BurmaNet News, April 8, 2010

[Editor]

April 8, 2010, Issue #3935


INSIDE BURMA
Irrawaddy: NLD: 'Flag will keep flying'

ON THE BORDER
Kaladan Press: Saudi Arabia and US support Burmese refugees in Bangladesh

BUSINESS / TRADE
DVB: ‘Only India has benefitted Burma’

ASEAN
AFP: ASEAN refrains from criticising Myanmar on elections
Bangkok Post: Asean awaits junta explanation
VOA: Rights groups want Indonesia to press Burma on democratic reform

INTERNATIONAL
Irrawaddy: Czech supports UN War Crimes inquiry on Burma
Irrawaddy: Burma not on UN agenda for April

OPINION / OTHER
Global Post (US): Stateless and starving in Bangladesh – Richard Sollom
Irrawaddy: New beginning for the opposition – Dr. Zarni?
Christian Science Monitor: ASEAN holds tongue on Burma election. What
options remain for Suu Kyi? – Simon Montlake
Foreign Policy: Happy birthday to Burma's military – David Scott Mathieson




____________________________________
INSIDE BURMA

April 8, Irrawaddy
NLD: 'Flag will keep flying'

Leaders of Burma's main opposition party, the National League for
Democracy (NLD), have decided not to remove the party signs and insignia
from outside the party's headquarters in Rangoon after the deadline for
party registration, according to party sources.

One source said the decision is in line with Suu Kyi's view that the NLD
will not cease to exist even if it is officially dissolved by the military
junta for refusing to register as a political party, the deadline for
which is May 7.

“However, the party leaders would not try to prevent the authorities from
removing the party signs,” the source said.

After the May 7 deadline for party registration, the NLD headquarters and
hundreds of its branch offices across the country, which were only allowed
to be reopened last month, are expected to be closed down.

"Why should we remove the party sign? We don't assume that our party is
finished just because we didn't register it,” said outspoken party
official Win Tin.

The party leadership is currently faced with the dilemma of what the party
will do after May 7. Speaking to The Irrawaddy, Suu Kyi's lawyer Nyan Win,
who met with the detained NLD leader on Wednesday, said, “All we can say
for now is we will continue in politics. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi has many
ideas on what to do next. But it is unfortunate that she is still under
house arrest.”

At Wednesday's meeting, Suu Kyi expressed her satisfaction at the party's
decision on March 29 not to register and contest the polls this year, Nyan
Win said.

“The party will be no more, but Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Vice-chairman Tin Oo
and party leader Win Tin will continue the democratic movement,” Nyan Win
said, adding that the party does not wish to give false hope to the
Burmese people by contesting the election.

As part of its preparations for the party's future after May 7, the
party's central executive committee formed a 17-member committee this week
to oversee the party's property and finances.

While some observers view the party decision as “suicide” or a
self-defeating response, recent surveys conducted by The Irrawaddy suggest
that many people in Burma welcomed the party decision, saying the party
would no longer be a respectable organization if it decided to register
under the regime's “unjust” election laws. The election laws effectively
bar Suu Kyi and more than 2,000 political prisoners from this year's polls
or from being members of a party.

On Wednesday, the United Nationalities Alliance (UNA), a coalition of 12
ethnic parties which contested and won 67 seats in the 1990 election,
issued a statement in support of the NLD decision. Prior to the NLD
decision, ethnic leaders representing the UNA made it clear that they will
not contest the polls without a review of the regime's 2008 Constitution.

Neither the NLD party or its leader Suu Kyi, currently serving an 18-month
house arrest sentence, have ever succeeded in any legal procedure against
the regime.

But Suu Kyi's lawyers said that she asked them on Wednesday to continue
pursuing legal proceedings on three cases: her continued detention; the
lawsuit against regime leader Snr-Gen Than Shwe for setting unjust
election laws; and for repairs at her Inya Lake house, which were halted
by the Rangoon municipality after Suu Kyi's estranged brother and a
distant relative launched objections.

Burma's supreme court in February rejected Suu Kyi's appeal against her
current detention, and refused last month to accept a lawsuit against Than
Shwe, saying it has no power to consider the case.

The Burmese regime has not set a date for the polls this year. Than Shwe
described the election as “the very beginning of the process of fostering
democracy,” in his speech on Armed Forces Day in Naypyidaw last month.

____________________________________
ON THE BORDER

April 8, Kaladan Press
Saudi Arabia and US support Burmese refugees in Bangladesh – Tin Soe

Chittagong, Bangladesh: Dr Abdullah Bin Naser Al-Busairi, Ambassador of
Saudi Arabia to Bangladesh, handed over a cheque of Taka 3.509 million to
the UNHCR Bangladesh representative Craig Sanders in his office on April
5.

Saudi Arabia provided financial assistance for supply of food grains and
other essential commodities to the Burmese refugees in Bangladesh in
coordination with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
(UNHCR), according to a press release from Saudi embassy.

The US Department of State posted on its website an urgent proposal;
“Current Funding Priorities for Assistance to Burmese Rohingya in
Bangladesh,” which mentions that to promote a holistic, district-wide
approach to both registered Rohingya refugees living inside the two
official refugee camps, Kutupalong and Nayapara, and unregistered Rohingya
and local Bangladeshi host population living outside the camps will be
prioritized above other project proposals submitted in response to this
Funding Opportunity Announcement.

