Saturday, 17 December 2011
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Burma: Amy turns deaf ear to halt war in Kachin State
By Zin Linn Dec 17, 2011 12:45PM UTC
Burma's President Thein Sein civilian government has been maneuvering war against the Kachin rebels incessantly, although there are heavy casualties on its side. Starting from 9 June, the six-month long civil war claimed more than a thousand lives of government soldiers.
Recently, President Thein Sein has issued an instruction to Burma's Commander-in-Chief to halt the offensive against the KIO. However, the war continues and people continue to run for their lives. So, the speech of the government is not consistent with the attempt of its armed forces.
As a consequence of the warfare between Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and the Burma Army, local inhabitants were fleeing from Kachin State to Northern Shan State, but authorities have taken no responsibility for them, quoting locals eyewitnesses, Shan Herald Agency for News (S.H.A.N) said.
According to one Nam-Kham resident, more than 400 victims arrived at the church last week. The victims said that the Burmese soldiers had bombarded their village as well as its surroundings. Altogether 456 people, mostly Shan and Kachin from Kachin State, reached Nam-Kham, Northern Shan State, in the evening of 12 December, Shan Herald Agency for News reported.
The victims are children, women and the elderly from villages including Kat-Para, Nam-Hsar, Oo-Lampa and Kha-Shan in Mansi Township, Kachin State. They had fled because they were afraid of being mistreated by the Burmese soldiers, according to one of the displaced people.
A temporary refugee camp has been set up by the Catholic abbot at Aung Myitta and Sa Lay Tan wards and provided for their requirements, a civilian official in Aung Myitta ward said.
The abbot and the neighborhood residents provided blankets, clothes, household utensils and food for the victims but government officials provided nothing. Instead, they asked questions like whether the war refugees had their ID cards or not.
As reported by Shan Herald Agency for News, more than 10,000 victims are fleeing to Bhamo, Waing Maw and Myitkyina. There are 40,000 displaced people said to be at Kachin Independence Organization (KIO)'s Laiza area. The United Nations organizations are there to help them, according to KIO sources.
On 14 December, the state-run New Light of Myanmar claimed that the central government provided a significant amount of aid to needy refugees living in the KIO-controlled territory on Monday December 12.
But, the KIO dismissed the news of aid to refugees in the government media. According to Kachin News Group, representatives of the KIO have proved their false propaganda published in Burmese government state-media about the central government's "humanitarian" contribution to refugees displaced by fighting in Kachin and Northern Shan state.
It was a UN convoy carrying humanitarian aid that arrived into the KIO territory on December 12, but there were no governmental "humanitarian" contribution to refugees. The state-media's description of the aid convoy is misleading and false, the KIO said.
Last month, representatives of the President Thein Sein government and the KIO met twice for talks which have so far failed to bring about a halt to the fighting. The Burmese army continues to send in troops to the area, leading many to conclude that Naypyidaw wants to bring about a military solution to the conflict.
Local sources on the ground in the Kachin state say that during the past week the Kachin resistance has inflicted a large number of casualties on poorly trained Burmese conscript troops, as the central government's offensive against the Kachin Independence Organization enters its seventh month.
According to a KIA source, in the outskirts of Dingga village there were more than 10 burial sites where fallen Burmese soldiers had recently been buried. One Burmese officer was among those fallen soldiers in the area, said a KIA officer to the Kachin News Group on Friday. The officer also said that the Burmese army's arson attack on the village appeared to be in retaliation to losing so many of their comrades to the Kachin resistance.
In September, the US-based NGO 'Physicians for Human Rights (PHR)' conducted an investigation in Burma's Kachin State in response to reports of grave human rights violations in the region. PHR found that between June and September 2011, the Burmese army looted food from civilians, fired indiscriminately into villages, threatened villages with attacks, and used civilians as porters and human minesweepers.
http://asiancorrespondent.com/72208/burma-army-turns-a-deaf-ear-to-halt-war-in-kachin-state/
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Authorities ignore war victims
Friday, 16 December 2011 15:30 Kham .
