Law and Constitution
Most of the areas below are divided into "texts" i.e. the actual statute, decree, legislation, treaty etc. and "commentary" i.e. analysis, discussion etc. on the area of law in question. The text sections contain bills (laws proposed but not yet enacted), laws (acts) and rules/regulations.
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Key documents of Burmese law
Individual Documents
| Title: | | The Courts Manual (4th Edition, 1999) |
| Date of publication: | | 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | TABLE OF CONTENTS (157K)...
PART I - LEGAL PRACTIONERS AND PETITION WRITERS (1.8MB)...
PART II - INSTRUCTIONS AND ORDERS RELATING TO BOTH CIVIL AND CRIMINAL PROCEDURE (2.9MB)...
PART III - CIVIL PROCEDURE (4MB)...
PART IV - CRIMINAL PROCEDURE (6.8MB)...
APPENDICES (1.3MB)...
THE COURTS MANUAL - ENGLISH (17MB) Full text...
THE COURTS MANUAL – ENGLISH AND BURMESE (26MB) Full text |
| Language: | | English, Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | Myanmar Supreme Court |
| Format/size: | | pdf (63K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 15 December 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Burma/Myanmar Code of Civil Procedure |
| Date of publication: | | 1979 |
| Description/subject: | | Scanned from "The Burma Code" 1979 edition |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Burma Code" Vol. XII (1979 Edition) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (8.3MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 December 2012 |
|
| Title: | | The Code of Criminal Procedure |
| Date of publication: | | 01 July 1898 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma via Burma Lawyers' Council |
| Format/size: | | html, pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 24 June 2005 |
|
| Title: | | The Evidence Act |
| Date of publication: | | 1872 |
| Description/subject: | | Sections:
1. Application of Act....
2. * * * *...
3. Interpretation clause...
4. “May presume.”...
“ Shall presume. ”
“ Conclusive proof. *....."The
Evidence
Act
of
1872
sets
out
the
rules
of
evidence
in
Myanmar.
The
Evidence
Act
establishes
rules
similar
in
form
and
content
to
those
in
other
former
British
colonies
in
the
region
and
in
Britain
today.
6
The
Evidence
Act
is
applicable
to
all
judicial
proceedings
before
any
court
7
and
to
all
judges
or
other
persons
legally
authorized
to
hear
evidence.
8
However,
the
Evidence
Act
does
not
apply
to
arbitrations..." (Alec Christie) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Myanmar via Myanmar Code, Vol. XII |
| Format/size: | | pdf (1.6MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 30 April 2013 |
|
| Title: | | The Penal Code |
| Date of publication: | | 01 May 1861 |
| Description/subject: | | Table of contents followed by all 511 articles, in one big document...
(INDIA ACT XLV. 1860) (1st May. 1861)
The pdf version is based on the BLC version. A spell-check was run on the BLC version and checked against a hard-copy version of the "Myanmar Code". The hard-copy version was taken as authoritative and the text amended accordingly. Some obvious mistakes exist in the hard-copy original. These are left as-is, followed by "[sic. "xxxx" is presumably intended"]". The BLC version does not contain all the footnotes which exist in the hard-copy version. These will be added in a Corr.2 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of Burma via Burma Lawyers' Council via Online Burma/Myanmar Library |
| Format/size: | | (pdf (785K); html (1.8MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 16 March 2006 |
|
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Legal sources and literature
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Burmese legal history
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Samuhadda Vicchedani: An Overlooked Source on the Dhammathats |
| Date of publication: | | April 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | "In 1874 the Burma Herald Press published Samuhaddha Vicchedani.1 This
Pali title means “Decisions on the Whole Law.” The work has a
Burmese subtitle Myanma taya lan dhammathat kyam which means “The
Dhammathat book that is a Pathway to Burmese Law” or (if we translate
taya lan as “legal principles”) “The Principles of Burmese Law
Dhammathat book.” It consists of 314 pages of Burmese text, within
which extracts from sixteen dhammathats are divided into eighteen
topical Chapters. The final chapter, for example, deals with the topic of
Debt and gives extracts from nine dhammathats about interest rates,
sureties, refinancing, and bankruptcy. Daw Than Saw’s translation of
that Chapter follows this introduction. Samuhadda Vicchedani is an
important source on Burmese legal history, which has been too long
ignored. Ryuji Okudaira (in 1979) and I (in 1997) both omitted it from
our bibliographies of Burmese law.2 In fact no 20th century source
makes mentions of it, though it was always on the shelves of European
and American research libraries..." |
| Author/creator: | | Andrew Huxley |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | SOAS BULLETIN OF BURMA RESEARCH 5 2007 |
| Format/size: | | pdf (168K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 01 October 2010 |
|
| Title: | | The Final Part of the Samuhadda Vicchedani, Relating to Debt |
| Date of publication: | | March 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | [Readers are directed to Andrew Huxley’s introduction to this translation
also in the present issue of the SBBR]. |
| Author/creator: | | Daw Than Saw (trans) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | SOAS BULLETIN OF BURMA RESEARCH 5 2007 |
| Format/size: | | pdf (176K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 01 October 2010 |
|
| Title: | | Challenges Facing “State” Building in Burma: Law and Legal Dimension |
| Date of publication: | | 2006 |
| Description/subject: | | Abstract:
"This paper explores evolutional process of legal concept and theory in Burma.
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the issues that Burma will face in legal
transformation and building state in Burma. Since its independence, the post-colonial
governments have failed to transform legal system in accordance with the social elements
that govern daily lives of Burmese. The paper argues that there are two fundamental
challenges Burmese society faces in legal transformation. The first challenge is the
emergence of a new constitution that will serve as a framework of citizen-sovereign state.
The second challenge resonates in the question of how Burmese society will achieve
“rule of law” that will be congruent with institutional foundation of Burmese society." |
| Author/creator: | | Tun Myint |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Indiana University |
| Format/size: | | pdf (65K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 24 August 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Pre-colonial Burmese Law: Conical hat and shoulder bag |
| Date of publication: | | October 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | "Of all the pre-colonial Southeast Asian legal cultures, the Burmese ranks among the most
fascinating. During the last twenty years, many new law texts have been published. They
have answered some old questions and posed some new ones. I shall give an overview of
scholarship since 1980 and explain its relevance to contemporary Burma's search for
identity..." |
| Author/creator: | | Andrew Huxley |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Newsletter, Issue 25, International Institute for Asian Studies (Leiden) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Judicial Independence in Burma: No March Backwards Towards the Past |
| Date of publication: | | 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | "This paper discusses and analyzes judicial independence in Burma, primarily since independence in 1948. To that end,
this paper analyzes and briefly comments on constitutional provisions concerning the independence of the judiciary in the two defunct provisions of post-independence constitutions of Burma, namely the 1947 and 1974 Constitutions. In doing so, the paper
focuses mainly on the post-1948 and post-1962 developments. The post-1962 developments highlight how the military takeover in March of that year eroded and extinguished the independence of the judiciary in Burma. To appreciate the concept of the independence of the judiciary in historical perspective, however, it is helpful to trace briefly the concept and practice of judicial
independence in the days of the Burmese monarchs of the pre-colonial era. Further, it is necessary to analyze briefly the impact
of British law on the notions and practice of judicial independence in the colonial era..." |
| Author/creator: | | Myint Zan |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Asian-Pacific Law and Policy Journal (APLPJ 5) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (154K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/public/documents/apcity/unpan010355.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | THE RULE OF LAW AND COMMERCIAL LITIGATION IN MYANMAR |
| Date of publication: | | 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | Abstract:
"After
nearly
thirty
years
of
self
imposed
isolation,
Myanmar
has
re-
emerged
as
a
significant
potential
destination
for
foreign
investment.
One
of
the
key
attractions
of
Myanmar
as
a
destination
for
foreign
investment
is
its
legal
system
and
historical
commitment
to
the
rule
of
law.
With
ASEAN
membership
and
increasing
levels
of
foreign
investment
in
Myanmar,
use
of
its
legal
system
by
foreign
investors
and
their
counsel
has
grown.
The
aim
of
this
article
is
to
outline,
for
both
investors
and
legal
professionals
in
other
countries
throughout
the
region,
Myanmar's
legal
system
and
its
practical
operation
in
the
area
of
commercial
litigation,
including
the
enforcement
of
foreign
judgments
and
arbitral
awards" |
| Author/creator: | | Alec Christie |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Pacific Rim Law & Policy Journal Association |
| Format/size: | | pdf (896K-original; 304K-OBL version) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.burmalibrary.org/docs15/Rule_of_Law_in_Myanmar-red.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 30 April 2013 |
|
| Title: | | The Last 50 Years of Burmese Law: E Maung and Maung Maung |
| Date of publication: | | 1998 |
| Description/subject: | | "Depending on when you start counting, Burma has enjoyed either forty-eight or fifty-four years of independence. De iure, the
era of British colonisation came to an end on the 4th January, 1948. De facto, the British had lost control six years earlier when
the Japanese army swept them and their Indian auxiliaries out of the country. Since independence, the principle question of
Burmese law has been how much of the colonial legal system to jettison: there is general agreement that the legal system
inherited in 1948 had to become more Burmese, but considerable debate about how far the legal decolonisation should go.
This article deals with the issue in terms of personalities. I focus on the careers of the two most distinguished Burmese lawyers
of the period and analyse their respective views on decolonisation. The influence of E Maung (1889-1972) over legal policy
was felt most strongly during the 1950s. During the 1960s and 1970s Maung Maung (1925-1994) single handedly redesigned
the legal system. In 1988 he became President of Burma, but was ousted, a month after his appointment, in SLORC's military
coup. Since 1988 the Burmese state has been delegalised. Eight years after the coup, martial law remains in force and the
colonels show no sign of respecting the result of the election they called in 1990. I conclude the article with speculations about
the future. Since law has undergone so many changes over the last fifty years, there is no single status quo ante to which a
democratic Burma could return. Theoretically, Burma could restore the substantive law and legal institutions that prevailed at
any of the following dates: 1988, 1970, 1959, 1947 or 1884. Which of these options will be a realistic possibility if Burma ever
does return to legality?" |
| Author/creator: | | Andrew Huxley |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "LawAsia" 1998:9-20 |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | The Importance of the Dhammathats |
| Date of publication: | | 1997 |
| Description/subject: | | Burma's dhammathats are pre-colonial compilations of legal and ethical material. They provide vivid insights into the details of everyday village life and into the process by which Burmese authors adapted Pali texts from India to their own purposes. They appear to be at least as old as any other surviving Burmese literature and contain valuable lessons for contemporary Burma. This article hopes to rescue them from their unjust neglect. |
| Author/creator: | | Andrew Huxley |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Journal of Burma Studies Vol. 1 (1997) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (1.28MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 10 March 2009 |
|
-
Legal studies and articles
Individual Documents
| Title: | | List of the most problematic provisions in the 2008 Constitution and Burmese laws |
| Date of publication: | | June 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | The below gives an overview of provisions in the 2008 Constitution and Burmese laws that are, in the
view of the BLC, the most problematic for the development of rule of law and democracy in Burma.
Each constitutional provision or law is accompanied with a short rationale explaining why it is
problematic...
This list is divided into three sections:
I: Problematic provisions in the Constitution
II: Repressive Burmese Laws and Acts
III: Problematic Provisions in the Penal Code |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council. |
| Format/size: | | pdf (174K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 17 July 2012 |
|
| Title: | | The State of Human Rights in Burma in 2010 |
| Date of publication: | | 09 December 2010 |
| Description/subject: | | BURMA: Government by confusion & the un-rule of law:
"The first elections held in Burma for two decades on 7 November 2010 ended as most people thought they would, with the military party, the Union Solidarity and Development Party, taking a vast majority in the national parliament through rigged balloting. Almost a week later, after days of disgruntlement and debate about the outcome of the elections, the military regime released the leader of the National League for Democracy, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, from house arrest.
Although Aung San Suu Kyi’s release was expected, since November 13 was the deadline on the period of imprisonment imposed through a fraudulent criminal case against her in 2009, it perplexed many foreign observers, who asked questions about why the military would acquiesce to her release at a time that it may provoke and create unnecessary problems during the planned transition from full-frontal army dictatorship to authoritarian clique in civilian garb.
What most of these persons have not yet understood about the nature of the state in Burma is that government by confusion is an operating principle. For them, as military strategists and planners who think in terms of threats and enemies, the most effective strategies and plans are those where both outside observers and as many people in the domestic population as possible are left uncertain about what has happened and why, what may or may not happen next, and what it all means.
This principle of government by confusion underpins the un-rule of law in Burma to which the Asian Human Rights Commission has pointed, described and analyzed through careful study of hundreds of cases and attendant information over the last few years. Whereas the rule of law depends upon a minimum degree of certainty by which citizens can organize their lives, the un-rule of law depends upon uncertainty. Whereas rule of law depends upon consistency in how state institutions and their personnel operate, the un-rule of law depends upon arbitrariness. Whereas rule of law is intimately connected to the protection of human rights, the un-rule of law is associated with the denial of rights, and with the absence of norms upon which rights can even by nominally established. In this annual report, the AHRC points more explicitly to the links between this operating principle and the un-rule of law..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC-SPR-002-2010) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (307K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 04 January 2011 |
|
| Title: | | Myanmar: Justice on Trial |
| Date of publication: | | 30 July 2003 |
| Description/subject: | | "On 22 May 2003 Amnesty International submitted a 29-page memorandum to the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC, Myanmar's military government), in order to provide the SPDC with the opportunity to comment on and to clarify various issues about the administration of justice raised in the document. The Memorandum reflected the organization's findings during its first visit to the country from 30 January to 8 February 2003, and drew on its institutional knowledge and expertise about both international human rights standards and human rights in Myanmar. The text of the original Memorandum has now been updated to reflect comments from the SPDC, which were received by Amnesty International on 9 July 2003. The updated Memorandum forms the text of this document, along with a summary of the current human rights situation in Myanmar... Since the submission of the Memorandum to the SPDC on 22 May, political tensions escalated sharply during a National League for Democracy (NLD) tour of Upper Myanmar, culminating in a violent attack on NLD leaders on 30 May. What follows below is a summary of both the attack and the subsequent deterioration in the human rights situation in Myanmar. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, NLD General Secretary, U Tin Oo, NLD Vice Chairman, and other NLD members had been travelling in Upper Myanmar, with the prior permission of the SPDC, during the month of May. As larger and larger crowds gathered to see the NLD leaders, tension increased between the NLD and the Union Solidarity Development Association (USDA), an organization established, organized, and supported by the SPDC.(1) NLD members and supporters were reportedly harassed, intimidated, and threatened by USDA members in various locations as they attempted to conduct their legitimate political party activities, including giving speeches and opening local NLD offices. However the SPDC reportedly did very little to diffuse tensions between the USDA and the NLD. While Amnesty International acknowledges the universal right to peacefully assemble and conduct protest demonstrations, the actions of the USDA went beyond such non-violent expressions of dissent. .." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Amnesty International |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/ASA16/019/2003
http://www.amnestyusa.org/document.php?id=E8E42C86A0BF5F7980256D72004704AB&lang=e |
| Date of entry/update: | | 19 November 2010 |
|
| Title: | | Burma's State Protection Law: An Analysis of the Broadest Law in the World |
| Date of publication: | | December 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | Forword by H. E. U Thein Oo, Minister of Justice, National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma.... Contents:
Foreword by H.E. U Thein Oo; Introduction; The Constitutional Period, 1948-1962; Military Rule, 1962-1974;
Military Rule, 1974-1988; Military Rule, 1988-1997;
Military Rule, 1997 to date; The State Protection Law of 1975: Articles 1 and 2: Name and Definitions;
Articles 3 to 6: State of Emergency; Articles 7 to 9: Restrictions of Rights; Articles 10 to 15: Preventive Detention; Article 16: No Real Provisions for Review; Articles 17 and 18: Reporting;
Articles 19 to 21: Appeal; Articles 22 to 24: General Provisions;
State Protection and Preventive Detention;
Is Burma Changing Towards Rule of Law?;
Conclusion. |
| Author/creator: | | P. Gutter and B.K. Sen |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (255K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 2001 |
|
| Title: | | Women and Law in Burma |
| Date of publication: | | August 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | "Women in Burma are struggling under the military regime. There is no policy, law or programme for the development of
women. Instead, women are often the target of particular abuse. Rape by soldiers is common. Military officers are even involved in the trafficking of Burmese women into prostitution in Thailand. The women in Burma are struggling, but continue to find ways to survive, nurture their communities and resist the military regime
with inspiring grace and humour. The vision of women for Burma is a foundation on which a new, democratic and just society
should be built. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi said, "Women are generally regarded as home-makers, tenders of the hearth around
which the family gathers, weavers of the gentle ties that bind faster than the strongest iron chains". But women in Burma have to battle against many odds: tradition, cultural discrimination, male domination, lack of access to
information and education, and inequalities that have become entrenched by law. The most critical factor in the transition to a
new society in Burma is the lack of provisions in law for the empowerment of women and their participation in decision-making
processes..." |
| Author/creator: | | B.K. Sen |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 9 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original (and authoritative) version of this article may be found in "Legal issues of Burma Journal" No. 9 at http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal%20Issues%20on%20Burma%20Journal%209.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Law Reporting in Burma: Lack of Transparency |
| Date of publication: | | April 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | "..."Burma Law Report" (BLR) is a government publication, published
annually by the state-controlled Law Report Publishing Board. It is the only source for Burmese advocates. The report is based on
judgments passed in significant cases by the Supreme Court. The selection of cases is at the discretion of government legal
officials of course, and there is no transparency of judicial proceedings. Law reporting means accountability the very thing that
military juntas are afraid of. So it is not surprising that the reasoning leading to judgments in the BLR usually consists of a few
sentences only, while the whole text contains repetition of selected facts. The duty to write down the judgment properly, in
compliance with the rules laid down for this, is shirked and perfunctorily performed. The gross abuse of the principle guiding law
reporting is patently visible. "Burma Law Report" reflects the way the junta is thinking in respect of law..." |
| Author/creator: | | Win Maung |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 8 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | New Lawsuit against Daw Aung San Suu Kyi: Hidden Agenda? |
| Date of publication: | | April 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | "The new lawsuit that U Aung San Oo has filed against Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is a suit filed after the Court had dismissed the
first suit for inheritance. The defect in the earlier suit apparently has been taken care of. But it will have to go through rough
water. Section 6 of the Transfer of Immovable Property Restriction Law of 1987 reads (...) when any person leaves Myanmar
for good (...), the Ministry concerned may after scrutiny case by case in respect of the immovable property owned by that person,
carry out in conformity with the procedures as follows: (a) allowing right of inheritance in accordance with law; (b) confiscating by
the State. Section 7 of the Law reads, If the Ministry concerned decides to allow right of inheritance under subsection 6, as to
who should inherit the immovable property shall be by consensus of the heirs or by the decision of the Court in accordance with
the relevant succession law..." |
| Author/creator: | | B.K. Sen, Khin Maung Win |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 8 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original (and authoritative) version of this article may be found in http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal%20Issues%20on%20Burma%20Journal%208.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Dealing With Past Human Rights Abuses: Promoting Reconciliation in a Future Democratic Burma |
| Date of publication: | | December 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | Justice in Transition:
"As the twenty-first century begins, transitions from repressive rule to democracy have become a worldwide phenomenon. In many
cases, the displaced regimes have been characterized by massive violations of human rights. While it is unclear when Burma will
be free, it is certain that it will eventually become a democracy. A critical challenge that will arise for the democratically-elected
government when it comes to power will be how to deal with past human rights abuses.1 Burma is not alone Czechoslovakia, El
Salvador, Guatemala, Germany, Honduras, Chile, Columbia, Greece, Germany, Poland, Hungary, the Philippines, Rwanda,
Ethiopia, Cambodia, East Timor, Nigeria, Northern Ireland, Sierra Leone and other countries have recently or are presently looking
at ways of dealing with these issues...A future democratic Burma will have to plot its course carefully with regard to dealing with the past. Decisions about whether to
have trials and, if so, who ought to be tried; or whether to pass or rescind amnesty laws; and whether there should be a truth
commission or some similar process are difficult and complex. They must be taken in the context of the unique historical,
economic, political and social factors, as well as what would best satisfy the needs of the victims. While there is an accepted and
majority view that, for certain crimes, international law puts a duty on a state to prosecute or extradite offenders, in reality the
type of justice which a particular country adopts is dependent on the balance of power between the new government and the
repressive one it replaces..." |
| Author/creator: | | Jeremy Sarkin |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 7 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original (and authoritative) version of this article may be found on http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal%20Issues%20on%20Burma%20Journal%207.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Law-Making and Law Enforcement in Burma: The Military Junta's Failure in Regard to Forced Labour |
| Date of publication: | | December 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | "The Tatmadaw in Burma have control of executive, legislative and judicial power and the Parliament has not met since before the
Tatmadaw seized power by military coup d etat on the 18th September 1988, installing the State Law and Order Restoration
Council (SLORC), predecessor of the present State and Peace and Development Council (SPDC). The SPDC is the creature of
the Tatmadaw (Burmas Armed Forces), as was the Tatmadaw's Burmese Socialists Program Party's (BSPP) Revolutionary
Council that ruled Burma for many years up until 1988. For functional purposes they are one and the same group, in essence a
military junta exercising the power of dictatorship..." |
| Author/creator: | | Janelle Saffin |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 7 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original (and authoritative) version of this article may be found on http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal%20Issues%20on%20Burma%20Journal%207.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Shadow over Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's inheritance case |
| Date of publication: | | December 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | "The lawsuit against Daw Aung San Suu Kyi filed by her brother Aung San Oo is for half ownership of the house where she now
lives. As with most property disputes, and particularly in the very difficult situation Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is presently in, a
private settlement would clearly have been preferred and would have been a more appropriate course of action for Aung San Oo
to take. There would have been many options available, including negotiating a money equivalent of the half share or establishing a
trust in which both interests could be held. However, he decided to file a suit against his sister without even affording her prior
notice of his intentions. This approach reeks of a sinister attempt to publicly humiliate the acclaimed leader of the National League
for Democracy (NLD), which overwhelmingly won the one and only democratic general election conducted by the military junta..." |
| Author/creator: | | B. K Sen, Khin Maung Win |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 7 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original (and authoritative) version of this article may be found on http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal%20Issues%20on%20Burma%20Journal%207.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | The Case for Humanitarian Intervention |
| Date of publication: | | December 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | "...The immediate need is to have UN presence inside Burma, to monitor abuses and prevent an outbreak of Civil War. The junta's
ongoing suppression and attempts to undermine and abolish the NLD and general pro-democracy movement, is leading the country
towards an uprising of volcanic proportions. There will be no sense in sending a peacekeeping force after widespread bloodshed.
Action is required, and it is required immediately. The international community and an ad hock " like-minded coalition " of regional
interests, must engage the military junta to prevent further catastrophe. Calling for dialogue has reached its practical zenith or
limitations. Burma has become a test case for ascertaining the sovereignty of people in contradistinction to sovereignty of State..." |
| Author/creator: | | Mr. B K Sen |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 7 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original (and authoritative) version of this article may be found on http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal%20Issues%20on%20Burma%20Journal%207.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Burma human rights body is not all that is needed |
| Date of publication: | | September 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | "...The Australian government has decided to cooperate with the Burmese junta in providing human rights training courses for
government officials. The decision was in response to the ruling State Peace and Development Council's (SPDC) indication that
it intends to establish a national Human Rights Commission..." |
| Author/creator: | | Khin Maung Win |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 6 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original and authoritative version of this article may be found on http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal%20Issues%20on%20Burma%20Journal%206.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Burma's Strugglefor Democracy: a Legal Perspective |
| Date of publication: | | September 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | "Even in the absece of the rule of law, legal measures can play an important part in Burma’s non-violent struggle for democracy. The exercise of power in Burma is beyond the law. There is total suppression of democracy, human rights and basic freedoms. What sense is there, then, in testing the impartiality and independence of the country’s judiciary on a vital national issue? This is a question now being asked by many observers as the National League for Democracy (NLD) makes its latest attempt to use the legal system as a means of restoring political justice in Burma..." |
| Author/creator: | | B.K. Sen and Khin Maung Win |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Irrawaddy", Vol. 8. No. 9 |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.irrawaddymedia.com/print_article.php?art_id=2006 |
| Date of entry/update: | | 08 December 2010 |
|
| Title: | | Some Thoughts on Burma-Thai Relations |
| Date of publication: | | September 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | Any attempt to understand Burma-Thai relations today must begin by recognizing the existence of misunderstandings on both
sides, open criticism of each other, friction and conflict. Why is this so?...Today, Burma and Thailand face a continuing stream of new issues and crises in their relations. With no rule of law that they
both accept, no courts to which they can turn to adjudicate their disputes, and no real will on either side to bury the long past
and create a new foundation for their relations based on trust, openness and honesty, the present state of their relations will
continue into the future." |
| Author/creator: | | Josef Silverstein |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 6 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original and authoritative version of this article may be found on http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal%20Issues%20on%20Burma%20Journal%206.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | New Mystery Laws Enacted |
| Date of publication: | | August 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | Burmese citizens planning to marry foreign nationals will no longer be permitted to do so legally, according to a report in a well-respected economics magazine. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Irrawaddy", Vol. 8. No. 8 (Intelligence section) |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Understanding Self-Determination: the Basics - Applying international law to civil wars and wars of national liberation. |
| Date of publication: | | August 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | Presentation to First International Conference on the Right to Self-Determination,
United Nations
Geneva
August 2000...
Basic principles and references; several case studies, including Burma. "The right to self-determination, a fundamental principle of human rights law,(1) is an individual and collective right to "freely determine . . . political status and [to] freely pursue . . . economic, social and cultural development." (2) The principle of self-determination is generally linked to the de-colonization process that took place after the promulgation of the United Nations Charter of 1945. (3) Of course, the obligation to respect the principle of self-determination is a prominent feature of the Charter, appearing, inter alia, in both Preamble to the Charter and in Article 1..." |
| Author/creator: | | Karen Parker |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | United Nations |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.guidetoaction.org/parker.html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 22 November 2010 |
|
| Title: | | Military Regime to Establish Base on Mars ... or a Human Rights Commission |
| Date of publication: | | April 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | "Recently, the military regime indicated it might establish a human rights commission in Burma...the article considers the practicalities of establishing an effective human rights commission under Burma's current governance.
The human rights commission being contemplated is a type of body existing in many countries and internationally known as a
National Human Rights Institution ('NHRI'). The article provides a general background of NHRIs, notes the existing NHRIs in
the Asia-Pacific, and addresses some main features of an NHRI. Then, with this background, an analysis is made of the
relevant factors in Burma. It is hoped this will provide a basic explanation about NHRIs, which may assist in the ongoing
discussion on how such a body could feature in Burma's future..." |
| Author/creator: | | John Southalan |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 5 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Hard cases: bringing human rights violators to justice abroad - A guide to universal jurisdiction |
| Date of publication: | | October 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | "In late 1998 the Chilean Senator Augusto Pinochet was arrested in London, following a request for
extradition by a Spanish prosecutor. He was charged under Spanish law for grave human rights
abuses, under a universal jurisdiction rule that had rarely been used. Anticipating that this case
would trigger others, in early 1999 the Council convened a meeting of human rights experts to
discuss the implications of using the universal jurisdiction rule more widely. Hard cases is based
on the meeting. Written for use by NGOs and for individuals interested in the ethical and legal
issues, it sets out the arguments that support its use and examines some of the ethical, practical
and legal problems that arise when it is applied..." |
| Author/creator: | | Peggy Hicks and David Petrasek. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | International Council for Human Rights Policy |
| Format/size: | | PDF (235K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Burma Beyond the Law |
| Date of publication: | | August 1996 |
| Description/subject: | | "...Decades of military rule in Burma have prevented the rule of law from taking deep
root during the country's post-colonial history. The concept of the rule of law suffered
a particularly severe blow with the accession to power of the SLORC in the coup
d'etat of 18 September 1988. Most of the laws passed since that date reveal a
persistent disregard for internationally-recognized human rights norms. What is more,
the few vestiges of constitutionalism and legality that remained at the time of the coup
have been all but extinguished by this military government whose legitimacy to
govern is highly questionable both under Burmese domestic law and international law...An indication of its lack of good faith is provided by the manner in which it
has sought to force through proposals for constitutional reform which are designed to
perpetuate military rule under the guise of democratic government. The National
Convention, which it created without any mandate or consultation and whose working
methods are so patently unfair and lacking in either transparency or legitimacy, bodes
ill for the future of democracy and freedom in Burma.
Urgent action is required to establish the rule of law, human rights and
governmental accountability in Burma. Many of these recommendations have been
made by the UN General Assembly and the Commission on Human Rights in
successive resolutions on Burma since 1990..."
FOREWORD...
INTRODUCTION...
1 INACCESSIBILITY AND VAGUENESS OF LAWS...
2 CONSTITUTIONAL BACKGROUND...
3 THE LEGITIMACY OF THE COUP D'ETAT OF 18 SEPTEMBER 1988...
4 THE SLORC'S REFUSAL TO TRANSFER POWER:
4.1 The Position Under International Law;
4.2 The Position Under Burmese Domestic Law...
5 THE MARTIAL LAW MEASURES AND THEIR COMPATIBILITY WITH
INTERNATIONAL LAW:
5.1 Some General Considerations;
5.2 The Martial Law Measures: A Detailed Analysis;
5.2.1 The Right to Life;
5.2.2 Arbitrary Arrest and Detention;
5.2.3 Cruel and Inhuman Detention Conditions;
5.2.4 Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment;
5.2.5 Fair Trial Concerns;
5.2.6 Freedom of Expression;
5.2.7 Forced Relocations;
5.2.8 Forced Labour and Forced Portering;
5.2.9 Citizenship Rights;
5.2.10 Freedom of Movement, Assembly and Association;
5.2.11 Right to Democratic Participation;
5.2.12 Human Rights Violations against Children and Women;
5.3 Violations of International Humanitarian Law...
6 CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENTS: THE NATIONAL CONVENTION...
7 THE SLORC'S SENSITIVITY TO INTERNATIONAL CRITICISM...
8 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS. |
| Author/creator: | | K S Venkateswaran |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Article 19 |
| Format/size: | | pdf (359K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.article19.org/pdfs/publications/burma-beyond-law.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 11 June 2005 |
|
-
"LawKa Pala - Legal Journal on Burma" (English)
Formerly "Legal Issues on Burma Journal"...
Despite the name, this is a distinct journal, and not simply the English version of the Burmese-language "LawKa pala" (formerly "Journal of Constitutional Affairs"). The BLC site is currently (permanently?) offline, but alternate links to the BLC site are provided in case it returns.
Individual Documents
| Title: | | "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma" - No. 39 (August 2011) |
| Date of publication: | | August 2011 |
| Description/subject: | | Contents:- Part A: Impunity in Burma:
(1) The Dangers of Soldiers Judging Soldiers By U Myo and James Tager -- "Burma’s Constitutional court can protect some civilians from
the dangers of the Courts-martial system, if it is brave
enough. But for others, there is currently no legal protection
from military impunity."
...
(2) Burma’s System of Impunity: A Legal Argument for Why 9
Burma Cannot Find a Domestic Resolution for its Heinous
Crimes - By James Tager -- "The new Constitution has created a system where the judicial branch functions
as an extension of the executive, the legislative branch is unable to act without
the consent of the military, and government members are given amnesty for
their crimes. In short, it has perpetuated the system of impunity upon which the
military junta has relied for decades"...
(3) The New Regime’s Judiciary Under the 2008 Constitution By B.K Sen - "...The 2008
Constitution has rendered the judiciary a cog in the bureaucratic machinery and
justice is as elusive as ever. The pre-constitution era of the judiciary has not
changed as the constitution has made no dent on it. Who will say that the present
judiciary is different from the military-ruled judiciary?..."...
Part B: Special Features:
(1) Burmese Government in Exile: Outcast but not Irrelevant By Stephanie Swigert - "...Although [the] influence [of the NCGUB] is limited,
their very existence serves as a constant reminder to the international community
that the legitimacy of Burma’s ruling party is disputed. As elected representatives,
the NCGUB and MPU have a strong legal basis from which to build
international support and lobby for democratic transition in Burma..."
(2) The USDP: An Unlawful Association - By Lane Weir "...this analysis demonstrates one way in which the existing Burmese
legal framework could be used to prosecute those who have persecuted political
opposition, ethnic minorities and Burma’s most vulnerable populations for decades..."...
(3) Action in Burma: The International Rule of Politics - By Pia Dutton - "...This article considers whether international intervention by the United Nations
in Burma can be justified according to principles of current international law
(jus ad bellum as distinguished from the jus in bello)..."
