Siam News

A spokesman for Burma democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi says she will run for a seat in parliament in the country’s next by-election, expected by the end of the year. Nyan Win, a member of the National League for Democracy’s executive committee, told reporters Monday the Nobel Peace laureate will run for one of the 48 seats available in Burma’s new Senate, but has not yet decided which district she will represent. The democracy activist hinted that she would run for office at a meeting of party delegates Friday, when they decided to re-register as a political party and take part in elections.   The NLD boycotted elections last year because of a law that prevented Aung San Suu Kyi from competing.  The government recently repealed that law. This will be the first time Aung San Suu Kyi has competed for a seat.  Her National League for Democracy party won a landslide victory in Burma’s 1990 general election.  However, she was under house arrest by the time the elections took place. Burma’s then-military government ignored the election results and placed Suu Kyi under a lengthy house arrest.  She has spent 15 of the past 22 years in some form of detention.

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The United States and Australia Thursday say there are hopeful signs of an easing of political conditions in Burma, where the new government is promising democratic reforms. Burma was on the agenda of a meeting of the U.S. and Australian foreign and defense ministers in San Francisco. U.S. officials have been openly skeptical that the nominally-civilian government which assumed power in Burma earlier this year will offer any real change from the previous decades of military rule. But at a news conference capping the U.S.-Australian ministerial meeting, both Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Australian Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd said there are grounds for optimism about the prospect of change in the isolated Southeast Asian state. The Burmese government has in recent weeks made overtures to the opposition, allowing democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi this week to address an observance of the U.N.-designated “International Day of Democracy” at her political party’s Rangoon headquarters. Clinton said the new U.S. special representative for Burma, Derek Mitchell, has just returned from that country after what she termed “productive” meetings with both the government and Aung San Suu Kyi, who was freed from years of detention late last year. The Secretary cited “welcome gestures” from Burma that, despite continuing problem issues, merit further dialogue. “Frankly, we have serious questions and concerns across a wide range of issues — from Burma’s treatment of ethnic minorities, and more than 2,000 political prisoners, to its relations with North Korea.  Still, we welcome the fact that the Burmese government has launched a dialogue with Aung Sam Suu Kyi and begun to speak of the need for important reforms,” Clinton said. Clinton’s Australian counterpart, who visited Burma in early July, had similar comments. Rudd said if Burma wants to re-engage with the international community, it needs “first and foremost” to ease political curbs and release all “prisoners of conscience.” “We welcome recent signs from the Burmese regime that they are open to such a dialogue, but like the United States we proceed cautiously. And we would call on the Burmese regime to take concrete steps to manifest to the world at large that they are serious about that country becoming a democracy, without the threat of imprisonment for those who pose, in the regime’s view,  a threat to them,” Rudd said. Clinton noted that despite conciliatory moves, the Burmese government this week added ten years to the eight-year prison term of a 21-year-old journalist and photographer (Eds: Sithu Zeya) jailed after shooting pictures of the aftermath of a bombing last year in Rangoon. She urged the Burmese government to follow its words and commitments with action leading to reform, national reconciliation and respect for human rights. A senior State Department official said Wednesday U.S. diplomats intend to follow up on the discussions of Burma envoy Mitchell in meetings with Burmese Foreign Minister Wunna Maung Lwin on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly next week in New York.

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Burmese democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi called for unity Sunday, as she addressed cheering crowds on her first political foray outside her home city of Rangoon since she was freed from house arrest late last year. Hundreds of people lined roadways to greet the Nobel laureate as she made stops in the northern towns of Bago and Thanatpin during her one-day trip, which unfolded without incident. The 66-year-old activist called for unity and asked crowds to support her National League for Democracy party, which the previous military government disbanded before general elections last November. Officials from Aung San Suu Kyi’s NLD party said there will be more trips in the future, despite warnings in June from the new military-backed government that such tours could spark chaos and riots. In 2003, during a political tour of upper Burma, as many as 70 of Aung San Suu Kyi’s supporters were killed in an attack widely seen as an assassination attempt by a pro-government mob. The NLD leader escaped harm, but was later arrested by government security forces and sentenced to seven years of house arrest. The NLD party was forced by the former junta to disband as a political party last year, when it boycotted national elections because Aung San Suu Kyi – then under house arrest – was not allowed to participate. Burma’s Supreme Court later rejected a legal challenge to the dissolution order. Some information for this report was provided by AP, AFP and Reuters.

