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| After Suu Kyi’s Release, Dangerous Time Sets In |
| Tuesday, 16 November 2010 |
BANGKOK — A dilapidated colonial villa on the banks of the Inya Lake in Rangoon, Burma’s largest city, has regained its identity as a home—instead of a prison—following the Saturday release of Aung San Suu Kyi, the icon of the military-ruled country’s democracy movement.
Yet it is not the first time that this change of identity has taken place. The 65-year-old Nobel Peace laureate’s release from house arrest by the junta brought to an end her seven-year stretch of political isolation, which began after pro-regime thugs attacked Suu Kyi and her supporters in central Burma in May 2003.
Suu Kyi, the daughter of Burma’s independence hero Aung San, has been granted freedom twice before since her first imprisonment in her ancestral home in July 1989. The freedoms granted to her by the military leaders of Burma, or Myanmar, were never permanent.
Thus, this early, as Suu Kyi takes her first tentative steps as a free Burmese citizen after spending 15 of the past 21 years as a prisoner in her home, concern is already being expressed about whether her freedom will be short- lived.
"This is a very dangerous period," says Khin Ohmar, chairwoman of the Network for Democracy and Development in Burma, a umbrella organization of Burmese political activists in exile. "The regime is not releasing her out of respect that she has an important role to play in Burma’s political process and national reconciliation."
The regime’s record over the past two decades feeds such worries. The junta’s reclusive strongman, Snr-Gen Than Shwe, has strengthened the military’s numbers and issued an order that has crushed any hint of political freedom and democratic sentiment.
"In the last 20 years, every single move by the regime has been to its benefit," Khin Ohmar explained during a telephone interview from the Thai- Burma border. "It has always been a part of their control strategy. They have never changed."
Some former political prisoners even worry for Suu Kyi’s life now that she has the liberty to go around in public. "We are concerned that she may be rearrested on some charge or attacked by government thugs," said Bo Kyi, joint secretary of the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners in Burma (AAPP), a group that campaigns for the rights of jailed political dissidents. "She has been attacked before."
Suu Kyi’s long spells as a political prisoner and how she has been treated once free have shaped these deep doubts about the junta’s motives. "There is no rule of law in Burma," Bo Kyi, himself a former political prisoner, told IPS. "The regime’s motives are never sincere."
Suu Kyi has been a thorn in the side of Burma’s military rulers since her return to the country in early 1988 to take care of her ailing mother. Her arrival after a long absence abroad coincided with a pro-democracy uprising that year against a military regime that had been in power since a 1962 coup.
The political neophyte was soon propelled into being a star of the country’s young democracy movement, drawing hundreds of thousands of supporters to a mass political rally she addressed in late 1988 in Rangoon. Soon after, she helped found the National League for Democracy (NLD) to contest the 1990 general election, the first multi-party poll in 28 years.
Yet her freedom was short-lived as the military leaders—who had already crushed the 1988 pro-democracy uprising where 3,000 people were killed—discovered the power of Suu Kyi’s message of democracy and non-violence. She was forced off the streets and imprisoned in her home almost a year before the 1990 elections, beginning her first stretch under house arrest that lasted six years.
But Burmese voters had other ideas. They gave the NLD a thumping majority, some 82 percent of the seats in the national legislature, in that 1990 poll. But the junta refused to recognize the results, setting into motion a long acrimonious relationship between those armed with the guns and those who derived strength from non-violent democratic sentiments.
"It is asymmetrical politics that you started to see in Burma after Suu Kyi arrived on the scene," said a Rangoon-based political analyst. "You had the powerful, heavily armed military against a woman leading a movement that stood for peaceful political change through democracy."
"She deserves credit for making the democracy movement in Burma a non- violent one and helping to keep it that way," the analyst, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told IPS.
"The anti-regime forces could have easily turned violent out of frustration and years of suppression."
Her stature in the past two decades has also gone beyond the country’s majority Burman ethnic community and reached the country’s patchwork of ethnic minority communities that have been at war and have endured decades of oppression under the grip of a Burman-dominated military.
Analysts have credited Suu Kyi and the NLD for getting the ethnic minorities to feel part of the movement for political change, though their push for tripartite talks between the regime, the pro-democracy movement and the ethnic minorities.
Among these groups are the Karen, one of the largest ethnic nationalities whose rebel forces have been waging a separatist struggle for six decades. "We are very happy to see Aung San Suu Kyi freed after so many years," said Zipporah Sein, general secretary of the Karen National Union. "She is very important for the ethnic groups and for the people of Burma because of her struggle for rights."
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| Junta Censors Suu Kyi News |
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RANGOON — The state-controlled censorship board in Burma, the Press Scrutiny and Registration Division (PSRD), has ordered domestic media to carry limited news about Aung San Suu Kyi, according to sources.
Media groups inside Burma were keen on reporting the most interesting news concerning Suu Kyi's release from house arrest, her public speech on Sunday, but were largely unable to do so due to restrictions by the PSRD.
“We were unable to run a large photo of Suu Kyi and could only use the size that we were allowed to use. We were also not permitted to use her photo on the front page. We wanted to carry news about her release on the front page, but the PSRD didn't allow us to do so,” said a reporter in Rangoon.
He said in printing excerpts from Suu Kyi's first public speech in seven and a half years, the PSRD only allowed statements that it thought were positive and banned sentences such as, “People should be active in politics,” and “People have to stand up for their rights.”
“It would be politically beneficial to the general public if her full speech could be printed. People will know that they have to work in unison to reach their goal—democracy,” said an editor from a Rangoon-based private news journal.
The PSRD also reportedly did not allow the media to mention the fact that Suu Kyi said her party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), would focus on political activities.
News journals were only able to report that Suu Kyi was released from house arrest and gave a public speech to her supporters.
At a press conference at NLD's headquarters on Sunday, when asked what she thought if the PSRD prevented domestic media from reporting about her, Suu Kyi said she would think nothing has changed even after the election.
Despite the regime's news restrictions on Suu Kyi, the sales of most of the news journals that carried her picture reportedly went up.
“True and Flower journals published on Sunday, and today's Weekly Eleven journal had very good sales because they carried Suu Kyi's photo and news. People asked for news about her before they bought it. Some bought journals because they said they wanted to keep them,” said a shop owner in Rangoon's Mayangone Township.
Burmese went to Internet websites, international televisions and exiled media to pick up more information on Suu Kyi, the daughter of Burma's independence hero, Gen Aung San. She was greeted by tens of thousands of supporters and well-wishers on Saturday, the day she was released, and on Sunday, when she gave a public speech.
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| Political Prisoners' Families Have Little Hope of Amnesty |
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While welcoming Aung San Suu Kyi's release from house arrest, families of Burma's other political prisoners hold out little hope that their loved ones will soon also be free.
Suu Kyi, the most famous of Burma's more than 2,000 political prisoners, asked people on Sunday to pray for their release after she was allowed to leave her Rangoon home for the first time in more than seven years.
Ma Nyein, sister-in-law of the popular satirist Zarganar, said she and other members of his family held out little hope that his 35-year prison sentence would end early, pointing out that Suu Kyi had been made to serve her full term.
Zarganar, who is held in Myitkyina prison in Kachin State, was imprisoned because of his involvement in the humanitarian relief effort in the Irrawaddy Delta after Cyclone Nargis devastated the region in May 2008.
Win Maung, father of imprisoned 88 Students Group member Pyone Cho, said Suu Kyi had so much to do now it would be difficult for her to concentrate on working for the release of the political prisoners.
“She has more important issues than politician prisoners,” said Win Maung.
Pyone Cho is serving a 65-year sentence in remote Kawthaung prison in Taninthariyi Division for his involvement in the anti-government uprising in 2007.
Aung Tun, younger brother of the prominent 88 Generation Students Group leader Ko Ko Gyi said there was little Suu Kyi could do to persuade the regime to free the political prisoners.
Like Pyone Cho, Ko Ko Gyi is also serving 65 years sentence, in remote Monghsat prison in Shan State, for his involvement in the anti-government uprising in 2007.
Tate Naing, secretary of the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP), a Burmese human rights group based on the Thai-Burmese border, told The Irrawaddy on Monday that the regime had no interest in freeing prisoners who had been working for democracy and human rights.
“The freedom of political prisoners is directly proportional to the political situation inside and outside the country. If the political movement inside the country grows and the international community exerts more pressure the political prisoners have more chance of being freed,” said Tate Naing.
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| Leaders of Armed Ethnic Groups Support Suu Kyi |
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Leaders of several of Burma's armed ethnic groups voiced support for freed pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, saying she is the appropriate person to lead an attempt at national reconciliation.
“We are very happy to hear that she is going to work for national reconciliation and a second Panglong conference. We believe that she is the right person for the task because there are many people in Burma and the international community who support her,” said Nai Hang Thar, the secretary of the New Mon State Party, an armed ethnic ceasefire group.
Maj Sai Lao Hseng, spokesperson for the Shan State Army-South (SSA-S), said, “We believe that she can work towards unity among the Burmese people and ethnic minorities.”
Suu Kyi is the one person suitable to organize the process of reconciliation in Burma and a second Panglong conference that includes ethnic minorities, said Sai Lao Hseng.
Upon her release on Nov. 13 after more than seven years under house arrest, Suu Kyi told thousands of cheering supporters that she first wanted to listen to the people before resuming new political activity and wished to form a strong “people's network.”
An official of the United Wa State Army (UWSA) in Panghsang, southern Shan State, said, “I personally support her efforts for democracy. We also want Burma to be a peaceful country.”
