ASEAN finance ministers to discuss hot money
by Stephen Coates – Thu Apr 7, 10:42 pm ET

NUSA DUA, Indonesia (AFP) – Southeast Asian finance ministers meet Friday for talks expected to focus on capital controls to shield the region’s booming economies from destabilising “hot money” inflows.

With Europe’s sovereign debt crisis spreading to Portugal and much of the developing world’s economies still in the doldrums after the global financial crisis, Asia has become a magnet for capital seeking better returns.

But much of the foreign capital has been in the form of volatile portfolio investments which can be withdrawn just as quickly as they were injected, raising fears for stability in economies that are leading the global recovery.

“We can intervene but we don’t know exactly how to do so. In the past few days the inflows have been huge,” Indonesian central bank Deputy Governor Hartadi Sarwono told reporters on Thursday.

“The capital inflows are so massive, and they don’t just flow to Indonesia but in the region.”

Indonesia’s rupiah hit four-year highs against the greenback earlier this week and inflation is running at more than 6.5 percent, underlining concerns that the region’s more successful economies may be close to boiling point.

Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is expected to open the meeting of finance ministers from the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) on the resort island of Bali.

ASEAN chief Surin Pitsuwan will attend, as will World Bank managing director Sri Mulyani Indrawati — a former Indonesian finance minister — and officials from the International Monetary Fund and Asian Development Bank.

Indonesia, which holds the current chair of ASEAN, has said the ministers will also discuss food security and progress toward a planned common market in the region of more than 500 million people by 2015.

The ASEAN region grew at around five percent last year, up from 1.5 percent in 2009 in the aftermath of the global credit crunch.

The block includes Brunei, Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

Analysts say Asia’s emerging economies are poised for another year of solid growth in 2011 even if the impact of the catastrophic earthquake and tsunami in Japan remains unclear.

But inflation is a key concern for the region, which faces tighter monetary policies as authorities seek to temper price rises including in food staples such as rice.

The ADB warned this week that some developing economies were showing signs of “potential overheating” and said more flexible exchange rates and capital controls could help curb soaring prices.

Governments have tried a range of responses to hot money but capital controls, such as transaction taxes and currency restrictions, have until recently been scorned by economists as unnecessary interference.

In February the IMF recognised that such controls were justified in the face of destabilising imbalances in the global economy.

In a recent report on Asian economies, Standard and Poor’s ratings agency said regional central banks might consider further capital controls and other actions to prevent risky asset bubbles.

Within Southeast Asia, it said Singapore’s growth would moderate sharply to 4.5-5.0 percent from 14.5 percent last year, Malaysia would expand 4.8-5.3 percent and Indonesia would grow 5.9-6.4 percent from 6.1 percent.

The Philippines was forecast to grow 5.1-5.6 percent from 7.3 percent and Thailand’s growth would ease to 4.0-4.5 percent from 7.8 percent.

Channel NewsAsia – ASEAN finance ministers warn of threats to economic growth
Posted: 08 April 2011 2037 hrs

NUSA DUA, Indonesia : ASEAN finance ministers agreed Friday to speed up regional integration and pledged to press ahead with plans for a disaster insurance fund in the wake of Japan’s tsunami disaster.

They also warned that rising food and oil prices could threaten the global economic recovery, and expressed concern about massive inflows of destabilising “hot money” from abroad.

Indonesia’s rupiah hit four-year highs against the greenback earlier this week and inflation is running at more than 6.5 percent, underlining concerns that the region’s more successful economies may be close to boiling point.

“In contrast (to developed countries), emerging and developing economies have led the global economic recovery,” Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said at the start of the talks on the Indonesian island of Bali.

“This is of course no time to be complacent,” he added, warning of inflation and the “increasing severity and impact of natural disasters and climate change”.

Trade and liquidity imbalances combined with rising commodity prices “may threaten the global economic recovery, food and energy security and the achievement of millennium development goals” such as poverty reduction, he said.

“The increasing linkage of ASEAN to the global economy has enhanced the potential spillover from external shocks into our region,” he told finance ministers and central bankers from the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

With Europe’s sovereign debt crisis spreading to Portugal and much of the developing world’s economies still in the doldrums after the global financial downturn, Asia has become a magnet for capital seeking better returns.

But much of it has been in the form of volatile portfolio capital that can be withdrawn just as fast as it is injected, raising fears of instability in economies that are leading the global recovery.

A joint statement released at the end of the talks said the ministers had “discussed concerns about the current surge in capital flows, (and) emerging inflationary pressures combined with strong commodity price vulnerability”.

Yudhoyono said the best protection from external shocks was closer regional cooperation and the creation of a planned ASEAN common market of almost 600 million people by 2015.

Indonesia is the current chair of the grouping and its biggest economy.

The group also includes Brunei, Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

The ministers said they had agreed to implement a $700 million credit guarantee and investment facility next month as previously promised under a broad range of initiatives to more closely link the region’s economies.

Along with the Asian Development Bank, they also pledged initial contributions of $482 million towards a Malaysia-based ASEAN infrastructure fund.

They also agreed to move forward with the liberalisation of financial services, and emphasised the need for “disaster risk financing” to insure against the impacts of catastrophes like Japan’s devastating tsunami.

ASEAN secretary general Surin Pitsuwan said the Japan disaster would have “minimal impact” on Southeast Asian economies, ahead of an ASEAN-Japan foreign ministers’ meeting in Jakarta on Saturday.

Singaporean Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam said it was “too early” to tell what impact it would have.

He warned that Southeast Asia would be “prudent” to assume the knock-on effects would last beyond a quarter or two.

The ASEAN region grew at around five percent last year, up from 1.5 percent in 2009 in the aftermath of the global credit crunch, yet Yudhoyono said it still counted almost 120 million people who live on less than $1.25 a day.

Time.com - Humanitarian Intervention: Whom to Protect, Whom to Abandon
By MICHAEL ELLIOTT – 1 hr 12 mins ago

Death and taxes are always with us, and so are arguments about whether nations ever have the right or duty to intervene in the affairs of others. The case for “humanitarian intervention,” under a variety of names, has been asserted at least since the great powers threw their weight behind Greece’s struggle for independence in the 1820s, but in its modern form was developed during the Wars of the Yugoslav Succession, when it appeared to many that armed force was the only way to end terrible atrocities. More recently, the U.N. has adopted as a norm of international affairs the “responsibility to protect,” which contemplates the possibility of armed intervention when a state shows itself unable or unwilling to prevent grave human rights abuses.

The war in Libya has opened up the can of worms once more, with those on one side arguing that international forces can prevent or end great wrongs, while others assert that intervention is based on the inconsistent application of fuzzy principles and amounts to little more than imperialism dressed in a cloak of bleeding-heart piety. (See exclusive photos of Libya’s rebels.)

