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BurmaNet News: July 13, 2001
- Subject: BurmaNet News: July 13, 2001
- From: strider@xxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 12 Jul 2001 04:05:00
______________ THE BURMANET NEWS ______________
An on-line newspaper covering Burma
July 13, 2001 Issue # 1842
______________ www.burmanet.org _______________
NOTED IN PASSING: "The economy may be bad, but there is little
motivation for those in control to reform...The government alternates
randomly between odd, desperate and occasionally appropriate measures."
A Rangoon-based economist quoted in The International Herald Tribune:
Crackdown Does Little to Help Burma's Economy
INSIDE BURMA _______
*Mizzima: Burma ranks 118 in UN Human Development Report
*Shan Herald Agency for News: Mobiles phones confiscated from Shans
*Xinhua: Myanmar Leader Urges Developed Countries to Assist Developing
Countries
*CHRO: Female Pastor Sentenced For Two Years With Hard Labour In Haka
MONEY _______
*The International Herald Tribune: Crackdown Does Little to Help Burma's
Economy
*Myanmar Times: Seasons of Yangon will weather the calm [Ramada pulls
out of Burma]
*The Scotsman (UK): Scouring the Mountains for Burma's Brown Gold
GUNS______
*Jane's Defence Weekly: Myanmar signs for surplus MiGs
*BurmaNet: Policy implications of regime?s borrowing to buy MiGs
DRUGS______
*Shan Herald Agency for News: Wa going 50-50 share with Burmese
commander-- Insider
REGIONAL/INTERNATIONAL _______
*Inter Press Service: Momentum Builds for Criminal Tribunals in Asia
EDITORIALS/OPINION/PROPAGANDA________
*Far Eastern Economic Review: The Burmese Military's Last Chance
__________________ INSIDE BURMA ____________________
Mizzima: Burma ranks 118 in UN Human Development Report
July 12, 1001
Mizzima News Group (www.mizzima.com)
Burma has moved up from low human development to medium human
development in four years and ranked at 118th on the Human Development
Index of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) out of 162
countries.
The Index, which measures the overall achievements of a country in three
basic dimensions of human development, is based on longevity,
educational attainment and ability to buy basic goods and services.
Burma, which is near the bottom of the Medium Human Development, is
above some of its Asian partners. Pakistan, Nepal and Bhutan, which fall
in the low human development category, are slotted at 127, 129 and 130
respectively. However, Burma is far below that of other South East Asian
countries. Thailand is ranked at 66, Malaysia at 56, Philippines at 70,
Indonesia at 102 and Viet Nam at 101.
Norway leads the 162 countries on the index while Sierra Leone
languishes at the bottom of the index. It is a jump-up for Burma, which
was ranked 131 out of 175 countries and fell in the category of "low
human development" by the HDR report in 1997.
In the Human Poverty Index, Burma is ranked at 43 while Thailand at 21.
Burma has Adult literacy rate of 84.4% while India has 56.5% and
Bangladesh 40.8%.
The Human Development report 2001 "Making New Technologies Work for
Human Development", released worldwide last Tuesday argues that new
technologies are a key to reducing world poverty and refutes the view
that technology is primarily a luxury for people in rich countries.
"Technology is like education ? it enables people to lift themselves out
of poverty. Thus technology is a tool for, not just a reward of, growth
and development". However it cautions that developing countries should
not simply import and apply knowledge from outside just by acquiring
equipment, seeds and pills. "Not every country needs to develop
cutting-edge technologies, but every country needs domestic capacity to
identify technology's potential benefits and to adapt new technology to
its needs and constraints."
However, Burma is no-where in the Technological Achievement Index, which
focus on "how well the country as a whole is participating in creating
and using technology". In the report, there are four categories of the
technological achievement index such as Leaders, Potential Leaders,
Dynamic Adopters and Marginalized. Burma is not in any of the
categories, placing as "no data available" while its neighbor Thailand
is in the category of Dynamic Adopters and Malaysia is in the category
of Potential Leaders.
Although the telephone has been around for more than a hundred years,
Burma has 6 telephones (mainland and cellular) per 1,000 people while
Thailand has 124 telephones per 1,000 people and Nepal has 12 telephones
per 1,000 people, according to the report.
