BURMA: Forced Labour Pangs Hit Junta

By Marwaan Macan-Markar Reprint | | Print |

Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK , Nov 18 2005 (IPS) - Burma’s military regime faces new hurdles, courtesy the International Labour Organisation (ILO), even as it desperately tries to redeem a record of extensively using forced labour.

Rangoon used a meeting of the ILO’s governing body to confirm that it would remain a member of the Geneva-based agency, ending weeks of speculation that it would quit the ILO. Burma’s representative told the meeting, on Thursday, that the South-east Asian country was willing to ”cooperate” with ILO.

But the junta has just four months to prove that it is serious about improving labour conditions. That includes senior members of the Burmese regime resuming an ”effective dialogue” with ILO representatives in Rangoon on ways to end forced labour.

The regime, which has changed the country’s name to Myanmar, is also under pressure from the ILO to end intimidation and prosecution of victims of forced labour or their representatives.

A test for the military government is to investigate death threats directed at the ILO liason officer in Rangoon, Richard Horsey. Between August and September, the 32-year-old official received 21 threats to his life via letters delivered through the postal system to his private residence.

One of the handwritten letters warns: ”If you interfere in our internal affairs, your head will be cut off and our people will crush you and poison you. Be careful, danger is everywhere for you.”

Till now, there has been little initiative on the junta’s part to investigate these threats, despite complaints being made, Horsey told IPS. ”There has been no response from the government and no sign of any investigations.”

Burma’s notorious forced labour record is only one in a long list of human rights violations that have hardly abated in the past five years, says Paulo Pinheiro, the U.N. human rights envoy to Burma.

Pinheiro’s bleak assessment of the increasingly secretive and oppressive country was announced at a press conference here Friday. ”I don’t see a big change that there has been an improvement in human rights,” he said of the period that he has been monitoring Burma, beginning in 2001.

Forms of forced labour common in Burma range from villagers in the provinces compelled by threats to porter for the army, build roads and bridges, cultivate military land and construct buildings. The victims are largely from the country’s ethnic minorities

Any hope of political transition from the current repressive state to a more open and democratic one is being undermined by the way the junta ill-treats pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, he added. ”The ICRC (International Committee of the Red Cross) has access to every prisoner in the country but has no access to (her).”

The junta has kept Suu Kyi under house arrest for 10 of the past 16 years. Since January, she has been subject to complete isolation, with even the family physician denied regular access to the Nobel Peace laureate.

At the same time, Rangoon has not eased its policy of arresting and jailing those it deems a political threat to its existence. Currently, there are close to 1,400 political prisoners in Burmese jails, which includes journalists, writers, parliamentarians, Buddhist monks and student activists.

This week, U.S. President George W. Bush reminded the Burmese generals, in undiplomatic language just what Washington thought of their iron grip on power. Bush described Burma as an outpost of ”isolation, backwardness and brutality”, during a speech in South Korea, ahead of a summit meeting of Asia-Pacific leaders.

The Burmese army, which came to power following a coup in 1962, has been condemned for human rights violations ranging from suppression of political and civil liberties, denying freedom of expression and systematically raping women during conflicts with ethnic communities.

It is, however, over the widespread use of forced labour that Rangoon has been compelled to respond, as was evident again this week, since the pressure from the members of the ILO has not been easy to ignore.

In June, the 178-member ILO told the Burmese regime that it is through with its ”wait-and-see” policy over forced labour reforms. This opened the way for the ILO members, which includes governments, employers and workers organisations, to consider imposing sanctions on Burma.

The threats that hovered over Burma included an end to foreign investments, boycott from international trade unions and U.N. and multilateral agencies reviewing their work there.

Such unprecedented measures on an ILO member-country had been considered in 2001, following reports of forced labour. Yet, they were put on hold after Rangoon agreed to end the practice, including a law to ban forced labour and a plan to work with the ILO.

It was in May 2002, that the ILO had set up shop in Rangoon, with Horsey as its liason officer.

But by June this year, the ILO’s premier decision-making body, the International Labour Commission, conceded that Rangoon had not delivered on its promise of reforms. This week’s decision by the ILO’s governing body only adds to the pressure Rangoon has been subjected to.

”The ILO’s pressure is significant, since it has extracted the best results for the people of Burma,” says Debbie Stothard of the Alternative Association of South-east Asian Nations Network on Burma (ALTSEAN), a regional human rights lobby. ”The military regime has been compelled to respond to the ILO’s measures unlike other forms of engagement.”

It is clear that the regime is ”afraid of the ILO,” she added during an interview. ”I am glad that the ILO has refused to pander to the regime. That is what is needed for change.”