BurmaNet News: September 5, 2003

[editor at burmanet.org]

September 5, 2003 Issue #2320

INSIDE BURMA
Irrawaddy: Ethnic Groups Map Their Own Solution
NST: Razali returning to Myanmar to obtain more details
Channel NewsAsia: Myanmar insists Suu Kyi "physically well"
Irrawaddy: Wa Making "Wise Moves"
Xinhua: Indian naval chief visits Myanmar

ON THE BORDER
Irrawaddy: Sanctioned Burma Hopes to Double Border Trade

MONEY
Narinjara: Why is Dollar increasingly smuggled into Burma?
Economic Times: Indian State-run MTNL to bid for telecom project in Myanmar

REGIONAL
Hindu: India offers unilateral trade concessions to Myanmar

INTERNATIONAL
AFP: EU concerned for Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi
AFP: Former US president Carter calls for Aung San Suu Kyi's release
Courier Mail: The amazing vanishing elephant

EDITORIALS/LETTERS
Guardian: Burmese Atrocities

STATEMENTS
U.S. Senator Feinstein Expresses Concern over Hunger Strike


----INSIDE BURMA----

The Irrawaddy   September 05, 2003
Ethnic Groups Map Their Own Solution

An alliance of ethnic groups presented a road map to rebuild Burma today,
saying the proposal will be sent to military leaders in Rangoon.

The Ethnic Nationalities Solidarity and Cooperation Committee (ENSCC)
announced the two-stage plan at a press conference this morning in Chiang
Mai, Thailand.

Panelists said the road map was designed to generate confidence in a
transition to democracy. The plan urges Burma’s military generals to
convene a "Congress for National Unity" with an equal proportion of
military representatives, winning parties from the 1990 election and
ethnic groups.

According to the ENSCC’s road map, a Congress for National Unity should be
convened to draft a National Accord. The Congress will call on the
international community to provide humanitarian assistance, and once the
Accord is agreed upon a Government of National Unity will be formed.

In the second stage, the plan calls for sanctions to be lifted and for a
referendum to be followed by general elections. The ENSCC estimates the
road map will take six years to implement.

Representatives from the committee are confident that Rangoon will
consider their plan. "The fact that the newly appointed Prime Minister,
Khin Nyunt, recently announced the regime’s road map means the generals
feel that they have to do something," said Harn Yawnghwe, an advisor to
the ENSCC.

But as Harn Yawnghwe explained, the ENSCC proposal is not a rejection of
the regime’s road map. The new plan improves on what has already been
proposed, he added.

Another member of the ENSCC, Lian Sakhong, says the road map aims to break
the political deadlock by inviting groups to participate.

Talks between opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and the regime since 2000
have faltered and both sides have become more confrontational, according
to an analysis prepared by the ENSCC. The regime will no longer tolerate
dialogue initiatives from Suu Kyi and the National League for Democracy.
And of the three potential tripartite dialogue partners, only ethnic
leaders have a real opportunity to initiate new talks, the ENSCC believes.

The release of the road map follows a confidential five-day workshop held
recently in Thailand. Saw Ba Thinn, chairman of the ENSCC and the Karen
National Union, who was not present at today’s press conference, said
participants at the workshop were not invited to represent their
organizations, but as individual leaders. The workshop gave ethnic leaders
a chance to brainstorm ideas for their roadmap, Saw Ba Thinn added.

The ENSCC was formed in August 2001 by the Karenni National Progressive
Party, the National Democratic Front and the United Nationalities League
for Democracy (Liberated Area).


New Straits Times (Malaysia)   September 5, 2003
Razali returning to Myanmar to obtain more details

PENANG, Thurs. - United Nations (UN) Special Envoy to Myanmar Tan Sri
Razali Ismail said he would return to Myanmar soon to get a detailed
picture of the latest development on the democratic change taking place in
the country.

He said he had planned to do so for quite some time but declined to
elaborate on the matter as he described it as sensitive.

Razali said he was also unsure of the current developments in Yangon
although the United States had claimed that Myanmar's pro-democracy leader
Aung San Suu Kyi, had launched a hunger strike.