The military-run Burma restricts its citizens from accessing foreign
television networks. Internet services are not available to the
citizens. The people need prior permission to own fax machine and the
exorbitant charges are levied on fax transmissions.
However, Myanma Posts and telecommunications, which is a sole provider
of telecommunication services in the whole country, claimed that it
intended to have the telephone density of the country as 12 per 1,000
inhabitants at the end of March 2000 and the number of telephones as
650,000. It said it is now operating Internet E-mail service initially
with 160 leased line users and 1,540 dial up users in the Capital.
Cellular Mobile Telephone system was first started in 1993 in Burma.
___________________________________________________
Shan Herald Agency for News: Mobiles phones confiscated from Shans
July 13, 2001
Following the battle of Pakhee that raged across the border opposite
Chaingmai on 22 April-3 May, the local Burmese military had seized a
number of mobile phones from the local people, said sources.
More than 30 handsets, purchased in Thailand, were seized in a raid by
LIB (Light Infantry Battalion) 333's 30-men team on 10 June, according
to the sources in Mongton Township, Monghsat District.
LIB 333 is stationed in Monghsat 110 miles from the Chaingmai border.
The raiding team was led by Capt. Thaung Nyunt.
The owners were left unharmed if they handed over their handphones
without protest, but those who denied having them in possession were
beaten and fined.
The list sent to S.H.A.N. includes:
9 sets from Nakawngmu;
6 sets from ex-Mong Tai Army men;
2 sets from Hwe Aw;
1 set from Maeken;
2 sets from Poongpakhem;
3 sets from Mongton and
3 sets from Nawngpayen.
Mobiles owned by Wa and Lahu were however left untouched.
Thousands of people who are engaged in cross-border trade usually use
handsets from Thailand.
___________________________________________________
Xinhua: Myanmar Leader Urges Developed Countries to Assist Developing
Countries
YANGON, July 12 (Xinhua) -- Myanmar leader Lieutenant-General Khin Nyunt
has called on developed countries to assist in the development process
of developing countries. Khin Nyunt, first secretary of the Myanmar
State Peace and Development Council, made the call at a ceremony here on
Wednesday marking the 2001 World Population Day, official newspaper The
New Light of Myanmar reported Thursday. He warned that should developed
nations act in their own interests only, the gap between the rich and
the poor will widen and undesirable socio-economic problems will emerge.
He said that in some cases, rich developed countries impose "
meaningless" sanctions on developing countries, thus marring potential
investments and obstructing developments.
He said that Myanmar is determined to continue to play an active role in
population-related programs, while strengthening its collaboration and
cooperation with all nations in the world and U.N. agencies as well as
local and international non- governmental organizations. According to
official estimation, Myanmar's population has reached 52 million with a
population growth at 2.2 percent annually. Its population density is 76
inhabitants per square- kilometer. Another statistics also show that out
of 18.225 million hectares of cultivable land in Myanmar, 9.315 million
hectares have been utilized with 8.91 million hectares remaining to be
reclaimed.
___________________________________________________
CHRO: Female Pastor Sentenced For Two Years With Hard Labour In Haka
Ottawa, July 10, 2001
The Chin Human Rights Organization CHRO received a report that a female
pastor Ms. Gracy of Rinpi Baptist church from central Chinland was
sentenced by Chin State court for two years with hard labour on 6 July
2001 in Haka, the capital of Chin State. Justice system in Burma is
completely controlled by the ruling military junta.
Pastor Gracy was arrested by the Burmese soldiers on February 13 this
year. She was accused of supporting the Chin National Front. Since her
arrest, she has been detained in Haka army camp, where prison conditions
are extremely severe, inadequate and precarious for a woman prisoner.
Pastor Gracy will soon be sent to Kalaywa hard labour camp in Sagaing
division, where her brother Pu Hoi Mang is now serving two years prison
term with hard labour.
In Chin State, the ruling military regime State Peace and Development
Council ( SPDC ) publicly declared that Christian pastors are their
number one enemy, accusing them of pro-colonialist white face.
