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HEADLINES
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AP - Foreign agencies, regime launch major assessment of cyclone survivors' needs in Myanmar
AP - Myanmar frees 15 opposition members who marched to pro-democracy leader's house
AP - Experts to assess Myanmar cyclone survivors' needs
Reuters - Cyclone raises tuberculosis risks in Myanmar: WHO
Reuters - USDA sees Myanmar rice crop even smaller in '08/09
Times - Burma: Than Shwe 'ordered troops to execute villagers'
CSM - Burma's (Myanmar's) elite help with aid
The Philadelphia Inquirer - U.N. helicopters reach more Myanmar areas
Philippine Daily Inquirer - Sight of Myanmar’s cyclone damage unspeakable -- RP team
EUbusiness - Cyclone must not overshadow push for change in Myanmar: EU
BBC News - Suu Kyi given freedom of Dundee
Canada Dot Com - Regina women sending underwear to Myanmar as part of Panties for Peace
The Nation - Asia and the west differ on indifference and compassion
Irrawaddy - Maung Waik, Burmese Tycoon, Arrested on Drug Charges
Mizzima News - Zarganar still under detention
DVB News - Police seize misappropriated aid in Kha Yan
DVB News - 1000 Karen villagers displaced by attacks
DVB News - Local officials charged with stealing aid supplies

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Foreign agencies, regime launch major assessment of cyclone survivors' needs in Myanmar
AP - Wednesday, June 11

YANGON, Myanmar - The United Nations expressed hope Tuesday that Myanmar's military regime has finally begun to cooperate in aiding cyclone victims as a major joint assessment was launched Tuesday.

Some 250 experts from the U.N., the Myanmar government and Southeast Asia headed into the Irrawaddy river delta for a village-by-village assessment of both emergency and long-term needs of the survivors.

"It has taken quite a long time but this shows the government is on board by its commitment to facilitate the relief operation and the scaling up that people are asking for," said Amanda Pitt, a U.N. spokeswoman in Bangkok, Thailand.

The ruling junta has been sharply criticized by foreign governments and aid agencies for both its ineptness in handling the disaster and barring foreign aid workers from the delta.

The U.N. estimated Cyclone Nargis affected 2.4 million people and warned more than 1 million of them, mostly in the delta, still need help. The cyclone killed more than 78,000 people in impoverished Myanmar.

The teams will spend the next 10 days in the delta to assess the immediate needs for food, water and shelter as well as long-term demands such as new schools, housing and measures to revive the region's economy.

They will be transported by truck, boat and helicopter.

"This should give us a comprehensive, across the board understanding of who has been reached, which responding agency reached them and what they received," Pitt said.

The information will be collected in a report to be released next month by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and should go a long way to boosting funding for the cyclone relief operation, Pitt said.

"Many donors said they were ready and willing to provide funding for relief operations and logistics but they wanted more access and more comprehensive assessments, " Pitt said.

Meanwhile, U.N. helicopters loaded with relief supplies were reaching areas of the delta that were cut off from regular aid since Cyclone Nargis struck May 2-3.

But aid groups say foreign relief workers still face hindrances in reaching cyclone victims, especially outside Myanmar's largest city, Yangon.

Until this week the U.N. had only one helicopter operating in Myanmar, said Paul Risley, a spokesman for the U.N. World Food Program in Bangkok.

Most supplies were being delivered by boats that took hours to travel short distances in the delta's network of waterways.

Risley said four more WFP-chartered helicopters in neighboring Thailand were expected to fly to Myanmar this week, bringing to 10 the U.N. agency's total number of choppers in the country.

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Myanmar frees 15 opposition members who marched to pro-democracy leader's house
AP - Tuesday, June 10

YANGON, Myanmar - Myanmar's ruling military junta has freed 15 opposition party members who were detained last month for demanding the release of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, a party spokesman said Tuesday.

The 15 members of Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy were shoved into police trucks and hauled away on May 27 after they marched from the party's headquarters to her house to demand her freedom.

"All 15 party members were freed last night," NLD spokesman Nyan Win said.

They had been held for two weeks inside a compound that once served as a government technical school on the outskirts of Yangon. The site has been used to hold hundreds of Buddhist monks and other citizens following pro-democracy protests in September that were violently suppressed by the military.

Pro-democracy leader Suu Kyi has been held under house arrest for more than 12 of the past 18 years.

Last month, the junta extended her detention by another year, sparking worldwide outrage from supporters who called the move illegal. Under Myanmar law, no one can be held more than five years without a trial. Suu Kyi's most recent arrest was in May 2003.

The extension came as the junta faced worldwide criticism for refusing to accept many offers of international assistance after Cyclone Nargis, which struck May 2-3.

The storm killed 78,000 people and left 56,000 others missing, according to the junta. An estimated 2.4 million people remain in desperate need of food, shelter and medical care.

The ruling generals have long regarded Suu Kyi, the daughter of martyred independence leader Gen. Aung San, as the biggest threat to their power. Her party is the country's largest legal opposition group.

U.N. efforts to push the junta into a dialogue with Suu Kyi after last September's protests have largely failed.

Suu Kyi was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in absentia in 1991 for her nonviolent efforts to promote democracy.

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Experts to assess Myanmar cyclone survivors' needs
AP - Wednesday, June 11

YANGON, Myanmar - Hundreds of experts began assessing the needs of Myanmar's cyclone victims Tuesday as the country's military junta finally gave them access five weeks after the disaster.

But that improved access was undermined by reports the isolationist government had arrested 18 survivors who were on their way to the United Nations office in the commercial capital of Yangon to plead for help.

Some 250 experts from the U.N., the Myanmar government and Southeast Asian nations headed into the Irrawaddy delta on trucks, boat and helicopters for a village-by-village survey, the United Nations said.

