BurmaNet News, January 21-23, 2006

[Editor]

January 21-23, 2006 Issue # 2884


ON THE BORDER
Mizzima: Thai FM urges Burma to allow ASEAN visit by March
AFP: Four Myanmar bodies repatriated, one year after tsunami
Mizzima: Bangladesh launches drives to stop fuel smuggling to Burma

BUSINESS / TRADE
Xinhua: Myanmar exports to hit 3 bln dollars in 2005-06

ASEAN
AP: Cambodia calls for Myanmar to stop delaying ASEAN democracy mission by
Malaysian envoy

REGIONAL
South China Morning Post: Junta faces revolt, Thai senator says

INTERNATIONAL
Time Asia: Going nowhere

OPINION / OTHER
Time Asia: Sanctions are the most effective weapon against Burma's
military regime - Mitch McConnell
SHAN: Dams, diseases, and displacement - Withaya Huanok

____________________________________
ON THE BORDER

January 23, Mizzima News
Thai FM urges Burma to allow ASEAN visit by March - Jessicah Curtis

Mae Sai: Thai foreign minister Kantathi Suphamongkhon said he suggested
Burma accept an ASEAN visit in February or March, during a meeting with
his Burmese counterpart at the opening of a bridge between the two
countries.

The new bridge between Tachileik in Burma and Thailand's Mae Sai, to be
used for cross-border trade, was officially opened by Kantathi and Burmese
foreign minister Nyan Win at a ceremony yesterday.

After a brief private exchange following their inauguration speeches,
Kantathi told reporters he had urged Nyan Win to allow ASEAN delegates
into Burma as soon as possible.

"I expressed the hope that it would take place before the end of March."

Burmese authorities had told ASEAN they were too busy moving to Pyinmana
to allow Malaysian foreign minister Sayed Hamid to visit the country this
month on behalf of the grouping.

Kantathi said Nyan Win explained the military administration's move to
their new capital at Pyinmana would be completed by the end of this month.

"I expressed the hope that the visit of ASEAN would happen soon after and
I had highlighted February and March and he said that that was a
possibility," Kantathi said.

But Nyan Win, who had told event organisers he would not take questions
from the media, said, during scuffles between his security team and
journalists, he had already proposed a date for an official visit to
Hamid.

"I have told him for the possible date. I have already told to Mr Hamid,"
Nyan Win said.

Nyan Win was also questioned on the security situation on Shan State's
border with Thailand after reports of fresh military offensives against
the Shan State Army – South emerged last week.

Skirmishes between the SSA and the Burmese military have twice resulted in
the closure of the Tachileik-Mae Sai border crossing.

In February 2001, fighting between the Burmese army and the SSA spilled
across the Thai border, with Burmese troops seizing a Thai security post
in order to better position themselves against Shan fighters.

The move resulted in exchanges of fire between Burma and Thailand.
Thousands of Thai civilians were evacuated when the Burmese army began
shelling Mae Sai.

Nyan Win responded to a question about the security situation saying,
"Everything is okay. You can ask to the local authorities."

One of Tachileik's Union Solidarity and Development Association leaders,
Dr Myint Aung, told Mizzima the security situation on the border with
Thailand was fine.

"Now it is okay. The SSA have a good relationship with Thailand . . . In
the past there have been some rebels but they have understood they need
the Thais."

But Kantathi was less dismissive of the news of fresh fighting. He said
Thai security agencies were monitoring the situation to make sure they
were prepared for any potential threat.

While questions over security issues, drug trafficking and Burma's
political stalemate undermined much of the significance of the bridge
opening, Thai and Burmese officials considered yesterday's event an
important milestone in diplomatic relations.

The 90-metre bridge is expected to help increase trade between the two
countries and will provide Thailand with a better road link to China.

Construction of the small concrete structure started early in 2003.

Its inauguration was delayed for two years after Burma stalled on their
payments for the structure leaving Thai authorities with little choice but
to finance the entire project.

But Burmese officials showed no sign of unease over their arrears,
organising a carnival-like display of Burmese culture on their side of the
new bridge.

Ethnic groups in traditional dress, dancing school children, musicians and
Tachileik residents covered the Burmese entrance to the bridge, welcoming
Nyan Win as he made his way to the podium in the centre.

In contrast, Thai authorities organised a modest marching band to welcome
officials.

While armed military personnel guarded the river underneath the bridge,
Thai and Burmese residents from the surrounding area took the opportunity
to cross into their neighbouring country without restriction.

____________________________________

January 23, Agence France Presse
Four Myanmar bodies repatriated, one year after tsunami

Bangkok: The remains of four Myanmar migrant workers killed in the tsunami
have been cremated and returned to their families in Thailand, more than
one year after the disaster, officials said Monday.

The four were cremated last week during Buddhist ceremonies with Myanmar
monks at a temple in Thailand's Phang Nga province, which suffered worst
in the tsunami, said Aiko Kikkawa of the International Organisation for
Migration (IOM).

"Some people say 'It's been a year, what's the point', but I think it's
really important for the families to identify the bodies to give them a
clear moment of truth and start a new life," Kikkawa, who helped organize
the transfer of the remains, told AFP.