The proposals for Araknese Rohingya refugee are:

(1) Proposed activities in the two official refugee camps, Kutupalong and
Nayapara, should support the following priority sectors:

a. Expand skills training to include income generating activities, with an
emphasis on the development of skills and vocational training to achieve a
measure of self-sufficiency and a reasonable livelihood;

b. Strengthen ongoing healthcare (including reproductive health),
education services, and psychosocial programming, particularly through
integrating and expanding support to the disabled;

c. Expand community mobilization programmes, especially in support of the
existing community-based counseling system for conflict resolution;

d. Improve physical infrastructure in the camps, including shelter and
interior roads; and

e. Improve knowledge of and enhance the capacity to identify and respond
to GBV, and build the capacity of service providers to incorporate GBV
prevention and response into their activities.

(2) Proposals that incorporate unregistered Rohingya living outside of the
two official camps, Kutupalong and Nayapara, should link the above
priority sectors with the following activities:

a. Expand access to justice by strengthening law and order in the
sub-districts where the camps are located, specifically to combat GBV and
support survivors; and

b. Expand access to education for refugee children that would serve both
Rohingya and Bangladeshi students, where Rohingya make up 50 per cent of
the targeted beneficiaries.

When asked refugees said, “it is good news as we can give our children
education, but we are not sure whether the programmes will be
implemented.”

“We thank Saudi Arabia and US for helping us and arranging a programme to
save our children and us in the camp,” said a woman from the unregistered
refugee camp of Kutupalong.

____________________________________
BUSINESS / TRADE

April 8, Democratic Voice of Burma
‘Only India has benefitted Burma’ – Francis Wade

India is the only country in Asia who’s policy of engagement with the
Burmese junta “has paid dividends”, according to an Indian think tank
report released yesterday.

The report, published by the Delhi-based Indian Council for Research in
International Economic Relations (ICRIER), also argues that the West’s
isolation of Burma is to blame for pushing the ruling regime into the
hands of China.

ICRIER were commissioned to write the report by the influential New
York-based Asia Society think tank, which last month released a
high-profile report warning that US engagement with the Burmese junta
risked legitimising the elections this year.

‘From Isolation to Engagement’ was launched yesterday in Delhi by former
Indian foreign secretary Shyam Saran, who oversaw India’s switch to
dialogue with the Burmese junta as part of the country’s ‘Look East’
policy.

The policy, gradually implemented throughout the 1990s, has sought to
build closer trade and strategic relations with its regional neighbours,
but has also attracted criticism as India’s arms exports to Burma continue
to rise.

Saran was quoted by the Mail Today newspaper in Delhi as claiming that
Indian policy towards Burma had been a success, with indications that “the
military regime [wants] to engage with India”.

She added that both the regime and “the people of Myanmar [Burma] see the
sanctions as a hindrance”, while the report contends that the West’s
economic boycott has only strengthened China’s influence over Burma.

Rights groups have however slammed the apparently warming relations
between Delhi and Naypyidaw, referencing in particular India’s place as
one of only six countries worldwide that regularly supplies military
equipment to the maligned ruling generals.

Recent reports claim that India is soon to sell patrol boats to the
Burmese army, despite calls from world leaders, including British prime
minister Gordon Brown, that a global arms embargo be enacted on the junta.

The two governments are currently cooperating on strategies to eliminate
Indian insurgents, particularly the United Liberation Front of Assam
(ULFA), who are nestled along India’s shared border with Burma and
believed to have bases in Burma’s northwestern Kachin state.

Relations between India and China have fluctuated in recent years as both
countries compete for Burma’s vast gas deposits. It was largely the lure
of Burmese natural resources that triggered Delhi’s switch from backing
for pro-democracy groups in Burma to support for the junta.

____________________________________
ASEAN

April 8, Agence France Presse
ASEAN refrains from criticising Myanmar on elections

Hanoi – Southeast Asian ministers meeting at a regional summit said
Thursday they quizzed Myanmar over its controversial election plans, but
stopped short of criticising the ruling junta.

Myanmar plans to hold its first elections in two decades later this year,
but new laws that effectively ban detained opposition leader Aung San Suu
Kyi from taking part have led her party to boycott the vote.

Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) foreign ministers met late
Wednesday ahead of the bloc's summit, and said the issue of holding free
and fair polls was raised with their Myanmar counterpart Nyan Win.

"We were not criticising him or lecturing him or telling him what to do.
We were just making observations and suggestions and he took them in a
good spirit," said Singapore Foreign Minister George Yeo.

"The coming months will be critical months for Myanmar," Yeo said, but
added: "In the end, what happens in Myanmar is for the Myanmar people to
decide. We are outsiders... we hope that they would make progress
quickly."

Under the electoral laws, Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy would
have to expel her in order to participate in the vote because she is
serving a prison term.

The Nobel peace laureate has been detained for 14 of the last 20 years.

Amnesty International said Wednesday that Myanmar's flawed election plans
and "appalling" human rights record should dominate the ASEAN summit, but
Yeo defended the group's policy of non-interference in members' affairs.

