Final arguments heard in Burmese-American’s trial

By Mungpi

New Delhi (Mizzima) – The final arguments by all lawyers in the trial against Burmese-born American citizen, Kyaw Zaw Lwin (aka) Nyi Nyi Aung was heard by a special court in Rangoon’s notorious Insein prison on Friday.

Nyan Win, one of the defence lawyers of the American citizen said “Today we submitted our final arguments. The verdict will be given on January 27.”

Arrested on September 3, 2009, Nyi Nyi Aung is facing trial on charges of fraud, forgery, illegal possession of foreign currency and charges under the Immigration Act.

However, his international counsel in New York, Beth Schwanke earlier told Mizzima that the charges were baseless and were cooked up to arrest and sentence her client as he is a well known pro-democracy activist, advocating democracy and human rights in Burma.

The Burmese-American was a student activist, involved in the nation-wide pro-democracy uprising in 1988. He was forced to flee to neighbouring Thailand in the wake of the military’s brutal crackdown on protesters.

Later, he migrated to Maryland in United States, where he was naturalized as a citizen.

Burma’s state-run media, the New Light of Myanmar, however, accused him of having entered the country secretly in disguise eight times. He was also accused of having maintained contacts with underground activists, planning to instigate public unrest.

However, the charge-sheet against him in court does not include any of the newspaper’s accusations but merely accuses Nyi Nyi Aung of using a fake Burmese national identity card, lying to the immigration, and possessing foreign currency.

Schwanke denied the first two charges and said Nyi Nyi Aung was arrested as he stepped out of the Bangkok-Rangoon Thai Airways International (TG) flight, even before he could approach the custom’s desk to declare his foreign currency. (JEG's: he is a foreigner on a visiting trip he is to carry foreign currency on him...)

“We don’t know what will be the outcome of the trial. We will have to wait and see on January 27. The court will decide what we will be doing next,” Nyan Win said.

Supreme Court advocates, Nyan Win and Kyi Win, who jointly defended detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi last year, teamed-up to defend the Burmese-American at the Southern District Court.

Burma Newscasts - Final arguments heard in Burmese-American’s trial - 22 January 2010
http://www.mizzima.com/news/inside-burma/3423-final-arguments-heard-in-burmese-americans-trial-.html

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Article in private journal attacks Burma Campaigners

by Salai Pi Pi

New Delhi (Mizzima) – An article published in the Rangoon-based “The Voice” journal on Monday made an unveiled attack on campaign groups such as the Burma Campaign UK, for misusing the name of Burma in lobbying western nations to impose sanctions on the Southeast Asian nation.

The article authored by “Aung Htut” a pen name on Monday said, the writer is extremely happy to see the US’s new policy of engagement with the Burmese regime, but fears that the US might revert to its old policy as these so-called activists are continuing to lobby to isolate Burma.

“It is not western governments but those individual foreigners who tried to formulate their own strategy in systematically isolating Burma,” the article said, “Most of misunderstandings (over Burma) came from them.”

The article also said these campaigners including members of the Burma Campaign UK and Institute of Democracy for Asia in the past had lobbied western countries for sanctions against Burma. As result Burma was isolated for several years.

Groups like the Burma Campaign UK have a limited number of Burmese people in the organisation, yet they have been effectively lobbying as representatives of the Burmese, the article said.

“The writer wonders how groups like the Burma Campaign UK have the right to represent the Burmese people. But what is certain is that they have misused the name of Burma and its people,” added the article.

But Mark Farmaner, Director of the Burma Campaign UK denied campaigning for the isolation of Burma but stressed that the BCUK is supporting sanctions against members of the Burmese junta and their business cronies, who are benefiting from the sufferings endured by the Burmese people.

He, however, viewed the attack as a natural reaction because of the nature of work that the BCUK has been committed to doing and the influence it has on government’s policies in telling the truth about human rights violations committed by the military junta.

“They attack us because we have been effective in raising awareness about what they are doing and getting the international community to increase pressure,” Farmaner said.

He said, the BCUK is not only committed to push for sanctions against the military regime, but is also pushing for a United Nations Security Council referral of Than Shwe and members of the military junta in the International Criminal Court for their crimes against humanity.

“Probably they attacked us as we are telling the truth about what is happening in Burma. We exposed human rights abuse, what is going on in jails with political prisoners in Burma and what is happening in ethnic areas where the Burmese Army is raping women and children,” Farmaner added.

The article in the Weekly also said, since the campaigners are mostly foreigners, the writer does not expect them to understand the Burmese peoples’ feelings and sufferings and will not sympathize with the life and condition of the country.

The writer said “as a strong advocate of engagement, it is encouraging to see key stakeholders are now showing signs of their willingness for engagement. If this could have been understood earlier, we could have seen good results. But it is only regrettable that much time had been wasted.”

But Farmaner said sanctions have been useful as a tool in reminding the Burmese generals that they are accountable for their actions and a reminder of the need to implement meaningful political reforms.

“We always support a combination of sanctions and engagement. So, the US policy is exactly what we have been campaigning for,” said Farmaner adding that the BCUK will continue campaigning for effective sanctions against the Burmese military regime.

Burma, under military rule since 1962, is contending with financial and economic sanctions by the United States, European Union and Australia for their human rights abuses and failure to implement democratic reforms.

But the US, after concluding its policy review on Burma last week, announced that it is changing track and will use a combination of sanctions as well as engagement.

The new policy comes at a time the Burmese regime, is particularly seen as keen to develop a new relation with the US, in the run up to their planned elections in 2010, which is a part of the junta’s seven-step roadmap to democracy.

While articles in privately owned journals are mostly written by authors unrelated to the Burmese regime, the journal, as per the junta’s law, has to go through the censorship board, which conducts a thorough check of the contents.

Occasionally, Burma’s military junta forces private journals to publish articles and commentaries written in favour of the junta, which the editors of the journals cannot refuse to publish as the consequences could cost their license to run the publication.

Burma Newscasts - Article in private journal attacks Burma Campaigners
Monday, 05 October 2009 22:33

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Don’t Let the Junta off the Hook

The Irrawaddy News - Editorial

On the eve of the 21st anniversary of the bloody coup that crushed the 1988 student-led pro-democracy uprising, Burma’s junta announced plans to free 7,114 prisoners. MRTV, the state-owned television station, announced on Thursday night that the prisoners were being released on “humanitarian grounds.”

Previous mass releases have mostly involved petty criminals, with just a handful of political detainees among those freed. No details were provided about the identities of the prisoners included in this latest amnesty, so it is difficult to even confirm if the regime has actually released the number of prisoners it said it would. But according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP), 87 political prisoners have so far been set free, while other sources estimate that the total could reach as high as 250.

This is good news for the prisoners and their families, and we should welcome it. However, we should also note that this apparent act of magnanimity comes as Prime Minister Gen Thein Sein prepares to travel to New York to attend this year’s United Nations General Assembly. Indeed, it has been widely expected for several months. In July, Burma’s ambassador to the UN, Than Swe, promised the Security Council that his government would grant an amnesty to an undisclosed number of political prisoners to allow them to participate in democratic elections scheduled for 2010.

Thein Sein will be the highest-ranking Burmese official to attend a UN meeting in over a decade, so it should come as no surprise that the regime decided to do something to deflect criticism of its abysmal human rights record ahead of his visit. Releasing some of the country’s estimated 2,100 political prisoners was an obvious course of action, as there are growing concerns over the dramatic increase in the number of activists detained since the monk-led Saffron Revolution was crushed almost exactly two years ago. Human rights watchdogs estimate that the political prisoner population has doubled since late 2007, when Burma witnessed its largest anti-regime protests in nearly two decades.

Conspicuously absent from the list of those released so far are the names of some of Burma’s most prominent activists. Far from considering leniency towards these prisoners, the regime appears to be intent on making their lives as miserable as possible. U Gambira, one of the leaders of the All Burma Monks Alliance, the group that spearheaded the 2007 uprising, has been moved to a remote prison, making it harder for his family to visit him. Other prisoners, including Shan ethnic leader Khun Tun Oo, activist-comedian Zarganar, labor activist Su Su Nway and 88 Generation Students group leader Min Ko Naing, are also suffering from physical and mental health problems due to their mistreatment, according to AAPP.

Political prisoners have always been treated like pawns in the junta’s political game. The regime continues to insist that there are no political prisoners in any of the country’s 43 prisons and more than 50 labor camps, but the fact is that the generals do not hesitate to imprison anyone who speaks out openly against their brutal misrule. Even as the junta makes a show of releasing some prisoners, it continues to round up new ones, including several democracy activists and monks who were arrested just last week.

With this in mind, the international community must continue to confront the regime and demand the release of all political prisoners in Burma, including pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi. Until this happens, and until all activists are allowed to participate freely in the country’s political process, we can only assume that the generals’ occasional release of political prisoners is just part of a cynical game.


