Part. 3 - Burma Discussion on the U

[freeburma@xxxxxxx]

Subject: Part. 3 - Burma Discussion on the U.S. Senate floor (July 25, 1996)

The Discussion on Burma Sanction Amendment on the Senate Floor (Part. 3)
                  July 25, 1996
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Mr. MOYNIHAN addressed the Chair. 

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New York [Mr. Moynihan], is recognized. 

Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I would like to speak to the amendment offered by the 
Senator from Maine as a substitute to Section 569 of this bill regarding sanctions 
against the regime in Burma. 

Section 569 is similar to a bill, S. 1511, offered by the distinguished Senator from 
Kentucky, which I have had the honor to cosponsor, and others have done as well. This is 
very simply a test of how we will respond to democracy denied. 

For the longest while now, from the time, I would suppose, of Woodrow Wilson's `Fourteen 
Points,' the United States has actively encouraged the spread of democracy and 
democratic institutions in the world, rightfully thinking that the world would be a 
safer and better place. We have seen in the course of this century events that would not 
have been thought possible at the outset. 

Here at the end of the century, we see events that would not have been thought possible. 
Russia has had two presidential elections, the first in Russian history. Mongolia has 
had free elections. The distinguished Senator from Virginia was on the floor speaking 
just the other day about his experience as an observer in Mongolia. Not only did 
Mongolia have a free election, but they had observers from around the world and,
principally, the United States to attest to that fact. 

The movement towards democracy is not universal. It has never taken strong hold on the 
continent of Africa, and yet it now appears in Eurasia and in South Asia. The Republic 
of India has just had its 11th, I believe, national election since independence, an 
unbroken sequence of democratic elections, with one interval of national emergency but 
it was for a relatively short period of time and ended with the constitution intact. 

The Government of Bangladesh has just had a free election between two formidable women 
political leaders who are descendants, in one form or another, of leaders previously 
deposed and shot, events that are too common in post-colonial nations. But they have had 
a free election and picked an impressive new Prime Minister to form a government. 

British India, as it was called, extended down to the Bay of Bengal on the eastern side 
and included not only Bangladesh but what is now Myanmar, formerly Burma . The choice 
between the term Burma and Myanmar is a choice of languages, Myanmar is a Burman term. 
It is a multiethnic state, with eight major ethnic groups, as all those states are, each 
with many languages--though none at the level of India itself. Burma has four principal 
languages and historically has had very strong disagreements on the periphery
with the governments at the center in what was Rangoon. The name has been changed, which 
is a perfectly legitimate thing to do, by the military regime whose initials form the 
unenviable acronym SLORC, as if `SLORCing' out of the black lagoon. 

This is a regime which has not simply failed to move toward a democratic government, but 
has overthrown a democratic government, imprisoned the democratically elected leaders, a 
Nobel Prize-winning Prime Minister, sir. 

Burma is largely a Buddhist nation. Tensions between the numerous ethnic groups resulted 
in a long and not happy post-colonial experience. 

I was once our Ambassador to India, and I remember visiting Mandalay, where we had a 
one-man consulate. I was being driven around. I came to the area of the city where there 
were Chinese language signs. I asked the Burmese driver, `Are there many Chinese here in 
Mandalay?' He said, `Well, not many now, but before independence, the Indians and the 
Chinese owned everything around here. And that's why we had to have socialism.' It was 
simply a form of expelling persons, moving in the general melee of the 19th century 
colonial Asia. 

After a series of decent enough governments, possibly too passive from one event to 
another, the army seized control. Twenty years of a hard dictatorship followed, with a 
military junta headed by a general playing golf in the shadow of a pagoda, while a 
nation, a potentially rich nation, all but starved. 

It is an experience we have seen before, nothing new, but it was cruelly inappropriate 
to Burma . I visited it at that time. Clearly, a land capable of great agricultural 
product, an industrial-capable people, ruined by government. They stayed ruined a long 
time, until they rose and realized, no, and in 1990, a free election at long last was 
held in Burma . The National League for Democracy won 82 percent of the vote, but the
military junta did not step down. 