(4) The Elements Necessary for the Development of a 73
Free Market Economic System in Burma - "...For a market economy system to succeed, it must be based on the rule of law
and protected by an impartial judiciary. To a large extent, a successful market
economy depends on the trust the market participants have in the legal system
to uphold their rights and fairly adjudicate their disputes. There must be an
efficient, just and affordable judicial mechanism to resolve disputes, including
the disputes involving governments. The mechanism must have strong, enforceable
safeguards to ensure that the parties are treated fairly..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (613K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 08 December 2011 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma" - No. 38 (April 2011) |
| Date of publication: | | April 2011 |
| Description/subject: | | Contents:- Part A: Special Features -
(1) Militarized development is always unsustainable - Leslie Choi;
(2) Burmese government land grabs: Farmers without rights - U Myo and Lane Weir;
(3) Undemocratic November, 2010 Election in Burma - Lane Weir;
(4) Under Review: Burma’s Failure to Comply with the Convention
on the Rights of the Child - Lane Weir;
(5) Burma’s System of Impunity: A Legal Argument for Why
Burma Cannot Find Resolution for its Heinous Crimes
Domestically - James Tager...
Part B: Constitutional Law:
(1) How the 2008 Constitution Restricts Multi-Party Democracy
in Burma - U Myo;
(2) The Burmese Constitution: “A Discipline-Flourishing
Democracy” Is No Democracy At All - Dustin Milligan. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (485K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 09 December 2011 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma" - No. 37 (December 2010) |
| Date of publication: | | December 2010 |
| Description/subject: | | Part (A)- Special Features:
- Freedom Address calls for cooperation and democracy.
- Accountability and the Future: A Commission of Inquiry into
War Crimes in Burma.
- Demand for the Unconditional Release of
Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.
- Suu Kyi says she is seeking: A Non-Violent Revolution
- Part 3 and Final: Excerpt from paper on the
National Convention's Principles of a Constitution.
- SPDC'S 2010 Election Result ...
Part (B)- Judiciary:
- The Issue on the Stability of Society in Thailand:
Judicial Review and the Role of Courts...
Part (C)- Rule of Law:
- The ICJ Decision on the Struggle for Self-Determination:
The Landmark Verdict of the International Court of
Justic on Separatism.
- Supreme Court Rejects NLD Appeal to be Reinstated...
Part D - Burmese Migrant Workers Issues:
- The Thai Ministry of Labour vows to control alien migrants:
no pregnancy or they will be sent back. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (662K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 12 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma" - No. 36 (August 2010) |
| Date of publication: | | August 2010 |
| Description/subject: | | CONTENT:- Part (A): Constitutional and 2010 Elections:
(A.1) The Impossibility of Free Fair Elections under Existing
Draconian Laws;
(A.2) The 2010 Elections: Political Parties and Ethnic Organizations;
(A.3) The Nexus Between the 2008 Constitution and 2010 Election;
(A.4) Disenfranchised Demographics: Migrant Workers, Refugees,
Internally Displaced Persons, and Political Prisoners;
(A.5) Analyses of the Situation in Burma...
Part (B): Judiciary and Rule of Law:
(B.1) A Comparative Study: Seeking Judicial Power with a Special
Focus on Burma's Judiciary;
(B.2) The Burma Lawyers’ Council Applauds the United States for Its
Support for a United Nations Commission of Inquiry...
Part (C): Federalism:
(C.1) Federalism in Multiethnic Societies: A Look at Accommodative
Institutions : C.Rubi |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (966K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 13 January 2011 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma" - No. 35 (April 2010) |
| Date of publication: | | April 2010 |
| Description/subject: | | CONTENT: Part A: Special Features:
1. Democratic Election Standard;
2. 2010 Election in Burma From the Perspective of Rule of Law;
3. The Economic Development and Rule of Law;
4. Civil Society Formation and Rule of Law;
5. Statement on the Parliamentarian’s Request to the UN Security
Council on the Formation of a Commission of Inquiry...
Part B: Judiciary:
The Role of Judiciary in Burma;
Part C: The Rule of Law;
BLC Statement on the false accusations against the organization; |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (1MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 13 January 2011 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma" - No. 34 (December 2009) |
| Date of publication: | | December 2009 |
| Description/subject: | | Part A: Special Feature:
(A.1) Summary of "Analysis of the forthcoming 2010 election in
Burma from the perspective of human rights" by Burma
Lawyers' Council;
(A.2) Constructive Engagement: A Critical Evaluation...
Part B: In Review:
(B.1) Burma: Many Crises, No Response;
(B.2) Position of UN Special Repporteur on Human Rights in
Burma and 2008 Constitution and 2010 Election;
(B.3) ASEAN Snubs Civil Society Groups, Dashes Hopes for
Effective Human Rights Mechanism, by Andrea Gittleman...
Part C: Ethnic Issue:
(C.1) Burma and National Reconciliation: Ethnic Conflict and
State-Society Dysfunction, by Chao-Tzang Yawnghwe...
Part D: The Rule of Law:
(D.1) Appeal to Take Action on the SPDC Military Regime in
Burma in Regard to its Recent Oppression of Reporters and
Journalists who Exercise Freedom of Expression;
(D.2) GJC/BLC Letter to Chief Justices in Asia on Chief Justice
U Aung Toe of Burma;
(D.3) Landmark Trial of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, by B.K. Sen;
(D.4) BLC/GJC letter to International Crisis Group;
(D.5) The Security Council should address the situation in Burma
and protection of civilians in armed conflict...
Part E: BLC Activities:
(E.1) Interface Burma: To promote awareness on International
Criminal Court;
(E.2) BLC's Participation in Assembly of State Parties to ICC. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (874K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 29 April 2010 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma" - No. 33 (August 2009) |
| Date of publication: | | August 2009 |
| Description/subject: | | Contents:
Part A. Seeking Criminal Accountability in Burma:
1. Seeking Criminal Accountability, the Rule of Law and Democratic
Transition for Burma;
2. Seminar on Advancing Human Rights and Ending Impunity in Burma;
3. End Burma’s System of Impunity;
4. A Summary of the IHRC Report on "Crimes in Burma";
5. BLC and GJC's open letter to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon;
6. WLB open letter to UN Secretay General Ban Ki-moon
7. 13th Conference of Forum on Burmese in Europe (FBE) and Open letter to
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon;
8. ICC Prosecutor's Comment on "Impunity No More";
9. The New ASEAN Inter-governmental Commission on Human Rights.....
Part B: Fair Trial and Judicial Issue:
1. Trial of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi by B.K Sen;
2. Putting Burma's Junta on Trial;
3. BLC Appeal on ICC and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi Case;
4. BLC Statement on Depayin Massacre.....
Part C: Labor Issue:
1. An Analysis of Article 2(d) of the ILO Convention on Forced Labour, 1930;
2. Current Situation of Burmese Migrant Workers and their Children in
Thailand.....
Part D: BLC Activities:
1. The activities of Peace Law Academy on February to May 2009;
2. BLC Chairperson's speech in POLA: Economic Development and the Rule
of Law in Burma. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (1.6MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 28 April 2010 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma" - No. 32 (April 2009) |
| Date of publication: | | April 2009 |
| Description/subject: | | Contents:-
Part A: Special Features:
(A.1) Burma’s Judiciary: What changes will be required to create
a new system?...
(A.2) Opening of Advanced Internship Program at Peace Law
Academy...
(A.3) Housing, Land and Property Rights in Burma: Towards
New Strategies.....
Part B: Rule of Law:
(B.1) Unlawful Imprisonment of Lawyers under Contempt of
Courts Act...
(B.2) The Case of Ma Kay Thi Aung...
(B.3) The Issuance of Passports to Burmese Migrant Workers...
(B.4) Statement on the Unlawful Confiscation of Land in Burma...
(B.5) Statement on the SPDC Government Ministries...
(B.6) Statement on the Abolishment of the Union Solidarity and
Development Association.....
Part C: Criminal Accountability:
(C.1) Call For Investigation of Human Rights Abuses after
Cyclone Nargis.....
Part D: Constitutional Issues:
(D.1) Analysis of the SPDC Constitution from the Perspective
of Ethnic Nationalities...
(D.2) Part 2: Excerpt from Paper on the National Convention’s
Principles for a Constitution...
(D.3) The Failure of the SPDC Constitution to Protect Judicial
Independence |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (2.2MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 18 December 2009 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma" - No. 31 (December 2008) |
| Date of publication: | | December 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | Contents:-
Part A: Persecution of Lawyers:
(A.1) Burmese Lawyers Sent to Prison for Demanding Fair Trials...
(A.2) Statement Concerning Myanmar Lawyers...
(A.3) Unlawful Convictions of Burmese Political Prisoners are Crimes Against
Humanity...
(A.4) Struggle to Achieve Fair Trial Rights and Justice.....
Part B: Rule of Law:
(B.1) Conclusive Recommendations of the BLC General Secretary...
(B.2) Key Legal Questions Raised by the Suffocation of 54 Burmese Migrant
Workers...
(B.3) A Discussion of Five Burmese Cases from the Perspective of the Rule of
Law...
(B.4) Unlawful Detention in the Case of Min Ko Naing and 21 Other Democracy
Leaders.....
Part C: Special Features:
(C.1) A Legal Analysis on the Plight of Ethnic Nationalities in Burma...
(C.2) Part 1: Excerpt from Paper on the National Convention’s Principles for a
Constitution.....
Part D: Criminal Accountability:
(D.1) Momentum Building for Criminal Accountability Campaign
(D.2) The ICC's Indictment of the Sudanese President and its Relevance to
Burma.....
Part E: Political Developments:
(E.1) Dictators Cannot Bury Democracy...
(E.2) UN Credentials Challenge and United Opposition to the SPDC Roadmap.....
Part F: Recent BLC Activities:
(F.1) BLC Lawyers Train Karenni Refugees on Lawmaking...
(F.2) Legal Training on DVB Television |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (7.4MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 18 December 2009 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma" - No. 30 (August 2008) |
| Date of publication: | | August 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | Contents:
Part A: Focus on Criminal Accountability:
(A.1) Burma Lawyers' Council Report on ICC Campaign...
(A.2) Special Announcement on the Fifth Anniversary of the Depayin
Massacre
(A.3) Statement Condemning Extension of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's
Detention...
(A.4) In Brief: ICC Rules of Evidence and their Relevance to Collection
of Evidence in Burma...
(A.5) The Junta's Criminal Constitution...
(A.6) Catastrophe in Burma a Wake Up Call to the International Community:
Time to End Impunity for Heinous Crimes by the Military Regime...
(A.7) In the Wake of Historic Resolution 1820 Women of Burma and Lawyers
Call to Refer the Situation in Burma to the International Criminal Court...
(A.8) EU Resolution Urges UK to Use Presidency of the Security Council to
Refer Burma to the International Criminal Court...
(A.9) Excerpts from "Dealing with Burma's Criminal Accountability Issue:
Trip Report of the BLC General Secretary to Australia and Japan".....
Part B: Special Feature:
Responding to the Human Rights Situation in Burma: A UN Framework
for Non-Forcible Measures by David I. Fisher, Professor of International
Law, Stockholm University......
Part C: Referendum and Constitution:
(C.1) 2010 Elections: No Hope for Human Rights...
(C.2) Activities conducted by the BLC on SPDC constitution and referendum...
(C.3) Analysis of the SPDC's Constitution from the Perspective of Human
Rights...
(C.4) Letter from United Nationalities Alliance on Political Situation in Burma.....
Part D: The Rule of Law:
(D.1) Response to Kyaw Ye Min regarding Extension of Daw Aung San Suu
Kyi's Detention...
(D.2) Appeal to UN Secretary General to Take Immediate Action for
the Release of Zagana. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (3.2MB) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/PDF/LIOB/LawkaPala%2030%20Eng.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 01 November 2008 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma" - No. 29 (April 2008) |
| Date of publication: | | April 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | Contents:
Part A: Referendum Issues:
(A.1) Statement Protesting the Unlawful Issuance by the SPDC of
Temporary National Registration Cards for Voting in the Referendum...
(A.2) Letter to ILO regarding Migrant Worker Voting in Referendum...
(A.3) The Referendum Law for the Approval of the Draft Constitution of
the Republic of the Union of Myanmar, 2008.....
Part B: Constitutional Issues:
(B.1) International Lawyers Denounce Attempt by Myanmar
Regime to Give Themselves Immunity From Criminal Prosecution
and Renew Call For Criminal Investigation...
B.2) The Burma Lawyers' Council Demands that the SPDC Officially
Announce and Release their Confirmed Draft of the Constitution.....
Part C: Rule of Law and Social Justice Issues:
(C.1)Accepting Statements made before Police or Military Intelligence
in Court Violates the Principle of an Independent Judiciary...
(C.2) Letter to Chief Justices regarding U Aung Toe...
(C.3) Chief Justice under Attack and Independence of the Judiciary:
What Lessons are there for Burma's Legal Profession?...
(C.4) Analysis on the status of the economic, social, cultural and
environmental rights of people in Burma (2007)...
(C.5) Analysis on the September Uprising
Part D: Criminal Accountability Issues.....
(D.1) FIDH: Possible Crimes against humanity: prosecuting the
Burmese military before the International Criminal Court (ICC)?:
(D.2) BLC General Secretary Travels to London for
Meetings on Criminal Accountability...
(D.3) Memorandum of Understanding between BLC and ND-Burma.....
Part E: Recent BLC Activities:
(E.1) A Brief Description of the Recent Work of the Legal Aid Section
of the BLC...
(E.2) Graduation Ceremony of the Advanced Internship Program
in Human Rights and Law. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (1.9MB) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/PDF/LIOB/LawKaPala%2029%20Eng.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 01 November 2008 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma" - No. 28 (December 2007) |
| Date of publication: | | December 2007 |
| Description/subject: | | CONTENTS: Part A: On Constitutional Issue of Burma:
(A.1) "The Minimum Elements Necessary in Burma's Constitution for
Economic Development"...
(A.2) IBA's Letter to the military regime in Burma on Constitutional Drafting
Process".....
Part B: On Foreign Investment Issue and Relevant Economic Laws in
Burma:
"An Analysis of the Application of Burma's Economic Laws in Myanmar:.
Foodstuff Industry Vs. Yaung Chi Oo Co., Ltd".....
Part C: On Criminal Accountability Issue in Burma and Possible Referral of
the UN Security Council to the International Criminal Court:
(C.1) Extracts from MOU of BLC and GJC for Joint Efforts of Criminal
Accountability...
(C.2) International Lawyers Call for Criminal Accountability for Myanmar
Regime...
(C.3) "BLC's Position on Mr. Ibrahim Gambari's October 5, 2007 Briefing
to UNSC"...
(C.4) BLC's Participation in ICC meeting for criminal accountablity issue...
(C.5) BLC's Efforts for the attention of the UNSC and the ICC on Criminal
Accountability Issue of Burma.....
Part (D): On the Rule of Law and Justice:
(D.1) Shooting Peacefully Demonstrating Monks...
(D.2) The BLC's call for Justice for the Burmese Military Junta's Violent
Crackdown...
(D.3) Request for ILO's Intervention in Burma for Violations...
(D.4) Burma Justice Committee presents petitions to the UN. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (828K-OBL; 1.1MB - BLC) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/PDF/LIOB/LawkaPala%2028%20Eng.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 01 November 2008 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma" - No. 27 (September 2007) |
| Date of publication: | | September 2007 |
| Description/subject: | | Part A: On Sham National Convention and Analysis on SPDC's Constitutional
Principles:
(1) A critique of the SPDC Constitutional Principles;
(2) Brief presentation of National Convention Delegates on their
experiences (at the press conference of NCUB July 15);
(3) Overview on National Convention by Mr. B.K. Sen;
(4) Cease fire issue and SPDC's National Convention;
(a) Introduction to Cease fire Background of KIO and its
involvement in SPDC's National Convention;
(b) KIO's recommendation to SPDC's National Convention;
(5) BBC Interview of BLC GS and U Aung Naing Oo on SPDC's
Constitutional principles...
Part (B): Heinous Crimes in Burma and the International Criminal Court:
(1) BLC's Legal Analysis on Heinous Crime taking place in Burma;
(2) Grave Crimes and ICC by Janet Benshoof...
Part (C): On The Rule of Law:
(1) BLC Statement on USDA;
(3) Three lawyers (inside Burma) discussions on the Rule of Law;
(4) Political Crisis in Turkey and the Role of Constitutional Court...
Part (D): On Social Security:
(1) BLC's Social security report for 2007. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (1.56MB) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/PDF/LIOB/LawkaPala%2027%20Eng.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 30 October 2007 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma" No. 26, April 2007 |
| Date of publication: | | 07 April 2007 |
| Description/subject: | | Special Features:
Legal comments of the Burma Lawyers' Council
on U Khun Htun Oo and Eight Other Shan Leaders;
Analysis on the Situation of the Refugee Camps
From the Rule of Law aspect...
In Brief:
Justice is conscience, not a personal conscience but the
conscience of the whole of humanity...
In Review:
Burma and the Common Law? An uncommon question...
BLC image:
Trip report...
Statement and Press release:
The Threat of Legal Action Against U Aung Shwe
and U Aye Tha Aung;
Arrests of Peaceful demonstrators in Burma;
Appeal from the Burma Lawyers' Council to Police
Officers inside Burma;
SPDC's unlawful support to the DKBA;
Unlawful arrest and detention of Demonstrators in
Burma;
Korean Court continued its trial on the case of
Daewoo International;
International Seminar on Human Rights in Japan. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (934K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/PDF/LIOB/LawKapala%2026%20Eng.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 31 October 2007 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Journal on Burma" No. 25 - December 2006 |
| Date of publication: | | December 2006 |
| Description/subject: | | Regular Features:
Burma and the Common law?
and An Uncommon Question;
Ethnic Issues and Civil Society in Burma;
Thailand must steer Clear from Burma junta's way to
Democracy...
In Brief:
Junta and its New Constitution;
UN & Burma...
In Review:
Power Sharing and International Mediation in Ethnic
Conflicts - Timothy D Sisk Publisher, US Institute of Peace
Policy Papers, Letters and Statements - Ethnic
Nationalities Council...
News and Note:
Custody dealth;
Burma Restricts ICRC;
UNDOC- Dangerous drug trend in Burma;
Corruption;
Law Academy. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (405K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 31 October 2007 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Journal on Burma" No. 24 - August 2006 |
| Date of publication: | | August 2006 |
| Description/subject: | | Regular Features:
Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and her detention;
Burma's military leader and freedom of expression;
SPDC's assault on humanitarian assistance;
Legal analysis on the case of advocate U Aye Myint...
In Brief:
Waiting on the rule of law;
Burma's junta's loss of sense...
In Review:
Burundi transition;
Interpretation of statutes...
News and Note:
Open letter to UN Security General;
Activities of Pyi-Daung-Su Law Academy;
UN Human Rights Council. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (265K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 31 October 2007 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Journal on Burma" No. 23, April 2006 |
| Date of publication: | | April 2006 |
| Description/subject: | | R Regular Features:
- Self-determination & Law, Venkat Iyer;;
- Laws of the child in Burma, B.K. Sen;
- Rule of Law on trial, Supara Janchitfah;
R In Brief:
- ASEAN Envoy's visit to Burma;
- The Supreme Court punts...
R In Review:
- Transition in Lebanon;
- Arbitration Act of Myanmar...
R News & Notes:
- Opening ceremony on Pyi-daung-Su Law
Academy (BLC). |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (546K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/PDF/LIOB/ljob23.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 February 2007 |
|
| Title: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 22 |
| Date of publication: | | December 2005 |
| Description/subject: | | Regular Features:
A Brief Analysis on the Legitimacy of SPDC’s
National Convention and its Constitution;
Six Migrant Workers Murder Case and Legal Status Issue of
Burmese Migrant Workers in Thailand;
Political Offences in Burma;
The Administration of Justice and Court Procedure in Myanmar...
In Review:
Law, Morality and Justice;
Democracy will come to China - in 25 years...
In Brief:
U.N. Hears Case against Burma;
Burma and its road map...
News and Notes:
Daw Aung San Suu Kyi
Conviction and sentence of the Shan leaders. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (405K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 16 March 2006 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 21 |
| Date of publication: | | August 2005 |
| Description/subject: | | Contents:
Position Paper of the Constitutional Committee on the
Revelations of the People’s Aspirations...
Part (1)
The Constitution, People’s Aspirations and Participation:
( 1 ) The Constitution and People’s Aspirations;
( 2 ) The Rights of the People to participate in the
development of the Constitution...
Part (2)
The Brief History of the Emergence of
Burmese Constitutions...
Part (3)
Work Schedule of the Emergence of the Constitution:
( a ) Work program of the Opposite Political groups;
( b ) The process implemented by the SPDC ( military rulers )...
Part (4)
Sectional Presentation for Systematic Revelation:
( A ) Rule of Law;
( B ) Human Rights and Constitution;
( C ) Bill of Rights;
( D ) The Structure of a State;
( E ) Sovereignty and Constitution;
( F ) Government Systems;
( G ) Independent Judiciary and Court Power;
( H ) Political Parties and Civil Society Organizations;
( I ) Women’s Rights and the Constitution;
( J ) Conservation of Natural Environment and the Constitution;
( K ) Self-determination of ethnic nationalities
according to the Constitution;
( L ) The Role of the Army in the Constitution. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (283K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/PDF/LIOB/LIOB21.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 02 November 2005 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 20 |
| Date of publication: | | April 2005 |
| Description/subject: | | Brief Survey of Development of Laws in Burma -
Burma Lawyers’ Council;
Evolution of Law and Legal Concept in Burma:
Challenges At the Transition -
Tun Myint;
Burma’s Junta Combating Corruption? -
B.K. Sen;
Legal Commentary: Kafkaism rules Burma Juidiciary -
Muhammad Yusuf;
New Wave of Democratic Struggles - reflection on
Burma, Iraq, Egypt, Palestine,
Lebanon, Kyrgyzstan; National Convention;
Current Legislations in Myanmar against AIDS;
The Emergency Provisions Act (1950). |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (920K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/PDF/LIOB/Liob20.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 05 May 2005 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 19 |
| Date of publication: | | December 2004 |
| Description/subject: | | Regular Features:
Where is Burma Heading?
Prof. Josef Silverstein...
Economic Pressure: The Political Currency of the
Burmese Junta. Reform through disengagement,
Jane Carter...
A Facet of Burma’s Criminal Justicce- Bail, Not Jail,
B.K.Sen...
Burmese Workers in a state of Forced Labour within
& without Burma, Jason Douglas Hoge...
Legal Commentary, Ms. Janelle Saffin...
In Brief:
Press briefings October 22, 2004 on Khin Nyunt;
2004 American Presidential Election;
Win, Loss or Draw for Rule of Law in Burma...
In Review:
The Administration of Justice and Court Procedure in
Myanmar;
Beyond the National Convention...
News And Notes. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (370K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob19.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 05 May 2005 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 18 |
| Date of publication: | | August 2004 |
| Description/subject: | | A Brief Analysis on the Judiciary of Burma;
Judiciary & Social Justice (by B.K. Sen);
Reflection on the Naitonal Convention (the Road Map in Burma);
Case of Nine Innocent Persons Condemned to Death;
Burmese Migrant Workers (A Question of Human Rights);
Family Law of Thailand;
With a Deep Desire to promote Judiciary. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (482K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob18.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 17 November 2004 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 17 |
| Date of publication: | | April 2004 |
| Description/subject: | | Moving in Two Directions: Where is Burma Headed?
Josef Silverstein...
Freedom of Expression and Transition away from
Authoritarian Rule, B.K. Sen...
Human Rights Norms in Burmese Society,
Khin Maung Win...
Impunity and Judicial Independence,
John Southalan. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (779K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob17.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 05 August 2004 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 16 |
| Date of publication: | | 31 December 2003 |
| Description/subject: | | A Brief Analysis on SPDC’s Constitutional Principles (Burma Lawyers’ Council);
Analysis of the National Convention Procedural Code 42
(Khin Maung Win);
Road Map or Road Trap? (BK Sen)
Clash of the Titans (Aung Naing Oo) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (320K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob16.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 12 April 2004 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 15 |
| Date of publication: | | August 2003 |
| Description/subject: | | *
Preliminary Report of The Ad hoc Committee on Dapayin Massacre (Burma) (by The Ad hoc Committee on Dapayin Massacre): It contains ten items tracing the formation of the Ad-hoc Commission on Depayin Massacre background of the event and the event itself and analysis as to why such event happened. As evidences, affidavits of eye-witnesses interviews, photo exhibits have been included. List of victims, list of persons arrested has also been given to lend authenticity...
*
Dapayin Massacre, Crime Against Humanity, National Reconciliation and Democratic Transition (by Aung Htoo): This is a special article "Depayin Massacre, Crime Against Humanity, National Reconciliation and Democratic Transition", by the General Secretary U Aung Htoo. He has explained the motive behind the crime, namely to deny result of 1990 may election. The fact that is well-planned and directed against a specific "Certain population", he argued, constituted crime against humanity and perpetrators should be brought to justice. Further he submitted that within accountability, genuine dialogue with SPDC was not a reality...
The State Protection Law Protects The Junta (by Aung Naing Oo): Aung Naing Oo explains the plight of U Kyaw San to illustrate Burma's notorious state Protection Law. Discusses the judicial Procedures and lack of protection or representation and includes that its abolition is a necessary condition for national reconciliation...
*
Ethnic Problems and Constitutional Solutions (by Dr. Alan Smith): Alan Smith gives an erudite exposition of politics of ethnicity in the context of Burma's perennial ethnic problems. The making of a future Constitution of Burma has been made difficult by the military. He has stated that the ethnic leaders in exile have made serious efforts in discussing a Federal Constitution including State Constitutions. Alan Smith has explained lucidly the problem of regional autonomy and federalism. This issue of 8 state formula Vs 14 State formula with diagrams, the rights of minorities. Alan Smith underscores the need for a consensus model of decision making at the national lever rather than pursue a pure form of federalism...
*
Securing Media Freedom in a Democratic Burma: Some Reflection (by Dr. Venkat Iyer): Dr. Venkat argues that Burma's post-independence need of despotism is an obstacle to clear and hard-heading thinking to evolution of a free media. Constitutional, Legal, political and practical protections are needed to guarantee Freedom of Media. Dr. Venkat also elaborates as to whether media should enjoy any special privileges under the law...
*
Perspective on Federalism and the Future Constitution of Burma:Interview with Colonel Zin Kyone, the General Secretary of the National Democratic Front (NDF). |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (860K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob15.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 13 April 2004 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 14 |
| Date of publication: | | April 2003 |
| Description/subject: | | Regular Features:
Some Thoughts on the Special Rapporteur Paulo Pinheiro
and his 2002 Final Report to the UN Human Rights
Commission - Joseph Silverstein;
Unocal’s Destructive Engagement in Burma- the Lawsuit Ensues -
Danya Marshman;
Criminal Case For A Cause - India’s Democracy on Trial:
The Government of India -v- Ko Soe Myint & One -
B.K. Sen and Thein Oo...
Special Feature: Legal Aid:
Need for Legal Aid Law in Burma: Problems and Prospects -
B.K. Sen;
Institutional Legal Aid:
Trends and Challenges in the Asian Region - Peter B. Payoyo (LL.M., Ph.D.);
Workshop on Mutual Legal Assistance and the Office of the
Attorney General...
Interview:
Interview with President of the Karenni State Khu Bya Reh...
In Brief:
SPDC and the Constitution;
The Bank Run in Burma
A Legal Issue;
In Review:
The 1973 Interpretation of Expressions Law;
The Bar Council Under the SPDC. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers's Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (629K) 67 pages |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob14.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 18 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 13 |
| Date of publication: | | December 2002 |
| Description/subject: | | Regular Features:
1) John Doe and Others vs. Unocal Corporation and Other (by John Southalan): This a judgment of U.S. Court confirming human rights abuses of the ruling junta, Burma SPDC associated with constraints of a pipeline in Southern Burma. The villagers were subjected to forced labor by the company and the military provided building infrastructure;
2) Anti-Trafficking Human Law in Burma -Need of the Hour- (by B.K. Sen): The article brought out the differences in former legal definition of the term. It focused on the magnitude of the problem and set out the recom- mended guidelines of human rights commission. The emphasis of the arti- cle was to put in place immediately an anti-human trafficking law;
3) "The controlling money Launder-ing Law" significance of the Press Briefing (by Legal Aid Section): In this article, the latest press briefing on the subject by the SPDC was analyz-ed. The significance of the press con- ference was to give assurance to the potential offenders not to panic;
Special Features:
1) Charter of Legal Reforms in Burma (by Thein Oo and Janelle Saffin): It is set out in the project the preamble, its description, objectives, and approach. It traces the legal history it marks the legal areas for reform, the need for new laws, the reform process as part of restoration of rule of law. However, this article does not reflect the official platform of the BLC;
Interview:
Interview with Pado Man Shar: This was by leading Karen leader, Pado Man Shar, and it brought out the com- mitment of Karen national ethnicities to the Federal Union of Burma;
In Brief:
1) Sri Lanka Peace talks: The peace talks in Sri Lanka Between ethnic minorities and majority were mentioned; also what reflection it has on Burma;
2) "Regime change" Burma and Iraq: The differences in situations of the two countries were brought out, although both needed changes;
In Review:
This is a new feature added to the journal.
1) Judicial Laws Exposed, China: This article gives a glimpse as to how China was trying to reform its legal system contrary to Burma;
2) Law Journal in Burma Attorney General or Prosecutor General (Burma)? |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (647K) 77 pages |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob13.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 18 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 12 |
| Date of publication: | | August 2002 |
| Description/subject: | | "Prospects for the Democratic Transition in
Burma", Josef Silverstein, p 3;
"Proposed Mass Media Law", BLC, p 17;
"Ne Win's Family Conspiracy Trial & Some
Questions", B.K. Sen, p 29;
"Burma's Toothless Money Laundering Law", BLC Legal Aid Section, p 35;
"Justice or Punishment: Forgiveness or Vengeance:
Amnesty or Amnesia: Is There a Middle Path for
Burma?", Thein Oo and Janelle Saffin, p 38;
"Forgotten: Political Prisoners in the Context of
Transitional Justice", Danya Marshman, p 64;
"Seeking Justice for Previous Human Rights
abuses and Democratic Transition in Burma", Zulma Niranda, p 85;
"Collapse of Transitional Strategy", B. K. Sen, p 93;
"International Criminal Court", B. K. Sen, p 95. |
| Author/creator: | | Josef Silverstein, BLC, B.K. Sen, Thein Oo, Janelle Saffin, Danya Marshman, Zulma Niranda. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (773K) 97 pages |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob12.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 11 |
| Date of publication: | | April 2002 |
| Description/subject: | | Special Issue on federalism: "Federalism as a solution
to the ethnic problem in Burma", Josef Silverstein; "In Search of
a Constitution for Burma", Aung Htoo; "Federalism with a
new twist: Burma's only option", B.K. Sen; "Federalism and
self-determination: some reflections" Venkat Iyer; Interview
with Sao Seng Suk: "Burma's ethnic problem is constitutional", Harn Yawnghwe and B.K. Sen; "Federalism: Putting Burma
Back Together Again" Chao-Tzang Yawnghwe; "Federalism, Burma and How
the International Community can Help", Janelle Saffin; "Coups,
Dialogue and Transition", B.K. Sen. |
| Author/creator: | | Josef Silverstein, Aung Htoo, B.K. Sen, Venkat Iyer, Sao Seng Suk, Harn Yawnghwe, Chao-Tzang Yawnghwe, Janelle Saffin. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (630K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 10 |
| Date of publication: | | December 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | Ethnic Issues:
"Burma and National Reconciliation - Ethnic
Conflict and State-Society Dysfunction", Chao-Tzang Yawnghwe, p1; "Secession and Self-Determination in the Context of Burma’s Transition", B.K. Sen, p11. Money Laundering: "Law and Money-laundering in Burma", Peter Gutter, p23. Migrant Issues: "Burmese Migrant Workers in Thailand: Policy and Protection", Darunee Paisanpanichkul, p39; "Burmese children in Thailand: Legal aspects", Nyo Nyo, p51. Transitional Burma: "Burma’s Democratic Transition: About Justice, Legitimacy, and Past Political Violence", Daniel Rothenberg, p57. In Brief: "Transition, Talks and Terrorism", B.K. Sen, p66. |
| Author/creator: | | Chao-Tzang Yawnghwe, B.K. Sen, Peter Gutter, Darunee Paisanpanichkul, Nyo Nyo, Daniel Rothenberg. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (559K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob10.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 9 |
| Date of publication: | | August 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | Environment and Law: "Environment and Law in Burma", Peter Gutter, p1. Women and Law: "Women and Law in Burma", B.K. Sen, p28. Investment Law: "The Burmese Junta’s Abuse of Investment Laws", B.K. Sen and Peter Gutter, p44. Thai-Burma Relations: "The Burmese Junta’s Impediment to Thai-Burma Relations", B.K. Sen, p56. Federalism in Burma: "Federalism and Burma", Khin Maung Win, p60. In Brief: "About Constitutions, Economics, and Talks", B.K. Sen, p66. |
| Author/creator: | | Peter Gutter, B.K. Sen, Khin Maung Win. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (570K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob9.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 8 |
| Date of publication: | | April 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | Law and Religion: "Law and Religion in Burma", Peter Gutter, p1.
