportation.
Under the program, migrant workers are required to verify their nationality with their home government before they will be issued a work permit in Thailand.
But Somchai says Burma's military government does not recognize some ethnic groups, such as the Rohingya, a Muslim minority, as citizens of Burma.
"There are many, many workers from Burma that will not be able to pass their national verification process and they will not get the passport from Burmese authority and will not get the work permit from the Thai authority. This is the big question that what Thailand will do for this group of [what] becomes the stateless persons. We don't have a clear answer from the Thai government even though we raised this issue some time ago," he said.
Somchai says many migrants from Burma also refused to register for fear of persecution from Burmese authorities.
Others, he says, could not afford fees for brokers who help migrant workers through the application process or were not aware of the verification requirement.
Thailand depends on migrants as a cheap source of manual labor. Many work on construction sites and fishing boats, or as household servants.
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6/22/2010
Globe and Mail - Aung San Suu Kyi’s unhappy birthday
UN group condemns continuing ‘illegal’ detention of Myanmarese democracy leader
Irwin Cotler
From Tuesday's Globe and Mail
In an important – though largely unacknowledged decision – the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has declared unequivocally that the ongoing detention of Myanmarese democracy leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi is “in violation of international law,” and it has urged her immediate and unconditional release.
In particular, the group condemned the Myanmarese junta’s “illegal” imprisonment of Ms. Suu Kyi – an honorary citizen of Canada – on the grounds that she “was not informed of the reasons for her arrest; had no effective remedy to challenge her detention; no records were given to her; she was never informed of her rights; she has been denied communication with the [o]utside world; and is being detained because of her political views.”
The UN decision also noted that a lawyer for Ms. Suu Kyi lost his licence simply for daring to represent her, that her trial was conducted in private and that the media were denied the right to speak to defence witnesses, some of whom were banned from testifying while all of the prosecution witnesses, nearly five times as many, were heard.
The UN working group said it “deems it necessary to recall that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights guarantees the right not to be arbitrarily detained, as well as the rights to due process and a fair trial, and to freedom of opinion, expression and assembly. None of these have been complied with.”
It also held that Ms. Suu Kyi had not been judged by an independent and impartial tribunal, as enshrined in Article 10 of the rights declaration, reflecting the view of the Special Rapporteur on the Situation on Human Rights in Myanmar (formerly called Burma) that “the judiciary is not independent, and is under the direct control of the government and the military.”
It should be noted that this was the sixth time the working group had found the terms of her house arrest in violation of international law. In effect, every one of her periods of confinement has been ruled illegal.
It is important to recall – and this also goes largely unaddressed – that Ms. Suu Kyi’s political party, the National League for Democracy, and its allies won the 1990 elections in Myanmar with more than 80 per cent of the parliamentary seats. Yet since that election, in a foundational assault on democracy and international law, she has spent more than 14 of the past 20 years under house arrest.
She had been charged under the Law to Safeguard the State against the Danger of Those Desiring to Cause Subversive Acts, which, interestingly enough, had been annulled by the military government when it took power in 1988.
The most recent extension of her house arrest is due to American citizen John Yettaw’s illegal and unannounced entry on the property where she was being confined in May, 2009. Yet it was Ms. Suu Kyi who was charged with “aiding and abetting” Mr. Yettaw's illegal entry – an utter inversion of the facts and the law.
After the illegal intrusion, Ms. Suu Kyi was sentenced for violating the terms of her previous house arrest, which the UN working group had repeatedly found to be without any legal basis whatsoever. In the words of the group, “No charges can flow from the charges of the terms of this previous arrest order ... [itself illegal]. Further, even if this were not the case, no controlling body – acting in good faith – could find that her actions violated the terms of her house arrest.”
Myanmar’s Foreign Ministry stated it “is a country that always respects UN declarations and decisions as it is a UN member country.” If this is the case, Ms. Suu Kyi should be immediately released.
It is tragic to note that Aung San Suu Kyi turned 65 years old on Saturday. She spent yet another birthday unjustly confined while the military junta continues to violate international law and ignore the decisions of the UN working group with utter impunity.
Irwin Cotler is member of Parliament for Mount Royal and former minister of justice and attorney-general of Canada. He is a member of the board of advisers of Freedom Now, a non-governmental organization that represents Aung San Suu Kyi.
