Myanmar Minorities Still Under Attack

For all the good thing happening in Myanmar/Burma as the country comes out of decades of military rule, the  vicious turn against the Royinga Muslims, particularly in the coastal state of Rakhine, seems to be getting worse instead of better.  The UN this week, called attention to the situation.

(Reuters) – U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s latest report on Myanmar raises serious concerns about ethnic and religious tensions that have led to violence against Rohingya Muslims, though he praises the government’s attempts to press ahead with democratic reforms.

The situation is especially worrying in Rakhine state, Ban said, where deep rifts between the Buddhist and Muslim communities have widened and the conditions at camps for internally displaced persons have deteriorated.

“The deep-seated inter-ethnic and inter-religious tensions that have re-emerged around the country have given rise to further violence, loss of life, displacement of populations and destruction of property,” the U.N. chief said in his annual report to the General Assembly’s Third Committee.

Human Rights Watch says that the government so called action plan will make things worse, instead of better;

A draft government plan would entrench discriminatory policies that deprive Rohingya Muslims in Burma of citizenship and lead to the forced resettlement of over 130,000 displaced Rohingya into closed camps, Human Rights Watch said today

The plan, a copy of which was obtained by Human Rights Watch, does not recognize the term Rohingya, referring throughout to “Bengalis,” an inaccurate and derogatory term commonly used by Burmese officials and nationalist Buddhists. Muslims are only mentioned in the plan with reference to religious schools.

“The long-awaited Rakhine State Action Plan both expands and solidifies the discriminatory and abusive Burmese government policies that underpin the decades-long persecution of the Rohingya,” said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director. “It is nothing less than a blueprint for permanent segregation and statelessness that appears designed to strip the Rohingya of hope and force them to flee the country.”

The man largely responsible for extremist turn against the Royhinga. a Buddhist monk named Wirathu, appeared last week in Sri Lanka, to address a large rally called by the militant Buddhist sect there, Bodu Bala Sena, promising to join them in fighting the “Islamist threat.”

Aljazeera

 

Thai Generals Applying the Gags

Since overthrowing an elected government in May, [Thailand’s] military rulers have jailed opponents who dared speak out and silenced the rest with the threat of prosecution. They have censored the media, dispersed protesters and forbidden open debate over the nation’s fate.

So when roughly 150 people attended the latest in a series of talks Thammasat University called “Democracy Classroom,” one weary student reminded all those present they should only discuss failed regimes — “please repeat after me, OVERSEAS.”

A few minutes after the event began, however, it was cut short by police — triggering a rare public uproar from university professors nationwide over the expanding reach of junta censorship. The incident, the first of its kind on a college campus here since the coup, also underscored the fact that the deep societal tensions that have fueled a decade of political upheaval here are not being healed, but suppressed.

 

More at ABC news

From Global Voices

The new United Nations Special Rapporteur on Myanmar, Yanghee Lee, has concluded a visit in the country and issued an initial reportabout Myanmar’s human rights situation:

The opening up of democratic space for people to exercise their rights to freedom of opinion and expression and to freedom of assembly and association is widely acknowledged as one significant achievement in Myanmar’s continuing reform process. Yet, in recent months many of my interlocutors have seen the shrinking of that space for civil society and the media.

There are also continuing reports of the excessive use of force by the police and the authorities in breaking up protests.

Yanghee Lee also expressed concern about the “spread of hate speech and incitement to violence, discrimination and hostility in the media and on the Internet, which have fuelled and triggered further violence” against minority ethnic groups and Muslims.

Laos: Still Clearing American Bombs

Un effing believable

“Women are on the frontline of the effort to find and destroy millions of unexploded cluster bombs which are still claiming lives decades after being dropped on Laos.

The US dropped up to 260 million cluster bombs on Laos during the Vietnam War – the equivalent of one bombing mission every eight minutes, for nine years.

It left Laos as the most heavily bombed country, per capita, in the world.”

ABC News

Cambodia: Protests Erupt in Phnom Penh

Another note to travelers ( see earlier posts). Know where you are traveling and to whom your money is going.

Clashes between security forces and Cambodian opposition supporters in Phnom Penh have left nearly 60 people injured.

The violence occurred early Tuesday when Mu Sochua, an elected member of parliament from the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party, led hundreds of supporters to Freedom Park, which has been closed to rallies since January.

A group of security guards moved to beat back the protesters when they tried to hang a banner on the razor wire barring entry to the park.

The protesters, however, fought back and about 40 security guards were injured in the ensuing violence. According to witnesses, some were stripped of their uniforms while others were beaten with flags.

VOA

South East Asia Travel Tips

These notes from responsibletravel dot com are about Myanmar/Burma but could well be applied most anywhere, especially the neighbors in South East Asia.

“Tourism must tread very carefully in Burma; responsibletravel.com’s 2 minute travel guide (http://www.responsibletravel.com/holidays/burma) explains why:

It does not bode well for tourism that it values highly the places where it has had the least impact. Burma is essentially an untouched, tourism clean slate and care must be taken to ensure the industry sets out on the right, sensitive and responsible foot.

