News & Articles on Burma

Sunday, 30 October 2011
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iNewp Media Press
The First Crack In The New Government? Myanmar Police Stops Protest
Around 60 demonstrators staged a peaceful protest by having a sit-in right outside a government building in Myanmar's biggest and former capital city of Yangon to protest against evictions which have confiscated their land and their sole way of making a living as farmers. A legal representatives of the group, Pho Phyu, stated that "parliament did not give help, so we decided to take to the street." Pho Phyu added that the Myanmar authorities have wreaked havoc by seizing around 10,000 acres of land owned by more than 1,000 farmers.

The agricultural sector of Myanmar was once the #1 supplier of rice but the government's frequent practice of evictions and other policies have reduced the output and the farmers' economic and political abilities.

Protests are incredibly rare in Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, which has been brutally ruled by a military junta for the past five decades which encompassed hushed mass murders and genocides up until a controversial election in 2010 elected a new government run by civilians.

This new government has promised economic and political reforms for the country. The newly elected president Thein Sein held a dialogue with Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel laureate and the symbol and leader of Myanmar's democracy movement.

Then the government released around 200 political prisoners in response to the international community's consideration of lifting sanctions if the government of Myanmar would act on their promise of reforms and changes in policy.

The military junta of course still holds the real power as many, including president Thein Sein, simply resigned right before the elections so they could run for office as civilians.

Some of their victories are further reinforced by the fact that roughly one-third of the seats in parliament are reserved for military officials.

Seven people who participated in the peaceful protest were charged with "unlawful assembly" and refusing to "comply with the police".

At worst, the seven people can face up to one year in prison. http://inewp.com/?p=9504
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Aung San Suu Kyi meets with Myanmar gov't minister as hopes high for political breakthrough
By Associated Press, Updated: Sunday, October 30, 7:13 PM

YANGON, Myanmar --- Myanmar democracy movement leader Aung San Suu Kyi has met with a Cabinet minister to discuss issues whose resolution could lead to a breakthrough in the country's long-running political deadlock.

Labor Minister Aung Kyi read a joint statement after meeting Suu Kyi on Sunday that said the two had discussed an amnesty, peace talks with ethnic armed groups and economic and financial matters. Some 200 of an estimated 2,000 political prisoners were released on Oct. 11 under an amnesty for 6,300 convicts.

An elected but military-backed government took power in March after decades of repressive army rule and President Thein Sein has moved to liberalize the political atmosphere.

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia-pacific/aung-san-suu-kyi-meets-with-myanmar-govt-minister-as-hopes-high-for-political-breakthrough/2011/10/30/gIQAORuPVM_story.html
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Myanmar gov't official, Aung San Suu Kyi meet for 4th round of talks
English.news.cn 2011-10-30 17:15:31

YANGON, Oct. 30 (Xinhua) -- Myanmar Minister of Labor U Aung Kyi and noted political figure Aung San Suu Kyi met for the fourth round of talks at the Sein Lei Kan Tha State Guest House here on Sunday for nearly an hour.

They had discussions on the country's requirements, rights of free trade and free flow of monetary for national economic development, U Aung Kyi told the press after the talks.

They also discussed the undertakings of the state on ethnic armed groups for getting eternal peace as well as amnesty to more prisoners, U Aung Kyi said, adding that they agreed to continue the dialogue based on the previous talks.

U Aung Kyi and Aung San Suu Kyi last met for the third time on Sept. 30.

Meanwhile, Myanmar President U Thein Sein had also met Aung San Suu Kyi in Nay Pyi Taw for the first ever time on Aug. 19 having discussions on prospect of cooperation for the common interest of the nation and the people, while putting aside the disagreements as claimed then.

Myanmar released 6,359 prisoners on Oct. 12 under the president 's amnesty order, the second in a year after the new government took office on March 30 this year. The first release in May covered 14,758 prisoners nationwide.
Editor: Tang Danlu http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/world/2011-10/30/c_131220386.htm
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Suu Kyi holds talks with Myanmar gov't minister
(October 30th, 2011 @ 5:12am)

YANGON, Myanmar (AP) - Myanmar democracy movement leader Aung San Suu Kyi has met with a Cabinet minister to discuss issues whose resolution could lead to a breakthrough in the country's long-running political deadlock.

Labor Minister Aung Kyi read a joint statement after meeting Suu Kyi on Sunday that said the two had discussed an amnesty, peace talks with ethnic armed groups and economic and financial matters. Some 200 of an estimated 2,000 political prisoners were released on Oct. 11 under an amnesty for 6,300 convicts.

