Myanmar activists urge China to halt pipeline project
War Is Not Answer: Wa Leader
Will Burma prevail in constitutional crisis?
Former KIO Leaders Prepare for 2010 Election
Wa supremo chooses understudy
Wa army evade Burmese troops
Prelude to a Civil War?
Turtle thought to be extinct spotted in Myanmar
Myanmar says market trading in Kokang capital returns to normal
Myanmar Fighting May Harm China Oil Plans, Exiles Say (Update1)
Junta Targets Ethnic Rebels to Forge Unity Ahead of Polls
Myanmar junta faces bigger ethnic challenge ahead of polls
China: Newly-Arrived Myanmar Refugees
Ethnic challenge for Myanmar
Shwe Gas Calls on Corporations, Govts to Suspend Pipeline Project
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Monday September 7, 01:19 PM    Reuters
Myanmar activists urge China to halt pipeline project

BANGKOK (Reuters) – Activists called on Monday for China to halt construction of controversial oil and gas pipelines through Myanmar, warning of instability and civil unrest if Myanmar’s ruling junta continued to starve its people of energy.

Shwe Gas Movement, a group of Myanmar exiles in Bangladesh, India and Thailand, also said the military’s recent offensive against ethnic rebels near the pipeline route showed the regime had no concerns about providing stability for investors.

“People across Burma are facing severe energy shortages and this massive energy export will only fuel social unrest,” Shwe Gas Movement said in a report released on Monday, referring to the country by its former name.

“These resources belong to our people and should be used for the energy needs of our country.”

Chronic fuel shortages triggered a series of monk-led protests in the resource-rich country in 2007, leading to the deaths of at least 31 people in the bloodiest army crackdown since a 1988 uprising.

China’s largest oil and gas producer, China National Petroleum Corporation, is due to start construction of nearly 4,000 km of duel pipelines from Myanmar’s western Arakan State to China’s Yunnan province.

The deal is expected to provide the military, which has ruled the country since a 1962 coup, with at least $29 billion (17.7 billion pounds) over 30 years.

The pipelines will supply China with oil shipped from the Middle East and natural gas from Myanmar’s vast offshore reserves in the Bay of Bengal.

The Shwe Gas Movement said foreign investors faced a “perfect storm” of financial and security risks by doing business with the junta and highlighted reports of forced labour, forced relocation and extortion by government troops in the construction of a much smaller pipeline to Thailand.

Last month’s incursion by Myanmar’s army into northeastern Shan State, which sent tens of thousands fleeing into China, has raised fears of more clashes with ethnic minority rebels that could exacerbate a refugee crisis at its border with economic and political ally China. (Editing by Nick Macfie)  http://uk.biz.yahoo.com/07092009/325/myanmar-activists-urge-china-halt-pipeline-project.html
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War Is Not Answer: Wa Leader
By WAI MOE      Monday, September 7, 2009

Speaking in an interview on China’s Phoenix TV broadcast on Monday, Bao You-Xiang, the leader of the United Wa State Army (UWSA), said, “We absolutely do not want fighting to break out in Wa State [Wa Special Region]. Only peaceful negotiations can defuse the tension.

“The Wa State hopes to become a democratic self-ruled autonomous region within a Burmese federal republic. Only peaceful means can solve the problem, not the use of force,” he said.
United Wa State Army leader Bao You-Xiang appears on China’s Phoenix TV.

Phoenix TV pictures clearly showed pictures of Gen Aung San, the founder of the Burmese army, and Snr-Gen Than Shwe, the leader of the Burmese junta on the wall of the Wa leader’s office.

Tension has risen dramatically on the Sino-Burmese border after the UWSA, the Kachin Independence Army, the Kokang armed group known as the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDDA) and the Mongla-based National Democratic Alliance Army(NDAA) refused to transform their militias into border guard forces as ordered by the Burmese junta in April.

The armed ethnic groups rejected the plan saying it ignores ethnic minority rights. By transforming their troops into border guard forces, the armed ethnic ceasefire groups would effectively put their troops under control of the Burmese army. The junta has set October as the deadline to begin training and forming the border guard force.

Lt-Gen Ye Myint, the head of Military Affairs Security [Burmese military intelligence] and the secretary of the Transformation Committee for the Border Guard Force repeatedly said in a letter to the UWSA that the Tatmadaw [Burmese armed forces] would not attack Wa troops.

With an estimated 25,000 soldiers, the UWSA is the biggest ethnic ceasefire group in military-ruled Burma. It signed a ceasefire agreement with the Burmese junta in 1989 after the MNDDA agreed to a ceasefire with the Burmese army.

The US Congressional Research Service describes the UWSA as “the largest of the organized criminal groups in the region,” due to its involvement in the drug trade.

The status of the Burmese military junta’s ceasefire agreements with 17 ethnic armed groups has been uncertain after Burmese government troops seized the Kokang capital, Laogai, on August 24.

After the fall of Laogai, there were skirmishes between government forces and MNDDA troops. At least 30 people, including Chinese citizens, were killed and more than 30,000 people fled to China.

The Kokang’s resistance to the junta’s troops ended abruptly after more than 1,500 Kokang fighters crossed the Sino-Burmese border and surrendered their arms to Chinese officials on August 29.

After the collapse of the MNDAA, observers have been openly wondering who the next target for the Burmese army will be. Many say the UWSA is the Burma army’s main target among the ceasefire groups because it is the leading group resisting junta plans to neutralize the armed militias.

Observers on the ongoing ethnic conflict in Shan State said Beijing would play an important role in maintaining stability along the Sino-Burmese border through negotiations with both sides as the Sino-Burmese overland oil and gas pipelines are scheduled to start this month.

The Chinese government is a close ally of the Burmese regime and is influential with the ethnic armed groups along the border.

During a meeting with Vice Snr-Gen Maung Aye in June, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao made it clear that the Chinese favor pushing forward the democratic process in Burma to achieve national reconciliation, safeguard national stability and promote economic development.

“What the Chinese do is paramount,” said Aung Kyaw Zaw, a former Communist fighter who is monitoring the situation from the Chinese border town of Ruili.

“However, the junta’s No1 Snr-Gen Than Shwe, No 2 Maung Aye and Secretary 1 Gen Tin Aung Myint Oo have paranoia over Beijing’s relationship with the ethnic groups along the Sino-Burmese border,” he said. “They fought against communist troops backed by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army. These troops became the militias of the UWSA, MNDAA and NDAA.”

