The Burmese government arbitrary extension of the detention of a prominent opposition party leader highlights the country lack of commitment to political change, Human Rights Watch said today. On Tuesday, the Home Ministry of the ruling State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) extended the house arrest of U Tin Oo, the deputy leader of the National League for Democracy (NLD). Burma’s military junta barred the NLD from taking power after the party overwhelmingly won the 1990 general election. U Tin Oo, a former Army Chief of Staff who was purged in the late 1970s and helped form the NLD, was arrested on trumped-up charges of disturbing public order on May 30, 2003, after pro-government militias attacked the convoy carrying him and other opposition leaders near Depayin in upper Burma. An unknown number of opposition supporters were killed in the attack, in which NLD leader Aung San Suu Kyi was also injured.

Four school girls were allegedly gang raped by Burmese army soldiers in Putao Township, Kachin State in early February. Relatives of the alleged victims are seeking more compensation than was paid by the army, according to a local source. The army paid 300,000 kyats (US $232) in compensation, but the families consider the amount too low, the source said. The family is seeking 2 million kyats ($1,550) to be divided by the four girls. The case was not reported to local police, the source said, because of a fear of reprisals. “The army officials have told the parents to clam down and not to report it to any other authority, saying they had already compensated for the case,” the source told The Irrawaddy.

Burma’s 60th Union Day was celebrated inside and outside of the country, but many people question why the event is celebrated at all, since the ideals expressed in the Panglong agreement have never been achieved. Union Day history starts at Panglong in southern Shan State on February 12, 1947, when 23 representatives from the Burman government, Chin Hills, Kachin Hills and Shan States signed an agreement in the presence of representatives from the executive council of the governor of Burma, to form an interim government. The emergence of Union Day initially, though, did not include all the ethnic nationalities of present day Burma, yet it has served as a threshold for a unified Burma. The agreement was aimed at establishing a federal Burma on the basis of socio-political equality and self-determination for all ethnic nationalities.

There has been a marked increase in poppy cultivation in Chin state, in the northwest part of Burma even as the United Nations views Burma as a country which has intensified its anti-drug campaign. The driving force is the joint activity relating to opium production and trafficking by military authorities and local businessmen from Chin state and Sagain Division in Burma. This is said to compel hill farmers to engage in poppy cultivation. As a result, the farmers have begun to abandon their traditional hill farm cultivation. Poppy cultivation is done mainly in Lamzang, Taingen, Lemthang, Muanluah, Hai Mual, Old Haimual, Bochung, Singpial and Tuisung village in Tedim Township, remote areas of Tongzang town ship, Falam Township in Chin state and Sakhan Kyi in Kalay town in Sagaing division, according to sources from Indo-burma border.

Thai authorities have been warned to prepare for an influx of illicit drugs as traffickers in Burma are anxious to rush top-grade heroin to international markets offering record-high prices, a Shan rebel leader said. Lt-Col Kornchuen, leader of the Shan State Army’s Kengtung Front, said heroin produced from last year’s quality opium crop was fetching the highest prices in 10 years. A measure of 1.6 kilogrammes was selling at 230,000-250, 000 baht, he said. “I believe as much, or more, heroin than usual will be shipped through Thailand on the way to international markets. And the heroin will be of good quality, with a high purity percentage,” he said. Lt-Col Kornchuen gave the warning at the recent celebration of Shan National Day at Loi Kaw Wan in Burma, opposite Chiang Rai’s Mae Fa Luang district. The Office of the Narcotics Control Board (ONCB) and the Third Army said they were bracing for trouble.

State of Terror, a report launched today by the Karen Women's Organization, provides graphic evidence of the widespread terror tactics being employed by the military regime's troops against women across Burma's Karen State. As the atrocities continue, the KWO appeals for concerted international pressure on the regime to bring about an immediate nationwide ceasefire and withdrawal of Burmese Army troops from the ethnic states. "We deeply regret the veto by China and Russia and South Africa’s vote against the UN Security Council Resolution on Burma last month," said KWO Secretary Naw Zipporah Sein. "It is equivalent to endorsing the regime’s terror campaign in Karen State. They are giving us a death sentence." The report documents over 4,000 cases of abuse, including rape, murder, torture and forced labour, mainly over the past few years, in over 190 villages by troops from over 40 Burmese Army battalions.

