Myanmar's Suu Kyi praises U.S. engagement
By Andrew Quinn | Reuters – 28 mins ago
YANGON (Reuters) - Pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi welcomed on Friday renewed U.S. engagement with Myanmar, saying she hoped it would set her long-isolated country on the road to democracy.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton held a final meeting with Suu Kyi as she wrapped up a landmark visit to Myanmar which saw the new civilian government pledge to forge ahead with political reforms and re-engage with the world community.
Clinton and Suu Kyi - the Nobel laureate who has come to symbolize the pro-democracy aspirations of Myanmar's people - held a private dinner on Thursday and met again on Friday at Suu Kyi's lakeside home, effectively her prison until she was released in November last year after years in detention.
"If we go forward together I'm confident there will be no turning back from the road to democracy. We are not on that road yet but we hope to get there as soon as possible with our friends," Suu Kyi said.
The two, arguably the world's most well-known women politicians, met for about an hour and a half then stood on a verandah, holding hands as they spoke to a crowd of reporters.
They both appeared visibly moved as they embraced after their meeting, and a senior U.S. official said it was clear they had established a strong personal rapport during their first face-to-face talks.
Neither mentioned U.S. sanctions on Myanmar, imposed because of rights abuses and the suppression of democracy. But Clinton said at a later news conference that the restrictions might end if reforms continue.
"If there is enough progress, obviously we will be considering lifting sanctions. But as I said before we're still at the very early stages of this dialogue," she said after being asked about sanctions by a Myanmar reporter.
She acknowledged that removing the sanctions would help Myanmar's struggling economy, but said the United States needed to be sure that real changes were under way.
"There need to be some economic reforms along with political reforms so that the benefits would actually flow to a broad base of people and not just to a very few," she said.
ALTERNATIVES TO CHINA
Clinton has repeatedly praised Myanmar's new army-backed civilian government for moving ahead with reforms following elections last November that ended some five decades of unbroken military rule.
The government has taken steps to broaden political participation, release some political prisoners, and gradually expand freedoms of expression and assembly.
Suu Kyi said Myanmar needed help on education, healthcare and strengthening rule of law and welcomed new U.S. support for World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) assessment missions to help draw up priorities for a country whose shambolic economy is increasingly reliant on China.
"We have to find out what our greatest needs are," she said.
Clinton said the United States would do what it could to help, announcing new support for small programs to help landmine victims and support microfinance and healthcare projects.
But in a sign of the straightened circumstances the United States faces amid fears of huge budget deficits, the new funding amounted to just $1.2 million on top of the $40 million the United States already provides in aid to Myanmar each year.
Clinton's trip follows a decision by U.S. President Barack Obama last month to open the door to expanded ties, saying he saw the potential for progress in a country until recently seen as a reclusive military dictatorship firmly aligned with China.
Suu Kyi and Clinton both stressed that Myanmar's new civilian leaders - many of them former military figures - must address the issue of political prisoners, which Clinton said still numbered more than 1,000 despite the release in October of about 230.
"We need all those who are still in prison to be released and we need to ensure that no more are arrested," said Suu Kyi, the daughter of the country's assassinated independence leader, Aung San.
OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES
Clinton's trip - the first by a senior U.S. official in more than 50 years - represents an opportunity for both Myanmar and the United States, and both appear eager to press ahead with rapprochement.
Myanmar's new leadership hopes the United States will eventually ease or remove the sanctions, opening the resource-rich but desperately poor country to more foreign trade and investment and help it catch up to booming neighbors such as Thailand and India.
For Washington, improved ties could underscore Obama's determination to up U.S. engagement in Asia and balance China's fast-growing economic, military and political influence.
Clinton met representatives of ethnic minority groups, some of which have been locked in bloody conflict with the army for decades, as well as civil society organizations
U.S. officials said the meetings were aimed in part at underscoring that the new outreach to Myanmar's government does not mean a halt to pressure on human rights and political freedom.
Both Clinton and Suu Kyi called for an end to the conflicts between the army and minority guerrillas, which U.S. officials say may prove the toughest challenge ahead for the country's leaders.
Clinton, after her talks with President Thein Sein on Thursday, announced a package of modest steps to improve ties, including U.S. support for the IMF and World Bank assessment missions and expanded U.N. aid programs.
She also said the United States would consider reinstating a full ambassador in Myanmar - a position which has been unfilled for more than 20 years - which could mark a symbolic next step in the warming ties between the two countries.
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Reports: Myanmar's Shan rebels sign cease-fire
AP – 1 hr 10 mins ago
BANGKOK (AP) — One of the main ethnic rebel groups battling Myanmar's government signed a preliminary cease-fire Friday, websites operated by exiled journalists reported.
The reported agreement comes as Myanmar's army-backed but elected government is seeking international legitimacy through democratic reforms after years of military repression. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton just concluded a visit to the country that was intended to encourage those reforms.
The Shan State Army-South rebel group was one of the biggest not to previously sign a cease-fire with the government.
The Thailand-based Irrawaddy website reported the rebels signed an agreement with Myanmar's official Shan State government. India-based Mizzima News and the Shan Herald Agency for News, a website close to the guerrillas, reported similar news.
During her visit that ended Friday, Clinton offered modest incentives to the new government, while calling on it to end brutal campaigns against ethnic minorities, free all political prisoners and break military ties with North Korea.
Myanmar for decades has been at odds with the ethnic groups who seek greater autonomy, but a military junta that took power in 1988 signed cease-fire agreements with many. Some of those pacts have been strained as the central government sought to consolidate power, and combat resumed.
Neither the government nor the rebel group would immediately confirm the new cease-fire, but the Shan Herald Agency's report cited Shan rebel leader Lt. Gen. Yawdserk saying an agreement was reached on a cease-fire, political negotiations, development and cooperation against drugs.
It was not clear when or if the Shan group would sign a cease-fire agreement with the central government.
Myanmar's government in recent weeks has held high-level but low-profile talks with rebel groups with which it has never signed cease-fires, or had cease-fires that have broken down. The groups reportedly involved in talks include the Shan, Karen, Karenni, Chin and Kachin.
A high-level government delegation met Tuesday with the Kachin Independence Organization in Ruili in China's Yunnan province, Myanmar's state press reported this week. The Kachin, whose state is in the north, have been fighting the government since June, when the army tried to break up some of their militia strongholds.
The reports said both sides agreed at the meeting to continue the initial peace talks aimed at a cease-fire and political dialogues.
Kachin sympathizers have circulated accounts of government brutality, but the remote area is mostly inaccessible to foreigners and the allegations are difficult to confirm. The government has reported little on the fighting.
Myanmar democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi has described an end to the fighting with ethnic guerrillas as national priority, and last month said she would be willing to help with peace negotiations.
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Myanmar Gov't Officials Meet With Kachin Rebels
YANGON, Myanmar December 1, 2011 (AP)
A Myanmar government delegation has held talks with representatives of a major ethnic rebel group with which it has had armed clashes since June, state-controlled media reported Thursday.
The state-run New Light of Myanmar newspaper said the high-level delegation met Tuesday with six representatives of the Kachin Independence Organization led by its chairman Zaung Hara — also known as Zawng Hkra — in Ruili in China's Yunnan province.
The report said both sides agreed at the meeting to continue the initial peace talks aimed at a cease-fire and political dialogues.
Myanmar for decades has been at odds with ethnic minorities living in border areas who seek greater autonomy. A military junta that took power in 1988 signed cease-fire agreements with many, including the Kachin, whose state is in the north.
In recent years, however, as the central government has sought to consolidate its power, some of the pacts have been strained, and sporadic warfare broke out with the Kachins in June this year as the government tried to break up some of their militia strongholds.
Kachin sympathizers have circulated accounts of government brutality, but the remote area is mostly inaccessible to foreigners and the allegations are difficult to confirm. The government had reported little on the fighting.
A website sympathetic to the ethnic rebels, The Kachin Post, confirmed Tuesday's talks and said the meeting was the fifth between the sides.
The meeting took place a day before U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton arrived on a visit to encourage the political and economic reforms started by the new nominally civilian but military-aligned and elected government.
A report released Wednesday by the U.S.-based group Physicians for Human Rights said its investigations had found that Myanmar's army in Kachin state had "looted food from civilians, fired indiscriminately into villages, threatened villages with attacks, and used civilians as porters and human minesweepers."
The group said the finding showed that ethnic minorities in border areas had not benefited from the reforms, and it urged U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton to make their plight a priority in talks with the Myanmar government.
Clinton on Thursday challenged the Myanmar's leaders to continue and expand upon the reforms, calling for the release of all political prisoners, an end to violent campaigns against ethnic minorities and a breaking of military ties with North Korea.
Clinton made her comments ahead of a meeting with Myanmar pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who was released from house arrest last year after two decades of on-and-off imprisonment.
She last month expressed concerns over the hostilities in Kachin state and said she would be willing to help with peace negotiations.
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Reclusive Myanmar takes a step out of the shadows
By Shaun Tandon | AFP – 18 hrs ago
Built from scratch by paranoid generals for maximum seclusion, Myanmar's remote capital is now gingerly stepping into the limelight as it hosts one of the world's most powerful political figures.
In a telling sign of the tentative nature of reforms in the long-closed nation, Myanmar's leaders hailed Clinton in private but there was little public welcome for the first secretary of state to visit in a half century.
The government-run New Light of Myanmar newspaper offered only a page-two photograph and a short piece announcing Clinton's arrival, with the front page featuring a dry curriculum vitae of the visiting prime minister of Belarus.
