World leaders scramble for funds to save the tiger
by Olga Nedbayeva – Sun Nov 21, 11:18 am ET

SAINT PETERSBURG (AFP) – World leaders sought Sunday to come up with the hundreds of millions of dollars needed to save the tiger from extinction and double the big cat’s numbers by the next Year of the Tiger in 2022.

Russian prime minister and self-proclaimed animal lover Vladimir Putin opened his native city to the world’s first gathering of leaders from 13 nations where the tiger’s free rein has been squeezed ever-tighter by poachers.

“This is an unprecedented gathering of world leaders (that aims) to double the number of tigers,” Jim Adams, vice president for the East Asia and Pacific Region at the World Bank, said at the opening ceremony of the four-day event.

“The global tiger initiative is an example of balanced economic development with nature preservation.”

Decades of tiger part trafficking and habitat destruction have slashed the roaming tiger’s number from 100,000 a century ago to just 3,200 today.

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) warns that the species is on course for outright extinction by the next Year of the Tiger under the Chinese calendar.

The tiger rescue effort’s success “depends on the political will of the countries that support it”, WWF Director General James Leape told the conference.

The World Bank estimates that it will take at least 350 million dollars to support joint efforts to fight poachers and introduce incentives for nature preservation over the next five years.

But the summit’s Russian hosts voiced optimism that the four-day conference would be crowned with success and provide a lesson for other joint environmental campaigns.

The tiger summit will be an example “for other challenges such as global warming”, Russian Natural Resources Minister Yury Trutnev told the gathering.

The high-profile meeting is due to be attended by Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao and delegations from India and Bangladesh — the three nations with the largest volume of tiger skin and other organ trafficking.

But consensus on the need to save the tiger has been hampered by a lack of coordination on the ground to stop the trafficking of tiger parts such as paws and bones — all prized in traditional Asian medicine.

Apart from Russia, 12 other countries host fragile tiger populations — Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Thailand and Vietnam.

Experts stress that India and China are by far the biggest players in saving the beast.

India is home to half of the world tiger population while the Chinese remain the world’s biggest consumers of tiger products despite global bans.

“In China, things are going from bad to worse,” said Alexei Vaisman of the WWF. “But it is hard for the Chinese authorities, who are fighting against a millennium-old tradition.”

Jia Zhibang, the head of China’s forestry administration, admitted Saturday that Chinese authorities had allowed “some exceptions” to a 1993 law that banned the use of tiger parts in Chinese medicine.

But he insisted that China was ready to line up behind the new emergency rescue plan.

“We are ready to cooperate with the World Bank and the other countries seeking to save the tiger,” the Chinese minister said.

Russia is the only country to have seen its tiger population rise in recent years.

It had just 80 to 100 in the 1960s but now has around 500, with experts praising Putin for taking an active role in the cause.

Putin has personally championed the protection of the Amur Tiger in the country’s Far East and was hailed by the Russian media for firing a tranquillizer dart at one of the fabled beasts in 2008.

Tigers could be extinct in 12 years if unprotected
By IRINA TITOVA, Associated Press – Sun Nov 21, 10:53 am ET

ST. PETERSBURG, Russia – Wild tigers could become extinct in 12 years if countries where they still roam fail to take quick action to protect their habitats and step up the fight against poaching, global wildlife experts told a “tiger summit” Sunday.

The World Wildlife Fund and other experts say only about 3,200 tigers remain in the wild, a dramatic plunge from an estimated 100,000 a century ago.

James Leape, director general of the World Wildlife Fund, told the meeting in St. Petersburg that if the proper protective measures aren’t taken, tigers may disappear by 2022, the next Chinese calendar year of the tiger.

Their habitat is being destroyed by forest cutting and construction, and they are a valuable trophy for poachers who want their skins and body parts prized in Chinese traditional medicine.

The summit approved a wide-ranging program with the goal of doubling the world’s tiger population in the wild by 2022 backed by governments of the 13 countries that still have tiger populations: Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Thailand, Vietnam and Russia.

The Global Tiger Recovery Program estimates the countries will need about $350 million in outside funding in the first five years of the 12-year plan. The summit will be seeking donor commitments to help governments finance conservation measures.

“For most people tigers are one of the wonders of the world,” Leape told The Associated Press. “In the end, the tigers are the inspiration and the flagship for much broader efforts to conserve forests and grasslands.”

The program aims to protect tiger habitats, eradicate poaching, smuggling, and illegal trade of tigers and their parts, and also create incentives for local communities to engage them in helping protect the big cats.

The summit, which runs through Wednesday, is hosted by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who has used encounters with tigers and other wild animals to bolster his image. It’s driven by the Global Tiger Initiative which was launched two years ago by World Bank President Robert Zoellick.

Leape said that along with a stronger action against poaching, it’s necessary to set up specialized reserves for tigers and restore and conserve forests outside them to let tigers expand.

“And you have to find a way to make it work for the local communities so that they would be partners in tigers conservation and benefit from them,” Leape said.

“To save tigers you need to save the forests, grasslands and lots of other species,” he added. “But at the same time you are also conserving the foundations of the societies who live there. Their economy depends very much on the food, water and materials they get from those forests.”

About 30 percent of the program’s cost would go toward suppressing the poaching of tigers and of the animals they prey on.

Russia’s Natural Resources Minister Yuri Trutnev said that Russia and China will create a protected area for tigers alongside their border and pool resources to combat poaching.
Leape said that for some of the nations involved outside financing would be essential to fulfill the goals.

“We need to see signficant commitment by the multilateral and bilateral indsitutions like the Global Environment Facility and the World Bank plus individual governments like the U.S. and Germany,” Leape told the AP.

For advocates, saving tigers has implications far beyond the emotional appeal of preserving a graceful and majestic animal.

“Wild tigers are not only a symbol of all that is splendid, mystical and powerful about nature,” the Global Tiger Initiative said in a statement. “The loss of tigers and degradation of their ecosystems would inevitably result in a historic, cultural, spiritual, and environmental catastrophe for the tiger range countries.”

Three of the nine tiger subspecies — the Bali, Javan, and Caspian — already have become extinct in the past 70 years.

Much has been done recently to try to save tigers, but conservation groups say their numbers and habitats have continued to fall, by 40 percent in the past decade alone.

In part, that decline is because conservation efforts have been increasingly diverse and often aimed at improving habitats outside protected areas where tigers can breed, according to a study published in September in the Popular Library of Science Biology journal.

