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AFP - Myanmar army continues forced displacement of civilians: HRW BANGKOK (AFP) - Myanmar's army continues to target civilians while fighting ethnic Karen rebels, with extrajudicial killings and forcible displacements of some people up to 100 times in their lives, Human Rights Watch says. Sexual violence, forced labour and looting of villages is a common practice of an "unreformed and unaccountable" Myanmar army, US-based Human Rights Watch said in a new report. Yangon also keeps conscripting villages, including children, despite repeated denials, the report said. "The government still allows the Burmese army to kill and drive people out of their villages with complete impunity," Human Rights Watch Asia director Brad Adams said in a statement, using the military-ruled country's former name. "While the world has rightly condemned the treatment of Aung San Suu Kyi and the lack of democracy, it needs also to focus on the Burmese army's brutal displacement of the Karen and other ethnic minorities." The human rights group interviewed 46 ethnic Karen for their 70-page report. The 46 Karen together said they were displaced more than 1,000 times in their lives, five of them more than 100 times each. Ethnic Karen leaders say some 200,000 Karen have been displaced by decades of fighting. The ruling junta and the Karen rebels called a halt to five decades of fighting with an informal pact in December 2003, but have never signed a formal ceasefire deal. The Karen National Union is the largest of a handful of rebel groups still resisting Yangon's rule. The junta estimates there are 7,000 rebels in the group which is fighting one of the world's longest insurgencies. BANGKOK (AP) - Myanmar's military continues to kill, rape and conscript impoverished ethnic Karen villagers as it drives thousands from their homes in its campaign against insurgents, Human Rights Watch said in a report Thursday. The New York-based group urged the junta to allow humanitarian agencies unfettered access to villagers who have been forced to flee by troops pursuing rebels through the jungles of eastern Karen State, which borders Thailand. Karen guerrillas have been fighting for independence from Myanmar, also known as Burma, for more than five decades in one of the world's longest-running insurgencies. They began peace talks with the junta in 2003 and later reached a provisional truce, but sporadic fighting has continued. "The government still allows the Burmese army to kill and drive people out of their villages with complete impunity," Brad Adams, the group's Asia director, was quoted as saying in a statement announcing the release of the report. Members of the international community, who have condemned Myanmar's lack of democracy and the junta's detention of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, should also focus on the plight of the displaced Karen, Adams added. Independent sources have suggested there were as many as 650,000 displaced people in eastern Myanmar in late 2004, Human Rights Watch said. Some 157,000 civilians have been displaced and at least 240 villages destroyed, relocated or abandoned in the region since 2002, it said, citing a recent survey. Recent military offensives have pushed thousands more into the countryside, it said. Many of the displaced villagers are trying to hide in war zones. The report is based on interviews with 46 Karen civilians who claim to have been driven from their villages _ in some cases as many as 100 times _ by government soldiers. It includes accounts by an unidentified Karen mother who said she was forced to flee her village after Myanmar troops shot and killed her daughter, a Karen man who witnessed troops looting and destroying his village and another who said Myanmar soldiers raped two women in his village. "Burmese soldiers came into Tho Mer Kee village and burnt down all the houses," one unidentified Karen woman was quoted as saying. "They killed all our pigs, goats and chickens _ and then shot the buffalos for fun." Many of the interviewed Karen villagers said they had fled their homes to avoid attacks by Myanmar forces and to escape forced labor or conscription, according to Human Rights Watch. Despite official denials, "the army continues to conscript local villagers, including children, to work either as army porters or as unpaid laborers," Adams said. Villagers said they suffered many problems from being forcibly displaced, including a lack of food, education and health services. Most said they mainly needed to be able to farm without being disturbed by encroaching troops. Human Rights Watch urged the junta to allow humanitarian agencies free access to the displaced people, and said that the mapping of land mines sown by soldiers was a particularly urgent need. Chinese Ambassador to Myanmar Li Jinjun held a grand reception here Wednesday to celebrate the 55th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Myanmar and to open the China Culture Month. Attending the event were First Secretary of the Myanmar