Because of the fighting between Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and the Burma Army, people were fleeing from Kachin State to Northern Shan State, but authorities were doing nothing for them, according to locals.
A Nam Kham resident said, "Over 400 victims arrived at the church in the evening on 12 December. They said the Burmese force had shelled the village including its surroundings."
Altogether 456 people, mostly Shan and Kachin from Kachin State, reached Nam Kham, Northern Shan State on 12 December at 5 p.m.
"The Catholic abbot set up a temporary refugee camp at Aung Myitta and Sa Lay Tan wards and provided for their needs," a civilian official who lives in Aung Myitta ward said.
The victims are children, women and the elderly from villages including Kat Para, Nam Hsar, Oo Lampa and Kha Shan in Mansi Township, Kachin State. They had fled because they were afraid of being molested by the Burmese soldiers, according to one of the displaced people.
"The residents including the abbot came and gave us blankets, clothes, household utensils and food but the government didn't. They came and asked many questions like whether we carried ID cards. It was very disturbing,"a displaced old woman said.
Refugees from Manwiang at Namkham refugee centers (Photo: SHAN)
Most of them are in Nam Kham and in Nongdao village tract, Ruili Township, China, staying with their relatives. Those who have been there for one or two months are issued temporary cards to stay in Chinese territory.
Over 10,000 victims are fleeing to Bhamo, Waing Maw and Myitkyina. There are 40,000 displaced people said to be at Kachin Independence Organization (KIO)'s Laiza base. The United Nations organizations are there to help them, according to KIO sources.
President Thein Sein was said to have issued a directive to the Burma Army to halt the offensive against the KIO but the fighting continues and the people continue to flee from their harms.
http://www.shanland.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4286:authorities-ignore-war-victims&catid=87:human-rights&Itemid=285
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Burma Army burns Kachin Baptist church in war-torn north
Category: News
Created on Friday, 16 December 2011 23:14
Published Date
Written by KNG
On Friday afternoon in Dingga Village in Burma's northern Kachin state, Burmese soldiers set fire to a building that houses the kitchen belonging to a Baptist church, local villagers report.
While troops from the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and local villagers were able to save the actual church building, 5 wooden homes located near the church were completely destroyed by the flames.
Local villagers report that the arson was carried out by soldiers from the Dawhpumyang-based Infantry Battalion No. 142 and Myitkyina-based Infantry Battalion No. 37. The soldiers were passing through the area while retreating from the frontlines.
Late on Wednesday, fighting erupted near Dingga Village, located about three miles south of Dawhpumyang on the Myitkyina to Manmaw (Bhamo) road.
Earlier this week Burmese soldiers in the area appeared to have halted their offensive. The temporary break in the conflict coincided with the visit of a UN team to the KIA's headquarters in nearby Laiza, the Burmese offensive resumed however, once the UN team was gone from the area.
A KIA officer reached by phone told the Kachin News Group today that in the outskirts of Dingga village he saw more than 10 mounds where fallen Burmese soldiers had recently been buried. He reported that a Burmese officer was among those killed in the area.
The officer also said that the Burmese army's arson attack on the village appeared to be in retaliation for losing so many of their comrades to the Kachin opposition.
More than 30,000 Kachin civilians have fled to refugee camps run by the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) since June, when the Burmese army unilaterally ended a 17 year cease fire with the KIO.
A recent report published by the US based NGO Physicians for Human Rights found strong evidence that Burma's army has committed numerous war crimes against the civilian population caught up in the Kachin conflict. The report which was released last month accused Burmese forces of committing acts of rape, summary execution and torture against Kachin civilians. http://www.kachinnews.com/news/2190-burma-army-burns-kachin-baptist-church-in-war-torn-north.html
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BBC:16 December 2011
Burma 'jails' Karen rebel leader Mahn Nyein Maung
One of the main ethnic Karen rebel leaders has been sentenced to 17 years in prison on a charge of "unlawful association", reports from Burma say.
