Friday, June 14, 2013

Democratic Voice of Burma

Democratic Voice of Burma

Thein Sein to visit Britain, France in July

Posted: 14 Jun 2013 04:12 AM PDT

President Thein Sein will visit Britain and France next month, an official said on Friday, as the international community continues to embrace his nation’s democratic reforms.

Thein Sein will travel to up to four countries on his second trip to Europe in months, a government official said requesting anonymity.

“Our President Thein Sein will visit about three or four countries in mid July…. he will visit the UK and Paris in France for sure,” a Burmese government official told AFP, adding detailed information of who will accompany him has not been released.

Burma’s leader visited several European countries in March – although not Britain or France – to drum up support for reforms that he has overseen since taking the presidency in 2011.

Those changes include freeing some political prisoners and holding by-elections, which saw opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi take a seat in parliament.

The European Union on Wednesday readmitted Burma to its trade preference scheme, saying it wanted to support reform in the once pariah state through economic development.

Burma’s membership of the scheme was withdrawn in 1997 due to concerns over the use of forced labour under the then-military junta, but it was reinstated in response to an International Labour Organisation report that labour practices in Burma had improved.

The EU had already ditched most sanctions against the country, although an arms embargo remains.

Washington has also lifted most embargoes and foreign companies are now eager to enter the resource-rich nation, with its perceived frontier market of some 60 million potential consumers.

Thein Sein met US President Barack Obama in Washington last month, becoming the first Burmese leader to do so for nearly half a century in a symbol of the end of his country’s diplomatic isolation.

UN convoy delivers aid to IDP camps in rebel territory

Posted: 14 Jun 2013 03:44 AM PDT

A ten-truck UN convoy with humanitarian assistance for more than 5,000 people arrived in displacement camps behind rebel lines in Kachin state on Friday for the first time in more than a year.

Since a 17-year ceasefire broke down between the Kachin Independence Organisation (KIO) and the government in 2011, Naypyidaw has consistently prevented the UN and international aid groups from accessing the population of internally displaced persons (IDPs) living outside of government territory.

Following lengthy negotiations with the government, UN representatives in Rangoon said they aimed to send additional humanitarian aid to the more than 100,000 people who have been displaced during fighting that broke out in Kachin state two years ago.

"Now we have the agreement of all sides," said UN spokesperson Aye Win, adding that a recent seven-point agreement signed by the KIO and Naypyidaw in late May likely helped push the government to allow international aid groups to enter rebel territory.

"It's raining hard and these people are in dire need of assistance. We certainly hope that we will be able to continue the assistance."

Relief workers on the ground said officials would be hosting workshops at camps in Majayang tonight and would begin distributing aid on Saturday.

According to the statistics published by the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, approximately 60,000 IDPs are living in territory outside of the government's control in Burma's far north.

In the past two years, the population has largely had to rely on support provided by community-based organisations, which often lack the financial support and distributional capacity to address the needs of the tens of thousands of displaced residents.

"The cross-line convoy represents a positive step forward by the government to help all people in need across Kachin state. It is crucial for this convoy to be the first of many, and that regular and unimpeded access to all people displaced in Kachin state is sustained," said UN Humanitarian Coordinator Ashok Nigam in a report published by the agency on Friday.

While rights groups lauded the UN's tenacity in pressing the government to allow aid groups access to the IDP camps behind KIO lines, analysts said it would take more than one convoy for Naypyidaw to prove they are willing to start abiding by basic humanitarian principles.

"The government has allowed the Burmese military to play games with humanitarian aid, that is the bottom line here," said Phil Robertson, deputy-Asia director of Human Rights Watch (HRW) during an interview with DVB.

"Now, the government needs to prove to the international community that they're prepared to fully comply with the international human rights practice of [providing] assistance to all, wherever they happen to be, according to their needs and nothing else."

Although the recent deal signed by the KIO and government-backed peace negotiators in May sought to reduce fighting between the two sides, the Kachin have refused to sign an official ceasefire with Naypyidaw until the country's ethnic minorities are granted greater political autonomy.

During the talks chief peace negotiator Aung Min said President Thein Sein is planning on hosting a summit later this summer with all of the country's armed groups to commence a political dialogue aimed at ending the myriad civil wars that have plagued Burma since independence.

 

Monks promote law restricting interfaith marriages

Posted: 14 Jun 2013 02:16 AM PDT

About 200 senior Buddhist monks met at a monastery in Rangoon to discuss ways to end violence between Buddhists and Muslims in Burma. The monks drafted a law that proposed restricting interfaith marriages and controlling the birthrate among Muslim families.

A long way to go

Posted: 13 Jun 2013 10:26 PM PDT

Despite a decline in HIV cases, Burma still has the worst infection rates in Asia.

A government plan was put in place two years ago to ensure that everybody would have access to anti-retroviral drugs by 2015, and aimed to have a generation free from HIV by this time.

But thousands of people are still not getting the treatment they need.

Malaysia to repatriate Burmese nationals after clashes

Posted: 13 Jun 2013 09:49 PM PDT

Malaysia said Thursday it would work with Burma to repatriate thousands of their nationals following clashes in the community that left at least four dead and led to a security sweep.

The two Southeast Asian nations insisted that violence – beginning late May at a wholesale market in Kuala Lumpur – linked to strife between majority Buddhists and minority Muslims in Burma was under control.

Malaysian authorities have suggested Buddhists came under attack from Muslim countrymen seeking vengeance over deadly sectarian strife back in Burma.

“It is a clash of Myanmars (Burmese) among themselves… The quarrel they have back home is brought to our country,” Malaysian Deputy Home Minister Wan Junaidi Jaafar told reporters after meeting a delegation from Burma.

He said some 257,000 Burmese nationals work in Muslim-majority Malaysia — 144,000 of these illegally – filling mostly lowly paid jobs in plantation, construction and other sectors shunned by locals.

Some 250 people remain in detention here after a security sweep last week following the deadly clashes, in addition to illegals held previously.

“We have 4,400 Myanmar detained in immigration detention centres now, and we have invited the Myanmar authorities, especially the embassy, to… bring them back,” Wan Junaidi said.

He also called on the United Nations refugee agency to swiftly process those who say they are refugees and feel unsafe to return to Burma.

The agency has documented some 95,000 Burmese refugees in Malaysia, which does not grant them any legal status but allows temporary stays.

Of them, 28,000 are Rohingya Muslims, who are denied citizenship in Burma, the United Nations has described them as one of the world’s most persecuted minorities.

Deadly sectarian strife pitting Buddhists against the Rohingya has continued since riots erupted last year in Burma’s western state of Arakan.

Burma's Deputy Foreign Minister Zin Yaw said in separate comments to reporters that the attacks in Malaysia were believed to be “gang-related” and not necessarily religious.

“We ask help from the Malaysian government to protect our people working here. Some want to go back to Myanmar so (we will) make arrangements for them to go back quickly,” he said.
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