On Sunday, a report about Burmese politics in a popular Chinese language news website, news.qq.com, said: “The Burmese people have been promised an improvement in their lives after the elections [in 2010]. However, analysts believe that if the new government fails to meet peoples’ needs, then this could lead to popular discontent.”
Copyright © 2008 Irrawaddy Publishing Group | www.irrawaddy.org

http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=16737
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Will Burma prevail in constitutional crisis?
By Zin Linn
Column: Burma Question
Published: September 07, 2009

Bangkok, Thailand — Burma is on the brink of a fresh civil war. Most citizens see the junta’s seven-step roadmap – which sanctions the 2008 Constitution and 2010 elections – as a declaration of war against the people of Burma.

The junta promised on Feb. 8, 2008, to hold elections in 2010, but failed to give a precise date for the elections or to release the rules and regulations concerning them. According to analysts in Rangoon, recent plans to release such laws and regulations seem aimed at placing the opposition parties, especially the National League for Democracy, at a disadvantage.

The junta’s Secretary-1 Lieutenant-General Tin Aung Myint Oo said on state-run radio and television that the government had managed to achieve economic and social stability. “So it is now suitable to change the military administration to a democratic, civil administrative system, as good fundamentals have been established,” he said.

The majority of Burmese citizens, however, oppose Tin Aung Myint Oo’s views on peace and stability. How dare he say the situation is stable when there are more than 2,100 political prisoners? As the anniversary of the 2007 Saffron Revolution nears, the junta has been continuing its manhunt for monks, students and politicians who support democracy.

The United Nations as well as the United States and European Union have been focusing on the continued detention of pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi and 2,100-plus political prisoners. The international community has been distressed over the extended house arrest of Suu Kyi.

Leaders of Britain, France and the United States all strongly condemned the one-and-a-half-year extended house arrest as a charade of justice and the trial as a farce. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon repeatedly called for the immediate release of the Lady.

Here is a question for the junta’s Secretary-1: Are the people of Burma secure in their daily lives?

According to findings by the Peace Way Foundation, the number of internally displaced persons in Burma continues to grow at an alarming rate. Military operations, development projects and economic hardship are all contributing to a catastrophic situation. Millions of people in Burma are facing starvation and displacement, with no access to basic services like education and healthcare.

Many of Burma’s displaced people are from minority ethnic groups. They live precarious and transient lives in the jungles of border areas and in the more urban central plains. They are denied stable homes and livelihoods, forced into a constant state of movement. Recent estimates say there are 2 million displaced people in military-ruled Burma. This is not the situation of a peaceful country.

In early August armed conflict broke out between Burmese troops and the ethnic Kokang, one of four ethnic rebel groups that signed a ceasefire deal in 1988 and 89. By the end of the month fighting had spread to Burma’s border with China.

The junta’s offensive against the Kokang group, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, is a challenge to the other groups that have signed ceasefires. It is a warning to obey the regime’s procedures for the 2010 elections. Actually, it’s a tactic to pressure the ethnic groups to lay down their arms and join the union designed by the junta. But such unity under military boots could break at any time.

Burma’s new Constitution, approved in a May 2008 referendum, is inundated with misleading principles. It says the country must be united under one military command. To bring the ethnic groups in line with this proviso, the military regime has ordered all armed rebel groups to become part of Burma’s border guard force ahead of the 2010 election.

The border guard force, which was announced in April 2009, will disband the rebel groups’ strength and end their military autonomy. All these border-guard regiments are supposed to come under the supervision of a Burmese army officer. This was a tactic to disarm the ethnic rebels, but it was rejected by the Kokang, Wah, Kachin, Shan and Mon ceasefire groups.

The ethnic conflicts created by the Burmese authorities are a challenge to a peaceful Burma. Is it really possible to change Burma to a democratic, civil administrative system while the ethnic population is under attack? Is the statement of the junta’s Secretary-1 true, that good fundamentals have been established? The average person considers this analysis as duplicity.

The regime is attempting to legalize the military dictatorship with a sham Constitution. Therefore most citizens view the junta’s 2010 elections as a declaration of war against its own people.

Ethnic minorities have been suffering through five decades of brutal military operations in the name of national unity. Attacks on these rural civilians continue on a daily basis. There is a constant demand from Burma’s ethnic groups to enjoy equal political, social and economic rights. The Constitution must guarantee the rights of self-determination and of equal representation for every ethnic group in the Parliament. It must also include provisions against racial discrimination.

At the June 2004 National Convention, 13 ceasefire groups submitted a political proposal demanding equal access to the plenary session. But the convention’s convening committee dismissed the proposal as inappropriate. When the 2008 Constitution came out, none of the political points proposed by the ethnic representatives was included.

Aung San Suu Kyi supports equal rights for all ethnic groups, while the military leaders are unwilling to grant this. This is one reason the military obstinately declines to release Suu Kyi and constantly exerts pressure to weaken the ethnic political parties and ceasefire groups.

There is a big gap between the military junta and the NLD led by the Lady. To the military autocrats, allowing the ethnic minorities to enjoy equal political, social and economic rights is a hazard to national unity and the perpetuation of sovereignty. To the NLD and ethnic alliance parties, granting equal rights to ethnic minorities will guarantee peace, stability and prosperity of the country.

Now the junta’s policy of guarding against the breakup of the union is starting a new war game with the ethnic ceasefire groups on the Sino-Burma border. Even China seems to be sandwiched between the junta and the United Wa State Army, as both depend on its assistance. But in defeating the Kokang, the junta sent a tough message to the UWSA. It might also be a warning to China not to intervene in Burma’s internal affairs.

According to some analysts, if the junta plans to postpone the controversial 2010 elections it will declare war on the UWSA. It would be one more unfortunate consequence – like the confinement of Aung San Suu Kyi and the 2,100-plus political prisoners and the wars on ethnic minorities – of the constitutional crisis.

Without a review of the 2008 Constitution by all stakeholders, Burma will not prevail in this crisis. Too many innocent people have been victimized in the ongoing constitutional misfortune.  http://upiasia.com/Politics/2009/09/08/will_burma_prevail_in_constitutional_crisis/9464/
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Former KIO Leaders Prepare for 2010 Election
By SAW YAN NAING        Monday, September 7, 2009

Five leaders of the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) including Tu Ja have resigned from their posts to prepare for the 2010 national election.

“We have separated from the KIO,” said Tu Ja, “and we will just focus on organizing our party.”

He named his party the Kachin State Progressive Party when it was formed in March 2009.

Tu Ja, who was vice chairman No 2, said he formed the party because political reform is needed in Burma, and it is being initiated by the military regime through its “seven-step roadmap” to democracy.

Tu Ja said that his party has the support of Kachin civilians.

The current KIO general secretary, La Ja, said the former leaders asked for permission to resign from the KIO because they wanted to focus on the election.

The KIO central committee approved the resignations during a meeting on Aug 5 at KIO’s headquarters in Laiza that was attended by more than 300 Kachin civilians.