Transitional Burma: "Toward Transition with Rule of Law", B.K. Sen, p18; "Ensuring Free and Fair Elections in a Democratic Burma: Establishing an Electoral System and Election Processes", Jeremy Sarkin, p25; "Human Rights and Legal Issues for a Democratic Transition of Burma", Aung Htoo, p37.
Due Process of Law: "New Lawsuit Against Daw Aung San Suu Kyi: Hidden Agenda?", B.K. Sen and Khin Maung Win, p52.
Law Reporting: "Law Reporting in Burma: Lack of Transparency", Win Maung, p55. Ethnic Issues: "Designing Constitution as Policy Formulation to Stop Human Rights Violations", Khin Maung Win, p63. In Brief:
"Burma's Transition to Rule of Law in Different Contexts". |
| Author/creator: | | Peter Gutter, B.K. Sen, Jeremy Sarkin, Aung Htoo, Khin Maung Win, Win Maung. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (595K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob8.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 7 |
| Date of publication: | | December 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | Justice in Transition: "Dealing with Past Human Rights Abuses: Promoting National Reconciliation in Future Democratic Burma", Jeremy Sarkin, p1. Humanitarian Intervention?: "A Case for Humanitarian Intervention", B. K Sen, p15. Forced Labour: "The International Labour Organization Makes History", Jane Carter, p24; "Law Making and Enforcement in Burma: Junta's Failure in Regard to Forced Labour", Janelle Saffin, p38. Constructive Engagement: "Constructive Engagement: A Critical Evaluation", Minn Naing Oo, p43. Due Process of Law: "Shadow over Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's Inheritance Case", B.K Sen and Khin Maung Win, p59. In Brief: "Constructive Engagement with Burma Sees Red Light", p64; "Burma's Election and Constitutional History: A Snapshot", p67. |
| Author/creator: | | B.K Sen, Khin Maung Win, Minn Naing Oo, Janelle Saffin, Jane Carter, Jeremy Sarkin. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (599K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob7.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 6 |
| Date of publication: | | September 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | Burma and Thai relations: "Some thoughts on Burma—Thai relations", Josef Silverstein, p1. Proposed Human Rights Commission in Burma: "Burma human rights body is not all that is needed", Khin Maung Win, p16; "Australia takes the wrong road to Rangoon", Ye Htut, p19. International Labour Organisation: "Forced labour, the ILO and Burma", Louise Southalan, p22. In Brief: "NLD proposed litigation - commentary",B K Sen, p55. |
| Author/creator: | | Josef Silverstein, Khin Maung Win, Ye Htut, Louise Southalan, B K Sen. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (550K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob6.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 5 |
| Date of publication: | | April 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | Ethnic minorities issues: "Issues of self-determination in Burma", Louise Southalan, p1; "Ethnic issues in Burma: "The fourth Burman empire", Aung Htoo, p18. Rights to land: "An overview of the recognition of Native Title in Australia",
D L Ritter, p18. Human Rights Commission: "Military regime to estalish base on Mars... or a Human Rights Commission",
John Southalan, p48. |
| Author/creator: | | Louise Southalan, Aung Htoo, D L Ritter, John Southalan. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (729K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob5.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 4 |
| Date of publication: | | October 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | "Federalism and the
Protection of Minority Rights:
Some lessons for a new democratic Burma"
- Dr. Venkat Iyer...
"Federalism:
The best option for national reconciliation
and peace in Burma" -
Dr. Thaung Htun,
"Religious Freedom in Burma:
A divisive and suppressive practice of the military regime" -
Khin Maung Win...
"Burma and the 1999 Commission
on Human Rights"
- John Southalan...
"Transitional Burma
Where to from here?" -
An interview with Professor Josef Silverstein...
"Burma's Future Constitution:
Comparing and contrasting democracy and
human rights provisions in two draft Burmese
constitutions from an international perspective" -
Jeremy Sarkin |
| Author/creator: | | Dr. Venkat Iyer, Dr. Thaung Htun,. Khin Maung Win, John Southalan, Professor Josef Silverstein, Jeremy Sarkin |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (683K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob4.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 3 |
| Date of publication: | | May 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | Drating a Constitution in Burma: "A struggle for participatory process, p2; "Lessons from the past" p8; "The Pyidaungzu, federalism and Burman elites" p16; "Burma, South-East Asia and the road to a democratic constitution", p20. "Convening the People's Assembly: A legal analysis", p25. "The NLD’s position regarding the convening of the People's Parliament", p29. Statements of the Committee Representing the People's Parliament: Statement No. 2, p32;
Statement No. 3, p33; Statement No. 4, p36; Statement No. 5, p37; Statement No. 7, p39. Judicial System in Burma: "The Trial of 18 Foreigners", p42; "Urgent need for judicial reform in Burma", p45. |
| Author/creator: | | LACKS COVER AND TOC |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (413K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 2 |
| Date of publication: | | June 1998 |
| Description/subject: | | Special Issue: Rule of Law in Burma...
Rule of Law in Burma under SLORC/SPDC;
Myo Myint Nyein and the 21 prisoners’ case;
The rule of law and the advocte’s role;
The protection of law for the rule of law;
Rule of law or rule of the military regime?
The rule of law and unjust laws and orders;
The rule of law and retrospective laws;
Just laws required for the rule of law;
The independence of the judiciary;
Martial law in Burma. |
| Language: | | Englsh |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (504K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob2.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 05 August 2004 |
|
| Title: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 1 |
| Date of publication: | | October 1997 |
| Description/subject: | | Modernization, Democracy and Constitutional Reform
in Burma;
Comparative Constitution Drafting Processes
in the Philippines, Thailand and Burma;
Legal Protection for Refugees from Burma;
Constitutional Protection of Environment in Burma. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (431K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/liob/liob1.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 05 August 2004 |
|
-
"LawKa Pala" (Burmese) -- formerly "Journal of Constitutional Affairs"
Despite the name, this is a distinct journal, and not simply the Burmese version of the English-language "LawKa PaLa - Legal Journal on Burma". The BLC site is currently (permanently?) offline, but alternate links to the BLC site are provided in case it returns.
Individual Documents
| Title: | | "LawKa pala" (Burmese) -- formerly "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 38 (December 2010)/"လောကပါလ ဥပဒေရေးရာစာစောင် အမှတ်စဉ် ၃၈ |
| Date of publication: | | December 2010 |
| Description/subject: | | USE Myanmar3 Font TO SEE THE DESCRIPTION TEXT.
မာတိကာ
(၁) ရွေးကောက်ပွဲဆိုင်ရာ
- မြန်မာနိုင်ငံရှေ့နေများကောင်စီ အထွေထွေအတွင်းရေးမှူး ဦးအောင်ထူးနှင့်
ရွေးကောက်ပွဲဆိုင်ရာ ဥပဒေရေးရာများ ဆွေးနွေးခြင်း ... ရွေးကောက်ပွဲ မဲပေး
သည့်နေ့နှင့် စပ်လျဉ်း၍ မြန်မာနိုင်ငံရှေ့နေများကောင်စီ အထွေထွေအတွင်းရေးမှူး
ဦးအောင်ထူး နှင့် ဆွေးနွေးမေးမြန်းခြင်း ...၂ဝ၁ဝ ခုနှစ် ရွေးကောက်ပွဲကျင်းပပြီးလျှင်
စစ်အစိုးရနှင့် စစ်အာဏာရှင် စနစ် ချုပ်ငြိမ်းသွားမှာလား ... ရွေးကောက်ပွဲနှင့် စပ်လျဉ်းပြီး
အသံစုံ ရှုထောင့်ထောင့်စုံ ထွက်လာအောင် ဖန်တီးပေးတဲ့ အစည်းအဝေးများ ပြည်တွင်းဉ်
လွတ်လပ်စွာကျင်းပ ခွင့်ပေးရန် ဘာကြောင့် လိုအပ်သလဲ ... နအဖ စစ်အစိုးရ၏ရွေးကောက်ပွဲ
ကော်မရှင် ကြေညာချက်အမှတ်(၉၇/၂ဝ၁ဝ) သည်ပါတီစုံစနစ်ကို ဖျက်သိမ်းခြင်းဖြစ်ကြောင်း
ဥပဒေရေးရာ ဝေဖန်သုံးသပ်ချက် ... ရွေးကောက်ပွဲအပေါ် ဦပိင်ဘက်ပါတီများ၏အမြင်.....
တရားဥပဒေစိုးမိုးရေး... နိုင်ငံတကာ စုံစမ်းစစ်ဆေးရေးကော်မရှင် ပေါ်ပေါက်ရေးဟာ
မြန်မာနိုင်ငံ ဒီမိုကရေစီရေးအပြောင်းအလဲအတွက် အထောက်အပံ့ရစေဖို့ဘာကြောင့်
အရေးကြီးသလဲ ... စုံစမ်းစစ်ဆေးရေးကော်မရှင် ပေါ်ပေါက်လာစေရေးတောင်းဆိုမှုနှင့်
စပ်လျဉ်းသည့် နောက်ခံအခြေအနေများ... နိုင်ငံရေးပါတီများ မတရားပြုခံရခြင်းနှင့်
လွတ်လပ်တဲ့ တရားစီရင်ရေး ... ၂ဝ၁ဝ ရွေ:ကောက်ပွဲအပြီး ပေါ်ပေါက်လာမည့်
လွှတ်တော်များမှ လူထူ အတွက် အကျိုးရှိစေမည့်ဥပဒများရေးဆွဲနိုင်ပါ မည်လား...
၂ဝ၁ဝ ရွေးကောက်ပွဲနဲဦဆက်စပ်ပြီး နိုင်ငံရေးပါတီစနစ် တွေ့ဆုံဆွေးနွေးရေးနှင့်
အမျိုးသားပြန်လည်သင့့်မြတ်ရေးတို့ကို ဘယ်လိုချဉ်းကပ်သင့်သလဲ ...
ပြည်ထောင်စု ကြံ့ခိုင်ရေးနှင့့်ဖွံ့ဖြိုးရေးအသင်းကို ဖျက်သိမ်းခြင်းအပေါ် ဥပဒေစိုးမိုးရေး
အခြေခံမှသုံးသပ်တင်ပြခြင်း .... ပြည်သူပိုင်စက်ရုံအလုပ်ရုံများကို အာဏာအလွဲသုံးစား
ပြုလုပ်နေသည့် ကြံ့ဖွံ့ပါတီအားအရေးယူပြီးဖျက်သိမ်းသင့်ကြောင်း ဥပဒေရေးရာသုံးသပ်
ထုတ်ပြန်ချက် ... လွတ်လပ်မှုကို အရယူကြပါ ... ပင်လုံပြီး ပင်လုံ (သို့မဟုတ်)
ပြည်ထောင်စုသဘောတရားမှ လက်တွေ့သို့ |
| Language: | | Burmese/ မြန်မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (731K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 14 January 2011 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa pala" (Burmese) -- formerly "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 37 (August 2010)/"လောကပါလ ဥပဒေရေးရာစာစောင် အမှတ်စဉ် ၃၇ |
| Date of publication: | | August 2010 |
| Description/subject: | | USE Myanmar3 Font TO SEE THE DESCRIPTION TEXT.
မာတိကာ-
လောကပါလအာဘော်
၁။ လူဏအခွင့်အရေးချိုးဖောက်မဆိုင်ရာ သတင်းအချက်အလက်
- ညဦင်းပန်းနှိပ်စက်၍ မတရားဖြောင့်ချက်ရယူခြင်းကို တရားရုံးများက
ခွင့်ပြုထား -ကလေးစစ်သားများကို ရည်ရွယ်ချက်ရှိရှိ စုဆောင်းနေခြင်း.....
၂။ သုံးသပ်လေ့လာအဖြာဖြာ - ရွေးကောက်ပွဲဆိုင်ရာ ဥပဒေများကို လေ့လာသုံးသပ်ခြင်း
- နိုင်ငတံ ကာ စုစံ မ်းစစ်ဆေးရေး ကော်မရှင်ပေါ်ပေါက်ရေးသည် မြန်မာနိုင်ငံ
ဒီမိုကရေစီ အပြောင်းအလဲအတွက် ဘာကြောင့် အရေးကြီးသလဲ - နိုင်ငံတကာ စုံစမ်း
စစ်ဆေးရေးကော်မရှင် ပေါ်ပေါက်လာရေးတောင်းဆိုမှုနှင့် နောက်ခံအခြေအနေများ
- အထူးကျွမ်းကျင်တဲ့ စပယ်ရှယ်လစ်ရှေ့နေ..... ၃။ အင်တာဗျူးကဏ္ဍ
-ကြံ့ခိုင်ဖွံ့ဖြိုးရေးပါတီက နိုင်ငံတော်ဘဏ္ဏငွေကို အသုံးပြုပြီး မဲဆွယ်စည်း ရုံးနေမှုနှင့်
ဒုပညာရေးဝန်ကြီးမှ စစ်တပ်နှင့်နီးစပ်တဲ့ပါတီများကို မဲပေးရန် ပြောကြားခဲ့ခြင်းအပေါ်
ဘီဘီစီမှတွေ့ ဆုံမေးမြန်းခြင်း ... မြန်မာစစ်အစိုးရ၏ ၂ဝ၁ဝ ရွေးကောက်ပွဲအပေါ်
မြန်မာနိုင်ငံရှေဦနေ များကောင်စီ၏အမြင်သဘောထားများ ... နိုင်ငံတကာ ပြစ်မှုဆိုင်ရာ
တရားရုံးနှင့် မြန်မာစစ်အစိုးရ ခေါင်းဆောင်များအပေါ် မြန်မာနိုင်ငံရှေဦနေများကောင်စီ၏
အမြင် သဘောထား ..... ၄။ မြန်မာနိုင်ငံရှေဦနေများကောင်စီ၏ထုတ်ပြန်ချက်များနှင့်
လှုပ်ရှားမှုများ... ပြည်ထောင်စုရွေးကောက်ပွဲကော်မရှင်ကိုဖျက်သိမ်းရမည်ဖြစ်ကြောင်း
ဥပဒေ ရေးရာသုံးသပ်ချက်... ကိုမင်းအောင်နှင့် ကိုကျော်မျိုးနိုင်တို့ကို အီလကထ် ရောနစ်
ဆက်သွယ်ဆောင်ရွက်ရေးဥပဒေဖြင့် ထပ်မံပြစ်ဒဏ်ချမှတ်လိုက်ခြင်းအပေါ် ဥပဒေရေးရာ
သုံးသပ်ချက် ... ပြည်ထောင်စုရွေးကောက်ပွဲကော်မရှင်၏လုပ်ရပ်များကို နိုင်ငံတော်
တရားရုံးချုပ်မှ တားမြစ်ပေးသင့်ကြောင်း ဥပဒေရေးရာ သုံးသပ်ချက် ... ညှဉ်းပန်းနှိပ်စက်၍
ဖြောင့်ချက်ရယူထားခြင်းကို အခြေခံလျက် ကိုသန်းမြင့်အောင်အား ပြစ်ဒဏ်စီရင်လိုက်ခြင်းအပေါ်
ဥပဒေရေးရာ သုံးသပ်ထုတ်ပြန်ချက် ... တရားဥပဒေစိုးမိုးရေးဆိုင်ရာသင်တန်းကို
ကရင်အမျိုးသမီး(ဗဟို)အစည်းအရုံးတွင် ပြုလုပ်ခြင်း ... ကုလသမဂ္ဂ မြန်မာနိုင်ငံ
ဆိုင်ရာလူ့အခွင့်အရေး အထူးကိုယ်စားလှယ် မစ္စတာကင်တားနားနှင့် မြန်မာနိုင်ငံ
ရှေ့နေများကောင်စီတွေ့ဆုံခြင်း ... မြန်မာနိုင်ငံရှေဏနေများကောင်စီ ဥပဒေ
အထောက်အကူပြုဌာန၏ မြန်မာ ရွေ့ပြောင်းအလုပ်သမားများဆိုင်ရာ လှုပ်ရှားမှုများ...
မြန်မာနိုင်ငံရှေဏနေများကောင်စီ၏ ပြည်ထောင်စုဥပဒေအကယ်ဒမီ ဥပဒေသင်တန်း
ကျောင်း..... ၅။ ဥပဒေဆိုင်ရာ အမေးအဖြေကဏ္ဍ-ရွေးကောက်ပွဲဆိုင်ရာ ပြစ်မှုနှင့် ပြစ်ဒဏ် |
| Language: | | Burmese/ မြန်မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (3.11 MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 14 January 2011 |
|
| Title: | | "LawKa pala" (Burmese) -- formerly "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 36 (April 2010)/"လောကပါလ ဥပဒေရေးရာစာစောင်"အမှတ်စဉ် ၃၆ |
| Date of publication: | | April 2010 |
| Description/subject: | | USE Myanmar3 Font TO SEE THE DESCRIPTION TEXT.
မာတိကာ_
(၂ဝ၁ဝ) ရွေးကောက်ပွဲ
-နအဖ စစ်အစိုးရ ကျင်းပပေးမည်ဆိုသည့် ၂ဝ၁ဝ ရွေးကောက်ပွဲ
သည် မကျင်းပမှီကပင် လွတ်လပ်မတရားမျှတမှုမရှိကြောင်း သုံးသပ်ထုတ်ပြန်ချက် ... နအဖထုတ်ပြန်လိုက်တဲ့ နိုင်ငံရေးပါတီများ မှတ်ပုံတင်ခြင်းဥပဒေနှင့် ပတ်သက်ပြီး မြန်မာနိုင်ငံရှေ့နေများကောင်စီ အထွေထွေအတွင်းရေးမှူး
ဦးအောင်ထူး နှင့် ဘီဘီစီ တွေဏဆုံမေးမြန်းခန်း ...
၂ဝ၁ဝ ရွေးကောက်ပွဲဆိုင်ရာဥပဒေများ နှင့် နိုင်ငံရေးပါတီများ၏ အခန်းကဏ္ဍ ...
ပြည်ထောင်စု ရွေးကောက်ပွဲကော်မရှင်ကို ဖျက်သိမ်းရမည်ဖြစ်ကြောင်း ဥပဒေ
ရေးရာသုံးသပ်ထုတ်ပြန်ချက် .....
ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေနှင့်လူထု၏အခန်းကဏ္ဍ-
ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေနှင့် လူထု၏ခန်းကဏ္ဍအပိုင်း(၆၃) ...
ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေနှင့် လူထု၏အခန်းကဏ္ဍ အပိုင်း(၆၄) ...
ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေနှင့် လူထု၏အခန်းကဏ္ဍအပိုင်း(၆၅) ...
ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေနှင့် လူထု၏အခန်းကဏ္ဍအပိုင်း(၆၆) .....
ဥပဒေစိုးမိုးရေး
-အကြမ်းဖက်ဖောက်ခွဲမှုများနှင့် ပတ်သက်၍ အခြေအမြစ်မရှိသည့် စွပ်စွဲ
ချက်များအပေါ် မြန်မာနိုင်ငံရှေ့နေများကောင်စီ၏ ထုတ်ပြန်-ကြေညာချက်...
နအဖ စစ်အစိုးရ၏အုပ်ချုပ်မှုအောက် တနေ့တခြားတိုးပွားလာသည့်
တပ်ပြေး ပြဿနာများအပေါ် ဥပဒေရေးရာသုံးသပ်ထုတ်ပြန်ချက် ... ညှဉ်းပန်းနှိပ်စက်မှုများ ကျူးလွန်၍ ဖြောင့်ချက်ရယူခြင်းသည် ပြစ်မှုကျူး
လွန်ခြင်းဖြစ်ကြောင်း ဥပဒေရေးရာသုံးသပ်ထုတ်ပြန်ချက် .....
နိုင်ငံတကာပြစ်မဆိုင်ရာတရားရုံးနှင့် မြန်မာ့ရေးရာ-
ကုလသမဂ္ဂလူ့အခွင့်အရေးကောင်စီ ညီလာခံကို တင်သွင်းတဲ့အစီရင်ခံစာနှင့်
ပတ်သက်ပြီး မြန်မာနိုင်ငံရှေ့နေများကောင်စီ အထွေထွေ အတွင်းရေးမှူး
ဦးအောင်ထူးနှင့် အာအက်ဖ်အေမှ ကိုကျော်ကျော်အောင် ဆက်သွယ်မေးမြန်း
ခန်း ... နိုင်ငံတကာ ပြစ်မှုဆိုင်ရာတရာရုံး အကြောင်း သိကောင်းစရာ ...
ကုလသမဂ္ဂေလုံခြုံရေးကောင်စီမှ စုံစမ်းစစ်ဆေးရေး ကော်မရှင်ဖွဲ့စည်းရေး
ဆိုင်ရာ ထုတ်ပြန်ချက် ..... |
| Language: | | Burmese/ မြန်မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (397.66 K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 14 January 2011 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 20 |
| Date of publication: | | December 2004 |
| Description/subject: | | * Democracy in Afghanistan (Win Maung);
* Women's Role in Constitution (Daw Molly);
* Discussion on Civil Society and Constitution (Aung Htoo);
* National Convention - Burma's Road Map (BLC);
* Federalism and Self-Determination (Dr. Venkat Iyer);
* Ukraine's Election (Win Maung Maung);
* Trial and Justice (B.K. Sen);
* Brief News and Commentaries Relating to Constitutional, Trial, Election and judicial Matters (BLC's Documentation Centre). |
| Language: | | Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (303K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/PDF/JOCA/Joca20.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 02 November 2005 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 19 |
| Date of publication: | | August 2004 |
| Description/subject: | | Secession and Self Determination (B.K. Sen);
Drafting Constitution and Public's Contribution (Win Maung);
Burma and National Reconceliation: Ethnic Conflict and State-Society Dysfunction (Chao_Tzang Yawnghwe);
Writ of Habeas Corpus (Min Lwin Oo);
Brief News and Commentaries Relating to Constitutional, Trial, Election and judicial Matters (BLC's Documentation Centre);
Discussion on Civil Society and Constitution (Aung Htoo); |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (370K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/PDF/JOCA/Joca19.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 17 November 2004 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 17 |
| Date of publication: | | December 2003 |
| Description/subject: | | Ethnic Problems and Constitutional Solution (Dr. Alan Smith);
Law and Mass Communication (Hla Htay);
Brief News (BLC's Documentation Centre);
Which Destination SPDC's National Convention Leads to; ( Win Maung);
Saddam Hussen and the difficulty of trial (Salai Paceu - Mezar);
Interview:Interview with Daw San San (Member of Parliament);
Lack of Protection of Violence Against Burmese Women (Daw Molly);
Episode behind the Depayin Massacre and Justice (Min Lwin Oo). |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers's Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (456K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/joca/joca17online.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 05 August 2004 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 16 |
| Date of publication: | | August 2003 |
| Description/subject: | | Independent Judiciary (Min Lwin Oo);
Ways of Access to Justice (Hla Htay);
Brief News and Commentaries Relating to Constitutional, Trial, Election and judicial Matters (BLC’s Documentation Centre);
Cambodia, A step to Democracy (Win Maung);
Interview: Perspective on Federalism and the Future Constitution of Burma: Interview with Colonel Zin Kyone: A conversation with the Colonel Zin Kyone, the General Secretary of the National Democratic Front (NDF).;
A Warning for Children (Min Myat Kyaw) |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers's Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (320K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/joca/joca16.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 05 August 2004 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 15 |
| Date of publication: | | April 2003 |
| Description/subject: | | Burmese Customary Law and Ethnic Buddhism (Hla Htay);
Freedom and Protection of Constitution ( Win Maung);
The Constitution and the role of Independent Peoples' Organizations (Ye Min Htat);
Brief News and Commentaries Relating to Constitutional Matters (BLC’s Documentation Centre);
Global Criminal Court's turning a new page historically, ( Alfred);
Women Rights (Daw Molly);
Rule of Law and the role of People;
Interview: The President of Karenni State Khu Bya Reh gave this interview stated his opinion on the Federation, Future Constitution, and State Structure. |
| Author/creator: | | Hla Htay, Win Maung, Ye Min Htat, Alfred, Daw Molly, Khu Bya Reh |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (285K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/joca/joca15.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 17 November 2004 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 14 |
| Date of publication: | | December 2002 |
| Description/subject: | | Electoral system - part three (by Khin Maung Win): It is the third final series of the article. In this part the author explains important of the electoral process management, which include the formation of the election commission and the important of its duty and responsibilities, election law, and budget for holding elections...
Federal Union and Upper House (by Win Maung): The author of this article explains comparatively powers of the Upper Houses of the federal countries. And differences of designation of representing from the states concern to the Upper House. In the article he suggests that the Senators of the future Union of Burma should be elected those who does not involve in the political party, and Senators should be elected on citizenship basis from the states concern rather than ethnic nationality...
Brief News and Commentaries Relating to Constitutional Matters (by BLC’s Documentation Centre): This is a brief report about the issues relating to constitutional matters in several countries, and how both people and politicians deal with such issues...
On Human Rights:
John Doe and Others vs. Unocal Corporation and Others (by John Southalan): This a judgment of U.S. Court confirming human rights abuses of the ruling junta, Burma SPDC associated with constraints of a pipeline in Southern Burma. The villagers were subjected to forced labor by the company and the military provided building infrastructure...
On Rule of Law:
Democracy and Rule of Law: Democracy and the rule of law: the author expresses that democracy and the rule of law go hand in hand. It is sure that without democracy there would be no rule of law. He also mentions that the independent of the judiciary is an element to have the rule of law in a country. He suggests to the military junta that it is inappropriate that saying repeatedly to obey the law and order, the rule of law, under martial law. The rule of law could be developed only under the Democratic rule...
Federal Affairs:
Interview: This was by leading Karen leader, Pado Man Shar, and it brought out the commitment of Karen national ethnicities to the Federal Union of Burma...
Transition:
Prospect for the Democratic Transition in Burma ( by Prof. Joseph Silverstein): The potential of the transition in Burma: The author focus on the potential of the transition in Burma, this article is translated to Burmese audiences...
On analysis:
In this section, the rulings of the Supreme Court are analyzed and flaws are shown. Author is Min Lwin Oo... |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (675K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/joca/joca14.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 18 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 13. |
| Date of publication: | | April 2002 |
| Description/subject: | | The Electoral Systems (Part 2) (Khin Maung Win);
Sri Lanka Constitution and Implementation (Win Maung);
Brief News and Commentaries Relating to Constitutional Matters (BLC,s Documentation Centre);
Introduction to The Internatinonal Criminal Court;
The History of the Development of Human Rights Treaties (Khin Maung Win);
The Union Members (Burma Lawyers' Council);
The Election and Politics Complication (Khin Maung Win);
Nigerian Women Rights (Ba Maung Zin);
Geneva Agreements or Law of International Humanitarian Law (Ba Maung Zin);
The Tamil Tiger and prospect of Peace in Sri Lanka (Ba Maung Zin). |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (875K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/joca/joca13.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 12 |
| Date of publication: | | January 2002 |
| Description/subject: | | The Electroal Systems (Khin Maung Win)
The Republic of India and Constitution (Win Maung)
Brief News and Commentaries Relating to Constitutional Matters (BLC’s Documentation Centre)
The Constitution Observation trip (Germany) (Aung Htoo)
Race, Nation and Nationalism (Bo Mote Seit)
Death Dam (Min Lwin Oo)
Afganistan Affair (Khin Maung Win)
100th Annaversary of Noble Peace Prize (Khin Maung Win)
Remearge of Japanese Militarialism (Khin Maung Win) |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (1.1MB) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/joca/joca12.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 11 |
| Date of publication: | | August 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | The 11th issue contains the following articles:
The Presidential System (Khin Maung Win);
Women Rights and abortion (Aung Htoo);
Brief News and Commentaries Relating to Constitutional Matters (BLC’s Documentation Centre);
The Dialouge and Transition (Tin Maung Than);
Law and Religion in Burma (Peter Gutter) (Translation)
Introduction (Dam)(Min Lwin Oo);
Lack of Transparency in Burmese Judgment (Win Maung);
Milosevic and War Crime Charge (Khin Maung Win);
Racial Discrimination and Asean (Khin Maung Win);
Khamer Rouge Trial (Khin Maung Win). |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (674K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/joca/joca11.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 10 |
| Date of publication: | | April 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | Constitutional discussion articles (Khin Maung Win)
Brief News and Commentaries Relating to Constitutional Matters (BLC’s Documentation Centre)
New Government and Past Human Rights Violations (Jeremy Sarkin)(Translation)
Consoiation Democracy (Khin Maung Win)
The Tatmadaw(Army) and Transition (Tin Maung Than)
Politics of the Phlippine and People Power Revolution (Khin Maung Win) |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (562K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/joca/joca10.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 9 |
| Date of publication: | | December 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | The 9th issue contains the following articles:
Discussions on constitutional matters, (this series is reproduced from the Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB) broadcasting programme).
Brief news and commentaries relating to constitution matters. This brief report, a production of the BLC Documentation Unit, intends to inform readers of the issues relating to constitutonal matters that arise in some countries, and how both people and politicians deal with these issues.
Writing of a new constitution in Burma. Ths short article, written by B.K. Sen, examines the necessary steps required in teh drafting of a new constitution for Burma.
Human Rights Philosophy. This article was written by Khin Maung Win, within teh scope of huamn rights matters. It introduces some baisc human rights issues from a philosophical perspective. This in contrast to most human rights courses conducted in Burmese, that usually specifically deal with individual rights.
"Rule of Law and the Chinese Experience", an article dealing with matters concerning rule of law. The author of this article, Hkun Okker, observed the implementation of the rule of law in China, during his recent visit to that country. He gives Burmese readers more insight into such an implementation.
"American Presidential electoral system", an article within the scope of election watch, written by Bo Moke Seik. The author explains how the American presidential electoral system works, and argues that this was specially devised to meet the requirements of the American federal system, although there are shortcomings in the electoral system. The devising of a similar system will be of particular importance for Burma, when seeking to establish a future federal union of Burma.
Thia General Elections, written by Win Maung. The author explains in teh context of this being the first general election held under the political reforms of the 1997 constituton. The author also explains teh workings of the two electoral systems in Thailand, manely the Single Member Constituency and the Party List System.
On analysis. Under this section, international events are specifically analyzed, as they provide valuable lessons applicable to the situation in Burma, now and in the future.
The legacy of a Dictator President: A Lesson from Ivory Coast, by Ba Maung Zin, In this article , the author examines the problems facing Ivory Coast, following the October 2000 presidential election. The main theme of this article is theat the democratically elected president is facing new challenges, as demonstrations are geing staged against the president by oposition leaders, who were disqualified from office by the former dictator president. There is a lesson oto be learnt from this experience, as a similar situation may arise in Burma, where a large number of politicians were unfirly disqualified by the military junta from contesting future elections.
People's Power Victory: Yugoslavia's Presidential Election and its Aftermath, also by Ba Maung Zin. This article explains haw a people's power movement came to overthrow a dictatorial president. |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (526K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/joca/joca9.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 8 |
| Date of publication: | | September 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | Discussion on Constitutional Affaris;
Duties emerging out of the Constitution;
Brief news on Constitutions;
Human Rights and Constitutional Affairs;
Naitonal Huamn Rights Commissions;
Human Rights Commission and Human Rights in Burma;
Australian Policy and Human Rights in Burma |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (836K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/joca/joca8.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 7 |
| Date of publication: | | April 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | Drawing up a Constitution and selecting government systems, (Burma Lawyers' Coucil)...
South Africa's courts - beyond Apartheid: the structure and role of the Constitutional Court, (Professor Jeremy Sarkin), translated in Burmese by Cho Cho Tun Nyein...
Limited government, (Bo Mote Seit)...
Huamn rights law, (Khin Maung Win)...
The meaning of human rights, (Khin maung Win)...
Anti-corruption experiences in Thailand, Indonesia and Burma, (Aung Htoo). |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (787K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/joca/joca7.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 6 |
| Date of publication: | | October 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | Lessons form the Past (Prof. Josef Silverstein) (Translation);
Constitution and the Constitutional Court - Thailand's experience;
Judicial Independence;
Amending the Constitution - the Philippines experience;
The June 1999 General Elections of Indonesia;
The 1998 Cambodian General Elections and Rule of Law;
Bureaucracy. |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (558K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/joca/joca6.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No.5 |
| Date of publication: | | May 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | Drafting a constitution: a relationship between texts and the drafting process;
an observation on the 1996 South African Constitution;
Solving ethnic conflicts:Sri-Lanka experiences;
Pyidaungzu (Union), Federalism and Burman Elites;
An introduction to 1997 Thai constitution - A brief observation;
Record of constitutional seminars - Bangkok seminar 1998 (May) and New Delhi seminar (1998 December). |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (762K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/joca/joca5.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | "Journal of Constitutional Affairs" No. 3 |
| Date of publication: | | July 1995 |
| Description/subject: | | Introduce to Constitution;
The book The Union of Burma, which refer to the 1947 Constitution and the 8888 uprising;
The study of the system of the parliamentary government and the presidential government;
The lost of Ma Nar Plaw and the Political Knowledge of the People;
The report of the DAB's Constituitonal Drafting Commmittee concerning the Drafting of the (Future) Federal Union of Burma Constituitonal (Draft);
The Parliament;
Justice and Law in Burma. |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council (BLC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (251K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/pdf/joca/joca3.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 17 November 2004 |
|
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International Law
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Burma/Myanmar's international legal obligations
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Burma/Myanmar's obligations under the UN Charter and customary international law
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Burma/Myanmar's obligations under the UN Charter and customary international law (commentaries)
Look in the section on the UN System for the UN resolutions on the situation of human rights in Myanmar and the reports to the General Assembly and Commission on Human Rights of the Special Rapporteurs on Myanmar.