"I am unsure of the exact situation in Myanmar now ...the Myanmar
government has, however, denied the US allegations.

"I will not comment further on this as it is a sensitive issue and I do
not want to create any misunderstanding."

Razali said this after closing Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) Penang
Schools Projek Warga finals held at the Dewan Budaya here today.

He was asked to comment on the US allegation that Suu Kyi had launched a
hunger strike after Myanmar's new Prime Minister, Khin Nyunt, tabled a
"democratic plan" which was received with uncertainty in Yangon.

In a news report today, a US State Department spokesman said the US
received information that Suu Kyi had launched a hunger strike as a show
of protest against her detention by the country's military regime.

However, Yangon's military junta has denied the American allegation.

Suu Kyi and members of her party, the National League for Democracy, were
held on May 30.


Channel NewsAsia   September 5, 2003
Myanmar insists Suu Kyi "physically well"

Myanmar's military government on Thursday said detained pro-democracy
leader Aung San Suu Kyi is "physically well", but a sceptical US wanted
proof for the claim.

The junta's statement was the latest of several denials since Washington
announced on Sunday that the Nobel peace laureate was on a hunger strike.

Myanmar's Foreign Ministry said Ms Suu Kyi was physically well and living
in the conditions that the International Committee of the Red Cross
described as 'highly satisfactory'."

Red Cross representatives met with the Mr Suu Kyi on July 28 and are the
last independent observers to have verified her health.

Myanmar accused US spin doctors of coming up with the hunger strike claim.

"The sudden but well-concerted appearance of a manufactured piece of news
relating to Aung San Suu Kyi's hunger strike is another glaring example of
spin doctors at work once again," the junta's statement said.

But despite Myanmar's denials, Washington repeated its assertions and
challenged Yangon to disprove its claim by releasing Ms Suu Kyi from
detention.

"The junta in Burma can easily and unambiguously resolve all these
concerns and reports, and resolve any questions by releasing her and, for
that fact, allowing international access," said State Department spokesman
Richard Boucher.

Ms Suu Kyi was brought under "protective custody" on May 30 following
violence between her supporters and a junta-backed mob in northern
Myanmar.


The Irrawaddy   September 05, 2003
Wa Making "Wise Moves"

With Burma’s political difficulties attracting greater international
attention, ethnic Wa leaders are now reconsidering their own political
future.

Early last month, top-ranking Wa officials met at their headquarters in
Panghsang, near the China border, to reassess their policies and discuss
Burma’s current political problems, according to Maha San, head of the Wa
National Organization, which has not entered a ceasefire with Rangoon.

Maha San said Wa leaders decided to ask Burma’s military government to
recognize the United Wa State Party (UWSP) as a legitimate political
organization. The UWSP is the political wing of the United Wa State Army
(UWSA).

The UWSP was initially established in 1989 as the Burma National United
Party, and is now headed by chairman Chao Ngi Lai, a forceful leader in
his 60s. Chao and Wa Army leader Pao Yuchang attended the meeting, said
Aik Pone, an ethnic Palaung leader.

The sources called the meeting a "wise move" politically, as the Wa rarely
engage in conventional political activities.

In July, Wa leaders met with top officials from Rangoon who asked the Wa
not to support the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) party.
Government officials also told the Wa delegates that it has no intention
to talk to the NLD or party leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

At the meeting in Panghsang, Wa leaders said neither the government nor
the NLD is considered an enemy, giving indication that the Wa are keeping
their distance from Rangoon. Wa leaders condemned the May 30 ambush on the
opposition in Depayin, which is widely believed to have been orchestrated
by the military government.

With an estimated 20,000 troops, the United Wa State Army (UWSA) is
considered the world’s largest armed drug trafficking organization,
producing mainly methamphetamines for foreign markets. The UWSA signed a
ceasefire agreement with Rangoon in 1989 and recently promised to
eliminate drug production in Wa-controlled territory by 2005.


