Burma Opposition ready for tlaks

[aungsan@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

Burma Opposition ready for talks
The Asian Age, 19 May 1996 (New Delhi)
 
Rangoon, May 18: Burmas leading opposition party, the National 
League for Democracy has said it plans to keep open the possibility of 
talks with the countrys ruling military junta.
 
"The NLD will continue to seek a dialogue so as to find solution for  
existing political, social and economic problems facing the country ... 
and will always leave the door open for it," a statement received on 
Saturday said. "Leaders of the State Law and Order Restoration Council 
have yet to pave the way for such a dialogue."
 
The NLD is boycotting the ongoing national convention organised by 
SLORC to draft a new state Constitution, saying the constitution would 
cement a central role for the military in government and sustain the 
juntas domination.
 
Since NLD won democratic elections held in 1990 by a landslide, 
SLORC has maintained it will not hand over power until a new 
constitution giving the military a central political role is established. 
The NLD statement listed efforts made by the party since its foundation 
in 1988 to initiate talks with the junta. It denounced a SLORC 
campaign against the NLD in the official media and rejected the juntas 
labelling of the opposition as "destructionists" -- an epithet seen 
around 
Rangoon on huge billboards which proclaim: "Annihilate all 
destructionists."
 
The NLD has announced that it will hold a conference between May 26 
and May 29 to be attended by NLD candidates victorious in 1990 
elections, when the party won 392 of 485 seats.
 
Official daily the New Light of Myanmar, expressed concern in an 
editorial that this conference would threaten "the political stability 
already attained." (AFP)