FTUB Daily News for Feb-27-2012, English News - Morning

News Headlines with Brief (1) What Our Readers Say | Source: Irrawaddy 25-Feb-2012 I think the NLD should get involved and publicly show solidarity with the exploited workers. It's by-election time and it would be hypocritical for an opposition party to ask people to vote for them if the party doesn't care about the fate of 99 percent of the population. Read More..... (2) Suu Kyi talks peace and Panglong on Kachin State trip | Source: KNG 25-Feb-2012 During a visit to the capital of war-torn Kachin state on Friday, Burma's famed opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi spoke about peace and an unimplemented agreement which her late father, General Aung San, concluded with ethnic leaders just before the country's independence. The 66-year-old Nobel Peace Prize laureate was in Myitkyina as part of a National League for Democracy (NLD) campaign tour ahead of April 1 parliamentary by-elections. The first elections her party will contest since the NLD's overwhelming May 1990 victory was annulled by the military. Read More..... (3) ‘The Glass Palace’ as a Mirror of Myanmar | Source: AT 27-Feb-2012 Amitav Ghosh’s The Glass Palace is a magnificent historical novel that begins with the demise of the Konbaung dynasty in ‘Burma’ (1885) and ends with the emergence of a democracy movement in ‘Myanmar’ symbolised by Aung San Suu Kyi (1988). First published in 2000, the novel has a renewed significance today given the revitalisation of the democracy movement in the country. Read More..... (4) Exploring for the long haul | Source: Bangkok Post 27-Feb-2012 Resource-rich Myanmar is poised to be a major contributor to Thailand's future energy needs, including gas and possibly electricity from hydropower dams planned for the years ahead. "Myanmar may account for up to 10% of our total investments in the years to come and the country would supply up to 25% of Thailand's need for natural gas," says Anon Sirisaengtaksin, the president and CEO of PTT Exploration and Production Plc. Read More..... (5) Govt to back Myanmar at UN summit | Source: Bangkok Post 27-Feb-2012 Thailand will play a more active role this year in helping Myanmar to fully engage with the international community as the formerly military-led country continues with political reforms. Permanent secretary for foreign affairs Sihasak Phuangketkaew said Thailand will use the 19th Session of the United Nations' Human Rights Council (UNHRC) meeting in Geneva today to show its readiness to help push Myanmar's engagement. Read More..... (6) Myanmar’s exiled media lured back home by reform | Source: Burma Time 27-Feb-2012 AS censorship eases in Myanmar and the press tastes long-suppressed freedom, exiled media groups are weighing up the risks of a return to cover the dramatic changes in their country from within. Not long ago, working for one of them could result in a lengthy prison sentence if caught inside the army-dominated nation, but the past year’s political openings have turned recent pipe dreams into real ambitions. Read More..... What Our Readers Say http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=23096 25-Feb-2012 For Rangoon Strikers, No End in Sight I think the NLD should get involved and publicly show solidarity with the exploited workers. It's by-election time and it would be hypocritical for an opposition party to ask people to vote for them if the party doesn't care about the fate of 99 percent of the population.—Tocharian PR Campaign Begins for Suspended Myitsone Dam It is an absolute nonsense stating that “the project has gone through scientific feasibility studies and strict examinations by both sides.” Burma, in its current state of affairs, has almost zero capability to do scientific feasibility studies and strict examinations. Chinese side’s impartiality is also questionable. There is a clear conflict of interest and the Chinese will benefit most from the project. Eventually, the Burmese people are the only ones who will bear the full blunt of ecological disasters and consequences if the project proceeds in this manner. The Burmese people’s legitimate leader, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, has never called for abandoning the project altogether. She just called for a “suspension” and invited the involvement of professionals, including Burmese and independent foreign contracters (Chinese included) to conduct comprehensive studies. After evaluating all the pros and cons, the project may be revived if the benefits outweigh the negative impacts. But we Burmese cannot accept China bulldozing through their idea using bullying tactics. —Than Lwin 'Zay Kabar' Khin Shwe Faces Lawsuit This is Burma—a lawless country where the generals and their cronies rule and do whatever they like, never giving a thought to ordinary people like us. I can understand their greed and selfishness.The only