Mahn Nyein Maung, of the Karen National Union, was deported to Burma after a visa problem on a trip between Thailand and China, Burmese journalists said.
Burma has not commented on the reports.
Burma's government says the KNU is illegal, but has recently held exploratory peace talks with it and other armed ethnic minority groups.
Mahn Nyein Maung was reportedly travelling from Thailand to China for talks about the peace process.
On his return to Bangkok, the Thai authorities allegedly found out that he had an invalid visa, sending him back to China. Beijing then deported him to Burma.
Mahn Nyein Maung was initially charged only with having false documents, reports say.
But when the Burmese authorities found out who he was, they laid the much more serious charge of unlawful association.
The KNU told the BBC it was aware of the reports of Mahn Nyein Maung's imprisonment and would raise the issue with government representatives.
The KNU has been fighting for greater autonomy since the late 1940s.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-16227766
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English.news.cn 2011-12-17 16:36:49
Thai PM expects to meet Suu Kyi during Myanmar visit next week
BANGKOK, Dec. 17 (Xinhua) -- Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra said on Saturday that she would pay an official introductory visit to Myanmar next week and she expected to meet Myanmar's opposition leader, Mass Communication of Thailand reported on Saturday.
Yingluck said during her weekly TV programme "Yingluck Government meets the People" that she will travel to Myanmar's capital Naypyidaw on Monday to attend the 4th Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) Summit 2011 before paying an official visit to Myanmar.
The premier said she may have an opportunity to meet with Aung San Suu Kyi in Yangon and exchange views.
During the 4th GMS Summit, the leaders of the six GMS countries -- Cambodia, China, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam will sign a Joint Declaration of the 4th GMS Summit.
The six leaders will also sign the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for joint action to reduce HIV vulnerability related to population movement, and another MoU on the Joint Cooperation in Further Accelerating the Construction of the Information Superhighway and its Application in the GMS, and on Articles of Association of the GMS Freight Transporters Association.
Editor: Fang Yang http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2011-12/17/c_131312452.htm
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Thai PM to meet Myanmar's Suu Kyi next week
(AFP)
BANGKOK Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra said that she would meet Myanmar's democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi on a visit to the neighbouring country next week.
Yingluck will travel to Myanmar's capital Naypyidaw on Monday for a meeting of Greater Mekong country leaders before visiting Yangon -- becoming the first Thai premier to meet Suu Kyi, a government spokesman said.
"I will attend the conference on Mekong energy cooperation in Myanmar and will take this opportunity to meet with Aung San Suu Kyi to exchange views and ideas," Yingluck said in her weekly live television broadcast.
"She is a remarkable woman who fights for democracy," she added.
Thai foreign affairs spokesman Thani Thongphakdi said it would be the first meeting between Suu Kyi and a prime minister of Thailand, which a key local partner of the military-dominated country.
Detained for most of the past two decades, Suu Kyi was released from her latest stint under house arrest a few days after a controversial election in November last year, which her opposition party boycotted.
But since coming to power in March after nearly five decades of outright military rule, Myanmar's nominally civilian government has surprised critics with a series of reformist moves.
It has also this month given Suu Kyi's party the go-ahead to rejoin mainstream politics and allowed her various high-profile meetings, including with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and China's ambassador to Myanmar.
Suu Kyi has said she will take part in by-elections expected in early 2012, although no date has been set.
Yingluck took office in August after sweeping to a Thai election victory with the support of her older brother, fugitive former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted in a coup in 2006.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hi9n9PmWUfUivgRIsT4DYk5uOcag?docId=CNG.cc0deb74231895b25c32fdd9a671f34f.b1
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Myanmar monk in trouble over speech at Suu Kyi party
Friday, Dec 16, 2011
YANGON - A monk in Myanmar has been ordered out of his monastery by Buddhist elders who said he had given an inappropriate speech at an office of pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyis party, he said Friday.
Ashin Pyinyar Thiha, who recently met US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during her historic visit, said he received a letter from the State Sangha Maha Nayaka committee asking him to leave Sardu Buddhist Monastery in Yangon.