This was not the beginning. This did not just happen suddenly. There was a movement for 
a democratic government that has been out in the jungles for a generation. I think if I 
had one photograph that would say to me more than anything else about our century, it 
would be a jungle clearing, I expect it would be up in the Shan state, where some 60 or 
so young men, aged 18, 19, 20--and this is at a time, about 15 years ago, when Ne Win 
was still in power. 

Senator Kennedy and I had made efforts such as Senator McConnell is leading today. There 
in perfect English, perfectly formed letters, a white sign with black letters, script 
that must have been 30 feet long--these young men were holding this sign which said, 
`Thank you Senators Kennedy and Moynihan.' They were out in the jungle and they knew, 
and it mattered that they knew. It kept them going. What we think matters so much in the 
world on these matters. 

The military regime that overthrew the democratic government--having stepped aside, then 
a coup immediately followed. The results of the election have not yet been implemented. 
The Prime Minister elected, Aung San Suu Kyi, has been released from house arrest, but 
only just barely. She has, you might say, a patio and a bit of garden, a front yard. 

The world is watching. We are going to hear today--and we will not hear wrong--that if 
we impose these sanctions, American firms will lose opportunities, and European firms or 
Asian firms will take advantage of them. And that may be true. But I wonder for how 
long, and I wonder in the end at what profit. If our firms are strong and competitive 
and international, it is because of the principles the United States has stood for in 
this century, and should continue to stand for. 

It is one thing when we find we cannot move a nation closer to democracy. Not many 
external forces can do that. It comes when the time is ready, then so often not even 
then. But when a democratic regime has not emerged, overwhelmingly supported by an 
oppressed people who have resisted that oppression, who have understood it, who looked 
abroad for any signs of support and seen in the United States, in this Senate Chamber, 
such support, emboldened, encouraged, and have risen to claim their rights as a people,
only to have it crushed by a military regime, SLORC? No, sir. 

This is the time for the United States to stand for what is best in our Nation, in our 
national tradition, what is triumphant in the world. This is not a time to allow the 
overthrow of the democracy. This is no time to beat retreat. This is a time for the 
McConnell provision for sanctions on Burma . 

And I thank the Chair for your courtesy. I yield the floor. 

                                [Page: S8756]

Mr. JOHNSTON. Will the Senator yield for a question? 

Mr. MOYNIHAN. Yes. 

Mr. JOHNSTON. Mr. President, there is no peer in the Senate, in fact, in the country, of 
the Senator from New York in his knowledge of history. Therefore, I wonder, what is the 
basis of this hope that other countries, particularly Asian countries, would join in a 
unilateral action started by the United States?  Can the Senator tell me, outside of 
maybe the South African situation, where we have had luck with having others joining us 
unilaterally? If we cannot get the Europeans to join us with 

Libya, an international terrorist organization, Iran, the same, and Cuba, how in the 
world are we going to get them to join with sanctions against Burma ? 

Mr. MOYNIHAN. I do not claim that this is something easily done or we would have done it 
long since. But I think that it is something which can be done. I think the Republic of 
South Korea is so little interested in how we feel about matters of Burma , there are 
ways to suggest to the Republic of South Korea that it might well reconsider its 
position. Not for nothing do we have the United States Army divisions in Korea. If they 
think that is not really in their interest, that can be arranged, too. 

I do not dispute the Senator's point. I simply make the argument that a matter of 
principle is at stake here. If it is costly, so be it. Principles are precious. 

Mr. JOHNSTON. If I may follow further on the example you mentioned, South Korea. If you 
turn the clock back to 1962, when General Ne Win took control, he had control for over a 
quarter of a century. At that time, Burma was a relatively prosperous country. South 
Korea was not prosperous and was---- 

Mr. MOYNIHAN. Was devastated. 

Mr. JOHNSTON. A totally repressive regime. The same, I think, would be said for our 
friends, the Taiwanese. 

Mr. MOYNIHAN. Yes. 

Mr. JOHNSTON. The difference between our treatment of the three is that we isolated 
Burma , and General Ne Win isolated himself, whereas, because of the cold war, we 
embraced the Taiwanese, we embraced the South Koreans. Today, having been isolated for 
over a quarter of a century, Burma continues to be the same country it was, maybe only 
worse than 30-odd years ago, whereas South Korea and Taiwan have developed into 
thriving, prosperous democracies. Now, does the Senator see any lesson to be learned 
from this difference in treatment? 