He also said that armed conflict between the Burmese government and ethnic groups will not end unless the government solves the conflict peacefully by political means.
Similarly, Suu Kyi said in response to a question at her press conference on Sunday that the ethnic conflicts should be solved peacefully, not by military means.
Zipporah Sein, the general secretary of the Karen National Union (KNU), said that even though the KNU and other armed ethnic groups engage in armed struggle, they wish to move in the same direction as Suu Kyi, who promotes nonviolent means.
“Suu Kyi is attempting to achieve democracy and change in Burma. Her goal is the same with ours,” she said.
Zipporah Sein also said that she believes the Burmese people will join Suu Kyi and the opposition political movement will be stronger.
“People will not sit and watch. They will join her as they have been waiting for her for so long,” she said.
Armed ethnic groups have been fighting for autonomy, self-determination and equality against the Burmese government since the country gained independence from Britain in 1948.
Tension between the government and the armed ethnic ceasefire groups that rejected the junta’s border guard force (BGF) has been mounting since April 2009, when the junta ordered the militias to join the BGF.
These tensions recently spiked when fighting between government troops and a splinter Karen rebel group, the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army's Brigade 5, erupted last week in several towns on the Thai-Burmese border, forcing more than 20,000 civilians to seek refuge on Thai soil for one night.
DKBA Brigade 5, led by Col Saw Lah Pwe, has rejected the BGF. Saw Lah Pwe said in a recent statement that he will join hands with Aung San Suu Kyi and fight for democracy, albeit by different means.
James Lum Dau, the deputy chief of foreign affairs in the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO), a cease-fire group that also rejected the BGF, said, “Ethnic conflict can be only solved by political means.”
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| Resumption of Fighting Sparks Further Exodus |
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More than 400 villagers fled late on Sunday night from the town of Valley, which straddles the Thai-Burmese border, following a resumption of hostilities between Burmese government forces and breakaway Brigade 5 of the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), according to Thai authorities.
A report released by the Thai government on Monday said that the clash between the DKBA Brigade 5 led by Col Na Kham Mwe, also known as Saw Lah Pwe, and Burmese government forces has prompted about 400 Thai and Burmese nationals in North Valley sub-district, Tak Province, to flee their homes and take temporary refuge in the compound of a local government building a few miles away.
The town of Valley straddles the border from Burma's Kawkareik Township to Ban Valley in Thailand's Phop Phra District in Tak Province, and is made up of Thai, Burmese and Karen people. It lies only a kilometer away from the site of the clash which, so far, has claimed heavy casualties on both sides. An influx of thousands of refugees into Thailand is expected over the next few days, according to the report.
One resident in Valley was wounded by a mortar during the exchange on Sunday, said the Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG).
A villager told the KHRG that some locals who attempted to cross into Thailand to escape the fighting have been prevented by the Thai army. Civilians remain at risk as the conflict continues, said the KHRG report.
Deputy Thai army spokesman Sirichan Nathong told The Bangkok Post on Monday that some 150 Burmese nationals who crossed into Thailand following the clashes will probably be sent back later that same day.
A combined force of Thai army soldiers, Border Patrol Police and provincial administrative staff reinforced the border at Phop Phra and led the escaping Karen group to safer places, according to reports.
Several representatives from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the Thailand Burma Border Consortium and some NGOs visited the refugees in Baan Valley and provided them with food on Monday.
Thai human rights groups, including the National Human Rights Commission of Thailand, were due to hold a meeting in Bangkok on Monday to discuss the situation surrounding the border conflict.
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| 40 Burmese Troops Wounded by Karen Rebels |
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About 40 Burmese government troops who were wounded in a series of attacks by Karen rebels were taken on Monday evening to a military base near Three Pagodas Pass, according to Mon sources in the area.
Thu Rain, a resident in Three Pagodas Pass Township, said that government forces from Light Infantry Battalion (LIB) 284 and 270 were attacked twice on Saturday by the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) stationed in Brigade 6, and again on Sunday by breakaway troops from Brigade 5 of the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA).
According to a local source, many of the government troops who were wounded had retreated and stepped on landmines after being forced by KNLA forces toward a minefield outside Kyauk Kwe village, some 20 km from Three Pagodas Pass.
The wounded soldiers were put in a truck and taken to the Burmese army base in Three Pagodas Pass. Sources said it is still unknown how many government soldiers were killed in the three attacks.
The sources said government soldiers from LIB 284 conscripted 15 Mon civilians on Saturday from Tha Thein village to work as porters, carrying their supplies and military equipment. The soldiers threatened to burn down the village if the conscripts refused to comply, according to an eye witness. Villagers in the area had earlier refused to work as porters after the Burmese army battalion was attacked by the KNLA on Saturday.
The 15 villagers were forced to carry military supplies to Three Pagodas Pass, a mountainous walk of about four hours.
Seven Burmese army battalions totaling more than 1,000 troops have been deployed near Three Pagodas Pass after the town was seized by DKBA Brigade 5 on Nov 8. The seven battalions are under the control of the Southeast Military Regional Command based in Moulmein in Mon State and Military Operations Command, based in Tavoy, Tenasserim Division.
Local observers said they believed that the Burmese army had brought in reinforcements to launch a major operation against the troops from DKBA Brigade 5 who are currently stationed at a base near the town.
The situation in Three Pagodas Pass was said by observers to be “more stable” since the clashes between the breakaway Karen faction and government troops last week. However, local residents said they still fear further hostilities could break out at any time as the KNLA and DKBA Brigade 5 are coordinating their attacks on the Burmese army in the area.
Clashes between the Karen rebels and Burmese troops have increased near Three Pagodas Pass since Karen soldiers ambushed government reinforcements en route to Three Pagodas Pass.
The Thai army has announced that it will not allow Burmese villagers to cross the border again if hostilities resume. Observers say this policy is a result of a request by the Burmese government to the Thais to deny shelter to Burmese refugees, and a Burmese demand that the Thai authorities pay 100,000 baht (US $3,000) compensation for any Burmese citizen killed on Thai soil.
Meanwhile, further north in Shan State, conflict has resumed on Tuesday between Burmese government forces and the Shan State Army-North.
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| Suu Kyi's TV Appearance a Boon to Burmese |
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In a scene that was repeated throughout Burma, shop owner turned on the TV at his home on Friday when he heard of Aung San Suu Kyi's impending release.
“I turned on the DVB [Democratic Voice of Burma] satellite broadcast on Friday evening and on Saturday we watched TV the whole day waiting to see her face,” he said, adding that many people came to his home to watch the event.
Ko Kyaw, a resident of Bogalay Township in the Irrawaddy Delta, said many of Bogalay's residents gathered at local tea shops, restaurants and other roadside shops waiting for news and images of Suu Kyi's release or turned on their shortwave radios to hear the news.
Ordinary citizens and government officials alike could not contain their happiness when they finally saw Suu Kyi appear on TV after 5 p.m on Saturday, he said.
“I feel that she [Aung San Suu Kyi] is a bright star for the future of our country,” he said, adding that people clapped when Suu Kyi finally appeared.
Ma Hnin, another housewife who owns a family tea shop in Bogalay said: “The whole family and many friends came to the tea shop to watch it.”
“ I’m so happy to see she [Suu Kyi] is free,” said Ma Hnin, adding that passers by also gathered at the tea shop to watch and continued to discuss her release long after the broadcast was over.
Other residents in Bogalay confirmed that houses with satellite TV were packed with people watching the news of Suu Kyi's release.
Despite official bans on receiving banned satellite news channels and shortwave radio broadcasts, the military government has been unable to block TV signals and prevent people from watching channels like the Oslo-based DVB.
“I felt hope returning after we had lost it for so many years,” said Ko Kyaw after he finally saw Suu Kyi on TV.
“We had lost sight of her since Depayin massacre,” he said, referring to the notorious incident when an attempt to assassinate Suu Kyi took place on the outskirts of Depayin Township in Sagaing Division, Central Burma, on May 30, 2003.
The attack was launched by pro-junta thugs who were members of the Union Solidarity and Development Association and the Swan Ah Shin militia, who blocked the road to prevent the convoy of vehicles from escaping the ambush.
Though more than 70 of her followers reportedly died in the ambush, Suu Kyi escaped but was arrested later in the day. She remained under house arrest from that day until her release on Saturday.
Bogalay residents said that some of the townspeople went to Rangoon in order to see Suu Kyi on Nov. 12, the day before she was released, and several thousand gathered outside her house from places as far away as Mandalay, 400 miles [640 kilometers] to the north, when she was freed on Nov. 13. Their only aim was to cheer her and support her.
Than Zaw, a Burmese migrant worker in Bangkok, said many migrant workers were delighted and cheered at the news of Suu Kyi's release.
“We hope that she can do better for the country and there will be more improvements,” said.Than Zaw, one of an estimated 2 million Burmese migrants work in Thailand.
“We are willing to return and work in Burma if the economic system in Burma improves,” he said.
In an interview with the BBC, Suu Kyi said the people of Burma want a better life, security and freedom and since her release Suu Kyi has vowed to listen to the voice of the Burmese people and work with all democratic forces.
Ko Kyaw said that if Suu Kyi had not been under house arrest when Cyclone Nargis hit Burma in May 2008, she might have been able to channel significantly more humanitarian aid and relief supplies from the international community freely into the hands of affected civilians.
