BurmaNet News, October 4, 2005

[Editor]

October 4, 2005 Issue # 2816


INSIDE BURMA
AFP: Myanmar business leaders warn against more sanctions
Irrawaddy: Investigation of New Mon State Party could threaten ceasefire
Irrawaddy: HK company to run Burmese internet services
Mizzima News: Sao Oo Kya gets 13-year prison term

DRUGS
Bangkok Post: Probe ordered into death of Karen suspects
SHAN: Drug stained group gets credit with Thailand

BUSINESS / TRADE
AFP: Gold coin prices soar in Myanmar as currency tumbles

INTERNATIONAL
Irrawaddy: Burmese activist wins Civil Courage Prize

____________________________________
INSIDE BURMA

October 4, Agence France Presse
Myanmar business leaders warn against more sanctions

Yangon: Myanmar business leaders said Tuesday that stiffer sanctions
against the military-ruled country would ruin the private sector,
condemning a recent report which urged the United Nations to take tougher
measures to press for reform.

"The report may bring about strong imposition of international community
pressure on Myanmar, depriving Myanmar private-sector businesses and
people from the privileges and benefits of international trade and
commerce," said a statement from the Union of Myanmar Federation of
Chambers of Commerce and Industry.

"That means thousands of jobs will be lost," it said.

"The report may lead to dismal understanding of Myanmar as disastrous,
causing gloom or depression," it added.

The report, by former Czech president Vaclav Havel and retired South
African archbishop Desmond Tutu, said Myanmar was "far worse" than seven
other nations, including Afghanistan and Rwanda, where the UN had taken
action.

Presented to the UN last month, it recommended the UN Security Council
adopt a resolution compelling Myanmar to work with the office of UN
Secretary General Kofi Annan in implementing a plan for national
reconciliation and a restoration of democracy.

It said the Security Council should urge the military junta to provide
access to the UN for humanitarian aid to be given to "vulnerable" groups,
and to seek the immediate and unconditional release of opposition leader
Aung San Suu Kyi.

The junta has rejected the report as unfounded.

Myanmar is already under stiff US and European Union sanctions that have
been tightened since the detention of Aung San Suu Kyi in May 2003. US
officials have said they want to bring Myanmar before the Security Council
to find ways of pressing the junta to reform.

____________________________________

October 4, Irrawaddy
Investigation of New Mon State Party could threaten ceasefire - Louis Reh

Alleged investigations by the State Peace and Development Council’s
intelligence agency into New Mon State Party activities in Moulmein, Mon
State, could threaten the NMSP and its ceasefire agreement with Burma’s
ruling junta, said an NMSP official.

“The SPDC investigations of our party activities are likely to threaten
peace and stability in Mon State,” said Nai Kwe Hong Mon, a liaison
official for the NMSP.

According to the official, the SPDC started investigating the party’s
activities in late September this year by collecting members’ names and
job descriptions, and by requesting detailed monthly reports on business
conducted by the party.

The SPDC has completed its investigation in Moulmein, and similar actions
in 10 surrounding townships are expected to begin soon.

Burma’s ruling junta had previously granted the party business concessions
for mining, fishing, trade, natural gas and logging, following a
negotiated ceasefire in 1995. However, most of those concessions have
since been withdrawn, notably the limited logging rights that would have
allowed the party to export timber to Thailand.

“The party’s central committee will have to sit and decide whether to
attend the National Convention or not,” said Nai Kwe Hong Mon of the
potential impact of growing tension surrounding the party’s continued
engagement with the SPDC, and their involvement in the National
Convention, which they are allowed to attend despite having no voice in
proceedings. The National Convention is set to resume in early December.

The NMSP also announced their support yesterday for a recent report by
former Czech Republic president Vaclav Havel and Nobel Peace Prize
laureate Bishop Desmond Tutu, calling for the UN Security Council to take
up the issue of Burma.

“We support the proposal because we want to achieve a political solution
to our problems in Mon State,” said Nai Kwe Hong Mon.

Nai Kasauh Mon, director of the Human Rights Foundation of Monland,
suggested that the ceasefire agreement has been in peril for several
years.

“Human rights abuses in Mon State have continued ever since the ceasefire
agreement was first negotiated,” he said. “The worst thing is the SPDC’s
confiscation of private Mon land.” He added that recent SPDC actions in
Mon State have aggravated the situation and made an already fragile
ceasefire even less likely to last.

