BurmaNet News, January 19, 2005

[Editor]

January 19, 2005, Issue # 2638

“To be sure, in our world there remain outposts of tyranny, and America
stands with oppressed people on every continent: in Cuba and Burma and
North Korea and Iran and Belarus and Zimbabwe.”
- Condoleezza Rice, Secretary of State Confirmation Hearings, January 18,
2005


DRUGS
Mizzima: Heroin production and trafficking in Indo-Burma border

BUSINESS
Mizzima: Primary jolt in Burma-India gas pipeline project

REGIONAL
AFP: Myanmar workers in Thailand are the forgotten tsunami victims
Reuters: Myanmar tsunami survivors disappear in Thailand
Deutsche Presse-Agentur: France contributes 1.5 million euros to set up
Mekong fund in ADB

INTERNATIONAL
Financial Times: Rice pledges a war on 'tyranny'


____________________________________
DRUGS

January 18, Mizzima News
Heroin production and trafficking in Indo-Burma border - T. Siamchinthang

Today, the Indo-Burma border is the world’s biggest heroin trafficking
area and heroin is frequently described as Burma’s most valuable export.
Since Burmas military regime, then called the State Law and Order
Restoration (SLORC), seized power in Burma in 1988, opium production, from
which heroin is refined, has risen to over 2,030 metric tons annually,
amounting to 60 per cent of world supply. Heroin from Burma has usually
supplied the North America and Australia markets while previously most of
the heroin sourced in European originated from the Golden Crescent,
Pakistan, Afghanistan and Turkey. Over the past two years, a growing
portion of the European heroin market has been Burmese heroin trafficked
out of north-west Burma.

Heroin production in northwest Burma is burgeoning and new refineries are
appearing. The improvement in drug enforcement in neighbouring Thailand
and China since the early 1990s has served to open up new trade routes for
both raw opium and heroin from Shan State to the plains around Mandalay,
through Chin State and Sagaing Division to north-east India.

According to Images Asias November 2004 report, Most of Burma’s opium for
conversion into heroin is grown in Shan State, in the infamous Golden
Triangle region. Despite the military juntas claims that they are actively
combating drug production and distribution, many areas of Shan State saw
massive increases in poppy cultivation after they came under the control
of military regime.

The Burmese military has been laying landmines in the border areas where
India, Bangladesh and Burma meet since mid-1997 in an attempt to prevent
militant insurgency. High-level anti-insurgency authorities from Burma and
north-east India have increasingly profited from the narcotics trade,
taking bribes not to send Burmese military troops into areas where
refineries are located. Large amounts of narcotics are carried through
official border crossings in north-east India, including at the Moreh-Tamu
border point, as well as across paths over the mountains that form much of
the border terrain. In north-western Burma, there are three new
drug-related trends, all of which involve the participation of Burmese
higher authorities.

(i)                  Opium production is increasing in the Chin and Naga
hills.
(ii)                Heroin refineries have been established in the
north-western Burma
(iii)               Heroin trafficking from the Shan State through
north-west Burma into north-east India
                    is increasing dramatically.

The plain areas in north-west Burma are primarily inhabited by ethnic
Burmans, while the hills are settled by Nagas, Chins (who refer to
themselves as Zomi) and the Kukis. Like the Zomis in Chin State, the Kukis
and Nagas have formed armed resistance organizations which are fighting
against the Burmese military regime for various degrees of political
autonomy. There are also Nagas, Zomis and Kukis in the Indo-Burma border
areas fighting for autonomous regions in India. Some insurgents are
fighting for independence in territory that includes parts of Burma, India
and Bangladesh. The largest Naga resistance organisation, the National
Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN) split into two factions in 1988. The
faction led by Isaac-Muivah (NSCN-IM) has been especially active in
Indo-Burma borderlands while the faction led by Khaplang, a Burmese Naga
(NSCN-K), has in the past been more focused on fighting the Burma Army.
The Zomi Re-Unification Organisation (ZRO) and its armed wing, the Zomi
Revolutionary Army (ZRA), and the Kuki National Army (KNA) are also active
in Chin State and north-east India.

Cultivation of Opium Poppies

      Previously, numbers of Zomi villagers based in the Tedim area of
Chin State and in Sagaing Division produced relatively significant
amounts of opium. As some farmers under pressure from military
extortion, forced labour and relocations find it harder and harder
to survive growing ordinary crops the temptation to grow opium has
increased. In northern Chin State along the Indo-Burma border, most
of opium poppy fields are found around the Tedim township but there
are a few optimum cultivation areas in Tonzang and Than Tlang
townships. In the south, in areas such as Paletwa township, the
climate is not conducive to growing opium. Opium cultivation also
takes place in the Naga hills of Sagaing Division.