Billboards made no mention of Clinton's visit but welcomed Prime Minister Mikhail Myasnikovich as well as visiting telecommunication ministers from Southeast Asia, who picked an unlikely destination considering the rudimentary phone and Internet network in the country formerly known as Burma.
Myanmar in 2005 abruptly moved its entire capital from the coastal hub of Yangon to a remote patch of farmland, for unstated reasons believed to include astrologers' advice and fears of a seaborne invasion by the United States.
The sprawling city now features an imposing museum devoted to gems, and glittering supermarkets, but most of its wide boulevards remain empty with only pictures to hint at future construction where water buffaloes now graze.
Hundreds of police fanned out across the capital Naypyidaw to guard Clinton, some waving their arms to shoo away non-existent traffic from cross-streets, as her motorcade cruised through a barren 12-lane highway to the presidential palace.
Workers in conical hats cut grass on their hands and knees below the palace, which rose like a pyramid above the quiet capital. Visitors walked by high-rising fountains into cavernous marble rooms of gold-leaf furniture and wood-carved Buddhist statues.
Despite the cautious public welcome, President Thein Sein -- a former general now at the vanguard of reforms -- smiled broadly as he greeted Clinton and saluted what he called a "new chapter in relations".
Myanmar's security guards were surprisingly relaxed as foreign and local journalists swarmed into the palace, elbowing one another for the historic shot of Thein Sein and Clinton. Authorities imposed no unusual restrictions on reporters, although Myanmar officials did not speak to the press.
And while some observers compare Naypyidaw to North Korea's other-worldly capital Pyongyang, the mood among the general public was clearly welcoming, even in a city devoted to the government and military.
"We are so proud to have her here. This is the first time in 50 years," said a worker at Clinton's hotel where staff welcomed the US delegation with cool towels and fresh watermelon juice.
A taxi driver looked visibly excited upon learning that his passenger was from the United States, exclaiming in what appeared to go beyond requisite politeness: "USA - very good!"
"I support Aung San Suu Kyi. We want democracy," he said of Myanmar's opposition leader who was freed last year after spending most of the past two decades under house arrest.
A senior US official travelling with Clinton said the United States was pleasantly surprised by Myanmar's cooperation on the visit, crediting the government with issuing visas more easily than at any time in recent memory.
"They're generally uncomfortable with (security agents), with guns. They've been very accommodating in a variety of the areas that we're seeking, what we would call hospitality," the official said on condition of anonymity.
"That's important to us, but what's really important to us is what are the steps that they're going to take (on political reform)."
However historic the visit, the US delegation will be left only with memories -- Myanmar is still subject to strict US sanctions, making any souvenir shopping a no-no.
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What's in a name? In Myanmar (Burma), a lot
AFP – 18 hrs ago
Some call the country Myanmar, others call it Burma, but for Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on a landmark visit, there was a better solution -- call it nothing.
Paying the first visit by a top US official in more than 50 years in a bid to push reform, Clinton faced a variety of obstacles but none required as much linguistic jujitsu as not mentioning the nation's name.
In public remarks in the showcase capital Naypyidaw, Clinton only employed the term Burma but said it sparingly, generally saying simply, "this country."
"The most consequential question facing this country is not its relationship with America or any other nation," Clinton said at a press conference.
"It is whether leaders will let their people live up to their God-given potential and claim their place at the heart of a Pacific century. Or will this country, once again, be left behind?" Clinton said.
The military leaders of "this country" changed the official name two decades ago to Myanmar, saying that the old term Burma was a sorry legacy of British colonialism and implied that the ethnically torn land belonged only to the Burman majority.
The opposition and exiles fiercely opposed the change, seeing it as a symbolic step to create an entirely new country, and the United States has stood in solidarity by officially calling the nation Burma.
Aides to Clinton acknowledged that she faced an unhappy choice -- offending her hosts by using a name they reject or angering US lawmakers and exiles who consistently call the country Burma.
State Department spokesman Mark Toner, asked about the issue ahead of her trip, said that Clinton was "mindful of all the sensitivities" but that the policy of the United States had not changed.
The United States believes that "any change of the name of a country should be a decision" for its people, Toner said. For which people? "The Burmese people."
The US delegation had no way of finding a balance on another issue -- the country's flag. Official cars and badges for the trip featured the yellow, green and red flag adopted under a controversial new constitution, not the classic blue-and-red.
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Clinton to continue visit with Myanmar's Nobel Peace laureate
By the CNN Wire Staff
updated 11:21 PM EST, Thu December 1, 2011
Yangon, Myanmar (CNN) -- U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton continued her landmark visit in Myanmar on Friday by resuming a meeting with Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel Peace Prize winner who intends to run in upcoming parliamentary elections with her newly registered political party.
The secretary was to tour Suu Kyi's home, where the activist spent most of the last two decades under house arrest imposed by Myanmar's military regime.
Clinton also was to meet members of Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy, representatives of ethnic groups, and civil society organizations, the State Department said.
On Thursday, Clinton, the first U.S. secretary of state to visit the country in 50 years, met with Suu Kyi in a wide-ranging discussion that covered matters ranging from books to political candidacy.
Clinton is in Myanmar to urge democratic reforms. Suu Kyi is regarded as the Southeast Asian country's leading reformer for democracy.
Clinton has told the country's leaders that the United States will help Myanmar economically and diplomatically if reforms there continue. On Thursday, she sat down with new President Thein Sein, who told Clinton about the importance of Myanmar's relationship with China, a senior State Department official said.
Sein said that his country sits at an "enormous crossroads" between India and China and needs to have good relations with both, the official said. Clinton told him that the United States wants Myanmar to have a good relationship with its neighbors, the official said.
Clinton held out the possibility that the United States would send an ambassador to Myanmar if reforms continue. She said the United States would support visits by officials from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to assess how they can help the country. Washington will help the United Nations Development Programme establish a micro-finance program in Myanmar and will invite the country to join the Lower Mekong Initiative, a regional environmental and health organization, Clinton said.
Suu Kyi initially met with Clinton Thursday night in Yangon at the residence of the U.S. Chief of Mission for dinner.
Suu Kyi said she supports the immediate return of a U.S. ambassador to Myanmar, but Clinton told her the timing was not yet right, the State Department official said.
The official described the U.S. posture as "careful and realistic" but wouldn't say whether the United States trusts the Myanmar government's pledges to continue reforms.
On Thursday, Clinton invited the foreign minister to visit Washington and he accepted, but no date was set, the State Department official said.
Also Thursday, the United States and Myanmar agreed to resume the search for missing American World War II soldiers, about 600 of whom remain unaccounted for, the official said.
Clinton's trip was made possible by the nation's unexpected steps at democratic reform.
Ruled by a junta since 1962, Myanmar elected Sein to the presidency in March. The new government freed dozens of political prisoners in October.
On Wednesday, Suu Kyi -- released since November of last year from her latest round of house arrest -- said she intends to run for parliament.
The developments stirred optimism among U.S. officials, who refer to the country as Burma -- the name it used before the junta took power.
The trip, the White House said, indicates that the time could be right for the two nations to forge a new relationship.
Still, Myanmar is far from a democracy -- and skepticism exists on both sides.
Journalists in the country enjoy new freedoms, but their work remains heavily regulated. Ethnic violence still occurs against Myanmar's minorities, and human rights groups estimate that more than 1,500 political prisoners are still detained.
Suspected cooperation between the government and North Korea on ballistic missiles and nuclear activity also is troubling to the United States.
As a result, the Obama administration is not ending sanctions and is not making any abrupt changes in policy.
For its part, Myanmar offered a cordial welcome to Clinton -- but the visit has been low key.
On Thursday, news of her trip and a photograph of her greeted by officials at the Naypyidaw airport ran on page 2 of the state-run newspaper, The Mirror. In contrast, the front page carried a prominently placed photograph of Mikhail Myasnikovich, the prime minister of Belarus -- who arrived Thursday.
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Clinton sees signs of opening in Myanmar
By the CNN Wire Staff
updated 8:40 AM EST, Fri December 2, 2011
Yangon, Myanmar (CNN) -- At the conclusion of her landmark visit to Myanmar Friday, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said she saw some encouraging signs in the changes underway in the country.
For the second day, she met with Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel Peace Prize winner who intends to run in upcoming parliamentary elections with her newly registered political party.
"We do see openings today that give us some signs of encouragement," Clinton said. "We want to see this country take its rightful place in the world."
Clinton met with Suu Kyi at her home, where the activist spent most of the last two decades under house arrest imposed by Myanmar's military regime.
"Because of this engagement, I think our way ahead will be clearer and we will be able to trust that the process of democratization will move forward," Suu Kyi said.
The new government has shown encouraging signs of reform and has released some political prisoners, but the activist said that all such prisoners must be released and that no one should be arrested for their beliefs.
"All hostilities must cease in this country," she said.
The road to democracy in Myanmar is closer than before, but there is still a ways to go, she added.
"We are not on that road yet, but we hope to get there as soon as possible with the help and understanding of our friends," she said.
Clinton became the first U.S. secretary of state to visit the country in 50 years.
Clinton was in Myanmar to urge democratic reforms. Suu Kyi is regarded as the Southeast Asian country's leading reformer for democracy.
Clinton's trip was made possible by the nation's unexpected steps at democratic reform.
Ruled by a junta since 1962, Myanmar elected Thein Sein to the presidency in March. The new government freed dozens of political prisoners in October.
On Wednesday, Suu Kyi -- released since November of last year from her latest round of house arrest -- said she intends to run for parliament.
The developments stirred optimism among U.S. officials, who refer to the country as Burma -- the name it used before the junta took power.
The trip, the White House said, indicates that the time could be right for the two nations to forge a new relationship.
Still, Myanmar is far from a democracy -- and skepticism exists on both sides.