State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) Lieutenant-General Thein Sein,Foreign Minister U Nyan Win and some other Myanmar ministers as well as representatives of overseas Chinese in Myanmar totaling nearly 500. Ambassador Li said that China and Myanmar are friendly neighbors linked by mountains and rivers and the two peoples have had close exchange and lived on good terms since ancient times, having forged deep "phawphaw" (fraternal) friendship. After the establishment of the diplomatic ties in 1950, leadersof older generation of the two countries made reciprocal visits and jointly promoted the "Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence",he noted. Entering into the new century, the two countries issued a joint statement with regard to future bilateral cooperation, pointing out the clear direction for the development of their bilateral ties in the 21st century, the Chinese ambassador added. He went on to say that in recent years, there have been many achievements in the two countries' economic and trade cooperation,the exchange and cooperation in the sectors such as culture, education, health, sports and drug control have deepened day afterday along. At the reception, First Secretary of the SPDC Lieutenant-General Thein Sein said Myanmar and China are good neighbors and have traditionally enjoyed good and friendly relations since time immemorial based on mutual respect and understanding. Since the establishment of diplomatic relations in 1950, the ties that bind the two countries have been strengthened and the relationship has blossomed into a special kinship known as "Pauk Phaw" (fraternal) friendship, he noted. He also said that Myanmar was one of the first countries to recognize the People's Republic of China after its founding in October 1949 and has constantly upheld the one-China policy. Myanmar-China relations of friendship and cooperation have grown from strength to strength and bilateral cooperation in various sectors has been progressing well to their mutual benefit,he pointed out. He emphasized that Myanmar and China have been able to work closely in regional and international fora and that their endeavors have contributed to the maintenance of peace, stability and prosperity of the two countries and the region as a whole. In celebration of the event, the China Culture Month activities,jointly sponsored by the Chinese embassy and the Myanmar Ministries of Culture and Information, was formally inaugurated onWednesday. The activities of the month include China's photo, painting, photo-taking and film exhibitions, performances of Heilongjian cultural troupe and men's friendly matches between Sichuan and Myanmar volleyball teams. The China Culture Month was formally inaugurated here Wednesday in celebration of the 55th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Myanmar. Main activities to be staged in the event include exhibitions of Chinese photos, paintings and films, performances of Chinese troupes and sports activities, a Chinese embassy official said. The event is jointly sponsored by the Chinese Embassy and Myanmar ministries of culture and information. Addressing an evening reception to mark the opening of the activities, Chinese ambassador Li Jinjun and First Secretary of the Myanmar State Peace and In his message sent on the occasion, Chinese Minister of Culture Sun Jiazheng said cultural exchanges have played an irreplaceable and active role in the good-neighborly relations between the two countries, expressing belief that the activities are bound to further enhance the friendly ties and mutual understanding between the two peoples. In their messages, Myanmar Minister of Culture Major-General Kyi Aung praised the China-Myanmar paukphaw friendship and the cultural exchanges between the two countries, and Myanmar Minister of Information Brigadier-General Kyaw Hsan expressed the belief that through joint efforts, the two countries will make further progress in their cooperation in information and culture sectors. Some 500 people attended the reception and the opening of the China Culture Month activities. : Source: Xinhua BANGKOK - Though she appears destined to mark her 60th birthday as a prisoner of Myanmar's military regime, jailed opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi will not be forgotten by the country's diaspora and her legions of sympathizers across the world. From Scotland to Thailand and Texas to Tokyo, plans are afoot to highlight her courage as a champion of democracy on her birthday, June 19. The messages appearing on the web pages of one Myanmar pro-democracy group - the Washington DC-based US Campaign for Burma, or USCB (Myanmar was formerly known as Burma) - reflect the moral high ground Suu Kyi enjoys on the world's political stage. After all, not only is she a Nobel Peace laureate, but she is the only one among the other winners of the global peace prize who is a prisoner. Her plight has prompted South Africa's Bishop Desmond Tutu, another Nobel Peace laureate, to declare on the USCB website that "as long as she