Production of Heroin

In the past, mostly opium was trafficked into north-east India. However,
since heroin factories have begun to appear in Chin State and Sagaing
Division in the early 1990s, locally produced opium as well as opium from
Shan State are now refined in the area.  According to the Geopolitical
Drug Dispatch, Heroin Laboratories and drug export routes have now shifted
to the south west (from Kachin State and the Chinese border).  Major drug
production units are now operation along the Chindwin river near the
North-East India Border, under direct protection by the Burmese Army, far
from zones controlled by the India North-East rebels and from the
notorious Golden Triangle rather than heading up to the Chinese border,
trucks leaded with raw opium and heroin began heading down the Central
plain to the South around Mandalay.  Shortly afterward, other sources in
India reported that the north-east region of Nagaland, Manipur and Mizoram
were flooded with heroin. (The Geopolitical Drug Dispatch, Edition No. 24,
December 2004).

As reported in the Geopolitical Drug Dispatch, a string of six new
refineries were identified along the Chindwin River, close to the
north-east Indian border:

1)      North of Singkaling Hkamti, near Tamanthi where the Burma Armys
52nd Regiment is headquartered
2)      Homalin (222nd Regiment Headquarters)
3)      Moreh and Kaleymyo (89th, 228th and 235th Regiment Headquarters)
4)      Tedim (89th Regiment Headquarters)
5)      Paletwa on the western edge of Chin and Arakan States.

For the first time refineries are being established in traditionally white
or areas where there is no north-east Indian rebel presence and close to
major Burma Army installations. Most of the opium and heroin trafficked
over these routes from Shan State enters Kalay and Tahan, a Sub-Division
of Kaleymyo, where there is a heroin refinery. Observers report that in
Kalaymyo, Sagaing Division, Burma Army officials have established heroin
refineries inside their main military camp. According to locals, heroin
produced from this refinery is sent to north-east Indian insurgents,
particularly the United National Liberation Front (UNLF) and the Peoples
Liberation Army (PLA) in Manipur Valley, the United Liberation Front of
Assam, (ULFA) and the National Socialist Council of Nagaland
(NSCN)-Khaplang Faction.

Trafficking Routes

North-west Burma and north-eastern Indian states extend from Sagaing
Division to Tamer to Manipur and Kalay/ Tedim to Mizoram.

>From the main refinery at Kalaymyo, under the control of a businessman who
works with well-known drug-traffickers from north-west Burma as well as
the army, there are three major drug trafficking routes (see map for major
routes):

1)      To the north towards Khampat and Tamumoreh and from there to
Imphal, Manipur
2)      To the west towards Rikhawdar/ Champhai and from there to Aizawl,
Mizoram
3)      To the south-west towards Lunglei and continuing north to Aizawl.

Other trafficking routes to Indias north-east include:

1)      from Khamti area through Noklok to Magokching in Nagaland
2)      from Tamanthi and Homalin to Somra and from there northwards
through Jessami to Kohima in Nagaland
3)      From Paletwa to Alikudam in the Chittagong Hills Track of
Bangladesh, to Coxs Bazaar and Chittagong.
4)      Some heroin is also trafficked over the Arakan State border into
Bangladesh, then on to India.

Most of the heroin trafficked to India passes through Tamu to Moreh,
Chandel District of Manipur State. Within north-western Burma, heroin is
often transported by the police officers, soldiers and prison guards when
they are ordered to escort prisoners from their work sites back to towns.
>From there, large amounts of heroin are stashed in army conveys, which
travel to the border avoiding inspection at the check points along the
way. Moreover, the traffickers pay Burma Army officials a fee for carrying
shipments and to pick-up the heroin at border towns such as Tamu. From
there it is brought into India both in trucks and by individuals. Drugs
coming from Burma into Manipur are mostly sent to Patna, one of the major
drug distribution centres in India, and to three other distribution
points; Kathmandu, Delhi and Bombay. From their, they are further
trafficked on to the international market, which is now overwhelmingly
reliant on Burmese heroin.