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Asia News Network - Suu Kyi needs more than just tributes
Editorial Desk, The Brunei Times
Publication Date: 22-06-2010
As Myanmar pro-democracy and opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi celebrated her 65th birthday last Saturday in incarceration in her dilapidated lakeside compound in Yangon, calls for her freedom reverberated across the world.
In a birthday message, US President Barack Obama hailed Suu Kyi's "determination, courage and personal sacrifice in working for human rights and democratic change".
"I once again call on the Burmese (Myanmar) government to release Aung San Suu Kyi and all political prisoners immediately and unconditionally and to allow them to build a more stable, prosperous Burma that respects the rights of all its citizens," he said.
Same messages were conveyed by other world leaders, including Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, who in a rare departure from the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations' (Asean) policy of non-interference in members' internal affairs, called on the Myanmar junta to embrace democracy and hoped that the electoral reforms adopted in Myanmar this year would involve all political players.
Despite overwhelming tributes and peace vigils over the world, the fact of the matter is that Suu Kyi has now spent 15 birthdays in detention over the past 20 years, mostly under house arrest. She is the world's only imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize winner.
This clearly highlights the failure of the international community to exert pressure on the military junta and extract something tangible.
The US policy of imposing unilateral trade and investment sanctions against Myanmar has proven to be a failure on all fronts as they (sanctions) have done nothing to improve the living conditions or human rights of the people of Myanmar. For its (Myanmar's) military it's business as usual. The suppression of basic human rights and freedom of speech continues unabated.
According to Amnesty International, pro-democracy activists and ethnic minority groups face systematic repression by the military authorities, including through arbitrary arrests, unfair trials, imprisonment, torture and extrajudicial executions. It says that since the start of the so-called Saffron Revolution in 2007 the number of political prisoners has doubled.
Amidst such conditions, the junta plans to hold historic elections for later this year -- the first in two decades. However, Suu Kyi's party, which overwhelmingly won the last election in 1990, will not be taking part.
Under new election laws, Suu Kyi and other political prisoners -- estimated at more than 2,000 -- are effectively barred from taking part in the polls.
The newly-established government-controll ed election panel has been given the power to prevent or annul voting in any part of the country for "security reasons". The international community, including Myanmar's influential neighbours such as China, India and Japan and the Asean countries has called for the forthcoming elections to be "free and fair".
The question is how free and fair elections can be held under the present regime which has barred a prominent political player from public life. Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) has rightly boycotted the polls because under such conditions, the polls will be anything but fair and free.
With each passing year one does not see any sign of flexibility in the attitude of the military junta and Suu Kyi continues to remain in detention.
If the international community wants to pay real tribute to the world's most famous prisoner of conscience it needs to do more than just praise her steely determination and willpower. Suu Kyi's dedication to non-violence in pressing for change has placed her along with Nelson Mandela.
The world needs to exert the same kind of pressure on the military junta which was applied against the apartheid regime of South Africa. Otherwise, Suu Kyi will again celebrate her next birthday in detention and we will witness customary condemnation of the junta and tributes paid to her fight for democracy in her country.
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Asia News Network - Dhaka readies for legal battle on maritime dispute with India-Myanmar
Rezaul Karim - The Daily Star
Publication Date: 22-06-2010
Bangladesh is preparing for a lengthy legal battle at an international tribunal to establish its claim over territorial waters in the Bay of Bengal, as talks for an amicable settlement of maritime boundary disputes with India and Myanmar do not seem promising.
Bangladesh's documents in the case regarding the dispute with Myanmar have been finalised, and will be filed at the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) by July 1. The deadline for filing of counter-documents by Myanmar is December 1.
Bangladesh is also scheduled to submit, by May 31, 2011, a memorandum to the Arbitral Tribunal of the United Nations, claiming its legitimate authority over territorial waters in connection with the dispute with India. India will submit a counter-memorandum by May 31, 2012.
The Bangladesh government already appointed a panel of foreign experts to prepare the documents for the legal battle at the UN, foreign ministry sources said.
Besides, a technical team of Bangladeshi experts, led by a retired navy official, is currently reviewing the legal provisions, while also negotiating with Myanmar.
