|
|
|
|
|
|
BURMA RELATED NEWS - OCTOBER 21, 2005. New York, 21 October, (Asiantribune.com): A global appeal to free Aung San Suu Kyi, the democratic icon of Burma, the lady who was first held under detention and later on house arrest since May 2003, would be completing a total of 3560 days since 1998 under house arrest on 24 October 2005. The international campaign to free the Burma’s opposition leader, who is considered, though slim and frail in physical appearance, a strong willed “Iron Lady of Asia” have been launched by, The National Council of the Union of Burma and The National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma. The appeal pointed out that Burmese Generals who have ruled the country through brute force since 1988, fear the unflinching support of the Burmese people for Aung San Suu Kyi, and continue to keep under house arrest by isolating her from her supporters. The appeal further unmasked the earlier devious game plan by the Burmese Generals. The statement reminded that in May 2003, Burmese Generals orchestrated a murderous assault on the supporters and members of Aung San Suu Kyi's party - The National League for Democracy - killing and maiming scores of them. It further added that the Generals wanted to frighten them into staying away from Aung San Suu Kyi, who was arrested again after that deplorable attack without any due legal process. The statement further underlined “We are deeply concerned about the situation and are calling on our friends all over the world to send 'Release Aung San Suu Kyi' Postcards to your Members of Congress/Parliament, governmental leaders, and influential officials so as to win the immediate release of Aung San Suu Kyi and all other political prisoners in Burma. The Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and the Leader of Burmese democracy movement Aung San Suu Kyi ia languishing, isolated and incommunicando in the house arrest and it is time that the call for her release reveberate all over. Win Myint, chairman of the Union of Myanmar Chamber of Commerce and Industry (UMCCI), Thursday expressed the hope that China's investors will become more active in the economic and trade activities in Myanmar. Speaking at the second China-ASEAN Business and Investment Summit, the official said China is currently the third largest trade partner of Myanmar after Thailand and Singapore. Especially during the past few years, Win said, bilateral trade is developing with great momentum. According to the statistics from the Myanmar Ministry of Commerce, the value of trade between the two countries reached 1.15 billion US dollars in 2004, accounting for 15.1 percent of Myanmar's total foreign trade. China promised at the second Great Mekong Subregion Summit Meeting in July this year to raise bilateral trade to 1.5 billion US dollars in the next three to five years. And Win said he firmly believes that this goal will be surely achieved. Along with the building of the China-ASEAN Free Trade Area in 2010, the world's largest free trade zone composed of developing countries with 1.8 billion consumers will also bring infinite commercial opportunities to the ASEAN member countries. Win said though China has great potentials in overseas investment, its total investment in Myanmar is still very low. At the end of 2004, only 22 China's companies build factories in Myanmar, with the total capital of about 130 million US dollars. The official said on behalf of the entire Myanmar business circle, he sincerely hoped that an increasing number of China's enterprises will make their investment in the country, bringing the local economy with more vitality. (Source: Xinhua) The Myanmar government highly appreciates the active role played by the China-ASEAN Expo in promoting regional economic cooperation and bilateral exchanges, and the China-ASEAN cooperation will benefit 1.88 billion people directly, Myanmar's Prime Minister Soe Win told reporters on Thursday, when attending the 2nd China-ASEAN Expo in Nanning, capital city of southwest China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. This is the second year that Prime Minister Soe Win leads a delegation to participate in this grand annual event, who also attended the opening ceremony of the 2nd China-ASEAN Business & Investment Summit a day earlier. Mr. Soe Win spoke highly of Guangxi's efforts in city construction and organization of the CAEXPO. He said that Myanmar began pushing forward state opening up and reform in 1988, and construction on all sides is going on. He hopes enterprises from various countries could go to explore his nation for business opportunities, bring advanced technologies to the country and seek mutual benefits from Myanmar's construction and development. Being close neighbors, Myanmar and China still see their bilateral trade focusing on the border, Mr. Soe Win noted. Last year the bilateral trade volume stood at 780 million US dollars, which is expected to reach 1.05 billion dollars this year. There exists large potential for border trade considering its relatively small scale at present. The Myanmar government encourages the development of private business at home, said the Prime Minister. A country of rich natural resources, Myanmar hopes to lure competitive enterprises from all countries to participate in multilateral economic cooperation. Prime Minister Soe Win extends warm welcome to Chinese entrepreneurs to seek business opportunities in Myanmar, who, like business people from other countries, will benefit substantially from preferential policies offered by Myanmar. Prime Minister Soe Win left for home in the afternoon. BANGKOK - Myanmar's top military leaders are planning a massive shakeup in the army and government in the coming weeks, according to diplomats and close watchers