About 90% of Chins are Christian and religious persecution is a major
concern in Chin State. For the past two years, the United States
Department of State designated Burma as country of particular concern
violating religious freedom.
______________________MONEY________________________
The International Herald Tribune: Crackdown Does Little to Help Burma's
Economy
July 11, 2001 Wednesday
Thomas Crampton
RANGOON
Until the police came for her this spring, Ma Khine Aye was known as the
woman who ruled Burma's currency, the kyat.
Operating openly from a shop marked by a signboard in downtown Rangoon,
Ma Khine Aye changed dollars to kyat for foreign and local businesses.
She even had a listing in the Yellow Pages and advertisements in
English-language publications.
That was before the ruling military junta began a crackdown on
unauthorized currency traders in April. It was the latest in a series of
awkward attempts to stop the currency's slide from the official rate of
6 kyat to the dollar to the black-market rate of 800 kyat to the dollar.
Police swept across the capital, arresting Ma Khine Aye and more than
400 other exchange traders, effectively shutting down the private
currency market.
The crackdown has crept into other markets that affect the currency.
Shops selling gold, a favored commodity of financial last resort, were
recently warned to set prices at a government-decreed level. About 30
brokers selling cars, all of which must be bought with hard currency,
were detained in the past two weeks pending tax inquiries. Taxi drivers
complain that gasoline rations have been cut from 3 gallons to just 2
gallons (7.6 liters) a day. "There are undercover military intelligence
officers watching from everywhere," one woman said.
"This is the tightest crackdown we have seen in more than five years."
The initiative has temporarily stabilized the exchange rate, but as
Thailand's border to Burma reopens after many months of closing, the
demand for hard currency may prove tempting to dealers.
With foreigners returning to Rangoon, the seedy basement bars in the
city's five-star hotels are doing a thriving business. Elsewhere,
however, the economic outlook remains bleak.
Since a burst of foreign investment at the height of Asia's economic
boom in the early 1990s came to an end, Burma's economy has been locked
in a downward spiral.
Exports are down, hampered by the country's record on human rights. The
government denies Western organizations' allegations that it tolerates
forced labor, but union groups and others have been pushing boycotts.
Investors shun the country, too. Two major foreign banks, frustrated at
the lack of economic progress, closed local offices in the past year.
"The economy may be bad, but there is little motivation for those in
control to reform," said one Rangoon-based Burmese economist. "The
government alternates randomly between odd, desperate and occasionally
appropriate measures."
Rules governing the key agricultural sector highlight the impact of
seemingly arbitrary policies. Price deregulation of beans several years
ago encouraged farmers to grow the crop, which became one of the
country's largest agricultural exports. Rice, by contrast, was
considered too strategically important for deregulation. As a result,
Burma, the world's largest exporter of the crop in the 1940s, now
exports little rice.
Economists now also fear that a confusing currency policy may encourage
the development of a cumbersome three-currency economy of dollars, the
official Burmese kyat and a proxy currency known as foreign-exchange
certificates.
The use of dollars in Burma is technically illegal, but the law is
frequently flouted by businesses and even the government itself, which
often requires dollar payments for services.
Foreign executives and visitors have long been urged by the government
to use the certificates.
To support the proxy currency, tourists entering Burma are required to
exchange at least $300 for an equal amount of the certificates, which
hold a 1-to-1 value to the dollar. This policy allows the government to
collect tourist dollars up front by requiring hotels and citizens to
accept the "Monopoly money" certificates as a dollar equivalent.
In what observers call a rare act of restrained economic management, the
government had maintained the certificates' equal value to the dollar.
In the last several weeks, however, the government appears to have
switched the peg to a fixed kyat value. Instead of is fixing their value
at $1, the government said certificates could be cashed in at government
counters for 490 kyat.
Unless Burma's government follows market trends, adjusting the kyat
value of the certificates as the kyat itself varies against the dollar,
the certificates could decouple from the dollar and create a third
currency, economists warn.