____________________________________

October 4, Irrawaddy
HK company to run Burmese internet services

A Hong Kong company, SS8 Networks Inc, has agreed with Burmese company
Ahaed Co. Ltd., to run security services for internet service providers in
Burma, the local news journal Voice reported Tuesday. Under the agreement,
security services will be provided for domestic internet subscribers. The
current private ISP in Burma is Bagan Cybertech Co, which launched the
internet and the internet-based telephone system in Burma in 2001 in
partnership with the Shin Satellite Co of Thailand.

____________________________________
DRUGS

October 4, Bangkok Post
Probe ordered into death of Karen suspects - Cheewin Sattha

Lamphun: Police Region 5 commander Lt-Gen Panupong Singhara na Ayutthaya
has ordered an inquiry into the death of three Karen drug suspects in
their detention cell at the Muang Lamphun district police station. The
three suspects were found hanging from the top bar of the cell door.
Police said they used their own shoelaces to hang themselves.

Pale-kwam or Pao Chobhatthakam, 24, Pachansuk or Paen Ornjong, 19, and
Boonchu Sujipat, 22, all from Chiang Mai's Om Koi district, were arrested
on Sunday along with Charnrit Palameesak, 23, a Lamphun native, while
allegedly delivering 1,700 metamphetamine pills to police posing as buyers
at a garage on Lamphun-Pa Sang road.

Police said the three Karens admitted to being members of a drug racket
run by drug warlord Wei Hsueh Kang, but Mr Charnrit denied any
involvement.

Police also said the Karens had asked the officers who arrested them to
shoot them, saying they feared the drug gang would hunt them down after
they regained freedom.

The four suspects were locked up in the same cell. The three Karens were
found dead around 4am yesterday. Police at the station said there was no
evidence they had been attacked.

Pol Lt-Gen Panupong said the Karen suspects probably decided to kill
themselves to avoid legal punishment or out of fear that they would be
hunted down by other drug dealers still at large.Pol Col Siroj
Pakwipicha-charoen, superintendent of the police station, quoted Mr
Charnrit as saying that before he fell asleep he heard the three Karens
speaking among themselves but did not understand what they were talking
about.

When he woke up, he saw them hanging from the cell door so he shouted for
the police to come and check.

The bodies of the three Karen suspects were sent to Maharaj Hospital in
Chiang Mai for autopsies.

____________________________________

October 4, Shan Herald Agency for News
Drug stained group gets credit with Thailand

The Karen splinter group, long considered a drug smuggling organization in
Thailand, handed over one of the most wanted criminals taking refuge in
Burma back to Thailand on 2 October, reported Bangkok-based Khom Chad Luek
daily yesterday.

A former non-commissioned officer from the Thai army, Sgt Chainarong
Busrakhtam "Muek", 45, of Maesod, who has for 3-4 years been living in
Myawaddy, was delivered to the Maesod-based 4th Infantry Regiment by Maj
San Pyo, Commander of the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA)'s
anti-narcotics unit. "From now on, we will cooperate fully with Thailand,"
he promised.

Chainarong has been on the 5th most wanted list of Police Region 6 over
several charges, including drug trafficking, robbery and importing illegal
migrant laborers.

Several drug consignments seized by the Thai army in the past have been
traced to the DKBA that had broken away from the main Karen opposition
movement Karen National Union (KNU) in 1995. Its switch of allegiance to
the Burma Army had contributed to the fall of the KNU's stronghold
Manerplaw.

_____________________________________

October 4, Mizzima News
Sao Oo Kya gets 13-year prison term - Myo Gyi

A Kyaukme district court in Shan State has sentenced Sao Oo Kya, the
brother of detained Shan National League for Democracy Chairman U Khun Tun
Oo, to 13 years imprisonment.

The court charged him with operating as a tour guide without a license,
defaming the State and being in violation of restrictions imposed under
the 'Habitual Offenders Act' before sentencing him on Friday.

Members of the Hsipaw (Thipaw) police force arrested him on August 3 and
charged him with operating as a tour guide without a license under the
'Hotel and Tourism Act'.

"When he gave anti-government statement in his interrogation, they added
another severe charge of 'defaming the State," U Khun Sai, the editor of
the Shan Herald Agency of News said.

Sao Oo Kya is the curator of the Hsipaw palace museum and had acted as a
guide to visitors. Since he played no significant role in Shan State
politics, many believe he was arrested for being a member of the Shan
State Consultative Council (SSCC).