Mr. MOYNIHAN. Yes. Both Taiwan and South Korea have now established freely elected 
governments. If they were suddenly to be overthrown by a military coup, our position 
would have to be, in my view, very different. But it is just such a situation in Burma. 

I have a letter here from the Office of the Prime Minister of the National Coalition 
Government of the Union of Burma , which says: 

Dear Senator Moynihan: I have been closely following the Burma sanctions bill on the 
Senate floor and I am extremely alarmed about the proposal put forth by Senator Cohen. 
As you are no doubt aware, the Senate vote is crucial because it will send a signal to 
both the prodemocracy movement and the military junta about how people in the United 
States view the struggle for democracy in Burma. 

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent this letter be printed in the Record. 

There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record, as 
follows: 

NATIONAL COALITION GOVERNMENT OF THE UNION OF BURMA , OFFICE OF THE PRIME
MINISTER, 
Washington, DC, July 25, 1996. 

Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, 
U.S. Senate, 
Washington, DC. 

Dear Senator Moynihan: I have been closely following the Burma sanctions bill on the 
Senate floor and I am extremely alarmed about the proposal put forward by Senator Cohen. 
As you are no doubt aware, the Senate vote is crucial because it will send a signal to 
both the prodemocracy movement and the military junta about how people in the United 
States view the struggle for democracy in Burma . Given the reality in Burma , the 
National Coalition Government categorically opposes Senator Cohen's legislation. The 
Senate cannot afford to send a wrong signal and there is no other time than now to
express its support for the democracy movement through the imposition of economic 
sanctions. 

Let me be clear, investments will not bring about better living conditions and democracy 
to the people because in Burma investments pay for the soldiers, buy the guns and the 
supplies and ammunition that is used to violently suppress the Burmese people. Daw Aung 
San Suu Kyi has called for the imposition of economic sanctions because it will hurt the 
ruling military junta. She has categorically expressed her wish that investments in the 
country cease until a clear transition to democracy has been established. The National 
Coalition Government fully supports Daw Aung San Su Kyi's call for sanctions and that is 
why we support Section 569 of the Foreign Operations Appropriations Act, `Limitation on 
Funds for Burma,' as tabled by Senator Mitch McConnell and co-sponsored by you. 

There can be no middle ground here. As it stands now, the Burmese people are not 
benefitting from any investment coming into the country. These funds are tightly 
controlled by the military junta and serves to strengthen the oppression of the Burmese 
people. No entrepreneur can start a business in Burma without enriching either the 
members of the military regime, their close associates or relatives. The common
people do not benefit from investments. I look forward to welcoming U.S. businesses 
helping rebuild our country once a democratically elected 1990 Parliament is seated in 
Rangoon. 

The National Coalition Government also opposes any funding to the military junta in 
connection with narcotics control. I cannot see a logical reason for the United States 
to fund a military regime that conspires with and provides a safe haven to the heroin 
kingpin Khun Sa. It well known that the Burmese Army are partners in transporting the 
heroin that is devastating the streets of America. 

I place my trust in the United States Senate to do the right thing. Each vote for 
sanctions is a vote for the democracy movement in Burma and our people who are 
struggling to be so desperately free. 

Sincerely, 

Sein Win, 
Prime Minister. 

Mr. MOYNIHAN. I yield the floor. 

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I know my friend from New York is in a conference and 
needs to return to it. I just wanted to commend the Senator for his longstanding 
interest and support for what we are trying to achieve in the underlying bill and 
further elaborate on the observation of Senator Johnston. 

I do not think we will be going this alone very long. Both the European Parliament and 
the European Union, this month, July, have begun to get interested in this issue because 
of the arrest and subsequent apparent killing of a man named Leo Nichols, who was a 
consulate official for a number of European countries and also happened to be, as my 
friend from New York knows, one of Aung San Suu Kyi's-- 

Mr. MOYNIHAN. He was murdered because he was found in possession of a fax machine. 

Mr. McCONNELL. So the Europeans are interested. One of their own has been treated like 
the citizens of Burma have been treated for years. 

There is an indication that the European Parliament this month, I say to my friend from 
New York, called upon members to suspend trade and investment with Burma . We will be 
the leader of the parade. 

