BurmaNet News, April 28, 2006

[Editor]

April 28, 2006 Issue # 2951

INSIDE BURMA
AFP: Myanmar steps up attacks on minority villages: rights groups
AP: Myanmar troops pursuing 2,000 ethnic Karen villagers hiding out in
jungles
DVB: Another NLD leader forced to resign by pressures from Burma junta
Reuters: Suu Kyi's party rebuffs Myanmar junta threat
Khonumthung: People despair over rumours of farm confiscation

ON THE BORDER
Irrawaddy: Migrant workers’ “human rights threat”

BUSINESS / TRADE
Irrawaddy: Fatter pay packets further boost inflation in Burma
Asia Pulse: Indian state eyes border trade with China, Myanmar, Bhutan
Narinjara: Burmese kyat falls compared to Bangladesh taka

REGIONAL
Japan Economic Newswire: Philippines to push Myanmar on reform

INTERNATIONAL
Irrawaddy: Burma’s slide “Horrific”—senior US official

ANNOUNCEMENT
Deserted Fields: now available in Burmese and Thai

____________________________________
INSIDE BURMA

April 28, Agence France Presse
Myanmar steps up attacks on minority villages: rights groups

Hundreds of villagers are fleeing to the jungles of eastern Myanmar as the
military intensifies its bloody crackdown on ethnic minorities, rights
groups said Friday.

Karen people sought refuge in the jungle after the military burnt down
their homes and crops as part of its decades-long offensive, the New
York-based Human Rights Watch said.

"We think women and children have also been killed," said the group's
Myanmar consultant Sunai Phasuk.

The Karen National Union (KNU) has been battling Yangon in one of the
world's longest-running insurgencies, and claims to have 10,000 resistance
fighters. Myanmar's junta has reached ceasefires with 17 ethnic armed
groups.

Sunai said the military had stepped up its attacks during the dry season
because it was easier and quicker to move troops around the country. The
wet season starts in June.

He said reports from Myanmar indicated that Karen villagers were being
uprooted and targeted for human rights abuses even if they had no
connection to the resistance.

"They are targeting the ethnic resistance groups and ethnic minorities
living in the villages. The Burmese military has no differentiation
between the two," he said.

Myanmar, formally known as Burma, has been widely condemned for its human
rights abuses.

While many Karen were sheltering in the jungles, others were fleeing to
refugee camps on the Thai border, he said.

Jack Dunford, executive director of the aid agency Thailand Burma Border
Consortium, this week confirmed the influx, saying the refugees from Karen
areas had arrived with "stories of increased troop activity, widespread
destruction of villages and crops, and human rights abuses."

Similar concerns have been reported by the Free Burma Rangers, who said up
to 11,000 people have been displaced since November. The volunteer group,
which supports the Karen, said the crackdown included torture and
killings.

The KNU has attributed the military's increased action to attempts to
secure areas around the new capital Pyinmana, which is near a brigade of
Karen guerrilla fighters.

Myanmar surprised the world in November by shifting its capital 320
kilometres (200 miles) north of Yangon.

The military-run government has denied human rights abuses against ethnic
minorities, including the Karen, which it blames for recent bombings.

More than 140,000 refugees live in nine refugee camps on the Thai side of
the border, set up since Myanmar troops overran most traditional ethnic
minority lands in the country's eastern mountainous region in the 1980s.

____________________________________

April 28, Associated Press
Myanmar troops pursuing 2,000 ethnic Karen villagers hiding out in jungles

Myanmar troops are hunting down some 2,000 civilians hiding out in the
jungle after being driven from their homes in a brutal offensive against
the Karen ethnic minority, reports from inside Myanmar said Friday.

The troops were some four hours walk from the fleeing refugees who had
split up into groups of 300 to 400 each, said a member of the Free Burma
Rangers contacted by satellite telephone as he moved with one of the
groups.

The Rangers, who include Western and ethnic volunteers, provide aid to
some of the estimated one million people displaced in Myanmar by decades
of conflict between the military regime and ethnic minorities seeking
autonomy.

Recent reports from the Rangers say the offensive, the biggest since 1997,
has already uprooted more than 11,000 Karen civilians in a campaign marked
by the torching of villages, destruction of food stocks, killings and
torture. The ruling junta denies any human rights violations, saying it's
taking military action against a terrorist group it holds responsible for
a series of bomb attacks in recent months.