Bogalay was in one of the hardest-hit areas by Cyclone Nargis, which left more than 130,000 people dead and affected around two million lives. The Burmese government did not permit the immediate entry of international humanitarian aid in the wake of the cyclone.
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| Junta Leaders Look Grim After Suu Kyi’s Release |
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Are Burma's top generals having second thoughts about releasing pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi on Saturday?
That's the impression that many Burmese are getting from the latest image of junta supremo Snr-Gen Than Shwe and his deputy, Vice Snr-Gen Maung Aye, to appear in the state-run press.
The picture—the first to be published since Suu Kyi was freed on Saturday—shows the two men seeing off Prime Minister Thein Sein at Naypyidaw airport on Monday, as Thein Sein departed to attend a pair of regional conferences in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
All three men look tense, in contrast to photos from just a few weeks ago, when the generals appeared more relaxed and confident, according to local observers.
“When Than Shwe welcomed the prime minster back from the Asean Summit in Hanoi on Oct. 31, he looked quite comfortable, and Maung Aye even smiled,” said one Burmese observer in Rangoon who spoke on condition of anonymity.
At the time, the generals were just one week away from holding an election that they seemed quite confident of winning. However, the subsequent round of international condemnation of the polls, which allegedly involved widespread vote-rigging, has probably made them less self-assured.
But it is Suu Kyi's release, and the jubilant reaction that it has unleashed among ordinary Burmese and in the international community, that has probably done the most to increase their uneasiness.
Tens of thousands of cheering people turned out on Saturday evening to see Suu Kyi and listen to her first words in public since she was placed under house arrest in 2003. The crowds were even larger the next day, when she went to the Rangoon headquarters of her National League for Democracy (NLD).
According to Burmese military intelligence sources, however, the regime was not unprepared for the sudden upsurge in activity among pro-democracy forces and their supporters. The sources said that authorities in Naypyidaw and Rangoon have been ordered to monitor Suu Kyi’s activities since she was released.
In Rangoon, Maj-Gen Tin Ngwe, the chief of Bureau of Special Operations-5, Maj-Gen Kyaw Swe, the chief of Military Affairs Security, and Brig-Gen Tun Than, the commander of Rangoon Regional Military Command, are reportedly in charge of keeping an eye on Suu Kyi and the opposition.
However, Rangoon mayor Aung Thein Lin of the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) and police chief Brig-Gen Khin Yi have also reportedly been assigned to keep an eye on the opposition’s activities in the wake of Suu Kyi's release.
The sources added, however, that doing Suu Kyi's surveillance detail has presented a bit of a dilemma for the security officers in charge. In all of her public appearances, Suu Kyi has been surrounded by massive crowds of supporters, presenting a spectacle that could only make the top generals wonder if it was a mistake to let her go free.
“All the photos in front of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s house and at the NLD headquarters showed thousands of people, so it was quite difficult to send them to Naypyidaw,” said an intelligence official in Rangoon.
Whatever their misgivings, Suu Kyi made an effort on Tuesday to assure the generals that she was not their enemy.
“I don't want to see the military falling. I want to see the military rising to dignified heights of professionalism and true patriotism,” she told the BBC in an interview.
Although Suu Kyi's release has received considerable attention in the international and Burmese exiled media and on the websites of private journals in Rangoon, the state-run media has been almost completely silent, apart from one brief report on Sunday.
Private journals in Rangoon have complained that some reports about Suu Kyi for their print editions have already been banned by the regime's draconian censorship board, resulting in delays in publication.
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| Shan rebel leader concerned about The Lady’s security |
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Lt-Gen Yawd Serk, leader of the anti-Naypyitaw Shan State Army (SSA) ‘South’, in response to Burma’s pro-democracy Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s call for “a second Panglong conference”, says he is still worried about her security and whether she will be able to hold the “21st century Panglong conference” because she will be under 24-hour surveillance by the ruling military junta.
“Her release doesn’t mean she can do everything she wants. It has limitations. So I am not sure whether she can move around freely or not because she will be followed by the ruling military either directly or indirectly,” Yawd Serk said.
Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, at the public gathering held yesterday, said that she is willing to call a 21st century “Panglong Conference” as mentioned earlier in 1989.
“I am therefore concerned how much she will be able to work for the ethnic peoples,” he said.
Nevertheless, Yawd Serk urged all people from Burma including ethnic nationalities to protect Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and continue supporting her because she is the only one who can lead the way in the implementation of the Panglong Agreement, which was signed between her father Aung San, who represented the Burmans, and leaders of Shans, Kachins and Chins in 1947.
“The root cause of the political problems in Burma is that the Panglong Agreement has been neglected and violated by the military junta. The problems between the ethnic groups and the Burmese Army will never come to an end if the Agreement is still ignored,” said Lt-Gen Yawd Serk.
“But to implement it, only Daw Aung San Suu Kyi can play the central role. Without Suu Kyi, nobody is going to believe the junta.”
The Panglong Agreement promises “Full autonomy in internal administration” and “rights and privileges which are fundamental in democratic countries.”
According to him, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi also needs to promote participation of the ethnic nationalities to build a genuine union. “Without ethnic participation, it will be difficult to resolve the problems of Burma.”
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| Canada renews sanctions on Burma following Su Kyi's release |
| Sunday, 14 November 2010 |
OTTAWA, (Xinhua) -- Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said on Saturday that Canada will continue to keep sanctions against Burma even Aung San Suu Kyi was released from house arrest the same day.
"I am pleased that Aung San Suu Kyi has finally been released from house arrest in Burma," Harper said in a statement."Those sanctions will remain in place."
Harper, who is in Yokohama, Japan for the APEC summit, said that Canada stands resolutely with Burma's democratic forces and like-minded members of the international community in the quest to restore civilian government to the Burmese people.
"We continue to call on the Burmese authorities to release all political prisoners and allow the meaningful political participation of all Burma's opposition and ethnic groups," he added.
Suu Kyi, who has spent 15 of the past 21 years in detention without trial, was freed by the government of Burma after her latest 7? years term of house arrest expired and after a general election was held in Burma.
In December, 2007, Canada granted Suu Kyi honorary Canadian citizenship and imposed the tough sanctions against Burma to " indicate its condemnation of the regime's complete disregard for human rights and its repression of the country's democratic movement."
Measures of the sanctions include a ban on all goods imported from Burma into Canada and exported from Canada to Burma, excepting only the export of humanitarian goods; a freeze on assets in Canada of any designated Burmese nationals connected with the Burmese State; a ban on new investment in Burma by Canadian persons and companies.
They also cover a prohibition on the provision of Canadian financial services to and from Burma; a prohibition on the export of any technical data to Burma; a prohibition on Canadian- registered ships or aircraft from docking or landing in Burma; a prohibition on Burmese-registered ships or aircraft from docking or landing in Canada and passing through Canada.
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| Nasaka agents monopolize river transport |
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Maungdaw, Arakan State: Two agents of Burma’s border security force (Nasaka) have taken control of Maungdaw’s border river transport, according to a trader who asked not to be named.
“In Maungdaw, we have a boat owner’s association, which supervises how members operate their boats in the public transport sector,” said an official of the organization.
“Boats travel from Maungdaw along the river to villages including Ngakura, Mingalagyi Kyein Chaung, Taungbro, and others, and they go one by one each day. But the main income route is from Maungdaw to Teknaf,” the official said.
“That route is now controlled by two agents of Nasaka.”
“We have to pay 100 taka for a one-way trip from Teknaf to Maungdaw on a Bangladeshi boat, but the Burmese boat charges 4,500 kyats one way (more than 300 taka),” said Anu Meah, a trader from Teknaf.
A traveller en route to Bangladesh for medical treatment complained that the boats operated by the two Nasaka agents leave from Maungdaw too late to make it convenient for passengers to continue travelling to Chittagong, adding that alternate boats were more expensive.
“If we want to travel on a Bangladeshi boat, we have to pay more money, 150 taka, to pass and get permission from authorities, but we will arrive early enough to continue on to Chittigong.”
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| Heroin traffickers elected in Burma |
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Mae Sot, Thailand: Six successful candidates backed by the junta in Burma’s controversial elections last weekend were heavily involved in drug trafficking, a crime expert says.Of the six, Liu Guoxi, 75, had the most senior role: managing drug profits with the knowledge of the military junta, said Bertil Lintner, an expert on transnational crime in south-east Asia.
”He was running heroin for years and years for the Kokang,” said Mr Lintner, the author of Brothers: The Criminal Underworld of Asia. ”Liu was a sort of accountant – it was his job to look after funds from the drug business.”
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The Kokang are a largely ethnic Chinese group in northern Burma. Last year the Burmese government attacked Kokang leaders, accusing them of drug running. Peng Jiasheng, the Kokang leader at the time, fled across the border into southern China, seeking refugee status.
”Basically, the Burmese government – while [Peng] supported them – didn’t have any problem with him running heroin,” Mr Lintner said. ”But when he refused to join a proposed Border Guard Force to incorporate various ethnic militias, the Burmese government turned against him.
”It was only then that they called him a drug trafficker.”
After last Sunday’s elections, the issue of the Border Guard Force – opposed by ethnic minority nationalists – has become a highly charged factor in sparking armed clashes along the Thai border with ethnic Karen forces.
This comes as Thai law enforcement agencies warn of an increasing flow of methamphetamines from ethnic armies in Burma seeking to raise money to buy weapons.
Mr Lintner said yesterday that while opium is no longer grown around Kokang, heroin production continues with poppies acquired elsewhere.