Over 10 days, they will determine how much food, clean water and temporary shelter the 2.4 million survivors need along with the cost of rebuilding houses and schools and reviving the farm-based economy.

"It has taken quite a long time but this shows the government is on board by its commitment to facilitate the relief operation and the scaling up that people are asking for," said Amanda Pitt, a U.N. spokeswoman in Bangkok, Thailand.

The United Nations estimates more than 1 million of the storm's survivors, mostly in the delta, still need help. Cyclone Nargis killed more than 78,000 people in impoverished Myanmar.

The information collected will be released in a report next month by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and should motivate more countries to donate to the cyclone relief operation, Pitt said.

"Many donors said they were ready and willing to provide funding for relief operations and logistics but they wanted more access and more comprehensive assessments, " she said.

The ruling junta has been sharply criticized by foreign governments and aid agencies for its ineptness in handling the disaster. It also has come under particular fire for forcing survivors from camps and allegedly dumping them in their destroyed villages.

Authorities detained 18 women and children Tuesday as they walked to U.N. offices to complain about not receiving any government assistance, according to a government official who refused to be identified for fear of retaliation by the leadership.

The group from Dagon township on the outskirts of Yangon was bundled into a waiting police car and remained in detention, witnesses said.

Pitt said she was unaware of the arrests.

The criticism of the junta's aid effort comes on top of long-standing concerns about its poor record on human rights, including its detention of Nobel Peace Prize laureate and pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

On Tuesday, the junta released 15 members of Suu Kyi's party who were detained last month for demanding her release, a party spokesman said.

The 15 were shoved into police trucks and hauled away May 27 after they marched from the National League for Democracy's headquarters to her house to demand her freedom. They were held at a compound that has been used to hold hundreds of Buddhist monks and other citizens following pro-democracy protests in September that were violently suppressed by the military.

Suu Kyi has been held under house arrest for more than 12 of the past 18 years. Last month, the government extended her detention by another year.

The European Union's envoy to Myanmar, Piero Fassino, said Tuesday that the focus on humanitarian assistance for cyclone victims "cannot sideline the importance of political problems that are still there."

Repeated attacks on the junta's rights record has fueled an intense xenophobia among the generals. That suspicion of foreigners has contributed to the junta barring most international aid groups from the delta until now and rebuffing offers from the U.S. military to help in the relief effort.

The country's top leader, Senior Gen. Than Shwe, promised U.N. Secretary Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon last month that he would improve access but until now only a trickle of foreign aid workers and relief supplies had reached survivors.

Pitt, the U.N. spokeswoman, said she was hopeful the start of the assessment signaled a greater willingness on the part of the government to work with aid workers to reach survivors and allow a better understanding of their needs.

The assessment began a day after U.N. helicopters loaded with relief supplies started reaching areas of the delta that were cut off from regular aid since Cyclone Nargis struck.
Four of the five aircraft that arrived over the weekend got to work shuttling emergency supplies like rice and water purification systems to villages around the hardest-hit towns of Bogale and Labutta, said Paul Risley, a U.N. World Food Program spokesman.

A total of four flights flew Monday to seven locations in the delta and six more sites were expected to be reached Tuesday, he said.

Until this week, the U.N. had only one helicopter operating in Myanmar, Risley said. Most supplies were being delivered by boats that took hours to travel short distances in the delta's network of waterways.

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Cyclone raises tuberculosis risks in Myanmar: WHO
By Laura MacInnis
Reuters - Wednesday, June 11

GENEVA (Reuters) - The cyclone that devastated Myanmar last month forced many tuberculosis sufferers to stop their treatment, triggering fears of drug-resistant strains spreading, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday.

Myanmar had 83,000 cases of the highly contagious disease in 2006 causing 6,000 deaths, according to the WHO's most recent figures for the diplomatically isolated country whose army rulers were initially reluctant to let in foreign aid workers after Cyclone Nargis hit on May 2.

The storm killed up to 134,000 people, left 2.4 million destitute, and destroyed many of the health centers which handed out antibiotics.

WHO spokeswoman Fadela Chaib said experts from the United Nations agency would travel to cyclone-affected areas this week to track down tuberculosis patients who lost access to their drugs since the May 2 storm.

"They will go to the hospitals and health centers, look at the records, look how many people were on treatment, and then try to trace them in villages and camps," Chaib said, calling the hiatus resulting from the storm "a serious issue."

"Tuberculosis is a life-threatening disease. Interrupting a course of six-month treatment can have an effect on creating resistance to tuberculosis drugs," she said.

Any pause in a course of antibiotics can give the bacterium causing tuberculosis a chance to mutate and build up immunity to standard medicines. Drug-resistant strains can require patients to take an expensive and arduous course of pills and injections, and some types are virtually untreatable.

Even before the cyclone, the weak health system and pervasiveness of fake drugs in Myanmar were seen as potential triggers for drug-resistant tuberculosis.

While no cases of "extensively drug-resistant" or "XDR" tuberculosis have been confirmed by the WHO in Myanmar, aid workers from Medicins Sans Frontieres last year reported cases among migrants from Myanmar in neighboring Thailand, raising concerns that it may already exist in the secretive state.

Chaib said authorities in Myanmar had worked hard with the WHO in recent years to fight the respiratory disease, which spreads through the air and kills about 1.5 million people worldwide every year.

In addition to tracking patients and helping them resume treatment, WHO staff deployed to Myanmar's cyclone-affected region will also seek to bolster general health services for those displaced by the storm.

The WHO is appealing for clean water and sanitation supplies to help reduce the risks of water-borne diseases among cyclone survivors. With the monsoon season coming, the U.N. agency said it was also critical for Myanmar to take steps to prevent malaria and other diseases spread by mosquitoes.

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USDA sees Myanmar rice crop even smaller in '08/09
Tue Jun 10, 2008 8:41am EDT

WASHINGTON, June 10 (Reuters) - Myanmar's rice crop will be even smaller than expected after the devastation of Cyclone Nargis, the U.S. Agriculture Department said Tuesday, reducing its production estimate for 2008/09 by 6 percent.

