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HEADLINES
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AP - Myanmar suffers steep drop in foreign tourists
Reuters, AlertNet - A preventable fate: the failure of ART scale-up in Myanmar
AFP - Online youth to fight crime, terrorism
The Earth Times - Myanmar faces 24,000 AIDS deaths for lack of antiretroviral drugs
Outlook India - 160 Myanmar fisherman repatriated by Indian coast guard ships
The Star Online - Understanding between cultures still lagging
Energy Bangla - Bangladesh Plans Dispatching Team to Talk with Myanmar
Oped News - Great Nations & Industry Captains Ignore Thugocracies in Burma & Darfur
GHRE - Save Our Girls: Three Horrific Stories of Abuse
Mizzima News - Spy identified at opposition meeting
Mizzima News - Prepaid card system for mobile phones in Burma soon
The Irrawaddy - Plight of Abused Burmese Women Highlighted on International Day
DVB News - Bilin monks boycott government officials

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Myanmar suffers steep drop in foreign tourists
AP - Tuesday, November 25

YANGON, Myanmar - A Myanmar news journal says foreign tourist numbers are down by half at one of the country's most revered Buddhist sites after the country was hit by a devastating cyclone in May that killed more than 84,000 people.

The Weekly Eleven news journal says foreign tourists visiting the famed Shwedagon pagoda fell to 25,380 during May through November compared with 53,841 in the same period last year.

The tourism sector across the impoverished country has been hit hard following Cyclone Nargis in May. The storm killed 84,537, left another 53,836 people missing, and caused a vast trail of destruction across the Irrawaddy delta.

The military has held authoritarian power in the Southeast Asian nation since 1962.

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A preventable fate: the failure of ART scale-up in Myanmar
25 Nov 2008 10:20:00 GMT
Source: Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) - International
MSF International
Reuters, AlertNet - Website: http://www.msf. org

Few of the big international donors provide resources out of concern over the appropriate and effective use of aid in the country, yet it is the people of Myanmar who suffer as a result.

MSF and podcasts: Thousands of people are needlessly dying due to a severe lack of lifesaving HIV/AIDS treatment in Myanmar, says international humanitarian organization Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) in a report released today. Unable to continue shouldering the primary responsibility for responding to one of Asia's worst HIV crises, MSF insists that the Government of Myanmar and international organizations urgently and rapidly scale-up ART provision.

An estimated 240,000 people are thought to have HIV/AIDS in Myanmar. Of these people, 76,000 are in urgent need of antiretroviral treatment, yet less than 20 percent of them are currently able to access it.

"Last year, around 25,000 people died of AIDS related illnesses. A similar number of people could suffer the same fate in 2008 unless there is a significant increase in accessible antiretroviral treatment (ART)", declared MSF Operations Manager, Joe Belliveau.

As it stands, the majority of ART available throughout the country is provided by MSF (to more than 11,000 people), with the Government of Myanmar and other non-governmental organizations (NGOs) providing relatively little.

"It is unacceptable that a single NGO is treating the vast majority of HIV patients in a crisis of this magnitude. It is unacceptable because it is wholly inadequate. We cannot meet the needs, and we therefore call upon those who can to take up this responsibility ", stated Belliveau.

Pushed to its limit, MSF has recently been forced to make the painful decision to drastically reduce the number of new patients it can treat. With so few other actors providing ART, there is little option to refer new patients for treatment elsewhere. "With so many needs still unmet, we strongly urge all actors, led by the Government, to scale-up the provision of ART", continues Mr. Belliveau.

The urgent need for increased treatment is evident, yet investment from both inside and outside of the country remains grossly insufficient. In 2007, the Government of Myanmar spent just $0.7USD per person on healthcare, with a paltry $200,000USD allocated for HIV/AIDS in 2008. This sum is hugely disproportionate when compared to the extent of the needs and availability of resources. The government of Myanmar has proven its ability to treat HIV/AIDS patients in the public sector, but must commit the necessary resources to scale-up.

