FWUBC-JAPAN

(1/FWUBC,Workshop19th)5-2-2012

2012-02-07T09:16:00.001+09:00

(2/FWUBC,Workshop19th)5-2-2012

2012-02-07T09:15:00.002+09:00

(3/FWUBC,Workshop19th)5-2-2012

2012-02-07T09:14:00.005+09:00

(4/FWUBC,Workshop19th)5-2-2012

2012-02-07T09:14:00.002+09:00

(5/FWUBC,Workshop19th)5-2-2012

2012-02-07T09:13:00.001+09:00

(6/FWUBC,Workshop19th)5-2-2012

2012-02-07T09:12:00.001+09:00

(Q&A-1/FWUBC,Workshop19th)5-2-2012

2012-02-07T09:11:00.001+09:00

(Q&A-2/FWUBC,Workshop19th)5-2-2012

2012-02-07T09:10:00.001+09:00

(Q&A-3/FWUBC,Workshop19th)5-2-2012

2012-02-07T09:09:00.003+09:00

(Q&A-4/FWUBC,Workshop19th)5-2-2012

2012-02-07T09:09:00.001+09:00

(Q&A-5/FWUBC,Workshop19th)5-2-2012

2012-02-07T09:08:00.002+09:00

(Q&A-6/FWUBC,Workshop19th)5-2-2012

2012-02-07T09:07:00.001+09:00

FTUB Daily News for Dec-23-2011, English News - Evening

2011-12-24T01:40:00.001+09:00

News Headlines with Brief (1) Election Commission Promises Suu Kyi Free and Fair Election | Source: Irrawaddy23-Dec-2011The chairman of Burma's Union Election Commission (EC), Tin Aye, has promised pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi that he will ensure the forthcoming by-elections are free and fair, and that the government was committed to cooperating with the opposition for the welfare of the country.Read More..... (2) Burma moots early 2012 prisoner amnesty | Source: DVB23-Dec-2011Two batches of prisoners will be released in January and February, according to leaders of the Karen National Union (KNU) who spoke with a Burmese government minister this week. The two releases would take place on 4 January and 12 February, railway minister Aung Min was quoted by the KNU’s David Htaw as saying. The two met earlier this week to thrash out plans for ceasefire negotiations between the KNU and Burmese army, who have been at war for more than six decades.Read More..... (3) India to dispatch army chief to Burma | Source: DVB23-Dec-2011Ongoing anxiety in the Indian government over security along its porous shared border with Burma has prompted New Delhi to line up a visit by army chief General VK Singh to Naypyidaw next month. The five-day trip beginning 5 January is the first time Singh will visit Burma, and points to continued concerns at Burma’s apparent reluctance to tackle Indian separatist groups believed to shelter in camps inside the Burmese border.Read More.....(4) Reward Offered for Remaining Bomber | Source: Irrawaddy23-Dec-2011Burmese authorities are offering 500,000 kyat [US $670] to anyone who can provide the whereabouts of the remaining bomber behind a blast that killed a woman in Rangoon on Wednesday. Three people suspected of involvement in the bombing have already been arrested while one suspect remains at large, according to a police source in Rangoon who spoke to The Irrawaddy on Friday.Read More..... (5) NLD Registers | Source: Irrawaddy23-Dec-2011Burma’s pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi formally registered her party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), on Friday morning at Naypyidaw's Union Election Commission where she was met by Chairman ex-Lt-Gen Tin Aye. On her second visit to the capital since her release from house arrest in November, Suu Kyi was accompanied by NLD colleagues including former general Tin Oo, spokesman Nyan Win and Win Myint.Read More..... (6) Hope rises for political prisoners release | Source: Mizzima23-Dec-2011The news of a probable release of Burmese prisoners including political prisoners on either January 4 or February 12 has given people hope for a brighter new year. The families of political prisoners are anticipating their release after Rail Minister Aung Min told ethnic armed groups and Lower House Speaker Thura Shwe Mahn told visiting U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton of a possible release.Read More..... (7) UNFC: Federal Army formed, better late than never | Source: Shan23-Dec-2011Burma’s latest ethnic alliance formed in February has successfully established the long awaited Federal Union Army after 10 months, according to United Nationalities Federal Council (UNFC) Assistant Secretary General Hkun Okker. The founding meeting, 16-17 December, was held at an undisclosed location along the Thai-Burmese border.Read More..... (8) Wa, Mongla: No graduates from 20 year junta run schools | Source: Shan23-Dec-2011From 1989, when the ceasefire agreement was concluded, to 2009, when Wa and Mongla rejected Naypyitaw’s Border Guard Force (BGF programme, the military government had set up schools in their territories to teach their children, but to date, there has not been a single graduate from these schools, claim Wa and Mongla officials.Read More..... Election Commission Promises Suu Kyi Free and Fair Electionhttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2271423-Dec-2011 The chairman of Burma's Union Election Commission (EC), Tin Aye, has promised pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi that he will ensure the forthcoming by-elections are free and fair, and that the government was committed to cooperating with the opposition for the welfare of the country.According to Nyan Win, the main spokesman for Suu Kyi's National League for democracy (NLD), the former lieutenant-general made the pledges when the pair spoke on Friday at his office in Naypyidaw following the NLD's registration at the election office.“U Tin Aye told Daw Aung San Suu Kyi that he will do his best to ensure the legitimacy of the upcoming elections, and he proposed that both the government and the opposition work together for the betterment of the country,” Nyan Win told The Irrawaddy on Friday afternoon.“He also proposed that both sides cooperate to improve the economy,” he said.“Daw Aung San Suu Kyi thanked U Tin Aye for his pledge to cooperate and to ensure free and fair elections,” Nyan Win said, adding that they also discussed a few technical details with regard to the by-elections during their two-hour meeting.Tin Aye did not disclose when the by-elections would be held, the NLD spokesman said. However, the EC chairman estimated that the bureaucratic process for giving the green light to the NLD application could take three or four weeks.“During the meeting, U Tin Aye appeared reassuring and friendly, and he offered his opinions frankly and openly,” Nyan Win said when asked about his impression of the man who used to be No.6 in the military junta hierarchy.According to reports from Naypyidaw, Suu Kyi also met Upper House Speaker Khin Aung Myint and then Lower House Speaker Shwe Mann, formerly No. 3 in the military hierarchy, at their offices in the capital on Friday afternoon.Correspondents from local journals said Suu Kyi discussed matters of democracy and parliamentary issues with both house speakers.“As a democratic system is based on justice, liberty and equality, we are serious on the issue of all-inclusiveness,” Khin Aung Myint was quoted by Weekly Eleven News as saying.Neither Suu Kyi nor any other NLD representative is scheduled to meet President Thein Sein on this visit as he has a prior engagement outside the capital.Tin Aye is not only the EC chairman, but is also the former chairman of the military’s Myanmar Economic Holdings Ltd, and a close aide to former junta supremo Than Shwe. Military sources describe him as Than Shwe’s “revenue keeper.” He previously attended the same Intake 9 of the Defense Services Academy along with Thein Sein.NLD party leaders Tin Oo and Suu Kyi formally registered the party on Friday morning at Naypyidaw's Union Election Commission office.On Suu Kyi's second visit to the capital since her release from house arrest in November, she was accompanied by NLD colleagues, including former general Tin Oo, spokesman Nyan Win and Win Myint.Suu Kyi's first trip to Naypyidaw was in August when she was invited to attend a government economic workshop. She met and held her first talks with Thein Sein at the presidential palace where they reportedly discussed the political situation in Burma and national reconciliation.After meetings with Thein Sein and other ministers in Naypyidaw on August 19-20, Suu Kyi said she was “satisfied” with the outcome.Following those positive first steps between the government and the country's main opposition leader, Parliament amended the Political Party Registration Law, effectively allowing the NLD to register again as a legal party and opening the way for it to contest by-elections next year.On Monday, the NLD leadership elected Suu Kyi as the deputy leader of the NLD, and her close aide, Tin Oo, as the leader for formal registration purposes.The NLD said it intends to contest 48 constituencies in the coming by-elections, and that Suu Kyi herself will be a candidate.Even if the NLD secures all 48 seats in the polls, it will be still be in a minority until the next general election in 2015. Meanwhile, the military-backed ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) will continue to dominate the majority of both houses. Burma moots early 2012 prisoner amnestyhttp://www.dvb.no/news/burma-moots-early-2012-prisoner-amnesty/1936223-Dec-2011 Two batches of prisoners will be released in January and February, according to leaders of the Karen National Union (KNU) who spoke with a Burmese government minister this week.The two releases would take place on 4 January and 12 February, railway minister Aung Min was quoted by the KNU’s David Htaw as saying. The two met earlier this week to thrash out plans for ceasefire negotiations between the KNU and Burmese army, who have been at war for more than six decades.According to David Htaw, the minister reportedly said that “political prisoners” would be among those released. The government has consistently refused to admit that it holds detainees on political charges, instead referring to the country’s estimated political prisoners as “common criminals”.“By [12 February], almost all political prisoners will be released, he told us,” said David Htaw.The number of political prisoners behind bars has become a matter of contention since the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) in October released a list of around 600 jailed activists, journalists, lawyers and so on. The Thailand-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners – Burma (AAPP) however puts the figure at 1,546.The Burmese comedian Zarganar, who was released in the October amnesty, also drew up a list of around 600 political prisoners during a visit to jails shortly after his release.No detail has been given on the reasons for the discrepancy, although it may stem from the fact that a number of political prisoners have been charged in relation to violent acts. Nay Zin Latt, a senior advisor to Burmese President Thein Sein, said the conflicting figures “could arise from differences in ideology”.Tate Naing, joint secretary of AAPP, said he thought the political prisoners would be released in the second amnesty in February. “As there has never been a declaration of what constitute a political prisoner, we are watching what kind of people will be released and how many will be released.” India to dispatch army chief to Burmahttp://www.dvb.no/news/india-to-dispatch-army-chief-to-burma/1934923-Dec-2011 Ongoing anxiety in the Indian government over security along its porous shared border with Burma has prompted New Delhi to line up a visit by army chief General VK Singh to Naypyidaw next month.The five-day trip beginning 5 January is the first time Singh will visit Burma, and points to continued concerns at Burma’s apparent reluctance to tackle Indian separatist groups believed to shelter in camps inside the Burmese border.New Delhi has taken steps over the past year to bolster its defence in the troubled northeastern states, including the development of infrastructure such as roads and helipads that will allow quicker deployment of paramilitary groups like the Assam Rifles to battle separatists.But despite a number of joint military agreements being signed by both governments aimed at closer cooperation in the region, Naypyidaw for its part has made little progress in clearing groups like the United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) from its territory.Analyst Bertil Lintner says that India’s frustration with Burma stems from the differing priorities of both governments. “[The separatist groups] are not a major concern in Burma – they have other [military] priorities that are more important, such as tackling the Karen, Shan and Kachin rebel groups”.Deploying army units to the Indian border is also a tricky task. “These regions are remote and isolated, and for Burma’s army to move around is a major operation logistically – there’s no infrastructure,” Lintner said.The ULFA, which is fighting for an independent Assam, has long been alleged to have bases in Burma’s northern Kachin state. India’s Maoist rebels are also believed to have trained over the border.While the Burmese drag their feet over the issue, Lintner says there is “no possibility” that Burma would allow small-scale Indian army operations on its soil in the near future. “They don’t want any foreign troops across their border – they’re too sensitive about that.”According to the Hindustan Times, Burma recently rejected offers of weaponry from India, which is one of only eight countries believed to supply arms to Naypyidaw. Instead, the paper reported, Burma requested only maintenance of existing purchases. Weapons’ supplies from India are thought to comprise mostly artillery, and destined mainly for Burmese army camps in its northwest.The visit by Singh may also be an attempt to draw Burma’s military away from China, which supplies most of its arms. India has made no secret of its attempt to entice its neighbour away from the clutches of Beijing, and may be looking to exploit an apparent unease within the Burmese government over its dependence on China, as signalled by the cancellation of the Myitsone dam in October.Burma has however sought to play India and China off against one another, likely in a bid to maintain a degree of independence from the region’s main powerhouses. Burma’s powerful parliamentary speaker Shwe Mann was in India last week, ostensibly to study the development of India’s own political arena since independence but the visit offered a clear indication of Burma’s attempt to wriggle out of Beijing’s orbit.India’s once frosty relations with the Burmese regime have warmed since the early 1990s when it sought to develop stronger business relations with its neighbour, which acts as its only geographical gateway to Southeast Asian economies and a coveted source of natural energy. Reward Offered for Remaining Bomberhttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2270923-Dec-2011 Burmese authorities are offering 500,000 kyat [US $670] to anyone who can provide the whereabouts of the remaining bomber behind a blast that killed a woman in Rangoon on Wednesday.Three people suspected of involvement in the bombing have already been arrested while one suspect remains at large, according to a police source in Rangoon who spoke to The Irrawaddy on Friday.The blast killed a woman civilian and seriously injured another on Wednesday morning in an incident that authorities are blaming on an unspecified Thailand-based dissident group.“According to our investigation, we learned that the suspects entered the country after attending explosion training at the Thai-Burmese border,” said the police source.“We believe that the bomber is still in Rangoon. We have distributed his photograph to all respective police stations,” he said, adding that the remaining suspect is a 23-year-old man.Local authorities have beefed up security around major locations such as railway and bus stations, and checkpoints at the outskirts of towns.The arrested suspects are to be tried on several charges, including murder and threatening the stability of the state, said the source.The homemade bomb exploded in a public toilet at the old campus of Rangoon University at 11 am on Wednesday, killing 30-year-old Mya San Yi and seriously injuring 24-year-old Khin Myat Nwe who is now being treated at Rangoon General Hospital.Local authorities said that they will hold a press conference after they arrest the remaining suspect. NLD Registershttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2270823-Dec-2011 Burma’s pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi formally registered her party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), on Friday morning at Naypyidaw's Union Election Commission where she was met by Chairman ex-Lt-Gen Tin Aye.On her second visit to the capital since her release from house arrest in November, Suu Kyi was accompanied by NLD colleagues including former general Tin Oo, spokesman Nyan Win and Win Myint.The group was received at the office of Tin Aye, recognized as No.6 in the hierarchy during the reign of the former military junta.While in Naypyidaw, Suu Kyi is expected to meet several high-ranking officials from the new government, including ex-Gen Shwe Mann who is currently the speaker for the Lower House of Parliament. However, neither Suu Kyi nor other NLD representatives are scheduled to meet President Thein Sein on this visit as he has a prior engagement outside the capital.Suu Kyi is booked to stay at the Royal Naypyitaw Hotel.Suu Kyi's first trip to Naypyidaw was in August when she was invited to attend a government economic workshop. She met and held her first talks with Thein Sein at the presidential palace where they reportedly discussed the political situation in Burma and national reconciliation.After meetings with Thein Sein and other ministers in Naypyidaw on August 19-20, Suu Kyi said she was “satisfied.”Following those positive first steps between the government and the country's main opposition leader, Parliament amended the Political Party Registration Law, effectively allowing the NLD to register again as a legal party and opening the way for it to contest by-elections next year.On Monday, the NLD leadership elected Suu Kyi as the deputy leader of the NLD, and her close aide, Tin Oo, as the leader for formal registration purposes. Hope rises for political prisoners releasehttp://www.mizzima.com/news/prisoner-watch/6312-hope-rises-for-political-prisoners-release.htmlFriday, 23 December 2011 14:11 Myo ThantChiang Mai (Mizzima) – The news of a probable release of Burmese prisoners including political prisoners on either January 4 or February 12 has given people hope for a brighter new year.The families of political prisoners are anticipating their release after Rail Minister Aung Min told ethnic armed groups and Lower House Speaker Thura Shwe Mahn told visiting U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton of a possible release. The families of the political prisoners “are expecting the release of their loved ones,” said Aung Zaw Tun of the Families of Political Prisoners Network.At informal peace talks with New Mon State Party (NMSP) on Thursday, team leader and Rail Minister Aung Min told them to expect a release on Independence Day (January 4) and Union Day (February 12), NMSP General-Secretary Nai Han Thar told reporters.Also, at peace talk with the Karen National Union (KNU) on Wednesday, Aung Min said prisoners including political prisoners would be released early next year.“They [the government] also want to release these prisoners so they will be released on January 4 and political prisoners will be among them. Also more prisoners will be released on February 12 and more political prisoners will be released among them too,” said KNU central executive committee member Pado David Taw, who attended the meeting.On Wednesday, Aung San Suu Kyi also told a meeting of 88-generation student leadeers that political prisoners would be released, said 88-generation student leader Tun Myint Aung, who attended the meeting.At a press conference held after the visit of the U.S. secretary of state in November, Shwe Mahn said, “We promised her to fulfill her request of allowing the participation of all nationals in state building and for the unity of all ethnic nationalities in state affairs,” which referred to political prisoners.Aung Tun, the younger brother of 88-generation student leader Ko Ko Gyi, who is serving a 65-year prison term in Mong Hsat Prison, said he hopes for the release of his elder brother, but he’s cautious.in18“We have heard similar news many times before. We have waited for many years. This is not new to us. We will be happy if they are released. We hope for this, but according to the teaching of Lord Buddha, his divine retribution has not yet finished for the sin in his past life.”President Thein Sein has granted amnesty to 6,356 prisoners this year, but only 220 political prisoners were among them, the exile-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (Burma) (AAPP-B) said in a press release.88-generation leader Phyo Min Thein said all political prisoners should be released now, and if no release occurs, the families of political prisoners will suffer even more.“The families of these prisoners must be cautious about believing the rumours. If the rumours do not come true, the families will suffer even greater despair,” he told Mizzima.There are currently about 600 political prisoners in prisons across Burma, according to Nai Nai, a member of the National League for Democracy Social Aid group that works with political prisoners. According to a AAPP-B list compiled on December 14, there are 1,546 political prisoners. UNFC: Federal Army formed, better late than neverhttp://www.shanland.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4299:unfc-federal-army-formed-better-late-than-never&catid=85:politics&Itemid=266Friday, 23 December 2011 11:21 S.H.A.N. Burma’s latest ethnic alliance formed in February has successfully established the long awaited Federal Union Army after 10 months, according to United Nationalities Federal Council (UNFC) Assistant Secretary General Hkun Okker.The founding meeting, 16-17 December, was held at an undisclosed location along the Thai-Burmese border.Maj Gen Bee Htoo of Karenni Army was appointed as its Commander-in-Chief, Brig Gen Gun Maw of Kachin Independence Army (KIA) as Deputy #1 and a yet-to-be-named Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) commander as Deputy #2.“The ball has begun rolling so things are getting better,” he said. “So we can’t really say we’re too late.”This statement was in response to comments that it should have been formed when all eyes and ears were still focusing on the UNFC early in the year. Critics have pointed out that the alliance had done every little to either deter or stage a collective defensive against the Burma Army’s offensives against its members, the Shan State Army (SSA) ‘North’ (13 March) and the KIA (9 June).According to its Circular #1 / 2011, the Federal Union Army’s aims and objectives are: To defend the Union To achieve peace To restore democratic rights and fundamental rights of the people To struggle for Equality and Right of self Determination To oppose human rights violations and war crimes committed by some elements of the Burma Army To serve as a rally point for Burma Army members who wish to stand by the people To become a part of the armed forces of the future federal unionThe circular also designates the following armed groups as its allies: Arakan Liberation Army (ALA), All Burma Student Democratic Front (ABSDF), United Wa State Army (UWSA), National Democratic Alliance Army (NDAA) and the Shan State Army (SSA) ‘South’.Apart from the first two, the rest are groups that have signed ceasefire agreements with Burma’s new government.The UNFC has demanded that President Thein Sein, who had offered peace talks on 18 August, to deal with it directly instead of group by group. However Naypyitaw’s negotiators say it will hold direct talks only at the third stage of the peace process.The three-stage peace process as outlined by U Aung Min, Naypyitaw’s chief negotiator at the 19 November talks, are: Ceasefire, Development and Conference to be held in the style of 1947 Panglong. Wa, Mongla: No graduates from 20 year junta run schoolshttp://www.shanland.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4301:wa-mongla-no-graduates-from-20-year-junta-run-schools&catid=93:general&Itemid=291Friday, 23 December 2011 12:21 S.H.A.N. From 1989, when the ceasefire agreement was concluded, to 2009, when Wa and Mongla rejected Naypyitaw’s Border Guard Force (BGF programme, the military government had set up schools in their territories to teach their children, but to date, there has not been a single graduate from these schools, claim Wa and Mongla officials.Since the teachers had complained that they were working at the border with law pay where the cost of living was high, both Wa and Mongla authorities had offered supplementary allowances, from 80-300 Yuan ($ 13-50) per month.Even so, there were many drop outs, they said, due to the following reasons: Teachers did not take their duties to heart. Teaching was only perfunctory They were always applying for transfer to towns outside the ceasefire areas When replacement teachers arrived, they started their lessons all over againA Mongla official added there were fewer students before the teachers’ departure in 2010 following tensions between Wa-Mongla and Naypyitaw than during the two years when they were on their own: Before 2009 After 2009Mongla 100+ 400+Mongma 50+ 250+“We were teaching Shan,” he explained, “and we saw to it that the teachers really earn their pay. But then we signed a new agreement and the Burmese teachers have returned.”He commented that had the government been serious about building up human resources, both the Wa and Mongla could already have several university graduates including PhDs. “Now we only have graduates from Chinese language schools and Buddhist temples,” said the official, who was formerly a Buddhist monk.“We hope our experiences serve as a warning for all our brother organizations,” concluded the Wa official.Wa and Mongla signed new ceasefire agreements on 6 and 7 September respectively. They also signed a Union level agreement pledging not to secede from the Union on 1 and 9 October respectively. During the Union level negotiation, each had presented a 14 point proposal. So far they have yet to receive a reply on them.

FTUB Daily News for Nov-28-2011, English News - Evening

2011-11-29T04:04:00.001+09:00

News Headlines with Brief (1) Bangladeshi PM in push for Burma gas | Source: DVB28-Nov-2011Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is due to travel toBurmaearly next month amid speculation that her country’s desire for gas imports from its neighbour to the east will dominate talks. Bangladeshi cabinet ministers were in Naypyidaw last week for preparatory discussions prior to the 5-7 December visit by Hasina, her first toBurmasince coming to office in 2008.Read More..... (2) China and Burma reaffirm strained ties | Source: DVB28-Nov-2011China’s leader-in-waiting Xi Jinping met Burma’s military chief on Monday and pledged stronger ties, days before US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton starts a historic trip to the closed state. Clinton will become the most senior US official to visit Burma in more than 50 years on Wednesday when she arrives on a trip seen as a bid to advance US priorities in a country that has long enjoyed close ties to China.Read More..... (3) Musicians band together for Suu Kyi’s party | Source: DVB28-Nov-2011Musicians gathered at the Rangoon lakeside home of Aung San Suu Kyi last week to pitch ideas for an album that her party will launch next month to galvanise support for them in the upcoming by-elections. The nearly 50 artists met on Friday last week, the same day the National League for Democracy (NLD) submitted its application to register as a political party. Kyi Toe, a member of the party’s information wing, told DVB that the brainstorming session would be the first of several before the album is released in December.Read More.....(4) Clinton seeks ally on China’s doorstep | Source: DVB28-Nov-2011US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton heads this week on a historic visit to Burma that aims not only to pry open the closed nation but to shake up the battle for global influence right on China’s doorstep. Clinton on Wednesday will become the top US official to visit the nation in more than 50 years as she tests the waters after dramatic — but tentative — reforms by the military-backed government.Read More..... (5) Burma Riven by Graft, Ethnic Conflicts | Source: Irrawaddy28-Nov-2011When U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton visits Burma this week, she'll see a country that has made some progress toward democracy, but has even farther to go to fix the corrupt economy and ethnic conflicts that stem from decades of military rule. After holding elections last November, Burma has begun to release political prisoners and work with opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi. That has earned political rewards, such as Clinton's visit starting late Wednesday, the first by the top U.S. diplomat in 56 years.Read More..... (6) Foreign-based dissident organizations reorganizing their missions | Source: Mizzima28-Nov-2011In response to the National League for Democracy’s (NLD) decision to re-register as a political party, many dissident organizations in foreign countries are reassessing their strategies and redefining their missions. Among the organizations are the NLD – Liberated Area; the National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma (NCGUB); Members of Parliament Union – Burma (MPU) and the National Council of the Union of Burma.Read More..... (7) NLD prepares to accept 1 million party members | Source: Mizzima28-Nov-2011Feeling its newfound strength in deciding to register and reorganize as a political party, the National League for Democracy [NLD] is preparing to accept 1 million party members. The NLD will begin distribution of application forms in a few days, said May Win Myint, one of the new founding members who signed the NLD re-registration application permit. Even former NLD members – including party leader Aung San Suu Kyi – will have to fill out and submit a new membership application form, May Win Myint told Mizzima.Read More..... (8) Burma: Arab Spring or Prague Spring? | Source: Shan28-Nov-2011Last October, the military-turned-civilian government bent its visa rules on blacklisted individuals and Harn Yawnghwe, head of the Brussels-based Euro Burma Office (EBO) that has been assisting activist groups struggling for democracy and ethnic rights was allowed to return to his home country after spending 48 years in exile. The trip coincided with a report by Financial Times on 25 November that had quoted him saying: “They have decided to change. It’s not what we called for, but there are changes. Even if they are pretending to change, we should push them so the change becomes irreversible. If we keep saying that ‘you haven’t change the way we want’ and put obstacles in the way, then the changes will never come.”Read More..... Bangladeshi PM in push for Burma gashttp://www.dvb.no/news/bangladeshi-pm-in-push-for-gas-imports/1894428-Nov-2011 Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is due to travel toBurmaearly next month amid speculation that her country’s desire for gas imports from its neighbour to the east will dominate talks.Bangladeshi cabinet ministers were in Naypyidaw last week for preparatory discussions prior to the 5-7 December visit by Hasina, her first toBurmasince coming to office in 2008.Relations between the two countries have at times been frosty, with their shared border a matter contention. An arbitration over disputed maritime boundaries in the Bay of Bengal is also currently being considered by the International Tribunal for the Laws of the Sea (ITLOS) in Berlin, with a decision due in the middle of next year. Both issues are likely to arise next week.“Every subject of possible cooperation in all fields and removal of all disputes would be discussed between the two,” Hasina’s secretary, Abul Kalam Azad, told the Dhaka-based Financial Express, referring to her scheduled meeting with senior officials in Naypyidaw.The maritime complaint first submitted by Dhaka in 2009, and which is only just being heard, centred on a submersible drilling rig owned by US-Swiss firm TransOcean Inc, which the Bangladeshi’s claim illegally entered their waters with a Burmese navy escort in 2008.The incident led to a naval build-up by both countries, and according to leaked US diplomatic cables, prompted Bangladesh to ask for US help as the Burmese strengthened their military presence on the shared border.Bangladeshi military sources claim Dhaka has consequently attempted to match Burmese mobile artillery capabilities with the purchase of the Serbian Nora B-52 155 mm self-propelled howitzer, which with an approximate range of 45 kilometres could reach Burmese forces that have amassed around 30 kilometres from the border.Since Hasina’s Awami League victory in 2008, which brought to an end military rule in Bangladesh, she has been busy repairing bilateral relations with its neighbours, including Naypyidaw and New Delhi.Dhaka’s chief concern is securing energy resources for the country, which according to the Financial Express is short by around 200 MW. This was the driving force for the maritime boundary dispute, but it also now sees Dhaka looking for fresh imports as questions over the reserves in Bangladesh’s scarce oil and gas blocks have surfaced. Talks have allegedly been underway since May over the potential for Bangladesh to buy Burmese gas at market rates.Bangladesh may, as a result, build a power plant near to the border, which lies close to gas fields in Burma’s western Arakan state. This was mooted following a meeting between Bangladeshi commerce minister Faruk Kahn and U That Hta, Burma’s energy minister, on Friday last week in Naypyidaw.In addition, Dhaka has pushed for an increase in border trade. The Bangladeshis however are insistent that the Burmese repatriate the estimated 300,000 Rohingya refugees who inhabit Cox’s Bazaar, whom have sought asylum in the overpopulated country as a result of religious and racial persecution in their native northern Arakan state.The discrimination against Burma’s Muslim minority was affirmed by parliament in late August when the immigration minister said that “indigenous” Muslim voters would still need to obtain permits to travel because they had “shared common religion, culture, appearance and language” with Bangladeshi’s.The Burmese military build-up on the border has included the ongoing construction of a 350 kilometre electrified border fence and other alleged military infrastructure near the town of Ann. However there have been tentative signs that a normalisation of border relations could move forward with a new rail link between the two countries, for which construction began in early April China and Burma reaffirm strained tieshttp://www.dvb.no/news/china-and-burma-reaffirm-strained-ties/1894828-Nov-2011 China’s leader-in-waiting Xi Jinping met Burma’s military chief on Monday and pledged stronger ties, days before US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton starts a historic trip to the closed state.Clinton will become the most senior US official to visit Burma in more than 50 years on Wednesday when she arrives on a trip seen as a bid to advance US priorities in a country that has long enjoyed close ties to China.Xi proposed that the nations’ militaries “enhance exchange and deepen cooperation” when he met the commander-in-chief of Burma’s armed forces, Min Aung Hlaing, in Beijing, the official Xinhua news agency said.“The friendship, forged by leaders of the older generations, has endured changes in the international arena,” Xinhua quoted Vice President Xi as saying.“China will work with Myanmar [Burma] to further bolster the comprehensive strategic partnership of cooperation,” added Xi, who is widely expected to take over from President Hu Jintao in 2013.Burma and China have long been close allies, although the relationship is complicated, with some in the Southeast Asian nation resentful over Beijing’s overwhelming economic influence and historic border conflicts.Burma — which since last year has held elections and freed democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest — recently defied China by shutting down work on an unpopular dam that would supply power across the border.Experts say Clinton’s trip to Burma aims not only to test the waters after dramatic but tentative reforms in the country, but also to shake up the battle for global influence on China’s doorstep.It follows a tour of Pacific nations by US President Barack Obama aimed at reinforcing US influence in the region amid growing concerns about the rise of China.During his trip, Obama announced the stationing of US troops in Australia — a move Beijing said may not be “quite appropriate” — and also pushed ahead a trans-Pacific free trade agreement that for now excludes China.But US influence in Burma is likely to be limited. Washington bans virtually all trade with the country and any decision to end sanctions would need approval from Congress. Musicians band together for Suu Kyi’s partyhttp://www.dvb.no/news/musicians-band-together-for-suu-kyi%E2%80%99s-party/1893928-Nov-2011 Musicians gathered at the Rangoon lakeside home of Aung San Suu Kyi last week to pitch ideas for an album that her party will launch next month to galvanise support for them in the upcoming by-elections.The nearly 50 artists met on Friday last week, the same day the National League for Democracy (NLD) submitted its application to register as a political party. Kyi Toe, a member of the party’s information wing, told DVB that the brainstorming session would be the first of several before the album is released in December.Among those present were famed hip hop artists Yatha and Zayar Thaw – the latter is recognised as one of the early pioneers of the genre in Burma, and his veiled anti-government lyrics earned him a popular following, but also a three-year spell in prison. He was released in May this year.Burma’s election body, the Union Election Commission, accepted the NLD’s application and will now deliberate over whether to approve the party to campaign for the interim vote. With the Thein Sein administration looking to appease international critics and portray Burma as a country in transition, however, the opposition party’s registration is expected to be accepted.That would enable Suu Kyi, whose ban on running in the 2010 elections prompted the party’s boycott and subsequent dissolution, to contest one of 48 seats vacant in the military-dominated parliament.The NLD’s application included the names of 21 people billed as the “founders” of the reborn party, 11 of whom are women. One of them, Nan Khin Htway Myint from Karen state, said however that this did not automatically mean they had a role in policy making.The party will keep its traditional structure and hierarchy, from the Central Executive Committee comprised of the likes of veteran members Win Tin and Nyan Win, down to township-level coordinators.Nan Khin Htway Myint said however that new members would be accepted after the by-elections.Parliamentary speaker Shwe Mann said last week that the by-elections, which had originally been mooted for November, wouldn’t be held until early next year. According to Burmese law, the government needs to give three months’ noticed before the vote is held. Clinton seeks ally on China’s doorstephttp://www.dvb.no/news/clinton-seeks-ally-on-chinas-doorstep/1893228-Nov-2011 US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton heads this week on a historic visit to Burma that aims not only to pry open the closed nation but to shake up the battle for global influence right on China’s doorstep.Clinton on Wednesday will become the top US official to visit the nation in more than 50 years as she tests the waters after dramatic — but tentative — reforms by the military-backed government.Clinton is expected to meet both President Thein Sein and democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi. She has said she will press for greater progress on human rights and democracy, without offering any let-up in biting US sanctions.The United States has been careful not to raise expectations for a breakthrough. But Clinton’s visit carries unmistakable symbolism as it seeks to advance US priorities in one of the countries most closely aligned with China.Burma’s “strategic importance to the United States is closely connected to concerns about rising Chinese influence,” said John Ciorciari, an expert on Southeast Asia at the University of Michigan.“To Beijing, Burma offers the possibility of natural resources and warm-water ports on the Indian Ocean that could be crucial in expanding China’s naval reach,” he said.“Successful US engagement would lessen the likelihood of a strong Sino-Myanmar [Burma] alignment in years ahead.”Beijing has provided the main diplomatic cover for Burma’s leaders but the relationship is complicated, with some in the Southeast Asian nation resentful over China’s overwhelming economic influence and historic border conflicts.Burma recently defied China by shutting down work on an unpopular dam that would supply power across the border. Burma’s leaders, known for deep distrust of the outside world, have reached out in recent years to India, Southeast Asia nations and, now, the United States.For the United States, progress on Burma could help resolve a main stumbling block inside the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, giving new influence to the fast-growing — and mostly US-friendly — 10-nation bloc.A stronger ASEAN would allow “China to grow and be secure but not use its new economic might to force neighbors’ hands on issues related to sovereignty,” said Ernie Bower of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.US President Barack Obama’s administration, while saying it wants a cooperative relationship with a rising China, has recently gone on the offensive amid suspicions over Beijing’s intentions.Obama recently announced the stationing of US troops in Australia — a clear sign of US priorities at a time of tight budgets — and has pushed ahead a trans-Pacific free trade agreement that for now excludes China.Burma’s military seized power in 1962 but since last year has held elections, nominally handed power to civilians and freed Suu Kyi from house arrest. The new government has opened a dialogue with the opposition and ethnic minorities.While the United States and the opposition were at first cynical about the moves, Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy recently said it will re-enter mainstream politics. The party won 1990 elections but was never allowed to take power.Even the most upbeat US policymakers acknowledge that Washington’s influence is limited in a country so fearful of outside invasion that it suddenly moved its capital to the remote outpost of Naypyidaw in 2005.The United States bans virtually all trade with Burma and any decision to end sanctions would need approval from Congress, with which exile groups have worked closely for years to pressure the generals.Walter Lohman of the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think-tank that is often critical of the administration, welcomed Obama’s phone consultations with Suu Kyi before the decision on Clinton’s visit.“The fact that the president called and got her blessing and that they’re tying their policy to her makes it a very difficult decision to criticize,” Lohman said.But Lohman doubted how much further Burma would reform, suspecting that the leadership’s main interest was to ensure it will be the chair of ASEAN in 2014.“My guess is that the regime is calculating exactly how far it can go to get all of these things it is looking for without going too far to accommodate the political opposition,” Lohman said. Burma Riven by Graft, Ethnic Conflictshttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2254628-Nov-2011 When U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton visits Burma this week, she'll see a country that has made some progress toward democracy, but has even farther to go to fix the corrupt economy and ethnic conflicts that stem from decades of military rule.After holding elections last November, Burma has begun to release political prisoners and work with opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi. That has earned political rewards, such as Clinton's visit starting late Wednesday, the first by the top U.S. diplomat in 56 years.But the new government, still dominated by the military, has scarcely begun to fix the mistakes made since the military took power in 1962, and fighting between the army and ethnic minorities who want more autonomy has intensified since the elections.While Burma's nascent political reforms hold promise, economic changes will be just as important to arrest the decline of what was once one of Southeast Asia's most prosperous countries but is now rated on a key U.N. index as the region's least developed.The military began opening the economy in the 1990s, after the 26-year socialist rule of the late dictator Ne Win, but the investment it has attracted has mostly been for its own benefit — including to build a remote and opulent new capital city where the government relocated to in 2005.Ne Win's eccentricities extended to issuing currency notes divisible by the supposedly auspicious number nine, and Burma retains a Byzantine exchange rate system. The official rate of the kyat currency is about 12,000 percent over market value.That has helped a kleptocracy to flourish. By using the official rate — which is largely ignored in day-to-day transactions — for accounting exports of natural gas and other resources, the government is believed to have underreported billions of dollars in revenues.In the past two years the government has accelerated its privatization of state enterprises and assets, but liberalization has not translated into a level playing field. Buyers of key holdings have been military-run corporations and government cronies.Transparency International, a Germany-based private group that campaigns against corruption, ranked Burma 176 out of 178 countries in its 2010 global index on graft — equal with Afghanistan and one place above last-place, lawless Somalia.In his inaugural speech in March, President Thein Sein promised tax and financial reforms to promote small and medium-size enterprises and to narrow the gap between rich and poor.There has been little substantive change so far, but a team of International Monetary Fund advisers visited in November to discuss plans to unify the exchange rate regime and lift restrictions on current international payments and transfers. A follow-up mission is expected early next year.Sean Turnell, an expert on Burma's economy at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia, said adopting the market exchange rate as the sole rate would have profound implications for the country by making the foreign exchange earnings of state-owned enterprises transparent."It is not just a technical issue, but could be seen as a fundamental reform of the country's political economy," he said.Implementing such reforms would be a complex business and would likely require support from international financial institutions, currently blocked by Western sanctions.But solving Burma's economic problems could pale next to the challenge of its ethnic conflicts.Minorities scattered around Burma's western, northern and eastern frontiers make up nearly one third of the 55 million people. Various splinter groups representing an array of ethnicities — the Karen, Shan, Kachin, Mon, Chin, Arakanese, Wa, Karenni, Paluang, Pa-O and Lahu — have all taken up arms at some point.Some of the rebellions have endured even longer than military rule. Some of the groups have reached cease-fires with the military, but none have won political power.Last year's elections offered a glimmer of hope. Burma now has local assemblies, and ethnic parties are represented in them and to a small degree in the federal parliament.But a ham-fisted attempt to get ethnic armies to become government-led border guards led to the collapse this year of long-standing cease-fires with two key groups, the Shan State Army-North and the Kachin Independence Army. The fighting has displaced tens of thousands of people. Clashes continue in Kachin State in the country's far north.That has compounded a humanitarian blight that has sent 140,000 minority refugees into neighboring Thailand since the 1980s and uprooted many more. Foreign-based dissident organizations reorganizing their missionshttp://www.mizzima.com/news/inside-burma/6226-foreign-based-dissident-organizations-reorganizing-their-missions.htmlMonday, 28 November 2011 13:14 Ko Wild Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – In response to the National League for Democracy’s (NLD) decision to re-register as a political party, many dissident organizations in foreign countries are reassessing their strategies and redefining their missions.Among the organizations are the NLD – Liberated Area; the National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma (NCGUB); Members of Parliament Union – Burma (MPU) and the National Council of the Union of Burma.The NCGUB includes five former MPs from the1990 general election and is led by Dr. Sein Win, the prime minister of the Burmese government in exile, who is Aung San Suu Kyi’s cousin. After a meeting last week, the NCGUB decided that the word “Government” in its name is no longer appropriate.Dr. Tint Swe, the information minister of the Burmese government in exile, told Mizzima, “If Aung San Suu Kyi and the NLD legally enter parliamentary politics, ‘NCGUB’, the name of our organization, will not be appropriate anymore.”However, he said he still had reservations about the current government because a military government ruled Burma for so many years. The group would continue to fight for human rights, peace in ethnic areas and work for the freedom of political prisoners, he said.The NCGUB was formed in December 1990. Tint Swe said the Norwegian government supports the group and it will continue to support its involvement in Burmese politics.The MUP, formed 15 years ago, will continue in its current form, said Tint Swe who also serves as an MPU member. The MPU comprises 32 MPs elected in the never-honoured 1990 general election.One significant change, he said, is that “the demand to convene the parliament in accord with the results of 1990 general election does not exist anymore. But, the electoral results and the support of Burmese citizens will be milestones in our history.”The MPU MPs represented the National Democracy Party, from Chin, Shan, Arakan, Mon, Lahu, Zomi parties, and independent MPs.An official of the NLD-LA Foreign Affairs sub-committee said a central executive meeting last week decided to drop the name “NLD-LA” because it is tied to the 1990 general election.“The NLD-LA may be transformed into NLD groups based in foreign countries. Eight branches of NLD-LA now exists in the U.S., Japan, Australia, Canada, Malaysia, South Korea, Norway and England.The NLD-LA would work for reconciliation between the government and opposition groups, including ethnic armed groups, he said.“We helped to hold the dialogue between the Minister Aung Min and ethnic groups. NLD-LA will be involved in seeking national reconciliation and working for the development of the country,” he said.Both the NLD-LA and MPU, along with Democratic Alliance of Burma and the National Democratic Front, are member groups of the NCUB.Aung Moe Zaw, the NCUB joint secretary No.1 and chairman of the Democratic Party for New Society, said that whether the member groups will continue as members of the NCUB has yet to be decided.“The NCUB needs to review its activities and structure, I think. Meetings between chairmen and secretaries of member groups need to be conducted as soon as possible. Most of our activities are related to the results of 1990 general election so we need to review whether our activities are in line with the current situation,” Aung Moe Zaw said.The NCUB was formed in September 1992 and it incudes 26 pro-democracy organizations. NLD prepares to accept 1 million party membershttp://www.mizzima.com/news/inside-burma/6227-nld-prepares-to-accept-1-million-party-members.htmlMonday, 28 November 2011 13:23 Myo ThantChiang Mai (Mizzima) – Feeling its newfound strength in deciding to register and reorganize as a political party, the National League for Democracy [NLD] is preparing to accept 1 million party members.The NLD will begin distribution of application forms in a few days, said May Win Myint, one of the new founding members who signed the NLD re-registration application permit.Even former NLD members – including party leader Aung San Suu Kyi – will have to fill out and submit a new membership application form, May Win Myint told Mizzima.Khin Moe Moe, another of the party’s new founders, said, “The membership form asks for an applicant’s age, education, race, religion and address.”Poet Nyein Thit, who volunteers for NLD social projects, said that ideally new members will want to become actively involved in NLD projects at all levels.“We don’t set specific qualifications: anyone who wants to become involved in pro-democracy issues – that quality will is enough to become a member,” Nyein Thit told Mizzima.Senior NLD members and new members will be treated equally. If new members have the right qualities, they can be NLD candidates and contest in the coming by-elections, said Nyan Win, the NLD spokesman.“Qualified activists, ethnic people and women will be given priority and the education of the candidate-to-be will also be considered in choosing candidates,” Nyan Win said.The NLD is preparing to form canvassing committees in states and regions, officials said.On Friday, Suu Kyi met with more than 50 musicians and singers at her lakeside home in Rangoon. The meeting was held to discuss songs and music for use in NLD canvassing in the coming by-election. A composer, Ye Lwin, told Mizzima that he planned to offer his help.“I’m not an NLD member,” he said. “But, I’ll help Amay Suu [Suu Kyi]. We believe in her. So, I’ll do what she told me to do.”The NLD party advocates a nonviolent movement towards multi-party democracy in Burma, which was under oppressive military rule from 1962 until March 2011, when a new military-dominated Parliament was formed after elections The party supports human rights – including broad-based freedom of speech – the rule of law, an end to fighting in ethnic areas and national reconciliation.The NLD party flag features a peacock, a prominent symbol in Burma. A dancing peacock was widely used in the flags of Burmese monarchies. The NLD peacock is now associated with a decades-long struggle against the military dictatorship in which hundreds of its members served terms in prison for their political activities.The party’s emblem, a traditional bamboo hat, will be replaced by a new emblem yet to announced. Burma: Arab Spring or Prague Spring?http://www.shanland.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4231:burma-arab-spring-or-prague-spring&catid=85:politics&Itemid=266Monday, 28 November 2011 16:55 S.H.A.N. Last October, the military-turned-civilian government bent its visa rules on blacklisted individuals and Harn Yawnghwe, head of the Brussels-based Euro Burma Office (EBO) that has been assisting activist groups struggling for democracy and ethnic rights was allowed to return to his home country after spending 48 years in exile.The trip coincided with a report by Financial Times on 25 November that had quoted him saying: “They have decided to change. It’s not what we called for, but there are changes. Even if they are pretending to change, we should push them so the change becomes irreversible. If we keep saying that ‘you haven’t change the way we want’ and put obstacles in the way, then the changes will never come.”What Harn said was interesting, as it parallels with what Sun Tzu (also spelled Sun Zi), the Chinese military maestro who flourished 2,500 years ago: Success in warfare is gained by carefully accommodating ourselves to the enemy’s purpose.The translator Lionel Guiles explains further: Ts’ao Kung says, “Feign stupidity” – by an appearance of yielding and falling in with the enemy’s wishes. Chang Yu’s note makes the meaning clear: The object is to make him remiss and contemptuous before we deliver our attack.Sun Tzu’s words could not have been more relevant. Since he took office at the end of March, ex-general Thein Sein who had been handpicked by the ageing but still all powerful Senior General Than Shwe to lead the new, “democratically-elected” government, had brought hopes (as well as suspicions) to his countrymen, both at home and abroad, and to the rest of the world.While believers say Thein Sein “is his own man,” non-believers disagree, saying, “How can he be? He’s not elected by the people like Obama was. He was on the contrary obviously appointed to play the old game with a new set of rules.”But believer or non-believer, one cannot help admit that Thein Sein has been saying and doing what we have been longing to hear and see – only just short of the required extent.For instance, his envoys have been busy negotiating peace talks with all the armed opposition groups since September, following the official “Invitation for Peace Talks” announced on 18 August, group by group or “groupwise” as the announcement says. Already most of the major armed movements have entered negotiations with: 3 of which signing peace agreements (United Wa State Army, National Democratic Alliance Army and Democratic Karen Buddhist Army) 2 more agreeing in principle to sign them (Shan State Army “South” and Chin National Front) 3 more agreeing to hold further talks (Karen National Union, Karenni National Progressive Party and Kachin National Organization)It is also holding talks with the Shan State Army “North” through the go-betweening of its former boss Gen Hso Ten, who was sentenced to 106 year imprisonment by Naypyitaw but released after serving 6 years.The only major group that has so far stayed out of the negotiations after the 6 October preliminary round in Ye is the New Mon State Party (NMSP), that is insisting that Naypyitaw talk to the non-Burman armed groups “collectivewise” and not “group-wise”.In addition, like the peace talks in 1989 held by its predecessor, the Thein Sein government is offering 3 things:But whereas the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) had promised ceasefire, development and “talk politics with the next government” which took almost 22 years to emerge, Thein Sein’s negotiators are assuring their opponents of ceasefire, development and “an inclusive conference in the style of Panglong, maybe even better than Panglong”.To the non-Burmans, especially Chin, Kachin and Shan, co-signatories together with Aung San Suu Kyi’s father Aung San of the 1947 Panglong Agreement, the words of U Aung Min, the President’s special representative on 19 November, were nothing less than honey. At least both the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) and the Shan State Army (SSA) ‘South’ have declared that with the promises of Panglong – “Full autonomy in internal administration” and “rights and privileges which are fundamental in democratic countries” – fulfilled, there will be no need for them to continue their armed struggles.Indeed, if the SSA “South” had any reservations about agreeing to sign a ceasefire pact, the promise of another Panglong was the clincher. As a result, it is expected to attend a formal signing ceremony before the end of the year.However, despite the promising signs, many questions remain unanswered: Why are Burma Army bases, established along the border of Wa-Mongla territory after tensions in 2009, still there and being reinforced although the two sides have signed the ceasefire agreements? Why since Naypyitaw desires peace and is ready to hold peace talks with every armed movement, has it not declared a nationwide ceasefire instead? Why is it adamant on talking to them “groupwise” when doing it collectivewise makes more sense?Of course, according to President Thein Sein, the non-Burman ethnic groups have different aims and desires, which is only partly true, true for individual ethnic group issues, but when it comes to common issues, they have always stood together. Just take a cursory look back at the Panglong Conference (1947) and Taunggyi Seminar (1961), out of which emerged the following 5 point call: Burma Proper must be a constituent state like Chin, Kachin, Shan and others Equal power to the two Houses of Parliament Equal representation for each state in the Upper House Reservation of the following subjects for the Union government and the remaining subjects for the states: Foreign affairs, Defense, Finance, Coinage and paper currency, Posts and Telegraphs, Railways, Airways and Waterways, Union Judiciary and Sea Customs Duty Fair distribution of the revenue collected by the Union Government among the statesThe President and his advisors should therefore not be bent on talking to them groupwise if they are ready to speak to him collectivewise, just because of differences in minor individual preferences.All these and others beg the question why he isn’t going all the way, when his advisors insist he “is his own man.” Is it because he is afraid of Than Shwe returning to power, as hinted by some, or is he just following the Senior General’s dictate: more words but less deeds?Not that I’m suggetting that we have to wait until the conditions are ideal, because they will never be, if history has taught us anything. I’m only humbly counseling caution to leaders both at home and abroad, both national and foreign, not to put all the eggs in the same basket, when we are dealing with such a situation, at least when many things are still in the dark.Personally, I would prefer Thein Sein becoming another Aung San, the leader that consolidates what his predecessors have won by negotiations, to becoming Mikhail Gorbachev who lost everything they had achieved.Because, after all is said and done, what the people of Burma need is an Arab Spring and not a Prague Spring.