Putin has done much to draw attention to tigers’ plight. During a visit to a wildlife preserve in 2008, he shot a female tiger with a tranquilizer gun and helped place a transmitter around her neck as part of a program to track the rare cats.

Later in the year, Putin was given a 2-month-old female Siberian tiger for his birthday. State television showed him at his home gently petting the cub, which was curled up in a wicker basket with a tiger-print cushion. The tiger now lives in a zoo in southern Russia.

YANGON, Myanmar, Nov. 21 (UPI) — The director of an AIDS clinic in Myanmar says the military government has been leaning on him ever since a visit by dissident leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

Yazar, who uses only one name, told CNN Sunday that shortly after Suu Kyi’s visit on Wednesday, the government told him to move out by Nov. 25.

“We have received this kind of threat before, but this time the warning is rude, much stronger and seems to be very serious,” Yazar said.

Suu Kyi, who received the Nobel Peace Prize for her pro-democracy activism, was freed from a long-running house arrest earlier this month. She made Yazar’s clinic one of her first public appearances.

Yazar said Suu Kyi chose the clinic in the suburbs of Yangon because she wanted to meet people who were in the direst need of help.

CNN said the government claimed it was shutting the clinic down due to complaints from neighbors.

Boston Globe – Myanmar elections aside, few see change
Activist’s release is called a sham
Associated Press / November 21, 2010

YANGON, Myanmar — The shopkeeper, a thin, jittery man who has spent nearly half his life in prison, wishes change were coming to Myanmar.

But the recent elections were a sham, he says, and the promises of democratic reform are empty words. He celebrated the release of prodemocracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest, but dismissed the idea it heralds a change in this secretive military-ruled nation.

“This is not a new era,’’ said Bo Bo Oo, 46, in sentiments echoed around the country, which is also known as Burma. “The generals will not change.’’

Globalization reached the long-isolated nation while Bo Bo Oo was in prison, serving 20 years for helping organize prodemocracy protests in 1988. Amid Myanmar’s withering poverty, you can now buy knockoff iPhones at the Mobile World shop in Mandalay and browse for lingerie at the Sexy Girl store in Yangon. You can live in a high-rise condo and watch CNN on satellite TV.

But belief in political change is much harder to find. This is a country battered by its own government, its pessimism shaped by decades of experience. In conversations with dozens of people, little was heard but anguish.

“The government has the power, and it does not want to give it up,’’ an elderly Buddhist monk said.

He remembers the days of British colonialism, and the Japanese occupation during World War II. He can talk about fleeing into the forests when Allied bombs began falling around the town, and the first military coup, in 1958. In 2007, he watched as monks were arrested and even killed during antigovernment protests dominated by the Buddhist clergy.

He sees modern Myanmar as the darkest time.

Like most people in Myanmar, he spoke on condition he not be identified, fearing retribution from the ruling junta’s agents and the Tatmadaw, as the army is called.

A few analysts do see signs of change. At the very least, they say, the elections will create new clusters of power in Naypyidaw, the capital city.

In Mandalay, a young businessman also sees a sliver of possibility in the elections.

“I don’t believe in these generals. I cannot see them giving up any power,’’ he said. “But maybe some new people [in the government] will change something. I hope so.’’

Bo Bo Oo, though, sees no hope. “All this is just about publicity,’’ he said of the Nov. 7 elections and Suu Kyi’s release.

Like many, he notes that Suu Kyi’s release came just a week after the first elections in 20 years, giving the junta a desperately needed publicity boost. While the military claims the vote will usher in a democratic government, much of the international community decried it as political burlesque that will entrench the generals behind proxy politicians.

“They want the world to think that this is becoming a democracy. But the Burmese people know the truth,’’ he said.

Myanmar holds nearly 2,200 political prisoners. Some of the country’s minority ethnic groups, who have faced brutal repression, back militias that have fought the generals for decades.

The government’s political agenda is seldom clear. Little is known about Than Shwe, the general who heads the junta, beyond rumors and gossip. International officials can go years without meeting him, and new ambassadors, who get a few minutes with him when they present their credentials, are grilled.

Index on Censorship – Suu Kyi Urges for Freedom of Speech in Myanmar
Posted by admin on November 18th, 2010

Saturday was a great day for all the people who believe in democracy. Aung San Suu Kyi, 65 year old lady who is a Nobel laureate, was under house arrest in Myanmar, was released after almost seven years. Suu Kyi is identified as a democracy icon of Myanmar and she is continuously trying to bring the democracy in the country and free the country from the junta military rule.

On the next day of her release, she addressed her supporters by appearing in public. She also gave her very first major speech after release. She urged for granting her a freedom of speech in the country where junta army is currently ruling. In her speech, she requested the western nations not to give any loans or help till the democracy is established again in her country. From her very first speech after release, it is not quite clear that she is going to play a major role in the politics of Myanmar in coming days. Her supporters were present in thousands outside the headquarters of the party where Suu Kyi was supposed to deliver her very first speech after coming out of her house arrest. With her arrival the crowd was overjoyed and roared to the extent of deafening. These are clear indications of starting of political reforms in Myanmar.

At the start of her speech, she told her supporters about the importance of freedom of speech. She mentioned that freedom of speech is the very first step towards democracy. Her speech was quite inspirational for the people present at the venue and also for all those who watched it over television. She mentioned in her speech that politics is an important aspect of common man’s life. She just mesmerized her audience with her magical words. She made it very clear by saying that she does not have any complaints about those, who have put her in house arrest for these many years.

Sunday November 21, 2010
The Star Online – Anwar is definitely no Aung San Suu Kyi
Comment by RACHEL MOTTE

Malaysia’s political landscape has little in common with Myanmar’s and Anwar’s personal case is very different from Aung San Suu Kyi’s.

MALAYSIAN opposition leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim is in Australia this week, speaking on social justice, democracy and his own legal woes. He has also addressed the recent release of Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese opposition politician, declaring that her release will mean nothing until she is permitted to take her place as the elected leader of Myanmar.

Anwar has used Suu Kyi’s release to attract attention to his own political problems, arguing that Australia ought to speak out in the face of atrocities in both Myanmar and Malaysia
“I’m not suggesting that (the Australian government) should interfere, but they should express their views, they should promote civil society, as a vibrant democracy, they’ve a duty…. But I think the issue of democracy, human rights, rule of law, they’re not something that you can just ignore.

