Burma faces stepped up calls for co

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Subject: Burma faces stepped up calls for consul autopsy.


		Burma faces stepped up calls for consul autopsy
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	Denmark and Switzerland have accused the Burmese Government of 
providing incomplete answers and steppedup calls for an autopsy on the 
body of a Danish honorary consul who died in custody.

	Denmark had received "verbal and totally incomplete" answers from 
Burma, the Danish Foreign Minister, Mr Neils Helveg Petersen, said in 
Copenhagen yesterday.

	He added that Denmark was now seeking a written reply to its 
request for an autopsy on Anglo-Burmese businessman James Leander 
Nichols, whose family lives in Perth, by an international forensic expert.

	The Danish ambassador to Thailand, Mr Joergen Reimers, was in 
Rangoon and would seek more satisfying answers from Burmese authorities, 
Mr Petersen said.

	In Bern, the Swiss press agency ATS quoted the Swiss ambassador 
to Thailand, Mr Blaise Godet, as saying: "The Burmese foreign ministry 
has provided us with incomplete information. The precise cause of the 
death of Mr Nichols has not been given."

	Speaking after a short visit to Rangoon, he added that, given the 
conditions of imprisonment in Burma, Nichols's death was "not totally 
unforeseeable".

	Nichols, 64, a businessman who represented the interests of 
Norway, Finland and Switzerland, as well as Denmark, was setenced in 
April to three years' imprisonment and fined $US 5000($^3330) for 
infringing laws regulating fax machines and telephone lines.

	A family friend of pro-democracy leader Ms Aung San Suu Kyi, 
Nichols died of an apparent stroke on June 23 in Rangoon's notorious 
Insein prison. Denmark, Finland, Norway and Switzerland last week 
requested a full medical report into Nichols's death.

	A Burmese official told the Danish ambassador on Friday that 
Nichols, who suffered from diabetes, high blood pressure and a heart 
condition, had been exmained eight times by a doctor since he began 
serving his sentence in April, Mr Petersen said.

	Before his death, Nichols had a heart attack and was taken 
unconscious to hospital, Burmese authorities said.

	While there has been no suggestion of foul play, the four 
European countries for whom Nichols worked suspect harsh prison 
conditions contributed to his death.

	Last week, the Danish Government resolved to urge its European 
partners to impose economic sanctions against Rangoon as punishment.

	European Union officials will discuss this issue is raised at a 
meeting of EU foreign ministers on July 15, Mr Petersen said.

	During the same news conference, Mr Petersen also called on the 
European Union to convince Japan, South-East Asian nations and the United 
Nations to impose sanctions against Burma.

	"Japan plays a central role in Asia, especially in relation to 
Burma, and could place pressure on the Rangoon regime to respect 
democracy," he said.

	"The European Union should also pressure South-East Asian 
nations, which have been reluctant to criticise the Rangoon regime, to 
change their attitude."

	In Rangoon, a senior Burmese general had accused international 
social and religious organisations of interfering in the country's 
internal affairs, official media reported yesterday.

	Lieutenant-General Khin Nyunt, Secretary One of the ruling State 
Law and Restoration Council (SLORC) and head of military intelligence, 
made the comments at a refresher course for local Red Cross Society 
executives, State run media said.

[AFP, By a correspondent in Copenhagen, 3 July 1996].

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