An elected but military-backed government took power in March after decades of repressive army rule and President Thein Sein has moved to liberalize the political atmosphere.

(Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.) http://www.620ktar.com/category/world-news-articles/20110812/Myanmar-government-urges-Suu-Kyi-to-register-party/
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Indonesian FM in Myanmar to weigh ASEAN bid
(AFP) -- 20 hours ago

YANGON --- Indonesia's foreign minister held talks with Myanmar's leaders on Saturday during a visit to consider the military-dominated nation's bid to chair the ASEAN regional bloc.

Marty Natalegawa -- whose country currently holds the rotating chair of the 10-nation grouping -- met President Thein Sein in Naypyidaw and was due to return to Yangon afterwards for talks with democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

Myanmar, which now has a nominally civilian leadership dominated by former generals, wants to take the chair of the 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations in 2014, when communist Laos was due to take the job.

The country also known as Burma relinquished the chance to head the bloc five years ago due to international pressure for democratic reforms.

"It was already our turn for the ASEAN chair in 2006. But we allowed others to take our turn as we were not ready for it at that time," a senior Myanmar government official who did not want to be named told AFP.

"I don't understand why there is so much criticism this year as we will take back our turn for the ASEAN chair. We're ready for it now."

Hopes of political change in Myanmar have increased recently, with efforts by the new government to reach out to opponents including Suu Kyi and the suspension of construction of an unpopular Chinese-backed mega dam.

Myanmar has been a source of embarrassment for ASEAN's more democratic states, overshadowing other problem members such as communist Vietnam and Laos, which have significant human rights issues of their own.

ASEAN also includes Brunei, Cambodia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand.

As chair of ASEAN, Myanmar would be required to speak on behalf of the bloc and host scores of meetings including the East Asia Summit which includes the United States.

The new US special envoy on Myanmar, Derek Mitchell, last week made his second trip in as many months to the long-isolated nation as part of an engagement policy launched by President Barack Obama's administration. http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5isrTdFk67GU_oSOEP3LnFrQCmcug?docId=CNG.8afe33535318c24070f41e6e1d325a2b.3a1
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Myanmar reassures China after dam blocked, sailors killed
BEIJING | Sun Oct 30, 2011 1:02am EDT

Oct 30 (Reuters) - A senior Myanmar government minister assured China on Sunday of his country's friendship and cooperation with Beijing, state news agency Xinhua reported, ties having been strained by the suspending of a dam project and the killings of Chinese sailors.

Last month, Myanmar's new civilian President Thein Sein suspended the $3.6 billion Myitsone dam being built and financed by Chinese companies in northern Myanmar after weeks of public outrage over the project in the country also known as Burma.

China has called for talks to resolve the matter. But it has also been angered by an Oct. 5 attack on the Mekong River near the Thai-Myanmar border in which 13 Chinese sailors were killed.

Myanmar Interior Minister Ko Ko, meeting China's Public Security Minister Meng Jianzhu in Beijing to discuss the Mekong killings, said his country would remain a good neighbour.

"The Myanmar government pays great attention to its friendly cooperation relationship with China," Xinhua paraphrased him as saying.

"Myanmar is willing to work hard with China on security cooperation on the Mekong River, take effective measures to crack down on cross-border criminal activities which harm the interests of countries on the river, and maintain international navigation safety on the river."

Thai police said on Sunday that nine Thai soldiers had turned themselves in over the killing of the Chinese sailors, which happened in the "Golden Triangle", where the borders of Myanmar, Thailand and Laos meet, a region notorious for drug smuggling.

China had demanded that Thailand, Laos and Cambodia ensure the safety of Chinese sailors on the river.

The deaths, as well as the suspension of the dam project, have underscored Chinese worries about both instability in Myanmar and how once close relations might change under the former British colony's new civilian government.

The shelving of the dam, agreed to by Myanmar's then military rulers in 2006, was seen as an unprecedented challenge to China's extensive economic interests in Myanmar, long shunned by the West for its poor human rights record.

In recent years, Myanmar's leaders have embraced investment from China as a market for its energy-related resources and to counterbalance the impact of Western sanctions.