Likewise, the level of international humanitarian aid is strikingly low, around $3USD per person, one of the lowest rates worldwide. This is significantly less than the far greater amounts received by nearby countries facing similar epidemics. Few of the big international donors provide resources out of concern over the appropriate and effective use of aid in the country, yet it is the people of Myanmar who suffer as a result.

A 29 year-old male ART patient in Myanmar best explains why more should be done, "It is everyone's responsibility to fight against this disease. All people must have a spirit of humanity in helping HIV patients regardless of nation, organization and government".

MSF's work has shown that even though working in Myanmar can be challenging, providing lifesaving HIV/AIDS care and treatment directly to patients is possible. It is long overdue that the Government of Myanmar and other international organizations step-up their efforts and make ART rapidly and widely available. It is crucial that they act now, in order to prevent the suffering and needless death of thousands of people.

MSF has provided essential healthcare services in Myanmar since 1993 and began an integrated programme to support people living with HIV/AIDS in 2003. Since then, MSF staff has assisted thousands of HIV patients, working from 23 clinics, in five areas throughout the country. Services include counseling, testing, treatment of opportunistic infections, nutritional support, health education and most importantly antiretroviral treatment.

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Online youth to fight crime, terrorism
Agence France-Presse
First Posted 19:39:00 11/25/2008

WASHINGTON -- The US State Department announced plans to promote online youth groups as a new and powerful way to fight crime, political oppression and terrorism.

Drawing inspiration from a movement against FARC rebels in Colombia, the State Department is joining forces with Facebook, Google, MTV, Howcast and others in New York City next week to get the "ball rolling."

It said 17 groups from South Africa, Britain and the Middle East which have an online presence like the "Million Voices Against the FARC" will attend a conference at Columbia University Law School from December 3 to 5.

Observers from seven organizations that do not have an online presence -- such as groups from Iraq and Afghanistan -- will attend. There will also be remote participants from Cuba.

They will forge an "Alliance of Youth Movement," said James Glassman, under secretary of state for public diplomacy.

"The idea is put all these people together, share best practices, produce a manual that will be accessible online and in print to any group that wants to build a youth empowerment organization to push back against violence and oppression around the world," he told reporters.

The conference will be streamed by MTV and Howcast, he said.

The list of organizations due to attend include the Burma Global Action Network, a human rights movement spurred into action by the ruling junta's crackdown on monks and other pro-democracy protestors last year.

There is also Shabab 6 of April, which has emerged as Egypt's largest pro-democracy youth group, and Invisible Children, which spotlights atrocities committed by the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda, Glassman said.

Others include Fight Back, which fights domestic violence in India, the Save Darfur Coalition, as well as One Million Voices Against Crime in South Africa, said Jared Cohen, from the secretary's policy planning staff.

Also attending will be People's March Against Knife Crime from Britain and Young Civilians from Turkey.

Cohen said Young Civilians is a human rights and pro-democracy organization which works online but has brought thousands of protestors into the streets of Turkey.

Glassman said the State Department is providing about 50,000 dollars in order to help bring delegates from the groups to the United States.

Among the speakers will be actress Whoopi Goldberg and a co-founder of Facebook.
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Myanmar faces 24,000 AIDS deaths for lack of antiretroviral drugs
Posted : Tue, 25 Nov 2008 09:51:09 GMT
The Earth Times - Author : DPA

Bangkok - An estimated 24,000 people will die of HIV/AIDS in Myanmar next year unless the international donor community is willing to provide funds for antiretroviral drugs (ART), a medical group warned Tuesday. "Myanmar has about 240,000 people with HIV/AIDS, and of them about one-third need antiretroviral treatment without which they cannot survive," said Frank Smithius, the head of Medecins Sans Frontier/Holland, which treats patients with ART in Myanmar.

The groups is providing ART to 11,000 patients while the Myanmar government, the United Nations and other non-governmental groups are supplying another 4,000.
"It's not enough, when 75,000 people need ART," said Smithius. "It is estimated by the UN and Myanmar government that 24,000 people will die if nothing is done in the next year."

Myanmar, which is run by a military junta that is condemned in the West for its atrocious human rights record and failure to introduce democratic reforms, is the second-lowest recipient of overseas development aid worldwide at 3 dollars per capita.