thing that makes me angry is their shameless and repeated claims of being patriotic.What a blatant insult to the country! Maung Soe Asia Society Urges IMF, World Bank Support in Burma Is Burma in need of urgent support from the World Bank and International Monetary Fund to restructure her whole financial systen including banking? The present banking system is outdated, so it's very difficult to do business in Burma. The country now has to pay back her debts to various financial institutions, so the goverment should encourage the openning of credible foreign banks from Asia, Europe, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Japan, South Korea and USA. Once microeconomic structures are reformed, that will lead to the elimination of the corrupt measures, and will uplift peoples' morals and standard of living. Farmers should be encouraged to produce more so that exports and imports are balanced, which will increase the GDP. Sooner or later unemployment can be eliminated by creating jobs in the field of foreign imvestment sectors. —Oo Maung Gyi Former NLD Member to Run as Independent Democracy flourishes when people are free to disagree. The new parliament will benefit from a freedom to oppose and to act with independence. Whilst I am supportive of Aung San Suu Kyi and the broad aims of the NLD it is great to see people with strength and conviction standing up for their own rights to disagree with party decisions and to have the right to attempt to enter parliament as independents.—Tom Turning Burma into Next Asian Tiger No Simple Task "On the plus side, the US has decided to relax its sanctions on Burma to allow the World Bank to provide some much-needed expertise.” This is a loaded statement that uncritically accepts impending neoliberal structural “reforms.” I hope, for the sake of people in Burma, that a robust discussion on the limitations and failures of the World Bank “expertise” will take place. Such reforms can easily lead to perpetuating poverty, disparity and an entrenched elite selling the myth of becoming the next Asian Tiger to the people and the international community. —Dennis Thein Sein: Reformist or Caretaker? Thank you very much Irrawaddy for sharing the human face of President U Thein Sein. A person who has a clean bill on his record on corruption, a good family life, sympathetic heart and attentive ears can be a good partner with the aspiring democratic icon Daw Aung San Suu Kyi toward nation-building. Suu Kyi talks peace and Panglong on Kachin State trip http://www.kachinnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2243:suu-kyi-talks-peace-and-panglong-on-kachin-state-trip&catid=8&Itemid=24 25-Feb-2012 During a visit to the capital of war-torn Kachin state on Friday, Burma's famed opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi spoke about peace and an unimplemented agreement which her late father, General Aung San, concluded with ethnic leaders just before the country's independence. The 66-year-old Nobel Peace Prize laureate was in Myitkyina as part of a National League for Democracy (NLD) campaign tour ahead of April 1 parliamentary by-elections. The first elections her party will contest since the NLD's overwhelming May 1990 victory was annulled by the military. “Equal political rights between the Burman majority and ethnic nationalities will come to the country if there is a genuine peace and political solutions based on the Panglong spirit,” she told the large crowd, referring to the February 1947 agreement her father reached with leader's from the Shan, Kachin and Chin communities just months before his assassination. Speaking about the ongoing conflict in northern Burma which broke out last June when a 17-year ceasefire ended, Aung San Suu Kyi said that a new ceasefire between the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) and the central government is needed first before genuine peace can be achieved through negotiation. She added however that the root cause of the current conflict in Kachin and northern Shan states stem from the unresolved struggle for ethnic rights. For many Kachin say the failure of General Aung San's successors to follow through on the Panglong agreement, which granted certain rights and a fair amount of autonomy to the country's non-Burman nationalities, lies at the heart of the 52-year long Kachin armed uprising. Lah Nan, Vice-general Secretary No.2 of the KIO, the last major armed ethnic group fighting against the Burmese army has frequently repeated his group's desire that talks with the central government be based on the Panglong agreement not the controversial May 2008 constitution. Often referred to by its critics as the only constitution in the world that gives the army the right to officially seize power whenever it sees fit. Despite recent changes in the country including the release of many political prisoners and the loosening of some press