Despite Bangladesh's move for seeking UN involvement, the country's Foreign Minister Dipu Moni said at a press conference on June 13, "We have kept open the option of amicable settlement through bilateral discussions. "
Bangladesh lodged objections with the UN, regarding the claims of India and Myanmar on October 8, 2009, as it has disputes with both countries in two areas -- ''natural prolongation of the continental shelf and the baseline".
ITLOS already nominated three of the five arbitrators of the tribunal instituted for settlement of the dispute with India. The three are Tullio Treves of Italy, Ivan Anthony Shearer of Australia, and Rudiger Wolfrum of Germany.
Bangladesh nominated Alan Vaughan Lowe, former professor of international law at the University of Oxford, and India proposed the name of P Sreenivasa Rao, former legal adviser to its external affairs ministry.
ITLOS, with its headquarters in Germany, is an independent judicial body established by the UN Convention on the Law of the Seas (UNCLOS) to adjudicate disputes arising out of interpretation and application of the convention.
India submitted its claim to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (CLCS), a UN body that also deals with the law of the seas.
A high official of the Bangladesh foreign ministry told The Daily Star that the UNCLOS wing of the ministry is working relentlessly, and coordinating with legal experts, to put forward the country's claims at ITLOS by July this year in the legal battle with Myanmar as well.
There will be 23 judges (21 from ITLOS and one each nominated by Bangladesh and Myanmar) during the hearing of Bangladesh's objection to Myanmar's claim.
ITLOS finds it necessary to authorise the presentation of the reply and rejoinder.
According to the UN body set schedule, Bangladesh is to reply to Myanmar's statement by March 2011, and Myanmar is to give its rejoinder by July 2011.
Bangladesh official sources said the hearing of their and Myanmar's claims will begin at the end of next year, and it might take two to two and a half years for the final judgment. Arbitration settlement with India might take five years, they added.
The officials said demarcation of maritime boundary is a lengthy battle because of its complicated nature and importance. "We are trying to engage all our resources and best efforts, no matter how many years it takes to establish our legitimate claims in the Bay."
The UNCLOS wing of the Bangladesh foreign ministry already sought a fund of Tk 80 crore for the legal battles, and sent a relevant letter to the finance ministry.
Meantime, Myanmar at the fifth round of technical level talks with Bangladesh, held in January in Chittagong, shifted from its rigid position for following the equidistance method, and agreed to resolve the dispute on the basis of "equity and equidistance of resources".
But at the sixth round of the talks Myanmar brought a new proposal for drawing a line near the "friendship line", which is an imaginary line down to St Martin's Island in the northeast part of the Bay.
The sixth round was held in Myanmar's new capital Nay Pyi Taw on March 17 and 18, where the Bangladesh expert-level delegation was led by Additional Foreign Secretary (UNCLOS) Rear Admiral (retd) Md Khurshed Alam.
Bangladesh officials said the sixth round of the talks did not progress much as Myanmar made the new proposal which apparently seems just a tactic for buying time, and for delaying a resolution through bilateral means.
Though the Bangladesh side agreed to consider Myanmar's new proposal, the officials said preparations are going on in full swing for the legal battle at ITLOS.
Talking to The Daily Star, Rear Admiral (retd) Khurshed Alam recently said the talks with Myanmar are still at the technical level.
About bilateral talks with both India and Myanmar, he said Bangladesh is ready to sit with any of its neighbours to resolve the disputes.
Speaking anonymously, another foreign ministry official said there has been no meeting with India for a long time, and it seems India wants to resolve the disputes through arbitration by the UN.
According to UNCLOS, any coastal country is entitled to have first 12 nautical miles from its baseline as territorial sea, 24 nautical miles as contiguous zone, and the next adjoining 200 nautical miles as its exclusive economic zone (EEZ).
Generally a state's EEZ extends to a distance of 200 nautical miles out from its coast. But in the cases of Bangladesh, India, and Myanmar the situation is difficult, as coasts of these countries follow a curve creating overlap of territories.
In 1974, Bangladesh became the first country in South Asia to have declared its jurisdictions on territorial waters, economic zones, and continental shelf by legislating the Territorial and Maritime Zones Act.