While China and Myanmar have close economic and political ties, including the building of oil and gas pipelines into southwestern China, there are also deep mutual suspicions. (Reporting by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Paul Tait) http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/30/china-myanmar-idUSL4E7LU01V20111030?rpc=401&feedType=RSS&feedName=rbssEnergyNews&rpc=401
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Myanmar has not finished with amnesty

Oct 30, 2011, 10:25 GMT

Yangon - Myanmar's pro-military government has not completed freeing political prisoners as part of the partial amnesty granted earlier this month, an official said Sunday.

'We will not stop, and also not jump with both legs,' Labour Minister Aung Gyi said after talks with opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi in Yangon.

On October 12, Myanmar's new government freed some 7,500 prison inmates, including more than 200 known political prisoners.

The partial amnesty has fallen short of the expectations of many observers.

The release of all political prisoners, estimated at more than 2,000, is one of the pre-requisites for Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) to cooperate with the new government that came to power after the November 7 general election.

Another was the amendment of the party registration law, which was approved by parliament a few weeks ago.

Suu Kyi said the NLD would meet to decide whether it would re-register as a political party once the amended law is promulgated.

The NLD boycotted the election on the grounds that a party registration decree, enacted by the previous junta, would have forced the opposition party to drop Suu Kyi from their ranks as it barred people serving prison terms from being members of political parties.

Suu Kyi, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991, has headed the NLD since it was founded in 1989. She has spent 15 of the past 21 years under house detention.

Her last jail term ended on November 13, six days after the general election that brought the pro-military government to power.

'Re-registration of party will depend on the law,' Suu Kyi told reporters after meeting with Aung Kyi, the government's liaison officer with the opposition.

If the NLD re-registered as a political party it could contest the planned December by-election.

NLD sources have said that Suu Kyi is seriously considering contesting the by-election herself.

http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/asiapacific/news/article_1672022.php/Myanmar-has-not-finished-with-amnesty
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editorial
Migrant workers must be treated with compassion
The Nation October 30, 2011 8:00 am
Burmese and others caught in flood should get free passage, not be fined

Thailand is going through a tough time at present, with millions hit hard by dramatic flooding. This is a national crisis that will cost the country billions. Amid this drama, there have been some magnificent reactions from volunteers, companies, as well as troops, government and city officials who have worked tirelessly for the public good. There have also been less than laudable responses, with some people taking advantage of others caught in the confusion and traumatic events that have played out in recent days. When disasters of this magnitude occur it is often people at the lowest levels who are worst affected. Here, that usually means the vast "underclass" of migrant workers. As well as millions of Thai victims there were many hundreds of thousands of Burmese, Lao and Cambodian workers, both registered and unregistered, who suddenly lost jobs. Many also found themselves with nowhere to stay. In some cases this was because emergency shelters had a policy of only accepting Thais. For some reason, state officials were so preoccupied with other things, they appear to have had no plan on how to help the "little people" caught in this crisis. In recent days, however, senior government ministers have been scrambling to rectify this oversight.

When news emerged last weekend that tens of thousands of Burmese were heading home - forced to travel back to Tak province and get a boat at Mae Sot over to the unofficial crossing in Myawaddy overseen by the DKBA, a rebel group allied with the junta - the Thai government suddenly announced that Burmese workers could take refuge at a temple in Nakhon Pathom. Within a day there were 500 people at Wat Rai Khing, and, allegedly no room for any more. Meanwhile, ordinary Burmese were being arrested by Thai police for being outside the province where they worked. Sometimes it was because they had no passports - still notoriously hard to get in their homeland, particularly for ethnic minorities in eastern Burma. For some, it was because employers kept their passports - a practice that is illegal but very common. In other cases, police in Bang Sue were openly seeking bribes - Bt4,000 to get each person back. On Friday, six "legal" migrants accused police at Victory Monument of stealing their money. This is the ugly side of Thailand, which needs to be stamped out aggressively. The new police chief should take note.

But let's not forget, the miserable treatment Burmese workers usually endure in Thailand, stems largely from their own government, which, until the last year or so, virtually took no interest whatsoever in the well-being of their own people. The supposedly civilian regime in Naypyidaw has yet to open the border crossing at Mae Sot - shut more than a year ago in the lead-up to the 2010 election. This has meant that all Burmese workers who returned to Myawaddy (up until at least a day ago) had to pay a bribe to the DKBA to return to their homeland.

This messy situation has led to appeals by groups such as the Mekong Migration Network (MMN) for the Thai government to allow migrant workers unimpeded access to essential services. They should also issue a directive to allow migrants to leave Thailand temporarily and return after the floods have receded without being penalised. "Thailand's computerised register of migrant workers can be used to reactivate their permits and visas on return," MMN's Jackie Pollock said. That would prevent workers being fleeced for making a journey that is partly humanitarian in nature and largely out of their control.