Xinhua General News Service   September 5, 2003
Indian naval chief visits Myanmar

YANGON, Sept. 5 (Xinhua) --Chairman of Chiefs of Staff Committee and Chief
of Naval Staff of Indian Navy Admiral Madhvendra Singh is currently on a
three-day visit to Myanmar.

Singh, who arrived here on Thursday leading a four-member Indian
delegation, will meet his Myanmar counterpart Vice-Admiral Kyi Min and the
two sides will exchange views on matters of common concern.

According to an Indian defense spokesman, Singh will seek a grant of
access for Indian vessels to Myanmar ports.

Singh's Myanmar visit was designed in response to a perceived increase in
influence on the Southeast Asian nation by Pakistan, according to the
Indian Express Newspaper.

As Pakistani naval vessels have been docking in Myanmar, Singh is expected
to ask the country to grant the same to Indian vessels to ease pressure on
the ships when they refuel as well as to grant them more access to the
routes of oil tankers heading from the Gulf to Asia.

Singh's trip is also aimed at consolidating political and military
relations within the region, said C. Uday Bhaskar, deputy director of the
New Delhi-based military think tank the Institute for Defense Studies and
Analyses.

India resumed arms shipments to Myanmar in 2002.

Since Myanmar's entry into the Association of Southeast Asian Nations
(ASEAN) in 1997, Myanmar-India bilateral relations have been markedly
improved.


----ON THE BORDER----

The Irrawaddy   September 05, 2003
Sanctioned Burma Hopes to Double Border Trade
By Aung Su Shin

Tough US sanctions are hitting people at the grassroots level, and not
affecting traders and high-ranking officials, a government official said
today at the opening of a border trade fair in Mae Sot, Thailand.

Dr Khin Shwe, who is leading a delegation of trade officials in the Thai
Province of Tak, said he hoped to ease Burma’s economic strife by boosting
trade on the Thai-Burma border. "Border trade has existed for a long time
but because of the new sanctions, we plan to double our trade figures,"
Khin Shwe said.

He said the delegation is in Thailand to improve relations with local Thai
traders. According to Khin Shwe, the Burmese merchants working around Mae
Sot and across the border at Myawaddy backed the government’s "road map,"
which was announced by the Prime Minister last Saturday.

He also spoke out against opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, saying she
had caused trouble for the people of Burma by acting out of self-interest.

Khin Shwe is a leading private businessman based in Rangoon and keeps
close links with many of the top generals.

He said transport links between Myawaddy and Rangoon were good and that it
only took ten hours for goods to reach the capital from the border. The
businessman is encouraging traders to barter or use Thai baht, because
sanctions had put the US dollar off limits.

Just before sanctions came in to effect, foreign banks refused to honor
Letters of Credit from Burmese banks. Because of the ban on US currency
exchange, banks in Burma no longer have access to dollars and importers
and exporters across the country have had to consider other ways to make
transactions.


----MONEY----

Narinjara News   September 5, 2003
Why is Dollar increasingly smuggled into Burma?

Teknaf: The smuggling of dollar has gone up since the imposition of US
sanctions on Burma, according to sources in the Burma  Bangladesh border. 
Recently in an emergency meeting of the National Smuggling Prevention
Committee under the Ministry of Home Affairs of Bangladesh a decision was
taken to curb the illegal money laundering and transfer business and
smuggling rampant on the Bangladesh  Burma border, reported the Ajker Desh
Bidesh, a Bengali daily published from the southeastern Bangladeshi town
of Cox’s Bazar on 27 August.

A list of smugglers and illegal money traders has been compiled to this
effect under the supervision of the Ministry.  There are reports of a
number of international syndicates engaged in the illegal trade of
smuggling US dollar into Burma.  The dollar is being smuggled regularly
from the chief seaport of the country in Chittagong to the western Burmese
Rakhine State via Ukhia and Teknaf in Cox’s Bazaar district.  Though the
exact figure of the smuggled dollar in not available, a rough estimate
would be between one-third to a half-million dollar a week, which is being
conducted by managing the border guards and administrations on both sides
of the border.