Since then there was a series of meetings with India and Myanmar, but negotiations remained inconclusive as all three countries took different approaches to demarcate their maritime boundaries.
Bangladesh favours a principle based on equity, which actually resulted in an area of overlap, while India and Myanmar favours line-based equidistance system to get bigger maritime areas.
Under a UN charter, the principle of "equity" takes into account a country's population, economic status and needs, GDP growth, and other human issues, while the "equidistance" system marks the boundary through geometric calculations.
According to UNCLOS, any such dispute should be resolved on the basis of equity, and in light of relevant circumstances. And that makes Bangladesh's demand for equity based demarcation the best choice.
The convention also says the states will first try to settle disputes through negotiations, and if the negotiations fail, the principle of equity will apply -- implying that justice and fairness must be the hallmark of settlement.
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BURMA
Bangkok Post - Opinion: Democracy icon turns 65, still riling 'the beast'
Published: 22/06/2010 at 12:00 AM
Newspaper section: News
It was not a happy birthday.
Why? Because the battle between the state of Burma and Aung San Suu Kyi goes on. On June 19, Suu Kyi celebrated her 65th birthday alone, except for two caretakers who share her lakeside home in Rangoon, where she has celebrated solo birthdays for 15 of the past 21 years in which she has been under house arrest.
This is a beauty versus the beast battle, borrowing the words of British historian and author Timothy Garton Ash, who wrote a popular story, Beauty and the Beast in Burma.
Daw Suu Kyi has been the victim of character assassination numerous times in the past 20 years. Physically, she was attacked by the ruling generals' thugs when her car was mobbed in 1996 in Rangoon and again, more publicly, when her motorcade was ambushed in Depayin in upper Burma in 2003. She is regularly attacked by the regime's media and junta-backed groups like the Union Solidarity and Development Association.
Although the regime regularly creates new schemes and plots to smear her image, she has survived and never lost the support of the people. In fact, Mrs Suu Kyi and Burmese politics have been like the two faces of a coin ever since she entered the country's political arena during the nationwide pro-democracy uprising in 1988. But the question is, for how much longer will she be under house arrest and ignored by the regime's leaders?
The problem between Mrs Suu Kyi and the junta is complicated. Since 1988, it's really come down to the relationship between three players: the military government and Mrs Suu Kyi, as the opposition leader, with the international community as moderator.
Let's look at the two key players - Mrs Suu Kyi and the regime, whose policies and style can be compared and contrasted in four areas.
First, Suu Kyi:
Ideology: liberal Western democracy; Ethics: plain honesty practised as political integrity;Force: National League for Democracy, winner of the 1990 elections, now disbanded; Methodology: dialogue (through non-violence) .
Now, the junta:
Ideology: disciplined democracy (opposed to liberal Western democracy); Ethics: cunning, manipulation and oppression; Force: more than 400,000 soldiers; Methodology: "democracy road map" with seven steps (the upcoming election being step five).
So far, Mrs Suu Kyi has been unsuccessful in persuading the generals to join her in reconciliation talks, a point stressed over and over again by members of the international community.
Everyone, from the United States to neighbouring countries to the UN, has been trying to bring Mrs Suu Kyi and the generals to the table.
In short, all efforts have failed.
Some critics say that the opposition movement has failed because of Mrs Suu Kyi's inflexibility and a lack of political strategy. A decade ago, British author Timothy Garton Ash, in his story, compared Mrs Suu Kyi with Vaclav Havel, another Nobel Peace prize-winner, who nominated Suu Kyi for the same prize. Mr Ash recalled: "Talking to him in the 1980s, I always had a strong sense of a political strategy. I did not have this impression with her. She has a firm grasp of which political systems Burma needs; a much less clear idea of how to achieve it."
On a fair and level playing field, Mrs Suu Kyi and the opposition would clearly come out winners. Mrs Suu Kyi still commands wide respect from the majority of the Burmese people. In Burma, there are not many leaders who have won the hearts of the people. But among them are Mrs Suu Kyi's father, Aung San, who won independence from the British in 1948, and Mrs Suu Kyi herself, the leader of what she calls "Burma's second struggle for independence" .