Consequences

The consequences for India, Burma, Bangladesh and the international
community are extreme. In Burma the addiction rate has increase
dramatically over recent years. The World Health Organisation believes
there are over 600,000 heroin addicts in Burma, more than 2% of the
population, and double this number of users of drugs. Non-government
organisations working in the region believe the real number may be two or
three times this again. The dire economic situation in Burma is
contributing to the rise of an opium-based economy in the areas reliant
not only on opium cultivation but on narcotics trade. Addiction to heroin
in the north-east Indian states of Manipur, Mizoram and Nagaland has
skyrocketed. According to Bertil Lintner, there were 12,000 drug addicts
in Burma in 1989. Two years later, there were at least 25,000 addicts. In
the north-east Indian states there are more than 90,000 HIV/AIDS carriers,
identified as heroin addicts who shared needles to inject their drugs. 
Manipur, a state of only 1.2 million people by 1992 had the highest
incidence of drug-related AIDS infections in India.

Conclusion

There is a direct correlation between the expansion of military control in
north-western Burma and the increase in the production and trafficking of
drugs along the Indo-Burma border. As locals in these inter-state
borderlands find it increasingly difficult to make ends meet because of
extortion, forced labour, and other demands enforced on them by the
Burmese military regime, they have become more willing to plant poppies.
The payment of bribes to local authorities, happy to supplement their
meagre income, ensures that poppies can be grown and heroin produced even
in the border areas close to Burma Army bases. Drugs are transported by or
with the collusion of Burma Army and intelligence personnel. Moreover, the
military juntas involvement in the heroin trade is being enhanced and
facilitated by the expansion of roads in the north-east India along which
a growing number of army vehicles are circulating that can carry narcotics
without being checked. With no concerted attempts as yet to stem the flow
of narcotics through north-western Burma, the twin plagues of increased
addiction and rapidly spreading HIV/AIDS continue to devastate the region.

_____________________________________
BUSINESS

January 19, Mizzima News
Primary jolt in Burma-India gas pipeline project - Nava Thakuria

Guwahati: The much hyped tri-nation gas project, which will enable
energy-hungry India to import gas from Burma across Bangladeshi territory,
has received primary jolt. The Bangladeshi Government has placed
conditions before signing the gas pipeline deal.

The deal was made clear by Bangladesh State Minister for Energy and
Mineral Resources, A. K. M. Mosharraf Hossain, that without fulfilling
their conditions, Dhaka will not sign the trans-boundary project.

Addressing journalists in Dhaka, the Minister for Energy and Mineral
Resources, who joined in talks with his Indian and Burmese counterparts
last week, stressed that the Begum Khaleda Zia-led government would not
sign the deal with India and Burma unless India agreed to sign a bilateral
agreement with Bangladesh.

"We'll not sign the tripartite deal without the bilateral one with India,"
said Mr Hossain, who had already discussed the matter with Prime Minister
Khaleda Zia.

After the tri-nation talks ended on positive note in Rangoon on Thursday,
the government in Dhaka reiterated its request for a final agreement with
India to have overland access to hydroelectricity generated in Nepal and
Bhutan as well as trade routes for commodities between Bangladesh and the
two Himalayan kingdoms.

Bangladesh has been requesting for this overland access for many years,
though India has not responded positively. But Dhaka is now reiterating
its demands after initially agreeing to lay a 290-km pipeline from gas
fields in Burma to India through Bangladesh. The pipeline would run
through Arakan state in Burma via the Indian states of Mizoram and Tripura
before crossing Bangladesh to Kolkata.

Taking advantage of India's need for natural gas, the Bangladeshi
Government has also argued for a decrease in the trade imbalance between
the two countries. India imports around $100 million worth of products
from Bangladesh, where as they import over $1400 million from their giant
neighbour.

Prior to the trilateral agreement, Dhaka had requested a bilateral
agreement to be signed with New Delhi that would enable Bangladesh to
increase trade with Bhutan and Nepal.

"They (India and Burma) want to do it (gas pipeline project) immediately,
but we're not in a hurry. Our point is to get the bilateral one first,"
affirmed Mr Hossain.

_____________________________________
REGIONAL

January 19, Agence France Presse
Myanmar workers in Thailand are the forgotten tsunami victims - Nicolas
Revise

Khao Lak: Myanmar migrant workers in Thailand were the forgotten victims
of the tsunamis and non-governmental organisations -- who say thousands
are dead and missing -- believe their fate will continue to be ignored.

Achai Saw Hlaing, a Myanmar labourer with a valid Thai work permit, was
the sole survivor from a hotel building site on the beach at Khao Lak
which was swept away by the tsunamis on December 26.

Unlike his 10 companions, 43-year-old Hlaing managed to climb on top of a
roof and avoid the giant killer waves.

When the sea subsided, he hid in a slum 10 kilometres (six miles) from
Khao Lak, his home for eight years, bundled together with 100 compatriots.

"The Thai authorities did not even come and ask how many Myanmar nationals
were dead," said Hlaing, a grim picture of skin and bones with hollowed
cheeks and bloodshot eyes.