Journalists in the country enjoy new freedoms, but their work remains heavily regulated. Ethnic violence still occurs against Myanmar's minorities, and human rights groups estimate that more than 1,500 political prisoners are still detained.
Suspected cooperation between the government and North Korea on ballistic missiles and nuclear activity also is troubling to the United States.
As a result, the Obama administration is not ending sanctions and is not making any abrupt changes in policy.
For its part, Myanmar offered a cordial welcome to Clinton -- but the visit was low key.
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China, Myanmar reaffirm ties amid U.S. diplomatic move
By Jaime FlorCruz, CNN
updated 10:54 PM EST, Thu December 1, 2011
Beijing (CNN) -- On a typical day, China's border with Myanmar is quite porous and vibrant. Often from the same ethnic groups, traders from both sides share much in common and do brisk business.
I saw that up close during a reporting trip for CNN a few years ago. At one border town in China's Yunnan Province, I saw residents from both sides, speaking similar dialects, buying and selling produce, consumer goods, minerals and timber, before crossing back to their own country.
We even brought back Myanmar bank notes as a souvenir from the trip.
Scenes like this along the two countries' 2,000-kilometer border serve as constant reminders of long and deep bilateral ties.
Myanmar, also known as Burma, was one of the first countries to recognize China's Communist government in 1949.
Over the years, after the 1962 coup d'état in Myanmar, most Western governments shunned the Southeast Asian nation because of its poor human rights record. China and the ruling junta grew closer, however, with Beijing becoming the country's most influential supporter on the world stage.
"The Myanmar government really was thrown an economic, military and political lifeline by the Chinese, particularly in the last 20 years in light of Western sanctions," says Stephanie Kleine-Ahlbrandt, Northeast Asia director of the International Crisis Group, an independent think tank.
"There is a very strong continuing political and economic relationship."
By the end of 2010, China had become Myanmar's second-largest trading partner. China is also the biggest foreign investor there, with Chinese companies building highways, pipelines and other major projects.
For its part, Myanmar offers China energy resources and a strategic gateway to the Indian Ocean.
Chinese access in and through Myanmar will lessen China's dependence on the Malacca Straits, a long and congested sea lane through which an estimated 80% of Chinese imported energy supplies pass.
"Close to the shipping lanes of the Indian Ocean and Southeast Asia, Myanmar is important for China to develop its southwestern provinces, which have a population of 200 million people," writes Li Xiguang, a professor with Tsinghua University in Beijing, in his column in the state-run Global Times newspaper.
Just days before U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's historic visit to Myanmar, amid signs of what Washington considers positive changes in the country under a new government, China's vice president Xi Jinping told Myanmar's top general in Beijing the two countries should strengthen military ties.
But not all has gone smoothly in China-Myanmar relations.
In September, Myanmar unexpectedly suspended the construction of the $3.6 billion Myitsone hydropower station financed by a Chinese company, citing environmental and social concerns.
The project was meant to provide much-needed power to China but it would have displaced thousands of local residents.
"The Myanmar people are very upset about particularly resource-extraction activities, where the Chinese are not consulting the communities, they are not providing benefits to the communities, they displace populations and they engage in environmental degradation," says Kleine-Ahlbrandt, the International Crisis Group analyst.
China is trying to learn about how it can exert soft power.
Stephanie Kleine-Ahlbrandt
The decision was seen as a rare concession by the government to public pressure -- and a blow to China.
"This incident made some believe that Myanmar is showing goodwill to the West at the expense of Chinese interest," an editorial on the Global Times this week reads.
Other observers say Myanmar's decision on the dam project was largely driven by internal factors.
"It's a strong indication that the government is ready to say 'no' to Beijing when it is in its interest to do so," says Suzanne DiMaggio of the New York-based Asia Society.
Clinton's visit is "an opportunity for the U.S. to help move Myanmar away from authoritarian rule and into the world community," she adds. "The visit also sends a strong signal to China that the U.S. is seeking to contain Beijing's influence in Myanmar."
Some Chinese political observers are picking up that signal too.
Clinton's visit "will further unnerve China, which has recently been increasingly worried that the aim of the United States' new Asia policy is to isolate and encircle China," writes Li, the Tsinghua University professor.
Publicly, at least, Beijing's diplomats maintain China is not worried about Myanmar's engagement with the U.S.
"China welcomes Myanmar and Western countries to improve their relations on the basis of mutual respect," says Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei. "We hope Myanmar's move will be conducive to the country's stability and development."
Beijing also appears more proactive in engaging the Myanmar people, especially after the controversial decision on the dam. It recently sent a rare Buddhist relic to Myanmar, a predominantly Buddhist country, to be on public display.
"It's part of this new outreach -- using religion, using media, using non-governmental organizations," observes Kleine-Ahlbrandt of the International Crisis Group. "China is trying to learn about how it can exert soft power."
Even as Myanmar's leadership begins to mend fences with Washington, few expect to see China and Myanmar drift too far apart, thanks to the two neighbors' inter-dependent relationship.
"Myanmar continually depends on China's investment, on Chinese trade and Chinese political cover in the international community," says Kleine-Ahlbrandt.
"China depends on Myanmar for access to its resources and also for the border to remain peaceful."
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Korea JoongAng Daily - Clinton pushes Myanmar to sever ties to North
Dec 03,2011
WASHINGTON - U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton pressed Myanmar on Thursday to live up to its promise to end military cooperation with North Korea.
After meeting with President Thein Sein in the Myanmar capital of Nay Pyi Taw, Clinton said the Myanmar president presented a “comprehensive vision of reform, reconciliation and economic development” for his nation, including nonproliferation commitments regarding North Korea, the release of political prisoners and fair by-elections.
“We support the government’s stated determination to sever military ties with North Korea,” she told reporters, according to a transcript released by the State Department.
There have been reports of shipments of military equipment from North Korea to Myanmar and the United States suspects that Myanmar might be seeking North Korea’s help for a nuclear weapons program.
Clinton is on a three-day trip to Myanmar, which the United States still calls Burma, demonstrating Washington’s willingness to consider engaging the nation and lifting sanctions if its iron-fisted regime adopts a path of change.
In dispatching the secretary there, President Barack Obama cited “flickers of progress” in efforts to democratize the country.
“We know from history that flickers can die out. They can even be stamped out. Or they can be ignited,” Clinton pointed out. “It will be up to the leaders and the people to fan those flickers of progress into flames of freedom that light the path toward a better future.”
She said the United States stands ready to support Myanmar if it decides to “keep moving in that direction.”
Clinton dismissed a view that the U.S. outreach to Myanmar was partially motivated by the growing influence of China.
“We are not viewing this in light of any competition with China,” she said. “We are viewing it as an opportunity for us to re-engage here. We welcome positive constructive relations between China and her neighbors.”
Yonhap
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Washington Post - Clinton, Aung San Suu Kyi vow to promote Myanmar democracy, reforms
By Associated Press, Updated: Friday, December 2, 6:28 AM
YANGON, Myanmar — In a striking display of solidarity and sisterhood between two of the world’s most recognizable women, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi vowed on Friday to work together to promote democratic reforms in Suu Kyi’s long-isolated and authoritarian homeland.
Wrapping up a historic three-day visit to Myanmar, the first by a secretary of state to the Southeast Asian nation in more than 50 years, Clinton and Suu Kyi held hands on the porch of the lakeside home where the Nobel peace laureate spent much of the past two decades under house arrest. Clinton thanked her for her “steadfast and very clear leadership.”
Suu Kyi has welcomed Clinton’s visit and tentatively embraced reforms enacted by Myanmar’s new civilian government. She thanked the secretary and U.S. President Barack Obama for their “careful and calibrated” engagement that has seen the United States take some modest steps to improve ties.
“If we move forward together I am confident there will be no turning back on the road to democracy,” Suu Kyi said, referring to her opposition National League for Democracy party, the government, the United States and other countries, including Myanmar’s giant neighbor China. “We are not on that road yet, but we hope to get there as soon as possible with the help and understanding of our friends.”
“We are happy with the way in which the United States is engaging with us,” she added. “It is through engagement that we hope to promote the process of democratization. Because of this engagement, I think our way ahead will be clearer and we will be able to trust that the process of democratization will go forward.”
As she did in the capital of Naypyidaw on Thursday, Clinton said more significant incentives will be offered, but only if the government releases all political prisoners, ends brutal campaigns against ethnic minorities, respects the rule of law and improves human rights conditions.
“We are prepared to go further if reforms maintain momentum,” Clinton said. “But history teaches us to be cautious. We know that there have been serious setbacks and grave disappointments over the past decades.”
Clinton’s meetings with Suu Kyi were the highlight of the U.S. secretary of state’s visit to the long-isolated country also known as Burma and forcefully underscored a U.S. challenge to Myanmar’s leaders.
In addition to the modest incentives Clinton announced Thursday for the government, she said Friday that the U.S. would spend about $1.2 million for preliminary projects aimed at helping the people of Myanmar. The money will go to microcredit and health care initiatives and assistance to land-mine victims, particularly in rural areas.
Suu Kyi, whose party won 1990 elections that were ignored by the then-military junta but now plans to run in upcoming parliamentary elections, endorsed that approach and called for the immediate release of all political prisoners and cease-fires to end the ethnic conflicts..
Suu Kyi, a heroine for pro-democracy advocates around the world, said Clinton’s visit represented “a historical moment for both our countries.”
With U.S. assistance and pressure on the government, which is still backed by the military, she said she believed change was on the horizon for Myanmar.
