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No opium free Burma in 2014 unless…
Korea-led consortium strikes Myanmar gas deal with China
India to hold talks with Myanmar to speed up Kaladan project
India, Myanmar to sign investment pact
What New World Order?
The Chinese Dictatorship's Olympics
Plans for some old dams unfortunately never die
Large Haul of Illegal Medicine Seized at Border

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No opium free Burma in 2014 unless…
23 June 2008
Drugs

As the world’s anti-drug day 26 June draws near, Shan Drug Watch, a branch of SHAN, has bad news for Burma’s military rulers: opium output in Shan State is up from last year’s by all accounts, a progress in the opposite direction if their 15 year master plan is taken into account.

Map of Opium Cultivation in Shan State

The plan’s Phase One (1999-2004) had "prioritized" 22 townships in Shan State. According to Drug Watch, only 77 townships can be reported as worthy of the claim, 3 of whom are under ceasefire groups’ administration.

Shan State	Township	Free/Not Free	Remark
North	Mongkoe	NF
	Kunggyan	F	MNDAA (Kokang)*
	Laokai	F	MNDAA (Kokang)
	Kunlong	F
	Hopang	F
	Mongyai	NF
	Tangyan	NF
	Lashio	NF
	Namtu	NF
	Mantong	NF
	Hsenwi	NF
	Kutkhai	NF
	Namkham	NF
	Muse	F
	Panghsai	F
East	Mongla	F	NDAA-ESS**
South	Kunhing	NF
	Mongpan	NF
	Langkher	NF
	Hsihseng	NF
	Faikhun(Pekhon)	NF
	Mongkeung	NF

*MNDAA =  Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army aka Shan State Special Region #1 or
Kokang, led by Peng Jiasheng (Phone Kya Shin).
**NDAA-ESS = National Democratic Alliance Army-Eastern Shan State aka Shan State Special Region #4 led by Sai Leun aka Lin Mingxian (U Sai Lin)

The ongoing Phase Two (2004-2009) is zeroed in on 20 townships. As can be seen in the following table, the success story, for which a steep price is still being paid by the local people, is in the United Wa State Army (UWSA)’s territory.

State	Township	Free/Not Free	Remark
Kachin	Karmaing	NF
	Waingmaw	NF
	Moemauk	NF
	Moehnyin	NF
Shan North	Pangwai	F	UWSA territory
	Manphang	F	UWSA territory
	Napharn	F	UWSA territory
	Mongmai	F	UWSA territory
	Pangyang	F	UWSA territory
	Wiangkao	F	UWSA territory
Shan East	Mongyang	NF
	Kengtung	NF
	Mongyawng	NF
	Monghsat	NF
	Mongton	NF
	Mongpiang	NF
	Mongkhark	NF
Shan South	Hopang	NF
	Mongnai	NF
	Panglawng	NF

If the two phases can serve as examples, there is not much hope for success for the 9 townships in the upcoming Phase Three (2009-2014):
 
Shan State South : Kehsi, Monghsu, Namzang, Yawnghwe and Laikha
Kayah (Karenni) : Loikaw and Dimawso
Chin : Tonzang and Falam
 
The last (2007-2008) poppy season also saw increased cultivation, up to 40% in Shan State South and East. However, presumably due to continued pressure from China, the data collectors saw little increase in Shan State North, except in 3 townships outside the target areas: Mongmit, Namhsan and Hsipaw.
 
Kachin News Group (KNG) also reported that poppy cultivation was on the rise in two more townships: Sumprabum and Putao. "Kachin State is somewhat outside the focus of the world," commented a businessman in northern Shan State. "There are only a few reports on the drug situation coming out of the state. The authorities there therefore feel more at ease to allow poppy cultivation compared to their counterparts in Shan State."
 
Khonumthung, a news group based in India’s Mizoram also reported cultivation in Tiddim township, Chin State.
 
The rest of Shan State likewise saw increased cultivation in at least 6 townships: Lawkzawk, Loilem and Mawkmai in the South and Markmang, Mongphyak and Tachilek in the East.
 
"One thing is also significant," said one of the collectors. "In a number of areas, we saw poppies being grown all year round, 2 crops in some places and 3 in others. So as far as farmers there are concerned, the word ‘poppy season’ is rather meaningless now."
 
To prove his point, the collector, who naturally wishes to be unidentified, had given Drug Watch a number of photos taken on 16 April, 2 miles east of the Loilem-Panglong motor road. The two towns are located six miles from each other.
 
Farmers were from the village of Namhu, made up of Shans and PaOs. The fields were also said to be close to a Burma Army outpost.
 
