More protest marches break out in Burma

last SG · 2007-09-24T10:01:48+00:00

Burmas junta generals may have already sent their families out of the country. Apparently, they are frightened of the massive demonstrations occurring acro...

walesa SG

So can we assume having a system of incarcerating convicted criminals isn't actually effective just because there're repeat offenders whose actions would obviously suggest their incarceration had not served the purpose it was intended to serve? Political objective has not been met from sanctions because your limited intellect doesn't permit you to comprehend it to be so. I suppose to nincompoops like you, success and failure can only be measured in absolute terms and anything that doesn't achieve absolute success is, by defacto, a failure, isn't it?

You must be some goner to be espousing the very issue I had brought up to begin with. Why was it a goner - because of the lack of majority support or the lack of Chinese support? If it's the latter, isn't the fact the Chinese wielding their veto card that actually renders this ineffective? Does your schizophrenic mind even allow you to see the difference between the two examples? Or do you need to imagine some warped concotions to sell your spin?

Collective security is never an effective obligation even if you had a consensus simply because the UN does not maintain its own troops - no resolution will ever be binding as far as dictating international military action is concerned. That's got nothing to do with "playing cards" as your deluded mind is led to believe. It's obviously exclusive for morons like you, through a lack of proper understanding of the functioning mechanisms that govern the UN's operations, to regard the UN's role to be nothing but a "show case" and a "dysfunctional organisation". Maybe going over detailed case studies starting with the Suez Crisis would be a good start before you come back for another round of drivel...

What bollocks are you on about? Asian problem and Asian influence? Really, have any asian countries proved any more successful in trying to resolve the Burmese issue?

If your diatribe were true, why would China be bothered to issue a condemndation through the UN? And clearly, you lack a dose of basic common sense - how on earth are you supposed to establish a "more legitimate government" by retaining the present one? Lest you get confused, the UN was dealing with the more pressing humanitarian issue of the regime's crackdown on protestors than the need for the regime to be toppled. So why are you comparing an apple with an orange? I suppose you must be linguistically challenged to have interpreted things that way.

LazerLordz SG

China calls for quick reforms in Myanmar

YANGON, Myanmar (AP) -- China called on Myanmar to speed up democratic reforms, state media reported Saturday - an unusual move for Beijing, which has traditionally refrained from criticizing the military regime.

The call came as a U.N. human rights investigator wrapped up a trip to the country that he said had helped him to determine that at least 15 people died during the junta's crackdown on pro-democracy protests in September.

China's Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi also expressed support for U.N. attempts to reconcile the regime and the suppressed democracy movement during a two-day meeting with the junta that ended Friday. The state-controlled New Light of Myanmar newspaper reported the meeting only after Wang had left the country.

China, a communist country whose own record on democratic reforms and human rights has been criticized, is one of Myanmar's largest trading partners and its main political ally.

Beijing does not usually publicly criticize Myanmar's military government, a reflection of its position of strict noninterference in the internal affairs of the country.

But in recent weeks, it has been credited with working behind the scenes to pressure Myanmar to embrace democratic reforms after the crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrations.

China also provided important backing for the mission of Ibrahim Gambari, the U.N. secretary general's special envoy on Myanmar, by supporting a Security Council declaration and helping persuade Myanmar to allow him to visit twice.

As Wang's visit ended Friday, U.N. human rights investigator Paulo Sergio Pinheiro announced that at least 15 people died in Myanmar's biggest city when the military crushed the demonstrations, five more than the government had acknowledged.

"This is just in Yangon," Pinheiro said. "The government has not told me all the casualties in the country."

He said numbers were based on post-mortems and other official information, adding that he would continue seeking relevant information from other sources.

It was the first trip the junta allowed the Brazilian professor to make to the country in four years.

Pinheiro said he would give as complete an accounting as possible to the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva on Dec. 11.

Myanmar's military government has said 10 people were killed when troops opened fire on crowds of peaceful protesters in late September. Diplomats and dissidents, however, said the death toll was much higher.

Pinheiro said the authorities gave him post-mortem reports on 14 people whose bodies had been sent from Yangon General Hospital to be cremated. He said the 15th known fatality in the crackdown was Japanese journalist Kenji Nagai, who was shot dead by security forces.

Pinheiro was allowed to meet with several prominent political prisoners at Yangon's infamous Insein Prison during his trip. He described the facility, which holds about 10,000 prisoners, as being "old and overcrowded."