The IOM and the Lawyers Council of Thailand are mediating between Myanmar
migrants and the tsunami victim forensics centre in helping identify and
arrange the transfer of the bodies, many of whom were illegal migrants.

The forensics centre has identified at least 83 Myanmar bodies using
fingerprints, while the IOM has sent investigators a list of more than 100
names using DNA and other details taken from relatives, Kikkawa said.

A total of six bodies have been returned to families of Myanmar migrants
in Thailand since the December 2004 disaster, including two shortly after
the waves struck the coast, police Colonel Ponprasert Ganjanarintr told
AFP.

Many migrants worked as labourers and fishermen but because they left
Myanmar illegally to seek work, they lacked identification documents.

That has left them in an administrative limbo, caught between an
uninterested Myanmar embassy in Bangkok, the Thai foreign ministry and the
strict requirements of the forensics centre.

But Kikkawa said the forensics centre had apparently relaxed its
requirements for Myanmar migrants to ease the return of bodies.

Almost 5,400 people were killed in the tsunami in Thailand, about half of
them foreign holidaymakers.

The forensics center still has 771 unidentified bodies, Pongprasert said.
Up to 400 of them could be Myanmar migrants, a lawyer involved in the
process said.

____________________________________

January 22, Xinhua General News Service
Myanmar exports to hit 3 bln dollars in 2005-06

Yangon: Myanmar's export are expected to hit 3 billion U.S. dollars in the
fiscal year of 2005-06 ending in March, slightly up from the previous
fiscal years, said a report of the Myanmar Times Sunday.

In the last fiscal year of 2004-05, the country's exports were valued at
2.9 billion U.S. dollars, while its imports stood 1.9 billion U.S. dollars
out of its total foreign trade volume of 4.9 billion U.S. dollars with a
trade surplus of 954 million U.S. dollars.

"The slight increase of the exports will be that the price of Myanmar
goods has gone up in the international market," the directorate of the
trade of the Ministry of Commerce was quoted as saying.

Myanmar mainly exports natural gas, marine and forest products as well as
agricultural products such as beans and pulses.

The private sector plays an important role in Myanmar's exports and
imports. In 2004-05 fiscal year, the private sector accounted for more
than 85 percent in its exports and more than 80 percent of the gross
domestic product.

Myanmar has set a target of 1.5 billion U.S. dollars of bilateral trade
with China, 1 billion U.S. dollars with India and 50 million U.S. dollars
with Vietnam in the fiscal year of 2005-06.

____________________________________

January 23, Mizzima News
Bangladesh launches drives to stop fuel smuggling to Burma - Siddique Islam

Authorities in Dhaka have launched operations to curb the smuggling of
fertilizer and gasoline to Burma.

The Bangladesh Navy and Coastguard have started drives to prevent the
follow of a variety of products out of Bangladesh via river routes.

Operations 'Bay Strip' and 'Sabuj Bangla' (Green Bengal) have already
resulted in several seizures.

"We will continue the drives as long as the smuggling could not be
stopped," a senior Bangladeshi official told Mizzima.

Significant quantities of imported petroleum products and locally
manufactured fertilizer are smuggled to Burma and India, where the
products fetch higher prices.

Bangladesh navy and coastguard personnel have seized 549 tons of
fertilizer worth about US $39,300 after raiding 33,554 vessels since
November last year. More than 120 people have been arrested for suspected
involvement in smuggling.

Tons of sugar, diesel and wood have been confiscated and authorities have
identified 13 smuggling channels. Goods are known to pass through several
rivers including Naf in Cox's Bazar and Sangu in Chittagong.

____________________________________
ASEAN

January 23, Associated Press
Cambodia calls for Myanmar to stop delaying ASEAN democracy mission by
Malaysian envoy

Phnom Penh: Cambodia's foreign minister on Monday urged the leaders of
Myanmar to stop delaying a visit by Malaysia's foreign minister to discuss
democratic reforms in the military-ruled country.

The visit by Malaysian Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar on behalf of the
Association of Southeast Asian Nations must "not be a tourist visit and
should yield" results in pressing Myanmar to fulfill reform pledges,
Cambodia's Foreign Minister Hor Namhong said.

He spoke at a joint press conference with visiting Singaporean Foreign
Minister George Yeo, who agreed that Syed Hamid's visit should be a
"concrete" one. Cambodia, Myanmar and Singapore are all members of ASEAN,
which comprises all 10 countries of Southeast Asia.

Myanmar's ruling junta took power in 1988 after violently suppressing mass
pro-democracy protests. It held a general election in 1990 but refused to
recognize the results after a landslide victory by the party of
pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi. The Nobel Peace Prize winner, who
has spent 10 of the last 16 years in detention, is among some 1,100
political prisoners in Myanmar.

ASEAN members are concerned at the political deadlock in Myanmar,
including the detention of Suu Kyi. The disapproval by Western nations of
the junta's poor human rights records and failure to hand over power to a
democratically elected government has complicated their relations with
ASEAN as a group.

The United States and other countries maintain economic and political
sanctions against Yangon.

Hor Namhong noted that Myanmar also known as Burma has said it has delayed
receiving Syed Hamid because it is busy moving its capital from Yangon to
a new location.

