[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index ][Thread Index ]

Burma's Army Keeps Its Grip



Burma's Army Keeps Its Grip

Embattled Opposition Could Be Targeted Anew After Regional Group's Meeting

By R. Jeffrey Smith
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, May 18 1997; Page A18
The Washington Post 

RANGOON, Burma

The police captain at the first checkpoint on the road leading to the home of 
1991 Nobel Peace Prize winner Daw Aung San Suu Kyi was unyielding as he and 
nearly a dozen colleagues blocked the path of a taxi and insisted that 
"foreigners are not allowed to visit" her walled compound.

When an American visitor with an appointment to see Suu Kyi at her home, less 
than a mile away, asked why, the captain -- who gave his name as Thein -- 
would only say, again and again: "Because of the order."

Thirty-five years after seizing control of this country, and seven years after 
annulling democratic elections won by Suu Kyi's political party, the Burmese 
military regime is accustomed to issuing orders without providing 
explanations. Many citizens here -- after looking around for spies of the 
government -- charge that its decisions are arbitrary, corrupt or inept and 
can be carried out with lethal brutality. As a result, they say, its leaders 
remain widely hated and greatly feared.

Despite the public's animosity, and the growing hostility of the Clinton 
administration, however, the military's grip on power in this Southeast Asian 
nation of 48 million shows no signs of slackening. In fact, the generals may 
even be getting stronger due to new repressive measures instituted in the last 
seven months against Suu Kyi and her supporters.

Hundreds of university students have been jailed since student protests 
against government education policies and police tactics flared briefly last 
December, effectively decapitating the student movement, according to several 
diplomats. Universities, which have been a crucible of anti-government 
sentiment in Burma since 1920, were abruptly shut that month with no date set 
for reopening.

Separately, a fierce offensive by as many as 100,000 troops since February has 
routed insurgent forces allied with the Karen National Union, an ethnically 
based party in Karen state, east of the capital. That party, until its 
repression in 1995, played a key role in opposing the military regime.

In the last year, the military junta here has persuaded a half-dozen other 
ethnic minorities that controlled vast areas in northern and western Burma to 
sign cease-fire agreements by promising them more autonomy and -- according to 
several Western diplomats -- permitting them to cultivate and refine a 
substantial portion of the opium gum that winds up on U.S. streets as heroin.

In addition, the military has jailed as many as 300 members of the National 
League for Democracy, the chief opposition party and the platform for Suu 
Kyi's activities, since last summer, including several of her close personal 
aides.

Win Thein U, for example, was sentenced to 14 years in prison last year for 
having arranged a meeting between Suu Kyi and some farmers to discuss the poor 
rice harvest and for having helped an American television reporter interview a 
victim of torture. Suu Kyi's press secretary, Aye Win U, also has been 
imprisoned without trial.

Suu Kyi, the charismatic daughter of the architect of Burma's independence 
from the British in 1948, has been blocked from making any public speeches 
since November. She also has been forced to restrict her movements outside the 
compound since hundreds of men in civilian garb were allowed to pass through a 
government cordon that month to attack her motorcade, smash its windows and 
beat up many of her supporters. No arrests were made in the attack.

Largely because of U.S. government complaints about the regime, some visiting 
Americans are subjected to extraordinary scrutiny by plainclothes men who ask 
where they are going and whom they represent -- at the airport, on the street 
and in hotel lobbies. Photographs are taken of those who try to see Suu Kyi, 
drivers are questioned, and those seen engaging in conversation with an 
American sometimes are subjected to more detailed police interrogation.

Interviews with dozens of people during a week of traveling in Burma suggested 
that public discontent is heightened by the country's economic failures. The 
government's statistics indicate the economy's growth rate has been falling 
steadily since changes were introduced in 1992 to move the country away from 
socialism toward a more market-oriented system.

Inflation exceeds 30 percent, defense expenditures reportedly consume as much 
as 50 percent of the budget, and corruption and inefficiency are rife at 
hundreds of large state-owned corporations or private firms controlled by 
senior military officers. Without striking a deal with such a firm, or handing 
over at least a 5 percent commission to a uniformed officer, it is virtually 
impossible to invest here, according to a half-dozen foreign businessmen.

Conditions outside this capital are stark. "They are basically losing a 
generation," said a diplomat. "Their infant mortality and life expectancy 
rates are as bad as you might find in the worst nations of Africa."

But the armed forces have prospered since 1988, when the State Law and Order 
Restoration Council was formed to bring military officials into a more direct 
governing role. The number of troops, then 186,000, has doubled. Everywhere, 
the council's facilities are the most modern and well tended, including an 
elaborate museum here with displays touting achievements of each of the 
country's regional military commanders.

To stem a grave shortage of foreign currency and build up its domestic 
manufacturing industry, the government last summer banned all imports of 
nonessential goods -- creating what several businessmen described as a brisk 
under-the-counter trade.

But the measure did little to promote the creation of factories in this 
overwhelmingly agricultural nation, with the result that few up-to-date 
consumer goods are on display. Only a few construction cranes dot the skyline 
of the capital, a city of 3 million to 4 million people with a decrepit, faded 
air that contrasts sharply with the modern bustle of neighboring Asian 
capitals.

The Clinton administration last month banned most American investment in Burma 
because of the government's failure to thwart the drug trade. But with few 
American goods in evidence -- other than Coke, Pepsi, Budweiser beer, and 
Lucky Strike and Salem cigarettes -- and few joint ventures with American 
firms outside the oil and gas sector, no one believes the sanctions will cause 
much immediate harm to the Burmese economy.

Many do say the publicity Washington's action has generated will discourage 
some foreign firms that are subject to consumer boycotts at home from 
investing here, and may further discourage foreign tourism. Since the U.S. 
sanctions announcement, the value of the local currency has fallen nearly 8 
percent against the dollar on the black market.

"The sanctions are good, but they are not enough," said a university student, 
who asked that his name be withheld because his family has been harassed for 
advocating democracy. He complained that other nations have not put similar 
pressure on the regime, a view echoed here by others interviewed on the 
street.

But many diplomats say that activists here are naive, and that there is little 
reason to expect the regime will substantially alter its hard-line policies 
under foreign pressure. "Too many generals are making too much money," said 
one envoy.

There appears to be a consensus among Western diplomats here that as bad as 
Suu Kyi's personal situation is now, it may become even more grim after a 
decision on Burmese membership in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, 
a regional trading group that could formally decide the issue as early as 
July. Many diplomats see the military's recent actions as having been 
relatively restrained by a desire to avoid embarrassing its ASEAN neighbors on 
the eve of the vote.

"If they get in, they will likely lock her up again," a senior diplomat said.