------------------------ BurmaNet ------------------------ "Appropriate Information Technologies, Practical Strategies" ---------------------------------------------------------- The BurmaNet News: June 21, 1997 Issue #754 HEADLINES: ========== REUTER: BURMA MILITARY DETAINS SUU KYI ASSOCIATES FTUB REPORT:RECENT ARRESTS OF MEMBERS FEER: SCHOOL'S IN ASIA INC: FRONTIER OF FURY THE NATION: ON THE FRONTIER OF AIDS TRANSMISSION TT: SLORC LAUNCHES PROBE INTO CORRUPT HIGH-RANKING OFFICIALS SLORC: US POLITICS AND ITS POLITICIANS BURMANET SUBJECT-MATTER RESOURCE LIST ----------------------------------------------------------------- REUTER: BURMA MILITARY DETAINS SUU KYI ASSOCIATES June 20, 1997 BANGKOK, June 20 (Reuter) - At least five close associates of Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi have been detained by authorities for allegedly smuggling her videotaped speeches abroad, opposition sources said on Friday. The ruling State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) was upset when non-government organisations obtained and used a smuggled videotaped speech by Suu Kyi opposing Burma's inclusion as a member of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), they told Reuters. ASEAN groups Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. The block recently agreed to accept Burma as a new member in late July, despite Suu Kyi's opposition. Cambodia and Laos are to be admitted at the same time. Relatives and her personal photographer were among those held, a source from Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy Party (NLD) said. There was no SLORC comment on the opposition's statement. Cho Aung Than, a cousin of the Nobel Peace laureate, was picked up for interrogation last Friday, while his sister and her husband were arrested a few days later on the same charge, the NLD source added. Photographer Ko Suny and Hon Myint, an ageing politician who is related to Suu Kyi, were arrested two days ago. "They interrogated Ko Sunny on what kind of pictures he took and how he managed to ship some video out of the country," a close Suu Kyi aide said. The NLD source blamed ASEAN for the new round of detentions. "ASEAN will have to bear full responsibility for this because they accepted Burma into the grouping that gives activists nothing but disservice in Burma," the source said. Suu Kyi has said that if Burma became an ASEAN member it would give the ruling military government a licence to repress the opposition movement and suppress human rights further in the country. ******************************************** FTUB REPORT:RECENT ARRESTS OF MEMBERS June 20, 1997 From: Aung San Myint Federation of Trade Unions - Burma responsibilities & rights International contact Fax: (202) 393-7343 Fax: (61) 6-297-4801 SLORC National Intelligence Bureau, NIB, (an umbrella bureau of all the intelligence units) has arrested KHIN KYAW son of U kyaw, and MYO AUNG THANT, son of U Hla Thein) both executive committee members of FTUB. MYO AUNG THANT was arrested on the 13th of June, 1997 at the Mingaladon airport on his return from Bangkok by a NIB team. That NIB team not only arrested MYO AUNG THANT but also his wife and children and the others who came to welcome him. After MYO AUNG THANT was arrested, the NIB team arrested KHIN KYAW and his wife at their residence. The NIB has not informed the respective families of the reason for their arrests nor the police released any information officially of the arrests. All those detained remain in the hands of theintellgience bureau. MYO AUNG THANT and KHIN KYAW are officials of the FTUB. They have been documenting economic and social hardships of the workers and presenting those information as well as issues concerning forced labor to the international trade union community. On our behalf, they have been helping the dismissed workers of the 1988 movement. The activities that the two union executives and the FTUB had conducted are legal, permitted in all civilized countries. But, union activities have to be carried out clandestinely in Burma as the military has unlawfully and unfairly banned all kinds of independent workers associations, organizations or unions. The mitary in Burma is against the formation of independent workers associations, organization, or unions and consider union members as enemies. It has always been the practice of the military intelligence to indiscriminately detain anyone they suspect of being an enemy and torture them into admitting guilt or giving out false information. We fear that the longer the union executives are detained the longer they will be tortured. We demand that the SLORC respect international laws and immediately release KHIN KYAW and MYO AUNG THANT as well as all those innocent family members now under detention. We request our fellow international trade unions to help obtain the release of MYO AUNG THANT and KHIN