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Myanmar: Justice on Trial |
| Date of publication: | | 30 July 2003 |
| Description/subject: | | "On 22 May 2003 Amnesty International submitted a 29-page memorandum to the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC, Myanmar's military government), in order to provide the SPDC with the opportunity to comment on and to clarify various issues about the administration of justice raised in the document. The Memorandum reflected the organization's findings during its first visit to the country from 30 January to 8 February 2003, and drew on its institutional knowledge and expertise about both international human rights standards and human rights in Myanmar. The text of the original Memorandum has now been updated to reflect comments from the SPDC, which were received by Amnesty International on 9 July 2003. The updated Memorandum forms the text of this document, along with a summary of the current human rights situation in Myanmar... Since the submission of the Memorandum to the SPDC on 22 May, political tensions escalated sharply during a National League for Democracy (NLD) tour of Upper Myanmar, culminating in a violent attack on NLD leaders on 30 May. What follows below is a summary of both the attack and the subsequent deterioration in the human rights situation in Myanmar. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, NLD General Secretary, U Tin Oo, NLD Vice Chairman, and other NLD members had been travelling in Upper Myanmar, with the prior permission of the SPDC, during the month of May. As larger and larger crowds gathered to see the NLD leaders, tension increased between the NLD and the Union Solidarity Development Association (USDA), an organization established, organized, and supported by the SPDC.(1) NLD members and supporters were reportedly harassed, intimidated, and threatened by USDA members in various locations as they attempted to conduct their legitimate political party activities, including giving speeches and opening local NLD offices. However the SPDC reportedly did very little to diffuse tensions between the USDA and the NLD. While Amnesty International acknowledges the universal right to peacefully assemble and conduct protest demonstrations, the actions of the USDA went beyond such non-violent expressions of dissent. .." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Amnesty International |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/ASA16/019/2003
http://www.amnestyusa.org/document.php?id=E8E42C86A0BF5F7980256D72004704AB&lang=e |
| Date of entry/update: | | 19 November 2010 |
|
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Burma/Myanmar's treaty obligations
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Burma/Myanmar's treaty obligations (texts)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime (including the protocols on trafficking and smuggling of persons) |
| Date of publication: | | 15 November 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | The Convention entered into force on 29 September 2003...
Annex I:
United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime...
Annex II:
Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women
and Children, supplementing the United Nations Convention against Transnational
Organized Crime...Annex III:
Protocol against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air, supplementing
the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime...Myanmar accession: 30 March 2004... The UNODC page at http://www.unodc.org/unodc/crime_cicp_convention.html contains the finalized instruments;
Signatures/Ratifications;
Legislative guides;
Background information;
Conference of the Parties. |
| Language: | | English (Arabic,Chinese, French, Russian and Spanish available) |
| Source/publisher: | | United Nations (A/RES/55/25) |
| Format/size: | | pdf, html |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/treaties/CTOC/index.html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 23 May 2005 |
|
| Title: | | Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) |
| Date of publication: | | 20 November 1989 |
| Description/subject: | | Adopted and opened for signature, ratification and accession by General Assembly resolution 44/25 of 20 November 1989; entry into force 2 September 1990. For the jurisprudence of the Convention, visit the site of CRC Committee. Myanmar accession: 15 July 1991. |
| Language: | | English, Francais, Espanol, Russian, Arabic, Chinese |
| Source/publisher: | | United Nations |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 and the 1977 Protocols |
| Date of publication: | | 12 August 1949 |
| Description/subject: | | Myanmar ratification: 25 August 1992.
See Article 3, commmon to all four Conventions, which covers conflict "not of an international character" i.e. civil war and other forms of internal conflict. Burma is a party to the Conventions but not to the Protocols. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | ILO Convention 87 on Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise |
| Date of publication: | | 09 July 1948 |
| Description/subject: | | Convention concerning Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise. The page also has a link to the list of ratifications. Myanmar ratification, 1955 |
| Language: | | English (French and Spanish available) |
| Source/publisher: | | International Labour Office |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | ILO Convention 29 on Forced Labour (1930) |
| Date of publication: | | 28 June 1930 |
| Description/subject: | | Convention concerning Forced or Compulsory Labour. The page also has a link to the list of ratifications. Myanmar ratification, 1955. |
| Language: | | English (French and Spanish available) |
| Source/publisher: | | International Labour Office |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) |
| Description/subject: | | Burma acceded to the Convention on 13 June 1997. The aim of the Convention is "...to ensure that international trade in specimens of wild animals and plants does not threaten their survival...CITES is an international agreement to which States (countries) adhere voluntarily. States that have
agreed to be bound by the Convention ('joined' CITES) are known as Parties. Although CITES is
legally binding on the Parties - in other words they have to implement the Convention - it does not
take the place of national laws. Rather it provides a framework to be respected by each Party, which
has to adopt its own domestic legislation to make sure that CITES is implemented at the national
level..." Click on Home etc. on the CITES page for more information. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | CITES |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
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Laws impacting on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
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Labour laws and decrees (texts)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Labour Disputes Settlement Act - Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Law No. 5/2012 - အလုပ္သမားေရးရာ အျငင္းပြားမႈေျဖရွင္းေရး ဥပေဒ |
| Date of publication: | | 29 March 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | Adopted 28 March 2012...(၂၀၁၂ ခုႏွစ္၊ ျပည္ေထာင္စုလႊတ္ေတာ္ ဥပေဒအမွတ္ ၅။)၁၃၇၃ ခုႏွစ္၊ တန္ခူးလဆန္း ၆ ရက္ (၂၀၁၂ ခုႏွစ္၊ မတ္လ ၂၈ ရက္) နိဒါန္း- အလုပ္သမားမ်ား၏ အခြင့္ အေရးကို ကာကြယ္ေစာင့္ေရွာက္ရန္ လည္ေကာင္း၊ အလုပ္ရွင္ႏွင့္ အလုပ္သမားမ်ားအၾကား ဆက္ဆံေရး ေကာင္းမြန္ၿပီး လုပ္ငန္းခြင္ ေအးခ်မ္းသာယာေစရန္ လည္းေကာင္း၊ အလုပ္ရွင္ႏွင့္ အလုပ္သမားအျငင္းပြားမႈအား တရားမွ်တစြာ ေျဖရွင္းေဆာင္ရြက္ေပးျခင္းျဖင့္ ရပိုင္ခြင့္မ်ားကို မွ်တမွန္ကန္စြာႏွင့္ ျမန္ဆန္စြာ ရရွိခံစားေစႏိုင္ရန္လည္းေကာင္း ျပည္ေထာင္စု လႊတ္ေတာ္သည္ ဤဥပေဒကိုျပ႒ာန္းလိုက္သည္။ ...Its relationship with the 1929 Trade Disputes Act is rather confusing - although that Act is apparently repealed by this new legislation, Law 5/2012 provides that some regulations, procedures and orders in the 1929 Act may be practiced as long as they do not contradict the new Act. |
| Language: | | Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ, English |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Mirror" ("Kyemon") ေၾကးမံု 29 March 2012 |
| Format/size: | | pdf (147K-Burmese; 66K-English) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.burmalibrary.org/docs13/Labour_Disputes_Settlement_Act-2012-en.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 31 March 2012 |
|
| Title: | | The Labour Organization Law - Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Law No. 7/2011 အလုပ္သမားအဖြဲ႔အစည္း ဥပေဒ (Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 12 October 2011 |
| Description/subject: | | (၂ဝ၁၁ ခုႏွစ္၊ ျပည္ေထာင္စုလႊတ္ေတာ္ ဥပေဒအမွတ္ ၇။)...
၁၃၇၃ ခုႏွစ္၊ သီတင္းကြၽတ္လဆန္း ၁၄ ရက္...
(၂ဝ၁၁ ခုႏွစ္၊ ေအာက္တုိဘာလ ၁၁ ရက္)...
This law was adopted on the 11th of October 2011 and came into force on the 9th of March 2012, though it is unclear whether the Legislature has adopted all enabling regulations (an amended Trade Disputes Act was enacted 28 March 2012) containing elements like the conciliation mechanisms referred to in the LOL. ...Apologies for the poor graphic quality of the Burmese text. There are also some errors in translation in the (official) English version --- Para 5 should read: ".......carry out its activities under its ....." and Para 48 should read: "....shall not be used for any other purpose than the matters provided....." These mistakes will no doubt be corrected in a future version.....The Alternate URL contains the same text, but as transmitted to the ILO with cover letter from the Myanmar Mission, Geneva. |
| Language: | | Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | Pyidaungsu Hluttaw |
| Format/size: | | pdf (118K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.burmalibrary.org/docs12/Labour_Organization_Law%20No.7-2011(bu)-ocr-red.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 23 December 2011 |
|
| Title: | | The Labour Organization Law - Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Law No. 7/2011 (English) |
| Date of publication: | | 11 October 2011 |
| Description/subject: | | Official version (on the site of the Ministry of labour)... This law came into force on the 9th March 2012, though it is not entirely clear to the Librarian whether the Legislature has adopted the enabling regulations and whether the amended Trade Disputes Act (now called The Settlement of Labour Dispute Law) contains all the conciliation mechanisms referred to in the LOL. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Pyidaungsu Hluttaw |
| Subscribe: | | http://www.mol.gov.mm/en/wp-content/uploads/downloads/2012/05/Labour-Org-Law-ENG.pdf |
| Format/size: | | pdf (62K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 23 December 2011 |
|
| Title: | | Trade Disputes Amending Law, 1963 |
| Date of publication: | | 1963 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Revolutionary Council (Law No. 20, 1963) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (172K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 23 April 2012 |
|
| Title: | | THE TRADE DISPUTES ACT. [INDIA ACT VII, 1929.] |
| Date of publication: | | 08 May 1929 |
| Description/subject: | | Contains amendments made in 1947, 1948, 1950, 1954 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma via "The Burma Code" Vol. V |
| Format/size: | | pdf (411K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 23 April 2012 |
|
| Title: | | The Trade Unions Act (India Act XVI, 1926) |
| Date of publication: | | 1926 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma via "The Burma Code" Vol. V |
| Format/size: | | pdf (73K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 May 2012 |
|
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Laws impacting on civil and political rights
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Association and Assembly
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Laws, decrees and regulations related to association and assembly (texts)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Regulations relating to the Right to Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Procession, 5 July 2012 (Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 10 July 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | Government of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar, Ministry of Interior, Order No. 364/ 2012, Nay Pyi Daw, 5 July 2012..... ၿငိမ္းခ်မ္းစြာ စုေ၀းခြင့္ ႏွင့္ ၿငိမ္းခ်မ္းစြာ စီတန္းလွည့္လည္ခြင့္ ဆိုင္ရာ နည္းဥပေဒမ်ား - ျပည္ေထာင္စု သမၼတ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံ ေတာ္အစိုးရ၊ ျပည္ထဲေရးဝန္ႀကီးဌာန၊ အမိန္႔ ေၾကာ္ျငာစာအမွတ္ ၃၆၄/၂ဝ၁၂၊ ေနျပည္ေတာ္၊ ၁၃၇၄ ခုႏွစ္၊ ပထမဝါဆုိလျပည့္ေက်ာ္ ၂ ရက္၊ (၂ဝ၁၂ ခုႏွစ္၊ ဇူလိုင္လ ၅ ရက္) |
| Author/creator: | | Myanmar Ministry of the Interior |
| Language: | | Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Mirror" ("Kyemon") ေၾကးမံု 10 July 2012 |
| Format/size: | | pdf (118K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 08 September 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Regulations relating to the Right to Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Procession 5 July 2012 (English) |
| Date of publication: | | 05 July 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | "...1. These By-Laws shall be cited as the Regulations relating to the Right to Peaceful Assembly
and Peaceful Procession
2. The Terms mentioned in these By-Laws must follow the same definitions as in the Right to
Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Procession Act and the terms mentioned below must be
defined as follows:
(a) The term Act refers to the Right to Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Procession Act..." |
| Language: | | English (unofficial translation) |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar, Ministry of Home Affairs (Order No. 364/2012) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (84K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 18 May 2013 |
|
| Title: | | Right to Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Procession Act - Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Law No. 15/2011 (English) |
| Date of publication: | | 02 December 2011 |
| Description/subject: | | "...In Article 354 Section (B) of the Union Republic of Myanmar Constitution Law, it is prescribed that if
not contrary to the laws enacted for Union security, rule of law, community peace and tranquility, or
public morality, every citizen shall be at liberty to assemble and hold a procession peacefully without
arms. So that citizens can exercise these rights legally, Pyidaungsu Hluttaw has enacted this law...
1. This law shall be called the law of peaceful assembly and peaceful procession..." ... Approved by the Pyidaungsu Hluttaw on 2 December 2011 |
| Language: | | English (unofficial translation?) |
| Source/publisher: | | Pyidaungsu Hluttaw |
| Format/size: | | pdf (69K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 18 May 2013 |
|
| Title: | | Law Relating to the Sangha Organization |
| Date of publication: | | 31 October 1990 |
| Description/subject: | | State LORC Law No. 20/90 of Oct. 31, 1990 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | SLORC |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Form for registration of associations and organizations (Directive No. 1/88 of the Ministry of Home and Religious Affairs) |
| Date of publication: | | 01 October 1988 |
| Description/subject: | | "Directive No. 1/88 of the Ministry of Home and Religious , signed by Maj-Gen. Phone Myint, prescribes the following Form for registration of associations and organizations, to be submitted to the Township LORC under the State/Division LORC where the organization is located:
Form (A)
Application for formation of associations in accordance with the Law for Formation of Associations or Organizations..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | SLORC |
| Format/size: | | html (6K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Law relating to Forming of Organizations (State LORC Law No. 6/88 of Sept. 30, 1988) |
| Date of publication: | | 30 September 1988 |
| Description/subject: | | The State Law and Order Restoration Council hereby enacts the following Law—
Chapter I Title and Definitions
1. This Law shall be called the Law relating to Forming of Organizations.
2. The following expressions in this Law shall have the following meanings--
(a) an organization means an association, society, union, party, committee, federation, group of associations, front, club and similar organization that is formed with a group of people for an objective or a programme either with or without a particular name.
(b) a political organization means an organization that has a political movement based upon a certain political ideology..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | SLORC |
| Format/size: | | html (13K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/html/Myanmar%20Law/lr_e_ml88_06.html |
| Date of entry/update: | | May 2003 |
|
| Title: | | SLORC Order 2/88 of 18 September 1988 |
| Date of publication: | | 18 September 1988 |
| Description/subject: | | Order No. 2/88 of the Organization for Building Law and Order in the State, dated 18 September 1988 - the 8th day of the waxing moon of Tawthalin, 1350...
"In order to ensure law and order, and peace and tranquility, as well as to ensure the security and ease of transport and communications and the people's livelihood, the chief of staff, Office of the Chief of Staff, issues the following order for all monks and people to abide by:..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | SLORC |
| Format/size: | | html (6K), Word (25K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs3/SLORC_Order_2-88.doc |
| Date of entry/update: | | 08 August 2005 |
|
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Laws, decrees, regulations and bylaws related to association and assembly (commentaries)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | SPECIAL DOSSIER: CASES UNDER THE UNLAWFUL ASSOCIATIONS ACT 1908 BROUGHT AGAINST PEOPLE ACCUSED OF CONTACT WITH KACHIN INDEPENDENCE ARMY |
| Date of publication: | | 21 January 2013 |
| Description/subject: | | "This special dossier of 36 cases brought under the 1908 Unlawful Associations Act against people
accused of contact with the Kachin Independence Army was researched and compiled in 2012 by
independent human rights defenders in Burma who have requested that the Asian Human Rights
Commission disseminate the material...At a time that the conflict in Kachin State between the Kachin Independence Army and Burma
armed forces is only getting worse, this dossier marks an important contribution to documentation
on human rights abuses in the region, because it signals very sharply the intersection between war
and law, between violence in armed combat and violence in interrogation, in the use of torture
and other techniques against persons who have been branded enemies of the state...the human rights defenders who gathered and translated this material
have two stated objectives: to document and inform people about the use of the Unlawful
Associations Act; and, to secure the release of the accused. Both of these objectives are laudable,
and strongly supported by the AHRC. Clearly, not enough has been done to document cases of
this sort in a way that makes explicit the connection between strategic practices of the military
and those of other parts of the state apparatus for the targeting of internal enemies. We firmly
hope that by taking these steps, not only will the connections be better understood but also those
whose cases are documented will obtain relief through some publicity and attention to their
specific plights..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) & Asian Legal Resource Centre (ALRC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (2.7MB-OBL version; 3.46-original) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.humanrights.asia/countries/burma/reports/Unlawful_Association_Dossier.pdf/view |
| Date of entry/update: | | 21 January 2013 |
|
| Title: | | Thein Sein Repeals Repressive Law on Public Speeches |
| Date of publication: | | 16 January 2013 |
| Description/subject: | | "Burmese President Thein has repealed a draconian law that was used to stifle public speeches and sentence dissidents to lengthy spells in prison under the previous military regime, according to an announcement in a state-owned newspaper on Wednesday.
The Burmese-language version of The New Light of Myanmar carried an announcement signed by President Thein Sein, which stated he had revoked Law 5/96, or the Law Protecting the Peaceful and Systematic Transfer of State Responsibility and the Successful Performance of the Functions of the National Convention against Disturbances and Oppositions.
It provided for up to 20 years imprisonment for anyone who criticizes the government in speeches or written statements that “belittle the National Convention” and make people misunderstand its proceedings..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Irrawaddy" |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 19 January 2013 |
|
| Title: | | Myanmar: The Decree on the Right to Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Procession 2012 - Legal Analysis (English and Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 20 September 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | Executive Summary and Recommendations: In July 2012, "ARTICLE 19 analysed the Decree on the Right to Peaceful Assembly and
Peaceful Procession of Myanmar, adopted by the Government of the Republic of the Union of
Myanmar on 5 July 2012.
The provisions of the Decree were examined for their compliance with international standards
on human rights. Myanmar has neither signed nor ratified the International Covenant on Civil
and Political Rights or other principal human rights treaties. Nevertheless, ARTICLE 19
suggests that guarantees to the right to freedom of expression and freedom of assembly, as
provided by Article 364 of the Constitution of Myanmar, allow a wide scope for interpretation
and that international standards regarding these rights should provide guidance to such an
interpretation.
In the analysis, ARTICLE 19 appreciates the Decree’s recognition of the state duty to protect
assembly participants. However, the requirement for permission to hold an assembly, the
grounds for denying permission, the lack of a court appeal and the absence of guarantees for
media access to assemblies are problematic and must be urgently revised. ARTICLE 19 also
calls on the Government of Myanmar – in consultation with civil society - to review other
legislative measures in light of international standards and to make them compliant with
these standards.
Recommendations
ARTICLE 19 calls on the Government of Myanmar:
• To sign and ratify the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights;
• To invite the UN special rapporteur on freedom of peaceful assembly and association
and the special rapporteur on freedom of opinion and expression to visit Myanmar;
• To ensure that the right to peaceful assembly and the right to freedom of expression
are safeguarded in line with international standards;
• To revise the Decree on the Right to Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Procession in
accordance with international standards on freedom of expression and freedom of
assembly, as recommended by ARTICLE 19;
• To initiate public discussion about the current legal framework on peaceful assemblies
and engage in consultation with civil society representatives on how to improve the
relevant legislation.
ARTICLE 19 calls on civil society in Myanmar:
• To engage in public debates and consultation with the government on how to improve
the domestic legislation on peaceful assembly;
• To form coalitions between civil society organisations and launch public education
campaigns on the right to peaceful assembly and the right to freedom of expression;
• To draft legislative proposals and advocate for specific changes in domestic legislation
aiming at the improvement of the protection of the right to peaceful assembly and the
right to freedom of expression;
• To seek partnerships with international organisations in a specific mandate on the
right to freedom of expression and the right to peaceful assembly." |
| Language: | | English, Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | Article 19 |
| Format/size: | | pdf (346K-English; 6.54MB-Burmese)) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.article19.org/data/files/medialibrary/3440/12-09-19-LA-Myanmar-BU.pdf
http://www.article19.org/resources.php/resource/3440/en/myanmar:-law-on-assembly-and-procession-inc... |
| Date of entry/update: | | 24 September 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Burma: New Law on Demonstrations Falls Short |
| Date of publication: | | 15 March 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | "...Legal Reforms Should Meet International Human Rights Standards
...Burma’s new law on assembly rejects the previous ban on demonstrations, but still allows the government to trump the Burmese people’s basic rights. There is a lot of excitement about changes in Burma these days, but the government shouldn’t be given credit for allowing some freedom just because none existed before. Instead, it should be pressed to make sure its laws meet international standards..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Human Rights Watch (HRW) |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 17 March 2012 |
|
-
Martial law decrees, States of Emergency etc.
-
Martial law decrees, States of Emergency etc. (commentary)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | BURMA: President too quick to proclaim state of emergency |
| Date of publication: | | 23 March 2013 |
| Description/subject: | | "The Asian Human Rights Commission has been following with concern news of the latest outbreak of communal violence in Burma. Although the circumstances of how the violence began are clouded, the president on 22 March 2013 declared an indefinite state of emergency over four townships of Mandalay Region--Meikhtila, Wundwin, Mahlaing and Thazi--after the imposition of an order under section 144 of the Criminal Procedure Code on March 20 to shut down businesses until the situation improved failed to quell growing conflict that has officially left eleven people dead. Eyewitness accounts put the number of dead possibly in the dozens, with many people besides injured.
It would be disingenuous of the authorities in Burma to describe the violence as unexpected. Throughout the latter part of 2012, they permitted demonstrations by thousands of persons calling for the expulsion from the country of Muslims in the west alleged to have entered illegally. At that time, a number of reprise attacks occurred against targets in other parts of the country, although these did not spread widely and attracted little media attention. Yet now the response has been, as previously, to react with the introduction of a state of emergency as if confronted with an event that was wholly unexpected, for which the authorities had not been prepared..." |
| Source/publisher: | | Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 23 March 2013 |
|
| Title: | | A law in force and its effects |
| Date of publication: | | 15 August 2009 |
| Description/subject: | | Commentary on the status of laws enacted under the 1974 Constitution |
| Author/creator: | | A Lawyer |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "The New Light of Myanmar" |
| Format/size: | | pdf (19K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 15 August 2009 |
|
| Title: | | Burma's State Protection Law: An Analysis of the Broadest Law in the World |
| Date of publication: | | December 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | Forword by H. E. U Thein Oo, Minister of Justice, National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma.... Contents:
Foreword by H.E. U Thein Oo; Introduction; The Constitutional Period, 1948-1962; Military Rule, 1962-1974;
Military Rule, 1974-1988; Military Rule, 1988-1997;
Military Rule, 1997 to date; The State Protection Law of 1975: Articles 1 and 2: Name and Definitions;
Articles 3 to 6: State of Emergency; Articles 7 to 9: Restrictions of Rights; Articles 10 to 15: Preventive Detention; Article 16: No Real Provisions for Review; Articles 17 and 18: Reporting;
Articles 19 to 21: Appeal; Articles 22 to 24: General Provisions;
State Protection and Preventive Detention;
Is Burma Changing Towards Rule of Law?;
Conclusion. |
| Author/creator: | | P. Gutter and B.K. Sen |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Lawyers' Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (255K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 2001 |
|
| Title: | | MYANMAR (BURMA): NEW MARTIAL LAW PROVISIONS ALLOWING SUMMARY OR ARBITRARY EXECUTIONS AND RECENT DEATH SENTENCES IMPOSED UNDER THESE PROVISIONS |
| Date of publication: | | August 1989 |
| Description/subject: | | "Since January 1989, especially since March and again in June and July, the
tempo of political arrests has accelerated in Myanmar as the main student
groups and political parties have organized more frequent and larger
gatherings at which opinions increasingly critical of the authorities have
been voiced. In a document made public on 14 July 989. Myanmar (Burma):
Call for Dissemination and Enforcement of International Standards on the
Use of Force, Amnesty International expressed the hope that martial law
restrictions on civil liberties currently imposed by the armed forces in
Myanmar would not be enforced through the deliberate killing of
demonstrators, contrary to international standards on the use of force and
the right to life.
On 17 and 18 July 1989 the martial law administration empowered the
military to impose death sentences on political opponents, including people
not accused of violence, through summary judicial procedures that fall
short of international standards for fair trial and are contrary to the
safeguards enshrined in the Myanmar Judicial Law. These deficiencies
include allowing the death penalty for non-violent, not clearly criminal or
else only minor offences, elimination of the right of appeal to a higher
court and apparent curtailments of the right to a defence, particularly as
regards the calling of defence witnesses.
The new martial law provisions could lead to arbitrary executions and
Amnesty International has called on the authorities not to execute three
political prisoners sentenced to death under them on 27 July 1989 The
three are accused of involvement in a terrorist bombing. They have 30 days
in which to ask the Myanmar armed forces Commander-in-Chief to review their
sentences. Unless he orders their reprieve, they will be hanged..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Amnesty International (ASA 16/15/89) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (71K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 19 August 2005 |
|
-
Martial law decrees, States of Emergency etc. (texts)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Declaration No. 6/88 of the State LORC |
| Date of publication: | | 25 September 1988 |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Working People's Daily" |
| Format/size: | | pdf (37K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 15 August 2009 |
|
| Title: | | Announcement No. 1/88 of the State Law and Order Restoration Council, 18 September 1988 |
| Date of publication: | | 18 September 1988 |
| Description/subject: | | The decree establishing the STate Law and Order Restoration Council...
"1) In order to effect a timely halt to the deteriorating conditions on all sides all over the country and for the sake of the interests of the people, the Defence Forces have assumed all power in the state with effect from today so as to carry out the following tasks immediately:..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | SLORC |
| Format/size: | | html (5K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 21 February 2004 |
|
| Title: | | SLORC Order 2/88 of 18 September 1988 |
| Date of publication: | | 18 September 1988 |
| Description/subject: | | Order No. 2/88 of the Organization for Building Law and Order in the State, dated 18 September 1988 - the 8th day of the waxing moon of Tawthalin, 1350...
"In order to ensure law and order, and peace and tranquility, as well as to ensure the security and ease of transport and communications and the people's livelihood, the chief of staff, Office of the Chief of Staff, issues the following order for all monks and people to abide by:..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | SLORC |
| Format/size: | | html (6K), Word (25K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs3/SLORC_Order_2-88.doc |
| Date of entry/update: | | 08 August 2005 |
|
| Title: | | SLORC Order No. 1/88 |
| Date of publication: | | 18 September 1988 |
| Description/subject: | | Order No. 1/88 of the Organization for Building Law and Order in the State, dated 18 September 1988 -- the 8th day of the waxing moon of Tawthalin, 1350...
"The Organization for Building Law and Order in the State has been formed with the following persons:..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | SLORC |
| Format/size: | | html (8K), Word (25K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs3/SLORC_Order_1-88.doc |
| Date of entry/update: | | 08 August 2005 |
|
| Title: | | State Protection Law (The Law to Safeguard the State Against the Dangers of Those Desiring to Cause Subversive Acts) - Burmese |
| Date of publication: | | 05 February 1975 |
| Description/subject: | | Pyithu Hluttaw Law No. 3, 1975. "The People’s Assembly enacts the following Law in order
to prevent the infringement of the sovereignty and security of the Union of Burma against any
threat to the peace of the people, and against the threat of those desiring to cause subversive
acts causing the destruction of the country, without impeding citizens’ fundamental rights..." |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Pyithu Hluttaw |
| Format/size: | | pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 2001 |
|
| Title: | | THE PUBLIC ORDER (PRESERVATION) ACT [BURMA ACT XVI, 1947] (3rd April, 1947) |
| Date of publication: | | 03 April 1947 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Burma Code, Vol. II, Government of the Union of Burma via Burma Lawyers Council |
| Format/size: | | html, pdf (97K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.burmalibrary.org/docs12/Public_Order_Preservation_Act_(1947).pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 11 October 2011 |
|
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Opinion and expression
-
Bills, laws, decrees, bylaws and regulations related to opinion and expression (commentary)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Myanmar draft printer’s law to reverse media freedom gains |
| Date of publication: | | 11 March 2013 |
| Description/subject: | | "The media community in Myanmar, international groups and observers are abuzz with criticism towards and protest against the Ministry of Information’s (MOI) draft Printers and Publishing Enterprise Law (PPEL) submitted to Parliament recently. And rightfully so.
The PPEL bill ensures government's continued grip on the print media through licensing controls, which represent a renewal of the old 1962 Printers and Publications Act (PPA). Furthermore, the MOI’s lack of transparency surrounding the process points to a regime still unwilling to embrace media freedom in its fullest sense.
The bill is being introduced by the MOI for the ostensibly benign purpose of establishing rules for conducting such businesses. Apart from the PPEL, bills to regulate the broadcast and online media are also on the agenda of the government..."...Commentary includes Burmese text |
| Language: | | English, Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Southeast Asian Press Alliance (SEAPA) |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 26 March 2013 |
|
| Title: | | Myanmar: Press bill falls far short of international law and would leave press open to abuse (English and Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 27 February 2013 |
| Description/subject: | | "Despite promises of reform, a new press bill to be presented in parliament retains a vagueness that will leave the print media open to abuse from the government and other powerful actors.
"The draft Press Law Bill (2013) says that the media should become “a fourth pillar” of democracy “watching and guiding the other three”. The media will not however become a fourth pillar under this draft because it undermines their role and overly restricts their work...The bill has both positive and negative aspects. On the positive side, it repeals draconian laws and replaces them with provisions that proclaim human rights. On the negative side it falls substantially below international freedom of expression standards..." |
| Language: | | English, Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | Article 19 |
| Format/size: | | html (Commentary, English and Burmese), pdf (3.35-draft bill) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.article19.org/resources.php/resource/3626/my/%E1%80%BB%E1%80%99%E1%80%94%E1%80%B9%E1%80%... |
| Date of entry/update: | | 27 February 2013 |
|
| Title: | | Myanmar: The Decree on the Right to Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Procession 2012 - Legal Analysis (English and Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 20 September 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | Executive Summary and Recommendations: In July 2012, "ARTICLE 19 analysed the Decree on the Right to Peaceful Assembly and
Peaceful Procession of Myanmar, adopted by the Government of the Republic of the Union of
Myanmar on 5 July 2012.
The provisions of the Decree were examined for their compliance with international standards
on human rights. Myanmar has neither signed nor ratified the International Covenant on Civil
and Political Rights or other principal human rights treaties. Nevertheless, ARTICLE 19
suggests that guarantees to the right to freedom of expression and freedom of assembly, as
provided by Article 364 of the Constitution of Myanmar, allow a wide scope for interpretation
and that international standards regarding these rights should provide guidance to such an
interpretation.
In the analysis, ARTICLE 19 appreciates the Decree’s recognition of the state duty to protect
assembly participants. However, the requirement for permission to hold an assembly, the
grounds for denying permission, the lack of a court appeal and the absence of guarantees for
media access to assemblies are problematic and must be urgently revised. ARTICLE 19 also
calls on the Government of Myanmar – in consultation with civil society - to review other
legislative measures in light of international standards and to make them compliant with
these standards.
Recommendations
ARTICLE 19 calls on the Government of Myanmar:
• To sign and ratify the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights;
• To invite the UN special rapporteur on freedom of peaceful assembly and association
and the special rapporteur on freedom of opinion and expression to visit Myanmar;
• To ensure that the right to peaceful assembly and the right to freedom of expression
are safeguarded in line with international standards;
• To revise the Decree on the Right to Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Procession in
accordance with international standards on freedom of expression and freedom of
assembly, as recommended by ARTICLE 19;
• To initiate public discussion about the current legal framework on peaceful assemblies
and engage in consultation with civil society representatives on how to improve the
relevant legislation.