Burma Newscasts - Don’t Let the Junta off the Hook
Saturday, September 19, 2009

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Webb to hold congressional hearing on Burma

by Mungpi

New Delhi (Mizzima) - US senator Jim Webb announced on Thursday that he will hold a congressional hearing on the impact and effectiveness of United States policy on Burma, according to a statement released by his office.

“Senator Webb intends a comprehensive hearing to examine Burma’s current economic and political situation and to seek testimony regarding that country’s long history of internal turmoil and ethnic conflicts,” the statement said.

The announcement came after Webb’s two week long visit to five Southeast Asian nations including Burma, where he became the first US official to visit the military-ruled country in a decade.

During his visit, Webb met the Burmese military supremo Sn. Gen Than Shwe, and was allowed a rare meeting with detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi. He also obtained the release of the American, John William Yettaw, who was sentenced to seven years in prison with labour, for intruding into the house of detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi in early May.

Webb, who is the chair of the East Asia and Pacific Affairs Subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, is a strong advocate for lifting US sanctions against the Burmese generals.

During his Southeast Asian trip Webb also told leaders of Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam that they and other members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations should join together in calling on the Burmese junta to free Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest and allow her to fully participate in the 2010 elections.

“The hearing will evaluate the effectiveness of U.S. policy towards Burma, with a focus on U.S.-imposed economic sanctions that have not been matched by other countries, will discuss what role the United States can and should play in promoting democratic reform in Burma, and hear testimony on how to frame a new direction for U.S.-Burma relations,” the statement said.

Meanwhile on Thursday, the New York-based Human Rights Watch said the US should wrap up its policy review on Burma immediately and urged it to take the initiative to make the US policy of Diplomacy, Sanctions and Humanitarian aid more meaningful.

HRW, in a report, said delays in announcing its policy could encourage the Burmese generals to think that the US is weakening on its commitment to human rights and pluralism.

The HRW, however, said the US should reconsider generalized sanctions as it hurts the common people and phase it out at an appropriate time but carefully implement targeted sanctions on the military generals of Burma.

Burma Newscasts - Webb to hold congressional hearing on Burma

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Punishment for a dream – the price of Burmese conscience

by Nay Tin Myint

Mizzima News - William Harvard wrote: "The greatest glory of a free-born people is to transmit that freedom to their children." This is the dream that I had for Burma in 1988, and I still have the same dream today. As a university student in 1988, I never imagined that I would spend the next fifteen years of my life in Burma’s notorious prisons for daring to hope for a better future.

It all began on a beautiful spring day, March 13, 1988, when I was a 21-year-old Rangoon University Zoology student in my senior year. Some Burma Socialist Program Party (BSPP) soldiers shot and killed an engineering student at the campus. Adding insult to injury, afterward the army denied any wrongdoing and ignored the students’ request for an investigation, eventually leading the students to strike.

During the ensuing crackdown, armed government soldiers savagely attacked unarmed student demonstrators, stole their possessions and gang-raped hooded female students in custody. According to eyewitnesses, armed soldiers also threw students into Inya Lake and ponds, watching many students drown. Since that day the "White Bridge" of Rangoon Arts and Science University, where soldiers attacked the unarmed innocent university students, was famously renamed the "Red Bridge" for the blood spilt during those tragic times.

By August 8, 1988, the momentum of the students' strike in the spring mushroomed into a nationwide uprising, with Burmese fed up with the government's negligence rising up against the abusive military junta. During these demonstrations, as one of the founders of the Tri-color Youth Organization, I gave a speech condemning the BSPP ruling party's mismanagement of the country. I demanded justice for the army's brutality and for the government to tell us what happened to the Rangoon University students who disappeared in March. The ruling junta immediately arrested me.

Right after the arrest, government agents began to torture me with the aim of breaking my silence. They forced me to kneel down and crawl over sharp stones with hands cuffed behind my back. Then they hung me from my handcuffs with my legs barely touching the ground while I continued to bleed all night. The tormentors placed a tin bucket on my head and beat it until blood ran down my ears. They offered me no food until the third day, when they brought foul and inedible food accompanied by a scant amount of water. They continued to beat me and torture me with electric shock to force me to disclose the names of my associates. I refused to give up their names, either to stop the torture or to gain my release. I was prepared to die alone under torture rather than to subject other innocent political activists to the same brutal punishments.

The courts in Burma were as lawless and fraudulent as other institutions under military rule. An army colonel, the head of a martial court, asked, "Do you think what you are doing is right?" I answered, "Yes, what I am doing is right and I have a lot of support from the people." I continued to point out the failures of the ruling party and promised that one day they would be defeated. He apparently already had orders to sentence me to three years of hard labor in prison, but after my reply, furious, he increased it to four years. He then asked whether I would like to comment on anything else. I replied, "Yes," but they refused to let me speak and dragged me away.

Similar to other leading political prisoners, they kept me alone in an eight by twelve foot cell in notorious Insein Prison near Rangoon. Although according to the official prison handbook prisoners have the right to take a walk twice a day and to have fifteen bowls of water for bathing, prison authorities locked me in my cell in clear violation of those rights. No prison in Burma followed the guidelines written in the prison manual. When, at the close of 1989, I demanded my rights according to the prison manual, they transferred me to another notorious prison, Tharawaddy, in Pegu.

In Tharawaddy, prison officials made me work in the plantation area. When they assigned me to collect toilet bowls, a job for criminal inmates, I refused, since I was not a criminal. Although I knew that my prison term would be reduced if I obeyed their rules I refused to be humiliated or degraded. Instead, I firmly held on to my convictions and did not surrender my political conscience for personal comfort or freedom.

Next, in an attempt to break my spirit further, they shackled my ankles and placed a metal bar between my legs. They continued to beat and kick me, even while I was shackled. During an episode of solitary confinement my toilet bowl was not collected for a month, and insects began crawling out of it and climbing onto me while I slept with no mattress or blanket on a concrete floor. I was not allowed to own clothing other than what I wore. After one month, my skin became infected and I suffered from stomach pain, but the prison warden refused treatment or for my family to bring any medication. When I tried to report this violation they transferred me to yet another prison, Myingyan, in central Burma in early 1991.

While at Myingyan prison they again immediately placed me in solitary confinement. They supplied only a small amount of food and allowed a bath once every three weeks. I could not wash clothes because there was not enough water. Therefore, I stood on my clothes while bathing and squeezed the water out to wash again. As a punishment for cleverly bathing and washing clothes at the same time, they added a second metal bar to my shackle. They also forced me to crawl over sharp stones with the shackle on, while two prison guards savagely struck me. The shackle stayed on for more than one year, and when it finally came off I was suffering from partial paralysis. I was not able to walk because my shackled legs had been held in an awkward position for so long and from the weakness caused by a general lack of nutrition.

Eventually I saw a prison doctor, but I still received no treatment for my paralysis. Finally, after a long interval, my family was allowed to visit and was permitted to supply medication. Although I was paralyzed I kept exercising my legs and I continued to discipline my mind. I needed to live, not to die in prison. I was determined not to let the military junta triumph over me. To keep my mind focused and sharp, I continued to meditate according to Burmese Buddhism.

In 1992, at the end of my four-year prison term, I was released only because of my physical disability. I spent the next six months in a hospital for medical treatment and physical rehabilitation. During this time I was invited to a meeting between National League for Democracy leaders Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and U Win Tin and the United Nations special representative to Burma. I agreed to have my name submitted to the United Nations for the purpose of this meeting. Soon after, the SLORC (State Law and Order Restoration Council) regime announced that a National Convention would be held to draw up a new constitution for Burma.

Since the ploy to draw up a new constitution came only after the army lost the 1990 general election, it was clear the generals were just buying time instead of genuinely preparing for a transfer of power. A constitutional convention dominated by handpicked delegates from the military and close associates of the army clearly was not intended to be free or fair. Not surprisingly, the junta intensified the crackdown on political dissidents and elected politicians, even while pushing for the National Convention on the pretext of writing a new constitution.

As democracy activists including myself began organizing with university students for a nationwide movement against the unlawful National Convention, SLORC henchmen came and raided my home, confiscated my personal possessions and arrested me for the second time on charges of distributing protest pamphlets and meeting with United Nations representatives. At my trial in October 1993, the judge told me, "You have been a leader during the 1988 unrest, and now you are protesting against the National Convention with the intention of demeaning the dignity of the country." Along with a false accusation of my conspiring with armed rebels, he sentenced me to twenty years in prison with hard labor.

After holding me in Insein Prison for a few months they again transferred me to Myingyan. Gradually it became clear to me that by sending political prisoners like me to Myingyan again and again, the ruling junta intended not only to torture and break our political will but also planned to systematically kill and eliminate all political opposition without leaving any trace of evidence behind. This plan was instituted with the same efficiency as the plan for ethnic cleansing in remote jungle villages hidden from the view of the international community.

With this understanding, I approached the Myingyan Prison entrance with great apprehension. Upon arrival, I was blindfolded and severely beaten with my hands cuffed behind my back. The beating continued even after I fell to the ground. They shackled my legs and ordered me put in solitary confinement for another seven years.