"We are not in a position to punish Myanmar," Yeo said, adding that tough
United States and European Union sanctions had failed to yield any change.

ASEAN secretary-general Surin Pitsuwan said the body was "giving the full
expression of support to what Myanmar wants to do", but said the ruling
generals were aware that its rights record continues to haunt ASEAN.

"Myanmar appreciates that... ASEAN has been seized with this issue for a
long, long time and would like to see an end to this issue so that Myanmar
itself and ASEAN can move on to a closer cooperation," Surin said.

Indonesia has been one of ASEAN's most outspoken members on Myanmar's
failure to shift to democracy and Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa called
on its rulers to live up to their promises over the long-awaited polls.

"We would have been keen to ensure that the planned election is carried
out in a manner that is free, democratic, transparent, inclusive along the
lines precisely as the Myanmar authorities themselves have said," he said.

____________________________________

April 8, Bangkok Post
Asean awaits junta explanation – Anucha Charoenpo

Hanoi – Southeast Asian leaders are keen to hear Burma explain its plans
for a "free and fair" election when they meet for a two-day summit
starting today.

"We will listen to how the Burmese junta will clarify the election after
they issued five electoral laws which may lead to problems among Asean
leaders and the international community," Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya
said yesterday.

Foreign ministers of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations,
including Mr Kasit, have been meeting in the Vietnamese capital to prepare
agendas for their leaders.

Burmese Prime Minister Thein Sein should clarify how the five laws would
lead to free elections, Mr Kasit said.

The five laws enacted by the junta were the political parties registration
law and four separate laws for the national election commission, the
election commissions of the two houses of parliament and all regional
parliaments.

Perhaps the most objectionable for the international community is the
registration law, which requires parties to re-register within 60 days
with a new junta-appointed commission.

It prohibits anyone convicted by a court from joining a party, which has
ruled out opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, of the National League for
Democracy, from running.

The Nobel peace prize winner, who has spent 14 of the past 20 years in
detention, was convicted last August of violating the terms of her house
arrest.

Her party has declared it will boycott the polls in protest at the new
laws, which it says are draconian.

The Burmese government has not announced the date of the election but it
is widely expected to be held in October or November.

Mr Kasit said Thailand wanted to see stability and national reconciliation
in Burma as its own interests were at stake.

Thailand was affected by political infighting between the Burmese junta
and ethnic minority groups inside Burma. Refugees crossed the border from
Burma, seeking refuge in Thailand.

Kyaw Zwa Moe, managing editor of the Chiang Mai-based Irrawaddy magazine,
said Burma's election laws were unjust, unfair and repressive.

"I do not believe that the junta's election will be free and fair.

"The junta has written those laws to oppress the participants, be they
voters, candidates or opposition parties," he said.

The election would not be as inclusive as the international community had
demanded, he said.

Kyaw Zwa Moe also doubted Burma would be criticised by other Asean members.

"I am sure that only the Burmese government will benefit from the Asean
summit, not the people of Burma," he said.
____________________________________

April 8, Voice of America
Rights groups want Indonesia to press Burma on democratic reform – Brian
Padden

Jakarta – Human rights groups are calling on Indonesia to urge Burma to
ensure its coming election is free and fair at a meeting of Southeast
Asian leaders.

Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has said that Indonesia will
promote democracy. And human rights groups in Asia want him to make good
on that pledge by pressing Burma's military government to hold free and
fair elections.

Mr. Yudhoyono meets Thursday and Friday in Vietnam the leaders of Burma
and the other members of the Association of Southeast Asia Nations.

Elaine Pearson, with Human Rights Watch, wrote an open letter to the
Indonesian foreign minister calling on him to press for reform in Burma.
She says Indonesia has both the experience and credibility to influence
the Burmese leadership.

"Because Indonesia is the leading member of ASEAN and it has been a strong
and principled voice on the human rights situation in Burma, and because
of its own history and transition from a military-led government to a
democracy. Really this puts Indonesia in a very strong position to be
listened to by the Burmese generals," she said.

Burma has been ruled by the military for most of the past six decades. The
government plans to hold elections this year but has yet to set a date.

The last time the country's leaders agreed to hold elections was in 1990.
The opposition National League for Democracy won, but the military refused
to recognize the results of the race.

The NLD is boycotting the coming elections over election laws they say are
restrictive and undemocratic. The laws prohibit registered parties from
having political prisoners in their ranks.

The NLD's leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, has been detained for most of the past
20 years, as have several other party officials.

ASEAN members are divided on how to respond to Burma, which is under
European Union and United States sanctions because of its poor human
rights record. ASEAN has a policy of not interfering in the internal
affairs of its members.

Yuyun Wahyuningrum, with the aid group Oxfam says, at this week's summit,
the political security community will for the first time discuss possible
sanctions for members that violate the ASEAN human rights charter.

But she says since ASEAN operates by consensus, it is unlikely they will
take any punitive actions.

"In one way or another they will talk about sanctions, but I am not sure
about the result because being a family and being living in harmony is one
of the principles in ASEAN," she said.

Still, she is hopeful that over time diplomatic engagement and increasing
pressure from democratic neighbors like Indonesia can help Burma make a
peaceful transition to democracy.