The Myanmar government spends a estimated 0.3 per cent of its gross domestic product on health, one of the lowest rates worldwide.

In 2008, it allocated the equivalent of 0.7 cents person on healthcare, of which about 200,000 dollars was allocated to treatment of HIV/AIDS patients, an MSF report released Tuesday said.

The health care organization has been operating in Myanmar since 1993. It said it spends about 300 dollars per patient for ART in Myanmar, or about 3.3 million dollars to treat 11,000 patients.

Smithius said it had no additional funds to treat the remaining 60,000 HIV/AIDS patients and called on the international donor community to assist in dealing with the pandemic.

An estimated 18 million dollars will be needed to treat the HIV/AIDS patients currently deprived of antiretroviral treatment.

International donors are often reluctant to send aid to Myanmar for fear the funds will be diverted to the government, which faces strict economic sanctions from both the US and Europe.

"If we can guarantee that we have been able to deliver medicines directly to the patients, then there is no reason to not provide aid to Myanmar, and at MSF we can make that claim," said Smithius.

He said the group runs 25 HIV/AIDS clinics inside Myanmar and has government permission to import antiretroviral drugs tax free.

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160 Myanmar fisherman repatriated by Indian coast guard ships
Outlook India - Nov 25 2:10 AM

Nearly 160 Myanmar fishermen, who had completed their jail terms, were today repatriated to Yangon by the Indian Coast Guard, Andaman and Nicobar region.

Inspector General, Commander S P Sharma, said yesterday these fishermen were apprehended by the coast guard and local police in various anti-poaching operations.

The Indian Coast Guard ship Vajra which arrived especially for the purpose along with C G Ships Ganga Devi and Arka Devi, will take these fishermen to their native land, he said.

The ships sailing today will reach Yangon on November 26. On their return, the ships will bring back six Indian fishermen of Hutbay whose boat had strayed into the Myanmar waters due to rough weather.

Sharma said that another batch of 161 fishermen of Myanmar would be repatriated on December 3 and would reach Yangon on December 5.

The repatriation has been planned consequent to the agreement between the governments of Myanmar and India.

This is the third such repatriation this year with 432 Myanmar fishermen being repatriated in C G ships earlier.

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Understanding between cultures still lagging
The Star Online - Tuesday November 25, 2008
By DR WAN AZHAR WAN AHMAD,
Senior Fellow/Director, Centre for Syariah, Law and Political Science, Ikim

Our mutual understanding, and consequently unity, still looks fragile due to the younger generation not being properly guided in the desired direction.

LAST October I attended the Asean-Canada Dialogue on Interfaith Initiatives in Surabaya, Indonesia.

The delegates were from Singapore, Malay- sia, Indonesia, Brunei, the Philippines, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Lao PDR, Myanmar and the Canadian ambassador to Indonesia.

The dialogue’s aims were to review activities and initiatives taken to minimise social tensions and to object to the increasing rise of terrorism and radical encounters.

It focused on the role of youth, education and media towards fostering better inter-religious and inter-cultural understanding among the younger generations from the different religious groups.

As a representative of Malaysia, I explained our position, rather unsatisfactorily though, mainly due to time constraints.

The term “youth” refers to those between childhood and adulthood. Malaysia’s Youth Societies and Youth Development Act 2007 defines “youth” as a person not less than 15 and not more than 40 years old – perhaps the only country in the world to prescribe to such an age bracket!

The United Nations (UN) defines it more realistically, as being between 15 and 24. Although I generally agree with the Malaysian definition, I prefer the UN’s definition.
Malaysia’s statistics show that youth constitute about 20% of the 27.5mil population, i.e. about 5.5mil. They shoulder the tremendous responsibility of shaping, leading and improving the future of this nation.

The Government has been introducing policies to mould our young generation towards a better future.

The most fundamental prerequisite is the unity of all inhabitants resulting from a reasonable inter-religious and inter-cultural understanding of all religious and ethnic groups. This is done through education.