Mr. MOYNIHAN. When the United States leads, others will follow. I am proud to be 
associated in this regard. 

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record an editorial from 
the Washington Post on this issue, `Burma Beyond the Pale.' 

There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record, as 
follows: 

>From the Washington Post, July 20, 1996

                  [FROM THE WASHINGTON POST, JULY 20, 1996]

Burma Beyond the Pale

On JUNE 22, James `Leo' Nichols, 65, died in a Burmese prison. His crime--for which he 
had been jailed for six weeks, deprived of needed heart medication and perhaps tortured 
with sleep deprivation--was ownership of a fax machine. His true sin, in the eyes of the 
military dictators who are running the beautiful and resource-rich country of Burma into 
the ground, was friendship with Aung San Suu Kyi, the courageous woman who won an 
overwhelming victory in democratic elections six years ago but has been denied power 
ever since. 

Mr. Nichols's story is not unusual in Burma . The regime has imprisoned hundreds of 
democracy activists and press-ganged thousands of children and adults into slave labor. 
It squanders huge sums on arms imported from China while leading the world in heroin 
exports. But because Mr. Nichols had served as consul for Switzerland and three 
Scandinavian countries, his death or murder attracted more attention in Europe. The 
European Parliament condemned the regime and called for its economic and diplomatic
isolation, to include a cutoff of trade and investment. Two European breweries, 
Carlsberg and Heineken, have said they will pull out of Burma . And a leading Danish 
pension fund sold off its holdings in Total, a French company that with the U.S. firm 
Unocal is the biggest foreign investor. 

These developments undercut those who have said the United States should not support 
democracy in Burma because it would be acting alone. In fact, strong U.S. action could 
resonate and spur greater solidarity in favor of Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi 
and her rightful government. Already, the Burmese currency has been tumbling, reflecting 
nervousness about the regime's stability and the potential effects of a Western boycott. 

The United States has banned aid and multilateral loans to the regime, but the junta 
still refuses to begin a dialogue with Aung San Suu Kyi. Now there is an opportunity to 
send a stronger message. The Senate next week is scheduled to consider a pro-sanctions 
bill introduced by Sens. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-N.Y.). 
This would put Washington squarely on the side of the democrats. Secretary of State 
Warren Christopher, who will meet next week with counterparts from Burma's neighbors, 
should challenge them to take stronger measures, since their policy of `constructive
engagement' has so clearly failed. 

The most eloquent call for action came last week from Aung San Suu Kyi herself, unbowed 
despite years of house arrest and enforced separation from her husband and children. In 
a video smuggled out, she called for `the kind of sanctions that will make it quite 
clear that economic change in Burma is not possible without political change.' The world 
responded to similar calls from Nelson Mandela and Lech Walesa. In memory of Mr. Nichols 
and his many unnamed compatriots, it should do no less now.  

Mr. JOHNSTON. Will my friend from Kentucky yield for a question? 

Mr. McCONNELL. I am happy to yield to the Senator. 

Mr. JOHNSTON. In that same July meeting of the European Union, did they not reject 
sanctions against Burma ? 

Mr. McCONNELL. I do not know whether that was on the agenda or not, but even if they did 
have it on the agenda, and if they did not approve it, that was July. We are just 
getting started here. 

The point the Senator from New York and I are making is, if the United States leads, it 
is reasonable to believe others will follow. 

Mr. JOHNSTON. Can the Senator name me some examples of where that has happened, other 
than South Africa? 

Mr. McCONNELL. Poland, South Africa. 

Mr. JOHNSTON. I say other than South Africa. 

Mr. McCONNELL. Why rule South Africa out? I think South Africa is precisely the 
parallel. 

Mr. JOHNSTON. But the whole world was united. 

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, the United States led in South Africa, and others 
followed. That is what we suggest here. The United States ought to stand up for what it 
believes in, ought to put its principles first. There is every reason to believe that 
with American leadership, the rest of the world would follow. That is what this is 
about. 

I yield the floor. 