restrictions, the mere mention of the Panglong agreement in public remains a bold gesture, thanks to a steady stream of years of military propaganda which claimed that ethnic rights would bring about the breakup of the country. Usually when Burma's most famous political dissident mentions Panglong to reporters or in speeches, she is quickly rebuked in Burma's state controlled media in an extremely undiplomatic nature. Suu Kyi and her NLD party are seeking to build with support from the mostly Christian Kachin population ahead of the coming elections in which 46 seats will be contested. Even if her party makes a strong performance during these polls, the overwhelmingly majority of seats in the both houses of parliament will remain in the hands of the military backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP). Many observers say that Suu Kyi remains the only person in the entire country who commands the respect of a cross section of people from both the Burman majority and ethnic nationalities. Despite her national popularity however, herself described goal of building a more democratic country will be very difficult to achieve. Once in parliament the prospect that the NLD and a few like-minded opposition parties will be able reform the constitution and limit the role of the armed forces in the country's affairs remains a far off dream. Draconian rules written into May 2008 constitution require a ¾ majority to be reached before any change can be implemented, the fact that 25% of the seats in the lower house are reserved for sitting members of the army makes this extremely unlikely. In addition the solid majority that the USDP and a smaller pro military party has in parliament likely means that the generals will dominate the national budget for many years to come. ‘The Glass Palace’ as a Mirror of Myanmar http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2012/02/26/%E2%80%98-glass-palace%E2%80%99-mirror-myanmar 27-Feb-2012 Amitav Ghosh’s The Glass Palace is a magnificent historical novel that begins with the demise of the Konbaung dynasty in ‘Burma’ (1885) and ends with the emergence of a democracy movement in ‘Myanmar’ symbolised by Aung San Suu Kyi (1988). First published in 2000, the novel has a renewed significance today given the revitalisation of the democracy movement in the country. There is of course a substantive story, other than the political saga. It is about paradoxical human characteristics like ambition, modesty, craving, generosity, intrigue, innocence, impatience and perseverance – all excellently and colourfully depicted through suitable narratives and different characters. After all, it is all about life’s ‘impermanence,’ many of the endeavours and personal relationships ending up in immense tragedies. The circumstances under which the tragedies unfold are mainly the British colonisation of India, Burma and Malaya - which dislocates the traditional cultures and introduces ‘modernity’ - and then the Second World War during which Japan invades the region with equal political ambition and ferocity. The Glass Palace is a 552 pages story separated into seven parts. The Story An orphan from Bengal, Rajkumar Raha, ends up in Mandalay (Myanmar, former Burma) at the age of eleven in a desperate effort of survival. A Chinese businessman from Singapore, Saya John, working in Burma, instils ambition in his mind and they become friends and later business partners. Saya John is a father figure to Rajkumar. Both are considered kalaa in Burma, a derogatory term for foreigners. The initial setting of the story is the Third Anglo-Burmese war in 1885 in which the King Thibaw is disgracefully disposed. The cause of war according to the story is Teak! “The English are preparing to send a fleet up the Irrawaddy. There is going to be a war,” Matthew says. “They want all the teak in Burma. The King won’t let them have it so they’re going to do away with him.” Matthew is Saya’s son. “Rajkumar gave a shout of laughter. ‘A war over wood? Who’s ever heard of such a thing?” But it is in the same Teak business that Rajkumar becomes a business magnate later. Before, as a boy, he becomes infatuated by Dolly (Sein), a ten year old palace maid of the Royal family only by glance and a chance encounter. This becomes a fateful story romantically related by the author. The King and Queen Supalayat were exiled in Ratnagiri (India) until their death in squalid conditions. The palace maids leave one by one because of the continued royal arrogance, except Dolly, a central character of the story. The family of four princesses eventually disintegrates step by step in India, some leaving back to Burma much later. This is a true and a sad story. There are two sources to the enigmatic title of the novel: The Glass Palace. One is within the story itself, which I would comment on later. Second is external, the Glass Place Chronicles, which is supposed