___________________________________________________
Myanmar Times: Seasons of Yangon will weather the calm [Ramada pulls out
of Burma]
Issue of July 2-8 2001
By Myo Lwin
THE Ramada Hotel at Yangon International Airport is no longer. Last
week, it became the Seasons of Yangon. Hotel owner Austral Amalgamated
(Myanmar), which has its head office in Malaysia, made the name change
following the expiry, last month, of its contract with US-based firm
Ramada International. "We have stopped using the brand Ramada on our
hotel as the five-year contract, under which we hired their management
and the right to use their brand, expired on May 25," said Austral
director Mr WongSek Onn. "That?s why we changed our hotel name. We?ve
chosen the name Seasons of Yangon after much consideration between
Yangon, Kuala Lumpur and Melbourne, involving both our overseas
directors and the hotel staff. The word ?seasons? is simple, but unusual
for a hotel, while ?of Yangon? depicts a specific property belonging to
Yangon." Mr Wong said the company would stay with the ?seasons? theme if
plans to develop a hotel in Melbourne, Australia, came to fruition. And
he said that the change of name, and an associated change in style,
would be a positive move for the company and the hotel?s clients. "
Although Ramada had brought some professionalism into the market, the
charm and hospitality of the Myanmar staff have been downplayed ," he
said. "We want to truly emphasise this great human software in our
hotel. Austral wants to project the unique charm and friendliness of our
Myanmar staff so that our hotel guests can personally feel the sincere
hospitality of the Myanmar culture," he said. With more than 3,000 inns
in America and 50 hotels elsewhere around the world, Ramada
International charged US$15,000 per year for marketing and management
fees. Mr Wong said cost control was another reason for the change. "The
hotel operation has lost US$ 1.5 million in the last five years. Now, we
can be cost-effective in our operation. "As the tourism market in
Myanmar is still very soft, the international hotels are suffering with
low room occupancy. A hotel should have 70per cent and upward
occupancy." Mr Wong said the hotel operators wanted to keep costs down,
but had not retrenched and would not retrench a single employee. Rates
at the 120-room airport hotel range from FEC$35 for a standard room to
$180 for a "royal" suite. Ramada is a Mexican word meaning ?cool, shady
tree?.
___________________________________________________
The Scotsman (UK): Scouring the Mountains for Burma's Brown Gold
July 11, 2001, Wednesday
Damien Mcelroy In Guyong
SKIPPING carefully over rivulets of muddy water for the sake of his
brilliant white slacks and polished plastic shoes, Fang Liguo cuts an
incongruous figure in this village, home to one of China's poorest
mountain tribes.
Dead black eyes in deep-lined faces watch the Chinese furniture
entrepreneur as he makes his way up the hill to meet the local headman,
seeking the roots of a fortune in the damp hills between China and
Burma. But the mahogany faces of the locals stir no anthropological
interest in him.
Marching past a clutch of men playing cards on the sodden clay, Mr Fang
reserves his attention for the hardwood trees that surrounds their
rickety wooden shacks. Almost one thousand miles away, in the coastal
province of Fujian, he is prospering through making furniture for
export, one of China's fastest growing industries.
Since a 1998 ban on logging in the upper reaches of its great rivers,
the Yangtse and the Yellow, the supply of wood from inland China has
dried up. Businessmen like Mr Fang have been reaching to the extremities
of the empire to secure their future.
"This area is perfect for me," he said. "I need semi-processed wood.
Here there is local supply and steady imports from Burma, more than
enough to meet my needs."
Along the roads that stretch across the Burmese border, logging is a
boom industry. On the hillsides huge sheds with blue corrugated iron
roves are spaced just miles apart.
Occasionally a huge sign proclaims, as at the gate of the Yongcheng
Timber Industry, a multi-million dollar Sino-foreign joint venture.
Roadside workshops are filled with sawdust-smeared migrant workers from
the great people-producing provinces of Sichuan and Anhui.
China shut down its own logging industry to prevent floods wiping out
parts of its most populous cities. It has turned to south-east Asia to
make up the shortfall, and its impoverished neighbours have eagerly
grasped at the resulting windfall.
But in moving to avert an ecological disaster at home, China is stoking
a "cataclysm" abroad.
Forest cover in Burma is shrinking rapidly. The monitoring group
Rainforest Network estimates that just 30 per cent of the country is
wooded today, down from a peak of more than 70 per cent after the Second
World War.