The meeting was the second in as many days for the pair who bonded deeply at a three-hour, one-on-one dinner in Yangon on Thursday, according to U.S. officials. One senior official said the dinner marked the beginning of what appeared to be a “very warm friendship” between the former first lady, New York senator and presidential hopeful and Suu Kyi, who plans to re-enter the political arena in upcoming parliamentary elections.
“We have been inspired by her fearlessness in the face of intimidation and her serenity through decades of isolation, but most of all through her devotion to her country and to the freedom and dignity of her fellow citizens,” Clinton told reporters after the meeting Suu Kyi.
Clinton said the two had discussed the “ups and downs and slings and arrows of political participation” at dinner and that Suu Kyi would be an “excellent member” of Myanmar’s parliament but declined to discuss any electoral advice she may have given here.
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Posted at 07:16 AM ET, 12/02/2011
Washington Post - Hillary Clinton in Burma: kisses for Suu Kyi, handshake for the president
By Debbi Wilgoren
There was no giggling when U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton met the former general who runs Burma’s oppressive government.
There were smiles (measured), of course, and handshakes, and ceremonial visits to historic sites and shrines. But the outreach was tempered by wariness and recognition that the first visit of a U.S. secretary of state to Burma in half a century carries with it no small amount of risk. It was only when Clinton sat down to dinner with another of the world’s most famous female leaders that the laughter, and good will, really began to flow.
“For decades, the choices of this country’s leaders kept it apart from the global economy and the community of nations,” Clinton said after meeting President Thein Sein. “While the measures already taken may be unprecedented and welcomed, they are just a beginning.”
Hours later, Clinton sat outside at a glass-and-wrought-iron patio table with Aung San Suu Kyi, Burma’s best-known opposition leader and a Nobel peace laureate, for an intimate private dinner.
Their choices of hairstyle--Clinton’s tresses held back with a scrunchy, Suu Kyi’s with an cluster of flowers--did not go unnoticed, with the Post’s Style Tumblr writing dubbing the image of them together: “Power to the Ponytails.”
Though the women had spoken previously by telephone, it was the first time that Clinton--who calls Suu Kyi an “inspiration,” had met the dissident leader in person.
Clinton traveled to Suu Kyi’s home on Friday for additional talks. The women greeted each other with kisses on the cheek, and spoke briefly to reporters afterward. They held hands at one point during the news conference, then paused, laughed and hugged before saying goodbye. The chief U.S. diplomat brought a chew toy for the Nobel laureate’s guard dog.
“Chew away, chew away,”Clinton told the pooch.
“Keep your distance,” Suu Kyi warned, “He thinks that people who stand close to me are a threat.”
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Channel NewsAsia - Clinton offers US$1.2m to Myanmar civil society
Posted: 02 December 2011 1708 hrs
YANGON: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Friday offered US$1.2 million in new aid aimed at civil society in Myanmar in a bid to bolster reforms on a landmark visit to the long-isolated nation.
In a news conference at the end of her visit, Clinton said that the funding would support microfinance, healthcare and help for the victims of landmines in the war-torn country formerly known as Burma.
"We will take a number of steps to demonstrate our commitment to the people of this country," said Clinton, who earlier Friday met civil society groups who have an uncertain role in a country long dominated by the military.
"We are prepared to go further if reforms maintain momentum," Clinton said.
Clinton said that the United States would support civil society actors who cater to "critical needs throughout the country, particularly in the ethnic minority areas".
A senior US official who accompanied Clinton said the new funding for the initiative would be US$1 million. Another US$200,000 will go to supporting landmine survivors and other victims of internal conflict, with a goal of raising that funding to US$800,000, the official said.
Clinton also announced that the United States will launch a "substantial" English-language teaching initiative in Myanmar supported by the Hawaii-based East-West Center.
The senior official, who requested anonymity, expected millions of dollars for the language initiative and said the money would come from Brunei, which like many Southeast Asian nations has welcomed US engagement with Myanmar.
The United States, where foreign aid is often controversial in Congress, annually provides more than US$38 million to various programs related to Myanmar.
Clinton had also announced small steps on Thursday after visiting Myanmar's isolated capital Naypyidaw, including supporting an international assessment of aid needs and resuming searches for missing US dead from World War II.
But the United States maintains sweeping sanctions on Myanmar. Clinton said she told the country's leaders that the United States was assessing progress by the new leadership before it considers lifting sanctions.
"We will match action for action, and if there is enough progress, obviously we will be considering lifting sanctions," Clinton said.
"But, as I said before, we are still at the very early stages of this dialogue," Clinton said.
She said that even if the United States lifted sanctions, the effects might not be felt immediately unless Myanmar also undertakes economic reforms.
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Time Magazine - Clinton in Burma: As Ties with U.S. Strengthen, Will the Country's Ethnic Minorities Be Forgotten?
Posted by Hannah Beech Friday, December 2, 2011 at 6:30 am
Nestled next to a placid lake in Burma's largest city, Rangoon, the villa of democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi is a pleasant spot—although no place can be so comfortable as to merit spending much of two decades under house arrest there. In 2009, before the Nobel Peace Prize laureate was released from villa detention by the ruling military junta, an American Vietnam War veteran secretly swam to her home unannounced because he believed he was on a mission from God. The American's surprise visit earned the opposition leader months more under lock and key, after the military regime ludicrously deemed that his entry had broken the conditions of her house arrest.
On Dec. 2, Suu Kyi, now freed for more than a year and gearing up to run in a parliamentary by-election made possible by tentative reforms instituted by Burma's new semi-civilian government, hosted another American at her home. This time, the U.S. visitor was far more welcome. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who dubbed Suu Kyi "an inspiration," visited the Burmese symbol of nonviolent resistance at her residence, where two of the world's most famous female politicians hugged, held hands and shared a predilection for a wardrobe shaded in blue. "We are happy with the way in which the United States is engaging with us," Suu Kyi said, "and it is through engagement that we hope to promote a process of democratization."
Clinton's Nov. 30-Dec. 2 visit to Burma, officially known as Myanmar, has excited residents of Rangoon (or Yangon). Far from sympathizing with the moral suasion of a U.S. policy of sanctions (and an attendant sense of isolation that was only heightened by the bunkered mentality of Burma's generals), most Burmese I know pine for engagement with the West. As Clinton met with Suu Kyi inside her villa, an elderly man with erect bearing strolled near the gate to her home dressed in a crisp oxford shirt and Burmese sarong, or longyi. A retired government official who speaks precise English, he said he was pleased that "the two ladies are meeting." (The pair of women met twice, once for a private dinner and once at Suu Kyi's home.) Burma, long a pariah state due to its recalcitrant generals and atrocious human-rights record, "has for round about 50 years been separated from the world," he said. "It is high time we join the brotherhood of nations again." The formality of his words was touching, as if the political idealism of an older, more genteel age had been preserved in this one retired Burmese bureaucrat.
(PHOTOS: Freedom for Burma's Aung San Suu Kyi{http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,2032170_2211619,00.html})
Clinton's visit—the first by a U.S. Secretary of State since 1955, seven years before a military junta grabbed power in Burma—has been hailed as a landmark moment in relations between the two nations. But both sides have downplayed major breakthroughs resulting immediately from her trip. While in the new capital Naypyidaw, which supplanted Rangoon in 2005, Clinton announced some small measures to warm ties between the two nations, like U.S. support for multilateral agencies like the IMF and World Bank to set up shop in Burma. Prior to her arrival in Burma, State Department officials cautioned that there would likely be no announcement on plans to lift U.S. sanctions on Burma, which were put in place because of the Southeast Asian nation's human-rights abuses.
Indeed, when Clinton and Suu Kyi addressed the press after their morning meeting at Suu Kyi's home, neither mentioned the issue of sanctions specifically. Many Western governments maintain trade restrictions on Burma, but the country's skyrocketing trade with its neighbors, most notably China, has made it harder to choke the regime economically. For years, Suu Kyi's support for sanctions has been matched with equal backing from Western governments. Since her release in November 2010, Suu Kyi has said that she would be open to sanctions being lifted should the Burmese government fulfill certain conditions, such as releasing political prisoners and pursuing peace with ethnic minorities who have suffered decades of abuse by the military. If Suu Kyi were to publicly announce that she thinks the financial restrictions should end, foreign governments would likely agree. Such is her moral power.
(MORE: "Burma's New Hope: A Repressive Regime Loosens Its Grip, for Now."{http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2100949,00.html})
After meeting with Suu Kyi, Clinton headed to meet with members of Burma's ethnic groups, who make up roughly 40% of the country's population. (The majority ethnic group is called Bamar, or Burman.) Even as Clinton's trip was being planned, fighting was flaring in northern Kachin State between the Burmese military and an ethnic rebel army. The Kachin, also known as the Jinghpaw or Jingpo, are a largely Christian population who have long chafed at the brutal rule of the Burmese regime{http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1921485,00.html}. Even though the Kachin were legendary during World War II as brave fighters, they have not been able to penetrate the top ranks of the Burmese army because of discrimination. In recent weeks, Kachin NGOs have alleged systematic rape and torture committed against their ethnicity by Burmese soldiers. Tens of thousands of Kachin have been displaced by the fighting over the past couple months, according to local aid organizations. Kachin and Burmese delegations are currently meeting in China to discuss potential peace negotiations, but such talks have collapsed before. (However, on Friday, another ethnic army in Shan state appeared to have signed a ceasefire with the government.)
As Burma eased away from British rule, Suu Kyi's father, independence hero Aung San, worked hard to bring unity among the new nation's diverse ethnics, as they are known in Burma. In the historic 1947 Panglong agreement, he promised that members of three ethnic groups—the Kachin, the Shan and the Chin—would be given significant autonomy and the right to secede from the Burmese union if they were not happy with the country's course. But soon after, Aung San was assassinated. The Bamar military rulers who eventually took over had little sympathy for the ethnics.