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Clashes in Burma between an ethnic-based army and government forces are presenting a challenge to the country’s new government, the regime’s relationship with its biggest ally, China, and also in its ability to maintain control of resource-rich and strategically important border areas. Although the conflict remains limited to a small region along the Chinese border, it has drawn international attention and public appeals from Burmese democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi. In Laiza, a sleepy border town nestled in lush jungles and hills, children are coming home from school, soldiers with rifles on motorbikes are preparing to return to the frontlines, and a Catholic priest is leading a service for internally displaced persons in an IDP camp. The latter group kneels on the floor, surrounded by children playing, sick people sleeping and families eating in the dusty, smoky hall. The Kachin are devoutly Christian and priests in Laiza have been working overtime to minister to some 7,000 newly arrived refugees in town who have fled nearby fighting. One refugee described being forced to act as a porter for Burmese troops before the latest violence flared. Increasing number of displaced persons He said that in the past, Burmese troops forced him for months to carry heavy loads and ammunition for them. He said he was beaten with a rifle butt for being slow. He said that when the recent tensions started, he just ran away. Local aid workers say that in all, about 16,000 people have been displaced by the fighting on the Taping River, where a Chinese corporation is building two hydroelectric dams. Many of those fleeing want to cross into China. However, Chinese officials have refused entry, saying the fighting is not close enough to the border to grant asylum. La Rip, who founded a refugee association to help people displaced by the conflict, said Burmese troops have emptied villages by threatening violence against locals if they are attacked by the ethnic militia known as the Kachin Independence Army. “The Burmese army already came in the village and dug a bunker in front of houses, and threatened them,” said Rip. “If the KIA shoots us, we’ll burn down the whole village. That village is very close to Laiza.” KIA, Burmese troops clash The Burmese government accuses the KIA of starting the conflict in June by attacking the Chinese-built dam. The KIA insists government forces started hostilities as early as May, when they fired mortars at their bases, and says its troops have responded only defensively. Kachin commanders say the fighting has meant an end to a 17-year-old ceasefire intended to prevent large-scale clashes between Burmese forces and the ethnic militia. Kachin militia commander Chyana Zaw Awn said the Burmese officials are using the construction of the dams as an excuse to go after his forces, because they refused to become border guards, working under the military. “The source of the conflict is the refusal of the border guard force proposal,” he said. “Since we reject that proposal, they have been looking for a way to ignite the conflict. So they have used the security of the Chinese investments as an excuse. We believe that they have planned from the beginning to eliminate the ethnic troops. It is the Burmese government’s strategic plan to eliminate the ethnic armies.” Pleas for peace U.S. and Chinese officials have urged all parties to settle the conflict peacefully. The conflict also has drawn in Burmese democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi. Last month, the Nobel laureate wrote an open letter to Burma’s President Thein Sein appealing for peace talks. The KIA’s vice chief of staff, General Gun Maw, has been pushing for a new ceasefire agreement to bring an end to the conflict. But he is seeking discussions covering much more than the conflict in Laiza. “We want a nationwide ceasefire in all conflict areas, and then we’d like to move toward political dialogue,” said Maw. “They seem to be happy to discuss peace, but don’t mention politics. They want a ceasefire, but are not willing to engage in political dialogue. What we want is real, genuine federalism. This word scares the Burmese.” It is unclear how much leverage the KIA has to force the government to the negotiating table. Despite calls from Aung San Suu Kyi and others inside Burma for the government to discuss the standoff, officials have been unwilling to directly talk to the group. The government has appointed two envoys to talk to the militias, but they do not have the authority to negotiate. Maw warns that his forces will escalate fighting if the standoff continues. “We are ready to go back to guerilla warfare, if it comes to that, we are ready to carry on the revolution. I believe the biggest battle has not yet been fought. The main thing is, they want to eliminate the ethnic groups,” he said. Kachin state is not a densely populated area. Laiza has a population of about 10,000 people. The state is slightly larger than 89,000 square kilometers, a fraction of which is KIA-controlled territory. All urban areas are controlled by the Burmese government, as well as key mining areas and rivers, which the KIA was required to hand over as part of the 1994 ceasefire. Sixty-three year-old Burma-analyst Aung Kyaw Zaw was once a soldier and a member of the Burma Communist Party. He stresses the importance of Kachin state’s location between India and China, and points up that it is where headwaters of the country’s vital Irawaddy river flow south. “KIA is the very clever insurgent in the northeast,” he said. “They know international politics and the Burmese politics and Chinese politics. It is not easy to face Kachin leaders.” Strategic resources in play Resource-rich Kachin state, littered with gold and jade mines, teakwood, rubber and banana plantations, is small but potentially profitable. Htoo Trading, a conglomerate owned by one of Burma’s richest business men, U Tayza, has a joint venture with a Russian mining company searching for uranium near local jade mines.   Outside analysts say they are watching to see if the militias will be able to broaden their struggle against Burma’s military to involve other ethnic groups. Ahnan is a spokesperson from the environmental watchdog group, Burma Rivers Network, who said other ethnic groups feel the Burmese government is cutting them out of lucrative projects, such as the hydroelectric dams. “A lot of anger [is] happening around the country, and also some of the development projects in ethnic areas, so it’s really possible civil conflict happens inside the country,” said Ahnan. KIA commanders in Laiza expect the fighting to increase when the rainy season ends in September. Maw said he believes much of the fighting is still ahead.