"They made lists of the Thai dead, of foreigners, but did not give a damn
about Myanmar," he said.

"Even though my papers were in order, I dared not go to the police for
fear they would arrest me."

Next to him, a woman from Myanmar told how she lost her daughter in the
catastrophe. Someone said to her the next day that the girl's body was
lying on the beach but she said the Thai police stopped her from going to
look.

The corpse had probably been dispatched to the morgue next to the temple
at Yanyao further south, she said.

Myanmar non-governmental organisations (NGOs) based in Thailand said that
thousands of migrant workers in the fishing and construction industries in
the area were killed by the tsunamis and thousands more were missing.

A total of 2,500 people from Myanmar were killed by the tsunami in Phang
Nga province, Moe Swe, the general secretary of the Yaung Chi Oo Workers
Association based in western Thailand, told AFP.

And 4,000 Myanmar migrants had gone missing, and among them many were
presumed dead, he said. Some are believed to have moved to other provinces
and others are thought to have gone back to Myanmar, said Moe Swe, whose
group does advocacy work for Myanmar migrants.

Htoo Chit, coordinator of the Grassroots Human Rights, Education and
Development Association based in Kanchanaburi, said the migrant death toll
may have reached 3,000, with between 5,000 and 7,000 missing.

The assessments were based on a one-week series of interviews and
information collected on the ground with Myanmar labourers, Thai employers
and local villagers, the organisations said.

The NGOs were unable to say immediately if the Myanmar dead were counted
among Thailand's official casualty total of 8,500 dead or missing.

But there was little chance that the Myanmar victims would ever be
recognised as such, they said.

"The military government in Myanmar does not even care about Burmese
people in Burma," said Myint Myint San, a member of the Burmese Women
Union NGO based in Chiang Mai in northern Thailand. Myanmar was formerly
called Burma.

"They will not claim their nationals," she said. "They consider these
people (as) having left their country."

As for Thailand, "they know they have hundreds of thousands of Burmese
migrant workers. Thailand should at least acknowledge that a lot of
Burmese nationals have disappeared."

For example, "a Thai employer told us in Khao Lak that half of his 150
workers are missing," she said.

And on Ko Khao island off the nearby coast at Takua Pa, "there were 10,000
Burmese workers. So far, we were able to locate 300 among them," she said.

According to the NGOs, some 900,000 Myanmar nationals work legally in the
whole of Thailand, mainly in the fishing and construction industry.

In Phang Nga, migrant workers from Myanmar had been profiting from the
tourist boom of the past two or three years.

"But these (Myanmar) people, dead or not, do not exist, they are
invisible," said Myint Myint.

_____________________________________

January 19, Reuters
Myanmar tsunami survivors disappear in Thailand - Nopporn Wong-Anan

Ban Namkhem: The Indian Ocean tsunami claimed the lives of hundreds of
migrant Myanmar workers in Thailand, dissident groups say, although a far
greater number have probably been deported or gone into hiding.

The tsunami-devastated village of Ban Namkhem used to be home to around
2,000 fishermen and their families from the former Burma, immigrants
sufficiently permanent to be registered with Thai authorities.

But at a special memorial service on Wednesday for Myanmar victims of the
Dec. 26 killer waves, only 35 turned up.

There will almost certainly be no verifiable final tally of victims from a
community that existed only semi-officially and at the margins of society.

However, dissident groups working outside the military-run Myanmar are
saying the toll is around 2,500 alone in the Thai province of Phang Nga,
where more than 5,300 bodies, of whom nearly 1,800 have been identified as
Western tourists, have been found.

That Myanmar toll could not be independently verified.

Myint Myint San, a relief worker with a dissident organisation in the
northern Thai town of Chiang Mai, said 7,000 were missing -- either swept
to an anonymous death, deported by Thai police as illegal immigrants or in
hiding.

Thailand is home to thousands of economic migrants from its military-ruled
and diplomatically isolated neighbour, whose economy is said to be in
ruins due to the army's handling of economic policy.

It is not clear how the Myanmar death toll, which is based on interviews
with witnesses and community leaders, has been compiled without the
recovery or identification of bodies.

What is clear is that those who survived are now caught in a desperate
situation.

With their papers destroyed or their employer -- the only person who might
vouch for them -- dead, they are at the bottom of the pecking order. In
Myanmar, their prospects are little rosier.

"I wish I could go back to Myanmar, but back home there is nothing for me
to do, so I have to be in Thailand. But I don't have any documents left
and I'm very afraid of the water," said Htu, a 34-year-old woman who lost
both her daughters to the wave.