____________________________________
INTERNATIONAL

April 8, Irrawaddy
Czech supports UN War Crimes Inquiry on Burma – Simon Roughneen

Bangkok—The Czech Republic has become the third country to back the
recommendation made by UN human rights Special Rapporteur on Burma, Tomas
Ojea Quintana, that the UN Security Council examine setting up a
Commission of Inquiry into war crimes and crimes against humanity in
Burma.

In a statement to The Irrawaddy, the Czech foreign ministry said, “We
believe that the possibility of establishing a Commission of Inquiry
should be seriously examined.”

“Political repression and military attacks against civilians of ethnic
nationalities continue in scale and gravity that may entail international
crimes under the terms of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal
Court,” the statement said.

The statement added that it “remains concerned at continuous grave human
rights violations in Burma/Myanmar” and questioned the efficacy of the
regime's “road map to democracy.”

Meanwhile former Czech President Vaclav Havel, an outspoken and prominent
supporter of Aung San Suu Kyi, released a statement that referred to  a
report titled “Displaced Childhoods,” by the Thai-Burmese border-based
Free Burma Rangers (FBR) and its partners on Wednesday that reported that
children's lives are scarred by death, destruction, loss and neglect at
the hands of Burmese junta troops in eastern Burma.

“I am appalled by the brutality with which Burmese authorities treat their
own citizens with impunity, and I am truly afraid that the situation might
get even worse and these attacks escalate later this year when the junta
prepares for the elections, the results of which are to be determined by
them, not by the people.”

In his message, Havel said, “The people of Burma still suffer today, and
it is our duty to stand by the oppressed. I hope that democracy in Burma
will be restored, that the ethnic people will have a stake in the
political future of Burma, and that children can lead free, full lives.”

Welcoming the news, Mark Farmaner, the director of the Burma UK Campaign,
said “real momentum” is gathering behind the call for a commission of
inquiry.

The Czech declaration makes it the third country to support Mr Ojea
Quintana's recommendation, after Australia and the United Kingdom. The US
said that it is “looking closely” at Quintana's recommendations, according
to a statement by political counselor George Kent in Bangkok.

The Czech statement came just days after the National League for
Democracy, Burma's most influential political party, refused to register
for the elections scheduled in Burma sometime in 2010.

Rather than have “fake elections legalize his dictatorship,” said
Farmaner, referringto junta leader Snr-Gen Than Shwe, this year is
“turning into the year when the international community woke up to the
fact that he is criminal and should be behind bars.”

____________________________________

April 7, Irrawaddy
Burma not on UN agenda for April – Lalit K Jha

Washington — Burma failed to appear on the April agenda of the UN Security
Council, apparently because of a lack of consensus among its members, as
its president for the month, Ambassador Yukio Takasu of Japan, released
the council’s schedule.

Takasu, speaking at UN headquarters in New York, said Japan was
disappointed by the electoral laws recently released by the Burmese
military junta, which disqualified political prisoners and failed to
provide for a free and fair election.

Takasu said the view of the Japanese government has been communicated to
the junta by Japan’s Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada.

“This disappointment has been communicated very directly from Foreign
Minister Okada himself, and that was conveyed to the very senior people in
the Myanmar leadership,” said the Japanese ambassador.

While acknowledging that Burma once again did not find a place on the
security council's agenda, he said there is broad support for the role of
the UN secretary-general's good offices on Burma.

Takasu said UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has been communicating with
the Burmese leaders and government.

Noting that Burma has made some “progress in democratization,” the
Japanese ambassador was quick to note that the general election, sometime
later this year, should be fair, inclusive and credible.

“I think there is broad support for that. What has happened since the
publication of the electoral law including this disqualification of
certain categories of people
.. it will not be a good basis for an
inclusive and credible election,” he said.

“As far as Japan is concerned, we regret [it] very much, because at a very
senior level we have been talking very closely, and we were hoping that
this forthcoming general election would be not only free and fair but
inclusive. However, because of the legal impediment...I don't think this
is inclusive,” Takasu said.

____________________________________
OPINION / OTHER

April 8, Global Post (US)
Stateless and starving in Bangladesh – Richard Sollom

COX'S BAZAAR, Bangladesh and CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — Government officials in
Bangladesh are preventing charities from delivering food to tens of
thousands of starving Burmese refugees living in its southeastern corner,
across the river from Burma (*Myanmar).

When a government does something so outrageous in flagrant violation of
international law, logical questions to ask are: Why is it doing this? And
what might change its course?

The government of Bangladesh justifies its decision to deny aid to most
Rohingya — a Muslim ethnic minority group despised on both sides of the
border — by saying they are economic migrants who left Burma in search of
work. They therefore lack legal protections afforded to refugees, it says,
and must be forcibly returned to Burma as soon as possible.

To call the Rohingya economic migrants reflects a willful refusal to
recognize the harsh circumstances forcing them to flee Burma, where most
of them face systematic persecution by Burmese authorities. They are
disenfranchised, subjected to forced labor and relocation, and in some
cases raped, tortured or even murdered.