However, due to insufficient rain, the output, in contrast to the input, was reportedly much lower in several localities except for upland areas. Estimates of the increase range from 5%-20% compared to last year’s.
 
UN Office For Drugs and Crime (UNODC) reported on 11 October 2007 a 29% increase in the cultivation and 46% crease in the output last year.
 
"One good indicator of the upsurge in the input is the growing piles of dried chicken droppings (used as fertilizers), on the roadside," according to a data collector. "As for the increase in the output, the pointer is the decrease in opium prices."
 
All these does not mean that Rangoon, or rather Nay Pyi Taw, will not be able to announce an opium free Burma by 2014. Opium can be allowed to grow until 2013, when draconian measures could be employed as it did during the 2001-02 season in the North. The only problem is that such action does not guarantee sustainability.
 
Which was what happened in Laos, that had "proudly proclaimed itself as opium free" in 2006, according to British journalist Tom Fawthrop, only to allow it to stage a comeback the next year. "What is for sure," according to one international NGO representative who prefers to remain anonymous," the programme was focusing on eradication more than finding alternatives to opium. They pushed for opium elimination before economic development was in place, so they put the cart before the horse."
 
With strife-torn Burma, it would need more than just an economic development. "Any counter narcotics policy to succeed in Burma must take into consideration the political side of the problem. Political solutions have not been properly explored, but this is the only way to get to the bottom of Burma’s vicious circle linking illicit drugs, insurgencies, reconciliation and democracy," wrote The Nation on 26 January 2006.
 
Mr Akira Fujino, UNODC regional representative in Bangkok, asked by participants in the forum at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand (FCCT) on 12 September 2007, also agreed that without peace and national reconciliation, there was no way to resolve the drug problem in Burma.
 
SHAN whole heartedly echoes their view.

http://www.shanland.org/drugs/2008/no-opium-free-burma-in-2014-unless

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Korea-led consortium strikes Myanmar gas deal with China

Seoul, June 23: A South Korean-led international consortium, which also includes ONGC and GAIL, on Monday said it has reached a deal to sell natural gas from Myanmar to China.

The consortium led by Daewoo international, operator of two natural gas fields in waters off Myanmar, said it signed a Memorandum of Understanding with China National Petroleum Corp last week.

Daewoo said in a statement it expects more than 10 billion dollars in profit in the next 25 years starting 2012, when the production of natural gas is expected to begin.

Daewoo has a 51 per cent stake in the consortium, followed by India's Oil and Natural Gas Corp with 17 per cent; Myanmar Oil and Gas Enterprise with 15 per cent; India's GAIL with 8.5 per cent; and South Korea's Korea Gas Corp with an 8.5 per cent.

Daewoo said it is also exploring four more gas fields off the country.

Myanmar has attracted relatively little investment from the West, with western governments denouncing the ruling Junta for its poor human rights record.

Bureau Report
http://www.zeenews. com/articles. asp?aid=450590&sid=BUS&ssid=51

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India to hold talks with Myanmar to speed up Kaladan project
Monday, 23 June 2008
Special Correspondent
It will provide a shorter route to north-eastern States
Jairam Ramesh is on a four-day visit to Myanmar
India to sign four pacts for economic cooperation

NEW DELHI: India will seek to accelerate the path-breaking Kaladan multi-modal transit project that will provide an alternative route to the north-eastern states and later to South-East Asian countries through Myanmar.

During the four-day Myanmar visit by Minister of State of Commerce and Power Jairam Ramesh, which began on Sunday, India will seek to hold discussions to ensure that the project is completed by May 2012, a year ahead of schedule.

This project will provide a shorter route to many north-eastern states. At present, all traffic is routed through the narrow and congested chicken neck corridor via Assam and West Bengal.

Port facilities

Mr. Ramesh is expected to visit the Sittwe port in the Arakan region on the Bay of Bengal. The facilities at the port will be expanded to accommodate goods traffic under an agreement signed by the two governments in April this year.

From Sittwe, the Kaladan river will be made navigable for 225 km up to a place called Kaletwa. From there, a 62-km highway will take the traffic to the India-Myanmar border in Mizoram. A road from the border will then link the project to National Highway-54.

The sea distance between Kolkata and Sittwe is about 540 km. India is financing the entire project at a cost of Rs.546 crore

India will also sign four economic cooperation agreements, including a Bilateral Investment Promotion Agreement (BIPA) to facilitate greater investment by both countries. The second pact would be for a $64 million credit line agreement for financing three transmission lines in Myanmar.