to be a history of the Burmese dynasty with fact and fiction. Likewise, Ghosh’s novel is also a combination of ‘fact and fiction,’ nicely woven into a compelling story. A lifelong friendship develops between Dolly and Uma Dey, the wife of the Collector in Ratnagiri, Prasad Dey, a British civil servant of Indian origin. That is the only relationship that lasts. After twenty years, Rajkumar comes in search of Dolly to Ratnagiri with a marriage proposal. Uma is the go between, convincing Dolly, who was otherwise not interested in marriage. However, after marriage, she becomes a committed wife and a mother. It may appear Rajkumar also to be a ‘committed lover’ or a husband. But that is not exactly the case. He is a ‘human trafficker’ from India to Malaya, particularly to Saya John’s new rubber plantation, ‘the money trees.’ He in fact fathers a boy, simply called Ilongo, to a woman taken from India to Malaya. Dolly displeasingly tolerates and in fact supports Ilongo’s upbringing. Uma, displeased with her husband’s rather monotonous bureaucratic life wanted to go back to her parents in Bengal. Her husband, Prasad, having remorse, rather kills himself by adventuring a boat in rough seas. An ‘Indian widow,’ Uma searches escape through travel and then radical politics. Dolly’s escape route is different. It is closer to the Burmese soul. She has two sons, thus obligations. First one, Neel, is exactly like Rajkumar and the second, Dinu, is closer to her heart. It is only at the end, she decides to go to Sagaing, the famous Buddhist nunnery, where she always wanted to go. Lankasuka in Bengal is another scene of the story, the ancestral home of Uma, where she lives as a widow, doing politics, finally joining Mahatma Gandhi. She has a nephew, Arjun, who joins the army, and two nieces, Manju and Bela. Manju almost by fate meets Neel Raha and accompanies him to Rangoon after marriage. They live in Kemendine, the house of Rahas and this is where the main tragedy unfolds. Bela opts to live as a spinster after having a sex encounter with his brother’s batman on her sister’s wedding night. Major Tragedies The second setting of the story is the Second World War and the Japanese invasion of Burma and Malaya in 1942. Rajkumar, after facing a business decline, decides to ‘hoard ’ Teak after disposing all other possessions, except the Kemendine house, in a bid to regain his old glory. Neel is his faithful accomplice. They remain in Rangoon without heeding to ‘good advice’ for them to leave for India before an invasion. At the verge of a major business deal, and in fact when the timber was being loaded, the Japanese raids Rangoon. Neel is killed in the commotion by elephant trampling. Manju becomes a widow with a small daughter, Jaya. They all become refugees and flee to Bengal with immense hardships, crossing the rivers and mountains. Manju already mentally deranged, commits suicide on their way. When Rajkumar and Dolly reach Lankasuka, Uma’s house, with Jaya, they were first taken as ‘some destitutes.’ “One afternoon, her elderly gatekeeper came to tell [Uma] that there were some destitutes outside asking for her. This was only too common at that time; Bengal was in the throes of a famine, one of the worst in history.” By this time Dinu was in Malaya at Morningside estate of Saya John and family in Sungei Pattani. He came to inquire about their situation. Saya was suffering from dementia and it aggravated when his son, Matthew and his American wife, Elsa, died in a motor accident leaving their only daughter Alison rather rudderless. Dinu almost instantly attracted to Alison and in fact wanted to marry her. It was at the same time that Arjun is stationed in Malaya. A flamboyant character, Arjun seduces Alison just before going to the war front. He betrays Dinu’s friendship. Dinu is nevertheless ready to forgive and forget. The Japanese also invade Malaya and in an effort to flee to Singapore, both Alison and Saya get killed by the Japanese. Perhaps that is what Alison wanted, under the circumstances of her guilt towards Dinu. Tragedy befalls on Arjun when he decides to defect from the British army in support of the Japanese, and more in support of the Indian independence, influenced by a friend, Hardy. True to whatever he decides, he refuses to side with the British, or be neutral, even after the Indian independence is promised and the Japanese had pushed away. Hardy makes the timely change, but Arjun fights to the end. He fights finally in rural Burma (near Huay Zedi), perhaps brought there for author’s convenience for Dinu to meet! By this time, Dinu is back in Burma. Dinu retorts, “You must see that you don’t have a hope. At this, Arjun laughed. “Did we ever have a hope? He said. ‘We rebelled against an Empire that has shaped everything in our lives; coloured everything in the world as we know it. It is a huge, indelible stain which has tainted all of us. We