This debate won’t be settled even if next year Libya looks like a North African version of Kent or Kansas, which it won’t. But we know enough about humanitarian intervention by now to reach some conclusions about what it means in practice.

First, it will indeed be applied selectively. There are leaders in the world at least as unpleasant as Muammar Gaddafi who sleep easily abed each night. In Bahrain, Yemen and Syria, peaceful protesters have been killed recently without anyone’s arguing for a NATO mission to be dispatched. The standard objection to this inconsistency is to say, “Just because you can’t save everyone doesn’t mean you shouldn’t save someone.” But although this line is flopped down as if it were the ace of trumps, it doesn’t end the matter. The “everyone/someone” argument is fine as a justification for those thinking of intervening. For those whom intervention might save, on the other hand, it is a form of cruelty: they are encouraged to think that the cavalry might come charging over the hill even if, usually, it won’t. “Consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds,” Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, to which the appropriate response is, “Not always, buster.” (See photos of the Yemen protesters.)

Second, it is dishonest to argue – though Barack Obama has tried – that humanitarian intervention has nothing to do with a desired regime change. Of course it does. If a regime is so mistreating its people that it deserves the intervention of outside forces, then it is illogical to argue that the interveners’ job is done if that regime stays in power. Otherwise, why take up arms in the first place? It’s sometimes argued that successful interventions such as the no-fly zone in Iraqi Kurdistan in the 1990s and the war in Kosovo did not involve regime change – Saddam Hussein and Slobodan Milosevic remained as leaders of Iraq and Serbia respectively. But this entirely misses the point that change certainly did occur in Kurdistan and Kosovo, where the old regime’s writ no longer ran. If the world were to decide that the human rights of Zimbabweans were so abused that armed intervention was necessary to protect them, would it be O.K. for Robert Mugabe to stay in power? Middle school kids can figure that one out.

Precisely because humanitarian intervention will often involve regime change – with all the messy questions of responsibility for what comes after it – many nations will shy away from getting involved. The third thing we have learned is that only some nations will ever join a robust intervention force, which limits where intervention may take place. The war in Libya is being conducted by NATO without Germany – any minute now, we’ll have a Glenn Miller revival – with a bit of Arab participation at the margin. This is how modern interventions typically have been and will be. They are NATO shows because NATO has the muscle, the organization and three large members – the U.S., France and Britain – with significant constituencies supporting such intervention. But there is no equivalent to NATO anywhere else, nor any great appetite for going abroad looking for dragons to slay. Germany is not taking part in the Libyan war, and India, China, Brazil and Russia abstained from the U.N. Security Council vote that authorized it. Lots of humanity – and economic clout – in those five nations. (See pictures of the battle for Libya.)

In practice, then, humanitarian intervention will take place only in parts of the world that are proximate to NATO’s traditional territory – Europe, the Middle East, North Africa. North Korea and Burma have for decades been run by regimes that are among the vilest on earth – one starved its people in the 1990s; the other criminally failed to ameliorate the impact of a terrible cyclone in 2008 – but their leaders needn’t worry. Their neighbors, in Northeast Asia and Southeast Asia respectively, are immune to the instincts of the French, British and Americans to make the world a better place by force of arms.

So where does this leave us? Are there any tests that we can apply that guide when humanitarian intervention is justified? There have been many such attempts, but I am still drawn to Tony Blair’s famous Chicago speech on the nation of an “international community” in 1999, at the height of the Kosovo war. Blair proposed five “major considerations” before deciding whether to intervene in the affairs of other countries. “First, are we sure of our case? War is an imperfect instrument for righting humanitarian distress; but armed force is sometimes the only means of dealing with dictators. Second, have we exhausted all diplomatic options? … Third, on the basis of a practical assessment of the situation, are there military operations we can sensibly and prudently undertake? Fourth, are we prepared for the long term? In the past we talked too much of exit strategies. But having made a commitment we cannot simply walk away once the fight is over; better to stay with moderate numbers of troops than return for repeat performances with large numbers. And finally, do we have national interests involved?” (See more about Kosovo.)

You can quibble with those tests, and many would – the fourth of them has to be read in the knowledge that it was written before the disasters of the Iraq war. But what really strikes me about them is not just that they are sensible, but how difficult it is to satisfy them all. (How many of them were truly met in the case of Libya?) When all is said and done, justified cases of humanitarian intervention will remain rare, but the arguments over the doctrine will continue endlessly. Death and taxes, indeed.

MYANMAR NATIONAL FOUND DEAD AT CAR PARK
Bernama – Fri, Apr 8, 2011 7:26 PM MYT

GEORGE TOWN, April 8 (Bernama) — A Myanmar national, believed to have been bludgeoned to death, was found at the Bukit Dumbar Squash Centre early this morning.

North-east district police chief ACP Gan Kong Meng said the man identified as Zam Thian Mang, 25, was found by a group of community volunteers who were on their rounds at the area at about 1am.

“The victim was found in a pool of blood with numerous injuries in his body and head while a helmet visor was found not far from his body,” he told reporters here today.

Gan said the motive of the murder could be revenge or a misunderstanding because his wallet, cash RM200 and his expired social visit pass were found.

He was believed to have been beaten up by more than one person, using helmets.

Gan said the victim’’s body was later sent to the Penang Hospital for post-mortem while the case has been classified as murder.

He urged anyone with information to contact the nearest police station.

This is Oxfordshire – Ex-Cheney pupil tells of Burmese refugee work
2:00pm Friday 8th April 2011

WHEN Ian Werrett learned of the actions of the brutal military junta in Burma, he knew he had to act in the most direct way possible.

And back home in Oxford after 18 months helping refugees from the South East Asian country, he’s raring to return to the region to continue his work.

The former Cheney School pupil said: “I developed an interest in South East Asian politics while studying at the University of Kent and when I learned what the government was doing in Burma, especially to the children, I knew I had to do something to help them.

“I had read reports of children being raped and burned alive.

Working in a youth centre in the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur, Ian, 25, from Headington, saw first hand the impact of the regime.

The Burmese junta is accused of persecuting all ethnic minorities, wiping out entire villages, systematically raping women and girls, and forcing young boys to become child
soldiers.  The US State Department has labelled it a “country of particular concern”, the worst rating for violations of religious freedom. Freedom of speech and movement are also greatly restricted and torture is common place in Burma’s many prisons, leading many people to flee to neighbouring Malaysia and Thailand.

Mr Werrett worked out of the KL Krash Pad youth centre in Chow Kit, a low income, high-crime area of Kuala Lumpur, and stayed at a small flat nearby.

He said: “Most could not speak English or Malay and it took time to adjust to local culture and laws.