Groups such as MAP Foundation in Chiang Mai have been getting constant calls from migrants in areas such as Pathum Thani who had no power, food or drinking water. "Feeling excluded from relief efforts and isolated from any assistance", many just wanted to get home as quick as possible, Ms Pollock said. But those with only a temporary ID card (Tor Ror 38/1) or a migrant workers card risked losing legal status in Thailand by crossing back to their country of origin. "Migrants with temporary passports are allowed to leave but need to make a re-entry visa somewhere before they leave." More than 100,000 Burmese have reportedly done this.

The good news is the new Burmese administration is doing more for their people. Officials at their embassy in Bangkok have reportedly moved to set up systems so that migrants crossing back into Burma at Mae Sot/ Myawaddy are not extorted by the DKBA. Still, groups are having a tough time getting supplies to those in need. "Army trucks are difficult to get," activist Andy Hall said. There was also a shortage of food and volunteers were "encountering electric shock, crocodiles and chemicals", he said.

For Thais, who have copped a bucketing both physically and literally, the message is simply: Don't succumb to the temptation to extort and brutalise those who are weak and unable to defend themselves. These may be testing times, but Bangkokians have got through these tests before and will do so again. In crises such as these, police and state officials should try to act with utmost compassion and patience. A graceful approach will encourage workers to return and help speed the recovery we all desperately want. http://www.nationmultimedia.com/opinion/Migrant-workers-must-be-treated-with-compassion-30168833.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Nationmultimediacom-Opinion+%28NationMultimedia.com+-+Opinion%29
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Indonesia Hints at Support for Burma Asean Chair
October 30, 2011

Rangoon. Indonesia's foreign minister welcomed signs of political reform in Burma during a visit aimed at assessing the military-dominated nation's bid to chair the Asean regional bloc.

"I get the impression that there are changes in Myanmar [Burma] and they are significant," Marty Natalegawa, whose country currently holds the rotating chair of the 10-nation grouping, told reporters late on Saturday.

"The full assessment I shall make upon my return to Jakarta and upon sharing my thoughts with my other ASEAN foreign minister colleagues," he added.

Natalegawa held a series of meetings with top government officials including Myanmar President Thein Sein, as well as pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

Suu Kyi indicated after the meeting that she might support Myanmar's ASEAN bid if there were further moves towards democratic reform in the authoritarian state.

"I told him [Natalegawa] that I hope to get an answer that can give happiness for all Myanmar nationals as well as people in Asean," she said. "He explained to me how they are working on it."

The Nobel Laureate, released from house arrest in November shortly after an election won by the military's political proxies, has welcomed signs of political change but called for the release of all dissidents in prison.

Burma, which now has a nominally civilian leadership dominated by former generals, wants to take the chair of the 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations in 2014, when communist Laos was due to take the job.

The country relinquished the chance to head the bloc five years ago due to international pressure for democratic reforms.

"It was already our turn for the Asean chair in 2006. But we allowed others to take our turn as we were not ready for it at that time," a senior Burmese government official who did not want to be named said.

"I don't understand why there is so much criticism this year as we will take back our turn for the Asean chair. We're ready for it now."

Burma's new government has reached out to political opponents in recent weeks, holding a series of meetings with Suu Kyi and suspending construction of an unpopular Chinese-backed mega dam.

The nation has been a source of embarrassment for Asean's more democratic states, overshadowing other problem members such as communist Vietnam and Laos, which have significant human rights issues of their own.

Asean also includes Brunei, Cambodia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand.

Agence France-Presse http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/home/indonesia-hints-at-support-for-burma-asean-chair/475028
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The Lady and the Peacock: The Life of Aung San Suu Kyi, By Peter Popham
Aung San Suu Kyi and Burma's Struggle for Democracy, By Bertil Lintner
Sunday, 30 October 2011
Seoul.go.kr

When the New Statesman asked readers to nominate "heroes of our time" in 2006, a woman who has never held elected office and who has spent most of the past 22 years under house arrest, with no means of communication for much of that time, topped the list.

Indeed, Aung San Suu Kyi received three times as many nominations as the next person on the list, Nelson Mandela. This slight, grave figure who became the embodiment of opposition to Burma's military dictatorship at the age of 43 has certainly captured the world's attention. That she has held that attention is testified to by the approaching release of Luc Besson's biopic, The Lady, and the publication of two new biographies.