It all began again with no bath for three months, a small amount of stale food and insufficient drinking water. To make life even more miserable the guards inside continually harassed political prisoners. To prevent contact between political prisoners when one of us was in the aisle, all other political prisoners were forced to sit in an extremely awkward position called "ponzan" at the back of their cells. On one occasion a prison guard savagely knocked me down in the shower after accusing me of making eye contact with other political prisoners, forcing me to crawl back to my cell.

Routine and cold-blooded assaults on political prisoners were meant as part of the punishment. For instance, frequently after I had finished cleaning the floor of my cell with my only sarong, a prison guard would blow the dust back in, subsequently striking me for not properly cleaning my cell. Subsisting all the while on a meager diet of foul rations contaminated with stones and un-hulled paddy grains added misery to our anguished years inside the prison and, consequently, political prisoners in Burma often succumbed to deteriorating health behind bars. When family members brought even a small amount of salt to alleviate the misery, prison authorities often punished the prisoners with more beatings.

According to the official prison manual, family visitations were allowed for up to 15 minutes. However, political prisoners were allowed only three minutes with family members who had often traveled long distances. The ruling junta also created an atmosphere in which family members and friends were forced to put pressure on prisoners to give up politics altogether. The junta frequently imposed penalties on innocent family members in an attempt to break down the political prisoners’ final defenses – forcing them to watch family members suffer by being forced to travel to remote prisons for visitations that tested strength beyond the endurance of even the most dedicated democrats.

I was not allowed to read any book from 1994 to 2000. When the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) came to visit in 2000, restrictions were slightly eased, with authorities allowing us more food and longer showers. After the ICRC chief representative came to meet me in prison and recorded my prison experiences, I was further allowed a few books for reading. I was also able to see a prison doctor and was allowed to do some physical exercise.

In 2001, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and the SPDC's General Khin Nyunt reached an agreement to work together. During that time, military intelligence (MI) frequently paid me visits and asked myself and other political prisoners to sign a pledge to never again engage in any political activity, in exchange for our release. Those of us who refused remained locked up in prison.

In early 2005, I was sent to Mandalay prison in upper Burma, where they immediately put me in solitary confinement for another six months. When authorities transferred me back to Myingyan for another stint in violation of my rights, I decided to go on hunger strike. On the sixth day of my hunger strike I was offered some water but the guards subsequently broke the water pot. After four more days without water I became unconscious. The Director General of the Penitentiary Department from Rangoon heard about me, immediately paying me a visit. I was brought to the hospital where I vomited blood and passed out. I was sustained only by the belief that my tormenters "can control me physically, but they cannot control my mind. My mind does not belong to them. My mind belongs to me."

I was eventually released on July 6, 2005, after over 15 years of imprisonment and nearly seven years in solitary confinement. "RELEASED" was just a statement on paper. Inside Burma I was never really free, since government agents continued to follow and watch my every move. Nevertheless, my mind was still occupied with 1988 and democratic aspirations for our people.

The generals in Burma wanted the Burmese people and the world to see that the army had the power to take away our lives, our liberty and our happiness at any time they chose. They wanted everyone to see the scars, the pain and the deaths of those who dared resist their brutal domination.

But even after 15 years in their infernal prisons, the SPDC was not able to make me obey their authority. My vow to continue struggling for democracy remained unbroken and I never wavered from my commitment toward freedom for Burma.

Countless people in Burma have sacrificed their lives and all that they held dear in the name of freedom for their children. The generals in Naypyitaw must see that our leaders, Aung San Suu Kyi and others who are still in prison will never give up their dream for democracy or exchange their political conscience for a life of luxury under the military regime.

Our real leaders know that there would not be an India without Gandhi, a South Africa without Nelson Mandela and an Obama without Martin Luther King, Jr. They also believe that Burma will overcome its troubles one day. Only for now, they need our help to make their dreams come true.

Nay Tin Myint escaped from Burma to Thailand in 2007. He was granted political asylum in the United States in 2008 and is the Secretary of the National League for Democracy – Liberated Area, USA branch.

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What price engagement? Did Jim Webb give the Burmese a "leave her in jail free" card?

By CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT/
The New ForeignPolicy.com

Sometimes diplomatic initiatives produce progress. But sometimes they produce just the illusion of progress. The best known example is that our efforts to promote democracy worldwide have produced a major uptick in the number of countries that conduct elections but that in many of those countries that's as far as democracy goes. In fact, from Russia to Venezuela the appearance of democracy is used to legitimize rulers with anti-democratic intentions.

The Obama administration is going to need to be very careful to make sure that we don't fall into the same trap with "engagement." Just as we need to upgrade our definition of democracy to include not just elections but checks and balances, the preservation of the rights of minorities, and the other legal guarantees necessary to ensure the survival of the culture and intent of true democracy, we are going to need to ensure that we don't accept as the fruits of engagement empty gestures or other forms of pseudo-progress that actually empower, elevate or play into the hands of problem regimes without actually advancing our interests in material ways.

The release of John Yettaw to Senator Jim Webb illustrates just how tricky the engagement calculus is. Yettaw is the Missouri man who said a vision compelled him to swim a lake to visit Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel Peace Prize-winning Burmese democracy champion who has been under house arrest for most of the past two decades. His entrance into the home in which Suu Kyi is confined resulted in a three year extension of her term of house arrest despite the fact that she had nothing to do with the incident. This term was cut to 18 months by the leader of Burma's military regime Than Shwe. Nonetheless, the central wrong here is that a woman whose party enjoyed a massive victory in Burma's quickly and brutally quashed 1990 effort at democracy, a woman the Burmese people had selected to be their Prime Minister, is now going to be unjustly imprisoned for another year and a half for something she did not do.

Yettaw is thus a pawn in a bigger game and to the supporters of Suu Kyi it appears the U.S. has been played in precisely the way that was discussed on this blog last week. Webb, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Sub-Committee on East Asian and Pacific Affairs, comes out with his man and his headlines and support for his conclusion that a thaw in the U.S. relationship with Burma would benefit us. But the injustice against Suu Kyi is prolonged even as her jailers receive a reward for undoing a secondary wrong that they had already capitalized on as a pretext for continuing policies that amount to nothing less than keeping a boot on the throat of the Burmese people. In other words, thanks to this intervention, both the arrest and the release of John Yettaw provide benefits to the Burmese regime and none to democracy, Suu Kyi or America's true interests in the country.

Apparently, according to preliminary reports, one of Webb's more substantial diplomatic "successes" was being allowed to see Suu Kyi. But according to a story by Seth Mydans in the New York Times, during that visit Suu Kyi and Webb may even have had a disagreement over the issue of continuing sanctions against the Burmese regime. Mydans suggested that Suu Kyi felt they had value. Webb reportedly argued that since so many countries in the region did not honor the sanctions that they were unenforceable and thus not a useful tool. While there is an undeniable practical reality to Webb's point, sometimes sanctions are useful even if they are not 100 percent effective, especially if the cost to the sanctioner, the U.S. in this case, is comparatively minor. In other words, since sanctions are a diplomatic tool, the metrics used to assess their value need to be more than just economic. If they send a message, advance a principle and complicate the lives of the targeted country or regime without causing damage to us that outweighs the (even limited) benefits then retaining them may make some sense. Just as winning a diplomatic "victory" may not make sense if it actually, on balance, benefits an adversary or undercuts our national interests or both.

Is there a path to engagement with the Burmese leadership that might be worth pursuing? Of course. And it may well be that gains from Webb's visit outweigh the negatives. It is too early to tell because thus far all the Burmese have done is what is easy for them and the only way to measure progress will be when they start doing things that are hard -- like freeing Suu Kyi or actually allowing free elections to take place.

There is never harm in dialogue that clarifies or advances our position. We should even be willing to shrug off claims by the other side that such dialogue represents a "victory" for them if it is we are net beneficiaries -- as I believe we were in the case, for example, of the release of the two American journalists from North Korea. In that instance, we got back Laura Ling and Euna Lee and the North Koreans at best, got a photo op with a stony-faced former U.S. president. Here, we got our prisoner back but in so doing appeared to be doing so by throwing Suu Kyi further under the bus and, inadvertently no doubt, underscoring differences between us and the revered leader of that country's democracy movement. We got one addled American but the Burmese junta got a "leave her in jail free" card and the perception that the U.S. might be willing to move forward with further engagement on better terms than might have been available in the recent past (better for the regime, not necessarily better for the 2100 political prisoners in Burma.)

The Bill Clinton visit was engagement with a purpose and with a carefully limited downside. The Webb visit, at first glance, appears not nearly so deft. The commitment to engagement with Iran falls somewhere in the middle with our reluctance to condemn the Iranian government's repression of its own people following a seemingly stolen election seen as either not giving enough support to reformers or, alternatively, not "tainting" the demonstrators with our support. It all depends on who you talk to. In yet another case, that of Cuba, we seem to be willing to require a clear quid pro quo for every future concession we may make, a much stricter standard than seems to be the case in some of these other instances. (Cuba must move toward democracy. Burma must move toward what? Repression that doesn't involve Americans? To my mind, until Suu Kyi is released a substantial change in our policy is not called for.)

