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Promotion of drug kingpin looms large over Wa army's outside relations
Hopes for Suu Kyi release fade at Asean meet
UN humanitarian chief visits Myanmar cyclone zone
Youthful activism takes root in Burma
Nobel laureate meets Burmese women

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Promotion of drug kingpin looms large over Wa army's outside relations
By Don Pathan
The Nation
Chiang Rai
Published on July 22, 2008

Something has got into drug kingpin Wei Hsueh-kang, the notorious opium warlord who controls a sizeable army near Thailand's northern border.

According to Chinese and Thai military sources and others monitoring the notorious Golden Triangle, Commander Wei is hoping he will be selected to the topmost position in the United Wa State Army (UWSA), one of Burma's ceasefire groups responsible for flooding Thailand with methamphetamines and the world with pure-white grade four heroin.

If that happens, Wei would replace ailing UWSA chairman Bao Yu-xiang, who runs the 20,000-strong army out of Panghsang, a small town on the Sino-Burmese border.

The Bao and the Wei families, while part of the UWSA structure, have historically been rivals. But they need each other in order to maintain their bargaining leverage with the Burmese government with whom they entered a cease-fire agreement in 1989.

Wei and his brothers have a firm grip on the Wa troops along the Thai border, an area commonly referred to as the South Wa region, while the Bao siblings control the area along the Chinese border, officially known as Special Region Two.

Since early 2000, Bao has shown signs of being willing to leave the trade, but in exchange for some sort of recognition from the international community, particularly from Thailand.

Bao even ceased opium cultivation in 2005 as a gesture of goodwill. But nobody took him seriously as millions of methamphetamine tablets coming from Wa-controlled areas continued to flood Thailand on a weekly basis. The opium harvest can be monitored by satellite images and quantified accordingly, but that is not the case with the clandestine labs pumping out so-called yaa-baa.

Over the past couple of years, chairman Bao has been in and out of hospital because of various illnesses. His brother Yu-yee, who used to command a Wa battalion near the Thai border when Wei had a run-in with Burmese Army commander Maung Aye in early 2001, has the potential to replace Bao.

But the extent of his influence in the so-called South Wa region near the Thai border is nothing compared to that of Wei Hsueh-kang and his brothers.

Besides the rivalries between the two families, the UWSA itself is a problem - a global one at that.

Wei has long been on the list of America's most-wanted criminals ever since an indictment was filed against him in 1993 in the New York Federal Court accusing him of conspiring to distribute heroin to the United States. The US has placed a US$2 million(Bt66. 8million) reward on his head. A Thai court sentenced him to death in 1997 on similar charges.

In January of 2005, the year that the UWSA announced it would put an end to its opium cultivation, the US Department of Justice charged seven more Wa leaders - including the three Bao brothers and two of Wei's siblings - with drug trafficking.

Thai and Chinese narcotic officials were irked by the move, saying the charges against the Bao brothers really tied their hands.

Prior to the US charges being laid in January 2005, the Thais and the Chinese had been toying with various options in their dealings with the UWSA. While the Chinese saw Bao as someone they could deal with, whether clandestinely or otherwise, the Thai side wanted to pit the two families against one another.

Officials from Thailand's Office of the Narcotics Control Board said they were willing to let bygones be bygones and turn a new leaf in their relations with the UWSA if the organisation quit the drug trade. This would have been a leap of faith indeed, considering how Wa militias and Thai soldiers have a history of engaging in bloody clashes along the border.

However, Thailand can't compromise on Wei because of legal implications, the officer added.

In early 2003, the Thai Army even tried to split the UWSA by negotiating directly with Wei Sai-tang, a Wa commander who, like Hsueh-kang, controls a battalion in the South Wa region near the Thai border.

"Sai-tang was a nationalist and didn't think highly of the 'White Wa' - the Wei brothers. They were called white because they were ethnic Chinese," said a Thai intelligence source who had direct dealings with Sai-tang.