He said the KIO plans to propose that a “state government” be formed to represent Kachin State after the 2010 general election and the formation of a national government.

In a meeting in Myitkyina on July 8 between KIO leaders and regime officials led by Maj-Gen Soe Win, the commander of the Northern Regional Command and head of the regional transformation committee of the border guard force, the KIO told the military government it planned to keep its military wing, the KIA, autonomous and it rejected the order to join a junta-dominated border guard force.

La Ja said the KIO will attempt to maintain its 1994 cease-fire agreement with the military government.

Aung Wa, who is close to the KIO, said that Tu Ja’s political party will probably retain close links with the KIO.

“If they [Tu Ja’s party] don’t have a connection with the KIO, it’s not clear that the party would succeed,” said Aung Wa.

The KIO military wing has between 4,000 to 5,000 soldiers in five brigades and one infantry division. KIA troops are stationed in Kachin State and northern Shan State.
Copyright © 2008 Irrawaddy Publishing Group | www.irrawaddy.org

http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=16735
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Wa supremo chooses understudy
News – Shan Herald Agency for News
Monday, 07 September 2009 09:44

As the prospect of war with the Burmese Army looms large, the ailing Wa supremo Bao Youxiang recently chose Zhao Zhongdang, known for his proven fighting abilities, to oversee the day to day political and military affairs of the United Wa State Army (UWSA), according to sources from the Wa capital Panghsang on the Sino-Burma border.

Sources, however, did not say when the new appointment was made.

His official position in the Wa hierarchy is second Deputy Commander in Chief. The first deputy is Ta Ai Lone.

Zhao’s latest assignment means he will also take precedence over Deputy Chairman Xiao Minliang and Zhao Wenguang in political matters. “Of course, whatever he wants to do, he will still need to consult with Bao and obtain his consent first,” said a source close to the Wa leadership.

Prior to the ceasefire in 1989, he was commander of the 418th Division operating in southern Shan State. “He created a lot of trouble for Col Hsang Mon (one of Khun Sa’s commanders operating in the same area) with his swift tactics (swift attack, swift withdrawal, swift concentration, swift dispersal),” remembers Sao Yawdserk, leader of the Shan State Army (SSA) ‘South’. “The UWSA, I think, will be decisive under him.”

He was married to Naw Htay (now deceased), second daughter of Shan Nationalities Peoples Liberation Organization (SNPLO) leader Tarkeley.
“His years of experience in areas west of the Salween means he understands political and social conditions in Shan State as a whole and not just the Wa State where he comes from,” said another source.

Earlier, it was reported that Bao’s younger brother Youliang, head of the Finance Department, would be handling the day to day affairs for him.

“To most Wa officers, Zhao Zhongdang may be a better choice than Bao Youliang,” commented a source, who had for years been doing business with the Wa. “He has travelled more widely and his military experience is second to none in the present leadership.”

The other leader, indispensable to Bao Youxiang, appears to be Wei Xuegang, who is officially the Commander of the Thai border-based 171st Military Region and the de facto finance head. “When I was recently invited to one of the close door meetings,” recalled a Shan ceasefire leader, “there were only Wei and Zhao apart from Bao.”  http://www.bnionline.net/news/shan/6974-wa-supremo-chooses-understudy.html
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Wa army evade Burmese troops

Sept 7, 2009 (DVB)–Officials from Burma’s largest ceasefire group have gone into hiding in eastern Burma due to increased tension in recent days between the group and the ruling military government.

Troops from the United Wa State Army (UWSA), based in the Wa region of Burma’s northeastern Shan state, have been preparing for possible conflict with the Burmese army following its recent offensive against an allied ceasefire group.

A number of UWSA officials and business owners based in the Burmese border town of Tachilek and have reportedly gone into hiding after fellow officials faced threats of arrest.

A Tachilek resident told DVB that a number of UWSA officials and people in connection with them were arrested by authorities and evicted from the town in recent days.

“Previously, the Wa used to be influential in this region and a lot of people claimed to have a connection with them to gain special privileges,” he said. “Now they are being chased down and deported.”

The leader of the 30,000-strong UWSA is said to be close to Peng Jiasheng, whose Kokang ceasefire group last month was engaged in heavy fighting with the Burmese army.

The eruption of violence forced around 37,000 refugees across the border into Thailand. Peng Jiasheng is now reportedly in hiding somewhere in the Wa region.

Sein Kyi, deputy of Thailand-based Shan Herald Agency for News (SHAN) said that senior Wa officials based in other border towns have also gone into hiding.

“The Wa are only keeping one or two officials – non-important personnel – in the offices in towns such as Tachilek, Keng Tung and Mong Hsat,” said Sein Kyi.

“This is more like a precaution to prevent similar circumstances to the recent Kokang conflict where people closed to Peng Jiasheng were detained by government authorities.”

He said the UWSA has been increasing troop numbers in southern Shan state, but the tension in the region was low compared the town of Panghsang where the group has its headquarters.

The Kokang group was reportedly joined by around 500 troops from the UWSA during fighting, which marked the end of a 20-year ceasefire with the Burmese government.

Reporting by Min Lwin http://english.dvb.no/textonly/news.php?id=2841
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CONTRIBUTOR
Prelude to a Civil War?
By HARN YAWNGHWE        Monday, September 7, 2009

Many were surprised by the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) attack against the Kokang forces.

Some had been so preoccupied with the trial of Aung San Suu Kyi that they were not even aware of the impending crisis. Others could not understand why the Burmese military would turn against their allies who have had a cease-fire agreement for more than 20 years.

Yet others thought that the Burma Army would never dare to incur the wrath of China. After all, had the Chinese not, in June, requested Vice-Snr-Gen Maung Aye to maintain stability on the border? This development was especially surprising to those who were convinced that Burma is a client state of China.

This failure to anticipate events underscores the weakness of the Burmese democracy movement, in particular, and the international community, in general.

We have often failed to understand the strategy and plans of the ruling military government. We have looked at their actions through our own prisms and misinterpreted their intentions. We have tended to see SPDC pronouncements as propaganda and have not paid enough attention to what it is planning to do.

Nobody is happy with military rule in Burma so we dismiss the SPDC “road map” to democracy and its constitution. But how many of us have actually studied the constitution in detail, not to criticize it, but to see how the military actually plans to implement its “road map” policies and how we can use its plans to our advantage?

In 2004, the SPDC announced the “road map,” and last year it announced plans for an election in 2010. We were outraged when the referendum was held two weeks after Cyclone Nargis had devastated the delta and Rangoon. We would not have been surprised had we realized that Snr-Gen Than Shwe takes the “road map” seriously.