"This postponement should not drag on indefinitely," Hor Namhong added.

The Malaysian foreign minister said he hoped to visit Myanmar by the end
of February or in March.

____________________________________
REGIONAL

January 21, South China Morning Post
Junta faces revolt, Thai senator says - Jim Pollard

Politician believes generals' shift to new city will weaken their grip on
power and accuses Thaksin of selling out

Bangkok: The junta's decision to shift the core of the Myanmese government
to the new city of Pyinmana could open the door to democracy, a top Thai
senator said this week.

"I think now the decision of the government to move the capital to
Pyinmana, 400km north of Rangoon (Yangon), will definitely weaken the
state's grip on the people," said Senator Kraisak Choonhavan.

"I think they have put themselves in a mine here. And I would encourage
the Burmese (Myanmese) people to be ready for an uprising in a few months.

"If an uprising is popular, I don't think the officers will defend the
SPDC (State and Development Council). I've heard officers are also quite
discontented about what's going on.

"All countries are very worried - where are they going to put their
embassies? There is an April deadline, I believe - it takes 12 hours to
get up there [to Pyinmana from Yangon] - and they've got to pick their
spot [where each embassy will be relocated to). There is something very
seriously wrong in Burma [Myanmar] now," he said.

The senator, head of Thailand's upper house panel on foreign relations,
suggested Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra's business interests may
have been allowed to influence relations with Yangon.

The problem was dealings with Yangon had now "gone way beyond constructive
engagement", he said. The Thai government was "using taxpayers' money for
roads in neighbouring countries built with forced labour".

Thailand's Export-Import Investment Bank had also financed billions of
baht in "dubious deals", a large chunk of which would benefit a telecoms
firm controlled by Mr Thaksin's family (which looked set yesterday to be
taken over by the Singaporean state investment agency Temasek), he
alleged.

"We find that unacceptable. These deals are not transparent and have not
even passed by parliament," he said.

Under the previous Chuan Leekpai regime, Thais had been proud to host
refugees from Myanmar and Cambodia, he said.

"But people in Thailand cannot accept befriending of a regime that has no
human rights. It's a farce."

Hundreds of politically active Myanmese had been rounded up and packed off
to the border refugee camps. There is now talk of extraditing them back to
Myanmar.

"I am ashamed of my government's treatment of the refugees," he said.

Myanmar's military junta has accused an ethnic Shan militia waging a
guerilla war for decades of forcibly recruiting child soldiers as young as
13.

Information Minister Brigadier-General Kyaw Hsan said 48 fighters of the
Shan State Army (SSA) had surrendered or been captured this month.

Of several teenagers in the group, the youngest, a private called Soe
Naing, was 13, he said.

____________________________________
INTERNATIONAL

January 22, Time Asia
Going nowhere - Michael Schuman

By doing business with Burma, Asian countries help its brutal military
regime stay in power—while the Burmese people remain trapped in a time
warp of poverty, oppression and economic misrule

Thaung Htun hasn't seen his homeland in 17 years. But the 49-year-old
former doctor hasn't abandoned hope that one day democracy will come to
Burma and it will be safe for him to return. In 1988, he participated in a
student-led uprising against Burma's military regime and then fled to
Thailand when the generals crushed the movement. Two years later, the
generals purged the National League for Democracy (NLD), led by Nobel
Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, after it won a landslide victory in
the 1990 elections, and Thaung Htun joined other fleeing democrats in a
government-in-exile. Today, he remains cloistered among stacks of dusty
papers in a one-room office across from the United Nations in New York
City, wooing delegates to his cause. He and scores of other exiles and
human-rights activists from Bangkok to London have received many a
sympathetic ear. Last September, South Africa's Bishop Desmond Tutu and
Vaclav Havel, former President of the Czech Republic, issued a call for
the U.N. Security Council to press the generals toward political reform,
warning that Burma "threatens the peace and stability of the region." U.S.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has labeled Burma an "outpost of
tyranny," and Washington continues to impose sanctions that ban all
imports from Burma and prohibit investment there by American companies.
Critics as diverse as British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Hollywood star
Susan Sarandon have implored tourists to boycott Burma, echoing Suu Kyi's
insistence that any influx of foreign money helps legitimize—and
enrich—the generals. The aim is to isolate and squeeze the junta until it
cedes power to Suu Kyi or moves toward true democracy. After all his years
of exile, Thaung Htun still hasn't given up. "I believe that I can go back
to my country in my lifetime," he says. "History is on our side."

But foreigners such as Gong Nengzheng aren't on his side—and that's a key
reason why Burma's military regime is still in power. While Thaung Htun
tries desperately to keep overseas money out of Burma, Gong, the gung-ho
mayor of the Chinese city of Ruili on the border with Burma, is striving
to get more mainland money in. The Chinese government has turned the
border area near Ruili into a special economic zone to boost trading ties
between the two countries. More than $400 million in trade funnels through
the Jiegao Border Trade Economic Zone each year. China exports household
appliances, chemicals and medicines, and Burma ships back jade, seafood
and timber. Jade bracelets and pendants cram glass cases in souvenir shops
along the "China-Burma Friendship Street," which straddles the border.
Residents on both sides pass between the two countries effortlessly,
lugging sacks of clothing and wicker baskets of fruit back and forth to
local markets. At one major crossing, marked only by a lone Chinese guard
standing under a multicolored umbrella, dozens of army-green trucks file
into Burma like a long line of soldier ants. Gong expects trade through
Jiegao to triple to $1.2 billion by 2008. He has expanded a bridge over
the Ruili River to handle the anticipated rush of rigs, and is
constructing a towering ceremonial gate at the border to symbolize China's
burgeoning relationship with Burma. Gong quips: "The countries are so
close together, Burmese chickens lay their eggs in China."