cannot destroy it without destroying ourselves. And that, I suppose, is where I am…” Arjun later executes his own former batman and a companion, Kishan Singh, under pressure from others when Kishan tried to escape. Then the others escape! Arjun was tracked down by the British with the assistance of a deserter, one of his own men. He refuses to surrender. “It was clear that he did not want to live.” Mirror of Myanmar What is this mirror about Myanmar? a reader might ask. The story of the Royals in part one and two of the novel, titled respectively as Mandalay and Ratnagiri, mirror the story of the declining Burma. Burma before colonialism was considered a ‘golden land’ where no one was hungry. But under the British, it changed, polarising the society into different classes, the rich and the poor, and poverty and dislocation creeping in. It is not only because of the British that the political edifice crumbled. The old order could not face the new challenges, cloistered in falls pride, fear, intrigue and deception. The last King Thibaw was a weakling, perhaps not interested in power. To keep him in power, the Queen had to order the execution of dozens of potential challengers within the same royal family. The British could not create, or not interested in creating, an intermediary class like what Macaulay talked about for India: “A class of persons Indian in blood and colour, but English in taste, in opinions, in morals and intellect.” Instead they used many Indians to govern Burma, especially in the army and the police. Burma in fact was governed as a part of the administration of Bengal until 1935. The Burmese were doubly humiliated. Presumably a harmonious ethnic mosaic of over a hundred of subgroups before, Burma became succumbed to anti-Indian hatred. Then it spilled over into other ethnic relations. Before The Wedding, the part three on The Money Tree mirrors the growing Burmese nationalism inspired by a new messianic variety of Buddhism. Dolly was asked “It is true that you worked in the Mandalay palace…Prepare yourself: there is soon to be another coronation. A prince has been found who will liberate Burma.” This was the Saya San rebellion in 1930 reminiscent of 1848 in Ceylon or 1857 in India. Modern nationalism emerged side by side, led by the educated Burmese. The ‘Thirty Comrades’ were the most prominent, led by Aung San, father of Aung San Suu Kyi, by the time when the war erupted. This does not mean that The Glass Place mirrors the Burmese story completely or correctly. As a novel, it is not necessary to be so either. As it is neatly argued by Pankaj Mishra (“There’ll Always Be an England in India”), The Glass Palace depicts the impact of colonialism on the middle class, particularly in India, Arjun as the main representative in the novel. Perhaps Uma is more representative of the more enlightened sections of this class with clear understanding and sympathy for the variety of Burmese nationalism. Rajkumar undoubtedly is the most lost representative. There is obviously a major weakness in The Glass Palace when it came to the post-colonial period of the Burmese story. Perhaps the part seven was a later addition or a kind of an after-thought, after the events of the great democracy movement led by Aung San Suu Kyi. The author, Ghosh, obviously could not jump to the ‘current’ circumstances of the democracy movement without tracing the events of independence, the assassination of Aung San, continued unrest and rebellion, the army take over in 1962 and the simmering student unrest below all these. The entire period is sketched with a quick brush. The author himself admits, “The seed of this book was brought to India long before my own lifetime by my father and my uncle.” “But neither my father nor my uncle would have recognized the crop.” This is an indication perhaps the story was planned to be end on The [War] Front. The book in essence is a novel, but a historical one. The speed of the last part and the chapters is very evident in many instances. Look at the following in chapter forty-eight. Relating the deaths of Uma and Rajkumar, Jaya says the following. “Yes, I remember it very well. My great-aunt Uma had died <="" u=""> before you see. They were almost ninety, both of them…” Then says: “Rajkumar died of a heart attack, a month later.” Symbol of Glass Palace There is a particular perspective or viewpoint governing Amitav Ghosh’s The Glass Palace. Apart from The Glass Palace Chronicles of the Myanmar’s history, the name derives Dinu now called U Tun Pe, names his photo studio in Yangon, after the war, The Glass Palace. As he explained to Jaya, his only brother’s daughter in 1996, “It was a favourite phrase of my mother’s…Just some things she used to say…” There was a hall called the Glass Palace in the Mandalay palace. Dolly particularly liked it. That is all she could remember. The walls were lined with ‘mirrors.’ “Everything there was crystal and gold. You could see yourself everywhere if you lay on the floor,” Dolly told Uma much later. Dolly always had this conception of reflecting on oneself like in a ‘glass palace.’ When Dolly met Uma, before the war, in then Rangoon, she told the following. “It’s hard to know where to start, Uma. You’ll remember that I wrote to you about Dinu’s illness? After it was over, I found that something had changed in me. I couldn’t go back to the life I’d led before.” “Then I heard about an old friend – we used to call her Evelyn. I heard she was in Sagaing, near Mandalay, and that she had become the head of a thi-la-shin-kyaung – what do you call it? – a Buddhist nunnery. I went to see her, and I knew at once that that was where I want to be – that this could be my life.” After the war and after a while, she in fact went to that ‘glass palace’ with her favourite son Dinu. “They walked the last few miles to Sagaing and took a ferry across the Irrawaddy. To their intense relief Sagaing was unchanged. The hills were tranquil and beautiful, dotted with thousands of pagodas. Dolly began to walk fast and then Evelyn led her in. The next day, when Dinu went to see her, her head was shaved and she was wearing a saffron robe. She looked radiant.” Dinu’s ‘glass palace’ was slightly different. It was linked to photography and politics. In the past, he was a left-wing student. He was strongly against Fascism and saw an immense danger. He considered the army or the military with hostility from the beginning. Therefore, his resistance to the army rule in Myanmar after 1962 was natural. He was impressed by the aesthetic theories of Stieglitz, Cunningham and Weston. Edward Weston was of his particular interest. Dinu, when he was depressed, adored his dark room. “He’d always been able to count on the ambiance of the dark room for reassurance; its dim red glow had been an unfailing source of comfort.” He was also amazed by the magic of photography and printing. “When you print by contact…when you lay the negative on the paper and watch them come of life…the darkness of the one becomes the light of the other.” It meant life to Dinu. Dinu continued this venture after the war and even after he was jailed in 1989. He lost his wife, Daw Thin Thin Aye in jail for tuberculosis. She was a radical writer involved in the democracy movement. She used to say: “To use the past to justify the present is bad enough – but it’s just as bad to use the present to justify the past.” When Jaya, his only niece from Neel, went in search of him in 1996 in Yangon, Dinu was having his glass palace day. “Is it a class? She asked. A lecture course? No! He laughed. They just come…every week…some are new, some have been here before. Some are students, some are artists, some have aspirations to become photographers…” This is apparently the ongoing mirror of Myanmar today. The people are reflecting, especially the young. There are many forms of awakening and many forms of reflecting. Dinu quoted Weston. “Weston reflecting on Trotsky…that new and revolutionary art forms may awaken a people or disturb their complacency or challenge old ideals with constructive prophesies.” If there is any meaning for the symbol that Amitav Ghosh has selected for his novel, The Glass Palace - that is the meaning - the revisualization. Exploring for the long haul http://www.bangkokpost.com/business/economics/281764/exploring-for-the-long-haul 27-Feb-2012 Resource-rich Myanmar is poised to be a major contributor to Thailand's future energy needs, including gas and possibly electricity from hydropower dams planned for the years ahead. "Myanmar may account for up to 10% of our total investments in the years to come and the country would supply up to 25% of Thailand's need for natural gas," says Anon Sirisaengtaksin, the president and CEO of PTT Exploration and Production Plc. The exploration arm of Thailand's largest energy company is no stranger to Myanmar, having begun operations there in 1989. And despite Myanmar's troubled political past, internal strife and occasional conflicts that resulted in border closures, natural gas supplies from Myanmar to Thailand have never been disrupted, says Mr Anon. "There is no threat to the company's operations from the changes in the government and therefore it gives more legitimacy to the government to grant more concessions," he said at a recent seminar. In the most recent licensing round overseen by the new government, PTTEP secured more exploration blocks in the Bay of Bengal. Its Zawtika wells are likely to start producing sometime in 2013 and others such as M-3 and M-11, still in the exploration process, may take more time to be operational. The Zawtika project, which covers 12,306 square kilometres in the Gulf of Martaban, is 80% owned by PTTEP International and 20% by Myanma Oil and Gas Enterprise. The company currently operates three offshore and two