The third agreement would be for a $20 million credit line for an aluminium conductor steel reinforced wire manufacturing facility. The United Bank of India and the Myanmar Economic Bank would sign the fourth agreement for providing a banking arrangement to implement the border trade agreement at Moreh in Manipur.

Mr. Ramesh would also be discussing the issue of opening more border trade centres at Avangkhu and Lungwa in Nagaland, Zowkhathar in Mizoram, Pangsau Pass in Arunachal Pradesh and Behiang, Skip and Tusom in Manipur.

http://www.thehindu .com/2008/ 06/23/stories/ 2008062359881500 .htm

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India, Myanmar to sign investment pact
AFP
Sun Jun 22, 6:33 PM ET

NEW DELHI (AFP) - India and Myanmar will sign an investment pact and hold talks on wider border trade as a sign of expanding ties between New Delhi and military rulers of the secretive state, officials said Sunday.

India would also offer credit totalling 84 million dollars to Myanmar during a trip to the country by junior commerce minister Jairam Ramesh, who left for Myanmar Sunday on a four-day working visit, commerce ministry officials said.

"He will also offer two million dollars for 16 power transformers that were damaged in the cyclone as well as 200,000 dollars for the repairs of a famous Buddhist pagoda also hit by the storm last month," a ministry official said.

India was one of the first countries to rush aid to Myanmar after Cyclone Nargis hit on May 2-3, leaving 134,000 people dead or missing by latest count.

A ministry official in New Delhi said the decade-long investment promotion and protection agreement will aim at "encouraging flow of funds between the two countries."

The accord comes amid criticism by the global community of Myanmar's cyclone relief efforts and longstanding international calls for India to pressure the junta-ruled nation to shift to democracy.

India was until the mid-1990s a supporter of Myanmar's pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi. But it has since cultivated ties with the junta as it sees Myanmar as a key source of energy to power fast economic growth.

Bilateral trade between India and Myanmar totalled 590 million dollars in 2005-2006, the latest figures available show, according to the Indian foreign ministry.

In April, the two sides signed an accord under which New Delhi would invest 130 million dollars in Myanmar's Sittwe port on the Bay of Bengal that will give India's northeast access to a new trade route to Southeast Asia.

Last year, New Delhi also pledged to invest 150 million dollars for gas exploration in Myanmar.

http://news. yahoo.com/ s/afp/20080622/ wl_sthasia_ afp/ indiamyanmar trade_0806222233 38

************ ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* **
The Shwe Gas Pipeline Campaign Committee- India
shwecampaign@ gmail.com
shweinfo@gmail. com
www.shwe.org
"You are never a loser, until you quit trying"

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What New World Order?
Dictator Watch / http://www.dictatorwatch.org/
By Roland Watson
June 23, 2008

Excuse me for being naïve, but I thought World War II made a difference. At least that’s what I was taught, as an American and a member of the Baby Boomer generation. The fight against the Nazis and Imperial Japan, in which seventy million people died, was a turning point. It was a true “World War,” of right against wrong, and right had triumphed. It would be followed by a “World Peace.”

Of course, there were still many great challenges. Nuclear weapons had been unleashed, and Stalin ruled the Soviet Union and Mao would soon take control of China. Racism and sexism remained widespread. There was also at yet no hint of the rise of Extremist Islam, fueled by Mideast oil production, nor of an ecological catastrophe triggered by corporate exploitation and, ironically, postwar overpopulation
.
The honest optimism of the 50s and 60s was justified. A decisive victory had been achieved. Things were looking up.

This is certainly not the case now. In the world of international politics, as the tyrannies in Burma, Sudan, Zimbabwe, North Korea and China illustrate, we have returned to the Age of Genghis Khan. There are no effective checks against aggression and conquest.

In these cases, excepting China and Tibet, the conquest is largely internal, but this does not invalidate the use of the term. Conquest is a regular feature of multiethnic dictatorships, by the majority group against the minorities. In any case, it would not be surprising to see a full-blown international adventure, or, as with the U.S. and Iraq, misadventure. The checks that are in place against this, foremost the United Nations Security Council, have comprehensively failed.

We have even seen an attempted repeat of the Holocaust, although not, of course, against the Jews. They have sworn Never Again, and mean it. However, an overt, systematic and rapid extermination was perpetrated in Rwanda, by the Hutu against the Tutsi, and similar although smaller scale efforts are in progress elsewhere (notably Sudan and Burma).

How could things fall apart so quickly? More to the point, who is to blame?

One reason why we are back where we started is that the people who fought in World War II, and led the way to victory, are for the most part gone. This reveals a telling fact about human nature: we only learn from the mistakes that we personally make, and the traumas we personally survive. It is not enough to hear about it from someone else, or to read it in a book. There is no substitute for experience.