USDA, in its monthly outlook report for world agriculture production, lowered its previous month's forecast for the country's rice crop by 600,000 tonnes to 9.4 million tonnes.

"The decline in Burma's crop results both from a reduction in area and an expected decline in average yield due to the effects of the storm damage from Cyclone Nargis in early May," USDA said.

The cyclone hit hard in Myanmar, also known as Burma, and its Irrawaddy delta region, which produces a third of the country's rice crop.

Global rice production, meanwhile, was forecast slightly lower than the previous month, down 600.000 tonnes at 431.41 million tonnes. Production estimates for some major exporters, like India, Vietnam and Thailand, were unchanged.

USDA also said it expected global ending stocks would be 81.5 million tonnes, down 1.1 million tonnes from last month's forecast.

On Monday, U.S. rough rice for July shipment RRN8 dropped 4 cents to $19.92 per hundredweight, below the record high of $24.68-1/2 per cwt set on April 24. (Reporting by Missy Ryan; Editing by John Picinich)

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Burma: Than Shwe 'ordered troops to execute villagers'
From The Times
June 7, 2008
Richard Lloyd Parry, Asia Editor

The leader of the Burmese junta, Than Shwe, personally ordered the murder of scores of unarmed villagers and Thai fishermen, according to a senior diplomat and military intelligence officer who defected to America.

Aung Lin Htut, formerly the deputy chief of mission at the Burmese Embassy in Washington, described to a radio station how 81 people, including women and children, were shot and buried on an isolated island after straying into a remote military zone in the southeast of the country in 1998.

After one general hesitated to kill the civilians, fearing that the commander who had given the order was drunk, he was informed that it came from “Aba Gyi” or “Great Father” – the term used to refer to Senior General Than Shwe, the head of the junta.

A few days later troops from the same military base captured a Thai fishing boat that had strayed close to Christie Island in the Mergui Archipelago. The 22 fishermen on board were also shot and buried on the island. “I was a witness to the two incidents in which a total of about 81 people were killed,” Mr Aung Lin Htut, formerly a major in military intelligence, told the Burmese language service of Voice of America. “All of them were unarmed civilians.” In 46 years of military rule in Burma, there have been numerous reports of grave human rights violations but few have been attested by so well placed a source as Mr Aung Lin Htut. They come at a time when General Than Shwe and his regime are coming under scrutiny, after their refusal to allow a full scale relief operation for the victims of Cyclone Nargis.

The French Government has said that it comes close to being a “crime against humanity”, and last week Robert Gates, the US Defence Secretary, called it “criminal neglect”. If a tribunal like the ones established for Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia is ever created for Burma, then Mr Aung Lin Htut will doubtless be called to give evidence.

He sought asylum in the US in 2005, along with six members of his family, after a purge against the country’s prime minister and intelligence chief of the time by General Than Shwe destroyed the careers of a generation of intelligence officers. Given the control of information in Burma, his account is impossible to verify. But it has credibility because it is the first time since his defection that Mr Aung Lin Htut has made any public comment on his former masters.

In May 1998 he was stationed on Zadetkyi island, a frontline base close to Burma’s maritime border with Thailand. The commander of the base was Colonel Zaw Min, who is now Minister for Electric

Power and general secretary of the Union Solidarity and Development Association, the junta’s grassroots organisation.

A unit led by the colonel landed on Christie Island and found 59 people living there to gather wood and bamboo, in violation of Burmese law. The order came back from headquarters that they were to be “eliminated”.

Myint Swe, an air force general, said that he was a religious person, and that the matter should be handled delicately. He said that he was very concerned by the timing of the elimination order – just after lunch, a time when General Maung Aye, now the number two in the junta, was usually drunk.

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Burma's (Myanmar's) elite help with aid
The Christian Science Monitor
By a correspondent
Tue Jun 10, 4:00 AM ET

Rangoon, Burma - While international aid groups and world leaders have been clamoring for greater access or accusing the government of Burma (Myanmar) of neglecting cyclone victims, the junta has effectively parceled out areas of the disaster zone to the country's corporate leaders. 

They are a "who's who" of Burma's business class: powerful execs with close ties to the ruling military junta, some of them under Western sanctions for that reason.

Despite those connections – indeed, because they have enabled these men to distribute badly needed relief – foreign aid workers in Burma, their own efforts inhibited by the junta, are partnering with these businessmen- turned-relief workers.

Andrew Kirkwood, Burma director for Save the Children, has been sharing boats and distribution networks in the hard-hit Irrawaddy Delta with corporate-relief volunteers from Serge Pun Associates.

"They've been doing a lot of good things. They have a lot of assets, and they've been putting it to good use," he says. "We've been coordinating at various levels to reach as many people as possible."
Burma's power class

A week after the May 2-3 cyclone Nargis left an estimated 134,000 dead or missing and 2.4 million more affected, the government put out a call asking business leaders to volunteer for relief operations, says James Kong, a Hong Kong-based surgeon and former head of Rangoon's Pun Hlaing International Hospital, who has returned to help his native Burma.

Some of them are under Western sanctions. Others hold foreign passports, work with business leaders across Asia, and have publicly listed companies on Asian markets.

On May 12, a number of executives formed the Cape Negrais Committee, named after the site where the cyclone first slammed into southern Burma's Irrawaddy Delta.

The team has so far helped 45,000 to 75,000 people on Middle Island, one of their areas of operation in the delta, says Mark Tippetts, an Englishman and longtime Burma resident who oversees the Pun Hlaing golf course, a favorite haunt of Burma's elite.

The hard-to-reach delta is where many of the more than one million people who have yet to receive aid are located, according to the United Nations.