Education refers to the process of instilling “something” into human beings. And that “something” is the inculcation of values.

It deals with self inner enhancement, the formation of right worldview and attitude, resulting in good behaviour, pointing to the fact that the purpose of education is to produce a good man, not merely a good citizen.

In Malaysia, we have start our inter-cultural understanding efforts from a very early age with the Vision School Project for primary school pupils. The achievements of its noble objectives is commendable thus far.

At secondary level, the compulsory teaching of history, in which world civilisations are taught, has been done.

In addition, there is the three-month Na- tional Service programme designed for post-SPM students where inter-religious understanding, mutual respect, national solidarity and patriotism are apparently nurtured.

Although they were included in my paper, I was unable to tell the audience about the TITAS Programme, where world cultures are taught in greater detail in our universities.

I was also unable to highlight the roles played by other governmental institutions, like the Youth and Sports Ministry, the Unity, Culture, Arts and Heritage Ministry (specifically the National Unity and Integrity Depart- ment) and the Institute of Islamic Understanding (Ikim) where discourses and programmes towards inter-religious understanding are regularly held.

Equally disappointing was that I was unable to mention the initiatives taken by various NGOs towards the same objective.

I managed to emphasise two things. Firstly, we must not attempt any dialogue that indulges in theological matters. We must agree to disagree in this area.

No agreement is possible in that regard. We can only agree in terms of ethics and morality as there are obvious parallelisms in these realms.

Secondly, regardless of our religions and cultures, we can also stand united as far as rejecting secularism as it is opposed to all religions and value systems.

Now the time has come to ask ourselves a question I deliberately did not raise in Surabaya. Have we done enough to foster inter-religious/ cultural understanding among youth? Are our youth prepared to embrace such an idea?

Many would agree that we have not, as our mutual understanding, and consequently unity, still looks fragile due to our youth not being properly guided in the desired direction.

Despite the best efforts of many, we have to accept the bitter reality that our education system is still struggling to prepare our youth to develop within themselves a sufficient degree of intercultural understanding.

Its success is questionable as we can still see the polarisation of ethnic groups at all levels. Many are aware that real unity is yet to become manifest.

What can we expect if our education system still maintains the policies of vernacular schools? Our political set-up seems to provide room to entertain the demands of the three main ethnic groups in this country.

While we are supposed to have only one type of national school where all our children, regardless of race, may attend and receive their early education, we still defend these schools on the basis of race. Some of us tend to become fanatical and extreme in this regard.

It is still something very practical for all Malaysians to follow a real standard of education system while at the same time maintaining our ethnic identities.

Our emphasis must be the formation of a better inter-religious and intercultural understanding within our younger generation.

Early exposure to a mixed environment will facilitate understanding.

The end result is real and concrete national unity to face the challenges of the world together as a nation, rather than struggle to face each other as a result of tolerable differences.

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Energy Bangla - Bangladesh Plans Dispatching Team to Talk with Myanmar
Monday, 11.24.2008, 11:59pm (GMT)

The state-owned Petrobangla is working towards establishment of friendly working relations with their Myanmar counterpart, Myanmar Oil and Gas, to augment bilateral understanding, officials said.

It will soon seek the energy ministry's consent for sending a delegation for talks with the Myanmar Oil and Gas as part of its initiative to establish mutual understanding between the two state-run bodies of the two countries.

This initiative from Petrobangla is a follow-up to the visit of a Myanmar delegation last week, when both Dhaka and Yangon agreed to continue talks until resolving the bilateral dispute over demarcation of the maritime boundary in the Bay of Bengal.

"We will send a proposal to the energy ministry within a day or two seeking approval for sending a delegation for discussion with the Myanmar counterparts, " Petrobangla Chairman Jalal Ahmed told.

He said the Petrobangla delegation is expected to visit Myanmar in December next if the energy ministry permits.

Dhaka and Yangon were locked in a duel early this month to establish their respective rights to exploration of oil and gas in the prospective Bay of Bengal.

The tensions between the two neighbors began to rise at the beginning of November when Myanmar started exploring oil and gas in one of its disputed offshore blocks, AD-7, in the bay that overlaps Bangladesh’s offshore block DS-08-13.