Rebel strongman Yawd Serk hopes for unity among ethnic minorities Charismatic Shan rebel army leader Colonel Yawd Serk has strengthened alliances with armed ethnic minorities along the Thai-Burma border. Yawd Serk said the United Wa State Army (UWSA) - which currently backs a counter-insurgency by the Burma Army against his Shan State Army (SSA) - had offered ties. Yawd Serk was speaking at celebrations he said marked 60 years of Shan resistance at its Doi Tai Leang stronghold across the border from Mae Hong Son. The SSA in various guises has been fighting Burmese forces for more than 48 years. He said the SSA will "never give up its fight for independence from Burma".

Messages from:

Shan Democractic Union

Col. Sao Yawd Serk, SSA-S

Ethnic Nationalities Council

Shan National for Democracy (Japan)

Shan National Day - (Photos)

Burma's state-run propaganda machine has been working overtime since junta leader General Than Shwe returned from a two-week hospital stay in Singapore earlier this month - to counter mounting evidence that the ageing military chief is no longer fit for office. In the past two weeks, photos of Than Shwe chairing meetings and mingling with foreign dignitaries have made the front page of the New Light of Myanmar newspaper almost every day, while footage of him chairing the quarterly State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) meeting has been aired on state television. In both the footage and photos Than Shwe looks fairly robust. But the carefully managed media appearances have done little to quell reports from among Burma's political elite that the senior general is far from fit. One source close to the top military leader told The Nation that Than Shwe had been flown to Singapore for extensive tests on December 31 last year after his personal physicians became concerned that he was suffering from intestinal cancer. Despite being cleared of the disease, Than Shwe remained in hospital until January 12 - the leader's longest stretch outside Burma for several years.

Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) will be launching a major new report on the persecution of Christians in Burma. The report identifies a range of tactics used by the military regime to suppress Christianity and cites a document, allegedly from the Ministry of Religious Affairs, which has been widely circulated in Rangoon with the headline “Programme to destroy the Christian religion in Burma”. It begins: “There shall be no home where the Christian religion is practised.” The report, Carrying the Cross: The military regime’s campaign of restriction, discrimination and persecution against Christians in Burma, will be launched at a meeting of the UK Government's All Party Parliamentary Group on Burma to be held in the Wilson Room, Portcullis House, House of Commons on Tuesday 23 January 2007 from 6pm to 8pm. The meeting will be chaired by John Bercow MP. The report will be presented by CSW’s Advocacy Officer for South Asia and author of the report, Benedict Rogers, and a delegation of Chin and Kachin activists from Burma will present evidence of human rights violations.

Muse district Drugs Control Forces (DCF) seized 20 kilograms of heroin, 50 kilograms of opium, about 1 million pills of Amphetamine (Yaba), 2 million Chinese RMB and 50 million Burmese Kyat from the homes of Daw Leetip Chang and Daw Karlut, near Pansay militia camp, Pansay village, Namkham township, Northern Shan State in 28 January 2007. The heroin, opium, Chinese cash and Burmese cash which were found in plastic bags were discovered in Daw Leetip Chang’s house. Daw Leetip Chang’s son-in-law, Chong Long Yung, escaped from detention as he was not at home at the time. Chong Long Yung is one of the leaders of the Pansay militia. Daw Leetip Chang’s family is well known for producing and smuggling drugs in that area.

Burma's top generals are in the throes of a full-blown power struggle as they grapple with how best to introduce significant political reforms, including a planned move toward some form of democracy, and hand political power to a new generation of military commanders. Senior General Than Shwe, head of the ruling State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), is of failing health and in recent months has become increasing reclusive amid growing international pressure for political change - including the United States' recent failed attempt to impose sanctions against the regime through the United Nations Security Council. Against that backdrop, the SPDC's top three generals - Than Shwe, Maung Aye and Thura Shwe Mann - reportedly cannot agree on how to move forward, according to Western diplomats who spoke with Asia Times Online.

Police Major-General Amaresrit Wattanavibool must have been unduly encouraged by official reports about dramatically low output of opium in Burma in recent years. He must have forgotten the wise saying, "You can prove anything with statistics except the truth." Nevertheless, I'm sure he will not be surprised to learn that opium production has now spread from the Shan State to other states and divisions in Burma: Karenni (Kayah), Kachin, Chin, Mandalay, Sagaing and Magwe, and what's more, from highlands to lowlands, farmers to police and soldiers and cold season to all seasons.