Battles raged for decades between various ethnic rebel militias and the Burmese army. Although ceasefires were eventually imposed in most areas, fighting erupted again two years ago and heightened this year, as the Burmese pressured the ethnics to give up their guns and instead join a "border-guard force" under Burmese command. That plan has largely been sidelined for now, but resentment still seethes because of continuing human-rights abuses. The Kachin, in particular, have shied away from signing a ceasefire they worry will degrade what autonomy they have. Much of Burma's rich natural-resource load, from hydropower to timber, is concentrated in ethnic areas{http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1886304,00.html}, and the "nationalities," as some ethnic minorities prefer to call themselves, feel they are not sharing fully in the wealth such treasures generate.
Suu Kyi has made the ethnic issue a precondition of her support to lifting sanctions. But there's a worry among the ethnics that if relations between the U.S. and Burma improve, their concerns will be lost in the overall glow of a new political era. "What I would like to tell Mrs. Hillary Clinton is that it's not just [Aung San Suu Kyi] who has been fighting for many years against the government," said one ethnic who was to meet with Clinton on Friday. "We have been, too, and [our people] have lost many lives. Don't forget about us, please."
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Telegraph.co.uk - Hillary Clinton Burma visit raises hopes political prisoners will be released
Hilary Clinton's historic visit to Burma has raised hopes that its estimated 1,000 political prisoners will soon be released.
By Dean Nelson, South Asia Editor
1:06PM GMT 02 Dec 2011
Her visit was welcomed by both the country's Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi and the influential speaker of its parliament who promised to press for more prisoner releases.
After meeting the US Secretary of State on Thursday, Thura Shwe Mann, speaker of Burma's lower house legislature said he had pledged new efforts to allow political prisoners to join the dialogue for reform.
"She urged Burma to release political prisoners. In response, I said I pledged that we will do as much as we can in order that all citizens including political prisoners can be involved in building the nation and for the sake of national reconciliation," he said after meeting Mrs Clinton in the capital Naypyitaw.
His comments raised hopes that more prisoners may be released in time to campaign in a series of by-elections expected in Spring next year.
Mrs Clinton, who is the highest level US official to visit Burma for more than 50 years, had raised the issue forcefully during her meetings with the speaker and the country's president Thein Sein. "No person in any country should be detained for exercising universal freedoms of expression, assembly and conscience," she had told him.
There was disappointment in October when around 200 political prisoners of were released despite hopes the figure would be much higher. They included high profile detainees like the comedian-activist Zarganar, who voiced anger on his release that around 1000 of his fellow dissidents remained in jail.
After meeting Mrs Clinton at her home in Rangoon on Friday, Ms Suu Kyi welcomed American support for Burma's democracy movement.
"I am very confident that if we work together... there will be no turning back from the road to democracy," she said. The military-supported government had a long way to go, she said, "but we hope to get there as soon as possible."
The government must end human rights abuses, hostilities against ethnic rebels, release all political prisoners and ensure "that no more are arrested in the future for their beliefs," she said.
Mrs Clinton added that she would give Burma's leaders a chance to ensure accountability for the past, rather than call for a war crimes investigation.
"We are going to support the principle of accountability and the appropriate mechanism to ensure justice and accountability will be considered," she said.
"But I think it's important to try to give the new government and the opposition a chance to try to demonstrate they have their own approach toward achieving that."
Mrs Clinton ended her visit with a pledge that Washington will match the Burmese government's reforms "action for action."
"And if there is enough progress, obviously we will be considering lifting sanctions," she said.
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The Borneo Post - China calls for end to Myanmar sanctions
Posted on December 2, 2011, Friday
BEIJING: China yesterday called for international sanctions against key ally Myanmar to be lifted, as US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made a historic visit to the isolated nation.
Myanmar has surprised observers with a series of reformist moves in the past year — including shutting down work on a controversial dam project backed by Beijing — leading to speculation it is trying to diversify its foreign policy.
But China, the primary supporter of the junta and the military-dominated civilian government that succeeded it after controversial elections last year, has given a cautious welcome to Myanmar’s moves to engage with the West.
Yesterday, as Clinton held landmark talks with Myanmar’s rulers, China’s foreign ministry called for sweeping sanctions on the military-backed government to be lifted.
“We believe that Western countries and Myanmar should enhance contact and improve relations on the basis of equality and mutual respect,” ministry spokesman Hong Lei told journalists at a regular briefing.
“We also maintain that relevant nations should lift their sanctions against Myanmar and promote Myanmar’s stability and development.”
The United States has said that Clinton will seek progress on human rights, including on the treatment of ethnic minorities, during her visit, but that talk of lifting sanctions on Myanmar is “premature”.
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02 December 2011 | Last updated at 01:01AM
New Straits Times - Myanmar farmers see no relief
The government’s reforms have yet to reach the countryside, lament the rural folk
FARMERS in the hamlet of Htan Pin outside Myanmar's commercial capital, Yangon, have never heard of Hillary Rodham Clinton, and they shrug when asked about democracy, a word they do not recognise.
Clinton's arrival in Myanmar on Wednesday captured the imagination of this nation's city dwellers and put a spotlight on the new government's ambitious agenda to ease years of military rule and economic mismanagement.
After a long bout of abysmal relations, the Barack Obama administration has promised to respond to progress -- Clinton's trip being the most significant reward so far -- even as it presses for more significant steps to end the country's repressive rule and international isolation.
A spokesman for the Myanmar government, U Yeh Tut, welcomed Clinton's visit, calling it "a great chance to normalise relations between the two countries".
"What we are trying to do is prove we are trying to make improvements in the democratic process," Yeh Tut said.
"We want the United States to understand the situation in our country."
The situation in the countryside is described by farmers as a feeling of stagnancy.
"Things are not so different," said U Tin Win Hlaing, 41, a rice farmer. "There has been a little bit of change."
Sitting in a thatch-roofed house surrounded by rice fields not long before Clinton arrived in Myanmar, Tin Win Hlaing and his neighbours said there was no relief in sight for their subsistence living, debilitating debts and recurring bouts of hunger when the rice run low.
Most of President Thein Sein's liberalisation moves -- the release of some political prisoners, the easing of restrictions on buying cars, the revamping of the banking system, among others -- have been winning over sceptics among the country's urban class and intelligentsia.
Those changes feel very distant here, less than an hour's drive from Yangon.
"We have no time to think about politics," said U Toe Naing, 44, a farmer who, like many of his neighbours, is dealing with a mountain of debt accumulated during the bad harvests of recent years, including the devastation of Cyclone Nargis in 2008, which virtually wiped out a year's worth of crops.
Seventy per cent of Myanmar's 55 million people work in agriculture, a sector that has been severely stunted in recent decades by a lack of credit, poor machinery and unreliable access to international markets.
Farmers take out loans on the black market at rates of more than 200 per cent a year.
"We have to borrow and pay back, borrow more and pay back," Tin Win Hlaing said.
Because they live near Yangon, the residents of this hamlet are better off than many farmers in Myanmar's vast hinterland. Even so, Tin Win Hlaing and his neighbours have no electricity or plumbing. The closest road is 20 minutes away, and no one owns a cellphone. Babies are born at home -- if the labour is trouble-free.
"Sometimes, the mothers die on the way to the hospital," Toe Naing said.
In the fields, farmers use land tillers, imported from China, that tend to break down often. Others use oxen.
The government has said that helping the agricultural sector is a priority, but the task is monumental. Myanmar is slowly emerging from decades during which the military tried to manage the economy directly.
Farmers are barred from owning the land they till, complicating future efforts to use property as collateral for loans.
One major difference between the current government and the military junta that preceded it is Thein Sein's apparent concern about poverty, especially in rural areas. The junta, which was in power for more than two decades, rejected the notion that there was poverty and expelled a top United Nations official who initiated an anti-poverty campaign.
On Wednesday, the government sought to highlight its focus on agriculture. The entire front page of its newspaper mouthpiece, The New Light of Myanmar, was dedicated to increasing the welfare of farmers by developing higher-yielding strains of rice. (The topic was covered much more prominently than articles in the same issue about the arrival in Beijing of the commander-in-chief of Myanmar's armed forces.)
The article on farming urged a switch from traditional farming techniques -- an apparent reference to oxen pulling plows -- to a "mechanised farming system". It also urged better education for farmers, saying that 80 per cent of them were "ordinary in terms of education". The article did not define "ordinary".
Farmers say they have felt the changes in Myanmar in two significant ways.
First, they are less fearful of approaching government officials, including those who made a recent plea to build a drainage ditch to relieve flooding.
Under the old government, Tin Win Hlaing said, "we weren't allowed to complain -- we were afraid they would seize our land".
Secondly, the government has increased the size of low-interest loans available to farmers, although this will not ease a farmer's outstanding debt.
Tin Win Hlaing, for example, owes the equivalent of US$5,000 (RM15,900). Most mornings, he gets up at 4.30am. Asked what he thinks about when he wakes, Tin Win Hlaing did not hesitate.
"My debts," he said. NYT
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msnbc.com (blog) - Myanmar's new capital: a vast, empty city
By Ian Williams, NBC News correspondent
NAYPYITAW, Myanmar – U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton could be forgiven for believing she's visiting two different countries – one called Naypyitaw, the other Myanmar.
Naypyitaw is the new capital of Myanmar, the country formerly known as Burma. It’s been built from scratch in the middle of nowhere. It's still a work in progress, it was only designated as the administrative capital in 2005, and until recently was largely off-limits to foreigners.