After a week of standoff, the tension eased following intervention of China and South Korea.

Pointing to the Petrobangla delegation's visit to Myanmar, a senior official said both the sides might sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to ensure future cooperation in the energy sector, if mutually agreed.

Petrobangla earlier signed MoUs with Thailand’s state-run PTT Exploration and Production Company and a consortium of Korean energy companies to enhance cooperation.

Myanmar and Bangladesh sharing around 320 kilometers of bordering areas are among the many impoverished countries around the globe.

According to an independent survey, Myanmar has encroached on half a dozen of Bangladesh’s offshore gas blocks in the Bay.

After intruding into Bangladesh’s offshore blocks, the Southeast Asian country already leased out those to Chinese, Indian and South Korean companies for exploration in last several years.

The companies that were awarded the disputed offshore blocks in the Bay include the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), Indian Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Ltd (ONGC) and South Korean Daewoo International.

The Chinese CNPC was awarded by Myanmar the block AD-8 that overlaps Bangladesh’s deep-sea offshore blocks - DS-08-18 and part of DS-08-17 and DS-08-13.

The Indian ONGC was awarded Myanmar’s block AD-9 that overlaps the Bangladeshi offshore gas blocks DS-08-22, DS-08-23, DS-08-27 and DS-08-28.

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Great Nations & Industry Captains Ignore Thugocracies in Burma & Darfur
Oped News - www.opednews. com
November 24, 2008 at 18:22:27
by richard power   

While Great Nations & Captains of Industry Look the Other Way, Unchastened Thugocracies Crush the Defiant in Burma & the Defenseless in Darfur
By Richard Power

Do not allow the leaders of the great nations or the captains of industry to wring their hands and tell you there is nothing they can do; there is a lot they can do economically and politically. They do not act because of business interests. That is the simple, ugly truth.

From Burma, there is the appalling news that Zarganar, a popular comedian who spoke out against the thugocracy, has been sentenced to 45 years in prison.

Imagine Stephen Colbert being sentenced to decades of imprisonment for speaking truth to power (through satire) at the Annual White House Correspondents Dinner in 2006. (Click here for the transcript.)

From the Hague, there is encouraging news that the International Criminal Court has issued warrants for the arrest of three individuals believed to be responsible for attacks on international peacekeepers in Darfur.

Next time you shake your head in astonishment about those, in your own country, who seem to be simply walking off into private life without facing special prosecutors, international tribunals, massive civil suits or at least impeachment proceedings, after brazenly trampling the Bill of Rights, the Geneva Accords and even the Magna Carta; remember the murdered peacekeepers in Darfur.

What were the peacekeepers doing? Well, one of their primary missions was going on "firewood patrols" to protect women and girls from rape and other acts of violence while they gathered grass and wood beyond the perimeters of the refugee camps. And yet, the leaders of some great nations will block efforts to bring their murderers to justice in the Hague; and some captains of industry will continue to do business with the thugocrats who armed and empowered those murderers.

With deepening global economic and environmental crises, it might seem to you that no time, resources or bandwidth for human rights issues. But you would be wrong to indulge in such a false assumption. There has never been a more desperate or urgent need for you to pay attention to human rights violations in Burma, Darfur, the Congo and elsewhere, because as the global economy tanks, and the global environment boils, it is your own human rights that will become increasingly disposable.

Here are excerpts from these two stories, with links to the full texts:

A popular comedian active in Burma's democracy movement has been sentenced to 45 years in jail by a Burmese court.

Zarganar was found to have violated the Electronics Act, which regulates electronic communications.  He is the latest in a string of opposition activists to be given long jail terms by the military government.  He was detained earlier this year for criticising the government's slow response to Cyclone Nargis in interviews with foreign news groups.

More than 100 activists have been sentenced over the past two weeks in a judicial crackdown across the spectrum of Burma's pro-democracy movement.  Some people have been sentenced to terms as long as 65 years.  Many took part in protests against the ruling junta sparked by fuel and food price rises in August 2007.