The fleeing civilians, pelted by rain storms, were hiding out in remote
areas of the Karen State's Mon Township, about a nine-day walk from the
Thai border to which some 1,500 other displaced people have already fled,
said the volunteer who demanded anonymity because of the sensitive
cross-border operation.

Karen families were carrying whatever few essential possessions they could
gather up before abandoning their villages. One 60-year-old women hauled a
pack weighing about 60 pounds (27 kilos) and stuffed with a cooking pot,
some plastic sheets, soap, rice, a torn blanket and utensils. Other women
also were loaded down with nursing children strapped to their chests, he
said.

Only a trickle of aid from the Rangers and other nongovernment
organizations based in Thailand has reached the 11,000 displaced including
some medicine for the increasing number of people suffering from malaria
and other diseases.

The Myanmar army campaign has been condemned by U.S. lawmakers, British
human rights advocates and others, with some calling on the U.N. Security
Council to take urgent action against the country's ruling junta.

"The longer the Security Council waits, the more villages will be
destroyed and more people will die," said Tom Lantos, the top Democrat on
the U.S. House International Relations Committee, in a statement earlier
this week.

"It has been clear for many years that the Karen people are facing
genocide and experiencing crimes against humanity and war crimes. This
latest evidence adds further weight to these charges," said Lord David
Alton, a member of the British House of Lords active in humanitarian
issues.

The Karen National Union, the main Karen guerrilla organization, says the
offensive, which began last November and recently intensified, may be
aimed at securing the hinterland east of the country's newly established
capital of Pyinmana.

Myanmar's military regimes, which first came to power in 1962, waged war
against numerous ethnic insurgent groups seeking autonomy until a former
junta member, Gen. Khin Nyunt, negotiated cease-fires with 17 of them.

But his ouster in 2004 reinforced hard-liners within the ruling junta and
"resulted in increasing hostility directed at ethnic minority groups,"
U.S.-based Human Rights Watch said in its 2006 report.

The KNU are the largest of the rebel groups still facing off against the
regime's 500,000-strong military.

The violence of recent years has spawned not only the internal refugees
but an exodus to neighboring countries. More than 140,000 Karen and other
ethnic minority people live in refugee camps inside Thailand.

____________________________________

April 28, Democratic Voice of Burma
Another NLD leader forced to resign by pressures from Burma junta

Due to intensive pressures from the local authorities of Burma’s military
junta, the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), another aged
National League for Democracy (NLD) leader, the honorary chairman of
Mandalay Division, San Hla Baw quit the party on 27 April.

According to Mandalay Division NLD organising member Win Mya Mya, San Hla
Baw and his wife were fetched from their home in Patheingyi Township in
Mandalay by authority members and taken to their office to sign their
resignation.

“There was a meeting between Northeast Township and NLD Division
organising committee members today. At ten past ten this morning,
Patheingyi Township NLD secretary U Zaw Hein reported to us at the
divisional office. As he said that a grey car came to fetch grandpa U San
Hla Baw, - divisional chairman Bo Zan, Myingyan Township elected
representative Paw Khin and me went to Col San Hla Baw’s home. At around
11am, the grey Toyota Corola I mentioned before returned and it must be
(belong to?) a high-ranking military official. Two men and Col San Hla Baw
and his wife alighted from the car. There, we entered the house and met
with Col San Hla Baw. His wife told us that they went to the (pro-junta)
Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA) office and the
(Election) Commission office which were full of people up to the position
of minister. We had to quit (the party). We had to sign a letter saying
that we quit, (she said). When I asked Col San Hla Baw, he said that it
was true. He had to sign a letter saying he quit/resigned. When asked why
he did so, he said he has to move to Moulmein. But that excuse is not very
strong.”

When asked how she feels about the forced resignations of NLD members and
leaders through pressures, Win Mya Mya replied:

“He faithfully fulfilled his duties given by the NLD HQs. I believe that
Mandalay Division NLD is being routed out properly for following the NLD
policies to the letter. The reason is, vice-chairman U Saw Htay had to
quit the other day. Now, it is Col. San Hla Baw. The other day, Myingyan
elected representative U Maung Maung Win was offered a loan of 100,000,000
Kyats (Approx. US$ 70,000) without interest and time limit to start a
business. We know that U Maung Maung Win refused to quit the party. We
don’t know about those who quit. We only know that they quit. It is sure
that they are trying to weaken the NLD and greatly pressurising the NLD
elected representatives to quit. If you look at what is happening closely
and pragmatically, it is certain. Therefore, I am feeling saddened by it.”