remains under arrest, none of us is truly free". Other supporters plan to raise a cry for her freedom by staging protests outside Myanmar's embassies in capitals across three continents. These cities including Tokyo, Seoul, New Delhi, London and Washington DC. "This outpouring of support will not be easy for the military regime to sidestep," Debbie Stothard of the Alternative Association of Southeast Asian Nations Network on Myanmar, a regional human-rights lobby, told Inter Press Service. "Despite her isolation, she still commands immense support and solidarity." Over the years, Suu Kyi's birthday has become a "powerful focal point" used by human-rights groups and critics of Myanmar's military junta to highlight Suu Kyi's ill-treatment and the ongoing plight of many political prisoners in Myanmar, said Stothard. Currently, there are close to 1,300 political prisoners in Myanmar's jails, including parliamentarians, writers, Buddhist monks and pro-democracy activists. Win Tin, a 75-year-old journalist, has been in prison for 16 years. Such victimization followed the harsh crackdown on a democracy uprising in Myanmar in September 1988. The results of a parliamentary election in May 1990, which the National League for Democracy (NLD), the party Suu Kyi heads, won by a landslide, were then ignored by the junta. After that, the military government that had ruled the Southeast Asian country since a 1962 coup continued in power with increasing brutality. The junta's treatment of Suu Kyi has, in fact, come to symbolize its ironclad rule. Her latest stretch under house arrest, which began in May 2003, is the most severe of the nine years and 230 days she has spent as a prisoner of the ruling generals. She has had no contact with the diplomatic community for months, she has been denied meetings with UN officials and non-governmental groups and all communication with other NLD leaders has been cut off. Even Suu Kyi's personal physician, Dr Tin Myo Win, has been restricted from meeting her, unlike during the two previous periods she was under house arrest, from 1989-95 and 2000-02. "Earlier, her family doctor was free to visit Aung San Suu Kyi, even twice a week," NLD member Zin Linn told IPS. "But now he has to get permission from the government before he goes, and his visits have become rare, once a month or even longer." According to Zin, himself a political prisoner for seven years in the 1990s, the doctor is now subject to a level of checks that was absent before. "They conduct a body search and go through his medical equipment before and after he visits Aung San Suu Kyi at home." For Myanmar journalists in exile, there is little mystery behind such treatment. "This is an attempt by the regime to completely cut her off and make her politically irrelevant," said Aung Zaw, editor of The Irrawaddy, a weekly news magazine on Myanmar's affairs published in northern Thailand. The silence from Suu Kyi and the world she currently inhabits reflects how far the junta has gone to isolate her, noted Aung Zaw. "There is no news, not a word coming out from her and what she is doing. It was never the case before." Yangon's fear of Suu Kyi's popularity stems from the hundreds of thousands of people who came to hear her during the political campaigns she conducted after she was released from 19 months of house arrest in May 2002. During her one year in freedom that followed, she is reported to have visited 135 townships and 12 states and provincial regions in Myanmar. The crowds she drew during those gatherings came from Myanmar's many ethnic communities. Then in May 2003 the junta struck: thugs linked to the military regime attacked Suu Kyi and leading members of her political party while they were campaigning in a town north of Yangon. Suu Kyi and senior NLD leaders were placed under house arrest soon after. But attempts to silence Suu Kyi have proven counterproductive, since the level of support she enjoys within Myanmar has not waned, said Stothard. Some of these sympathizers, in fact, have taken a grave political risk to sign a petition being circulated in Myanmar calling for Suu Kyi's unconditional release, she revealed. "To sign this petition is an act of defiance," Stothard said. "The people are doing so because she is such a powerful political symbol in Myanmar. People believe in her." To date, close to 300,000 people have signed the petition, which also calls for the right to freedom of association for all political and ethnic groups in Myanmar, said NLD's Zin Linn. "This petition will be submitted to the regime and the UN." (Inter Press Service) JAKARTA: Southeast Asian countries, under pressure from the West, are close to persuading military-ruled Myanmar to forego its turn at the helm of the region's main political grouping next year, Indonesia said on Wednesday. The United States and the European Union have threatened to boycott high-level meetings with the 10-member Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) if Myanmar takes the rotating chairmanship without making progress on human rights, including