Zarganar led a group of entertainers who organised private aid deliveries to victims of Cyclone Nargis, which hit in May.  An outspoken satirist of the military government, Zarganar had already been arrested and jailed four times before he was taken from his home again by the authorities in June. BBC, 11-21-08

The request on November 20 by the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court for arrest warrants for three rebel leaders believed to be responsible for attacks on international peacekeepers in Darfur is an important step toward protecting those who protect civilians, Human Rights Watch said today. Repeated attacks on international peacekeepers have severely compromised the effectiveness of peacekeeping operations in Darfur. ...

Security concerns remain a serious obstacle for the joint AU-UN peacekeepers (UNAMID) who took over peacekeeping in Darfur on December 31, 2007. The new peacekeeping force has also repeatedly come under direct attack from both rebel and Sudanese government forces:

* On July 8, 2008, unknown attackers killed seven peacekeepers and wounded 22 in a government-controll ed area of North Darfur.
* On two occasions in July, unknown attackers shot at patrols in West Darfur, killing a peacekeeper on July 16.
* On July 21, government forces assaulted and arrested a UNAMID security officer in El Fasher.
* In August and September, unknown gunmen fired on peacekeepers' helicopters on at least four occasions.
* On October 6, a group of peacekeepers were ambushed at Menawashei, 75 kilometers north of Nyala, during an assessment patrol from Nyala to Khor Abeche in South Darfur.
* On October 29, a peacekeeper was killed when UNAMID forces came under attack at a water point near the Kassab displaced persons camp in North Darfur.
* On November 9, a peacekeeping patrol was ambushed by a group of well-armed men near Geneina in West Darfur, wounding one peacekeeper.

The suspects have been charged with war crimes for: murder and causing severe injury to peacekeepers; intentionally directing attacks against personnel, installations, material, units or vehicles involved in a peacekeeping mission; and pillaging. Human Rights Watch, 11-20-08

I encourage you to follow events in Darfur on Mia Farrow's site, it is the real-time journal of a humanitarian at work; the content is compelling, insightful and fiercely independent.

http://words- of-power. blogspot. com
Richard Power writes and speaks on the 21st Century security and sustainability crisis. He is the author of five books. He has also delivered executive intelligence briefings and led professional training in over thirty countries. You can read his full bio at http://www.wordsofp ower.net He blogs at http://words- of-power. blogspot. Com

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Save Our Girls: Three Horrific Stories of Abuse
GHRE - Monday, 24 November 2008 12:15
By Htoo Chit, Director of the Foundation for Education and Development (FED), formerly Grassroots HRE

As a Burmese community leader and long-time human rights activist, I was invited to visit a Thai government Child Care Center in Bangkok. More than 300 hundred young girls were living there under the protection of the Thai government. Some of them were Burmese. Though from many different backgrounds and having endured many different kinds of abuse, the girls shared a common history of having faced horrific and often sexually abusive human rights violations. A Thai human rights activist had invited me to visit the Center because he wanted me to meet the young women there who were Burmese. His invitation was both thoughtful and kind. The Burmese victims were feeling terribly isolated and alone. They needed to tell their stories. They needed to be heard, in their own language.

“Are you Burmese?” one of the girls, Mu Naw, asks me in Burmese, in a Karen ethnic accent. She looks to be younger than sixteen and is eager to share her experience. “Yes,” I answer, and soon realize that this girl, who should be in high school, not working as a domestic, has been brutally tortured.

“I worked as house maid at a Thai family’s house in Bangkok for eight months where I was often tortured by my employer,” she begins. “I was beaten or kicked when I made any small mistake because I didn’t understand the Thai language. I began to think my employer had mental problems because she was always angry with me. She always beat me and threw things at me-- like knifes, plates, spoons and even a pestle for pounding chilies,” Mu Naw explains, in tears.

She shows me her head, arms and legs. I am horrified to see scars on her head and more than 30 stitches. There are bruise marks and lacerations on her whole body. It was impossible not to be furious with the perpetrator of these violent crimes.