That the Rohingya are also limited to menial jobs in Burma, where per
capita income is even lower than in Bangladesh, does not make them
“economic migrants” any more than were the Jews who fled Hitler’s Germany.

The distinction is important because a well-founded fear of persecution
entitles asylum applicants to seek refugee status from a host government,
and therefore gain protection by the United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees (UNHCR) and aid from other U.N. agencies. Some 28,000 Rohingya in
Bangladesh have been granted such status, and are being cared for in
compliance with international standards.

Yet upward of 200,000 other Rohingya in Bangladesh are denied such
protection, because the Bangladeshi government stopped granting them
refugee status in 1993. Many of them live in and around the town of Cox’s
Bazar, but the government has forced some 40,000 of them into two
makeshift camps where they are denied access to food and most other forms
of aid.

When my colleague, Dr. Parveen Parmar, and I conducted a rapid health
survey in the squalid camps in February, we observed that nearly one child
in five was acutely malnourished, and we interviewed several people on the
brink of starvation who had not eaten for two or more days.

Abdul Momen, Bangladesh’s representative to the U.N., has denied that his
government is withholding aid from the Rohingya. Officials are simply
ensuring that no aid is coming from terrorist groups, he said.

“Bangladesh always stands by human rights,” Momen declared. “We are an
impoverished country, and in spite of that, we tried to help [the
Rohingya] as best we can.”

To what kind of help does he refer? Rohingya men who leave the camps to
try to find work are now routinely arrested, beaten and forced back to
Burma. Rohingya women are barred from receiving food from any aid group,
and struggle to keep themselves and their children alive on what little
food they can beg, borrow or scrounge.

But lest even this degree of misery be deemed insufficient to dissuade an
influx of additional Rohingya from crossing into Bangladesh, the
government has added a new disincentive. People we spoke with during our
recent trip describe a systematic campaign by local officials to whip up
public sentiment against Rohingya outside the camps. Their Bangladeshi
neighbors are encouraged to identify them to authorities, who can then
arrest them and expel them from the country.

As the world saw in Rwanda, such government-sponsored hate campaigns
sometimes spiral out of control, becoming a precursor to a bloodbath. In
this context, Momen’s assurance that “We are trying our best to keep [the
Rohingya] in good humor” seems almost willfully obtuse.

Confronted with this growing crisis, UNHCR should exert its global mandate
to protect the Rohingya whom the government of Bangladesh has refused to
register as refugees. UNHCR should press the government to stop arresting
Rohingya and forcing them back to Burma, and to permit aid groups to
deliver life-saving humanitarian assistance immediately.

The U.S. State Department should urge Bangladesh to cease its campaign of
persecution and forced repatriation against the Rohingya.

And American citizens can express to Congress and the Obama administration
their views that it is unconscionable for tens of thousands of people to
be condemned to die of starvation or disease because they are caught
between two poor countries that do not want to help them.

*The writer uses Burma, rather than Myanmar, because it is the form
preferred by the leaders of Burma’s pro-democracy movement.

Richard Sollom is Director of Research and Investigations at Physicians
for Human Rights in Cambridge, Mass., where he directs public health
research and human rights investigations in areas of armed conflict.
____________________________________

April 8, Irrawaddy
New beginning for the opposition – Dr. Zarni?

Beyond the shadow of a doubt, Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League for
Democracy (NLD) colleagues have effectively diminished the credibility of
the military generals' election in Burma by refusing to register the party
under unjust election laws.

At the same time, the regime’s Asian friends such as the Association of
Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) are also widely expected to endorse the
outcome of the election, with Asean Secretary-General Surin Pitsuwan
euphemistically framing the charade as “a new beginning.”

Negative reactions—from the Economist to The New Yorker, from Reuters to
the Christian Science Monitor—should dishearten neither the NLD rank and
file nor their worldwide supporters. For not a single commentary or news
article appears to be informed by the mechanics and history of social
movements.

Nor does the general media coverage and commentary appreciate the hardcore
reality on the ground that nothing short of system implosion will bring
hope and possibilities for a real new beginning for the Burmese people.
Some authoritarian and/or near totalitarian systems are just beyond
gradual reform.

The NLD’s decision to, in effect, dissolve itself as a “legal” entity is
actually a brilliant strategic move from an organizer’s perspective, not a
vain moral statement as many self-styled pundits on Burma have wrongly
asserted.

A political movement which aims to attack the foundations of the very same
repressive system needs no “legal” recognition by Burma’s de facto regime,
not when the latter has been hell-bent on obliterating it by any means
necessary.

Had the NLD decided to comply, if only grudgingly, with the regime’s
registration ultimatum it would not only have let down the 2,000 plus
dissidents behind bars who continue to resist the regime, it would also
have deprived the party itself of the power to inspire future waves of
activists and  mobilize public and international support.

To belabor the obvious, the regime-certified NLD has long been paralyzed
as a political party operating at the whim of the regime, with the sole
operational office in its decrepit headquarters in downtown Rangoon: the
military regime has sealed off numerous NLD local offices across the
country, while jailing hundreds of competent NLD operatives and
organizers, as well as able leaders and forcing others into exile.