KYAW. ************************************************** FEER: SCHOOL'S IN June 19, 1997 Asean's peer pressure Peer pressure at school can be a potent force, as any teacher can attest. Now that the Association of Southeast Asian Nations has mailed its acceptance letter to Burma, the question is whether peer pressure works in regional blocs as well as it does in the schoolyard. Asean, of course, has long rejected the sanctions approach favoured by the West, arguing that its policy of constructive engagement will prove a better vehicle for bringing Burma around to more accepted norms. Unfortunately, right now there is little to show for either policy. Although we ourselves agree that sanctions are not the answer, the inherent problem with the Asean approach is that the bloc is about as diverse as a Baskin-Robbins ice cream selection, with regimes as varied as Singapore and Vietnam, Brunei and the Philippines, Thailand and Indonesia. If Asean thinks it can make Burma more like itself, just which part would that be? Still, Asean was determined to expand. And so, like it or not, Burma, as well as Laos and Cambodia, will join Asean this year as it celebrates its 30th anniversary, an admissions policy based less on strategy than on sentiment. Having decided to go ahead, the onus now is on Asean to do the job for which it claims it is the most qualified: To make us stop pinching our noses when talking about Burma. The varied nature of the regimes under the Asean roof suggests that it has little standing to nudge Rangoon down a kinder and gentler political path. But with Burma now eager for trade, economic peer pressure may be Asean's best bet. That will mean persuading Rangoon (not to mention Hanoi) that the wealth of more prosperous members has come with steadily greater economic transparency and accountability. If done properly the flowering of a private economy in Burma may gradually erode the authoritarian grip the ruling generals now have over life, as well as empower ordinary Burmese in ways no communique, no matter how finely worded, could ever do. But even in the best of all worlds it looks to be a long school term. Is Asean up to it? (FEER) ****************************************************** ASIA INC: FRONTIER OF FURY June 20, 1997 The Thai-Burmese border could become a new gateway for economic growth ... or remain a battle zone On the mountaintop along Burma's border with Thailand, a Burmese army major, a Thai special-forces captain and a white South African security guard scan the horizon from sandbagged redoubts. One thousand meters below, clearly visible through the early-morning mist, a large area of jungle is being cleared by giant earthmovers. To one side is a helicopter landing pad. In the hazy distance, a wide brown trial disappears toward the sea. The trio are surprised at the arrival of an Asia, Inc. Reporter. When a camera is produced, they are even more unsettled. Little wonder. This remote spot near Ban I-Thong border village, some 400 kilometers by road northwest of Bangkok, marks another stage in the controversial constitution of a $1.2 billion pipeline from Burma's Yadana gas field to energy-starved Thailand. Western critics say the project is soaked in blood, and is being built with slave labor. Burma's military junta, the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC), has launched a massive offensive to "annihilate" (its own chilling word) ethnic Karen rebels who for 50 years have controlled vast tracts of the 2,400-km Thai-Burma border. Part of the reason is to allow the gas pipeline to be built. More ambitiously, though, it is to clear the way for Thai and Burmese businessmen to redevelop the entire border region for industry, trade and tourism. As the Karen flee, many with tales of murder and rape by Slorc troops, the entrepreneurs are moving in. The question now is: Will Asian businessmen succeed in swapping conflict for commerce, as they have done elsewhere? Or will they end up trying to do business on the front line of a brutal local war? Singh Tangcharoenchaichana, a flamboyant Thai-Chinese factory owner in Kanchanaburi, 60 km from the Burma border and 130 km west of Bangkok, has no doubts. Says Singh: "People realize it is better to trade business than bullets. They are all getting sick of fighting." That is not the view inside the sprawling refugee camps_bulging with 90,000 Karen, as well 22,500 other uprooted ethnic minorities_tucked just inside Thailand. Grim defiance hangs in the air at Wangkha camp, 14 km north of the Thai town of Mae Sot. Feelings have been running especially high since the camp was torched and looted during a cross-border raid by Slorc-backed forces. Major Mary Oh, 63, a veteran Karen fighter, declares: "Surrender is out of the question." At nearby Mae Hla, the largest Karen camp with 26,000 refugees, the latest arrivals are sheltered only by blue plastic sheets donated by an aid agency. Pastor Simon, a softly