Htoo Trading, led by young entrepreneur Tay Za, is operating in the delta's Bogale area. Tay Za came under US economic sanctions last October when President Bush tightened restrictions on ranking members of Burma's ruling junta and associated business groups.

Another company, Max Myanmar Ltd., is running relief operations in the town of Labutta.

'He's got boats'

Save the Children, a respected international organization which has reached about 300,000 cyclone survivors in Burma, is working closely with Serge Pun, the chairman of Yoma Bank and 40 other companies, who is not under US sanctions.

"I feel absolutely comfortable with our relationship with him," says Mr. Kirkwood, adding that, before accepting Pun's offer to help, the aid agency conducted a background check and concluded there was no reason to refuse.

"He's got boats and people and warehouses, and we've got lots of aid to deliver, and together we can get stuff to people who need it," Kirkwood continues.

Pun, who is pioneering private healthcare in Burma, flew back to the country on May 11 and converted his companies' executives, as well as doctors at Pun Hlaing hospital, into volunteer aid workers.

After some quick training on how to handle emergencies and trauma, 12 doctors and a team of nurses and support staff headed deep into the delta.

They endured seven-hour boat rides amid stormy currents and rain, says Joseph Lopez, chief operating officer at Pun Hlaing hospital.

Corporate efforts: good, not enough

International aid workers and Western diplomats are quick to praise the heroic response of private groups and individuals in Burma to the disaster.

But Western diplomats say this shouldn't distract from the regime's continued obstruction of foreign aid and equipment and refusal to allow many foreign experts into the disaster zone.

"There no doubt they [the business groups] are helping people get access to aid and medicine, says a Western diplomat.

"But rather than rely on local businesspeople with no aid experience, it makes more sense for experts to be allowed to mobilize properly," the diplomat continues.

Last Wednesday, a prominent entertainer and political activist known as Zarganar, who had led private relief operations in the Delta, was arrested at his home in Rangoon.

His detention may be linked to his background and his speaking out critically against the government to foreign media, says Win Min, an exiled Burmese professor in Chiang Mai, Thailand, adding that it sends a worrying signal to other private groups.

"If Zarganar can be arrested, anyone can be arrested if the government is angered by what you're doing" in the delta, says Win Min.

Media reports have carried accounts of Burmese being prevented from driving to the delta with aid supplies and of private trucks being seized by police and soldiers.

• Simon Montlake contributed reporting from Bangkok, Thailand.

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U.N. helicopters reach more Myanmar areas
The Philadelphia Inquirer - Posted on Tue, Jun. 10, 2008
Associated Press

YANGON, Myanmar - U.N. helicopters loaded with relief supplies reached areas of Myanmar's Irrawaddy Delta yesterday that have been cut off from regular deliveries of aid since a devastating cyclone five weeks ago, an official said.

Four of the five aircraft that arrived over the weekend got to work shuttling rice, water-purification systems, and other emergency supplies to villages around the hardest-hit towns of Bogale and Labutta, said Paul Risley, a spokesman for the U.N. World Food Program.

There were four flights yesterdaymon to seven locations in the delta, and six more sites were expected to be reached todaytue, he said.

U.N. officials and aid groups have criticized Myanmar's military regime for restricting access to the delta, saying it has prevented enough food, water and shelter from reaching survivors.

Until now, the United Nations had only one helicopter operating in Myanmar. It made six trips last week, Risley said. Supplies were mainly being delivered by boats that took several hours to navigate short distances in the delta's network of waterways.

"Today was the first day where you really saw a multiplier effect," Risley said, adding that the helicopters reached four villages in the morning. "These are areas that clearly have not received regular supplies of food or other relief assistance."

Four more helicopters chartered by the World Food Program, which are currently in neighboring Bangkok, Thailand, are expected to fly to Myanmar this week. That will bring the U.N. agency's total number of helicopters in the country to 10, he said.

The relief effort still faces myriad problems, including a severe shortage of housing materials that could leave hundreds of thousands of survivors exposed to heavy rains as the monsoon season begins, the WFP and other aid agencies say.

"There's clearly a need for tarps and other roofing material, for anything that can help them rebuild their houses," Risley said, noting that rains have left many delta villages knee-deep in mud.

The United Nations estimates a total of 2.4 million people were affected by Cyclone Nargis and warns that more than one million of those still need help, mostly in hard-to-reach spots in the Irrawaddy Delta.

The cyclone killed more than 78,000 people in the impoverished country.

In Geneva, Switzerland, yesterday, the United Nations' expert on human rights in Myanmar said he was worried about the arrest Wednesday of a well-known comedian who was trying to help cyclone survivors.

Tomas Ojea Quintana, the U.N. Human Rights Council's new investigator for Myanmar, said he had asked the government for clarification about the arrest of comedian Maung Thura, whose stage name is Zarganar.

The 46-year-old comedian and his team had made videos of their relief activities, and Zarganar gave interviews critical of the government's relief effort to foreign media, including the BBC, whose news broadcasts are popular in Myanmar.

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Sight of Myanmar’s cyclone damage unspeakable -- RP team
Philippine Daily Inquirer - Posted 19:51:00 06/10/2008
By Tarra Quismundo

MANILA -- The Philippine flag waved mightily over a refugee camp in badly hit Irrawaddy delta, the only foreign flag allowed to be raised in reclusive Myanmar.

Amid stringent restrictions to foreign aid workers in the cyclone-ravaged country, the 30-member Philippine humanitarian mission sent to Burma two weeks ago was permitted to hoist the country's colors in Irrawaddy, the delegation said upon returning to Manila Monday night.

"We were able to raise our flag in a sovereign country. They allowed us because they appreciated the performance of the medical team," said mission chief Dr. Arnel Rivera.

The Philippine humanitarian mission, a team of 30 doctors, nurses, psychologists, social workers and environmental sanitation experts from the Department of Health, planted the Philippine flag on a refugee camp in Laputta, a township in the Irrawaddy delta, when they arrived there on May 30.