“But I’m of course appreciative of the fact that Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd took time, and we had very, very useful discussions, some issues affecting both countries, and of course my personal predicament. But I always make it a point that they should extend the issue, the issue of freedom, human rights. It goes beyond Anwar’s personal case,” he was quoted as saying.

The problem here is that “Anwar’s personal case” is very different from Suu Kyi’s, and Malaysia’s political landscape has little in common with Myanmar’s.

Aung San Suu Kyi was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991 for “her non-violent struggle for democracy and human rights”. Her father, Aung San, who negotiated Burma’s independence from the British Empire in 1947, was killed by his political rivals when Suu Kyi was only two years old. When her mother, a Burmese ambassador, died in 1989, Suu Kyi dedicated her life to fighting for democracy in Burma as her parents had done.

She was active in Burma’s pro-democracy movement, and as a result was placed under house arrest in 1989; no charges were brought against her, and no trial occurred. Despite her confinement, she won a landslide victory in the 1990 election, and would have become Prime Minister had the military not intervened.

Suu Kyi was released from house arrest just days ago, on Nov 13. During her confinement, which spanned 15 of the past 21 years, she was usually separated from her family. She saw her husband, Michael Aris, only five times during the decade that preceded his death; even the intervention of such figures as then United Nations secretary-general Kofi Annan and Pope John Paul II could not persuade her captors to allow Aris to join her. She was also separated from her two sons and lived in less than ideal physical conditions, sometimes without access to electricity.

Suu Kyi chose to live under these restraints rather than abandon her pro-democracy work; she was offered freedom in exchange for her leaving her country, but she refused.

If anyone has suffered for the cause of democracy, Suu Kyi has. Yet Anwar, who has enjoyed the benefits of a trial, a team of lawyers, access to local, national, and international media outlets, his own political party, and the freedom to travel the globe, told Australians this week that “Australia needs to be more pronounced in its support for democracy. Otherwise, you have a strong position on Burma, but not on the atrocities in Malaysia.”

Anwar is no Suu Kyi. Indeed, his actions as the co-founder of a front organisation for the Global Muslim Brotherhood indicate that he is in fact opposed to the democratic ideals she has sacrificed so much for.

In the 1970s and 1980s, while Suu Kyi busied herself with the work that would later imprison her, Anwar served as a trustee for the World Assembly of Asian Youth. The Pew Forum described the assembly as being so intertwined with the Muslim Brotherhood that it was difficult to tell them apart.

In 2002, Suu Kyi took advantage of a brief respite from imprisonment to continue her work on behalf of Burmese freedom. Meanwhile, Anwar’s International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT) was named in a class-action suit brought on behalf of 9/11 family and survivors against organisations that helped fund radical Islamism.

In 2007, when Suu Kyi made her first state media address in the four years since her then current confinement had begun, the Muslim Brotherhood named Anwar’s IIIT in a list of 29 of “our organisations and the organisations of our friends.”

Though Anwar clearly equates his own political and legal troubles in Malaysia to the human rights abuses Suu Kyi has worked to end in Myanmar, no one else should. Anwar and Suu Kyi may both be political opposition leaders in their respective nations, but their similarities end there.

Rachel Motte is a blogger, editor, and commentator on political and cultural issues. She has written for CNN.com and has been heard on multiple radio stations nationwide.

Independent Online – Myanmar opens doors to foreign business
November 21 2010 at 09:27am

Just days after releasing Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest, Myanmar’s military rulers have a message for investors with a steely risk appetite – their isolated country is open for business.

After entering a new era of military-managed democracy after the November 7 election, the secretive junta is courting investment and touting the potential of a country rich in natural gas, timber and minerals with urgent infrastructure needs.

Myanmar Prime Minister Thein Sein gave a rare speech at a regional summit on Wednesday in the Cambodian capital Phnom Penh to promote the former Burma’s business credentials and trumpet plans for a regulatory framework that is friendly towards investment.

“We encourage participation from the private sector,” Thein Sein told leaders and business executives from Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand and Laos packed into a conference room. “We are creating a pro-business environment in order to work together to get much more business and investment in the region,” he said.

After decades off the investment radar, Myanmar appears ready to open its doors to foreign businesses, a step that analysts warn is easier said than done in a country blighted by decades of economic mismanagement and closed off by Western sanctions.

Sean Turnell, expert on Myanmar’s economy at Sydney’s Macquarie University, cautions that Myanmar is vastly different from other Asian frontier markets, such as Vietnam, whose communist government opened to foreign investment in the 1990s.

Since then, multinationals have piled into Vietnam, keen to break ground on factories and hire some of Asia’s cheapest workers. Today, Vietnam boasts gleaming shopping malls, a $33 billion (about R230bn) stock exchange and a surplus of foreign-run factories.

“In Vietnam, there may be problems with democracy, but that country has latched on to the southeast Asian ‘tiger’ economy model, which is about identifying external markets and investing in manufacturing, with a view to employing lots of people and getting into the global production chain,” said Turnell.

“But in Burma, it has been about dividing up the domestic economy rather than any sort of outward projection. The regime lacks that developmental mindset. That explains a lot about their decisions, which don’t make any economic sense. That is what separates them from Vietnam.”

US, European, and Australian sanctions, imposed in response to human-rights abuses, have stifled Western investment in the country of 50 million people, that just more than 50 years ago was the world’s biggest rice exporter and a major energy producer.

But the embargoes have not stopped the flow of money. China, Thailand and India are big investors. Official data show that China pumped $8.2bn into Myanmar from January to May, including $5bn in hydroelectricity projects and $2.2bn into oil and gas.

But last weekend’s release of Suu Kyi may offer a chance to recalibrate those sanctions, which critics say have hurt ordinary people by allowing the junta to monopolise the country’s economy.

Some diplomats expect the pro-democracy leader to play a pivotal role in pushing for a relaxing of embargoes. She hinted at this a day after her release. “If people really want sanctions to be lifted, I will consider this,” she told reporters.

The military junta rarely comments on sanctions. But diplomats in Myanmar say growing dependence on China is a concern for the generals, while analysts say the military leaders want an end to arms embargoes that limit their access to modern weapons technology.

Washington is wasting no time and said on Monday it was ready to engage with the new government, but made no mention of sanctions.