ARTICLE 19 calls on civil society in Myanmar:
• To engage in public debates and consultation with the government on how to improve
the domestic legislation on peaceful assembly;
• To form coalitions between civil society organisations and launch public education
campaigns on the right to peaceful assembly and the right to freedom of expression;
• To draft legislative proposals and advocate for specific changes in domestic legislation
aiming at the improvement of the protection of the right to peaceful assembly and the
right to freedom of expression;
• To seek partnerships with international organisations in a specific mandate on the
right to freedom of expression and the right to peaceful assembly." |
| Language: | | English, Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | Article 19 |
| Format/size: | | pdf (346K-English; 6.54MB-Burmese)) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.article19.org/data/files/medialibrary/3440/12-09-19-LA-Myanmar-BU.pdf
http://www.article19.org/resources.php/resource/3440/en/myanmar:-law-on-assembly-and-procession-inc... |
| Date of entry/update: | | 24 September 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Analysis of the Guarantees of Freedom of Expression in the 2008 Constitution of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar August 2012 |
| Date of publication: | | August 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | "When it was first introduced in 2008, the new Constitution of the Republic of the Union
of Myanmar was deemed to be a great improvement over the previous constitution. An
important part of this was the more robust guarantees it included for human rights. And
an important part of the latter was its relatively strong guarantees for freedom of
expression.
At the same time, the guarantees for freedom of expression in the 2008 Constitution do
not fully meet international standards in this area. This Analysis outlines the key
attributes of international standards, and indicate how the guarantees of freedom of
expression in the 2008 Constitution fail to meet these standards..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Centre for Law and Democracy (CLD); International Media Support (IMS) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (456K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 September 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Burma: Role of freedom of expression in democratisation processes |
| Date of publication: | | 29 March 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | 29 Mar 2012
Presentation to the Conference on Media Development in Myanmar, Organised by the Ministry of Information and UNESCO Rangoon, Myanmar, March 19-20, 2012.....CONCLUSION:
"...At the outset I emphasised that law is the essential business of government and noted the critical part to be played by the tripartite system of law making, law enacting and law protection. The legislators, executive and judiciary fulfil critical functions without which the rule of law fails and the fabric of sustainable society falls.
To set solid foundations for sustainable society, there are important laws, which should be drafted according to international standard and enacted accordingly. Critical are those that protect and uphold the rights to freedoms of expression, assembly and information and freedom of the press. They are a stable society’s backbone and shoulder blades.
Robust legal frameworks for freedoms of expression, information and the media are critical and irrevocable human rights in their own right. They are also powerful social goods in that they enable government to fulfil its tri-partite functions, to maintain its responsibilities to the law and to uphold the best practices of good governance. The transparency provided by freedom of information, the scrutiny provided by freedom of the press and the critique provided by freedom of expression create the environment in which high quality accountability government can flourish and deepen.
In other words if law is the skeletal framework on which stands and falls the strength and sustainability of a society, then the rights to freedoms of expression, information and the press is also a government’s personal trainer! A challenge, a goal, an encouragement and a motivator: without which no government can perform to the highest standard or achieve the best possible for those who give governments its raison d’etre: the people." |
| Author/creator: | | Agnes Callamard |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Article 19 |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 01 April 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Acts of Oppression: Censorship and the law in Burma |
| Date of publication: | | March 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | "Freedom of expression has been one of the prime casualties of prolonged military rule in Burma. Since the army first began
controlling the levers of state power in 1962, numerous publications have been censored or banned; hundreds of journalists,
writers, poets, playwrights and cartoonists, as well as pro-democracy activists have been arrested, detained or sentenced to long
prison terms, tortured, ill-treated or otherwise harassed, even killed, and tens of thousands of ordinary people have been punished
simply for peacefully expressing their views. The impact has been immense and crippling, reverberating through all aspects of life
in Burma and blighting the country?s social, cultural and, particularly, economic development. Years of strong-arm military
dictatorship and misrule, buttressed by one of the world?s severest censorship regimes and systematic abuse of human rights, have
driven thousands of Burma?s citizens to seek refuge abroad and marked out Burma as a pariah within the international community
of nation states..."
Contents: I) INTRODUCTION; II) POLITICAL AND CONSTITUTIONAL BACKGROUND; III) FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION: AN HISTORICAL OVERVIEW; IV) THE STATE OF THE RULE OF LAW; V) FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION AND ITS PROTECTION IN LAW: (a) The constitutional position; (b) Specific legislative measures: a detailed analysis: 1 The Printers and Publishers Registration Law 1962; 2 Emergency Provisions Act 1950; 3 State Protection Law 1975; 4 The Television and Video Law; 5 The Motion Picture Law; 6 The Computer Science Development Law; 7 The Official Secrets Act 1923; 8 Other Laws. VI) EXTRA-LEGAL DENIAL OF FREE SPEECH.
VII) CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS. |
| Author/creator: | | Venkat Iyer |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Article 19 (ISBN 1 902598 04 0) |
| Format/size: | | html (102K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.article19.org/pdfs/publications/burma-acts-of-oppression.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Burma Beyond the Law |
| Date of publication: | | August 1996 |
| Description/subject: | | "...Decades of military rule in Burma have prevented the rule of law from taking deep
root during the country's post-colonial history. The concept of the rule of law suffered
a particularly severe blow with the accession to power of the SLORC in the coup
d'etat of 18 September 1988. Most of the laws passed since that date reveal a
persistent disregard for internationally-recognized human rights norms. What is more,
the few vestiges of constitutionalism and legality that remained at the time of the coup
have been all but extinguished by this military government whose legitimacy to
govern is highly questionable both under Burmese domestic law and international law...An indication of its lack of good faith is provided by the manner in which it
has sought to force through proposals for constitutional reform which are designed to
perpetuate military rule under the guise of democratic government. The National
Convention, which it created without any mandate or consultation and whose working
methods are so patently unfair and lacking in either transparency or legitimacy, bodes
ill for the future of democracy and freedom in Burma.
Urgent action is required to establish the rule of law, human rights and
governmental accountability in Burma. Many of these recommendations have been
made by the UN General Assembly and the Commission on Human Rights in
successive resolutions on Burma since 1990..."
FOREWORD...
INTRODUCTION...
1 INACCESSIBILITY AND VAGUENESS OF LAWS...
2 CONSTITUTIONAL BACKGROUND...
3 THE LEGITIMACY OF THE COUP D'ETAT OF 18 SEPTEMBER 1988...
4 THE SLORC'S REFUSAL TO TRANSFER POWER:
4.1 The Position Under International Law;
4.2 The Position Under Burmese Domestic Law...
5 THE MARTIAL LAW MEASURES AND THEIR COMPATIBILITY WITH
INTERNATIONAL LAW:
5.1 Some General Considerations;
5.2 The Martial Law Measures: A Detailed Analysis;
5.2.1 The Right to Life;
5.2.2 Arbitrary Arrest and Detention;
5.2.3 Cruel and Inhuman Detention Conditions;
5.2.4 Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment;
5.2.5 Fair Trial Concerns;
5.2.6 Freedom of Expression;
5.2.7 Forced Relocations;
5.2.8 Forced Labour and Forced Portering;
5.2.9 Citizenship Rights;
5.2.10 Freedom of Movement, Assembly and Association;
5.2.11 Right to Democratic Participation;
5.2.12 Human Rights Violations against Children and Women;
5.3 Violations of International Humanitarian Law...
6 CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENTS: THE NATIONAL CONVENTION...
7 THE SLORC'S SENSITIVITY TO INTERNATIONAL CRITICISM...
8 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS. |
| Author/creator: | | K S Venkateswaran |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Article 19 |
| Format/size: | | pdf (359K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.article19.org/pdfs/publications/burma-beyond-law.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 11 June 2005 |
|
| Title: | | Censorship Prevails: Political Deadlock and Economic Transition in Burma |
| Date of publication: | | March 1995 |
| Description/subject: | | "Burma remains one of the most heavily censored states in the world. The main instrument of day-to-day censorship continues to
be the Printers and Publishers Registration Law of 1962. Introduced shortly after the military coup which brought Gen. Ne Win
and his newly-formed BSPP to power, the law has been repeatedly expanded in scope and severity over the years, including by
the present SLORC government.
Currently, all books, magazines, periodicals, songs and films must be submitted under this law to the Press Scrutiny Board (PSB)
prior to being printed or, in some cases, distributed. Books, for example, must be submitted to the PSB before printing and again
afterwards to check that no changes have been made, whereas magazines, which must be legally registered, are required to take
the more risky method of submitting copies for censorship only after they have been printed. Under the 1985 Video Law, all
videos must also be submitted to the Video Censorship Board (which comes under the Film Censorship Board) for
pre-publication scrutiny, reflecting the authorities' nervousness about the rapid proliferation of this form of expression..."
Contents: 1 Overview of Recent Events; 2 Continuing Mechanisms of Censorship; 3 New Developments in the State Media; 4 Alternative Expression and the Private Sector Media; 4.1 Business Publications; 4.2 Film and Video; 4.3 Literary Rallies; 5 The SLORC's Political Reform Process; 6 Academic Freedom and Education; 7 Constraints on Freedom of Association and Movement; 8 Ethnic Minority Languages and Literature; 9 Foreign Media and Non-Governmental Organizations; 10 Conclusion and Recommendations.
Appendix: Writers and Political Activists Imprisoned for the Peaceful Expression of Their Opinions. |
| Author/creator: | | Martin Smith |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Article 19 (ISBN 1 870798 77 5) |
| Format/size: | | html (121K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.article19.org/pdfs/publications/burma-censorship-prevails.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | State of Fear: Censorship in Burma (Myanmar) |
| Date of publication: | | December 1991 |
| Description/subject: | | "...T h i s report documents the extent and mechanisms of censorship
in Burma and the many restrictions on political, cultural,
religious and academic freedoms, both under the former BSPP
government and its successor, the SLORC, which assumed
power in September 1988. Since then, writers and journalists
have continued to be detained, harassed and dismissed from
their posts. Publications have been banned and, using new
martial law restrictions, press censorship has been further tightened.
Foreign journalists have been banned and the SLORC has
launched frequent attacks on foreign news organizations and
journalists..." 3 The Background to Crisis:
3.1 Economic and Social Collapse;
3.2 Ethnic Strife and Civil War;
3.3 Narcotics and AIDS;
3.4 Ecology;
3.5 Refugees;
3.6 The Issue of Human Rights...
4 Development of the Press in Burma:
4.1 The Colonial Era;
4.2 The Parliamentary Era...
5 The Legacy of the Burma Socialist Programme
Party (BSPP):
5.1 The Ne Win Period;
5.2 The Media Under Ne Win;
5.3 The 1974 Constitution;
5.4 The Publishing Registration Law;
5.5 Alternative Expression;
5.6 Ethnic Minorities and Burmanization;
5.7 Religious Minorities;
5.8 Literacy...
6 The Press in the 1988 Democracy Summer:
7 The State Law and Order Restoration Council
(SLORC);
7.1 SLORC Claims of Legitimacy;
7.2 SLORC's Use of the Law;
7.3 SLORC Actions in the pre-Election Period;
7.4 Restrictions on Movement and Forced Relocations
of Civilians...
8 The 1990 General Election:
8.1 Arrests and Retrospective Laws in the
post-Election Period;
8.2 Continuing Use of Press Laws to Stifle Freedom of
Expression;
8.3 Ill-Treatment and Death in Custody of Poltical Prisoners...
9 Cultural and Political Expression Under the SLORC:
9.1 Newspapers;
9.2 SLORC's Cultural Revolution;
9.3 Music and Films;
9.4 Journals, Books and Magazines;
9.5 Education;
9.6 Restrictions on Public Servants and Political Parties;
9.7 Religious Freedom;
9.8 Ethnic Minorities;
9.9 The Insurgent Press...
10 The SLORC and the International Community:
10.1 The Foreign Press;
10.2 The International Response;
10.3 The Reply from the SLORC;
10.4 The Role of the United Nations...
11 Summary of the SLORC Period and Prospects
for the Future...
12 Conclusions and Recommendations...
Appendix 1: Journalists,Writers and Intellectuals
in Detention;
Appendix 2: Country Statistics...
Appendix 3: Extracts from "What has become of us?"
by Min Lu...
Appendix 4: SLORC Questionnaire to Public Servants,
1 April 1991...
Appendix 5: SLORC Questionnaire to Political Parties, 5 August 1991...
Appendix 6: Multilateral and Bilaterall Aid to Burma...
Appendix 7: Foreign Company Investments and Trade
in Burma...
Select Bibliography.
ISBN 1 870798 71 6 |
| Author/creator: | | Martin Smith |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Article 19 |
| Format/size: | | pdf (451K - without covers; 720K - with covers) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs3/State-of-Fear-ocr.pdf (with covers) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 11 June 2005 |
|
-
Religion
-
Laws and decrees related to religion (commentary)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Law and Religion in Burma |
| Date of publication: | | April 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | "Burma was annexed by the British through the three wars in 1824-1826, 1852-1853 and 1885-1886. When colonial rule started, it
was British policy (as in other British colonies) not to interfere with local religion. The British did not want to create further
confrontations. If they had not adopted this policy, there would have been more uprisings and more discontent among the people.
And that would have endangered the position of the British. The policy reflected the experience of the colonial administrators in
the implementation of colonial rule in India in the 18th century...Although according to the regime there is religious freedom in Burma, the
reality is that there is religious discrimination. The junta is suppressing Muslims and Christians in order to disperse them, while it
pretends to promote Buddhism. Buddhism is promoted by the military at the expense of other religions to increase SPDC?s
nationalism. The generals systematically use propaganda in their attempts to falsely convince the Buddhists that the military regime
is representing their interests.49 Such is the state of Law and Religion in Burma today. Under the cloak of law, Buddhists are
suppressed and the Sangha curtailed, as these are among the most active in the struggle for the restoration of democracy and
human rights." |
| Author/creator: | | Peter Gutter |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 8 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original (and authoritative) version of this article may be found in http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal%20Issues%20on%20Burma%20Journal%208.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
-
Judiciary
-
Laws and decrees relating to the judiciary (commentaries)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Myanmar: Justice on Trial |
| Date of publication: | | 30 July 2003 |
| Description/subject: | | "On 22 May 2003 Amnesty International submitted a 29-page memorandum to the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC, Myanmar's military government), in order to provide the SPDC with the opportunity to comment on and to clarify various issues about the administration of justice raised in the document. The Memorandum reflected the organization's findings during its first visit to the country from 30 January to 8 February 2003, and drew on its institutional knowledge and expertise about both international human rights standards and human rights in Myanmar. The text of the original Memorandum has now been updated to reflect comments from the SPDC, which were received by Amnesty International on 9 July 2003. The updated Memorandum forms the text of this document, along with a summary of the current human rights situation in Myanmar... Since the submission of the Memorandum to the SPDC on 22 May, political tensions escalated sharply during a National League for Democracy (NLD) tour of Upper Myanmar, culminating in a violent attack on NLD leaders on 30 May. What follows below is a summary of both the attack and the subsequent deterioration in the human rights situation in Myanmar. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, NLD General Secretary, U Tin Oo, NLD Vice Chairman, and other NLD members had been travelling in Upper Myanmar, with the prior permission of the SPDC, during the month of May. As larger and larger crowds gathered to see the NLD leaders, tension increased between the NLD and the Union Solidarity Development Association (USDA), an organization established, organized, and supported by the SPDC.(1) NLD members and supporters were reportedly harassed, intimidated, and threatened by USDA members in various locations as they attempted to conduct their legitimate political party activities, including giving speeches and opening local NLD offices. However the SPDC reportedly did very little to diffuse tensions between the USDA and the NLD. While Amnesty International acknowledges the universal right to peacefully assemble and conduct protest demonstrations, the actions of the USDA went beyond such non-violent expressions of dissent. .." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Amnesty International |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/ASA16/019/2003
http://www.amnestyusa.org/document.php?id=E8E42C86A0BF5F7980256D72004704AB&lang=e |
| Date of entry/update: | | 19 November 2010 |
|
-
Laws and decrees relating to the judiciary (texts)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | The Law Amending the Attorney General Law, 2001 (SPDC Law No. 3/2003) |
| Date of publication: | | 02 February 2003 |
| Description/subject: | | The Union of Myanmar...
The State Peace and Development Council...
The Law Amending the Attorney General Law, 2001
(The State Peace and Development Council Law No. 3/2003)
The 1st Waxing Day of Tabodwe, 1364 ME (2nd February 2003) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | SPDC via BLC |
| Format/size: | | pdf (55K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 16 July 2005 |
|
| Title: | | Attorney General Law, 2001 |
| Date of publication: | | 27 February 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | SPDC Law 1/2001 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Peace and Development Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (65K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | The Courts Manual (4th Edition, 1999) |
| Date of publication: | | 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | TABLE OF CONTENTS (157K)...
PART I - LEGAL PRACTIONERS AND PETITION WRITERS (1.8MB)...
PART II - INSTRUCTIONS AND ORDERS RELATING TO BOTH CIVIL AND CRIMINAL PROCEDURE (2.9MB)...
PART III - CIVIL PROCEDURE (4MB)...
PART IV - CRIMINAL PROCEDURE (6.8MB)...
APPENDICES (1.3MB)...
THE COURTS MANUAL - ENGLISH (17MB) Full text...
THE COURTS MANUAL – ENGLISH AND BURMESE (26MB) Full text |
| Language: | | English, Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | Myanmar Supreme Court |
| Format/size: | | pdf (63K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 15 December 2012 |
|
| Title: | | The Contempt of Courts Act |
| Date of publication: | | 01 May 1926 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Burma Code" Vol. I (Govt. of the Union of Burma) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (11K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 17 March 2009 |
|
| Title: | | The Code of Criminal Procedure |
| Date of publication: | | 01 July 1898 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma via Burma Lawyers' Council |
| Format/size: | | html, pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 24 June 2005 |
|
| Title: | | The Evidence Act |
| Date of publication: | | 1872 |
| Description/subject: | | Sections:
1. Application of Act....
2. * * * *...
3. Interpretation clause...
4. “May presume.”...
“ Shall presume. ”
“ Conclusive proof. *....."The
Evidence
Act
of
1872
sets
out
the
rules
of
evidence
in
Myanmar.
The
Evidence
Act
establishes
rules
similar
in
form
and
content
to
those
in
other
former
British
colonies
in
the
region
and
in
Britain
today.
6
The
Evidence
Act
is
applicable
to
all
judicial
proceedings
before
any
court
7
and
to
all
judges
or
other
persons
legally
authorized
to
hear
evidence.
8
However,
the
Evidence
Act
does
not
apply
to
arbitrations..." (Alec Christie) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Myanmar via Myanmar Code, Vol. XII |
| Format/size: | | pdf (1.6MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 30 April 2013 |
|
| Title: | | The Penal Code |
| Date of publication: | | 01 May 1861 |
| Description/subject: | | Table of contents followed by all 511 articles, in one big document...
(INDIA ACT XLV. 1860) (1st May. 1861)
The pdf version is based on the BLC version. A spell-check was run on the BLC version and checked against a hard-copy version of the "Myanmar Code". The hard-copy version was taken as authoritative and the text amended accordingly. Some obvious mistakes exist in the hard-copy original. These are left as-is, followed by "[sic. "xxxx" is presumably intended"]". The BLC version does not contain all the footnotes which exist in the hard-copy version. These will be added in a Corr.2 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of Burma via Burma Lawyers' Council via Online Burma/Myanmar Library |
| Format/size: | | (pdf (785K); html (1.8MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 16 March 2006 |
|
-
Civil and administrative law
-
Land, property and planning
-
Laws, decrees and constitutional provisions related to land, property and planning (texts)
Most of these texts were taken (with permission) from the Displacement Solutions Book: "HOUSING, LAND AND PROPERTY RIGHTS IN BURMA: THE CURRENT LEGAL FRAMEWORK" http://www.displacementsolutions.org/files/documents/Burma_HLP_book.pdf
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Law Amending 1955 Government Housing (Expelling) Act - Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Law No. 16/2012 (Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 02 September 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | Adopted: 31, August 2012 ... ၁၉၅၅ခုႏွစ္၊ အစိုးရအိမ္ဥပစာ (ႏွင္ထုတ္ျခင္း) အက္ဥပေဒကို ျပင္ဆင္သည့္ ဥပေဒ (၂၀၁၂ ခုႏွစ္ ျပည္ေထာင္စု လႊတ္ေတာ္ ဥပေဒ အမွတ္ ၁၆။) ၁၃၇၄ ခုႏွစ္၊ ဝါေခါင္လဆန္း ၁၄ ရက္ (၂ဝ၁၂ ခုႏွစ္၊ ၾသဂုတ္လ ၃၁ ရက္) |
| Language: | | Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Mirror" ("Kyemon") ေၾကးမံု 2 September 2012 |
| Format/size: | | pdf (63K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 08 September 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Farmland Rules - Notification No 62/2012 (English) |
| Date of publication: | | 31 August 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | Notification No 62/2012 -
14 Waxing Wagaung 1374 ME
(31, August, 2012) -
Designating the Date of Coming into Force of Farm Land Law...The Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation promulgated the following rules by using the
power vested by the section-42, sub-section (a) of farm land law with the approval of
Pyidaungsu Government....
1. These rules shall be called farm land rules.
2. The words and expressions contained in these rules shall mean as contained
in Farm Land Law. And the following words shall mean as described..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | The Republic of the Union of Myanmar President Office |
| Format/size: | | pdf (159K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 14 January 2013 |
|
| Title: | | Vacant, Fallow and Virgin Lands Management Rules.- Notification No. 1/2012 (English) |
| Date of publication: | | 31 August 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | The Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation, exercising its given rights, and with the approval of
the Union Government, has issued the following rules in accordance with Section 34, Subsection
(a) of the Vacant, Fallow and Virgin Lands Management Law - 1. These rules shall be called the Vacant, Fallow and Virgin Lands Management Rules.
2. The terms and expressions used in these rules shall have the same meaning as used in the
Vacant, Fallow and Virgin Lands Management Law. In addition, the following expressions shall
have the meanings as stated below: |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | The Republic of the Union of Myanmar Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation (Unofficial Translation by UN-Habitat) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (295K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 14 January 2013 |
|
| Title: | | Farmland Act - Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Law No. 11/2012 / လယ္ယာေျမ ဥပေဒ (၂၀၁၂ ခုႏွစ္ မတ္လ ၃၀ ရက္) (Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 03 April 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | Adopted 30 March 2012...This law repeals: (a) The Land Nationalization Act of 1953; (b) The 1963 Tenancy Law; (c) The Law Safeguarding Peasant Rights, 1963. / ၂၀၁၂ ခုႏွစ္၊ ျပည္ေထာင္စု လႊတ္ေတာ္ ဥပေဒ အမွတ္ ၁၁။... ၁၃၇၃ ခုႏွစ္၊ တန္ခူးလဆန္း ၈ ရက္... (၂၀၁၂ ခုႏွစ္ မတ္လ ၃၀ ရက္)... ေအာက္ပါဥပေဒမ်ားကို ဤဥပေဒျဖင့္ ႐ုပ္သိမ္းလိုက္သည္-
(က) ၁၉၅၃ ခုႏွစ္၊ လယ္ယာေျမႏိုင္ငံပိုင္ျပဳလုပ္ေရးအက္ဥပေဒ၊
(ခ) ၁၉၆၃ ခုႏွစ္၊ သီးစားခ်ထားေရးဥပေဒ၊
(ဂ) ၁၉၆၃ ခုႏွစ္၊ ေတာင္သူလယ္သမား အခြင့္အေရးကာကြယ္သည့္
ဥပေဒ။ |
| Language: | | Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Mirror" ("Kyemon") ေၾကးမံု 3 April 2012 |
| Format/size: | | pdf (143K-"Mirror" version; 125K, Alternate URL)) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.burmalibrary.org/docs13/Farmland_Act%28bu%29.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 05 April 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Environment Conservation Law - Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Law No. 9/2012 (English and Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 01 April 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | Adopted 20 March 2012, published 1 April 2012....."The objectives of this Law are as follows:
(a) to enable to implement the Myanmar National Environmental Policy;
(b) to enable to lay down the basic principles and give guidance for systematic
integration of the matters of environmental conservation in the sustainable
development process;
(c) to enable to emerge a healthy and clean environment and to enable to
conserve natural and cultural heritage for the benefit of present and future
generations;
(d) to reclaim ecosystems as may be possible which are starting to degenerate
and disappear;
(e) to enable to manage and implement for decrease and loss of natural
resources and for enabling the sustainable use beneficially;
(f) to enable to implement for promoting public awareness and cooperation in
educational programmes for dissemination of environmental perception;
(g) to enable to promote international, regional and bilateral cooperation in the
matters of environmental conservation;
(h) to enable to cooperate with Government departments, Government
organizations, international organizations, non-government organizations
and individuals in matters of environmental conservation..." |
| Language: | | English, Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Format/size: | | pdf (58K-English; 215K-Burmese) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.burmalibrary.org/docs13/Environment_Conservation_Act-bu.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 17 May 2013 |
|
| Title: | | Farmland Act - Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Law No. 11/2012 (English) |
| Date of publication: | | 30 March 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | Farmland Act
(Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Law No.ll of 2012)
Day of 8th Waxing of Tagu 1373 ME (30th March, 2012).....The translation has some notable shortcomings... |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar (GRUM) via UN Habitat |
| Format/size: | | pdf (36K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 14 May 2013 |
|
| Title: | | Ward and Village Administration Amending Act -Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Law No. 7/2012 (Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 30 March 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | Adopted 30 March 2012... ရပ္ကြက္ သို႔မဟုတ္ ေက်းရြာအုပ္စု အုပ္ခ်ဳပ္ေရးဥပေဒကို ျပင္ဆင္သည့္ ဥပေဒ...
(၂ဝ၁၂ ခုႏွစ္၊ ျပည္ေထာင္စုလႊတ္ေတာ္ဥပေဒအမွတ္ ၇။)...
၁၃၇၃ ခုႏွစ္၊ တန္ခူးလဆန္း ၆ ရက္...
(၂ဝ၁၂ ခုႏွစ္၊ မတ္လ ၂၈ ရက္)... |
| Language: | | Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | "Myanmar Alin" 30. 3. 2012 ျမန္မာ့အလင္းသတင္းစာ |
| Format/size: | | pdf (191K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.burmalibrary.org/docs13/Ward_and_Village_Administration_Amending_Act(bu).pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 29 April 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Ward or Village Administration Law - Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Law No. 1/2012 (English |
| Date of publication: | | 25 February 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | Date of adoption, 24 February 2012. Date of publication 25 February...We are not 100% sure if this English version is of the adopted law or if there were amendments. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Pyidaungsu Hluttaw |
| Format/size: | | pdf (602K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 16 May 2013 |
|
| Title: | | 2011 Farmland Bill |
| Date of publication: | | 20 September 2011 |
| Description/subject: | | The Draft land law |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Hluttaws |
| Format/size: | | pdf (34K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 10 January 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Burma HLP Initiative |
| Date of publication: | | November 2009 |
| Description/subject: | | "Since its establishment in 2006, Displacement Solutions has been active in exploring the housing, land and property rights situation in Burma. The Burma HLP Initiative aims to shed new light on the numerous HLP rights issues in Burma today by building capacity for enforcing these rights by citizens of the country. The Initiative works together with various groups within and outside Burma towards these ends.
The Initiative explores key questions such as:
* What are the characteristics and status of the legal regime in Burma as it relates to HLP rights issues?
* How effective is the current legal regime in promoting human rights standards relevant to HLP rights? What are the key issues facing the HLP rights regime in Burma?
* In what ways can the legal code more effectively address HLP rights in Burma, and how might it be reformed to avoid problems in the future transition process? This will draw on the many experiences of political transition since the end of the Cold War.
* How can the capacity of the Burmese democratic opposition be enhanced to structurally address the HLP legal environment in Burma today? How can expert capacity be strengthened to better prepare the broader democratic opposition to address the HLP challenges that will arise during and after political transition?..." THIS LINK CONTAINS A HYPERLINKED SET OF BURMESE HLP-RELATED LAWS |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Displacement Solutions |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 20 October 2010 |
|
| Title: | | HOUSING, LAND AND PROPERTY RIGHTS IN BURMA: THE CURRENT LEGAL FRAMEWORK |
| Date of publication: | | November 2009 |
| Description/subject: | | A compilation of all of the existing housing, land and property laws in Burma, plus commentary...
"The deplorable human rights record of Burma’s military junta has been a key focus of
international attention for many years. The military has ruled the country for half a century,
and has presided over a collapse of the economy and of social services. At the same time,
successive military regimes have perpetuated an almost feudal governance system – where
the population is seen as a resource at the disposal of the rulers – that is in many respects
unchanged since pre-colonial times.
A combination of deliberate abuse, a general climate of impunity, and out-dated and
ineffective social policies all contribute to a fundamental absence of basic human rights in
this country of 55 million people. To date, the bulk of attention has focused on important
questions of political prisoners, denial of basic freedoms, forced labour, forced displacement,
as well as the other abuses related to the army’s brutal counter-insurgency policies.
However, there are additional types of rights abuses that are not as frequently mentioned,
but that have a critical impact on the daily lives of millions of people across Burma. And
it is these – housing, land and property (HLP) rights – that form the contents of this
important new book.
This volume contains all of the existing housing, land and property laws in Burma, and
makes a vital contribution to understanding the impact that these legal structures have
on communities across the country. Being able to view the HLP legal code in its entirety
for the first time reveals more clearly than ever before that supporters of democratic and
governance reform within Burma need to better understand – and place greater emphasis
on – HLP issues than they have to date. Understanding how these issues are dealt with in
both law and practice will enable more creative thinking about Burma’s HLP future, in
order that the peoples of the country can most fully enjoy their legitimate housing, land
and property rights." |
| Author/creator: | | Scott Leckie and Ezekiel Simperingham (eds) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Displacement Solutions & The HLP Institute |
| Format/size: | | pdf (3.42MB) - 1255 pages |
| Date of entry/update: | | 30 December 2009 |
|
| Title: | | THE LAW AMENDING THE TRANSFER OF IMMOVEABLE PROPERTY RESTRICTION LAW (2005) |
| Date of publication: | | 13 January 2005 |
| Description/subject: | | (State Peace and Development Council Law No. 1/2005)
The 4th Waxing Day of Pyatho, 1366 M.E
(13th January, 2005) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Peace and Development Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (61K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | CITY OF YANGON DEVELOPMENT (AMENDMENT) LAW (1996) |
| Date of publication: | | 25 January 1996 |
| Description/subject: | | The State Law and Order Restoration Council Law No. 1/96 -
The 6th Waxing Day of Tabodwe, 1357 M.E.-
25 January 1996 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (62K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE CITY OF YANGON DEVELOPMENT (AMENDMENT) LAW (1995) |
| Date of publication: | | 04 May 1995 |
| Description/subject: | | The State Law and Order Restoration Council Law No. 5/95 -
The 6th Waxing of Kason, 1357 ME. -
4 May 1995 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (64K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE NARCOTIC DRUGS AND PSYCHOTROPIC SUBSTANCES LAW (1993) |
| Date of publication: | | 24 January 1993 |
| Description/subject: | | The State Law and Order Restoration Council -
The Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Law -
(The State Law and Order Restoration Council Law No.1/93) -
The 5th Waxing Day of Tabodwe, 1354 ME. -
27th January, 1993 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (96K); html |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Narcotic_Drugs_Act.htm |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE FOREST LAW (1992) |
| Date of publication: | | 03 November 1992 |
| Description/subject: | | The State Law and Order Restoration Council Law No. 8/92 -
The 9th Waning Day of Tazaungmon, 1354 M.E. -
3 November 1992 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (102K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE LAW FOR THE REPEAL OF LAWS (1992) |
| Date of publication: | | 19 February 1992 |
| Description/subject: | | The State Law and Order Restoration Council Law No. 1/92 -
The 1st Waning Day of Tabodwe, 1353 ME -
19 February 1992 -
"Whereas it is expedient to provide for the repeal of certain laws from among existing laws, which on
scrutiny have been found to be no longer in conformity with the changing circumstances, laws which have
not been in use for a very long time and laws for which there are no reasons for use in future, the State
Law and Order Restoration Council hereby enacts this Law..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (74K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | PROCEDURES CONFERRING THE RIGHT TO CULTIVATE LAND/ RIGHT TO UTILIZE LAND (1991) |
| Date of publication: | | 12 December 1991 |
| Description/subject: | | The Government of the Union of Myanmar -
The Central Committee for the Management of Culturable Land, Fallow Land and waste Land -
Notification No. 1/91 -
6th waxing Day of Nadaw, 1353 M.E -
(12th December, 1991) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (62K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE LAW AMENDING THE CITY OF YANGON MUNICIPAL ACT (1991) |
| Date of publication: | | 22 April 1991 |
| Description/subject: | | The State Law and Order Restoration Council Law No.8/91
The 10th Waxing Day of Kason, 1353 M.E.
22 April 1991 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (70K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | City of Yangon Development Law |
| Date of publication: | | 14 May 1990 |
| Description/subject: | | The State Law and Order Restoration Council ...The City of Yangon Development Law (The State Law and Order Restoration Council Law No. 11/90) The 6th Waning Day of Kason, 1352 M.E. (14th May, 1990). The State Law and Order Restoration Council hereby enacts the following... |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | The State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC Law No.11/90) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (19K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE LAW AMENDING THE ELECTRICITY LAW (1990) |
| Date of publication: | | 07 March 1990 |
| Description/subject: | | The State Law and Order Restoration council Law No. 3/90...