spoken Karen Baptist minister, says: "They want to eliminate us because of the business interest. They want to wipe out all our people there. But even if Slorc captures the whole border, the Karen will keep fighting." That would spell trouble, possibly disaster, for Thai and foreign investors preparing to pump billions of dollars into a host of grandiose projects in the region. CROSS-BORDER HIGHWAY, PORTS, TRADE ZONES AND RAILROADS Arguably the most ambitious plans center on a 250-km road linking Bangkok and Kanchanaburi with the southern Burmese coastal city of Tavoy. Ital-Thai Development PCL, one of Thailand's largest construction companies, has signed a memorandum of understanding with Slorc to build a major of deepwater port in Tavoy. Presently, all Thailand's west-bound trade takes the lengthy sea route through the Gulf of Thailand and around the bottom of the Malay peninsula, via Singapore, to the Malacca Strait. The new road would be a shortcut to the Indian Ocean, shrinking the distance to the Middle East and Europe by some 3,000 km. Boasts Kanchanaburi businessman Somphob Teerasan: "It will save 14 days' travel time and a huge amount of money." Agrees a foreign diplomat: "It will be worth billions of dollars to business." In the near future, developers will move into the Thai border village of Bon Ti, mid-way between Kanchanaburi and Tavoy. On a balmy late afternoon recently, the only signs of village life were four Karen women, white thanaka-bark powder daubed on their faces and market produce slung on their backs, walking along a dirt track fringed by flaming bougainvillea. The tranquillity was deceptive. Here, weeks earlier, the Thai army forced 1,800 fleeing Karen refugees to turn back and face the guns of the advancing Slorc. A wide, newly surfaced road from Kanchanaburi already reaches to within 7 km of the frontier. (Outside Thailand, Kanchanaburi is best known as the setting for the Oscar-winning movie -The Bridge of the River Kwai.) Businessmen Singh and Somphob have just revealed plans for a 160-hectare industrial zone on what was formerly military-owned land adjacent to the Bon Ti border. Singh, president of the local branch of the Federation of Thai Industry, even talks about re-establishing a rail link following the route of the notorious wartime Burma-Thailand "Death Railway." The line_the building of which cost the lives of 100,000 conscripted Asian laborers and 16,000 Allied prisoners of war_briefly linked the Southeast Asian and Burmese rail networks via the Three Pagodas Pass. After the war, much of the track was torn up, but a train still runs from Bangkok over the River Kwai bridge to Nam Tok, halfway to the pass. Is ambition running ahead of realism? Perhaps not. Burma will soon forge closer ties with Thailand by joining the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean). And a newly published report by Thailand's National Economic and Social Development Board outlines plans for a major redevelopment of the border area, including a series of road and rail corridors between Thailand and Burma. Says Manu Sattayateva, director of the board's Central Development Center: "My dream is that we will eventually create links like those that exist in the European Union." In April, Thai Prime Minister Chavalit Yongchaiyudh threw his weight behind the development of the border region when he officially opened a $40 million industrial estate in Kanchanaburi created by Singh, Somphob and their partners. The businessmen claim that 40 percent of the 14-hectare site has already been snapped up. Among the investors are textile and shoe factories relocating from Bangkok, as well as Iron Classic, a Singapore-based steel-plate manufacturer, and companies from Japan and Italy. Apart from proximity to the border, the region boasts another advantage: abundant, very cheap labor from Burma. Last June, to ease a chronic labor shortage, Thailand allowed Burmese immigrants to work in more than half the country's provinces, including Kanchanaburi. Says Singh, who operates a canned-and frozen-food factory: "The minimum wage for Thai workers is 128 baht [about $5.10] a day, but you can get immigrants for 60 baht [$2.40] or less." Now he plans to develop two more industrial estates in Tavoy and Rangoon. Other entrepreneurs see vast tourism opportunities along Burma's pristine and picturesque Tenasserim coast, which could soon be just a few hours' drive from central Thailand's major population centers. In January, Phuket-based South East Asia Liveaboards Co was licensed by Burma to offer trips through the formerly off-limits Mergui Archipelago. Such plans, however, depend on security forces being able to guarantee safe passage into and out of Burma. At Bon Ti and the nearby Karen camp at Phu Muang, where 2,500 refugees huddle at night under plastic sheeting, machine-gun fire can sometimes be heard from across the border. Last year, a