Webb says he was not an official emissary of the administration. Bill Clinton said the same thing. Clearly, in both instances this particular bit of diplomatic kabuki theater is transparent to all. Webb is the regional subcommittee chair on a critical Senate subcommittee, he is close to the administration, was briefed by them before his trip and promises to brief them on his return. At no time did they renounce the trip and he traveled on a U.S. government plane. His visit was official and the credit for the release of Yettaw and the potential negative consequences of the mission must accrue to the president and his team.

Personally, I think making engagement a centerpiece of a new U.S. foreign policy is a major positive development for which the administration deserves great credit. But as with any such new initiative, we need to be careful about how we approach it prior to getting all the bugs worked out. The Webb mission, even with is success in terms of securing the release of Mr. Yettaw, winning a session with Suu Kyi and engaging in a rare exchange with the leader of the regime, raises important concerns that need to be addressed if the new policy is to work to our best advantage in the future.

CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT/AFP/Getty Images

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US Senator’s mercy mission to Burma may start a new process

by Larry Jagan

Bangkok (Mizzima) - The American senator, Jim Webb may have started something significant, but at this stage everything to do with his visit is still shrouded in mystery. Even at his two press conferences in Bangkok on consecutive days, the usually garrulous and talkative politician was overtly coy, dodging questions and being continually non-committal. “He appears frightened and is hiding something,” said a senior western diplomat who closely follows Burmese affairs. “He knows more than he’s telling, something is surely afoot.”

This was certainly no ordinary or even private visit, despite senior state department officials insisting the senator visited Burma in a personal capacity. The US Secretary of State, Hilary Clinton, rang him last night to talk about the trip, Webb let slip during his encounter with the press on Monday. This only adds to the increasing suspicion that something significant may be happening beneath the public gaze. After all that is how serious diplomacy takes place.

Senator Webb, it must be remembered, is a rising political star in Washington, close to the Clintons and Barack Obama, according to sources on the Hill. He is also tipped to become the next secretary of defense, when the Bush-appointee Bill Gates stands down in around two years’ time. So the US could not have had a better envoy – even if unofficially -- than this conservative Democrat from Virginia.

One of the key messages Webb passed onto Than Shwe was that Aung San Suu Kyi should be released before the 2010 election, and allowed a political role. “We will just have to wait and see how the Myanmar government responds,” he told Mizzima. “I am hopeful that they will give my recommendation [that she be freed] serious consideration,” he added.

The pro-democracy opposition abroad is still complaining that Webb’s visit gave the Burmese military leaders international credibility, and even a measure of legitimacy. This accusation at least the senator dismisses. “I am not pro-Myanmar, but I believe the Burmese people deserve better than they are getting now. Isolation is only preventing them from developing economically and politically,” he told journalists on Sunday. A day later he was still loath to call his visit a success – the jury is still out, he implied. “It’s now in the hands of the Myanmar government,” he said.

Sensibly the senator is distancing himself from what many want to dub as his key success: bringing the American intruder, John Yettaw, out of Burma after he was officially deported on Sunday. It was Yettaw whose unwanted visit to Aung San Suu Kyi’s residence some three months ago resulted in the detained opposition leader being put under house arrest for a further 18 months. “Mr Yettaw’s actions were regrettable,” Webb said. “But the Myanmar government responded favourably to my request to release him on humanitarian grounds.”

The American was sentenced to seen years in jail with hard labour – and his family feared that given his ill-health he would not cope with conditions in a Burmese jail. In fact during his imprisonment while the trial as on he frequently needed medical attention and was hospitalised at least once. Many analysts saw the harsh sentence as an open invitation to Washington to open discussions with the military government.

Yettaw is now in a Bangkok hospital undergoing an intensive medical check-up before returning to the US. “He's got severe medical problems, and had a relapse and fit this [Sunday] after he was handed over to US embassy officials,” a senior American state department diplomat told Mizzima on condition of anonymity.

The hapless American’s release was one of three major requests the US senator made during his crucial meeting with the junta's reclusive leader, General Than Shwe. The other two were to be permitted to see the pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi and to strongly urge the regime to release her and allow her to fully participate in the country's political process. “He granted my first two requests during our meeting, and there is yet to be a response to my third,” he told journalists at a press conference in Bangkok.

In fact it is the two meetings – the one with Than Shwe and the other with Aung San Suu Kyi – that may yet prove to be more significant than the release of the hapless American visitor. The senator remained coy about the details of the talks he had with the two, though he said he had an extensive exchange with both on the current political process, which the junta calls its roadmap to disciplined democracy. “Without Aung San Suu being released and allowed to participate in the elections, the US and the international community would find it impossible to accept the process as free and fair,” he told General Than Shwe.

The pro-democracy leader preferred to wait until she and her party had formulated a detailed policy towards the elections, before issuing a statement, he told Mizzima. On sanctions we had a long and vigorous discussion, he added. “It was my impression that she was not opposed to lifting some sanctions, that is all I will say as I do not want to misquote her,” he said. He declined to give further details. This seems to be an admission that the detained Nobel Laureate may have given the new US administration the green light to consider dismantling some of the sanctions.

Many analysts believe that it is the senator’s support for a change in US policy towards Burma and his opposition to the sanctions’ approach that encouraged the regime to invite him. That and the fact that he is a former soldier, a marine who fought in the Vietnam War would also have been important. Burma’s military rulers mistrust all civilians.

Senator Webb’s visit is the first by an American Congressman in more than 10 years. But US officials, and Webb himself, played down any suggestion that he was an envoy for the Obama administration or that he was an interlocutor between the two governments. “I went in a private capacity – and in my role as chairman of the Senate foreign affairs East Asia and the Pacific sub-committee,” he told journalists in Bangkok. “But I will be reporting back on the visit to the Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, on a wide variety of issues, including increasing humanitarian assistance,” he said. In fact Clinton could not wait until he returned and phoned him in Bangkok on Sunday evening.

Apart from conveying Aung San Suu Kyi’s best wishes to President Barack Obama, Webb said he had only his own impressions and general issues to report back to the White House. But all this will be part of the mix as the new administration mulls over what kind of policy changes might best help encourage the regime to introduce genuine political reform and make its roadmap internationally credible, according to senior state department officials. Many people are optimistic that the administration is planning significant if not radical changes to US policy towards Burma.

“Webb is after ‘aggressive engagement’, like Senator Lugar's report on US-Cuban relations,” seasoned Burma-watcher, Derek Tonkin told Mizzima. “The US and Burma should now look for areas of mutual interest on which they can start talking -- narcotics, even US certification, international terrorism, piracy around SE Asia and off Somalia, communicable diseases, conservation -- the list is endless,” he said.

What is now needed is quiet diplomacy, a senior European diplomat with experience in behind-the-scenes exchanges and negotiations in Asia told Mizzima on condition of anonymity. Webb seems to be optimistic: “maybe this trip has helped to start the ball moving forward,” he said. But it is yet to be seen whether Webb’s trip is a one-off visit or the start of a new serious policy of engagement by Washington.

But more importantly, perhaps the visit and the outcomes show a new approach on the part of the junta. Senator Webb was given a ceremonial reception – with all the top generals – that is usually reserved only for visiting heads of state. Shown prominently on the state-run television, it clearly shows Burma’s military rulers now crave international, especially American, recognition, said a long-time foreign resident in Rangoon.

If the Burmese military regime really does want to engage with the international community, it may even heed some of its concerns, and then they will have no alternative but to deal with Aung San Suu Kyi. Than Shwe, at the behest of some of its Asian allies, especially Singapore and China, is keen to improve relations with the US, according to military sources in the Burmese capital Naypitdaw. The senator’s visit makes this extremely evident.

“You cannot fail to see in this that the junta is keen to tell the world that sanctions do not work and we are open to dialogue – at least with other governments, if not Aung San Suu Kyi and the pro-democracy movement inside the country,” said a western diplomat based in Rangoon.

But in the end the regime will proceed with its plans for a disciplined democracy no matter what the international community thinks. But what Webb’s visit does show is that Than Shwe is getting ready to push the process forward. The next step will be the creation of an interim government, according to senior Burmese military sources. Than Shwe plans to announce this soon and it will take control of the government for a year, possibly from September, a Burmese official told Mizzima. Aung Thaung, the minister and a close confidante of Than Shwe’s, recently told his deputies that there would be a new government soon, and he may no longer be the minister. Most other ministers have also told their staff that they will not be in their current posts by the end of the year.

“According to Than Shwe’s plans, all the current ministers will have to resign, if they are to join a political party and fight the forthcoming elections,” said the independent Burmese academic, Win Min based in Chiang Mai. So far there have been no hints as to who will be in the interim administration. Some analysts speculate that it may even include a senior member of the NLD.