onshore blocks while another two (Yadana and Yetagun) are joint ventures with foreign partners. "We are at the moment looking for technology for deep water, technology that is not there in Myanmar and for M-11 we need deep water of more than one kilometre," Mr Anon said. The Yadana and Yetagun blocks have been relatively successful, in contrast to the disappointment of PTTEP's first venture into Myanmar. It began work in the country on the so-called Block F in 1989 but found no gas and terminated the contract in 1997. "We returned the first block (a joint venture with Unocal) as it was unsuccessful and since then there have been a series of opportunities and more will arise in the future," Mr Anon said. PTTEP could face more competition in the future in Myanmar if its current reforms lead to the easing of sanctions imposed for two decades by western governments. No major western oil and gas company has any big presence in Myanmar except Total of France. That has left the field open to Asian players including PTTEP, Sinopec of China, Petronas of Malaysia and Essar of India. And even as the new government starts to open up the economy and welcome more foreign investment, there are signs that it will start driving a harder bargain with companies seeking to exploit its rich oil and gas reserves. As well, as the economy grows, so too will domestic energy needs. "Myanmar is now looking at greater supply for itself as there is a growing shortage of electricity and new projects now have a clause requiring that they supply part of the gas to the domestic market," said Mr Anon. He also has a few words of advice for investors who may be looking at Myanmar for the first time: Don't look at the short-term returns only, as was evident from early struggles of PTTEP, which has a long-haul outlook. "Once you go to Myanmar you have to think long-term and not hit-and-run," he said, adding that while many drawbacks remain in the country, the opportunity outweighs most of them. These opportunities for oil and gas companies exist not just in the upstream market but also downstream where there is a lack of infrastructure for petrochemical plants. Myanmar, with oil production capacity estimated in 2010 at 21,000 barrels a day and natural gas production of 11.54 billion cubic feet, still lacks facilities such as modern refineries and has a very limited processing capacity. "Myanmar needs things such as deep-water technology, which it is looking for, and downstream operations are either ageing or not sufficient to meet future needs. It is basically an overhaul of the system that needs to be undertaken," he said. Govt to back Myanmar at UN summit http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/local/281695/govt-to-back-myanmar-at-un-summit 27-Feb-2012 Thailand will play a more active role this year in helping Myanmar to fully engage with the international community as the formerly military-led country continues with political reforms. Permanent secretary for foreign affairs Sihasak Phuangketkaew said Thailand will use the 19th Session of the United Nations' Human Rights Council (UNHRC) meeting in Geneva today to show its readiness to help push Myanmar's engagement. Foreign Minister Surapong Tovichakchaikul will represent Thailand at the High Level Segment of the UNHRC meeting that will discuss the Myanmar issue. Mr Sihasak said the EU has in recent years dominated drafting of the UNHRC's resolutions on Myanmar. "We will try to work with the EU this year to help push for a more constructive resolution so the EU can recognise the positive development in Myanmar which will help open the doors for Myanmar to associate with the outside world," he told the Bangkok Post. Mr Sihasak said he believed that Myanmar is ready to adjust its stance to have more engagement with other countries. His resolution to help the Asean country push its positive developments is part of Thailand 's readiness to act as a bridge between Myanmar and foreign countries at the UNHRC meeting, he said. Besides the Myanmar issue, Foreign Ministry spokesman Thani Thongphakdi said Mr Surapong will underline the importance of human rights to the Thai government and the country's readiness to join the international community in taking responsibility for protecting human rights everywhere. Mr Surapong will deliver a statement underscoring Thailand 's commitment to democracy and human rights. In the statement, he will clarify what the government has done in advancing the social and human rights agenda during its seven months in office. This has included the creation of the National Women's Development Fund; public access to quality and equitable health care; the use of technology to enhance the quality of education; and the promotion of the rights of persons with disabilities, he said. The minister will also underline the government's support for the Truth for Reconciliation Commission. Mr Surapong