It said the action was taken because of a speech he made at a branch of Suu Kyis National League of Democracy in Mandalay in central Myanmar in September.
The 46-year-old said he would write to the Buddhist elders to appeal the decision.
I will apologise... after that everything will be okay, Ashin Pyinnyar Thiha, who has spent 27 years as a Buddhist monk, told AFP. This is not the time to quarrel with very senior monks.
He blamed the authorities for sending inaccurate information to the senior monks about the incident, which Suu Kyis party described as a misunderstanding.
It was just an ordinary donation event, spokesman Nyan Win told AFP.
Observers suggested the action might be linked to recent political activities at his monastery, as well as Ashin Pyinyar Thihas meeting with Clinton earlier this month at the residence of the US Charge dAffaires in Yangon.
A Myanmar government official said Ashin Pyinnyar Thihas case was an internal issue for the monks.
A new nominally civilian government that came to power in March has surprised critics with tentative signs of reform.
A small group of monks held a rare protest in Mandalay last month but no action was taken against them, in the latest tentative sign of change.
It was thought to be the first such rally since mass protests led by clergy in 2007 were brutally quashed, with the deaths of at least 31 people and the arrests of many monks.
http://news.asiaone.com/News/Latest%2BNews/Asia/Story/A1Story20111216-316692.html
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No progress since 2010 elections: reportShareComments
(0)By FRANCIS WADE
Published: 15 December 2011
This photo, taken on 7 June 2011, shows a 7-year-old who was severely injured in his head when Burmese troops shelled Mae TLer village in Karen state. He later died from his injuries (KHRG)Conditions for civilians in Burmas border regions, long beset by conflict and lack of development, have continued along the same trajectory for nearly two decades, despite elections a year ago that many hoped would prompt an improvement in livelihoods for ethnic peoples, a study of the past year warns.
The mood of the report is built on testimonies collected since November 2010 from 1,207 civilians in four states and divisions in eastern Burma Karen, Mon, Tenasserim and Karenni. It seeks to build a retrospective of a year that many claim has dramatically altered the landscape in Burma.
But the findings appear to prove otherwise. Some people are discussing changes since the election, and the potential for reform. But the villagers speaking and working with us are struggling to respond to the same abuses now as in the past, said Saw Albert, field director for the Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG), which compiled the report.
Nothing that has happened over the last 12 months has created new opportunities for them to address this abuse let alone resolved the root causes.
Among its findings is evidence of continued egregious human rights abuses by the army consistent with patterns of abuse that KHRG has documented over the last twenty years. These include forced expropriation of labour, land and property from rural communities and the wide-scale and destructive extraction of natural resources.
Both are cause and effect of heavy militarisation of Burmas border regions, which began half a century ago to quell rebellions by ethnic armies, but which has ramped up over the past decade as the government looks to secure these resource-rich regions for exploitation.
In many areas conflict has intensified since the November 2010 elections, which ironically ushered in a pseudo-civilian government and cautious hope that protracted wars would end. Fighting against groups like the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) and the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) in the countrys north were triggered by their refusal to become government-controlled Border Guard Forces.
The report notes that of the seven regions in eastern Burma where testimonies were taken, civilians in four had been tortured by Burmese troops over the past year. All regions had populations that had suffered as a result of landmines and indiscriminate firing of artillery, while at least one civilian in five of the seven regions had been extra-judicially executed.
Yet many assessments of Burma by international players lend somewhat myopic attention to the political reforms underway, whilst sidelining ongoing abuses of ethnic minorities, KHRG says.
No accurate external assessment of current conditions in eastern Burma can be conducted without heeding the concerns of rural people who are gauging, on a day-to-day basis, the way abuse compromises their priorities, notes the report.