The paper also mentioned that there are eight dollar traffickers in Teknaf
municipality, 3 in Sabrang, 4 in Shah-pari Island, 13 in Hnila Bazaar and
5 in Ukhia under Cox’s Bazaar district.  They are alleged to have
maintained a strong international syndicate of dollar traffickers.

From another source it has been known that there is a famine going on in
the western part of Rakhine State of Burma, especially in Buthidaung and
Maungdaw Townships, which sent the price of a 50 kg bag of rice to 12,000
kyat from the previous price of kyat 8,000 just a month ago in Sittwe, the
state capital. Besides rice has also vanished from the open market from
last month. Meanwhile many of the traders are offering advance money in
dollars for hording rice.   This has created a famine like situation,
especially in the border areas.


The Economic Times   September 5, 2003
MTNL to Bid for Overseas Projects

State-run Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd plans to bid for overseas telecom
projects in a bid to offset competitive pressures in the domestic telecoms
sector, the communications minister said on Thursday.

New Delhi-based Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd (MTNL) provides basic,
cellular and limited mobility services and Internet access in the national
capital and Bombay.

Arun Shourie told reporters MTNL was looking at telecom projects in Kenya
and Myanmar, but gave no details. It is also bidding for a rural telephony
contract in neighbouring Nepal where it already has a contract to provide
basic services.

"MTNL is to become a very important flagship for India in acquiring
telecoms contracts abroad," Shourie told reporters on the sidelines of an
economic summit.

The company faces cut-throat competition from private rivals such as
Bharti Tele-Ventures Ltd, 16 percent owned by Singapore
Telecommunications, and the Indian mobile unit of the Hutchison Whampoa
group in New Delhi and Bombay, the country's most lucrative telecoms
zones.

MTNL has already announced plans to bid for a license in the island nation
of Mauritius and has bid for a controlling stake in a telecoms firm in
Malawi.

Shourie said MTNL's cash reserves of around 18 billion rupees could be
used for the overseas expansion.

When asked if the government planned to privatise MTNL, also listed on the
New York Stock Exchange, Shourie said: "All of us feel it has to reinvent
itself as a company."

MTNL and more than a dozen other telecoms services firms compete for a
slice of the Indian telecoms sector, one of the fastest growing markets
globally.


----REGIONAL----

The Hindu   September 5, 2003
Development not given due attention in trade talks, says Vajpayee
By Amit Baruah

The "development dimension" of the Doha round of multilateral trade
negotiations was not receiving sufficient attention, the Prime Minister,
Atal Bihari Vajpayee, said in his inaugural address to the Second
India-ASEAN (Association of South-East Asian Nations) Business Summit
today.

Pledging $ 1 billion to the proposed "Asian Bonds Fund" of the Thai Prime
Minister, Thaksin Shinawatra, Mr. Vajpayee said India "supported" Dr.
Thaksin's initiative. "If widely supported and wisely operated, this
scheme can provide long-term security and stability to our financial
instruments, ensure better returns on our investments and fuel faster
economic growth," he said in the presence of delegates from all the 10
ASEAN member-nations.

Pointing out that the summit was taking place on the eve of the Cancun
Ministerial Review meeting, Mr. Vajpayee said: "We try to highlight the
asymmetries and imbalances in the multilateral trade agreements, but keep
getting side-tracked into non-trade related issues."

"We are finding that the Doha Agenda negotiations are a two-track process,
with our concerns always on the slower track," he said, stressing that it
was in the hands of the ASEAN, India and other developing nations to
arrest the trend. "We have to insist that the multilateral trading regime
takes into account the genuine concerns of the not-so-rich countries for
the welfare and livelihood of billions of their citizens."

Stressing that agriculture was a key issue in which nations such as India
had a vital stake, Mr. Vajpayee told the meeting that India and other
countries, including some from the ASEAN, had to take some important
initiatives in the run-up to the Cancun meeting.

"India and the ASEAN also have common concerns on Singapore issues and on
non-agricultural market access. We have recently put behind us the
contentious issues of TRIPS (Trade-Related Intellectual Property Rights)
and public health. We hope the same spirit permeates through other
negotiations on the Doha Agenda," he said.