“I tried to help the Burmese refugees by providing the basic goods, such as food and medicine, as well as education for the children.”

The children yearn for education, he said, while school supplies were “treated like birthday presents”.

He recalled one refugee who told him how the military would visit his village most weeks to take boys for the army and rape girls and women.

Mr Werrett recalled him saying: “When we did not have time to run to the forest my family dug a hole in the ground – we would cover the hole and bury ourselves in there.”

Mr Werrett said: “Perhaps most worrying was the young man who told me how some people had even fled Burma and left their very young children behind.

“They were too poor to pay for their children to go with them.”

He is now seeking a job to fund another trip next year to continue his work.

He said: “I feel incredibly lucky, now I am back in Oxford, for the wealth of human rights and democracy we enjoy here.  “The main thing I take away from my time with the Burmese refugees is the ability to enjoy life regardless of circumstance.

“Although they had fled a genocide and struggled to provide food for their families, they were some of the happiest and kindest people I have ever met.”

Asian Correspondent – Burma looks for a space in ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Assembly (AIPA)
By Zin Linn Apr 08, 2011 7:59PM UTC

The new government of Burma is attempting to join the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) Inter-Parliamentary Assembly (AIPA), by sending its representatives to Cambodia, which will host the 32nd ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Assembly (AIPA 32) in September, quoting an anonymous member of the Constitutional Drafting Department of the Burmese Peoples Parliament, Kachin News Group [KNG] reported.

According to him, the representatives attended a meeting from April 2 to 5 as part of Burma’s efforts to become a long term member of the AIPA. The representative team was led by former ambassador and mayor of Rangoon, Hla Myint ( ex-Brigadier General) and included Immigration Office Director, Khin Maung Than, as well as National Parliament Constitutional Drafting Department Vice President, Mya Nyein and National Parliament Constitutional Drafting Committee Member, Khyet Htein Nang.

The General Assembly (Union Parliament) announced on March 28th it agreed to seek long term membership in the AIPA. Burma will become the ninth member in the AIPA if approved by the assembly. The present members include Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. That would leave Brunei as the last of the 10 ASEAN member countries without membership in the AIPA.

The establishment of ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Organization (AIPO) was at the initiative of Indonesia. In the early 1970’s, encouraged by the progress being made by ASEAN, the Indonesian House of Representatives came up with the idea of setting up an organization consisting the parliaments of the then five ASEAN member countries of Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand.

Following the initial contacts, the Parliaments of ASEAN member-states agreed to hold the first meeting in Jakarta to further discuss the realization of the idea to form a parliamentary cooperation forum, and Indonesia was chosen as the host of the First ASEAN Parliamentary Meeting (APM) from 8th to 11th January, 1975.

As a follow up to the First APM, the Working Committee meeting was held at Tugu, Puncak, Bogor; in May, 1975. The outcome was a proposal on the form   and structure of the
forum for inter-parliamentary cooperation and the proposed Statutes to be discussed at the Second APM.

The signing of the Statutes of AIPA on 17th April 2007 in Kuala Lumpur replacing the previous Statutes of AIPO marked the transformation of the ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Organization or AIPO into the ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Assembly or AIPA. A new era of a more closely integrated ASEAN inter-parliamentary cooperation has set in.

Since its commencement in 1977, AIPO holds its General Assembly annually. The First General Assembly of AIPO was in Singapore, 26 – 28 September 1978.

Burma’s Thein Sein Government which has been blamed widely for its seven-step roadmap that produced a sham constitution, vote-rigging elections and a namesake parliament.

JANY Summer
Color Market Reports
National Jeweler – Human rights abuses documented in Myanmar
Apr 8, 2011

New York–Recent footage has surfaced detailing disturbing conditions in the mines of Myanmar (Burma) where Burmese rubies, which remain under U.S. embargo, are produced.

Time magazine recently posted a video on its Web site of two-and-half minutes of footage at the off-limits Mogok area of Myanmar, secretly filmed by Arabic news agency Al Jazeera.

According to the report, the government finds new sources of rubies by moving miners–surrounded by armed guards–onto farms in the middle of the night, despite the protests of the land’s rightful owners. If the miners unearth rubies, then the land become property of the government, and the owners end up as virtual slaves in the ruby trade.

The report shows that children as young as four years old toil in Myanmar’s government-controlled ruby mines, while the adults who work in the mines earn as little a $1.50 a day.

In the United States, Burmese rubies, which are prized worldwide for their high quality, and jade from Myanmar have been embargoed since 2003, with President Barack Obama renewing the U.S. ban in July 2009. The European Union also has an embargo on gems from Myanmar.

Myanmar, however, finds plenty of other outlets for its mineral wealth. Al Jazeera reports that the state raked in a record $1.67 billion in gem sales last year. And an auction of gems, jade and pearls held in March by the government reportedly netted nearly $3 billion.

Washington Post – Activists fight plan for first dam across lower Mekong River, in wilds of northern Laos
By Associated Press, Friday, April 8, 5:36 AM

BANGKOK — A plan for the first dam across the Mekong River anywhere in its meandering path through Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam has set off a major environmental battle in Southeast Asia.

The $3.5 billion Xayaburi dam is slated for the wilds of northern Laos and would generate power mostly for sale to Thailand. The project pits villagers, activists and the Vietnamese media against Thai interests and the Laotian government in its hopes of earning foreign exchange in one of the world’s poorest countries.

A decision on whether the dam gets the green light, is axed or deferred for further studies is expected April 19 during a meeting in the Laotian capital among Laos, Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia.

Opponents warn it could open the way for 10 more dams being considered along the lower Mekong.

“Our lives and livelihoods depend on the health of the Mekong River,” said Kamol Konpin, mayor of the Thai riverside town of Chiang Khan.

“As local people have already suffered from dams built upstream in China and watched the ecosystem change, we are afraid that the Xayaburi dam will bring more suffering.”

China has placed three dams across the upper reaches of the Mekong, but otherwise its 3,000-mile (4,900-kilometer) mainstream flows free.

The Xayaburi would cut across a stretch of the river flanked by forested hills, cliffs and hamlets where ethnic minority groups reside, forcing the resettlement of up 2,100 villagers and impacting tens of thousands of others.

Environmentalists say such a dam would disrupt fish migrations, block nutrients for downstream farming and even foul Vietnam’s rice bowl by slowing the river’s speed and allowing saltwater to creep into the Mekong River Delta.

A Thai firm would build the 1,260 megawatt hydroelectric project. However, Thai villagers along the river are staging protests and planning to deliver letters to Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva and the Lao Embassy in Bangkok, where the Thai government has maintained an official silence on the issue.

Pianporn Deetes, of the U.S.-based International Rivers, said environmentalists are ready to take their case to court if Abhisit doesn’t deliver a positive response.