The leaders of the Free World now have no such experience. Most importantly, they have not learned its lessons: the need to act decisively and with courage when faced with great peril.

Of course, you might say, what not just embrace the New-Old world order, especially if you are American and have the strongest military around? Genghis Khan and for that matter Alexander the Great are lionized. We can have an empire, too.

This was the position of the Neo-Conservatives, although one wonders why, if they wanted oil so much, they picked Iraq? Saudi Arabia and Kuwait would have been far easier targets, and with much greater reserves. Surely an acceptable rationale could have been devised. It would then have been relatively straightforward to cut deals with Russia and China, and launch a world of interlinked authoritarian centers, as envisioned by George Orwell in his work, 1984.

It didn’t work because the belief that there is a distinction between right and wrong, and that we should try our best to do right, is still strong in America. The country was founded on this idea, and it will take more than the efforts of a cabal of ideologues to change it. Moreover, the electoral system remains intact. With term limits in place, the longest any wannabe dictator can stay in power is eight years.

We are still left with the problem of leaders, though (including how to survive bad ones who are somehow able to manipulate the majority to elect them for eight years). A political leader’s job is difficult, to say the least. He or she has to make decisions that may – or will – put lives at risk, and to resist corrupting interests. The first is only acceptable in the narrowest of circumstances: to defend oneself, or, as this paper will argue, others who are deserving, and when the danger is clear, immediate and verified. The second is extremely broad: requests for special favors and treatment can come from any direction, and they all must be denied.

There are also the risks that come with the position itself. Power easily gives way to arrogance, which is an extremely dangerous combination, particularly for leaders who are untested.

Even more challenging is when different legitimate interests compete. Leaders then have to decide, which should take precedence? Most problematic of all are situations where a nation’s interests are in conflict with, or appear to be in conflict with, those of other nations or even the entire world.

The only way a leader can approach the wide-ranging and agonizing decisions with which he or she will be faced is to have a firm set of basic principles and then to apply them with rigor and determination. The starting point is never to do anything that clearly is wrong, whether there is a law against it or not. For instance, working with or otherwise supporting the dictators of other nations is always wrong. It makes your country complicit in the crimes they perpetrate upon their people.

An important and related issue is the question of characterization. In order to address a problem effectively, you first have to properly define it. The definition, a “war against terror,” for example, is inadequate. The real war the world faces in this regard is the war against extremist cells of Islam that use terror as their primary tactic. The appropriate strategy therefore is military defense against such cells, including in cooperation with the governments of any nations where they are resident, or unilaterally if such governments refuse to shut them down. At the same time, we need a direct and transparent communication between the political leaders of the West and the world’s Islamic leaders, on how Islam itself can purge its criminal elements.

Burma is another example of mischaracterization. The ruling regime has been engaged in war: a civil war against the people. The world should not legitimize this and act as if it is acceptable behavior for a sovereign nation. As mentioned above, a war within a country is still a war.

For four and a half decades, Burma’s military junta has ruthlessly subjugated the people, and imprisoned if not killed anyone who dissents. It has conducted numerous and ongoing ethnic cleansing campaigns against minority groups. Now, in the wake of a major cyclone, it is denying humanitarian relief, and instead seems intent on having the people die of starvation and disease. The Burmese army further is weak, with limited and unsophisticated weaponry; a decimated navy (due to the cyclone); known conflicts within the top leadership; low moral among ordinary soldiers (who in many cases are under-aged and were press-ganged into service); and not a single foreign ally, not even China, who would assist it directly were it attacked.

Why, then, where the distinction between right and wrong could not be clearer, and the task is so straightforward, won’t the world intervene to help the Burmese? The appropriate course of action is to equip the people to defend themselves, or, more directly, to intercede militarily and expel the tyrants. Are our leaders cowards, or is something else going on?

While it is true that the international community is not acting on Burma in deference to perceived geopolitical interests (everyone is kowtowing to China, and the U.S. is backing oil company Chevron and France and the EU TotalFinaElf), there is a deeper reason as well. There has never been a “humanitarian war.” It is considered politically unacceptable to put one’s soldiers’ lives at risk, in defense of others, unless national interests are at stake. For the U.S., even World War II involved many direct national interests, including the need to assist allies.

This precedent has not yet been set, nor, in a larger context, putting one’s national interests aside in preference to the overall interests of the world (witness the stalemate on global warming, and not only by America).