Gong's enthusiasm for his Burmese neighbors is far from unique in China,
which has become the military regime's most important partner. Officially,
trade between the two countries more than doubled in five years to $1.1
billion in 2004, according to Chinese government statistics, and China has
been a major provider of foreign investment and aid. But China isn't the
only Asian country supporting the junta, despite its reputation for brutal
repression. Many of Burma's neighbors are happy to do business there,
attracted by its rich natural resources. Thailand's imports from Burma
jumped 50% in the first 10 months of 2005 to nearly $1.5 billion,
according to Thailand's central bank, and India is looking to make major
investments there for the first time, particularly in the Burmese energy
sector. In fact, no Asian nation has fully supported U.S. sanctions, not
even democratic allies like South Korea. As a result, the junta's coffers
are more stuffed than ever before. In 1988, Burma boasted only $89 million
in hard-currency reserves, but by 2004, it held $685 million, according to
the International Monetary Fund. All of this aid, trade and investment has
enabled Burma's junta to shrug off 15 years of pressure from the
international community aimed at bringing about democratic reform. The
generals' "principal concern is to ensure their survival, and they have
enough money to do that," says Robert Templer, Asia program director of
the International Crisis Group in New York.

Indeed, the military regime appears as entrenched as ever. The junta,
which has euphemistically named itself the State Peace and Development
Council, is dominated by hard-liners led by its chairman General Than
Shwe. He consolidated power in 2004 after purging Khin Nyunt, then Prime
Minister and a more moderate voice in the government. The NLD is in
disarray, and its members—like many opponents of the regime—are routinely
killed, detained or forced into exile. Suu Kyi, 60, remains under house
arrest, where she has spent 10 of the past 16 years; in December, the
junta extended her detention for at least another six months. In 2003, the
government announced what it calls a "Roadmap to Democracy," which would
eventually lead to new elections, and it intermittently stages a
convention to write a new constitution (the latest session began in
December). But Suu Kyi and other key members of the opposition have either
been excluded or have boycotted the convention, stripping the process of
any credibility. Meanwhile, the junta is digging in—literally. The
generals are building a new capital at Pyinmana, a town 400 km north of
Rangoon, with a massive complex to house government ministries and the
army's headquarters, complete with a network of fortified tunnels and
bunkers. The generals, says David Steinberg, author of the book Burma: The
State of Myanmar, "have the idea that they can go it alone forever."

The natural resources at their disposal have clearly made it easier for
the generals to cling defiantly to power. Burma boasts sizable reserves of
natural gas near three fast-growing, energy-hungry nations: China, India
and Thailand. While most major oil companies are barred by sanctions from
investing in Burma's energy sector, there has been no shortage of
foreigners scrambling for a piece of the action. Two existing operations,
one managed by France's Total and the other by Malaysian state oil company
Petronas, provided Burma with about $1 billion in revenues in 2005,
estimates one energy consulting firm. (Total and Petronas wouldn't comment
on revenues provided to Burma's government, citing contractual
agreements.) Much more is in the pipeline. In 2004, a consortium led by
South Korea's Daewoo International and including Korea Gas, India's ONGC
Videsh and the Gas Authority of India discovered new gas reserves larger
than either of the existing fields. An investment of about $2 billion
might be needed to develop the find. Another group of investors, including
China National Offshore Oil Corp. (CNOOC), signed six contracts with the
Burmese government in June to explore for more fields. India is also
planning a $1 billion pipeline to ship natural gas from Burma. "The
ability of sanctions to limit investment in energy is probably
negligible," says Andrew Symon, an energy-industry specialist at the
Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore.

Other Asian companies have invested in Burmese pearl farms, hotels, truck
manufacturers and even pencil producers. Singaporean firms are among the
most enthusiastic, putting nearly $1.6 billion into 72 projects in Burma.
Cheap wages—possibly the lowest in Southeast Asia—have been a big draw in
labor-intensive industries such as textiles. Business deals have involved
some of Asia's most powerful people. Thailand's telecom giant Shin Corp.,
founded by Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, has provided Burma's state
phone company with access to Shin's satellites for international phone
services and domestic TV broadcasts since 1998. In 2002, Shin expanded
phone services to countryside villages and two years later, a Thai state
bank granted a $97 million credit line to the Burmese phone company to
help it purchase telecom equipment from Shin. Richard Jones, a spokesman
for Shin, calls Burma "one of our oldest customers," and says the
company's business there "is a way of helping many people in Burma
communicate with the outside world for the very first time." The flow of
money from around Asia is unlikely to slow. "We have no plans to restrict
Japanese business activities in Burma," says Hideaki Mizukoshi, the
director of the Asian and Oceanic Affairs Bureau in Japan's Ministry of
Foreign Affairs. "Democracy is not the only standard in deciding our
relationship with a country."