FTUB Daily News for Nov-28-2011, English News - Morning

2011-11-28T12:51:00.001+09:00

News Headlines with Brief (1) No reason to rush Myanmar to the Asean chair | Source: The Star26-Nov-2011MYANMAR’S formal request to chair Asean in 2014 has sparked debate in the media.The Myanmar government says it is now ready to take the opportunity to lead the organisation, after passing up the opportunity to do so in 2006. At that time, Myanmar said it needed to focus on managing domestic affairs, although it was widely believed that the decision was a result of pressure from fellow Asean members and the international community.Read More..... (2) Burma ex-junta chief 'really retired' | Source: Bangkok Post26-Nov-2011A top Burma official on Friday insisted feared strongman Than Shwe has no government role, in the first public confirmation that the former junta head had released the reins of power. The senior general is really retired," Thura Shwe Mann, lower house speaker, told reporters after the final session of parliament in Naypyidaw. After a two-decade reign marked by suppression, isolation and deep paranoia about democracy champion Aung San Suu Kyi, Than Shwe officially stepped down from his role as head of Burma's "Tatmadaw" armed forces after the military junta was disbanded in March.Read More.....No reason to rush Myanmar to the Asean chairhttp://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2011/11/27/focus/9986030&sec=focus26-Nov-2011 MYANMAR’S formal request to chair Asean in 2014 has sparked debate in the media.The Myanmar government says it is now ready to take the opportunity to lead the organisation, after passing up the opportunity to do so in 2006.At that time, Myanmar said it needed to focus on managing domestic affairs, although it was widely believed that the decision was a result of pressure from fellow Asean members and the international community.Many scholars and government officials support Myanmar’s willingness to take the opportunity to chair Asean in 2014, believing that giving it this opportunity will serve as an incentive to continue political reforms there.Article 31, paragraph 1 of the Asean Charter reaffirms the traditional principle of alphabetical order in deciding the rotation for Asean chairmanship, stating that “The chairmanship of Asean shall rotate annually based on the alphabetical order of the English names of member states.”Therefore, according to this rule, Myanmar should not become Asean chair until 2016. Myanmar clearly has its own reasons for requesting an earlier turn. One thing that might come to mind is the fact that 2014 is only a year before the implementation of the Asean Community in 2015, and Myanmar may want to take the opportunity to improve its political standing in the international arena.Leading the organisation in the vital stage of realising this long-desired vision would undoubtedly be a prestigious position for any member.Some promising developments have in fact taken place in Myanmar since the November 2010 elections. The new administration under President Thein Sein was reported to have released around 200 political prisoners last month, an indication of its seriousness in implementing political reform.It is however difficult to make a good and objective assessment of Myanmar’s readiness to lead the organisation in 2014, particularly because it has only been a year since the country began the political transition process. It would have been wise, therefore, not to rush into the chairmanship.It would have been better, both for Asean and for Myanmar, to give the Myanmar government and people time to focus on domestic political developments and to develop its capacity to lead a people-centered Asean. — The Nation / Asia News Network. Burma ex-junta chief 'really retired'http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/asia/267928/burma-ex-junta-chief-than-shwe-really-retired26-Nov-2011 A top Burma official on Friday insisted feared strongman Than Shwe has no government role, in the first public confirmation that the former junta head had released the reins of power."The senior general is really retired," Thura Shwe Mann, lower house speaker, told reporters after the final session of parliament in Naypyidaw.After a two-decade reign marked by suppression, isolation and deep paranoia about democracy champion Aung San Suu Kyi, Than Shwe officially stepped down from his role as head of Burma's "Tatmadaw" armed forces after the military junta was disbanded in March.The senior general, whose face had been emblazoned across the front pages of state newspapers on an almost daily basis, has been virtually invisible since then.A fleeting reference in Burma newspapers on Thursday -- reporting his donation of money and gemstones to a relic reputed to be a tooth of the Buddha -- was the first time his name had been printed in months.Than Shwe himself was not said to have gone to visit the relic -- which is touring Burma on loan from China -- and no photographs of him appeared in the press.His low profile had not convinced many experts that he had fully relinquished his grip on the impoverished nation, despite controversial November 2010 polls which brought a nominally civilian government to power.Thura Shwe Mann said the ailing 78-year-old is "absolutely" not involved with the army-backed United Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), which won an overwhelming majority in the election."To be more clear, the senior general is absolutely not concerned with the party, nor the government, nor our parliament, nor legislative organisations," he said, at the first public news briefing the top official has ever given.Analysts have said Than Shwe would retain some influence over the government after the elections.The military strongman knew the risk of retiring only too well, having put his predecessor, the late dictator Ne Win, under house arrest in 2002 after his family members were convicted of plotting to overthrow the regime.Burma, which for decades has been isolated on the world stage, has shown signs of reform in recent months, despite a parliament that remains dominated by the military and former junta generals.The new administration has surprised many observers with a series of reformist moves.In a diplomatic coup last week, Burma won approval from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations to chair the 10-nation bloc in 2014.On Friday, Suu Kyi's opposition took its first step towards a return to mainstream Burma politics by re-registering as a political party, days before a historic visit by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

FTUB Daily News for Nov-16-2011, English News - Evening

2011-11-16T23:25:00.001+09:00

News Headlines with Brief (1) MNDF to strengthen itself by adding former rebel leaders | Source: Mizzima16-Nov-2011The Mon National Democratic Front (MNDF), a political party that was dissolved by the former junta, says that it will strengthen itself by adding eight former leaders of the armed rebel New Mon State Party (NMSP) to its ranks. “They have offered to join us under our party’s flag. We’ve invited them to attend our coming meeting,” said MNDF General-Secretary Dr. Min Soe Lin. In October, former NMSP central committee members held meetings in Mon State and decided to join up with the MNDF to take part in political activities, according to sources close to them. Read More..... (2) Protesting Burmese monks deliver final talk | Source: Mizzima16-Nov-2011At the request of 10 Buddhist abbots including the chairman of the Mandalay Region Sangha committee, five Burmese monks who are staging a protest delivered their final talk to supporters on Wednesday. “Originally, they planned to deliver talks for three days. The location they are protesting in is a teaching-monastery, so talks can disturb the student monks. At the request of the abbots, they will deliver talks for one day (Wednesday),” said a supporter, one of an estimated 1,200 people who attended the talks. Most of the audience was made up of monks, sources said.Read More..... (3) Activist arrested for filming protest | Source: DVB16-Nov-2011Police have detained an activist on charges of breaching Burma’s notorious Video Act after he allegedly filmed a protest by landless farmers in Irrawaddy division two months ago. Myint Naing’s house in the division’s capital of Bassein was surrounded by some 30 officers in an early morning raid on Monday. The Human Rights Watchdog Network’s leader is being held at a local police station.Read More..... (4) NDF picks 20 candidates for by-election | Source: DVB16-Nov-2011Burma’s opposition National Democratic Force says it will field 20 candidates in the upcoming by-elections, the ambiguous date of which still remains a source of frustration from would-be contenders. Its leader, Khin Maung Swe, said that he and colleagues were negotiating with the various members of the 10-party alliance the NDF is part of to finalise a strategy for the by-elections, with 48 parliamentary seats up for grabs.Read More..... (5) Amnesty Still Uncertain as Prisoners Transferred | Source: Irrawaddy16-Nov-2011Burma’s prominent dissident Min Ko Naing and other political prisoners are being transferred to different jails as prospects for a further amnesty remain in doubt, claim sources in Rangoon. And it seems unlikely that those transferred will be included in any forthcoming release with the move considered a reaction to humanitarian calls to relocate remaining incarcerated dissidents to be closer to their relatives on the outside.Read More..... (6) US Calls for More Change in Burma | Source: Irrawaddy16-Nov-2011Hours before US President Barack Obama landed in Australia, a top White House official said there have been positive changes in Burma recently and that the US wants those changes to continue. “We have seen some positive movement [in Burma], but of course we’d like to see a continued change in the behavior of the government with respect to human rights,” Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes told reporters travelling with Obama on his way to Canberra.Read More..... (7) Than Shwe's Grandson Visits France: Sources | Source: Irrawaddy16-Nov-2011The grandson of Burma's former military dictator, Snr-Gen Than Shwe, reportedly traveled to Europe late last month after being granted a visa by the French Embassy in Rangoon, according to sources in the former Burmese capital. Nay Shwe Thway Aung, 21, left for Europe on Oct 26 despite a visa ban that prohibits senior Burmese military leaders and their families from traveling in the European Union, the sources said. He was allegedly issued a Schengen visa, which allows unrestricted travel within 25 European countries, including 22 in the EU.Read More..... (8) 1,000 Kachins Flee to IDP Camps | Source: Irrawaddy16-Nov-2011More than 1,000 villagers in southern Kachin State have taken shelter in makeshift camps in the jungle after fleeing their homes to avoid being caught in the crossfire of an intensifying conflict between the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and Burmese government forces. Relief workers say the internally displaced persons (IDPs) in question have fled in the last few days and are from five villages around Mansi Township, some 25 km southeast of Bhamo in southernmost Kachin State, close to the Shan State and Chinese borders.Read More..... (9) Shan party hopes to regain seat lost last year | Source: Shan16-Nov-2011The Shan Nationalities Democratic Party (SNDP), the third largest winning in the 2010 November elections, is planning to re-contest in the coming by-elections at the vacant seat for the Upper House in Northern Shan State’s Lashio district, which it had lost to its rival junta army-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) due to advance votes, according to party vice Chairman Sai Hsawng Hsi.Read More.....MNDF to strengthen itself by adding former rebel leadershttp://www.mizzima.com/news/inside-burma/6190-mndf-to-strengthen-itself-by-adding-former-rebel-leaders.htmlWednesday, 16 November 2011 11:54 Kun Chan Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – The Mon National Democratic Front (MNDF), a political party that was dissolved by the former junta, says that it will strengthen itself by adding eight former leaders of the armed rebel New Mon State Party (NMSP) to its ranks. “They have offered to join us under our party’s flag. We’ve invited them to attend our coming meeting,” said MNDF General-Secretary Dr. Min Soe Lin. In October, former NMSP central committee members held meetings in Mon State and decided to join up with the MNDF to take part in political activities, according to sources close to them. The MNDF has not identified the eight Mon leaders, but sources said that they may include former NMSP joint secretary Nai Chan Twe, Nai Lawi Mon, Nai Htaw Ein, Nai Nyan Tun, Nai Kaw Hta and former central executive committee member Nai Tin Aung, who retired from the NMSP in 2000. On November 20, the MNDF will hold a meeting in Mawlamyaing, the capital of Mon State. Min Soe Lin said that more than 50 people including former NMSP leaders, scholars and nationalists have been invited. In the meeting, new members will be accepted and they will discuss whether the MNDF will register as a political party or not, he said. “Mainly, we will discuss ways to strengthen our party. Now, our leaders in Rangoon are talking with ethnic political parties and the NLD [National League for Democracy]. We will review their decision and decide if our party will register or not,” Min Soe Lin said.The NLD, led by Aung San Suu Kyi, will hold a central committee meeting on Friday to decide whether the NLD will register as a political party or not before the coming by-elections.Under the Constitution, a political party needs to contest in at least three constituencies to remain a legal political party. Presently, the MNDF and some political parties including the NLD are cooperating with the Committee Representing People's Parliament and the United Nationalities Alliance. The MNDF was formed on October 11, 1988. Nineteen MNDF candidates contested in the 1990 general elections and five won seats. The former junta refused to recognize the 1990 elections result. In 1991, a number of MNDF leaders were arrested and the former junta dissolved the party on March 19, 1992. Protesting Burmese monks deliver final talkhttp://www.mizzima.com/news/inside-burma/6191-protesting-burmese-monks-deliver-final-talk.htmlWednesday, 16 November 2011 16:16 Ko Wild Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – At the request of 10 Buddhist abbots including the chairman of the Mandalay Region Sangha committee, five Burmese monks who are staging a protest delivered their final talk to supporters on Wednesday. A protesting monk addresses a crowd from a religious building in Mandalay in central Burma after they locked themselves inside and called for the release of all political prisoners on Tuesday, November 15, 2011. Photo: AFP “Originally, they planned to deliver talks for three days. The location they are protesting in is a teaching-monastery, so talks can disturb the student monks. At the request of the abbots, they will deliver talks for one day (Wednesday),” said a supporter, one of an estimated 1,200 people who attended the talks. Most of the audience was made up of monks, sources said. The monks who are staging the protest had lunch at the Masoeyein Monastery in Mandalay and then, along with about 20 government intelligence officials in civilian clothes, they listened to a 15-minute sermon by abbots in the dining room of the monastery. The protesting monks have called for the release of all political prisoners and an end to fighting between the government and ethnic armed groups. “Generally, they have accepted the requests of the abbots after their negotiations,” said a resident who attended the abbots’ sermon. The protesting monks told their audience that they sent an appeal to President Thein Sein, with a copy to the State Sangha Maha Nayaka Committee at Gaba Aye Hill, calling for a stop to the civil war and the immediate release of all political prisoners, including monks. “They asked whether the audience agreed with them or not? People shouted three times that they agreed,” said an audience member. Monk Ashin Sopaka, a leader of the protest, told the audience that he hoped that political prisoners would be released soon. At the end of the talk, the five protesting monks and audience members recited religious slogans that monks had recited during the 2007 “Saffron Revolution,” such as “May human beings stop torturing each other” and “May our love spread across the world,” to mark the end of the talks.This week, opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi said that the National League for Democracy believes there are 591 political prisoners held in Burma’s jails, according to the latest NLD research. “According to some figures,” she said, “there are about 2,000 political prisoners. Based on those figures received from outside the country, we made inquires and found that some of those [on the lists] had been released a long time ago. But, we have not conducted comprehensive inquires. Meanwhile, we specify that the number is 591, because we are sure that all of them are in prison.” Activist arrested for filming protesthttp://www.dvb.no/news/activist-arrested-for-filming-protest/1874616-Nov-2011 Police have detained an activist on charges of breaching Burma’s notorious Video Act after he allegedly filmed a protest by landless farmers in Irrawaddy division two months ago.Myint Naing’s house in the division’s capital of Bassein was surrounded by some 30 officers in an early morning raid on Monday. The Human Rights Watchdog Network’s leader is being held at a local police station.His lawyer, Phyo Phyu, said that Myint Naing was brought to the courtroom on the day of his arrest and denied bail.“About 30 policemen including their commander surrounded [Myint Naing]’s house and charged him … under the Video Act for distributing and exhibiting a video that is not legally approved,” the lawyer said.Up to 200 farmers had marched to the office of Irrawaddy division’s chief minister, Thein Aung, demanding that land confiscated from them by the army be returned.That protest pre-empted a similar demonstration in Rangoonon 27 October that ended with eight people being arrested. One of those was Pho Phyu, who is now on bail.Despite some signs that restrictions on freedom of speech in Burma are easing, the government’s intolerance towards public displays of disquiet remains. In September police detained a man for holding a solo protest against the Chinese-backed Myitosne dam and blocked another rally against the project, which was later suspended by the authorities in a rare response to public opinion.Pho Phyu is accused by police of leading the Rangoon farmers’ protest, which also demanded the return of confiscated land. He claims that he was drugged during the 12 hours of interrogation he was subjected to.The protestors are among some 1,000 farmers in three townships in Rangoon division whom since 1989 have seen more than 60,000 acres of arable land taken by the Burmese military, which often coverts them for cash crops or uses the land for infrastructural projects.Despite the presence of the International Labour Organisation, which has a mandate to investigate instances of land confiscation in Burma, laws governing the ownership of land are malleable.More than 60 percent of Burma’s population is dependent on agriculture as its primary source of income. NDF picks 20 candidates for by-electionhttp://www.dvb.no/news/ndf-picks-20-candidates-for-by-election/1876316-Nov-2011 Burma’s opposition National Democratic Force says it will field 20 candidates in the upcoming by-elections, the ambiguous date of which still remains a source of frustration from would-be contenders.Its leader, Khin Maung Swe, said that he and colleagues were negotiating with the various members of the 10-party alliance the NDF is part of to finalise a strategy for the by-elections, with 48 parliamentary seats up for grabs.The NDF, which split from the National League for Democracy in order to contest the election, came in fifth place in the polls last year, winning 16 seats.The lack of clarity surrounding the date of the interim vote has angered a number of parties. When asked by DVB when the poll was scheduled for, the spokesperson for Burma’s Union Election Commission, Thaung Hlaing, replied: “You just be patient and wait.”He said he could not comment without permission from his seniors in the UEC, but only that that announcement would be made “when the time comes”.Of the seats available, 40 are in the People’s Parliament, six in the National Parliament and two in the Regions/States Parliament.Despite months of campaigning last year, few parties were able to match the might of the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), led by President Thein Sein and formed only months prior to the November poll.The USDP ended up claiming more than 80 percent of the vote, and its members dominate parliament, implicitly aided by the nearly 350 military officials who were automatically awarded seats prior to the polls.The NLD, led by Aung San Suu Kyi, says it will make a decision on 18 November as to whether it will register again as a political party, following amendments to electoral laws that had initially barred it from running in the polls.Suu Kyi is believed to be in favour of competing, although other influential party members, such as Win Tin, are more cautious about the extent of impact that Burma’s most popular, albeit it historically sidelined, political force could have in a USDP-dominated arena. Amnesty Still Uncertain as Prisoners Transferredhttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2246716-Nov-2011 Burma’s prominent dissident Min Ko Naing and other political prisoners are being transferred to different jails as prospects for a further amnesty remain in doubt, claim sources in Rangoon.And it seems unlikely that those transferred will be included in any forthcoming release with the move considered a reaction to humanitarian calls to relocate remaining incarcerated dissidents to be closer to their relatives on the outside.Alongside Min Ko Naing, leader of the 88 Generation Students group, other well known political prisoners reportedly being transferred include Hkun Htun Oo of the Shan Nationalities League for Democracy, leading monk Ashin Gambira, prominent female activist Nilar Thein of the 88 group, Pandeik Tun also of the 88 group, Nyi Pu who won a seat in the 1990 elections and labor activist Thuyein Aung.“As far as I know from family members and prison officials, Min Ko Naing will be transferred from Kengtung to Rangoon by air,” said Thein Than Tun, a member of the 88 Generation Students group who is monitoring the situation from Rangoon. “U Hkun Htun Oo will be transferred from Putao Prison in Kachin State [in northern Burma] to Thaungoo Prison in Pegu Region through Myitkyina and Mandalay,” he added. “Ashin Gambira and U Nyi Pu will be transferred from Kalay Prison.”Saw Thet Tun, a former political prisoner who was released last month from Tharyawaddy Prison in Pegu Region, told The Irrawaddy on Wednesday that he heard Nilar Thein had arrived in Tharyawaddy Prison that afternoon. Meanwhile, a diplomatic source in Rangoon who is in touch with government officials said he heard almost all inmates of the 88 Generation Students group who are serving 65-year sentences would be transferred from remote prisons. “All those serving 65 years except Ko Mya Aye in Thaunggyi Prison will be moved to different prisons. We will have to see if it is to Insein Prison [in Rangoon],” he said. US Calls for More Change in Burmahttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2246616-Nov-2011 Hours before US President Barack Obama landed in Australia, a top White House official said there have been positive changes in Burma recently and that the US wants those changes to continue. “We have seen some positive movement [in Burma], but of course we’d like to see a continued change in the behavior of the government with respect to human rights,” Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes told reporters travelling with Obama on his way to Canberra.Meanwhile, the US State Department welcomed recent news reports from Burma according to which the opposition leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, will be contesting upcoming by-elections in the country. “We’ve seen some positive developments, or signs, from the government in Burma. We’ve had some good discussions with the government,” State Department spokesman Mark Toner told reporters at his daily news conference.“We have said that we want to see concrete and positive steps, including the release of all political prisoners. We would also like to see an opening-up of their political system there,” Toner said. The US spokesman said that until these concrete steps are taken, the US administration will not change its policy of economic sanctions against the Burmese government.“We believe that our discussions thus far have been positive. They’ve been constructive, but we’re looking for more concrete action,” Toner said. Meanwhile, speaking in Bali, Asean Secretary-General Surin Pitsuwan said that “things are moving in the right direction, with some fundamental changes taking place,” in reference to Burma's attempt to meet conditions to chair the bloc in 2014, a decision that the Asean leaders are expected to make at the Bali summit this week. Than Shwe's Grandson Visits France: Sourceshttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2246816-Nov-2011 The grandson of Burma's former military dictator, Snr-Gen Than Shwe, reportedly traveled to Europe late last month after being granted a visa by the French Embassy in Rangoon, according to sources in the former Burmese capital.Nay Shwe Thway Aung, 21, left for Europe on Oct 26 despite a visa ban that prohibits senior Burmese military leaders and their families from traveling in the European Union, the sources said. He was allegedly issued a Schengen visa, which allows unrestricted travel within 25 European countries, including 22 in the EU.A French embassy official in Rangoon declined to comment on the report, on the grounds that visa applications are considered confidential. However, the official added that no visas have been issued to anyone on the sanctions blacklist.Since formally transferring power to a nominally civilian government in March, Than Shwe and his family have kept a low profile. However, Nay Shwe Thway Aung, also known as Poe La Pyae, has often been the subject of rumors in the past.According to a leaked US diplomatic cable, in January 2009, he urged his grandfather to make a US $1 billion bid to buy the Manchester United football club. The plan was dropped, however, because at the time Than Shwe's regime was still facing severe criticism from the United Nations over its “unacceptably slow” response to Cyclone Nargis the previous year.In December 2010, Burmese exiled media reported that Nay Shwe Thway Aung had ordered his assistants to physically assault Win Htwe Hlaing, a business rival and the son of former Maj-Gen Win Hlaing.A similar incident was reported the previous year, when he allegedly ordered his associates to destroy a coffee shop in Rangoon owned by former army captain Tay Zar Saw Oo, the son of the regime's Secretary 1 Gen Thiha Thura Tin Aung Myint Oo, who is currently serving as vice president. 1,000 Kachins Flee to IDP Campshttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2246516-Nov-2011 More than 1,000 villagers in southern Kachin State have taken shelter in makeshift camps in the jungle after fleeing their homes to avoid being caught in the crossfire of an intensifying conflict between the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and Burmese government forces.Relief workers say the internally displaced persons (IDPs) in question have fled in the last few days and are from five villages around Mansi Township, some 25 km southeast of Bhamo in southernmost Kachin State, close to the Shan State and Chinese borders.The relief groups accuse the Burmese government of denying the UN and intentional organizations access to the IDP camps to deliver humanitarian assistance. Kaw Ja, a member of a Kachin youth group which is assisting refugees and IDPs at the Sino-Burmese border, said that the number of IDPs had reached 1,187 by Tuesday, and that they had been separated into six camps near the border behind KIA front lines.“In this camp alone, there are 400 refugees,” he said. “They are currently sheltering in temporary makeshift tents and sharing whatever food they have brought with them.”“We are not able to adequately supply the IDPs, and in the long run they will face food shortages. They presently have no support,” he said.A recently arrived IDP named Churchman said he and 180 fellow villagers from Mansi Township had fled in a hurry, and that many had run away without carrying any supplies. He said some had sheltered with relatives in other villages, but that he and his family had joined hundreds of other villagers in seeking refuge at a camp in Nawng Tau, near the Chinese border. “Our living conditions are alright,” said Churchman. “However, we are worried about food supplies.”Villagers fleeing from conflict in Kachin State are not recognized as refugees by the Chinese government and cannot therefore cross the border freely, said KIA spokesman La Nan. Mai Ja, a local relief worker, told The Irrawaddy on Tuesday that the offensive is intensifying and more troops are being deployed into the region. The exodus of people from their villages across Kachin State began on June 9 due to the resumption of hostilities between the two sides. There now estimated to be some 30,000 IDPs sheltering at nine camps in and around the main town of Laiza and seven camps in Maija Yang on the Shan-Kachin border. The villagers say they fear being captured, abused or even killed by Burmese soldiers; accounts are rife of human rights abuses by troops in the area.Mai Ja said that Tuesday marks the 19th day that a 28-year-old Kachin woman from Moemot Township has been held in captivity by government troops from Light Infantry Battalion (LIB) 321. “The troops seized the girl, her husband, their infant and her father-in-law while they were returning home from their fields with maize,” she said. “The others were later released, but not the woman.”According to a report by the Kachin Women's Association Thailand, on Oct. 8, soldiers from LIB 74, 276 and 601 arrested eight males aged between 17 and 65 years from Namlim Pa village in Bhanmaw District. The eight were forced to work as porters, carrying army supplies and weapons. Villagers often have to carry sacks of rice, food and heavy weapons, frequently have their hands tied, and may be forced to walk all day on very little water and food, the report said.A UK MP, Andrew Mitchell, the country's secretary of state for international development, visits Burma this week. Burma Campaign UK has called on him to do more to ensure British aid reaches internal refugees who have fled increased attacks by the Burmese army over the past year. Burma Campaign UK said that almost 150,000 people in Burma have been forced to flee their homes in the past year because of internal conflicts, and that the Burmese government is severely restricting access to these internal refugees by the UN and other aid agencies, resulting in a shortage of food, shelter, clothing and medicine. Shan party hopes to regain seat lost last year http://www.shanland.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4208:shan-party-hopes-to-regain-seat-lost-last-year&catid=85:politics&Itemid=266Wednesday, 16 November 2011 17:34 Hseng Khio Fah The Shan Nationalities Democratic Party (SNDP), the third largest winning in the 2010 November elections, is planning to re-contest in the coming by-elections at the vacant seat for the Upper House in Northern Shan State’s Lashio district, which it had lost to its rival junta army-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) due to advance votes, according to party vice Chairman Sai Hsawng Hsi.The party hopes it will regain it back as it has made itself well prepared due to lessons learned from last year. The person whom the party will nominate is well educated and is also considered as one of the most favored by Shan people as well, said Sai Hsawng Hsi, while refusing to identifying the person.It was Sai Kham Leng, a respected former educator, who contested last year. But he lost the seat to his rival USDP candidate Dr. Sai Mawk Kham, at present Vice President #2. According to party members, it was, in fact, their candidate who won the seat on the election day with thousands of votes more. However, on the next day, the USDP’s candidate was announced the winner, after all the advance votes were counted. Sai Kham Leng was said to have received 28,861including 271 advance votes and Dr. Sai Mawk Kham 43,641 including10, 140 advance votes.“So we are planning it well as we have learned our lessons. At that time we did not have many people to help and not much time because it was countrywide. But this time we all are going to help at the contest. And the person who will take part in the contest is also the one who the people can accept,” Sai Hsawng Hsi said.The party however has yet to make an official decision as the date to hold the by-elections is not announced yet. There are 48 seats available in parliament, 40 seats in Lower House, 6 in Upper House and 2 in division/state houses, according to Eleven Media Group’s report.The other vacant seat in Shan State, is at Kalaw Township for the Shan State Assembly. The party however will contest only for the Upper House seat in Lashio, Shan State North, said Sai Hsawng Hsi.During the November 2010 polls, the SNDP contested for 114 seats in the whole Shan State, North, East and South, 35 seats in Kachin State and 6 seats in Sagaing Division and 1 in Mandalay Division.It won the second largest seats in Shan State, 31 to the regime proxy party’s 54 and was given 2 portfolios: Industry-mining and Construction.