In fact, the NLD operating as a “legal” party with one office in the
country has made the regime’s surveillance exceedingly easy. All that the
spooks need to do to intimidate party members is station themselves
outside NLD headquarters and take pictures of who goes in and out or
follow them.

Another reason behind the NLD’s decision to risk legal dissolution of the
party  appeared to have been to stave off external efforts, by both the
regime and other elements, to split the NLD on the election issue.

Aung San Suu Kyi and the senior leadership were fully aware of  efforts
that attempted to undermine highly respected leaders, including Win Tin,
by painting them as “unreasonable hardliners.”

At the same time, the pro-election voices within the NLD (for instance,
Khin Maung Swe with little or no national or global standing) were being
promoted in the media and foreign policy circles as moderates or
pragmatists because they were easier to manipulate politically by those
who stand to gain from the sham elections, with the purpose of
deliberately fracturing the NLD.

According to NLD sources some of the external players who attempted this
“divide and rule” tactic were representatives of the aid sector, certain
Western diplomats, foreign and local commercial interests, self-styled
civil society stakeholders with hidden personal agendas, and last but not
least, the regime’s political agents operating in the guise of social
entrepreneurs and independent local journalists.

As a matter of fact, the near unanimity of the NLD decision to
categorically reject the regime’s attempt to constitutionalize what is in
effect a political apartheid speaks volumes about Suu Kyi’s leadership and
her till able to rally her colleagues to close ranks when it comes to life
and death matters for the party.

Burma “expert” and sometime adviser to Western oil interests, Robert H.
Taylor who, by his own admission, has crafted statements for the Burmese
regime, was recently quoted as saying the NLD will fade into history.
History would be nothing without historical ironies.

Over the past decade, a worldwide cabal of Western interests and their
hired mouths from, you rightly guessed, oil, gas and natural resource
industries, as well as national security establishments and the global aid
industry, have been rooting for unconditional re-engagement  with the
morally repugnant generals while quietly discrediting Aung San Suu Kyi as
“stubborn” and “too moral,” a spin originally manufactured by the regime’s
psychological warfare division straight from the Ministry of Defense.

It is conveniently forgotten that Snr-Gen Than Shwe and company are
interested in engagement with the outside world, but only on its own
terms. Like Teheran’s ayatollahs, the paranoid regime in their capital
tellingly named “Abode of Kings” is unable to see engagement efforts as
anything other than a global plot against the generals. The regime’s new
capital Naypyidaw is a graveyard of all past unconditional engagers—from
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and US Sen. Jim Webb to Dr. Ibrahim
Gambari and, most recently, Prof Joseph Stieglitz.

If there is to be a real new beginning, it is the NLD's collective
decision to forgo the bogus legality of its party’s existence so that a
mass political movement with multiple focal points and leadership circles
can organically re-emerge.

Burmese of different ethnic and religious backgrounds should now be able
to join and declare themselves as “NLD,” be they residing in the
military-controlled “black areas” of the country or in the “white” or
liberated zones, that is, armed resistance and cease-fire territories or
within the diasporas.

The NLD or future oppositions will have no shortage of supporters,
sympathizers and potential members in multi-ethnic and dispersed people
seething with a deep sense of pervasive injustices and grievances.

There is another Burma which most Burma analysts fail to see, which is
pregnant with potential for new political movements and grassroots-driven
societal transformation.

The rank and file of the armed forces, according to numerous army
deserters, have become not only disillusioned with the regime’s
nationalist propaganda but have also been personally disgusted with their
greedy and abusive superior officers.

The civil servants abhor the destruction of professional bureaucracy. The
peasantry that makes up the country’s majority lives under economic
conditions considered worse than those under the British rule at the
height of the Great Depression in the late 1920s and 1930s. The urban
business class, including even the regime’s cronies, can’t stand their
kleptocratic patrons in generals’ uniforms.

The ethnic minorities, who make up 30 to 40 percent of the total
population, harbor a deep sense of injustices regarding the ethnic and
socio-economic inequalities—all hold the generals responsible for their
plight.

Burmese soil is fertile for political mobilization which will eventually
induce system implosion, especially given the potential new waves of
social movements that are likely to demand justice, equality and
democratization in nearby geo-political and economic regions, including
China, Thailand, Vietnam and Bangladesh.


Dr Zarni is a research fellow on Burma at the London School of Economics
and visiting senior fellow at the Institute of Security and International
Studies at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok. He founded and headed the
Free Burma Coalition from 1995 to 2004.

____________________________________

April 8, Christian Science Monitor
ASEAN holds tongue on Burma election. What options remain for Suu Kyi? -
Simon Montlake,

During this week's ASEAN summit, Asian leaders fell short of criticizing
the rules that ban Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi from participating in
the upcoming Burma election. But hope remains for moderate voices.

Bangkok, Thailand — Military-ruled Burma (Myan­mar) is preparing to hold
elections this year, its first since 1990. But the party that won the
majority of seats then, a result later annulled, has refused to
participate in protest at the regime's election rules.

Since announcing its decision in March, the National League for Democracy,
led by Aung San Suu Kyi, now faces dissolution after May 7, the deadline
to register for the Burma election.