The recently formed Myanmar Business Council handed out glossy pamphlets this week to investors in a ballroom of the Cambodiana Hotel in Phnom Penh after its director delivered a presentation on investment opportunities in Myanmar.

“After 50 years of isolation, Myanmar’s doors have been unlocked,” read one pamphlet. “Myanmar is not a ‘maybe market’, it will be a ‘must-have’ market.”

“Unfavourable” Western sanctions offered opportunities for Myanmar’s closest neighbours, the council added, encouraging Thai investors to use the baht currency instead of dollars. It said Myanmar was “just like Thailand 20 years ago”, offering tax breaks.

But analysts, diplomats and executives with experience in Myanmar identify a host of risks for those trying to get in on the ground floor – corruption, fiscal mismanagement, poor infrastructure, cronyism, a rudimentary banking system, an unclear regulatory framework and opaque foreign investment laws.

“The major problem is political uncertainty. We never know what those generals want and if they will change their mind. It’s very risky,” said a trader at a leading Thai sugar miller, who declined to be identified.

This year, the junta set up the Myanmar Sugarcane Enterprise, a think tank, ahead of a free-trade zone in the Association of South East Asian Nations, whose newest members – Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam and Myanmar – must eliminate tariffs by 2015.

Asked how Myanmar was preparing for competition, Yi Yi Mon, the organisation’s general manager, said: “We are planning to increase sugar production.” But she declined to elaborate.

Myanmar produces 800 000 tons from six major millers, mostly run or held by the military. Unlike Cambodia and Laos, it has done little to attract foreign investment.

Some analysts see hints of change. The government sold off more than 300 state assets in the past year in areas such as shipping, aviation, banking and property.

Although the deals are likely to favour businessmen close to the regime, they could also generate interest among US and European investors willing to take a hit on their reputation.

Letters to the International Herald Tribune
New York Times – Engaging Tyrants
Published: November 21, 2010

Brahma Chellaney (“Why single out Myanmar for sanctions?” Views, Nov. 18) makes an excellent point in asking why Western countries are singling out Myanmar (Burma) for human rights abuses while China gets a free ride. Sadly, instead of logically concluding that China should suffer the same penalties as Myanmar, Mr. Chellaney argues for easing sanctions and increasing economic ties with the Burmese regime.

China executes more people than any other country, engages in egregious currency manipulation, bullies its neighbors, supports disgusting regimes, violates its citizens’ rights on a daily basis and turns a blind eye to the theft of intellectual property. China should be subjected to Myanmar-style sanctions not the other way around.

Globalization and integration will not change China, and it will not change Myanmar. The West has already made the mistake of being lax with China. Let’s not do the same thing in Myanmar.

Economic engagement only empowers those tyrants who already hold all the cards.

Peter Ripley, Tokyo

Scoop – Burma’s Remaining Political Prisoners
Monday, 22 November 2010, 9:41 am
Press Release: Terry Evans

With Aung San Suu Kyi’s recent release, the focus has now shifted to the plight of Burma’s remaining 2,202 prisoners of conscience.

The generals have been busy since the monk-led Saffron Revolution of 2007. In an effort to stamp out dissent, the number of political prisons detained during the last three years has doubled. Leading critics of the regime have been removed systematically to remote areas of Burma, cutting them off from family and friends who would normally provide them with food and medicine during their incarceration.

A recent report by the UN Special Rapporteur on Burma to the UN General Assembly stated, “Torture or other forms of inhuman treatment of political detainees are believed to be routine, especially during initial interrogation. Convicted prisoners are also reported to be subjected to torture and other forms of cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment for breaches of prison regulations.”

The health conditions in Burma’s 50 prisons and 44 labour camps are appalling, with a lack of doctors, medicines and access to timely treatment. It is hardly surprising that, in Aung San Suu Kyi’s first address since her release, she asked for her supporters to pray for Burma’s remaining political prisoners.

According to Assistance Association of Political Prisoners (Burma), currently, the 2,202 political prisoners jailed across Burma can be broken down as follows:

Monks: 258
Members of Parliament: 12
Students: 286
Women: 177
NLD Members: 413
Members of the Human Rights Defenders and Promoters Network: 31
Ethnic Nationalities: 233
Cyclone Nargis Volunteers: 20
Teachers: 26
Media Activists: 40
Lawyers: 12
Labour Activists: 36
88 Generation Students: 39
Doctors: 11
Individual Activists: 608

The Telegraph, Calcutta – Not a Mandela moment
FIFTH COLUMN -GWYNNE DYER

People love historical analogies. So it’s easy to think of Aung San Suu Kyi’s release from house arrest as Myanmar’s ‘Mandela moment’. When Nelson Mandela was freed from 27 years of imprisonment in 1990, it marked the start of a process that saw the negotiated end of the apartheid regime, followed by genuinely free elections in just four years. Maybe that sort of thing will now happen in Myanmar too.

That would be nice, but it would be unwise to bet the farm on it. ‘The Lady’, as everybody in Myanmar calls her, has the same combination of saintly forbearance and tough political realism that enabled Mandela to lead the transition to democracy so successfully in South Africa. But her situation is very different.

South Africa was utterly isolated politically, and its economy was crumbling under the impact of sanctions. The Myanmarese regime has diplomatic relations with its trading partners in Southeast Asia and a powerful supporter in China. Myanmarese living standards are dramatically lower than those in neighbouring countries due to 40 years of corrupt and incompetent military rule. But the economy is growing.

And the most important difference: when the South African president, F.W. de Klerk, freed Mandela in 1990, he already knew that the apartheid regime was doomed. He wanted to negotiate a non-violent transition to a democratic system that would preserve a place for South Africa’s white minority. Mandela was the best negotiating partner he could hope for.

The regime that has just released Suu Kyi, by contrast, does not think it has lost, and a transition to a genuinely democratic system is the last thing on its mind. It has just finished an elaborate charade of elections under a new constitution. It already has all the democracy it wants.

Why did Myanmar’s military rulers bother to construct a pseudo-democratic façade like this? After all, their power really rests on their willingness, demonstrated again three years ago, to kill unarmed civilian protesters. They don’t care about being loved, so long as they are feared.