It was their first destination in a 15-day tour that took them through four towns around Myanmar -- two in the Irrawaddy and two in Yangon. The team folded the flag as they left the delta for Yangon a week later, said team member William Sabater.

For the mission, it was both a diplomatic and humanitarian breakthrough as the Philippine flag was raised over Burma amid an international clamor for the strict military junta to grant foreign aid workers full access to towns hardest hit by Cyclone Nargis.

"It was more of a feeling that you're brothers and sisters working together. It was a very nice coordinated activity... and even when we arrived, you'd see how prepared they were, you can see the way the briefing was carried out, civilians and military working together," said Rivera.

The Filipino aid mission was the first group to enter Myanmar after military rulers agreed to grant foreign access as the country grappled with its worst humanitarian crisis in years. The junta opened up following a donors conference initiated by the United Nations and backed by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, of which Myanmar was a member.

"What others say that there were many soldiers around, we never felt like that," said the team leader.

As they described it, the Filipino contingent was feted to a reception fit for dignitaries as soon as they touched down aboard a military plane in Yangon.

"They greeted us with the presence of representatives of the Myanmar government, from the uniformed services, the ministers of foreign affairs and health," said Rivera.

The team was provided transport for their mission and a cargo truck for their load of close to 13 tons of medicine and relief goods. Myanmese civilian officials were with them throughout the mission, but there was no feeling of being watched.

"We were accompanied. .. We didn't find any problem, they were already well organized, the system was already in place and we were there augmenting them. We never implied that we were doing something other than assisting," Rivera said.

Still, the team had to submit to protocol imposed by Myanmar rulers. As Sabater put it, "we had to get a clearance for our every move."

"Our guide had to talk to so many people, coordinate with many people to get clearances. For whatever we do, there has to be a clearance. For the lecture we gave, we had to get a clearance. What we say, we should be given clearance," said the engineer.

But the team just went along as "they know we are there to help."

Sabater said the Philippine contingent was the first foreign group allowed to legally enter Irrawaddy, a region that was the hardest to access for other international aid agencies and hence was only reached through stealth.

Once in Irrawaddy, the impact of Nargis' devastation met them eye-to-eye.

For Sabater, a native of disaster-prone Bicol, ground zero was nothing like any disaster area he had seen before.

"Look to the right, to the left, to the front and back, there was not a single mountain. The area was like one major river with many branches, and the terrain was so flat," said Sabater, explaining the lack of natural barriers against storms.

And unlike in the Philippines, where multiple typhoon visits are part of the annual weather cycle, Myanmar is not familiar to such a climate catastrophe. What came with the unfamiliar was Nargis' deadly surprise.

The storm surge came at 28 feet above ground at speeds of 120 miles per hour, as fast as a car breezing through a highway.

In the aftermath, close to 78,000 were killed as of the latest count, but the figure is feared to exceed 100,000.
And unspeakable damage was all over.

"Imagine one whole barrio where all homes were destroyed, school buildings without roofs. And that was already 24 days since the cyclone hit," Rivera said.

Most refugees suffered colds and coughs but what many urgently needed was counseling for their loss.

"One of the locals told me they had never seen a cyclone so what they did was hug trees to survive. Most of the people we talked to lost their entire families," said social worker Jing Guerrero, one of those who gave psychosocial treatment to refugees.

The Philippine team went around with the help of interpreters as most locals only spoke the vernacular. Translators were especially helpful when the team gave a lecture on disaster management to communities.

There was even technology transfer, said Sabater, as the team taught locals an improvised water filtration system used in Philippine villages.

The system uses the Burmese version of the tapayan (clay jar) and sand and gravel for natural filtration, Sabater said. As a tap system is non-existent, locals source water for drinking, washing, cooking and bathing from murky ponds or collected rainwater.

"After our demonstration, we showed a bottle of clear water. A child grabbed it and drank it straight. That's how thirsty the people there were," Sabater said.

The medical team flew back from Myanamr through a commercial flight that arrived at 7:30 p.m. Monday.

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Cyclone must not overshadow push for change in Myanmar: EU
EUbusiness (press release)
10 June 2008, 18:47 CET

(BANGKOK) - The world must not allow the rush to help Myanmar with relief efforts after a deadly cyclone overshadow the struggle for political change in the military-run nation, an EU envoy said Tuesday.

Myanmar's junta has ruled since 1962 and keeps opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi locked away, but the world's gaze has recently been on efforts to get aid to some 2.4 million survivors of the storm that hit in early May.

"We must not forget the political problems," Piero Fassino, the European Union special envoy for Myanmar, told reporters in Bangkok.

"The only way for this problem to not disappear from the radar is to commit not only on the humanitarian side but also on the political side to a long-lasting solution," he said.

The cyclone left more than 133,000 people dead or missing. The junta outraged the international community by blocking the delivery of foreign assistance and refusing visas for aid workers.

The regime relented after a personal visit by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, and aid is slowly making its way to Myanmar's needy.

"The priority now is to make sure that the promises (junta head) Than Shwe made to the secretary general are actually fulfilled," Fassino said at the end of a tour of Southeast Asia to discuss Myanmar.

The junta has agreed to let regional bloc, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), lead the relief effort. Fassino said the organisation should exert its influence over the junta.

"I believe that the ASEAN countries can actually assert a very important influence on the Burmese (Myanmar) junta and this is why the European Union is ready to support the ASEAN countries," he said.

Aung San Suu Kyi led her National League for Democracy party to a landslide victory in 1990 elections, but the junta never allowed them to take office.

They have kept her under house arrest for most of the last 18 years, resisting pressure from the international community to free her and move towards democracy.

A crackdown on anti-government protests last year that left at least 31 people dead briefly invigorated the diplomatic push for change in Myanmar, but produced few results.