(Note: I disagree with former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who in her article earlier this month in the New York Times, The End of Intervention, said that this precedent has already been established. She is mistaken. The cases she cites are weak – and, regarding those from the period that she was at State for President Clinton, self-serving. For Serbia and both Bosnia and Kosovo, European interests were at risk, hence Nato’s involvement. U.S. action in Somalia was small scale and short-lived. U.N. peacekeeping missions, in such places as Timor Leste and the Congo, are just that, “peacekeeping,” not interventions to end a war and through this to establish peace. The world is still waiting for a full commitment of the democratic powers to act decisively against wrong in an indisputably humanitarian setting, and where the stakes are great, in other words, where the suffering is severe and where there is a risk of extensive conflict and loss of troops. Indeed, for the conflict in Iraq to have been in any way justifiable, its basis should have been solely humanitarian. The removal of Saddam Hussein was well suited to be the first such precedent, but this opportunity was missed.)

If we are going to base our political organization on democracy, on representative democracy rather than direct, we must have strong, capable leaders. This is actually one of the system’s weakest points, because if our leaders fail, all of society may fail.

One proof of such leadership would be individuals who would be willing to set these precedents. Perhaps the most illustrative example of this quality in a leader was Abraham Lincoln, and the Emancipation Proclamation.

For America in the present day, Bush has been a bomb. He was misled by his associates, foremost Cheney, to believe that one party Republican rule was possible. Like all self-absorbed demagogues, he denied conflicting evidence and opinion and launched the disastrous conflict in Iraq. Then, with America preoccupied in an expensive fiasco, and with his term winding down, he apparently decided that there was no need to act on Burma, his strong words of support notwithstanding, or on other similar crises.

Fortunately, Bush is on the way out. His replacement is likely to be Barack Obama, who also is inexperienced, although he does not appear to be ethically tainted. The world looks to America for leadership, and while we would prefer that this not be the case – all nations of their own accord should choose to do what is right – with Russia under authoritarian leader Putin and China a full force and unrepentant dictatorship, the free world does need a national leader, one that has moral authority and also the power to back it up.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates recently said that it was criminal neglect for Burma’s junta, the SPDC, to deny humanitarian relief. We would counter that it is also criminal neglect for the United States and the other nations of the free world to allow this to occur.

Wouldn’t it be glorious for the first black president to set this new precedent, and in so doing follow in the footsteps of the man who freed the African-Americans?

A final question is: Are the people themselves powerless if they lack good leaders? The answer to this is, no, not at all. We can individually determine the appropriate course of action, and then push together collectively until it is taken. It is only in a few places, like Burma, where the conflict is so one-sided that outside assistance is required. But, in keeping with the request of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, we can use our liberty to help the Burmese win theirs, including by convincing our leaders, beginning with President Obama, to take the decisive steps that are required to create a true new world order.

http://www.dictatorwatch.org/articles/newworldorder.html

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The Chinese Dictatorship's Olympics
Dictator Watch / http://www.dictatorwatch.org/
By Roland Watson
June 23, 2008

One thing you can say about the run-up to the Beijing Games: it is revealing the nature of the Chinese Dictatorship, in full and undistorted view, to the people of the world. This is interesting in it own light, as a lesson about authoritarian societies, in particular because China is the world's largest political dictatorship; and also because of what it is saying to the many consumers who buy Made in China products because the price is cheap, without thinking about the broader consequences
.
China’s behavior is reprehensible, both in the international and domestic spheres. For the first, it is the primary and unwavering backer of many fellow dictatorships, foremost North Korea, Burma, Sudan and Zimbabwe. In the United Nations Security Council it blocks all diplomatic progress on motivating such regimes to change, and on the ground it is the primary supplier of the weapons that they use to repress their people. In the worst cases, in Darfur, Sudan, and Eastern Burma, the local regimes are committing genocide, which crimes against humanity would not be possible without China’s help.

China also engages in international conquest, in Tibet, which is in no way a part of the “People’s Republic of China” (PRC). It is a conquered land. It has similarly threatened to invade Taiwan. With the local regimes’ consent (more accurately, blackmail), it is encouraging its people to colonize the northern provinces of Laos and Burma, although not, interestingly, Vietnam. China also invaded Vietnam, in 1979, which invasion was successfully repelled. The Vietnamese remain extremely distrustful of the Chinese, and have refused to allow a cultural assault as well.