In parts of Indonesia, Sumatra and Borneo, the situation is even worse.
In a recent report the World Bank warned that lowland forests now the
world's "richest source of timber", home to a huge variety of flora and
fauna, will be extinct by 2010.
The torrid growth of China's furniture business means pressure on
south-east Asia's forests will only get worse. Exports grew last year
and domestic sales rose even faster spurred by changes in government
policy to encourage home ownership.
Industry officials date the explosion of timber imports directly to the
decision to ban logging across most of China.
"They cut tariffs to zero after the floods. It was unilateral
disarmament," said Betsy Ward, executive director of the American Forest
and Paper Association.
China is poised to become the world's biggest importer of logs, figures
show. Without urgent action to stop unsustainable logging to meet this
huge demand, Indonesia and Burma will be denuded of trees.
Burmese teak has been popular in China since the reign of the emperor
Quailing (1736-1799), who imported it on the back of an elephant, to
make beds for his concubines. Officially, Burma supplies 10 per cent of
the logs used in China but the real figure is thought to be much higher.
The government monopoly, the Myanmar Timber Enterprise, still sticks
with a 19th century timber selection system, but the Burmese warlords
stripping the hills along the Chinese border pay no heed to the rules of
sustainable development.
According to one businessman, local chieftains are constantly expanding
their territory only to be beaten back. A deal to extract logs from a
particular patch must be rapidly executed for it's hard to know how long
the warlord will hold his ground.
The extinction of its teak forests would be a devastating blow for
Burma's already feeble economy. A ton the "brown gold", sells for GBP
1,500. Timber exports last year topped GBP 200 million, a quarter of the
country's total exports.
_______________________GUNS________________________
Jane's Defence Weekly: Myanmar signs for surplus MiG-29s
July 11, 2001
NIKOLAI NOVICHKOV JDW Correspondent
Moscow
The government of Myanmar (Burma) has signed a contract with the
Russian Aircraft-building Corporation (RSK) MiG covering its
acquisition of 10 MiG-29 fighter aircraft, comprising eight MiG-29Bs
and two MiG-29UB trainers.
To be drawn from a stock of about 70 aircraft assembled at RSK MIG's
plants in the early 1990s and now stored at its Lukhovitsy machine-
building plant, the MiG-29s have been acquired for a total of $130
million, said military-diplomatic sources. Around 30% of this sum
will be paid initially, with the rest in instalments across the next
decade.
Myanmar will use its new aircraft, a delivery schedule for which has
not been disclosed, to augment its fleet of around 42 Chengdu F-7M
and Nanchang A-5C strike aircraft, operations of which started in
1991 and 1993, respectively.
___________________________________________________
BurmaNet: Policy implications of regime?s borrowing to buy MiGs
July 13, 2001
Reports first carried in the July 3 issue of TTU, a French intelligence
newsletter and now in Jane?s Defence Weekly indicate that Russia is
extending credits of approximately $90 million to finance the purchase
of ten MiG 29 fighters. The regime?s acquisition these expensive and
potent weapons will have regional and international policy implications.
The acquisition appears to be a response to clashes earlier this year
with Thailand?s military after Burmese troops crossed the border to
attack ethnic rebels. In those clashes, Thailand used its F-16 fighters
drive home a message to Burmese troops about their almost total
vulnerability to Thailand?s air superiority. Thai F-16s staged low
overflights of Burmese troop positions but did not open fire. The
Burmese, lacking any aircraft remotely comparable to the F-16 withdrew
and protested angrily claiming the Thai aircraft had fired on them.
An immediate effect of Burma?s procurement of the fighters will likely
be a countermove by Thailand to seek delivery of sophisticated US air to
air missiles. The F-16 fighter is roughly comparable to the MiG 29 and
Thailand has purchased 32 of them from the United States.
Of these, half were purchased in 1998 and configured to carry the AIM-30
advanced medium range air to air missile (AMRAAM), which are the most
sophisticated air to air missiles in the US inventory. While the
aircraft were configured to carry AMRAAMs, the Clinton administration
resisted actually delivering them because of concerns that their
introduction could cause regional instability and trigger an arms race.