In exchange for parting with the UWSA, the Thai Army would provide Sai-tang's outfit with an economic and military lifeline from Thailand.

In this connection, Sai-tang would cleanse himself of the UWSA's past and effectively become a Thai proxy in the rugged hills of the Golden Triangle, a deadly region where everybody plays for keeps.

But when news got out, Hsueh-kang and Yu-xiang acted quickly. They whisked Sai-tang away from the Thai border and locked him up in Panghsang. He was charged with, among other things, producing illicit drugs and fake bank notes.

Bao went ahead anyway and tried hard to befriend the international community. He allowed international NGOs to work inside Wa territory and public health and crop substitution projects, and reached out to UN agencies and foreign journalists.

While the Chinese and the Thais were willing to give Bao - not Wei - the benefit of the doubt, Washington didn't care to make the distinction between an opium warlord who wants to kick the habit and a kingpin who didn't have much to lose.

But with an ailing Bao Yu-xiang's days numbered, the issue of succession has become a hot topic.

Thai officials said they could forget about any future talk with the UWSA if Wei takes over.

Chinese officials echoed the same sentiment. They said future dealings with the UWSA would be extremely difficult, given the US indictments.

For the time being, all eyes are on Xiao Ming-lien, the deputy chairman of the UWSA.

"What's important is that Ming-lien is not on the US Department of Justice's wanted list," said the Thai military officer. "There would still be some breathing room," he added.

Both sides see Ming-lien as clean. But that, too, could be a problem. Without drugs, Ming-lien has no money. Without money, he has no army.

http://www.nationmultimedia.com/worldhotnews/read.php?newsid=30078673

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Hopes for Suu Kyi release fade at Asean meet
The Daily Star
Afp, Singapore

Aung San Suu Kyi

Hopes for the release of Myanmar democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi were raised and then quickly faded at a meeting of Southeast Asian ministers, as officials said Monday that comments indicating she could be freed within months had been misinterpreted.

Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) foreign ministers have told their Myanmar counterpart they were "deeply disappointed" over the junta's recent decision to extend the opposition leader's house arrest by another year.

But Singapore Foreign Minister George Yeo said Sunday that the regime's foreign minister Nyan Win had suggested she could be freed within six months under a technical deadline set in Myanmar law.

Asked Monday whether Aung San Suu Kyi could be released then, Indonesian Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda said: "That's our hope."

But Yeo said Monday that Nyan Win had been misunderstood, and that the legal limit of the detention period would only be reached "six months from May 2009" when the one-year extension expires.

Aung San Suu Kyi has spent most of the past 18 years under house arrest at her home in the country's main city Yangon, with the most recent spell beginning in May 2003.

Trevor Wilson, a former Australian ambassador to Myanmar, said he expected the democracy leader to be kept in detention until elections billed for 2010.

"I don't think there's any evidence that the government is ready to release her," he told AFP.

David Mathieson, a consultant on Myanmar for US-based Human Rights Watch, said the military regime's claims to be abiding by national laws were farcical.

When the six-year limit expires "they'll probably just come back up with another excuse and bank on people's short memories" he said.

Mathieson urged Asean to push for Aung San Suu Kyi's immediate release, and to ensure she was freed without conditions and was permitted to travel the country and participate in the elections.

"It's a slow way of making her irrelevant, and that's the real crime," he said.

Myanmar's treatment of its democratic opposition is a perennial embarrassment for the bloc, comprised of Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

On Monday it formally ratified Asean's new charter, but observers said they doubted the regime would live up to the document's ideals on democracy and human rights.

http://www.thedailystar.net/story.php?nid=46797

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UN humanitarian chief visits Myanmar cyclone zone
AFP
52 minutes ago

UN humanitarian chief John Holmes arrived in Myanmar on Tuesday for a three-day trip to see how the military-run nation is coping after a devastating cyclone, a UN spokeswoman said.