Last month, 263 non-governmental organizations from 51 countries sent letters to the governments of Laos and Thailand urging that the project be shelved.

Laos said in February that the Xayaburi would be the “first environmentally friendly hydroelectric project on the Mekong” and that will “not have any significant impact on the Mekong mainstream.”

“We are excited about this project,” the statement said.

Vietnam’s official media, in a rare disagreement with its communist neighbor, has blasted the dam, while scientists and environmental groups have called for its construction to be delayed for 10 years until more research is conducted.

“It seems that countries of the lower Mekong still haven’t learned lessons from the impact of the Chinese dams,” Pianporn said. “Xayaburi is so important because it could set off the destruction of the lower Mekong.”

Since 2007, there have been proposals to put up 11 mainstream dams in Cambodia and Laos.

The Mekong River Commission, set up by the four Southeast Asian neighbors in 1995 to manage the river, has expressed serious reservations about Xayaburi. A study by the group recommended a 10-year moratorium on all mainstream dams, a stand supported by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during a Southeast Asian trip earlier this year.

The commission cited feared damage to migrations of between 23 and 100 fish species, among a host of other environmental problems.

Another MRC document showed nobody spoke in favor of the dam during public consultations this year in Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand, while many officials, academics and residents cited problems or lack of information about the project. No consultation was held in Laos.

“If this project goes ahead it would be unimaginably irresponsible,” said Ame Trandem of Rivers International.

Somkiat Khuengchiangsa, who has spent his life along the river and heads The Mekong-Lanna Natural Resources and Culture Conservation Network, said governments are more interested in the economics of the project than its effect on residents.

“Rivers are not the property of nations or groups of people. They belong to all mankind,” he said.

April 7, 2011, 5:00PM EST
Bloomberg News – Food: Why Thai Rice Production May Decline
Facing greater competition, the world’s leading rice exporter is determined to pull back on production
By Alan Bjerga and Supunnabul Suwannakij

Many Thais revere Me Posop, the rice goddess who guards humankind and rewards good stewards of her grain. Me Posop has been kind to Thailand in recent decades. While its neighbors Vietnam, Myanmar, Cambodia, and Laos struggled through war, Marxist-Leninism, and authoritarian rule, Thailand prospered from its new factories and booming rice exports. The nation surpassed Myanmar as the world’s top rice shipper in 1965: Last year 9 million tons of Thai rice were exported around the world. Thailand, like the Saudis in oil, became the key producer, the country that could always moderate global prices with its abundant reserves. This year, while corn and wheat prices have reached new highs, ample stockpiles of Thai rice have driven rice prices down.

Now the Thai government is proposing a major change in strategy for its rice growers, who feel hard pressed by low prices, an assault of pests, and the presence of low-cost competition from emerging rivals. The government seems ready to abandon Thailand’s position as the world top rice exporter—a serious decision, considering the mounting anxiety over the size and stability of the global food supply.

Thai farmers are certainly worried about their business. In the rice paddies near Ayutthaya, a former Siamese capital that 17th century emissaries from Louis XIV compared with Paris in its wealth and importance, Payao Ruangpueng must battle an infestation of rice planthoppers that are munching their way through the paddies. That’s not all. “We’re suffering from a rice price slump, crop damage, and lower-than-expected production,” she says, standing on the edge of a rain-soaked paddy. “Production costs are higher than income. We can’t afford to continue planting.”

In March the Thai government stated its intention to eliminate a third planting this year to improve rice quality and to combat the hopper, which dies if deprived of rice plants for 25 days. The plan may eventually reduce annual exports by 2 million metric tons, or about 20 percent of Thailand’s shipments.

Thai officials say they want the industry to focus on fancier grades of rice that fetch higher prices. While Thai rice shipments have increased 33 percent in the past decade, Vietnamese exports are up 70 percent in the same period to 6 million tons, according to the U.S. Agriculture Dept. Cambodia and even Myanmar are also emerging as global rice powers, says Pramote Vanichanont, honorary president of the Thai Rice Mills Assn. and a member of the National Rice Policy Committee. Thailand, following the classic curve of development, has priced itself out of much of its own market, he says. Land prices have shot up, as well as the cost of tractors and the wages of farmhands.

The government also plans to turn the country into the warehouse, finance, and marketing hub of Southeast Asia’s rice trade. The Agricultural Futures Exchange of Thailand, the nation’s government-backed rice and rubber bourse, is rolling out a new futures contract on Apr. 29 intended to be a regional benchmark for standard quality rice.

This long-term strategy may not be good for global food needs. The U.N. expects world food demand to rise 70 percent by 2050, and its Food and Agriculture Organization in February urged Thailand and its neighbors to grow more rice. Reductions in Thailand’s production may end up hurting poor consumers in Africa and elsewhere while doing little for Thai prices, says Kiattisak Kanlayasirivat, a director at the Thai office of trading company Novel Commodities. “I doubt whether it is a good policy, as cutting the supply may lead to food shortages,” says Kanlayasirivat, whose firm trades about $600 million of rice a year.

The Vietnamese may not even have the resources needed to replace major cuts in Thai production. “I personally think that Vietnam doesn’t need to become No. 1 in rice exports,” says Nguyen Van Bo, president of the Vietnamese Academy of Agricultural Science. “To export a lot, Vietnam will have to exploit a lot of land, use a lot of fertilizers. That could cause degradation of natural resources.”

The bottom line: While Thailand is the world’s top rice exporter, falling prices and rising competition may lead to a strategic decision to abandon that role.

Asia News Network - ASEAN’s AMRO may ‘replace’ IMF financial role
By Esther Samboh in Nusa Dua, Bali/The Jakarta Post | ANN – Fri, Apr 8, 2011 6:40 PM MYT

Nusa Dua, Bali (The Jakarta Post/ANN) – After two years of preparation, the ASEAN+3 Macroeconomic and Research Offices (AMRO) will start operation early in May this year to perform surveillance functions in the region.

Bambang Brodjonegoro, the Indonesian Finance Ministry’s fiscal policy office acting chief, said that deputy finance ministers of the Association of the Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) member countries had recently agreed to launch the operation of AMRO on May 1.

“AMRO will become a body that will supervise financial development in the region and provide early warnings if a member country needs support,” Bambang told reporters on the sidelines of the ASEAN Finance Ministers Meeting in Nusa Dua, Bali.

“AMRO will give recommendations after receiving a request from that country.”

AMRO members comprise 10 ASEAN member countries (Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines, Myanmar, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Brunei Darussalam) and the plus three nations (Japan, China, South Korea).