The 12th Waxing Day of Tabaung, 1351 M.E....
7 March 1990 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (63K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | PROCEDURES RELATING TO THE UNION OF MYANMAR FOREIGN INVESTMENT LAW (1988) |
| Date of publication: | | 07 December 1988 |
| Description/subject: | | THE GOVERNMENT OF THE UNION OF MYANMAR NOTIFICATION NO.11/88
The 14th waning day of Tazaungmon, I350 B.E. (7th December, 1988) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (89K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE UNION OF MYANMAR FOREIGN INVESTMENT LAW (1988) |
| Date of publication: | | 30 November 1988 |
| Description/subject: | | The 7th waning day of Tazaungmon, 1350 B.E.
(30th November, 1988) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (90K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | The 1963 Tenancy Law & the 1965 Amendment (English and Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 1965 |
| Description/subject: | | Renting Land for Cultivation Law
The Union of Burma Revolutionary Council Law 8, 1963
[Reprint 1963]....THE TENANCY LAW AMENDING LAW, 1965.
(THE UNION OF BURMA REVOLUTIONARY COUNCIL LAW NO. 2 OF 1965) |
| Language: | | English, Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Union of Burma Revolutionary Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (1MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE LAW SAFEGUARDING PEASANT RIGHTS, 1963. |
| Date of publication: | | 1963 |
| Description/subject: | | (THE UNION OF BURMA REVOLUTIONARY COUNCIL LAW NO. 9 OF 1963) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Union of Burma Revolutionary Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (50K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE CITY OF YANGON MUNICIPAL (AMENDMENT) ACT (1961) |
| Date of publication: | | 17 March 1961 |
| Description/subject: | | ACT NO. 1 OF 1961 THE 17th MARCH 1961 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (49K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | 1960 Urban Rent Control Act (1960, Act No.8) |
| Date of publication: | | 1960 |
| Description/subject: | | This text also includes the 1960 Urban Rent Control (Amendment) Act (1960 Act Number 20)and the 1961 Urban Rent Control (Amendment) Act (1961 Act number 31) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (98K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | URBAN RENT CONTROL (AMENDMENT) ACT (1960) |
| Date of publication: | | 1960 |
| Description/subject: | | Act No. 20, 1960 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (101K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE CITY OF YANGON MUNICIPAL (AMENDMENT) ACT (1958) |
| Date of publication: | | 24 March 1958 |
| Description/subject: | | Act No. XVII OF 1958 The 24th March 1958 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (66K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | Land Nationalization Act of 1953 (Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 26 October 1953 |
| Description/subject: | | Replaced the Land Nationalization Act of 1948 |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (873K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 26 March 2011 |
|
| Title: | | The Land Nationalization Act of 1953 (English) |
| Date of publication: | | 26 October 1953 |
| Description/subject: | | Appended with ACT NO. 75 of 1953 (October 26, 1953), Amendment ACT NO. 22 of 1954
(March 30, 1954), Amendment ACT NO. 54 of 1955 (October 19, 1955), Amendment ACT NO.
49 of 1957 (October 16, 1957). |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (188K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | Land Nationalization Act of 1948 |
| Date of publication: | | 1948 |
| Description/subject: | | No longer in force -- Replaced by the Land Nationalization Act of 1953 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (94K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 14 August 2009 |
|
| Title: | | THE PUBLIC PROPERTY PROTECTION ACT (1947) |
| Date of publication: | | 24 December 1947 |
| Description/subject: | | BURMA ACT LXXXIII, 1947] (24th December 1947) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (91K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE REQUISITIONING (EMERGENCY PROVISIONS) ACT (1947) |
| Date of publication: | | 28 July 1947 |
| Description/subject: | | [BURMA ACT XXXVIII, 1947] (28th July, 1947).....
"WHEREAS it is expedient to make provisions for requisitioning lands and premises in certain
respects;
* * * *
It is hereby enacted as follows : — ..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (85K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE CUSTODIAN OF MOVABLE PROPERTY ACT (1945) |
| Date of publication: | | 01 November 1945 |
| Description/subject: | | BURMA Act X, 1945
1st November, 1945.....
"WHEREAS it is expedient to make legislative provision for the recovery and return to the
owners of movable property of which the owners have been deprived of possession by
circumstances arising out of the war and for the appointment of Custodians of such property ;
* * * *
It is hereby enacted as follows: -..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (64K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | The Hindu Gains of Learning Act (1930) |
| Date of publication: | | 25 July 1930 |
| Description/subject: | | India Act XXX, 1930
25th July, 1930.....
"Whereas it is expedient to remove doubt, and to provide an uniform rule, as to the rights of a
member of a Hindu undivided family in property acquiredby him by means of his learning ;
It is hereby enacted as follow:-..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (51K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | The Hindu Law of Inheritance Amendment Act (1929) |
| Date of publication: | | 21 February 1929 |
| Description/subject: | | INDIA Act II, 1929
21st February, 1929...
"Whereas it is expedient to alter the order in which certain heirs of a Hindu male dying intestate
are entitled to succeed to his estate ; It is hereby enacted as follows:-..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (47K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE HINDU INHERITANCE (REMOVAL OF DISABILITIES) ACT (1928) |
| Date of publication: | | 20 September 1928 |
| Description/subject: | | India Act XII 1928
20th September, 1928...
"Whereas it is expedient to amend the Hindu Law relating to exclusion from inheritance of certain
classes of heirs, and to remove certain doubts;
It is hereby enacted as follows:-..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (45K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE WATER POWER ACT (1927) |
| Date of publication: | | 29 October 1927 |
| Description/subject: | | BURMA ACT XI, 1927 29th October, 1927 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (58K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE CANTONMENTS (HOUSE ACCOMMODATION) ACT (1923) |
| Date of publication: | | 01 April 1923 |
| Description/subject: | | INDIA ACT VI 1923
1st April 1923 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (77K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE CITY OF RANGOON MUNICIPAL ACT (1922) |
| Date of publication: | | 22 August 1922 |
| Description/subject: | | [Burma Act VI, 1922]
[1 August, 1922]....."...1. This Act extends to the City of Rangoon [See clause (vii) of section 3 and Schedule VI] only:
Provided that the President of the Union may, by notification, extend this Act or any part to any
other local area in the Union of Burma...." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (315K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE RANGOON DEVELOPMENT TRUST ACT (1921) |
| Date of publication: | | 01 February 1921 |
| Description/subject: | | Burma Act V, 1920
1st February, 1921.....1. "...This Act shall extend to the City of Rangoon and to such areas in the neighbourhood thereof
as the President of the Union may, by notification, specify in this behalf:..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (161K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE HINDU DISPOSITION OF PROPERTY ACT (1916) |
| Date of publication: | | 28 September 1916 |
| Description/subject: | | India Act XV 1916 28th September 1916....Whereas it is expedient to remove certain existing disabilities in respect of the power of
disposition of property by Hindus for the benefit of persons not in existence at the date of such
disposition ;
It is hereby enacted as follows: |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (49K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE VILLAGE ACT (1907) |
| Date of publication: | | 01 January 1908 |
| Description/subject: | | BURMA ACT VI 1907 1st JANUARY 1908.....PRELIMINARY...DUTIES AND POWERS OF VILLAGE COMMITTEES, HEADMEN AND RURAL
POLICEMAN...GENERAL DUTIES OF VILLAGERS...PROVISIONS RESPECTING RESIDENCE IN VILLAGE=TRACTS AND ERECTION OF
HOUSES...PAWN SHOPS...PWES...SUPPLEMENTAL PROVISIONS |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (90K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://displacementsolutions.org/?page_id=197 http://displacementsolutions.org/?p=20 |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE BURMA LAWS ACT (1898) |
| Date of publication: | | 04 November 1898 |
| Description/subject: | | India Act XIII, 1898 4th November, 1898...."...5. The President of the Union may, for administrative including revenue purposes,-
(q) divide Upper Burma into divisions and each of these divisions into districts, and vary the
limits of those divisions and districts, and
(b) divide each of those districts into sub-divisions, each of those sub-divisions into townships
and each of those townships into circles, and vary the limits of these sub-divisions, townships
and circles.
6. For the purpose of facilitating the application of any enactment for the time being in force in
any part of Upper Burma, any Court may construe the enactment with such alterations, not
affecting the substance, as may be necessary or proper to adapt it to the matter before the Court..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of India |
| Format/size: | | pdf (49K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://displacementsolutions.org/?page_id=197 http://displacementsolutions.org/?p=20 |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE PARTITION ACT (1893) |
| Date of publication: | | 09 March 1893 |
| Description/subject: | | INDIA Act IV, 1893 9th March, 1893....."...Whenever in any suit for partition in which, if instituted prior to the commencement of this
Act, a decree for partition might have been made, it appears to the Court that, by reason of the
nature of the property to which the suit relates, or of the number of the shareholders therein or of
any other special circumstance, a division of the property cannot reasonably or conveniently be
made, and that a sale of the property and distribution of the proceeds would be more beneficial
for all the shareholders, the Court may, if it thinks tit, on the request of any of such shareholders
interested individually or collectively to the extent of one moiety or upwards, direct a sale of the
property and a distribution of the proceeds..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of India |
| Format/size: | | pdf (51K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE KAZIS ACT (1880) |
| Date of publication: | | 09 July 1880 |
| Description/subject: | | INDIA ACT XII, 1880.....
"Whereas by the preamble to Act No. XI of 18642 it was (among other things) declared that it
was inexpedient that the appointment of the Kazi-ul- Kuzaat, or of City, Town or Pargana Kazis,
should be made by the Government, and by the same Act the enactments relating to the
appointment by the Government- of the said officers were repealed ; and
Whereas by the usage of the Muhammadan community [ * * * * ] the presence of Kazis
appointed by the Government is required at the celebration of marriages and the performance of
certain other rites and ceremonies, and it is therefore expedient that the Government should again
be empowered A to appoint persons to the office of Kazi; It is hereby enacted as follows:..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of India |
| Format/size: | | pdf (59K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://displacementsolutions.org/?page_id=197 http://displacementsolutions.org/?p=20 |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | LAND AND REVENUE ACT (1879) |
| Date of publication: | | 01 February 1879 |
| Description/subject: | | INDIA Act II 1876..... "WHEREAS it is expedient to declare the law relating to the acquisition by private
persons of rights in land in the Union of Burma ;
And whereas it is expedient also to consolidate and' amend the law relating to the
assessment and collection of land-revenue, capitation-tax and certain other taxes ;
It is hereby enacted as follows :--..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of India |
| Format/size: | | pdf (123K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://displacementsolutions.org/?page_id=197 http://displacementsolutions.org/?p=20 |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE MARRIED WOMEN’S PROPERTY ACT (1874) |
| Date of publication: | | 24 February 1874 |
| Description/subject: | | INDIA Act III, 1874....."Whereas it is expedient to make such provision as hereinafter appears for the enjoyment of
wages and earnings by women married before the first day of January, 1866, and for insurances
on lives by persons married before or after that day:
And whereas by the Indian Succession Act, 1865, section 4,1 it is enacted that no person shall by
marriage acquire any interest in the property of the person whom he or she marries, nor become
incapable of doing any act in respect of his or her own property, which he or she could have
done, if unmarried : ·
And whereas by force of the said Act all women to whose marriages it applies are absolute
owners of all property vested in, or acquired by, them, and their husbands do not by their
marriage acquire any interest in such property, but the said Act does not protect such husbands
from liabilities on account of the debts of their wives contracted before marriage, and does not
expressly provide for the enforcement of claims by or against such wives :
It is hereby enacted as follows : -,,," |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of India |
| Format/size: | | pdf (61K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://displacementsolutions.org/?page_id=197 http://displacementsolutions.org/?p=20 |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE HINDU WIDOWS’ REMARRIAGE ACT (1856) |
| Date of publication: | | 25 July 1856 |
| Description/subject: | | INDIA Act XV, 1856....."Whereas it is known that by the law as administered in the civil Courts, Hindu widows with
certain exceptions are held to be, by reason of their having been once married, incapable of
contracting a second valid marriage, and the offspring of such widows by any second marriage
are held to be illegitimate and incapable of inheriting property;..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of India |
| Format/size: | | pdf (53K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://displacementsolutions.org/?page_id=197 http://displacementsolutions.org/?p=20 |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE CASTE DISABILITIES REMOVAL ACT I |
| Date of publication: | | 11 April 1850 |
| Description/subject: | | INDIA ACT XXI, 1850....."Whereas it is enacted by section 9, Regulation VII, 1832, of the Bengal Code, that “whenever in
any civil suit the parties to such suit may be of different persuasions, when one party shall be of
the Hindu and the other of the Muhammadan persuasion, or where one of more parties to the suit
shall not be either of the Muhammadan or Hindu persuasions, the laws of those religions shall
not be permitted to operate to deprive such party or parties of any property to which, but for the
operation of such laws, they would have been entitled”; and whereas it will be beneficial to
extend the principle of that enactment; It is enacted as follows:-..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of India |
| Format/size: | | pdf (34K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://displacementsolutions.org/?page_id=197 http://displacementsolutions.org/?p=20 |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
-
Laws and decrees relating to the Economy
-
Laws and decrees related to trade and investment
-
Laws and decrees related to trade and investment (commentary)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | New Regulations under the Foreign Investment Law released |
| Date of publication: | | 04 February 2013 |
| Description/subject: | | On January 31, 2013 the Ministry of National Planning and Economic Development released the new detailed regulations under the 2012 Myanmar Foreign Investment Law. The much awaited regulations are provided under two separate notifications, Notification 1/2013 and Notification 11/2013, spread over a total of 67 pages. No formal translation has yet to be published.
The release of the notifications answers the question everybody has asked themselves – will the new regulations provide a higher level of detail than before? The answer is yes – the new notifications do provide significant more details in many areas. Thus, the positive trend continues – where the government is strengthening Myanmar’s position as an attractive jurisdiction for foreign investments. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | KPMG |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 16 May 2013 |
|
| Title: | | Myanmar to delay foreign investment law |
| Date of publication: | | 17 September 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | "Myanmar is to delay the implementation of controversial foreign investment legislation passed this month, but will step up reforms in areas including the financial sector and land use and will streamline government structures..." |
| Author/creator: | | Gwen Robinson |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Financial Times" |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 18 September 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Investment law to decide if Burma’s growth will be ‘transformational’ |
| Date of publication: | | 14 September 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | "...Currently awaiting the signature of the president [returned unsigned to Parliament for amendment late October] is the new Foreign Investment Law designed to make the country more attractive to foreign investors.
This law will grant them the right to hold long leases on land (until now leases have been greatly restricted and the state was the exclusive owner of most productive land). Overseas investors will also be able to enjoy a five-year profit tax “holiday,” other tax concessions, and are guaranteed against the nationalization of their businesses (a necessary step given Myanmar’s long history of state expropriation).
So far, so good, but Myanmar’s new Foreign Investment Law is also reflective of the country’s continuing divisions.
The law has been heavily influenced by the interests of Myanmar’s “crony” conglomerates, which in recent years have come to dominate key areas of the economy. With interests that extend to almost every sector, such cronies (as people in Myanmar routinely refer to them) are likely to feel the threat of foreign competition first and foremost.
Accordingly, despite the liberal elements of the new Foreign Investment Law, other key clauses limit the role of foreign investors in a host of sectors, including retail trade, agricultural processing, fisheries and many light industries and services.
The outcome of this struggle between liberal reformers and the beneficiaries of Myanmar’s past regime will ultimately shape the new Foreign Investment Law. This struggle will also determine if Myanmar is finally on the path to genuine transformational growth. A tiger in waiting perhaps, but not one yet." |
| Author/creator: | | Sean Turnell |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Mizzima News" |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 18 September 2012 |
|
| Title: | | The Burmese Junta's Abuse of Investment Laws |
| Date of publication: | | August 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | "Burma continues to be a pariah state for its gross violations of human rights. The refusal of the Burmese military junta to honour
the results of the May 1990 elections made its isolation complete: so much so that Burma was denied ASEAN membership for a
long time. The junta has even gone so far as to abuse its own laws, including those regulating foreign investment. As there are
already many international reports on the link between foreign investment and violations of human rights in Burma, this paper will
mainly focus on the aspect of Burma?s investment laws itself?what kinds of investment laws there are in Burma and how these
are being abused by the junta..." |
| Author/creator: | | B.K. Sen, Peter Gutter |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 9 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original (and authoritative) version of this article may be found in "Legal issues of Burma Journal" No. 9 at http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal%20Issues%20on%20Burma%20Journal%209.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Grave Diggers: A report on Mining in Burma |
| Date of publication: | | 14 February 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | A report on mining in Burma. The problems mining is bringing to the Burmese people, and the multinational companies involved in it. Includes an analysis of the SLORC 1994 Mining Law.... 'Grave Diggers, authored by world renowned mining environmental activist Roger Moody, was the first major review of mining in Burma since the country's military regime opened the door to foreign mining investment in 1994. Singled out for special attention in this report is the stake taken up by Canadian mining promoter Robert Friedland, whose Ivanhoe Mines has redeveloped a major copper mine in the Monywa area in joint venture enterprise with Burma's military regime. There are several useful appendices with first hand reports from mining sites throughout the country. A series of maps shows the location of the exploration concessions taken up almost exclusively by foreign companies in the rounds of bidding that took place in the nineties. |
| Author/creator: | | Roger Moody |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Various groups |
| Format/size: | | pdf (1.4MB) html |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.miningwatch.ca/en/grave-diggers-report-mining-burma
http://www.miningwatch.ca/sites/miningwatch.ca/files/Grave_Diggers.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 09 September 2010 |
|
-
Laws and decrees related to trade and investment (texts)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Foreign Investment Law: Stipulation of types of economic activities (English and Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 31 January 2013 |
| Description/subject: | | "The Republic of the Union of Myanmar, Myanmar Investment Commission, in exercise of
the powers conferred under Section 56, subsection (b) of the Foreign Investment Law
,
in
stipulating the applicable business under Chapter 2 of the Foreign Investment Law,
and
with
the approval of
the Union Government,
prescribes the list of economic activities which are
prohibited, the list of economic activities which are allowed only in joint ventures with
Myanmar nationals, and the list of economic activities which are allowed in accordance with
certain
separately stipulated conditions. ..." |
| Language: | | English, Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | Myanmar Investment Commission: Notification No. 1/2013 |
| Format/size: | | pdf (317K-English; 35K-Burmese) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.networkmyanmar.org/images/stories/PDF14/Notification-1-2013.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 28 April 2013 |
|
| Title: | | Myanmar Special Economic Zone Law. |
| Date of publication: | | 27 January 2011 |
| Description/subject: | | ( The State Peace and Development Council Law No. 8 / 2011)
The 8th Waning Day of Pyatho, 1372. M.E.
(27th January, 2011)
The State Peace and Development Council hereby enacts the following Law:
Chapter I -
Title and Definition.
1 This Law shall be called the Myanmar Special Economic Zone Law. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Peace and Development Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (94K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 January 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Myanmar Citizens Investment Law |
| Date of publication: | | 31 March 1994 |
| Description/subject: | | [The State Law and Order Restoration Council Law No. 4/94]
The 5th Waning of Tabaung, 1355 M.E.
(31st March, 1994 ) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council via BLC |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 08 December 2010 |
|
| Title: | | The State-owned Economic Enterprises Law |
| Date of publication: | | 31 March 1989 |
| Description/subject: | | (The State Law and Order Restoration Council Law No. 9/89)
The 10th Waning Day of Tabaung, 1350 M.E
(31st March, 1989)
The State Law and Order Restoration Council hereby enacts the following Law:
Chapter 1.
Title and Definition
1. The expression Government contained in this Law includes departments,
corporations and other organizations under the Government.
2. This Law shall be called the State-owned Economic Enterprises Law. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (65K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 January 2012 |
|
-
Laws regulating extraction and energy
-
Laws regulating extraction and energy (texts)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | The Atomic Energy Law (SPDC Law Law No. 8/98) |
| Date of publication: | | 08 June 1998 |
| Description/subject: | | The State Peace and Development Council...
The Atomic Energy Law...
(The State Peace and Development Council Law No. 8/98)...
The 14th Waxing of Nayon 1360 M.E.
(8th June, 1998) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | The State Peace and Development Council via BLC |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 16 July 2005 |
|
| Title: | | The 1994 Mining Law |
| Date of publication: | | 06 September 1994 |
| Description/subject: | | The State Law and Order Restoration Council...
The Myanmar Mines Law
(The State Law and Order Restoration Council Law No 8/94)...
The 2nd Waxing Day of Tawthalin, 1356 M.E.
(6th September, 1994)
"The objectives of this Law are as follows:
a.to implement the Mineral Resources Policy of the Government;
b.to fulfil the domestic requirements and to increase export by producing more mineral products;
c.to promote development of local and foreign investment in respect of mineral resources;
d.to supervise, scrutinize and approve applications submitted by person or organization desirous of conducting
mineral prospecting, exploration or production;
e.to carry out for the development of, conservation, utilization and research works of mineral resources;
f.to protect the environmental conservation works that may have detrimental effects due to mining operation..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | SLORC via BLC |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | THE LAW AMENDING THE ELECTRICITY LAW (1990) |
| Date of publication: | | 07 March 1990 |
| Description/subject: | | The State Law and Order Restoration council Law No. 3/90...
The 12th Waxing Day of Tabaung, 1351 M.E....
7 March 1990 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (63K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 25 May 2011 |
|
| Title: | | Electricity Law (1984) |
| Date of publication: | | 1984 |
| Description/subject: | | (1984 People's Parliament (PyiThu Hluttaw) Act No. 7)
See also the The Law Amending the Electricity Law(1990) |
| Language: | | English, Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Union of the Socialist Republic of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (English - 74K; Burmese - 348K)) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.burmalibrary.org/docs11/Electricity_Law(bu).pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 27 March 2011 |
|
| Title: | | THE ELECTRICITY ACT (1910) |
| Date of publication: | | 01 January 1911 |
| Description/subject: | | [INDIA ACT IX, 1910.] (1st January, 1911.).....Replaced by the 1984 Electricity Law |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of India |
| Format/size: | | pdf (487K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 28 March 2011 |
|
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Money-laundering laws and decrees
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Notification No. 1 /2003: Control of Money Laundering Rules [and forms] |
| Date of publication: | | 05 December 2003 |
| Description/subject: | | "In exercise of the power conferred by sub-section (a) of section 41 of the Control of Money Laundering Law, the Ministry of Home Affairs issues the following Rules with the approval of the Government:-..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Ministry of Home Affairs |
| Format/size: | | html (111K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 06 December 2003 |
|
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Laws related to foreign relations (texts)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | The Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Law (SPDC Law No. 4/2004) |
| Date of publication: | | 28 April 2004 |
| Description/subject: | | The Union of Myanmar:
The State Peace and Development Council -
The Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Law
(The State Peace and Development Council Law No. 4/2004)...
The 10th Waxing of Kason 1366 ME
(28th April, 2004)...
The State Peace and Development Council hereby enacts the following Law:-
"..This Law shall apply to providing assistance in criminal proceedings with States parties to an international convention or regional agreement to which the Union of Myanmar is a State party or with the State that has entered into bilateral agreement or with the State that will provide reciprocal assistance though not a State party to the international convention or regional agreement or bilateral agreement with respect to investigation, prosecution and judicial proceedings in criminal matters..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | SPDC |
| Format/size: | | html (38K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 02 May 2004 |
|
-
Criminal law
-
Criminal law (commentary)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Law and Money Laundering in Burma |
| Date of publication: | | December 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | "Money laundering is the most significant economic phenomenon of organized crime. Containing the influence of organized crime
requires the elimination of its livelihood, which in Burma is mainly the illicit drug trade. Under the rule of the military junta,
Burma has become the worlds biggest producer of heroin and methamphetamines. Burmas drug lords are now major
investors in the countrys economy and have considerable cash reserves at their disposal. In many countries nowadays, tighter
banking controls make it difficult for criminals to launder money for use in the legitimate economy. However, banking control in
Burma is not very tight, legislation is ineffective, and the military junta is clearly benefiting from the drug trade. The Organization
for Economic Cooperation and Development has added Burma to its blacklist of countries deemed uncooperative in fighting
money laundering. As a result of this, the Burmese junta is currently in the process of drafting an Illicit Proceeds and Property
Control Law..." |
| Author/creator: | | Peter Gutter |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 10 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original (and authoritative) version of this article may be found in http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal_Issues_on%20Burma_Journal_10.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
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Criminal law (texts)
-
The Code of Criminal Procedure (Burmese)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Article 401 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (Burmese)/ ျပစ္မႈဆိုင္ရာက်င့ ္ထံုးဥပေဒပုဒ္မ ၄ဝ၁၊ |
| Date of publication: | | 01 July 1898 |
| Description/subject: | | အက်ဥ္းသား၊ အက်ဥ္းသ ူ (၆၅၁)ဦးအား ျပစ္မႈဆိုင္ရာက်င့ ္ထံုးဥပေဒပုဒ္မ ၄ဝ၁၊ ပုဒ္မခြဲ(၁)အရ လြတ္ၿငိမ္းခ်မ္းသာခြင့ ္ျပဳ ခဲ့သည္ဟု ေရးသားေဖၚျပခဲ့...
ျပစ္မႈဆိုင္ရာက်င့ ္ထံုးဥပေဒပုဒ္မ ၄ဝ၁၊ အျပည့္အစံု ကို ေဖၚျပပါသည္။
(ျပစ္ဒဏ္မ်ားကို ဆိုင္းငံ့ထားျခင္း၊ လြတ္ၿငိမ္းသက္သာခြင့္ေပးျခင္းႏွင့္ ေလွ်ာ့ေပါ့ ေျပာင္းလဲျခင္း)...This legislation was cited in the release of prisoners, 13 June 2012 |
| Language: | | Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (286.89K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 14 January 2012 |
|
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The Code of Criminal Procedure (English)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Article 401 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (English) |
| Date of publication: | | 01 July 1898 |
| Description/subject: | | Legislation cited in the release of prisoners, 13th January, 2012 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of the Union of Burma |
| Format/size: | | pdf (37.48K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 14 January 2012 |
|
| Title: | | The Code of Criminal Procedure: Schedules II, III, IV |
| Date of publication: | | 01 July 1898 |
| Description/subject: | | The Code of Criminal Procedure, [India Act V, 1898, 1st July 1898].....
SCHEDULE I: REPEALED (OMMITTED)...
SCHEDULE II: TABULAR STATEMENT OF OFFENCES...
SCHEDULE III: ORDINARY POWERS OF MAGISTRATES...
SCHEDULE IV: ADDITIONAL POWERS WITH WHICH MAGISTRATES MAY BE INVESTED
. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Union of the Union of Burma via "The Burma Code" |
| Format/size: | | pdf (343K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 08 December 2012 |
|
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The Penal Code
Individual Documents
| Title: | | The Penal Code |
| Date of publication: | | 01 May 1861 |
| Description/subject: | | Table of contents followed by all 511 articles, in one big document...
(INDIA ACT XLV. 1860) (1st May. 1861)
The pdf version is based on the BLC version. A spell-check was run on the BLC version and checked against a hard-copy version of the "Myanmar Code". The hard-copy version was taken as authoritative and the text amended accordingly. Some obvious mistakes exist in the hard-copy original. These are left as-is, followed by "[sic. "xxxx" is presumably intended"]". The BLC version does not contain all the footnotes which exist in the hard-copy version. These will be added in a Corr.2 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of Burma via Burma Lawyers' Council via Online Burma/Myanmar Library |
| Format/size: | | (pdf (785K); html (1.8MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 16 March 2006 |
|
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Other crime-related laws (texts)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Anti-Bribery Bill / လဒ္ေပးလဒ္ယူမႈ ပေပ်ာက္ေရး ဥပေဒၾကမ္း (Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 02 August 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | Revoking Anti-Corruption Act of 1948 by this law.... ၁၉၄၈ ခုႏွစ္ အဂတိလိုက္စားမႈ တားျမစ္ေရး အက္ဥပေဒ (ဥပေဒ အမွတ္ ၆၇ / ၄၈) ကို ဤဥပေဒ ျဖင့္ ရုပ္သိမ္းလိုက္သည္ |
| Language: | | Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | "Myanmar Alin" |
| Format/size: | | pdf (1.15MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 22 September 2012 |
|
| Title: | | The Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Law (SPDC Law No. 4/2004) |
| Date of publication: | | 28 April 2004 |
| Description/subject: | | The Union of Myanmar:
The State Peace and Development Council -
The Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Law
(The State Peace and Development Council Law No. 4/2004)...
The 10th Waxing of Kason 1366 ME
(28th April, 2004)...
The State Peace and Development Council hereby enacts the following Law:-
"..This Law shall apply to providing assistance in criminal proceedings with States parties to an international convention or regional agreement to which the Union of Myanmar is a State party or with the State that has entered into bilateral agreement or with the State that will provide reciprocal assistance though not a State party to the international convention or regional agreement or bilateral agreement with respect to investigation, prosecution and judicial proceedings in criminal matters..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | SPDC |
| Format/size: | | html (38K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 02 May 2004 |
|
-
Constitutional and parliamentary processes
-
National and State constitutions, draft constitutions, amendments and announcements (texts)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Shan State Constitution (2nd Draft) |
| Date of publication: | | 20 September 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | Contents:
Foreword for the second draft (A- C)...
Preamble...
Chapter One Chief Characteristics ...
Chapter Two Bill of Rights, Guarantees and Duties ...
Chapter Three Member sub-states of Shan State ...
Chapter Four Shan State Congress ...
Chapter Five Shan State Legislation ...
Chapter Six Shan State President ...
Chapter Seven Shan State Government ...
Chapter Eight Shan State Judiciary ...
Chapter Nine Citizenship ...
Chapter Ten State Defense and Security Forces ...
Chapter Eleven State of Emergency ...
Chapter Twelve General Provisions ...
Chapter Thirteen Transitional Provisions ...
Chapter Fourteen Amendment of the Constitution ...
Appendix (1) Shan State Flag (Article 76)...
Appendix (2) Shan State Anthem (Article 179) - 3 -...
Appendix (3) Structure of Shan State. |
| Language: | | Burmese, English |
| Source/publisher: | | Shan State Constitution Drafting Commission (SSCDC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (681K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 06 May 2009 |
|
| Title: | | Announcements 1/2008 and 2/2008 |
| Date of publication: | | 11 February 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | "...it is most appropriate to
transform the administration of Tatmadaw into democratic administration of the
people. Thus, in accordance with the forthcoming State Constitution, the multi-party
democracy general elections will be held in 2010...Approval of the Constitution draft will be sought in a National Referendum to be held in May 2008...
In accordance with the forthcoming State Constitution,
the multi-party democracy general elections will be held in 2010...NAY PYI TAW, 10 Feb—The State Peace and Development Council of the Union of Myanmar issued Announcement Nos 1/2008 and 2/2008 yesterday.