freeing opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi. "They will decide later in July when the ASEAN foreign ministers meet in Laos. We will wait until July, but my feeling from discussions in Cebu is that probably Myanmar will not take its turn and that means it will fall on the Philippines," Indonesian Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda told a parliamentary hearing. "We openly said (to Myanmar) that when the situation in your country is ready, you will not need to wait until the other nine get their chairmanship turns. Just slip in." ASEAN foreign ministers met in Cebu in the Philippines in April. Myanmar, under pressure to forego its chairmanship, hinted last Saturday it may be working on an alternative solution. "Only we can decide. It is still very early," Myanmar Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs U Maung Myint said on the sidelines of a security conference in Singapore. Asked whether Myanmar would give in to international pressure and relinquish the ASEAN chair, he said: "No, we are preparing another situation." He declined to elaborate. The issue has threatened the unity of ASEAN, with some countries opposing Myanmar's chairmanship unless it shows concrete progress in implementing a roadmap to democracy. ASEAN is made up of Brunei, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines. The grouping's rotating chairmanship is based on alphabetical order. Laos currently chairs the group. -- Reuters Burma says it has received $9 million from an international fund to help control the spread of malaria in that country. Burma's National Malaria Control Program will use the money to fund a range of initiatives until March 2007, including expanded treatment and training courses for health care workers and volunteers. Officials hope to cut the number of malaria cases in half by 2010. About 700,000 Burmese are treated each year for the mosquito borne disease, and 2,000 die from malaria each year. The money is coming from the Geneva-based Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. It is part of a $35 million package for Burma that will also be used fight the spread of HIV and tuberculosis. The once-thriving ties between India and Myanmar, linked to each other culturally and historically, are firmly back on track with a more business-centric approach after decades of denial and vacillation. The result of this deepening multi-faceted engagement is there for all to see. Bilateral trade is on an upswing. In 2004, the two-way trade was estimated at $480 million and the two governments plan to increase it to $1 billion by 2006. Realpolitik has guided India's shift from Nehruvian idealism to a more business-centric approach in its dealings with Myanmar, which is emerging from self-imposed isolation and keen to pursue market reforms. India is also fast catching up with China, which has entrenched its influence, strategically and economically, in Myanmar, which borders India's insurgency-ridden northeastern states. "A great deal of change is taking place here. It's a complex country passing through a phase of transition, from tradition to modernity and from military rule to their own form of democracy," India's Ambassador to Myanmar Rajiv Bhatia told a group of visiting Indian journalists here. India has stepped up participation in infrastructure projects that were so far dominated by the Chinese, and is currently engaged in some 15 developmental projects including roads, ports, power, telecom and railways. The proposed India-Myanmar gas pipeline is another crucial project, which promises to network the two countries closer in their common pursuit of prosperity. Some Western powers may accuse India of mollycoddling the ruling military junta, but India has chosen to follow the policy of non-interference in Myanmar, also known as Brahmadesh (the sacred land of Lord Brahma) and Suvarnabhumi (the golden land) in Indian mythology. "I must reassure my Myanmar friends that we are not in the business of exporting democracy to other countries," says Bhatia, underscoring the new note of realism in India's engagement with the Myanmarese junta. The visit of the ruling State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) chairman Senior General Than Shwe to India in October 2004 imparted fresh momentum to bilateral relations. External Affairs Minister K. Natwar Singh sought to cement energy dialogue with Myanmar when he visited here earlier this year. This new approach has already started yielding results with Myanmar unequivocally backing India's candidature for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council (UNSC). "We have very cordial relations. Myanmar wants India to become a permanent member of the UNSC," Information Minister Brigadier General Kyaw Hsan told the visiting journalists. India's insistence on democracy and its support for National League for Democracy led by Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi resulted in a chill in bilateral relations since General Ne Win came to power in 1962. The coup d'etat in 1988 and