AMRO, which will function like the International Monetary Fund (IMF), will perform a key regional surveillance function as part of the US$120 billion Chiang Mai Initiative Multilateralization (CMIM) currency swap facility, which was established by ASEAN+3 finance ministers and central bank governors in December 2009.

“AMRO is kind of the first line of defense for Southeast Asia.

“If financial disruption is considered too massive, it will step in,” Bambang said, adding that the headquarters of the regional surveillance body would be in Singapore and chaired by Japan and China.

On one level, the role of AMRO is like that of the IMF.

IMF’s financial support and bailout package given to a number of Asian countries including Indonesia to cope with the financial crisis in the region in 1998 has been widely criticized.
Critics said that many of the agency’s reform programs given as part of the aid package had failed to deal with the crisis.

The regional surveillance role for the CMIM was previously handled by the Asian Development Bank and ASEAN’s secretariat. But the recent establishment of AMRO will take over the surveillance role for the use of CMIM funds.

“AMRO will identify and recommend how much in funds a country will need to take out from the CMIM in times of financial disruption,” Bambang added.

South Korea contributed $19.2 billion or 16 percent of the $120 billion fund. China and Japan each provided 32 percent, while ASEAN members the other 20 percent.

Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Singapore respectively contributed $4.77 billion into the CMIM liquidity protection fund, while the Philippines stored $2.68 billion.

The five countries are allowed to borrow 2.5 times their funding contribution at times of crisis using the CMIM funds.

ASEAN members, Japan, China and South Korea previously proposed the establishment of the Asian Monetary Fund (AMF) to support the CMIM financial initiatives.

The plan, however, was later dropped.

8 Apr, 2011, 10.10PM IST,PTI
Economic Times – ‘Visa on arrival’ scheme for tourists from 6 more countries

NEW DELHI: The ‘visa on arrival’ scheme, launched early last year to increase foreign tourist inflows, has been extended to citizens of six more countries from January this year.

The new countries added to the list of beneficiaries of this scheme are Cambodia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Philippines, Laos and Myanmar, said a government statement, adding between January and March 2905 visas were issued under this scheme.

The maximum number of visas under this scheme was issued at Delhi airport (1512), followed by Mumbai (759), Chennai (474) and Kolkata (160), the statement said.

According to a different release, the ‘Incredible India’ campaign has led to a surge in the number of foreign tourists visiting the country with more than 5 lakh visitors coming to India in March this year.

Asia Times Online – Without a homeland, without a hope
By Tony Cliff

COX’S BAZAR, Bangladesh – Mahamuda Khatur remembers the fateful day three years ago. At dawn her husband had left their Kutupalong refugee camp in southern Bangladesh for the forest to fetch firewood he would sell to other refugees or local people. He never returned.

Mahamuda was told that he had drowned in a river, a claim she has never independently verified. That left her as a 27-year-old widow with two children. Now, suffering from tuberculosis for eight months, Mahamuda is too weak to work and cannot feed herself or her children.

The pallor of her face and the thinness of her arms show the

unmistakable signs of severe malnutrition. Now, she has to rely on other refugees’ generosity to survive. “But there is not much that the people here can do for us,” she says. “Everybody is in the same situation.”

Mahamuda is an ethnic Rohingya, a Sunni Muslim community that has fled persecution in its native Myanmar for neighboring Bangladesh and other countries. Throughout this region, on a narrow strip of beach, sparse forest or sandy land squeezed between the Bay of Bengal and the Myanmar border, Rohingya exiles can be seen carrying heavy bags of salt, bundles of firewood, stacks of bricks, baskets of fish, blocks of ice.

Above all, they carry the weight of being one of the largest stateless populations on the planet. Out of an estimated 1.5 to 2 million population, only the 48,800 Rohingya registered as refugees with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Bangladesh and Malaysia have legal status. The one million or so Rohingya living in Myanmar’s western Arakan State are not recognized as citizens and the 500,000 to one million others who have chosen exile in other countries are mostly considered illegal migrants.

The Rohingya were not always a pariah in Myanmar, previously known as Burma. Although they have been a constant victim of a chauvinist Buddhist regime animated by anti-Muslim and anti-Indian sentiment dating back to the British colonial occupation, the Rohingya had citizen status in Myanmar until 1982. That year, then dictator Ne Win promulgated a citizenship law that stripped them of their nationality. It was the epilogue of one of the darkest chapters in the country’s recent history, the Naga Min Operation (”Operation Dragon King”) launched in 1978 in the west Arakan State.

In the name of a crackdown on “illegal migrants”, the army killed, raped and arrested scores of people, mostly Rohingya. Villages were burned and looted. Mosques and other religious sites were particularly targeted. That operation forced some 200,000 Rohingya to flee to neighboring Bangladesh. Most of them were repatriated by the end of 1979. In 1991-1992, fleeing the junta’s widespread use of forced labor, summary executions, torture and rape, another wave of 250,000 Rohingya left the country. Currently the regime continues repressive practices, although on a lesser scale.

During a discrete visit in a large Rohingya village in Arakan State last year, in the relative safety of an old mosque, an elder detailed the numerous restrictions imposed by Myanmar authorities on the local population. “Even though we have been living here for many generations, we need a special authorization for almost everything: to move out of our area, send our children to the university, marry them, run a business. And, as everyone else in the state, we are constantly submitted to forced labor, arbitrary arrest, land confiscation and other abuses by the authorities.”

Rohingya also complain of being targeted by the Rakhine, the predominant Buddhist group in Myanmar’s Arakan State. It’s a bitter irony considering that the Rakhine themselves are subject to the junta’s systematic oppression against ethnic minorities. Violent incidents such as attacks on mosques by Buddhist radicals and retaliation by Rohingya are regularly reported. To justify their stance, both communities have traded endless arguments often founded on biased or reconstructed historical facts.

Xenophobia, fueled by extremists from both sides but also by the ruling junta, which has masterfully used divide and rule tactics to maintain its control, has submerged any hope of a dispassionate debate. Still, arguments forwarded by the Rakhine community, such as the “fear that the Rohingya occupy our land because of their high birth rate and rapidly increasing population”, as a Rakhine journalist exiled in Bangladesh put it, have some basis and will eventually need to be properly addressed.

The dramatic situation of Rohingya exiles in Bangladesh, a country more accessible than Myanmar to outside observers, has become the show case for the minority’s stateless plight. Some 29,000 Rohingya live as refugees in Kutupalong and Nayapara camps, south of Cox’s Bazar, a booming beach resort in Bangladesh. These camps are under the UNHCR’s supervision and benefit from the presence of a few international non-governmental organizations (NGOs). With properly built houses, schools, playgrounds and a sewage system, they look like any other adequately administered refugee camps in the world.