But most diplomats and analysts in Rangoon remain skeptical that Than Shwe plans any real change, even the formation of an interim government may be intended to deflect international criticism. The end result of all these changes is clearly to make sure the military retains political control.

“There have been abundant signals that the roadmap is not an inclusive process and the referendum [in May last year] dispelled any remaining doubts – this is a hyper-flawed process that will not lead anywhere, it’s simply a consolidation of the military’s control of the state,” the former UN human rights rapporter for Burma Professor Paulo Pinheiro recently told Mizzima.

But there may still be surprises in store. Never underestimate the generals’ cunning and ability to wrong-foot the opposition by doing the unexpected. Than Shwe is already planning to release political prisoners, including some high-profile activists, in the near future, according to a senior government source close to the junta leader.

After all, Than Shwe promised the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon when he visited Burma last month that political prisoners would be released. The Burmese Ambassador to New York re-iterated this when he told the UN Security Council last month that political prisoners would be released before the elections and allowed to participate – though did not say how many or who would be included.

So it should not be a surprise if Aung San Suu Kyi is freed before the elections – and maybe even sooner than that. Senator Webb’s coyness during his encounters with the press in Bangkok gives the impression he is definitely hiding something. A western diplomat who follows Burma closely believes the US senator may have been given some form of assurances or undertakings that the pro-democracy leader will be freed in the near future -- but has to keep mum for the time being.

READ MORE---> US Senator’s mercy mission to Burma may start a new process...

NLD Leader Undergoes Operation

By ARKAR MOE
The Irrawaddy News

Win Tin, 80, a senior National League for Democracy (NLD) leader, underwent an operation for a heart condition at a private clinic in Rangoon on Sunday.

Family members said he is in good condition.

Win Tin was hospitalized on Saturday. An NLD spokesperson, Nyan Win, said he may remain in the clinic this week.

Win Tin stands next to Aung San Suu Kyi's portrait at the headquarters of National League for Democracy in Rangoon. (Photo: Getty Images)

A family member told The Irrawaddy on Monday, “He was operated on successfully in Asia Taw Win Clinic last night.”

Win Tin, a former editor, was released from prison in September 2008 after serving 19 years in Rangoon’s notorious Insein Prison.

He served as an adviser to pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi and was sentenced to 21 years in prison in 1989 during a crackdown on government opponents.

In 1996, he received an additional 7-year sentence for writing a testimonial on torture and the lack of medical treatment in Insein Prison, which he sent to the UN. As punishment, he was placed in solitary confinement in a room intended for dogs and was deprived of food and water.

He said a few hours after his release from prison, “I will keep fighting until the emergence of democracy in this country.”

READ MORE---> NLD Leader Undergoes Operation...

Burmese Puzzled and Angered by Yettaw’s Release

By WAI MOE
The Irrawaddy News

The release of John W Yettaw, the American who got Aung San Suu Kyi into trouble by intruding into her home, has puzzled and angered many Burmese.

Bo Kyi, joint-secretary of the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, a Burmese human rights group based on the Burmese-Thai border, said Yettaw’s release came as no surprise. “I think the regime just wanted to use him. Everybody knows that the regime wanted Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, not Yettaw.”

Bo Kyi was accused by the regime of sending the American to Burma, where he entered Suu Kyi’s home illegally at the beginning of May and gave the regime a pretext for arresting her and putting her on trial. She was sentenced to three years hard labor, but had her sentence cut to 18 months house arrest.

Yettaw was sentenced to seven years imprisonment, but a US senator, Jim Webb secured his release after a meeting with junta leader Snr-Gen Than Shwe.

Several Burmese, both within the country and in exile, likened the drama to a Hollywood farce.

One wrote on the Web site of The Irrawaddy: “Webb’s performance reminds me of Patti Page's song ‘How much is that (Yankie) doggie in the window” and [a] ‘Saving Private Yettaw’ movie directed by Than Shwe. Perhaps, they might win Oscars next year.”

A Rangoon physician said it was “unreasonable that the main culprit in the case was released but Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, who is totally innocent, is still detained.”

Win Tin, a prominent opposition leader said the Burmese were interested not in the release of Yettaw but in Suu Kyi’s fate.

Aung Naing Oo, a Burmese analyst based in Chiang Mai, Thailand, said the junta killed two birds with one stone by freeing Yettaw. “Now the regime successfully keeps Daw Aung San Suu Kyi under arrest and then they may reopen engagement with Washington.”

A veteran Rangoon journalist speculated that Webb’s success in securing Yettaw’s release was “part of the packages from America to restore a normal relationship with the regime.”

Speculation continued that Yettaw’s venture had been orchestrated—also with help from the US—to create a legal case against Suu Kyi. There were suggestions, not supported by hard evidence, that Yettaw had been paid by the regime to undertake it.

Yettaw claimed he entered Suu Kyi’s home to warn her after dreaming that she was in danger of assassination.

For his part, Senator Webb said in Rangoon: “I believe he (Yettaw) was probably motivated by good intentions but he committed a very serious violation in this country.”

Webb found good words to say to the regime about its role in the drama. “It was a good gesture from your country to our country for humanitarian reasons to allow him [Yettaw] to return to his family,” he told the junta.

Not only Yettaw’s family rejoiced at his release. One source at Insein Prison, where Yettaw spent the past three months—much of the time in the prison hospital—told The Irrawaddy anonymously: “He complained all the time.”

READ MORE---> Burmese Puzzled and Angered by Yettaw’s Release...

Mae Sot Reacts to Suu Kyi Verdict

By ALEX ELLGEE
The Irrawaddy News

News of Aung San Suu Kyi’s trial verdict spread through Mae Sot’s Burmese community last week, sparking outrage at her extended 18-month house arrest.

Having read the news on the Internet, heard it on the radio or via word of mouth, everyone in Mae Sot was almost instantly aware that the democracy leader would spend the 2010 election campaign in her crumbling two-story house in Rangoon.

For many, Mae Sot acts is the bridge between the tight fists of the junta and Thailand’s democracy. Many political dissidents, who run the risk of lengthy prison sentences in Burma, flee to Mae Sot to operate in relative safety. As a result, many feel especially connected to their hero, Suu Kyi.

Political activists were deeply angered by the Insein Prison court’s verdict, seeing it as the work of a corrupt, dictatorial government.

“I think it is extremely unfair and a brutal act of the military regime,” said a leader of a prominent youth activist group. “It’s clearly all a trap, and we are likely to see trap after trap until the very end.”

In the lawyer community that has been forced to flee to Mae Sot as a result of challenging the junta’s legal system, many are fuming at the court proceedings.

“I am so angry with their behaviour” said Nyi Nyi Hlaing a prominent lawyer now working in Mae Sot. “They said no one is above the law, and then days later they act like they are above the law.”

“The verdict is not legal because they used the 1974 constitution law which was broken in 1988, so they don’t have any law to judge the case on,” said Nyi Nyi Hlaing.

“The government was not chosen by the 1974 constitution, making them an illegal government so they cannot judge Aung San Suu Kyi. I don’t need to say whether the verdict is illegal or not legal because the whole ordeal has been illegal since they arrested Suu Kyi.”

The same sentiments were reiterated by U Myo, a spokesman for the Burma Lawyer council.

“I think that the verdict is entirely wrong in a legal aspect and totally unfair,” said U Myo.

“The charge upon her itself is completely wrong since the responsibility lies upon the security personnel guarding her house.”

A major grievance among the lawyer community is Snr-Gen Than Shwe’s interference with the court proceedings, which they argue is an illegal act.

U Myo explained that the Criminal Procedure Code Section 401 (5) stipulates that only the president is allowed to exercise his or her power over the court.

“Than Shwe is not the president of state because the 2008 Constitution will come to life only after the first session of the 2010 Parliament” said U Myo. “So no one can affirm whether Than Shwe is president now. Thus he could not exercise the power in the said Code to put her under house arrest for one and half year. He has acted in total disregard of the judiciary and has interfered in a case which ought to be acquitted in higher courts. This verdict shows that there is no rule of law in Burma.”

Ko Bo Kyi, a joint-secretary of the Mae Sot-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners in Burma, had another view on why Than Shwe intervened in the court proceedings.

“Than Shwe was just playing, because many high-ranking officers don’t agree with the verdict, and he wants to try to please them. He also wants other countries to be pleased and ease some of the pressure. Because he is an expert in psychological warfare, we can tell he is just doing it for psychological reasons not for the good of Burma.”

One of the major concerns in the Mae Sot activist community is that without Suu Kyi there can be no real democracy or fair elections in Burma.

“If Aung San Suu Kyi is not included in Burma’s political process, then Burma will not get peace and it will be difficult for national reconciliation” Ko Bo Kyi said.

The Karen communities have also followed the news closely, seeing Suu Kyi as the only way out of their decades-long conflict with the SPDC in Karen State. Although not all Karen wholeheartedly trust her, they see her as a beacon of hope that there may one day be national reconciliation.