He will not allow anything to stand in its way. A series of recent events has also taken some of us unaware—he release of U Win Tin; the first ever post-1990 congress of the National League for Democracy (NLD);  Aung San Suu Kyi’s trial, the unseasonable attack on the Karen National Union; the attack on Kokang and now possibly an attack on the Wa.

These seem to be the random acts of a paranoid and unpredictable leader—he image we like to portray of Snr-Gen Than Shwe. But in reality, all these events have a common goal: the success of the 2010 elections. They are the rational outworking of a well-calculated and orchestrated operation plan of the SPDC.

The proposal to the ethnic cease-fire groups to transform themselves into Border Guard Forces (BGF) under the control of the Burma army is also an attempt to clear the decks before the 2010 elections. It was meant to either provoke the cease-fire groups to reject the proposal and be destroyed or frighten them into submission and acceptance of the SPDC road map.

It is clear that the BGF proposal was a provocation. This is because during the past 20 years, nothing of this matter was ever discussed with the cease-fire groups. They were told they could keep their arms and could negotiate with the newly elected government on the political terms they wanted.

Suddenly, in April they were told they had until October 2009 to decide. Analyzing the ceasefires, it is clear that the SPDC never meant to negotiate. The plan was to stop hostile action, provide incentives to entice individual commanders to split from the main groups and slowly weaken the ethnic groups to the point where they could be easily eliminated.

The cease-fire groups cannot accept the BGF because it is actually a plan to destroy the groups by attrition. But if they refuse to accept the proposal, they will be destroyed now, before the elections. The Kokang (MNDAA), the Wa (UWSA) and the Mongla (NDAA) groups rejected the BGF proposal and also refused to accept the SPDC’s road map and constitution. They do not want any changes. Therefore, if nothing changes, the SPDC will move against the UWSA and the NDAA. Which group will be attacked first will depend on the tactical advantage.

What about China? Is the SPDC not beholden to China? The short answer is—no. Whatever we may think about the SPDC, the Burma Army is very proud of the fact that it is “patriotic.” The SPDC has never danced to the tune of a foreign power. It has, rather, made foreign powers big and small dance to its tune. Since the SPDC has been largely ostracized internationally, it has had to depend on China.

But it was never happy about it. When Burma was discussed at the UN Security Council and it had to depend even more on China, the SPDC began to cultivate Russia, so that it would not be at China’s mercy. But Snr-Gen Than Shwe’s problem was solved when John Yettaw decided to take a swim. He enabled the SPDC to ensure that Aung San Suu Kyi would have no role in the election, and he also enabled Than Shwe to raise the stakes and create a direct link with the Obama administration.

This in turn gave Than Shwe the card he needed to ignore China’s wishes and move against the Kokang and Wa.

If Snr-Gen Than Shwe’s calculations are correct, the SPDC will be able to wipe out the Wa and Mongla groups, and the 2010 elections can be held on a less contentious playing field according to schedule.

The unpredictable factor, of course, is how much resistance the Wa army will offer. And what the reaction of the other cease-fire groups will be. Some like the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) and the New Mon State Party (NMSP) are in the process of negotiating with the SPDC over the BGF issue.

Other groups like the KNU and the Shan State Army (South) are watching closely to see how the battle develops. If Than Shwe’s calculations are wrong, Burma could face a period of serious instability and the 2010 elections will be jeopardized.

But on the other hand, the SPDC may have decided that the elections could actually lead to democratization, and it is trying to create a pretext to postpone the elections indefinitely.

Harn Yawnghwe is executive director of the Brussels-based Euro-Burma Office.
Copyright © 2008 Irrawaddy Publishing Group | www.irrawaddy.org

http://www.irrawaddy.org/opinion_story.php?art_id=16730
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ILO turns spotlight on officials to end forced labour

Source: InterPress Third World News Agency (IPS)

Date: 03 Sep 2009

By Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, Sep 3 (IPS) – The International Labour Organisation (ILO) is turning its attention to a western corner of military-ruled Burma to end the scourge of forced labour, which remains rampant in most parts of the South-east Asian nation.

On Sunday, the ILO will be hosting a rare meeting of judges, military officers, police officers and members of the local labour department as part of its effort to raise awareness aimed at ending a form of human rights abuse that, at times, has included victims as young as 11.

“We hope to make presentations on international humanitarian law and raise issues about forced labour, child soldiers and harassment,” says Steve Marshall, the ILO’s representative in Burma, also known as Myanmar. “This is a positive step.”

There are a lot of “policy conflicts” on this issue, Marshall told a small group of journalists during a recent visit to Bangkok. “Even though we are being permitted to have this event, the military see themselves as above the law.”

The weekend meeting in Sittwe, a port city in Burma’s Arakan state, close to the Bangladesh border, will be the fifth of its kind the Geneva-based labour organisation has held in Burma since July 2007.

The ILO’s efforts to make such inroads in a country ruled by a notoriously stubborn and defiant regime – particularly in placing strict limits on international agencies challenging its grip on power – have set this labour rights body apart from other United Nations agencies and international humanitarian organisations operating in Burma.

“The ILO is the only international organisation that has maintained principled pressure and engagement of the Burmese regime,” says David Scott Mathieson, Burma consultant for Human Rights Watch, the New York-based global rights lobby. “It has shown how international organisations should deal with the Burmese government – that they will not keep quiet about problems, yet keep engaging and trying to help improve the situation.”

At the same time, though, the concessions the military regime is offering to the ILO is not a sign of a growing shift in policy aimed at ending the forced labour problem, Mathieson tells IPS. “It is one of grudging respect. If the Burmese government can get away with not dealing with the ILO, it would do so.”

The pressure on the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), as the military regime is formally known, stems from its running battles with the ILO. In 2006, following reports that Burma was failing in its obligations to the ILO to end forced labour, more pressure was turned on the SPDC.

The ILO’s members threatened to haul the country before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague for its record of abusive labour practices. Burma would have been the first country to face such humiliation had no changes been made on the ground.

One of the demands placed by the ILO was for Burma to have in place a “credible mechanism for dealing with complaints of forced labour with all necessary guarantees for the protection of complaints.”

Yet, while the ILO office in Burma has developed a network to gather information on incidents of forced labour, the mechanism for victims of the abuse or their families to lodge complaints is far from perfect. “That people are getting arrested when complaining is still a concern,” admits ILO’s Marshall. “Currently there are two people in jail for making complaints to the ILO. They have been charged under the Official Secrets Act.” This law considers it an offence for any person to possess information deemed classified by the state.

Also coming in the way of the ILO’s forced labour-reporting mechanism is the junta preventing reader-friendly material about these human rights violations being printed in local languages and distributed across the country. Only the formal document, peppered with legal language, has been approved for distribution.