the influx of refugees into Indian camps in the northeast states forced India to rethink its relationship with Myanmar. The 'Look East' policy, crafted during the time of former Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao, and Myanmar's 'Look Around' policy resulted in a decisive shift to a more realistic engagement with the junta. Jaswant Singh, external affairs minister in the National Democratic Alliance government, visited the country in 2001 and 2002 and paved the way for a long-term engagement. The construction of the Tamu-Kalemyo-Kalewa road, called the India-Myanamar road of friendship, which links Moreh in Manipur to central Myanmar was taken up during this period. Washington D.C., 09 June, (Asiantribune.com): Burmese students presently residing in the United States of America has pointed out very clearly that India is under siege by Chinese forces, as air strips and naval bases are being built and Chinese vessels manned by ethnic Chinese, flying Burmese flags and fitted with modern day hi-tech gears are snooping on India at all times. They further revealed that it certainly posed a clear danger on India. India has been told of their vulnerability and how the country is under the siege by Chinese armed forces due to Burma’s deceptive maneuvering of allowing the Chinese forces to make use of their territory by Chinese against India. It has been brought to the attention of the Prime Minister of India that since 1988, in the aftermath of the failed nationwide uprisings in Burma, the Co Co Islands and Hine-gyi Island, strategically placed in the Indian Ocean and commanding the sea lanes from the Indian Ocean to the Far East and the Pacific, are in China’s hands, courtesy of the present ruling military oligarchy in Rangoon. The full text of the letter addressed to the Prime Minister of India is given below: Dear Mr. Prime Minister, We are Burmese students and activists residing in the United States after relocating from the Burma-Thailand borders where we escaped in the wake of severe crack downs on our endeavors to restore freedom and democracy in Burma in 1988, by the military junta today known as the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC). Today we are still carrying on with our obligation to restore freedom and democracy in Burma, under the banner of Anti-Dictatorship, People’s Freedom Movement, based in Washington DC, USA, demonstrating and condemning among others, the present illegal ruling regime in Rangoon for its gross human rights violations, forced labor and child labor (70,000 child soldiers among some400,000 plus strong Burma Army fully armed and backed by China) not to mention drug producing and trafficking, and also, for raiding, pillaging, raping and murdering ethnic people, mainly the Karen and lately the Shan as publicized worldwide. There are hundreds of thousands of ethnic Karen and Shan refugees languishing on the Thai side of the Burma-Thailand borders. The Thai authorities are driving them back into Burma, into the hands of the raping and murdering regime. As relevant and warranted at this juncture, we would like to reflect on our two countries’ relationship and friendship started since more than half a century ago until today, as forged and bonded by our past and late leaders, the likes of Mr. Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first popularly elected prime minister of India and U Nu, Burma’s first and only democratically elected Prime Minister, after Burma’s independence on January 4, 1948, in the wake of India’s freedom from colonial rule in 1947. In fact, Mr. Nehru has given crucial and vital advice and help to our late architect of Burma’s independence, General Aung San, father of today Burma’s most popular freedom fighter and world icon of democracy Daw Aung San Suu Kyi (1991 Nobel Peace Laureate), when he dropped in on Mr. Nehru on his way to London in the United Kingdom and demanded Burma’s independence from the British colonialists in 1946, just after the conclusion of World War Two on August 16, 1945, when Japan surrendered to the Allies led by the United States. Many patriots from Burma escaped to India after the Japanese occupation of Burma in the early stages of the last Great War to struggle against the fascist Japanese presence in their country. As given help and advice by their Indian colleagues the revolutionaries from Burma sneaked back into their homeland and played crucial roles in concerted actions with the Burma Defense Army led by General Aung San, who led a nationwide rebelion on March 27, 1945, and drove the two-timing (for giving a fake independence for Burma) Japanese occupiers out of Burma, before the Allied Forces led by Lord Louis Mountbatten of Burma marched into the country via India in the closing months of the Second World War. Mr. Nehru and U Nu were among the founders of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) with Chinese premier Chou En Lai among others, at the onset of the cold war between the communist bloc the USSR (Union of Socialist Soviet Republics) and the western nations