But the largest facility, Kutupalong, has a twin brother with a much less amiable face. “Kutupalong makeshift”, as it’s commonly known, is literally stuck to “Kutupalong registered”. Thousands of adobe huts covered with plastic sheets, branches and dried leaves cluster together over a succession of bare hills, sheltering a population of 20,000, according to the latest count by a NGO active in the area.

Here, there is not a single trace of shade. Nor are there latrines or a proper sewage system. Only a few pumps installed by the French NGO Solidarites International provide for basic water needs. In the summer season, the heat inside the huts is sweltering. During the monsoon season, water often dissolves the huts’ walls and transforms steep alleys into muddy torrents. In any season, day and night, disease-carrying insects are ubiquitous.

“We don’t have enough mosquito nets,” laments Karim, the community leader of one of the six blocks dividing the camp. “Many diseases are endemic here, malaria, diarrhea and tuberculosis. And now we have to face an epidemic of chicken pox and measles.”

Almost like an indecent exhibit, mothers show the faces of their infants and children marked with chicken pox pustules. More worrisome is the 30% rate of acute malnutrition reported in the camp by the European Commission Humanitarian Aid Office (ECHO). Only the NGO Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) Holland, in a clinic set out of the camp along the main road, and the French Action Contre la Faim (ACF), has the right to provide medical treatment to the “Kutupalong makeshift” population.

A few kilometers to the south, Leda, the other non-official camp with a population of 13,700, offers a relatively less desperate face. Rattan-built houses are properly aligned along paved alleys, here and there emblazoned with flowers and greenery. Yet restrictions imposed by Bangladesh authorities in the makeshift camps are drastic. Food distribution and education are sharply curtailed. Still, if these rules were strictly enforced then “Kutupalong makeshift” and Leda would have turned into full-blown death camps.

Despite the appalling conditions, refugees manage to bypass these interdictions and organize their survival. In Kutupalong, for instance, as a substitute to a proper schooling establishment, community leaders with the help of outside sympathizers have set up a network of 30 classes inside huts with locally trained teachers.

The restriction on wandering outside the makeshift camps is perhaps the least observed of the restraints. “Many refugees leave them for a few days or a week to work in brick or dried fish factories, salt pans, as rickshaw drivers,” says Karim, the Kutupalong community leader. “They usually work for 100 taka a day [about US$1.4], which is not enough to feed a family so often both parents have to work.”
This population of illegal workers is particularly vulnerable to abuse and is constantly at the local authorities’ and people’s mercy. Rapes, beatings, thefts and other abuses against Rohingya have been well-documented over the years. There are an estimated 250,000 to 350,000 other Rohingya who live outside of the camps and are scattered all over the country who are equally at risk without legal status.

There is an ethnic irony to their situation. The Rohingya have similar origins with the predominant Bengali from southeast Bangladesh and share the same language spoken in Chittagong, the country’s largest seaport, and its surrounding areas. They mix easily within a dense and already impoverished local population but are likewise seen as taking jobs and encroaching on scarce land.

“A deep tension between the two communities has developed over time, particularly the last two or three years,” comments Chris Lewa, coordinator of The Arakan Project, a human-rights group monitoring the Rohingya’s situation. In Ukhia, a small town near Kutupalong, local people have created “anti-Rohingya committees”. “They organize meetings, publish documents denouncing how the Rohingya take over their work and ask for their deportation,” says a journalist from Kaladan, a Rohingya news agency based in Chittagong.

Abuses by the local authorities had become so egregious that in February 2010 MSF stirred up a hornet’s nest by strongly denouncing “a violent crackdown against stateless Rohingya in Bangladesh forcing thousands of people to flee in fear” to refugee camps. The campaign had an at least temporary positive impact on the Rohingya, seen in fewer cases of arrest and harassment from the police.

However, MSF’s outburst, which some critics said “only developed an unconstructive approach towards the Bangladesh government” later triggered a strong reaction from the authorities. Work permits for NGOs active in the camps were suspended, putting them in the uneasy position of having to work on a day-to-day basis under the constant threat of expulsion. “It appears to be a government strategy to silence the NGOs,” said Lewa.

The presence in both Myanmar and Bangladesh of a large population of young destitute Rohingya men regularly raises the concern of their potential exploitation by Islamic extremist groups. Although a few cases of recruitment by Islamic terrorist movements in Bangladesh were reported in the 1990s, there is no evidence today showing any link with this kind of organization, say aid workers.

In Myanmar, the omnipresence of the junta’s vast surveillance apparatus acts to dissuade any recruitment efforts by outsiders. “These accusations result more from a fantasy,” says a MSF staffer in Yangon who used to work in the Arakan State. “The Rohingya are surely orthodox Islamic, conservative people but it does not mean that they are terrorists.” In Bangladesh, meanwhile, a massive crackdown launched by the authorities in 2005 has practically decimated local Islamic terrorist outfits.

Instead, thousands of Rohingya exiles are opting to leave Bangladesh for other supposedly more accommodating countries. Many attempt the dangerous and costly trip by boat across the Indian Ocean to more prosperous destinations in Southeast Asia. About 25,000 Rohingya now live in Malaysia, including 19,800 who are under the UNHCR’s care. Over the past two years, another 420 or so have reached Indonesia.

In Thailand, authorities have been embroiled in controversy about their treatment of Rohingya boat-people. In 2009, the Thai army was accused of pushing back to sea about 1,000 Rohingya boat-people without a working engine and with little food or water. According to human-rights organizations, more than half of them drowned. Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva last month reaffirmed to a meeting of foreign journalists his government’s policy to deport Rohingya, who he considers “economic migrants” rather than political refugees.

Among themselves, Rohingya often denounce the lack of solidarity from other Muslim communities. “There is no religious consideration, no Muslim brotherhood,” laments a leader of the exile group Arakan Rohingya National Organization (ARNO). A large community of Rohingya has settled in Saudi Arabia, a predominantly Sunni Muslim country.

The Saudi Embassy in Yangon claims that there are 120,000 there, though many of them arrived in the country with Bangladeshi passports. Another estimated 300,000 Rohingya have lived for years in Pakistan, mostly in the Karachi area where they are reportedly well integrated into the local community.

Repatriation of Rohingya from Bangladesh to Myanmar, meanwhile, has been on hold for several years because the political situation there offers few guarantees for a safe return. According to Kitty McKinsey, UNHCR’s spokesperson in Asia, “Between 1992 and the end of 2005, when the last repatriation took place, 236,599 Rohingya refugees went back to Myanmar from Bangladesh.”

She adds: “There are indications that as many as half of the 200,000 to 400,000 undocumented Rohingya that the Bangladesh government says are in the country now may have been registered as refugees in 1991, gone home to Myanmar, and come back to Bangladesh again.” That, McKinsey says, means many have thus lost their previous refugee status.