FTUB Daily News for Nov-16-2011, English News - Morning

2011-11-16T23:21:00.001+09:00

News Headlines with Brief (1) Karen, Mon armies make stab at peace | Source: DVB15-Nov-2011The opposition Karen National Union is due to meet with high-level government officials this week following the formation of a committee aimed at negotiating an end to one of the world’s most protracted conflicts. Also engaged in talks with Naypyidaw is the New Mon State Party (NMSP), which hosted government representatives yesterday at its headquarters in the eastern Burmese state.Read More..... (2) Burma gets resounding ASEAN support | Source: DVB15-Nov-2011Burma moved one step closer to being handed the ASEAN chair for 2014 following months of speculation over whether minist- ers would give their official endorsement to the region’s most controversial government. The Bangkok Post reported this aftern- oon that ASEAN foreign ministers had thrown their support behind Burma’s bid following a summit in Bali. Naypyidaw looks set to host the 2014 summit, which had initially been mooted for Laos before President Thein Sein put in a bid earlier this year.Read More..... (3) Monks in daring Mandalay protest | Source: DVB15-Nov-2011Five monks staged a rare protest in army-dominated Burma on Tuesday, witnesses said, drawing a crowd of about 500 people with calls for peace and the immediate release of political prisoners. The monks locked themselves in a building on a religious compound in the central town of Mandalay and were using loudspeakers to spell out their demands a day after an expected amnesty for political prisoners failed to materialise.Read More.....(4) New Military Chief Snubs China with Vietnam Visit | Source: Irrawaddy15-Nov-2011As Burma wakes up to the news it will assume the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) chair in 2014, Gen Min Aung Hlaing arrived in Vietnam on Monday for his first trip as commander-in-chief of defense—conspicuously not choosing to visit China like his predecessors. And observers believe that Burma's new position at the centre of Asean could signal a departure from its previous close relationship with Beijing in the wake of the Myitsone Dam project suspension.Read More..... (5) 7-Day News Journal apologizes to readers for hoax story about gecko | Source: Mizzima15-Nov-2011The 7-Day News Journal said that the information and photos about the purchase of a US $2 million gecko published in the journal was a fake story sent in by a gecko trader. The article with a headline “A 3 and ½ foot long gecko sold for 1.7 billion kyat” was published on the front cover of one the bestselling journals in Burma, on November 9. The journal apologized on its Facebook page on Tuesday and said the information was not true.Read More..... (6) Shell could return to Burma’s oil and gas sector as PTT partner | Source: Mizzima15-Nov-2011After an 18-year absence, Shell may return to Burma’s booming oil and gas sector, according to a report published last week in the Bangkok-based Nation newspaper. The anglo-Dutch multinational oil giant may partner with Thailand’s state-owned PTT Exploration and Production (PTTEP). PTTEP is seeking to develop Burma’s M11 deep-water offshore block that PTTEP currently wholly owns. In August, PTTEP’s president and chief executive Anon Sirisaengtaksin told the Bangkok Post that PTTEP wanted a partner to assist in the development of M11 because of its challenging location. Referring to M11 Anon told the Post, “The block is located a kilometres under the sea, so we really need partners.”Read More..... (7) Police arrest owner of Myitkyina orphanage | Source: Mizzima15-Nov-2011The owner of a Burmese orphanage in Myitkyina in Kachin State in which 10 people died and 27 were injured in a bomb explosion on Sunday has been detained by police. Dayaung Tangoon, 48, was arrested in Katha Township in Sagaing Region and transferred to Myitkyina on Tuesday morning. When the bomb explosion took place, Dayaung Tangoon was traveling with Christian pastors, according to reports.Read More..... (8) Tourism chairman Khin Shwe calls Burmese media pessimistic | Source: Mizzima15-Nov-2011The Myanmar Tourism Board (MTB) chairman Khin Shwe says the Burmese media, which opposed his idea to transform the historic Ministers’ Office building where Burmese martyrs were assassinated into a hotel, displays a pessimistic attitude. The Ministers’ Office building is located in Kyauktada Township in Rangoon.Read More..... (9) Press release by the Shan Herald Agency for News | Source: Shan15-Nov-2011The latest Shan Drug Watch report, released today, reveals that opium cultivation and drug production have surged across Shan State in areas of government control since Burma’s 2010 election. Survey results show opium was grown during the 2010-2011 season in 45 out of 50 Shan townships controlled by government troops, while remaining ceasefire areas along the China-Shan border were opium free.Read More..... (10) Police rescue 70 Burmese sex workers | Source: Bangkok Post15-Nov-2011Nearly 70 Burmese women, half of them under the age of 18, have been rescued from a massage parlour in Chanthaburi's Muang district. Pol Lt Col Komvich Pathanarat, head of the Department of Special Investigation's (DSI) Anti-Human Trafficking Centre, said the women are now being cared for by Social Development and Human Security Ministry officials in Chanthaburi.Read More..... Karen, Mon armies make stab at peacehttp://www.dvb.no/news/karen-mon-armies-make-stab-at-peace/1872815-Nov-2011 The opposition Karen National Union is due to meet with high-level government officials this week following the formation of a committee aimed at negotiating an end to one of the world’s most protracted conflicts.Also engaged in talks with Naypyidaw is the New Mon State Party (NMSP), which hosted government representatives yesterday at its headquarters in the eastern Burmese state.Both rebel groups have been fighting the Burmese army but a concerted push for a cessation appears underway. A member of the Karen National Union (KNU) said the group’s leadership had formed a Peacemaking Committee last week with KNU deputy chairman David Takabaw as the committee chairman.It will meet with a high-level government delegation, including Railway Minister Aung Min, within a few days. The two sides held preliminary talks on 9 October in the Thai border town of Mae Sot.A number of ethnic armies who have been approached by the government in recent months had until recently stated that negotiations would only take place as part of the umbrella group of rebel forces known as United Nationalities Federal Council.That alliance however appears to be dissipating: the KNU has already struck out on its own, and the NMSP says it is ready to follow suit.“It seems like the policy is changing,” said Nai Kaung Yut, a former colonel with the NMSP who is on its peace-brokering committee. He said also that Karen officials had chosen to negotiate directly with Naypyidaw instead of the usual route through Karen state government officials.The flurry of talks follows hot on the heels of a ceasefire between the government and the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) on 6 November.The two sides had been embroiled in a bitter conflict since DKBA troops attacked government positions in Myawaddy on 7 November last year, the day of Burma’s first elections in 20 years.Troops had defected from the pro-government faction of the DKBA in August last year after leader Na Kham Mwe refused to transform into a Naypyidaw-controlled Border Guard Force. Similar refusals among other ethnic armies inBurma, including the NMSP, have sparked widespread fighting this year. Burma gets resounding ASEAN supporthttp://www.dvb.no/news/burma-gets-asean-chair-for-2014/1873115-Nov-2011 Burma moved one step closer to being handed the ASEAN chair for 2014 following months of speculation over whether ministers would give their official endorsement to the region’s most controversial government.The Bangkok Post reported this afternoon that ASEAN foreign ministers had thrown their support behind Burma’s bid following a summit in Bali. Naypyidaw looks set to host the 2014 summit, which had initially been mooted for Laos before President Thein Sein put in a bid earlier this year.Speculation has been mounting in recent months over whether the bid would meet with success, but Burma was given a boost last week when Indonesia’s foreign minister Marty Natalegawa said he had received “an overwhelming sense” from his regional counterparts that Burma should get the revolving chairmanship.Yesterday members of the ASEAN Inter-parliamentary Myanmar Caucus (AIPMC) urged leaders not to endorse the bid, and instead push for more changes in the country, which has been ruled by a nominally civilian government since March this year.It also criticised the Indonesian government for not putting enough pressure on Naypyidaw, the Jakarta Post reported.Lily Chadidjah Wahid and Dadus Sumarwanto expressed dissatisfaction with current ASEAN chair Indonesia for its lackluster support of significant change in Myanmar.“The government looks less committed to encouraging major reform,” AIPMC member Lily Chadidjah Wahid said. “Thein should release all political prisoners without reservation and pursue comprehensive reconciliation with all minorities.” Monks in daring Mandalay protesthttp://www.dvb.no/news/monks-in-daring-mandalay-protest/1873615-Nov-2011 Five monks staged a rare protest in army-dominated Burma on Tuesday, witnesses said, drawing a crowd of about 500 people with calls for peace and the immediate release of political prisoners.The monks locked themselves in a building on a religious compound in the central town of Mandalay and were using loudspeakers to spell out their demands a day after an expected amnesty for political prisoners failed to materialise.The protesting monks unfurled banners in English and Burmese reading: “We want freedom”, “Free all political prisoners” and “Stop civil war now” — a reference to the decades-long conflict between the army and ethnic minorities.A Burmese government official confirmed the protest was taking place, telling AFP that the five monks were from Rangoon, not Mandalay.“Local monks are trying to negotiate with them to solve the problem,” he said.No police had arrived at the scene yet, a witness said, adding that a large group of people, including many monks, was sitting on the ground outside the compound and “listening peacefully” to the protest.The five demonstrators claimed they had enough food and water to stay inside the building for three days.Demonstrations by monks are extremely rare in the repressive state, and mass protests led by clergy in 2007 were brutally quashed, with the deaths of at least 31 people and the arrests of many monks.The release of all of the country’s prisoners of conscience, whose exact numbers remain unclear, is one of the major demands of Western nations which have imposed sanctions on Burma.Authorities had been expected to release some political detainees on Monday before President Thein Sein attends a meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) regional bloc later this week in Indonesia.But officials said the move was put off at short notice by the powerful National Defence and Security Council. New Military Chief Snubs China with Vietnam Visithttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2245815-Nov-2011As Burma wakes up to the news it will assume the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) chair in 2014, Gen Min Aung Hlaing arrived in Vietnam on Monday for his first trip as commander-in-chief of defense—conspicuously not choosing to visit China like his predecessors.And observers believe that Burma's new position at the centre of Asean could signal a departure from its previous close relationship with Beijing in the wake of the Myitsone Dam project suspension.Although there has been no detailed announcement about the trip from Naypyidaw, military observers have said that the visit was intended to cement military bilateral corporation between the two countries at the invitation of Vietnam’s National Defense Minister Gen Phung Quang Thanh.Burma’s former Commander-in-Chief Tin Oo, currently one of the leaders of the National League for Democracy (NLD), said that there have not been many instances of military corporation with Vietnam. He added that the two nations merely conducted research together and Burmese commanders made a case study of the separation of North and South Vietnam.Tin Oo said, “There’s a small difficulty with China since the president declared the suspension of the Myitsone Dam. Although it is just a military delegation, they want to gain some political respect from China by showing military corporation with Vietnam.”Burma’s newly elected President Thein Sein suspended the Chinese-funded Myitsone Dam project on Sept. 30 in the face of fierce protests from local people and environmental groups.Tin Oo also speculates that “the United States is trying to engage with both the Burmese government and opposition groups like our NLD. Therefore, the delegation might also ask for suggestions regarding how to deal with the United States.”Aung Lynn Htut, a former major in Burmese intelligence who defected in 2005 while serving as deputy chief of the Burmese embassy in Washington D.C., said that although Burma and Vietnam are not military allies, there’s a historical relationship between the respective armed forces regarding defense strategy during the American-Vietnam war.Aung Lynn Htut said, “it is a significant visit because in the past the trip would be made by ministers. It seems that the Burmese Army wants a military alliance in the Southeast Asian region in order to get an alternative against China being the main source of military hardware to Burma.”Aung Kyaw Zaw, a Sino-Burmese military observer, said that the goal of the trip is more likely to be influencing Burma's relationship with China.“China might be worried when they see that a Burmese commander-in-chief went to Vietnam which has been in conflict with [Beijing] over the maritime dispute [regarding oil and gas exploration in the South China Sea]. Burma also wants to show China that they can deal with any country,” said Aung Kyaw Zaw. “They might also ask to buy some military installations from Vietnam in the future.” 7-Day News Journal apologizes to readers for hoax story about geckohttp://www.mizzima.com/news/breaking-and-news-brief/6189-7-day-news-journal-apologizes-to-readers-for-hoax-story-about-gecko.htmlTuesday, 15 November 2011 21:15 Te Te New Delhi (Mizzima) – The 7-Day News Journal said that the information and photos about the purchase of a US $2 million gecko published in the journal was a fake story sent in by a gecko trader. The article with a headline “A 3 and ½ foot long gecko sold for 1.7 billion kyat” was published on the front cover of one the bestselling journals in Burma, on November 9. The journal apologized on its Facebook page on Tuesday and said the information was not true.The invented story said that a gecko trader offered to buy the gecko at a price of 1 billion kyat but the seller did not sell at that price. When he returned with a higher offer, the story said the gecko had been sold to another trader for 1.7 billion kyat at Kyaukse village in Sagaing Region. The gecko trader used a picture from a Thai website. The journal said on its Facebook page that the gecko trader had sent information to the journal earlier, and he was a reliable news source, so it used the information. The journal said that it failed to cross-check the story, but it did not invent the information. When the journal published the story, there were many debates among readers and the story was popular on websites and Facebook pages. Shell could return to Burma’s oil and gas sector as PTT partnerhttp://www.mizzima.com/business/6186-shell-could-return-to-burmas-oil-and-gas-sector-as-ptt-partner.htmlTuesday, 15 November 2011 14:15 Thomas Maung Shwe (Mizzima) – After an 18-year absence, Shell may return to Burma’s booming oil and gas sector, according to a report published last week in the Bangkok-based Nation newspaper. The anglo-Dutch multinational oil giant may partner with Thailand’s state-owned PTT Exploration and Production (PTTEP). PTTEP is seeking to develop Burma’s M11 deep-water offshore block that PTTEP currently wholly owns. In August, PTTEP’s president and chief executive Anon Sirisaengtaksin told the Bangkok Post that PTTEP wanted a partner to assist in the development of M11 because of its challenging location. Referring to M11 Anon told the Post, “The block is located a kilometres under the sea, so we really need partners.”The M11 block is 7,278 square kilometres in size and located South of the Irrawaddy delta in the Gulf of Martaban. If M11 proves to be a viable source of oil or gas, PTTEP and its future partners are expected to use the planned Zawtika pipeline, a project currently under construction, which will send Burmese gas to Thailand from the already proven M-9 block located just north of M11. Shell is considered a leader in deep water offshore drilling and earlier this year became involved with PTTEP and two other international firms in developing a deepwater concession off the coast of New Zealand.In October 1989, Shell became the second foreign firm to enter Burma in the post-Ne Win era when it signed an exploration agreement with the ruling State Law and Order Restoration Committee (SLORC). Less than four year later in March 1993, Shell and its wholly owned Burmese subsidiary Myanmar Shell B.V suspended operations in Burma citing “disappointing exploration results" at its Apyauk onshore concession located in the Pegu Yoma region. Police arrest owner of Myitkyina orphanagehttp://www.mizzima.com/news/inside-burma/6187-police-arrest-owner-of-myitkyina-orphanage.htmlTuesday, 15 November 2011 19:33 Phanida Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – The owner of a Burmese orphanage in Myitkyina in Kachin State in which 10 people died and 27 were injured in a bomb explosion on Sunday has been detained by police. Dayaung Tangoon, 48, was arrested in Katha Township in Sagaing Region and transferred to Myitkyina on Tuesday morning.When the bomb explosion took place, Dayaung Tangoon was traveling with Christian pastors, according to reports. "His is locked up in legs," said a friend. "They suspect that he was conducting a bombing campaign.”The explosion at his house in Thida ward in Myitkyina in northern Burma killed two of his sons, one grandchild, four orphans and three refugees, who had fled a neighbouring town to escape the fighting between government troops and the rebel Kachin Independence Organization (KIO). A funeral service for the victims was held on Tuesday.Body parts were blown out of the house due to the powerful explosion, according to local residents, who said earlier that two men riding a motorcycle threw a parcel into the orphanage compound before the blast occurred. No one has been arrested or claimed responsibility for the explosion.Dayaung Tangoon was a mentor of the Myanmar Martial Arts Group. His wife, who was among the 27 injured, is being treated in a Myitkyina hospital. Sources said the injured were not allowed to meet visitors.A member of the Kachin Culture Organization and a teacher in a marching music band, Dayang Tangoon has received support from a well-known businessman, Yupzau Hkawng, the owner of the Jade Land Company, sources said. An article in the government-backed Myanmar Ahlin daily newspaper contained an unsubstantiated accusation linking other previous bombings in the town to Dayang Tangoon and speculated that a bomb went off inside his house-compound. The article also mentioned destructive acts by the KIO from June 2010 to November 2011. Tourism chairman Khin Shwe calls Burmese media pessimistichttp://www.mizzima.com/news/inside-burma/6188-tourism-chairman-khin-shwe-calls-burmese-media-pessimistic.htmlTuesday, 15 November 2011 20:37 Myo Thein (Mizzima) – The Myanmar Tourism Board (MTB) chairman Khin Shwe says the Burmese media, which opposed his idea to transform the historic Ministers’ Office building where Burmese martyrs were assassinated into a hotel, displays a pessimistic attitude. The Ministers’ Office building is located in Kyauktada Township in Rangoon.Khin Shwe made his remarks at a press conference about Burmese tourism held in the Yuzana Garden Hotel in Rangoon on Tuesday.Khin Shwe, who owns of the Zaygabar Company, said local media covers news in a pessimistic way like the foreign media. “Spiteful reports depress me very much,” he said. “They [the media] cannot see the good part. It seems that they cannot recognize that the path the country is taking is good.”A member of the Upper House of Parliament and the ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), he also made a verbal attack on people who said they would try to protect the building from being transformed into a hotel.“I heard that some people said that they would sacrifice their lives to protect the building. They don’t need to sacrifice their lives. If those people cadged 100,000 kyat (about US $126) per person to protect the building, nobody would give it. They only want to sacrifice their lives,” Khin Shwe said. “The local journals do not have enough experience,” he said. However, he praised an article, “Which ruler will be used to measure?” about expressing different views. He passed out the article that was published in the “Monitor Journal.”The article said, “The Ministers’ Office is just an inheritance from the English and National Hero General Aung San used the building as an office just for a few months, so instead of the Burmese people maintaining it as an inheritance, English people who colonized Burma should maintain it, and if the state maintains it, it will cost a lot of money.”Khin Shwe said that he could afford to visit foreign countries such as Singapore and the U.S. and spend a lot of money. Although he could live as a millionaire in a foreign country, he said he was living and working in Burma. Press release by the Shan Herald Agency for News 15-Nov-2011 The latest Shan Drug Watch report, released today, reveals that opium cultivation and drug production have surged across Shan State in areas of government control since Burma’s 2010 election. Survey results show opium was grown during the 2010-2011 season in 45 out of 50 Shan townships controlled by government troops, while remaining ceasefire areas along the China-Shan border were opium free.The report exposes how the regime’s policies of military expansion and nurturing of “People’s Militia” forces in Shan State are fuelling the drug trade, as these forces are given the green light to deal in drugs in exchange for suppressing resistance groups.“There has been a massive increase in poppy cultivation, as well as heroin and methamphetamine production, in the regime’s militia-controlled areas,” said Khuensai Jaiyen, principal author of the Shan Drug Watch report.The report profiles seven druglords, all militia leaders, now serving as MPs for Burma’s ruling party, the Union Solidarity and Development Party in Shan State. They had promised voters they could grow poppies freely if they were elected. “If Burma’s generals are serious about making Burma drug-free by 2014, they must stop their war-mongering and negotiate a political settlement to the civil war,” said Khuensai Jaiyen, referring to Burma’s drug-free target date, set a year before that of ASEAN.Favourable weather and intensive cultivation made last season’s opium harvest the best in years, according to farmers. In some areas, two to three crops of opium were grown during the year, and in central Shan State farmers have even started harvesting sap from the stems as well as the pods.Despite the increased availability of opium and heroin, methamphetamine or “yaba” has become the most popular drug among youth in Shan State, where the cost of a pill is as low as 1,500 kyat (US$1.7) compared to 100 baht (US$3.3) per pill across the border in Thailand. Police rescue 70 Burmese sex workershttp://www.bangkokpost.com/news/local/266254/police-rescue-70-burmese-sex-workers15-Nov-2011 Nearly 70 Burmese women, half of them under the age of 18, have been rescued from a massage parlour in Chanthaburi's Muang district.Pol Lt Col Komvich Pathanarat, head of the Department of Special Investigation's (DSI) Anti-Human Trafficking Centre, said the women are now being cared for by Social Development and Human Security Ministry officials in Chanthaburi.He said all the women will be sent back to their homes in Burma once investigations are completed, which will take about 2-3 months.Some of the women entered the country illegally to work as prostitutes, while the others were promised legitimate work only to be forced into prostitution, Pol Lt Col Komvich said."We found about half of them are still under age, probably not more than 18 years old."We are now investigating how many were forced into prostitution and are gathering further evidence in order to go after those who lured them into the sex trade," he said.The DSI rescue was the result of an appeal by the Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women late last month asking the department to help find a 16-year-old Burmese girl, called Khon.The girl's aunt had contacted the alliance to help find her missing niece in Thailand.Pol Lt Col Komvich said the breakthrough in the search for Khon came when the alliance contacted the DSI again, informing them that she had telephoned her aunt for help, and telling her she had been lured into working in a massage parlour in Chanthaburi by a human trafficking gang.The girl told her aunt she had been forced to work as a prostitute in the massage parlour for two months and had never received any money, he said.Pol Lt Col Komvich then posed as a customer to find the girl and check whether she was really working there.The DSI then raided the place after obtaining a search wa

FTUB Daily News for Nov-15-2011, English News - Morning

2011-11-15T19:30:00.001+09:00

News Headlines with Brief (1) Burma delays prisoner amnesty | Source: DVB14-Nov-2011A release of political prisoners in military-dominated Burma which was expected on Monday has been delayed after a meeting of top officials, sources said. “So far we haven’t had any order or instruction from superiors,” an official who asked not to be named told AFP, adding that the decision to delay the process was made “at the last minute” by the crucial National Defence and Security Council.Read More..... (2) Officer killed, three others injured in bomb blast at police station in Shan State | Source: Mizzima14-Nov-2011The state-run newspaper New Light of Myanmar reported on Monday that a bomb exploded on Thursday outside a police station in Namhkam Township in Shan State, killing one police officer and injuring three people. At about 8.45 pm, a passenger on a motorcycle threw a one-feet-square paper package outside the Namhkam police station on Myawaddy Road and drove away, according to the newspaper. Acting on a tip, Police Sub-inspector Zaw Htoo Khoung Hsan and others went to inspect the packet and a bomb exploded.Read More..... (3) Fire devastates the largest market in Minbya in Arakan State | Source: Mizzima14-Nov-2011A fire at the Myoma Market, the largest market in Minbya in Arakan State, on Saturday damaged about 700 shops, according to the Minbya Township police station. The fire started in a shop that stored palm oil in the market on Strand Road in Alelpine Ward in Minbya and spread through the vast market complex. Estimates said 567 market shops and more than 100 temporary shops were destroyed in the fire.Read More..... (4) Burma bomb blast kills 10: government official | Source: Bangkok Post15-Nov-2011A bomb blast in the capital of Burma's northern Kachin state has killed 10 people, including two women, a government official in the military-dominated country said on Monday.Another 23 people, including some 15 children, were injured in the explosion on Sunday evening in the town of Myitkyina, the official, who did not wish to be named, told AFP.The blast occurred in a two-storey house and caused a fire that spread to two neighbouring homes, he said.Read More..... Burma delays prisoner amnestyhttp://www.dvb.no/news/burma-delays-prisoner-amnesty/1872314-Nov-2011 A release of political prisoners in military-dominated Burma which was expected on Monday has been delayed after a meeting of top officials, sources said.“So far we haven’t had any order or instruction from superiors,” an official who asked not to be named told AFP, adding that the decision to delay the process was made “at the last minute” by the crucial National Defence and Security Council.Burmese President Thein Sein is due to attend an Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summit on the Indonesian island of Bali later this week, and the official said an amnesty had been expected before his departure.“I think they delayed the process as they only wanted to release the political prisoners slowly with the pardon of the president,” the official said.Burma carried out a mass prisoner amnesty last month but this did not include most key dissidents, disappointing observers and the opposition.The release of all of the country’s political detainees — who include democracy campaigners, journalists and lawyers — is one of the major demands of Western nations which have imposed sanctions on Burma.The reasons for the delay were not clear, but the authorities are now expected to decide on a case-by-case basis which prisoners to release. Officer killed, three others injured in bomb blast at police station in Shan Statehttp://www.mizzima.com/news/breaking-and-news-brief/6181-officer-killed-three-others-injured-in-bomb-blast-at-police-station-in-shan-state.htmlMonday, 14 November 2011 19:19 Mizzima News Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – The state-run newspaper New Light of Myanmar reported on Monday that a bomb exploded on Thursday outside a police station in Namhkam Township in Shan State, killing one police officer and injuring three people.At about 8.45 pm, a passenger on a motorcycle threw a one-feet-square paper package outside the Namhkam police station on Myawaddy Road and drove away, according to the newspaper. Acting on a tip, Police Sub-inspector Zaw Htoo Khoung Hsan and others went to inspect the packet and a bomb exploded. Police Sub-inspector Zaw Htoo Khoung Hsan was killed, and police Lance Corporal Kyaw Swa Moe and two women were injured. The injured were taken to Muse District Hospital, according to the newspaper.Meanwhile, on Sunday evening two people riding a motorcycle threw a parcel that contained a grenade into an orphanage in Myitkyina in Kachin State, leaving 10 people dead and 27 injured. No group has claimed responsibility for the bomb attacks. Fire devastates the largest market in Minbya in Arakan Statehttp://www.mizzima.com/news/breaking-and-news-brief/6182-fire-devastates-the-largest-market-in-minbya-in-arakan-state.htmlMonday, 14 November 2011 19:22 Te Te New Delhi (Mizzima) – A fire at the Myoma Market, the largest market in Minbya in Arakan State, on Saturday damaged about 700 shops, according to the Minbya Township police station.The fire started in a shop that stored palm oil in the market on Strand Road in Alelpine Ward in Minbya and spread through the vast market complex. Estimates said 567 market shops and more than 100 temporary shops were destroyed in the fire.“They thought that the a spent fire in a charcoal stove could not cause a fire and did not pay attention. Palm oil was seeping into the stove. When people noticed it, they could not put out the fire,” a police official said.Government authorities said the total value of the damage is about 850 million kyat (about USD $1 million), but shop owners said the value of the damage was about two billion kyat.“The fire left the market in ashes. All the property in my shop was burned. Nothing can be used anymore,” a textile shop owner said.The shops included household appliance shops, food shops, clothing shops, construction material shops and medicine shops. A fire engine from Minbya and two fire engines from Mrauk-U fought the fire, which was extinguished about 10:15 p.m. Residents said the fire caused extensive damage because firemen could not respond quickly. “The fire engines are not in good condition. One fire engine could not start its engine. Fire engines that came from other towns could not get here in time because of poor roads so all we could do was watch the fire,” said a resident.On Sunday, the Arakan State chief minister inspected the market. The municipality will attempt to build a temporary market in a space near the market, according to the township police station. Burma bomb blast kills 10: government officialhttp://www.bangkokpost.com/news/asia/266243/burma-bomb-blast-kills-10-government-official14-Nov-2011 A bomb blast in the capital of Burma's northern Kachin state has killed 10 people, including two women, a government official in the military-dominated country said on Monday.A Myanmar newspapers vendor waits for customers in downtown Yangon in March 2011. A bomb blast in the capital of Myanmar's northern Kachin state has killed 10 people, including two women, a government official in the military-dominated country said on Monday. Another 23 people, including some 15 children, were injured in the explosion on Sunday evening in the town of Myitkyina, the official, who did not wish to be named, told AFP.The blast occurred in a two-storey house and caused a fire that spread to two neighbouring homes, he said.The explosion appeared to have been unintentional, occurring when a man in the building was "showing others how to plant a bomb", the source said.He added that there were several orphans living in the dwellings, some as young as three.Two other bombs exploded in the same town on Saturday but caused no casualties, according to the state-run New Light of Burma newspaper.Burma has been hit by several bomb blasts in recent years, most of them minor, which the authorities have blamed on armed exile groups or ethnic minority fighters.Several ethnic rebel groups, seeking more autonomy and rights, have waged war against the state since independence in 1948, leading to six decades of civil conflict in some regions, although most groups have signed fragile ceasefires.In the areas where fighting continues, rights groups have accused the army of waging a brutal counter-insurgency involving the rape, torture and murder of villagers and the recruitment of child soldiers.A nominally civilian government replaced Burma's long-ruling military junta in March.Observers say the ethnic minority conflict is the main threat facing the regime, posing an even bigger challenge for the long term future of the country than democratic reforms.Fighting between the army and ethnic militias has intensified in recent months in northern and eastern parts of the country.In August, state media accused ethnic fighters in Kachin state of killing seven people who visited a Chinese-run dam at the centre of an ongoing conflict between the army and rebels.In June, bomb blasts rattled three Burma cities, including the capital Naypyidaw, injuring two people.In April last year, in the worst attack in five years in Burma's main city Rangoon, a series of blasts left 10 people dead and about 170 wounded as thousands of people gathered for festivities to mark the Buddhist New Year.