Burma still has a non-democratically elected government and human rights abuses continue. Tourists and tourism organisations should be aware and do all they can to ensure they are supporting the military junta as little as possible, but as all locally run guesthouses and restaurants etc pay taxes it is impossible not to fund the government in some way. Extra care therefore must be taken to ensure as much tourism money as possible ends up in local hands.

Bad tourism practises will take hold quickly if unchecked. Already Kayan women, famed for their elongated neck, are migrating to popular Inle Lake to earn a living from tourism, where they are photographed in a form of human zoo.

Even the most seasoned traveller will need to remind themselves that they are in a country unused to Western tourists, and the impact of an incorrectly calculated tip, a bare shoulder or refusal of food will be much greater than Burma’s more tourism-weary neighbours.

It may be depicted as a pristine wilderness but deforestation is a huge problem in Burma. Responsibly run tourism projects can offer a sustainable alternative to logging and poaching. It is important these are set up carefully and are well supported.

Read more: http://m.digitaljournal.com/pr/2058734#ixzz37kIT45y0

Thailand: Still Knotted by the Past

Traveler Awareness Bulletin:

Very interesting article on Thailand’s Great Depression revolution and how it has shaped the stumbling forward, most recently in the recent coup

“In many ways, the crisis that has convulsed Thailand for much of the past decade dates back to the turbulent period of the 1932 revolution that abolished the absolute monarchy and set out to establish democracy in the country and can be understood as part of a long, historical struggle between civilian politicians and royalist elites for primacy – a theme explored in the recently released book “Good Coup” Gone Bad, a collection of essays on the 2006 military coup, currently not available for purchase in Thailand.”

“Thailand cannot move forward until it has dealt with its past. As in 1932, the advance towards a meaningful democracy once again faces resistance from entrenched royalist elites. Today, however, the struggle is not only between aristocratic and “commoner” elites but has been nationalized to include all levels of a deeply divided society. Like the coup of 2006, the recent military takeover has deepened Thailand’s crisis instead of resolving it. This is unsurprising because neither were genuine attempts to break the impasse but were instead measures for the royalists to regain the upper hand.”

From The Diplomat

Myanmar: Journos to Jail

From NYT

“Myanmar took a giant step away from democracy last week when a court sentenced five journalists to 10 years in prison with hard labor for reporting news that the government did not The journalists were charged with threatening national security. Their conviction followed reporting in the weekly news journal Unity in January on the military’s seizure of farmland for construction of a chemical weapons facility.

AND
WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. State Department’s top human rights official on Wednesday accused Myanmar authorities of resorting to police state tactics after five journalists from a weekly magazine got 10 years of hard labor for a disputed story about a weapons factory.

AP

China Signals 30% of Car Fleet to be Non (less) Fossil Fuel

China’s official news agency reported that at least 30 percent of government cars that will be newly purchased will be electric cars or “new energy vehicles.”

“New energy vehicles” include plug-in hybrid cars, fuel cell-powered cars and solar-powered cars.

Tech Times

If true, and done, good.  How about throwing down the challenge glove China?  We won’t accept number 2.! Anyone else who promises 31% we’ll go to 32%.  A race to the top, instead of the bottom!  What a concept.

What about a World Cup, alternative fuel vehicles competing?

Burma Burns

The Buddhist led attacks on Myanmar Muslims has expanded beyond the initial targets of Royhinga, coastal people with imputed and real connections to Bangladesh.  Last week, mobs went after Chinese Muslims in the 2nd largest city, Mandalay.

Two men died.  Died ugly.

 The body of the Muslim man was identifiable by his wife only by a distinctive blemish on one of his toes.

More deaths were prevented by the intervention of a Buddhist monk, urging the club-wielding young men to go home.

A Buddhist monk, Galonni Sayadaw, approached the roving bands of young Buddhist men and urged them to return to their homes. The monk also publicly exhorted the chief of police, who as in previous bouts of religious unrest did not immediately intervene, to disperse the crowds.

In an interesting insight, a few are claiming, this is not simply spontaneous violence, or even something directed by the hate mongering  monk, Wirathu and his 969 movement.

Tin Tin Kyaw (centre) cries near the body of her husband Soe Min, a 51-year-old man who was killed in the riot, at a mosque in Mandalay. Photo: Reuters

Tin Tin Kyaw (centre) cries near the body of her husband Soe Min, a 51-year-old man who was killed in the riot, at a mosque in Mandalay. Photo: Reuters

David Scott Mathieson, an analyst with Human Rights Watch in Myanmar, wrote after the Mandalay riots that it appeared that the “violence was not just an organic eruption of communal resentment” and noted that it may have been linked to a planned visit to Mandalay on Sunday by Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the opposition leader. Burmese analysts have speculated that the violence might be associated with efforts to slow her ascension in politics and ultimately derail her attempts to become president.

NY Times: Fuller