My anger has no time to subside. The next victim at the Center, Kon Wot, a young Mon girl, was gang raped by a group of Thais in Koh Kow Khaung island in Phang-Nga province in 2006. “I was raped by four people. I was terribly afraid and ashamed and I tried to escape, but they threatened me with knives and beat me,” she says. “Fortunately, some Thai people helped me and sent me to a monastery.”

We wanted to prosecute this savage crime, and began by sending Kon Wot to the local hospital in order to get a medical report from a doctor. The hospital concurred that she had been raped by more than one man. We felt relieved to have such official evidence for a case, and advised the family to initiate a lawsuit, but Kon Wot’s father refused.

“My daughter is still young and is going to marry one day. She will face problems in the future if she gets involved in a lawsuit around having been raped,” her father pleaded.

“Our society is very traditional and most of the men do not want to marry a girl who has been raped. We have to move to another province and keep this quiet,” said her father. There was no changing his mind.

In 2006, a young girl attending one of the Grassroots Learning Centers was raped by a Thai man on her way home from school. I went to meet with her at the hospital and she told me, “My house is five minutes from the main road. While I was walking there, a Thai guy pulled up next to me and told me to get into his car. I couldn’t run away because he had a gun and I was scared he’d shoot me. He then drove away and soon parked somewhere more isolated and raped me in his car. After that, he dropped me back near the road,” said Mee Kan, a little Tavoy girl.

“Can you can imagine how I am feeling?  My daughter is only 12 years old,” the mother of this young victim tells me with tears in her eyes. She’s quite right. I actually can imagine because I too am a parent. What I feel most of all is rage and the imperative of doing something to stop this brutality.

Though the Burmese military ratified the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women CEDAW in 1997, Burmese women and girls still face these kinds of human rights violations in Burma and in Thailand. They also endure domestic violations in their own homes, a common phenomenon police too often see as “family business” in which they are reluctant to interfere. Something must be done, starting with more awareness of the severity of the problem.

To all my sisters of all ages and backgrounds, I am committed to working for your rights, as women, as human beings.  I believe wholeheartedly that the human rights situation will not improve, and might even deteriorate further, if we allow the current brutal military regime to govern Burma. We cannot sit silently and watch our people’s rights being abused. We must act.

We must fight for the human rights of our people!

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Spy identified at opposition meeting  
Mizzima News - by Than Htike Oo  
Tuesday, 25 November 2008 18:22

Chiang Mai – A government informer sent by the Burmese Embassy was exposed at a recent meeting held by opposition members in Malaysia, according to participants in the meeting.

A person attending a meeting for Burma affairs held at a hotel in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, on the morning of the 23rd of November, was later exposed as an employee of the Burmese Embassy in the Malaysian capital.

"When we suspected him, he was called and taken outside by two of our participants. Then they shouted, 'The intelligence official from the Burmese Embassy is here,' holding his ID card. Only after that, did we realize that a government informer was sitting among us," Than Pe, Chairman for the Arakan League for Democracy-Exile, and one of the participants in the meeting, told Mizzima.

The accused received frequent phone calls and the people at the meeting later suspected him after seeing him passing information on to those on the other end of the call.

The participants of the meeting seized his voice recorder and camera but let him go.

The meeting was attended by Dr. San Aung from the exile-government National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma (NCGUB) and Khin Ohnmar, Chairman of the Network for Democracy and Development (NDD), among others residing in Kuala Lumpur.

The meeting discussed and exchanged views on the current situation in Burma.

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Prepaid card system for mobile phones in Burma soon  
Mizzima News - by The The  
Tuesday, 25 November 2008 21:04

New Delhi – Mobile phone users in Burma have reasons to cheer for they will be free of the monthly hassle of queuing up front of telephone offices to pay bills for their Global System for Mobile (GSM) as the Myanmar Post and Telecommunication department will soon introduce a prepaid system.

An official at the Myanmar Post and Telecommunication told Mizzima that it is all set to introduce a prepaid card system for mobile users, but it will initially be targeted at foreign tourists as the prepaid coupons will be sold in US dollars.