Resettlement in third countries remains an exceptional outcome despite a program initiated in the refugee camps in 2006. According to a spokesman of the International Office for Migration (IOM), the program’s implementing agency, “926 Rohingya have been resettled mostly in United Kingdom, Canada and Australia. Another 500 people are expected to be resettled this year but we have to wait for the conclusions of a program review currently done by the Bangladesh government.”

Any mass repatriation of Rohingya will remain wishful thinking as long as a comprehensive political settlement that purposefully addresses the fate of Myanmar’s numerous ethnic minorities remains elusive. The newly appointed cabinet in Naypyidaw has so far demonstrated no sign of interest in reaching such an accommodation. Myanmar’s Rohingya will thus be condemned to survive many more years in a stateless existence.

Tony Cliff, a pseudonym, is a Bangkok-based freelance photojournalist. He may be reached at tonycliff7@gmail.com.

Myanmar prepares for first water festival celebration after emergence of new government
English.news.cn   2011-04-08 11:02:55
By Feng Yingqiu

YANGON, April 8 (Xinhua) — Heavy timber wood are found unloading from trucks in some areas of Myanmar’s former capital city, now known as the commercial city, especially in front of the City Hall where these long timber woods are used to erect the city ’s biggest Thingyan water throwing pandal and stage which represents a face of the city celebrating the Myanmar traditional water festival.

Myanmar’s forthcoming water festival this year is due to fall on next Wednesday with people starting to make preparations for the first celebration of such traditional festival after the emergence of a new elected government.

Traditional songs and music related to the festival are found producing from loudspeakers on streets, some from shops, while some from vehicles passing by carrying such speakers.

The filling of such noise in the sky signaled the soon coming of the festival and people are also found rushing here and there to buy decorative materials as well as food to be stocked for consumption during the four-day long water festival plus another six-day new year holidays running from the 12th through to the 21st.

An open-air Yangon Mayor’s water-throwing pandal, which will be the central and the biggest one in the city, is being set up as in the previous years and be inaugurated on April 13, the eve of the festival, to mark the set-in of the event.

However, according to local reports, a few dozens of water throwing pandals only will be allowed for erection this year.

Traditional song and dance performances will be staged with part of the famous vocalists set to remain in the city to give entertainment, while the most number of them are assigned to do so in Nay Pyi Taw as in the previous year in order that the festival can be launched on a grander scale in the new capital.

During the festival, special trains will be put on run to facilitate holiday makers traveling to all parts of the country.

The venue of the water throwing pandals and entertainment stages are selected around the hotel zones in the new capital with the main pandal to lie also at the Nay Pyi Taw City hall.
In fact, the Thingyan water festival lasts for four days from April 13 to 16 before the new year day ushers in on April 17 according to the Myanmar lunar calendar.

Moreover, Myanmar’s second largest city of Mandalay will also have most of the pandals and stages lying as usual around the canal of the Royal Palace.

Mandalay, which boasts the cultural center of Myanmar and the business center in the north, is traditionally featured by procession of decorated floats in the evening during the water festival.

Rich with cultural heritage, Mandalay, also known as Yadanabon, was historically built by King Mindon in 1897, standing as the last royal capital of Myanmar.

Among Myanmar’s 12 seasonal festivals throughout the year, the Thingyan water festival represents the grandest which brings peace and prosperity to the entire people.

The media are calling on revelers to join in the festival happily by dousing each other with cool water upholding the country’s fine culture and traditions.

However, the authorities will tighten security measures against probable renewed bomb attacks during the forthcoming Thingyan water festival taking the lesson of last year’s tragic incident which was that a series of three bombs in short intervals blast in front of a water throwing pandal, named X-2-O, in Yangon on April 15 last year when hundreds of thousands of revelers were enjoying water splashing. The bomb killed 10 people and injured 170.

Rules to be observed have been attached to the erection of water throwing pandals in Yangon, setting that mine search apparatus shall be equipped and mine trench be dug with sand bags and round tyres in place at the water throwing pandals.

CCTV cameras will be used to monitor the movement of people during the festival.

The authorities urged people of young generation in the country to celebrate the Thingyan Water Festival in a way of preserving and maintaining its culture and traditions.

“As the water festival reflects Myanmar’s culture and traditions, it is the duty of the national people to maintain and preserve the traditions of holding Myanmar Thingyan festival,” the authorities stressed through media.

Although the style of holding the Thingyan water festival is slightly different among the nationalities due to geographical conditions, its basically same tradition has existed for hundreds of years, it was pointed out.

Myanmar also maintains some styles of some nationalities with the festival, that is in the ethnic Rakhine water festival, young men and women stand face to face and drench each other with water from the long boats.

Offering wax smelly Thingyan rice is the tradition of Mon ethnic minorities and the tradition of paying respects to the elderly and providing free meal by seeking fund with the performance of Thaman Kyar dances in Dawei and Myeik regions in the southern part is also among the happy occasion of Myanmar nationalities in the water festival.

The Irrawaddy – 19 ‘Taliban’ Appear in Arakan Court
By KHIN OO THAR Friday, April 8, 2011

Nineteen Muslim men, who were arrested last month in western Burma for alleged ties with the Taliban, appeared before a court in Maungdaw on Wednesday for a preliminary hearing, according to sources in Arakan State.

Burma’s Border Security Forces—a combination of army, police, immigration and customs, known commonly in Burmese as the Nasaka—arrested nearly 100 Muslim men in Maungdaw Township, Arakan State, in early March, and accused them of belonging to a terrorist ring linked to the Taliban.

A lawyer in Maungdaw told The Irrawaddy that the Nasaka had filed a case against the men under Articles 17 (A) and (B) of the Unlawful Association Act and, on April 6, a jury led by Maungdaw District judge Soe Lwin started questioning 19 of them.

“Three lawyers … are preparing to defend the case of the 19 Muslims,” said the lawyer. “The next court hearing will be around the 23rd of this month.”

He said he heard the Nasaka will also bring its own prosecutors to the court. Although the trial is being presided over by the local court, the Nasaka is taking a leading role in the case, he said.

Maungdaw residents told The Irrawaddy that the suspects were arrested in Kamaungseik Village in Arakan State. The authorities immediately accused them of plotting terrorist activities. They were also accused of organizing secret training in combat and bomb-making, and a seal and documents related to the Taliban were allegedly seized at the time of their arrest, residents said.

However, not everyone is convinced as to the Nasaka’s claims that there is a Taliban connection.

“Violence often takes place in this area,” said a Maungdaw resident. “Bombs and other explosives are frequently seized.”

He said the authorities have imposed frequent security checks on travelers and taken other measures aimed at preventing people from coming or going freely from predominantly Muslim areas. The Nasaka is still stopping and searching many Muslims they suspect of having connections with the arrestees.