It’s a sprawling, surreal place with so few people that its eight-lane highways are almost deserted – a somewhat shocking site in this congested part of the world.
For several miles down one stretch, I saw just three motorcycles and a truck transporting a group of workers who had been tending the landscaped gardens on either side of the road.
Despite the apparent lack of people, Naypyitaw does have plenty of monstrous government buildings and villas, and several hotels and an international airport are under construction.
"Where's downtown?" I asked a Myanmar journalist. "I keep asking them that," he replied, “But nobody seems to know."
For many, Naypyitaw is a symbol of military ego, a metaphor for the former junta's isolation from the world – and its own people.
Myanmar's new president, Thein Sein, a former army officer, is reportedly a modest man. But there's little modesty about his sprawling palace, where he and other officials from the new and nominally civilian government received Clinton in an ornate reception room. It was so new you could almost smell the paint.
The police made a big show of stopping what little traffic there was to make way for the Clinton cavalcade as it crisscrossed the city.
There was never any danger of congestion.
Myanmar has been so secretive that it's not clear precisely when work began on the city, nor how much it cost. It is lavish by any standards, but almost obscenely so against the backdrop of the enormous poverty elsewhere in the country.
It's hard to say where the money came from – but the military had its finger in many business pies, of various degrees of legitimacy. China has also been a big benefactor.
The government justified the move by saying Yangon was too crowded, and that Naypyitaw was chosen because it is smack in the middle of the country. Though one bizarre explanation was that former military strongman Than Shwe was shaken by an astrologer's warning that an American attack was imminent and Yangon was too exposed. Cynics suggested he was afraid of his own people as well.
The real Myanmar
Clinton flew late in the afternoon Thursday to the country’s old capital, Yangon, the city also known as Rangoon, seemingly a world away. Yangon, 200 miles from Naypyitaw, is a city of stunning pagodas and dilapidated, colonial-era buildings, including the run-down lakeside residence of pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
It’s a real city, with real people and a real soul. And for the most part, its residents are giving the benefit of the doubt to the reforms coming from Naypyitaw.
Clinton met Suu Kyi for a private dinner Thursday evening, the meeting itself a remarkable sign of change.
Many are still skeptical about the government's intentions – although Suu Kyi isn't among them.
She was expected to tell Clinton she thinks President Thein Sein is sincere in wanting change, that he truly believes it is the best way forward for the country.
Suu Kyi will likely test the reforms by standing for a vacant parliamentary seat early next year.
It is an unusually positive response to the government’s claims of reform – she’s been persecuted for years by the regime for her pursuit of democracy, spending 15 of the last 21 years under house arrest.
Thursday evening was the first time the two have met, and Clinton, while welcoming the reforms, is taking a more cautious public line.
That, after all, is her job.
Though it’s my guess that she'll be enchanted both by Suu Kyi and Yangon – a good deal more so than the sterile meeting rooms of Naypyitaw.
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December 1, 2011 7:18 PM
CBS News - Refugees from Burma now call Kentucky home
By Seth Doane
America has always been a beacon for those escaping persecution. Since 1990, 92,000 refugees have fled the brutal regime in Burma to settle in the United States. CBS News correspondent Seth Doane reports on some who have made a new start in Kentucky.
A lot of folks think it's the best Thai restaurant in Louisville. As indicated by accolades on its wall, "Simply Thai" gets terrific press.
But the real story here is not the food:
"You were a physician in Burma," Doane asked Mahn Myint Saing in his kitchen, "but you run a restaurant here in the U.S. Was that difficult?
"It needs a little bit of adjustment," he said, "but, no it's not difficult."
In 1988, Dr. Saing found his clinic in the crossfire of a brutal government crackdown in Burma, which is also known as Myanmar -- persecuted, he said, because he's part of "the wrong" ethnic group.
"They shoot at the building - boom, Boom, boom, boom, boom! (making a gun gesture). Glass shattered."
"Your clinic was destroyed?" asked Doane.
"Totally destroyed," he said.
Saing took up arms against the government, but was eventually forced to flee with his family. "No human rights in Myanmar at all! No human rights." he said.
In the conflict, thousands fled into neighboring Thailand. For 23 years, 150,000 people have been trapped -- unable to go home -- yet not permitted to leave the camps by the Thai government. The best hope is an offer from the U.S. government to immigrate.
That's what happened to 16-year-old Eh-Nay-Thaw, who spent 10 years in the camps before being resettled in Kentucky.
"When your mother tells you about those times, what does she tell you? Doane asked.
"Horrible stuff. Our house was burned. The only thing you see was ash -- they destroy everything."
Eh-Nay-Thaw is among several hundred refugees from Burma who have been embraced by Crescent Hill Baptist Church. Officially resettled as refugees, they come here with full legal status: Welcome to work, welcome to go to school, welcome to stay.
"God has sent a miracle for us and we have a chance to come here, which is good," said Eh-Nay-Thaw.
Groups like Kentucky Refugee Ministries provide support with English classes, assistance with government paperwork, and job placement.
Having started as a dishwasher, Dr. Saing is something of a legend among the refugees.
"America is not perfect," he said. "But in my mindset, it's the best place, bar none. The best place to live in this world"
While they've lost their homeland -- in Kentucky, they've found a home.
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Myanmar, Belarus sign accords on bilateral cooperation
English.news.cn 2011-12-02 22:39:51
YANGON, Dec. 2 (Xinhua) -- Myanmar and Belarus have reached a series of accords on bilateral cooperation in Nay Pyi Taw, state radio and television reported Friday.
The agreements were signed after President U Thein Sein met with visiting Belarusian Prime Minister Dr. Mikhail V. Myasnikovich.
The agreements cover economic and trade cooperation, visa exemption on holders of diplomatic and special passports, educational cooperation and agricultural cooperation, the report said, adding that one more agreement on cooperation was signed between chambers of commerce and industry of the two countries.
Myasnikovich also met speakers of both houses of the parliament -- U Khin Aung Myint and U Shwe Mann as well as Foreign Minister U Wunna Maung Lwin, said the report.
Myasnikovich will attend a Myanmar-Belarus economic forum set for Saturday as a follow-up as scheduled.
Belarusian Embassy based in Vietnam's capital of Hanoi also represents its diplomatic mission to Myanmar.
Aimed at promoting bilateral relations between the two countries, Myasnikovich arrived in Nay Pyi Taw Thursday evening on a three-day goodwill visit to Myanmar.
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Myanmar women in cross-border marriages receive free AIDS treatment in SW China city
English.news.cn 2011-12-01 23:48:37
KUNMING, Dec. 1 (Xinhua) -- Women from Myanmar who are married to Chinese men in neighboring Yunnan Province are able to receive free HIV/AIDS checks or medical treatment if found infected, health officials said Thursday.
It is estimated at least 25,000 people in Yunnan, which borders Myanmar, Vietnam and Laos, are in cross-border marriages, of which HIV carriers and AIDS patients account for 2 percent, said Xu Heping, director of the provincial bureau of HIV/AIDS prevention and control..
Because as many as 95 percent of those people are in "de facto" marriages, or marriages that are not legally registered, it is extremely difficult to offer HIV/AIDS prevention and control services among them, Xu said.
Beginning from January, authorities in Ruili City, which borders Myanmar, decided to provide pre-marriage HIV/AIDS testing, anti-viral treatment and prevention of mother-to-child HIV transmission free of charge to married Myanmar women who reside in Ruili.
"All they (the women) need to present (for free services) is a statement from the village they reside in to prove their marital status," said Zhang Miaoyun, director of the city's AIDS prevention and control bureau.
Zhang noted that the decision was based on recent findings that indicate that nearly 60 percent of newly discovered HIV carriers or AIDS patients in Yunnan are women from Myanmar, many of whom are married to local residents.
Around 20,000 people cross the China-Myanmar border in Ruili every day. It is estimated that about 6,000 people in Ruili are in cross-border marriages and most are in "de facto" marriages.
"That means the majority of foreign brides are either unable or unwilling to apply for Chinese citizenship," said Zhang, adding that some of the women are unable to get valid identification from their home countries as well.
Without the policy, they would be unable to acquire free anti-HIV services that are typically reserved for Chinese nationals.
Ruili's program has received recognition from other anti-AIDS departments on both provincial and national levels.
Yunnan will look into creating a more effective AIDS prevention mechanism based on enhanced cooperation between cities on both sides of the province's borders, said Xu Heping.
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INTERVIEW
The Irrawaddy - ‘They Are Fighting Us Like a Foreign Invasion'
Friday, December 2, 2011
General Gun Maw, 46, is the Kachin Independence Army’s (KIA) vice chief of staff and heads the Foreign Affairs Department of the KIA’s political wing, the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO). He was interviewed by Edith Mirante, of Project Maje, in the besieged town of Laiza on November 21, a week before the KIO met with Burmese government representatives in China.
Question: Because it has been 6 months of fighting, what are the challenges?
Answer: The conflict started June 9th and now it’s been almost 6 months. Actually we wanted to solve the problem by political means, but this political way of resolution is not open to us, that’s why we are still holding the defensive warfare. The time of fighting is increasing from month to month. Within October, one month, there were about 180 of these clashes.
Likewise in November, over 100 of these fightings. During these battles, the government are using infantry divisions. Usually these infantry divisions are used to defend against foreign invasion. So that means they are fighting us like a foreign invasion.
Q: Would you characterize this as defensive warfare, or guerrilla, mobile?
A: We use a combination of defensive line and mobile guerrilla warfare. We use tactics depending on the situation or the geography or the terrain. For the whole country, for the whole area, our overall strategy is the defensive situation, but later we use some guerrilla tactics.
