Wednesday, December 27, 2017

The Irrawaddy Magazine

The Irrawaddy Magazine

Yangon Govt to Sell 1,200 Affordable Apartments

Posted: 27 Dec 2017 01:34 AM PST

YANGON — The Department of Urban and Housing Development under the Ministry of Construction will sell, for the first time since the new government took office, more than 1,200 affordable apartments in Yangon Region under the arrangement of the regional government.

"The regional government has formed a team to sell the apartments. The team will include officials from our department as well as other authorities," said director U Yu Khaing of the Yangon branch of the Urban and Housing Development Department.

"We'll announce soon when and how we'll sell those apartments," he added.

The apartments—categorized as low-cost and reasonably priced structures, respectively—for sale are in Kanaung Housing in Dagon Seikkan Township, Yuzana Garden Housing Phase-1, and Shwe Lin Pan Housing Phases 2 and 3 in Hlaing Tharyar Township, according to director U Yu Khaing.

More than 700 low-cost units and about 500 reasonably priced apartments will be up for grabs, he added.

"We'll sell the apartments in Shwe Lin Pan Housing Phases 2 and 3 first. There are about 1,000 apartments there. They will be sold according to the plan of the Yangon regional government," he said.

The prices of the low-cost apartments start at 9.8 million kyats and prices of apartments at lower and ground levels are a little bit higher, standing between 12 and 12.5 million kyats, according to the Urban and Housing Development Department.

Most of the buildings will have four floors with six apartments on each level. The reasonably priced apartments will be more spacious, and the prices will be between 20 and 40 million kyats.

A total of 2,208 apartment units are being built in Yangon Region, and the regional government is planning to sell more than 1,200 of them that have been completed so far. Retired civil servants, retirees and the homeless will be favored to purchase the apartments, which can be paid for in installments.

Those wishing to buy the apartments have to open a bank account at the Construction and Housing Development Bank (CHDB), and upon saving up to 30 percent of the price of the apartment, buyers can get 10 year loans from the bank to pay the remaining 70 percent in installments, said U Hein Wai Naung, assistant manager of the bank.

"They can start living at the apartments after paying 30 percent. They will get ownership after they pay in full," he said.

Under the U Thein Sein government, the regional government sold 527 low-cost apartments in Shwe Lin Pan Housing in Hlaing Tharyar Township.

Meanwhile, the Construction Ministry is also planning to reduce the savings amount from 30 percent to 20 percent, as well as increase the loan period from 10 to 15 years.

Translated from Burmese by Thet Ko Ko.

The post Yangon Govt to Sell 1,200 Affordable Apartments appeared first on The Irrawaddy.

Monks Get Jail, Hard Labor for Anti-govt Protest

Posted: 27 Dec 2017 01:21 AM PST

MANDALAY — A court in Chanmyathazi Township, Mandalay Region, on Wednesday sentenced six nationalist monks to a year and a half in prison with hard labor for taking part in an anti-government protest.

The Buddhist monks were all arrested during a police raid on their protest camp in early August and later charged with incitement under Article 505 (b) of the Penal Code. They had been calling on the government to step down for failing to protect national interests.

"One year and six months in prison is too harsh. We will submit an appeal to the higher courts," said U Aung Ye Soe, the monks' lawyer.

U Kyaw Myo Shwe, a layman also facing an incitement charge for taking part in the same protest, is still on trial and has requested bail for health reasons. He was arrested two days after the monks when he showed up at court for his lawsuit against a Myanmar Now reporter.

U Kyaw Myo Shwe's next court appearance is scheduled for Jan. 3.

There are still arrest warrants out for two monks and four laymen related to the protest.

"We are not afraid of the harsh sentence. Down with the NLD government!" the monks yelled before being sent back to Obo Prison — where they will serve their jail terms — after Wednesday's sentencing.

More than 50 monks and dozens of other supporters greeted the defendants at the court with flowers and food and panned the government for arresting and suing them.

The post Monks Get Jail, Hard Labor for Anti-govt Protest appeared first on The Irrawaddy.

Journalists Appear in Court after 15 Days of Interrogation

Posted: 27 Dec 2017 12:08 AM PST

YANGON — "We have not made a mistake, neither violations of the media law nor ethics. As we have to face this situation, we will face it as best we can," said Ko Wa Lone, a detained Reuters journalist who appeared at the Mingalardon Township court on Wednesday for the first time since his arrest on Dec. 12.

Ko Wa Lone and his colleague Ko Kyaw Soe Oo were arrested for allegedly violating the colonial-era Official Secrets Act and questioned at the Aung Tha Pyay police interrogation center in Mayangone Township for 15 days.

Ko Wa Lone told reporters that he was "fine" and faced no mistreatment during the detention.

Two police officers who were also detained along with the reporters did not appear at the court on Wednesday.

The pair saw their family members for the first time since their arrest. Ma Pan Ei Mon, the wife of Ko Wa Lone (aka) Thet Oo Maung, and Ma Nyo Nyo Aye, the sister of Ko Kyaw Soe Oo, were able to talk to their loved ones and followed the pair in a van when they left the court.

Ma Nyo Nyo Aye told The Irrawaddy before meeting her brother that her family had been worried but that they didn't know what to do. "I want to see my brother," she said in a soft voice.

Ko Kyaw Soe Oo (aka) Moe Aung. (Photo: The Irrawaddy)

The pair was taken to Insein prison after about 10 minutes at court, where police extended the remand. They will appear next on Jan. 10.