However, on March 29, the NLD, following Mrs Suu Kyi's decision, voted not to register as a political party to contest the junta's upcoming election this year. In reality, honesty and political integrity cannot defeat the cunning, manipulation and oppression of the generals in Burma today. Recognising its failure, the NLD officially apologised in a public letter for its "unsuccessful struggle for democracy" over a 20-year period.
In spite of the party's failure, Mrs Suu Kyi is still the person the generals fear most. The former prime minister of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew, wrote in his book, From Third World to First: "They [the generals] could not lock her up forever; she would be a continuing embarrassment to their government."
That's true. But for now, it's her 65th birthday, and she's still locked up and still haunting the generals' every move. She has the power of political integrity, dedication and righteousness. But that isn't enough to defeat the beast.
Kyaw Zwa Moe is managing editor of The Irrawaddy magazine based in Chiang Mai.
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The Irrawaddy - Are Kachin Parties Being Excluded?
By SAW YAN NAING - Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Months after applying for party registration, ethnic Kachin political parties say they have still not received permission from Burma's election commission to contest this year's election, leading some to believe that the Kachin will be excluded from the country's first polls in two decades.
Speaking with The Irrawaddy on Tuesday, Tu Raw, secretary of the Kachin State Progressive Party (KSPP), said: “We feel upset. We feel that we don't get equal rights. There is no equality.”
He said that the party applied for registration more than two months ago, before other parties, including other ethnic parties, that have already been granted permission to contest the election.
So far, 33 parties, including ethnic Karen, Mon, Palaung and Pa-O parties, have been allowed to register, out of 36 that applied, according to the state-run The New Light of Myanmar newspaper.
Tu Raw said that even if the KSPP is belatedly allowed to register, it would adversely affect the party's ability to campaign, putting it at a disadvantage to other parties.
On June 16, a KSPP delegation went to Naypyidaw to ask the election commission to prioritize the party's application for registration after confirming that permission had not yet been granted. However, the election commission simply told the delegation that it had not yet reached a decision on the party's registration request.
Some observers in Kachin State said the election commission would probably not grant the KSPP or other Kachin parties permission to contest the election until shortly before it was to take place, in order to prevent them from carrying out campaign-related activities.
Kachin sources also claimed that the Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA), a junta-backed civic organization, has been actively campaigning in Kachin State on behalf of the newly formed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), led by Burmese Prime Minister Thein Sein, which intends to contest the election.
Lapai Naw Din, editor of the Thailand-based Kachin News Group, said the Burmese regime is worried that the KSPP would win major constituencies in Kachin State if the party had enough time to campaign.
Many sources in Kachin State also said the KSPP would enjoy strong support among the Kachin people, whose only other options are parties dominated by ethnic Burmans.
Some observers said, however, that the delay in granting permission to the KSPP may be due to suspicions that the party is in contact with the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO), a cease-fire group that refused to transform its troops into a border guard force.
The KSPP is led by Tu Ja, the former vice chairman of the KIO. He formed the KSPP in March 2009 and officially unveiled the party in July. The party applied for registration in April.
Awng Wa, a Kachin observer on the Sino-Burmese border, said that the Burmese regime may be reluctant to allow NSPP to contest the election because of its connections to the KIO.
In addition to the KSPP, there are two other Kachin-led parties—the United Democracy Party (Kachin State) (UDPKS) and the Northern Shan State Progressive Party. So far, none of these parties have been given permission to run in the election.
Leaders of the UDPKS are former members of New Democratic Army-Kachin (NDA-K) who resigned from the organization after it decided to transform its troops into a border guard force.
Tu Raw denied that his party had any ties to the KIO. He added that KSPP party leaders have already sent all required documents to the election commission, including resignation letters from the KIO.
“If the election commission links us to the KIO, it is because they don't want to grant permission to our party,” he said. “Or perhaps they are just trying to make trouble for us by giving us insufficient time to prepare for the election.”
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The Irrawaddy - The Junta's New Look
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Is this photo a sneak preview of what civilian rule in Burma will look like?
While many observers predict that the end of military rule will bring no more than superficial change, they may not have realized just how cosmetic it will be.
After years of wearing the same old uniforms, it seems that Prime Minister Thein Sein and his entourage of government ministers couldn't wait to make a statement that would really tell the world that Burma is about to break out of the straitjacket of military rule.