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I want to discuss some concerns I have about section 569 of 
the Foreign Operations Appropriations bill, H.R. 3540--limiting funds for Burma . Before 
I begin outlining my concerns, I want to thank my colleague from Kentucky, Senator 
McConnell, for pursuing this issue. While we may disagree on the details of the best 
policy to pursue with Burma , we wouldn't even be having this important discussion 
without his leadership on this issue. In addition, I doubt that we would be
pursuing a much needed comprehensive, multi-national policy toward Burma . Without such 
an effort, we could certainly find ourselves on the floor of the Senate in the future, 
reacting to some catastrophic event in Burma , having done nothing constructive in the 
interim. 

Mr. President, Burma is a nation I have never visited or studied. I do not come to the 
floor today to debate this issue as an expert on Burma . However, I know more than a 
little about its poor record on human rights. What we need to debate here is the 
efficacy of mandatory unilateral sanctions in the case of Burma . 

While we all hope for some small signs of change, I think we all share the concern that 
hope is not enough to live on--especially for the Burmese people. We recognize the 
problem there and want to develop a policy to address that problem. 

Any change will be slow in coming. However, while patience and persistence will rule the 
day, we need to nurture an environment in which all Burmese people are respected and 
treated both humanely and fairly. 

In short, we need to look at putting forward a policy that will encourage the changes we 
seek. In addition, that policy should not negatively impact U.S. nationals and 
business--without the benefit of establishing changes in Burma . 

The United States represents a small percentage of foreign investment in Burma . It is 
my understanding that depending on the survey, the U.S. ranks anywhere from third to 
seventh. Regardless, the private investment presence there is not on a grand scale that 
would likely have any crippling effects on the operations of the current government in 
Burma , the State Law and Order Restoration Council--commonly referred to as the 
`SLORC.' 

In addition, indications from our trading partners in Europe and the region do not 
demonstrate movement toward the application of sanctions. 

Cutting off this trade by prohibiting U.S. nationals' private investment will not affect 
the current governing regime in Burma . However, it will affect American companies and 
American jobs. Unilaterally forcing American companies out of Burma at this time will 
simply provide an economic opportunity for other nations, who will quickly step forward 
to assume the contracts and business opportunitie of the departing American companies. 

American companies have taken risks and borne all the startup costs for the contracts 
they hold in Burma. If their departure results in replacement by companies from our 
trading partners in Europe and the region, any influence we might have wielded in this 
foreign policy game is lost. All indications at this time lead me to believe that any 
gap left by U.S. companies in Burma will quickly be filled by others. 

In addition to the loss of that private level of interaction between Americans and 
Burmese, the benefit of jobs for Burmese citizens with American companies is also lost. 
Mr. President, in order for the United States to encourage Burma to move toward a free 
society, an American presence should be felt. This is best done by private investment in 
the local economy. Private investment and other nongovernmental cultural exchanges can 
provide an important link with the people of Burma . 

Mr. President, let me be perfectly clear, I do not support oppressive actions such as 
those taken by the SLORC in its efforts to prevent the citizens of Burma from exercising 
their basic human and political rights. Likewise, I do not support abandoning the 43 
million people who live in Burma by withdrawing all American presence. Many times, 
unilateral sanctions hurt only those at the bottom of the economic scale, when the 
intended targets are those at the top. 

Mr. President, at the core of this debate is the efficacy of unilateral sanctions as a 
tool of foreign policy to encourage change. And, more specifically, the usefulness of 
unilateral sanctions in the case of Burma . I feel very strongly that mandatory, 
unilateral sanctions are not the most effective tool of foreign policy. 

I do not support impacting private industry in this manner if the projected policy will 
not yield the intended response. We must all realize that while we seek change, Burma is 
not South Africa, nor is it Iran. We face a unique situation, and the effectiveness of 
mandatory unilateral sanctions must be judged independently. 

Mr. President, it is very important, not only for the United States but for other 
nations as well, to evaluate the situation in Burma and what ways we can work both 
independently and together, that will encourage the improvements in human rights and 
will move Burma toward a free and democratic society. 

I support amending section 569 of this bill to address the concerns I have outlined here 
today. We can encourage humanitarian relief, drug interdiction efforts, and promote 
democracy. I believe that these activities, in addition to denying multilateral 
assistance through international financial institutions, and the establishment of a 
multilateral strategy will provide the best roadmap to reach these goals. 

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