Executives and diplomats around the region bristle at the suggestion that
they are sacrificing human rights for profits. "By engaging Myanmar, that
doesn't mean we look at it as just business as usual, as an excuse to do
business with them," says Sihasak Phuangketkaew, spokesman for Thailand's
Foreign Ministry. "We do recognize there are problems and we want to see
progress." Many officials and investors in Asia believe that business and
trade have a greater chance than sanctions of fostering political reform
by opening up the isolated country. Ruili's Gong argues that China's
economic role "helps to push forward economic and political reform in
Burma." This thinking led the Association of Southeast Asian Nations
(ASEAN), the region's main political forum, to invite Burma to become a
member in 1997. James Gulkin, chief executive of Bangkok-based fisheries
company Siam Canadian, which does about 10% of its business in Burma, says
the idea behind such engagement with the junta is to "kill them with
kindness."

In reality, neither engagement nor isolation has converted the generals
into upstanding citizens. In a report last February, the U.S. State
Department declared that "the government's extremely poor human-rights
record worsened" during 2004 with "numerous serious abuses," including
forced labor, executions, and the torture and rape of prisoners and
political opponents. Nearly 700,000 refugees are currently living in
Thailand, Malaysia, Bangladesh and India, having escaped from Burma.

The junta is a hazard to more than just its own people. The U.S.
government claims that Burma is the second-largest producer of illegal
opium in the world (after Afghanistan), and that it's Asia's primary
supplier of methamphetamines. The drug problem is so severe in the border
areas around Ruili that, says mayor Gong, Chinese officials employ some
1,000 people to round up addicts and force them into rehabilitation
"farms." Human trafficking of Burmese is rampant, with young women forced
into prostitution in Thailand and elsewhere. Fueled by this booming trade
in drugs and sex, Burma "may be the greatest contributor to new types of
HIV in the world," according to a study by New York's Council on Foreign
Relations. The report noted that all but one of the AIDS outbreaks in a
massive area spanning from Kazakhstan to southern Vietnam can be traced
back to Burma.

His name card reads "Min Thein Kha, Seer of Myanmar." Hundreds of Burmese
arrive daily to seek advice at his sprawling Buddhist commune, an hour's
drive from Rangoon. Min Thein Kha, a 67-year-old chain smoker, claims his
powers can soothe quarrelsome households, lure back wayward husbands, and
compel thieves to return stolen property. Best of all, he professes that
he can alleviate poverty. "Most people come here with financial problems,"
he says. "These days those problems are very bad." How does he solve them?
"I do some chanting and make miracle remedies."

Today, Min Thein Kha is unwell, and politely declines to predict his
country's future. He doesn't need to. Burma's woes are obvious and it will
require more than chanting to address them. While the junta has benefited
from the economic support provided by its neighbors, it has done almost
nothing for the welfare of Burma's roughly 50 million people. Per capita
income is just $225, among the lowest in Asia, estimates the U.S. State
Department. The future doesn't look any brighter. Though the junta claims
that GDP in Burma's last fiscal year grew an astounding 12.6%—outpacing
even China and India—economists consider such official statistics pure
fiction. The Economist Intelligence Unit estimates that GDP shrank by 2.7%
in 2004 and grew a mere 1.5% in 2005. The generals, though, live in
luxury. Early in 2005, a police raid on the property of former Agriculture
Minister Nyunt Tin, who was arrested on corruption charges, allegedly
turned up a rich stash of gold, cash and jewelry.

A stroll across the Chinese border into northern Burma shows just how
little the Burmese benefit from the trade between the two countries. While
Gong's Ruili is a modern metropolis of wide streets, incessant
construction and per capita income five times higher than the surrounding
district, the Burmese town of Muse directly across the border is mostly a
jumble of huts made of bamboo, thatch and tin sheets. City buses are so
old that rain pours through the roofs. The main market, with stalls
hawking almost entirely Chinese-made goods, is nearly empty. Packs of
beggars hassle Chinese tour groups for spare coins. The only concrete
houses are two-floor villas said to be owned by Chinese gem merchants.
"The trade is not good for the Burmese people; it's good for the
government," complains Aung Kyaw Zaw, a former antigovernment rebel living
in China. "China sends so much to Burma, but the community gets poorer."

And more desperate. While the country was once so productive that it was
known as the region's rice bowl, today one-third of Burmese children are
chronically malnourished or physically stunted, according to World Food
Programme chief James Morris, who toured the country last August. "The
humanitarian issues are serious and getting worse," he warned the Burmese
government. Unable to find work in their chosen fields, physics graduates
drive taxis, and doctors hustle real estate. Prostitution is one of the
few businesses that are obviously thriving. Downtown touts who pester
Western tourists to change money or hire cars now offer additional
services: "Massage? Lady?"