In essence, the US has told Thailand that they couldn?t have AMRAAMS yet
but that the missiles would be forthcoming if ever needed. Until now,
Thailand?s air force has outclassed anything its immediate neighbors
have (with the arguable exception of friendly Malaysia). MiG 29s in
Burma are likely to alarm Thailand?s military which in turn will press
the Bush administration to deliver AMRAAMs.
Burma?s purchase of high tech weapons capable of threatening Thailand
also carries risks for the current Thai government. The $40 million
downpayment was revealed in the same week that Burma received its
initial share of royalties (approximately $100 million) from Thailand?s
state oil company for gas from the Yadana pipeline. Thailand?s current
foreign minister, Surakiat Sathirathai, as head of the exploration and
production arm of the Thai state oil company, was largely responsible
for the creation of the Yadana project. Burma now appears to be buying
weapons to threaten Thailand in large part with revenues from the
project Surakiert put together.
A third area where the deal will have repercussions is in foreign aid
and loan forgiveness. Burma is a heavily indebted poor country owing
more than $6 billion and is seeking increased foreign aid and debt
forgiveness. Burma is slated to receive approximately 3 billion yen
($30 million) in recently announced foreign aid from Japan in order to
refurbish generators at the Lawpita hydroelectric plant, which is in
addition to $150 million in interest payments that Japan forgives every
year on $3 billion in previous loans. In taking on $90 million in new
loans to buy weapons, the regime risks undermining its case for further
foreign aid and loan write-offs.
________________________DRUGS______________________
Shan Herald Agency for News: Wa going 50:50 share with Burmese
commander--Insider
July 13, 2001
Wei's brother implicated
According to a report by a trader across the border from Chiangmai on
Tuesday (10 July), Wa and Burmese officials have concluded a new pact
recently on joint drug undertakings.
The agreement that was made on 4 June at the command post of IB
(Infantry Battalion) 65 in Mongton stated that the Burmese and Wa would
share the proceeds from their sales equally, said the insider.
The meeting was attended by Lt.-Col Myint Sway, Commander, IB 65, "Hsaw
Hsing", a ethnic Chinese who is wanted in Thailand on drug charges and
Wei Hsao-ying a.k.a. Sophol Jandee, younger brother of Wei Hsiao-kang,
both of whom are also wanted in Thailand and the United States.
Wei Hsiao-ying has been in Hwe Aw, 20 miles north of Chiangmai province,
for almost a year now, the source added.
Also on the agreement were that Hsaw Hsing would be responsible for
"finding buyers," Burmese troops for safe transport to the border and Wa
troops for security at the border.
"At present, the passage to Thailand is through Poongpakhem, 10 miles
north of the border, to Namhukhun and Kangti," he said. "From Kangti,
one can cross over into Thailand through Tham-ngob where there is a big
Chinese community."
Kangti is just south of Pakhee, where a fierce battle took place between
the Shans and Burmese forces in late April, after the former claimed to
have captured nearly 200,000 speed pills.
Tham-ngob in Chaiprakarn District, Chiangmai province, 120 km north of
Chiangmai, used to be the headquarters of the Kuomintang's Third Army
commanded by Li Wenhuan who died on 6 December.
Related News:
The latest transaction took place on 7 July, when 4 buyers from
Tham-ngob and its neighboring Banmai Nongbua led by Jiahong (family
name not known), 45, who purchased 500,000 pills of "yaba"
(methamphetamines) at 11 baht per pill.
"He paid B. 300,000 in advance. The remainder would be settled on
delivery at the border on 12 July, according to their agreement," said
the unnamed source.
___________________ REGIONAL/INTERNATIONAL___________________
Inter Press Service: Momentum Builds for Criminal Tribunals in Asia
[Abridged]
July 9, 2001, Monday
By Satya Sivaraman
CHIANG MAI, Thailand
As the prosecution of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic on
charges of "crimes against humanity" moves forward, momentum is building
in Asia to try despots linked to similar crimes.
Preparations are underway for the setting up of an international
tribunal under the auspices of the United Nations to try leaders of the
now defunct Khmer Rouge for its role in the murder of over one million
Cambodian citizens between 1975 and 1979.