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Zaw Win’s journey from Burma to Buffalo, New York was not a matter of just buying an airline ticket. He spent five years as a political prisoner in his native country where Win says he was tortured and starved. Escaping after paying smugglers to hide him in the bottom of a fishing boat, he eventually made it to the United States where he was  granted asylum. In 2005, he was resettled in Buffalo. Now, Win runs a laundromat where the walls are plastered with colorful posters denouncing Burma’s military junta. “Whenever I put the sign, the customer they ask me question and they can explain current situation in my country,” he says.  “Where is location of Burma? What happening in Burma now? Who is the leader now? What is the military dictatorship?” Thousands of Buffalo residents already know the answers. Like Win, they fled from Burma. And they also landed in America’s third poorest city unable to speak English with almost no money or job prospects. But some long-time residents see investing in these refugees as Buffalo’s way forward. “What we feel like we’re doing is just giving people a little leg up on prosperity and we’ve seen people take hold of that and blossom with it,” says Bonnie Smith. “Slowly the community begins to improve.” Working through her church, the retired businesswoman helped Win develop a business plan and provided collateral for him to get a microloan. It’s something he never would have qualified for on his own. In the past decade, close to 10 nonprofits in Buffalo have started or added refugee resettlement to their mission. That can include English classes, driving lessons or help buying and improving one of the economically-depressed region’s thousands of abandoned homes. Cities along the Great Lakes used to rule the American economy, manufacturing steel by the shipload. Now, these once mighty metros are known as the Rust Belt. Since the aging industrial plants in Buffalo started closing in the 1950s, more half of its population has left. But now, thousands are moving in: refugees from Burma, Sudan and other far-away, conflicted places. Officials are trying to turn their relocation into a renaissance.    According to Aaron Bartley, director of PUSH Buffalo, refugees are perfect candidates to bring Rust Belt cities back to life. “The way we’re going to solve that is by making it a neighborhood people want to stay in. And a neighborhood the various communities – whether they’re Burmese, Somalian, Sudanese, Liberian – want to put down roots in. That they don’t see it as a stopping point to get to another place.” This wouldn’t be happening on such a large scale without the Refugee Protection Act of 1980. The law was designed to stop population loss in Rust Belt cities like Buffalo, Detroit and Cleveland by subsidizing refugee resettlement there. About 1,500 refugees came to Buffalo just last year. “Even with that 1,500 refugees, we still saw a population decline in our community. We’re still trying to catch up even with those refugees coming in,” says Molly Short, who runs Journey’s End, one of Buffalo’s four resettlement agencies. While most American cities have one agency like hers, the Rust Belt is home to dozens and Short says they can barely meet the demand. She adds that services like hers have been severely hurt by federal budget cuts in recent years. Often times, the agencies can’t predict what help a refugee needs to feel at home. “Sometimes we’ll have a refugee arrive who has literally never been in a car before they left a refugee camp, never used electricity and then we have refugees come in who are doctors and scientists and mathematicians.” And many times, the educated and illiterate are competing for the same small pot of jobs. While Burmese refugee Win feels quite welcome in Buffalo, some customers can be difficult and Win feels business could be better. “Not really bad, not really good. So-so. Not much money for my pocket. And then for future more and more better, I believe this.” Win says his microloan will be paid off in a year or two. Then, he plans to assist others just as he was aided – helping out-of-work refugees open their own shops and create their own jobs.

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The United States is sending a senior diplomat for “introductory” talks with leaders of Burma’s new, nominally-civilian, government. The new government was seated in late March to replace a military junta but U.S. officials say the military retains effective control. Officials here say the dispatch of the diplomat to Burma does not reflect any easing of the critical U.S. view of the political changes there, but that the Obama administration remains committed to trying dialogue with Burma. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Joseph Yun is due to leave Washington Wednesday for a visit to Burma spanning three days. The senior diplomat last visited Burma in December and so his visit his week will be the first since the new government was sworn in on March 30th. The military junta that ruled Burma for decades ceded power at that time, following a national election in November that was widely criticized as a sham. A quarter of the seats in the new parliament were set aside for military officers and more than half of the remaining seats were won by a pro-military party. Announcing the Yun visit, State Department Acting Deputy Spokesman Mark Toner said the United States still considers the political process in Burma badly flawed and does not approach this week’s talks with any illusions. “It’s consistent with our two-track approach to Burma. There’s nothing [unduly optimistic] about this. We recognize that there’s some fairly serious challenges to address in this relationship. But we’re going to continue to pursue a dual-track policy that involves pressure, but also principled engagement,” he said. A senior official who spoke to reporters said that in addition to meeting government officials and civil society members, Yun will try to meet opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who was freed last November after spending most of the previous 20 years in detention. Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy Party won Burmese elections in 1990 but was barred by the military from taking power. The November elections were largely boycotted by the opposition. In a notice to Congress Monday, President Barack Obama renewed U.S. economic sanctions against Burma, including a near-total trade ban, that would have otherwise expired this month. The routine extension notice said Burma is still engaged in actions hostile to U.S. interests including the large-scale repression of the democratic opposition. The State Department also Monday dismissed a limited clemency program announced by Burmese President Thein Sein that would among other things cut sentences for all Burmese prisoners by a year. It said Burma should immediately free all of the country’s estimated 2,200 political prisoners.