Many Burmese get into odd get-rich-quick schemes. Rangoon boasts an
extensive network of underground lotteries, with one of the most popular
based on the last two digits of Bangkok's main stock market index. A
winning $1 bet can rake in $80—equal to four months' salary for an average
government employee. The capital is littered with unfinished hotels and
tower blocks, many abandoned after Asia's 1997 economic crash. At scenic
Kandawgyi Lake, the tennis courts at an uninhabited apartment complex have
been reclaimed by the jungle, while the enterprising caretaker supplements
his meager income by raising bananas in the forecourt. The government
apparently does little for the poor. The International Crisis Group says
that in 2004 the junta spent a total of only $22,000 to help AIDS victims.
Says a Burmese economist: "If you don't care about your people, then
sanctions are not an issue."

The junta blames U.S. sanctions for the country's financial hardships.
When the U.S. banned all imports from Burma in 2003, the country lost one
of its biggest trading partners, which bought some $350 million in
Burmese-made goods annually. Textile companies were hit especially hard,
and the U.S. government estimates that 40,000 Burmese textile workers
quickly lost their jobs. Burma's democracy movement insists that the
populace stands behind sanctions, but it's hard to find much support among
ordinary Burmese. "We want pressure from the international community, but
we don't want sanctions," says a Rangoon-based Burmese journalist. "Our
people are very, very poor."

However, the junta's own inept and unpredictable economic policies inflict
far more damage than sanctions cause. For example, the prices of essential
services suddenly surge when the government decides it needs cash. Last
August, fees for water service rose eightfold after the government reduced
subsidies; in September, the cost of a ride on Rangoon's antiquated buses
jumped from 20 kyat to 50 kyat in a week. One measure of the country's
economic dysfunctionality is that while the kyat's official exchange rate
is about six to a dollar, the black market values the dollar at 1,160
kyat. When the generals want to halt the currency's decline, they detain
illegal—but usually tolerated—money changers operating out of shops and
markets. The banking sector still barely functions three years after it
suffered a collapse in public confidence and a run on deposits due to
feeble government oversight. All of this economic chaos keeps survival,
not politics, uppermost in most Burmese minds. "We're not thinking about
Aung San Suu Kyi or General Than Shwe," says one Burmese trader. "We're
thinking about food, clothes and housing."

Back in his New York office, Thaung Htun sees a glimmer of hope. The
junta, he believes, is causing Asia enough harm and embarrassment that the
region's governments are coming to see a reformed Burma as a necessity.
"There is a policy shift in the region," he says. "If Burma is a failed
state, it will create problems for its neighbors."

Some of Burma's friends do seem to be turning against the generals, even
within clubby ASEAN. Members usually don't publicly criticize the junta,
citing a policy of avoiding interference in others' internal affairs. But
late last year, that stance changed dramatically. At a December summit,
ASEAN's leaders issued a formal call for Burma to "expedite" democratic
reform and release political prisoners. Though her name wasn't used, ASEAN
was clearly referring to Suu Kyi. The association discussed the "need [for
Burma] to be more responsive to the wishes of the international
community," said Malaysia's Foreign Minister, Syed Hamid Albar. The
statements followed a tussle over ASEAN's 2006 chairmanship. Burma was
scheduled to claim the post, but, faced with the prospect of a pariah
state heading their organization, some ASEAN members, especially
Singapore, pressed Burma to stand aside. Folding under the pressure, the
junta decided to forgo the chairmanship because, an ASEAN statement said,
it wants "to focus its attention on the ongoing national reconciliation
and democratization process." The Bush Administration is also campaigning
for the U.N. Security Council to take action on Burma, which led in
December to the Council's first-ever briefing on the country.

Meanwhile, many foreign investors have also come to the conclusion that
Burma's generals make miserable business partners. Citing everything from
currency controls and irrational regulations to power shortages and bad
roads, 40% of the South Korean textile firms that set up operations in the
country have left in the past three years, and about a quarter of all
Japanese companies have pulled out since the late 1990s. "The low cost of
labor doesn't make up for the high cost of staying," says Koji Ida, a
Burma expert at the Japan External Trade Organization in Tokyo. The
ethical taint of any association with Burma has chased others away.
Lingerie maker Triumph closed its factory in Burma in 2002 after a U.K.
human-rights group launched a campaign under the slogan SUPPORT BREASTS,
NOT DICTATORS with posters showing models wearing barbed-wire bras.
American oil giant Unocal has received perhaps the worst bloody nose. In
March last year, the company settled lawsuits by paying compensation to
Burmese citizens who claimed they suffered abuses by Burma's
military—including rape and forced labor—during the construction of a gas
pipeline in which Unocal invested $340 million in 1993 (before sanctions
were imposed). Unocal, recently acquired by Chevron, has never admitted to
any crime, and Chevron says it's continuing to evaluate Unocal's assets
but has yet to make any decision about the pipeline. Says Katie Redford,
co-founder of EarthRights International, the Washington-based activist
group that launched one of the suits: "Business is never going to be the
same."