FTUB Daily News for Nov-14-2011, English News - Evening

2011-11-14T22:30:00.001+09:00

News Headlines with Brief (1) Suu Kyi says 1990 election win ‘history’ | Source: DVB14-Nov-2011Aung San Suu Kyi addressed the media today in a frenetic press conference at the National League for Democracy’s headquarters in Rangoon to mark a year since her release from house arrest. In her opening remarks she said that the rule of law was the most crucial challenge for democratisation in Burma, but closed with comments signalling that the party will put the disregarded 1990 election win behind them as a they forge a new path.Read More..... (2) Bomber kills Kachin orphans, refugees | Source: DVB14-Nov-2011At least 10 people have been confirmed dead after a bomber targeted a row of houses in the Kachin state capital of Myitkyina yesterday that were used as shelters for orphaned children. Local officials said that the blast had also killed the man thought to have been behind the attack, which occurred Sunday evening and left 25 more injured. The motive is unknown. Read More..... (3) Nine die in Mandalay bus crash | Source: DVB14-Nov-2011Nine people were killed and 27 injured when an express bus travelling from Rangoon to Mandalay crashed in the early hours of Sunday. The accident happened around 10 kilometres from Mandalay town. Locals believe the driver, from New Mandalar Htun bus company, had fallen asleep at the wheel.Read More.....(4) Asean Urged to Put Burma Abuses on Agenda | Source: Irrawaddy14-Nov-2011Ahead of the upcoming summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) in Bali, parliamentarians of member states have called on bloc leaders to include human rights abuses and ethnic conflict in Burma on its agenda. Parliamentarians who form the Asean Inter-Parliamentary Myanmar Caucus (AIPMC) called on Monday for Asean delegates to urgently address concerns regarding democratic reform, ethnic conflict and human rights abuses in Burma at the upcoming 19th Asean Summit in Indonesia.Read More..... (5) Mon Leaders Meet With NMSP | Source: Irrawaddy14-Nov-2011Five Mon community leaders met with leaders of the New Mon State Party (NMSP), an ethnic armed group, at the NMSP headquarters in the town of Bee Ree River in Ye Township, Mon State on November 13, according to Mon sources. The five community leaders were sent by Ohn Myint, the chief minister of Mon State, who wrote a letter to the NMSP outlining the issues he wanted discussed.Read More..... (6) Despite Disagreement, NLD Stalwart Stands Behind Suu Kyi | Source: Irrawaddy14-Nov-2011Win Tin, one of the most influential members of Burma's main opposition party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), has vowed to throw his support behind party leader Aung San Suu Kyi when the NLD makes a decision later this week about whether to run in upcoming by-elections. “I am for the re-registration of our party, but I would say it's too early for us to participate in the formal political framework under a military constitution,” said 82-year-old Win Tin, who was one of the co-founders of the NLD along with Suu Kyi.Read More..... (7) Grenade attack on orphanage in Kachin kills 10, wounds 27 | Source: Mizzima14-Nov-2011A hand grenade thrown into an orphanage in Myitkyina in the north of Burma killed 10 people and seriously injured 27 on Sunday evening, according to residents. At around 9 p.m., two people riding a motorcycle threw a parcel that contained a grenade into an orphanage owned by Dayaung Tangoon near the AG Church in Thida Ward in the capital of Kachin State. Ten people including Dayaung Tangoon’s teenage son, Sai Kwan, one daughter and a 1-year-old grandchild were killed by the explosion.Read More..... (8) KNU appoints new peace negotiation team to meet with government | Source: Mizzima14-Nov-2011A seven-member, high-level delegation of the Karen National Union will talk about a cease-fire and peace with the government, said KNU sources. The KNU held an emergency conference and formed a new negotiation team last week consisting of Vice Chairman Padoh David Tharkabaw, General-Secretary Naw Ziporah Sein, Commander in Chief Colonel Mutu Saepho, In-charge of Justice Department Padoh David Taw, Saw Roger Khin of the health department, Padoh Arh Toe of the forestry department and Pa-an district chairman Padoh Aung Maw Aye. Read More..... (9) Sino border town under curfew | Source: Shan14-Nov-2011Namkham, one of Shan State's northernmost townships bordering China, has been under virtual curfew after a bomb explosion occurred near the police station last week, killing one police officer and injuring four, according to sources from the border. It was announced through loudspeakers by headmen of the villages and quarters that no one was allowed to be outside after 21:00 until 6:00 (local time). Otherwise authorities will not take responsibility for anyone caught outside after the curfew. It was reportedly enforced by high ranking officials from Naypyitaw. But there has been no information how long the curfew will last, said a local source.Read More..... Suu Kyi says 1990 election win ‘history’http://www.dvb.no/news/suu-kyi-says-1990-election-win-%E2%80%98history%E2%80%99/1871614-Nov-2011 Aung San Suu Kyi addressed the media today in a frenetic press conference at the National League for Democracy’s headquarters in Rangoon to mark a year since her release from house arrest. In her opening remarks she said that the rule of law was the most crucial challenge for democratisation in Burma, but closed with comments signalling that the party will put the disregarded 1990 election win behind them as a they forge a new path.The 66-year-old described the year since her release as “eventful, energising and encouraging,” before adding that the “door to democracy in the country is not open until we have the rule of law”, which is the most ”important” issue. Her party needs to have “faith and [be] daring” as they move forward.“We are looking for the opening to the road democracy. We have not come to the end of our road,” she said, before adding that “there is never an end to political endeavour.”The Nobel laureate refused to answer questions on the party’s registration, but did confirm that the party would vote on the issue on 18 November. The NLD is expected to register as a political party after registration and electoral laws were amended in favour of their ostensible role in parliament. She hinted that the NLD had requested such amendments to the government.She continued that without the rule of law, “we can’t guarantee that there won’t be political prisoners in the future”.Touching on the NLD’s figure for political prisoners, which she described as a “controversial” issue, Suu Kyi claimed that there are only 525 jailed activists. Groups such as the exiled Assistance Association for Political Prisoners – Burma (AAPPB) asserts a higher figure of around 1,700.The government had their “own list,” Suu Kyi said, despite them not publicly acknowledging the existence of political prisoners. The government claims instead that only “common criminals” are behind bars. Party spokesperson Nyan Win stated that the NLD believed that around 100 of their members were behind bars.During the year since her release, Suu Kyi had attempted to build a “network of democracy” with a variety of social services. She added that some 18 free schools for the most deprived had been developed, which she believed were well received by parents and pupils alike.The Nobel laureate said that she and her party remained “very concerned” about the situation in the ethnic areas, particularly in Kachin state. She said her offer to mediate peace talks between ethnic armed groups and the government still stood, as it has since her release.When asked by DVB, Suu Kyi refused to be drawn on issue of whether she supported a commission of inquiry into such matters, instead delegating responsibility to the UN’s special rapporteur for human rights, Tomas Ojea Quintana. “It is the responsibility of Mr Quintana, and we believe he should be given every assistance necessary to carry out his duties. If he believes the commission of inquiry is necessary then we should back him up.”In the past the lawyer has voiced support for the inquiry, but more recently has welcomed legislative reforms in Naypyidaw. Suu Kyi added however that any commission of inquiry was not a “tribunal”; rather it would be a “fact-finding mission”.Answering questions from Chinese journalists, she said that the two neighbours should look for “harmony”, as they had done for time immemorial, but asked China to consider the interests of Burma’s people.Marking something of a break with the past, Suu Kyi stated that the party should also accept that the 1990 election results were “history” – this after the speaker of the National Parliament, Khin Aung Myint, said that he “recognised the result”. This had been one of the party’s demands in their 2009 Shwegondaing proclamation, which set out the conditions for their re-entry into parliamentary politics. Bomber kills Kachin orphans, refugeeshttp://www.dvb.no/news/bomber-kills-kachin-orphans-refugees/1869314-Nov-2011 At least 10 people have been confirmed dead after a bomber targeted a row of houses in the Kachin state capital of Myitkyina yesterday that were used as shelters for orphaned children.Local officials said that the blast had also killed the man thought to have been behind the attack, which occurred Sunday evening and left 25 more injured. The motive is unknown.A member of staff at Myitkyina hospital told DVB that 10 bodies were brought in. The incident came the day after a series of blasts rocked three sites in the town, although no casualties were reported from these.Two women are believed to have been among the dead on Sunday, the majority of whom were children. The house had belonged to martial arts instructor Deyawng Tangwe, who used his house and two others next door as shelters for orphans and refugees who had fled fighting in Kachin state.A doctor on duty at Myitkyina hospital said it had received three bodies yesterday evening but refused to comment further.On Thursday evening a bomber struck a police station in the Shan state town of Namkham, killing a deputy commander and injuring three more, including two civilians.“A man came on a motorbike and dropped a bag outside our station around 8:40pm,” an officer at the station told DVB. “Some people saw that and informed the station so our supervisor [Zaw Htoo Gun Seng] went out to check it and the bomb exploded before he got to it.”He said that although darkness prevented police from chasing the culprit, “one thing for sure is that the attack was definitely carried out by an insurgent group”. No one has so far claimed responsibility.The injured three were initially taken to Namhkam Hospital, but a coordinator there said they would be transferred on account of the seriousness of their wounds.Houses near the police station were also damaged by the explosion, which officials believed was detonated by a remote device. The bomb was homemade, they said.Namhkam township has been in the midst of fighting between Kachin Independence Army, which has forces in northern Shan state, and Burmese troops. Police speculated that the attack could be related to the fighting. Nine die in Mandalay bus crashhttp://www.dvb.no/news/nine-die-in-mandalay-bus-crash/1868814-Nov-2011 Nine people were killed and 27 injured when an express bus travelling from Rangoon to Mandalay crashed in the early hours of Sunday.The accident happened around 10 kilometres from Mandalay town. Locals believe the driver, from New Mandalar Htun bus company, had fallen asleep at the wheel.According to a local news reporter, an eight-year-old girl was among those killed, while an official at Mandalay General Hospital told DVB that the 27 injured had been taken there for treatment.Police in Mandalay, who are preparing to charge the driver, confirmed that nine people were killed.“We still don’t know full details of the incident yet, although we learnt that the bus was going over the speed limit,” said a police official. Asean Urged to Put Burma Abuses on Agendahttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2244914-Nov-2011 Ahead of the upcoming summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) in Bali, parliamentarians of member states have called on bloc leaders to include human rights abuses and ethnic conflict in Burma on its agenda.Parliamentarians who form the Asean Inter-Parliamentary Myanmar Caucus (AIPMC) called on Monday for Asean delegates to urgently address concerns regarding democratic reform, ethnic conflict and human rights abuses in Burma at the upcoming 19th Asean Summit in Indonesia.Speaking with The Irrawaddy on Monday, AIPMC Executive Director Agung Putri Astrid said that the slow process of democratic reform in Burma should be seriously considered during the summit.“Political reform is very slow in Burma. We don’t see comprehensive reform and are concerned with the process. So Asean is responsible for monitoring human rights abuses in Myanmar,” she added. While Naypyidaw claims that it wants to talk to opposition leaders and achieve national reconciliation, little effort has been made to involve ethnic minorities.Agung Putri Astrid said that AIPMC was trying to remind Asean leaders to include peace in Burma on the summit agenda as the bloc has not so far approached Burma’s ethnic issues.A statement from AIPMC said the association welcomed recent changes in Burma, but remains concerned about ongoing military conflicts with ethnic groups and the relatively slow pace of political reform. It is vital, therefore, that delegates from members states ensure these issues are officially placed on the agenda at the 2011 Asean Summit.Despite recent limited improvements, Burma President Thein Sein has demonstrated a lack of willingness to undertake genuine reforms, such as releasing political prisoners or ending armed conflict with ethnic groups, said the statement. A recent survey by the Thailand Burma Border Consortium (TBBC) humanitarian agency found that more people in southeast Burma had been forcibly displaced from their homes during the past year than any other since data was first collected in 2002.In relation to human rights protection, the AIPMC asked that Asean be firm and resolute in calling for the immediate cessation of hostilities in Burma, especially in ethnic areas. In Karen, Kachin and Shan states, there remain grave concerns that war crimes and crimes against humanity continue to be perpetrated, as mentioned in the recent report by the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Burma, Tomás Ojea Quintana.Burma is hoping to get approved for the 2014 Asean chair at the Bali summit with recent limited reforms understood to have been undertaken in order to achieve this goal.Eva Kusuma Sundari, the AIPMC president and a member of the Indonesian Parliament, said in the group statement, “Gross human rights violations against ordinary people in ethnic areas continue despite lip service towards reform from Naypyidaw.”“If anything, life under this regime is worse for many ethnic minorities and vulnerable people than it was before,” he added.Projects such as the Yadana and Shwe Gas pipelines, undertaken by the government of Burma and fiscally supported by other states including China, have led to serious environmental concerns and human rights violations. These include land confiscations, displacement, torture, rape and other forms of systematic violence.An estimated 50,000 people have been displaced due to the Shwe Gas pipeline project, according to the Shwe Gas Movement campaign group.“Reconciliation is a prerequisite of any political initiative for peace in Myanmar and should serve as a critical indicator of how meaningful any democratization process is,” Sundari added. Mon Leaders Meet With NMSPhttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2245114-Nov-2011 Five Mon community leaders met with leaders of the New Mon State Party (NMSP), an ethnic armed group, at the NMSP headquarters in the town of Bee Ree River in Ye Township, Mon State on November 13, according to Mon sources.The five community leaders were sent by Ohn Myint, the chief minister of Mon State, who wrote a letter to the NMSP outlining the issues he wanted discussed. The members of the Mon community delegation were former NMSP executive and central committee members Nai Tin Aung and Nai Soe Myint, Mon National Democratic Front members Nai Thet Lwin and Dr. Min Kyi Winn, and a respected Mon Buddhist Monk, Nai Ketumalar.“Ohn Myint wants to have peace talks with the NMSP, so we came here to discuss it,” said Nai Ketumalar. “We still have a little more to talk about today. The NMSP have not made a decision. They say they are going to observe the situation more.” “Our party will accept peace talks if the offer meets our party’s position,” said Col Nyan Tun, the NMSP deputy liaison officer.Some Mon community leaders said that the NMSP should enter into peace talks in order to prepare for its participation in mainstream Mon politics if Aung San Suu Kyi and the National League for Democracy decide to register and compete in future elections. Dr. Min Soe Lin, who is a senior member of Mon National Democratic Front, said, “I do not want to tell them not to have peace talks because I think they know the problem they will have. But I want to tell them to do something when they come to town. Please do not act like in the past, when many of their members resigned from the party.”On Oct. 6, three NMSP leaders met with a delegation from the Mon State government in Ye Township that was led by Col Htay Myint Aung, the Mon State minister for security and border affairs. The NMSP entered into a ceasefire agreement with the government in 1995, but the ceasefire collapse in 2010 when the government attempted to force the NMSP to become part of its Border Guard Force under Burmese military control. Meanwhile, on Nov. 10, the Karen National Union set up an eight-member peace commission to hold talks with the Burmese government. Despite Disagreement, NLD Stalwart Stands Behind Suu Kyihttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2245214-Nov-2011 Win Tin, one of the most influential members of Burma's main opposition party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), has vowed to throw his support behind party leader Aung San Suu Kyi when the NLD makes a decision later this week about whether to run in upcoming by-elections. “I am for the re-registration of our party, but I would say it's too early for us to participate in the formal political framework under a military constitution,” said 82-year-old Win Tin, who was one of the co-founders of the NLD along with Suu Kyi.His comments came a day after NLD spokesman Nyan Win broke the news on Sunday that the party, which was officially disbanded in September 2010 because of its boycott of last year's election, might re-register under a recently amended electoral law. He also said it was likely that Suu Kyi, who was previously barred from running for office, would contest one of around 50 Parliamentary seats up for grabs in a by-election expected to be held later this month. Since his release from prison in 2009 after more than 19 years behind bars as a political prisoner, Win Tin has played a key role in the NLD's affairs, including its decision to boycott the Nov 7, 2010, Parliamentary election, which were held a week before Suu Kyi herself was released from house arrest.“The reasons why we boycotted the election last year is because we don't accept the current constitution drafted by the military. There is no change in this constitution yet,” Win Tin told The Irrawaddy by phone on Monday.In contrast to Win Tin's views, however, Suu Kyi appears to be be more optimistic about Burma's political direction under the new government of ex-army general President Thein Sein, who she described as “honest, open and straightforward” after a meeting with him in August. The NLD announced on Tuesday that it will hold a major party conference on Friday this week to decide whether to re-register as a political party and contest seats in the national Parliament, which is dominated by the army-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party. The USDP claims to have won around 80 percent of the contested seats in the election, which was marred by heavy vote-rigging. Speaking to Burmese exiled radio stations on Sunday, NLD spokesman Nyan Win hinted that the majority of party leaders, including Suu Kyi, have already reached a decision ahead of Friday's meeting. “Those who oppose the NLD re-registering and joining the Parliament point out that the Constitution must change first before we do that. If it is the government and the Parliament that can change the Constitution, then do we have to wait for them to take these steps? Do we have to wait until they do that before we can do politics? We have to be in the Parliament,” said Nyan Win.Nyan Win acknowledged, however, that some grassroots party members are opposed to the move, which they said should not be taken until all political prisoners are released and major amendments are made to the Constitution, which grants the army the power to legally end civilian rule “in times of national emergency.”Despite such internal differences, however, Win Tin—who has worn shirts the same blue color as his former prison uniform since his release to protest the continuing detention of around 2,000 other political prisoners—said his faith in Suu Kyi's leadership remained strong, and that he would respect the majority decision of the party, which is now leaning toward party registration and joining the formal political process. “We have differences that we share with each other openly and democratically. But we will work with the unity of the party in mind. As for me, I am too old and don't have any thought about joining the election,” he said.Win Tin's remarks contradict a report in the Guardian newspaper published on Sunday that he opposed both the party registration and joining the by-elections. Grenade attack on orphanage in Kachin kills 10, wounds 27http://www.mizzima.com/news/inside-burma/6178-grenade-attack-on-orphanage-in-kachin-kills-10-wounds-27.htmlMonday, 14 November 2011 15:44 Phanida Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – A hand grenade thrown into an orphanage in Myitkyina in the north of Burma killed 10 people and seriously injured 27 on Sunday evening, according to residents. At around 9 p.m., two people riding a motorcycle threw a parcel that contained a grenade into an orphanage owned by Dayaung Tangoon near the AG Church in Thida Ward in the capital of Kachin State. Ten people including Dayaung Tangoon’s teenage son, Sai Kwan, one daughter and a 1-year-old grandchild were killed by the explosion. Three buildings including the orphanage burned after the attack. Residents said they have no idea who was responsible for the bombing. “At the back of Dayaung Tangoon’s orphanage, there is a path. Residents said that two people riding a motorcycle threw a parcel into the orphanage compound and shortly after that they heard the sound of the blast,” a neighbour said. Dayaung Tangoon, a member of Myanmar Martial Art Federation, was traveling when the bombing occurred. More than 30 people including orphans, refugee children and martial arts students lived in the compound. Some of the injured underwent surgery at the local hospital. Increased police patrols have basically shut down the city after 7 p.m.Residents said a series of earlier bomb explosions were probably intended as threats because they occurred in npopulated areas. The state-run newspaper New Light of Myanmar reported on Monday that two bomb blasts hit Myitkyina on Sunday evening, and authorities successfully removed one time bomb. The newspaper said that an explosion occurred near the Sports and Physical Education Department Office in Thida Ward at 9.55 p.m., leaving a deep hole marking the explosion. Another blast followed at 10.15 p.m. near Sumprabum Road and Sethmu junction in Tatkon Ward. There were no casualties, said the newspaper. The newspaper also reported a time bomb was disabled: “Acting on a tip-off that a suspicious package was found near a lamppost by Aung San Road in Ayeya Ward in Myitkyina, authorities removed a time bomb in a plastic box with a diameter of 3 X 2 inches filled with TNT gunpowder set to detonate at 9 p.m.” On Monday, Kachin State Chief Minister La John Ngan Hsai visited the injured at Myitkyina Hospital.The Kachin Independence Organization and government troops have been fighting about 10 miles away from Myitkyina. KNU appoints new peace negotiation team to meet with governmenthttp://www.mizzima.com/news/inside-burma/6176-knu-appoints-new-peace-negotiation-team-to-meet-with-government.htmlMonday, 14 November 2011 12:55 Phanida Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – A seven-member, high-level delegation of the Karen National Union will talk about a cease-fire and peace with the government, said KNU sources. The KNU held an emergency conference and formed a new negotiation team last week consisting of Vice Chairman Padoh David Tharkabaw, General-Secretary Naw Ziporah Sein, Commander in Chief Colonel Mutu Saepho, In-charge of Justice Department Padoh David Taw, Saw Roger Khin of the health department, Padoh Arh Toe of the forestry department and Pa-an district chairman Padoh Aung Maw Aye. The KNU has fought against the central government for more than six decades, calling for greater autonomy and equality. Some KNU leaders met with a government delegation recently. No agreement, however, was reached. After the meetings with the government delegates, the KNU held an emergency conference with its top 50 political and military leaders land appointed the new team. The Democratic Kayin Buddhist Army (DKBA), which broke away from the KNU, has recently signed a peace agreement. In 1994, it had a cease-fire with the Burmese military regime, but it resumed fighting after it was pressured in 2010 to transform into a Border Guard Force (BGF) under the command of the Burmese army. The breakaway group leader Saw Lar Pwe met with local villagers to explain the new cease-fire agreement to about 70 local delegates from 37 villages in their control area. A villager said: “The government will provide us with some developmental projects such as building roads, bridges and infrastructure. The villagers have endorsed the cease-fire agreement.” The villagers said they wanted education projects. He said DKBA head Saw Lar Pwe (Col. Whiskers), deputy-chief of the DKBA forces Saw Mu Shay, chief of staff Major Saw Sein Myint and Quartermaster General Bo Steel participated at the public gathering. Maj. Saw San Aung said: “We have to make proposals. The talk isn’t a one-stop solution. We will propose developmental projects. We need clinics, schools, bridges.”The DKBA signed a new cease-fire agreement with the government on November 3, after their second meeting. U Thein Zaw, secretary-2 of USDP, and the chairman of the Lower House ethnic affairs and peace committee, Captain Maung Maung Thein, represented the central government. The agreement includes ending hostilities, opening a DKBA liaison office in the border town of Myawaddy, demarcating control areas of the forces, to inform the other side if forces travel outside of their areas and to proceed with further talks. Sino border town under curfew http://www.shanland.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4201:sino-border-town-under-curfew&catid=86:war&Itemid=284Monday, 14 November 2011 16:42 Hseng Khio Fah Namkham, one of Shan State's northernmost townships bordering China, has been under virtual curfew after a bomb explosion occurred near the police station last week, killing one police officer and injuring four, according to sources from the border. It was announced through loudspeakers by headmen of the villages and quarters that no one was allowed to be outside after 21:00 until 6:00 (local time). Otherwise authorities will not take responsibility for anyone caught outside after the curfew. It was reportedly enforced by high ranking officials from Naypyitaw. But there has been no information how long the curfew will last, said a local source.Meanwhile, the township is one of the places where the Burma Army and Kachin Independence Army (KIA) fighting taking place. As a result, any civilian seen outside after the curfew is reportedly being recruited by the Burmese Army to give porter service, she said.“The outcome is no one even the animals are seen hanging out on the street even though the time is not yet 9 p.m. The town is so quiet now. It is therefore a problem for traders and vendors who want customers,” she said.Last Thursday on 10 November, a bomb explosion took place in front of the town’s police station, killing one police officer Zau Htu Khawng Zang and seriously wounding two police corporals and two civilians.One female student caught taking photographs of the carnage was detained and later released after village authorities spoke for him, according to another source.Since security in the town has tightened and everyone crossing and passing the police station is strictly checked and asked to show ID cards by Burma Army authorities, according to local sources.Apart from townships in Shan State, many areas in Kachin State even the capital of the state Myitkyina faced similar situation. Latest report says a bom blast had taken place in Myitkyina downtown last night at around 20:00 killing at least four people and wounding dozens.

FTUB Daily News for Nov-14-2011, English News - Morning

2011-11-14T21:48:00.000+09:00

News Headlines with Brief (1) Clinton Calls for Release of Political Prisoners in Burma | Source: Irrawaddy12-Nov-2011Burma is making real progress toward reforms but much more needs to be done, including the release of political prisoners, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Friday. A recent visit by senior U.S. diplomats found “real changes taking place on the ground,” Clinton said on the sidelines of an annual Pacific Rim summit.Read More..... (2) The Gorkhalis of Myitkyina | Source: Irrawaddy12-Nov-2011My flight to Rangoon on June 18 is canceled. Thai Airways announces that heavy rain has closed Yangon airport. In the restless gloom of the waiting area, rumors start to spread. The Burmese army has taken over the airport, people whisper. Aung San Suu Kyi’s birthday is a day away. Has some event occurred while they have been away? Young fathers sit staring into space, wondering whether they can ever return home.Read More..... (3) A Tradition Revived, and a Cartoonist Remembered | Source: Irrawaddy12-Nov-2011If Ba Gyan, the father of Burmese cartoonists, were still alive today, he would no doubt delight in drawing some of the figures who dominate the country's current political landscape. But even more than this, he would take real pleasure in witnessing the revival of a tradition he started long before Burma achieved independence, and which continued long after his death in 1953.Read More..... (4) Myanmar to free more political prisoners: officials | Source: AFP13-Nov-2011"Some prisoners will be released on Monday," an official who did not wish to be named told AFP, while another added that "some prisoners of conscience from prisons outside Yangon" would be among those freed. The move comes after a mass amnesty by the regime last month disappointed observers and the opposition by failing to release most key dissidents.Read More..... (5) Suu Kyi may stand in Burma poll | Source: Bangkok Post12-Nov-2011Burma's democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi is likely to contest an upcoming by-election, a party spokesman said Saturday, paving the way for a political comeback after years of exclusion by army generals. Her National League for Democracy (NLD), delisted last year for boycotting the first elections for 20 years, will consider on Friday whether to re-register as a political party, after Burma's president recently approved changes to the registration laws. "The NLD is likely to register and also Daw Suu is likely to participate at the coming by-election," Nyan Win, a party spokesman told AFP. Daw is a term of respect.Read More..... Clinton Calls for Release of Political Prisoners in Burmahttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2244112-Nov-2011 Burma is making real progress toward reforms but much more needs to be done, including the release of political prisoners, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Friday.A recent visit by senior U.S. diplomats found “real changes taking place on the ground,” Clinton said on the sidelines of an annual Pacific Rim summit.“It appears there are real changes taking place on the ground and we support these early efforts at reform,” she told reporters. “We want to see the people of Burma able to participate fully in the political life of their own country.”Clinton said the US would continue to call for release of all political prisoners, an end to conflict in minority areas and greater transparency regarding Burma’s relations with North Korea.At stake are political and economic sanctions the US and other Western countries imposed against the junta that had ruled Burma until handing over power to the current elected military-backed government in March this year.Those sanctions were imposed for the failure of Burma’s rulers to hand over power and its poor human rights record. But the administration of US President Barack Obama has sought to engage the government, shifting away from the previous policy of shunning it.The US could gradually ease its sanctions against Burma and allow aid from multilateral lending institutions such as the World Bank, over which it has exercised a veto.Among the changes Washington wants to see in Burma is the inclusion of the National League for Democracy, led by democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi, into the political system. Suu Kyi’s party overwhelmingly won a 1990 general election, but the army refused to hand over power, instead repressing Suu Kyi and other activists.The junta that previously ruled Burma enacted a constitution and other laws with provisions aimed at limiting Suu Kyi’s political activities, fearing her influence.The US special envoy to Burma, Derek Mitchell, told reporters in Rangoon on Oct.18 that the government has taken positive steps and that the US is thinking of how to actively support those reforms. The Gorkhalis of Myitkyinahttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2244212-Nov-2011 My flight to Rangoon on June 18 is canceled. Thai Airways announces that heavy rain has closed Yangon airport. In the restless gloom of the waiting area, rumors start to spread. The Burmese army has taken over the airport, people whisper. Aung San Suu Kyi’s birthday is a day away. Has some event occurred while they have been away? Young fathers sit staring into space, wondering whether they can ever return home.We get bussed to the Amaranth Hotel, a fancy five-star hotel in the outskirts of Suvarnabhumi Airport in Bangkok. Using my wireless thumb drive, I e-mail my friend in Washington, DC, and request her to check Twitter. Within a few minutes, I get my answer: a plane has skidded off the tracks at Yangon Airport. Flights supposed to land there are being rerouted to Singapore.We fly to Rangoon the next morning. In the excited conversations I start up with my fellow travelers, I refer repeatedly to my visit to “Burma,” to which they politely remind me it is now “Myanmar.” At a crowded traffic junction, a young newspaper boy flashes me illicit news printed in The Nation, a Thai newspaper. The front flap is folded over to hide the headlines inside: “Kachin Rebels Resume Fighting at Border, Threats of Civil War.” only 3,000 kyats (US $4.70), he says. I get a Hollywood thrill seeing the news, hidden so discreetly and flashed briefly before my eyes.In a nearby restaurant, the kindly owner starts to discuss the Kachin rebels with me. The people are protesting, she says, because the benefits of the new hydroelectricity dam currently being built willall go to China. The Ayeyarwady (Irrawaddy) River will dry up and the Kachin will get nothing in return. She is surprised I do not know all this already. “I think you are journalist and you come to report about this,” she confides. I deny this, but she hardly believes me: how could I not be a journalist? Obviously I was not a tourist—clearly I had come for some specific purpose.Four months earlier, in February, I had ridden a pickup truck to Lashio, in the northern Shan state. A government official had looked at me and asked, “Are you a writer?” Do I have “I am a writer” written on my forehead, I had wondered at the time. In hindsight, this was disingenuous: which tourist in her right mind would be riding a pickup truck to Lashio, sitting squashed alongside 30 laborers in the back with a giant pile of goods, and only a plastic mat as cushioning?I had admitted I was a writer, of sorts, but I need not have worried—the official went on to tell me that Myanmar was now introducing democratic norms and would soon become like other democracies. He also told me that he never took the state-owned Myanma Airlines, and thathe felt that his country would slowly but surely adopt the political freedom of other countries. He admired writers, and wanted to learn to write in English.Of course, he was a government official whose children studied at the best schools. His three rosy-cheeked children went to one of the best boarding schools in the country, in Pyin U Lwin (formerly Maymyo), where he was picking them up to take them for a short vacation. Ordinary people had told me that only government officials get to send their children to good schools, or to buy property or start businesses. We can’t do anything, they said. It might have been true in this case but the official was so pleasant, polite and charming, and so clearly on the side of a democratic system, that it was hard to fault him. Despite all this, I was unsure how much I should reveal—would saying that I was writing a book about the Nepali/ Gorkhali community in Myanmar bring unwelcome attention? Did I want to invite the possibility of more government officials asking me more questions?I was unsure, and in the confusing absence of information it seemed better not to say anything.Back in the Rangoon restaurant on a steaming and oppressive June evening, I shook my head and said: “No, I’m not here to report on the Kachin rebellion.” The owner was surprised by this. Then she resumed telling me the story of what was happening in Myitkyina, almost as if it did not matter why I had come in the first place, as long as I got a chance to witness what was going on there. I was educated, it was clear. I could speak and write in English. And this was enough credentials to be a witness.Reading the New Light of Myanmar, the government-run newspaper, I saw that indeed the Kachin rebels have resumed fighting in Myitkyina, where I was headed. As the restaurant owner had earlier indicated, the news also told me that the Kachin were protesting the building of a dam by China; they had already blown up 22 bridges. A Tradition Revived, and a Cartoonist Rememberedhttp://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2244312-Nov-2011 If Ba Gyan, the father of Burmese cartoonists, were still alive today, he would no doubt delight in drawing some of the figures who dominate the country's current political landscape. But even more than this, he would take real pleasure in witnessing the revival of a tradition he started long before Burma achieved independence, and which continued long after his death in 1953.That tradition is the annual cartoon exhibition held at his home on Lower 13th Street in Rangoon, now named U Ba Gyan Street in his honor. For years, the exhibition was one of the local highlights of the Tazaungdaing festival of lights, which falls on the first full moon after the end of the Buddhist Lent. But in the late 1990s, the exhibition fell foul of Burma's censors and quietly faded away.Now, however, it has returned, in the latest sign of a modest cultural reawakening stirred by the Burmese government's recent relaxation of restrictions on artists and journalists.It was nearly a century ago that Ba Gyan started developing his talents at the Burma Art Club (BAC) in Rangoon. Founded by a high-ranking British railway official named Martin Jones in 1918, the BAC offered drawing and painting lessons to young Burmese artists, and a place where they could meet and exchange ideas. It was here that Ba Gyan met Ba Gale (another pioneering cartoonist), Hein Sunn, Saya Mya, Ba Zaw and Ohn Lwin, who all became famous national artists. Ba Gyan got his first break when one of his cartoons appeared in the Rangoon Gazette. He quit his government job and soon established himself as a household name. In addition to editorial cartoons that he used to spread a message of peace and reconciliation, he illustrated many children's books and directed Burma’s first animated film. One of his fans was Burma's then Prime Minister U Nu, who thought that Ba Gyan's popular cartoons could be used not only to promote peace, but also to portray the dark side of the enemy—the communist insurgents who were waging war against his government. But Ba Gyan, who led a simple life and showed little interest in government offers of opportunities to study overseas and other perks, always said that the was too busy to meet U Nu. This is not to say, however, that Ba Gyan spared the communists in his cartoons. Both the government and the insurgents were regular targets of his sometimes biting sarcasm.But Ba Gyan also had his critics. The late Ludu Daw Amar, one of Burma's most famous leftist writers, described Ba Gyan's politics as simplistic. The cartoonist was, she said, better at ridiculing those opposed to his vision of peace and unity than he was at doing anything to achieve these goals.Such criticism did nothing, however, to blunt the Burmese public's love for Ba Gyan's creations. One of his characters, Hpyauk Seik, earned a special place in people's hearts. After Ba Gyan's wife died, Hpyauk Seik became hermit dressed in the garb of a holy mendicant, reflecting his sorrow.After independence, Ba Gyan was given Burma's highest honor for a national artist, the Ahlinga Kyawswa. But an even more fitting testimony to his greatness may be that nearly 60 years after his death, his spirit lives on through generations of fellow cartoonists who remain as inspired as ever by his vision and his wit. Myanmar to free more political prisoners: officialshttp://news.yahoo.com/myanmar-free-more-prisoners-officials-060811571.html13-Nov-2011 Some prisoners will be released on Monday," an official who did not wish to be named told AFP, while another added that "some prisoners of conscience from prisons outside Yangon" would be among those freed.The move comes after a mass amnesty by the regime last month disappointed observers and the opposition by failing to release most key dissidents.It also comes just a few days before the country's new nominally civilian administration is due to attend a summit of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) on the Indonesian island of Bali.Myanmar, which has shown signs of tentative reform in recent months and appears keen to break out of its international isolation, is seeking to take the ASEAN chair in 2014.Since assuming power in March, President Thein Sein, a former general, has surprised critics by holding direct talks with opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and by defying ally China by freezing work on an unpopular mega-dam.The release of all of the country's political prisoners, who include pro-democracy campaigners, journalists and lawyers, however, remains a top demand of Western nations which imposed sanctions on Myanmar.The new regime, which replaced a long-ruling military junta after a controversial election, pardoned more than 6,300 prisoners -- including about 200 political detainees -- in a much-anticipated amnesty in October.Among those released were members of Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) party and celebrated comedian and vocal government critic Zarganar, who goes by one name only.But many leading dissidents, including key figures involved in a failed 1988 student-led uprising, were kept behind bars.The exact number of political prisoners currently locked up in Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, is unclear.Before last month's amnesty, rights groups and observers believed the country had roughly 2,000 political detainees but NLD spokesman Nyan Win said the real number was lower."About 500 political prisoners are still in prison. About 200 of them are NLD members," he told AFP.A government-appointed human rights panel, meanwhile, said in an open letter in the state-run New Light of Myanmar newspaper on Sunday there were around 300 political detainees left in the country.In the letter, the national human rights commission, which was created in September, called for a new amnesty that would include political prisoners "who do not pose a threat to the stability of State and public tranquility".The previous amnesty was also preceded by an open letter from the commission.Monday's prisoner release will coincide with a press conference by popular democracy icon Suu Kyi to mark the first anniversary of her release after years of house arrest, just days after the country's widely condemned 2010 elections.Her NLD party was delisted last year for boycotting the first polls for 20 years, but its members will discuss this Friday whether to re-register following changes to registration laws.Amid a thaw in relations with the government, the NLD is widely expected to return to the political arena, paving the way for Nobel Peace Prize winner Suu Kyi to contest an upcoming, as yet unscheduled, by-election.While the United Nations, the United States and the European Union have acknowledged the army-backed government's recent conciliatory gestures, they continue to press for major reforms.US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Friday said Myanmar needed to do "much more" to improve human rights despite her belief that "real changes" were under way.Speaking to reporters at an Asia-Pacific gathering in Hawaii, she also repeated a call for the unconditional release of all political prisoners. Suu Kyi may stand in Burma pollhttp://www.bangkokpost.com/news/asia/265948/suu-kyi-likely-to-stand-in-burma-by-election12-Nov-2011 Burma's democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi is likely to contest an upcoming by-election, a party spokesman said Saturday, paving the way for a political comeback after years of exclusion by army generals.Burmese democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi (pictured in September) is likely to contest a by-election in the coming months, following a change to party registration laws. The National League for Democracy, delisted last year for boycotting a rare election, will on Friday consider whether to re-register as a political party, paving the way for Suu Kyi to return to the official political arena.Her National League for Democracy (NLD), delisted last year for boycotting the first elections for 20 years, will consider on Friday whether to re-register as a political party, after Burma's president recently approved changes to the registration laws. "The NLD is likely to register and also Daw Suu is likely to participate at the coming by-election," Nyan Win, a party spokesman told AFP. Daw is a term of respect.It is not yet clear when a by-election will be held, but there are more than 40 seats available in parliament's two chambers.Suu Kyi swept the NLD to election victory in 1990 but the party was barred from taking office, and it shunned last year's vote largely because of rules that would have forced it to expel imprisoned members. Suu Kyi was under house arrest at the time.Locked up for 15 of the past 22 years, the 66-year-old Nobel peace prize winner was released from her latest stint in detention a few days after last November's poll, which was widely condemned as a farce by the West.The new army-backed government has, however, surprised critics with a string of reformist steps, such as defying ally China by freezing work on an unpopular mega-dam in the north, and holding direct talks with Suu Kyi.The daughter of Burma's independence hero Aung San, who was assassinated in 1947, Suu Kyi took on a leading role in the pro-democracy movement in 1988, the year that protests erupted against the military and were brutally crushed.Widely known as "The Lady" in Burma, she became a beacon of hope for many in her country in the face of repression, but was widely feared by the military rulers.While Burma's nominally civilian government is still filled with former generals, the government said in September it was ready to work with Suu Kyi and her party if they officially re-entered politics.A decision to re-register is widely expected, with 100 senior NLD members gathering in Rangoon on Friday to discuss the move.Nyan Win did not comment on which constituency Suu Kyi would stand in, or what kind of position she expected, but party sources said she would contest in a Rangoon township.His comments came a day after US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Burma needed to do "much more" to improve human rights, despite her belief that "real changes" were under way."We continue to call for the unconditional release of all political prisoners and an end to the violence in ethnic minority areas," she told reporters at an Asia-Pacific summit in Hawaii.Burma's law on political parties amended this month, and endorsed by President Thein Sein, removes the condition that all parties must agree to "preserve" the country's 2008 constitution, according to state media.The wording has now been changed to "respect and obey", it said -- a small alteration but one that would allow the NLD to criticise and suggest changes to the constitution.Burma expert Aung Naing Oo of the Vahu Development Institute, a Thai-based think-tank, said the NLD's return to the political process would offer the country "a better relationship with the international community"."It is really, really important for Burma. It will be seen as a normal country for the first time in 23 to 24 years," he told AFP, using Burma's former name.Suu Kyi, who was feted by thousands of supporters in August on her first political trip outside Rangoon since she was freed, is expected to hold a press conference on Monday to mark the first anniversary of her release.