The following is the full text of the announcements—..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "The New Light of Myanmar" |
| Format/size: | | pdf (285K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 13 February 2008 |
|
| Title: | | The Fifth Draft of Chinland Constitution |
| Date of publication: | | 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | PART ONE:(1)Preamble..(2)Part One:The territory of Chinland..(3)Part Two:Presiding Ideals..(4) Part Three:Individual Rights..(5) Part Four:Individual Duties..(6) Part Five:Language..(7) Part Six:Chin Ethnicity and Culture..(8) Part Seven:Citizenship..(9) Part Eight:Suffrage.. (10) Part Nine:The Legislature (11)Part Ten:The Executive..(12)Part Eleven:The Judiciary..(13)Part Twelve:Administration..(14)Part Thirteen:The Civil Service Commission..(15)Part Fourteen:Impeachment..(16)Part Fifteen:Local Government..(17)Part Sixteen:Finance, Revenue, and Taxation..(18)Part Seventeen:Public Education..(19)Part Eighteen:Public Health..(20)Part Nineteen:Public Welfare..(21)Part Twenty:Culture and Media..(22)Party Twenty-One:State Armed Forces..(23)Part Twenty-Two:State of Emergency..(24)Part Twenty-Three:General Provision..(25)Part Twenty-Four:Inter-State and State-Federal Relations..(26)Part Twenty-Five:Amendment of Constitution..(27)Part Twenty-Six:Ratification..... PART TWO:Suppression of Chin National Movement for Federalism..... PART THREE:(i)The Chin Forum Managing Board (CFMB)... (ii) Chin Forum Chronology of Events |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | The Chin Forum |
| Format/size: | | pdf (1.11 MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 16 September 2010 |
|
| Title: | | The Fundamental Principles and Detailed Basic Principles (Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 10 September 2007 |
| Description/subject: | | The 15 chapters of principles adopted by the National Convention which the SPDC has said will form the basis of a new constitution. |
| Language: | | Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | "The New Light of Myanmar" via Khin Kyaw Han |
| Format/size: | | pdf (1MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 October 2007 |
|
| Title: | | The Fundamental Principles and Detailed Basic Principles (English) |
| Date of publication: | | 10 September 2007 |
| Description/subject: | | The 15 chapters of principles adopted by the National Convention which the SPDC has said will form the basis of a new constitution. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "The New Light of Myanmar" via Khin Kyaw Han |
| Format/size: | | pdf (546K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 14 September 2007 |
|
| Title: | | Karenni State: Second Draft Constitution |
| Date of publication: | | 2007 |
| Description/subject: | | 1. The Emergence of Karenni State Constitution;
2. Introduction;
3. Preamble;
4. The Attributes of the Karenni State;
5. The Basic rights;
6. The Structure of the Karenni State;
7. The Chambers of the State Parliament;
8. The Karenni State Legislation Process;
9. The State Government;
10. The Judiciary;
11. Financial Ordinances;
12. Citizenship;
13. Maintaining Customs its Chieftains;
14. Institution of the Commissions;
15. Amending of the Constitution;
16. National Emergency Law;
17. National Defense;
18. Police Force;
19. National Economy.
N. B. the text is undated. We have guessed at a date in 2007. |
| Language: | | English, Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Karenni State Constitution Drafting Committee |
| Format/size: | | pdf (522K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 23 September 2007 |
|
| Title: | | Draft Constitution of Future Rahmonya Mon State |
| Date of publication: | | December 2006 |
| Description/subject: | | THE FORMATION OF RAHMONYA MON STATE; THE RIGHTS OF THE PEOPLE; THE STATE PARLIAMENT AND THE FEDERAL PARLIAMENT; ELECTION OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE HOUSE OF RAHMONYA MON
STATE PARLIAMENT; RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN RAHMONYA MON STATE AND FEDERAL
UNION; RAHMONYA MON STATE GOVERNMENT; LEGISATION (MAKING LAWS); THE JUDICIALSYSTEM OF RAHMONYA MON STATE; PUBLIC SERVANTS; NATURAL RESOURCES AND THE ENVIRONMENT; EDUCATION; WORKERS; HEALTH; FINANCE AND TREASURY; TAXATION AND REVENUES; THE ECONOMY; DEFENCE AND SECURITY; SOCIAL SECURITY; FARMERS (INCLUDING GARDENERS, CULTIVATORS ETC.); ETHNIC GROUPS OR RACES OF RAHMONYA MON STATE; PUBLIC RELATIONS; AMENDMENT OF THE CONSTITUTION; |
| Language: | | Burmese and English |
| Format/size: | | pdf (361K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 18 September 2007 |
|
| Title: | | The Second Proposed Draft of Future Constitution of Kawthoolei (Karen State) |
| Date of publication: | | 08 August 2006 |
| Description/subject: | | Table of Contents:
Bill of Rights;
General Provisions;
Legislature;
Executive;
Judiciary;
Suffrage and Elections;
Local Government;
Finance and Taxation;
Education;
Amendments;
Miscellaneous. |
| Language: | | English, Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Karen State Constitution Drafting Committee (SCDC) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (222K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 23 September 2007 |
|
| Title: | | Shan State Constitution, First Draft |
| Date of publication: | | 24 May 2006 |
| Description/subject: | | CONTENT
Forward;
Preamble;
Founding Provision;
Supremacy of Constitution...
CHAPTER [1]
Characteristics;
Name: Shan State;
Supremacy of Constitution;
Citizenship;
National Flag;
National Anthem;
National Capital;
Nation Seals;
A multi-ethnic Nation/State...
CHAPTER [2]
Bill of Rights;
Human dignity;
Freedom and Security;
Religion and belief;
Freedom of expression and information;
Freedom of Assembly;
Freedom of Association;
Freedom of movement and residence;
Freedom of trade;
Labor Rights;
Land and property ownership rights;
Right to environmental protection;
The right to informed choice;
The right to be served by the Public Institutions;
Rights Abuse Prevention Measure;
Human Rights Promotion Measure;
The rights to recall and impeachment;
Duty and Responsibility of Citizens and Civil Society Organizations;
Duty of Media and its Responsibility;
Rights of differently able people;
Rights of people to initiate legislation...
CHAPTER [3]
Legislature...
CHAPTER [4]
Legislative Powers;
National Congress;
Legislative Powers of National Congress;
Formation of House of Nationalities;
Exclusive legislative power;
Ordinary Bills;
Formation of House of People’s Representatives;
Legislative Power of House of People’s Representatives;
State Constitution (Constituent State);
Special Provision;
Formation of the State Legislature;
Legislative Power [Const State];
House of National Ethnics;
Formation of State House of People’s Representatives;
Legislative powers provided for the State House of People’s ;
Representatives;
Legislative powers provided for the Sub-States and ;
Autonomous Regions;
Local Government;
Municipal of Township Administration;
Village Tract Administration;
Village Administration...
CHAPTER [5]
National Executive.
Federal Union Executive;
Constituent State’s Executive...
CHAPTER [6]
Judicial Power [Judiciary]...
CHAPTER [7]
General Provisions;
Note: Spread out to other chapters/provisions...
CHAPTER [8]
The amendment of the constitution. |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Shan State Constitution Drafting Commission |
| Format/size: | | pdf (244K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 18 September 2007 |
|
| Title: | | The Constitution of the Federal Union of Burma (First Draft) |
| Date of publication: | | April 2006 |
| Description/subject: | | Commentary and text. This text, based on the draft adopted by the Democratic Alliance of Burma (DAB) in 1993, was adopted by the National Council of the Union of Burma (NCUB) as its First Draft, at the Fourth Conference of the NCUB, May 16-23, 1996..." We the peoples of the Federal Republic of the Union of Burma, with complete faith in the universal principles of freedom, equality and justice, do hereby adopt this Constitution for the Federal Republic of the Union of Burma in order to establish a multi-national country that is peaceful, prosperous, and enduring.
In the land of this Federal Union, many different nationalities have lived, each with their own sovereignty and independence, ever since ancient times. Although each nationality lived independently for most of its history, they all fell under the long occupation and servitude of the British colonialists. In order to regain its own freedom more quickly, each nationality joined with the others so as to obtain independence from the colonial power together, and they thus formed a Federal Union at the Panglong Conference in the year 1947.
The Conference unanimously adopted the Panglong Agreement which guaranteed ethnic equality, self-determination, and democratic rights. Although the Agreement promised that the new states of the union could govern themselves, those in power failed to implement the Agreement. Civil war ensued for more than half a century, during which countless lives were sacrificed and natural resources wasted. Since 1962, the peoples of Burma have suffered under a series of dictatorial regimes with different names but a common history of denying democratic rights, human rights, and the rights of self-determination for ethnic nationalities who joined the Union as equal partners in 1947. We shall never forget the heart-breaking experiences that the people of the Federal Union have had to endure.
In order to prevent a recurrence of the mistakes of the past and to realize the future aspirations of all our peoples, we based this Constitution on the fundamental principles of political equality for all ethnic nationalities, the rights of self-determination for all member states of the Federal Union,and the democratic rights for all citizens. This Constitution further provides guarantees for human rights and gender equality; minority rights for all religious and ethnic groups; and the separation of politics and religion. In order to prevent the recurrence of military dictatorship, this Constitution enshrines civilian control of the armed forces.
We establish this Constitution so as to secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and future generations. Banishing all the past outrages, shattering the dark, shining the light, and establishing the dignity of the Federal Union among the family of nations, this Constitution shall become the highest law of the Federal Republic of the Union of Burma.
We the peoples of the Republic of the Federal Union of Burma, with complete faith in the universal principles of freedom, equality and justice, do hereby adopt this Constitution for the Federal Republic of the Union of Burma in order to establish a multi-national country that is peaceful, prosperous, and enduring.
In the land of this Federal Union, many different nationalities have lived, each with their own sovereignty and independence, ever since ancient times. Although each nationality lived independently for most of its history, they all fell under the long occupation and servitude of the British colonialists. In order to gain its own freedom more quickly, each nationality joined with the others so as to obtain independence from the colonial power together, and thus they formed a federal union at the Panglong Conference in the year 1947.
The Conference unanimously adopted the Panglong Agreement which guaranteed ethnic equality, self-determination, and democratic rights. Although the Agreement promised that the states of the union could govern themselves, those in power failed to implement the Agreement. Civil war ensued for more than half a century, during which countless lives were sacrificed and natural resources wasted. Since 1962, the peoples of Burma have suffered under a series of dictatorial regimes with different names but a common history of denying democratic rights, human rights, and the rights of self-determination for ethnic nationalities who joined the Union as equal partners in 1947. We shall never forget the heart-breaking experiences that the people of the Federal Union have had to endure.
In order to prevent a recurrence of the mistakes of the past and to realize the future aspirations of all our peoples, we based this Constitution on the fundamental principles of political equality for all ethnic nationalities, the rights of self-determination for all member states of the Federal Union; and the democratic rights for all citizens. This Constitution further provides guarantees for human rights and gender equality; minority rights for all religious and ethnic groups; and the separation of politics and religion. In order to prevent the recurrence of military dictatorship, this Constitution enshrines civilian control of the armed forces.
We establish this Constitution so as to secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and future generations. Banishing all the past outrages, shattering the dark, shining the light, and establishing the dignity of the Federal Union among the family of nations, this Constitution shall become the highest law of the Republic of the Federal Union of Burma..." |
| Language: | | English, Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Ethnic Nationalities Council |
| Format/size: | | PDF (493K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.burmalibrary.org/docs09/ENC-draft-bur.pdf (Burmese)
http://www.blc-burma.org/lr_con.html#ncub |
| Date of entry/update: | | 08 December 2010 |
|
| Title: | | Kachin State Constitution (Draft) |
| Date of publication: | | 2006 |
| Description/subject: | | Contents: Chapter (1) Kachin State;
Chapter (2) Fundamental Rights and Freedoms;
Chapter (3) Kachin State Legislative Assembly;
Chapter (4) Kachin State Government;
Chapter (5) Suffrage and Elections;
Chapter (6) Judiciary;
Chapter (7) Inter-Governmental Relations;
Chapter (8) Emergencies;
Chapter (9) General Provisions;
Chapter (10) Transitional Provisions;
Chapter (11) Amendment of the Constitution. |
| Language: | | English, Burmese |
| Source/publisher: | | Kachin State Constitution Drafting Committee |
| Format/size: | | pdf (513K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 October 2007 |
|
| Title: | | THE FOURTH INITIAL DRAFT OF CONSTITUTION OF CHINLAND |
| Date of publication: | | May 2004 |
| Description/subject: | | ချင်းလဲန်းဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြခံမူကြမ်း(၄):
"အပိုင်း(၁)ချင်းအမျိုးသားများ၏နောက်ခံသမိုင်းများ"
(၁)ချင်းအမျိုးသားများ၏နိုင်ငံရေးနှင့်လူမှုရေး နောက်ခံသမိုင်းအကျဉ်း
(၂)နိုင်ငံရေးနောက်ခံသမိုင်း
(၃)ချင်းလူမျိုးတို့၏လွတ်လပ်သောနိုင်ငံတည်ထောင်ပိုင်ခွင့်
(၄)ပြည်ထောင်စုမြန်မာနိုင်ငံ ဖွဲ့စည်းမှု အဖွဲ့ဝင်အဖြစ်ချင်းလူမျိုးများပါဝင်ခြင်း
(၅)အင်္ဂလိပ်အုပ်ချုပ်မှုမတိုင်ခင်လွတ်လပ်သော ချင်းလဲန်းနှင့် ယနေ့ချင်းလဲန်း
(၆)ချင်းလူမှုရေးနှင့်ယဉ်ကျေးမှုနောက်ခံသမိုင်း
"အပိုင်း(၂)ဖက်ဒရယ်ပြည်ထောင်စုပြန်လည်တည်ဆောက်ရန်
ချင်းအမျိုးသားများ၏တောင်းဆိုချက်များ"
(၁)ပြည်ထောင်စုမြန်မာနိုင်ငံအားဖက်ဒရယ်ပြည်ထောင်စုအဖြစ် ပြန်လည်
ဖွဲ့စည်းခြင်း
(၂)ဖက်ဒရယ်ပြည်ထောင်စုပြန်လည်ဖွဲ့စည်းနိုင်ရေး အခြေခံသဘောတရားများ
(၃)ချင်းလဲန်းဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေနှင့်အစိုးရဖွဲ့စည်းပုံများ
"အပိုင်း(၃)ချင်းလဲန်းဖွဲ့စည်းအုပ်ချုပ်ပုံမူကြမ်း"
(၁)ချင်းလဲန်းဖွဲ့စည်းအုပ်ချုပ်ပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေနိဒါန်း
(၂)ချင်းလဲန်းပိုင်နက်နယ်မြေ
(၃)ချင်းပြည်သူတို့၏ဆန္ဒ
(၄)တသီးပုဂ္ဂလအခွင့်
အရေးများ
(၅)တသီးပုဂ္ဂလတာဝန်များ
(၆)ချင်းနိုင်ငံသားဖြစ်မှုနှင့် အမျိုးသားရေး
(၇)ရွေးကောက်တင်မြောက်ခြင်း
(၈)ဥပဒေပြုရေး
(၉)အုပ်ချုပ်ရေး
(၁၀)တရားစီရင်ရေး
(၁၁)အုပ်ချုပ်ရေး (စီမံခန့်ခွဲရေး)
(၁၂)ပြည်သူ့ဝန်ထမ်းကော်မရှင်
(၁၃)ရာထူးမှဖယ်ရှားခြင်း
(၁၄)ဒေသန္တရအစိုးရ
(၁၅)ဘဏ္ဍာရေး၊အကောက်ခွန်နှင့်
ဘဏ္ဍာတော်
(၁၆)ပြည်သူ့ပညာရေး
(၁၇)ပြည်သူ့ကျန်းမာရေး
(၁၈)ပြည်သူ့လူမှုဖူလုံရေး
(၁၉)ယဉ်ကျေးမှုနှင့် လူထု
ဆက်သွယ်ရေး
(၂၀)ချင်းလဲန်းလက်နက်ကိုင်အဖွဲ့
(၂၁)အထွေထွေဥပဒေများ
(၂၂)ပြည်နယ်များနှင့် ပြည်နယ်ဖက်ဒရယ်ဆက်ဆံမှု
(၂၃)ပြင်ဆင်ဖြည့်စွက်ခြင်း၊အချက်ပို (၁) |
| Language: | | မြန်မာဘာသာ/အင်္ဂလိပ်ဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | The Chin Forum |
| Format/size: | | pdf (434 KB) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.chinforum.org/cfconstitutions/4th_cc_eng_bur.pdf (Burmese&English)
http://www.chinforum.org/cfconstitutions/4th_chin_con.pdf (English) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 15 September 2010 |
|
| Title: | | Arakan State Constitution (The First Proposed Draft) |
| Date of publication: | | 2004 |
| Description/subject: | | Preamble:
The Constitution of Arakan State is instituted for the preservation of a united and durable Arakan Nation; and for every citizen to be fulfilled in justice, life, liberty, prosperity, respect, dignity, kindness, tradition, and faith...
Part One:
Bill of Rights; Part 2:
Formation of the State;Part 3:
Provision of citizenship; Part 4:
Provision of Voting Rights and Creation of Constituency: Part 5:
Administrative power; procedure for the transfer of power; Part 6:
Legislative Power; Part 7:
Judicial; Part 8:
State Government Administration. |
| Language: | | Burmese, English |
| Source/publisher: | | Arakan State Constitution Drafting Committee (Arakan National Council) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (662K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 October 2007 |
|
| Title: | | Federalism, State Constitutions And Self-Determination in Burma_Report on State Constitutions Drefting Process |
| Date of publication: | | 2003 |
| Description/subject: | | Part One: Burmese Section:ပြည်နယ်များ၏ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေရေးဆွဲရေးလုပ်ငန်းစဉ်နှင့်ပတ်သတ်သောအစီရင်ခံစာ (ဆလိုင်းလျန်မှုန်းဆာခေါင်း)
Part Two: English Section
1.Introduction:(i)Foreword (Chao-Tzang Yawnghwe)(ii)Report on State Constitutions Drafting Process(Lian H. Sakhong)
2.Federalism, State Constitutions and Self-Determination:(i)Federalism, State Constitutions and Ethnic Self-Determination (Chao-Tzang Yawnghwe)(ii)Burma:State Constitutions and the Challenges Facing the Ethnic Nationalities (Chao-Tzang Yawnghwe)
3.The Role of State Constitutions in the Protection of Nationality and Monitority Rights:Lessons From Other Countries (i)Australian Federalism, State Constitutions and the Protection of minority Rights (Cheryl Saunders)(ii)Federalism, Diversity and Minority Rights: What can we learn from India (Yogendra Yadav) (iii)Nigeria'sExperience in Managing the Challenges of Ethnic and Religious Diversity through Constitutional Provisions (Otive Igbuzor)
4.American Model Of State Constitutions:(i)Model State Constitution
5.German Model Of Local Governments: (i)Federalism and Local Self-Governmennt in Germany (Harald Hofmann) |
| Author/creator: | | Chao-Tzang Yawnghwe and Lian H.Sakhong |
| Language: | | အင်္ဂလိပ်ဘာသာ/မြန်မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | ENC "PEACEFUL CO-EXISTENCE: Towards Federal Union of Burma [Series No.5]" |
| Format/size: | | pdf (942 KB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 14 September 2010 |
|
| Title: | | The original chapters on Fundamental Principles and Detailed Basic Principles |
| Date of publication: | | 1996 |
| Description/subject: | | The original chapters on Fundamental Principles and Detailed
Basic Principles adopted by the National Convention
These chapters, 1. State fundamental principles; 2. State Structure; 3. Head of State; 4. Legislature; 5.
Executive; 6. Judiciary were adopted by the National Convention between 1993 and 1996. In 2007, in the
process of completing the National Convention, some changes were made to the original versions and
incorporated into the document issued as “Fundamental Principles and Detailed Basic Principles”
(Adopted by the National Convention), online at http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs4/DBP-KKH-2.pdf
For the record, and in case anyone wants to compare the versions, they are presented here, along with
the section on Self-Administered Divisions and Self-Administered Zones which was not allocated to a
specific chapter.
Sources: “The New Light of Myanmar” -- see http://www.burmalibrary.org/show.php?cat=1314&lo=d&sl=0 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "The New Lilght of Myanmar" |
| Format/size: | | pdf (323K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 October 2007 |
|
| Title: | | NLD Interim Constitution |
| Date of publication: | | 28 July 1990 |
| Description/subject: | | Amendments to the 1947 Original Law of the Constitution |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | National League for Democracy |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 15 December 2010 |
|
| Title: | | Shan Federal Proposal, 1961 |
| Date of publication: | | 25 February 1962 |
| Description/subject: | | Document containing proposals For the REVISION of the CONSTITUTION OF THE UNION OF BURMA submitted by THE SHAN STATE, translated by Sao Singha. This document was ratified by the Convention, attended by delegates from the entire Shan State, which was held in Taunggyi on Saturday, 25th of February, 1961. |
| Language: | | English |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 08 December 2010 |
|
| Title: | | Government of Burma Act, 1935 ("The 1937 Constitution") |
| Date of publication: | | 02 August 1935 |
| Description/subject: | | "An Act to make further provision for the government of Burma. [2nd August 1935.]
Be it enacted by the King’s most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:-
PART I.
INTRODUCTORY
1.
This Act may be cited as the Government of Burma Act, 1935.
2.
(1) All rights, authority and jurisdiction heretofore belonging to His Majesty the King, Emperor of India, which appertain or are incidental to the government of the territories in Burma for the time being vested in him and all rights, authority and jurisdiction exercisable by him by treaty, grant, usage, sufferance or otherwise in, or in relation to, any other territories in Burma, are exercisable by His Majesty, except in so far as may be otherwise provided by or under this Act, or as may be otherwise directed by His Majesty.
(2) The said rights, authority and jurisdiction shall include any rights, authority or jurisdiction heretofore exercisable in relation to any territories in Burma by the Secretary of State, the Secretary of State in Council, the Governor-General of India, the Governor-General of Indian in Council, the Governor of Burma or the Local Government of Burma, whether by delegation from His Majesty or otherwise..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | HMSO |
| Format/size: | | pdf (407K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 16 March 2010 |
|
| Title: | | PROPOSALS OF THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA FOR A NEW CONSTITUTION FOR BURMA. |
| Date of publication: | | 1920 |
| Description/subject: | | 1. Letter from the Government of India to the Secretary of state for India, No. 1 (Reforms), dated 25th March, 1920:
Enclosures in No. 1.:
1. Resolution by tbe Government of Burma, No. 1 L—7, dated 17th December, 1918,
publishing for discussion and criticism a provisional scheme of reform ...
Annexures to Enclosure No. 1.
1. Budget Committee under the proposed scheme;
2. (1) Board for Home Affairs;
(2) Board of Revenue and Finance;
(3) Board of Development ;
(4) Board of Local Self-Government...
3. Summary of Recommendations.....
2. Government of Burma's first scheme.:
Letter from the Government of Burma to the Government of India, No. 21—1—L—1. dated 2 June, 1919....
Annexures to Enclosure No. 2.
1. Speech by Sir Reginald Craddock, Lieutenant-Governor of Burma, 19th April,
1919, (Extract);
2. Proposed grouping of towns for purpose of representation on the Burma Legislative
Council;
3. Budget Committee under the proposed scheme;
4. (1) Board for Home Affairs...
(2) Board of Revenue and Finance;
(3) Board of Development;
(4) Board of Local Self-Govermnent …..
3. Criticism by the Government of India of the first scheme of the Government of Burma.
Letter from the Government of India to the Government of Burma, No. 2425, dated 18th
November, 1919;
4. Second scheme of the Government of Burma;
Letter from the Government of Burma to the Government of India, No. 59 T—1—L—8, dated
22nd January, 1920 . |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Government of India via His Majesty's Stationary Office |
| Format/size: | | pdf (3.4MB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 04 September 2012 |
|
-
National and State constitutions, draft constitutions and amendments (commentary)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Institutional Design for Divided Societies: A Blue-print for a multi-ethnic Burma |
| Date of publication: | | May 2012 |
| Description/subject: | | "The retrospective analysis of an institutional breakdown – democratic breakdown – in the union of Burma demonstrates that over six decades of conflict in Burma is rooted in a constitutional arrangement that fails to recognize the existence of ethno-cultural cleavages, resulting in the denial of power to territorially concentrated ethnic national minorities. Therefore, in this article, I argue that an asymmetrical federation with a written constitution is the most viable governance framework for a democratic future Burma due to its multi-ethnic segmental cleavages such as ethnicity, language, religion, culture, and territory. Such a constitutional federation will ensure shared rule for a common Union and self-rule for federating states drawn upon ethnic lines.
To contextualize an institutional design for future Burma in a comparative international perspective, I examine the core arguments put forward by the integrationist and accommodationist camps as a theoretical framework within which to discuss the management of societal divisions, including their implications and applicability to Burma. To prove that a constitutional federation that draws together elements of both integrationist and accommodationist theory, I revisit and analyse reasons behind the constitutional crises of Burma, the basis upon which Burma emerged as a country, the composition of its ethnic fragmentations, and competing visions of the Union of Burma itself. With respect to an institutional design for a future Burma, there are two main components in my proposal: a disproportional upper chamber in the union legislature, whereby I envision an equal number of representatives from each constituent state; and separate legislatures and constitutions for each federating unit, dividing power between central and state governments along the line of US states and Canadian provinces. Lastly, I look at the current provisional constitution drafted by leaders of a democratic opposition – seven ethnic national minorities - in anticipation of a future federal Union of Burma..." |
| Author/creator: | | Zaceu Lian |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Burma Centre for Ethnic Studies (Working Paper No. 1) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (377K - OBL version; 868K - original) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://burmaethnicstudies.net/pdf/BCES-WP-1.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 17 May 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Preliminary Analysis of Myanmar’s 2010 Electoral Laws |
| Date of publication: | | 31 March 2010 |
| Description/subject: | | "This briefing paper is intended to give a concise overview of the main provisions of the
electoral laws and bylaws issued by the Myanmar authorities in March 2010, and to
discuss some of the implications of the most important provisions. These laws establish
the detailed framework for the first elections in Myanmar for 20 years, which will take
place later this year on a date yet to be announced. These elections, while they will not
be free and fair, nevertheless represent the most important political shift in a
generation. A new political space will be created – however constrained it may be –
along with a set of new State institutions. The ageing military leadership will also hand
over the reins of power to a new generation. It is therefore vital to have a clear
understanding of this legislation and its likely consequences; however, much of the
debate so far has been based on a hasty and often erroneous reading of the laws..." |
| Author/creator: | | Richard Horsey |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Conflict Prevention and Peace Forum |
| Format/size: | | pdf (149K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 April 2010 |
|
| Title: | | Major flaws in the 2008 constitution |
| Date of publication: | | 06 March 2010 |
| Description/subject: | | "Burma’s constitution was ratified in the days following cyclone Nargis in May 2008 by an alleged 92 percent of the population, out of a total 98 percent who turned out to vote, the ruling junta asserted. International observers have said however that voter intimidation and corruption, not to mention the deaths of 140,000 people from the cyclone, distorted the real picture, particularly as the cyclone prevented millions from accessing polling booths.
The constitution will play a key role in the results of elections this year; several clauses bar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi from participating, while other deliberately vague laws appear to permit use of intimidation and threats against opposition by the government. Critics of the ruling junta have already said that the elections will be a charade aimed at cementing military rule in Burma..." |
| Author/creator: | | Aung Htoo |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB) |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 26 October 2010 |
|
| Title: | | A State-run "Market Economy" |
| Date of publication: | | November 2009 |
| Description/subject: | | Without the rule of law, there are no guarantees the economy will be free of state interference under the 2008 Constitution...
"The economic aspects of Burma’s 2008 Constitution have been notably absent from the recent written analysis of its implications for Burmese society. Though constitutions are not primarily economic documents, Burma’s latest Constitution does contain clauses that have economic import, and it is worth looking at them carefully.
There is an important caveat, however, and this is that a regime that consistently honors the rule of law only in the breach and has many incentives (financial and otherwise) for maintaining the status quo is unlikely to change its behavior anytime soon; therefore, the Constitution may amount to little. Regardless of whether the military abides by its Constitution, however, the document can provide insight into the thinking of its drafters..." |
| Author/creator: | | Sean Turnell |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Irrawaddy" Vol. 17, No. 8 |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www2.irrawaddy.org/print_article.php?art_id=17134 |
| Date of entry/update: | | 28 February 2010 |
|
| Title: | | Above the Law |
| Date of publication: | | November 2009 |
| Description/subject: | | Burma’s rulers will continue to lean heavily on the judiciary to impose their vision of a “discipline-flourishing democracy”...
"After decades of military rule, many Burmese are no longer aware that their country had one of the most progressive judicial systems in the region after independence in 1948. Judges had secure salaries and could only be removed for misbehavior or incapacity. The courts were not afraid to challenge the executive, and the Supreme Court proclaimed that the 1947 Constitution should be interpreted in a “liberal and comprehensive spirit.” Even at the height of insurgencies against Rangoon in the late 1940s, the Supreme Court ordered police to release men who had been detained illegally.
ILLUSTRATION: HARN LAY/THE IRRAWADDY
The slide from a judiciary with integrity to its present role as defender of the military began when the late Gen Ne Win seized power and imprisoned Chief Justice Myint Thein for six years—longer than he imprisoned former Prime Minister U Nu. When Ne Win drafted the 1974 Constitution, he removed any remaining separation between the judiciary and the government. He packed the Council of People’s Justice, which replaced the Supreme Court, with members of the Burma Socialist Programme Party. The Constitution required the court to “protect the socialist system” rather than the rights of Burmese citizens.
Although the military revived the Supreme Court in 1988, Human Rights Watch maintains that judges still “serve at the whim of the SPDC and must follow the directives of the military.”..." |
| Author/creator: | | Arnold Corso |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Irrawaddy" Vol. 17, No. 8 |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 28 February 2010 |
|
| Title: | | MYANMAR: Institutionalized denial of fundamental rights and the 2008 Constitution of Myanmar -- Human Rights Council, 12th Session |
| Date of publication: | | 07 September 2009 |
| Description/subject: | | "...The deeply flawed 2008 Constitution further entrenches arrangements for abuses of the sorts outlined above, and any serious attempts from the international community to take up issues of concern to the people of Myanmar in the lead up to and after the anticipated election must respond to the peculiar variety of unconstitutional constitutionalism that it envisages. In particular, the following aspects of the charter must be brought to the foreground and addressed before it is possible to proceed to more in-depth discussion about human rights in Myanmar under a government operating according to its parameters:..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Asian Human Rights Commission via UN Human Rights Council (A/HRC/12/NGO/21) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (36K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.ahrchk.net/statements/mainfile.php/2006statements/2201/ |
| Date of entry/update: | | 04 December 2009 |
|
| Title: | | MYANMAR: TOWARDS THE ELECTIONS |
| Date of publication: | | 20 August 2009 |
| Description/subject: | | Executive Summary: "The bizarre prosecution and conviction of opposition leader and Nobel Peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi for violating her house arrest has returned attention to repression in Myanmar, as preparations were underway for the first national elections in twenty years, now scheduled for 2010. This further undermined what little credibility the exercise may have had, especially when based on a constitution that institutionalises the militaryâ�" a number of prominent regime opponents have been arrested and sentenced to prison terms over the last year â�" the constitution and elections together will fundamentally change the political landscape in a way the government may not be able to control. Senior Generals Than Shwe and Maung Aye may soon step down or move to ceremonial roles, making way for a younger military generation. All stakeholders should be alert to opportunities that may arise to push the new government toward reform and reconciliation.
At first glance, the obstacles to change seem overÃÂwhelming. The 2008 constitution entrenches military power by reserving substantial blocs of seats in the national and local legislatures for the army, creating a strong new national defence and security council and vesting extraordinary powers in the commander-in-chief. It prevents Aung San Suu Kyi from standing for president, even if she were not imprisoned. It is extremely difficult to amend. And while not all regulations relating to the administration of the elections have been anÃÂnounced, they are unlikely to offer much room for manoevre to opposition parties.
But the elections are significant because the controversial constitution on which they are based involves a complete reconfiguration of the political structure â�" establishing a presidential system of government with a bicameral legislature as well as fourteen regional governments and assemblies â�" the most wide-ranging shake-up in a generation. The change will not inevitably be for the better, but it offers an opportunity to influence the future direction of the country. Ultimately, even assuming that the intention of the regime is to consolidate military rule rather than begin a transition away from it, such processes often lead in unexpected directions.
This report looks at the elections in the context of MyanÃÂmarâ�â¢s constitutional history. It examines key provisions of the 2008 constitution and shows how many of the controversial articles were simply taken from its 1947 or 1974 predecessors. Noteworthy new provisions include strict requirements on presidential candidates, the establishment of state/regional legislatures and governments, the reservation of legislative seats for the military, military control of key security ministries, the authority granted to the military to administer its own affairs (in particular military justice) and the creation of a constitutional tribunal.
Criticism of the constitution from groups within MyanÃÂmar has focused on military control, ethnic autonomy, qualifications for political office, and the very difficult amendment procedures. The main reaction of the populace to it and the forthcoming elections is indifference, rooted in a belief that nothing much will change. Some of the so-called ceasefire groups â�" ethnic minorities that have ended their conflicts with the government â�" are endorsing ethnic political parties that will take part in the polls. These groups take a negative view of the constitution but feel that there may be some limited opening of political space, particularly at the regional level, and that they should position themselves to take advantage of this. There are increased tensions, however, as the regime is pushing these groups to transform into border guard forces partially under the command of the national army.
The National League for Democracy (NLD), winner of the 1990 elections, has said it will only take part if the constitution is changed, and it is given the freedom to organise. Assuming this will not happen, it is not yet clear if it will call for a complete boycott in an attempt to deny the elections legitimacy or urge its supporters to vote for other candidates. A boycott could play into the hands of the military government, since it would not prevent the election from going ahead and would mainly deprive non-government candidates of votes, potentially narrowing the range of voices in future legislatures.
The Myanmar authorities must make the electoral process more credible. Aung San Suu Kyi and all other political prisoners must be released now and allowed to participate fully in the electoral process; politically-motivated arrests must cease. It also critical that key electoral legislation be promulgated as soon as possible, in a way that allows parties to register without undue restriction, gives space for canvassing activities and ensures transparent counting of votes.