Today, the 31st of January, is the 58th Anniversary of Karen people’s war of revolutionary resistance. As the cause of the Karen is a political one, Karen national leaders had tried to resolve the problem peacefully by political means. However, as the ruling AFPFL government used military attacks to wipe out the Karen people’s movement, the armed resistance of the Karen People had arisen inevitably. The Karen national leaders have met with successive military regimes in power in order to resolve the problem peacefully by political means, on several occasions. However, as the resolution of problem peacefully by political means has not been successful, we still cannot struggle out of the war situation. The Karen people have been consistently calling for the resolution of problems politically through tripartite dialogue, as the cause of the Karen people, the cause of the various ethnic nationalities and that of the democratic forces as well, are basically political.

Amid harsh criticisms against China and Russia following their vetoing of US initiated draft resolution on Burma on 12 January, the anti-junta Shan State Army (SSA) South is counseling a different approach: dialogue instead of confrontation, according to Col Yawdserk. "The two countries may be hearing only from one side, and that is from the Burmese military, and not enough from us," he told S.H.A.N. "To them, the Burmese military may seem the only option seeing it is stronger, but force without justice never fosters peace and tranquility which both want and we should all endeavor to bring home the point to them."

On Feb 7, the Shan State Army will celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Panglong Agreement, which enshrines the rights of ethnic groups in Burma Shan State Army (SSA) leader Yawd Serk insists he is ready to hold peace talks with the Burmese government to break the country's political deadlock. "The SSA is ready to enter talks through political means if the Burmese government gives us the opportunity, " said Col Yawd Serk. He reiterated his readiness to negotiate with the junta as SSA troops and Shan people were preparing an event to mark the 60th anniversary of the Panglong Agreement on Feb 7.

Myanmar's military government may have narrowly escaped United Nations Security Council sanction, but it is facing an unprecedented political challenge at home, not by the crippled opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) but by an emerging network of dissidents who refer to themselves as the 88 Generation Students' Group. Unlike the NLD, the 88 Generation is not a political party, but rather a movement comprising a generation of students who were active during the 1988 pro-democracy uprising. The military crushed that movement and later sentenced many of the demonstrators to prison for various anti-state crimes. Nearly two decades later, many of those activists are now coming of age and in recent months they have launched a series of civil-disobedience campaigns that have openly challenged the ruling junta.

When SWAN issued the “Licence to Rape” report to the international community, it told a sad and true story of Shan State and Shan State peoples to the outside world. Later, the “Licensed to Lie” report of the SPDC appeared, and it rambles on slowly as though waking up from sin, and running with a limp, to shout their lie squarely, to the inside peoples of the so-called Union of Burma with a special hateful racist attitude. However, as many people know, it is not unusual for the Burmese regime to always retaliate and avenge in this way to all kinds of opposition. It is their normal behaviour and their own way. But after I had read SPDC’s “Licensed to Lie” that responds to SWAN’s “Licence to Rape”, I suddenly remembered my friend’ face when he passed the book to me and ask me to read it. He, who did not know who Charm Tong is before, and what SWAN is, and what their work is. But his face was very angry and he said to me, “you just read this book, your mother’ xxx marn” which surprised me. Now I understand his feelings and learned that, although he is an ordinary young Shan like me who had been educated under Burmese ideological school since childhood and had been taught Burmese ideological concepts, his consideration and the conscience of his human nature means that he realizes what is right and what is wrong.

Shwe Ohn, elder Shan leader, calls on the National League for Democracy (NLD):

• To confer with allied parties before making important decisions
• To form a consultative council for the purpose
• To formulate short-term, long-term plans in consultation with the said council
• To continue placing priority to holding dialogue with the SPDC

Reports of the arrival of ten 10-wheeled trucks of the United Wa State Army (UWSA) on the border last week have triggered a new red alert among Shan and Thai security services. The trucks arrived in Hwe Aw, Mongton township, opposite Chiangmai, in the dead of night on 11 January. They continued their way to Mongjawd, west of Hwe Aw, on the next day. While some sources have speculated that the fresh troops were for reinforcements in the Wa bases around the Shan State Army (SSA) South's Loi Taileng base, opposite Maehongson, some are wary about giving comments. "Twice during the last 3 months we had sounded alert of an imminent attack coming from the Burma Army which turned out to be false alarms," said one veteran Burma watcher. "So let me reserve my comments until further information have been received."