Liu Guoxi was described in the 1990s, in an article in the respected magazine Far Eastern Economic Review, as a drug kingpin. Last year he was made the deputy to Bai Xuoqian, who became Kokang leader after Peng Jiasheng was overthrown.
Security experts on the border said people with drug connections had been elected to some of the 14 regional parliaments, as well as to the national parliament.
The ethnic nationalist Shan Herald website named six people involved in drugs who were elected to the Shan State North legislature, in an area notorious for the drug trade.
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| UN refugee agency signals more fighting in Myanmar |
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Geneva — The UN refugee agency said on Friday that most of the 15,000 people who fled from Myanmar earlier this week have returned from Thailand despite renewed post-election fighting near the border.
A spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Adrian Edwards said fighting reportedly erupted again overnight after the Thai army cleared their return, with the potential for more clashes around the Myanmar villages of Maekata and Halokani.
“As of today most of the 15,000 Myanmar refugees who fled into Thailand earlier this week have returned across the border,” Edwards told journalists.
Sites in northern Thailand’s Tak province emptied by Wednesday while all 3,000 refugees further south in Sanghklaburi had disappeared by early Friday, he added.
“In the light of the confused situation and the risks to safety, UNHCR is advocating with the Royal Thai government that refugees be given further time before being encouraged to return home,” Edwards said.
UN human rights experts on Friday expressed concern about the impact of the earlier fighting and reiterated calls for the release of “over 2,200 prisoners of conscience” including jailed opposition leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.
“The elections were billed as one of the final elements of the so-called seven-step roadmap to democracy,” the four experts said in a joint statement.
“However, the renewed clashes and resulting humanitarian crisis as civilians fled to a neighbouring State highlight the many unresolved challenges that Myanmar faces,” they added in a statement.
“True democratic transition will require genuine dialogue with all stakeholders including Aung San Suu Kyi, and the various ethnic minorities that were excluded from the electoral process.”
The statement was made by the Special Rapporteurs on human rights in Myanmar, Tomas Ojea Quintana, on the right to freedom of opinion, Frank La Rue, on human rights defenders, Margaret Sekaggyawas, and the chairman of the working group on arbitrary detention, El-Hadji Malick Sow.
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| SWAN denounces Burma Army build-up and rape in central Shan State |
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Shan Women's Action Network
SWAN strongly denounces the Burma Army build-up around the Shan ceasefire area in Ke See township, central Shan State, which led to the rape of a young disabled woman on the eve of the November 7 election.
Since November 3, more than 1,000 new troops have been deployed from other parts of Shan State to areas adjacent to territory of the Shan State Army-North (SSA-N) First Brigade. These troops have been conducting patrols and hunting out villagers suspected of supporting the SSA-N 1st Brigade, which refused to become a Border Guard Force under the Burma Army.
On November 6, a fully armed 10-man patrol from Mong Nawng-based LIB 286, led by Major Win Zaw Latt, searched the village of Wan Nawng New, about five miles north of Mong Nawng. One of the troops raped a 25-year-old disabled woman who was alone in her house with her two-year-old niece.
The soldier tied up the woman’s hands and feet, and then bound her hair to one of the house posts before raping her. Neighbours heard her screams but did not dare come to her aid until after the patrol had left the village. No one dared complain about the crime, and the woman herself has fled the village in fear of repercussions.
SWAN is gravely concerned at the fate of this woman, and of other civilians in this area, who are being deliberately targeted under this new military campaign against the SSA-N.
SWAN has repeatedly documented the systematic use of sexual violence by the Burma Army, and is appalled that even just before the election, when the eyes of the entire world were on Burma, troops dared openly commit rape. This is a clear sign that the impunity enjoyed by the Burma Army for sexual violence is set to continue.
“We strongly urge the international community not to recognize the Burmese generals’ new proxy government,” said SWAN spokesperson Nang Moan Kaein. “It is tantamount to legitimizing the Burma Army’s crimes, and will condemn women in Burma to continued systematic sexual violence.” |
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| Suu Kyi Still Burmese Idol |
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Burma’s pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s popularity appears to be increasing in the wake of a general election widely rejected as a sham and her release from house arrest on Saturday after a total of 15 years and 20 days in detention out of the past 21 years and four months.
When she appeared above the wall of her guarded compound, at least 3,000 supporters had come out to her lakeside house in the hope of catching a glimpse of her. It was an iconic moment in Burma's history.
Members of her party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), and journalists who came to see her said more and more people were heading in the direction of her house as word spread that she was to be released. Observers said more Suu Kyi supporters turned out on Saturday than on the occasions of her two previous releases, in 1995 and 2002.
“I was there when she was released in May 2002,” Yar Zar, an NLD youth member said. “There weren't the number of people then that are here today. It's not only NLD members, but other people have come today as well.”
Suu Kyi, 65, was released at around 5 pm on Saturday while thousands of her supporters waited outside her house. Observers realized she was about to be released when three vehicles entered her compound and riot police began dismantling the barbed wire from around her compound. Then, executive members of the NLD went into the compound.
A few minutes later, the riot police withdrew and thousands of her supporters ran toward the gate to await their leader.
“I have been waiting for this day for seven years,” said one supporter. “I am so happy that she is now freed. She is like my mother. She is our mother.”
Suu Kyi’s latest term of detention term began back in May 2003 when her convoy was brutally ambushed by junta-backed thugs who were members of the Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA) which was transformed for the election into the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP).
Shortly after her release was confirmed, Suu Kyi greeted the crowd and gave her first public speech in years. “We must work together to achieve our goal,” she began. “We have not seen each other for so long. We have so much to talk about,” she added. “Come to the office [of the NLD] tomorrow at 12:00 pm,” she concluded after a few minutes.
This evening, she is expected to meet with party leaders and then to meet with foreign diplomats at the lakeside home, said NLD sources. One of the NLD's leaders, Ohn Kyaing, said earlier the party had been organizing for her release since Friday.
NLD sources also said Suu Kyi will visit party secretary U Lwin at his home on Saturday evening as his wife passed away on Friday.
Even after she went back into her house, the crowd waited, others turned up, and people cheered.
“She is the Burmese people’s leader. She is our leader. I am also glad to know she has been released this afternoon,” said Khin Maung Swe, a leader of the National Democratic Force, the splinter group of the NLD. He added that the junta released Suu Kyi only after they manipulated the election.
A day before Suu Kyi’s release, Burma's state-run media reported that the USDP had won the Nov. 7 election.
Representatives of several ethnic armed groups, such as the United Wa State Army and the Kachin Independence Organization, said they welcomed Suu Kyi’s release and hoped she would play a significant role for ethnic minorities' rights in the country.
Ironically, even military sources in Naypyidaw and Rangoon expressed delight that the Nobel laureate was finally free.
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| Brigade 5 Cease-fire Talks Break Down |
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MAE SOT, Thailand — Cease-fire talks between leaders of the armed ethnic splinter group, Democratic Karen Buddhist Army Brigade 5, and Burmese army commanders broke down on Thursday afternoon.
The commander of the DKBA Brigade 5, Col. Saw Lah Pwe, said that he had withdrawn from talks under Thai army mediation and requested Burmese army commanders not to reinforce their units to Myawaddy and Three Pagodas Pass. He also said he ordered his troops to maintain the cease-fire, but said that he had instructed them to open fire if government forces attacked them first.
A minor exchange of gunfire had broken out earlier on Thursday morning in Three Pagodas Pass in southern Karen State, said DKBA sources.
“The Thai authorities want to see an end to the fighting,” said Maj. Cha Mu Say of Brigade 5. “They want a stable border and that's why they initiated cease-fire talks.”
Sources said that Thai authorities may also be unhappy with the clash as it totally shut down border trade on Monday and Tuesday.
Thai officials said that the conflict could reduce the value of trade at the key crossing to between 20 billion and 24 billion baht this year from an earlier projection of 30 billion, according to The Bangkok Post.
Trade was totally halted since the weekend when the fighting broke out in Myawaddy. However, a border closure had, in fact, limited trade since July.
Banpot Kokiatcharoen, the chairman the of Tak Chamber of Commerce, told The Bangkok Post that the Mae Sot-Myawaddy crossing was a significant source for transporting Thai consumer goods into Burma.
Markets, restaurants, shops and stalls began reopening on Wednesday around the Thai-Burmese Friendship Bridge connecting Myawaddy and Mae Sot after refugees began returning home to Myawaddy.
DKBA sources said that the conflict could reignite at any time.
DKBA Brigade 5 troops has pulled its troops out of Three Pagodas Pass and Myawaddy, and are now positioned around the two towns.
Government troops have reinforced and taken control over Myawaddy while several battalions under Light Infantry Battalion 22 were sent to Three Pagodas Pass to stabilize the situation, said sources close to the Burmese police.
Some observers said the Monday clash was based on border trade, but others pointed to the ongoing border guard force (BGF) issue. The DKBA's Brigade 5 is the the only DKBA unit to reject the junta’s BGF order.
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| Junta Expels Documentary Film Makers |
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Two Australian journalists making a documentary for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) in Burma have been arrested and deported, according to ABC news.
The journalists were making a film about independent media in Southeast Asian countries and had focused on the Rangoon-based Myanmar Times and its Australian editor, Ross Dunkley.
The journalists had long-stays visas for Burma but they were arrested and deported at the wish of the Burmese authorities, the ABC said.
Filmaker Hugh Piper, who was deported on Thursday night along with producer Helen Barrow, told reporters in Bangkok that he first learned of the deportation order when visiting the office of the Myanmar Times.