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Suu Kyi given freedom of Dundee
BBC News
Tuesday, 10 June 2008 12:53 UK

Burma's pro-democracy leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, is to be granted the Freedom of Dundee.

Ms Suu Kyi has been under house arrest in Rangoon since 2003, and has spent more than 12 of the last 18 years in detention.

The 62-year-old' s party won the country's election in 1990, but the junta denied her the chance to govern.

The honour from Dundee will be accepted on her behalf by the director of the Burma Campaign UK in September.

'Act of solidarity'

The idea of giving Ms Suu Kyi the Freedom of the City was proposed by the Lord Provost John Letford.

A report to the council stated: "The Freedom is in recognition of her achievements in the service of democracy, which has merited the award of the Nobel Peace prize, and signifies the council's support for her immediate release and the restoration of democratic government in Burma."

Anna Roberts, director of the Burma Campaign UK, said: "We're absolutely delighted that Dundee Council have given this honour to Aung San Suu Kyi.

"It's a great act of solidarity and it's very important that the world doesn't forget Aung San Suu Kyi and this honour will help keep her profile high.

"We know that it's the public attention, the international concern for Aung San Suu Kyi and the consistent calls for her release that keep her safe."

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Regina women sending underwear to Myanmar as part of Panties for Peace
Canada Dot Com
Memory McLeod, Leader-Post
Published: Tuesday, June 10, 2008

REGINA -- Fighting injustice and oppression is as easy as dropping a pair of panties into an envelope and mailing it to the Burmese Embassy in Ottawa.

It's all part of a campaign called Panties for Peace, which was started among Burmese women in exile in Thailand last October in response to violence aimed at monks and civilians engaged in a peaceful protest in Yangoon.

"From a western perspective, this seems silly and strange, but for the Burmese this is a very powerful act," said Patricia Elliott, who volunteers with Saskatchewan Friends of Burma.

She describes Burmese military and government leaders as highly superstitious, paranoid and fearful of western influence, which is why receiving mail riddled with panties would be a very unsettling experience. Military leaders in Burma, more recently known as Myanmar, closely follow advisors who practise an ancient form of magic that holds that any contact with women's undergarments from below the waist will sap all power.

Packages containing panties decorated with anti-regime slogans have been arriving at Burmese embassies from around the world.

"This idea gave the women not only a chance to laugh again, but to let them feel they had some power in the faces of such an oppressive regime," said Elliott.

Elliott said the country, devastated by a cyclone on May 2, has been ruled by a military regime that is brutally violent against its own people.

"The cyclone drew a lot of media attention, but what people aren't seeing is there has been a human rights disaster in that country that has been ongoing since 1962. Hundreds of thousands of people have been killed or forced into exile," she said.

She described the country as a police state, where basic human rights such as religion, travel, communication, and education are regulated and restricted.

She pointed out that foreign aid for disaster relief has been tightly controlled and even withheld.

"They are setting up roadblocks to keep out aid agencies, kicking people out of storm shelters and sending people home with 20 bamboo poles and a sheet of plastic and saying, 'That's it, disaster over,' " Elliott said.

On their official Web site organizers encourage protesters around the world to "post, deliver or fling your panties at your closest Burmese Embassy."

For more information go to www.pantiesforpeace .info.
mmcleod@leaderpost. canwest.com

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Asia and the west differ on indifference and compassion
The Nation
Published on Jun 11, 2008

Why are French, British and American warships, but not Chinese or Malaysian warships, sitting near the Burmese coast loaded with food and other necessities for the victims of Cyclone Nargis?

Why has the Association of South East Asian Nations (Asean) been so slow and weak in its response to a natural calamity that ravaged one of its own members?

The French junior Human Rights minister, Rama Yade, declared that the United Nations' principle of the "responsibility to protect" should be applied to Burma, forcibly if necessary. And the Malaysian opposition leader Lim Kit Siang has said that Asian countries' inaction "reflects dismally on all Asean leaders and governments. They can definitely do more."

So, are Europeans and Americans simply more compassionate than Asians?

Given the West's record of horrendous warfare and often brutal imperialism, this seems unlikely. Moreover, the way ordinary Chinese rallied to help victims of the earthquake in Sichuan has been quite remarkable, as have been the spontaneous efforts of people in Burma to assist their fellow citizens, even as the military did very little. Buddhism stresses compassion and mercy as much as Christianity does. Indifference to suffering is not inherent to any Asian culture.

Indeed, none of the Asian members disagreed when the UN General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. The declaration held that "recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world."

Nevertheless, there may be cultural differences in understanding how compassion should be applied. The ideal of universal equality and rights does owe something to the history of Western civilisation, from Socrates' "natural justice" to Christianity and France's Declaration of the Rights of Man. Western peoples have not always lived up to their universalist ideals, but they have in modern times built institutions designed to implement them, in Europe and beyond. There is, so far, no Asia-wide institution to protect the human rights of Asians, let alone mankind.

In fact, Chinese and other Asians frequently criticise the West for using human rights as an excuse to impose "Western values" on former colonial subjects. To be sure, such accusations are especially common in autocracies whose rulers, and their apologists, view the idea of universal human rights as a threat to their monopoly on power. But distrust of universalism in Asia is not confined to autocrats.
In many Asian countries, favours invariably create obligations, which is perhaps why people are sometimes disinclined to interfere in the problems of others. You are obliged to take care of your family, your friends, or even your fellow countrymen.

But the idea of universal charity is too abstract, and smacks of the kind of unwelcome interference that Western imperialists - and the Christian missionaries who followed them - practiced in the East for too long.

The notion of "Asian values", promoted mostly by Singaporean official scribes, was partly a critique of universalist Western claims. Asians, according to this theory, have their own values, which include thrift, deference to authority, the sacrifice of individual to collective interests, and the belief that countries should not stick their noses into others' affairs.