Burmese such as Ye Winn are hoping that's true. The 59-year-old trader set
up shop in Ruili's Jiegao economic zone eight years ago to export
Chinese-made engines into Burma. Early on, business was brisk, but sales
have since fallen by 40%, and are still declining. His Burmese customers
are becoming so poor, he says, that they can't even afford cheap Chinese
goods anymore. The erratic Burmese government has slapped so many new
restrictions on small traders like him that many have been forced to
become smugglers, who slip motorcycle convoys laden with computer parts
and Hollywood DVDs through the jungle between border posts. But Ye Winn
says he's scared of getting into trouble, so he just sits in a sweltering
storefront, smokes, and wonders what he can do to make money. "We are all
hoping and waiting for the Burmese government to change," he says.
"Without reform, things are only going to get worse." That's a fate that
Burma's downtrodden people—and the rest of Asia—can ill afford.

With reporting by Aravind Adiga/New Delhi, Robert Horn/Bangkok, Kim
Yooseung/Seoul, Jake Lloyd-Smith/Singapore, Andrew Marshall/Rangoon, Toko
Sekiguchi/Tokyo and Jodi Xu/Beijing

____________________________________
OPINION / OTHER

January 22, Time Asia
Sanctions are the most effective weapon against Burma's military regime -
Mitch Mcconnell

I have never met Nobel laureate and Burmese democracy leader Aung San Suu
Kyi, but I hope one day I will. Suu Kyi's picture hangs prominently in my
Capitol Hill office, reminding me daily of her plight—and her strength.

Courageous and tenacious, Suu Kyi is the symbol of the nonviolent struggle
for freedom and justice in Burma. As head of the National League for
Democracy (NLD), she and other Burmese patriots have dedicated their lives
to reform in one of the world's most repressive countries, currently
misruled by an illegitimate military regime calling itself the State Peace
and Development Council (SPDC).

Burma today is synonymous with state-sponsored killings, torture and rape.
The horrors committed by the SPDC against the people of Burma are known to
the entire world—and are spilling over into neighboring countries. In
India, Thailand, China and elsewhere, illicit drugs grown and manufactured
in Burma wreak havoc. An unchecked HIV/AIDS pandemic follows drug routes
emanating from Burma. As many as 700,000 refugees have crossed Burma's
borders in recent years seeking safe haven from SPDC atrocities. And
inside Burma, the growing phenomenon of internal displacement evidences a
people who live in fear and are ruled by force. Burma's problems are
Asia's problems, and Asia's problems are the world's.

As befits a superpower rooted in democratic traditions, America has
imposed severe economic sanctions against the SPDC. They include banning
imported goods from Burma, limiting investments there, forbidding arms
sales, and restricting visas for members of the SPDC and junta-affiliated
organs. The European Union takes a similar approach, albeit to a lesser
degree.

Proponents of engagement with Burma, who wrongly believe the SPDC can be
swayed to undertake political and economic reforms through dialogue alone,
claim that the people hurt by sanctions are the very ones we are trying to
help. But sanctions don't pull the trigger of a gun or indiscriminately
rape ethnic-minority women and girls. Proponents of engagement say that
sanctions don't work, and that they offer no incentives for Burmese
generals to change their hard-line positions. They could not be more
wrong. The efforts of Thailand and Japan over the years to reform Burma
through engagement have yielded no results. Further, with the sacking and
imprisonment of SPDC Prime Minister Khin Nyunt last year, Bangkok and
Tokyo have lost their primary interlocutor in the Burmese government.

Sanctions worked in South Africa, and they will in Burma too. They strike
at the junta's lifeblood, namely its monopoly on all investments and total
dominance of Burma's licit and illicit economies. Sanctions are a
tremendous loss of face for the SPDC, a scarlet letter, particularly in
the international arena. More important, sanctions empower those in Burma
on the front lines of this struggle. The fact that the legitimately
elected leaders in Burma support sanctions should be enough for democratic
nations to impose them.

Until recently, Burma was a low priority for most foreign governments. Now
it is all the more important that democratic nations consistently
challenge the SPDC's tyranny at every opportunity in the international
arena. The SPDC's forfeiture of its chairmanship of the Association of
Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in 2006 indicates not only that asean is
finally embarrassed by its most odious member, but that the generals in
Rangoon do indeed respond to outside pressure. We must keep this pressure
up. The renewal of sanctions against the junta last summer by overwhelming
votes in the U.S. Congress underscores Washington's commitment to
democracy in Burma. And efforts by members of the U.N. Security Council to
discuss Burma have already met with some success, giving the junta the
scrutiny it has long deserved. Dialogue without pressure leads nowhere.

The cause of and solution to Burma's problems are political. Through
sanctions and unwavering support for the forces of freedom in Burma,
democratic nations must secure the immediate and unconditional release of
Suu Kyi and all prisoners of conscience, the first necessary step toward a
credible process of national reconciliation. The NLD and Burma's ethnic
minorities must have a seat at the negotiating table, and the phony
efforts by the SPDC to hold a sham constitutional convention must be
roundly denounced. Only then will freedom come to Burma.

The triumph over evil in Burma will take time. But the Lady can count on
my support for as long as it takes.