Peter Popham and Bertil Lintner both explain the familiar but essential backstory: that Suu Kyi came to prominence because her father, General Aung San, was the man who negotiated Burma's independence from Britain and whose early death (he was assassinated in 1947, just months before he would have become the country's first prime minister) ensured that he is almost the sole unsullied hero in that benighted state's postwar history. Consequently his only daughter, who looks extraordinarily like him, would always be treated as one who shared his aura. Even before Suu Kyi's permanent return from Oxford to Burma, her unwillingness to bend to the regime led a friend to tease her: "You not only have the courage of your convictions -- you have the courage of your connections!"

Both authors also take us through the decades of military dictatorship during which Aung San's old comrade-in-arms, General Ne Win, reduced the "rice bowl of Asia" to poverty: through his disastrous Burmese Path to Socialism; the 1988 massacres, after which even Ne Win realised he had to stand down, at least formally; the lost moment when it seemed the country might follow the example of the Philippines, where two years earlier the People's Power Revolution removed a tyrant and installed democracy; and the final extinction of that hope in the years since the junta ignored the 1990 election overwhelmingly won by Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy.

Where the authors differ is in their assessment of the heroine at the heart of this tragic story. Lintner is a veteran reporter who has written several books on Burma. His expertise is widely acknowledged -- not least by Peter Popham, who quotes him at length. While Suu Kyi still emerges as a remarkable, if somewhat testy, saint in Lintner's book, he doubts her appreciation of Burma's ethnic complexities, and writes disparagingly of her "mystical streak". Most damagingly of all, he queries whether her "lack of a comprehensive political plan of action may fail to prevent more tragedies ... and may stall the re-emergence of a credible force that can challenge the present regime."

Popham, whose exemplary foreign coverage is well known to Independent on Sunday readers, takes a very different view. He acknowledges that a "personality cult" has grown up around Suu Kyi, even against her wishes. But where Lintner sees only imprecision and impracticality in her deepening spiritual journey, Popham argues that her "virtue-based politics" draws on the country's ingrained Buddhist culture and, combined with her insistence on Gandhian non-violence, provides her with a moral legitimacy that makes her "the single most important counterweight to the brutal might of the army".

Although Lintner has had longer experience of the country, Popham's links with his subject run deeper and he has had the great advantage of access to the diaries of Ma Thanegi, Suu Kyi's personal assistant during her campaigning travels in 1989. Popham has a gift for description (I particularly liked "it is the season when Burma is most quintessentially Burmese -- hot and sultry and shriekingly green and fertile") but the first-hand notes of a woman who was like a sister to Suu Kyi (until they later fell out; Ma Thanegi is believed to have been "turned" during a period of imprisonment) ring especially true and vivid.

Lintner's conclusion is pessimistic. "Burma's future looks bleak," he writes. Aung San Suu Kyi "may be a heroine in the West ... but realpolitik dominates the thinking of Burma's immediate neighbours." Popham is more upbeat, albeit while refraining from concrete predictions. "Her impact on her society has been enormously rich and important. Whatever happens or does not happen between now and her death, Burma will never be the same again." I am more inclined to agree with Lintner. But as a portrait both warm and objective, Popham's biography goes a long way to explaining why Aung San Suu Kyi is admired by so many all over the world. It will not be bettered for a long time. http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/the-lady-and-the-peacock-the-life-of-aung-san-suu-kyi-by-peter-pophambraung-san-suu-kyi-and-burmas-struggle-for-democracy-by-bertil-lintner-2377643.html
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Myanmar Netizens to BBC: Apologize Now
Posted 29 October 2011 17:53 GMT

Some Myanmar netizens are asking BBC to apologize for publishing an 'inaccurate' map of Myanmar's ethnic groups. They claim that BBC reporter Anna Jones used an inaccurate map in an article she wrote on November 5, 2010 titled "Bleak outlook for Burma's Ethnic Groups."

According to them, the map showed that Rakhine (Arakan) State is represented by Rohingya who are identified as a minority group in Myanmar even though the state is inhabited by Rakhine People (Arakanese). Furthermore, they said the map wrongfully depicted the Shan State to be represented not only by "Shan" ethnics but also by "Wa"; and that the Ayeyarwaddy Division and Kayah are represented by Karen and so on which are not in conformity with Myanmar's official ethnic and state definitions.
http://globalvoicesonline.org/2011/10/29/myanmar-netizens-to-bbc-apologize-now/