အလုပ္ရုံေဆြးေႏြးပဲြ အမွတ္စဥ္ (၁ရ)။

2011-10-24T07:43:00.002+09:00

ျမန္မာႏုိင္ငံသားအလုပ္သမားမ်ားသမဂၢ - ဂ်ပန္ျပည္ရဲ႕အလုပ္ရုံေဆြးေႏြးပဲြ အမွတ္စဥ္ (၁ရ)။"ဂ်ပန္ေရာက္ျမန္မာနုိင္ငံသားအလုပ္သမားမ်ားရဲ႕ စိုးရိမ္ဘြယ္ အနာဂတ္"သမတဦးသိန္းစိန္အစိုးရရဲ႕ အေပၚယံဟန္ျပ "ဒီမိုကေရစီျပဳျပင္ေျပာင္းလဲေရး"ႏွင္႔ ေစတနာမွန္ႏွင္႔ ျပဳလုပ္ေနတာ ဟုတ္ရဲ႕လားလို႕ သံသယျဖစ္စရာ "ျပည္ပေရာက္ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံသားမ်ားကို ျပန္လာဖို႔ ဖိတ္ေခၚေနတဲ႔ကိစၥ"တို႔ကို အေၾကာင္းျပဳၿပီး ဂ်ပန္ နယူကန္ (လူ၀င္မႈႀကီးၾကပ္ေရး)က ျမန္မာရစ္ဖ်ဴဂ်ီ (ဒုကၡသည္)ေတြႏွင္႔ ျမန္မာရစ္ဖ်ဴဂ်ီ (ဒုကၡသည္) ေလွ်ာက္ထားဆဲ ပုဂၢိဳလ္မ်ားေပၚ ဘယ္လိုတုန္႔ျပန္ လုပ္ေဆာင္ လာႏိုင္သလဲဆိုတာကို ယခုအခါ ဂ်ပန္ေရာက္ျမန္မာနုိင္ငံသားအလုပ္သမားမ်ားအၾကားမွာ ေဆြးေႏြးတိုင္ပင္ၿပီး၊ လိုအပ္တဲ႔ ျပင္ဆင္မႈေတြလုပ္ဖို႔ အခ်ိန္တန္ေနပါၿပီ။ထို႔အျပင္ လာမည္႔ ၂၀၁၂ခုႏွစ္၊ ဇူလိုင္လမွာ အသက္၀င္လာမည္႔ "ႏိုင္ငံျခားသား မွတ္ပုံတင္ ဥပေဒသစ္" က ဂ်ပန္ေရာက္ျမန္မာနုိင္ငံသားအလုပ္သမားမ်ားအေပၚ ဘယ္လို ကန္႔သတ္ ဖိစီးမႈေတြျဖစ္လာေစမွာလဲ ဆိုတာကိုလည္း သိထားဖို႔အေရးႀကီးပါတယ္။ အထူးသျဖင္႔ ေနထိုင္ခြင္႔ဗီဇာ မရွိသူမ်ားအတြက္ အလြန္ စုိးရိမ္ဘြယ္ အက်ဳိးဆက္မ်ားရွိေနပါတယ္။ တရား၀င္ အလုပ္လုပ္ခြင္႔ ဆုံးရႈံးဖို႔ ေသခ်ာသေလာက္ျဖစ္ေနၿပီ ႏိုင္ငံျခားသားမွတ္ပုံတင္ကဒ္ျပားမ်ားလည္း ကုိင္ေဆာင္ခြင္႔ ရေတာ႔မွာ မဟုတ္ေတာ႔ပါဘူး။ အနာဂတ္ကာလတခုအထိ ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံမွာ ဆက္လက္ေနထိုင္ရမည္႔ အေျခအေနရွိေနတဲ႔ ဂ်ပန္ေရာက္ ျမန္မာနုိင္ငံသားအလုပ္သမားမ်ား ကလည္း ေရရွည္ေနထုိင္ဖို႕ လိုအပ္တဲ႔ ျပင္ဆင္မႈေတြလုပ္ဖို႔ကလည္း အလြန္ အေရးႀကီး ေနပါၿပီ။ သက္ႀကီးပင္စင္ကိစၥ၊ သားသမီး ပညာေရးကိစၥ၊ တည္ၿငိမ္ၿပီး ေရရွည္တည္တန္႔မယ္႔ အလုပ္အကိုင္၊ "အဆင္႔ျမင္႔ၿပီး အာမခံရွိတဲ႔ ဂ်ပန္လူမႈလုဲၿခံဳေရးကြန္ရက္" အတြင္း၀င္ေရာက္ခြင္႔ရရွိေရး စတဲ႔ ကိစၥရပ္မ်ားကို ေတြးေႏြးႏိုင္ရန္ မရွိမျဖစ္လိုအပ္ေနပါၿပီ။အထက္ေဖၚျပပါကိစၥရပ္မ်ားကို ကၽြမ္းက်င္ေသာ ဂ်ပန္အလုပ္သမားသမဂၢအရာရွိတဦးႏွင္႔ ဂ်ပန္တြင္ ေနထိုင္လွ်က္ရွိေသာ အေမရိကန္ အလုပ္သမားေရး ကၽြမ္းက်င္သူတဦးတို႔ႏွင္႔အတူ ေဆြးေႏြးမည္ျဖစ္ပါသျဖင္႔ ဂ်ပန္ေရာက္ျမန္မာနုိင္ငံသားအလုပ္သမားမ်ား (သမဂၢ၀င္မ်ားေရာ သမဂၢ၀င္ မဟုတ္သူမ်ားပါ) ပါ၀င္ေဆြေႏြးပါရန္ ေလးစားစြာ ဖိတ္ေခၚအပ္ပါသည္။အလုပ္ရုံေဆြးေႏြးပဲြ က်င္းပမည္႔ေနရာ။ ။ Takabanobaba-Totsuka Chiki Center B-1 新宿区　高田馬場　戸塚地域　センターအလုပ္ရုံေဆြးေႏြးပဲြ က်င္းပမည္႔ေနရက္။ ။ ၂၀၁၁ခုႏွစ္၊ ေအာက္တိုိဘာလ(၃၀)ရက္။အလုပ္ရုံေဆြးေႏြးပဲြ က်င္းပမည္႔အခ်ိန္။ ။ မြန္လဲြ (၁)နာရီမွ (၄)နာရီ အထိ။အဂၤလိပ္ -ျမန္မာ၊ ဂ်ပန္ - ျမန္မာ ဘာသာမ်ားျဖစ္ေဆြးေႏြးပါမည္။ ဂ်ပန္ - ျမန္မာ ဘာသာျပန္ကို ဆရာဦးေရႊဘ က ကူညီေပးပါမည္။

စြပ္စြဲခ်က္မ်ား အေျခအျမစ္မရွိဟု FTUB ဦးေမာင္ေမာင္ ေျဖရွင္း

2011-04-05T05:32:00.003+09:00

ဦးေမာင္ေမာင္ ရွင္းလင္းေျပာၾကား ေနစဥ္ (ဓာတ္ပံု - ဧရာ၀တီ)

04 April 2011,

ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံ အလုပ္သမား သမဂၢမ်ား အဖြဲ႔ခ်ဳပ္ (FTUB) ၏ အေထြေထြ အတြင္းေရးမႈးခ်ဳပ္ ဦးေမာင္ေမာင္က ျမန္မာျပည္ တြင္းသို႔ သြားသည္ဆိုေသာ ၎အေပၚ စြပ္စြဲထားမႈ မ်ားသည္ အေျခအျမစ္ မရိွသည့္ ႏိုင္ငံေရးအရ ထိုးႏွက္ တိုက္ခိုက္မႈ မ်ားသာ ျဖစ္ေသာေၾကာင့္ ေျဖရွင္းရန္ အသင့္ ရိွသည္ဟု ေျပာၾကား လိုက္သည္။

ဦးေမာင္ေမာင္သည္ လြန္ခဲ့သည့္ ၂၀၀၈ ခုႏွစ္မွစ၍ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံသို႔ ၃ ႀကိမ္ သြားေရာက္ ခဲ့သည္ဟု ဦးေမာင္ေမာင္၏ မိခင္ အဖြဲ႔အစည္းမွ ဘ႑ာေရးမႉးေဟာင္း ဦးေဇာ္ထြန္းက မတ္လ ၃ ရက္ေန႔တြင္ အင္တာနက္ စာမ်က္ႏွာမ်ား မွတဆင့္ ဖြင့္ခ် ခဲ့သည္။

ထုိသုိ႔ ဖြင့္ခ်မႈႏွင့္ပတ္သက္၍ ထိုင္းျမန္မာနယ္စပ္တြင္ ယမန္ေန႔ကျပဳလုပ္ခဲ့သည့္ FTUB အဖြဲ႔၏ သတင္းစာ ရွင္းလင္းပြဲ တြင္ ဦးေမာင္ေမာင္က ရွင္းလင္းေျပာၾကားျခင္းျဖစ္သည္။

၎က“က်ေနာ္ ျမန္မာျပည္ လံုး၀ မသြားဘူး ဆိုတာကို ရွင္းလင္းတာျဖစ္တယ္၊ စြပ္စြဲခ်က္ေတြနဲ႔ ပတ္သက္ၿပီး အိမ္ရွင္ႏိုင္ငံ ရဲ႕လ၀က ကို သြားေမး တဲ့အခါမွာ ဘယ္သူမဆို ဒီႏိုင္ငံကေန ႏုိင္ငံတကာ ခရီးစဥ္ သြားမယ္ဆိုရင္ ဓာတ္ပံု မွတ္တမ္းရိွပါ တယ္၊ က်ေနာ့္မွာ ထိုင္းႏိုင္ငံကေန အ၀င္ အထြက္မွတ္တမ္း ေတြရိွပါတယ္၊ စြပ္စြဲ ထားတဲ့ခရီးစဥ္ ၃ ခု ရဲ႕ရက္စြဲေတြမွာ ျမန္ မာျပည္ သြားထားတဲ့ မွတ္တမ္းေတြ လံုး၀မရိွပါဘူး”ဟု သက္ေသခံ စာရြက္စာတမ္း မွတ္တမ္း ဓာတ္ပံုမ်ားႏွင့္ တကြ ရွင္း လင္းေျပာဆိုသည္။

စြပ္စြဲခ်က္ပါ ေန႔ရက္မ်ားတြင္ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံသို႔ ခရီး သြားလာခြင့္ မရိွေၾကာင္း ေဖာ္ျပထားသည့္ ထိုင္းႏိုင္ငံ လူ၀င္မႈ ႀကီးၾကပ္ေရး ဌာန(လ၀က)မွ ထုတ္ေပးသည့္ သက္ေသခံ စာရြက္စာတမ္းမ်ား ႏွင့္အတူ ထိုင္း ေလေၾကာင္းလိုင္း Thai Airways Royal Orchid Plus က ထုတ္ေပးသည့္ အခ်က္အလက္ မွတ္တမ္း မ်ားကိုလည္း ဦးေမာင္ေမာင္ က သက္ေသ အျဖစ္ တင္ျပ သည္။

FTUB မွျပဳလုပ္ခဲ့သည့္ သတင္းစာ ရွင္းလင္းပြဲပါ အခ်က္အလက္ႏွင့္ အေၾကာင္း အရာမ်ားကို အေသးစိပ္ သိရိွလိုပါက ဖုန္းနံပါတ္ ၀၈၀ - ၆၈၈ ၃၅ ၁၉ သို႔ ဆက္သြယ္ ေမးျမန္း ႏိုင္သည္ဟုလည္း ဆိုသည္။

ျမန္မာ အတိုက္အခံ တပ္ေပါင္းစု ေခါင္းေဆာင္ တဦးက“ဒီျပႆနာက အေတာ့္ကို ႀကီးမားတဲ့ ကိစၥ ျဖစ္တယ္၊ စြပ္စြဲခ်က္ ေတြမွန္ခဲ့ရင္ ႀကီးမားတဲ့ အေရးယူမႈေတြနဲ႔ ရင္ဆိုင္ ရမွာျဖစ္သလို၊ မဟုတ္ ခဲ့ရင္လည္း စြပ္စြဲတဲ့လူကို သူ ေနထိုင္ရာ တိုင္းျပည္ ရဲ႕ ဥပေဒ ေၾကာင္းအရ အေရးယူမႈေတြ လုပ္ကို လုပ္ရမွာျဖစ္တယ္၊ ဒီကိစၥက တပ္ေပါင္းစု ေတာ္လွန္ေရးႀကီး တခုလံုးကို ဖ်က္လို ဖ်က္ဆီး လုပ္တာ ျဖစ္တဲ့အတြက္၊ ဘယ္ တပ္ေပါင္းစု အဖြဲ႔၀င္ကမွ သည္းခံ ခြင့္လြတ္မွာ မဟုတ္ဘူး”ဟုေျပာ သည္။

သတင္းစာ ရွင္းလင္းပြဲတြင္ ဦးေမာင္ေမာင္ ျမန္မာျပည္ သြားမသြား ဧရာ၀တီ က ေမးျမန္းသည္ကို ၎က ျမန္မာျပည္သို႔ လုံး၀ မသြားေၾကာင္း၊ ေျဖရွင္းရန္ အသင့္ ရွိေၾကာင္း ျပန္လည္ ေျဖၾကားသည္။

ျမန္မာ အတိုက္အခံ တပ္ေပါင္းစု ေခါင္းေဆာင္ တဦးျဖစ္သည့္ ျပည္ေထာင္စု ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံ အမ်ိဳးသားေကာင္စီ(NCUB) ၏ အေထြေထြ အတြင္းေရးမႉး ဦးေမာင္ေမာင္ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံတြင္းသို႔ ၃ ႀကိမ္ သြားေရာက္ ခဲ့သည္ဟူေသာ စြပ္စြဲခ်က္ႏွင့္ ပတ္ သက္၍ NCUB အဖြဲ႔သည္ စံုစမ္း စစ္ေဆးမႈမ်ား ျပဳလုပ္ႏိုင္ရန္ အတြက္ ၄ ဦးပါ ေကာ္မရွင္အဖြဲ႔ကို မတ္လ ၁၉ ရက္ေန႔က ဖြဲ႔စည္းခဲ့သည္။

ယင္း ၄ ဦးပါ အဖြဲ႔က လိုအပ္သည့္ အဖြဲ႔အစည္းမ်ား၊ သက္ဆိုင္သူမ်ားအား ေမးျမန္းစစ္ေဆးမႈမ်ားကို အျမန္ဆံုး ျပဳလုပ္ သြားမည္ျဖစ္ကာ စံုစမ္း စစ္ေဆး ေတြ႔ရိွခ်က္မ်ားအား ဧၿပီလကုန္လွ်င္ NCUB သဘာပတိ အဖြဲ႔ထံသို႔ တင္ျပ အစီရင္ခံ ရမည္ျဖစ္သည္။

ေကာ္မရွင္၏ စစ္ေဆး ေတြ႔ရိွမႈမ်ားအရ NCUB သဘာပတိအဖြဲ႔က ျဖစ္စဥ္ႏွင့္ ပတ္သက္၍ ၾကားနာ သြားမည္ျဖစ္ၿပီး လက္ရိွတြင္ စံုစမ္း စစ္ေဆးေရး ေကာ္မရွင္အဖြဲ႔သည္ သက္ဆိုင္ရာလူပုဂၢိဳလ္တခ်ိဳ႕ အပါအ၀င္ ဦးေမာင္ေမာင္ႏွင့္ ဦးေဇာ္ထြန္း တို႔ကိုလည္း စံုစမ္း ေမးျမန္းမႈမ်ား ျပဳလုပ္ခဲ့ၿပီး ျဖစ္သည္ဟု သိရသည္။

FTUB ကျပဳလုပ္သည့္ သတင္းစာ ရွင္းလင္းပြဲႏွင့္ပတ္သက္၍ စံုစမ္းစစ္ေဆးေရး ေကာ္မရွင္အဖြဲ႔၀င္တဦး ျဖစ္သည့္ ပဒို ေစာအားတိုးက“အဲဒီ သတင္းစာ ရွင္းလင္းပြဲက FTUB အေနနဲ႔ လုပ္တာ၊ ဒါက သူတို႔ရဲ႕လြတ္လပ္ခြင့္ပဲ၊ NCUB နဲ႔ ဘာမွ မဆိုင္သလို ေကာ္မရွင္အဖြဲ႔နဲ႔လည္း ဘာမွမသက္ဆိုင္ဘူး၊ ေကာ္မရွင္ကေတာ့ သူ႔အလုပ္ပဲ သူလုပ္သြားမွာျဖစ္တယ္”ဟု ဧရာ၀တီသို႔ ေျပာသည္။

NCUB အဖြဲ႔ကို ၁၉၉၂ ခုႏွစ္က မာနယ္ပေလာ လြတ္ေျမာက္နယ္ေျမတြင္ ျမန္မာ အတိုက္အခံ အင္အားစုမ်ားႏွင့္ စတင္ဖြဲ႔စည္းခဲ့ၿပီး လက္ရိွအဖြဲ႔၏ ဥကၠဌ မွာ ပဒို ေဒးဗစ္ သာကေဘာ ျဖစ္ၿပီး အေထြေထြ အတြင္းေရးမႉး မွာ ဦးေမာင္ေမာင္ျဖစ္သည္။

Posted by PNSjapan at 10:27 PM

Labels: သတင္း

FTUB အတြင္းေရးမွဴး ဦးေမာင္ေမာင္ ထုတ္ျပန္ေႀကျငာခ်က္

2011-04-04T18:43:00.000+09:00

2011_April_3_UMM_did_not_travel_to_Burma_bur_ -

ILO ကိုယ္စားလွယ္အဖြဲ႔ FTUB ေခါင္းေဆာင္ေတြနဲ႔ ေဆြးေႏြး

2011-02-27T03:17:00.000+09:00

2011-02-26
ၿပီးခဲ့တဲ့ ရက္ပုိင္းအတြင္း ျမန္မာႏုိင္ငံကို သြားေရာက္ခဲ့တဲ့ ILO ဒု ညႊန္ၾကား ေရးမွဴးခ်ဳပ္ Mr. Guy Ryder နဲ႔ ကိုယ္စားလွယ္အဖြဲ႔ဟာ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံ အလုပ္သမားသမဂၢမ်ားအဖြဲ႔ခ်ဳပ္ FTUB နဲ႔ ဘန္ေကာက္ၿမိဳ႕မွာ ဒီကေန႔ ေတြ႔ဆုံေဆြးေႏြးခဲ့တယ္ လို႔ သိရပါတယ္။

ေဖေဖာ္ဝါရီလ ၂၂ ရက္ကေန ၂၅ ရက္ေန႔အထိ ၄ ရက္ၾကာ ျမန္မာႏုိင္ငံခရီးစဥ္ အၿပီး ဘန္ေကာက္ၿမိဳ႕ကို ျပန္ေရာက္လာစဥ္ အခုလို ေတြ႔ဆုံၾကတာ ျဖစ္တယ္လို႔ FTUB ရဲ႕ အေထြေထြအတြင္းေရးမွဴး ဦးေမာင္ေမာင္က RFA ကို ေျပာပါတယ္။

“FTUB နဲ႔ ဒီ Guy Ryder ဦးေဆာင္တဲ့ ILO ကုိယ္စားလွယ္အဖြဲ႔ အစည္းအေဝးပါ။ ဒါ သူ႔ရဲ႕ ပထမဆံုး ခရီးစဥ္ေပါ့ေနာ္။ က်ေနာ္တို႔ႏိုင္ငံကို စီးပြားေရးပိတ္ဆို႔မႈနဲ႔ ပတ္သက္ၿပီးေတာ့ ရွင္းရွင္းလင္းလင္း သိခဲ့ရတယ္၊ ေနျပည္ေတာ္မွာလည္း သူသြားၿပီး ေတြ႔ခဲ့ရတယ္ ဆုိတဲ့အတြက္ အားမရေသးတာေတာ့ ရွိေပမယ့္ ဆက္လက္ၿပီး အလုပ္လုပ္ဖို႔၊ ေနာက္ ILO ရံုးကို လူအင္အား ေငြအင္အား ျဖည့္ဖို႔ေတြ၊ ေနာက္တခါ လြတ္လပ္စြာ ဖြဲ႔စည္းမႈဆုိတဲ့ Freedom of association နဲ႔႔ ပတ္သက္ၿပီး ပိုၿပီး ထိထိေရာက္ေရာက္ လုပ္ဖုိ႔ လုိမယ္ဆုိတဲ့အေၾကာင္း ေဆြးေႏြးသြားပါတယ္။”

Mr. Guy Ryder ရဲ႕ ကိုယ္စားလွယ္အဖြဲ႔ဟာ ေနျပည္ေတာ္ကို ေရာက္ခဲ့စဥ္ ျမန္မာစစ္အစိုးရ အလုပ္သမားေရး ဝန္ႀကီး အပါအဝင္ အက်ဥ္းဦးစီးဌာန တာဝန္ရွိသူေတြနဲ႔ ျမန္မာႏုိင္ငံမွာ လြတ္လပ္စြာ သင္းပင္းဖြဲ႔စည္းပိုင္ခြင့္ ဆိုင္ရာ အေၾကာင္းအရာေတြကို ေဆြးေႏြးခဲ့ၾကတယ္လို႔ သိရပါတယ္။

အဓမၼလုပ္အားေပး ခုိင္းေစမႈ ပေပ်ာက္ေရးအတြက္ ILO အဖြဲ႔နဲ႔ လက္တြဲ လုပ္သြားဖို႔ ျမန္မာစစ္အစိုးရက သေဘာတူ လက္မွတ္ေရးထိုးခဲ့တာဟာ အခုတႀကိမ္န႔ဲဆို ၄ ႀကိမ္ရွိသြားၿပီလုိ႔ သိရပါတယ္။

ဒီကေန႔ ဘန္ေကာက္ၿမိဳ႕မွာ ILO ကိုယ္စားလွယ္အဖြဲ႔နဲ႔ ေတြ႔ဆုံေဆြးေႏြးခဲ့တာန႔ဲ ပတ္သက္လို႔ FTUB အေထြေထြ အတြင္းေရးမွဴး ဦးေမာင္ေမာင္ကုိ RFA ဝိုင္းေတာ္သား ကိုဥာဏ္ဝင္းေအာင္က ဆက္သြယ္ ေမးျမန္းထားပါတယ္။

ျမန္မာစစ္အစိုးရႏွင့္ အုိင္အယ္အုိ စာခြ်န္လႊာ သက္တမ္းတုိး

2011-02-26T03:27:00.000+09:00

2011-02-25
ရန္ကုန္မွာ ေရာက္ရွိေနတဲ့ အုိင္အယ္အုိ အရာရွိ မစၥတာ ဂုိင္း ႐ိုက္ဒါက ဒီကေန႔ ေဖေဖာ္ဝါရီ ၂၅ ရက္ မနက္မွာ ျမန္မာ့ ဒီမုိကေရစီ ေခါင္းေဆာင္ ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္ကုိ ေနအိမ္မွာ သြားေရာက္ ေတြ႕ဆုံခဲ့ေၾကာင္း သတင္းရရွိပါတယ္။

(Photo: AFP)

ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံတြင္ ကေလးသူငယ္မ်ား အ႐ြယ္ႏွင့္မမွ် ဤကဲ့သို႔ အလုပ္လုပ္ေနၾကရသည္မွာ အလုပ္သမား ျပႆနာႀကီးတခု ျဖစ္ပါသည္။ (Photo: AFP)

မစၥတာ ဂုိင္း ႐ိုက္ဒါဟာ ျမန္မာစစ္အစိုးရနဲ႔ အုိင္အယ္အုိအၾကား နားလည္မႈ စာခၽြန္လႊာ တႏွစ္ သက္တမ္းတုိးဖုိ႔ ျမန္မာႏုိင္ငံမွာ ေရာက္ရွိေနတာ ျဖစ္ၿပီး မေန႔က စာခၽြန္လႊာကုိ လက္မွတ္ေရးထုိးခဲ့ပါတယ္။

ဒီကေန႔ ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္နဲ႔ ေတြ႕ဆုံေဆြးေႏြးခဲ့တဲ့ အေၾကာင္းေတြကုိ အန္အယ္ဒီ ျပန္ၾကားေရးတာဝန္ခံ ဦးအုန္းႀကိဳင္က အခုလို ေျပာျပပါတယ္။

“ILO အဖြဲ႕က နအဖ အစိုးရနဲ႔ ေဆြးေႏြးခဲ့တဲ့ အေၾကာင္းအရာေတြကို ရွင္းျပတယ္လို႔ သိရပါတယ္။ အဓမၼ လုပ္အားေပး ခိုင္းေစမႈ ကိစၥေတြ ပေပ်ာက္ေရးအတြက္ သေဘာတူထားတဲ့ စာခၽြန္လႊာကို သက္တမ္း တႏွစ္ တိုးၿပီး ေဆာင္႐ြက္ဖို႔ သေဘာတူခဲ့ၿပီး ျဖစ္တယ္။ ၿပီးေတာ့ ေနာက္ အလုပ္သမား အက်ိဳးစီးပြား ခံစားခြင့္ေတြနဲ႔ ပတ္သက္ၿပီးေတာ့ လုပ္ပိုင္ခြင့္ေတြ တိုးခ်ဲ႕ဖို႔ ကိစၥလည္း ေဆြးေႏြးခဲ့တယ္လို႔ အဲလို ေျပာပါတယ္။”

“အလုပ္သမားမ်ား အစည္းအ႐ံုးတို႔၊ သမဂၢတို႔ ဖြဲ႕စည္းေရး ကိစၥေတြလည္း ပါတယ္လို႔ ဆိုပါတယ္။ အဲဒီမွာ အေထြေထြ အတြင္းေရးမႉးကေတာ့ အခုလို အလုပ္သမား အက်ိဳးခံစားခြင့္ေတြကို တိုးခ်ဲ႕ၿပီးေတာ့ လုပ္ကိုင္ဖို႔ ႀကိဳးပမ္းတာကို သိရတဲ့အတြက္ေၾကာင့္ အားရပါတယ္၊ ဒီကိစၥေတြအတြက္ သေဘာလည္း တူပါတယ္၊ အဲဒီေတာ့ မည္သို႔ပင္ျဖစ္ေစ ILO လုပ္ငန္းေတြဟာ အခက္အခဲ အမ်ိဳးမ်ိဳးၾကားထဲမွာ ႀကိဳးပမ္းေနရတယ္ဆိုတာ သေဘာေပါက္ပါတယ္၊ ဘာပဲျဖစ္ျဖစ္ ILO ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံမွာ ဆက္လက္ၿပီး တည္ရွိေနတာကိုက အားတက္စရာ တခုပါပဲလို႔ အဲဒီလို ေျပာလိုက္တယ္လို႔ သိရပါတယ္ခင္ဗ်။”

ဒီေတြ႕ဆုံပဲြမွာ အန္အယ္ဒီ အလုပ္အမႈေဆာင္ေတြ ျဖစ္တဲ့ ဦးဉာဏ္ဝင္းနဲ႔ ဦးဟံသာျမင့္တုိ႔လည္း တက္ေရာက္ေၾကာင္း သိရပါတယ္။

ဒီကိစၥနဲ႔ ပတ္သက္လုိ႔ ဦးဉာဏ္ဝင္းကို RFA ဝိုင္းေတာ္သား ကိုေနရိန္ေက်ာ္ ဆက္သြယ္ ေမးျမန္းထားပါတယ္။

FWUBC ျပည္တြင္းနိုင္ငံေရးရံပုံေငြ-လစဥ္(ယန္းတစ္ေထာင္)-အလႉရွင္စာရင္း(၁၃-ေဖေဖာ္ဝါရီ-၂၀၁၁ေန ့စာရင္း)

2011-02-14T02:19:00.000+09:00

FWUBC ျပည္တြင္းနိုင္ငံေရးရံပုံေငြ-လစဥ္(ယန္းတစ္ေထာင္)
အလႉရွင္စာရင္း(၁၃-ေဖေဖာ္ဝါရီ-၂၀၁၁ေန ့စာရင္း)

၁။ဦးတင္ဝင္း
၂။ေဒၚတင္ႏြယ္ဝင္း
၃။ေဒၚမာလာ
၄။ဦးသန္းထြန္းနိုင္
၅။ဦးဘုန္းလိႈင္
၆။မေႏြရည္ဦး
၇။မညိုညိုစန္း
၈။ေမာင္ျမတ္ေထြး
၉။ကိုေဌးျမင့္
၁၀။ဦးျမင့္ေဆြ
၁၁။ကိုလွစိုးဦး
၁၂။ကိုေနလင္းေအာင္
၁၃။ကိုစိုးမင္းသိန္း
၁၄။ကိုစိုးမင္းျငိမ္း
၁၅။ဦးေနေအာင္
၁၆။မဇင္ေဝျဖိဳး
၁၇။မမီမီခိုင္
၁၈။ကိုေအာင္မ်ိဳးမင္း
၁၉။ကိုေက်ာ္သိန္းလြင္
၂၀။ကိုထိန္ဝင္း
၂၁။ကိုဇာနီေအာင္နိုင္
၂၂။ကိုထြန္းေအာင္လင္း
၂၃။မျမင့္ျမင့္လိႈင္
၂၄။မေမနွင္းေဝ
၂၅ကိုေအာင္ေအာင္မိုး
၂၆။ကိုဝင္းႀကိဳင္
၂၇။မသင္းသင္းဦး

၂၈။ဇင္မီမီျမင့္

JAMとアウンサンスーチー氏の電話会談

2011-02-10T01:04:00.002+09:00

日時：２０１１－０２－０４（１３；４５－１４；２０）
場所：JAMの事務所（田町）
出席者：JAMから副書記長・小山正樹さん、全国オルグ・北方龍二さん、大谷直子さん
ポンミントゥンさん、ミャットゥさん、ミンスイさん

冒頭、小山さんから、これまでのJAMとFWUBCのつながりを説明した。２００２年４月２８日、FWUBC結成大会からのさまざまな支援、そしてビルマでの民主化に対する協力を詳しく話した。北方さんからは、解雇や賃金未払い等に関するさまざまな労働問題の発生と解決に向けた労働相談活動の概要を説明した。そして労働問題だけではなく、山村医師の協力による健康相談や社会問題等に関する取り組みも紹介した。会談の中では、ＪＡＭから今後も出来る限りFWUBCの組合員、在日ビルマ人たちからの相談を受け、協力するとともに、ビルマでの民主化運動を支援し、日本政府へも働きかけていきたいと話した。

アウンサンスーチー氏の話の概要は以下のとおり。

「FWUBCＦＷＵＢＣの3つの目的が気に入りました。特に最後の『自由な労働組合をビルマ国内で設立できるようにするため』という点です。民主主義国家であるからこそ、自由な労働組合を作ることが出来る、だからこそ民主主義を応援する、などの文言に私はとっても感心しました。それから、私たちとJAMと緊密な関係を構築することが大切だと思います。ビルマの労働者達とも連携を取っていただきたいのです。なぜならば、現在、ビルマでは、労働者達に現政府が労働組合を作ってあげるという情報が出ていますが、どんな組合になるのか、私には分かりません。真の労働組合はどういう形であるべきか、そして、労働者にとってなくてはならない等、労働組合の目的や役割を労働者達に知ってもらうための勉強会や、実践を前向きに行いたい。そして、民主主義は労働者達にとってどんなに重要なのかを労働者達に知ってもらい、そして、民主主義実現のため、われわれには日本政府の支援が必要不可欠であり、現政府に対しての圧力が必要であると考えます。」

在日ビルマ市民労働組合
書記長ミンスイ

Military junta ex-general named Myanmar president

2011-02-04T23:47:00.000+09:00

Fri Feb 4, 6:01 am ET
YANGON, Myanmar – Myanmar's newly elected parliament named a key figure in the long-ruling military junta as president Friday, ensuring that the first civilian government in decades will be dominated by the army that has brutally suppressed dissent.

The appointment of Thein Sein, 65, was the latest step in Myanmar's self-declared transition to democracy following elections in November, but critics including recently freed opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi have slammed the process as a sham aimed at cementing military rule.

"This is not surprising. It is what we had expected," Nobel Peace Prize laureate Suu Kyi told reporters Friday. Suu Kyi's party won the previous elections in 1990 but was blocked at the time from taking power by the military. The party boycotted November's vote, calling it unfair.

Suu Kyi spent 15 of the last 21 years in prison or under house arrest and was released late last year after the vote was held.

The military's delegates in parliament and their civilian allies hold an 80 percent majority in the new legislature, which handpicked the new president from a pool of three vice presidents named on Thursday. Thein Sein is the most prominent of the three and was seen as a shoe-in for the head of government.

An upper house lawmaker, Khin Shwe, contacted as he left the parliament said Thein Sein won 408 out of 659 votes.

The future role of junta chief Senior Gen. Than Shwe, who has wielded absolute power since 1992, remains unclear. But he is expected to remain a dominant force.

Under the 2008 constitution that came into force Monday with the opening of the Union Parliament, the president appoints the commander-in-chief, chief ministers of the regions and states and several Cabinet ministers.

Thein Sein is a former general who served as the junta's prime minister from October 2007 and now heads the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party, which won a huge majority in November's general elections that much of the international community dismissed as rigged in favor of the junta.

He also has an image as a "clean" soldier, not engaged in corruption. Still, as prime minister and the fourth-ranking military leader in the junta, Thein Sein previously did not have much decision-making power.

Members of the new president's political party described him as a moderate with political skills that went unnoticed in his previous job.

"He's a very patient man and very decisive. I believe he can do more for the welfare of the grassroots people, and I see him as a person who can help develop Myanmar's economy," said Khin Shwe, a business tycoon and lawmaker from Thein Sein's USDP party.

The army has held power in Myanmar since 1962. There has been general curiosity in Myanmar about who will become the next president, but there is also a widespread perception that the military cheated in the elections and that the new government will not bring democratic change.

(This version corrects that Suu Kyi was detained for 15 of last 21 years)

Demo infront of the National Diet of Japan,tokyo/26-1-2011

2011-01-27T04:50:00.000+09:00

(ေပၚေပါက္လာမည့္အစိုးရကိုဂ်ပန္ေရာက္ၿမန္မာ့ဒီမိုအင္အားစုမ်ားမွအသိအမွတ္မၿပဳေႀကာင္းႏွင့္
ဂ်ပန္အစိုးရမွလည္းအသိအမွတ္မၿပဳရန္တိုက္တြန္းေတာင္းဆိုပြဲ
26/27/28-1-2011 pm3 to pm4) ...

Letter to His Excellency Mr. Seiji Maehara on the Eve of Burmese military junta’s sham parliament From Network for Democracy in Burma

2011-01-26T03:31:00.000+09:00

Letter to His Excellency Mr. Seiji Maehara on the Eve of Burmese military junta’s sham parliament
From Network for Democracy in Burma

His Excellency Mr. Seiji Maehara,
Ministry of Foreign Affairs,

Date January (25), 2011

Dear H.E Mr. Seiji Maehara,

On 31st January, the Burmese military junta will convene their sham parliament to cement their rule. The unequivocal denial of Senior General Than Shwe to review the Constitution before the election, as demanded by the NLD, has finally ended the NLD’s long quest to achieve a political dialogue between the junta leader and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of the party which won a landslide victory in the 1990 election but the results of which were never recognized by the junta.
There is no doubt that the Nov. 7 elections were not only flawed, but also rigged and thoroughly fraudulent and the military’s grip on Burma is as iron-fisted as ever. This election is a means to institutionalize the military’s grip on power under the 2008 Constitution, rather than establishing a democratic system in the country.
U.S. President Barack Obama had accused Burma’s military rulers of “stealing” the country’s first election in 20 years as part of a ploy to remain in power and also U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Burma held the vote in conditions that were “insufficiently inclusive, participatory and transparent.”
We have to understand that the recent election and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s release were not the beginning of the end of repression, or the first, tangible step toward national reconciliation.
It is essential to remember that the recent elections will only produce yet another military government under a different guise, which has also happened before. In 1962, a Revolutionary Council seized power, organized a “referendum” on a new constitution in 1973, then in 1974 the military-controlled Burma Socialist Programme Party formed a “civilian” government made up of “retired army officers.”
For those reasons mentioned above, we, the member organizations of newly founded “Network for Democracy in Burma” like to appeal to Your Excellency not to acknowledge or recognize the sham parliament and the so-called constitutional government that in actual fact is the new wine in the old bottle.
We would also like to urge Your Excellency to pressure the military junta to release all the political prisoners unconditionally and immediately and start the dialogue process with democratic leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.
Moreover, we would like to appeal to Your Excellency to give unwavering support both politically and materially to Daw Aung San Suu Kyi even well beyond her political party National League for Democracy was eventually disbanded by the military junta.

Sincerely yours,
Network for Democracy in Burma (in Japan),

軍事政権による偽りのビルマ国会開会にあたっての要請

2011-01-26T03:26:00.002+09:00

前原誠司外務大臣閣下

2011年1月25日

親愛なる前原誠司閣下

ビルマ軍事政権はその支配を強固なものにすべく、今年1月31日、偽りの国会を開会するとしています。国民民主連盟(NLD)の求めていた、総選挙前に制定された憲法の見直しを、タン・シュエ上将が全面否定したことにより、NLDが長く追求してきた、軍事政権指導者とアウン・サン・スー・チー女史、および、軍事政権は決して認めませんでしたが、1990年の総選挙で地滑り的勝利を収めた政党指導者との政治対話の実現に終止符が打たれました。

昨年11月7日に実施された総選挙は、欠陥があっただけでなく、全面的に不正に操作されたことに疑問の余地はなく、ビルマにおける軍事支配の冷酷さはこれまでと変わりありません。今回の総選挙は、ビルマにおける民主的システムを確立するよりもむしろ、2008年憲法の下、軍による政権掌握を制度化する手段として実施されまた。

バラク・オバマ米大統領は、ビルマ軍支配者が政権の座にとどまるための策略として、20年ぶりに実施された総選挙を「盗んでいる」と非難しました。また、潘基文国連事務総長は、「包括性、人々の参加、透明性のいずれも不十分」という状況下で投票が行われたと述べました。

私たちは、過日の総選挙とアウン・サン・スー・チー女史の解放が、抑圧の終わりのはじまり、あるいは、国民和解に向けた具体的な第一歩ではなかったということを理解する必要があります。過日の総選挙は、かつて起きたように、別の装いをした、もう１つの軍事政府をさらにつくりだすだけであろうということを思い出すことが重要です。1962年、革命評議会が政権を握り、1973年には新憲法に関する「国民投票」を組織しました。そして、1974年、軍事支配的な社会主義計画党が、「退役将校」からなる「文民」政府を樹立したのです。

これらの理由から、私たち、新たに結成された「ビルマ民主化ネットワーク」の構成組織は、閣下に、偽りの国会、および、実態は古い革袋に入れた新しいワインである、いわゆる立憲政府を承認あるいは理解されることのないよう要請します。

加えて、軍事政権に対し、すべての政治犯を即時に無条件解放し、民主化指導者アウン・サン・スー・チー女史との対話プロセスを開始するよう、強く働きかけていただくようお願いいたします。

さらに、政治および物資の両面から揺るぎないご支援を、軍事政権によって解散を余儀なくされた国民民主連盟以上に、アウン・サン・スー・チー女史に賜りますようお願い申し上げます。

ビルマ民主化ネットワーク日本

ျမန္မာ့ဒီမိုကေရစီအေရးေတာ္ပုံလႈပ္ရွားမႈဖိတ္ႀကားျခင္း

2011-01-23T03:24:00.002+09:00

ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံ ဒီမိုကေရစီ ကြန္ယက္(ဂ်ပန္)NDB-Japan
ျမန္မာ့ဒီမိုကေရစီအေရးေတာ္ပုံလႈပ္ရွားမႈဖိတ္ႀကားျခင္း
ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံ ဒီမိုကေရစီ ကြန္ယက္(ဂ်ပန္)NDB-Japan
မွဦးစီး၍ ေအာက္ပါအစီအစဥ္အတိုင္း နိုင္ငံေရးလႈပ္ရွားမႈ မ်ားကို က်င္းပျပဳလုပ္မည္
ျဖစ္ပါေသာေႀကာင့္ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံေရာက္ ျမန္မာ့ဒီမိုကေရစီေရးတိုက္ပဲြဝင္အဖဲြ ့အစည္း
အားလုံးပူးေပါင္းပါဝင္ႀကပါရန္ေလးစားစြာ ဖိတ္ႀကားအပ္ပါသည္။

အခမ္းအနားအစီအစဥ္မ်ား
◆ဇန္နဝါရီလ(၃၁)ရက္ေန႔တြင္ နအဖကျပဳလုပ္မည့္ လႊတ္ေတာ္ေခၚယူျခင္းနွင့္အဆိုပါ လြတ္ေတာ္မွတဆင့္ ေပၚေပါက္လာမည့္ ဟန္ျပ အရပ္သား အစိုးရအေပၚ ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံေရာက္ ျမန္မာ့ဒီမိုကေရစီ အင္အားစုမ်ားမွ လံုးဝအသိအမွတ္မျပဳေၾကာင္း နွင့္ ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံအစိုးရမွလည္းအသိအမွတ္ မျပဳရန္အတြက္ တိုက္တြန္း ေတာင္းဆိုမည့္
ဆႏၵျပပြဲမ်ားကို
☛(၁) ၂၀၁၁၊ဇန္နဝါရီလ၂၄ရက္ႏွင့္၂၅ရက္ေန႔မ်ားတြင္……..MOFAေရွ႔တြင္ လည္းေကာင္း၊
(KASUMI KASEKI ဘူတာ ထြက္ေပါက္-C-8)
အခ်ိန္(ညေန -၃-နာရီမွ-၄-နာရီအထိ)

☛(၂)၂၀၁၁၊ဇန္နဝါရီလ၂၆ရက္/၂၇ရက္/၂၈ရက္္……..ဂ်ပန္လႊတ္ေတာ္ေရွ႔
(KOKAI GIJIDOO MAE ဘူတာ ထြက္ေပါက္ -၂-)
အခ်ိန္(ညေန -၃-နာရီမွ-၄-နာရီအထိ)
☛(၃)၂၀၁၁၊ဇန္နဝါရီလ၃၁ရက္ေန ့တြင္…….. နအဖ မွ လြတ္ေတာ္ ေခၚယူၿပီး အဆိုပါ လြတ္ေတာ္မွ ေပၚေပါက္လာမည့္ ဟန္ျပ အရပ္သား အစိုးရအေပၚ ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံေရာက္ ျမန္မာ့ဒီမိုကေရစီ အင္အားစုမ်ားမွ လက္မခံေၾကာင္း ဆန္က်င္ ကန္႔ကြက္သည့္ အခမ္းအနား
ေနရာ-နအဖအခြန္ရုံးေရွ
အခ်ိန္(ညေန -၃-နာရီမွ-၄-နာရီ-၃၀-အထိ)
ေလးစားစြာျဖင့္-
ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံ ဒီမိုကေရစီ ကြန္ယက္(ဂ်ပန္)NDB-Japan
☆ျမန္မာ့ဒီမိုကေရစီတိုက္ပဲြမုခ်ေအာင္ရမည္☆

ILO Welcomes Burma's Proposed New Labor Laws

2011-01-20T05:29:00.002+09:00

Ron Corben | Bangkok 18 January 2011

The International Labor Organization (ILO) says it is encouraged by proposed legislation in Burma to allow greater freedom for labor unions, but remains concerned about the use of forced child labor in the military and private sector.