U Than Zaw Aung, the lawyer for the pair, said: "We can only give details after looking at the case file."

The pair was charged under Section 3 of the Official Secrets Act, which carries a maximum prison sentence of 14 years.

The lawyer said, “The journalists should not be charged under this act. They were doing their job in accordance with journalistic ethics. Not only do the journalists suffer from such a charge, the public also loses its right to information.”

The two Reuters journalists had worked on coverage of a crisis in Rakhine, western Myanmar, where an estimated 655,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled from a fierce military crackdown on militants, following the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army's Aug. 25 attack on security outposts.

In solidarity with the detained journalists, the reporters covering their case wore black t-shirts to express their support of them and of press freedom in Myanmar.

The post Journalists Appear in Court after 15 Days of Interrogation appeared first on The Irrawaddy.

Thai Court Extends Deadline for Counter Appeal in Koh Tao Murder Case

Posted: 26 Dec 2017 10:41 PM PST

CHIANG MAI, Thailand — Thailand's Supreme Court has approved Thai prosecution lawyers' request to extend their counter appeal deadline by one month in the case of two Burmese migrants who were sentenced to death for the murder of two British backpackers.

The defense team—made up of members of the Lawyers Council of Thailand, legal advisers from the Myanmar government, and members of non-governmental organizations advocating for labor rights—submitted a 319-page appeal to Thailand's Supreme Court in August.

Since then, Thai prosecution lawyers have asked four separate times to postpone the deadline for them to counter the appeal.

The prosecution team is set to submit their argument against the appeal on Jan. 23, said defense lawyer U Aung Myo Thant.

"They are not yet ready to make the final plea, and therefore set the date for the 23rd of next month," he told The Irrawaddy.

Win Zaw Htun and Zaw Lin—both in their early 20s—were sentenced by the Koh Samui Township Court in December 2015 for charges they have denied, involving the September 2014 deaths of British nationals Hannah Witheridge, 23, and David Miller, 24, on Koh Tao island.

The Thai police's investigation of the murder has raised questions over the integrity of the prosecution as police failed to test Witheridge’s clothing and were unable to find any DNA, apart from that of the victims, on the alleged murder weapon, a blood-stained hoe.

"The two were in good health except that Zaw Lin had a toothache when I visited them some time ago," said U Aung Myo Thant.

In March, they lost their first appeal to the District Court, which spanned 198 pages and was submitted in May 2016.

The Thai police at first said that the two suspects confessed to killing the British backpackers, but later both defendants testified they were beaten and threatened into making confessions.

Translated from Burmese by Thet Ko Ko.

The post Thai Court Extends Deadline for Counter Appeal in Koh Tao Murder Case appeared first on The Irrawaddy.

China, Pakistan to Look at Including Afghanistan in $57 Billion Economic Corridor

Posted: 26 Dec 2017 08:30 PM PST

BEIJING — China and Pakistan will look at extending their $57 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor to Afghanistan, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Tuesday, part of China's ambitious Belt and Road plan linking China with Asia, Europe and beyond.

China has tried to position itself as a helpful party to promote talks between Pakistan and Afghanistan, both uneasy neighbors ever since Pakistan's independence in 1947.

Their ties have been poisoned in recent years by Afghan accusations that Pakistan is supporting Taliban insurgents fighting the US-backed Kabul in order to limit the influence of its old rival, India, in Afghanistan.

Pakistan denies that and says it wants to see a peaceful, stable Afghanistan.

Speaking after the first trilateral meeting between the foreign ministers of China, Pakistan and Afghanistan, Wang said China hoped the economic corridor could benefit the whole region and act as an impetus for development.

Afghanistan has urgent need to develop and improve people's lives and hopes it can join inter-connectivity initiatives, Wang told reporters, as he announced that Pakistan and Afghanistan had agreed to mend their strained relations.

"So China and Pakistan are willing to look at with Afghanistan, on the basis of win-win, mutually beneficial principles, using an appropriate means to extend the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor to Afghanistan," he added.

How that could happen needs the three countries to reach a gradual consensus, tackling easier, smaller projects first, Wang said, without giving details.

Pakistani Foreign Minister Khawaja Asif said his country and China were "iron brothers," but did not directly mention the prospect of Afghanistan joining the corridor.

"The successful implementation of CPEC (China-Pakistan Economic Corridor) projects will serve as a model for enhancing connectivity and cooperation through similar projects with neighboring countries, including Afghanistan, Iran and with central and west Asia," he said.

India has looked askance at the project as parts of it run through Pakistan-administered Kashmir that India considers its own territory, though Wang said the plan had nothing to do with territorial disputes.

China has sought to bring Kabul and Islamabad together partly due to Chinese fears about the spread of Islamist militancy from Pakistan and Afghanistan to the unrest-prone far western Chinese region of Xinjiang.

As such, China has pushed for Pakistan and Afghanistan to improve their own ties so they can better tackle the violence in their respective countries, and has also tried to broker peace talks with Afghan Taliban militants, to limited effect.

A tentative talks process collapsed in 2015.

Wang said China fully supported peace talks between the Afghan government and Taliban and would continue to provide "necessary facilitation."

The Belt and Road infrastructure drive aims to build a modern-day "Silk Road" connecting China to economies in Southeast and Central Asia by land and the Middle East and Europe by sea.

The post China, Pakistan to Look at Including Afghanistan in $57 Billion Economic Corridor appeared first on The Irrawaddy.
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