POLITICS-BURMA: Coming Weeks Watched for Signs of Some Change

By Larry Jagan Reprint | | Print |

Analysis - By Larry Jagan

BANGKOK, Sep 9 2003 (IPS) - The coming weeks will show if new, though modest, signs of possible moves toward some reform by the Burmese military government will indeed come to fruition.

Interviews with Burmese leaders, diplomats and analysts show that they are closely following reports that Rangoon is under increased pressure from South-east Asian governments to free opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi before a regional summit next month – and that new Prime Minister Gen Khin Nyunt may take some new steps to restart the dialogue with her.

The U.N. special envoy Razali Ismail had been trying to visit Burma in the next few weeks, but has been refused entry, according to government sources. On Monday, he was dropping plans to go this time.

Still, he tried to encourage efforts toward a road map to reform in Burma, calling on foreign governments to give Khin Nyunt, who spoke about it at a press conference last month, ”a chance to try to get it done”.

”We hope that this proposal is the precursor, the beginning of a healing process that will bring about the release of Aung San Suu Kyi and other parties,” he said. Khin Nyunt promised to negotiate with Aung San Suu Kyi’s party on stalled efforts to draft a new constitution, and later hold free and fair elections, but did not spell out what role there was for Suu Kyi.

There is also given growing speculation in Rangoon that the Burmese government is planning to meet directly with Aung San Suu Kyi.

”A meeting between Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and Burma’s military rulers was scheduled,” an Asian diplomat in Bangkok who regularly deals with Burma said in an interview. ”It was to be with the members of the SPDC (State Peace and Development Council, as the junta is called) and the regional commanders,” he said.

Diplomats in Rangoon believe there has already been a meeting several weeks ago between a senior member of the regime, probably Gen Khin Nyunt and Aung San Suu Kyi.

The military intelligence liaison officer General Than Thun has been seeing the opposition leader regularly over the last two months, according to Burmese military sources.

”The question now is where will the national reconciliation process go from here.,” a Rangoon-based Asian diplomat said in an interview. ”Is Khin Nyunt going to include Aung San Suu Kyi in the dialogue process?”

Khin Nyunt in his newly appointed capacity as prime minister obviously plans to reconvene the National Convention, which was established more than 10 years ago to draw up a new constitution.

It has not met now for nearly five years since Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy (NLD) walked out in protest at the lack of free debate and discussion within the convention and its unrepresentative nature.

A new convening committee has been named and the process of drafting a new constitution likely to restart soon. It is all part of Khin Nyunt’s seven-stage road map to democracy.

But unless the NLD is involved, the national convention is likely to remain ineffectual.

In recent days, too, the Indonesian government, host of the summit of the Association of South-east Asian Nations (ASEAN), which is hosting the meeting, called on Rangoon to free Suu Kyi before that goes underway.

Officially, Aung San Suu Kyi is still being held in a secret location somewhere in Rangoon, and the government says it is for her own protection. She was put under ‘protective custody’ on May 30, after a violent attack on her convoy blamed on the Burmese military junta.

Originally she was incarcerated in the capital’s notorious Insein prison. She has since been moved from there, according to Burmese government officials. ”We believe she is being held in a State Guest House not far from her own residence,” said a senior Asian diplomat who asked not to be named.

Observers in Rangoon believe that Aung San Suu Kyi’s release will be a staged affair and that she is likely to be moved to her home and put under house arrest in the near future.

”It is likely to be a return to the situation prior to her release last year,” said a Rangoon-based diplomat. ”She’ll be allowed to meet some of the other senior NLD party leaders who are currently under house arrest, but not diplomats,” he added.

The government has denied her access to visitors except Razali and representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross, who saw her on Saturday.

International concern about Aung San Suu Kyi was complicated by allegations that the opposition leader was on a hunger strike in protest against her continued detention. Despite widespread scepticism, the U.S. State Department insisted that it knew better than anyone.

”Daw Aung San Kyi knows how crucial she is to the democracy movement and would unnecessarily endanger her health,” said a senior ranking member of her party.

The Burmese government reacted angrily and dismissed the U.S. claims. When the Red Cross saw Suu Kyi over the weekend for half an hour, they endorsed the Burmese government’s position that she was not on hunger strike.

Burma’s military rulers must now be feeling smug, and called the U.S. government ”irresponsible”. U.S. credibility is certainly shattered.

At best it has been a major public relations coup for Rangoon and seems to strengthen their allegations of interference by the West. But it is not going to effect the key issue in Burma’s political future what role Aung San Suu Kyi and her NLD will play in the process of reform.