Uncertain route

But they are as concerned about preserving the country’s independence as any other Myanmarese, and that makes it desirable to end Western sanctions against the regime. They are hugely dependent on China as an investor and a market for their raw materials, and that is not a comfortable position for any Myanmarese to be in. If Suu Kyi can persuade the Western powers to end sanctions against Myanmar — and she has already hinted that she will help — then the regime can use better relations with the West to counterbalance China’s overweening influence in the country.

Obviously, the regime is betting that it can use The Lady in ending sanctions without risking its own hold on power; and perhaps it is right. She faces a hard task in rebuilding her party, which split over the question of whether to participate in the recent bogus elections. Even if she succeeds, the generals can always arrest her again and lock her away for as many years as they like. But they could still lose their bet.

The citation for Suu Kyi’s Nobel Prize in 1991 called her a shining example of “the power of the powerless” — and that power is real. It could be seen in the adoring crowds who came out to see her when she was freed. Like Mandela in apartheid South Africa, or Václav Havel in communist Czechoslovakia, or Gandhi in colonial India, she is a realist about power and fear.

Despite all odds, those other heroes of non-violence got what they were really struggling for in the end: a free and democratic country. Suu Kyi could ultimately achieve that too, even though it is hard to see from here the precise route that might lead her to that goal.

Asian Tribune – A Burmese Perspective: Different Thinking and Philosophy
Mon, 2010-11-22 02:30 — editor
By Kanbawza Win

Following the euphoria of Daw, Aung San Suu Kyi’s release, she make it vividly clear that she wanted to listen to the people first before embarking on new activities and wanted to form a strong “people’s network,” the basic philosophy of democracy, which are all categorically opposite to the Junta’s theory that “the people should listen to the Tatmadaw as it is their father and mother”.

Of course, Than Shwe is an absolute monarch of the army, who had unwittingly driven the country to deplorable wretched balkanizing status within the two decades of his harsh and tyrannical rule and stills bent on clinging to power under a different guise.

Even his predecessor Ne Win, with his Burmese Way to Socialism responsible of making Burma, from the rice bowl to the rice hole of Asia, dragging the country to the Least Developed Status, has some sort of patriotism, when he sorrowfully discovered that his BSPP is not working well and willingly step down, but not Than Shwe, for this wicked, and crafty general does not have a pale of patriotism and is out and out for power. So when Daw Suu declared that for the sake of the country and people she wants to talk face to face with Than Shwe, the entire people of Burma and the international intelligentsia are very worried.

As a fervent believer of national reconciliation and peaceful collaboration, she has reiterated her call for dialogue to settle things across the table with the sole aim of settling things amicably instead of arrest, threats, torture, killing and imprisonment. But the Generals who does not harbour an ounce of love for the country simply does not care, for dialogue culture is entirely absent in their curriculum. They have been taught to shoot first before they talk somewhat similar to the early American pioneers “A good Red Indian is a dead Indian”. They are not only anathema to dialogue and discussion but also could not comprehend the value of it. What more prove is wanted, when all these two decades they have never embarked on serious dialogue except some photo display for PR purpose. These thugs sincerely believe that all democrats must be crushed and that their way is the only way. They abhor national reconciliation because it means sharing power and construe themselves as the monarch of all they survey and there’s none to dispute.

The basic thinking and philosophy of Daw Suu and the Junta are categorically on opposite ends. The cruel Generals loves their nefarious dictatorship and are determined to cling on to power at any cost and any slightest hint that the military is losing control then she will find herself back to her house arrest and isolation. They were forced to release her because any rationale to hold her has exhausted. It seems that the Generals are just waiting for her to make some tactical error to crack down on her again. One should remember that many a democracy leaders around the world had disappeared sometimes literally, sometimes figuratively, and even though Daw Suu is considered. too important to be killed, up to this day nobody can guarantee that she will be not as three attempts has been made on her life (The first incident occurred in April 1989 when she toured Irrawaddy Division when an army captain was about to shoot her as she passed through an army blockade in Danubyu Township. The second incident occurred in November 1996 when her motorcade was attacked by a group of thugs with sticks and bricks on Kabar Aye Pagoda Road in Rangoon. The third incident occurred on May 30, 2003, when her motorcade was attacked by a large mob systemically organized by the junta and its civilian wing, the Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA), which has now been transformed into a political party that won the election unfairly with widespread vote rigging) .

Even now, unconfirmed reports through our indigenous means indicated that General Than Shwe, seeing the mass people that supported her had ready given a green light to finish her off with some pretext before she turned the table on what he has done.

One of the indications is that ever though Suu Kyi’s release was given considerable attention in the international and exiled media and on the websites of private journals in Rangoon, the state-run media has been almost completely silent. Private journals in Rangoon have complained that some reports about Daw Suu for their print editions have already been banned by the regime’s draconian censorship board, resulting in delays in publication. This clearly indicates of how much the General abhor her.

Another pointer is that her repeated remark, “I don’t want to see the military falling. I want to see the military rising to dignified heights of professionalism and true patriotism,” a wish widely believe by the majority of the military personnel send cold shivers through the spines of senior Generals as they sense that many a Young Turks may imitate the one and only patriotic Muslim soldier Ohn Kyaw Myint to save the country. Even now several hundred disgruntled soldiers from battalions in Rangoon and Pegu divisions, along with their families went to see the release of Daw Suu with the hopes that the lady might be the solution to their woes.

Her release, even though is well timed to cover up the fraudulent elections and a carefully plan strategy designed to release the Western sanctions, realizing that her freedom had been a key demand of Western nations critical of their abysmal human rights record and is eager to burnish its international image, is very pivotal as it re-energize and reorganize this opposition and if she can seal the common bond between the ethnics and the pro democracy movement, that will be the end of the Junta. The crafty and cunning Generals see the writings on the wall.

The sincerity of Daw Suu can be seen not only for national reconciliation but also in nation building, the union of Burma when she said “A second Panglong Conference addressing the concerns of the 21st century is needed for national reconciliation.” She has done her home work well on the country’s contemporary history and knew that this is the crux of the Burmese problem for she realised that because the elected civilian government cannot resolve the ethnic problems in 1962 it paves the way for the Burmese army to take over, if not, there will be no such thing as the struggle of democracy.

The charismatic leader remains a political figurehead in Burmese politics—most of the ethnic leaders agreed that, like her father, she is the only one who can reconcile Burma’s deep political and ethnic divisions. On the very first day of her release all the evidence points out that she is very relevant in Burmese politics.