The international community, including Myanmarâ�â¢s ASEAN neighbours, must continue to press for these measures while looking for opportunities that the elections may bring. This will require a pragmatic and nuanced strategy towards the new government at the very time, following a deeply flawed electoral process, when pressure will be greatest for a tough stance. The new Myanmar government, whatever its policies, will not be capable of reversing overnight a culture of impunity and decades of abuses and political restrictions. But following the elections, the international community must be ready to respond to any incremental positive steps in a calibrated and timely fashion. To have any hope of inducing a reform course, it is critical to find ways to communicate unambiguously that a renormalisation of external relations is possible..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | International Crisis Group (Asia Report Nð174) |
| Format/size: | | pdf (2.5MB) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.crisisgroup.org/~/media/Files/asia/south-east-asia/burma-myanmar/174_myanmar___towards_t... |
| Date of entry/update: | | 24 August 2009 |
|
| Title: | | An Independent Analysis of the Principal Elements of the 2008 Constitution |
| Date of publication: | | 2009 |
| Description/subject: | | Reproduced, with the author’s permission, from “The State in Myanmar” by
Robert H Taylor published in 2009 by Hurst & Company, London..."The 2008 constitution contains a number of points that attempt to address issues
that had grown out of the state in Myanmar’s post-colonial history. Among these, most
prominently and controversially, in addition to the power and autonomy of the armed
forces under the constitution, and the complex issue of political autonomy for ethnicallydesignated
groups, was the distribution of power between the executive, legislature and
judiciary at various levels of government. The constitution is the army government’s
attempt to cast these issues in terms that will be politically resolvable and will avoid in
the future both the severe conflicts of the civil war and the popular upheaval of 1988.
Whether the constitution proves to be more durable and adaptable than its two
predecessors, of course, is a question that future historians will answer..." |
| Author/creator: | | Robert Taylor |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Network Myanmar |
| Format/size: | | pdf (124K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 10 March 2010 |
|
| Title: | | Constitutionalism Before Constitutions: Burma's Struggle to Build a New Order |
| Date of publication: | | 2009 |
| Description/subject: | | "In at least some cases - and Burma is one - seeking trust, integration,
and unity in the abstract may be neither useful nor even possible. Instead, a
reconciliation process should seek, quite specifically, to find constitutional
common ground well before drafting begins; it should be oriented toward
developing a shared constitutional vision that will provide the warring sides
with reason to commit to the new proposed regime. As the contending sides
come to realize that they might share specific and concrete constitutional
desires, they also come to realize that cohabitation might be possible. The moral of the story is that constitution making (broadly defined) is part and
parcel of the creation of social integrity and not merely its consequence...Part I offers an overview of the constitutional history of Burma to the
year 2000. Part II explains the constitutional processes going on today-not
only the military government's "roadmap to democracy" but also the
democracy movement's alternative process (or processes, depending on your
perspective). As will become plain, the two processes are very different: the
junta's roadmap has yielded a written constitution that will shortly become
the law of the land but which lacks all legitimacy.6 By contrast, the
democracy movement's alternative will not become sovereign law anytime
soon, but it has set in train social dynamics that might, in the long run, build the conditions necessary for genuine constitutional rule..." |
| Author/creator: | | David C. Williams |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Indiana University Maurer School of Law Faculty Publications. Paper 492. |
| Format/size: | | pdf (740K-OBL version; 2.42K - original) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1492&context=facpub |
| Date of entry/update: | | 17 May 2012 |
|
| Title: | | The 2008 Myanmar Constitution: Analysis and Assessment |
| Date of publication: | | December 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | Contents:
I Purposes of constitutions and constitution making processes . 1
II Context of Constitutional Reform .. 4
III Process .. 6
Process for the preparation of the Constitution .. 7
IV Constitution. 11
Objectives and Basic Principles of the Constitution 11
Overview of the structure of the Constitution .. 12
Electoral system ... 16
Legislative bodies 20
State and Regional legislatures 22
Union territory legislature 22
Self-administered zone or division legislature . 23
Executives and Presidency ... 23
Constituting the Union government . 24
Powers and responsibilities of the President 25
Accountability of the President 26
Tatmadaw and Commander in Chief ... 26
Judiciary ... 28
Constitutional Tribunal 29
The relationship between the Union, States and Regions, and Self-Administered Areas . 31
Compatibility of laws ... 32
Finance and resources: relations between the Union and State, Regions and Self-Administered Areas . 33
Executive: relations between the Union and State, Regions and Self-Administered Areas 33
Emergency Powers... 34
Amendment Procedure. 36
Transitional Provisions 36
V Assessment ... 37 |
| Author/creator: | | Yash Ghai |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Yash Ghai |
| Format/size: | | pdf (217K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 19 December 2008 |
|
| Title: | | NEUE VERFASSUNG: Burmas Militärherrscher jubeln über ihr Referendum |
| Date of publication: | | 15 May 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | Hunderttausende Menschen in Burma leiden - doch die Militärjunta verkündet Erfolgsmeldungen: Den Generälen zufolge wurde die neue Verfassung mit über 92 Prozent Zustimmung angenommen. Ausländische Hilfe lassen die Machthaber weiter nur eingeschränkt zu - die Uno ist frustriert; referendum 2008; cyclone Nargis; UN aid programmes; |
| Language: | | German, Deutsch |
| Source/publisher: | | Spiegel Online |
| Format/size: | | Html (82 kb) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 15 May 2008 |
|
| Title: | | Chronology of Burma's Constitutional Process |
| Date of publication: | | 01 May 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | 1947-2008 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Human Rights Watch |
| Format/size: | | pdf (88K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 01 May 2008 |
|
| Title: | | Vote to Nowhere - The May 2008 Constitutional Referendum in Burma |
| Date of publication: | | 01 May 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | "...On May 10, 2008, the Burmese military government will hold a referendum on a draft constitution that it claims will usher in a new era of “discipline-flourishing genuine multiparty democracy.”
However, the generals’ referendum, reflecting 46 years of brutal military rule, will not bring the people of Burma any closer to a democratic and rights-respecting government they so desperately seek, and for which they have courageously struggled. Instead, the draft constitution that the generals are demanding the Burmese people approve is designed to perpetuate military control in Burma, and obstruct any steps toward a meaningful multiparty democracy that upholds human rights.
The environment in Burma prior to the referendum has been one of continuing intimidation of the political opposition and general populace, denial of basic freedoms of expression, association, and assembly, and arbitrary arrests and detention. Under such widespread repression and a pervasive climate of fear, no free and fair referendum can take place in Burma.
Since the military crackdown on monks and pro-democracy protestors in August-September 2007, foreign governments and intergovernmental bodies have responded in varying ways. International criticism may be partly responsible for the referendum being announced, in February 2008, but it will not ensure that the vote is conducted freely. Concerted public pressure and targeted sanctions by the military government’s international supporters as well as its detractors is needed if there is to be any hope that real democratic progress, rather than further constitutional travesties, can be achieved..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Human Rights Watch |
| Format/size: | | html, pdf (536K) |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/2008/04/30/vote-nowhere-0 |
| Date of entry/update: | | 01 May 2008 |
|
| Title: | | Burma - schon vergessen? Diktatorische Volksabstimmung |
| Date of publication: | | 29 April 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | Am 10. Mai wird Burmas Bevölkerung an die Urne gerufen, um über die neue Verfassung abzustimmen. Dabei legt die burmesische Militärjunta ein kleines Lehrstück vor, wie Demokratie bei einer Volksabstimmung zur Farce wird.
politische Gefangene; referendum 2008; political prisoners |
| Author/creator: | | Christine Pluess, Arbeitskreis Tourismus & Entwicklung |
| Language: | | German, Deutsch |
| Source/publisher: | | Fairunterwegs |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 May 2008 |
|
| Title: | | Constitutional Conundrum |
| Date of publication: | | April 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | As analysts and activists debate how to respond to the regime’s draft constitution, others ask if it will cement the generals’ hold on power or trigger a popular uprising...
"FOR the generals who rule Burma, it is a step closer to the coveted goal of permanent military control of the country’s politics. For its detractors, it is a potential lightning rod for decades of pent-up discontent. But for most, it is still a mystery, as they wonder if this is really a distant light at the end of the tunnel or the headlights of an impending disaster.
The Burmese regime’s draft constitution, which Burmese voters will be asked to endorse or reject in a referendum in May, has drawn many reactions from people both inside and outside the country.
Although there is little consensus on the constitution, which was 14 years in the making, few doubt that the referendum, if it actually goes ahead, will be the junta’s most significant political move since elections in 1990, when voters unequivocally signaled a desire for an end to military rule..." |
| Author/creator: | | Kyaw Zwa Moe |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Irrawaddy" Vol. 16, No. 4 |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 27 April 2008 |
|
| Title: | | Framing the Future |
| Date of publication: | | April 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | Burma has always been cursed by its constitutions. So, is the upcoming referendum a chance for progress or a step back for the people? |
| Author/creator: | | Dominic Faulder |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Irrawaddy" Vol. 16, No. 4 |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 27 April 2008 |
|
| Title: | | Essay on The Government of India Act 1935 |
| Date of publication: | | 01 February 2008 |
| Description/subject: | | 1. Introduction
2. Genesis of the Act
3. Some Features of the Act
4. Provincial Part of the Act
5. Federal Part of the Act
6. Gambles Taken by the British Government
7. Indian Reaction to the Proposed Federation
8. The Working of the Act
9. Postscript |
| Author/creator: | | David Steinberg |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | House of David |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 17 March 2010 |
|
| Title: | | DESIGNING FEDERALISM IN BURMA |
| Date of publication: | | 2005 |
| Description/subject: | | CONTENTS:Forewords (David Williams)...
PART ONE:THE BASIC PRINCIPLES:
1. Federalism, Constitution Making and State Building in Burma (Lian H. Sakhong) Introduction ... Federalism: Theoretical Analysis... Federalism in Burmese Contexts: Lessons from 1947... Nation-Building and the Problem of Forced Assimilation ... State-Building and Unity in Diversity: An Option for the Future... Conclusion: Finding Equilibrium between Nation-Building and State Building ....
2. The Basic Principles for Future Federal Union of Burma
(Lian H. Sakhong)... Preamble ... The Basic Principles of Federalism at the time of Union Formation ... Proposal for the Future ....
PART TWO:CONSTITUTIONAL DESIGN FOR BURMA...
3. Constitutional Design for Burma:The First Lecture (2003)
(David C. Williams)... A. The Purpose of a Constitution ... (i) Electoral Systems ... (ii) Separation of Powers ... (iii) Federalism .... (iv) Individual Rights ... B. Securing the Basis of Consent ... C. Federalism ... D. Electoral Systems ...
E. The Union Constitution ... F. Judicial Review ...
4. Constitutional Design for Burma:The Second Lecture (2004)
(David C. Williams)... A. Introduction ... B. State-Building and Nation-Building ... (i) States ... (ii) Nations ... (iii) States and Nations ... C. Federalism ... D. Federalism in Foreign Affairs ... (i) The States’ Ability to Make Their Own Foreign Policy ...
(ii) The States’ Participation in Foreign Policy ... (iii) Political Pressure ... (iv) Implementation ... (v) Direct Participation ... (vi) Permanent Staffs ...E. Electoral Systems ... (i) Majoritarian Systems ... (ii) Proposal Systems ... (iii) Combing Systems ... F. Conclusion ....
PART THREE:CONSTITUTIONAL DESIGN AND FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS...
5. Constitutional Drafting and Fundamental Rights:The Example of Religious Freedom (Susan H. Williams) ...
6. Constitutional Drafting and Fundamental Rights:The Example of Gender Equality (Susan H. Williams) .... |
| Author/creator: | | David C.Williams, Lian H.Sakhong, Susan H.Williams |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | ENC "PEACEFUL CO-EXISTENCE: Towards Federal Union of Burma [Series No.10]" |
| Format/size: | | pdf (723.41 KB) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 30 August 2010 |
|
| Title: | | Burma's Ethnic Problem is Constitutional |
| Date of publication: | | April 2002 |
| Description/subject: | | Federalism in Burma: "...Has Burma really been on the brink of fragmentation since independence? Are
the ethnic nationalities and the politics of ethnicity the root cause of the problem? Was General Ne Win correct when he
claimed in 1962 that he had to seize state power to prevent Burma from disintegration? The current State Peace and
Development Council also claims that there are 135 languages and 8 major races in Burma requiring a strong centralized
military to keep the country together. Is this true? ..." |
| Author/creator: | | Harn Yawnghwe and B. K. Sen |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 11 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Format/size: | | PDF |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original and authoritative version of this article may be found in "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 11 at
http://www.blc-burma.org/activity_pub_liob.html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Federalism and Self-Determination: Some Reflections |
| Date of publication: | | April 2002 |
| Description/subject: | | Federalism in Burma:
"Federalism has, for many decades now, been seen an answer to the challenges posed by multi-ethnic societies the world over.
In some cases, the idea has worked, while in others it manifestly has not. Where it has failed, the reasons have often lain as
much with human deficiencies as with systemic shortcomings..." |
| Author/creator: | | Venkat Iyer |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 11 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Format/size: | | PDF |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original and authoritative version of this article may be found in "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 11 at
http://www.blc-burma.org/activity_pub_liob.html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Federalism as a Solution to the Ethnic Problem in Burma |
| Date of publication: | | April 2002 |
| Description/subject: | | Federalism in Burma: "From January 4, 1948, the day the Union of Burma came into existence as an independent nation, the people and their leaders
have been divided over how to achieve national unity and structure their state. Until 1988, it was federal in name and theory,
but unitary in practice. After five decades of political discussion, peaceful movements for secession or autonomy and warfare,
the majority Burmans and most of the ethnic minorities remain disunited. From time to time efforts have been made by the
Government of Burma and the minorities, either alone or in groups, to end revolt and disunity, but none have succeeded.
Today, the basic problem is the same as the one the nation's founding fathers faced fifty years ago: how to construct a political
system wherein diverse peoples feel free and equal, able to govern themselves in their own areas, protect and preserve their
languages, cultures and traditions, while at the same time give their political loyalty to the nationstate..." |
| Author/creator: | | Josef Silverstein |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 11 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Format/size: | | PDF |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original and authoritative version of this article may be found in "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 11 at
http://www.blc-burma.org/activity_pub_liob.html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Federalism With A New Twist: Burma's Only Option |
| Date of publication: | | April 2002 |
| Description/subject: | | Federalism in Burma:
"The author of the article "The Panglong Spirit Lives On" (Chao-Tzang Yawnghwe in The Irrawaddy, July 2001) argued that the
guiding principle of the Panglong Accord is "unity in diversity". He raised the question as to whether there is a formula for
ending Burma's decades of ethnic strife, and answered it himself with "Yes, and it is none other than the political vision that
brought modern Burma into existence half a century ago".
This is begging the question: what is this political vision, which is abstract in terms of people's understanding? The meaning of
terminology such as "unity in diversity" is academically attractive, but in the understanding of the activists it helps little. However,
Yawnghwe retrieved much of the ground lost in the struggle evolving a viable concept for the establishment of a stable Burma
by stating that the major goal is the establishment of a democratic, federal Union of Burma, to be composed of self-determining
states living together in equality and peace. It is argued that core issues must be addressed, and the debate has to be brought to
a fruitful end..." |
| Author/creator: | | B. K. Sen |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 11 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Format/size: | | PDF |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original and authoritative version of this article may be found in "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 11 at
http://www.blc-burma.org/activity_pub_liob.html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Federalism, Burma and How The International Community Can Help |
| Date of publication: | | April 2002 |
| Description/subject: | | Federalism in Burma: "International Community can help via systematic study and consideration of the world's federations, in pursuit of an
understanding of what federalism can achieve when presented with a range of entrenched political and/ or ethnic problems. The
international community thus provides and becomes the backdrop, and the actor/ participants can research, inform, educate,
and consider whether and in what ways federalism can provide some solutions to the crisis of governance in which they
flounder.
Burma has never progressed past the polarised and prevailing view of federalism, yet for so long an aspiration of many of
Burma's leaders, notably the National Democratic Front (NDF) since its formation in 1976, and still today. 1 The United
Nationalities League for Democracy (UNLD) an umbrella political organisation of non-Burman nationalities that formed in 1989
likewise embraces federalism as a path to political, therefore constitutional settlement, that will bring peace and prosperity. 2
Until the political actors in and of Burma have this debate, its ability to resolve its political differences by political means to
effect a constitutional settlement will elude them. National reconciliation will remain a catch cry..." |
| Author/creator: | | Janelle Saffin |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 11 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Format/size: | | PDF |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/activity_pub_liob.html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Federalism: Putting Burma Back Together Again |
| Date of publication: | | April 2002 |
| Description/subject: | | Federalism in Burma: "This paper deals with the absence or the non-existence of a functional relation between the state in Burma and broader society
which is also made up of non-Burman 1 ethnic segments that inhabit the historical-territorial units comprising the Union of
Burma. 2
Introduction: Putting the Country Back Together Again
The paper looks into the problems related to the task, as yet to be accomplished, of "putting the country back together again",
in contrast to the claim of the military and its state is "keeping the country together". It is here argued that although the military
has, in a manner of speaking, "kept the country together", it has also distorted the relation between the state in Burma and
broader society by monopolizing power and excluding societal elements and forces from the sphere of the state and from the
political arena. The military's centralist, unitary impulse, informed by it ethnocentric (Burmanization) national unity formula, has
contributed to a dysfunctional state-society relation, that has in turn brought about the present crisis of decay and general
breakdown, making Burma a failed state..." |
| Author/creator: | | Chao-Tzang Yawnghwe |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 11 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Format/size: | | PDF |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/activity_pub_liob.html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 15 July 2010 |
|
| Title: | | In Search of a Constitution for Burma |
| Date of publication: | | April 2002 |
| Description/subject: | | Federalism in Burma: "Constitution can be a strong foundation for every country to be established as a just, free, peaceful and developed society.
Burma is in the process of producing a new constitution. By amalgamating lessons from previous historical experiences and
current practical situation of the country, it is hoped that a proper constitution for future Burma might be produced.
Major concern is that without finding ways and means to resolve the underlying issues of a country, production of constitution
superficially is meaningless and constitution might not be effective from positive aspect in our future society. In this account, the
constitution making process or the way, how a constitution will be produced, is of paramount importance. In attempting to
produce a constitution, onesided or unproper guidance to the people should be avoided. In a genuine constitution making
process, the people, regardless of race, social origin, gender and etc, should be allowed to uncover their sufferings frankly,
propose possible solutions positively, and express their will to restructure the society freely thereby leading the process to be
more and more participatory. Any kind of discrimination should not be exercised within a genuine constitution making process
whether be it federal or state constitution making processes..." |
| Author/creator: | | Aung Htoo |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 11 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Format/size: | | PDF |
| Alternate URLs: | | http://www.blc-burma.org/activity_pub_liob.html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Interview With Sao Seng Suk |
| Date of publication: | | April 2002 |
| Description/subject: | | Federalism in Burma:
(Sao Seng Suk is the Chairman of the Shan State Constitution Drafting Committee. Following is a literal transcript of the
interview he had with U Aung Htoo and B. K. Sen).
"Do you consider the constitution to be the core issue in a peaceful political settlement in Burma?"
Sao Seng Suk: "Yes, I certainly do. Because all problems arose since Pyidaungzu was established in 1947 from the then
constitution. If all accept democratic constitution, historical problems can be settled peacefully and the country rebuilt according
to constitution, as there will be many kinds of freedom, freedom of expression, freedom of activities, etc."
"What type of Constitution will be viable?"
Sao Seng Suk: "Federal type constitution, federal is suitable for us..." |
| Author/creator: | | U Aung Htoo, B. K. Sen |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 11 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Format/size: | | PDF |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original and authoritative version of this article may be found in "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 11 at
http://www.blc-burma.org/activity_pub_liob.html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Secession and Self-Determination in the Context of Burma's Transition |
| Date of publication: | | December 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | "The word 'secession' has originated from the concept of 'self-determination'. Apart from its historical context,
'self-determination' can also be seen in its plain meaning. The Oxford Dictionary defines 'self-determination as, 'The right of a
nation or people to decide what form of government it will have or whether it will be independent of another country or not'.
The second part of this definition is easy to understand. A nation or people has the right to be independent of another country
when under subjugation of that country. But sometimes it is difficult to determine whether a nation striving for selfdetermination
is actually a nation..." |
| Author/creator: | | B.K. Sen |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 10 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original (and authoritative) version of this article may be found in http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal_Issues_on%20Burma_Journal_10.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Designing Constitution as Policy Formulation |
| Date of publication: | | April 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | "An intensive people's movement for the restoration of democracy and human rights has been existing in Burma for more than a
decade. In the meantime, both government and opposition groups have been drafting constitutions, to be put into force during the
transition to a more open and democratic system of government..." |
| Author/creator: | | Khin Maung Win |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 8 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original (and authoritative) version of this article may be found in http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal%20Issues%20on%20Burma%20Journal%208.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Burma's Election and Constitutional History: A Snapshot |
| Date of publication: | | December 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | "...The nation's constitutional and election history highlights the difficulties that
have been encountered in securing peace with the people, particularly as the
armed forces (Tatmadaw) have long ruled Burma. There is no culture of consent
between the governed and the government and this is a constant of political
life. Until this is remedied, the country embroiled in its own civil war for 52
years will stay at war in one form or another..." |
| Author/creator: | | Janelle Saffin |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 7 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original (and authoritative) version of this article may be found on http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal%20Issues%20on%20Burma%20Journal%207.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Rival Constitution Writing Processes: A Problem in National Reconciliation in Burma |
| Date of publication: | | December 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | "One of the major issues proving to be an obstacle to the achievement of national reconciliation in Burma is the rival constitution
writing processes initiated by opposing forces. As the competing political forces use the constitutional drafting process as a
political football, the chance for dialogue and prospects for national reconciliation remain dim.
The State Peace and Development Council's (SPDC) constitution drafting process, which started in January 1993, emerged as a
method utilized by the junta to deter the National League for Democracy (NLD) from taking power. As the junta strictly controls
the entire constitution writing process, other forces including the NLD and ethnic organizations who have signed ceasefire
agreements with the junta, have been denied the right to freely participate in the junta initiated process..." |
| Author/creator: | | Khin Maung Win |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 7 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original (and authoritative) version of this article may be found on http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal%20Issues%20on%20Burma%20Journal%207.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Issues of self-determination in Burma |
| Date of publication: | | April 2000 |
| Description/subject: | | "This paper seeks to provide an introduction to the concept of self-determination, and to suggest the importance of this concept
in Burma. A comprehensive analysis of either topic is beyond the scope of this paper, which is aimed at readers without great
familiarity with either area. Suggestions for further reading may be found in the references.
The paper begins by discussing the concept of self-determination, and its varied meanings. A brief history of the development of
the concept follows, in which the meaning of self-determination beyond decolonisation is touched upon. The situation of
minorities within a state is then considered. The second section of the paper is a discussion of the particular case of Burma..." |
| Author/creator: | | Louise Southalan |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 5 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Burma's Future Constitution: Comparing and contrasting democracy and human rights provisions in two draft Burmese constitutions from an international perspective |
| Date of publication: | | October 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | "...This article has discussed the draft constitutions for Burma proposed by the National Convention, the body established by the
ruling party, and that proposed by the opposition National Council of the Union of Burma. It has reviewed aspects such as the
process of constitution of drafting, the electoral system, constitutional supremacy and amendments and appointments to and
function of the courts, as well as a Bill of Rights, a Human Rights Commission and declarations of states of emergency.
The National Convention's constitution contains many strongly anti-democratic provisions and is silent on several key issues. In
contrast, the NCUB's constitution attempts to create a democratic system, but includes several provisions that should be
reworked to strengthen democratic checks and balances and prevent future state abuse of power." |
| Author/creator: | | Jeremy Sarkin |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 4 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Burma, South-East Asia and The Road to Democratic Constitution |
| Date of publication: | | May 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | Drafting a constitution in Burma. Comparison of the constitutional history of Burma and Thailand and a list of elements needed in a new Burmese constitution. |
| Author/creator: | | Vitit Muntarbhorn |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 3 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Convening the People's Assembly: A Legal Analysis |
| Date of publication: | | May 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | "According to Burma's two supposedly superseded constitutions, that of 1947 and 1974, the Pyithu Hluttaw (the People's
Assembly) is the body charged with exercising State power. The 1989 Pyithu Hluttaw Election Law (called the Election Law),
under which the 1990 elections were conducted, also provides that the duty of representatives elected in accordance with the
Election Law is to form the Pyithu Hluttaw (Section 3).
The ruling military junta, the people of Burma and the international community acknowledged without qualification that the May
1990 general election was free, fair and lawful. It then follows that those representatives elected by the people in the 1990
election have the lawful right to form a Pyithu Hluttaw that exercises legislative power and appoints a government in accordance
with the legal norms of Burma..." |
| Author/creator: | | Burma Lawyers' Council |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 3 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Drafting a Constitution in Burma: A Struggle for Participatory Process |
| Date of publication: | | May 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | Critique of the National Convention. Comparison between the constitution-drafting processes and principles of the Burmese military, the NLD and the NCUB, with additional comparison with the constitution-drafting processes in the Philippines and Thailand. |
| Author/creator: | | Burma Lawyers' Council |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 3 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Lessons From the Past |
| Date of publication: | | May 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | Drafting a constitution in Burma
"As the peoples and leaders of Burma approach the task of writing a third constitution, a good place to begin is by asking the
question, why did the previous constitutions fail to unite the indigenous ethnic minorities and the government in peaceful viable
polity. At the heart of the problem is the questions which vexed the founding fathers-how to construct a union in which people
who formerly were separated could be joined together so as to benefit from unity while remaining nominally autonomous in their
own areas on matters of political rule, economy and culture.
Probably the clearest and most direct statement on the question was made by the AFPFL- the nationalist party which led the
nation to independence- just before Aung San went to England to discuss Burma's future with the British Prime Minister..." |
| Author/creator: | | Josef Silverstein |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 3 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | The Pyidaungzu, Federalism and Burman Elites: A Brief Analysis |
| Date of publication: | | May 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | Drafting a constitution in Burma.
"Federalism is not quite understood in Burma. In fact, it would not be wrong to say it is grossly misunderstood by -- among
many others -- the Burman population segment, or at least by its armed elites (or elites in uniform).
To armed Burman elites, Federalism is synonomous with the destruction or the disintegration of the Union. The
Burman-dominated military led by General Ne Win introduced and entrenched this idea when they usurped power in 1962..." |
| Author/creator: | | Chao-Tzang Yawnghwe |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 3 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Format/size: | | html |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 August 2004 |
|
| Title: | | THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE; HUMAN RIGHTS AND CONSTITUTION MAKING IN BURMA |
| Date of publication: | | 14 December 1991 |
| Description/subject: | | by Janelle M. Diller,
Legal Director International Human Rights Law Group,
December 14, 1991 Oxford, England.
"We find ourselves in an era of accelerated change. Many nations around the world, including Mongolia, Nepal and the countries of Eastern Europe, are thrusting themselves into the process of democratization and democratic constitution-making. Such momentum persists even though, in many cases, democracy has not been a part of the political, social, economic or legal infrastructures of the changing countries. Yet in Burma, nearly one and a half years after the peaceful election of a People's Assembly, the people of Burma continue to be governed by the ruling military State Law and Order Restoration Council ("SLORC"). The awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to Aung San Suu Kyi this week has helped dispel the prevailing complacency in the international arena with regard to the current situation in Burma. However, just and equitable governance continues to evade the people of Burma.
Into the SLORC-controlled environment in which an electoral mandate continues to be withheld and reports of human rights abuses appear with disturbing frequency, the SLORC has announced a plan for arriving at a national consensus which will pave the way for a new constitution to be drafted. How can the Burmese people exercise such a supreme act of popular sovereignty under these conditions? And what international legal standards govern the constitution-making process and its result?
Let me briefly review events leading up to the present scenario in order to provide insight into the complexities involved in the establishment of a constitutional culture in Burma. The term 'constitutional culture' here refers to the capacity of political, social and legal infrastructures to cultivate and practice a respect for some sort of supreme law of the land that governs both rulers and governed. Such a culture nurtures both individual and institutional respect for the rule of law..." |
| Author/creator: | | Janelle M. Diller |
| Language: | | English |
| Format/size: | | html (184K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
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Laws and decrees relating to the parliamentary process
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Laws and decrees relating to the parliamentary process (texts)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Law Amending the Division Regional or State Parliament Election Law - Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Law No. 10/2011 (Burmese) |
| Date of publication: | | 19 October 2011 |
| Description/subject: | | Adopted 18 October 2011...
တုိင္းေဒသႀကီးလႊတ္ေတာ္ သုိ့မဟုတ္ ျပည္နယ္လႊတ္ေတာ္
ေရြးေကာက္ပြဲဥပေဒကုိ ျပင္ဆင္သည္႕ဥပေဒ...
(၂ဝ၁၁ ခုႏွစ္၊ ျပည္ေထာင္စုလႊတ္ေတာ္ဥပေဒ အမွတ္ ၁ဝ။)...
၁၃၇၃ ခုႏွစ္၊ သီတင္းကြၽတ္လျပည္႕ေက်ာ္ ၆ ရက္...
(၂ဝ၁၁ ခုႏွစ္၊ ေအာက္တုိဘာလ ၁၈ ရက္)... |
| Language: | | Burmese/ ျမန္မာဘာသာ |
| Source/publisher: | | "The Mirror" ("Kyemon") ေၾကးမံု 19 October 2011 |
| Format/size: | | pdf (116K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 29 April 2012 |
|
| Title: | | Political Parties Registration Law (State Peace and Development Council Law No. 2/2010) |
| Date of publication: | | 08 March 2010 |
| Description/subject: | | State Peace and Development Council
Political Parties Registration Law
(State Peace and Development Council Law No. 2/2010)
9th Waning Day of Tabaung, ME 1371
(8 March 2010) |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Peace and Development Council |
| Format/size: | | pdf (90K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 17 March 2012 |
|
| Title: | | SLORC Declaration No. 1/90 of July 27, 1990 |
| Date of publication: | | 27 July 1990 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council |
| Format/size: | | html (18K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Pyithu Hluttaw Election Rules, |
| Date of publication: | | 30 June 1989 |
| Description/subject: | | The Multi-Party Democracy General Election Commission Rules No. 1/89, 12th Waning
Day of Nayon, 1351 B.E. 30 June 1989...
"In exercise of the powers conferred by Section 81 of the Pyithu Hluttaw Election Law, the Multi-Party Democracy General Election Commission in order to hold a free and fair election hereby makes the following Rules:-..." |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | SLORC |
| Format/size: | | html (250K) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 21 February 2004 |
|
| Title: | | Pyithu Hluttaw Election Law |
| Date of publication: | | 31 May 1989 |
| Description/subject: | | The State Law and Order Restoration Council Law No. 14/89, 13th Waning Day of Kason, 1351 B.E., 31st May, 1989 |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | State Law and Order Restoration Council |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
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Laws and decrees relating to the parliamentary process (commentary)
Individual Documents
| Title: | | Ensuring Free and Fair Elections in a Democratic Burma: Establishing an Electoral System and Election Processes |
| Date of publication: | | April 2001 |
| Description/subject: | | "A country embarking on a transition to democracy has many issues to deal with. One of the most critical is the question of
elections, the type of system chosen and the manner in which elections are conducted.1 Free and fair elections are necessary to
establish a democratic, human rights-based society, and to ensure that the government and the state are legitimate.2 The right to
vote is an instrument of power for both the voter and the state. When giving the people the right to vote, it is necessary to
determine who is permitted to vote, and to regulate the exercise of the vote through a system which could include legislation and
ways of verifying the identity of people. Such a system helps to prevent non-resident citizens from voting, and to exclude residents
who do not qualify to vote. In some countries, for example, prisoners may not vote..." |
| Author/creator: | | Jeremy Sarkin |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | "Legal Issues on Burma Journal" No. 8 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Alternate URLs: | | The original (and authoritative) version of this article may be found in http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/Legal%20Issues%20on%20Burma%20Journal%208.pdf |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
| Title: | | Convening the People's Assembly: A Legal Analysis |
| Date of publication: | | May 1999 |
| Description/subject: | | "According to Burma's two supposedly superseded constitutions, that of 1947 and 1974, the Pyithu Hluttaw (the People's
Assembly) is the body charged with exercising State power. The 1989 Pyithu Hluttaw Election Law (called the Election Law),
under which the 1990 elections were conducted, also provides that the duty of representatives elected in accordance with the
Election Law is to form the Pyithu Hluttaw (Section 3).
The ruling military junta, the people of Burma and the international community acknowledged without qualification that the May
1990 general election was free, fair and lawful. It then follows that those representatives elected by the people in the 1990
election have the lawful right to form a Pyithu Hluttaw that exercises legislative power and appoints a government in accordance
with the legal norms of Burma..." |
| Author/creator: | | Burma Lawyers' Council |
| Language: | | English |
| Source/publisher: | | Legal Issues on Burma Journal No. 3 (Burma Lawyers' Council) |
| Date of entry/update: | | 03 June 2003 |
|
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The 1990 elections and the National Convention process
In the wake of the SLORC's refusal to transfer power following the 1990 elections, it claimed that a new constitution would first have to be written. The National Convention, most of whose members were hand-picked by SLORC, first met in January 1993 with the goal of drafting the basic elements for such a constitution. However, "the representatives elected by the people are those who have the responsibility to draw up the constitution of the future democratic State" (para 20 of Declaration 1/90).
|