Col San Hla baw was the chairman of Mandalay Division NLD up to 2000 when
he retired for health reasons but the NLD HQs conferred upon him the
position of honorary chairman of Mandalay Division NLD.

____________________________________

April 28, Reuters
Suu Kyi's party rebuffs Myanmar junta threat

Myanmar democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy
rejected on Friday a threat by the military government to ban the party
for alleged illegal activities.

"They cannot dissolve the party without sound evidence," NLD secretary U
Lwin said in rejecting the charges levelled on Wednesday by Information
Minister Brigadier General Kyaw Hsan.

Kyaw Hsan said the NLD "has connections with expatriate groups, terrorists
and destructive groups" which had attacked the former Burma, under
military rule since 1962.

"The government has firm evidence to declare the NLD unlawful," he told
reporters during a drug-burning ceremony in Southern Shan State.

"But the government, assessing the situation from all view points and
exercising tolerance and patience and farsightedness, still permits the
NLD to stand as a legal political party."

The NLD won a landslide election victory in 1990 only to be denied power
by the army. Its offices outside Yangon have been shut since a government
crackdown in May 2003 when Suu Kyi, 60, was detained.

Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace laureate who has spent about 10 of the past 15
years in some form of detention, remains under house arrest at her Yangon
home, her telephone cut off and visitors restricted.

"If the NLD was dissolved, it would be an insult to the entire people,"
said Pu Chin Sian Thang, spokesman of the Committee Representing People's
Parliament (CRPP), a loose opposition alliance.
____________________________________

April 28, Khonumthung News
People despair over rumours of farm confiscation

A pall of gloom and despair has descended on people in southern Chin
state, Burma following rumours that the junta was gearing up to confiscate
250 acres of paddy fields for conversion into a tea plantation.

Reports suggest that Colonel San Aung, Commander, Tactical II, mentioned
confiscating land in Phaneng village during a visit in March. The Colonel
made the announcement when he promised to establish a middle school and
auto–telephone line in Phaneng village.

A villager from Phaneng told Khonumthung, "There will be scarcity of food
if the paddy fields are confiscated. We may have to migrate to other
places."

San Aung has been quoted as saying that the farmlands are around three
miles from Matupi town and the authorities can manage tea plantation on
this land.

Locals between Phaneng village and Matupi town call the farms targeted for
confiscation – ‘Ti Tlok Kol.’ The area produces around 3,000 quintals of
rice annually.

The locals rely on Ti Tlok Kol as the main producer of rice while jhoom
cultivation is irregular.

A migrant from Matupi town, when interviewed, opined that the authorities
discourage jhooming, as it degrades the environment. Tea and Jatropha
plantation has therefore been forcibly introduced. The confiscation of
paddy fields is meaningless and the authorities want the local people to
migrate to other places.

Another report says that the regime authorities will prohibit plantation
in the paddy fields and jhoom cultivation Confiscation of land and
plantation of tea is to be initiated in the coming year. The authorities
wish to engage the people fully in tea plantation rather than allow them
other occupation, according to our source.

The authorities in Matupi Township had confiscated jhoom land and
residential areas for tea plantation in 2004. No report has been received
of the success of tea plantation in the confiscated jhoom land and
residential areas.

____________________________________
ON THE BORDER

April 28, Irrawaddy
Migrant workers’ “human rights threat” - Sai Silp

Thai government attempts to make employers more accountable for their
immigrant workers, notably from Burma, is forcing labor underground and
may jeopardize their human rights, a conference of NGOs in Bangkok heard
Friday.

The conference, organized by the Office of the National Human Rights
Commission of Thailand (NHRCT), heard that only around 152,000 workers
from Burma, Laos and Cambodia had been registered this year, compared with
1.2 million last year. This is because employers had shied away from the
risk of paying higher registration and deposit fees.

The conference agreed to petition the Bangkok government to revise its
policies on migrant labor registration in favor of workers rather than
employers and state administrators.

Sunee Chairot, from NHRCT, told The Irrawaddy that many immigrant workers,
the bulk of them from Burma, had gone underground working illegally as a
result anticipated government migrant worker policy changes.