Surely ethnic armed groups or otherwise including democratic groups will be watching how she reacts to the conflict in ethnic regions and anticipating her important role in the national reconciliation process. Whereas the General Than Shwe wants to set up the fourth Burmese kingdom with nuclear arms and its Myanmarnizationpolicy treating the ethnic nationalities as second class citizen if not subdued colonial people. The proof it was its vigorous ethnic cleansing policy all these years.

Daw Suu stance of nonviolent revolution would consist of a radical change for a better world through a peaceful manner is a far cry from the Junta’s vision of building “a modern developed nation” under the leadership of the military in politics. “If we want to get what we want, we have to do it in the right way; otherwise we will not achieve our goal however noble or correct it may be,” she cautioned. She has become an international symbol of democratic reform, willing to negotiate, even with the Junta and the Thugs while the Burmese Generals could never comprehend such thinking.

Daw Suu is ready to facilitate “systematic” reports on any topic base on laws, justice and the truth, which again clash with the Junta’s theory of “lying the very concept of truth.”

Everybody has known that the Junta embarked on a sham and fraudulent elections to create a façade of democratization. Hence it was by design and pre meditated that they would not allow neutral and outside observers especially the international community to monitor the elections or otherwise the cat would be led out of the bag. Now a huge international joke is when the election commission threatened to take harsh legal penalties for those filing complaints about the election results deemed fraudulent and that individuals can be jailed for three years and fined up to £200. The world laugh hilariously but the people of Burma has to be contend in laughing in their sleeves.

Decades-long nightmare of military rule that has made what was once one of Southeast Asia’s most prosperous countries, now the poorest and most repressed, rest on her courage and moral clarity. Now there is some light for democracy and secure future and quite singularly represents a people desperately yearning to be free and hence she automatically became the biggest threat to the Generals continued rules.

One could vividly construe the Generals about their fear of losing power that drives them to oppress their own people and stand in the way of their nation’s potential. It was fear of losing power that drove a terrified junta to ruthlessly deny the people the democratic mandate they had entrusted to the NLD in 1990. It is the same fear that made the generals brutally crush the Buddhist monks and increased repression. It was also the fear of losing power that compels them to stop the international aid for the cyclones victims. So how can one negotiate with these unreasonable and paranoid Generals? As Daw Suu said “the economy is devastated, ethnic tensions are increasing, many political prisoners and too many refugees leaving the country, and even people who believed in this election, but they lost in the end.” Daw Suu and the current NLD team must be very wise to be able to see from the Generals’ perspective.

One should also recollect that Than Shwe rank as the third cruellest and repressive ruler of the world. Kim Jong Il, is the most ruthless in the late 1990 when the wife of one of Kim Jong Il’s bodyguards complained about the Dear Leader’s womanizing, she was brought out before the guests and then Kim Jong Il allowed the bodyguard the opportunity to execute his own wife — and he did so.

Omar al-Bashir, Sudan. Bashir launched the genocide in Darfur as well as mass killings in other parts of Sudan and initiate children to kill their parents. If compared to these two, Than Shwe ranked only third measured by his brutal repression of the ethnic nationalities, ordering the army to shoot into the crowds and later the mass killings of the Buddhist monks and blocked foreign assistance to the cyclone victims.

All in all, instead of concentrating on dialogue, the entire leadership should concentrate on more monolithic approach and capacity building of their young followers while many old comrades who are not relevant or are unable to cope with the changing times should be gracefully retired. Since it is impossible to negotiate with the Burmese Hitler we should rather emphasize on our allies.

Sunday, Nov. 21, 2010
The Japan TImes – Suu Kyi: free to do what?
By KEVIN RAFFERTY
Special to The Japan Times

HONG KONG — Aung San Suu Kyi regained her freedom last weekend, but walked into a “free” life that is still misgoverned by one of the most repressive and stupid regimes in the world, which only days before had thumbed its nose at its own people by conducting fake elections.

Her release offers a moment of opportunity, but it will require great graciousness on her part, an unexpected burst of patriotic imagination by the still ruling generals, and careful but remorseless pressure from the friends and neighbors of Myanmar before the country can be put back on the road to freedom and the kind of prosperity that is the norm in Asia.

Her own graciousness is evident. Suu Kyi emerged with a coolness that would make a cucumber wilt. Closer up, there are deep lines round her eyes — she is after all 65 years old — but being imprisoned or under house arrest for 15 of the last 21 years appears not to have created bitterness. She said, “I don’t feel I have suffered greatly; many others have suffered more,” a reference to Myanmar’s 2,200 political prisoners.

As to being parted from her husband when he died from cancer in England, she responded with icy cool that she had made her choice — to stay in Myanmar — and must take responsibility for her choice. She even made light of her plight when imprisoned, saying that she had had time to think and to read books, whereas now that she’s free, “I don’t seem to have time to breathe, so many things are happening.”

Critics think that she made wrong choices. Was it wise to stay in the country and be silenced for such a long time? But if she had left to campaign from abroad, the generals would have said that she had deserted the country; a voice from abroad would lose its authenticity and its power. Others claim that she should have allowed her party to contest the Nov. 7 elections. The “elections” were both farce and fake.

The generals fixed them. They revised the constitution to give a key role — a 25 percent block of seats in Parliament and control of important ministries — to the military. They excluded Suu Kyi from contesting and banned her party when it failed to register to take part. They set up a proxy party, the Union Solidarity and Development Party, which key generals, including Prime Minister Thein Sein took off their uniforms to join. They boosted the party with state funds so that it and the National Unity Party, mainly consisting of retired generals, were able to field candidates throughout the country. Then they restricted campaigning and created an atmosphere of fear and intimidation — vote for the generals’ proxy party or else. They refused to allow independent observers to watch the polling or the counting.

The government parties won by an 80 percent margin. That isn’t much of a conjuring trick even by the standards of corrupt elections. Could the generals really be so stupid to believe that an election like this could have any credibility?

When I first visited the country 35 years ago, it was already poor and run-down. I noted that if you keep a lion for a pet, you must expect to pay a big bill for feeding it. The expression “the lion’s share” does not mean 40 or 50 or 60 percent, but more like 95 percent. So it has proved in Myanmar, which in colonial times was the most prosperous country in Southeast Asia, the world’s biggest exporter of rice, rich in timber, minerals and with good reserves of oil and gas.