Q: Up to now the fighting has been in the east. Is there any consideration of pushing the conflict further out?
A: The Burmese government also cannot spread their troops into other areas, they have to concentrate on this area. And also on the other hand, since the beginning of the conflict, they have lost their face in front of the Chinese authorities. They want to reclaim it, so they want to concentrate there.
Q: Is the [China] pipeline project considered an intrusion in KIA territory?
A: We have discussed about this pipeline project but we don’t make any decision about that. Because it is not yet active in our area. And also even though it crosses in our area it is just a very short term crossing. But we’re still watching about this, the progress of it, and we are discussing about this.
Q: Your neighbors the Wa—do you consider them neutral?
A: Their interest, their destination is different than us. Because they transformed from communist to now they are a national [ethnic] organization. Actually they are a friendly organization, they are not likely to fight against us.
Q: What would be your message to the outside world?
A: The first thing is that in order to solve the problem in Burma we have to go the parallel approach—democratizing and ethnic issues. If the ethnic issues are omitted in this process and democratizing is prioritized this time, the government of Burma can become stronger, financially and politically. On the other hand, this government will continue to suppress the ethnic people, for example it’s like Suharto’s government in Indonesia.
Their final intention for ethnic peoples is disarmament. If the disarmament happens, for them it means peace, the solution. But we cannot trust just disarmament, that’s why we are always pushing them to have the political dialogue.
But no result for us.
In the past 17 years of experience, in that period, we just got the ceasefire, and on the government’s explanation, the ceasefire meant peace for them—the solution for them. That’s why we are asking them, we said, the conflict in Burma is the problem of the political approach. That’s why to solve the problem, we need to discuss politics. So far now, even though we are fighting each other, we always try to communicate with them. By means of correspondence, by means of telephone, and a couple of days ago, we sent some of our delegates to meet with Gen. Aung Min [The Burmese railways minister, an ex-general] in Thailand. We are just trying to let them know that we are struggling for, we are demanding, for ethnic equal rights and democracy and real federalism. We are not trying to be separated from this union.
Q: The KIO lost forests during the ceasefire, and minerals. Are you trying to protect resources for the future?
A: We have been trying to protect all these resources for a long time but since we are the revolutionary group we cannot work on it very effectively, successfully. We lost a lot of our natural resources, like the wood, forests and jade mines, they are almost gone now. When we speak about the Myitsone Dam, we objected to this project because we need to preserve, protect the environment, the land. But on the other hand, the government says we are disturbing the national interest. That’s why we lost a lot of nonrenewable resources from our land. That will never come back again.
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Ethnic leaders brief Clinton on conflicts
Friday, 02 December 2011 22:29 Phanida
Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – As U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton wrapped up her visit to Burma on Friday, she met leaders of ethnic political parties and social organizations to hear first-hand what’s it like to deal with the new Burmese government.
Sao Yun Paing of the Shan Nationalities Democratic Party (SNDP) told Mizzima his party asked Clinton to seek the release of Shan National League for Democracy (SNLD) Chairman Khun Tun Oo, who is being held as a political prisoner.
“We told her about the losses to Shan State in terms of stability and peace. Our needs cannot be achieved by armed conflict. They must be solved by a political dialogue,” he said.
Rakhine Nationalities Development Party (RNDP) Secretary Oo Hla Saw said his party told Clinton that Burma’s greatest need is a definitive resolution to the ethnic issues that prevent improvements in economic development, education and health.
“Ethnic areas are lagging far behind in education and health. We told her about the fighting in ethnic areas, our efforts to stop the civil war, and the difficulties our people have encountered,” said Oo Hla Saw.
Kachin religious leaders and social organizations briefed Clinton on the fighting in the state, the conditions of war refugees and the problems regarding education and health care. Sai Yaw of the Metta Foundation and Kachin Baptist Christian Association General-Secretary Dr. Sam Zun talked about current conditions in Kachin State.
Oo Hla Saw said Clinton told them that she understood their problems in dealing with the new government, and said that when she returned to the U.S., she would make further recommendations to the government on how to deal with ethnic issues.
The meeting with Clinton on Friday included RNDP Secretary Oo Hla Saw; CPP chairman Noe Thang Kup; Sao Yun Paing of the SNDP; Nai Khin Maung of the All Mon Region Democracy Party; Dr. Sai Montha of the Kayin People’s Party; and Sai Saw Aung of the SNLD.
Also attending were NGO representatives; an official from the Metta Foundation; a religious leader from the Kachin Baptist Christian Association; and an official from the Karen Development Network.
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U.S. welcomes Burma’s decision to cut military ties with North Korea
Friday, 02 December 2011 18:46 Tun Tun
New Delhi (Mizzima) – U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ended her three-day visit to Burma on Friday, saying she welcomed the Burmese government’s promise to break off its military relationship with North Korea and it’s commitment to keep implementing democratic reforms.
She told a press conference in Naypyitaw, the capital, after her meeting with President Thein Sein and other key government officials on Thursday: “We look to the government to fully implement UN Security Council Resolutions 1718 and 1874, and we support the government’s stated determination to sever military ties with North Korea.” The UN resolutions imposed an arms embargo against North Korea.
Secretary Clinton also said that if Burma wants to establish a relationship with the U.S., it must abide by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
On Tuesday, a senior U.S. official said in a press conference held in Busan, South Korea, that Clinton would raise the issue of secret ties between Burma and North Korea and the case that Burma reportedly received missile technology from North Korea.
It was difficult to know how the authorities made decisions in Burma, said the official, who referred to North Korean missile technology that Burma reportedly received.
Lower House speaker and former military leader No. 3, Thura Shwe Mann, said Burma had military ties with North Korea, but he denied it had tried to get North Korean nuclear technology.
“Some allegations said that some officials including me went there and signed an agreement regarding nuclear aid. That’s not true,” Thura Shwe Mann said in a press conference in Naypyitaw on Thursday.
He said that to promote Burma’s defense system, Burma signed a military cooperation agreement with North Korea, and he observed North Korea’s defense systems against air attacks, its ammunition plants and air force and navy operations.
“The U.S. has a very good intelligence system. It has not only people intelligence but also intelligence satellites. When I went to North Korea as a general in the past, the U.S. knew about it. It knows what we were doing,” he said.
During Clinton’s visit to Burma, she discussed upgrading its diplomatic relationship and helping Burma in areas of human trafficking, seeking peace in ethnic areas, clearing landmines, education and granting small-scale loans.
She also urged the government to let human rights organizations enter Burma, to release all political prisoners and to ensure a free and fair by-election.
“In response, I said I pledged that we will do as much as we can in order that all citizens including political prisoners can be involved in building the nation and for the sake of national reconciliation,” Thura Shwe Mann said after meeting with Clinton.
Clinton also met with Union Assembly Speaker Khin Aung Myint, who later told members of Parliament that political prisoners would be released when the time comes.
On Friday, before her departure from Rangoon, Clinton also met with Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi for the second time, and National League for Democracy central committee members, in addition to ethnic representatives and local social organizations.
The following are excerpts from the official transcript of Clinton’s press conference on Thursday:
On National Reconciliation:
National reconciliation remains a defining challenge, and more needs to be done to address the root causes of conflict and to advance an inclusive dialogue that will finally bring peace to all of the people. We discussed these and many other challenges ahead, including the need to combat illegal trafficking in persons, weapons, and drugs. And I was very frank in stating that better relations with the United States will only be possible if the entire government respects the international consensus against the spread of nuclear weapons. We look to the government to fully implement UN Security Council Resolutions 1718 and 1874, and we support the government’s stated determination to sever military ties with North Korea.
On President Thein Sein:
His government has eased some restrictions on the media and civil society, opened a dialogue with Aung San Suu Kyi, rewritten election and labor laws, and released 200 prisoners of conscience. The president told me he seeks to build on these steps, and I assured him that these reforms have our support. I also told him that while the measures already taken may be unprecedented and certainly welcome, they are just a beginning. It is encouraging that political prisoners have been released, but over a thousand are still not free. Let me say publicly what I said privately earlier today. No person in any country should be detained for exercising universal freedoms of expression, assembly, and conscience.
He laid out a comprehensive vision of reform, reconciliation, and economic development for his country, including specifics such as the release of political prisoners, an inclusive political process, and free, fair, and credible bi-elections, a rigorous peace and reconciliation process to bring to an end some of the longest-standing conflicts anywhere in the world, and strong assurances regarding his country’s compliance with United Nations Security Council Resolutions 1718 and 1874, and their nonproliferation commitments with respect to North Korea.
On Aung San Suu Kyi:
It is also encouraging that Aung San Suu Kyi is now free to take part in the political process. But that, too, will not be sufficient unless all political parties can open offices throughout the country and compete in free, fair, and credible elections. We welcome initial steps from the government to reduce ethnic tensions and hostilities. But as long as terrible violence continues in some of the world’s longest-running internal conflicts, it will be difficult to begin a new chapter.
This country’s diversity, its dozens of ethnic groups and languages, its shrines, pagodas, mosques, and churches should be a source of strength in the 21st century. And I urged the president to allow international humanitarian groups, human rights monitors and journalists access to conflict zones.
On ethnic groups:
National reconciliation remains a defining challenge, and more needs to be done to address the root causes of conflict and to advance an inclusive dialogue that will finally bring peace to all of the people.
On economic sanctions:
With regard to sanctions, we’re in the early stages of our dialogue. And I want to state for the record that my visit today is the result of over two years of work on our behalf. We’ve had at least 20 high-level visits. We have Assistant Secretary Campbell, and our former representative Scott Marciel. We’ve had a very active engagement by our chargé, and then we filled the position that the Congress created for a permanent special representative with Ambassador Derek Mitchell.