That emphasis on local voices, which are largely left out of think tank reports and governmental statements hailing the perceived transition to democracy, should function as a stinging critique of any attempt to assess changes since the election that excludes the voices of rural people in ethnic areas, it adds.
http://www.dvb.no/news/%e2%80%98no-progress-since-2010-elections%e2%80%99-report/19221
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Burma: Amy turns deaf ear to halt war in Kachin State
By Zin Linn Dec 17, 2011 12:45PM UTC
Burma's President Thein Sein civilian government has been maneuvering war against the Kachin rebels incessantly, although there are heavy casualties on its side. Starting from 9 June, the six-month long civil war claimed more than a thousand lives of government soldiers.
Recently, President Thein Sein has issued an instruction to Burma's Commander-in-Chief to halt the offensive against the KIO. However, the war continues and people continue to run for their lives. So, the speech of the government is not consistent with the attempt of its armed forces.
As a consequence of the warfare between Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and the Burma Army, local inhabitants were fleeing from Kachin State to Northern Shan State, but authorities have taken no responsibility for them, quoting locals eyewitnesses, Shan Herald Agency for News (S.H.A.N) said.
According to one Nam-Kham resident, more than 400 victims arrived at the church last week. The victims said that the Burmese soldiers had bombarded their village as well as its surroundings. Altogether 456 people, mostly Shan and Kachin from Kachin State, reached Nam-Kham, Northern Shan State, in the evening of 12 December, Shan Herald Agency for News reported.
The victims are children, women and the elderly from villages including Kat-Para, Nam-Hsar, Oo-Lampa and Kha-Shan in Mansi Township, Kachin State. They had fled because they were afraid of being mistreated by the Burmese soldiers, according to one of the displaced people.
A temporary refugee camp has been set up by the Catholic abbot at Aung Myitta and Sa Lay Tan wards and provided for their requirements, a civilian official in Aung Myitta ward said.
The abbot and the neighborhood residents provided blankets, clothes, household utensils and food for the victims but government officials provided nothing. Instead, they asked questions like whether the war refugees had their ID cards or not.
As reported by Shan Herald Agency for News, more than 10,000 victims are fleeing to Bhamo, Waing Maw and Myitkyina. There are 40,000 displaced people said to be at Kachin Independence Organization (KIO)'s Laiza area. The United Nations organizations are there to help them, according to KIO sources.
On 14 December, the state-run New Light of Myanmar claimed that the central government provided a significant amount of aid to needy refugees living in the KIO-controlled territory on Monday December 12.
But, the KIO dismissed the news of aid to refugees in the government media. According to Kachin News Group, representatives of the KIO have proved their false propaganda published in Burmese government state-media about the central government's "humanitarian" contribution to refugees displaced by fighting in Kachin and Northern Shan state.
It was a UN convoy carrying humanitarian aid that arrived into the KIO territory on December 12, but there were no governmental "humanitarian" contribution to refugees. The state-media's description of the aid convoy is misleading and false, the KIO said.
Last month, representatives of the President Thein Sein government and the KIO met twice for talks which have so far failed to bring about a halt to the fighting. The Burmese army continues to send in troops to the area, leading many to conclude that Naypyidaw wants to bring about a military solution to the conflict.
Local sources on the ground in the Kachin state say that during the past week the Kachin resistance has inflicted a large number of casualties on poorly trained Burmese conscript troops, as the central government's offensive against the Kachin Independence Organization enters its seventh month.
According to a KIA source, in the outskirts of Dingga village there were more than 10 burial sites where fallen Burmese soldiers had recently been buried. One Burmese officer was among those fallen soldiers in the area, said a KIA officer to the Kachin News Group on Friday. The officer also said that the Burmese army's arson attack on the village appeared to be in retaliation to losing so many of their comrades to the Kachin resistance.
In September, the US-based NGO 'Physicians for Human Rights (PHR)' conducted an investigation in Burma's Kachin State in response to reports of grave human rights violations in the region. PHR found that between June and September 2011, the Burmese army looted food from civilians, fired indiscriminately into villages, threatened villages with attacks, and used civilians as porters and human minesweepers.
http://asiancorrespondent.com/72208/burma-army-turns-a-deaf-ear-to-halt-war-in-kachin-state/
--------------------------------------
Authorities ignore war victims
Friday, 16 December 2011 15:30 Kham .