“There were a couple of guys inside the Myanmar Times newspaper who liaise with the government and they said 'you need to now return to your hotel where you'll be met by various officials from the immigration department who are going to escort you to the airport and expel you,'” Piper said.
Piper, who is now in Bangkok, said they were deported from Burma because of the sensitivity over foreign reporting on the country's election.
Speaking to the Irrawaddy on Friday, a Rangoon-based journalist said: “I’ve heard that the Australian crews were reporting on the election, which is why they have been deported. Every foreign journalist is tracked by intelligence officials, so the authorities know everything they have done.”
A Japanese journalist, Mr. Toru Yamaji who sneaked into Myawaddy on the Thai-Burmese border on election day was arrested by the authorities on Nov. 7 and deported on Nov. 9.
According to the ‘Press Freedom Index 2010’ published by Reporters Without Borders, an organization which fights for press freedoms around the world, Burma is one of the five worst countries suffering from restrictions on the freedom of press.
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| Ethnic Conflict Spreads to Shan State |
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The cease-fire in Shan State between the Shan State Army-North (SSA-North) and the Burmese army has been broken after a series of clashes in Mong Hsnu Township in southern Shan State.
SSA-North officials have told The Irrawaddy that the armed Shan cease-fire group has fought a series of skirmishes with Burmese Infantry Battalion 33 in the area, the latest being a two-hour skirmish on Thursday evening.
“The Burmese troops broke the cease-fire,” said an SSA-North Brigade No. 1 official on condition of anonymity. “Fifty soldiers from the Tatmadaw [Burmese army] sneaked up and attacked us.”
A villager in Mong Hsnu said that the fighting started five days ago and that troops from the SSA-North had passed through his village.
SSA-North Brigade No. 1 is based in Kehsi Township in southern Shan State. Brigade No. 3 is based in Mongyai Township in northern Shan State, and Brigade No. 7 is based in Hsipaw Township, which is also in the northern part of the state.
Saengjuen Sarawin, an editor with the Shan Herald Agency for News, told The Irrawaddy on Friday that the Tatmadaw had been passing down instructions to their troops to launch attacks on the SSA-North since Sept. 1.
“What I think is that this clash is not an offensive action by the Tatmadaw, but a military strategy to seal the way out of southern State State,” he said.
The SSA-North signed a cease-fire agreement with the Burmese regime in 1989. The original agreement allowed the Shan militia to retain arms and granted them several business concessions, particularly in logging and tax collection.
Last year, however, Burmese commanders began pressuring all the ethnic cease-fire groups to transform their battalions into border guard forces (BGFs); their latest deadline for the SSA-North expired on April 22.
Sources have said that the SSA-North is likely to split into two factions due to a disagreement over whether to join the military regime's BGF plan.
An SSA-North official emphasized that they expect more hostilities in the area and that they are ready to respond to any attack.
“The Burmese government forces have reinforced to about 1,000 soldiers in the region,” he said. “Tensions are high.”
He pointed out that local people were cut off from fleeing to the Thai border and that villagers could face ill-treatment and torture at the hands of the Tatmadaw.
The Burmese regime signed cease-fire agreements with several ethnic groups over the past 21 years—including the SSA-North, the United Wa State Army, the Kachin Independence Organization, the Kokang army (officially called the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army), and the Mongla-based National Democratic Alliance Army.
However, since the regime tried to implement a BGF plan in eastern Burma, tensions have mounted and the ethnic armies have formed alliances against the Tatmadaw.
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| Government Troops Secure Myawaddy |
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A joint force of Burmese government forces and a newly formed border guard force (BGF) unit have begun conducting door-to-door searches of houses belonging to members of the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) Brigade 5 in Myawaddy on Saturday, seizing arms and anything deemed suspicious, according to DKBA Brigade 5 sources.
“They searched every known house of Brigade 5 soldiers, including mine,”said Maj. Cha Mu Say. “They seized all arms and equipment, including any uniforms they found.”
“The government soldiers were also looking for members of Brigade 5,” said a source close to the Burmese police in Myawaddy. “They heard that a few Brigade 5 soldiers are still hiding in the town.”
The sources said that Burmese soldiers and the BGF unit, which is composed of former DKBA soldiers, were securing the town in preparation for another assault by Brigade 5, which has an estimated troop strength of some 1,000 men.
Brigade 5 is led by Col. Saw Lah Pwe, and it is the only DKBA brigade that has rejected the Burmese junta's BGF plan. On Sunday, the day of the country's first general election in 20 years, the splinter group seized key positions in the border town of Myawaddy. In the days that followed, a series of clashes between Brigade 5 and Burmese government troops saw some 20,000 local residents fleeing across the border to Thailand to escape the fighting. Most have now returned home.
On Wednesday, government troops burnt down houses belong to Brigade 5 members, including a house belonging to Saw Lah Pwe, which reportedly served as the Brigade 5 headquarters and was located on a hilltop opposite Thailand's Amphur Phop Phra in Tak Province.
Sources in Mae Sot said that Lt-Col Saw Kyaw Thet—who leads Brigade 5's Battalion 902—plans to launch a fresh assault on government positions in Myawaddy.
Over the past week, separate clashes have also broken out in Three Pagodas Pass and Kyarinseikyi in southern Karen State. Brigade 5 troops say they captured Burmese Capt Thet Naing during the fighting, but later released him.
Several battalions from Burma's Light Infantry Division 22 have been sent to Three Pagodas Pass as reinforcements and to secure the town.
DKBA Brigade 5 sources said its leaders ordered them to cease hostilities and observe a cease-fire on Friday and Saturday; however, expectations are high that conflict will resume.
Tension between Saw Lah Pwe' unit and the Burmese authorities has been mounting since Brigade 5 rejected the order to transform its battalions into BGF units under Burmese army command in April 2009.
Other major ethnic cease-fire groups, including the United Wa State Army and the Kachin Independence Organization, have also rejected the BGF order and preparations for conflict are currently underway.
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| Burmese and Shan troops face off in fresh battle |
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Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – Fresh armed clashes broke out on Thursday between Shan troops and the Burmese Army near Wan Hai, Kesi Township, in northern Shan State, according to a Shan source.
The firefight kicked off when a unit of the Light Infantry Division (LID) 33 ran into a patrol from Battalion 24 of the Shan State Army-North (SSA-N) in the early evening. The battle lasted for 45 minutes from around 5.15 p.m., but details of the casualties on both sides were unavailable at the time of reporting.
The incident occurred at Kunkieng-Wanlwe, three miles (around five kilometres) west of Wanhsaw, a village near Wanhai, the SSA-N’s main base, the Shan Herald Agency for News reported.
According to the source: “Burmese troops are encroaching on our territory and the shooting took place in the jungle, not on the highway, because we put our security men there.”
Meanwhile, Burmese troops from Kunhing and Mongnawng townships in southern Shan State and Namlan and Hsipaw townships in northern Shan State reportedly moved forces troops into the Wanhai area, controlled by SSA-N Brigade 1 at Kesi Township, the source said.
Around 1,500 to 2,000 Burmese troops were already in the area, he said. The deployed Burmese troops were avoiding highways or well-travelled paths, change in tactics, making their way through the jungle to set up bases on mountains. This was carried out in the apparent belief of gaining a tactical advantage against the opposing ethnic groups.
The source added, LID 33 had already passed through the first checkpoint of the SSA-N and were about to enter the second before reaching to the main base of the SSA-N, when SSA-N troops confronted them and the clashes started.
SSA-S (non-ceasefire group) spokesman Sao Lao Hseng said: “The purpose of sending reinforcements against the 1st Brigade of the SSA-N is to cut off the communication lines between the SSA-N and outsiders, typically from the United Wa State Army (UWSA). It is to … block any outside assistance if fighting breaks out between the SSA-N and the Burmese troops.”
Tension between the ceasefire groups and Burmese troops has become explosive since ceasefire groups rejected being brought under Burmese Army command within the junta’s Border Guard Forces.
The frequency of clashes between SSA-N and Burmese troops has risen greatly since September, when Burmese troops launched the first of three attacks on the group.
Recently however the SSA-N had formed a military alliance with five other ethnic armed opposition groups in Chiang Mai, Thailand last week. The alliance comprises the Kachin Independence Organisation, New Mon State Party, and Shan State Army North (SSA-N); and non-ceasefire groups, the Karen National Union, the Karenni National Progressive Party and the Chin National Front.
The formation of the alliance was aimed at assisting each other if a member group was attacked by the Burmese Army.
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| One down and 2,199 other prisoners to go |
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Aung San Suu Kyi has been freed, but Human Rights Watch estimates that 2,200 people continue to languish in Burmese prisons.
The figure has more than doubled since the 2007 anti-government protests and 350 political activists have been jailed since October 2008.
Among those currently imprisoned by the Burmese junta are:
- Labour activist Ma Su Su Nway, who was arrested on Nov 13, 2007, while attempting to put up an anti-government poster. A year later, she was sentenced to 12 years and six months, later commuted to eight years and four months. She is serving her sentence in the remote Kale Prison, 680km from Rangoon.
- U Gambari, one of the monks who led the September 2007 ''Saffron Revolution'' protests. The regime sentenced U Gambari to 68 years in jail, 12 to be served as hard labour.
- Min Ko Naing, a leader of the 1988 student uprising and chair of the All Burma Federation of Student Unions and a believer in non-violent civil disobedience protests against military rule. After a series of court hearings, he was sentenced on Nov 11, 2008, to 65 years in jail.