The junta’s resolve to stop the forced labour network being dismantled stems from how much the military culture depends on such abuse to achieve its military and development ends. The more pervasive forms of forced labour, some in almost slave-like conditions, include portering for the military, cleaning army camps, building military structures and even walking ahead of troops in areas infested with landmines.

“Forced labour and Burma is like the head and tail of a coin,” states the Federation of Trade Unions – Burma, a network of Burmese labour rights activists operating in exile, including Thailand and the United States. “Millions of people of Burma have been used for state projects of railroad building, strategic road construction, army barrack building, army-run businesses and (for the) agro-economy.”

The Arakan state, where the ILO is hosting Sunday’s meeting, is notorious. The victims are the state’s Rohingyas, an ethnic Muslim minority in predominantly Buddhist Burma. They have been a victim of gross rights violations, including restrictions to get married unless the state gives approval. Familes are forced to work four days a week and have to plant crops that the military orders.

Forced labour the Rohingyas are subject to during the ongoing monsoon season has been documented in the paddy fields, planting physic nut trees and rubber saplings, for road repair, states a recent report by The Arakan Project, which monitors rights violations of the Rohingyas.

In addition, due to border tensions between Burma and Bangladesh, “the Burmese regime suddenly brought shiploads of building material in order to erect a border fence along the Bangladesh-Burma border,” adds the Project report, ‘Large Increase in Forced Labour along the Bangladesh-Burma Border: Forced Labour Practices in North Arakan’. “By April large numbers of villagers were then recruited to raise an embankment.”

“This year forced labour in North Arakan has significantly increased mainly due to the construction of the border fence along the Bangladesh-Burma border and the sudden increase of army battalions along the border,” says Chris Lewa, author of the report and coordinator of the Project.

“Forced labour occurs throughout the year and usually follows a seasonal pattern. In the dry season, villagers are mostly recruited for construction work in military camps and repairing roads,” she says.

Yet she doubts the ILO’s presence in the Arakan state will reduce the suffering endured by the persecuted Rohingya minority. “Most Rohingyas would not be aware of the ILO’s complaint mechanism, but even if they were and would be ready to take the risk of lodging a complaint, they would be unable to do so due to the restriction of movement imposed on them,” Lewa reveals in an interview. “They need to obtain permission even to travel to a neighbouring village.”

(END/2009)

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Turtle thought to be extinct spotted in Myanmar

By MICHAEL CASEY, (AP) Environmental Writer Michael Casey, Ap Environmental Writer – 43 mins ago

BANGKOK – The rare Arakan forest turtle, once though to be extinct, has been rediscovered in a remote forest in Myanmar, boosting chances of saving the reptile after hunting almost destroyed its population, researchers said Monday.

Texas researcher Steven Platt and staff from the New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society discovered five of the brown-and-tan-spotted turtles in May during a survey of wildlife in the Rakhine Yoma Elephant Sanctuary.

The sanctuary contains thick stands of impenetrable bamboo forests, with the only trails made by the park’s elephants, said Platt, of Sul Ross State University in Alpine, Texas.

Plat said he and his team were able to reach the area only by small boat and endured round-the-clock torrential rains and bands of leeches before finding their first Arakan turtle on May 31.

“At this moment, all of the physical hardships of the trip were forgotten,” Platt said in an e-mail interview.

Native to the Arakan hills of western Myanmar, the turtles were believed extinct for close to a century until they started turning up in Asian food markets in the mid-1990s.

The local name for the turtle is “Pyant Cheezar,” which translates to “turtle that eats rhinoceros feces.” Sumatran rhinos were once found in the area, but vanished half a century ago due to hunting.

Scientists blame the near-disappearance of the turtle on their popularity in Asia as an ingredient in cooking and medicine. Known by its scientific name, Heosemys depressa, it is listed as critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources and has proven difficult to breed in captivity.

The discovery in May makes scientists hopeful that the species can survive.

“Throughout Asia, turtles are being wiped out by poachers for the illegal wildlife trade,” Colin Poole, the Wildlife Conservation Society’s director of Asia programs, said in a statement. “We are delighted and astonished that this extremely rare species is alive and well in Myanmar. Now we must do what we can to protect the remaining population.”

Douglas B. Hendrie, a freshwater turtle expert from Education for Nature-Vietnam who did not take part in the research, said he was not surprised by the discovery because he had heard anecdotes of hunters and guides finding the turtle.

“That said, I think it is good to bring attention to the species,” Hendrie said in an e-mail interview, adding that it is an “an important part of furthering the aims of conservation.”

Platt and the conservation society recommend that guard posts be set up on roads leading in and out of the park to thwart poaching and that additional data be collected on the species to develop a conservation plan for it. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090907/ap_on_re_as/as_myanmar_rare_turtle
==========================
Myanmar says market trading in Kokang capital returns to normal
www.chinaview.cn 2009-09-07 13:26:37

YANGON, Sept. 7 (Xinhua) — Myanmar authorities said Monday that market trading has returned to normal in Laukkai, capital of the Kokang ethnic region, more than a week after armed clashes ended there.

Up to 13,255 local inhabitants had come back to Laukkai from China’s Yunnan province as of Sunday, the official newspaper New Light of Myanmar said. “The town has returned to normal and shops, stores and markets have been reopened,” it said.

“Chickens and fish are sold at mobile shops in the town,” it added.

According to official estimation, a total of 37,000 Kokang inhabitants fled days of fighting between government forces and a local ethnic army late last month to neighboring Yunnan province, southwest of China.

In Yunnan, the refugees were provided with humanitarian care by the Yunnan provincial government.

The runaway inhabitants started to return home from Aug. 31 through Yanlonkyaing and Chinshwehaw border gates, a day after the Myanmar government said peace has been restored in the region.

The local administration is now controlled by the newly-formed “Kokang Region Provisional Leading Committee” in Laukkai, led by the Myanmar government.

The Kokang region is also known as the Shan State Special Region-1 (North) in northeast Myanmar.

The local ethnic army reached a ceasefire with the Myanmar government on March 31, 1989, and was allowed to retain arms and enjoy conditional self-administration.

Kokang, bordering China’s Zhen Kung, Geng Ma, Meng Ding and Long Ling areas, has a population of about 150,000.
Editor: Anne Tang http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-09/07/content_12009467.htm

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Myanmar Fighting May Harm China Oil Plans, Exiles Say (Update1)
By Daniel Ten Kate

Sept. 7 (Bloomberg) — China’s plans to pipe oil and gas across Myanmar may be threatened by renewed fighting between the ruling junta and ethnic minorities along the proposed route, an exile group said.

The 4,000 kilometers (2,486 miles) of pipes would stretch from the Indian Ocean to China’s southern Yunnan province, reducing the need to ship fuel through the Strait of Malacca. China National Petroleum Corp., the country’s largest oil company, planned to start construction on the lines this month.