The photo shows Thein Sein et al welcoming visiting Laotian Prime Minister Bouasone Bouphavanh (wearing a business suit) at a military compound in Naypyidaw on Monday.
From head to toe, they are dressed in nothing but the best in traditional Burmese finery: gaungbaung headdresses, immaculately white taikpon jackets, brightly colored silk longgyi and velvet sandals normally reserved for Buddhist novitiation ceremonies.
Along with Thein Sein, 26 other generals resigned from the military in April to take part in this year's election as political candidates for the pro-junta Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), including many who appear in this photograph.
The USDP has been officially registered by Burma's election commission and currently faces criticism from other political parties that its inclusion of government ministers violates election laws.
Their ostentatious fashion statement notwithstanding, it is interesting to note that the ministers who appear in this photograph are standing stiffly at attention—more like good soldiers than ministers greeting a foreign dignitary.
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The Irrawaddy - Mon Leaders Refuse Meeting with Junta
By LAWI WENG - Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Leaders of the New Mon State Party (NMSP), the Mon armed ceasefire group in southern Burma, have rejected a request by Lt-Gen Ye Myint, the regime's chief of Military Affairs Security, to meet and discuss the Border Guard Force (BGF) plan, according to sources close to the NMSP.
Ye Myint issued a request on June 9 for NMSP party leaders to meet him at the Southeast Region Command in Moulmein, capital of Mon State. But at their executive committee meeting held last week at their jungle headquarters near Ye Township, the NMSP leaders decided to reject the request—marking the first time they have refused a meeting with Ye Myint, according to NMSP members.
“The senior party leaders will not meet Ye Myint because they know he will talk about the same issue again—the BGF,” a member of the NMSP told The Irrawaddy on Tuesday, the NMSP leaders, including executive committee and central committee members, met with Ye Myint at the Southeast Region Command several times since April 2009, when the junta first proposed the BGF. The last meeting was on April 7, when Ye Myint admonished the NMSP three times during the 45 minute session for failing to join the BGF.
“They [NMSP leaders] say they don't want to hear him [Ye Myint] repeat these words again at another meeting,” said the source.
The Burmese military junta has been pressuring armed ethnic ceasefire groups in Burma to transform into members of the BGF, saying that all such groups should transform their troops before the election this year. However, many of the groups have rejected the junta's request.
The War Office in Naypyidaw has instructed the battalion bases in Kyar Inn Seik Gyi Township and Three Pagodas Pass, both in Karen State, to put military pressure on the NMSP if the party leaders fail to attend the requested meeting with Ye Myint, according to a military source.
The source said that Napyidaw ordered all battalion commanders in these areas to meet at their base in the village of Anan Kwin, Kyar Inn Seik Gyi Township, to discuss how to prepare for war with the NMSP.
Tension has increased between the NMSP and the military regime since the NMSP rejected the BGF plan in April. The junta has threatened to use force, and the NMSP no longer trusts the generals.
The NMSP has decreased their presence at party offices in Mon State and Rangoon, ordering all party officials to return to the NMSP jungle headquarters and prepare to go to war if necessary. The party leaders and officials will no longer travel to inside Mon State for fear of arrest by the Burmese authorities.
The NMSP leaders decided at their meeting last week to appoint one central committee member to stay at a liaison office in Moulmein in the future. This central committee member will be the only person made available to meet junta officials when the military regime requests talks in the future.
June 29 marks the 15 year anniversary of the ceasefire agreement between the military junta and the NMSP. Some NMSP leaders believe the ceasefire agreement will be revoked if the junta uses force against them.
The NMSP leaders say they will continue their armed struggle until the Mon people obtain their freedom.
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NLD top leaders take roadshow to grass roots
Tuesday, 22 June 2010 16:56 Myint Maung
New Delhi (Mizzima) – Leaders of the National League for Democracy are conducting a roadshow of states and divisions to meet grass-roots members, explain policies and listen to the challenges they are facing since the party was declared illegal and disbanded by the ruling military junta early last month after deciding against registering under “unjust” electoral laws, a senior leader said.
The tour comes at the request of NLD general secretary Aung San Suu Kyi, central executive committee member Ohn Kyaing said.