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The European Commission visited Burmese refugee camps along the Thai-Burma border this week to evaluate a shift in priorities from basic relief services to longer-term sustainable assistance. But as aid workers on the border scramble to cope with the newest wave of ethnic Karen refugees fleeing war at home, questions remain about whether sustainable assistance is possible in such an unstable region. More than 10,000 refugees from eastern Burma have crossed into Thailand since fighting erupted between government troops and the opposition Democratic Karen Buddhist Army in November after the country’s first national elections in two decades. Thailand considers them to be illegal migrants, so they are not allowed in the refugee camps, and have little access to humanitarian aid. Instead, they seek shelter in the jungle or in squatter camps. Four months of continuous fighting in border areas of Burma’s Karen State shows no signs of letting up. Sally Thompson, of the Thai/Burma Border Consortium says the election has made Thai authorities more reluctant to offer aid to refugees. “The fact that the elections have been held is seen as the start of a new phase which is not more refugees,” Thompson said. “The hope from the Thai government and others is that the new phase is that the refugees will be able to gradually return back to Burma so there is not a willingness at this stage to put new mechanisms in place that are likely to attract more refugees to Thailand it would be seen from the Thai government’s perspective if they were to establish more official sites they consider that would be a pull factor.” Thompson’s organization estimates more than 140,000 people from Burma live in 10 refugee camps along the border. Thousands more reside in nine camps inside Burma that the consortium monitors. The lack of health care at home or in Thailand remains a critical issue for the refugees. “Basically there’s no effective health system in eastern Burma and so people are coming to places like Mae Tao clinic because it’s the only place they can get any health care,” Thompson added. “There’s no health system that’s been put in place from the government’s side what people have access to is what the ethnic groups themselves have established.” The Mae Tao clinic, founded by Dr. Cynthia Maung in Mae Sot, provides free health services to refugees. Lok Gwa, a trainee surgeon at the clinic, says since the border was closed in September, they have been seeing fewer patients. Hospital records confirm patient numbers have held at around 10,500 a month, about 2,000 less than usual. The clinic’s staff says this indicates not that fewer people are sick, but that fewer can reach the clinic and either go without, or must have health care come to them. Naw Paw Hser Mu Lar has spent the past 10 years as a member of the Backpack Health Worker Team, a network of more than 300 mobile health care providers who care for those living in conflict areas in Burma. She says the fighting has led to a rise in malaria, diarrhea, maternal and child illnesses, and land mine injuries since November. “Policy has not changed,” said Mu Lar. “I think more fighting than last year. More patients. More fighting means more patients, more serious cases.” Mahn Mahn, the president of the Backpack Health Worker Team, has similar fears. “In terms of before the election in Burma we expected there would be more conflict but nobody in the international community believed us,” Mahn Mahn said. “But anyway, before the election in Burma we started to prepare for after the election, and fighting started in Myawady and then we started to form the seven emergency backpack teams.” Human rights activists and refugees say the conflict escalated after the election, as the Burmese army tries to gain control over more Karen territory. Burma’s military government has signed peace agreements with several of the country’s ethnic militias, including the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army. But none of the ethnic groups agreed with a government demand that they become part of a national border guard, and as a result, fighting has flared in many parts of the country. A European Union delegation plans to visit the border refugee camps this week. The team aims to evaluate new sustainable options for helping the Burmese, even as Thai officials look to repatriate them. Thompson sees the resolution to Burma’s refugee crisis as primarily a political one. “Until the ethnic issue is resolved in Burma the conflict will be ongoing,” Thompson said. “It’s very unlikely in the short-term that the ethnic issue will be resolved so it’s very likely that we will see low intensity ongoing conflict in the ethnic areas which will continue to generate more arrivals into Thailand.”   Karen refugees began fleeing into Thailand 26 years ago, and aid workers say what originally was seen as temporary situation has become permanent. The EU says its delegation hopes to come up with ways to help the refugees rebuild their lives, and bring them health care, education and livelihoods.

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