Today, Myanmar is one of the poorest countries in the world. Per capita income is about $1,100, in 210th place in the world league, with a third of its children malnourished. In the laconic words of the CIA Factbook: “Burma suffers from pervasive government controls, inefficient economic policies and rural poverty. . . . Socio-economic conditions have deteriorated under the regime’s mismanagement, leaving most of the public in poverty, while military leaders and their business cronies exploit the country’s ample natural resources.”

As an example of the gap between fact and fiction, the official exchange rate for the U.S. dollar is 6.5 kyats, but on the more realistic black market you can get 1,000 to 1,300 kyats for your dollar, depending on the tourist season.

The economy has made significant progress in the exploitation of oil and gas, timber and minerals, where the generals have struck such lucrative deals that there has been a clamor of foreigners countries fighting for a share. China has been the biggest beneficiary. Beijing sees Myanmar as essential to its energy security and has been developing oil and gas pipelines. It is also helping to develop hydropower supplies. Thailand also has close economic ties and buys about 30 percent of its gas from Myanmar to light the streets of Bangkok. India has been doing deals to prevent China from turning Myanmar into a client state.

These multibillion dollar deals have benefited the generals but done little for the country. Foreign earnings helped the generals build a sparkling new capital, Naypyidaw, carved out of bamboo forests and gentle hills 320 kilometers north of Rangoon, with eight lane highways (well-lit at night) and monster statues to heroes of the past, instead of the crumbling buildings, frequent power cuts and potholed roads of Rangoon. The generals themselves are out of sight in an isolated guarded zone of Naypyidaw.

Here they can make decisions in splendid isolation free from their people or fear of foreign invasion. It explains why they were little concerned with Cyclone Nargis last year: Even though it killed 130,000 people and badly damaged Rangoon, in inland Naypyidaw the generals felt only a gentle zephyr, yet stirred with concern that the foreign ships rushing with assistance might be an invasion fleet.

Re-enter Suu Kyi. Her immediate message was that she wanted to listen before she would talk, but that she would talk to anyone, even generals. Pertinently, she said she did not wish them ill or see them fall: “I want to see the military rising to dignified heights of professionalism and true patriotism.” The gentle irony was probably lost on the generals.

Don’t expect an inevitable happy ending. The generals probably released Suu Kyi not so they could negotiate but because they had run out of excuses for holding her or because they thought she was a spent force. The electricity of excitement among the crowds who surrounded her shows otherwise.

But she will need help. Western governments and Japan have to devise sweeter carrots and more effective sticks with their sanctions. They also have to encourage India to listen to its democratic heart and soul, not merely its geopolitical head, and persuade Southeast Asian leaders, particularly Thailand, Singapore and Vietnam, that a prosperous Burma where there are fewer refugees is in everyone’s interests, especially theirs.

And then there is China, which increasingly listens to no one but its own business interests and prefers the ease of dealing with dictators. Even China should be aware — since it held up release of the document for six months — that the United Nations has found that North Korea is taking part in “nuclear and ballistic missile-related activities” with Myanmar. Why would the generals want nukes? Even Beijing should beware of the junta’s dangerous appetite.

Kevin Rafferty, formerly in charge of the Financial Times’ coverage of Asia, is editor in chief of PlainWords Media.

The Irrawaddy – Main Ethnic Parties Plan to Sit in New Parliament
By SAI ZOM HSENG Saturday, November 20, 2010

Burma’s two largest ethnic parties have said that they will claim their seats in Parliament when it is formed sometime next year, despite their allegations of cheating by the junta-backed party that has been declared the winner of the country’s Nov. 7 election.

Leaders of the two parties, the Shan Nationalities Democratic Party (SNDP) and the Rakhine Nationalities Development Party (RNDP), said that they would join the Parliament for the sake of their people.

“We will take our seats in Parliament even if other parties boycott it,” SNDP Chairman Sai Aik Pao told The Irrawaddy on Friday. “We want to use our position inside Parliament to improve the living standards of our Shan people.”

The SNDP, also known as the White Tiger Party, fielded 157 candidates in the election, of whom 57 won.

Concerning widespread allegations of vote-rigging by the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), regarded as a regime proxy, Sai Aik Pao said that his party had no plans to call for an investigation.

“We are well aware of the USDP’s cheating, but we don’t see any point in disputing the results of the election,” he said. “If we sue them, we will have to pay one million kyat (US $1,150) for every constituency that they stole. We don’t want to waste our time and money on this.”

The RNDP, which enjoyed strong support in Arakan State, also said that it would not boycott the Parliament, but intended to challenge the results in some constituencies where  the USDP was accused of ballot stuffing.

RNDP Chairman Dr Aye Maung told The Irrawaddy recently that the party is “collecting evidence of cheating by the USDP during the election. When we are finished, we will send it to the Election Commission (EC).”

He also said that his party intended to work to promote the equality of the ethnic Rakhine people  and wanted to discuss the government’s gas projects in Arakan State.

The RNDP won in 35 of the 44 constituencies it contested.

Another ethnic party, the All Mon Regions Democracy Party (AMDP), said that it would boycott the new Parliament if other parties also did so.

Speaking to The Irrawaddy on Friday, AMDP Chairman Naing Ngwe Thein said that his party also had evidence of cheating by the USDP, but the EC has refused to acknowledge the problem.

“We told them the USDP used advance votes to fix the election results, but the EC dismissed our complaints,” he said.

The AMDP, which had 34 candidates in the election, won 16 seats.

According to China’s Xinhua news agency, the USDP won 883, or 76.5 percent, of the 1,154 seats contested in the election. The pro-regime National Unity Party came in second with 63 seats, followed by the SNDP and the RNDP, with 57 and 35 seats, respectively.

The National Democratic Front, a party formed by a breakaway faction of the National League for Democracy, which won 80 percent of the seats in Burma’s last election in 1990, matched the AMDP with 16 seats.

The Irrawaddy – ‘We’re Simply Hopeless and Helpless Here’
By SEIN HTAY Friday, November 19, 2010

MYITSONE, Kachin State — The path to Myitsone Village is thickly covered with weeds. Most of the houses in the village are abandoned. No children, no noise, no music in this village, which used to be home to 62 families.

The regime and China’s state-owned China Power Investment Corporation are jointly constructing the country’s largest dam just 1.6 km below the confluence the of the Mali and N’ Mai rivers. Sixty villages in the flood zone have been ordered by the government to relocate to a new location.