From June 12, NLD central executive committee members Ohn Kyaing and Kyi Win have been on a tour set to take in Moegyoke, Thapatekyin, Mattaya, Patheingyi, Meiktila, Myinchan, Kyaukpadaung, Nyaung Oo in Mandalay Division and Pakokku in Magway Division. Similarly, central executive committee members Dr Win Tin and Han Tha Myint, and Bahan Township NLD chairman Aung Myint, have been touring Karen State since Saturday, Suu Kyi’s 65th birthday.
“We will not hold political meetings, issue political statements or direct the grass roots of the party. But we do need to find out about conditions on the ground,” Ohn Kyaing told Mizzima. “Aung San Suu Kyi told us to meet our political colleagues and listen to their difficulties.”
Suu Kyi issued the directive to listen to grass-roots voices when she met her lawyer Nyan Win. At the meeting, she asked the leaders to carry the message to township leaders that although the NLD had been barred from political activities, the group should continue working for national reconciliation, human rights and democracy as a leading political opposition group.
In the states and divisions visited so far during the NLD tours, the senior party executives explained to grass-roots party members the nature of the junta’s one-sided and unjust electoral laws and the party’s decision against re-registering with the junta’s Union Election Commission (UEC). Township members said they supported the party’s decisions and that they would follow unanimously the leadership of Suu Kyi and party policy, the party sources said.
Ohn Kyaing said: “Aung San Suu Kyi, party’s vice-chairman Tin Oo and CEC member Win Tin told us to carry out non-profit social services under a political agenda.”
CEC members met grass-roots party leaders Thein Tan and Dr. Zaw Myint Maung, NLD leaders in Mandalay Division. NLD members Myo Naing and Maung Maung Than also attended. Ohn Kyaing said the team would visit townships in Magway including Pakkoku after Mandalay.
A group led by Win Tin has since Saturday visited Hlaingbwe and Phaan in Karen State. He called in on the party grass roots in Mandalay, Pegu (Bago) and Rangoon Divisions early this year.
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DVB News - Burmese courts ‘breaching domestic law’
By KHIN HNIN HTET
Published: 22 June 2010
Denial of legal aid and detention without charge for the man arrested in connection to a series of grenade attacks in Rangoon in April is in violation of Burmese domestic law, his lawyer has said.
Phyo Wei Aung was initially held in Rangoon’s Insein prison on a 14-day remand after being arrested on 23 April, although the remand appears to have been extended. Police claim he was behind the bombings on 15 April that left nine dead and hundreds injured, although no charges have been brought.
His lawyer told DVB that he tried to meet with his client on 21 June but was denied access. Kyaw Ho is apparently yet be given approval by the government’s intelligence branch to speak with Phyo Wei Aung, but said the restriction breaches Burmese domestic law. It is the fourth time he has requested permission to see his client.
“There was no reason given for not allowing the meeting,” he said. “His detention is also not in accordance with the law which states that a person cannot be detained for more than 30 days [without charge], even if facing a charge that can be penalised by the death sentence.”
The lawyer said that his client is likely to be brought before the court on 28 June when his remand expires. Phyo Wei Aung is accused by the government of being a member of the Vigorous Burmese Student Warriors, stormed the Burmese embassy in Bangkok in 1999 and took 38 hostages.
Htay Htay, wife of Phyo Wei Aung, said he has been denied medical assistance and not allowed to exercise since his arrest. Furthermore, prison authorities have allegedly ignored his requests to see a doctor.
She said the prison also refused to hand him a copy of the state-run Myanmar Ahlin newspaper issue which carried a report on Burma police chief Khin Yi’s press conference on the bombing.
“[Phyo Wei Aung] said he wanted to read about the conference in the newspaper so I sent it [to the prison] about three weeks ago, but he didn’t receive it. So I took another copy [on Monday] and was told that newspapers will not be allowed,” she said.
“I complained that the newspaper was a legally published material but [the prison officials] said the government ones are not allowed.”
Police said that three grenades had been thrown into the crowds who were celebrating the annual water festival close to Rangoon’s Kandawgyi lake. Another device, made with a beer can filled with explosive powder and attached by detonation wire to a mobile telephone, failed to explode.
Meanwhile, a father and son arrested after photographing the aftermath of the grenade attacks are also being held in Insein prison and are yet to be convicted of any offense.
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