Kanchanaburi businessman, Patana Sinkanchanamalai, attempted to mediate between Slorc and the Karen. The talks failed. THE FRIENDSHIP BRIDGE Mae Sot is a brash, freewheeling Thai border town in Tak province, 500 km northwest of Bangkok. For years, it was an unofficial base in Thailand for Karen rebels, whose "capital," Manerplaw, was just four hours by road and river to the north. Rangoon's forces controlled only three border posts along the entire border, one of which was Myawaddy, across the Moei River from Mae Sot. In those days, Thailand tolerated the Karen and other insurgent ethnic groups, regarding them as a buffer against Burma, its old enemy. (In 1767, the Burmese sacked the former Thai capital of Autthaya.) Thai soldiers and businessmen also could profit from the black-market border trade and the teak forests under Karen control. Now, as Burmese opens for business, those priorities have changed- and, at the same time, the Karen have been in retreat. After gradually losing ground to the Burmese, the Karen lost Manerplaw in 1995. This year, they have lost the rest of their fixed positions. Now, the area on both sides of the border around Mae Sot and Myawaddy seems likely to develop rapidly following the opening, scheduled for this month, of the "Friendship Bridge" carrying a highway from Bangkok to Rangoon and on, eventually, to Europe. The road is a long-awaited section of the so-called Pan-Asia Highway that will eventually link every major Asian city on a direct route from Singapore to Istanbul, as well as connecting with an east-west road joining Vietnam, Laos and Central Thailand. Already road improvements within Thailand have cut traveling time between Bangkok and Mae Sot to five hours. As in Kanchanaburi province, Mae Sot businessmen operate their food-processing and textile factories with low-cost Karen, Burmese and Mon labor. Even before the bridge opens, hotels, resorts and shopping centers are rising along the banks of the Moei River on the Thai side. Plans also have been mooted for a 100-hectare industrial park and free-trade zone. At Mae Sot Central Hills resort, Paniti Tungphati, 47, vice president of the Tak Chamber of Commerce, relaxes in the lobby and talks with cautious enthusiasm about Mae Sot's new role as a major business and tourism gateway to Burma. Paniti, whose company, Chaipatana Ltd. Partnership, exports car parts to Burma, spent his early living and trading in one of Thailand's largest cities, Hat Yai (pop. 157,700), center of the booming border trade with Malaysia. He has waited a long time for the Friendship Bridge, construction of which began in 1994 but was frequently delayed because of border disputes. "Today, Mae Sot has a population of only 25,000," says Paniti. "But soon it will become another Hat Yai." THE GAS PIPELINE By far the largest foreign investments in Burma are in two 700-km-long pipelines that will carry natural gas from Burma's Yadana and Yetagun gas fields in the Gulf of Martaban to a 4,600-megawatt power station in the Thai city of Ratchaburi, 100 km west of Bangkok. Yadana's gas will come on stream next year; Yetagun's by 1999. Both fields are being mainly developed by Western resource companies: Yadana by the U.S's Unocal Corp and France's Total SA, and the $600 million Yetagun field by a consortium led by the U.S.'s Texaco Corp. In the U.S. and Europe, however, Slorc's human rights abuses have made it a pariah regime. In April, the U.S. government slapped a ban on new investment in Burma in response to what it called "large-scale repression" there. According to a U.S. report, for instance, slave and child labor, which is often used on infrastructure projects, accounts for 3 percent of Burma's GDP. As existing rather than new Burma investors, Unocal and Texaco are exempt from the sanctions, but pressure groups in the U.S. have launched boycott campaigns and lawsuits against them. So far, though, the companies are standing firm, denying complicity in human rights abuses and contending that the gas projects are in the long-term interests of the region's people. Their resolve has been severely tested: In 1995, five Total workers were killed and 11 injured in a Karen ambush. At Ban I-Thong, the Slorc major interviewed by Asia, Inc. acknowledges a Karen base is only 8 km away. And despite 10,000 Slorc troops saturating the pipeline corridor, Texaco has hired a private security outfit, Ordsafe, to protect its Western employees surveying the route. Six of the Ordsafe security team are ex-South African military; on the clifftop at Ban I-Thong, one of them introduces himself as Philip Smith. "Our job is purely to get the expats out," he explains. "And get them out fast before anything happens." Turning battlefields into marketplaces, as former Thai Prime Minister Chatichai Choonhavan once put it, has become relatively commonplace in post-Cold War Asia. The difference on the Burma-Thailand border is that Slorc's generals are trying to create that marketplace at the point of a gun.