Domestically, China is suppressing the people of Xinjiang Province, which like Tibet is also arguably not a true part of the country (rebels in Xinjiang have ample reason to say that they are an independent nation; they call their land East Turkestan), and of course ordinary Chinese. For the latter, China is a police state, with community spies, secret police and kangaroo courts, and prisons and forced labor “reeducation” camps. Like all dictatorships, political dissent is forbidden and harshly punished. The government maintains a media blackout on dissent, and this extends to the complaints of farmers whose land has been expropriated, or poisoned with pollution, and parents whose children died in an earthquake because of poorly constructed school buildings. Chinese media is a massive and well-organized propaganda machine. It even targets the Falun Gong, a peaceful association of individuals who engage in meditation, simply because they are freethinkers and refuse to submit to the regime’s demand for conformity.

Following the popular uprising and subsequent mass murder at Tiananmen Square in June 1989, the Communist Party of China (CCP) realized it had a problem. The people were unhappy, and were no longer so willing to accept the status quo. They were beginning to demand democracy. The Chinese system is a variant on the Soviet model developed by Vladimir Lenin. At the top are the leaders of the Communist Party, the Politburo, as well as the regional leaders. Underneath are the ordinary members of the Party. Below this is the bulk of the population, the workers, or proletariat. Lenin envisioned that the progress to the communist utopia would have two stages. A vanguard, the Party, would lead the way, and during this stage dictatorship would be necessary. However, with arrival at the utopia, this system of distinctions would be dissolved and a classless and consensual society would be achieved.

The first stage in practice is meant to serve the people, but in reality it serves only the top party leaders. The Chinese people, following tumultuous and dreadful periods such as the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, were beginning to see through the charade.

In response to this development, and Tiananmen, supreme ruler Deng Xiaoping decided to open the country to capitalism, as a means for ordinary people to improve their circumstances. China became what has to be one of the greatest oxymorons of all time, a capitalist communism.

This hasn’t exactly worked out as planned. The primary beneficiaries have been Party members, who because of their status and connections were best positioned to grasp the new opportunities: to open factories and other types of businesses. The ordinary people moved from rural villages to the cities, only to end up in sweatshops and dormitories and slums.

At the same time, the push for rapid development has had disastrous environmental consequences, both in the cities and the countryside.

The net result has been to increase slightly the population of the privileged class, while leaving the condition of the workers little improved. In fact, their quality of life has declined. This means there is still the potential for widespread unrest, and demands for political participation and empowerment, i.e., democracy.

The Chinese leaders are a clever lot, and they have been adapting to this threat as well, first by distributing the propaganda that a system of dictatorship is acceptable, since it is the continuation of historical norms dating back to the glorious Chinese empires. Secondly, the Chinese have been following the standard operating procedure of authoritarian regimes everywhere, by initiating a popular hatred of external enemies as a means to divert the people from their own problems. If you are consumed with hatred, for example of the Dalai Lama and the Tibetans, this takes your mind off the fact that you are really a slave in a totalitarian nightmare.

Chinese nationalism, though, has a distinctive racial bent. It is not the people of China against the world; rather, it’s Chinese people against the world. There is an undercurrent of racial superiority that makes this form of nationalism much more virulent. Ordinary Chinese are being taught that their past was magnificent and noble, whatever the real situation on the ground might have been, and that they have a manifest destiny not only to rule or at least dominate East Asia, but perhaps even the world. Moreover, this covers more than the people of the PRC; it subtly extends to all Chinese people everywhere. (Note: evidence of this is that of the thousands of Chinese who demonstrated along the Olympics torch route, many of them were undoubtedly not citizens of the PRC.)

In a sense it is akin, although not as pronounced, as the type of brainwashing that Al Qaeda is trying to perpetrate on the Muslim community.

For their nationalist propaganda, the Chinese rulers have been taking advantage of the common response in East Asia to insult. An insult, or for that matter any criticism, is viewed as a loss of face. For people who do not have experience with this, it is difficult to convey the importance in such societies of face. Causing someone to lose face is unpardonable. You could easily be killed for doing it. Such a reaction is even considered acceptable in many places.

The CCP has been capitalizing on this trait over criticism of the Beijing Games and its recent crackdown in Tibet. Chinese nationalists have been outraged, and with all manner of response.

As noted, there were fervent demonstrations by the nationalists along many stages of the torch route. There have been calls in China for boycotts of foreign companies, from France and the U.S., as revenge for these nations’ displeasure over Tibet. Foreigners in China have been assaulted. Chinese people themselves who have had the audacity to disagree with the nationalists, have been attacked over the Internet, had their personal information including phone numbers and home addresses posted online, and received death threats.

This is something that foreigners who are planning to attend the Games, and everyone who wants the Chinese people to escape from their tyrannical overlords, should consider carefully. Elements of the Chinese public are becoming an ultra-nationalist mob, and with CCP encouragement and blessing. But once such a mob is formed, there are no atrocities that it does not have the potential to commit.