led by the United States, after their victory over the fascist Japanese forces. Burma was subjected to military rule when the late armed forces chief of Burma, Ne Win, seized the power of the country on March 2, 1962, and drove U Nu and democracy as well as the freedom of the people into history. Even and until then India had been supporting Burma’s freedom and democracy by giving a post to one of U Nu’s daughters in the All India Radio to voice Burma’s cause among others. During Mrs. Indira Gandhi tenure as prime minister of India, All India Radio has reiterated the fact that freedom and democracy ruled no longer in Burma and criticized then Ne Win’s regime for it. Also, Mr. Rajiv Gandhi has greatly offered help and others in Burma’s cause. Furthermore, India has given a safe haven to Burmese students and activists when they escaped to India, in the wake of the nationwide uprisings for freedom and democracy in 1988, and then military junta the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) made its debut on September 18, 1988, killing thousands of people and held the country hostage until today. In the midst of the tenure of the last Indian administration led by your predecessor Mr. Vajpayee, the amicable and fruitful relation between the peoples of Burma and India turned for the worse. In a sudden political about face Mr. Vajpayee’s administration sacked then Defense Minister of India, who had been giving safe havens to Burmese student activists and supporting them fully in their struggles to free Burma from the military yoke, for his open criticism of military rule in Burma and mainly for refusing to take his place among the Indian dignities welcoming a top military dictator from Burma on a state visit to India. At present, the Burmese students and activists in India are being forced to keep a low profile and their activities to free their brethren in Burma curtailed or abandoned. In return, the Indian administration was promised help from the ruling SPDC regime in containing a Naga and Mezo rebels and others fighting against the Indian administration for their rights and autonomy. In this respect, we would like to point out the bigger and ominous picture for India at least, that today India is under siege by long time and deadly foe the communist China, aiming for world hegemony. Since 1988, in the aftermath of the failed nationwide uprisigs in Burma, the Co Co Islands and Hine-gyi Island, strategically placed in the Indian Ocean and commanding the sea lanes from the Indian Ocean to the Far East and the Pacific, are in China’s hands, courtesy of the present ruling military oligarchy in Rangoon. Air strips and naval bases are being built and Chinese vessels manned by ethnic Chinese, flying Burmese flags and fitted with modern day hi-tech gears are snooping on India at all times, as you might very well know. This certainly posed a clear and present danger on India, the world’s largest democracy, by the world’s remaining largest communist country. Despite the fact, the previous Indian administration has forged an unholy alliance with the Rangoon junta, notorious worldwide for its horrendous human rights abuses and cruelty, not to mention its illegal status for ignoring the results of the multi-party elections held on May 27, 1990, and cracking down on the winning party, the National League for Democracy (NLD) led by Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, still held under house arrest since after her narrow escape from certain death on May 30, 2003, in an ambush orchestrated and executed by the present prime minister in the SPDC administrative body, Soe Win, at De-pe’-yin, in upper Burma. As widely known Burma today is a lackey of China literally, as its armed force of more than 400,000 men are wholly armed by China and the SPDC regime is fully backed also, by the communist Chinese regime in Beijing wielding a veto power in the United Nations, in return for the Chinese use of Burma’ territories as bases for Chinese military to snoop on India and probably attack India, if the occasion calls for or warrants. Today, we are very surprised and frustrated to see that India, under the stewardship of Mrs. Sonia Gandhi, widow of the late Mr. Rajiv Gandhi and specifically under your auspices is continuing to embrace the same atrocious policies and negative legacy leftover by the previous administration of Mr. Vajpayee, counter productive and most damaging for India’s prosperity and posterity, specifically India’s security on the long run, with China laying siege on India on land and sea borders, as evidenced today. In terms of trade also, India has nothing of much significance to gain from the present military ruled country as China has taken monopoly over all exports from Burma – teak, gems and others – including drug trade; illicit drugs like methamphetamine and heroin produced in Burma are finding their way through China to the western world as known widely today. Even Thailand, the main conduit for illicit drugs and holding monopoly on border trade since decades ago, is losing business