The Maungdaw lawyer said a Nasaka official told him that there were about 400 people suspected of having political ties with the arrested men, some of whom have fled across the border to Bangladesh. The group had planned to attack religious festivals, government offices and officials, he said.

According to statistics from local organizations, over 95 percent of the population in Buthidaung and Maungdaw areas are Muslims, while the rest comprises Arakan, Burman, Mro, Khami, Chin and other ethnic groups.

The Irrawaddy – Suu Kyi Named ‘Voice of the Decade’
By LALIT K JHA Friday, April 8, 2011

WASHINGTON — US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will honor Aung San Suu Kyi, the pro-democracy icon of Burma, with the Global Trailblazer Award and named “Voice of the Decade” at a glittering ceremony in Washington on April 12.

Aung San Suu Kyi will not be attending the ceremony, said organizers of the event, Vital Voices, the international NGO dedicated to empowering women leaders around the world. The awards honor and celebrate women leaders on the front lines of positive political, social and economic change who are strengthening democracy, increasing economic opportunity, and preserving human rights.

Nobel Peace Prize winner and leader of the Burmese democracy movement, Suu Kyi will be honored with the Global Trailblazer Award. The gala will feature a special on-camera interview with Suu Kyi conducted last month by Vital Voices in Rangoon.

Suu Kyi, released from years of house arrest last November, is not guaranteed entry back in to Burma if she leaves the country.

“Vital Voices Global Leadership Awards are unique,” said Vital Voices board of directors chair Susan Ann Davis.

“The awards provide additional credibility and often additional security for courageous women leaders, helping to strengthen their leadership and accelerate progress in their communities,” Davis said.

Among other honorees are: Sunitha Krishnan of India, an anti-human trafficking pioneer and co-founder of the NGO, Prajwala; Liron Peleg-Hadomi and Noha Khatieb of Israel, who have defied the Zionist regime by reaching across the cultural barriers dividing Jewish and Arab Israelis; Kah Walla of Cameroon, a businesswoman and elected official working to advance the economic status of the women in her country; and Fatema Akbari of Afghanistan, an entrepreneur who uses her carpentry business to promote economic independence for the women in her community.

“It is humbling to share a stage each year with these incredible women,” said Vital Voices president and CEO Alyse Nelson.

“They are social entrepreneurs, political representatives, businesswomen, human rights defenders and civil society advocates. From remote villages and wired cities, they are innovators who transcend barriers to move whole communities forward.” Nelson said.

Unofficial survey: 25 percent of people in Chin State have malaria
Friday, 08 April 2011 19:56 Tun Tun

New Delhi (Mizzima) – More than 25 percent of the people in Chin State are infected with malaria and an estimated 20 percent die from the disease in Chin State, according to a Indo-Burma group that conducted a private, unofficial health survey.

The survey was conducted along the border with a focus on Chin State. The findings are in sharp contrast to official government figures found in ‘Myanmar Health Statistics 2010’ data posted on the health ministry website, which says 4.8 percent of the people in Chin State are infected with malaria.

‘According to the health workers here, many deaths are found with symptoms of malaria. So we examined the cases with a RDT (Rapid Detection Test) method, and we got these results and figures’,  said one of the leaders in the non-government survey.

Groups that took part in the unofficial survey included the Chin Public Affairs Committee (CPAC), Naga National League for Democracy (NNLD), Arakan Liberation Party (ALP), Zomi Human Rights Foundation and the Kuki Women Human Right Organisation.

The group was formed in October 2007 to work in malaria disease control and provides medical assistance to women and children, medical treatment, diagnosis, and educational campaigns in Chin, Rakhine, Naga Hills, Kabaw valley and Kachin State.

The deputy coordinator of the CPAC field survey team said he did not accept the official government statistic of 4.8 percent in Chin State.

He said he has met with health workers in the area who haven’t been paid and who have no or little medicine to treat malaria patients. ‘How can we believe their official statistics’, he said.

The unofficial high incidence of malaria cases, he said, can be attributed to a lack of information among local people and lack of proper medicine.

‘Some drug stores and some small shops run by families sell malaria drugs in these malaria-prone areas, but they don’t know the exact dosage and prescription. The patients buy drugs from these unauthorized shops and stores. Then they stop the medicine based on their own decisions when their condition improves. They might not take a full course of the drugs because it gives them headaches and dizziness’, he said.

Min Thang, who works with the Zomi Human Rights Foundation, said, ‘People have no awareness and knowledge of malaria. Another factor is malnutrition’.

Health Minister Dr. Pe Thet Khin said at a meeting held in Naypyitaw on April 4 that he suspected the existence of Artemisinin drug resistant malaria cases in Burma. He urged the Drug Administration Department and Economics and Commerce Ministry to stop importing substandard medicine to treat malaria.

He also said high standard drugs must be made available because malaria cases have been found in 284 townships across the country.

‘People are using easily available cheap and fake drugs produced in China or drugs unrecognized by UN health agencies’, said a member of the survey team, which increases the liklihood of drug-resistant cases. ‘This is very dangerous’, he said.

‘People do not have support mechanisms to combat malaria such as mosquito nets or mosquito spray. Most of the people cannot afford to buy mosquito nets. They have to work in the mosquito- infested deep jungle and have no protection so they face a high incidence of malaria’, he said .

According to official health department statistics, 500,000 people were infected with malaria and 974 people died of the disease in 2009. The official website says Rakhine State has a 4.1 percent malaria rate; Kachin State, 3.9 percent; and Kayah (Karenni) State, 3.1 percent.

Wa issue appeal to new government for a political dialogue
Friday, 08 April 2011 20:38 Phanida

Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – The United Wa State Party (UWSP), the political wing of the strongest ethnic armed group, says that it wants to begin a political dialogue with the new Burmese government.

A member of the UWSP central committee told Mizzima the group is ready to talk, but it does not know how their proposal will be received.

On February 5,  UWSP chairman Bao Yu Xiang sent felicitations to newly elected President Thein Sein. In the message, Bao Yu Xiang urged him to work to end the armed conflicts in the country.

However, Bao Yu Xiang said, ‘In the past, they wore military uniforms. Now, they wear Burmese traditional turbans in the Parliament. That’s all they changed’.

The UWSA has more than 30,000 troops, according to observers. During the UWSP’s party conference in March, chairman Bao Yu Xiang said that the group had the capaciy to defend its territory and would not give up even one inch of land.

He said he believed that when Jia Qinglin, a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China, recently met with President Thein Sein, they talked about Sino-Burmese border security issues. In the past, China has called for a peaceful resolution to the disputes between ethnic groups and the central government.

In the past year, both the Wa and Burmese government troops have been preparing for possible clashes.