(AI) It looks like being a bloody business. _William Mellor, with additional reporting by Vissuta Pothong, Thomas Crampton and John Clewley ************************************************** THE NATION: ON THE FRONTIER OF AIDS TRANSMISSION June 16, 1997 [abridged] Mukdawan Sakboon Border barriers to trade and migrant movements are coming down but old prejudices about disease remain in place, imperilling the potential economic gains. Yet, even now, with more than 22 million people around the world estimated to be infected with HIV, misconceptions about the disease continue to thrive, particularly in Southeast Asia. In much the same way as Europeans once argued over the origins of syphilis the Aids virus remains the disease of the "outsider" in the region. In the context of migration, the conventional thinking is that it is "the migrant who brings in the disease". Migrant populations - whose definitions often overlap and change to include asylum seekers, refugees, clandestine groups, workers and ethnic minority groups are often considered by many governments as the main transmission route for the disease into their countries. Immigrants are rather vulnerable to HIV but this often has more to do with their precarious social and legal statuses and their inferior living conditions than the fact that they are foreigners. Transnational migration and HIV/Aids was the focus of a recent technical consultation among Aids programme directors and academics from eight Southeast Asian countries, and Hong Kong and China, which was co- organised by the Asian Research Centre for Migration in Chiang Rai recently. While information about migration and HIV patterns is either non-existent or inadequate and few education programmes exist for migrants in most countries, the increasing rate of HIV incidence in border areas, ports and markets is a great cause of concern. High HIV prevalence along with rising sexually transmitted disease (STD) rates are being reported in the border areas of many countries where internal movement and cross-border migration is a common practise, either through official border checkpoints or centuries-old trade (and migration) routes. The twin border towns of Tachileik in Burma's eastern Shan state and Mae Sai in Chiang Rai have in the past few years experienced a sharp rise in HIV among commercial sex workers and intravenous drug users. HIV prevalence among pregnant women in Tachileik is the highest in Burma at 7.5 per cent, said Dr Rai Mra, deputy director for Aids/STD at Burma's Health Ministry's Department of Health. While on average, HIV prevalence among pregnant women in Thailand is less than two per cent, the incidence among the same group at Chiang Rai's Mae Sai hospital is reportedly 14 per cent. Burmese and Chinese ethnic minorities and Thai women are also recruited for "entertainment places" in Yunnan, said Dr Rai Mra of Burma's Health Ministry. Cultural sexual practices which facilitate the rapid spread of Aids exist in many countries. Why are border towns so different and dangerous as springboards for HIV transmission? Don Douglas, country director of Programme for Appropriate Technology in Health (Path) in Indonesia said it is partly because of the wider availability of drugs at lower prices and the thriving sex industry thrives and exploitation of young girls and people from rural area is rife," He cited two border areas where this twin attraction has made them hot spots for HIV transmission - Mae Sai/Tachileik and Indonesia's Jayapura and Papua New Guinea's Vammo. The promise of earning relatively good money in Mae Sai attracts thousands of Burmese girls while cheap sex and ethnic variety attracts Thai clients, said Douglas. However, not all the border points are vulnerable to infection, said Tony Bennett of Bangkok-based Aidscap. There are other factors such as social disruption and peer pressure which are important in creating a dangerous HIV/Aids environment, he said. DISCRIMINATORY STRATEGY Though countries have thus far been unable to harmonise policies towards immigrant populations, particularly workers, many have developed preventative strategies aimed at containing the spread of HIV/Aids which go far beyond the principle of "minimum interference with international traffic" as laid down by the International Health Regulations. The regulations were adopted in 1951 under the auspices of the World Health Organisation to ensure the maximum security against the international spread of disease. Many Asian countries have adopted a "send-back" policy on foreign migrant workers found to be infected with HIV. Countries often cite the high incidence of the disease in neighbouring countries as justification for the restrictions. Such strategies as mandatory testing are deemed "impractical" and "discriminatory" by experts who warn that they