Because of the fighting between Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and the Burma Army, people were fleeing from Kachin State to Northern Shan State, but authorities were doing nothing for them, according to locals.
A Nam Kham resident said, "Over 400 victims arrived at the church in the evening on 12 December. They said the Burmese force had shelled the village including its surroundings."
Altogether 456 people, mostly Shan and Kachin from Kachin State, reached Nam Kham, Northern Shan State on 12 December at 5 p.m.
"The Catholic abbot set up a temporary refugee camp at Aung Myitta and Sa Lay Tan wards and provided for their needs," a civilian official who lives in Aung Myitta ward said.
The victims are children, women and the elderly from villages including Kat Para, Nam Hsar, Oo Lampa and Kha Shan in Mansi Township, Kachin State. They had fled because they were afraid of being molested by the Burmese soldiers, according to one of the displaced people.
"The residents including the abbot came and gave us blankets, clothes, household utensils and food but the government didn't. They came and asked many questions like whether we carried ID cards. It was very disturbing,"a displaced old woman said.
Refugees from Manwiang at Namkham refugee centers (Photo: SHAN)
Most of them are in Nam Kham and in Nongdao village tract, Ruili Township, China, staying with their relatives. Those who have been there for one or two months are issued temporary cards to stay in Chinese territory.
Over 10,000 victims are fleeing to Bhamo, Waing Maw and Myitkyina. There are 40,000 displaced people said to be at Kachin Independence Organization (KIO)'s Laiza base. The United Nations organizations are there to help them, according to KIO sources.
President Thein Sein was said to have issued a directive to the Burma Army to halt the offensive against the KIO but the fighting continues and the people continue to flee from their harms.
http://www.shanland.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4286:authorities-ignore-war-victims&catid=87:human-rights&Itemid=285
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Burma Army burns Kachin Baptist church in war-torn north
Category: News
Created on Friday, 16 December 2011 23:14
Published Date
Written by KNG
On Friday afternoon in Dingga Village in Burma's northern Kachin state, Burmese soldiers set fire to a building that houses the kitchen belonging to a Baptist church, local villagers report.
While troops from the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and local villagers were able to save the actual church building, 5 wooden homes located near the church were completely destroyed by the flames.
Local villagers report that the arson was carried out by soldiers from the Dawhpumyang-based Infantry Battalion No. 142 and Myitkyina-based Infantry Battalion No. 37. The soldiers were passing through the area while retreating from the frontlines.
Late on Wednesday, fighting erupted near Dingga Village, located about three miles south of Dawhpumyang on the Myitkyina to Manmaw (Bhamo) road.
Earlier this week Burmese soldiers in the area appeared to have halted their offensive. The temporary break in the conflict coincided with the visit of a UN team to the KIA's headquarters in nearby Laiza, the Burmese offensive resumed however, once the UN team was gone from the area.
A KIA officer reached by phone told the Kachin News Group today that in the outskirts of Dingga village he saw more than 10 mounds where fallen Burmese soldiers had recently been buried. He reported that a Burmese officer was among those killed in the area.
The officer also said that the Burmese army's arson attack on the village appeared to be in retaliation for losing so many of their comrades to the Kachin opposition.
More than 30,000 Kachin civilians have fled to refugee camps run by the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) since June, when the Burmese army unilaterally ended a 17 year cease fire with the KIO.
A recent report published by the US based NGO Physicians for Human Rights found strong evidence that Burma's army has committed numerous war crimes against the civilian population caught up in the Kachin conflict. The report which was released last month accused Burmese forces of committing acts of rape, summary execution and torture against Kachin civilians. http://www.kachinnews.com/news/2190-burma-army-burns-kachin-baptist-church-in-war-torn-north.html
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BBC:16 December 2011
Burma 'jails' Karen rebel leader Mahn Nyein Maung
One of the main ethnic Karen rebel leaders has been sentenced to 17 years in prison on a charge of "unlawful association", reports from Burma say.
Mahn Nyein Maung, of the Karen National Union, was deported to Burma after a visa problem on a trip between Thailand and China, Burmese journalists said.
