BURMA: To Believe the Generals or Not, That Is the Question

By Marwaan Macan-Markar Reprint | | Print |

Analysis - By Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, Dec 10 2003 (IPS) - The mixed messages coming from Rangoon’s military government ahead of an unprecedented international meeting next week to discuss Burma’s future have lent more weight to the question of the hour: How serious are the generals?

This week, for instance, an interview with Burmese Prime Minister Gen Khin Nyunt on Japan’s public television station revealed that the impoverished South-east Asian country was hurting under the weight of current international pressure.

The general used the occasion to ask Japan to ease up on the tough line Tokyo has taken following the repression unleashed by the junta.

”To push for democratisation of our country, it is important that we build a solid economic foundation. Japan’s current economic assistance is not enough, but I believe Japan would extend a helping hand,” Khin Nyunt said on NHK.

Following the 1988 military crackdown of democracy advocates, after which the junta grabbed power, the Japanese government froze the flow of large-scale loans and other development assistance to Rangoon. Nevertheless, Tokyo still kept alive the flow of humanitarian aid.

Yet at the same time, the ruling generals are in no mood to be reprimanded by countries such as Japan, which will be one among the estimated 10 countries due to attend a Dec. 15 meeting in Bangkok to discuss political reform in Burma.

Late last week, the Burmese deputy foreign minister issued a veiled threat to the participating countries that the junta will not tolerate criticism. ”If (the meeting) is meant to criticise the nation, then we won’t attend, but if it is there as a constructive action we are willing to attend and clarify the situation,” Khin Maung Win told the media.

The thrust of the discussions, hosted by the Thai government, will focus on the seven-point plans for political reform announced by Khin Nyunt soon after he was appointed premier in August.

Burma watchers, however, are placing less emphasis on such signs of bravado and drawing attention to the significance of this month’s meeting itself. It is ”unprecedented,” since the military government has never favoured such international events, says Debbie Stothard of the human rights lobby Alternative ASEAN Network on Burma (ALTSEAN).

According to her, Rangoon’s decision to participate is more out of desperation to salvage itself than a major sea change within the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), as the junta calls itself, to achieve genuine reform.

”It is clear that the current international pressure being exerted on the SPDC by the U.S. sanctions is having an effect. It has triggered this change,” Stothard told IPS. ”We only hope the meeting will not stem this growing pressure.”

Mid-ay this year, the U.S. Congress endorsed a sanctions regime that included the ban on imports from Burma. At the time, the United States was the principal market for Burmese-made goods, according to a report on the sanctions by ALTSEAN.

In 2001, Burma shipped 456 million U.S. dollars worth of goods to U.S. markets, up from 443 million dollars in 2000, reveals the report.

In addition to Japan, the countries due to attend this month’s meeting include China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore.

Stothard’s scepticism about the SPDC’s commitment to change is shared by Burmese political exiles living in Thailand. Many say this is because of several reasons – Khin Nyunt’s ”road map” for reform has not mentioned a time frame for change, pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi or her National League for Democracy are not named, and the document is as silent on the fate of the country’s many ethnic communities.

Hence, exiles like Soe Aung wryly observe: ”This is an opportunity for the SPDC to show that they are doing something to solve the country’s domestic politics. The meeting will give legitimacy for the SPDC’s road map, which is military dominance.”

Such a reading by Soe Aung, external affairs director at the Network for Democracy and Development (NDD), an umbrella organisation of Burmese exiles, stems from the string of false starts and failures by Rangoon’s junta to push for meaningful change.

The May arrest of Nobel peace laureate Suu Kyi and her senior officials was a typical example of a setback. For Burmese exiles, it was another reason to lose faith in the SPDC’s political agenda.

Yet at the same time, the SPDC has succeeded in convincing a traditional foe that the ”road map” has merits worth endorsing. This week, a leader of an ethnic rebel movement that has been fighting Rangoon for decades was quoted as having said that the SPDC appears genuine.

”(Karen National Union) Deputy Chairman Gen Bo Mya said he has fewer doubts about the genuineness of the junta’s intentions after hearing his deputy’s reports of their discussions in Rangoon,” the on-line magazine ‘Irrawaddy,’ published by Burmese exiled in Thailand, reported in its Dec. 9 edition.

The junta received similar ringing endorsements from Razali Ismail, the former Malaysian diplomat who has tried to push the junta towards reform in his capacity as the U.N. special envoy to Burma, which the junta has renamed Myanmar.

”It is inevitable that change will happen in Myanmar,” Razali told journalists on Monday in Kuala Lumpur. ”There is progress, but there are bigger expectations politically and economically.”

For Stothard, this month’s unprecedented meeting will, if anything, help clarify to which tune Rangoon’s generals have chosen to march. ”The countries participating have a big responsibility to make sure the SPDC is not given a break, but pressured into moving towards genuine reform,” she said.