David Thackrabaw, vice president of the Karen Nation Union, told The Irrawaddy that he saw the trial as “a plot by the junta to exclude Suu Kyi from the coming election.”

“Her verdict has created even more mistrust of the junta because they cannot treat the Burmese political organizations fairly, so it’s absolutely sure that they will not treat the ethnic organizations fairly” he said.

For the KNU and all Karen people her continued detention is a sign that Karen will continue to be pitted against Karen, all for the benefit of the SPDC. It’s also a sign that thousands of villagers will continue to flee the armed clashes, leaving behind everything they know and own to settle on Thai soil.

News of the trial has spread through the refugee camps surrounding Mae Sot. An English teacher working in the Mae La refugee camp told The Irrawaddy he was surprised to hear that so many of his students had already heard about the verdict.

Asked how she felt about Suu Kyi being sent back to house arrest, a 20-year-old Karen girl said that she “felt so sorry because she is an old lady, but we are not surprised because she is such a massive threat to the generals.”

The migrant worker community that has settled in Mae Sot, forced out of Burma as a result of economic hardships, see their future as being closely tied with the future of Suu Kyi.

“If Suu Kyi is released then all our country’s problems will be resolved” said a woman from Mon State who works in a knitting factory. “If she is freed and is our leader, then I can leave Thailand and live happily in Burma with my family.”

News of the verdict also swept through the brothels in Mae Sot. Like other migrant workers, sex workers left Burma with the hope of making money to send back to their family, but many young girls end up in the sex industry.

One 23-year-old sex worker from Karen State said doubted the government would allow Suu Kyi to participate in the elections even if she was released.

“We know the government is so unfair they will not share their power with her,” said the sex worker.

Even the poorest people in the Mae Sot community, people who work in the rubbish dump to make enough money to survive, have followed the events.

One woman from Karen State, who settled around the rubbish dump five years ago with her family, recalled how many people from the dump sat around a radio, waiting for the announcer to give the verdict.

“When they announced that Suu Kyi was to be sent back to house arrest, we got so angry we lost our minds and begun cursing the radio,” she said.

Mae Sot also has an artist community that followed the news closely.

Tee Lay Tee, a seven-man comedy troupe that was formed in 1998 with the help of the famous comedian Zarganar, who is now serving a 35-year prison sentence, performed at a large show in Rangoon in 2007 where they acted out a joke highlighting the government’s oppression. The Democratic Voice of Burma broadcasted the joke, forcing the group to flee to Thailand to avoid the same fate of their mentor, Zarganar

“When we were living in Burma, we were unable to make shows the way we wanted because there is no freedom of speech,” said a member of the group, now based in Mae Sot. “The moment we criticized the government even the slightest we were forced to leave behind our families and country to come to Thailand.”

He said Suu Kyi is so highly respected that even though the government sentenced her to further house arrest, it can only control her body and is unable to control her soul and the love she has from the Burmese people.

“The government can only imprison Suu Kyi’s body; it will never arrest her mind or spirit” he said.

The Burmese communities in Mae Sot continue to have high hopes for Suu Kyi and remain confident that she is the one person who can bring peace to Burma.

A construction worker summed up the feelings of many people who admire her.

“Like everyone I know in Mae Sot,” he said, “I would take her punishment any day so that she can save our country.”

READ MORE---> Mae Sot Reacts to Suu Kyi Verdict...

Washington Hopes Webb Can Clarify Its Policy to Junta

By YENI
The Irrawaddy News

Burma's military junta led by Snr-Gen Than Shwe is set to meet an American senator at its administrative capital, Naypyidaw, this weekend just days after pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi was convicted and returned to house arrest.

The meeting will be the first between a senior US official and the secretive leader of Burma's ruling military government. US Sen Jim Webb, a Democrat who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee on East Asian and Pacific Affairs, also plans to meet representatives of Burma’s leading opposition, the National League for Democracy.

US Sen Jim Webb (Photo)

The senator’s visit to Burma has been described as non-official, and The New York Times, quoting senior US officials, said he is "not carrying a message from the administration." But US officials say they welcome the visit, which they viewed as affording an opportunity for Washington clarify its policy to Burma's top leader directly.

“It is important for the Burmese leadership to hear of the strong views of American political leaders about the path it should take toward democracy, good governance and genuine national reconciliation,” said Mike Hammer, a spokesman for the National Security Council.

“The recent conviction of Aung San Suu Kyi, which was a serious step backward, indicates the magnitude of the challenge the international community faces in persuading the Burmese leadership to embark on that path,” he said. “Sen Webb can convey American views effectively on such subjects.”

Although a member of President Obama’s Democratic Party, Webb is known for his strong criticism of the administration’s Burma sanctions, arguing that isolating Burma has strengthened China's grip, weakened US influence and done nothing to improve the junta's behavior.

Currently, the US administration says its policy on Burma is still very much under review. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has made clear that the US could expand its relationship with Burma and allow US investment there if Suu Kyi were released. But the sentencing of Suu Kyi to a further term of house arrest seems have made any forward movement difficult.

Webb’s Burma trip has also led to speculation that he might negotiate the release John W Yettaw, the US citizen tried alongside Suu Kyi and sentenced to seven years imprisonment with hard labor. Yettaw triggered the case against Suu Kyi by staying illegally at her home after penetrating security around the property.

Observers following the Yettaw case point to the visit to North Korea last week by former President Bill Clinton, who secured the release of two American women journalists after weeks of quiet negotiations between the US State Department and North Korea. The North Korean regime hailed the release as a sign of its "humanitarian and peace-loving policy."

Aung Naing Oo, a Thailand-based Burmese political analyst, told The Irrawaddy he saw no sign that Webb’s visit to Burma would secure the release of Yettaw.

"Webb's visit is posed as just a point of entry to start the lines of communication between the United States and Burma, “he said. “So far, I don't see any indication that Webb would secure the release of Mr Yettaw. But I guess that the result might depend on how bad Mr Yettaw's health is."

Concern is growing over Yettaw's health after he spent several days in hospital being treated for epileptic seizures. Yettaw suffers from diabetes and other medical conditions, including post-traumatic stress disorder from his time serving in the US military.

"How is he going to do hard labor if he is so ill?" a former wife, Yvonne Yettaw, asked in a telephone interview with The Associated Press after hearing the verdict. "Maybe they'll realize he won't make seven years, and they'll send him home."

A spokesman for the US embassy in Rangoon said the issue had "not been officially discussed."

The meeting between Webb and the regime leaders is seen by some observers as an effort by the junta to exploit the different reactions by international and regional governments to Suu Kyi's conviction and her return to house arrest.

The UN Security Council released a press statement heavily influenced by Burma's biggest ally, China, which inserted indirect praise for Than Shwe's act of "mercy" by halving Suu Kyi's sentence and allowing her to return home.

A tougher US draft would have condemned Suu Kyi’s conviction but ran into opposition not only from China but also from Russia, Vietnam and Libya.

Explaining why the Security Council statement had been watered down, Britain’s UN Ambassador John Sawers, the council chair this month, said: “I think we all know that different members of the Security Council have different views on the situation there and that the strong views in various Western capitals are not entirely shared in countries elsewhere."

Applauding the regime's policy line, the regime’s official mouthpiece The New Light of Myanmar said on Friday that Than Shwe's intervention in the Suu Kyi verdict was "designed to ensure a win-win situation." It gave the opposition "good opportunities to accept the situation and keep on carrying out political activities," the newspaper said.

Naypyidaw had made a giant step towards change, the newspaper said—adding: "We should show loving kindness in return when someone shows loving-kindness for us. Only then will there be a change."

READ MORE---> Washington Hopes Webb Can Clarify Its Policy to Junta...

Indonesian Government Attempts to Stop Burma Democracy Meeting

By Katie Hamann

(VOA) -Burmese democracy leaders have successfully concluded a meeting in the Indonesian capital Jakarta to push a plan for transition to democracy in Burma. The Indonesian government earlier attempted to prevent the conference from taking place, dispatching local police to the hotel where the delegations had planned to meet.

Members of the Burmese government in exile and a coalition of pro-democracy groups and ethnic leaders came to Jakarta to officially launch their 'Proposal for National Reconciliation' in Burma, an alternative to the current regime's so-called "roadmap to democracy."

Indonesian Parliamentary member Eva Kusuma Sunardi was among those who lent their support to the conference. She says the department of foreign affairs was given several weeks notice of the conference and made no objections, until a letter arrived from the embassy of Burma, which now calls itself Myanmar.

"On the 4th of August the foreign ministry accepted a letter, the objection letter from the embassy of Myanmar, asking the foreign ministry to stop this event on the argument that this is illegal and it will potentially damage the relationship between the two countries," Eva Kusuma Sunardi. "So the foreign ministry asked the police actually using the letter from the Myanmar embassy."

But Indonesian foreign affairs spokesman Teuku Faizasyah said his government's objections had nothing to do with the letter from Burma.