He stood for the SSCC as the Hsipaw representative of ceasefire group Shan
State National Army, according to statements.

On February 7, the regime arrested Shan leaders who attended a meeting
held in Taungyi, focusing on the future Shan State affairs.

_____________________________________
BUSINESS / TRADE

October 4, Agence France Presse
Gold coin prices soar in Myanmar as currency tumbles

Yangon: Gold coin prices have soared in military-ruled Myanamr as the
local kyat currency keeps falling, having lost more than half its value
this year, the government's official dealers said Tuesday.

The currency, which traded at 900 to the dollar in January but has since
fallen to 1,400, has boosted demand for gold from the official state sales
facility.

The government opened an official sale of 24-carat gold coins on September
21, drawing long lines of people keen to invest in something seen as more
secure their local currency savings.

Prices for one tical coins opened at about 300,000 kyat (214 dollars) at
the start of the sale but by early Tuesday were up risen 13 percent to
340,000 kyat (242 dollars), an official at the Myanmar VES gold shop told
AFP on condition of anonymity.

A tical is 0.56 ounces.

Each citizen of Myanmar is allowed to buy only one coin, creating a brisk
business for people buying their allotted coin to resell at a quick
profit.

Resellers said they were adding about 5,000 kyat (3.57 dollars) to the
price of the coin but they declined to be identified because their work is
illegal.

Official sales of the gold coins were due to stop during the junta's gems
auction, which begins Wednesday, because of security concerns with dozens
of people waiting outside the building for coins.

Myanmar's economy has been reeling under decades of mismanagement by the
military. European Union and US sanctions that have been tightened since
the detention of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi in May 2003 are also
biting hard.

_____________________________________
INTERNATIONAL

October 4, Irrawaddy
Burmese activist wins Civil Courage Prize - Yeni

Well-known Burmese democracy advocate Min Ko Naing, who endured 15 years
of imprisonment under the military junta, has been named one of this
year’s Civil Courage Prize winners. The award is presented annually by the
New York-based Northcote Parkinson Fund, a private foundation which
supports economic and political liberalism and honors "steadfast
resistance to evil at great personal risk."

Min Ko NaingMin Ko Naing, a leader of the 1988 popular uprising against
Burma's dictatorship, is described by the Fund as “a central figure in the
Burmese democracy movement.” He was arrested by military intelligence
agents on March 23, 1989, and was sentenced to a 20-year prison term,
which was later commuted to 10 years under a general amnesty. For most of
his imprisonment he was held in solitary confinement. He was released from
prison in November last year but remains under government surveillance.

Min Ko Naing said he has declined his portion of the prize money—US
$25,000—and instead wants it to be used for humanitarian aid, especially
in the areas of education and health assistance for former political
prisoners. “It is a great honor for all people who sacrifice and
contribute their lives to the struggle,” Min Ko Naing told The Irrawaddy
by phone on Tuesday from Rangoon.

Anna Politkovskaya, a leading Russian journalist, will also receive the
award. A special correspondent for the Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta and
author of three books, she has reported on the plight of Chechnya’s
civilian population, which has been under military assault since 1994. 
She has put herself in danger by openly challenging government
authorities.

In February of 2000, the Federal Security Bureau (formerly the KGB)
arrested Politkovskaya in Chechnya and imprisoned her in a pit without
food or water for three days. In 2001 a Russian officer, whose war crimes
Politkovskaya had earlier exposed, threatened to kill her, and she was
forced into hiding. As she flew to Beslan in 2004 to report on the school
hostage crisis, she lost consciousness and believes that she was poisoned.

A third recipient, Munir Said Thalib, will be awarded the prize
posthumously. Once Indonesia's leading human rights activist, Thalib
investigated the disappearance of activists at the hands of security
forces and went on to become a searing critic of the Indonesian military,
particularly of abuses in the regions of East Timor, Aceh and Papua. In
September 2004, the 38-year-old activist was reportedly killed by arsenic
poisoning en route to Amsterdam to take up a scholarship to study
international law at Utrecht University. The perpetrators have yet to be
found.

This year’s award ceremony will be held at the Harold Pratt House in New
York City on October 11. Anna Politkovskaya is expected to receive her
award in person, but Min Ko Naing is under constant government
surveillance and cannot leave Burma.