The ILO representative in Burma, Steve Marshall, speaking to reporters Tuesday, said Burma’s military is preparing legislation that will allow for legal trade unions, with rights to strike. Marshall said this is a further step in signs of economic reform.

The legislation is set to be presented before a new parliament elected last November and due to hold its first session in late January. Marshall said the legislation marks a major step in the country’s labor rights.

"Obviously, the issue of freedom of association, which is effectively the right of workers and people to be represented which includes the issues of, for example, collective bargaining, it would include the issues of the right to strike ... they are critical and if passed into law make a big change in terms of the way in which the society is able to develop," said Marshall.

The military government in Burma, also known as Myanmar, already has ratified the internationally recognized Freedom of Association Convention, which is the standard set by the ILO.

Marshall says, though, that while the introduction of the legislation is a step towards an improved labor market in Burma, the overall reform program remains in its early days.

Human rights groups say while unions and associations have been a feature of Burma’s economic and political life, they have been tightly regulated by the military.

Trade unionists also have been jailed for activities "not sanctioned’ by the military." Thailand-based rights group, Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (Burma), says of the more than 2,100 political prisoners currently detained, 44 are labor activists.

The ILO’s chief goal in Burma has been to assist in ending forced labor and it has an agreement with the military government that enables complaints to be lodged with the organization’s country offices. Last year the ILO received 370 complaints, marking a sharp increase over recent years.

Marshall said the ILO remains concerned over ongoing issues of child labor and recruitment of child soldiers into Burma’s armed forces. He said there have been signs of progress in dealings with the armed forces.

"In the area of child soldiers - yes - there is a general positive move," said Marshall. "In the last year, for example, 73 children - as a result of complaints made to the ILO - were released and discharged from the military."

The military government recently announced a program of national military service for both men and women that may come into effect beginning in 2012.

Burma’s army, faced with problems of recruitment and desertion, has looked to underage recruitment using labor brokers. Marshall said the proposed national service is expected to have a direct impact on child recruits.

Marshall added that many children often are lured into forced labor due to poverty when families are unable to pay for the child’s education.

But forced labor remains a major problem across Burma, with rights groups citing villages forced to construct roads and other work for the military, while jailed prisoners also are recruited for local industries.

A further assessment of Burma’s labor practices is expected to take place in February, when an ILO mission, including labor specialists, will appraise the reforms and new labor legislation. http://www.voanews.com/english/news/asia/southeast/ILO-Welcomes-Burmas-Proposed-New-Labor-Laws-114145209.html
--------------------------------------------

Trade unions may be allowed back into Burma

2011-01-20T05:27:00.002+09:00

RADIO AUSTRALIA NEWS
Girish Sawlani

The Burmese government is set to table new legislation that could allow workers to establish trade unions.

The proposal has been welcomed by the International Labour Organisation (ILO), which says it's working with the Burmese government to improve workers' rights in the impoverished nation.

The ILO's representative in Burma, Steve Marshall, says it's a significant move by the government.

"It is obviously extremely significant, the situation has arisen that the constitution that was adopted in 2008 has a provision that makes allowance for the right of persons, particularly workers to be represented, which would lead them to the situation of collective bargaining."

Since the Burmese military's crackdown on the country's trade union movement, many groups have been driven from the country or reduced to underground associations.

Recently, suspected trade unionists were still being arrested and imprisoned despite the government having already ratified the ILO convention on the Freedom of Association.

But international pressure has seen the government adopt a lighter approach to workers' dissent.

Since November 2009, there have been a series of strikes in Rangoon, with workers protesting and demanding higher wages - with little or no interference from armed forces.

And as far as the new legislation is concerned, Mr Marshall says the initiative is driven by the government.

"It was brought to our attention by senior government representatives that with the adoption of the new constitution, it was the intention to put those principles into practice."

'It is being driven from inside the government at a very senior level, which is excellent."

The latest developments come amid calls from Southeast Asian neighbours for Western nations to either lift or ease their crippling sanctions against Burma.

Moves to permit the establishment of trade unions could vindicate ASEAN's stance that Burma has made significant progress towards democracy, especially since the release of opposition figurehead, Aung San Suu Kyi.

But many, including Dr Myint Cho, an exiled Burmese national who now heads the Burma Office in Sydney, say they are still sceptical about the government's motives.

Dr Cho says he has seen such gestures before.

"I have seen it so many times before, when the previous regime formed a non-independent trade union under the control of the government. So they controlled totally the movement of the trade union in the past."

"Right now, because of international pressure for the workers' rights in Burma, the regime is trying to use this kind of initiative as a public relations move to relax international pressures."

Even if legislation gets passed through parliament, Dr Myint Cho doesn't expect the new trade unions to be genuinely independent.

"Under the current military controlled government, that kind of parliament is just a sham and it cannot operate freely,"

"So of course the pressure from the current military regime, the parliament will adopt some kind of policies in dealing with the trade unions around the world, as well as the International Labour Organisation. So I don't expect the newly formed trade union organisations will be independent and genuine."

Steve Marshall, from the International Labour Organisation, says while there will be scepticism his organisation is adopting a wait and see approach.

"We do need to put into consideration that this is a very major step and we don't know at this stage what structure will be put into place,

Whether it will be a full liberal trade union type structure or whether it will be one of the other models that exist elsewhere in the world which are slightly more constrained."

"That is something that we will be continuing to discuss with the government in terms of the structures concerned."

The bill is set to be tabled before the country's

FWUBC ျပည္တြင္းနိုင္ငံေရးရံပုံေငြ-လစဥ္(ယန္းတစ္ေထာင္)အလႉရွင္စာရင္း(၁၆-ဇန္နဝါရီ-၂၀၁၁ေန ့စာရင္း)

2011-01-16T21:38:00.000+09:00

၁။ဦးတင္ဝင္း
၂။ေဒၚတင္ႏြယ္ဝင္း
၃။ေဒၚမာလာ
၄။ဦးသန္းထြန္းနိုင္
၅။ဦးဘုန္းလိႈင္
၆။မေႏြရည္ဦး
၇။မညိုညိုစန္း
၈။ေမာင္ျမတ္ေထြး
၉။ကိုေဌးျမင့္
၁၀။ဦးျမင့္ေဆြ
၁၁။ကိုလွစိုးဦး
၁၂။ကိုေနလင္းေအာင္
၁၃။ကိုစိုးမင္းသိန္း
၁၄။ကိုစိုးမင္းျငိမ္း
၁၅။ဦးေနေအာင္
၁၆။မဇင္ေဝျဖိဳး
၁၇။မမီမီခိုင္
၁၈။ကိုေအာင္မ်ိဳးမင္း
၁၉။ကိုေက်ာ္သိန္းလြင္
၂၀။ကိုထိန္ဝင္း
၂၁။ကိုဇာနီေအာင္နိုင္
၂၂။ကိုထြန္းေအာင္လင္း
၂၃။မျမင့္ျမင့္လိႈင္
၂၄။မေမနွင္းေဝ
၂၅ကိုေအာင္ေအာင္မိုး
၂၆။ကိုဝင္းႀကိဳင္
၂၇။မသင္းသင္းဦး

တကယ္ေပ်ာ္စရာေကာင္းရဲ ့လား … ႏွစ္သစ္

2011-01-01T02:57:00.001+09:00

အခ်ိန္က မေရာက္ေသးဘူး
လူေတြက တေယာက္ၿပီး တေယာက္
ေရာက္လာၾကတယ္ …
စကား၀ိုင္းေတြရဲ ့
ေရခ်ိန္က ျမင့္တက္လာၿပီ …..။

တိုင္းေရး ျပည္ေရး
ေတာ္လွန္ေရး ေ၀ဖန္ေရး
အသံမ်ား အဆံမ်ား
စကားလံုးျဖင့္
ေသြးေခ်ာင္းစီး သတ္ျဖတ္မႈမ်ား
ဘီယာဗူးခြံမ်ား
အရက္ပုလင္းမ်ား
အဆီျပန္မ်က္ႏွာမ်ား
အခ်ိန္က နီးလာၿပီ ……..။

ဘယ္သူ ဘယ္၀ါ
ေရာက္မလာေသးဘူးလား
အေသအခ်ာ ေျပာထားရက္နဲ ့
ဒီမွာ လူစံုေနၿပီ
တဖ်စ္ေတာက္ေတာက္ ေရရြတ္ပူပန္(ပင္)
အခ်ိန္က နီးလာၿပီ …….။

ေရ(ရည္)တြက္သံမ်ား ဆူညံလာ
ေဟး သံၿပိဳင္ေအာ္သံ
ဟက္ပီးနယူးရီးယား
ဖန္ခြက္ခ်င္းတိုက္ၾက
လူခ်င္းေပြ ့ဖက္ၾက
ေပ်ာ္ရႊင္မႈ အဆိုင္အခဲေတြနဲ ့ ျပစ္ေပါက္ၾက
အခ်ိန္ေရာက္ၿပီ …..။

ေပ်ာ္ရႊင္စရာ ျမင္ကြင္းဟာ
ေၾကကြဲစရာေတြနဲ ့ ျပည့္ႏွက္ေနတယ္
ေကာင္းကင္ကို ေမာ့ၾကည့္တဲ့အခါ
ၾကယ္ေႂကြေတြက
ငါ့ကို … ႏႈတ္ဆက္သြားၾက …..

သံတိုင္ေတြေနာက္က
အုတ္နံရံေတြအေနာက္က
ေနာင္ေတာ္ အမေတာ္တို ့
ညီငယ္ ညီမငယ္ ရဲေဘာ္တို ့
ႏွစ္သစ္ရဲ ့ညမွာ … သင္တို ့ကို
ဘယ္သူမွ သတိတယမရွိၾကလည္း
အသင္တို ့ကေတာ့
ယံုၾကည္ခ်က္နဲ ့ ႏွစ္ေတြကို
သစ္ၿမဲသစ္ေနၾကမယ္ဆိုတာ
ငါ …ယံုတယ္။

သင္တို ့မလြတ္ေျမာက္သေရြ ့
ေရာက္ေရာက္လာတဲ့ ႏွစ္သစ္ေတြဟာ
ငါတို ့အတြက္
ေပ်ာ္ရႊင္စရာ မဟုတ္ပါ ….
မိတ္ေဆြတို ့ ေရ
ႏွစ္သစ္ဟာ ငါတို ့အတြက္
ေပ်ာ္ရႊင္စရာမဟုတ္ပါဘူး …….။

(မိတ္ေဆြမ်ားခင္ဗ်ား လြတ္လပ္စြာကြဲလြဲခြင့္ရွိပါသည္)

ရဲရင့္သက္ဇြဲ ၃၁ ၁၂ ၂၀၁၀

News & Articles on Burma-Friday, 31 December, 2010

2011-01-01T02:09:00.000+09:00

News & Articles on Burma
Friday, 31 December, 2010
-------------------------------------------------
Suu Kyi calls for reconciliation push
MYANMAR: Remittances support survival
Junta’s Drug ‘Exports’ to China Test Economic Ties
Martin reaffirms Ireland's support for Burma's pro-democracy groups
North's long struggle for peace spurs on Suu Kyi
U.S. wants more engagement with Suu Kyi
US Urges Burma to Free Political Prisoners Ahead of Independence Day
Asian ‘martyrs’ underscore poor year for human rights
-----------------------------------------------------------

Suu Kyi calls for reconciliation push

31 December 2010 | 10:27:03 PM | Source: AAP

Burma's democracy champion Aung San Suu Kyi called for citizens of her country to rejuvenate their struggle for national reconciliation in 2011 in a New Year's message.

She asked the people of Burma "to struggle together with new strengths, new force and new words in the auspicious new year", in the message released by her National League for Democracy (NLD) party on Friday.

"We must struggle by establishing people's political and social networks to get national reconciliation as well as a truly united spirit," she added.

The 65-year-old was released from more than seven years' house arrest on November 13, days after Burma's widely criticised first election in 20 years, in which the junta-backed party has claimed overwhelming victory.

Suu Kyi was locked up for the poll, which her party boycotted. This led to a split in the opposition movement, with some NLD members leaving to form a new party to contest the election.

On Thursday the United States called again on Burma to free political prisoners and engage in dialogue to promote democracy, as the military-led country prepares for its 63rd independence anniversary on January 4.
http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/1456051/Suu-Kyi-calls-for-reconciliation-push
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MYANMAR: Remittances support survival
Photo: Stacey Winston/ECHO

Remittances are lifelines for residents in Myanmar, where foreign direct investment is weak and international markets are almost non-existent
DALA THAYA, 31 December 2010 (IRIN) - Remittances to Myanmar continue to be a lifeline for communities strapped for cash and short of food throughout the country, according to researchers and migration experts.

While officially recorded remittances to Myanmar accounted for only 0.4 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2009, a 2008 university study calculated remittances were at least four times higher than the official figures.

Australia-based Macquarie University estimated average annual remittances to Myanmar from Thailand alone - US$300 million - amounted to five times the level of overall foreign direct investment in Myanmar.

“Some 96 percent of respondents [Burmese workers in Thailand] nominated [their family’s] survival as their first order priority,” said Claudia Natali, labour migration programme manager for the International Organization for Migration in Thailand, referring to the university survey.

According to the World Bank, $150 million in remittances was sent to Myanmar in 2008 through formal channels - the most recorded in over a decade.

But most migrants use an informal system called `hondi’ to transfer remittances to Myanmar, bypassing official recordkeeping.

“Persons moving irregularly across the border are entrusted to deliver agreed amounts of money from migrants in Thailand to family members in the migrants’ source community,” said Natali.

Migration

The number of Burmese migrants who entered Thailand “regularly” - with legal permission - between July 2010 and November 2010 was 702, according to the Thai government. But most Burmese migrants working in Malaysia or Thailand enter without documentation.

A memorandum of understanding between Thailand and Myanmar, which foresees mechanisms for migrants to enter and stay legally in Thailand for employment, was only implemented in July 2010.

In the Thai border town of Mae Sot, many Burmese migrants work in garment factories, while in southern Thailand they work on palm oil plantations or as fishermen.

“Those seeking work in Malaysia are usually village residents or lower middle class young men recruited formally by overseas employment agencies in Myanmar,” said Natali.

“It cost $1,300 to send my son to Malaysia,” said U Kyaw, a retired army sergeant in Myanmar’s capital, Yangon, whose pension, equivalent to 40 US cents a day, is barely enough to cover his expenses.

“I borrowed $600 from a rich relative, the agent gave us a loan of $400 and the family put the rest up,” said the 63-year-old father of three.

His youngest son Mya, who left for Malaysia to work as a day labourer in March 2010, now sends back $150-$200 a month. By contrast Thein, the eldest son, earns some $80 a month driving a bus in Yangon.

Poverty line

Once known as the “rice bowl of Asia”, Myanmar’s per capita GDP in 2009 was just over $1 a day.

Maung, the youngest of three brothers, exchanges the highly volatile Burmese currency into US dollars on the black market, where 10,000 Burmese kyats equalled $10 in December, versus the official bank exchange rate of $1,560. Over the course of a year, each brother earns on average $5 a day. “Luckily, my sister works in Malaysia. Last year she sent back $2,000,” said the 16-year-old.

After nearly 20 years of various trade and aid sanctions, the vast majority of people in Myanmar survive thanks to small-scale local businesses, according to US-based research group Asia Society.

The average citizen spends more than 70 percent of his or her income on food, according to a March 2010 Asia Society report.

The researchers calculated this was the highest proportion in Southeast Asia.

mh/pt/cb http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=91498
-----------------------------------------------
Junta’s Drug ‘Exports’ to China Test Economic Ties
By Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, Dec 31, 2010 (IPS) - As military-ruled Burma prepares to unveil its new political cast, an enduring link between the junta and the country’s notorious drug lords is poised to come under the spotlight.

Among the candidates who won in the South-east Asian nation’s first election in 20 years on Nov. 7 are six well- known drug barons. They represented the Union Solidarity and Development Party, the junta’s political front, which triumphed comfortably in the poll.

The bespectacled Kyaw Myint is among this gang of six who emerged victorious in a poll clouded with questions of fraud for the estimated 1,163 seats in the national parliament and regional assemblies that were up for grabs.

The elected national and regional legislators are to begin their new role in Burma by the first week in February. The opening of the new parliament 90 days after the November poll is the sixth step in the junta’s seven-step political roadmap to create a "discipline-flourishing democracy" in Burma, or Myanmar as it is also known.

Prior to slipping into his role as a legislator, the 51- year-old Kyaw Myint was better known as a junta-backed militia chief "notorious among local people as (a) drug dealer in the Shan State North’s Namkham township," reveals the Shan Herald Agency for News (SHAN), a media organisation run by journalists from Burma’s Shan ethnic minority.

"Many ferry crossings on the Mao-Ruli river that serves as a boundary between China and Burma are guarded by Kyaw Htwe aka (also known as) Li Yonping, younger brother of Kyaw Myint," adds SHAN.

Yet this political identity for Kyaw Myint, with the junta’s blessings, will test the growing economic bonds between Burma and its giant north-eastern neighbour China. According to official figures released by Burmese officials, China has pumped in over eight billion U.S. dollars in foreign direct investment this year to tap Burma’s resource- rich environment.

The investments by Chinese state-run companies in the oil and gas, hydropower and mining sectors mark a dramatic increase from what Chinese investments were five years ago – some 194 million dollars.

"Myanmar and China have grown closer over the past four years and Beijing is on the verge of displacing Thailand as the country that tops investment in Myanmar," says a South- east Asian diplomat who spoke on condition of anonymity.

But one Burmese "export" to China has Beijing concerned, the diplomat added. "Beijing is worried at the increase in drugs flowing from Burma to its south-western Yunnan province."

U.N. officials confirm this. "Yes they (Beijing) are concerned not only with ATS (amphetamine-type stimulus) but also with heroin," says Gary Lewis, East Asia and Pacific regional representative of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).

The spike in the number of methamphetamine pills seized in China in 2009 underscores such worries. "In 2009, China reported total seizures of more than 40 million pills. This represented as almost six-fold increase from 6.25 million pills seized in 2008," UNODC says in a December 2010 report on the ATS trade in Burma, whose north-eastern part comes within the narcotics producing Golden Triangle region.

"The Chinese government has been reporting a sharp increase of drug trafficking into China from the Golden Triangle region by means of constantly changing drug trafficking routes and methods," states the 45-page report, ‘Myanmar – Situation Assessment on Amphetamine-Type Stimulants’. "Reports have pointed to transnational drug syndicates attempting to sell stored drugs, with a resulting sharp increase of drug smuggled into China."

"The seizure of 3.2 tonnes of heroine and approximately the same quantity of methamphetamine in Yunnan province accounted for half of the total quantity of illicit drugs seized in China in 2009," the report adds. "Three of the self-administered regions in Myanmar are located on the border with Yunnan province. Methamphetamine pills seized in Yunnan province are – at the very least – trafficked through these Special Regions."

Burma’s rise as a major production centre of methamphetamine pills, with the drug factories located in the north-eastern Shan State, adds to its previous notoriety as a supplier of opium and heroin.

Burma’s emergence as an ATS producer followed a decision by the junta to launch a 15-year drug elimination programme in 1999. The Drug Elimination Plan (DEP) targeted the poppy fields in the north and eastern regions of the country, which accounted for 163,000 hectares under opium cultivation in the mid-1990s.

Before the DEP, Burma was known as the world’s largest producer of illicit opium, "accounting for approximately 700 metric tonnes annually between 1981 and 1987," according to UNODC. "(That dropped) to 21,600 hectares in 2006, the lowest ever recorded."

However, this 83 percent decline in poppy cultivation under the DEP has not seen a change in the cross-border trade of ATS, which follows the routes once frequented by drug caravans that moved heroin from Burma into China.

"The border is very porous and there are no markers to say where the Burmese border ends and the Chinese border begins," says an official from Thailand’s Central Narcotics Control Agency. "It is easy to move drugs from Burma’s Shan State into China’s Yunnan province in remote areas where there are no checkpoints."

"The caravans move at night. They take the drugs in backpacks," the official tells IPS on condition of anonymity. "The Chinese government is faced with a problem because the domestic market is large." (END) http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=54007
---------------------------------------------
The Irish Times - Friday, December 31, 2010
Martin reaffirms Ireland's support for Burma's pro-democracy groups

MINISTER FOR Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin has restated Ireland’s support for the struggle of pro-democracy groups inside Burma during a telephone conversation with recently released Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

“We wanted to articulate our delight at her release and convey our respect for the iconic nature of her position now in terms of democracy,” Mr Martin said last night. “She sounded relaxed and in good form. She came across as strong and very clear-minded.”

During the 25-minute conversation, which had been arranged through UN channels, Mr Martin praised the Nobel laureate’s peaceful campaign for democratic reform.

“She was very anxious that we would continue to support that aspect of her work,” he said. “She was anxious to develop closer links with Ireland, particularly on the diplomatic side, in terms of getting easier mechanisms for contact.”

He assured Ms Suu Kyi of the importance both Ireland and the EU attach to her continued freedom and personal safety following her years of arbitrary detention by the Burmese junta.

“She wanted to convey her deep thanks and appreciation to the people of Ireland for their support,” Mr Martin said.

During the conversation, Ms Suu Kyi made reference to the Burmese being referred to as “the Irish of the east” during colonial times.

Mr Martin told her of the Northern Ireland peace process. “She was anxious for good reading material on that,” he said.

Ms Suu Kyi was awarded the freedom of Dublin City in 2000. The Minister said the subject of a possible visit to Ireland was not broached in a “substantive” way during the phone call.

“We would be delighted to invite her to Ireland but obviously that would depend on her own schedule,” he added.

They also discussed recent events in Burma including the deeply flawed parliamentary elections which took place in November.

Mr Martin stressed the need for all political prisoners to be released as the first step in a process of political dialogue involving all groups in Burma.http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2010/1231/1224286545096.html
-------------------------------------------------
North's long struggle for peace spurs on Suu Kyi
By ine Kerr Political Correspondent

Friday December 31 2010

THE world's most prominent political dissident joked yesterday how her people had been referred to as "the Irish of the East".

Burma's Aung San Suu Kyi spoke to Foreign Affairs Minister Micheal Martin for 20 minutes and the pair discussed the peace process here.

Mr Martin said he had promised the celebrated pro-democracy leader that he would send her a collection of books on the North.

During their telephone conversation, Ms Suu Kyi told of how the British had sometimes called the Burmese the "Irish of the East".

"I laughed at that," said Mr Martin.

"We discussed how Northern Ireland had come a long way through the peace process and she asked about good reading materials. We are going to gather materials and send them on to her."

The Northern peace process was discussed in the context of Ms Suu Kyi telling the minister about the challenges facing the Burmese people in their struggle for democracy and human rights.

"She was very much clued into Ireland and has great affection for this country," the minister said following his conversation with the iconic leader.

Ms Suu Kyi, who won the 1991 Nobel Peace prize for her non-violent struggle for democracy, was first arrested in 1989.

She was detained for 15 of the past 21 years before her release from house arrest in November.

The minister said he had briefly referred to a long-standing invitation for Ms Suu Kyi to visit Ireland.

"We would love to have her here but appreciate her focus must be on Burma at the moment," the minister said.

In March 2000, the pro-democracy leader was given the Freedom of Dublin City, and later made the Freewoman of Galway in 2005.

Both Dublin City Council and Galway County Council are reissuing invitations for the Nobel Peace prize winner to visit Ireland and receive the awards.

Mr Martin said her "spirits were upbeat".

"She was very anxious to thank the Irish people for their support and continued support," Mr Martin said.

Pro-democracy and human rights groups inside Burma are facing daily harassment, intimidation and persecution, Ms Suu Kyi told the minister.

The two also discussed the flawed parliamentary elections which took place in November and the humanitarian relief efforts after the damage caused by Cyclone Giri in October.

Ms Suu Kyi has been anxious since her release to speak to countries which supported the campaign for her release and to ensure their continued support for the people of Burma.

The minister also underlined the need for the release of all political prisoners as the first step in a process of political dialogue in Burma.

Earlier this week, Ms Suu Kyi made the shortlist for the annual Tipperary International Peace Award.

- ine Kerr Political Correspondent

Irish Independent http://www.independent.ie/national-news/norths-long-struggle-for-peace-spurs-on-suu-kyi-2479588.html
------------------------------------------------
U.S. wants more engagement with Suu Kyi
Published: Dec. 30, 2010 at 1:34 PM

WASHINGTON, Dec. 30 (UPI) -- Washington aims to engage the military junta in Myanmar with the aim of advancing democracy and freeing political prisoners, a spokesman said.

Myanmar had general elections in November in what the military junta said was a step toward a democratic government. International observers doubted the claims as the junta-supported Union Solidarity and Development Party handily won the contest.

Opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi was released from house arrest shortly after the election.

Mark Toner, a deputy spokesman for the U.S. State Department, said Washington hopes to engage Suu Kyi and the junta leaders in 2011.

"We've sought a path of principled engagement with the Myanmar government," he told reporters during a press briefing in Washington. "We haven't had a great deal of success."

The international community following Suu Kyi's release said Myanmar could do more to address concerns about the 2,000 political prisoners behind bars in the country.

"(C)ertainly we call on the release of all of Myanmar's political prisoners and hope to work more closely with Aung San Suu Kyi and the opposition there," added Toner.

The opposition leader in a mid-December interview with Germany's Deutsche Welle said "it would help a great deal" if Europe, for its part, did more to help usher in reforms in Myanmar. http://www.upi.com/Top_News/Special/2010/12/30/US-wants-more-engagement-with-Suu-Kyi/UPI-39331293734057/
-----------------------------------
US Urges Burma to Free Political Prisoners Ahead of Independence Day
VOA News 30 December 2010

The United States is calling on Burma's military rulers to free all political prisoners and engage in dialogue with opposition groups as the country prepares to mark its 63rd independence anniversary.

State Department spokesman Mark Toner issued a statement Thursday saying the Burmese government must take action to meet the aspirations of its diverse peoples and improve relations with the Obama administration. He also congratulated the people of Burma ahead of their independence day on January 4.

The Burmese military released opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi from years of house arrest last month, but only after holding a rare general election denounced by Western nations and opposition groups as a sham. Rights groups also say the Burmese military continues to detain more than 2,100 political prisoners.

Toner reiterated U.S. calls for the release of those prisoners and said the Burmese military must engage in an "inclusive and meaningful dialogue" with all citizens in pursuit of "genuine national reconciliation."

He said the United States is "unwavering" in its support of an independent, peaceful, prosperous and democratic Burma. He also said Washington looks forward to the day when the Burmese people will succeed in "peaceful efforts" to freely exercise what he called "their universal human rights."

Some information for this report was provided by AFP. http://www.voanews.com/english/news/asia/US-Urges-Burma-to-Free-Political-Prisoners-Ahead-of-Independence-Day-112678334.html
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Friday, 31st December 2010
Focus
Asian ‘martyrs’ underscore poor year for human rights
AFP
In some of 2010’s most compelling images, Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi emerged from her home after years in detention and an empty chair marked the absence of Liu Xiaobo from his Nobel prize ceremony.

Asia’s two human rights martyrs serve as compelling reminders that a region celebrated for its economic vibrancy also harbours some of the world’s most intractable and brutal regimes.

And despite outrage from foreign governments, and an increasing awareness among Asia’s billions who have embraced the internet and social media, the region’s dictatorships and corrupt regimes show no sign of bending.

“There seems to have been a downturn in respect for human rights,” said Dave Mathieson from the Asia division of Human Rights Watch. “There’s been a more sophisticated backlash against global human rights norms.”

Countries that had once argued that western notions of democracy were not in keeping with “Asian values” were now instead muting criticism by staging parodies of the democratic process, he said. “A lot of states talk about democracy and say – at least we’re holding elections, it’s progress. When of course most of them are illiberal processes that just support the status quo.”

Myanmar’s ruling generals held the impoverished country’s first elections in two decades in November, ignoring complaints that barring Suu Kyi’s opposition party rendered the ballot illegitimate.

The 65-year-old democracy icon last month walked out of her lakeside home where she has been locked up for 15 of the past 21 years, smiling and in high spirits, but her future remains precarious and at the mercy of the junta.

In Sri Lanka, January elections were held after the island’s long-running civil war against Tamil Tiger rebels ended in an onslaught that has drawn allegations of war crimes.

President Mahinda Rajapakse was re-elected by a huge margin over his opponent, former army chief Sarath Fonseka. He alleged he was the victim of massive fraud and was then promptly arrested and jailed.

Grisly new photos emerged last month of piles of dead bodies and execution-style killings allegedly taken during the final stages of the war, during which up to 30,000 ethnic Tamil civilians perished, according to several rights watchdogs.

Myanmar and Sri Lanka both count as a key ally China, whose own rights record was on display when jailed dissident Mr Liu was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in absentia in a ceremony Beijing attacked as “political theatre”.

China mounted a fearsome response to the Nobel committee’s decision, pressuring around 20 countries to boycott the ceremony and blacking out live broadcasts of the event by CNN and the BBC in China.

On Tuesday, Mr Liu marked his 55th birthday in a prison in northeast China, prompting renewed calls from rights groups for the Nobel laureate’s immediate release from an 11-year jail sentence for breaching anti-sedition laws.
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20101231/world-news/asian-martyrs-underscore-poor-year-for-human-rights

လူထုေခါင္းေဆာင္ ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္၏ ႏွစ္သစ္ကူး ႏွစ္သစ္ကူး ႏွဳတ္ခြန္းဆက္ သဝဏ္လႊာ

2011-01-01T02:07:00.000+09:00

(ဒီမိုေဝယံထံမွကူးယူတင္ျပပါသည္)

ႏွစ္သစ္ကူး ႏွဳတ္ခြန္းဆက္ သဝဏ္လႊာ

ႏွစ္ေဟာင္းလြန္ေျမာက္ ႏွစ္သစ္ေရာက္ခ်ိန္တြင္ ကၽြန္မ၏ ႏိုင္ငံေရးဘဝ ျဖတ္သန္းမွဳကို ျပန္လည္ သံုးသပ္ၾကည္႔ေသာအခါ.. ျပည္သူလူထု၏ ဒီမိုကေရစီႏွင့္ လူအခြင့္အေရးအတြက္ ၾကိဳးပမ္းသည္႔ကာလ၊ ေနအိမ္အက်ယ္ခ်ဳပ္ က်ခံသည္႔ကာလ၊ ျပန္လည္ လြတ္ေျမာက္လာသည္႔ကာလ ဟူ၍ ကာလသံုးပါးကို ေတြ႔ျမင္ရပါသည္.။

ယင္းကာလသံုးပါးစလံုးတြင္ ကၽြန္မအတြက္လည္းေကာင္း၊ ကၽြန္မ၏ ရည္မွန္းခ်က္အတြက္ လည္းေကာင္း.၊ က်မ၏ ၾကိဳးပမ္း ေဆာင္ရြက္မွဳမ်ား အတြက္လည္းေကာင္း၊ ေထာက္ခံသူ အားေပးသူ ကူညီသူ အေျမာက္အမ်ားရွိပါသည္။ ႏိုင္င့ံေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ား၊ ဘာသာေရးေခါင္းေဆာင္ၾကီးမ်ား၊ ျငိမ္းခ်မ္းေရး ႏိုဘယ္ ဆုရွင္မ်ား အပါအဝင္..ပုဂၢိဳလ္မ်ား၊ ကုလသမဂၢ၊ ဥေရာပသမဂၢ၊ အျပည္ျပည္ဆိုင္ရာ လြတ္ျငိမ္းခ်မ္းသာခြင့္ အဖြဲ႕ စသည္စသည္ပါဝင္ေသာ အဖြဲ႔အစည္းမ်ား၊ အေမရိကန္ႏွင့္ ဥေရာပႏိုင္ငံအမ်ားအျပားမွ ႏိုင္ငံသူ ႏိုင္ငံသားမ်ား၊ ျပည္တြင္းျပည္ပမွ ကၽြန္မတို႔ တိုင္းရင္းသား ျပည္သူမ်ား ပါဝင္ၾကပါတယ္..။

ထိုသူမ်ား၏ ကာယကံအားျဖင့္၊ ဝစီကံအားျဖင့္၊ မေနာကံအားျဖင့္ ရိုင္းပင္း ကူညီခဲ့သူမ်ားအတြက္ ကၽြန္မက အထူးတလည္ ေက်းဇူးဥပကာရ တင္ရွိပါေၾကာင္း အထူးတလည္ ေဖာ္ျပအပ္ပါတယ္..။

အထူးသျဖင့္ ယခုတစ္ၾကိမ္ ျပန္လြတ္ရာတြင္ ပိုမို တက္ၾကြေနေသာ လူငယ္မ်ားအပါအဝင္ ျပည္သူမ်ားမွ အင္တိုက္အားတိုက္ ေထာက္ခံ အားေပးမွဳေၾကာင့္ ကၽြန္မအလြန္ ဝမ္းေျမာက္ ၾကည္ႏွဴးရပါသည္။ အမ်ိဳးသားျပန္လည္ သင့္ျမတ္မွဳရရွိေရး စစ္မွန္ေသာ ျပည္ေထာင္စုစိတ္ဓာတ္ တဖန္ႏိုးထ ရွင္သန္လာေရးတို႔ အတြက္ ျပည္သူ႔ႏိုင္ငံေရး လူမွဳကြန္ယက္ၾကီး တစ္ရပ္ ထူေထာင္ျခင္းျဖင့္ ကၽြန္မတို႔ မျဖစ္မေန ၾကိဳးပမ္းရပါဦးမယ္။ မဂၤလာႏွစ္သစ္တြင္ ခြန္သစ္အားသစ္ လုပ္ငန္းပံုစံသစ္ျဖင့္ တိုင္းရင္းသားျပည္သူအားလံုး လက္တြဲၾကိဳးပမ္းၾကပါစို႔ဟု ႏွဳိးေဆာ္ရင္း ႏွဳတ္ခြန္း ဆက္သလိုက္ပါသည္.။

ရက္စြဲ ၁-၁-၂၀၁၁
မိုကေရစီေရး မုခ်ေအာင္ရမည္.

ေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္

ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္ကို အုိင္အယ္အုိအရာရွိ ေတြ႕ဆုံရွင္းျပ

2010-12-21T03:12:00.000+09:00

2010-12-20
ဒီကေန႔ ဒီဇင္ဘာ ၂၀ ရက္ ေန႔လည္ ၂ နာရီေလာက္က အုိင္အယ္အုိ ညိႇႏႈိင္းေရးအရာရွိ မစၥတာ စတိဗ္ မာရွယ္ဟာ ျမန္မာ့ ဒီမုိကေရစီေခါင္းေဆာင္ ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္ကုိ သြားေရာက္ေတြ႕ဆုံခဲ့ပါတယ္။ ျမန္မာႏုိင္ငံအတြင္း အုိင္အယ္အုိ အဖဲြ႕အစည္းအေနနဲ႔ လုပ္ေဆာင္ေနတာေတြကုိ ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္ကုိ ေျပာျပ ေဆြးေႏြးခဲ့တယ္လုိ႔ မစၥတာ စတိဗ္ မာရွယ္က RFA ကုိ ေျပာပါတယ္။

(Photo: AFP)

ျမန္မာ့ ဒီမိုကေရစီ ေခါင္းေဆာင္ ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္ ႏိုဝင္ဘာ ၂၆ ရက္ေန႔က အမ်ိဳးသား ဒီမိုကေရစီ အဖြဲ႕ခ်ဳပ္ (NLD) ႐ံုးမွ ထြက္ခြာသြားစဥ္ ေတြ႕ရပံု ျဖစ္ပါသည္။ (Photo: AFP)

ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္နဲ႔ ဒီကေန႔ ေန႔လည္က ေတြ႕ဆုံခဲ့တယ္ဆုိတာ မွန္ကန္ေၾကာင္း၊ သူ႔အေနနဲ႔ အုိင္အယ္အုိ လုပ္ေဆာင္ေနတာေတြကုိ ေျပာၾကားခဲ့ေၾကာင္း၊ ျမန္မာႏုိင္ငံအတြင္း အုိင္အယ္အုိ အေနနဲ႔ လုပ္ေဆာင္ႏုိင္ခြင့္ ရွိတဲ့ အတုိင္းအတာအရ လုပ္ေဆာင္ေနေတြကုိ ရွင္းလင္း ေျပာၾကားခဲ့ေၾကာင္း၊ အဓိက ေဆြးေႏြးခဲ့တဲ့ ကိစၥေတြကေတာ့ အဓမၼ လုပ္အားေပး ေစခုိင္းေနတဲ့ကိစၥ၊ ခေလးစစ္သားကိစၥ၊ လူကုန္ကူးမႈ စတဲ့ ျပသနာေတြကုိ ေဆြးေႏြးခဲ့ေၾကာင္း၊ အလြန္ေကာင္းမြန္တဲ့ ေဆြးေႏြးပဲြတရပ္ ျဖစ္ေၾကာင္း မစၥတာစတိမာရွယ္က ေျပာျပသြားပါတယ္။

ဒီကေန႔ ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္နဲ႔ သြားေရာက္ ေတြ႕ဆုံခဲ့တဲ့ ပဲြမွာ မစၥတာ စတိဗ္ မာရွယ္နဲ႔အတူ လက္ေထာက္ ညႇိႏႈိင္းေရးအရာရွိလည္း လုိက္ပါေတြ႕ဆုံခဲ့ေၾကာင္း သိရပါတယ္။

Penan Sayardaw Advice

2010-11-18T03:51:00.000+09:00

လုပ္ေဖာ္ကိုင္ဘက္ေရာင္းရင္းမ်ားခင္ဗ်ာ

က်ေနာ္ ဟီ႐ိုရွီးမားကေန ျပန္ေရာက္လာခဲ့ၿပီးတဲ့ေနာက္ ပီနန္ဆရာေတာ္ႀကီးက ေတြ႕ခ်င္တယ္ လာဦးလို႕ မႏြဲ႕ကေန တဆင့္ေခၚတဲ့အတြက္ ႏို၀င္ဘာ ၁၅ ရက္ေန႕က သြားခဲ့ပါတယ္။ ဟီ႐ိုရွီးမားမွာ ႏိုဘဲလ္ဆုရွင္ေတြ က ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္နဲ႕ပတ္သက္ၿပီး ဘာေတြေျပာသလဲ၊ ဘာေတြလုပ္သလဲဆိုတာကိုေမးပါတယ္။ က်ေနာ္က ဟီ႐ိုရွီးမားအစည္းအေ၀းတက္တဲ့ေန႕မွာ ေဒၚစုပံုပါတဲ့ Free Aung San Suu Kyi, Free Burma ရင္ထိုးကိုတပ္ၿပီး အစည္းအေ၀းခန္းထဲအသြားမွာ လမ္းမွာေတြ႕တဲ့သတင္းေထာက္ေတြက ေဒၚစုကို္ယ္စား လွယ္မဟုတ္လား လို႕ေမးတယ္၊ က်ေနာ္က ေဒၚစုကိုေထာက္ခံတဲ့ ဂ်ပန္ေရာက္ျမန္မာေတြရဲ႕ကိုယ္စား လွယ္၊ ေဒၚစုရဲ႕ကုိယ္စား လာတက္တာျဖစ္ပါတယ္လို႕ေျဖခဲ့တဲ့အေၾကာင္းကို ေျပာျပပါတယ္။

အစည္းအေ၀းခန္းအ၀လည္းေရာက္ေရာ က်ေနာ့္ရင္ပတ္က ရင္ထိုးကိုေတြ႕တဲ့သူတိုင္းက က်ေနာ့္ကို ၀မ္းသာအားရနဲ႕ႏုတ္ဆက္ၾကတဲ့အေၾကာင္း၊ က်ေနာ့္အတြက္သတ္မွတ္ေပးထားတဲ့ ကိုယ္စားလွယ္ Delegate ေတြေနရာမွာ တာ၀န္ရွိသူေတြကေနရာခ်ထားေပးတဲ့အေၾကာင္းေျပာပါတယ္။ ဘုန္းေတာ္ႀကီး ဒလိုင္လားမားအစည္းအေ၀းခန္းထဲ၀င္လာတဲ့အခ်ိန္ လူေတြအံုးအံုးၾကြက္ၾကြက္ျဖစ္လာတဲ့အေၾကာင္း က်ေနာ့္ေဘးကျဖတ္သြားတဲ့အခ်ိန္မွာ က်ေနာ္က ဒလိုင္လားမားလက္ကို ဆြဲကိုင္ၿပီး က်ေနာ္ ျမန္မာျဖစ္ ေၾကာင္း၊ ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္ရဲ႕ကိုယ္စားလာေရာက္တာျဖစ္ေၾကာင္းကို ေျပာလိုက္ေတာ့ ဘုန္းေတာ္ ႀကီးဒလိုင္လားမား မ်က္ႏွာလည္း ၀င္းသြားၿပီး ေက်နပ္အားရတဲ့အသံနဲ႕ Oh…Good လို႕ ျပန္ေျပာ တဲ့အေၾကာင္းကို ဆရာေတာ္ထံရွင္းျပခဲ့ပါတယ္။

ေဒၚစုပံု ရင္ထိုးတံဆိပ္ေၾကာင့္ က်ေနာ့္ကို လူေတြက တရင္းတႏွီး တေလးတစားနဲ႕မိတ္ဖြဲ႕စကားလာေျပာ ၾကတာျဖစ္ေၾကာင္းကိုလည္း ေျပာျပခဲ့ပါတယ္။ ဒီလူေတြဟာ ေဒၚစုနဲ႕ သိခ်င္မွသိပါလိမ့္မယ္။ ေဒၚစုကို လူ ကိုယ္တိုင္ ေတြ႕ဘူးခ်င္မွ ေတြ႕ဘူးပါလိမ့္မယ္။ ဒါေပမဲ့ ေဒၚစု ေျပာတဲ့စကားနဲ႕ သူ႕အေၾကာင္းေတြကို သိရွိ ထားလို႕ ေလးစားတဲ့စိတ္နဲ႕ က်ေနာ့္ကို လာေရာက္စကားေျပာၾကတာျဖစ္ပါတယ္။ အဲဒီလူေတြ ေဒၚစုနဲ႕ လူကိုယ္တိုင္ေတြ႕ရ စကားေျပာရမယ္ဆိုရင္ဘယ္လိုေနမလဲဆိုတာကို စဥ္းစားမိတယ္ဆိုတဲ့အေၾကာင္း ကိုလည္း ဆရာေတာ္ႀကီးကို ေျပာျပခဲ့ပါတယ္။

အဲဒီေနာက္ ႏိုဘဲလ္ၿငိမ္းခ်မ္းေရးဆုရွင္ေတြ ေျပာဆိုေဆြးေႏြးၾကတဲ့အေၾကာင္းအရာေတြ၊ သူတို႕တေတြက က်ေနာ္တို႕တေတြမျမင္မိတဲ့ မေတြးမိတဲ့အေၾကာင္းအျဖစ္အပ်က္အေနအထားေတြကို ေျပာဆိုေဆြးေႏြး သြားတာေတြဟာ က်ေနာ့္အတြက္ အင္မတန္ဗဟုသုတရတယ္ဆိုတာနဲ႕ ဒီလူေတြဘာေၾကာင့္ ကမာၻေက်ာ္ ရသလဲဆိုတာကို ေကာင္းေကာင္းနားလည္ခဲ့တယ္ဆိုတာနဲ႕ က်ေနာ္တို႕ရဲ႕ေခါင္းေဆာင္ဟာလည္း သူတို႕ တေတြလိုပဲ ကမာၻေက်ာ္ျဖစ္တယ္ဆိုတာကိုလည္း ဂုဏ္ယူေလးစားမိတဲ့အေၾကာင္း ေျပာခဲ့ပါတယ္။

ဆရာေတာ္ႀကီးက ေအး ေအး ေကာင္းတယ္ ေကာင္းတယ္ လို႕ က်ေနာ့္ကို ေျပာပါတယ္။ ၿပီးေတာ့ ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္လြတ္လာတဲ့အတြက္ သူ႕စိတ္ထဲမွာ အင္မတန္မွ ၀မ္းေျမာက္မိတဲ့အေၾကာင္း ေျပာ ပါတယ္။ ေနာက္ၿပီးေတာ့ ေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္အတြက္ ငါေျပာခ်င္တဲ့စကားနည္းနည္းရွိတယ္ဆိုၿပီး အခုလို ေျပာပါတယ္။

လက္ရွိအေျခအေနကို ေကာင္းေကာင္းနားလည္ဖို႕လိုအပ္တယ္။ လိမၼာပါးနပ္မႈရွိဖို႕လိုအပ္ပါတယ္တဲ့။

လုပ္စရာရွိတာေတြကို စနစ္တက်နဲ႕အစီအစဥ္ဆြဲၿပီးလုပ္ပါ၊ ဒါမွေအာင္ျမင္မႈရမွာ။ ဟိုဘက္ကလူေတြက ဘာကိုပဲလုပ္လုပ္ ေသေသခ်ာခ်ာစနစ္တက်အစီအစဥ္တက်လုပ္တဲ့အတြက္ သူတို႕က ငါတို႕ကို အသာစီး နဲ႕အုပ္ခ်ဳပ္ေနတာျဖစ္တယ္ဆိုတာကိုသေဘာေပါက္ဖို႕လိုတယ္တဲ့။

ေနာက္ၿပီးေတာ့ ေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္က outspoken ျဖစ္တယ္။ တျခားဒီမိုကေရစီႏိုင္ငံေတြမွာ ဒါမ်ဳိးေျပာ လို႕ရွိရင္ ဘာမွမျဖစ္ဘူး၊ အားလံုးကနားလည္ၾကတယ္၊ နားေထာင္ၾကတယ္၊ ငါတို႕ႏိုင္ငံက ငနဲေတြက ဒါမ်ဳိး မဟုတ္ဘူး၊ ဒီေတာ့ နည္းနည္းေလွ်ာ့ၿပီးေျပာဖို႕လိုလိမ့္မယ္တဲ့။

ကိုယ့္ရဲ႕အင္အားစုေတြကို organize ေကာင္းေကာင္းလုပ္ပါ။ ဒါမွ လိုတဲ့အခ်ိန္မွာ စုစုစည္းစည္းနဲ႕လုပ္ႏိုင္ မွာျဖစ္တယ္တဲ့။

ေနာက္တခုက audience ရဲ႕အဆင့္ကိုနားလည္ပါတဲ့။ ျပည္သူေတြကိုပညာေပးပါတဲ့။ ဒို႕ျပည္သူအမ်ားစုက ဒီမိုကေရစီဆိုတာကို ေကာင္းေကာင္းနားလည္ၾကေသးတာမဟုတ္ဘူး၊ ေနာက္ၿပီး လူေတြကို အသိပညာ အေတြးအေခၚျမင့္မားလာေအာင္လုပ္ေပးဖို႕လိုတယ္။ ဒါမွတိုင္းျပည္တိုးတက္မွာ လို႕လည္း ေျပာသြား ပါတယ္။

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ေနာက္ၿပီးေတာ့ ျမန္မာျပည္အတြက္ လႈပ္ရွားလုပ္ကိုင္ေနတဲ့သူအားလံုးအတြက္လည္း အခုလိုေျပာပါေသး တယ္။

တေယာက္နဲ႕တေယာက္ ညီညီညြတ္ညြတ္ရွိၾကပါတဲ့။

အျဖစ္အပ်က္အေၾကာင္းအရာမွန္သမွ်ကို analyse လုပ္ပါတဲ့။ ဒါမွ ဘာကိုဆက္လုပ္ရမလဲဆိုတာ နားလည္ မွာျဖစ္တယ္တဲ့။

ေငြေၾကးေတာင့္တင္းေအာင္လုပ္ၾကပါတဲ့။ အဖြဲ႕အစည္းနဲ႕လုပ္ၾကၿပီဆိုရင္ ေငြေၾကးကုန္က်မႈေတြမ်ားတာ မို႕ ထိထိေရာက္ေရာက္ရွိဖို႕ဆိုရင္ ေငြေၾကးသံုးႏိုင္ဖို႕လိုအပ္တယ္တဲ့။

ေနာက္ၿပီးေတာ့ ကိုယ့္အားကိုယ္ကိုးပါတဲ့။ ႏိုင္ငံျခားအကူအညီဆိုတာ political interest, economic interest ေတြပါတယ္ကြ၊ ဘယ္သူမွ ကိုယ့္အက်ဳိးတခုခုမရွိပဲနဲ႕ေတာ့ အကူအညီေပးမွာမဟုတ္ဘူး၊ NGO ေတြမွာ ကိုယ္က်ဳိးဆိုတာပါ၀င္ၾကတာပဲကြ။ ဥပမာ ႏိုင္ငံတကာၾကက္ေျခနီအဖြဲ႕တို႕ UNHCR တို႕လည္း သူတို႕ အက်ဳိးစီးပြားပါၾကတာပဲ။ ဒါေပမဲ့ သူတို႕လို႕အဖြဲ႕ေတြကိုလည္း ပစ္ပယ္လို႕မရဘူး။ ငါတို႕ မလုပ္ႏိုင္တာေတြကို သူတို႕လုပ္ႏိုင္တာေတြရွိလို႕ပဲ။ ဒီေတာ့ သူတို႕လိုအဖြဲ႕ေတြရဲ႕ အကူအညီကေတာ့ လိုအပ္တာပဲလို႕ ေျပာခဲ့ပါတယ္။

ဆရာေတာ္ႀကီးဟာအသက္ႀကီးေနၿပီျဖစ္ေပမဲ့လည္း အေတြးအေခၚအယူအဆဟာ ေခတ္မီပါတယ္။ ျမန္မာ့ လူမႈအသိုင္းအ၀ိုင္းကို ေျပာင္းလဲတိုးတက္ေစလိုတဲ့စိတ္နဲ႕ အျမဲစဥ္းစားလုပ္ကိုင္ေနတဲ့သူျဖစ္တယ္ဆိုတာ ကို သူနဲ႕ေအးေအးေဆးေဆးစကားေျပာခြင့္ရတဲ့အတြက္ သိခဲ့ရပါတယ္။

သူက ဆႏၵျပင္းျပရင္၊ အဲဒီအတြက္ ႀကိဳးစားရင္ ေအာင္ျမင္မွာပဲ လို႕ဆိုပါတယ္။ သူႏိုင္ငံျခားထြက္လာတဲ့ အခ်ိန္မွာ ပိုက္ဆံမရွိဘူး။ သာသနာျပဳလုပ္ငန္းလုပ္ခ်င္စိတ္ဆိုတဲ့ဆႏၵနဲ႕ နည္းအမ်ဳိးမ်ဳိးကိုစဥ္းစားၿပီး ႀကိဳးပမ္းခဲ့လို႕ ပီနန္၊ ကြာလာလမ္ပူ၊ စကၤာပူ၊ အေမရိကန္၊ ၾသစေၾတးလ်ား၊ အဂၤလန္ စတဲ့ႏိုင္ငံေတြမွာ ဘုန္းႀကီးေက်ာင္းေတြ၊ ဘုရားေတြ တည္ႏိုင္တာ သာသာနာျပဳႏိုင္တာျဖစ္တယ္။ ဒါေၾကာင့္ အျမဲပဲ ႀကိဳးစားၿပီး အလုပ္လုပ္ၾကကြ လို႕ က်ေနာ့္ကို ၾသ၀ါဒေပးပါတယ္။

ဒီအေၾကာင္းေတြကို က်ေနာ္ရဲ႕လုပ္ေဖာ္ကိုင္ဘက္ေရာင္းရင္းေတြကို အခုလို အသိေပးတာျဖစ္ပါတယ္။

ေက်ာ္ေက်ာ္စိုး

ႏို၀င္ဘာ ၁၆ ။ ၂၀၁၀ ခုႏွစ္

PRESS RELEASE BY FTUB ABOUT DAW AUNG SAN SUU KYI

2010-11-17T03:20:00.000+09:00

2010

DAW AUNG SAN SUU KYI PRESS RELEASE(FROM U MG MG HLA KYAING)

2010-11-16T02:34:00.003+09:00

15-11-2010-Brief Notes of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi Press Release

Obama welcomes release of Aung San Suu Kyi

2010-11-14T04:02:00.002+09:00

Sat Nov 13, 7:52 am ET

YOKOHAMA, Japan – President Barack Obama on Saturday welcomed Myanmar's decision to release a "hero of mine," democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, following the expiration of her latest term of detention.

In a statement issued from Japan where he was attending a regional economic summit, Obama said he welcomed Suu Kyi's "long overdue release" and issued a new call for the military leadership in Myanmar, also known as Burma, to free its remaining political prisoners.

Obama said Suu Kyi's release doesn't change the fact that she and the political opposition she represents has been "systematically silenced" and denied an opportunity to take part in political processes that could change her country.

"While the Burmese regime has gone to extraordinary lengths to isolate and silence Aung San Suu Kyi, she has continued her brave fight for democracy, peace, and change in Burma," Obama said. "She is a hero of mine and a source of inspiration for all who work to advance basic human rights in Burma and around the world."

"The United States welcomes her long overdue release," he said.

Myanmar released its archrival on Saturday after the expiration of her 7 1/2-year period of detention. The 65-year-old Nobel Peace Prize laureate has become a powerful symbol of the struggle for democracy in the Southeast Asian nation.

Suu Kyi's freedom also came a week after Myanmar's first election in 20 years, balloting that was swept by the military's proxy political party and condemned by Obama and other Western leaders as a sham to keep the junta in power.

During a visit to India last Sunday, Obama said Myanmar's election "will be anything but free and fair," and said that, for too long, "the people of Burma have been denied the right to determine their own destiny."

Suu Kyi's pro-democracy party won a landslide victory in the 1990 election, but was barred from taking office. She had been under house arrest for most of her life since then, after the ruling generals ignored the poll results.

07-11-2010-BURMA SHAM ELECTIONS-THE JUNTA WAY(BY BBC)

2010-11-07T21:55:00.003+09:00

(JTUC-RENGO)နွင့္ ျမန္မာ့ဒီမိုကေရစီေရး အင္အားစုမ်ား ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံ ဒုတိယနိုင္ငံျခားေရးဝန္ႀကီး နွင့္ေတြ ့ဆုံေဆြးေႏြး

2010-11-06T03:30:00.002+09:00

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2010
(JTUC-RENGO)နွင့္ ျမန္မာ့ဒီမိုကေရစီေရး အင္အားစုမ်ား ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံ ဒုတိယနိုင္ငံျခားေရးဝန္ႀကီး နွင့္ေတြ ့ဆုံေဆြးေႏြး

၂၀၁၀ ခုႏွစ္ ႏို၀င္ဘာလ(၅)ရက္ေန႔ ညေန (၅)နာရီ (၁၅)မိနစ္တြင္ တိုက်ိဳျမိဳ ့ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံ နိုင္ငံျခားေရး ဝန္ႀကီးဌာန ဒုတိယ နိုင္ငံျခားေရးဝန္ႀကီး မစၥတာ ယုတက ဘန္နို နွင့္ JTUC-RENGO ကိုယ္စားလွယ္မ်ား ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံအေျခစိုက္ ျမန္မာ့ဒီမိုကေရစီေရး အင္းအားစုမ်ား အႀကား လာမည့္(၀၇-၁၁-၂၀၁၀)ေန ့တြင္ ျမန္မာ စစ္အုပ္စုမွ ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံ၌ က်င္းပျပဳလုပ္မည့္ ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြနွင့္ ပတ္သက္၍ ေဆြးေႏြးပဲြကို က်င္းပျပဳလုပ္ ခဲ့ပါသည္။

အထက္ပါ ေဆြးေႏြးပဲြကို မႀကာခင္ကာလက ေဟာ္လန္နိုင္ငံ ဘရတ္ဆယ္ျမိဳ႔တြင္ က်င္းပ ျပီးစီးခဲ့ေသာ အျပည္ျပည္ဆိုင္ရာ လြတ္လပ္ေသာ အလုပ္သမား သမဂၢမ်ားအဖဲြ ့ခ်ဳပ္ (ITUC)၏ ဆုံးျဖတ္ခ်က္ နွင့္အညီ ျပဳလုပ္ခဲ့ျခင္း ျဖစ္ၿပီး ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံသား အလုပ္သမား သမဂၢမ်ားအဖဲြ႔ခ်ဳပ္(FTUB)၏တင္ျပ အကူအညီ ေတာင္းခံခ်က္အရ တကမၻာလုံးရိွ ITUC မွမိမိတို႔ သက္ဆိုင္ရာ နိုင္ငံအလုိက္ နအဖ၏ ၂၀၁၀ ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြ ကိုဆန္႔က်င္ ကန္႔ကြက္ျခင္းျဖစ္သည္။ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံ အလုပ္သမား သမဂၢမ်ားအဖဲြ႔ခ်ဳပ္ (JTUC-RENGO)၊ျမန္မာ့ေရးရာရုံး-ဂ်ပန္ ႏွင့္ ၂၀၁၀ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြ ဆန္႔က်င္ေရးေကာ္မတီ (EBC-JAPAN)တို႔နွင့္ ညိွနိႈင္း၍ ဤေဆြးေႏြးပဲြကို က်င္းပျပဳလုပ္ခဲ့ျခင္ ျဖစ္ပါသည္။

အဆိုပါေဆြးေႏြးပဲြသို ့ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံအစုိးရဘက္မွ ဒုတိယနိုင္ငံျခားေရးဝန္ႀကီး မစၥတာ ယုတခ ဘန္နို နွင့္ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံျခားေရး ဝန္ႀကီးဌာနတာဝန္ခံမ်ား တက္ေရာက္ခဲ့ျပီး JTUC-RENGO ကိုယ္စား အေထြေထြအတြင္းေရးမႉး မစၥတာ ဟီရိုယုခိ နဂမို နွင့္ နိုင္ငံျခားေရးရာ ညႊန္ႀကားေရးမႉး မစၥတာ မာစယုခိ ရီွယိုတာ တို ့ကဦးေဆာင္၍ ျမန္မာ့ေရးရာရုံး ဒါရိုက္တာ ေဒါက္တာမင္းညို၊ ေဒၚခင္ေဆြေအး (FTUB JAPAN REP.) ၊ ဦးထင္ေက်ာ္(ဒု-ဥကၠဌ-NLD-LA-JAPAN)၊ ဦးမိုင္ေက်ာ္ဦး (NDF-Japan/AUN)၊ ဦးျမင့္ေမာင္(အေထြေထြအတြင္းေရးမႉး-LDB)၊ ဦးမင္းမ်ိဳးခ်စ္(ဥကၠဌ-PMNS-Japan/AUN)တို႔ တက္ေရာက္ ခဲ့ႀကျပီး ၂၀၁၀ ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြဆန္ ့က်င္ေရးေကာ္မတီ(EBC-JAPAN)ကိုယ္စား ဦးျမတ္သူ(DPNS-JAPAN) နွင့္ ဦးဘုန္းလိႈင္(ဒု-ဥကၠဌ-FWUBC) တို႔ တက္ေရာက္ခဲ့ႀကသည္။

ေဆြးေႏြးပဲြမွာ JTUC-RENGO အေထြေထြအတြင္းေရးမႉးမွ ျမန္မာ့အေရး ေဆြးေႏြးရန္ လာေရာက္ျခင္း ျဖစ္ေႀကာင္း မိတ္ဆက္ျပီး ျမန္မာ့ေရးရာရုံး ဒါရိုက္တာ ေဒါက္တာမင္းညိုမွ နအဖ က်င္းပျပဳလုပ္မည့္ ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြသည္ စစ္အာဏာရွင္စနစ္ကို တရားဝင္ေအာင္ျပဳလုပ္မည့္ ၂၀၀၈ အေျခခံ ဥပေဒ အေပၚအေျခခံသည္ ့ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြျဖစ္၍ မိမိတို႔ အေနနွင့္ ဆန္႔က်င္ေႀကာင္း နွင့္လက္မခံနိုင္ေႀကာင္း ေျပာႀကားခဲ့သည္။ ဖိအားမေပးပါက နအဖ အေနျဖင့္ ေတြ႔ ဆုံေဆြးေႏြးပဲြ ျပဳလုပ္ရန္ စိတ္ဝင္စားမည္ မထင္ေႀကာင္း လုံေလာက္ေသာ ဖိအားေပးမွသာ စစ္မွန္ေသာေတြ႔ ဆုံေဆြးေႏြးပဲြ ျဖစ္ေျမာက္ရန္အတြက္ ဖိအား မ်ားမ်ားေပးေစလိုေႀကာင္း-ဥပမာ-Selected Sanction – အကန္႔ အသတ္နွင့္ စီးပြားေရးပိတ္ဆို ့မႈျပဳလုပ္ျခင္းမ်ိဳးကို ျပဳလုပ္ေစလိုေႀကာင္း ဥပမာေပး ေျပာႀကားသြားသည္။

NDF-JAPAN ကိုယ္စားလွယ္ ဦးမိုင္ေက်ာ္ဦးမွ- မႀကာမီ က်င္းပမည့္ ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြကို တိုင္းရင္းသားမ်ား အေနျဖင့္လည္း လက္မခံနိုင္ေႀကာင္း အဆိုပါ ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြအျပီးတြင္ ဆက္လက္က်င့္သုံးမည့္ ၂၀၀၈ အေျခခံ ဥပေဒသည္ တိုင္းရင္းသားမ်ား၏ အခြင့္အေရးမ်ားကို အာမခံ ထားျခင္းမရိွေႀကာင္းနွင့္ အဆိုပါ ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြ အျပီးတြင္ တိုင္းရင္းသား လက္နက္ကိုင္ အဖဲြ႔အစည္းမ်ာတို႔ကို နအဖ စစ္တပ္မွ စစ္ေရးျဖစ္ ေျဖရွင္းနိုင္သည့္ အလားအလာ အလြန္မ်ားေႀကာင္း နအဖ တို႔က လက္နက္ႀကီးမ်ားကို တိုင္းရင္းသား လက္နက္ကိုင္ အဖဲြ႔အစည္းမ်ား၏ တပ္စခန္းမ်ား အနီးသို႔ ေရႊ႔ေျပာင္း ေနရာခ်ထား လွ်က္ရိွေႀကာင္း နွင့္ အဆိုပါစစ္ပဲြ မျဖစ္ပြားေစရန္ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံအစိုးရမွ အကူအညီ ေပးပါရန္ ေမတၱာရပ္ခံခဲ့သည္။

၂၀၁၀ ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြဆန္႔က်င္ေရး ေကာ္မတီကိုယ္စား ဦးျမတ္သူမွ ေျပာႀကားရာတြင္ ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုႀကည္နွင့္ ဗိုလ္ခ်ဳပ္သန္းေရႊ တို႔အႀကားေဆြးေႏြးပဲြ ျဖစ္ေျမာက္ရန္ ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြ မတိုင္ခင္ေရာ ေနာက္ပိုင္းတြင္ ပါ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံအစိုးရမွ နအဖ အားဖိအား အဆက္မျပတ္ ေပးေစ ခ်င္ေႀကာင္းနွင့္ ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြဆန္႔ က်င္ေရးကာလာမွ ျပီးဆုံးသြားျပီဟု မိမိအေနျဖင့္ ယူဆေႀကာင္း နွင့္ ေရြးေကာက္ပဲြ ကာလ ေနာက္ပိုင္းတြင္ ျမန္မာနိုင္္ငံအတြင္း မတရားဖမ္းဆီး အေရးယူ ေထာင္ခ်မႈမ်ား ညွင္းပမ္း နိွပ္စက္မႈမ်ား ပိုမိုတိုးပြားလာမည့္ အလားအလာမ်ား အလြန္မ်ားလွ်က္ ရိွေသာေႀကာင့္ ထိုသို႔ မျဖစ္လာေစရန္ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံ အစိုးရအေနျဖင့္ နအဖ အား ဖိအားေပးရန္ ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံ အတြင္းမွ ေမတၱာရပ္ခံ လာပါေႀကာင္း ေျပာႀကားသြားပါသည္။

ဂ်ပန္ ဒုတိယနိုင္ငံျခားေရးဝန္ႀကီးမွ ျပန္လည္ ေဆြးေႏြးရာတြင္ မိမိအေနျဖင့္ ယခု လႊတ္ေတာ္ အစည္းအေဝး က်င္းပေနခ်ိန္ အတြင္းလာေရာက္ ေတြ႔ဆုံျခင္းျဖစ္ျပီး မိမိအားတကူးတက ေစာင့္ ေပးသည့္အတြက္ ေက်းဇူး အထူးတင္ပါေႀကာင္ ေျပာႀကားျပီး ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံနွင့္ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံတို႔သည္ အာရွ တိုက္တြင္ အလြန္ရင္းနီွးေသာ နိုင္ငံမ်ားျဖစ္ေႀကာင္း ယေန႔ ႀကြေရာက္လာေသာ ေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ား အေနျဖင့္ ေရွ႔မတိုး ေနာက္မဆုတ္နိုင္ ျဖစ္ေနေသာ ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံ အေျခအေနအတြက္ အလြန္စိုးရိမ္ ပူပန္လွ်က္ရိွသည္ကို မိမိအေနျဖင့္ သေဘာေပါက္ပါေႀကာင္း ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံအေရးကို ဝန္ႀကီးခ်ဳပ္ ခန္ နွင့္ နိုင္ငံျခားေရးဝန္ႀကီး မိုင္းဟာရ တို႔နွင့္ တိုင္ပင္၍ ေဆာင္ရြက္လွ်က္ ရိွပါေႀကာင္း ျပီးခဲ့ေသာ (၃၀-၁၀-၂၀၁၀) ေအပက္ ညီလာခံတြင္ ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံျခားေရး ဝန္ႀကီးနွင့္ ေတြ ့ဆုံျပီး ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံ၏ သေဘာထားကို ေျပာႀကားခဲ့ျပီး ျဖစ္ေႀကာင္း ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုႀကည္အား အျမန္ဆုံး ျပန္လႊတ္ေပးရန္လည္း ဖိအားေပး ေနပါေႀကာင္း ကုလသမဂၢတြင္ မစၥတာကင္တားနားမွ တင္ျပထားေသာ ျမန္မာျပည္ဆိုင္ရာ လူ ့အခြင့္အေရး စုံစမ္းစစ္ေဆးေရးေကာ္မရွင္ ဖဲြ႔ရန္ကိစၥကို အေလးထား ေဆြးေႏြးေနပါေႀကာင္း အခုအခ်ိန္အထိ တံခါးဖြင့္ထားဆဲ ျဖစ္ပါေႀကာင္း မိမိအေနျဖင့္ ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံသားမ်ားနွင့္ ထပ္တူထပ္မွ် ခံစားခ်က္ရိွပါေႀကာင္း ကိုယ္ခ်င္းစာပါေႀကာင္း ေျပာႀကားသြားပါသည္။

သတင္းမွတ္တမ္း ။ ဘုန္းလိႈိင္-FWUBC

Fwubc Statement Concerning About Arriving of Burmese Refugees in Japan

2010-10-06T22:17:00.000+09:00

Fwubc Statement Concerning About Arriving of Burmese Refugees in Japan

Reasons for No Against 2010 Elections

2010-10-06T21:22:00.000+09:00

Reasons for No Against 2010 Elections

Concerns over Thai plans to return Burmese asylum seekers

2010-10-06T21:09:00.000+09:00

Concerns over Thai plans to return Burmese asylum seekers
Liam Cochrane

Last Updated: Wed, 6 Oct 2010 17:06:00 +1100

Human rights groups have expressed concern over Thailand's plan to repatriate Burmese asylum seekers to Burma after the country's November 7 elections.

Thailand's foreign minister, Kasit Piromya, who made the announcement in New York, says repatriating Burmese asylum seekers is a priority for his government.

"I am going back to Bangkok, and one of the first things I will be doing is to launch a more comprehensive program for the Myanmar (Burmese) people in the camps."

"The displaced persons, the intellectuals that run around the streets of Bangkok and Chiang Mai province, to prepare them to return to Myanmar (Burma) after the elections," he said.

More than 140,000 Burmese asylum seekers live in nine camps spread along the Thai-Burma border.

Most of them have fled conflict, and persecution along ethnic or political lines.

David Mathieson, senior researcher on Burma for Human Rights Watch, says the idea of making those Burmese return is "absurd".

"It's simply not safe for them to go back. Just because Burma's holding elections in November doesn't mean the conditions have changed at all."

Rights groups, as well as the United Nations, have expressed concern about the credibility of the election system, which reserves a quarter of all seats for the army and will take place without the main opposition party.

The National League for Democracy chose to not take part because its leader Aung San Suu Kyi wasn't allowed to be involved and remains under house arrest.

Thailand's foreign minister, Mr Kasit says it is unlikely Burma�s elections will be completely free or fair, but he says it is the first step on the road back to an open and democratic Burma.

"We are going to prepare the Myanmar (Burma) people in Thailand for an eventual return to a new Myanmar (Burma), maybe half-democratic, but I think it is a beginning."

But David Mathieson says the vote next month is merely a mirage of democracy.

"This is one of the negative sides of the Burmese elections, this kind of phoney optimism that people have that the Burmese elections are a serious process - and they're just not."

Despite the comments from Thailand's Foreign Minister, groups involved with refugee resettlement say they have seen no changes to policy about Burmese asylum seekers.

Kitty McKinsey is the spokeswoman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Asia.

"The UN refugee agency has no reason to believe that the Thai government intends to force refugees to return to Myanmar," she said.

David Mathieson from Human Rights Watch says that while forced repatriation would be frowned upon by the Western world, Thailand has done it recently.

"It's very unlikely they would force refugees back after the elections. However, Thailand did do that over Christmas with the Hmong refugees in the north. They forced them back and there was very little Western countries could do to stop that."

In addition to the asylum seekers in camps on the border, Thailand is also home to an estimated two million Burmese economic migrants, most of them working without proper visas.

Chris Lom, information officer at the International Organisation for Migration, says many of those migrants need the Burmese economy to strengthen and provide them with the chance of work.

"For the vast majority of those two million irregular migrants here, and also registered migrants working here in Thailand, they are here for economic reasons," he said.

"But there are very large numbers of people from Myanmar (Burma) who would go back if the economic situation allowed them to and they could find jobs there."

Thailand's Foreign Minister, Kasit Piromya, says the elections in Burma next month will be a test, not just of Burma but also of the regional bloc, ASEAN.

"The credibility of the election is not only on the credibility and respectability for Myanmar (Burma) but for ASEAN as a whole. It's our credibility and respectability and also on the notion of ASEAN centrality to the whole Asia Pacific."

Announcement of the election date on 7th November 2010 is only a diversion.