For instance, even with the sympathy that exists over the Sichuan earthquake, it is likely that there will be many expressions of dissent during the Games, including by visitors and also the athletes, focused on Tibet, Sudan, Burma and other issues. These actions will certainly inflame the ultra-nationalists, and a violent reaction is likely.

It is also significant the effect that all of this is having on freedom of expression within China. The regime has allowed the Internet to boom, which has enhanced personal freedom, although at the same time the authorities are conducting a major effort at censorship and retaliation against those who diverge from the party line. But with the rise of the ultra-nationalists, the Internet in China is in a sense becoming self-policing. Anyone who does not parrot party orthodoxy is immediately and aggressively attacked.

(Many of the most apoplectic nationalists are young Chinese, who because of CCP censorship do not even know about Tiananmen and the pro-democracy movement that developed at the time.)

This is a huge and new barrier to democratic change, that large numbers of Chinese have been successfully brainwashed, and no longer oppose the CCP. Instead, they are becoming its popular enforcers: its thought police.

Outside China, there are many people, largely business people and their professional retainers – political leaders and diplomats – who argue that we should ignore all of this. At the least, they say, think of Sichuan. We shouldn’t put pressure on the regime while the country is recovering from a national tragedy.

They are the same as the individuals who say, of Burma, think of the poor people who are dying in the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis. There is no need to push for freedom and democracy at this time.

Anyone who argues, let China be – let them open up and change at their own pace, is effectively saying, let torturers and murderers be. Let nuclear proliferation and for that matter anything else that you might be concerned about be. Nothing can stand in the way of our profit.

We, meaning the world and most importantly the United States, do not want to have close ties to the Chinese regime. We do now want to participate in its experiment to merge political dictatorship with capitalism.

Contrary to the statements of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, China has not been helpful on North Korea, Sudan or Burma. Please do not try to deceive the world that it has.

China has to change. The CCP has to go. The real national tragedy in China, like Burma, is that a small group of criminals has been able to rule over everyone else for so long. Boycott the Beijing Games. Protest. Our goal should be to make the Chinese dictatorship lose as much face as possible. Boycott “Made in China.” Pressure your leaders to stop kowtowing to China, and instead demand that it end its support for the other dictatorships of the world; that it Free Tibet and East Turkestan; and that it renounce dictatorship and embrace democracy.

Increasing protest inside China is inevitable. The country cannot fuel its industrial powerhouse for much longer. It is running out of natural resources, oil is too expensive, and this is affecting both production costs and international demand. It is already losing ground to other, even cheaper, national competitors. A turning point is coming, and it may be a cataclysm, when laid off workers cannot find work – factories in the Pearl River delta are already closing – and the villages they left behind can no longer support them. It will be a traumatic period, and we outside China should do everything we can to help the Chinese people, so they are able to throw off their rulers as quickly and as painlessly as possible.

One final comment about the Olympics: in 1936 in Berlin, Hitler wanted to showcase Nazi Germany. In exactly the same way, China wants to use the Beijing Games to promote itself as an Asian ideal of authoritarian social order.

Hitler’s attempt to prove the racial superiority of what he called the Aryans (which is not even a real group) was negated by Jesse Owens, and through this his overall aspirations for the Berlin Olympics were defeated. The 1936 Games are forever tainted.

It will be the same with China. Something dramatic is almost certainly going to happen in August, and seventy years from now the Beijing Games will be remembered not for China’s grand coming out party but for this event or events. More generally, people will understand that another Dictatorship Olympics should never have been allowed. If there is such a thing as an Olympic ideal, freedom must be part of it. This means that the host, if not all of the participants, must be free and democratic, and also that the International Olympic Committee has no right to forbid the athletes to freely speak their minds.

http://www.dictatorwatch.org/articles/dictatorolympics.html

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Plans for some old dams unfortunately never die
The Bangkok Post
ENVIRONMENT
Monday June 23, 2008
PIANPORN DEETES

Perhaps Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej thinks it is still the 1960s. As new prime minister, he autocratically announced water diversion projects for the Mekong and Salween rivers, callously calling these international rivers ''public waters'' in the faulty belief that anyone can utilise them without repercussions.

In power for only four months, he has already revived almost all the historically rejected water infrastructure schemes, including the infamous Pa Mong dam _ the Mekong's Hoover, proposed by the US some four decades back _ along with other multi-gigawatt dams and poorly planned water diversions.

The Salween/Yuam-Bhumibol dam diversion appears it would be the most destructive to both forests and climate. The project consists of a dam on the Yuam River, a Salween tributary. The project calls for a water pumping station, a 61km-long, nine-metre-wide underground tunnel, and 202km of new electric lines.