Mr. Vajpayee said that India and the ASEAN had made "remarkable progress"
towards a "framework agreement" on comprehensive economic cooperation
between them. "Just yesterday, our Economic Ministers reached agreement on
the text to be signed at the Bali (India-ASEAN) Summit."

India, he said, had offered to negotiate an "early harvest programme",
identifying fast track measures for economic cooperation and trade
promotion. In this category, it had also offered unilateral trade
concessions to the less-developed CLMV (Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and
Vietnam) countries.

Referring to the Bangladesh-India-Myanmar-Sri Lanka-Thailand Economic
Cooperation, Mr. Vajpayee said efforts were on to forge a free trade
arrangement within this grouping and a summit-level meeting was expected
early next year to give this initiative a push. "Trade and investment are
the basic building blocks of the India-ASEAN relationship. India-ASEAN
trade now exceeds $ 10 billion, but it has barely scratched the surface of
its potential. We must aim high, and target a turnover of $ 15 billion
over the next two years, and $ 30 billion by 2007."

India, he proposed, could share with the ASEAN its expertise in space
technology for mapping of natural resources, flood forecasting and
hydrology. "We can expand this cooperation to the manufacture and launch
of remote sensing and communication satellites."

"India has built and launched a number of satellites, both for itself and
other countries. We can offer this service to the ASEAN countries, at
considerably less cost than what they can incur at present," Mr. Vajpayee
suggested.

According to him, globalisation and communications technologies had shrunk
distances, but they had not made geography irrelevant. India and the ASEAN
were neighbours, but had not exploited this to full economic advantage.
"To do this, we must upgrade our transport linkages."

"Work has started on a trilateral highway project linking Thailand,
Myanmar and India. This highway could further link up with the existing
road networks in the ASEAN. Under the Mekong-Ganga Cooperation (an India
plus Mekong nations grouping), we are also looking at a New Delhi-Hanoi
rail link.


----INTERNATIONAL----

Agence France Presse   September 5, 2003
EU concerned for Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi

The European Union presidency on Friday voiced extreme concern following
reports that Myanmar's detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi had
embarked on a hunger strike.

"The EU notes with grave concern the reports that Daw Aung San Suu Kyi may
have started a hunger strike," Italy, which currently holds the EU's
rotating six-month presidency, said in a statement released in Brussels.

Nobel prize laureate Suu Kyi was detained in late May following an
outbreak of violence between her supporters and a mob backed by Myanmar's
military junta.

The United States said at the weekend that the pro-democracy activist had
started a hunger strike, and has challenged the Myanmar authorities to
release her in order to disprove the reports.

"The EU holds the view that the best way for the government to dismiss
these reports is to proceed immediately to her release," the statement
said.

"The EU considers the government of Myanmar to be responsible for the
health and welfare of all political prisoners," it added.

Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy won a landslide election victory
in 1990, but the result has never been recognised by the ruling military.


Agence France Presse   September 5, 2003
Former US president Carter calls for Aung San Suu Kyi's release

Former US president and 2002 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Jimmy Carter on
Friday urged Myanmar's military junta to release democracy leader Aung San
Suu Kyi from detention.

All the Nobel Prize winners "have strongly supported the complete freedom,
and release and proper political role of the future of Aung San Suu Kyi,"
also a Nobel laureate, he said at a Tokyo lecture.

"We would like to do everything possible to promote the world's awareness"
over the Myanmar issue, Carter added, praising the incarcerated leader as
a "heroic woman".

Aung San Suu Kyi was detained in late May following violence between her
supporters and a junta-backed mob as she made a political tour of the
country's north.

The United States has claimed she is on hunger strike, an assertion
rejected by the Myanmar junta and treated with scepticism by some analysts
as no more than an attempt by Washington to bring international pressure
to bear on Yangon.

Carter made the comment when a woman from Myanmar asked him to help
promote democracy in her country.

Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy won a landslide election
victory in 1990, but the result has never been recognised by the ruling
military.