Burma has not commented on the reports.
Burma's government says the KNU is illegal, but has recently held exploratory peace talks with it and other armed ethnic minority groups.
Mahn Nyein Maung was reportedly travelling from Thailand to China for talks about the peace process.
On his return to Bangkok, the Thai authorities allegedly found out that he had an invalid visa, sending him back to China. Beijing then deported him to Burma.
Mahn Nyein Maung was initially charged only with having false documents, reports say.
But when the Burmese authorities found out who he was, they laid the much more serious charge of unlawful association.
The KNU told the BBC it was aware of the reports of Mahn Nyein Maung's imprisonment and would raise the issue with government representatives.
The KNU has been fighting for greater autonomy since the late 1940s.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-16227766
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English.news.cn 2011-12-17 16:36:49
Thai PM expects to meet Suu Kyi during Myanmar visit next week
BANGKOK, Dec. 17 (Xinhua) -- Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra said on Saturday that she would pay an official introductory visit to Myanmar next week and she expected to meet Myanmar's opposition leader, Mass Communication of Thailand reported on Saturday.
Yingluck said during her weekly TV programme "Yingluck Government meets the People" that she will travel to Myanmar's capital Naypyidaw on Monday to attend the 4th Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) Summit 2011 before paying an official visit to Myanmar.
The premier said she may have an opportunity to meet with Aung San Suu Kyi in Yangon and exchange views.
During the 4th GMS Summit, the leaders of the six GMS countries -- Cambodia, China, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam will sign a Joint Declaration of the 4th GMS Summit.
The six leaders will also sign the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for joint action to reduce HIV vulnerability related to population movement, and another MoU on the Joint Cooperation in Further Accelerating the Construction of the Information Superhighway and its Application in the GMS, and on Articles of Association of the GMS Freight Transporters Association.
Editor: Fang Yang http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2011-12/17/c_131312452.htm
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Thai PM to meet Myanmar's Suu Kyi next week
(AFP)
BANGKOK Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra said that she would meet Myanmar's democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi on a visit to the neighbouring country next week.
Yingluck will travel to Myanmar's capital Naypyidaw on Monday for a meeting of Greater Mekong country leaders before visiting Yangon -- becoming the first Thai premier to meet Suu Kyi, a government spokesman said.
"I will attend the conference on Mekong energy cooperation in Myanmar and will take this opportunity to meet with Aung San Suu Kyi to exchange views and ideas," Yingluck said in her weekly live television broadcast.
"She is a remarkable woman who fights for democracy," she added.
Thai foreign affairs spokesman Thani Thongphakdi said it would be the first meeting between Suu Kyi and a prime minister of Thailand, which a key local partner of the military-dominated country.
Detained for most of the past two decades, Suu Kyi was released from her latest stint under house arrest a few days after a controversial election in November last year, which her opposition party boycotted.
But since coming to power in March after nearly five decades of outright military rule, Myanmar's nominally civilian government has surprised critics with a series of reformist moves.
It has also this month given Suu Kyi's party the go-ahead to rejoin mainstream politics and allowed her various high-profile meetings, including with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and China's ambassador to Myanmar.
Suu Kyi has said she will take part in by-elections expected in early 2012, although no date has been set.
Yingluck took office in August after sweeping to a Thai election victory with the support of her older brother, fugitive former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted in a coup in 2006.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hi9n9PmWUfUivgRIsT4DYk5uOcag?docId=CNG.cc0deb74231895b25c32fdd9a671f34f.b1
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Myanmar monk in trouble over speech at Suu Kyi party
Friday, Dec 16, 2011
YANGON - A monk in Myanmar has been ordered out of his monastery by Buddhist elders who said he had given an inappropriate speech at an office of pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyis party, he said Friday.
Ashin Pyinyar Thiha, who recently met US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during her historic visit, said he received a letter from the State Sangha Maha Nayaka committee asking him to leave Sardu Buddhist Monastery in Yangon.
