The Nation - Canada engages Burma o

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Subject: The Nation - Canada engages Burma on drugs

The Nation - August 1, 1999.
Headlines

Canada engages Burma on drugs

IN a major policy shift, Canada has expressed readiness to engage Burma on
drug-related issues, breaking its long-standing no-contact policy with the
Rangoon military junta.

However, Canadian Foreign Minister Lloyd Axworthy reiterated to The Nation
in an interview on Friday that Canada would stand firm on its human-rights
policy despite willingness to hold talks and work directly or indirectly
with Burma on drug cooperation.

''Some 90 per cent of hard drugs come to Canada from that particular region,
so we have a direct interest,'' Axworthy said.

The minister added that it was necessary to have dialogue and cooperation in
the matter of drugs with Burma and other Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (Asean) governments. He said Canada would join the ongoing regional
effort, which Thailand was currently involved in, on suppressing the
narcotics trade.

He said Canada was involved in regional efforts with Latin and North America
to combat drugs and had in fact taken the lead in cooperation involving 34
countries in the western hemisphere within the framework of the Organisation
of American States.

Canada, Axworthy said, wants to work actively with Asean and engage in
dialogue to make the grouping's vision of establishing a drug-free zone by
2020 a reality.

Canada has until now maintained a hard-line position against the Rangoon
military regime because of its record of human-rights violations and
suppression of democratic aspirations of the Burmese people.

Axworthy was in Bangkok last weekend as guest of the Foreign Ministry. He
held talks with his Thai counterpart Surin Pitsuwan and paid courtesy calls
on Prime Minister Chuan Leekpai and Deputy Prime Minister Bhichai Rattakul.
Human security issues and drugs topped the agenda.

Canada, said Axworthy, backs Surin's proposal to set up an Asean Human
Resource Development Fund, which was one of the human security issues in the
region. He said he was looking for ways to assist the programme through a
C$10-million development fund, currently frozen because of Burma's admission
to Asean.

Thailand plans to provide places in medicine, engineering and computer
science in Thai universities to train students from neighbouring countries

to integrate them with the region.

Both Thailand and Canada are part of the 11-nation group known as the Lysoen
Meeting. The group comprises liberal democracies representing all
geographical locations. It is trying to raise international awareness of
serious human-security issues such as proliferation of small arms,
land-mines and trafficking in women. The group will meet again at the
upcoming United Nations General Assembly in New York.

Axworthy said Canada had succeeded in including the issue of small arms in
the Asian Regional Forum discussion in Singapore last week and the export of
small arms would feature in inter-sessional discussions as small arms were
responsible for most of the victims in wars throughout the world.

In his discussion with Surin, Axworthy said the two countries are
identifying human-security issues and wanted to do something about them. He
pointed out that the crack-down on smuggling of women and campaigns against
land-mines and small arms were concrete examples of how human-security
issues could be approached in the regional context.

Canada will send a team of land-mine experts to Thailand to help draft a
plan of action and identify areas in which Canada can be of assistance, and
Canadian experts will help with demining operations along the Thai-Cambodian
border.

BY RITA PATEYASERI and

KAVI CHONGKITTAVORN

The Nation