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ASEAN: swaggering playboys of Burma
Subject: ASEAN: swaggering playboys of Burma....
Opinion on ASEAN
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[ASEAN's closer engagement with the swaggering playboys of Burma has
done nothing to moderate their behavior.]
When the Association of South-East Asian Nations was formed in 1967, it
was a modest partnership built in the name of economic development and
cooperation. The real, mostly unspoken reason for its creation was the
Vietnam War and fears of a communist surge.
As an economic and security alliance, ASEAN rewarded the ambition of
its founders. As the communist threat withered, members boomed
economically and the grouping helped cement peace between neighbours
with different cultures and political systems and unresolved
territorial disputes.
As ASEAN approaches its 30th anniversary, a new dynamic is working to
castit in a new role; not that of peacemaker and unifier, but as a
force of reaction confronting the aspirations of a new Asian generation.
The organisation that helped an emerging region find its voice is now
acting to silence the clamor for those same freedoms it once claimed to
defend.
The weekend decision of ASEAN foreign ministers to admit Burma as a
full member next month - in defiance of the United States and many
Western governments, and against the manifest wishes of the
Burmese people - confirmed the grouping's status as an authoritarian
club deaf to the forces of change gathering in the region.
The decision could seriously complicate ASEAN's relation with Europe
and with the United States, the power which still underwrites regional
security. It will undermine the credibility of ASEAN claims of
commitment to democratisation and human rights, and impair its ability
to speak with moral authority in international affairs.
In rushing the entry of Burma, Cambodia and Loas, ASEAN could also
threaten its internal cohesion. Burma and Cambodia are politically
unstable and, with Loas, are a long way from being capable of
filfilling the association's commitments on free trade.
While it is hardly suprising that the likes of Indonesia and Vietnam
have chosen to give comfort to a regime cast in their own totalitarian
mould, the alacrity with which the ostensibly democratic Thailand and
the Philippines have joined the bandwagon, sends a disturbing message
about the future of political liberalisation in South-East Asia.
There are, of course, economic and political considerations that will
dissuade any ASEAN member from rocking the boat. Thailand, which shares
an unstable border with Burma, has a special reason to aviod
antagonising its troublesome neighbour.
But the conspicuous failure of the Philippines to take a stand against
the worsening repression in Burma - and the military's denial of the
popular will expressed in Aung San Suu Kyi's landslide election victory
in 1991 - is a betrayal of the spirit of the 1986 People Power victory
over the Marcos regime, and all who cheered it across the region and
the world.
ASEAN justifies its Burma decision on the grounds of regional security.
It argues that the regime should be engaged rather than isolated, that
the political situation in Burma is an "internal affair" and that
through engagement the generals can be persuaded to reform.
But the latest wave of arrests of members of Ms Suu Kyi's National
League for Democracy - on the eve of the foreign ministers' meeting -
has made clear the regime's contempt for ASEAN's token criticism of its
repression.
In defence of ASEAN's discredited policy of constructive engagement
with Burma, the Thai Foreign Minister, Mr Prachuab Chaiyasan, said:
"Even a playboy can become a good husband after his marriage, with the
family's help. That's the Asain way."
The sad reality is that ASEAN's closer engagement with the swaggering
playboys of Burma has done nothing to moderate their behaviour and has
simply emboldened them in their trampling of the rights and wishes of
their people.
The ASEAN decision to close ranks behind Burma while international
sanctions are being stepped up has drawn widespread condemnation from
human rights groups, political analysts and independent newspapers in
the region.
In perphaps the toughest newspaper editorial, Bangkok's Nation
declared: "ASEAN will never be the same again. By embracing Burma as a
member it has itself become a pariah organisation...the decision was a
triumph of evil over humanity."
The only reaction still missing is that of Ms Suu Kyi. Back under
virtual house arrest in Rangoon - her phone cut, approaches to her
house barricaded by soldiers, and dozens more of her supporters in
detention - the Nobel Peace laureate was stopped from adding her voice
to the protests.
Instead, Burma's official New Light of Myanmar" newspaper - crowing at
the diplomatic coup - stepped up its viriolic onslaught against Ms Suu
Kyi, describing her as a "maggot" and insulting the memory of her
father, General Aung San, the hero of Burmese independence.
Emboldened by the knowledge that its neighbours have no intention of
trying to curb its behavior, the regime has fired broadsides at the West
and "traitorous" elements within the country, caliming the time is
approaching for "the downfall of hegemonism".
But, as the modern political history of Thailand and the Philippines
has shown - and the recent violent election campaign in Indonesia has
reaffirmed - the democratic aspirations of the Burmese people are not a
regional aberration.
It is the leaders of ASEAN who now stand isolated and who, with their
Burmese military cohorts, eventually will be swept aside by the
inexorable march of history.
[Mark Baker, The Age's South-East Asia correspondent, 4 June 1997].
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