Even more rashly, the prime minister announced these schemes as a way to mitigate climate change.

How could that be? According to the World Commission on Dams, reservoirs emit up to 28% of global greenhouse gases, with tropical reservoirs being most to blame.

''All large dams and natural lakes in the boreal and tropical regions that have been measured emit greenhouse gases [carbon dioxide, methane, or sometimes both].''

Mr Samak's logic is tragically wrong, and we will all pay the price for his folly.

This particular project will devastate at least 2,300 hectares of forest along the Thai-Burma border, a pristine jungle with hundreds of species. A simple calculation suggests that destroying the forests for the water diversion will release about 300,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide initially, and prevent thousands more tons from being absorbed every year.

Besides environmental damage, the diversion project will use an enormous amount of electricity to pump water uphill to the tunnel. The energy to be used is 320 megawatts _ three times the controversial Pak Moon dam's installed capacity, or enough for 98,000 homes.

Thailand's decision-makers should learn from past hydropower failures. Lessons in mismanagement and overlooked social costs are rife in the region, yet they have been consistently ignored.

Dams in Thailand are an excellent example. Almost 40 years after commissioning the project, the people resettled by the Sirindhorn dam project still lack any measure of fair compensation, such as land replacement or an ability to achieve the quality of life they had prior to the dam. In most cases, resettled villagers find their lives worse than before the dam was built.

Simply put, the rural poor and the environment always seem to bear the burden of the greedy and short-sighted dam builders in Bangkok.

Neither the rivers nor their water belong exclusively to Thailand. The Mekong is shared by six countries, and the Salween is shared by three. Bangkok alone cannot decide to exclusively exploit mainland Southeast Asia's common resources to the detriment of other countries, especially poor countries that lack democratic governments like Burma.

First of all, the projects need complete and transparent impact assessments. A valid environmental impact assessment (EIA) must include an analysis of the need for the project, a valid purpose, a range of alternatives and full public participation that includes providing local people with the chance to see the EIA before it is adopted.

Further, the consideration of the cumulative impact of all of these projects taken together has never been performed _ the piecemeal analysis of individual projects hides the gross harm of repeated industrial development schemes. Many EIAs that affect Thailand never see the light of day (like Burma's Ta Sang dam that will provide electricity to Thailand), since the government likes to call their pet projects ''official secrets'' to prevent public opposition.

The new 2007 constitution requires a health impact assessment (HIA), but none of these projects has been considered. The loss of farmland and fisheries upstream on the Yuam could easily overcome any positive impact of more water flowing down the Ping River, but without an open and public HIA this will never be known.

As a result of these deficiencies, approval of the schemes should be immediately withdrawn. A transparent process with informed public participation, particularly for affected communities, that also includes all riparian countries, must be undertaken instead to avoid future conflicts.

There is a lesson the prime minister seems to have failed to learn from the Pak Moon dam, which to this day has failed to realise Egat's promises. An outstanding one is the World Commission on Dams' case study that concluded in 2000 that: ''If all the benefits and costs were adequately assessed it is unlikely that the project would have been built in the current context.''

Mr Prime Minister, pay attention. It is now 2008, and the mistakes that were missed 40 years ago will cause even more severe problems if undertaken now.

Pianporn Deetes is a campaigner with Living River Siam, a Chiang Mai-based non-profit environmental group.

http://www.bangkokpost.com/230608_News/23Jun2008_news15.php

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Large Haul of Illegal Medicine Seized at Border
Naranjara News
6/23/2008

Cox's bazaar: Bangladesh authorities seized a haul of medicine from Burma worth an estimated 1,870,400 taka and arrested a smuggler on Friday in Teknaf on Cox's Bazar highway near the Burmese border, according to a local official report.

The medicine that was seized includes Piriktin Tablets and Sakarin, which are made in Burma. The arrested smuggler was identified as Narul Along, a Burmese national.

The authority source said a BDR force from Battalion 42 seized the medicine while the smuggler was transporting them in a car with the number Dhaka 7959, traveling from Teknaf to Cox's Bazar, both of which are on the border with Burma.

An official said the medicine is not allowed to be imported to Bangladesh and is blacklisted like yaba and other stimulant tablets.

On the border between Burma and Bangladesh many smuggling syndicates are involved in smuggling drugs and medicine. Some syndicates are sending Bangladesh-made medicine to Burma, while others are smuggling Burmese-made drugs into Bangladesh.

Most of the Burmese-made medicine, however, is traditional and is also used by Bangladeshi people in the border area.

http://www.narinjara.com/details.asp?id=1789

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