A similar international tribunal has been recommended by the U.N. to try
Indonesian military and militia leaders for their role in the violence
in East Timor during the formerly occupied country's referendum on
independence in 1999.
A human rights panel established in Jakarta has found sufficient
evidence to charge key Indonesian military officials with a host of
crimes including allegations of torture, forced evacuation, kidnapping,
rape, and mass killings.
Meanwhile, there is a growing clamor for the investigation of various
other instances of crimes against humanity and even genocide in Asia.
These range from the massacre of Bangladeshi civilians by the Pakistani
army during the country's war of liberation in 1971 to the still
continuing mass deportations and arbitrary killing of civilians
belonging to ethnic minority groups in Burma by the ruling military
junta.
"If there is a serious investigation of cases of crimes against humanity
-- defined similarly to the alleged Serb atrocities against ethnic
Albanians in Kosovo -- there are many regimes in Asia that could be
indicted," says an Asian diplomat.
According to him, the level of understanding of what constitutes a war
crime or crime against humanity in most Asian countries is so poor that
such crimes get committed as a matter of routine by the armed and police
forces especially in situations of civil conflict.
The Charter of the International Military Tribunal, set up after the
Second World War in Nuremburg to try Nazi officials, defines crimes
against humanity as being "murder, extermination, enslavement,
deportation, and other inhumane acts committed against civilian
populations, before or during the war; or persecutions on political,
racial or religious grounds in execution of or in connection with any
crime within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal, whether or not in
violation of the domestic law of the country where perpetrated."
In the international criminal tribunals set up for Rwanda and former
Yugoslavia, the list of the specific crimes against humanity has been
expanded to include rape and torture.
The statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC), endorsed by 120
countries in Rome in 1998, also expands the list of specific acts to
include the crimes of enforced disappearance of persons and apartheid.
"Using these definitions there is no doubt that what the Burmese army is
doing to the ethnic minority population fits perfectly under the
category of crimes against humanity but the catch is to come up with
evidence that will stand up in a court of law," says a British human
rights campaigner investigating such allegations against the Burmese
military regime.
There are an estimated two million internally displaced civilians
belonging to the Shan, Karen and Karenni ethnic minorities, most of them
forcibly moved by the Burmese army as part of its conflict with rebel
groups fighting for autonomy or independence.
Human rights groups report numerous instances of systematic rape of
ethnic minority women, arbitrary murders, forced labor, destruction of
crops and settlements .
The problem, however, say human rights activists, has been that no one
has systematically collected evidence, apart from oral accounts of
victims and witnesses, that could establish without doubt that such
violence is part of a systematic and widespread campaign of terror
launched by the Burmese regime.
Even in the case of Slobodan Milosevic, for example, the International
Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia (ICTY) at The Hague where his case is
being heard is expected to have a tough time proving with hard evidence
that he was personally responsible or connected to the various crimes
against humanity committed by Serb troops.
But the lack of evidence is only one obstacle to bringing up such
charges against despotic regimes and individuals in Asia. The bigger
problem is expected to be political -- many of those accused of crimes
against humanity are either still in power or under the protection of
those in power.
"The mass state-sponsored killings of supposed communists in Indonesia
in 1965 and the subsequent arbitrary detention of hundreds of thousands
more accused of being Communists are undoubtedly crimes against humanity
on a large scale," says Vanessa Johanson, an adviser to the National
Commission on Human Rights in Jakarta.
"However, legal resolution of this case remains highly unlikely, as
Communism remains illegal in Indonesia," she adds.
Nearly one million Indonesians are estimated to have lost their lives
within a month of General Suharto taking power at that time.
Even in the case of the East Timor, for example, senior Indonesian
military officials implicated in the large scale atrocities against the
island's population have warned of a "possible military coup" in
Indonesia if an attempt is made to actually charge and punish them.
In Burma, of course, the process of bringing the perpetrators of crimes
against humanity is likely to be even more complicated since the
military junta is still well-entrenched and in recent times has even
consolidated its position.
But not all the allegations of crimes against humanity, war crimes or
even genocide in Asia are pinned on the region's own rulers. Such
charges are also being made against the United States for its role in
the Vietnam War in the 1960s and 70s.
