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

NEWS- Shantytown: Behind a fence in



Subject: NEWS- Shantytown: Behind a fence in Rangoon 

http://newsweek.com/nw-srv/gallery/portfolio/ah/inside_burma/front.htm
News/Photo Gallery by Andres Hernandez - Inside Burma
NEWSWEEK

Shantytown: Behind a fence in Rangoon 


                 The expression 'Bamboo Curtain' was
                 coined to describe China, but it might
                 just as well describe life in the South
                 Asian nation of Burma, formally known
                 as Myanmar. In 1962, only 14 years
                 after the Burmese won their
                 independence from Britain, Gen. Ne
                 Win seized power and sealed the
                 country off from the outside world.
                 The "Burmese Road to Socialism," as
                 he called it, lay in an isolationism so
                 extreme it bordered on paranoia. In
                 fact, except for the general and his
                 cronies, it was a road to ruin. Burma's
                 economy had never recovered from
                 the Japanese occupation during World
                 War II, and nationalizing industry only
                 made things worse. By the late 1980s,
                 Burma was a backwater, one of Asia's
                 poorest nations.