At a summit Wednesday and Thursday in Hanoi, foreign ministers from the
10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) fell short of
urging Burma to to modify election laws to allow Ms. Suu Kyi to
participate. More than 100 regional legislators had called for ASEAN to
help ensure a free and fair election. Singapore's foreign minister said
foreign ministers met with their Burmese counterpart and made
"observations and suggestions," though the bloc held to its policy of
noninterference.

The NLD's boycott puts Western powers in a bind as well. Last year the
Obama administration switched to a policy of engaging the regime, which
has proved impervious to economic and political pressure. But the United
States and other powers remain critical of any political process that
doesn't involve the NLD and its charismatic leader, a Nobel Peace Prize
laureate who has spent 14 of the past 20 years in detention.

Why did the NLD decide to boycott the election?

The party said the rules governing the election were unfair and that it
would be wrong to participate. A sticking point was a ban on prisoners
joining or founding political parties. This applies to Suu Kyi, who is
serving an 18-month sentence that lasts until November. To register for
the vote, the NLD would have had to expel Suu Kyi. More than 2,100 other
political prisoners are also excluded.

Party members were also reluctant to lend legitimacy to an election that
they believe won't be free or fair.

Some members wanted to contest, believing that a flawed vote is better
than nothing and may pave the way to semidemocratic rule, says a Western
diplomat who covers Burma. On a recent visit, a senior NLD official told
him that "he had the numbers." But the party's committee fell in line
after Suu Kyi spoke out against participation.

How has the party's decision been received?

Many analysts are critical of the NLD's opt-out, given the long wait for
elections and the frustration of ordinary Burmese with the current
standoff. The party's popularity stems from its victory in 1990 and its
resistance to the regime's unpopular policies. By not running in the
elections, the party robs Burma's 27 million voters of a credible choice,
argue observers.

The prospect of a legal breakup of the party is alarming, says Aung Naing
Oo, an exiled Burmese analyst in Chiang Mai, Thailand. Despite decades of
repression, the NLD has remained intact. "It's better to participate. The
NLD isn't an underground organization," he says.

The Irrawaddy, a publication edited by Burmese exiles in Thailand, said in
a critical online editorial that the boycott may rob the election of its
legitimacy in Western eyes. "But even if this does turn out to be the
case, it may prove to be a Pyrrhic victory at best."

What happens now to the election, and is it expected to bring change?

The elections will go ahead, probably in October or November. As many as
15 parties have registered, with more expected. Some parties are seen as
military fronts, while others are vehicles for influential businesspeople
close to the junta.

Pro-democracy parties have also formed and may gain quiet support from NLD
activists unhappy with the boycott. That runs the risk of upsetting a
military-appointed election commission, which has the power to vet
candidates.

In the 1990 election, the NLD won 82 percent of the seats. Analysts expect
a more fragmented distribution this time.

Whatever the lineup, nobody expects an easy transition to civilian rule
after nearly five decades of military regimes. "It's going to be a
predictable result. The question is, are you going to get some good people
into a position where they have some influence," says the Western
diplomat.

How has the regime responded to the boycott?

The junta has made no official reaction to the NLD's decision. But it has
reason to feel pleased, says Thant Myint-U, a Burmese historian and former
United Nations official. (He is the grandson of former UN
Secretary-General U Thant.)

He says the regime probably anticipated the boycott and will now feel more
confident. "A decision by the NLD to participate in the elections would
have placed the regime in a far more difficult position," he says.

Western countries have called repeatedly for inclusive elections and for
all political prisoners to be released. Britain said that by excluding Suu
Kyi, the regime had "squandered the opportunity for national
reconciliation." The US also criticized the regime over its election laws.

What options does the NLD have?

Some NLD activists may throw their weight behind other parties. A
breakaway group could register a new party, but this would inflame
hard-liners.

A low turnout would be embarrassing for the regime. But the military can
compel people to vote, as they did in a 2008 constitutional referendum
where the official turnout was 98 percent, says Benjamin Zawacki, a
researcher for Amnesty International in Bangkok. By opting out, he says,
the NLD "has taken a huge gamble. It's the most high-profile opposition
group in the country." Should voters ignore its stance and go to the
polls, its clout would have shrunk, despite the abiding popularity of Suu
Kyi, among the world's most famous political prisoners.

____________________________________

April 7, Foreign Policy
Happy birthday to Burma's military – David Scott Mathieson

It's been a hell of an awful 65 years.

To mark the 65th anniversary of Burma's military last week, the country's
leader, Senior Gen. Than Shwe, made a rare public appearance, presiding
over a grand Armed Forces Day parade through the streets of Naypyidaw, the
country's lavish, newly constructed capital city. Thousands of troops
marched in formation past fountains as the ruling general saluted and
promised the select crowd that the coming elections would be free and
fair.

There was much to celebrate as far as the Burmese military is concerned.
The junta is confident in its hold on political power, monopoly over the
economy, and near-complete neutralization of domestic opponents. The ideal
conditions are in place to give the military junta its best-ever birthday
present: continuing dominance over a future civilian parliament and
continuing control of Burma's 58 million people after the country's
elections, promised to take place this year. Everything the ruling junta,
formally known as the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), has been
planning is methodically coming to fruition. The system it dubbed
"disciplined democracy" is living up to its Orwellian name. And it shows
no sign of changing.