The government resolved at end of last year to make employers pay an
additional deposit of between 10,000 ($250) and 50,000 baht ($1,250) for
each worker, but abandoned this after numerous protests. For the present,
employers still have to register their foreign workers but pay only the
old permit fee of 3,800 baht (approximately US $100) for each worker.
However, many employers feared that the government would introduce higher
fees and so in effect were “hiding” their workers, NGOs said.

Pranom Somwong from the Migrant Assistance Program (MAP) said there was a
risk of higher deposit fees encouraging employers to in effect imprison
their registered workers to ensure they did not leave and trigger a
deposit forfeit. “The deposit money policy could be a cause of forced
labour because the employer may be scared that their workers will leave,”
Pranom said.

Only 152,000 migrant workers have been registered with the Department of
Employment this year: 114,551 are Burmese, 16,888 from Laos and 20,580
Cambodians. Last year the total was about 1.2 million.

____________________________________
BUSINESS / TRADE

April 28, Irrawaddy
Fatter pay packets further boost inflation in Burma - Yeni

About one million government-employed workers—from junta chief Snr-Gen
Than Shwe right down to the country’s road sweepers—received up to 1,000
percent increases in their pay packets today, sparking fears of a new
boost to Burma’s inflationary spiral.

When the much-anticipated salary increases of between 500 and 1,000
percent were announced in late March commodity prices leapt upwards, and
the kyat fell to another all-time low of 1,450 to the US dollar. Although
the private sector seemed to panic as the higher salaries were being paid,
analysts believe the real effects of the move will not be felt for two to
three months when the extra money has filtered through Burma’s economy.

The government, meanwhile, has warned the private sector not to profiteer
from the situation. The state-controlled New Light of Myanmar accused gold
traders of “greed” and accused them of responsibility for high gold prices
which reached 450,000 kyat (US $310) a tical (0.525 troy ounces) on the
day the revised salaries were paid. Shopkeepers were warned that
unjustified price rises could lead to their licenses being withdrawn, The
Myanmar Times reported.

In the month since the salary increases were announced the prices of such
commodities as rice, cooking oil and other foodstuffs have increased 10-20
percent.

Traders along Burma’s borders say business has dropped considerably since
the salary hikes were first announced.

Burmese economists believe the government would need about 100 billion
kyat ($71,500,000) to implement the wage hike. “It definitely exacerbates
the country’s already high inflation,” Sein Htay, Bangkok-based Burmese
economist, told The Irrawaddy.

According to the latest report of the Manila-based Asian Development Bank,
the government’s eightfold increase in fuel prices last month and a 68
percent rise in tax revenues has prompted higher prices for basic
commodities.

Said Sein Htay: “Burmese generals always say Burma’s economy is based on a
free market system. But the reality is that Burma runs a command economy.”

____________________________________

April 28, Asia Pulse
Indian state eyes border trade with China, Myanmar, Bhutan

Low volume border trade with China, Myanmar and Bhutan could be revived
through Arunachal Pradesh if necessary clearance was obtained from the
government and the three countries, Trade and Commerce Director of the
state Tokong Pertin said on Thursday. On starting large scale trade with
these countries, he said, "besides clearance from these countries, it
requires development of infrastructure in which our side is lagging".

* After a five-day visit by a high-level team, Pertin said Khathing had
assured the local people that he would study the memorandum which he had
received from them on the reopening of border trade and recommend it to
the government.

* "Initially it is feasible to revive the trading huts which were
functioning at Mechuka and Monigong where people from both the sides of
the international border were engaged in barter trade prior to 1962 war,"
Pertin said.

SUMMARY

Indian border trade with China, Myanmar, Bhutan could be revived via
Arunachal Pradesh if clearances obtained

____________________________________

April 28, Narinjara News
Burmese kyat falls compared to Bangladesh taka

The value of the Burmese currency fell on the Burma-Bangladesh border
after the Burmese authorities increased its servants' salaries this month,
said a currency dealer from a border town in Bangladesh.

Currently, a Bangladesh taka is equivalent to 19.5 Burmese kyats in the
border area, but the value of the taka was equivalent to 16.5 kyats two
weeks ago.

According to sources, it is first time this year that the value of the
Burmese currency decreased like this.

Since the value of the Burmese currency fell, many kinds of Burmese goods
have entered into Bangladesh, both legally and illegally, through border
points along Naff River.