After his morning arrival in Yangon, Holmes took a helicopter straight to areas of the Irrawaddy Delta worst-hit by Cyclone Nargis, which left about 138,000 people dead or missing when it battered southern Myanmar in early May.

"Mr John Holmes arrived in Yangon and left for the delta already. He's accompanied by the deputy foreign minister and other officials," United Nations spokeswoman Laksmita Noviera said.

The UN said in a statement that Holmes would "make a rapid aerial assessment of the delta area".

Holmes, who flew in from Singapore where he attended a meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), will return to Yangon later Tuesday and meet with aid workers and donors on Wednesday.

On Thursday, he will travel to Myanmar's isolated new capital Naypyidaw to meet with government representatives, the UN said, before leaving the country.

A Myanmar government official said Holmes will likely be granted a meeting with Prime Minister Thein Sein, but Noviera was unable to confirm which officials Holmes will be holding talks with in the capital.

This will be the envoy's second visit to Myanmar since the cyclone hit, causing major damage to parts of the country's infrastructure and creating a humanitarian emergency.

Myanmar's ruling generals -- wary of any outside interference -- at first blocked entry to many foreign aid workers and relief shipments, and only relented after a personal visit by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.

ASEAN on Monday released a report saying that rebuilding Myanmar's cyclone-devastated south and bringing aid to millions of survivors will cost one billion dollars over the next three years.

Holmes told the ASEAN meeting that the relief operation was still ongoing in impoverished Myanmar, and urged donors to come forward with funds to help the nation to rebuild.

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Suu Kyi's detention to last until 2009
AP
By VIJAY JOSHI, Associated Press Writer / Mon Jul 21, 11:30 PM ET

Myanmar's foreign minister has said pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi can be kept in detention legally until late 2009 and not until December this year as reported earlier, Singapore officials said Tuesday.

Myanmar Foreign Minister Nyan Win was misunderstood by his nine counterparts from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations during a dinner conversation on Sunday, said a Foreign Ministry official.

Singapore Foreign Minister George Yeo subsequently passed on Nyan Win's remarks to the media, which reported widely that a new glimmer of hope had been raised for Suu Kyi's early freedom.

Yeo had quoted Nyan Win as saying that a political detainee can be held for a maximum of six years, and that the limit was approaching in about "half a year's time."

But the Straits Times newspaper on Tuesday quoted Yeo as saying that the six-year period will only be reached in the six months after May 2009, when her latest one-year detention period expires.

The Times quoted Yeo as saying the ministers had "misunderstood" Nyan Win.

The Foreign Ministry official confirmed Yeo's comments. Singapore government officials cannot be named under briefing rules.

The new position dashes hopes of an early release for Suu Kyi, who has now been detained for more than 12 of the last 18 years at her home in Myanmar, also known as Burma.

In a clear sign that ASEAN is getting fed up of the Myanmar junta's foot-dragging on democracy, the foreign ministers issued a statement Sunday expressing "deep disappointment" at the junta's decision in May to extend Suu Kyi's detention.

The harsh call went against ASEAN's policy of not interfering in each other's domestic affairs.

ASEAN has faced international criticism, especially from the West, for not putting enough pressure on Myanmar, the most recalcitrant member of the grouping.

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Youthful activism takes root in Burma
The Irish Times
Tue, Jul 22, 2008

BURMA:Following the crackdown on dissent last year and the devastating cyclone in May, a new generation of Burmese opposition activists are organising underground, a Special Correspondent reports from Rangoon

THEY OPERATE in the shadows, slipping by moonlight from safe house to safe house, changing their cellphones to hide their tracks and meeting under cover of monasteries or clinics to plot changes that have eluded their country for 46 years.

If one gets arrested, another steps forward.

"I feel like the last man standing. All the responsibility is on my shoulders . . . There is no turning back. If I turn back, I betray all my comrades," said a Burmese activist who heads a leading dissident group, the 88 Generation Students, named after a failed uprising in 1988. He took command after the arrest last August of its five top leaders.