Carter arrived in Japan on Thursday for a four-day private visit. He
delivered a speech on assisting Africa at the UN University here.


Courier Mail (Queensland, Australia)   September 6, 2003
The amazing vanishing elephant
By John Wright

A television documentary team set out to find Asia s missing elephants.
What it didn t find makes for even more compelling viewing, reports John
Wright

ELEPHANTS make great television. Asian, African, small ears, big ears --
it doesn't matter which variety. Put them on the small screen in a
wildlife documentary, add warnings about how they're endangered and have
to be studied and protected, and you have compelling viewing.

And why not? We've lived and worked with these stupendous creatures for
thousands of years, employing them as heavy haulage contractors and living
bulldozers in both peace and war.

We've taken their land, killed -- and are still killing -- them for their
ivory, done our best to break up their herds and social structures and
decimated their populations.

About a century ago, for example, there were perhaps 200,000 Asian
elephants living in the wild across much of Asia and China; now there may
be as few as 28,000 and, on some scientific estimates, probably no more
than 42,000.

They have already gone from southwest Asia and most of China.

Some of their remaining wild habitats are believed to lie close to the
border of India and northern Myanmar (Burma), a remote, heavily forested
spot on the planet which has seen few outside travellers since the 1940s,
when Burma was caught up in World War II.

The search for Asian elephants in these forests, primarily to study the
migratory and interbreeding behaviour of isolated herds against a history
of human encroachment, is the subject of a new documentary, The Old
Elephant Route, to screen on ABC TV tomorrow.

A young female Indian ethnologist who wrote the documentary and figures
largely in it, Prajna Chowta, had one aim: "To find out if elephants from
northern Burma can migrate through remote mountain passes and still
communicate with elephants from Assam (northern India) and vice versa."

To answer this question, Prajna and a team of elephant experts set off
from Assam for the Burmese border after an aborted initial trip to
Rangoon, the Burmese capital, where they discovered they couldn't do the
journey the other way round, from Burma into India.

Why the team didn't establish this earlier is not explained, but there are
references to political sensitivity and army control, and some interesting
war film of Burma under a Japanese invasion force and of Allied soldiers
using elephants to build a road which passed through northern Burma into
China and which was rarely used again after the war ended. Thousands of
elephants died building it, the documentary says.

To get to where it wants to be to study wild elephants, Prajna's team has
to find and rent enough domesticated pachyderms to cover a 20-day trip
through wild country. Just how wild and miserable the trip will be becomes
apparent later.

As a study in elephant husbandry, this "how to pack an elephant for a
trip" segment is fascinating, and the inherent problems of elephant travel
obviously are manifold.

Riding an elephant through a mud bath might sound like fun, but this
documentary makes it look miserable. After a freezing night in the
mountains, the beasts are so cold they're shivering and are fed rum and
rice to warm them.

THE first hint that this documentary isn't going to produce what the team
wants comes on day four of the expedition, when the leader of a remote
tribal group "of questionable reputation" tells Prajna that wild elephants
still come into India from Burma, but that the last one he saw was in
1974.

Drenched by monsoonal rains and in despair, the experts press on towards
the border, but have the consolation of finding the footprints of a lone
male elephant by a mountain river.

On the seventh day, with the elephants sliding around in the mud and
impassable terrain ahead, the team turns back with a resolve to return the
elephants to their owners and try again with human porters.

The second attempt is more penetrative, but the porters are unhappy and
ultimately and obstinately unco-operative.

"It is strange," Prajna relates, "we hardly find traces of elephants. My
feeling is that the elephants in this area have either been killed or
captured in great numbers."

The porters, reluctant to go on because they think there will be ice on
the mountain passes into Burma, drop their packs and refuse to budge. What
is more, they decide to go home and, presumably, leave the elephant
experts to their fate.

No matter. A helicopter transfer back to civilisation is arranged, though
it is not explained how that's done. From the air, Prajna says, she
finally understands the scale of the trip they have made.