will also hold bilateral talks with Navanethem Pillay, High Commissioner for Human Rights, and Supachai Panitchpakdi, secretary-general of the UN Conference on Trade and Development, to promote further cooperation on human rights and development issues. Myanmar’s exiled media lured back home by reform http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2012\02\27\story_27-2-2012_pg14_8 27-Feb-2012 AS censorship eases in Myanmar and the press tastes long-suppressed freedom, exiled media groups are weighing up the risks of a return to cover the dramatic changes in their country from within. Not long ago, working for one of them could result in a lengthy prison sentence if caught inside the army-dominated nation, but the past year’s political openings have turned recent pipe dreams into real ambitions. Exiled reporting groups want permission to return to Myanmar, also known as Burma - but only when they are sure there will be no turning back on the new regime’s radical steps towards reforms. “It is our dream to publish a publication or online magazine inside Burma. I hope it will happen soon,” said Aung Zaw, the founder of the Irrawaddy news website based in neighbouring Thailand. The journalist has just completed his first trip to Myanmar since he escaped after a popular uprising in 1988 was brutally crushed by the junta. This time, he came back charmed. “I think the authorities will consider my proposal if we want to publish inside Burma,” he said. Over the past year the government of former general Thein Sein, which took over from the junta in March, has overseen dramatic political reforms, including in the media. Censorship, already softened, will supposedly disappear. Opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, released from house arrest in late 2010, has crept on to the front pages, while exiled media websites are no longer blocked. Even imprisoned journalists from the Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), a broadcasting group based in Oslo, were all released in January in a mass amnesty for political prisoners. For the exiles, what remains is the strategic question of timing. According to Aung Zaw, senior journalists have suggested to the Irrawaddy to “remain here in Thailand until 2015” to ensure the reforms are well entrenched. “Laws that restrict press freedom are still there,” so “it is too risky” for them to go back now, said Maung Maung Myint, chairman of the Burma Media Association based in Oslo, whose members are mostly exiled journalists. In Myanmar’s capital of Naypyidaw, the Ministry of Information says that the way is clear. Ye Htut, the ministry’s director general, told AFP that there was “no restriction” on the media in exile. “We only ask for fair and balanced reporting,” he said. But the new press legislation under development is limited to print media. Even if the law enters into force, “pluralism and good practices will still be missing,” noted Benjamin Ismail, head of the Asia bureau at media watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) in Paris. In terms of press freedom, Myanmar is still ranked just 169th among 179 countries, according to an index by RSF published in January. Exiled media therefore have no choice but to take things step by step. The editor of Mizzima, a news agency based in India, told the Myanmar Times that, similar to the Irrawaddy, it was “ready to set up our office in Yangon”. As for the DVB, the first step is “legalising DVB’s operation in the country” and preventing further arrests, according to its deputy director Khin Maung Win. The government is closely linked to the previous military rulers, who “treated DVB as the enemy,” he said. Although the group is still considered illegal, the new regime has behaved differently, for example by accepting interview requests from DVB reporters. Ultimately, the exiles’ return seems inevitable if decades of military rule really are consigned to the history books. “The exiled Burmese media will simply fade away when Burma has become a truly democratic society,” said the Burma Media Association’s Maung Maung Myint. Meanwhile, international donors who are increasingly tempted to favour projects inside the country must continue to support them, he argued. DVB, which has already experienced financial problems linked to an embezzlement scandal, has only found 10 percent of its $3.5 million budget for 2012. “DVB donors are excited with the changes in Burma and like to switch their support to inside Burma, rather than outside,” said Khin Maung Win. Whatever their future role, the contributions of these experienced English speakers will be crucial for a country where the main newspaper, The New Light of Myanmar, remains a dogmatic mouthpiece of the regime. “They have said that they wanted us to do some training and introduce quality standards of journalism,” said Aung Zaw. “If they are serious, I’m ready.” afp