could create a false sense of security and lead to the abandonment of safe sex practises. For many infected migrants, the situation back home may be even worse, with many facing the prospect of being arrested, detained or simply disappearing. As more borders open to economic cooperation, a condition which will ensure more mobility of people, it's important that national programmes which are culturally appropriate be developed for migrants. Vulnerable migrant groups needed to be empowered to enable them to assess their own risks and needs, said Dr Naing of the UK-based NGO World Vision, who is involved in planning intervention programmes for Burmese migrants in Tachileik and Kawthaung. Different type of migrants need different types of strategies, said Dr Usa Duangsa of the Northern Thai-Australia Aids prevention and Care Programme (Napac). There is an urgent need to set up a network to monitor migration and HIV/Aids in the region and for information and education programme to be launched in both the sending and receiving countries. Asian governments must make greater efforts to collaborate in addressing the issue of migration and HIV/Aids, while respecting the rights of the migrants. Adequate health care should be made accessible to migrant populations, the experts urged. Preventative measures such as condom promotion should be made visible and there must be no HIV-testing zone, said Jon Ungpakorn of the non- governmental organisation Aids Counselling Centre Education and Support Services (Access). But the most important thing is for the governments of this region, where HIV/Aids could bring disaster- socially, economically and medically - to realise and accept the existence of the problems and the conditions which fuel the spread of HIV in the countries, without pointing fingers at each other. HIV PREVALENCE IN COUNTRIES WHERE DATA ARE AVAILABLE, 1996 -------------------------------------------------------------- Country Pregnant Woman Sex Workers Drug Injectors ----------------------------------------------------------------- Cambodia 1.7% 41% Not available Indonesia 0.0% 0.04% Not available Malaysia 0.2% Not available Not available Burma 2.0% 21% 63% Thailand 1.7% 16.7% 46.7& Vietnam 0.04% 0.7% 11% ----------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE: These rates are measured at sentinel sites. However it should be noted that the sample populations and testing practices differ from country, so they may not be directly comparable. *In 1996, Thailand combined data for brothel-based sex workers and those working out of restaurants, bars and other locations. These two groups, classified as "direct" and "indirect" sex workers, were until 1995 reported separately. Nation graphic: P. Buranasiri Source : UNAIDS ********************************************************* THAILAND TIMES: SLORC LAUNCHES PROBE INTO CORRUPT HIGH-RANKING OFFICIALS June 19, 19997 By Kachorn Boonpath MAE HONG SON: The Burmese military junta has stepped up anti- corruption measures by calling an investigation into high-ranking officials who were reportedly receiving bribes from Thai loggers . A source from Ho Mong township said the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) has initiated an investigation into Brigadier General Chit Maung and 17 other officials who were in charge of the township since February last year. The inquiry was made following a complaint from Cham Moung, son of opium warlord Khun Sa, that the Burmese officials accepted bribes from Thai loggers who illegally ran logging operations in Ho Mong and Nam Rin townships and helped them transport the logs into Thailand via Mae Hong Son's Huay Pheung passage. The source said there was an intensive activity of illegal hauling of logs into Thailand last year and Chit Maung was allegedly paid about five million kyat by Thai merchants for facilitating it. Some of these officials were also accused of tax evasion and taking bribes from Thai cattle traders, said the source . The source said the corruption rumor began last year in Ho Mong township after Khun Sa surrendered to the military junta. Ho-Mong was once a military base of Khun Sa's Mong Tai Army (MTA). ******************************************** SLORC: US POLITICS AND ITS POLITICIANS June 18, 1997 by Min Aung Min From: OKKAR66127@AOL.COM I had the opportunity to meet MS Madeleine Albright when was in Myanmar, in her capacity as the U S Ambassador to the UN. I watched her carefully at a reception, and observed that she never had serious dialogue as such with any one but was literally wandering around picking at tit-bits from the tables. Members of her staff were huddled in nooks and corners with the anti-elements, whilst government officials were representative of the UN and various international organizations were ignored. At the end of her tour made far reaching statements on matters she knew little or nothing about. In other