Senator Mitch McConnell is the second-ranking Republican in the U.S.
Senate, and chairman of the State, Foreign Operations and Related Programs
Appropriations Subcommittee

____________________________________

January 23, Shan Herald Agency for News
Dams, diseases, and displacement - Withaya Huanok, MPH, MD

The potential public health costs of the Salween Dams

It has often been said that public health can be a thankless line of work:
where it is successful, it is largely invisible and ignored.  The
corollary is that, where systems fail, the results often are catastrophic
and incur monumental costs, both to deal with the problem and in its toll
on lives.  Unfortunately, largely as a result of this circumstance, public
health considerations seldom form part of decision-making in public works
projects, often with disastrous consequences.

Many examples of such man-made disasters exist.  One of the most extreme
is the Aswan High Dam in Egypt, where changes in water flow and irrigation
from dam construction resulted in favorable breeding conditions for snails
and subsequently increased rates of schistosomiasis, a parasitic disease
of which the snail is an intermediate host.  To add further, mass
treatment campaigns for schistosomiasis often entailed re-using syringes,
fueling a spread of hepatitis C; today, Egypt has the highest infection
rates of this disease in the world.  Its effects are heavily felt today,
as individuals continue to sicken and die from its long-term consequences:
liver failure, cirrhosis, and liver cancer.  While the case of
schistosomiasis and the Aswan High Dam is one of the most dramatic, other
examples abound.  In many areas, changes in water flow due to the
construction of dams in malaria-endemic areas resulted in subsequent
changes in vector biology, such as predominance of more competent mosquito
vector species.  This, coupled with migration, has resulted in increases
in malaria transmission and/or type, such as shifts from vivax malaria to
the far deadlier falciparum malaria.  Similarly, dams and resultant
flooding in some cases have resulted in increases in Wuchereria bancrofti
infection, a parasite causing lymphatic filariasis (elephantiasis).  This
also has largely been due to the creation of favorable breeding conditions
for appropriate mosquito vectors.

These are but two sentinel diseases that are highly relevant to Thailand
today, although they are certainly not common in this country, yet. 
Thailand has renewed its interest in investing in a series of
hydroelectric dams on the Salween River in Burma, particularly with the
rising costs of fossil fuels.  The proposed sites are close to the border
with Thailand and, in some cases, less than a hundred fifty kilometers
away from Thailand’s second-largest city, Chiang Mai.  These sites are in
war-torn areas which have witnessed widespread human rights abuses
directed by the Burmese military largely against ethnic minority
civilians, driving hundreds of thousands to seek refuge in Thailand, often
as undocumented migrant workers.  Human rights and environmental concerns
have already been raised with regard to these projects, objections which
have largely gone unheeded.  Ongoing negotiations and agreements, the most
recent of which was signed December 9th for the Hutgyi Dam, in Burma’s
Karen State, lack transparency and thus critical, independent evaluation,
particularly with the increasingly autocratic nature of both countries’
governments.  Thailand’s Energy Minister continued to justify the mutual
benefit to both countries, saying these dams will “reduce reliance
 on
expensive fossil fuels and provide a much cheaper source of energy.”  The
implication is that, since importation of fossil fuels from abroad is one
of Thailand’s largest sources of capital outflow, these dams will save
Thailand money.

This view is myopic, seeing the proverbial trees but failing to see the
forest.  Polar differences in public health conditions between Burma and
Thailand exist.  Burma’s infant, child, and maternal mortality rates
amongst internally displaced persons is several times higher than that of
Thailand, resembling corresponding figures from other humanitarian
disasters, such as Sierra Leone, Niger, and Liberia.  Much of this is due
to the high prevalence still of infections such as malaria, lymphatic
filariasis, typhoid, cholera, tuberculosis, and, increasingly, AIDS.  The
WHO ranks Burma’s health system second worst in the world, only slightly
outperforming Sierra Leone.  This, coupled with ongoing migration that
likely will worsen with militarization of these areas preparatory to dam
construction, can result in disastrous public health consequences. 
Already, this has been seen near another Thailand-Burma mega-project, the
Yadana Pipeline, where ecologic changes and high levels of migration may
have contributed to severe malaria outbreaks this year in southern
Thailand.  Similarly, worsening human rights conditions in Shan State near
Mae Hong Son and resulting migrations have fueled a large malaria outbreak
this year in this Thai border province.  And, for the first time in
decades, lymphatic filariasis was seen again in urban Chiang Mai, where
competent vectors still exist.  The patients were migrants from Mongnai,
Shan State, an area near the proposed Tasang Dam on the Salween River. 
Thailand’s cornerstone for monitoring and treating infectious diseases in
migrants remains the worker registration process.  However, with an
estimated less than half of migrants in Thailand legally registered, such
reliance is foolhardy.  These epidemics should serve as early warnings
about cracks in the current Thai public health system as well as to the
potential dire health consequences of the Salween dam mega-projects,
consequences that do not respect limitations of borders.  The costs of
controlling such problems should the dams proceed may very well outweigh
potential savings from cheaper electricity, particularly tragic as
Thailand has sufficient domestic production sources, rendering the Salween
Dams superfluous.

Disease prevention should be a consideration prior to planning of any
project that may cause perturbations in the environment or may fuel
demographic changes.  The cost of preventing infectious diseases is much
lower than that of controlling them once they have been loosened upon a
population, and further research into these potential problems may yield
higher returns than the very projects themselves.