In a nearly deserted coffee shop in Rangoon (also known as Yangon) one recent morning, he spoke in an urgent whisper, often glancing over his shoulder to keep an eye out for informers.

The security apparatus of Burma's military junta was thought to have largely shattered the opposition last August and September, in a crackdown that included soldiers firing on an alliance of monks and lay people who had taken to the streets by the thousands to protest over a rise in fuel prices. More than 30 died. At least 800 were detained and many more were forced into exile, according to the Thailand-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners.

But a new generation of democracy activists fights on, its ranks strengthened both by revulsion over last year's bloodletting and the government's inept response after Cyclone Nargis caused the deaths of an estimated 130,000 people in early May. Largely clandestine, these activists make up a diffuse network of students, militant Buddhist monks, social service workers and leaders of the 1988 uprising.

Some activists express impatience with what they call the largely passive policies of the National League for Democracy, the country's main opposition party and one of the few anti-government groups operating legally. In 1990, the league won a national election by a landslide, but the military prevented it from taking office.

From its closely watched headquarters in downtown Rangoon, with its clutter of dusty wooden desks and chairs, the league is led by three octogenarians whom many people here call the "uncles". The men oversee the party while its leader, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, languishes under house arrest.

"Their biggest goal in life is to return the party to the lady [ the honorific which Burmese sympathisers use for Suu Kyi]," said the leader of the 88 Generation. "They won't do anything. They are just guardians . . . Because of them, their party is divided."

One woman who is active in the new opposition said she thinks that "the NLD has lost the trust of the people. They have been issuing many announcements, that the government must do this. But the government has not, and anyone who gets involved with the NLD gets in trouble."

Because of what it sees as an absence of clear direction from the NLD's leaders, the 88 Generation has acted on its own, issuing statements with the All Burma Monks Alliance and the All Burma Federation of Student Unions. The most recent statements criticised the junta for holding a referendum on a new constitution while the bodies of cyclone victims still floated in the waterways of the Irrawaddy Delta.

Since its founding in late 2006 by newly freed political prisoners including student leader Min Ko Naing, the group has launched a series of creative civil disobedience campaigns. Last year, people were invited to dress in white as a symbol of openness; to head to monasteries, Hindu temples or mosques for prayer meetings; and to sign letters calling for the release of Suu Kyi and other political prisoners.

The group was at the forefront of the protests last August and had reached out to monks, the 88 leader said. "The struggle is still on," said a young lawyer who was sentenced to seven years in jail for starting a student union at a university. Since his release, four years early, he said he has resumed regular contact with several groups of politically active current and former students.

One group of young people, whose members gathered as a book club, decided to organise votes against the proposed constitution, dismissing it as a sham that reinforces the military's control of the country. So they created hundreds of stickers and T-shirts bearing the word "No" and scattered them on buses, in university lecture halls and in the country's ubiquitous tea shops.

Another student said he and some of his peers acted as unofficial election monitors during the referendum, taking photos and interviewing voters who were given already marked ballots or coerced to vote Yes. The 88 leader said such efforts have given him a stock of evidence to show the vote was neither free nor fair. Despite the obstacles, the group has not ruled out trying to become a legal party to run for elections in 2010, he said. "People think that if you accept to run, that means you accept the constitution. No! I want to have a legal party to fight from within."

Outside experts have compared the network to Poland's Solidarity movement in the 1980s, a coalition of workers, intellectuals and students that emerged as a key political player during the country's transition to democracy.

Just as Solidarity organised picnics to keep people in touch, some new groups in Burma meet as book clubs or medical volunteers but can turn readily to political activity when necessary, according to Bertil Lintner, a journalist and author of several books on Burma.