Like most of the roughly 100 Myanmar in Ban Namkhem, a village almost
eradicated by the tsunami, she and her husband are sleeping at the house
of her employer.

Other survivors have disappeared, either pushed back by Thai police over
the border 140 km to the north or in hiding in Thailand, spelling bad news
for a local fishing industry that was dependent on their labour.

"I have received phone calls from people who have been hiding, asking us
for help, but I have had to say they must tell me where they are first
before I can help," said Myint Myint San.

_____________________________________

January 19, Deutsche Presse-Agentur
France contributes 1.5 million euros to set up Mekong fund in ADB

Manila: The Asian Development Bank (ADB) said Wednesday France was
contributing 1.5 million euros (about 2 million dollars) to set up a
cooperation fund to prepare and design programmes for the Greater Mekong
Subregion (GMS).

The "Cooperation Fund for Project Preparation in the Greater Mekong
Subregion" will be administered by the Manila-based ADB.

"The initial contribution of 1.5 million euros will be committed by the
Agence Francaise de Developpement (AFD) upon signing of the Channel
Financing Agreement," the ADB said. "At its discretion, AFD may provide
resources to the fund at a later date."

The GMS comprises Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar (Burma), Thailand, Vietnam and
China's Yunnan province. In 1992, with ADB's assistance the six countries
entered into a programme of subregional cooperation to boost economic
ties.

_____________________________________
INTERNATIONAL

January 19, Financial Times
Rice pledges a war on 'tyranny' - Guy Dinmore

Washington: Condoleezza Rice laid out yesterday the second Bush
administration's foreign policy priorities for waging what she called a
"generational struggle" against militant Islam and supporting movements
for freedom in six countries she listed as "outposts of tyranny".

At her first confirmation hearing before the Senate foreign relations
committee, Ms Rice balanced a neoconservative view of the world with
emphasis on the importance she would place as next US secretary of state
on democracy, allies and multilateral institutions.

"The time for diplomacy is now," she said in an attempt to address
concerns that the departure of Colin Powell would remove the
administration's main advocate of multilateralism.

However, the thrust of her prepared statement reflected the
neoconservative vision, presenting herself and President George W. Bush as
the new generation of cold war warriors called to duty by what she
described as the "defining moment" of the September 11 2001 attacks by
al-Qaeda.

"America and the free world are once again engaged in a long-term struggle
against an ideology of hatred and tyranny and terror and hopelessness. And
we must confront these challenges with the same vision and the same
courage and the same boldness that dominated our post-war period," she
said.

Her speech balanced a recognition that the US could not wage this war
alone, but would do so at times, if necessary. The benefits to the US of
international rules, treaties and institutions were a "core conviction"
that would guide her actions, Ms Rice said. She immediately added: "Yet,
when judging the course of action, I will never forget that the true
measure of its worth is its effectiveness."

Under questioning from senators, Ms Rice spoke of the "scandal" of the
UN-run oil-for-food programme for Iraq, saying those responsible should be
held accountable. France and Germany, opponents of the Iraq war, were
singled out for praise in helping on the issue of non-proliferation.

The first task of the US, she said, was to unite the community of
democracies in building an international system, the second to strengthen
that community to fight common threats to security, and the "third great
task" was to "spread freedom and democracy".

The US, she said, "stands with oppressed people on every continent" and
she listed six "outposts of tyranny": Cuba, Burma, North Korea, Iran,
Belarus and Zimbabwe. "And we cannot rest until every person living in a
fear society has finally won their freedom."

Analysts immediately noted the absence of Syria from that list, as well as
US allies in the "war on terror" such as Pakistan and Uzbekistan.

Under fire from Democratic senators - who were critical but nonetheless
said they would vote for her confirmation - Ms Rice insisted that the
strategic decision to remove the regime of Saddam Hussein was correct, and
that the administration had sent sufficient troops to Iraq.

But she conceded that the US had managed to train only about 120,000
Iraqis for the country's new security forces. Senator Joe Biden, the
senior Democrat on the committee, noted that nearly a year ago Donald
Rumsfeld, the defence secretary, had spoken of the "amazing
accomplishment" of standing up 210,000 Iraqi troops and police.

Pressed for an Iraq exit strategy, Ms Rice said she was reluctant to put a
timetable on withdrawal of the 150,000 US troops, saying it depended on
the ability of the government to be elected on January 30 to fight
ex-Ba'athists and terrorists itself.

Ms Rice, an expert on the former Soviet Union, spent little time on the
big powers. She said the success of democracy was not yet assured in
Russia but the two nations had shown they could work together on joint
problems.