A trader from Teknaf said that Burmese goods, whichever they are, are sold
to make a profit in Bangladesh because the value of the Burmese currency
fells as compared to the Bangladesh currency.

Many traders from Arakan State are bringing a number of Burmese goods to
Bangladesh hoping for good profits.

The goods that are entering Bangladesh include timber, bamboo, longji,
slippers, women's utensils, rice, salt, plum, preserved fruit (Zitawfi),
baby toys, Burmese-made sculptures, alcohol and whiskey, fish and shrimp.

____________________________________
REGIONAL

April 28, Japan Economic Newswire
Philippines to push Myanmar on reform

Philippine Foreign Secretary Alberto Romulo said Friday he may visit
Myanmar in June to discuss democratic reform in the military-ruled
country.

"I was invited by the foreign minister of Myanmar, so I will go, probably
in June," he told reporters on the sidelines of a Malaysia-Philippines
joint commission meeting.

The visit is scheduled as Philippines is to host the leaders of the
10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations in December.

ASEAN, which used to hold sacred its doctrine of noninterference and
"constructive engagement," has recently broken tradition with a rare
display of criticism against Myanmar, a member since 1997.

The group has voiced frustration over the snail-pace reforms promised by
Myanmar's ruling generals and the continued detention of opposition leader
Aung San Suu Kyi.

Growing pressure from ASEAN and the international community forced Myanmar
to give up its turn to host the ASEAN leaders' summit this year and passed
it on to the Philippines.

The ASEAN chair rotates according to alphabetical order among its member
countries.

But aside from giving up the chairmanship, it has been "business-as-usual"
in Myanmar and that led ASEAN to dispatch Malaysian Foreign Minister Syed
Hamid Albar as its envoy to Yangon to gauge progress of reforms.

His two-day trip in March, however, was deemed a failure because Syed
Hamid was barred from meeting both Suu Kyi and junta leader Than Shwe.

Romulo was noncommittal about his chances for success, but he said he has
asked to meet both leaders and would raise the issues of democratic
reforms and the release of political prisoners with the junta.

"We will not hesitate to remind them," he said.

ASEAN groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the
Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

____________________________________
INTERNATIONAL

April 28, Irrawaddy
Burma’s slide “horrific”—senior US official - Clive Parker

Eric John, US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia and the
Pacific has talked of the “horrific descent of the situation in Burma,” in
an interview with The Irrawaddy on Friday.

John pointed to Burma’s reportedly worsening HIV/AIDS pandemic, the recent
outbreak of bird flu in the country and a “misguided, armed leadership” as
the main examples of the slide. He repeated that Burma presents a danger
both to itself as well as the region, and should therefore be referred to
the UN Security Council.

“Nothing is getting better, things are only getting worse,” he said in the
interview at The Irrawaddy’s office in Chiang Mai, Thailand.

He was positive about Asean’s recent increased concern about Burma’s
continuing political deadlock and failure to move towards democracy. John
described this as “unique in Asean’s history.”

 John said that the onus remained on the region to keep the pressure on
Burma, but also warned that Washington would continue to push the Burma
issue at the UNSC. The US has led the effort to address Burma at the
UNSC, which culminated in an informal briefing on the situation to
members in December.

The senior state department official refuted claims by Burma’s Information
Minister Brig-Gen Kyaw Hsan on Wednesday that detained opposition leader
Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy is linked to terrorists.

“The NLD is not a terrorist group
it is just a group that wants to help
give a voice to the Burmese people,” he added.

On the new Burmese administrative capital, Pyinmana, John was emphatic
that the US would not relocate its embassy to what he called an
“illegitimate capital,” describing the move as a “sad ego project.”

There was, however, bad news for the many Burmese both inside and outside
the country waiting for the US to do to Burma what it did to Iraq under
the former dictator Saddam Hussein in 2003.

“We’re not going to attack Burma,” John said, which was good news for the
ruling Burmese generals rumored to be fear such an invasion.

____________________________________
ANNOUNCEMENT

Deserted Fields: The destruction of agriculture in Mong Nai township, Shan
State, a 22-page report published by Shan Relief and Development Committee
on 17 January is now available in Burmese and Thai. The Shan version is
expected soon, according to the authors.

Anyone interested can contact email: srdc97 at yahoo.com