The government has said it detained almost 3,000 people during crackdown and that most of them have been released, but many prominent political activists remain in custody.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/M/MYANMAR?SITE=MOSTP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

googoomuck SG

ASEAN rejects US senate's call to suspend Myanmar

'It's like you as a parent, if you have a troubled child, do you say, 'Go to the sanitarium, go out of the house, I don't want to talk to you?' said ASEAN secretary-general Ong Keng Yong (above). -- PHOTO: AFP

I see no similarity between his parent-child analogy and the Burmese junta-people situation.
He should have empathy for the Burmese people while the juntas are mistreating them. His belief of more intensified dialogue is - what the critics called ASEAN - just a little more than a talk shop.

LazerLordz SG

Burma has decided to slap us in the face again.

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Myanmar rejects calls to include Suu Kyi in reforms

NAYPYIDAW - MILITARY-ruled Myanmar on Monday brushed off mass pro-democracy protests as 'trivial' and refused to include detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi in its own plodding reform plans.

Top officials spoke to reporters at the first press conference since the military staged a deadly crackdown on protests in September, leaving at least 15 dead and 3,000 jailed, according to a UN envoy.

Buddhist monks and former student leaders led the protests in the main city of Yangon and in provincial towns around the country, in the biggest challenge to military rule in nearly two decades.

But Information Minister Brigadier General Kyaw Hsan brushed off the protests as the work of 'bogus' monks organised by exiled dissidents and the United States.

'It is found with sound evidence that ex-convicted bogus monks got joined with anti-government groups inside and outside the country,' he said.

'Those unrests and violence, not participated by the majority of the people and the majority of monks, have been put under control,' he said.

National police chief Khin Yi said the protesters had hoped to overthrow the government.

'The demonstrations and protests were planned and conspired months ahead to topple the government,' Mr Khin Yi told reporters.

He accused a non-government organisation called the Forum for Democracy in Burma of working with exiled dissidents to orchestrate the protests, and said the US embassy had also helped train the activists.

'The American Centre held a three-day training course on infiltrating and organising the public,' he said.

'The uprisings dissolved within a very short time frame simply because the general public did not take part and our security forces were able to make pre-emptive strikes,' he added.

The crackdown drew international condemnation and demands for Myanmar to make democratic reforms and to free Aung San Suu Kyi, who has spent 12 of the last 18 years under house arrest.

Self-styled 'road map'
But BG Kyaw Hsan rejected those calls, saying the junta would stick to its own self-styled 'road map' to democracy.

A 54-member panel appointed by the junta began work on Monday on drafting a new constitution, which the regime says will eventually lead to elections.

A National Convention of delegates also chosen by the military wrapped up 14 years of talks in September, laying out principles to be enshrined in the new charter.

There is no timeline for completing the charter, and BG Kyaw Hsan ruled out any role for Aung San Suu Kyi or her National League for Democracy (NLD) party, which won elections in a landslide victory in 1990 but was never allowed to govern.

'No assistance or advice from other persons is required,' he said, adding that no changes to the National Convention's work would be considered.

'It is not reasonable or fair to amend those principles adopted by the delegates,' he said.

Since the crackdown, the United States and the European Union have toughened sanctions on Myanmar to push the regime to open a dialogue on democracy.

Prisoners released
State media said late on Monday that 8,585 prisoners had been released to mark the end of the National Convention, but the NLD said only 10 of the estimated 1,800 dissidents detained here were among them.

In hopes of defusing the global pressure, the junta appointed a liaison officer to coordinate contacts with Aung San Suu Kyi.

The person chosen, Aung Kyi, told the press conference that his three meetings with the Nobel peace prize winner had yielded 'positive developments,' but he declined to elaborate.

The top US diplomat in Yangon, Shari Villarosa, warned on Friday that the new constitution would have no international credibility unless the military brought the NLD and other political groups into the process.

'If they can somehow open it up so that there is more debate and it looks more representative, then it will gain more international acceptability,' she told reporters in Bangkok.

'If they continue on the track that they are on, without any changes whatsoever, it will have no credibility,' she said. -- AFP

http://www.straitstimes.com/Latest%2BNews/Asia/STIStory_183246.html

Demonight SG

bogus monks?sheesh…I’d call the junta a bogus government

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