Long known for its wheeling and dealing in heroin, methamphetamines and pirated video discs, Myanmar's United Wa State Army (UWSA), the world's largest armed narcotics-trafficking group, is dangerously diversifying its business interests into a new type of contraband: newly produced war weapons. Intelligence sources inside Myanmar told Asia Times Online that the UWSA has recently established new production lines for assault rifles and light machine-guns inside the country's Special Region No 2, the UWSA-controlled autonomous enclave in northeastern Shan state. The factory became operational in September and occupies a structure inside UWSA chairman Bao You-xiang's heavily guarded compound in the town of Kunma, 125 kilometers north of the militia's main headquarters at Pangshang.

A ten-fold pay rise last year notwithstanding, more and more army men and their families are being forced to look out for themselves and some of them are engaging in poppy cultivation, reports Hawkeye from the border: Shans coming from Kengtawng sub-township, Mongnai township, Langkher district, Southern Shan State told S.H.A.N. among the officers-turned- poppy growers were two from Kunmong-based Light Infantry Battalion (LIB) 569: one a company commander with the rank of captain and another Sgt Joseph of Lahu descent. "They used to tax us in the past," said a 56-year old grandmother from the area. "But this year, they tax us and they also grow poppies themselves." Which was reassuring, according to her 61 year old friend. "We used to worry that they might change their minds all of a sudden and destroy our fields," she said. "But now we know we are in the same boat."

A year after the cross-border timber trade has been closed off by Burma's ruling military junta, the cash-strapped Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) is increasingly becoming dependent on drug production and trade for survival, Hawkeye reports from the Sino-Burma border: Before 2006, the group's income could be roughly broken down into 4 categories, according to sources close to the KIO: timber (40%), jade (30%), casinos (20%) and others (10%). However, since the arrival in 2005 of the new regional commander Maj-Gen Ohn Myint in Kachin State, the logging business have been seeing better days. Chinese loggers working in the Kachin forests were cracked down and some shot down in cold blood, forcing several Chinese companies to close shop.

The world’s largest tiger reserve—the Hugawng Valley Wildlife Sanctuary in far northwest Burma—is threatened by extensive gold mining operations that not only devastate the environment but lead to human right violations and social problems in isolated communities, according to the Kachin Development Networking Group. A report, “Valley of Darkness: Gold mining and militarization in Burma’s Hugawng Valley,” released by the group on Wednesday, says the Burmese military has increased significantly in the Hugawng Valley area despite a ceasefire agreement reached between the junta and the ethnic Kachin Independence Organization, a former insurgent group.

Speaking in Stockholm's parliament building and later at the church of Salemkyrkan where he was accepting the Martin Luther King Prize yesterday, Burma's opposition Ethnic Nationalities Council (ENC) General Secretary Dr Lian Hmung Sakhong called for "state-building" in lieu of "nation-building" that has been pursued by the country's military regime since 1962. He said in a country like Burma peopled by multi-nationalities , the notion of nation-building in which the concept of 'nation' is blended with "one ethnicity, one language and one religion," the only choice for minority groups is between assimilation and resistance.

Since the fall of ex-prime minister Khin Nyunt in October 2004, the situation for most cease-fire groups has deteriorated, as they no longer have access to the centre of power in Burma . The situation is particularly difficult for groups such as the New Mon State Party (NMSP) and Kachin Independence Organisation (KIO), which have publicly challenged the government - including by endorsing Burma 's inclusion on the UN Security Council agenda. Since it reconvened in 2004, 28 cease-fire groups have sent over one hundred delegates to the National Convention - although most realise that this process is designed to perpetuate and institutionalise military rule. The NMSP, KIO and several other cease-fire groups have issued demands regarding the type of (broadly federal) constitution they would like to see emerging from the convention. In doing so they have sketched the outlines of what a future political settlement to "the ethnic question" in Burma might look like. Although most of their demands have been rejected by the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), in expressing their aspirations the cease-fire groups have raised the political profile of Burma 's ethnic nationalities.