"As a matter of principle the Indonesian government cannot allow its territory to be used for activities by the so-called government in exile while Indonesia and other ASEAN countries as well as the members of the United Nations recognize Myanmar as well as the government of Myanmar. So it's not in our tradition to allow such political activities, political campaigns in our territory," the spokesman said. (JEG's: this is to show next meeting has to be kept under wraps until is completed like any ordinary meeting away from nosy ears)

Despite police threats to lock the delegation out of their hotel meeting room, the Burmese delegation continued their program at alternative venues in the capital Jakarta, including Indonesia's House of Representatives.

They met with Indonesian political leaders, diplomats and civil society groups to share their 'Proposal for National Reconciliation'.

Presented as an alternative to the Burmese regime's so-called roadmap to democracy, their plan demands the immediate release of detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and other political prisoners, a nationwide ceasefire with rebel groups and a review of the 2008 constitution.

Burma's Prime Minister in exile Sein Winn was asked about the demands and said they must be met and a dialogue begun before next year's elections. "This election is tied to the constitution. And this constitution making process as well as the results are so biased and screwed [up] that according to this constitution, we will never get democracy," he said.

VOA: Assuming the regime or if the regime doesn't yield to your demands in this transition plan, will you participate in the elections in some capacity?

Sein Winn: "No, no, we will not participate as it is. That is why we are saying we have to review the constitution; you have to release the political prisoners. This is the bottom line."

But Jason Abbott, a specialist on Southeast Asian politics at Britain's University of Surrey, says the refusal of leaders of Burma's democracy movement to negotiate on certain points, particularly the question of Aung San Suu Kyi's participation is also thwarting progress.

"While it may be significant that so many groups are coming together for this meeting this week, until there is a change in their demands that shows a willingness to compromise with the regime, then it's only going to continue to be ignored by the junta. There will be no dialogue until there is movement from one side, the junta doesn't need to revise the constitution, the junta doesn't need to change the rules of the election, it will go ahead," he said. (JEG's: if the constitution is cutting democracy-freedoms then what is to compromise?)

The exiled leaders conceded that the military junta is unlikely to yield to their demands. They urged the United Nations Security Council to draft a binding resolution on Burma and for partners at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations to exert more pressure on the Burmese leadership.

READ MORE---> Indonesian Government Attempts to Stop Burma Democracy Meeting...

UNSC Meeting on Burma Remains Inconclusive

By LALIT K JHA
The Irrawaddy News

WASHINGTON— An emergency meeting of the powerful United Nations Security Council convened on Tuesday afternoon at the request of France to discuss the situation in Burma in the aftermath of the fresh sentence against pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

However, the meeting ended without conclusion because of sharp differences among its members.

Emerging from the closed-door meeting, the Security Council president for the month of August, Ambassador John Sawers from Britain, said the 15-member UN body would meet again on Wednesday.

A draft statement was circulated by the United States among the member countries, which, among other things, condemns the conviction of Aung San Suu Kyi and calls for her immediate release and ability to participate in the political process.

When asked about Russia and China, the two members that have asked for more time to consider the draft statement, Deputy French Ambassador to the UN Jean-Pierre Lacroix said “I mean, everybody pretty much knows the dynamic within the Council, but we are in the midst of a discussion now and, as I said, we will do our best to try and achieve the kind of outcome that we are looking for.

“The draft statement has been circulated by the US delegation. We support that initiative, we support that draft. Some members of the Council have asked for some time to communicate this draft to their capital, and we respect that. But it is our firm position that there has to be a speedy and firm reaction of the Security Council,” he said.

“It has been our longstanding position, but also one of the [UN] secretary-general, that if there is to be an inclusive and fair electoral process in Burma, it cannot be without the participation of all relevant political players, particularly Aung San Suu Kyi. That is why we think there has to be a reaction by the Security Council. The verdict is in clear violation and breach of the request made by the Security Council,” he added.

Talking to reporters, the US ambassador to the UN, Susan Rice, said: “We recognize that other members of the Council may take different views on this, and we think it is important nonetheless to have a discussion and a debate and to seek as a matter of principle and policy a statement by the Council in accord with the principles of the Charter and the principles of democracy and respect for human rights that we are committed to.”

Earlier in the day, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed his deep disappointment over the verdict and deplored the decision.

“The secretary-general urges the [Burmese] government to immediately and unconditionally release Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and to engage with her without delay as an essential partner in the process of national dialogue and reconciliation,” said a statement issued by his spokesperson.

“Unless she and all other political prisoners in Myanmar [Burma] are released and allowed to participate in free and fair elections, the credibility of the political process will remain in doubt,” the statement said.

Ban also spoke to British Prime Minister Gordon Brown after Suu Kyi was sentenced to another 18 months of house arrest.

Meanwhile, however, China urged the international community to respect Burma's judicial sovereignty, reacting to the regime's decision to prolong the pro-democracy leader’s house arrest, according to Agence France-Presse news agency.

"The international community should fully respect Myanmar's judicial sovereignty," foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said.

Meanwhile Malaysia's foreign minister called for an "urgent meeting" of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) after the verdict was announced.

"I think there is a need for Asean foreign ministers to have an urgent meeting to discuss this issue, which is of grave concern," Foreign Minister Anifah Aman said.

"With this sentence there is no possibility for Aung San Suu Kyi to participate in the general election next year which should be free, fair and inclusive," he added.

READ MORE---> UNSC Meeting on Burma Remains Inconclusive...

Man's 'divine mission' to save Aung San Suu Kyi lands both in jail

By Danny Kemp in Bangkok

* Suu Kyi's visitor on "divine mission"
* Wanted to warn her she was in great danger
* She got extra 18 months, he got seven years
* Times UK: Suu Kyi silenced again

JOHN Yettaw thought he was on a divine mission to save Aung San Suu Kyi when he swam to her lakeside house - but the troubled US military veteran instead left her at the mercy of Burma's (Myanmar's) junta.

The 54-year-old from Missouri was initially branded a "fool" by lawyers for the detained Nobel Peace Prize winner after his bizarre adventure in May gave the military regime a ready-made excuse to keep her locked up.

Yet a picture eventually emerged of a somewhat tragic figure on a spiritual quest, a devout Mormon who sought redemption after his teenaged son was killed riding a motorcycle that Mr Yettaw had bought for him as a present.

Yesterday, a prison court sentenced Mr Yettaw to seven years of hard labour and imprisonment - three years for breaching security laws, three years for immigration violations and one year for a municipal charge of illegal swimming.

Ms Suu Kyi was sentenced to three years but junta chief Than Shwe signed a special order allowing her to serve just half that time, under house arrest.

The 64-year-old Suu Kyi was later driven back to the house under tight security and the road outside the crumbling villa was sealed off. She has already been in detention for 14 of the past 20 years since Burma's ruling generals - who renamed the country Myanmar - refused to recognise her National League for Democracy's landslide victory in 1990 elections.

The rulings were met with instant condemnation around the world: US President Barack Obama called it "unjust" and demanded Ms Suu Kyi and all other Burmese political prisoners be freed; the European Union vowed the reinforce existing sanctions and France called for new sanctions.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd called the charges against Ms Suu Kyi "spurious" and branded the court ruling a "new low" for the junta. The Government will resume broadcasting Radio Australia into Burma, something Ms Suu Kyi had previously called for.

Court drama

The diabetic, epileptic father-of-seven found himself at the centre of Ms Suu Kyi's two-decade struggle with Burma's generals when police arrested him climbing out of the waters of Yangon's Lake Inye on May 6.

He was found with a pair of homemade flippers, along with an amateurish "spy kit" of a black shoulder bag, torch, folding pliers, a camera, two $US100 bills and some Burmese currency.

State media printed photographs that Mr Yettaw had taken of himself before his ill-fated adventure sporting his flippers for his swim, wearing a short-sleeved shirt and looking intensely into the lens. "(Mr Jettaw's) a very sincere and pious person," his lawyer Khin Maung Oo said.

It later transpired that it was not the first time he had been to Ms Suu Kyi's crumbling villa. In November 2008 he walked along a lakeside drain and left a copy of the Book of Mormon at her house before escaping.

His activities spawned conspiracy theories on both sides. During the trial, it emerged that he had been in contact with exile groups in Thailand before crossing over to Burma, prompting the junta to suggest that he was a "secret agent or her (Suu Kyi's) boyfriend".

The exiled activists meanwhile wondered whether he had been paid by Burma's rulers to give a reason for extending her detention, which was due to expire just days after he was arrested.

But it turned out that Mr Yettaw believed he was taking orders from a higher authority still - he had experienced a divine vision that "terrorists" would assassinate Ms Suu Kyi and wanted to warn her.

"Yettaw said he came here because God asked him to," Nyan Win, one of Ms Suu Kyi's lawyers, quoted him as telling the trial in May. "In his vision, the terrorists assassinated Aung San Suu Kyi and then they put the blame for the assassination on the government, so that's why he came here, to warn both of them," he said.