- Zargana is the stage name of U Thura, Burma's most famous comedian. After the devastation of Cyclone Nargis in 2008, Zargana organised aid deliveries to people in 42 villages. He received threats from the military to stop. He was arrested on June 4, 2008 and sen tenced to 59 years' imprisonment, later reduced to 35. He is serving his sentence in a one square metre cell in the remote Myitkyina Prison in Kachin state in northern Burma.
- Nilar Thein was a high school student when she first took to the streets in 1988 to protest for political change in Burma. She was jailed for two months in 1991.
In 1996, she was arrested again for protesting against the government and jailed for nine years. Despite the harsh jail terms, she refused to stop protesting for change. In August 2007, she marched with her husband, Kyaw Min Yu, to protest high fuel costs. Her husband was arrested on Aug 21, 2007. After avoiding arrest for a year, Nilar Thein was captured on Sept 10, 2008. On Nov 11, 2008, she and 13 other political activists, including her husband, were sentenced to 65 years in jail.
Burma has 44 prisons and at least 50 labour camps, depending on the regime's infrastructure projects. Many of the jails do not have hospitals, and at least 12 of them do not have a doctor.
The regime jails political prisoners in remote areas to obstruct family members from visiting and delivering food and medicine.
Human rights groups working to free the prisoners say those arrested are rarely charged. They are held, interrogated and tortured for days or months without access to lawyers or family in secret detention centres, jails or police cells. When prisoners are finally taken to court, it is usually behind closed doors or locked prison gates without legal representation.
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| Junta offers reward for capture of Karen army leader, dead or alive |
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TAK: The Burmese government is offering a cash reward for information leading to the arrest of Col Na Kaw Muay, leader of the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA).
A military source from the Thai-Burmese border in Tak's Phop Phra district said the Burmese intelligence agency has offered a reward worth millions of kyat (1 kyat equals about 4.6 baht) for information leading to the capture, dead or alive, of Col Na Kaw Muay.
The Burmese military-led government has branded him a rebel and a criminal for instigating unrest and leading the recent attack on Myawaddy, the source said.
The Burmese government said the DKBA's actions have also affected Thai-Burmese ties as shells landed on Thai soil during the fighting between Burmese troops and Karen rebels, the source said.
The source said the DKBA has just revamped its structure and promoted Col Na Kaw Muay to the rank of major general.
Under the DKBA's structure, three new units in charge of tactical operations have been set up with a total of 10 battalions of troops.
Each unit has a commander holding the rank of colonel.
The first unit comprising three battalions covers areas opposite Kanchanaburi's Sangkhla Buri district. The second unit of three battalions will operate in areas bordering Phop Phra and Mae Sot districts of Tak.
The third unit, with four battalions, is responsible for patrols, guerrilla tactics and sabotage operations. It will operate in southern areas in Myawaddy and near Myawaddy's special economic zone and in Kawkareik.
Burmese troops yesterday raided the homes of relatives of DKBA soldiers led by Col Na Kaw Muay on the banks of the Moei River in Myawaddy, military sources said. At least 20 various firearms and a lot of ammunition were seized.
Meanwhile, the border situation in Mae Sot and Phop Phra districts of Tak was calm yesterday.
Tight security was in place at a camp in Tha Song Yang district of Tak sheltering Burmese civilians, mostly Karen, fleeing the fighting between Karen rebels and Burmese government forces.
Entry into and departure from the camp has been strictly controlled to ensure it will not be used as a base to stir unrest in Burma.
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| Nobel committee invites Suu Kyi to Oslo |
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Oslo, Nov 14 (DPA) Norway's Nobel committee Saturday invited Aung San Suu Kyi to Oslo to make a belated acceptance speech for the peace prize she won 19 years ago but did not pick up.
The Myanmar opposition icon was honoured in 1991 for her non-violent struggle for democracy and human rights, but was unable to travel to Scandinavia because she was under house arrest.
She also feared she would not be allowed to return to Myanmar, and asked her husband, who has since died, to accept the prize on her behalf.
The head of the Nobel committee, Thorbjrn Jagland, said he would seek a guarantee from the government in Yangon that Suu Kyi would be allowed back if she visited Oslo.
'I don't believe she would leave the country without first obtaining such a guarantee, Jagland told the Norwegian news agency NTB.
Her release Saturday after a decade-and-a-half of house arrest was good news for political prisoners all over the world, he said.
This year's peace prize was warded to Liu Xiaobo, who is serving an 11-year prison term in his native China for his commitment to democracy.
The Norwegian committee believes neither Liu nor his wife Liu Xia will be allowed to travel to Norway for the award ceremony Dec 10.
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| Aung San Suu Kyi Release Sparks Celebration, Caution |
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Aung San Suu Kyi's release from house arrest in Burma, also known as Myanmar, has sparked worldwide celebrations among supporters of the long-time pro-democracy activist. But her supporters are also cautious in noting the daughter of Burma's assassinated independence leader, Aung San, has been previously released before being detained again.
Members of the Burmese community in France as well as supporters of Aung San Suu Kyi immediately took to the streets to display their relief.
Mireille Boisson was among the protesters in Paris. "As you can guess, it can only be joy right now. It can only be joy for all of us who have been fighting for so long, for her, for the Burmese population who support her, we are really full of joy. But at the same time we are very cautious. I mean, we rejoice now in the moment and we want her to be safe and we ask the Burmese authorities to guarantee her safety," she said.
In Washington, a lawyer who tries to assist some of the hundreds of pro-democracy Burmese activists who are in jail, Jared Gensler also expressed caution about Aung San Suu Kyi's release. "She has been out three times before and nothing has changed in the country. In fact, in recent years, there has not been any indication from the military regime that it intends to compromise in any way whatsoever by engaging in any sort of dialogue with her," he said.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton released a statement saying she joined billions of people around the world who are welcoming the release of the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate.
The statement also called on Burma's military leaders to make her release unconditional so she can travel and take part in politics without restriction.
The 65-year-old Aung San Suu Kyi, who led the National League for Democracy to the most votes in 1990 elections which were then ignored, has been under house arrest for most of the past 20 years.
Her release Saturday from her home in Rangoon comes after November elections in which the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party won in a landslide, but opposition parties who decided to compete were able to gain some seats in parliament and in local legislative assemblies.
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| Japanese Reporter Recalls Arrest in Myawaddy |
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TOKYO — A Japanese journalist arrested in Burma while trying to cover its elections says he was locked up in a room that looked like a pigpen, but shed tears of joy when fellow inmates thanked him for coming to report on the country.
Toru Yamaji, 49, a reporter with the Tokyo-based APF news agency, also said he heard shots fired in skirmishes between ethnic rebels and Burmese government troops during his three days of detention.
Yamaji was detained Sunday on the eastern border of the military-ruled country, and freed Tuesday. A Japanese diplomat quoted Burmese officials as saying he was freed because of the "mutual friendly relations between the two countries."
Foreign reporters were not granted visas to cover the Nov. 7 election in Burma, which has been widely seen as rigged to favor the ruling junta's proxy party.
Yamaji said he had barely entered the country for an hour when he was surrounded by four men who said they were secret police and took him to a police station near the border.
"I was in a solitary room in what looked like a pigpen covered with bars," Yamaji said in a statement released by APF.
Inmates in a nearby cell were political prisoners, including a pro-democracy activist who had been imprisoned since 1995, and they thanked him for doing journalistic work that could help their cause, according to Yamaji.
"I was so happy I cried," he said.
The military, which has ruled Burma since 1962, continues to hold some 2,200 political prisoners, including pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
Yamaji said officers threatened to keep him for five or seven years. Skirmishes broke out between ethnic rebels and government troops, and shots were fired into his building, filling him with fear, he recalled.
But Yamaji said he had no regrets because during the hour in the border city of Myawaddy before he was detained he was able to see for himself that voter turnout was low, despite contrary claims by the government. Very few people were entering voting booths while crowds thronged the streets, he said.
Yamaji works for the same agency as Japanese video journalist Kenji Nagai, who was shot and killed in 2007 while covering a pro-democracy uprising in Rangoon.
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| Other Ethnic Militias May Join Battle |
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Additional battles may flare-up in and around Myawaddy and the Three Pagodas Pass area because other armed ethnic groups may come to assist the breakaway Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) Brigade 5, led by Col Saw Lah Pwe, according to a military observer.
DKBA Brigade 5 took control of government buildings in the border town of Myawaddy on Sunday, then attacked government troops and burned government buildings in Three Pagodas Pass on Monday.
Since Monday morning, DKBA Brigade 5 troops have been engaged in armed conflict with Burmese government troops and, in the case of Myawaddy, DKBA Brigade 999 troops who have joined the junta's border guard force (BGF).
Burma's state-run television is now describing the DKBA Brigade 5 faction as “insurgents” belonging to the Karen National Union (KNU), the only non-ceasefire armed Karen rebel group.
“If the military government continues their attack, we cannot avoid fighting. We will cooperate and fight together,” said Maj Saw Hla Ngwe, the KNU's Joint-Secretary 1. “We didn’t divide territory by ethnic group within this area. Every group is working based on an understanding [we have with each other]. So we have to prepare for war.”
Government troops retook major areas of Myawaddy on Monday afternoon and the town is currently quiet. But fighting has continued in the Three Pagodas Pass area and junta troops also seized and burnt down the DKBA Brigade 5 headquarters based on a Burmese hill located opposite Thailand's Amphoe Phop Phra, Tak Province, and forced the ethnic militia to abandon its base.