Hence, the hesitant response of Southeast Asian governments - and public opinion - to the Burmese disaster.

One possible line of criticism of this kind of thinking is simply to claim the superiority of Western values. But another, more sympathetic response would be to show that individual rights and notions of freedom are by no means alien to non-Western civilisations.

Amartya Sen, the Nobel Prize-winning economist, has pointed out that great Indian rulers, such as Ashoka (third century BC) and Akbar (sixteenth century), advocated pluralism, tolerance and reason long before the European Enlightenment. He has also observed that famines don't occur in democracies, because freedom of information helps to prevent them.

Sen, not surprisingly, is a trenchant critic of the "Asian values" school. It has, nonetheless, become a commonly held opinion that democracy, like universal human rights, is a typically Western idea, and that Asian autocracy, as practiced in China, for example, is not only more suited to Asians, but also more efficient. Democratic governments are hampered by lobby groups, special interests, public opinion, party politics and so forth, while Asian autocrats can make unpopular but necessary decisions.

The two recent natural disasters in Burma and China have put this idea to a severe test. China has not fared too badly, largely because its government was forced by the Burmese example, bad publicity surrounding the Tibetan demonstrations, and the impending Olympic Games to allow far more freedom of information than it normally does. One can only hope that this crack of freedom will widen in time.
Burma failed miserably, and, despite belated efforts to make the best of terrible circumstances, so has Asean.

In the end, of course, it doesn't matter much whether or not we ascribe the failures of autocracy and non-intervention to anything specifically "Asian".

Whatever the cause, the consequences remain deplorable.

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Maung Waik, Burmese Tycoon, Arrested on Drug Charges
The Irrawaddy - Tuesday, June 10, 2008
By MIN LWIN

Maung Waik, one of the richest men in Burma and a powerful crony of the country’s ruling military regime, was arrested and detained in late May on charges of drug abuse and involvement in a trafficking ring run by the son of one of the junta’s leading generals, according to a former business partner.

The arrest was part of a crackdown on associates of Aung Zaw Ye Myint, son of the chief of the Bureau of Special Operations No. 1, Lt- Gen Ye Myint.

Aung Zaw Ye Myint was arrested on May 29 for alleged drug trafficking. When police and military intelligence agents raided his office at Yetagun Tower in Rangoon’s Kyeemyindaing Township, they reportedly found illegal drugs and six guns in his possession.

Aung Zaw Ye Myint is widely known among wealthy Burmese and celebrities as a drug dealer, according to sources in Rangoon. At the time of his arrest, he was in the company of Nawarat, a well-known movie actress.

Speaking to The Irrawaddy on Tuesday, a police sergeant from the Kyeemyindaing Township Police Station confirmed that the anti-narcotics division of the police force carried out a raid on Yetagun Tower, but declined to provide further details. 

“Maung Waik and Aung Zaw Ye Myint used to take drugs together and sell them to movie stars,” said a former business partner of Maung Waik.

“They often held parties at their offices or homes and invited celebrities,” said one of the partygoers, speaking on condition of anonymity. “They got people hooked on drugs and then started selling them to the addicts.”
 
According to sources in Rangoon, Aung Zaw Ye Myint owns Yetagun Construction Company, which has its head office in Yetagun Tower on Pan Hlaing Street. The company relies heavily on subcontractors to do most of its work, the sources added.

Following Aung Zaw Ye Myint’s arrest, military intelligence went after Maung Waik and several others, including a number of celebrities. Maung Waik, the founder of Maung Weik & Family Co., is believed by some to be the richest person in Burma.

The Irrawaddy contacted the company’s head office in Rangoon’s Lanmadaw Township on Tuesday, but senior staff declined to discuss Maung Waik’s arrest.

Maung Weik is known as a generous donor to projects sponsored by the Burmese junta, once giving 270 million kyat (nearly US $235,000) for restoration work on Shwedagon Pagoda, Burma’s most famous religious site.

Maung Waik has also attempted to strengthen his ties to the regime through marriage. According to a relative of Snr-Gen Than Shwe, the most powerful figure in the junta, Maung Waik has recently been courting the general’s daughter, Khin Pyone Shwe.

According to members of Rangoon’s business community, Maung Weik recently divorced his wife, Yin Min Khin, in the hope of marrying Than Shwe’s daughter.

When Maung Waik was arrested in late May, his mother and ex-wife fled to Singapore.

Maung Waik was released on June 7, and several celebrities associated with Aung Zaw Ye Myint, including actresses Nawarat and Phoe Kyaw, have also been freed. However, Aung Zaw Ye Myint is believed to still be in detention.

Sources said that while under interrogation, each detainee was asked to name five persons he or she knew in connection with Aung Zaw Ye Myint and drug trafficking, indicating that the investigation was ongoing.

But some observers said that the authorities were less interested in pursuing the whole network than in finding a scapegoat so they could release Aung Zaw Ye Myint.

Meanwhile, Rangoon-based journals and magazines have been forbidden to publish news of the arrests.

A Rangoon-based journal editor said: “Burmese journals don’t have the right to publish anything concerning the military or cronies of the generals, but some journals have published their messages indirectly to reach the readers.”

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Zarganar still under detention
Mizzima News - Tuesday, 10 June 2008 19:35
( Interview with his mother-in-law Daw Kyi Kyi Soe )

News circulated some corners in Rangoon that famous comedian and actor Zarganar (tweezers) was released from detention on Monday and is now under house arrest. He conducted relief efforts actively providing relief supplies to cyclone victims.

Mizzima tried to contact him last night, but in vain. Mizzima, however, got in touch with his mother-in-law Kyi Kyi Soe today. She said that the news of Zarganar being released is not true and his family members still do not know his whereabouts. Huai Pi contacted and interviewed his family member.

Q: We heard that Zarganar has been released. Is it true?