The story behind this vision revealed a lost soul with a difficult past. Military records showed that he had spent a brief spell in the US military in the 1970s, although Mr Yettaw told Burmese authorities that he was a Vietnam veteran with a history of post-traumatic stress disorder.

Married four times and with a history of drink problems and living in trailers, he was described locally as something of a misfit. Then his son Clint died two years ago in a motorcycling accident at the age of 17, and was buried on the family farm in the hamlet of Falcon, according to a US-based website.

The trauma changed everything. He took a backpack tour through Asia with another son, during which he made his first swim to Ms Suu Kyi's house, and then had the latest of the visions which he had experienced for years, according to Newsweek magazine.

Then he left his children with friends and in April this year set off for Thailand and then Rangoon (Yangon).

news.com.au-Agence France-Presse

READ MORE---> Man's 'divine mission' to save Aung San Suu Kyi lands both in jail...

Australia condemns Suu Kyi conviction

By Sandra O'Malley

(The Age) -Canberra has condemned the latest conviction against Burma's pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi and plans to call in the Burmese ambassador to protest against the verdict.

It also flagged a further tightening of sanctions against Burma's military junta.

On Tuesday, the Burmese opposition leader was sentenced to three years' jail but the ruling junta signed an order commuting the term to 18 months' house arrest.

Suu Kyi was charged following an incident in which a US man swam to her lakeside residence in May.

Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said Australia condemned the conviction and sentencing, which removed any prospect of Suu Kyi taking part in Burmese elections scheduled next year.

"Australia again repeats its call for the Burmese regime to release Aung San Suu Kyi immediately and unconditionally, and to release the more than 2,000 political prisoners in Burma," he said in a statement.

Mr Smith has asked the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade to call in the Burmese ambassador to express Australia's "dismay" at the turn of events.

"Australia's ambassador to Burma is on my instruction also conveying the Australian government's views directly to the Burmese regime," he said.

Burma's ruling junta has kept Suu Kyi in detention for nearly 14 of the past 20 years after it refused to recognise her National League for Democracy party's landslide victory in 1990 elections.

Mr Smith said there was still opportunity for the Burmese government to set aside the conviction and sentence, and lead the country down the path to national reconciliation.

"Australia will now consult closely with the international community including the United Nations and Australia's ASEAN partners on the need to put even more pressure on the Burmese regime to move down the path of democracy," he said.

"Australia maintains financial sanctions against the Burmese regime.

"The government will now move to update these and keep them focused for maximum impact."

The opposition and Australian Greens backed the condemnation of the Burmese regime.

"The military rulers have used trumped-up charges to prevent Suu Kyi from taking an active role during elections to be held next year," opposition foreign affairs spokeswoman Julie Bishop said.

"Any election held without the direct involvement of Suu Kyi cannot be accepted as legitimate by the international community."

Greens senator Scott Ludlam, co-chair of Australian Parliamentarians for Democracy in Burma, said the verdict was as illegitimate as the Burmese regime.

READ MORE---> Australia condemns Suu Kyi conviction...

Asia's leaders condemn Aung San Suu Kyi's continued detention

by Larry Jagan

Bangkok (Mizzima) - As Aung San Suu Kyi awaits her fate at the hands of the Burma’s military regime, more Asian leaders are lending their voices to the international demand for her immediate release. The judges are scheduled to announce the verdict on Tuesday in the court inside Insein prison where she is on trial for allegedly breaking the conditions of her house arrest when she gave food and shelter to an uninvited American intruder, who swam to the back of her lakeside residence. If she is found guilty, she faces a maximum of five years in jail. She has already spent more than 13 of the last 20 years in detention.

“Aung San Suu Kyi’s continued detention shames all of Asia,” the former South Korean president and fellow Nobel Peace laureate, Kim Dae Jung said recently. It is a travesty of justice that cannot be tolerated by the international community he added. “Burma’s authoritarian rulers have suppressed the people for too long.”

Kim Dae Jung and the former Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim have both joined the campaign urging concerted international action on behalf of the detained Burmese opposition leader. They were amongst more than a hundred former political prisoners who signed a statement released on the eve of Aung San Suu Kyi’s 64th birtday, (on 19 June), calling for her release and for the United Nations Security Council to establish a global arms embargo on Burma. The political prisoners signed the statement as part of the continuing campaign organised by Amnesty International to draw attention to Aung San Suu Kyi’s plight, www.64forSuu.org.

Amnesty International believes that the participation of key Asian political personalities like Anwar and Kim shows that Aung San Suu Kyi’s continued unjustified detention is an international concern – not just that of Europe and the United States.

“The willingness of Anwar Ibrahim and Kim Dae Jung to join the campaign to free Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and Myanmar's other political prisoners is critically important, as it gives the lie to the notion -- voiced most often by the generals in Myanmar and their defenders in China and Russia -- that Daw Suu Kyi is a concern only of the West,” Benjamin Zawacki, Amnesty’s Bangkok-based Burma researcher told Mizzima.

“ASEAN’s policy of non-intervention is not helping to serve regional interests,” said Anwar. “We need to work together in ASEAN for regional stability and prosperity. Political progress in Burma is an integral part of this, including the release of Aung San Suu Kyi and all other political prisoners,” he said.

Anwar Ibrahim, whose official title is Dato' Seri Anwar, is currently the de facto leader of one of Malaysia’s main opposition parties Keadilan, the People’s Justice Party. Following mass protests calling for political reform in 1997, he was sentenced to six years in prison for corruption and to another nine years for sodomy in 2009. He reportedly endured six years in solitary confinement. In 2004 his conviction was reversed and he was released. Subsequently the Malaysian government, fearing his popularity in the country brought fresh charges against him and his new trial is about to start.

Over the weekend Mizzima was able to conduct an exclusive interview with the Malayisan politician.

Q: What do you think of the charges against Aung San Suu Kyi and what would you say if she is sentenced to jail?

A: The charges are contrived and have been made simply to deny Aung San Suu Kyi the freedom that she is entitled to and that has been denied to her for so many years. It is quite clear that the democratic contagion which is sweeping across Southeast Asia has made inroads into Myanmar such that the generals are fearful of what she can achieve as a free citizen leading her people. I think her continued imprisonment would be a tragedy for Myanmar and an embarrassment to the international community’s efforts to bring a measure of justice to Myanmar.

Q: What does Aung San Suu Kyi mean to you personally – do you draw inspiration from her courage; do you see a parallel with your own struggle and your own personal history?

A: She is an inspiration to all who struggle to free their country or people from the chains that bind them and who fight for freedom and justice. I see in her a reflection of the spirit of the late Cory Aquino whose memory we celebrate this week as one of Asia’s most heroic women leaders.

We are in a similar fight in Malaysia but it would not be accurate to say that conditions in Malaysia and Myanmar are similar. The situation is far worse in Myanmar. But I can empathise with her personal situation. We in Malaysia have fought hard against laws that deprive personal freedoms and permit detention without trial or due process, most recently in the demonstrations in Kuala Lumpur in August against the Internal Security Act.

Q: Why should the junta free her – of course it’s a human rights issue, but what is Burma and Asia missing out on by her continued detention?

A: The junta should free her because she is the leader of the democracy movement in her country. She is the legitimate choice of her people as expressed in an election that took place in 1990 whose results have been ignored by the junta. All of free Asia should join in one voice to press for Myanmar’s immediate transition to democracy. Isn’t 47 years of military rule long enough to be ended for a people willing and able to move out of the shadows of military dictatorship and economic stagnation?

Q: What can the international community do to get her released; do you agree with sanctions, or should there be renewed engagement?

A: The policy of constructive engagement has clearly failed as we see members of the junta and the generals deriving massive financial benefits from contracts and business deals without any inclination to change repressive policies and redress the massive denial of basic human rights of the people of Myanmar. It is critical that the centers of power in Asia take a firm stand on this issue. India, China, Japan and the Asean bloc must be vocal in condemning the ongoing persecution of Suu Kyi and the other political prisoners held in Myanmar. Along with the United Nations, the European Union and the United States, the international community must make common cause in pressuring the junta to agree to a timetable for Myanmar’s transition to democratic rule. Pressure – diplomatic, political and cultural – should be applied but not economic sanctions as they would impoverish an already beleaguered people.

Anwar and Kim are being joined by many more voices throughout Asia, as Aung San Suu Kyi faces the grim prospect of another five years in jail. “The issue isn't the freedom of a single woman, or even of 2,160 other political prisoners, but the advancement of human rights that are as important in Malaysia and South Korea as they are in Myanmar -- or the West. It is indeed the international community that is demanding change in Myanmar,” said Benjamin Zawacki.

The top general Than Shwe must be in doubt that the eyes of the world are watching the current events in Burma, and if Aung San Suu Kyi is not released soon international pressure is set to increase further.

READ MORE---> Asia's leaders condemn Aung San Suu Kyi's continued detention...