Created at the end of World War II by a cabal of pro-Japanese nationalists
and British-trained officers, the Burmese defense services, known as the
Tatmadaw, were instrumental in safeguarding the weak central government
against ethnic and communist insurgencies in the 1950s. In 1962, to secure
its own interests and sideline bickering civilian politicians, the
Tatmadaw staged a coup. The new junta nationalized almost all economic
entities in the country, launching an era of xenophobic socialist rule
under the leadership of Gen. Ne Win.

By 1988, the system was crumbling. Nationwide protests erupted against
disastrous economic policies and military control. But rather than reform,
the military doubled down on repression, ruling without any ideology other
than nationalism and corporate self-interest. When the Army's preferred
party lost in a landslide to the opposition National League for Democracy,
led by the daughter of the Army's beloved first commander, Gen. Aung San,
the Tatmadaw simply nullified the elections. It drafted a new Constitution
to ensure its future dominance, partially liberalized the economy, began
to slowly destroy the political opposition, bought off the ethnic
resistance, and successfully made the vast majority of Burma's citizens
fearful of any involvement in politics.

Now 20 years into its campaign to ensure uncontested primacy in Burma, the
Tatmadaw's birthday goals are equally chilling. As announced on Armed
Forces Day, they include: "To work hard with national people for
successful completion of elections due to be held in accordance with the
new Constitution, to crush internal and external subversive elements
through the strength and consolidated unity of the people, and to build a
strong, patriotic modern Tatmadaw."

Clearly, Burma's rulers haven't changed much in two decades, and if
anything, they have become more isolated and paranoid. The parades have
become more ostentatious and generally exclusive, especially since the
ruling SPDC moved to Naypyidaw. The massive parade grounds are closed to
the public and all outsiders except foreign defense attachés, who sit
under the gaze of three gargantuan golden statues of former Burmese kings.
This year, the regime permitted some foreign journalists to attend for the
first time since 2006 -- but then the junta changed its mind with CNN's
Dan Rivers. He was granted a visa to cover the parades, but was
inexplicably detained in Naypyidaw and then sent back to Thailand the day
before the event.

Behind the facade of a triumphant, neomedieval military state, it's hard
to tell what the real condition of Burma really is. But government
spending offers a good clue: The SPDC spends a mere 1.4 percent of GDP on
health and education, while the Tatmadaw and state enterprises account for
80 percent of government expenditures. The junta spent some $2 billion
building the new capital. Meanwhile, Burma's humanitarian crisis is
deepening, with severe malnutrition and livelihood challenges affecting
one-third of the population. This doesn't affect military leaders, who
control Tatmadaw-only hospitals or can travel to Singapore for treatment.

Economic gains are either captured by the regime, senior military leaders,
or their favored business associates (many of whom find themselves on
Western sanctions lists). The income from energy deposits such as the
Yadana and Yetagun gas projects net the regime $2.4 billion a year,
proceeds the junta converts at the official exchange rate but squirrels
away in offshore banking centers at the market rate. When the Chinese
oil-and-gas pipelines are completed in several years, the military will
have access to even more foreign-exchange earnings and the finances to
guarantee its interests.

With such cash, Burma has no trouble finding ways to spend. The elite send
their children overseas for education and bestow lucrative business
concessions to their family members. The country's main friends and arms
suppliers are now North Korea, China, and Russia, which furnish weapons in
return for access to Burma's raw materials.

For a military state, however, life in Burma's army is surprisingly
dismal. While the junta buys sophisticated MiG-29 fighter aircraft, it
sends its poorly trained and supplied foot soldiers into brutal civil wars
with ethnic militias in the country's east. Military offensives have
displaced more than half a million civilians and sent hundreds of
thousands more fleeing across Burma's borders to Thailand, Bangladesh, and
India over the last two decades.

Among the rank and file, morale is extremely low; contempt for the
privileged officer class is high; and desertion rates are climbing to a
point that alarms even senior Army commanders. Child soldiers remain a
staple of combat, necessary for the Tatmadaw to stem the flow of
desertions and replenish its ranks as the junta demands a military
expansion. Still, despite these internal stress fractures, no overt
divisions within the Tatmadaw appear likely to force a change of
direction.

Meanwhile, the militarization of Burmese life marches on. In December, the
prestigious Defence Services Academy in the city of Maymyo turned out more
than 2,400 new officers, the largest graduating class in the Tatmadaw's
history. Retiring officers are taking up posts in local administration --
or preparing to contest the 2010 elections. The new Constitution reserves
for officers one-quarter of lower-house seats, one-third of upper-house
seats, and all key government portfolios.

So, 65 years old this month, the military in Burma is not a state within a
state -- it has become the state. The only real opposition, the National
League for Democracy, headed by Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi,
which won the last elections held in Burma in 1990, announced on March 29
that due to the unjust electoral laws governing the elections, it would
boycott.

The Tatmadaw could well continue to thrive under a civilian system it
controls. The Army will do so at the expense of legitimacy, popular
support, and honor. But that's exactly why this year's elections have been
so carefully arranged -- to ensure the right result. A free and fair
election would most likely give the Tatmadaw its marching orders: out of
power.