Farmers in this area are frustrated about how to begin their new life. They paid little attention to the recently completed election, and have little hope for help.

Lum Dau, in his forties, scratched his head, thought hard, and said simply, “I don’t know what to expect. Like the present [military] government, the new government will also do whatever it likes. It’s no use hoping.”

People in Myitsone Village, about 27 miles to the north of Myitkyina, the capital of Kachin State, want the government to halt dam construction and return their families to their villages. But they know that’s just a dream. But many plan to keep fighting, to keep hope alive.

In this northern state bordering with China, the Burmese government and its cronies have been exploiting forests and natural resources such as teak, jade and gold for many years, and there has been very little help for the people.

Now in partnership with the China state-owned company, the government has set about to build seven hydroelectric power plants on the Mali, N’ Mai and Irrawaddy rivers. Myitsone Dam is one of them and the first on the Irrawaddy River.

Because of Myitsone Dam, 15,000 people from 60 villages will lose their means of livelihood, including farming, fishing and non-timber forest product collection, according to the Chiang Mai-based Kachin Development Networking Group (KDNG).

The dam’s flood zone will be 766 square kilometers—as large as New York City—in an area that is renowned for its biodiversity.

The Kachin people see the dam also as a threat to their cultural heritage, since the confluence area is integral to Kachin traditions. The confluence marks the beginning of the Irrawaddy River, one of the longest rivers in Southeast Asia.

In addition, the dam, which will be 152 meters high, is the first dam to be built on the Irrawaddy River—a major waterway in the country which will be severely impacted, say environmentalists.

Experts also warn that the Myitsone Dam, which would be the world’s 15th largest dam, could also bring disaster to the people living down river, because it will be located just 100 km from a major fault line in an earthquake-prone area.

Kachin groups have called for a halt, but their efforts have proven unsuccessful. Observers say that the junta will not stop the dam, and it will earn US $500 million annually from selling electricity to China.

“We’re determined to fight until the government agrees to halt [building this dam],” said Awng Wa, the chairman of KDNG. “We strongly believe we will win.”

Awng Wa said that it’s important to raise awareness about the dam’s impact so that people not only from Kachin State, but from all along the Irrawaddy River will join their calls.

“We’ll protest in many ways inside [the country],” the KDNG chairman said. “If the next government is a real democratic government, they have to allow our protests against this dam.”

However, the Kachin people don’t hold out much hope. During the election campaign, the Union Solidarity and Development Party and Unity and Democracy Party of Kachin State did not even discuss the dam issue during their campaign speeches in the election period.

“That means that they won’t bother to call for a halt to building the dam [when they become a government],” said a man in Tanphre Village, which sits just below he confluence and has not yet been relocated.

In the meanwhile, the Asia World Company, which is owned by a government crony, has been building houses between the dam site and Myitkyina to house relocated villagers.

Some villages, including Myitsone, have already relocated to the resettlement area, called Aungmyin Thar Yard, while other villages have yet to relocated.

Every householder is to be given a house and compensation for their land, if they can show a land title.

If you can’t show a land title, you will not be compensated for your land, paddy field or orchard.

However, even if you can show a land title, villagers say they can’t expect to receive land as good as what they’ve lost.

“I was given three acres when I showed my land titles. But the land they gave me is full of small stones and sand. How can I grow paddy on such land?” said a farmer in Kyainkaran Village.

Another villager complained that the government replacement land he was given is covered by bushes and trees, and it will take hard labor, money and time to make it useful.

Even housewives are unhappy, even though they will receive a new two-story wood house with a zinc roof, rice for one year for the whole family, piped water and a 21-inch color TV.

“We just miss our home [in the old village]. We just want to go back home,” said a 28-year-old housewife, as she piled firewood under the stairs of her new house. Like other households, her family left orchards and paddy fields behind.

Since she doesn’t see any means of livelihood here in the area of her new home, she worries about the future.

“I feel sad and cry whenever I think of our plight,” said the woman, a mother of two children. “Look, we’re simply hopeless and helpless here.”

Indian state revokes exile order for 34 jailed Burmese
Saturday, 20 November 2010 17:20 Salai Han Thar San

New Delhi (Mizzima) – India West Bengal State revoked on November 11 its order to deport to Burma 34 Arakanese and Karen rebels being held at a Kolkata prison, one of their representatives said.

The joint secretary of the state’s Home Ministry had issued the order in the middle of last month.

“Now this order has been revoked,” Dr. Tint Swe, a representative of the 34 Burmese, said. Tint Swe was elected in 1990 as a National League for Democracy member of parliament and has been living in New Delhi since December that year, after fleeing a junta crackdown on NLD members and others of the pro-democracy movement.

The members of National United Party of Arakan (NUPA) and the Karen National Union (KNU), armed ethnic groups fighting the Burmese regime, were arrested by the Indian army on February 11, 1998. The rebels claimed they were betrayed by the Indian military intelligence officer Lieutenant Colonel Grewal, who they said offered them safe haven on Landfall Island on India’s Andaman and Nicobar Islands.  But upon arrival at the island six of their top leaders were led off and shot dead, they said.

The rest were detained for six years without trial at Port Blair on Andaman Island. In October 2006, after work on their behalf by a group of rights lawyers and politicians, they were transferred to the Presidency Jail in Kolkata. The city’s sessions court charged them with illegal entry into India, and possession of arms and explosives.

Grewal has since left military intelligence and was reportedly living in Rangoon as a guest of the Burmese military junta. Reports have said at the time of the group’s arrest, Burmese Army officers were present on a neighbouring island.

After more than three-year trial, the Indian Central Bureau Investigation (CBI)  reached a settlement with the accused in July last year. The court accepted a plea bargain based on time served but imposed a fine of 6,000 rupees (US$128) on each of the group.

All 34 of the group had paid their fines on September 15 but were still being held in the Kolkata prison on the grounds that they were without proper documents to stay in India, Tint Swe said. Nevertheless, they had submitted applications with UNHCR to be recognised as asylum seekers.

The UNHCR had asked permission from the Indian government to interview them over the applications, a UN official from New Delhi said on condition of anonymity. She said that Indian officials had failed to respond.

“They want their freedom as soon as possible. They have spent more than 12 years in prison and their case has been concluded by the court, so they are suffering great stress … in facing an uncertain future,” Dr. Tint Swe said.