US Senate To Review Burma Policy
Apr 9th, 2009
According to AFP news
WASHINGTON—The U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee is set to launch a review of U.S. policy toward Burma.
The review, which will kick off next month, comes as President Barack Obama’s administration is also reviewing U.S. Burma policy and follows a meeting last month between a senior U.S. diplomat and the Burmese Foreign Minister, Retired Major General Nyan Win, in the Burmese capital, Naypyidaw.
The review was described by a congressional source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, that it would take at least three to four months and expressed hope that recommendations might be ready this fall.
The review comes against a backdrop of Senate frustration that current sanctions are not spurring progress toward democratization, release of political prisoners, and other reforms in junta-ruled Burma, and follows last year’s enactment of the Block Burmese JADE (Junta’s Anti-Democratic Efforts) Act.
That law contains sanctions language and provisions requiring the appointment of a special envoy to Burma, along with calls for increased international support for NGOs doing humanitarian work in Burma and authorized U.S. government licenses for humanitarian or religious activities in Burma.
Part of the goal of the Senate review, the source said, is to increase international cooperation on pressuring the SPDC.
He added that the goal is to use sanctions as leverage on the ruling generals, but to exploit that leverage by contacts with both the SPDC and Burma’s neighbors to try to agree on an agenda for change.
The source cited a growing feeling that pressure on countries that are the subject of sanctions should be “complemented” by dialogue, and that pressure without a strategy about how to effect change will not bring that change about.
At the same time, he stressed that he sees “no appetite to lift sanctions” without a real move by Burma’s junta to free dissidents or expand the country’s political process.
Among the areas the Senate wants to look at, he said, are China’s growing influence in Burma, public health issues, hurricane reconstruction, and successful and unsuccessful NGO activities.
The Senate also wants to look at the country’s preparations for an election next year and what that election could mean for the future of the country.
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April 20th, 2009 at 12:05 am
The Senate should be frustrated, not only by how sanctions fail to change Burma’s government, but more by how sanctions are helping destroy Burmese society. The sanctions SHOULD be lifted, and economic opportunity allowed to empower ordinary Burmese.