“The companies, governments and investors involved in these projects are vulnerable to financial losses from re- ignition of fighting along the pipeline route, public relations disasters and costly litigation,” the Shwe Gas Movement, an alliance of exiled activist groups based in Chiang Mai, Thailand, said in a report today. The group urged the immediate suspension of the project.

Eighty percent of China’s oil imports pass through the waterway between Malaysia and Indonesia, which is 1.7 miles wide at its narrowest point and vulnerable to pirate attacks.

Myanmar has Asia’s seventh-largest natural gas reserves, or 17.5 trillion cubic feet, according to BP Plc estimates, which China is keen to tap to help fuel economic growth. South Korea’s Daewoo International Corp. said Aug. 25 it would invest 2.1 trillion won ($1.68 billion) in a Myanmar gas project to supply China National Petroleum Corp.

Foreign Reserves

The gas pipeline will supply 500 million cubic feet a day, according to Daewoo. That’s equivalent to 6.4 percent of the 7.8 billion cubic feet a day China consumed last year.

The oil pipeline would be able to carry 22 million tons of crude per year, China National Petroleum said on June 19. That’s equivalent to 12 percent of the 178.9 million metric tons China imported last year.

Myanmar has increased its foreign currency holdings fourfold since 2004 to $3.6 billion, mostly on oil and gas sales to China and Thailand. Talks continue on how construction costs for the gas pipeline may be split, Daewoo International said.

As many as 37,000 ethnic Kokang living near the pipeline route fled into China since Aug. 8 to escape fighting between the junta and a local militia, threatening to end a 20-year ceasefire agreement. More than 12,000 have now returned, Xinhua reported yesterday, citing Myanmar state-run media.

The Kokang are one of the ethnic groups on Myanmar’s borders that agreed to join the state in 1947 in return for autonomy. They formed the backbone of the Communist resistance supported by China in the 1980s.

“China has so many economic interests in Burma,” said Aung Naing Oo, a Thailand-based political analyst, referring to the country by its former name. “It must decide whether its support for ethnic minorities will help its long-term relationship in the country.”

Myanmar’s military rulers have tried to persuade the Kokang and other armed ethnic groups to become border guards partially under their control ahead of elections planned for next year, a move they have resisted.

“We hope Myanmar could properly handle its domestic issues and take every measure necessary to restore stability along the border and guarantee the safety and property of Chinese citizens in Myanmar,” Jiang Yu, spokeswoman for China’s foreign ministry, said Sept. 3.

To contact the reporter on this story: Daniel Ten Kate in Bangkok at dtenkate@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: September 7, 2009 03:11 EDT http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601072&sid=aQX1LfpTebJ4
===========================
Junta Targets Ethnic Rebels to Forge Unity Ahead of Polls
By MARWAAN MACAN-MARKAR / IPS WRITER    Monday, September 7, 2009

BANGKOK — Burma’s military regime is turning to a familiar strategy—sending in troops—to impose its will on the northeastern corner of the country that shares a border with China’s Yunnan province in the east. The move shatters a 20-year peace deal with an armed ethnic rebel group that controls part of that mountainous terrain.

This eruption of hostilities has much to do with a promised general election next year that the oppressive rulers of Burma, also known as Myanmar, are marching towards. The junta wants a “discipline-flourishing democracy” to take root with the 2010 polls, the first such election after the results of the last one, in 1990, were annulled.
Soldiers from the United Wa State Army patrol a street of Nandeng, in the Wa region of Burma, on September 3. (Photo: AP)

Clashes between Burmese troops and the Kokang, one of four ethnic rebel groups that signed a ceasefire deal in the 1988-89 period, began in early August and escalated by the end of the month in an area close to the Chinese border. Casualty figures are still uncertain.

“About 7,000 troops with tanks, armored vehicles and heavy cannons are trying to control the region,” says the US Campaign for Burma, a Washington DC-based group of Burmese political exiles. “The junta is sending 3,000 more troops from other parts of Burma to the region.”

By Thursday, an uneasy calm had returned to Laogai, the Kokang capital, now in the hands of the Burmese troops, according to an aid worker in Burma, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “Some of the 37,000 people who fled across the border to China after the fight broke out have begun to return,” she says.

Sporadic sounds of gunfire were heard, she reveals, adding that the locals were not sure if the defeated Kokang rebels will resort to “guerrilla attacks” on the Burmese troops who have poured into Laogai. This capital has a substantial presence of Chinese businessmen, involved in the border economy of logging, mining and casinos for gambling.

The fighting resulted in an abrupt halt of the agriculture programs being run by the World Food Programme (WFP), the only United Nations (UN) agency that has a permanent presence in a region known for being a poppy-growing area and having a booming narcotics trade.

“Our operations have been suspended,” Chris Kaye, the head of the WFP’s operations in Burma, confirmed during a telephone interview from Rangoon, the former capital. “The people in that area are inherently poor and depend on our programs as an alternative to growing poppy.”

The UN agency’s work involves assisting the ethnic Kokang to grow tea, paddy and maize as an alternative source of income and to help the locals overcome food insecurity. It followed an announcement by leaders of the ethnic groups to end poppy cultivation by 2005 in the terrain that had been part of this region’s infamous ‘Golden Triangle,’ one of Asia’s largest opium-producing areas.

There are concerns, however, that the attack on the Kokang may not be a limited strike, but part of the junta’s broader plan to go after other armed ethnic groups along the country’s northeastern border. Among those are the Wa, the most armed of the ethnic rebels, with a force of some 25,000, and the smaller Kachin.

They are concerns shaped by the political developments in the ethnic areas of Burma, which has never been able to control all of its borders since gaining independence from the British over six decades ago. The country has 135 registered ethnic groups, of which the Burmans are the largest. Scores of ethnic rebels began separatist battles with the Burmese army to create independent countries.

Peace returned to Burma’s north-eastern border in the late 1980s after the Wa, Kachin and Kokang joined 14 other ethnic rebel movements to sign ceasefire agreements in exchange for greater political autonomy, freedom for their ethnic communities and more economic independence.

“The attack against the Kokang is an attempt to intimidate the other ceasefire groups to fall in line with the regime’s plans for the elections next year,” says Win Min, a Burmese national security expert at Payap University in Chiang Mai, located in northern Thailand. “They are going to deal with them one by one to impose what the junta thinks will be unity in the country. But this is only a military-imposed unity.”

“It will not be easy for the Burmese army,” Win Min added during a telephone interview. “Going after the Wa will result in many casualties because it is the strongest armed ethnic group in the country.”