The U.S. carpet bombing of Cambodia in the late 60s and early 70s, for
example, is estimated to have killed nearly 600,000 civilians and
displaced many hundreds of thousands more, while many cases of
cold-blooded massacres of Vietnamese civilians by U.S. army troops have
been documented.
The movement to make people, irrespective of their status, accountable
for crimes against humanity, he says, is likely to gain more and more
momentum in the years to come.
___________EDITORIALS/OPINION/PROPAGANDA__________
Far Eastern Economic Review: The Burmese Military's Last Chance
By Zaw Oo
Issue cover-dated July 19, 2001
The writer is coordinator of the Technical Advisory Network of Burma and
a doctoral candidate at the School of International Service of the
American University in Washington
After 12 years of rule, the Burmese military, known as the Tatmadaw, has
lost its capacity to govern, particularly in managing the complex task
of economic reform. The military opened talks with Aung San Suu Kyi
eight months ago. The talks, presumably still at the
"confidence-building" stage, prompt this question: Will the military
soon extricate itself from power and facilitate wider democratization in
Burma? But in truth, the question is not whether the military has to
extricate itself. Rather, it is how and when.
Meanwhile, the military has reached a stage where its role as a
government is now seriously undermining its other role as an army
institution. Ten years ago, the military government decided to expand
the army to 500,000 servicemen. This ambitious plan in effect broke the
back of the economy, aided the emergence of powerful regional commanders
(and with it the rise of warlordism) and retarded military
professionalism as thousands were drafted without proper training. Not
surprisingly, desertion is rising, while most units are pushed into
living off the land. As a result, extortion, the drug trade and forced
labour have become widespread.
The military needs to address these internal problems. There is the
inequality of power and influence between military and political
positions, where political appointments determine which officers get
rich. This inequality fuels dangerous rifts within the military. Also,
the military intelligence apparatus is getting so powerful that it is
making crucial political decisions. But their power lacks proper
institutional grounding.
Finally, the military's own constitutional proposal makes it very
difficult to "civilianize" the regime. It proposed five years ago that a
strong president--which it expected would be its own man--would head
Burma. But the military's constitutional experts also slipped in a
clause that states that the commander-in-chief of the armed forces,
rather than the president, possesses the authority to declare state
emergencies and dissolve government. It is understood that the clause
was inserted as a strategy to maintain the military's dominance. In the
process, this has made increasing civilian control more difficult by
confusing two sources of authority. Given such an unstable foundation,
the military does not have the luxury of sticking blindly to a deadly
status quo. It must move on.
Searching for a sensible way to extricate itself from its current
position as an illegitimate and hated government is a much worthier goal
for the military than trying to resuscitate a failing regime at all
costs. And if the military is serious about this, the country would be
willing to help restore the military's original role as a patriotic army
of the people. Here, there are three options to consider.
First, the military can consider transferring power to the country's
legitimate leaders, those elected in the 1990 elections. The current
talks could be the venue where the terms of power transfer are discussed
or negotiated.
Secondly, if the immediate transfer of power is too dangerous for the
military to contemplate, it could consider forming a government of
national unity with elected representatives and others, particularly
from national groups. This interim government could then establish a
transition period, within which attempts to resolve serious national
problems would be jointly undertaken, and organize new elections to
renew the people's mandate.
Lastly, the military could begin serious political liberalization and
put civilians in charge of the administration. However, this gradual
strategy has the least chance of success, particularly in a situation
where there is an absence of institutions and procedures to mobilize
public acceptance.
For the democratic opposition, all three options can be considered in
order of preference, but with genuine political liberalization as the
bottom line. For Burma to survive with its integrity intact, the
military must agree to democratization, but at a pace negotiated with
civil-society forces and other elements. However, such a pace has
serious time constraints. Economic factors mostly underlie the urgency
of the solution, but more seriously, the Aids epidemic poses a great
time pressure on all sides. A peaceful, orderly but timely transition
through dialogue is the military's last chance to become the true
saviour of the nation. Of course, it is also the last chance for all
Burmese to unite again to save the country.
________________
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