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THE NATION: Surin says Asean ought
- Subject: THE NATION: Surin says Asean ought
- From: suriya@xxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 23 Mar 1998 17:39:00
Politics
Surin says Asean ought
to discuss intrusions
THAILAND will seek an explanation from
Rangoon on a series of border intrusions
by armed groups from Burma and will
suggest the issue be put on the agenda of
the forthcoming Asean ministerial meeting
in Manila, Foreign Minister Surin Pitsuwan
said Monday.
His response came as the Democratic
Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), believed to
be backed by Burmese troops, attacked
and burned a refugee camp inside Thailand
early Monday, destroying 50 homes and
wounding 14 people, four of them seriously.
Describing the latest invasion into Thai
territory from the Burmese side as
unacceptable and a violation of Thai
sovereignty, the minister said Thailand was
unhappy with the recurrence of invasion of
Thai territory.
Surin said these kinds of border problems
should be dealt with by undertaking serious
and careful bilateral talks.
At the same time he said he believed the
issue of the intrusions should be raised and
discussed when Asean foreign ministers
attended their annual meeting in the
Philippines this July.
The minister also suggested that the Asean
membership of Burma and Laos,
approaching their first anniversary this July,
should be reviewed.
He said this would allow the grouping to be
able to learn whether the new members had
any problems as members of the grouping
and find out how the other members could
help them.
The intrusions on to Thai soil by armed
groups from Burma will be a top priority
when Deputy Foreign Minister
Sukhumbhand Paribatra makes an official
visit to Burma on April 7-8.
Surin added that Sukhumbhand would seek
a dialogue with Rangoon in an attempt to
ease the problems away from other
bilateral issues.
The minister said he also believed that the
Thai army, based so close to its Burmese
counterpart, could talk with them in order to
curtail border intrusions.
However, Army commander-in-chief Gen
Chettha Thanajaro said over the weekend
that Rangoon denied its involvement in the
DKBA attacks on Thai soil and had given
the army the green light to do whatever it
could to stop them.
The latest raid took place just one day after
a group of foreign diplomats based in
Thailand inspected Thai shelters for
Burmese displaced persons in Tak and
Mae Hong Son provinces.
The attack began about 1 am, when
attackers fired two artillery shells into Maw
Ker, a camp sheltering more than 8,700
refugees from Burma, said an aid worker
who spoke on condition of anonymity.
The invaders then entered Maw Ker and
burned about 50 homes in the camp, which
lies some four kilometres from the Burmese
border. Most of the refugees belong to the
Karen ethnic group.
All the wounded were taken to a hospital in
nearby Mae Sot, 370 km northwest of
Bangkok. Two men and two boys were
seriously wounded.
The DBKA is a splinter group of Karen that
has allied itself with the military government
in Rangoon.
Thai army units were firing shells in the
direction of Burma in retaliation after dawn.
Most of the more than 100,000 refugees
from Burma living in Thailand are
sympathetic to the Karen National Union,
which has been fighting for autonomy from
Rangoon since 1948.
Two weeks ago nearly 9,000 refugees
were left without shelter when the nearby
Huay Kaloke camp was burned.
Refugees at Maw Ker told aid workers that
they had heard commands in Burmese
shouted by the attackers.
A spokesman for the Karen National Union
said Burmese troops had comprised the
majority of the invading force.
Although the DKBA is widely believed to be
under the control of the Burmese army,
Burma's military government has denied
either participating in or directing the
attacks.
The Nation