It is a view echoed by others familiar with this region of Burma, which is part of the Shan state and home to the large Shan ethnic community. “If the Burmese regime thinks they will be able to subdue the ethnic rebel groups before next year’s election, they are dreaming,” Khuensai Jaiyen, editor of the Shan Herald Agency for News, told IPS. “The fighting on the border is bound to escalate.”

Already the attacks against the Kokang have left the ethnic Kachin worried that they may be next in the firing line. “The attacks are a violation of the ceasefire and we are worried about who will be targeted next,” says Col James Lum Dau, deputy chief of foreign affairs for the Kachin Independence Organisation. “They want us to change militarily and be under complete Burmese control before the elections. We are against this kind of thing.”

“It may be good for them but not for us. This is a military solution and not a political solution,” he said in a telephone interview. “We are ready to support the elections that will ensure freedom for us.”

Under Burma’s new constitution, approved in a May 2008 referendum plagued with fraud, the country can only have one armed group—the military. And to bring the country’s many armed ethnic groups in line with this provision, the military regime has ordered all rebel groups to become part of a border guard force ahead of the 2010 poll.

The border guard force, which was announced in April, will strip the ethnic rebels of their troop strength and their military independence, since each of these border battalions will come under the wing of a Burmese officer. It was a disarmament plan that the Kokang rejected as did the Wa and Kachin fighters, among others.

“It is unthinkable to expect the Wa to conform to the border guard plan,” says a European diplomat who regularly visits Burma. “They have a hatred towards the Burmese; it is deeply rooted.”

“There is also opposition to this new force because none of these ethnic groups know what political concessions they will get after the elections,” the diplomat, who requested anonymity, told IPS. “The next weeks will reveal if the attacks on the Kokang will force the Wa and others back to the negotiating table about the border guard force.”
Copyright © 2008 Irrawaddy Publishing Group | www.irrawaddy.org http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=16729
=======================
Myanmar junta faces bigger ethnic challenge ahead of polls
Web posted at: 9/7/2009 2:18:53
Source ::: REUTERS

BANGKOK: Myanmar’s military junta may have taken Aung San Suu Kyi out of the picture ahead of elections next year, but it could face an even greater challenge from rising ethnic unrest, analysts said.

The regime has recently stepped up its decades-long campaign against minority groups, with offensives against ethnic Chinese rebels in the northeast in August and Christian Karen insurgents near the Thai border in June.

Civil war has wracked the country since independence in 1948, and while most rebel groups have reached ceasefire deals with the junta, analysts say the army is determined to crush the rest before the 2010 polls.

The offensives have mirrored the ruling generals’ efforts to take Suu Kyi off the political stage by sentencing her to another 18 months’ house arrest after a bizarre incident in which an American man swam to her lakeside home.

The Nobel Laureate’s lawyers launched an appeal against her conviction last week, but with the country’s pliant courts likely to do the junta’s bidding, the ethnic problem is the next real hurdle for the regime, analysts said.

“This is a very complicated issue. After Aung San Suu Kyi’s case, the next big issue is the issue of ethnic minorities,” Aung Naing Oo, an independent Myanmar analyst based in Thailand, said.

Military ruler Than Shwe has long made the struggle for the “stability of the state” the main justification for the army’s continued dominance over the Southeast Asian nation.

In recent years the regime has been able to reach peace pacts with key ethnic groups, co-opting some to become junta-backed border forces that have taken on their former rebel brothers-in-arms.

But August’s outbreak of fighting in Kokang, a mainly ethnic Chinese region of Myanmar’s Shan state, showed the tensions near the surface and earned a rare rebuke from Beijing, usually Myanmar’s closest ally.

The offensive was a warning to other minority groups thinking of causing disruption before the polls, said Win Min, a Myanmar expert at Payap University in the northern Thai city of Chaing Mai.

Critics have denounced the elections as a sham aimed at legitimising the junta’s grip on power, but the influential International Crisis Group (ICG) think-tank said recently that the polls could be an opportunity for change.

“These things are happening in the context of the 2010 elections. The Burmese military are showing ceasefire groups that if they don’t agree with their plans they are going to fight,” Win Min said, using the country’s former name.

The new constitution — pushed through in a referendum in 2008 just days after a cyclone ravaged southern Myanmar — does not provide the autonomy many groups had hoped for, Win Min added.

“The groups signed ceasefires but in the hope that they would get greater autonomy. But they have been mostly rejected. They would like to wait until after there is a new government to negotiate greater autonomy,” he said.

Compounding the problem is the fact that many of the groups, especially the powerful Wa in northern Myanmar, are heavily involved in the drugs trade, often with the tacit assent of the government, analysts said.

“But now the government is using it (the narcotics issue) as a pretext to put pressure on the ethnic groups who don’t want to join Burmese security forces,” Win Min said.

The ethnic problems could end up with the effective “Balkanisation” of Myanmar, a European diplomat in the region said on condition of anonymity. http://www.thepeninsulaqatar.com/Display_news.asp?section=World_News&subsection=Philippines+%26+South+Asia&month=September2009&file=World_News2009090721853.xml
=========================
China: Newly-Arrived Myanmar Refugees
Monday, 7 September 2009, 3:00 pm
Press Release: United Nations

China: UN Seeks Access To Newly-Arrived Myanmar Refugees

New York, Sep 4 2009 11:10AM The United Nations refugee agency today called on China to allow it access to civilians who recently arrived in Yunnan province after fleeing violence in north-eastern Myanmar, and proposed a joint needs assessment to offer support for any possible unmet needs.

“We hope this request will be positively considered as additional displacement may occur in the region should the situation deteriorate in the Wa state of Myanmar,” Andrej Mahecic, spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), told reporters in Geneva.

The 13,000 or so refugees, who reportedly fled fighting in early August between Myanmar Government troops and ethnic minority groups, are being accommodated in seven camp sites in Yunnan province.

UNHCR thanked the Chinese Government for hosting them and the provincial authorities for their assistance, including emergency shelter, food, clothing and medical care.

“As a protection agency, UNHCR wishes to visit these locations to assist the Government in the provision of humanitarian assistance and to determine whether any of the people who remain there are in need of international protection,” said Mr. Mahecic.

He added that the agency is aware of reports from the Chinese media that some of the 37,000 ethnic Chinese Kokang people who crossed into China from Myanmar have begun returning home.

ENDS http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/WO0909/S00071.htm
==========================
The Syraits Times: Sep 6, 2009, Mon
Ethnic challenge for Myanmar

BANGKOK – MYANMAR’S military junta may have taken Aung San Suu Kyi out of the picture ahead of elections next year, but it could face an even greater challenge from rising ethnic unrest, analysts said.

The regime has recently stepped up its decades-long campaign against minority groups, with offensives against ethnic Chinese rebels in the northeast in August and Christian Karen insurgents near the Thai border in June.