words, like all politicians she delivered those statements as tutored. It was apparent that her visit was a deliberate exercise to be able to meddle more in Myanmar. Even before her appointment to the State department, MS. Albright was the most vocal advocate for sanctions. I often wonder if Ms. Albright and her cronies are aware of the implications their actions will have on millions of lives? Surely they have seen it in Cuba, Iran, Iraq, and are witnessing it vividly in North Korea? Sanctions deprive a nation and its people access to investment capital from the international community. It places severe constraint on social, economic and human resources development. It denies millions of people the right to job opportunities, income generation, enhanced standards of living, uplifted morale and morals; in other words, a chance to a healthy, happy, productive life. Health and eduction standards effected; environmental conservation concerns shelved. The work force being denied accessibility to modern technology, market expertise market expertise, market familiarization make modernization nigh on impossible. The ultimate objective of sanctions is to force a nation and its people to their knees. Once achieve, it puts them at the mercy of their so-called benefactors upon whom they become totally dependent and who are in a position to call all the cards. Applying of sanctions is the cruelest form of Human Rights abuse, for it is intended to force whole nations and their people into dire straits. The worst part of it all, is that it is undertaken not for the love of anyone but as a coercive political tool. No respectable responsible nation or politician aspiring to a leadership role should stoop to such depths; especially if they or their kin are not going to suffer with the people, or their children are not going to lose out in education and career opportunities like the rest of the nation's youth. It is utterly immoral. I can cite hundreds of incidents of human rights violations in the U.S.A alone. John M.Broder's article in the 3rd March 1997 issue of the New York Times, gives a vivid account of the crimes committed against humanity by generations of American politicians under the dictatorship of the C.I.A and F.B.I. President Clinton's early 1996 address to the nation about the rise in violent crime and under age violent drug addiction and drug related crime, increase in broken marriages, unwed teenage mothers, rising abortion wife abuse, child abuse, loss of family values etc. all profess severe depravation and inequities that have led to a frayed social fabric; and present a bleak future for the U.S. Poverty in America used to involve mostly Black American; they were later joined by the Hispanics; now a large number of Whites, including war veterans have joined the army of lost souls. These deprived underpriveleged people have become so disillusioned with their political system and their politicians, that armed and trained militia groups are growing. Their aim? To defend themselves against the Federal government. And now the independent statehood movement has started in Texas. How would Mr Albright explain this? Does she feel that these groups are within their legitimate democratic right? If not, why are they making a big issue of the Myanmar military subueing their insurgents they have had on their hands for over 50 years? Recent post election revelations have exposed the American political system for what it is. Big money is the game; and no individual can be elected to high political posts without limitless funds. As such-principled honourable, well intentioned and qualified people are automatically excluded from the political process, resulting in a leadership crisis. But may be worse is the trade off deals which have made the pursuit of self interests standard norm in American politics. Many nations have learn from bitter experiences that U.S national self interest was too often used to justify ignoble means. The U.S has long interfered in other nations' inter affairs, toppling or installing leaders in every continent. The congress appropriates tens of millions of dollars yearly for covert and overt operations to influence domestic politics abroad, and the C.I.A arrogantly exercises power to intervene in the internal affairs of others. When Ms. Albright was asked why it was that the U.S did not apply the same standards and norms it did to Myanmar to other similar but much worse off censorious'? She replied not so brightly - that it was " due to national interest". It is clear-that these people are willing to play zeallously with the izal:e of nations and their peoples as a gambit, as though they were pawns in a chess game. The world needs to understand that the ultimate aim of all their machinations is the containment of China, why else would they be pressuring for the expansion of NATO to the east; to the extent of including Russia? Myanmar