It said the action was taken because of a speech he made at a branch of Suu Kyis National League of Democracy in Mandalay in central Myanmar in September.
The 46-year-old said he would write to the Buddhist elders to appeal the decision.
I will apologise... after that everything will be okay, Ashin Pyinnyar Thiha, who has spent 27 years as a Buddhist monk, told AFP. This is not the time to quarrel with very senior monks.
He blamed the authorities for sending inaccurate information to the senior monks about the incident, which Suu Kyis party described as a misunderstanding.
It was just an ordinary donation event, spokesman Nyan Win told AFP.
Observers suggested the action might be linked to recent political activities at his monastery, as well as Ashin Pyinyar Thihas meeting with Clinton earlier this month at the residence of the US Charge dAffaires in Yangon.
A Myanmar government official said Ashin Pyinnyar Thihas case was an internal issue for the monks.
A new nominally civilian government that came to power in March has surprised critics with tentative signs of reform.
A small group of monks held a rare protest in Mandalay last month but no action was taken against them, in the latest tentative sign of change.
It was thought to be the first such rally since mass protests led by clergy in 2007 were brutally quashed, with the deaths of at least 31 people and the arrests of many monks.
http://news.asiaone.com/News/Latest%2BNews/Asia/Story/A1Story20111216-316692.html
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No progress since 2010 elections: reportShareComments
(0)By FRANCIS WADE
Published: 15 December 2011
This photo, taken on 7 June 2011, shows a 7-year-old who was severely injured in his head when Burmese troops shelled Mae TLer village in Karen state. He later died from his injuries (KHRG)Conditions for civilians in Burmas border regions, long beset by conflict and lack of development, have continued along the same trajectory for nearly two decades, despite elections a year ago that many hoped would prompt an improvement in livelihoods for ethnic peoples, a study of the past year warns.
The mood of the report is built on testimonies collected since November 2010 from 1,207 civilians in four states and divisions in eastern Burma Karen, Mon, Tenasserim and Karenni. It seeks to build a retrospective of a year that many claim has dramatically altered the landscape in Burma.
But the findings appear to prove otherwise. Some people are discussing changes since the election, and the potential for reform. But the villagers speaking and working with us are struggling to respond to the same abuses now as in the past, said Saw Albert, field director for the Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG), which compiled the report.
Nothing that has happened over the last 12 months has created new opportunities for them to address this abuse let alone resolved the root causes.
Among its findings is evidence of continued egregious human rights abuses by the army consistent with patterns of abuse that KHRG has documented over the last twenty years. These include forced expropriation of labour, land and property from rural communities and the wide-scale and destructive extraction of natural resources.
Both are cause and effect of heavy militarisation of Burmas border regions, which began half a century ago to quell rebellions by ethnic armies, but which has ramped up over the past decade as the government looks to secure these resource-rich regions for exploitation.
In many areas conflict has intensified since the November 2010 elections, which ironically ushered in a pseudo-civilian government and cautious hope that protracted wars would end. Fighting against groups like the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) and the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) in the countrys north were triggered by their refusal to become government-controlled Border Guard Forces.
The report notes that of the seven regions in eastern Burma where testimonies were taken, civilians in four had been tortured by Burmese troops over the past year. All regions had populations that had suffered as a result of landmines and indiscriminate firing of artillery, while at least one civilian in five of the seven regions had been extra-judicially executed.
Yet many assessments of Burma by international players lend somewhat myopic attention to the political reforms underway, whilst sidelining ongoing abuses of ethnic minorities, KHRG says.
No accurate external assessment of current conditions in eastern Burma can be conducted without heeding the concerns of rural people who are gauging, on a day-to-day basis, the way abuse compromises their priorities, notes the report.
That emphasis on local voices, which are largely left out of think tank reports and governmental statements hailing the perceived transition to democracy, should function as a stinging critique of any attempt to assess changes since the election that excludes the voices of rural people in ethnic areas, it adds.
http://www.dvb.no/news/%e2%80%98no-progress-since-2010-elections%e2%80%99-report/19221
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