of the reclusive country. The country's military ruler, General Than Shwe, is also expected to stand down as the junta's leaders pass on power to the next generation of generals. The planned changes are intended to prepare the army for the next phase in the country's move towards political reform and the introduction of a civilian administration. A national convention is set to resume drafting a new constitution before the end of the year and put to a referendum, with elections to be held within the next 12 months. The changes in government and the army are the most dramatic since the military seized power 17 years ago. The top general is reportedly planning to give up at least one of the three key posts he holds - chairman of the State Peace and Development Council (as the junta calls itself), supreme commander of the army, and defense minister. "We expect Than Shwe to relinquish his position as defense minister in the forthcoming reshuffle," said a senior Southeast Asian diplomat who has regular contact with the regime. Than Shwe recently told the visiting Thai army's supreme commander, General Chaisit Shinawatra, that he would retire soon and that General Thura Shwe Mann would take over as the country's leader. There are increasing doubts about Than Shwe's health. Six months ago he had a mild stroke, but has recovered. Dr Kyaw Myint, the health minister and Than Shwe's personal physician, visits him every day to monitor his medical condition, according to family friends. Time appears to be catching up with the 75-year-old-senior general, according to diplomats who recently met him. When he met visiting Malaysian Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar in early October, the general could not say more than a few words before gasping for breath and wheezing. Than Shwe is known to suffer from hypertension and is a diabetic. "He's subject to frequent diabetic rages when his sugar levels get out of control," an army doctor recently told Inter Press Service (IPS). This may have prompted the senior general to take a back seat for the time being, but although he may even retire as the SPDC chairman, he is unlikely to give up the post of supreme commander of the army. "Even if Than Shwe officially retires he will not give up his power. Instead he'll remain the grey eminence behind the throne, along the lines of Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping in the years before his death," said independent Myanmar analyst Win Min, who is based in Chiang Mai, Thailand. Chief of General Staff Thura Shwe Mann is tipped to replace General Maung Aye as the army's commander-in-chief, paving the way for him to take the reigns of power some time next year and mark control of the military by the next generation of army officers. Thura Shwe Mann recently led a high-profile delegation on a visit to Bangladesh. Thura Shwe Mann will head the new triumvirate of military leaders, supported by the prime minister, General Soe Win, and secretary one, General Thein Sein. "This is the new generation of military leaders who are being readied to take over power," according to a senior Indian diplomat who deals with Yangon. But, they warn, this group of generals lack the manners and intelligence of their superiors. "These men are uncouth, uneducated and only know how to bark orders," said a former Indian diplomat who has been based in Yangon previously and knows the new generals well. In recent weeks, the second-most powerful general, Maung Aye, has dominated the front pages of the government-controlled newspapers, with Than Shwe increasingly less prominent. "Maung Aye's mug is everywhere in the Burmese media - a clear sign that he has strengthened his influence and control within the junta," according to a senior Western Yangon-based diplomat. But other diplomats and analysts believe this is only a ploy by Than Shwe until he is ready to resume his central role and become the country's first president under the new constitution that is expected to be adopted early next year. "Than Shwe is only giving Maung Aye enough rope to hang himself," according to a Southeast Asian diplomat who closely follows events in Yangon. Maung Aye is currently being allowed to run things and take the blame for any future mess. Than Shwe will then re-emerge from the shadows, according to Thai military intelligence. It is clear that the country's economy is in dire straits. Inflation is spiralling out of control. An acute shortage of diesel oil in the past few weeks has forced prices to rise astronomically and fuel inflation, especially the cost of imported consumer goods. "Prices in the supermarket have doubled since the beginning of the month," a Yangon housewife, Cho Cho complained to IPS. Observers believe, though, that the new generation of military leaders is even less likely than its predecessors to give up power. So the chances of significant political reform, and even the release of pro-democracy leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, remain a distant hope. (Inter Press Service) BEIJING (AP) - Anti-drug officials from China and Southeast Asia said Thursday they have sharply cut illicit opium production but warned that abuse of methamphetamines and other synthetic drugs is soaring, especially among young people. The officials were speaking at the end of a three-day conference held by China, the 10-country Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the United Nations and international law enforcement groups. Maj. Gen. Maung Oo, an official of Myanmar's Home Affairs Ministry, said poppy cultivation in his country, part of the heroin-producing "Golden Triangle", has been reduced to limited border areas near China. The UN said in a June report that opium poppy cultivation in Myanmar fell 23 per cent from 2003 