Fighting is expected to increase if junta troops continue to attack DKBA Brigade 5 in the Three Pagodas Pass area because, in addition to the KNU, the Karen Peace Force, led by Col Thu Mu Heh, and the New Mon State Party armed ethnic group are both based in the area and may join in the fight.
According to a report by the Associated Press, Nataphon Wichienprerd, governor of Thailand's Kanchanaburi province, said casualties in the fighting at Three Pagodas Pass included a 9-year-old Burmese girl shot by government soldiers who died in a Thai hospital, and a 13-year-old Burmese girl shot by Karen guerrillas who died on the spot.
Nataphon said about 3,500 refugees sheltered on Thai territory Tuesday night, with assistance provided by Thai and international organizations including the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. In addition, villagers who live near the Brigade 5 headquarters fled across the border to Thailand seeking temporary security when the headquarters were attacked.
Although most DKBA troops agreed to join the BGF earlier this year, Brigade 5 rejected the plan. Observers said the regime is now using propaganda to mislead people into believing that all DKBA troops have accepted the BGF plan.
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| Refugees Trickle Back to Mae Sot Amid Safety Concerns |
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MAE SOT, Thailand — Almost all of the thousands of people who fled the Burmese border town of Myawaddy on Monday have returned, but many still fear for their security following an outbreak of hostilities between Burmese troops and ethnic rebels earlier this week.
Thai authorities said that most of the estimated 20,000 refugees had been repatriated by Wednesday morning, after the their Burmese counterparts, led by Col Khin Maung Htay, assured them that the situation was under control.
However, it appears that while fears of renewed attacks by a breakaway faction of the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), which seized control of Myawaddy on Sunday, have abated, many residents of the town have returned to Thai side of the border to avoid being used as porters by the Burmese army.
“The town was silent when we went back this morning, but there were soldiers searching for explosive devices. Then we heard the soldiers wanted porters, so we come back to the Thai side,” said Han Sein (not his real name), a retire civil servant from Myawaddy, speaking to The Irrawaddy on the bank of the Moei River, which separates Thailand and Burma.
“I saw that some of the shops—particularly the phone shops—had been looted, but I have no idea who did it,” he said, adding that this was the worst incident he had experienced since moving to Myawaddy in 1992.
While many local residents have returned to the town to check their property, many others say they are still too worried about their personal safety to remain there.
“After I got back to my house, I cooked some rice. Then I saw that some people were running away to escape being recruited as porters, so I also came back to Thailand,” said Daw Yee, 74. “I am worried about my home, but right now, safety is my main concern.”
Many who have returned to the Thai side of the border have taken shelter in local monasteries or in houses near the river. Others are said to be hiding in the woods around the Thai border town of Mae Sot.
“I feel the situation in the town is still uncertain. That's why I decided to come to Thailand this morning,” said Ba Maung, 84, who was taken to the Mao Tao clinic in Mae Sot after he arrived on the Thai side. “I was at a monastery during the fighting on Monday.”
Thai soldiers at the Thai-Burmese Friendship Bridge between Mae Sot and Myawaddy said they could understand why the refugees were nervous. “The opposite side of the river is too quiet. It's not normal. Something could happen at anytime,” said one Thai sergeant at the bridge.
However, local authorities in Mae Sot are struggling to deal with the influx of thousands of refugees and are eager to see the situation return to normal as quickly as possible. Thai officials and NGO workers said there were only 13 toilets for about 20,000 refugees who arrived on Monday and Tuesday.
“I want to thank the Thai people and authorities,” said Daw Yee. “I understand that it is quite difficult to take care of thousands of refugees.”
According to international NGO workers and Thai officials who spoke to The Irrawaddy on condition of anonymity, Thai authorities have not been happy with the slow pace of the response to the crisis by international aid agencies, including the UNHCR, the UN's refugee agency.
“There was a meeting between Thai officials and aid agencies on Monday evening. Some arguments occurred then,” said a foreign NGO worker in Mae Sot.
Meanwhile, officials in Myawaddy said that a list had been made of all those who fled to Thailand during the incident. One official in the town said the order to make the list came from the Southeast Regional Military Command.
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| Election Reignites Ethnic Tensions |
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The seizure of two Burmese border towns by ethnic rebels is a significant move in the ethnic armed struggle of the past 20 years, and the latest attacks this week are a byproduct of the junta's controversial election on Sunday and are likely to spark other clashes.
On Sunday morning while Burma went to polls, troops of the 5th Brigade of the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) entered Myawaddy and seized government buildings in the town which borders Mae Sot, Thailand. The following morning, DKBA rebels seized another township, Three Pagodas Pass, opposite Sankgkhlaburi, Thailand.
“We heard that the Burmese military regime forced the residents of Myawaddy to vote. People didn't want to go, and we heard that the junta threatened them with guns. So, we deployed our troops in Myawaddy for security,” said Col Saw Lah Pwe, commander of the 5th Brigade.
“The election will not bring democracy to the people of Burma and equality for ethnic minorities. It is not real democracy. The regime only shed their skin,” the rebel fighter, known as Bo Mustache for his mustache, told The Irrawaddy in an interview hours after his troops seized the town.
Burma has had dozens of ethnic armed groups and at least 17 have signed cease-fire agreements after the current regime took power in 1988. But, other ethnic groups, including the Karen National Union (KNU) and Shan State Army (South), have continued to fight regime troops, demanding autonomy in their ethnic areas.
Troops of Col Saw Lah Pwe were part of the DKBA when it broke away from the KNU and signed a cease-fire agreement with the government in 1995. But last year, when the regime pushed all cease-fire groups to transform into a border guard force under the control of the government, Saw Lah Pwe's troops broke away from the DKBA, after it agreed to transform into a border guard force. The latest attacks by Saw Lah Pwe's troops are believed to have received support from the KNU.
The sham election on Sunday has reignited old war zones along the border. But it is even more alarming that the ongoing attacks in Karen State will probably spread to other ethnic areas. The worst scenario could lead to a full-fledged civil war.
Almost all major ethnic groups have had their own armies ever since Burma gained independence from Britain in 1948,
“This latest fighting is not a new development considering our country's history of decades-old armed ethnic strife,” said Dr. Manam Tuja, the former vice chairman of the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO), a cease-fire group based in northern Kachin State near the Chinese border.
“But I think this [current fighting] is a consequence of the government's border guard force plan and also of other domestic problems,” said Tuja, whose party, the Kachin State Progressive Party (KSPP), was not recognized by the junta's Union Election Commission to contest the election. It is believed that his party and two other Kachin parties were rejected because the KIO has resisted the border guard force order.
Though cease-fire agreements have been in place since the early 1990s, stability and peace has never been restored in many ethnic areas. Due to ongoing instability and sporadic clashes between ethnic groups and the government, as many as 150,000 ethnic refugees have sought shelter in at least nine refugee camps along Thailand's border for decades. Last year, government attacks on the ethnic Kokang army, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, on the China-Burma border, sent 37,000 Kokang-Chinese refugees fleeing to China. The clash was a result of the Kokang army's rejection of the junta's border guard force plan.
Ethnic and pro-democracy leaders, including detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, have shared an idea that a genuine dialogue between the military government and ethnic and opposition leaders could solve the problems of ethnic areas and lead to national reconciliation. The junta rejected the idea.
Last October, only two weeks before the election, a group of ethnic leaders and politicians who opposed the general election called for a second Panglong conference to establish a federal system that would allow equality and democracy in ethnic areas. The 1947 Panglong agreement, reached by the late national leader Aung San and ethnic leaders, led to the independence to Burma.
But such a conference is unlikely to be repeated in the foreseeable future. Whether Suu Kyi will be allowed to play a political role after her release from house arrest is unknown, and other ethnic leaders, including Shan leader Hkun Htun Oo, have served lengthy prison terms. The government has never allowed those leaders to sit at the same table to discuss the country's problems.
The election itself reignited ethnic tensions and the unfair results are highly likely to increase those tensions.
“Tension is high between the KIA [the military wing of the KIO] and the government,” Tuja told The Irrawaddy. “These issues have been resolved through military means for decades. More bloodshed will occur, since there is little chance of a peaceful solution to these issues.”
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| Escalation of civil war looms |
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Washington, DC – As fierce fighting broke out between the military regime and some ethnic forces in Karen state recently, the possibility of an escalation of civil war looms in ethnic minority areas. The U.S. Campaign for Burma (USCB) calls on the UN Security Council to take effective action to pressure the regime to pursue a peaceful solution through an all-inclusive political dialogue and the UN General Assembly to establish a Commission of Inquiry to investigate war crimes and crimes against humanity in Burma as a necessary preventative measure.“The situation in Burma is now on the verge of chaos as the military regime completed its sham elections on Sunday with an aim to install a permanent military dictatorship in the country under the disguise of a so-called civilian government”, says Aung Din, former political prisoner and Executive Director of USCB, based in Washington, DC. Widespread fraud, voter intimidation, cheating, and irregularities were reported throughout the country. It is clear that the authorities, election commission and the regime’s party the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) worked together to secure victories for their USDP candidates. While the ‘official’ election results have not been announced, USDP leaders already claimed that their party won over 80% of the contested seats, about 60% of the total. Combined with 25% of the seats which will be appointed by the Commander in Chief, the military and its proxy party the USDP will control over 85% of the seats in the Parliaments (both national and state/regional levels), and they will crush any voices from the so-called opposition MPs.