What did she accomplish? This is more difficult territory than the terrain
below. The ABC publicity says Prajna returns in triumph, having found what
she searched for: hope. Prajna, drawing on evidence not shared with the
viewer, is more specific.

"I know that some wild elephants still use the old elephant route," she
says. "If the area is protected and poaching stopped, the elephant
population will grow again and play, along with other animal species, its
essential role as a keystone of a complex ecological system."

This seems a combination of speculation on the one hand (the team didn't
see a wild elephant either on the old elephant route or off it) and
environmental pap on the other (the documentary showed no evidence of
elephant poaching in the region, nor offered an estimate of past or
present numbers). It is self-evident that if animals threatened by humans
are left alone, they will have a greater chance of survival.

Elephants, though, make for great television, and this documentary does
offer an insight of sorts into their relationship with humans. It also is
a travelogue about a little-known part of the world. Beyond that, it is
curiously disjointed and it seems to have failed in its primary objective,
partly because of poor on-the-ground planning.

The Old Elephant Route, ABC, 6pm, tomorrow


----EDITORIALS/LETTERS----

The Guardian   September 5, 2003
Burmese atrocities
Wilfred Wong, Jubilee Campaign

You quoted the Foreign Office minister, Mike O'Brien, as saying that the
British government holds the Burmese authorities responsible for Aung San
Suu Kyi's health and welfare (Suu Kyi 'hunger strike' denied, September
2). While I hope that this courageous woman's health will not be harmed by
her hunger strike, we also need to focus on the bigger picture regarding
persecution in Burma, which also involves thousands of non-Burman ethnic
people who are being subjected to horrific atrocities.

 Relatively little international focus has been given to the atrocities
the Burmese military is inflicting on the Karen, Karenni and Shan people.
These include summary executions, rape, forced relocations, destruction
of villages and crops, and forced labour. This has caused the internal
displacement of over 650,000 Karen, Karenni and Shan in Burma.

Many displaced people are hiding in the jungle with little or no food and
are shot on sight by Burmese soldiers. At least Suu Kyi has the option to
choose whether or not to abstain from food, whereas these displaced people
are forced to go hungry. On behalf of the human rights group, the Jubilee
Campaign, I have visited displaced Karen and Shan people inside Burma and
seen their terrible conditions. Jubilee Campaign is convinced that they
are facing genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes at the hands
of the Burmese military.

Most of the human rights focus on Burma is on political prisoners and
democracy.

These are important issues, but surely the Burmese army's systematic
destruction of three different ethnic communities should be treated as
being just as important.


----STATEMENTS----

Senator Feinstein Expresses Concern over News that Imprisoned Burmese
Leader is on a Hunger Strike
- Calls on the Military Junta to immediately release Aung San Suu Kyi -
September 4, 2003

Washington DC - U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) today expressed
her deep concern over news that Aung San Suu Kyi, the imprisoned Nobel
Peace Prize winner, was on a hunger strike. The 58-year-old leader of
Burma's National League for Democracy (NLD) and several of her colleagues
have been detained since May 30, 2003, when their convoy came under attack
by paramilitary thugs.

"I find the news that Aung San Suu Kyi is on a hunger strike to be deeply
troubling," Senator Feinstein said. "She is a brave and remarkable woman
who has fought tirelessly for the Burmese people for decades now, often at
great risk to herself and her supporters. The military dictatorship that
is holding her and her colleagues should release them immediately.

I would also urge the international community, particularly ASEAN and the
United Nations, to take action to bring pressure to bear on Burma's
military junta. Indeed, the U.N. Security Council should hold an emergency
session on Burma as soon as possible, to condemn the military government's
crackdown on the democratic opposition. This tyrannical regime must know
that the world speaks with one voice and that its days are numbered."

On July 28, 2003, President Bush signed the Burmese Freedom Act into law,
which imposes economic sanctions on Burma, including a ban of imports from
that nation, for the next three years. The law was similar to legislation
introduced in the Senate by Senators Feinstein and McConnell (R-KY) on
June 3, just days after Aung San Suu Kyi and her colleagues were detained.