A: This is just concocted news. We still don't know his whereabouts since he was taken from here. His wife, who is in the US called me at 2 a.m. today after seeing the news of his release on some websites. The news also said that he has been put under house arrest after being released from detention. I told my daughter this was not true. I am answering your phone call from his bedroom staying with my granddaughter' s pet dog. I am not lying. I am telling the truth. He has not yet been released.

Q: What do you think about Zarganar's detention?

A: The authorities forced Zarganar to sign a pledge on 28th October last year not to talk to the media. After Cyclone Nargis struck Burma, he did relief work and talked to the media. I think this is the reason why the authorities took him away.

Q: Are there any surveillance teams outside your residence?

A: Yes, a lot, but I don't know the exact number. I don't know to which units they belong. Yesterday two police officers came to my home. One was from the West District Police Force and was of captain rank. Another one was a police inspector who always watches and monitors Zarganar.

Q: Did you ask them about Zarganar?

A: Yes, I asked them but they could not answer. They said that they also don't know about Zarganar. They were responsible for monitoring  Zarganar's movement and had to hand him over to the higher authorities on that day. An unknown couple asked my younger daughter Ma Nyein to harbour a youth aged about 23 at our home as they have been fired and are unemployed at the moment. We happily accepted this boy and he is living together with my two grandchildren. We simply thought it is a good deed to provide food to anyone who is in trouble. He reached our home just three days before Zarganar was taken away. He accompanied Zarganar in his relief campaign to cyclone-hit areas.

He was out of the house when the police came and took away Zarganar. Our neighbours informed him about Zarganar 's arrest when he came back. He left immediately. I don't know where he's gone. He's left here himself. We don't know even his name. We simply called him 'Kadone' (clean shaven head).

Q: Did the police visit your home again in the meantime?

A: They came and asked about this youth on the 6th of this month. I told them I don't know about him as he has not come back since that day. I told them we don't know about him and his parents. I am worried about the police visiting the couple and inquiring about the youth. They are simple persons like Zarganar. The police came at noon and searched all three bedrooms.

The police said that they have to take away my daughter Ma Nyein and the youngest one if we cannot find this youth. My youngest daughter is suffering from heart disease and she is nervous and timid. She was shocked and collapsed when the police said this. Only after that, a woman police sub-inspector, a woman police sergeant and other personnel who came to our home when Zarganar was taken away, left our home at about 10 p.m.

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Police seize misappropriated aid in Kha Yan

Jun 10, 2008 (DVB)–Police raiding a house in Kha Yan township on 27 May recovered international relief supplies intended for cyclone survivors, according to a Kha Yan resident.

Township Peace and Development Council chairperson Hla Thaung was alleged to have secretly stored the aid in office guard Aye Hlaing’s house instead of distributing it to cyclone victims.

“Police found 27 different kinds of supplies made in the USA including waterproof torches, lighters, tanned fish and so on,” the Kha Yan resident said.

“Aye Hlaing was asked why these items were in his house. He said he was given them and that’s why he had kept them,” he went on.

“He also told the police that other people were sharing the aid as well.”

The secretary and the police tried to prosecute Hla Thaung for misappropriation of aid but the chairperson denied the charges.

“Hla Thaung once told ward Peace and Development Council chairpersons that they could distribute aid to whoever they wanted and also that they could use it for themselves,” the resident said.

DVB was told that cyclone survivors in Kha Yan township did not receive as much aid as they should have done because ward PDC authorities shared it with their relatives and USDA members before distributing it to local residents.

“In the villages, every person got one pyi [approximately 4 kg] of rice and in urban area each person got three pyi,” the resident said.

“They were badly affected by the cyclone but none of them received any good quality supplies,” he complained.

“When the generals came, the local authorities showed them nice tents and said the cyclone survivors were staying there but those tents disappeared once the generals left. None of the refugees was given a nice tent.”

Reporting by Khin Hnin Htet

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1000 Karen villagers displaced by attacks

Jun 10, 2008 (DVB)–Around 1000 villagers from Pha-pon district have been forced to flee after Burmese troops advanced on the area, according to Karen National Union spokesperson Pado Saw David Htaw.

The villagers have been hiding in the jungle since the government forces set fire to Theh Mu Doh village, Pado Saw David Htaw said.

"The Burmese Army has advanced into Pha-pon district and villagers have been forced to move out of the area," the spokesperson said.

"The Burmese government's Light Infantry Battalion 567 and 240 recently entered the area around Theh Mu Doh village and burnt it down thus, causing locals in nearby villages to flee their homes in fear," he said.

"About 1000 villagers from seven nearby villages, including Teh-O Doh, Padeh Doh, Theh Khaw Boh Baw and Kyi Boh Doh, have now been displaced and are hiding in the jungle."

Reporting by Aye Nai

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Local officials charged with stealing aid supplies

Jun 10, 2008 (DVB)–Two local officials in Irrawaddy division's Labutta township have been arrested by police for allegedly stealing foreign aid materials donated to cyclone victims, according to local residents.

A resident of Labutta township's ward 1 told DVB that ward Peace and Development Council members U Yan Naing Htun and U Tin Htun were arrested after aid workers accidentally found some aid materials hidden at the bottom of a lake behind the office building.

"On 2 June, a group of aid workers came and drained the water out of the lake which was polluted with waste matter after the cyclone," said the resident.

"At the bottom of the lake they found over 100 zinc kitchen utensils, 12 packages of canned food, seven buckets of cooking oil and four tarpaulin sheets."

Ward PDC chairman U Thein Htun Aung was originally investigated along with Yan Naing Htun and Tin Htun but was released when authorities determined he had not been involved.

Yan Naing Htun and Tin Htun have now been charged for stealing aid materials and placed in police detention.

Labutta residents also said rice packages donated to victims in the township were being sold by local village officials for 8,000 kyat each at rice shops on the Strand Road.

Reporting by Aye Nai

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