2010-10-06T20:50:00.001+09:00

2010_August_17 the Election Announcement is Only a Diversion (Eng)

NCUB Deplores China’s Support for Tyrannical Regime of Burma

2010-10-06T20:46:00.000+09:00

2010 September 17 NCUB Statement Deploring China Support for the SPDC English Version

"Burma’s Children: a Generation Sacrificed"

2010-10-06T20:34:00.000+09:00

Burma en Final

Trade Unions Call on ASEM to Act on Burma

2010-10-06T20:26:00.000+09:00

Trade Unions Call on ASEM to Act on Burma-04!10!2010l

NUCLEAR FREE BURMA POWER POINT PRESENTATION

2010-10-06T19:31:00.000+09:00

Nuclear Free Burma

BURMESE(KAREN) REFUGEES ARRIVED IN JAPAN

2010-09-28T22:21:00.006+09:00

「第三国定住」ミャンマー難民が日本へ出発

日テレNEWS24

ယေန ့(၂၈-၀၉-၂၀၁၀) ေန ့နံနက္ ၇း၂၅ နာရီတြင္ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံ တိုက်ိဳျမိဳ ့ နာရီတာေလဆိပ္သို ့ဂ်ပန္ပန္အဲယား-JAL FLIGHT
718 ျဖင့္ ထိုင္းနိုင္ငံမွ ကရင္ ဒုကၡသည္(၁၈) ဦးဆိုက္ေရာက္လာခဲ့ျပီး ေလဆိပ္အတြင္း ဂ်ပန္ လဝက ျဖတ္ျခင္း ေခတၱအနား
ယူျခင္းနွင့္ ကေလးငယ္မ်ားေနမေကာင္းျဖစ္ေန၍ ေလဆိပ္ေဆးခန္းတြင္ ကေလးငယ္မ်ားအားေဆးကုသမႈမ်ားခံယူျပီး
ေနာက္ မနက္(၉) နာရီတြင္ ေလဆိပ္အျပင္သို ့ထြက္လာခဲ့ႀကရာ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံေရာက္ ကရင္တိုင္းရင္းသားဒုကၡသည္(၃၀)
ခန္ ့နွင့္္ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံေရာက္ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံသားဒီမိုကေရစီေရးလႈပ္ရွားသူ(၁၀) ဦးခန္ ့စုစုေပါင္း(၄၀) ေက်ာ္မွ ကရင္ဘာသာ
ဆိုင္းဘုတ္မ်ား ျမန္မာ အဂၤလိပ္ နွစ္ဘာသာပါ -
ျမန္မာစစ္အစိုးရ၏ ရက္စက္မႈေၾကာင့္ ထြက္ေျပးလာရေသာ ဒုကၡသည္မ်ားအား ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံမွ ေႏြးေထြးစြာ ႀကိဳဆိုပါသည္။
Refugees from Burma (Myanmar) under the junta are warmly welcome to Japan.ဟူေသာဆိုင္းဘုတ္မ်ားကိုင္ေဆာင္၍ ႀကိဳဆိုခဲ့ႀကပါသည္။ ယေန ့ဆိုက္ေရာက္ရန္ရည္ရြယ္ထားသည္မွာ (၂၇) ဦးျဖစ္ေသာ္လည္း
ကေလးငယ္မ်ားေနမေကာင္းျဖစ္ေနေသာေႀကာင့္ မဲေဆာက္တြင္ မိသားစုတစ္စု နွင့္ ဘန္ေကာက္တြင္ မိသားစုတစ္စု က်န္ရစ္
ေနခဲ့ျပီး People forum of Burma မွ Yamamoto San က ေျပာျပသည္မွာ အဆိုပါက်န္ေနခဲ့ေသာ မိသားစုနွစ္စုမွာ မိမိ ထိုင္း
နိုင္ငံသို ့သြားေရာက္ခဲ့စဥ္ ကသိရိွမိတ္ေဆြျဖစ္ခဲ့သူမ်ားျဖစ္ေႀကာင္းနွင့္ မိမိအေနျဖင့္ ယေန ့အဆိုပါမိသားစုမ်ားနွင့္ ျပန္လည္
ေတြ ့ဆုံရန္အားခဲျပီးႀကိဳးစားလာခဲ့ေသာ္လဲ ပါမလာ၍ အလြန္စိတ္မေကာင္းျဖစ္မိပါေႀကာင္းေျပာႀကားခဲ့ပါသည္။
ေလဆိပ္အျပင္ဘက္ ဘတ္စ္ ကားေပၚမတက္ခင္တြင္ သတင္းစာရွင္းလင္းပဲြျပဳလုပ္ခဲ့ရာ ပထမဦးစြာ
ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံျခားေရးဝန္ႀကီးဌာနမွ အရာရိွတစ္ဦး က ရွင္းလင္းေျပာႀကားခဲ့ျပီး ျပန္လွန္ေမးခြန္းထုတ္ျခင္းမ်ားျပဳလုပ္ခဲ့ျပီး
ယေန ့ေရာက္ရိွလာေသာဒုကၡသည္မ်ားထဲမွ ကရင္လူငယ္တစ္ဦးနွင့္ ကရင္အမ်ိဳးသမီးငယ္တစ္ဦး တို ့နွင့္လည္းမိတ္ဆက္
ေပးျခင္းကိုျပဳလုပ္ခဲ့ပါသည္။
ယေန ့ေန ့လည္ (၃)နာရီခန္ ့မွစတင္၍ TBS News Birds တြင္ UNHCR ညႊန္ႀကားေရးမႉးခ်ဳပ္ ဂ်ပန္လူမ်ိဳး
မစၥတာတာကီဂါဝါ မွရွင္းလင္းတင္ျပရာတြင္လည္း ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံသည္ UNHCR မွတဆင့္ ဒုကၡသည္မ်ားအတြက္ ေဒၚလာသန္း
ေပါင္းမ်ားစြာနွစ္စဥ္ ေပးအပ္ခဲ့ေသာ္လည္း ကမၻာ့နိုင္ငံအမ်ားစု က ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံသည္ ဒုကၡသည္မ်ားကိုလက္ခံလိုစိတ္မရိွ၍
၄င္းအစားေငြမ်ားစြာေပးအပ္ေနျခင္းျဖစ္ေႀကာင္းရႈျမင္ျပီး မိမိ နိုင္ငံျခားတြင္ UNHCR ဝန္ထမ္းအျဖစ္သြားေရာက္လုပ္ကိုင္စဥ္
အထင္ေသးေသာမ်က္လုံးျဖင့္အႀကည့္ခံခဲ့ရ၍ မိမိအေနျဖင့္ အလြန္စိတ္မေကာင္းျဖစ္မိပါေႀကာင္း။ ယခုအခါ ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံမွ ဒုကၡ
သည္မ်ားကို မိမိတို ့ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံမွ စတင္လက္ခံခဲ့ရာ အာရွတိုက္မွ ဒုကၡသည္မ်ားကို အာရွတိုက္နိုင္ငံတစ္နိုင္ငံက ပထမဦးဆုံး
စတင္လက္ခံခဲ့ျခင္းျဖစ္ျပီး မိမိအေနျဖင့္အလြန္ဝမ္းေျမာက္ဝမ္းသာျဖစ္မိပါေႀကာင္းနွင့္ အေမရိကန္ျပည္ေထာင္စု အေနနွင့္
နွစ္စဥ္ ဒုကၡသည္ေသာင္းနွင့္ခ်ီ၍ လက္ခံေနရာ အဆိုပါအေရအတြက္နွင့္နိႈင္းယွဥ္ ပါက ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံက လက္ခံေသာ ဒုကၡသည္
အေရအတြက္မွာ အလြန္နဲေနေသးေႀကာင္းေျပာႀကားခဲ့ပါသည္။ ယခုမွစ၍နိုင္ငံျခားရိွ ဒုကၡသည္မ်ားကိုလက္ခံျခင္းနွင့္ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္
ငံအတြင္းဒုကၡသည္ေလွ်ာက္ထားသူမ်ားကို ဒုကၡသည္အျဖစ္ လက္ခံျခင္းနွစ္မ်ိဳးစလုံးကို အတူယွဥ္တဲြ၍ တိုးခ်ဲ ့ျမွင့္တင္သြားျခင္း
ကိုျပဳလုပ္ရမည္ျဖစ္ေႀကာင္းေျပာႀကားသြားခဲ့ပါသည္။ ထို ့အျပင္ ယေန ့ေရာက္ရိွလာေသာ ဒုကၡသည္မ်ား အမ်ားဆုံးစိုးရိမ္ပူပန္
ႀကေသာ အရာမ်ားမွာ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံတြင္ မည္ကဲ့သို ့အသက္ေမြးဝမ္းေႀကာင္းျပဳလုပ္ရမည္နည္းဆိုသည္နွင့္ ဂ်ပန္လူ ့အဖဲြ ့အစည္း
အတြင္းမည္ကဲ့သို ့ဝင္ဆန္ ့ေအာင္လုပ္ရမည္နည္း စသည္တို ့ျဖစ္ေႀကာင္းေျပာႀကားသြားပါသည္။ ထို ့အျပင္ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံသို ့
ေရာက္ရိွလာေသာ ဒုကၡသည္မ်ားကို မည္ကဲ့သို ့ကူညီေထာက္ပန္ ့မည္လဲဟူေသာေမးခြန္းကိုျပန္လည္ေျဖႀကားရာတြင္ ဂ်ပန္
နိုင္ငံသည္ ကမၻာ ့ဒုကၡသည္မ်ားအတြက္ ေငြေႀကးေျမာက္ျမားစြာေထာက္ပန္ ့လွ်က္ရိွရာ အဆိုပါေထာက္ပန္ ့ေငြ၏ (၀.၁)ရာခိုင္နႈန္း
ကိုအသုံးျပဳလွ်င္ ပင္ လုံေလာက္သည္ဟု မိမိထင္ျမင္ေႀကာင္းနွင့္ ဂ်ပန္အစိုးရက အမွန္တကယ္ပန္ ့ပိုးသင့္ေႀကာင္းေျပာႀကားသြား
ပါသည္။

ယေန ့ေရာက္ရိွလာေသာ ကရင္ဒုကၡသည္မ်ားအတြက္ ကရင္ဘာသာစကားျပန္အျဖစ္ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံေရာက္ကရင္ဒုကၡသည္
တစ္ဦးျဖစ္ျပီး ျမန္မာ့ဒီမိုကေရစီေရးကိုလုပ္ေဆာင္လွ်က္ရိွေသာ ကရင္အမ်ိဳးသားနိုင္ငံေရးအဖဲြ ့အစည္းတစ္ခုျဖစ္ေသာKNL-JAPAN
ေခါင္းေဆာင္ ကိုေစာဘလွသိန္းမွေဆာင္ရြက္ေပးခဲ့ျပီး ယေန ့ေရာက္ရိွလာေသာကရင္ဒုကၡသည္မ်ားကို (၆)လ ႀကာသင္တန္းအမ်ိဳး
ေပးမည္ျဖစ္ျပီး အဆိုပါကာလအတြင္း ျပင္ပသို ့အဆက္အသြယ္လုပ္ခြင့္ကိုကန္ ့သတ္ထားမည္ျဖစ္ျပီး သင္တန္းကာလ(၆) လအျပီး
တြင္ မိမိတို ့ႀကိဳက္နွစ္သက္သလို ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံတြင္ေနထိုင္လုပ္ကိုင္စားေသာက္နိုင္မည္ျဖစ္ေႀကာင္း ကိုေစာဘလွသိန္းမွတဆင့္သိရိွ
ခဲ့ရပါသည္။
သို ့ျဖစ္ရာကရင္ဒုကၡသည္မ်ားမိမိတို ့ေျခေထာက္ေပၚမိမိတို ့ရပ္တည္နိုင္ရန္ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံရိွျမန္မာနိုင္ငံသား
ဒီမိုကေရစီေရးအင္အားစုမ်ားအေနျဖင့္ မိမိတို ့တတ္အားသေရြ ့အကူအညီေပးရန္တာဝန္ရိွေပသည္။
ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံ၏ဒုကၡသည္ျပႆနာမွာ ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံအတြင္းယေန ့အုပ္ခ်ဳပ္ေနေသာ စစ္အာဏာရွင္
စနစ္၏ ေနာက္ဆက္တဲြ ဆိုးက်ိဳးမ်ားျဖစ္ရာ အဆိုပါျမန္မာျပည္တြင္းရိွ နိုင္ငံေရးျပႆနာကိုေျဖရွင္းေရးမွာ အဓိကနွင့္အေျခခံ
အေႀကာင္းအရင္းျဖစ္ရာ ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံအတြင္း စစ္မွန္ေသာနိုင္ငံေရးျပဳျပင္ေျပာင္းလဲမႈမ်ားျဖစ္ရန္အတြက္ ဂ်ပန္နိုင္ငံအစိုးရအေနျဖင့္
အေမရိကန္ျပည္ေထာင္စုအပါအဝင္ ကမၻာ ့ဒီမိုကေရစီနိုင္ငံမ်ားနွင့္အတူလက္တဲြ၍ ျမန္မာစစ္အာဏာရွင္မ်ားအေပၚပိုမိုဖိအားေပး
လုပ္ေဆာင္သြားမွသာလွ်င္ ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံျပည္သူမ်ားအေပၚအမွန္တကယ္ကူညီရာေရာက္မည္ျဖစ္ေပသည္။

သတင္းမွတ္တမ္းနွင့္ေဝဖန္ခ်က္။ ။ ဘုန္းလိႈင္-FWUBC
ဗီြဒီယို-日テレNEWS24
ဓါတ္ပုံ-FWUBC

Japan urges Myanmar to release Suu Kyi, hold free, fair election+

2010-08-22T01:53:00.001+09:00

TOKYO, Aug. 20 (AP) - (Kyodo)—Japan has urged Myanmar to release political prisoners including pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi and conduct its general election slated for Nov. 7 in an open, free and fair manner, Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada said Friday.
The minister told a press conference that the Japanese government conveyed Thursday its concern over the November poll, which will be held for the first time in two decades, through Myanmar's ambassador to Japan.

"If Myanmar holds the general election without releasing political prisoners including Ms. Suu Kyi, it would not be a free, fair and open election that the international community has called for and thus would be regrettable," Okada said.

He called on the Myanmar government to swiftly hold a substantive dialogue with Suu Kyi and conduct the general election by including all the concerned parties.

Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy won the 1990 election in a landslide, but it has decided to boycott the upcoming election. The party became legally defunct after failing to re-register with the election commission by a deadline.

The pro-democracy leader has been under some form of detention, mostly house arrest, for 15 of the past 21 years.

Myanmar junta sets election date for Nov 7

2010-08-14T02:26:00.000+09:00

YANGON, Myanmar – Myanmar's ruling junta set Nov. 7 as the date for the country's first election in two decades, but made no concessions to critics who say the rules favor the army and its allies and bar democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi from taking part.

Foreign governments renewed calls for urgent changes allowing a free-and-fair vote. Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy already announced it was boycotting the polls and other parties are wary of participating.

Friday's brief election-date announcement by the Election Commission was carried on state TV and radio.

"Multiparty general elections for the country's parliament will be held on Sunday Nov. 7," said the announcement, which called on political parties to submit their candidate lists starting Monday through Aug. 30.

The elections are part of the junta's "roadmap to democracy," a seven-step program which it says will shift the nation from almost 50 years of military rule in Myanmar, also known as Burma. But critics charge the rules and army-guided constitution are meant to perpetuate the military's commanding role in politics.

The National League for Democracy won a landslide victory in the last elections in 1990. But the junta refused to honor the results and has kept the Nobel laureate Suu Kyi locked away, mostly under house arrest, for 15 of the past 21 years, ignoring worldwide pleas for her freedom.

The NLD and others said the election date would not allow sufficient time for campaigning, which cannot officially begin until the junta announces a campaign period.

"Without freedom of media or expression, the elections cannot be either free or fair," NLD party spokesman Nyan Win said.

Election laws passed ahead of the voting have been criticized as undemocratic by the international community. They effectively bar Suu Kyi and other political prisoners — estimated at more than 2,000 — and members of religious orders from taking part in the elections. Suu Kyi's party was also automatically disbanded under the laws for refusing to register for the elections.

Strict rules for campaigning bar parties from chanting, marching or saying anything at rallies that could tarnish the country's image.

"For these elections to have any credibility, the regime must allow a free and fair campaign and polling process; release all political prisoners, including Aung San Suu Kyi, and instigate an inclusive dialogue with the full participation of all opposition and ethnic groups, towards genuine and lasting national reconciliation," Britain's foreign ministry said in a statement.

The United States holds a similar position. After visiting with Myanmar officials in May, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia Kurt Campbell said the junta's unwillingness to compromise and reform the electoral process led Washington "to believe that these elections will lack international legitimacy."

With the NLD out of the race, it appears likely the junta-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party will get the most votes. The USDP was set up and supported by the generals since 1993. It has unrivaled access to funds, a nationwide presence, and a claimed official membership of tens of millions.

The only other party with widespread organization and sufficient funding — but little popular appeal — is the National Unity Party, descendant of the Burmese Socialist Programme Party that ruled under late strongman Ne Win, who held power until 1988.

Out of 40 new political parties, all but four or five are almost unknown. Many will have trouble raising the necessary expenses, which include a 500,000 kyat ($500) for each candidate, more than half a year's salary for the average schoolteacher.

A total of 498 seats will be contested, while another 166 seats will be taken by representatives of the military. A 2008 constitution adopted under the junta's roadmap reserves 25 percent of parliamentary seats for the military and says more than 75 percent of the lawmakers must approve any amendments to the charter.

"I am happy that the government has finally set the date as there had been rumors that elections will not be held this year," said Thu Wai, chairman of the Democratic Party.

However, Thu Wai, 77, a longtime democracy activist and former political prisoner, complained that, "We have very little time for party campaigning and we are short of funds."

The Democratic Party earlier this week protested to the Election Commission that police were intimidating its members.

"Nothing has been free or fair since the start," said Khin Maung Swe, leader of the National Democratic Force. "Despite all the obstacles we are determined to contest the elections."

___

Associated Press writer Jocelyn Gecker in Bangkok contributed to this report.

ျမန္မာနိုင္ငံအလုပ္သမားသမဂၢမ်ားအဖဲြ ့ခ်ဳပ္၏တိုက္တြန္းနိႈေဆာ္ခ်က္

2010-08-13T20:54:00.001+09:00

2010 Aug 12 FTUB Call for United Action (Bur)

2010 Aug 12 FTUB call for united action (Bur)

2010-08-13T06:49:00.000+09:00

2010 Aug 12 FTUB Call for United Action (Bur)

မၿငိမ္းေသာမီး

2010-08-07T01:33:00.001+09:00

From: Ye Yint Thet Zwe

ႏွစ္ဆယ့္ႏွစ္ႏွစ္တဲ့လား

ခ်စ္ျခင္းမ်ားစြာနဲ ့

ျဖစ္ျခင္း ပ်က္ျခင္း တရားမ်ား

တေရြ ့ေရြ ့ … ခရီးရွည္ …။

ေပးဆပ္ျခင္းမ်ား

ဘ၀ အမ်ိဳးမ်ိဳး အဖံုဖုံ

ေဟာဒီ … လူ ့ဘံုႀကီးမွာ

တခ်ိဳ ့ … ေကာက္ရိုးမီး

တခ်ိဳ ့ … မၿငိမ္းေသာမီး

တခ်ိဳ ့ … မီးခဲျပာဖံုး

တခ်ိဳ ့ … ေတာက္မယ့္မီးခဲ တရဲရဲ

စသည္ျဖင့္ …

ကိုယ့္ေရြးခ်ယ္မႈနဲ ့ ကိုယ္

ေခတ္ေတြကို ျဖတ္သန္းသြားခဲ့ၾက …..။

နာရီေတြ ရာသီေတြ

တျဖဳတ္ျဖဳတ္ေၾကြ

အသက္ေတြ လြတ္လပ္ခြင့္ေတြ

တျဖဳတ္ျဖဳတ္ေၾကြ

လူ ့ေဘာင္ႀကီးတခုလံုး

တျဖဳတ္ျဖဳတ္ေၾကြ

ကမၻာမေၾကေတးသံ ေ၀တဲ့ေျမေပၚမွာ …။

သတိတယ ရွိၾကေဟ့

အေမွာင္ေခတ္ႀကီးရဲ ့အေၾကာင္းကို

ျပန္ေျပာင္းေျပာျပ

အရိုးပံုထဲက တြန္သံမ်ား

ကုန္းရုန္းထၾက

အနာဂတ္ဟာ အမွန္တရားနဲ ့ ၀င္းလက္ေတာက္ပလို ့ …။

(ရွစ္ေလးလံုးအေရးေတာ္ပံုႀကီး ၂၂ ႏွစ္ျပည့္သို ့)
၂၄ ဂ်ဴလိုင္ ၂၀၁၀

An Open Letter to His Excellency Ban Ki-moon

2010-08-07T00:34:00.000+09:00

1
An Open Letter to His Excellency Ban Ki-moon,
Secretary-General of the United Nations.
Date 6th August, 2010.
His Excellency Ban Ki-Moon
Secretary-General of the United Nations
United Nations
3 United Nations Plaza
New York, NY 10017
Dear your Excellency,
First of all, let me introduce myself. My name is Tin Win and I am a Burmese democratic
and human right activist living in Japan.
I would like to welcome you to Japan as, first ever UN General Secretary who attend
the Peace Memorial Ceremony in Hiroshima and the first to visit Nagasaki. I also
enthusiastically welcome Your Excellency’s words on intensifying efforts toward nuclear
abolishment. I share Your Excellency’s view that the need to work together toward the
day when governments no longer have a choice but to respond to the will of the people
for a nuclear-free world, by way of Your Excellency have termed in the message to the
Hiroshima Conference for the Total Abolition of Nuclear Weapons by 2020.
As a democratic activist living in Japan I had seen first-hand the drastic reality caused
by the nuclear war. Furthermore, I have been working very closely with the Japanese
Unionists and other Japanese people to send the same massages as Your Excellency
had mentioned in your letter.
I would like to inform Your Excellency that these generals have banned basic human
rights, but spent tens of millions of dollars building the bases with the reported help of
nuclear experts from Russia and North Korea. The first indications of its nuclear
ambitions came last February when army Major Sai Thein Win defected with a dossier
on the secret sites. The several hundred photographs of the plants that Major Win
brought with him have aroused huge interest among defense chiefs in neighboring
Asian countries and western governments.
2
The Directorate of Defense Services, Science and Technology Research Centre in Pyin
Oo Lwin city at the Defense Services Technological Academy manage the country’s
nuclear effort. Evidence has also emerged of a “nuclear battalion” is working at a place
called Thabeikkyin where there are also extensive mining and ore concentrations.
There are suggestions that they are trying to produce yellowcake, a kind of uranium
concentrate powder, for possible use in processing uranium.
Moreover, Burma has obsoleted agreements with the Geneva-based International
Atomic Energy Agency but has not signed protocols that would allow detailed
inspections of the factories. The generals have ignored requests to improve the
agreements that mean the country is virtually exempt from inspections. Nevertheless,
with the generals’ current freedom from sanctions and relative economic prosperity, it is
highly likely that the junta may be able to outsource the technical expertise and tools to
reach its goals far sooner than expected.
In addition to that, Professor Yozo Yokota who was the UN Special Rapporteur on the
Situation of Human Rights in Burma had recently wrote in the Jakarta Post that impunity
prevails in Burma and no action has been taken to bring an end to the war crimes and
crimes against humanity committed by the generals of Burma. That is why he said that
he believe the United Nations has an obligation to respond to the current rapporteur’s
recommendation, establish a commission of inquiry, and propose action.
Given the Balkan-like nature of Burma's domestic situation and its strategic position
between India and China, a nuclear Burma will probably present the single greatest
threat to regional security and will in the long run be very bad for ASEAN countries. The
US and other Asia-Pacific countries have expressed concern that North Korean may
help Burma to become the first nuclear-armed nation in the Southeast Asia, saying the
military ties with North Korea are breaking UN Security Council Resolution 1874.
3
For those reason mentioned above, I would like to appeal Your Excellency to make
every effort, using your good office, to investigate the above mentioned information and
take appropriate actions to halt the doomsday scenario of our future.
Please kindly be warned that rogue nation as North Korea has developed the nuclear
capability by the failure on part of UN to make a concerted actions appropriately and
timely. Please do not allow the generals of Burma to create a new rogue state with
nuclear armaments and with Weapon of Mass Destruction. If Your Excellency fail to
take a timely action, the words you had pronounced in your message will never
materialized.
Respectfully,
Tin Win,
Gunma Prefecture, Ota City,
Ushizawa Chou 1000-1, Ushizawa Shiei Jutaku 3-13,
373-0833 Japan.
Phone/Fax: 0(81)276-38-1036
Mobile 0(81)80-3443-2447
E mail: mtinwin@pc5.so-net.ne.jp
END
4

Letter to His Excellency Ban Ki-moon-General Secretary, The United Nations

2010-08-03T22:56:00.002+09:00

To
Mr. Ban Ki-moon
General Secretary
The United Nations
Dated – 3-8-2010
Dear Mr. Ban Ki-moon,
First of all, we would like to let you know that our Burmese people would be suffering more
grievances evidently because of the gross violation of human rights and lack of rule of law
under the Burmese dictatorial regime and there will be a bigger burden on the shoulders of
international community including the United Nations as long as all of us cannot set the
following targets in Burma’s political affairs -
1. the current regime should recognize Burma’s 1990 election result appropriately;
2. all concerned parties should amend the 2008 Constitution to be compatible with a
democratic standard,
3. all political prisoners including Daw Aung San Suu Kyi should be released immediately
and unconditionally, and
4. all inclusive dialogue for national reconciliation should be launched immediately.
Without implementing such targets, it is very clear that we cannot make political progress to
change Burma as a democratic nation.
The Burmese regime was completely ignorant of the above-mentioned targets; instead, it
continued to announce its one-sided 2010 Election Law based on the so-undemocratic 2008
Constitution. It should be well aware that any election in accordance with such election law
cannot be considered a free and fair election which the UN and international community have
long expected.
If the current Burmese regime holds an election desperately without the above-mentioned
important political process, as this will not certainly be the much needed one that our
Burmese people and international community including the UN, we request you to use your
good office to leverage the United Nations not to recognize the result of such election.
In addition to these political affairs, we strongly urge you to consider without delay a report
from Mr. Tomás Ojea Quintana, the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Burma, in
which he has recommended that the UN should consider establishing a Commission of
Inquiry into war crimes and crimes against humanity by the Burmese government.
2
As the IAEA has planned to play a big role in insuring that nuclear materials do not fall into
the wrong hands, we again request you to take necessary measure against the Burmese
junta who has been aiming to develop nuclear weapons despite being a member of the
nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), a global anti-nuclear arms pact, and of the IAEA.
Finally, we would like to let you know that there will be no economic development for our
Burmese people but only for the unnecessarily longer dictatorship in Burma when Daewoo
Group, a major conglomerate from your native South Korea, has invested extremely in Burma
and collaborated with the junta leaders for their bilateral self-interest.
May you be well during your official trip to Japan!
From:
Burmese democratic forces in Japan
N.B. We are individuals and groups of pro-democracy Burmese community in Japan.

ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံေရာက္ ကုလသမဂၢ အေထြေထြအတြင္းေရးမႉးခ်ဳပ္ ဘန္ကီမြန္းအား တိုက္တြန္းေတာင္းဆိုသည့္ လႈပ္ရွားမႈ

2010-08-03T22:53:00.001+09:00

Tuesday, August 3, 2010
ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံေရာက္ ကုလသမဂၢ အေထြေထြအတြင္းေရးမႉးခ်ဳပ္ ဘန္ကီမြန္းအား တိုက္တြန္းေတာင္းဆိုသည့္ လႈပ္ရွားမႈ

ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံ ဟီရိုရွီးမားၿမိဳ့ႏွင့္ နာဂါဆာကီးၿမိဳ့မ်ားတြင္ က်င္းပရန္ရွိသည့္ Peace Memorial ႏွစ္ပတ္လည္ အခမ္းအနားသို႔ တက္ေရာက္လာမည့္ ကုလသမဂၢ အေထြေထြအတြင္းေရးမႉးခ်ဳပ္ ဘန္ကီမြန္းအား ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံေရာက္ ျမန္မာ့ဒီမိုကေရစီ အင္အားစုတို႔မွ ျမန္မာ့အေရးႏွင့္ ပတ္သက္၍ တိုက္တြန္း ေတာင္းဆိုသည့္ လႈပ္ရွားမႈတရပ္ကို တိုက်ိဳ Shibuya UN House ေရွ႔၌ ယေန႔ ညေန ၃း၀၀ နာရီ မွ ၄း၀၀ နာရီအထိ က်င္းပျပဳလုပ္ခဲ့ပါသည္။

အေထြေထြအတြင္းေရးမႉးခ်ဳပ္ ဘန္ကီမြန္းအား ျမန္မာ့အေရးႏွင့္ ပတ္သက္သည့္ တိုက္တြန္း ေတာင္းဆိုသည့္စာကို ကုလသမဂၢရုံး(ဂ်ပန္)တာ၀န္ရွိသူ Mr.KAWADE NOBUYUKI မွလကၡံရယူေပးခဲ့ပါသည္။ တိုက္တြန္း ေတာင္းဆိုသည့္စာတြင္ လက္ရွိ ျမန္မာႏိူင္ငံ၏ အေထြေထြ အက်ပ္အတည္းမ်ားကို ၿငိမ္းခ်မ္းစြာ ေျဖရွင္းႏိုင္ရန္အတြက္ ေရႊဂံုတိုင္ ေၾကညာစာတမ္းပါ အခ်က္မ်ားကို ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံေရာက္ ျမန္မာ့ဒီမိုကေရစီ အင္အားစုတို႔မွ အဓိကထားၿပီး တိုက္တြန္း ေတာင္းဆိုထားပါသည္။

ေရႊဂံုတိုင္ ေၾကညာစာတမ္းပါ ေတာင္းဆိုခ်က္မ်ားကို နအဖ စစ္အာဏာပိုင္တို႔က လံုးဝ လစ္လ်ဴရႈကာ ၂ဝ၁ဝ မတ္လတြင္ ၎တို႔စိတ္ႀကိဳက္ တဘက္သပ္ ေရးဆြဲထားေသာ ေရြးေကာက္ပြဲ ဥပေဒမွာ ဒီမိုကေရစီ စံႏႈန္းမ်ား မျပည့္စံုဘဲ ရွိေနသျဖင့္ ကုလသမဂၢႏွင့္ ႏိုင္ငံတကာမွ ေမွ်ာ္လင့္ထားသည့္ ဒီမိုကေရစီ အသြင္ေျပာင္းေရးအတြက္ လြတ္လပ္၍ တရားမွ်တေသာ ေရြးေကာက္ပြဲ ျဖစ္မလာႏိုင္ေၾကာင္းကိုလည္း ဘန္ကီမြန္းအား တပ္မွန္ၿပီး အသိေပးျခင္းျဖစ္ပါသည္။ တိုက္တြန္းေတာင္းဆိုမႈမ်ားကို လစ္လ်ဴရႈလ်က္ ေရြးေကာက္ပြဲကို ဇြတ္အတင္း က်င္းပလာမည္ ဆိုပါက ကုလသမဂၢ အပါအဝင္ ႏိုင္ငံတကာက အလိုရွိအပ္ေသာ ဒီမိုကေရစီ အသြင္ကူးေျပာင္းျခင္း မဟုတ္သျဖင့္ အဆိုပါ ေရြးေကာက္ပြဲ၏ ရလဒ္ကို ကုလသမဂၢမွ အသိအမွတ္ မျပဳရန္ ဘန္ကီမြန္းအား တိုက္တြန္းေတာင္းဆိုခဲ့ပါသည္။

အထက္ေဖာ္ျပပါ ႏိုင္ငံေရးကိစၥမ်ားအျပင္ ျမန္မာနအဖ စစ္အစိုးရမွ အႀကီးအက်ယ္ က်ဴးလြန္ေနေသာ စစ္ရာဇဝတ္မႈမ်ား (war crimes) ႏွင့္ လူသားမ်ားအေပၚ က်ဴးလြန္သည့္ ရာဇဝတ္မႈမ်ား(crimes against humanity) ကို စံုစမ္းစစ္ေဆးရန္ ေကာ္မရွင္တရပ္ ဖြဲ႔စည္းေရးကို ကုလသမဂၢမွ သံုးသပ္ စဥ္းစားသင့္ေၾကာင္း ကုလသမဂၢ အထူးကိုယ္စားလွယ္ Tomas Ojea Quintana ၏ အစီရင္ခံစာကို ဘန္ကီမြန္းမွ အေလးအနက္ထားကာ အေရးယူ ေဆာင္ရြက္ေပးသင့္ေၾကာင္းႏွင့္ သံသယျဖစ္ဖြယ္ရာ အႏုျမဴလက္နက္မ်ားကို ထုတ္လုပ္ရန္ ၾကံစည္ႀကိဳးပမ္းေနျခင္းကို ကုလသမဂၢအေနျဖင့္ လစ္လ်ဴမရႈပဲ လိုအပ္သလို အေရးယူ တားဆီးေပးရန္ စသည့္အခ်က္မ်ားကိုပါ ထည့္သြင္းေတာင္းဆိုထားေၾကာင္း သိရွိရပါသည္။တိုက္တြန္းေတာင္းဆိုသည့္ အခမ္းအနားတြင္ ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံေရာက္ ျမန္မာ့ဒီမိုကေရစီ အင္အားစု စုစုေပါင္း ၉၀ ခန္႔ ပူးေပါင္း ပါ၀င္ခဲ့ၾကေၾကာင္း သိရွိရပါသည္။

သတင္းမွတ္တမ္း ။ Mai Kyaw Oo
မွတ္တမ္းဓါတ္ပုံ ။ Lian Khan Sum(CNC-Japan)

Posted by PNSjapan at 6:02 AM

Labels: သတင္း

(၆၃)ႏွစ္ေျမာက္ အာဇာနည္ေန႔ အထိမ္းအမွတ္ စာတမ္းဖတ္ၿပိဳင္ပြဲ

2010-07-20T03:56:00.003+09:00

http://www.pnsjapan.org/2010/07/blog-post_18.html

(၆၃)ႏွစ္ေျမာက္ အာဇာနည္ေန႔ အထိမ္းအမွတ္ စာတမ္းဖတ္ၿပိဳင္ပြဲ အခမ္းအနားကို ဂ်ပန္္ႏိူင္ငံေရာက္ ျမန္မာႏိူင္ငံသားမ်ား၏ ပူးေပါင္း ေဆာင္ရြက္ေရး ေကာ္မတီ (JAC)မွ ဦးစီး၍ တိုက်ိဳၿမိဳ႔ Toshimaku Minami Otsuka Dai Ichi ခမ္းမ၌ ညေန ၅း၃၀ နာရီ မွ ၉း၀၀ နာရီ အထိ က်င္းပျပဳလုပ္ ခဲ့ပါသည္။

ယေန႔ အခမ္းအနားက်င္းပျပဳလုပ္ရျခင္း ရည္ရြယ္ခ်က္ကမွာ စစ္အာဏာရွင္တို႔က ျမန္မာသမိုင္း အစစ္အမွန္ကို ေမွးမွိန္တိမ္ေကာ ပေပ်ာက္ေအာင္ ႀကံစည္ျပဳမူ လုပ္ေဆာင္ေနျခင္းကို ဖယ္ရွားရန္ မရွိမျဖစ္ လိုအပ္ေနသည့့္အျပင္ လြတ္လပ္ေရးတိုက္ပြဲ၀င္ ဗိုလ္ခ်ဳပ္ေအာင္ဆန္းႏွင့္တကြ အာဇာနည္ ေခါင္းေဆာင္ႀကီးမ်ားက တိုင္းျပည္နဲ႔ လူမ်ိဳးအတြက္ အသက္စြန္႔ ေပးအပ္ခဲ့တဲ သမိုင္းအေမြအႏွစ္ေကာင္းမ်ားကို အမ်ိဳးသားေရး တာ၀န္ႀကီးတရပ္ အေနျဖစ္ ယေန႔ေခတ္ မ်ိဳးဆက္လူငယ္မ်ား တာ၀န္ေၾကစြာ ဆက္လက္ထိမ္းသိမ္းသြားႏိုင္ရန္ အာဇာနည္ေခါင္းေဆာင္ႀကီးမ်ား ေမွ်ာ္မွန္းခဲ့သည့္ ျပည္ေထာင္စု ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံေတာ္ တည္ေဆာက္ေရးမွာ ယေန႔ မ်ိဳးဆက္သစ္ လူငယ္မ်ား ပုခုံးေျပာင္းတာ၀န္ယူသြားႏိုင္ရန္အတြက္ က်င္းပရျခင္းျဖစ္ပါသည္။

အခမ္းအနားတြင္ဂ်ပန္ႏိုင္ငံေရာက္အဖြဲ႔အစည္းအသီးသီးမွွတာ၀န္ရွိပုဂၢိဳလ္(၇)ဦးတို႔မွအမွတ္ေပးဒိုင္မ်ားအျဖစ္ တာ၀န္ယူ ေဆာင္ရြက္ခဲ့ၾကၿပီး မ်ိဳးဆက္သစ္ လူငယ္ ၁၁ ဦးတို႔က သမိုင္းေနာက္ခံ အခ်က္အလက္
အေထာက္အထားမ်ားကို ကိုးကား၍ “ အာဇာနည္ေခါင္းေဆာင္ႀကီးမ်ား ေမ်ွာ္မွန္းခဲ့သည့္ ျပည္ေထာင္စု ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံ” ေေခါင္းစဥ္ျဖစ္ စာတမ္းဖတ္ ယွဥ္ၿပိဳင္ ေဟာေျပာသြားခဲ့ၾကရာ အေကာင္းဆုံ ပထမဆုကို FWUBC မွ ကိုစည္သူေက်ာ္ ကလည္းေကာင္း၊ ဒုတိယ ဆုကို BDA မွ မေအးနႏၵာေအာင္ ကလည္းေကာင္း၊ တတိယ ဆုကို DPNS-Jp မွ မၾကည္ျပာေဇာ္၀င္း မွလည္းေကာင္း အသီးသီးရရွိခဲ့ၾကပါသည္။ ယေန႔ က်င္းပျပဳလုပ္သည့္ စာတမ္းဖတ္ၿပိဳင္ပြဲတြင္ ပရိတ္သတ္ အထူးစိတ္၀င္စားမႈရရွိၿပီး ပါ၀င္ယွဥ္ၿပိဳင္ခဲ့ၾကေသာ မ်ိဳးဆက္သစ္ လူငယ္မ်ားအား ႏွစ္သိမ့္ဆုမ်ားျဖင့္ ဂုဏ္ျပဳလက္မွတ္မ်ား ခ်ီျမွင့္ခဲ့ပါသည္။

စာတမ္းဖတ္ၿပိဳင္ပြဲ က်င္းပပုံ အစီအစဥ္မ်ားကို Burma Campaign Japan (BCJP)(www.burmacampaign.net)မွ ဂ်ပန္ႏွင့္ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံအပါအ၀င္ ႏိုင္ငံတကာမ်ားပါ ၾကည့္ရႈႏိုင္ရန္အတြက္ တိုက္ရိုက္ ထုတ္လႊင့္ျပသခဲ့ပါသည္။ညေန ၉းး၀၀ နာရီတြင္ ၿပီးဆုံးခဲ့ၿပီ ပထမ ဆုံးအႀကိမ္ က်င္းပျပဳလုပ္သည့္ စာတမ္းဖတ္ၿပိဳင္ပြဲတြင္ တက္ေရာက္သူ စုစုေပါင္း ၁၀ဝ ေက်ာ္ခန္႔ ရွိေၾကာင္း သိရွိရပါသည္။

သတင္းမွတ္တမ္း ။ Mai Kyaw Oo
မွတ္တမ္းဓါတ္ပုံ ။ Lian Khan Sum(CNC-Japan)