Meanwhile, the devastation wrought by the cyclone has sometimes been a trigger for more overt political activities. A handful of members of an embattled activist group called Human Rights Defenders and Promoters headed to the delta after the storm to hand out relief supplies as well as copies of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, according to a lawyer. They were later sentenced to four years in jail, he said.

Monks remain politically active, too, in spite of increased harassment from security forces.

Some have hidden pamphlets inside their alms bowls to distribute when they go out to collect food in the mornings, according to a Mandalay monk. They have smuggled glue and posters inside the bowls to stick on street walls.

Ten years ago, the monk said, he started a library that has since expanded to 14 branches across the country. Under cover of membership, patrons take classes in public speaking and pass around material that is often scathing about the rulers, he said.

"I told people to read lots of books, so they can start to know, and then they can change the system," he said. "Because we want freedom."

The cyclone's aftermath has also spurred vast new stores of anger, sometimes among monks, who take vows of non-violence.

"Now we want to get weapons," said a religious known to other dissidents by the nom de guerre the Militant Monk for his ability to organise and vanish without a trace. "The Buddhist way is loving-kindness. But we lost. So now we want to fight."

In the dormitory of a monastery one recent afternoon, he sat among piles of handwritten speeches and clandestine pamphlets stamped with names of groups such as Generation Wave and the All Burmese Monks Alliance. Two young monks listening from a tattered mattress nearby nodded excitedly, and a third pretended to wield a machine gun. Because of his role as a chief galvaniser of the monks in the protests, the monk has been on the run since September, moving from one monastery to the next. Since the cyclone, he has managed to make about 20 trips to the devastated areas, where he buried more than 200 bodies and co-ordinated with monks and lay people. "In September we lost because everywhere, every village did not follow, because of fear," he said. But in the post-cyclone period, "we can do more. Now I can grow and grow."

At a 1,500-strong ceremony commemorating the victims of the cyclone, 15 dissident monks and lay people pondered their options, he said. Should they organise a strike in September to mark the first anniversary of the protests? Hold one to coincide with the auspicious date of 8-8-08, 20 years since the 1988 uprising?

Asked about prospects for an armed struggle, the 88 leader demurred. "We are totally, from beginning to end, peaceful," he said. But the Militant Monk, he said, chuckling, was a force to be reckoned with. - ( LA Times-Washington Post service)

© 2008 The Irish Times
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2008/0722/1216627313450.html

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Nobel laureate meets Burmese women
Bangkok Post
AMITHA AMRANAND

CHIANG MAI : Nobel Peace Prize laureate Jody Williams met a group of women from Burma as well as from various ethnic groups in this northern province yesterday to gather information about their plight. "We're here to bring messages of the women of Burma, of the marginalised, to the world. We're here to listen. We're here to learn the common concerns that women of the world seem to share," said Ms Williams, an American teacher and aid worker who received the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize.

The Nobel laureate was accompanied by actor-activist Mia Farrow, together with Dr Sima Samar of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission and Chinese labour activist Qing Zhang.

The Nobel Women's Initiative delegation focused on the plight of Burmese women in the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis during their information-gathering trip to Thailand.

They had a closed-door meeting with marginalised Burmese, ethnic and Thai women in Chiang Mai and also visited the Thailand-Burma border.

The women shared stories of discrimination faced by hilltribe women and shed light on the continuing struggle of Cyclone Nargis victims.

"I am still shaking [from listening to these women]. I am moved and inspired to go forward stronger than ever. I want to be part of the solution anyway I can," Ms Farrow told a symposium at Chiang Mai University.

Renowned Burmese women activist Charm Tong, of Shan Women's Action Network, told the symposium that political pressure must be maintained for genuine political change to come to Burma.

"Aid alone will not solve Burma's problems. Unless political issues are addressed, this crisis will continue," she said.

After Thailand, the delegation will visit Addis Ababa, Juba in South Sudan and conclude their trip in Chadian refugee camps bordering Darfur.

http://www.bangkokpost.com/220708_News/22Jul2008_news07.php

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