as a result of the majority of drugs going to China and the border trade also, is in the hands of the Chinese at present. In case, you aim to make a fortune out of Burma – gas pipeline and others - and the rag-tag regional grouping the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) you are in for a great shock and loss as the generals in Burma have no credibility or less integrity to honor their contract or given word as proven on many occasions in the past and at present. Besides purges and killings among the SPDC elite and specifically, lack of economic expertise, foreign investment and most importantly trust on the regime itself have taken a devastating toll on the SPDC economy wise and others at least as witnessed today. And most undoubtedly, you are also very well aware of the fact that Burma will regain freedom and democracy, not to mention its rightful place among nations on earth, in a very near future, as the SPDC regime’s days are numbered and nearing demise. This is inevitable and true also, given the present deteriorating developments in Burma today. The SPDC regime is rife with internal rifts and power struggles among its elite members are heating up and ongoing until today. Lieutenant General Khun Nyunt the most credible and considered a moderate by many has been alleged with corruption and cashiered out of his Prime Minister post and imprisoned for 40 long years to come, today by the hard line faction led by Than Shwe, presently heading the SPDC and his deputy Maung Aye. The De-pe’-yin murderer Soe Win, was rewarded with Khin Nyunt’s post currently as Prime Minister of Burma. According to publicized reports 282 innocent people fell victim to Soe Win, who headed the plot to kill Burma’s national leader Daw Aung San Suu at De-pe’-yin. They died while defending her and U Tin Oo on that fateful day May 30, 2003. Worldwide calls for independent investigation into the murders were ignored by the SPDC regime until today. Series of bombings, which the SPDC fingered first on U Sein Win and his KNU colleagues and then on the American Central Intelligence Agency and America’s ally Thailand, are the works of the SPDC regime out of sheer despair and desperation, if not pure stupidity on the part of the head of the SPDC, whose very limited formal education and little intellect are widely known. The bombings have claimed 19 innocent lives and more than a hundred injured and maimed, according to publicized reports. And lately, six regional commanders are dismissed and replaced with four of Than Shwe’s and two of Maung Aye’s lackeys. This evidenced the existence of cronyism and prejudice among the military elite and their community in Burma. This has given rise to dissent and uncertainty in the rank and file, as due recognition and promotion are deprived of those who are entitled. And graft is running rampant among the military and their community, serving their respective own means and aims, promotion and wealth. This in turn has prevented the ordinary citizenry from practicing their inherent righteousness and virtues for a clean living and survival, without exercising malpractices, become naïve and impossible on their part. Sooner rather than later the people and even the majority of the armed forces personnel together will resort to overwhelming might on the ruling military clique at their first opportunity given. And the SPDC and its cohorts will be decimated and driven into history and oblivion no doubt. In case this historic advent comes to pass, then India can gain more than you can imagine from Burma than you have hoped to secure at present by colluding and cooperating with the present ruling illegal and brutal military dictatorship in Burma, led by the likes of Than Shwe and Maung Aye. Most importantly, it would be monstrously shameful and disgraceful for the people and country of India specifically, and you personally, that the biggest democracy in the world possessing nuclear weapons and others, out of fear or most likely acquiescing nature, is colluding or collaborating with or being bullied by a handful of Burmese military dictators, shunned by all the civilized people of the world and backed by India’s arch foe, the communist China, just for the sake of gaining a pittance or two only and that also, is via an unlawful way and out of greed like today. In this view, we urge you to use your conventional wisdom and utmost discretion after perusing over this letter at your earliest leisure, which is written in good faith and strong friendship in a way, and also taking into account the most valued friendship between close neighbors still existing until today as forged and bonded by our past and late leading figures, the likes of Mr. Jawaharlal Nehru and U Nu among others. Expeditious and utmost discretion on your part in this matter would be greatly appreciated by us and helpful for the people of Burma and the existing friendship between them and the people of India would be greatly enhanced and fruitful also, of course. Shwe Sin Htun |
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