because of its strategic geographical location has historically been known as the back door to China. Being wedged between India and China, the two most populous nations in the world, any super power that gained a foot hold in Myanmar could do a lot to destabilize the region. Many positive things are happening in Myanmar today. Infrastructural development is taking place at a phenomenal pace with little or no external support. But all this is being ignored. They have not stopped to think sensibly as to why it is that 15 major insurgent groups that have been up in arms against successive governments for half a century would choose to seek a peaceful settlement at a time when a military government is in power. Would these groups have done so if SLORC were as repressive as it is being made out to be? Certainly not. They have sought peace because they respect and trust SLORC's goodwill and sincerity. For once in its history, Myanmar is in a very good position to achieve peace and prosperity If not for this bizzare malady. All this posturing about propping Suu Kyi up in the guise of defending democracy and hum right is merely a ruse to attain their selfish evil means. Their imposition of sanctions have misfired; for the world at large is disgusted with their bully-bouncing. We need to be grateful for the wisdom and far steadiness of the leaders of the Southeast Asia Region in particular; together with Japan and Australia who have come out on the side of right against might. We anticipate that the EU and Canada will follow suit and make a " Hands off Myanmar " stand as they did valiantly for Cuba. ********************************************* BURMANET SUBJECT-MATTER RESOURCE LIST BurmaNet regularly receives enquiries on a number of different topics related to Burma. If you have questions on any of the following subjects, please direct email to the following volunteer coordinators, who will either answer your question or try to put you in contact with someone who can: Campus activism: zni@students.wisc.edu Boycott campaigns: ai268@freenet.carleton.ca Buddhism: Buddhist Relief Mission: brelief@gol.com Chin history/culture: [volunteer temporarily away] Fonts: tom@cs.colgate.edu High School Activism: [volunteer needed] History of Burma: zni@students.wisc.edu International Affairs: Julien Moe: moe@interport.net Kachin history/culture: 74750.1267@compuserve.com Karen history/culture: Karen Historical Society: 102113.2571@Compuserve.com Mon history/culture: [volunteer needed] Naga history/culture: Wungram Shishak: z954001@oats.farm.niu.edu Burma-India border Aung San Myint: aungsan@giasd101.vsnl.net.in Pali literature: "Palmleaf": c/o burmanet@igc.apc.org Pipeline Campaign freeburma@irn.org Resettlement info: refugee_help@mail.serve.com Rohingya culture volunteer needed Shan history/culture: Sao Hpa Han: burma@ix.netcom.com Shareholder activism: simon_billenness@mail.cybercom.net Total - France Dawn Star: cd@utopia.EUnet.fr Tourism campaigns: bagp@gn.apc.org "Attn. S.Sutcliffe" volunteering: refugee_help@mail.serve.com World Wide Web: FreeBurma@POBox.com Geographical Contacts: Massachusetts simon_billenness@mail.cybercom.net [Feel free to suggest more areas of coverage] --------------------------------------------------------------------------- FREE BURMA WEB PAGES: http://FreeBurma.org This single page serves only as an easy to remember URL and departure point to resources promoting the establishment of democracy in Burma. Please write to FreeBurma@pobox.com to add a site or for further information." - Glen, system administrator FREE BURMA COALITION: to get involved in the Free Burma Coalition, send a message to: zni@students.wisc.edu or visit their homepage, accessible through: http:// FreeBurma.org There is also an e-mail list-server especially for Free Burma activists BURMANET SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION: The BurmaNet News is an electronic newspaper covering Burma. Articles from newspapers, magazines, newsletters, the wire services and the Internet as well as original material are published. It is produced with the support of the Burma Information Group (B.I.G) and the Research Department of the ABSDF. We are also grateful to many other friends around the world who send us articles to post. The BurmaNet News is e-mailed directly to subscribers and is also distributed via the soc.culture.burma and seasia-l mailing lists. For a free subscription to the BurmaNet News: send a message to: majordomo@igc.apc.org a. For the BurmaNet News only: in the message, type: subscribe burmanews-l b. For the BurmaNet News and 4-5 other messages a day: in the message, type: subscribe burmanet-l (NOTE: all lower case letters, last letter is a lower case "L", not the numeral one). Letters to the editor, comments or contributions of articles should be sent to the editor at: strider@igc.apc.org ***************************************************