As expected, Burma will be under the continued military rule and escalating violence. Those political parties, who had believed that they could bring about change in the country by participating in the election, have begun to say that they would not recognize the elections’ results. The people of Burma who were forced to polling stations and whose votes were manipulated by the regime continue to challenge military rule. Ethnic minorities whose fundamental rights were denied by the regime’s constitution and election are attempting to protect their population from the regime’s abuses. On Election Day, a Karen armed group, called the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), which was allied with the regime in the past, attacked the regime’s troops in two important towns on the Thai-Burma border, “Myawaddy” and “Three Pagodas”, and seized these towns for two days. During the severe fighting, both sides used heavy artillery and forced tens of thousands of residents to flee to Thailand. Several bridges connecting these towns and other parts of Burma were destroyed by the DKBA soldiers, who attempted to block the regime’s troops marching toward the areas.
Other ethnic resistance groups, such as the Karen National Union (KNU), the New Mon State Party (NMSP) and the Karen Peace Council (KPC) also helped DKBA in fight the Burmese Army. Other powerful ethnic resistance armies operating on the China-Burma border, the Kachin Independence Army (KIA), the United Wa State Army (UWSA), and the Shan State Army (South) (SSA-South) are also putting their troops on alert and preparing to respond if they are attacked by the regime’s troops. They all have refused to participate in the elections and to put their troops under the direct command of the regime in the name of Border Guard Forces. They recently formed a military alliance.
“This is the time for members of the United Nations to adopt a resolution to establish a UN Commission of Inquiry to investigate war crimes and crimes against humanity in Burma during the ongoing UN General Assembly. This is essential and urgent to prevent further crimes perpetrated by the military regime as an escalation of civil war is almost unavoidable,” said Aung Din. “I also call on the UN Security Council to take effective action to demand the regime stop its violence against the people and start negotiations with democracy forces led by Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, and ethnic representatives for a peaceful solution in Burma,” Aung Din continues
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| Cyclone starves 86,000 of income |
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More than 86,000 are “without any hope of cash” in coastal areas of Arakan state nearly three weeks after cyclone Giri flattened houses and destroyed farmland.According to UN estimates, at least 16,187 hectares of rice paddy were destroyed when the cyclone slammed in Burma’s western coast on 22 October. Initial reports put the number of those affected at around 260,000, with more than 80,000 left homeless.
IRIN news agency quoted Sanaka Sanarasinha, deputy resident representative at the UN Development Programme (UNDP) in Burma, as saying that 40 to 50 percent of the area was no longer harvestable.
Rice is the staple crop in Burma and, despite witnessing a massive fall in production since its heyday in the 1930s, remains a major export commodity. The cyclone hit at the very time harvesting was due in Arakan state, destroying the only source of income for thousands of people.
Figures released by the Burmese government’s Central Statistical Organisation (CSO) show that rice exports fell from 750,000 tonnes in the first six months of 2009 to just over 270,000 this year.
In contrast to scathing condemnation of the Burmese junta’s reluctance to allow aid to the Irrawaddy delta following cyclone Nargis in 2008, there have been no reports that food and medicine to the Arakan region have been blocked.
Following Nargis, which destroyed an estimated 1.75 million hectares of farmland, or 30 percent of the wet season rice area for Burma, the junta attracted further criticism for continuing to export rice at the same levels as prior to the disaster.
The UN Development Programme has put the figure needed for reconstruction of affected Arakan state areas over the coming three months at $US6-7 million.
In the worst-hit town of Myebon, more than 10,000 houses were destroyed, according to the Myanmar Information Management Unit (MIMU). Only 10 percent of those households are now in camps.
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| Karen retreat Three Pagodas Pass border town after one night siege |
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Three Pagodas Pass – A combined force composed of the Karen National Union (KNU) and the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) have retreated from the border town on the Burma side near to Three Pagodas Pass after a one night siege against the Burmese Army stationed there.
The spokesperson of KNU’s 6th Brigade, Padoh Hte Nay, told a Kaowao reporter that the Karen took control of the border town on Monday and destroyed the Burmese government’s offices in the town.
The military and government offices including the Special Branch (SB), Agriculture, Forestry, and Post and Telegraph Departments were all burnt down by the rebel groups on Monday, November 8, the day after the first General Election in Burma in 20 years.
A Kaowao reporter from the Thai side of the border town reported that about 120 troops from the Burmese Army Light Infantry Battalion (LIB) No. 283 and 60 troops from the LIB No. 405 failed to defend the town and government employees and officers were forced to retreat from the area. The combined forces of the Karen rebels seized nine arms from the Burmese Army.
“The DKBA troops entered the border town from different directions surprised the Burmese government troops, who fled the town shortly after. The DKBA troops gained control of the area around noon,” said Nai Lun, a town resident.
Meanwhile, the DKBA troops attacked the Myawaddy border town in Burma opposite Maesot, Tak Province. The attack was led by Colonel Saw Lah Pwe (Bo Nha Khan Mwe) of the DKBA Brigade No. 5 who rejected orders to join other DKBA troops, who had transformed into a Border Guard Force (BGF) under the Burmese Army’s command.
As of November 9 on Tuesday morning, the DKBA troops retreated from the town and many civilians have now started to return home. About 4000 town residents including women and children had crossed over to the Thai side yesterday fearing that the Burmese army troops would return during the night to launch an offensive against the Karen rebels. Local civilians were taking refuge at the Plain Japan village which is under New Mon State Party’s control.
Mi Khaing, a Three Pagodas Pass resident said, “We packed our belongings and crossed the border into Thailand because the Karen soldiers told us to leave for our safety”.
According to a military observer who lives in Sangkhlaburi, the TPP area is difficult for the Burmese Army to reinforce their troops unless they have air power to back up their ground troops. According to an earlier report, the Karen troops had planned to attack during the General Election in Burma on Sunday, November 7, 2010.
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| Few voters at poll stations without foreign diplomats |
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On election day the polling stations, where diplomats were allowed to observe voting, were crowded with voters but some polling stations, where diplomats could not reach, had very few voters. It had only police and USDP members, according to polling officers.
“Nobody seemed interested in the election. Police and the USDP members came to the polling station. Less than 100 voters came to vote at each station,” an observer from Pankan village-tract in Loikaw township said.
Indian Ambassador to Burma Dr. Villur Sundararajan Seshadri, Deputy Secretary of the Chinese embassy in Yangon Mr. Xu Tao and First Secretary of Laos embassy in Yangon Mr. Vangparo Sipaseuth were allowed to observe voting in some polling stations in Karenni State.
State Election Commission officials led the diplomats visiting Loikaw township. The diplomats visited polling station no. 1 in high school no. 1 in Naungyar A ward, polling station no. 1 in middle school no. 2 in Naungyar B ward, polling station no.1 in high school no.1 in Min Su ward in Loikaw.
Voters went back from half way to the polling station that the diplomats could not reach, according to a local from Sanpya (6) mile village in Deemawso township said.
“I did not go anywhere as I was afraid of being arrested. I did not want to vote for any party,” a local, who did not vote from Deemawso town said.
The junta-backed USDP and the NUP, which is a heritage party from Gen. Nay Win’s days, contested the elections in Karenni State.
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| USDP claims victory in Myanmar |
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‘INSUFFICIENTLY INCLUSIVE’:Although world leaders found the election to be fatally flawed, China welcomed it as an integral part of a seven-step road map to democracy
The Myanmar military’s political proxy claimed an overwhelming victory yesterday in an election condemned as a sham by the West, as fresh fighting erupted between rebels and government forces.
Pro-democracy parties urged the authorities to act against “cheating” during the poll, in which the junta-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) enjoyed major financial and campaigning advantages.
“We have won about 80 percent of the seats. We are glad,” said a senior USDP member who did not want to be named.
The vote appeared to have gone largely according to the junta’s plans, but clashes between -government troops and ethnic minority soldiers on Monday triggered an exodus of about 20,000 people into neighboring Thailand.
At least three civilians were killed when heavy weapons fire hit the town of Myawaddy in Karen State, an official in Myanmar said. Local residents said yesterday that Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) rebels had retreated into surrounding forests pursued by government forces.
The army-backed party — formed by Prime Minister Thein Sein and other former military top brass who shed their uniforms for the vote — said turnout was more than 70 percent, despite muted activity seen at many polling stations.
Opposition parties -complained about widespread reports of irregularities, particularly with advance ballots.
Than Nyein, chairman of the National Democratic Force (NDF) said the party, created by former members of Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy, appeared to have won only about 10 percent of the more than 160 seats it contested.
“Our country has lacked dignity in the world so we wanted to restore our pride with a fair election. I’m very sorry because these acts could further harm the dignity of our country,” he said.
Thu Wai, chairman of the Democratic Party, said that when people were allowed to vote freely they had supported his party.
With 25 percent of the seats in parliament reserved for military appointees, the two main pro-junta parties needed to win just 26 -percent of the elected seats to secure a majority.
US President Barack Obama led international criticism of the vote.
“It is unacceptable to steal an election, as the regime in Burma [Myanmar] has done again for all the world to see,” he said in a speech to the Indian parliament on Monday.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called the vote ”insufficiently inclusive, participatory and transparent,” his spokesman said.
Myanmar’s ASEAN neighbors, however, welcomed the poll as a “significant step forward.”
China applauded the military junta yesterday for holding a weekend election.
“This is a critical step for Myanmar in implementing the seven-step road map in the transition to an elected government, and thus is welcome,” Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Hong Lei (洪磊) told reporters.
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21:46 |
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