So for more than two years, ever since I asked that we do a review of our Burma policy in 2009, we have been reaching out, we’ve been trying to gather information, because we wanted to see change for the benefit of all of the people. And so we have been working toward this, and the reason that we were finally able to reach the decision that the president announced for me to visit is because of the steps that the government has taken.
We know more needs to be done, however, and we think that we have to wait to make sure that this commitment is real. So we’re not only talking to senior members of the government, but we’re talking to civil society members, we’re talking to members of the political opposition, we’re talking to representatives of ethnic minorities, because we want to be sure that we have as full a picture as possible.
So we’re not at the point yet that we can consider lifting sanctions that we have in place because of our ongoing concerns about policies that have to be reversed. But any steps that the government takes will be carefully considered and will be, as I said, matched because we want to see political and economic reform take hold. And I told the leadership that we would certainly consider the easing and elimination of sanctions as we go forward in this process together. And it has to be not theoretical or rhetorical. It has to be very real, on the ground, [something] which can be evaluated. But we are open to that, and we are going to pursue many different avenues to demonstrate our continuing support for this path of reform.
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Peaceful assembly and march bill waits for president’s signature
Friday, 02 December 2011 19:31 Ko Wild
Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – A major step forward for Burmese society will take place when President Thein Sein signs the bill approved by both houses of Parliament to guarantee the right to peacefully assemble and march in demonstrations.
However, observers said the bill, approved on November 22, did not specify when it would be sent to the president to sign.
Home Minister Lieutenant General Ko Ko introduced the bill in the Lower House on September 26.
While some politicians criticized the bill, others said it’s a step forward in the early stages of moving toward democratic principles.
The bill specifies that permission to demonstrate must be sought at least five days in advance from the township police chief concerned and biographies of leaders must be submitted to authorities, a requirement criticized by some observers.
“I think that is intended to allow authorities to restrict things by verbal orders. I see many points that reflect restrictions in the law,” said an opposition activist lawyer Pho Phyu.
He said requiring the authority's permission and seeking intrusive information is a way to discourage or deny permits.
The bill says the relevant township police chief, along with the approval of the township’s administrative office chief, must inform leaders who want to protest 48 hours prior to the designated time of the protest.
If the request to demonstrate is rejected, the group can submit an appeal to the relevant state or region police chief within seven days after the rejection, according to the bill.
One MP, who asked for anonymity, said: “The Constitution does not forbid military personnel from staging a protest. It uses the word 'every citizen'.”
Section 12 (a) of the bill submitted by the home minister said, “[Protestors cannot do] anything that would seem to create a disturbance…” MP Khaing Maung Yi tried to remove "seem to" from the sentence, but his effort failed.
“Even if nothing happens, the words ‘seems to’ can create problems. How will we measure the phrase ‘seems to create disturbance?’ But, the home minister would not accept my suggestion. So, I said if they could not remove it, I would withdraw my suggestion. Even if the case was put to a vote, it was sure that I would be defeated,” he said.
Section 12 (e) of Chapter V of the bill originally said, “Chanting slogans and shouting are not allowed,” but a Lower House MP from the Shan Nationalities and Development Party submitted a motion to remove the phrase “chanting slogans” and the motion was approved.
Lower House MP Khaing Maung Yi of the National Democratic Force (NDF) put forward a motion urging the Parliament to replace the “demanding biographies of protestors” requirement with requiring “names and addresses of protestors,” but the motion was rejected.
“I said that police should not demand unnecessary facts. I was defeated. I got 26 yes votes, nine neutral votes and 349 no votes,” he said.
Meanwhile, a seven-person group led by Difference and Peace Party chairman Nay Myo Wai is preparing to stage a protest on December 12 under the new law, which they expect to go into effect next week.
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DVB News - World Bank, IMF to enter Burma: US
By JOSEPH ALLCHIN
Published: 2 December 2011
Clinton said the US would drop its blockade on the IMF entering Burma (Reuters)
The US will “agree to and support” assessment missions to Burma by the World Bank and IMF as one of a number of rewards for recent reforms offered by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during her meeting with President Thein Sein yesterday.
The international lenders could now “begin studying the needs here”, she reportedly told the Burmese leader in Naypyidaw. US sanctions on Burma currently prohibit Washington’s support for lending and technical assistance to Burma by the likes of the World Bank and IMF.
The World Bank ceased its operations in the country in July 1987, and since 1998 Burma was considered unable to pay back its debts to the Bank. The IMF however still carried out annual trips to the country but has not provided any assistance.
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) would most likely also be included among financial institutions able to re-enter Burma. ADB has not provided new finance since 1986 and Burma stopped “servicing” ADB loans in January 1998.
Following the meeting yesterday, a US official said of the IMF: “They’ve had some people here, but the United States has not in the past supported a full, comprehensive assessment of needs, and we are now prepared to do that.”
The most common use for loans from such institutions is for large scale infrastructure projects, of which many analysts suggest Burma badly needs. The country’s debt burden is growing, and according to the US State Department it currently stands in the region of $US9 billion, with around $US4.7 billion owed to Japan alone.
Infrastructure projects have been put on hold, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit, because of budget shortfalls. Burmese economist Khin Maung Nyo believes this to include projects like the trans-Asia highway.
The World Bank has historically been the world’s largest financier for big dams, currently funding an average of four per year globally. Somewhat ironically, this has included dams in China, which has been the biggest player in the Burmese hydropower sector. According to the Guardian newspaper, the World Bank’s portfolio of dams stands at around $US11 billion, with a 50 percent increase in financing since 1997.
The ADB meanwhile is financing dam construction on the Mekong in neighbouring Laos and other regional rivers. The ADB announced last month that they were providing $US465 million for a at 440 MW dam on the Nam Ngum River in northern Laos, one that would be slightly smaller than the proposed Myitsone Dam in northern Burma. Like Myitsone, the majority of the dam’s energy would be destined for a neighbouring country, in this case Thailand.
The Financial Times asserted that the exploratory missions in Burma by the two financial institutions would be “one of the first steps towards lending programmes” and that “analysts say the Obama administration has some room to increase engagement and technical assistance before it must seek the permission of Congress”.
Clinton also said the US would loosen restrictions to UN Development Program (UNDP) funding in the country, “particularly in the area of health and microfinance”.
Burma is in dire need of both, with the current government making no commitments to increase its health spending beyond the 0.9 percent of its annual budget, which equates to about $US1 per person, per year. In comparison, neighbouring China spends roughly $US66 per person each year.
Clinton also said that the US would resume counter-narcotics programmes in Burma, with a US official noting in September that the country’s narcotics industry would grow in importance.
US anti-drug efforts in the country that historically have been carried through with the help of the CIA continued until 2004 when Prime Minister Khin Nyunt was purged, according to former Burmese intelligence officer, Aung Lynn Htut.
In the past they have included the supply of equipment such as Antelope helicopters to the Burmese military, but such measures made little difference to Burma’s narcotics’ output.
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DVB News - Aid push to stem Kachin refugee crisis
By NAW NOREEN
Published: 2 December 2011
Calls from eight Kachin groups on visiting US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to press the government to draw to a close months of heavy fighting in the northern Burmese state have been welcomed by rights groups.
The US-based Physicians for Human Rights (PHR), who released a report this week detailing ongoing human rights violations by the Burmese army against Kachin civilians, further
applauded Clinton’s request that the government drop its blockade on aid reaching the thousands displaced by fighting since June.
Naw Din, editor of the Thailand-based Kachin News Group, a signatory to a letter sent to Clinton prior to her meeting with President Thein Sein yesterday, said the denial of the extent of the refugee crisis was proof that the government’s “democratic reform is not genuine”.
“If they want genuine democratic reform, they should initiate a ceasefire, not only in Kachin state but nationwide and then hold negotiations,” he said.
Of the estimated 40,000 forced to flee their homes in the past six months in Kachin state, the government is allowing the UN to access only 6,000 sheltering in government-controlled territory. The remaining have fled to areas controlled by the warring Kachin Independence Army (KIA) or across the border to China.
A number of charity groups from Rangoon and Mandalay are heading to the northern state this weekend to support the aid effort, which local groups in Kachin state say is woefully undernourished.
Among them are the renowned Free Funeral Service Society, which has donated around 20 million kyat ($US25,000) to supplying food and medicine to the refugees. Also heading north is the Mandalay-based Bawa Ahlin, whose leader monk Ashin Uttamatharya, told DVB that it would bring doctors from Mandalay to the war-torn frontier region.
Weather conditions are expected to deteriorate in the mountainous region as winter kicks in, and other groups included in the aid effort, such as the Child Lovers Network from Rangoon, say they will send winter clothes and blankets there.
Ethnic political parties have also waded into the debate over aid to the refugees, and urged a more substantial push for a ceasefire. Nai Ngwe Thein, chairman of Mon National League for Democracy, believes however that the government has no interest in allowing groups like the KIA to continue controlling areas of the resource-rich state.
“[The Burmese government] has a lot of joint investments with China in Kachin state and they are merely looking to secure them … [and] completely crush the KIA so that they can get hydropower from Kachin state,” he said, adding that China was playing a “discreet role” in the conflict and refusing to support refugees crossing over the border.
While the political reforms underway in Burma have received strong support from the international community, PHR say they are serving to distract from crises in the border regions. “Incremental changes that do not reach ethnic minority communities are not signs of sustainable progress,” it said in a statement released today.
“Secretary Clinton noted that preliminary gestures of openness on the part of the leaders of Burma will not automatically translate into a lifting of sanctions,” it added.
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Saturday, 3 December 2011
BURMA RELATED NEWS - DECEMBER 02, 2011
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