Civil war has wracked the country since independence in 1948, and while most rebel groups have reached ceasefire deals with the junta, analysts say the army is determined to crush the rest before the 2010 polls.

The offensives have mirrored the ruling generals’ efforts to take Ms Suu Kyi off the political stage by sentencing her to another 18 months’ house arrest after a bizarre incident in which an American man swam to her lakeside home.

The Nobel Laureate’s lawyers launched an appeal against her conviction last week, but with the country’s pliant courts likely to do the junta’s bidding, the ethnic problem is the next real hurdle for the regime, analysts said.

‘This is a very complicated issue. After Aung San Suu Kyi’s case, the next big issue is the issue of ethnic minorities,’ Aung Naing Oo, an independent Myanmar analyst based in Thailand, told AFP.

Military ruler Than Shwe has long made the struggle for the ’stability of the state’ the main justification for the army’s continued dominance over the Southeast Asian nation.

In recent years the regime has been able to reach peace pacts with key ethnic groups, co-opting some to become junta-backed border forces that have taken on their former rebel brothers-in-arms.

But August’s outbreak of fighting in Kokang, a mainly ethnic Chinese region of Myanmar’s Shan state, showed the tensions near the surface and earned a rare rebuke from Beijing, usually Myanmar’s closest ally.

The offensive was a warning to other minority groups thinking of causing disruption before the polls, said Win Min, a Myanmar expert at Payap University in the northern Thai city of Chaing Mai. — AFP

Critics have denounced the elections as a sham aimed at legitimising the junta’s grip on power, but the influential International Crisis Group (ICG) think-tank said recently that the polls could be an opportunity for change.

‘These things are happening in the context of the 2010 elections. The Burmese military are showing ceasefire groups that if they don’t agree with their plans they are going to fight,’ Win Min said, using the country’s former name.

The new constitution – pushed through in a referendum in 2008 just days after a cyclone ravaged southern Myanmar – does not provide the autonomy many groups had hoped for, Mr Win Min added.

‘The groups signed ceasefires but in the hope that they would get greater autonomy. But they have been mostly rejected. They would like to wait until after there is a new government to negotiate greater autonomy,’ he said.

Compounding the problem is the fact that many of the groups, especially the powerful Wa in northern Myanmar, are heavily involved in the drugs trade, often with the tacit assent of the government, analysts said.

‘But now the government is using it (the narcotics issue) as a pretext to put pressure on the ethnic groups who don’t want to join Burmese security forces,’ Mr Win Min said.

The ethnic problems could end up with the effective ‘Balkanisation’ of Myanmar, a European diplomat in the region said on condition of anonymity.

‘We’ve never been closer to this than we are now,’ the diplomat said. ‘If no political solution is found for these ethnic groups the whole situation is going to implode.’ The diplomat said it was ‘not at all the case’ that Myanmar’s political problems are just about the situation between Ms Suu Kyi and the regime.

‘There are so many questions before 2010, so much that’s to be done. I’m sure Than Shwe has no clue how to tie up loose ends.’ But the Brussels-based ICG said in a report last month that some ethnic groups which had made ceasefire deals were endorsing political parties that would take part in the polls.

‘These groups take a negative view of the constitution but feel that there may be some limited opening of political space, particularly at the regional level, and that they should position themselves to take advantage of this,’ it said.

‘There are increased tensions, however, as the regime is pushing these groups to transform into border guard forces partially under the command of the national army.’ — AFP http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking%2BNews/SE%2BAsia/Story/STIStory_426174.html
=======================
Shwe Gas Calls on Corporations, Govts to Suspend Pipeline Project
By LAWI WENG    Monday, September 7, 2009

Shortly ahead of the beginning of construction of gas and oil pipelines from the Bay of Bengal to southwest China, a prominent rights group has called on corporations and governments involved in the project to suspend their activities.

The Shwe Gas Movement, an oil and gas watchdog based in Thailand, on Monday released a report titled “Corridor of Power” in which it claimed to expose how China is “plunging ahead with construction of nearly 4,000 kilometers [6,400 miles] of dual oil and gas pipelines across the heartland of Burma despite financial and political risks from social unrest,” as well as “impending human rights abuses and environmental destruction.”

The group said the pipelines will pass through cozens of villages in Burma, causing forced relocations, environment damage and human rights abuses.

“We are very worried about the human rights abuses that will happen along the route of the pipelines, because this is what happened in the past,” said Wong Aung, a spokesman for the Shwe Gas Movement. “During the construction of the Yadana gas pipeline in Mon State, there was a broad range of human right abuses.”

According to Wong Aung, there are 44 military battalions based along the pipeline route from Kyaukpyu Port in Arakan State to northeastern Shan State.

“We want China to stop this project because the pipeline will destroy the environment, the Burmese troops will confiscate people’s land and it will result in forced relocations and human rights abuses along the route of the pipeline,” he said.

The proposed route for the oil and gas pipelines will pass through Kunming in Yunnan Province and continue through Guizhou Province to Chongqing municipality in southwest China.

The project will include construction of railways, roads and waterways, as well as upgrading the port at Kyaukpyu.

Beijing has also secured a 30-year deal with the Burmese military government for natural gas tapped off the Burmese coast.

Monday’s report said that the project will provide the military junta a minimum of US $29 billion over 30 years. Meanwhile, China is reported to have set up oil refineries in Chongqing in Sichuan Province to process crude oil from the Sino-Burmese pipeline.

“People across Burma are facing severe energy shortages. These resources belong to our people and should be used for the energy needs of our country,” said Wong Aung.

Observers say that China intends to use the pipeline to avoid shipping oil through the Malacca Strait, which is slow and expensive, and tankers are prone to attacks by pirates.

China currently imports 85 percent of its oil from the Middle East and Africa.

Several analysts said they believed that the recent attacks by Burmese government forces against ethnic Kokang troops was a clear attempt to clear the area for the pipeline project. The fighting in the region forced an estimated 37,000 refugees across the Sino-Burmese border.

Last week, China warned the Burmese military leaders to solve the ethnic conflict on the border peacefully.

The Shan Sapawa Environmental Organization and the Salween Watch rights group have claimed that the Burmese government forces wanted to dispose the Kokang army from its stronghold in order to secure a 2,400-megawatt capacity hydroelectric dam project at Kunlong in northeastern Shan State.

Burma’s abundant offshore oil and natural gas reserves have attracted a great deal of interest from foreign investors. The country is estimated to have 3.2 billion barrels of recoverable crude oil.

The oil and gas sector receives the second-largest share of foreign investment in Burma, after hydropower projects.
Copyright © 2008 Irrawaddy Publishing Group | www.irrawaddy.org

http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=16736