to 2004, and production in nearby Laos fell 43 per cent during the same period. Thailand and Vietnam are "clear to a large extent" and Laos "is about to be declared opium-free" in terms of cultivation, said Akira Fujina, the East Asian and Pacific representative for the UN Office on Drugs and Crime. But while opium cultivation waned, use of synthetic drugs has boomed in Asia, the officials said. Some 80 per cent of the world's seizures of methamphetamines occur in the region, said Antonio Maria Costa, executive director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime. Costa said Myanmar, also known as Burma, is the region's largest producer of methamphe-tamines. "Amphetamines obviously are replacing the narcotics, are replacing opium and heroin," said Costa. The abuse of methamphetamines in Asia is "spreading rapidly, especially among the youth," delegates said in a joint statement. The drugs pose "a serious threat to the fabric of society and the nations in this region." Costa called on Myanmar's neighbours to crack down harder on chemical exports to Myanmar in a bid to reduce the country's methamphetamine production. "Myanmar has no chemical industry of its own, so it does count, of course, on imports from its neighbouring countries," Costa said. Busts of major labs that made metham-phetimines and related synthetic drugs in the Philippines; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; Fiji and the Indonesia capital, Jakarta, indicate significant smuggling along Southeast Asian sea routes, according to Fujina. He called for increased cooperation to stop such smuggling. Delegates also promised to help farmers in the Golden Triangle area develop new crops and to provide aid to make up for the loss of hundreds of thousands of acres of lucrative poppy fields. "Assist the farmers so you don't replace the tragedy of opium cultivation with another tragedy of humanitarian suffering," Costa said. The United Nations says it hopes to declare the Golden Triangle area - the world's second-largest heroin-producing region behind Afghanistan - free of opium poppy cultivation by 2007. The Beijing conference was the Second International Congress of ACCORD, or the Asean and China Cooperation Operation in Response to Dangerous Drugs. The first congress was held five years ago in Bangkok, Thailand. Men who frequent vice dens beware - the police may tip off your wives on your immoral activities! Penang police chief Deputy Comm Datuk Christopher Wan said he felt this was one sure way to stop men from visiting brothels. “They now get away without any repercussions as we only take down their particulars before releasing them,” he said. He said there would be no more vice workers if men stopped frequenting such places which were often disguised as health centres. “We are always on the lookout for foreign women who enter the state as tourists but end up as vice workers. We carry out regular raids to flush them out as we do not want the state to be overrun with them,” he said. A housewife, who wanted to be known only as Yati, 50, said she supported the CPO’s idea because the HIV threat was very real, adding that she would want to know her husband's outside activities. “The police should implement the idea immediately. I do not want to be exposed to any sexually transmitted disease (STD) which could cost me my life,” she said. On Tuesday, three men in their early 20s were caught in the act of having sex with three prostitutes, including an underage girl in different rooms at a hotel in Bukit Mertajam here. A police team, with assistance from the state religious department, raided the “health centre” and rounded up women, and three others following a tip-off. DCP Wan said on Oct 13, the police also raided a massage centre in Nibong Tebal and apprehended 12 Thai masseuses who were offering sex services on the side. A check by The Star showed that more than 600 vice workers from China, Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia, Uzbekistan and Myanmar have been arrested in the state so far this year. The government has decided to stick to its earlier stand for recognition of the proposed Dhaka-Yangon Road via Teknaf (AH-41 route) as the Asian Highway in Bangladesh territory instead of AH-1 route from Tamabil to Benapole or Banglabandha.(The New Age BD ) An inter-ministerial meeting on Thursday decided that Bangladesh at the joint working committee meeting on Asian Highway, would pursue the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific to amend the route plan and recognise AH-41 as the Asian Highway in Bangladesh territory. It also decided that the foreign ministry would pursue Thailand, China or Myanmar, the allies of Bangladesh’s ‘look east’ policy, to raise the amendment proposal in the working committee meeting scheduled to be held in Bangkok on December 14-15. ESCAP, the project initiator, in an August 25 letter to the Economic Relations Division stated that it would consider the amendment proposal if raised by a member country other than Bangladesh. ‘Our foreign ministry will pursue these countries to raise the issue in the joint working committee meeting,’ said the communications minister, Nazmul Huda, who chaired the meeting at his ministry’s conference room. It also decided to send a two-member team, led by a foreign ministry official, at the Bangkok meeting. ‘We see the AH 41 route as the part of our “look east” policy and its recognition as the Asian Highway is must for the success of our diplomatic policy,’ he said. The deadline for Bangladesh to ratify the agreement for joining the Asian Highway is December 31. The proposed AH 41 road has to be given the status of AH 1 as Bangladesh does not want India to be the entry and exit points of the route, Huda said. ‘We will not ratify the agreement to give transit to India.’ Earlier, the foreign ministry, however, recommended ratifying the agreement and initiating negotiations on a route favourable for Bangladesh to join the 32-nation highway that will link some 140,000 kilometres of road network from Tokyo to Ankara. Bangladesh has so far showed reluctance in joining the highway project, initiated in 1959 and endorsed by the ESCAP in its 1992 session, which is regarded as one of the three pillars comprising Asian Highway, Trans-Asian Railway and the facilitation of land transport projects. So far, 27 member countries out of 32, including Japan, China, Malaysia, Pakistan, Iran, Turkey and all the South Asian nations except for Bangladesh, signed the agreement in 2004. Bangladesh could not make any decision in joining the project following its dissatisfaction at the proposed route with Tamabil in Sylhet the entry point for Bangladesh and Banglabandha in Panchagarh the exit point. But Bangladesh earlier favoured a road link with Myanmar as it has a good road up to Teknaf, the south-eastern tip of Bangladesh. However, the Teknaf Road, which falls in AH-41, is considered as a sub-regional road in the highway map. Bangladesh earlier pursued to treat the road as an international road like AH1. Bangladesh has already taken some initiatives to establish road link between Bangladesh and Myanmar, bypassing the proposed Asian Highway map. (The New Age BD) Amid a slowdown in used-car re-exports, the Foreign Trade Department is meeting with more than 30 used-car modifiers today. The participants will look for ways to help struggling local manufacturers as demand from neighbouring countries is expected to fall by half this year, an official at the department under the Commerce Ministry said yesterday. Thailand imports used cars, especially from Japan, and re-exports them to markets in Asean, China and the Middle East. Burma, which accounts for 70 per cent of Thailand’s total car re-exports, has reduced its orders this year due to the political problems there. Last year, Thailand shipped about 10,000 used cars to Burma. But in the first eight months of this year, Burma has taken only 1,000, a Commerce Ministry source said. Used-car modifiers are now suffering from the cutbacks by their best customer while the cost of importing used cars keeps rising. To help the used-car firms move their inventory, the ministry will ask Thai trade representatives in 53 countries to seek new markets for them. The firms may also need to reduce their imports of used cars if the used-car re-export situation does not improve by the end of this year, the source said. Oct 20, 2005 (DVB) - Copies of ‘fighting peacock’ images, were found stuck on walls and doors inside the campus of Dagon University in Rangoon on 18 October, causing considerable panic among the local authorities. The pictures were found with a caption which says, ‘The fighting peacocks are back’, according to a university lecturer who doesn’t want to be named. It is still not known who placed them there and the authorities are urgently looking for the ‘culprits’ who distributed them. The authorities are tightening security measures in other university and college campuses to prevent similar incident from occuring again, the lecturer added. In early March, a colourful dancing peacock flew into the main campus of Rangoon University and rested on the historic Convocation Hall before flying away, causing excitement among students and onlookers who regard the bird’s visit as an auspicious sign for the country. It was captured ten days later by the local police force by the order of ‘the authorities from above’ and sent back to a Buddhist monastery where it has been reared. A policeman said it was very strange that the peacock chose to land on the university campus, rather than many other pleasant places in Rangoon. The ruling military junta, State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) seemed to be particularly worried by the incident, and its agents questioned people who first saw the bird and photographed it. The ‘fighting peacock’ was also adopted by the main opposition party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), led by detained Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, which won a landslide victory in the 1990 election. But the ruling generals still refuse to hand over power to the party. Oct 20, 2005 (DVB) - Burmese authorities had sued some villagers of Ngapyin, Aunglan (Allen) Township, Pegu Division in central Burma, for allegedly reporting ‘false’ news to the International Labour Organisation (ILO), in connection with the death of Win Lwin during a forced labour session. On 8 December 2004, local authorities forced Ngapyin villagers including Win Lwin to repair a road connecting Ngapyin to Rangoon-Prome motorway. Win Lwin was killed by an avalanche of stones. His family reported the incident to the ILO and Labour Ministry at Rangoon in February 2005. The brothers of Win Lwin and some villagers of Ngapyin were later forced to state by the authorities concerned that they willingly took part in forced labour practice. Aunglan Township National League for Democracy (NLD) member Zaw Htay told DVB that he and two other villagers named Than Zan and Aung Than Tun, were sent a summon letter on 14 October informing them that they are to be sued for sending untrue reports to the ILO. The letter was sent to them by Aunglan Township court judge Khin Khin Swe and the litigant is Thayet District chief of police Sein Win. The latest lawsuit came after another NLD youth leader and human rights activist, Su Su Nway of Htan Manaing Village in Rangoon Kawmoo Township was sent to prison recently by the authorities, in revenge for successfully suing them over forced labour practices. |
|
|
|
|
|