"Initially we are eyeing foreign tourists as the coupons will be sold in US dollars, but it does not restrict Burmese people if they can afford to buy the coupon in dollars," the official said.

While the official refused to go into details of the rates of the coupons and the quantum that will be made available, a source close to the MPT said the initial denominations for the coupons will be of US $ 10, 30 and 50.

The validity for a US$ 10 coupon will be a week, while for a US$ 30 coupon it will be for three weeks. For a US$ 50 coupon it will be and five weeks, the source said. In keeping with the practice in other countries, the coupons can be topped-up before the validity period expires.

The source added that call rates using the prepaid system will be 00.30 cents per pulse for domestic calls while overseas calls will be charged at the rate of 1.20 US$ per pulse.

Relief is at hand for subscribers for currently Burma's mobile users are required to line up at government telephone offices to pay the bills at the end of every month. But prepaid cards will enable users to fill in as much talk-time as they require and they will be alerted when their balance runs low.

Quoting MPT statistics, a Rangoon based weekly journal said there are currently over 200,000 GSM phones being used across the country. Burmese military authorities, who have maintained a tight grip over all communication lines, have limited the use of mobile phones by allocating only a limited number of mobile phones periodically.

With the limited availability of mobile phones, a GSM telephone handset and a Sim card in the black market costs about 1.5 million to 2 million kyat (approximately US $ 1200).

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Plight of Abused Burmese Women Highlighted on International Day
The Irrawaddy - By LAWI WENG
Tuesday, November 25, 2008

The plight of women in Burma’s conflict areas and of Burmese women migrant workers who suffer exploitation and abuse was highlighted in statements marking Tuesday’s International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women.

The Thailand-based Women’s League of Burma (WLB), which held events marking the occasion at several places along the Thai-Burmese border, urged the UN to put pressure on the Burmese military government to act to prevent sexual violence against women in conflict areas.  The WLB also urged the UN to press the Burmese regime to investigate allegations of human rights abuses against women in ethnic areas.

Than Zaw, secretary of the Bangkok-based Migrant Karen Labor Union (MKLU), drew attention to the plight of many Burmese migrant women employed as domestic workers who suffer physical and sexual violence and exploitation.

Than Zaw said the MKLU dealt with about four such cases a month. Many abused women failed to report abuse because they feared deportation to Burma, he said.

Human Rights Watch said millions of female domestic workers in Asia suffered sexual
violence. Most of them were unable to seek legal redress because governments failed to enact laws to protect them.

“There are countless cases of employers threatening, humiliating, beating, raping, and sometimes killing workers,” said Nisha Varia, Deputy Director of the women’s rights division of Human Rights Watch.

In a message marking International Women’s Day, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said more should be done to enforce existing laws.

 “We need to combat attitudes and behavior that condone, tolerate, excuse or ignore violence committed against women,” he said. “And we need to increase funding for services for victims and survivors.”

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Bilin monks boycott government officials

Nov 25, 2008 (DVB)–Monks in Bilin township, Mon state, decided during a recent meeting to launch a boycott against government officials and supporters by refusing alms from them and not performing religious rites in their homes.

The monks, who are led by the abbots of Kyauktalone- taung, Three Pagodas and Kaylatha-taung monasteries, could not be reached for comment.

But Aye Myint, a lawyer from Bago and leader of the Guiding Star legal aid group, recently visited the area and heard about the boycott.

Aye Myint said he had found out about the protest when his relatives had asked the monks to perform a religious rite at their home.

"It was only when they told the abbots that they were from the authorities that the monks agreed to come to the house," Aye Myint said.

"They also spoke to me because they found out that I was Aye Myint of Guiding Star,” he said.

“They are boycotting the officials because they are still feeling aggrieved by the arrests and imprisonment of monks."

U Thuriya, the abbot of Kinywa monastery, told Aye Myint that the monks had decided not to perform religious rites at the homes of ward, village or township chairs, civil servants or members of the Union Solidarity and Development Association.

The abbot said the decision had been taken in protest at the public humiliation of monks during last year’s Saffron Revolution and at the recent sentencing of monks.

Reporting by Naw Say Phaw

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