Dragon’s Burmese Blister
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/24/dragons-burmese-blister/
China’s Myanmar Strategy: Elections, Ethnic Politics and Economics
Asia Briefing N°112
21 Sep 2010
China’s Myanmar Strategy: Elections, Ethnic Politics and Economics
Myanmar’s 2010 elections present challenges and opportunities for
China’s relationship with its south-western neighbour. Despite
widespread international opinion that elections will be neither free
nor fair, China is likely to accept any poll result that does not
involve major instability. Beijing was caught off-guard by the Myanmar
military’s offensive into Kokang in August 2009 that sent more than
30,000 refugees into Yunnan province. Since then it has used pressure
and mediation to push Naypyidaw and the ethnic groups that live close
to China’s border to the negotiating table. Beyond border stability,
Beijing feels its interests in Myanmar are being challenged by a
changing bilateral balance of power due to the Obama administration’s
engagement policy and China’s increasing energy stakes in the country.
Beijing is seeking to consolidate political and economic ties by
stepping up visits from top leaders, investment, loans and trade. But
China faces limits to its influence, including growing popular
opposition to the exploitation of Myanmar’s natural resources by
Chinese firms, and divergent interests and policy implementation
between Beijing and local governments in Yunnan.
The Kokang conflict and the rise in tensions along the border have
prompted Beijing to increasingly view Myanmar’s ethnic groups as a
liability rather than strategic leverage. Naypyidaw’s unsuccessful
attempt to convert the main ceasefire groups into border guard forces
under central military command raised worries for Beijing that the two
sides would enter into conflict. China’s Myanmar diplomacy has
concentrated on pressing both the main border groups and Naypyidaw to
negotiate. While most ethnic groups appreciate Beijing’s role in
pressuring the Myanmar government not to launch military offensives,
some also believe that China’s support is provisional and driven by
its own economic and security interests.
The upcoming 7 November elections are Naypyidaw’s foremost priority.
With the aim to institutionalise the army’s political role, the regime
launched the seven-step roadmap to “disciplined democracy” in August
2003. The elections for national and regional parliaments are the
fifth step in this plan. China sees neither the roadmap nor the
national elections as a challenge to its interests. Rather, Beijing
hopes they will serve its strategic and economic interests by
producing a government perceived both domestically and internationally
as more legitimate.
Two other factors impact Beijing’s calculations. China sees Myanmar as
having an increasingly important role in its energy security. China is
building major oil and gas pipelines to tap Myanmar’s rich gas
reserves and shorten the transport time of its crude imports from the
Middle East and Africa. Chinese companies are expanding rapidly into
Myanmar’s hydropower sector to meet Chinese demand. Another factor
impacting Beijing’s strategy towards Myanmar is the U.S.
administration’s engagement policy, which Beijing sees as a potential
challenge to its influence in Myanmar and part of U.S. strategic
encirclement of China.
Beijing is increasing its political and economic presence to solidify
its position in Myanmar. Three members of the Politburo Standing
Committee have visited Myanmar since March 2009 – in contrast to the
absence of any such visits the previous eight years – boosting
commercial ties by signing major hydropower, mining and construction
deals. In practice China is already Myanmar’s top provider of foreign
direct investment and through recent economic agreements is seeking to
extend its lead.
Yet China faces dual hurdles in achieving its political and economic
goals in Myanmar. Internally Beijing and local Yunnan governments have
differing perceptions of and approaches to border management and the
ethnic groups. Beijing prioritises border stability and is willing to
sacrifice certain local commercial interests, while Yunnan values
border trade and profits from its special relationships with ethnic
groups. In Myanmar, some Chinese companies’ resource extraction
activities are fostering strong popular resentment because of their
lack of transparency and unequal benefit distribution, as well as
environmental damage and forced displacement of communities. Many
believe such resentment was behind the April 2010 bombing of the
Myitsone hydropower project. Activists see some large-scale investment
projects in ceasefire areas as China playing into Naypyidaw’s strategy
to gain control over ethnic group territories, especially in resource-
rich Kachin State.
This briefing is based on interviews conducted on both sides of the
China-Myanmar border, including Yunnan province, Kachin State and Shan
State, as well as in Beijing, Kunming, Yangon, Chiang Mai, Bangkok,
New York and Washington DC. Crisis Group spoke to a wide range of
individuals, including: Chinese experts and officials, ethnic group
representatives, members of Burmese civil society, and local and
international NGOs. Most interviewees asked to remain anonymous, due
to the sensitive nature of the subject.
Beijing/Jakarta/Brussels, 21 September 2010
China’s Ambitions in Myanmar
India steps up countermoves
WHILE MYANMAR remains shunned by the West, the country’s two giant
neighbours, India and China, are jockeying for influence in Yangon.
Since the beginning of the year, India’s army chief General Ved
Prakash Malik has made two trips to Myanmar and his Burmese
counterpart General Maung Aye has visited both India and China. These
top-level exchanges have highlighted Myanmar’s importance in the
strategic competition between Beijing and New Delhi.
China enjoys a considerable head start in the race to woo Yangon’s
military leaders. Since 1988, Myanmar has become China’s closest ally
in South-east Asia, a major recipient of Chinese military hardware and
a potential springboard for projecting Chinese military power in the
region. During Maung Aye’s trip to Beijing in June to mark 50 years of
diplomatic ties, his host, Chinese Vice-President Hu Jintao, noted
that strengthening Sino-Myanmarese relations was ‘an important part of
China’s diplomacy concerning its surrounding areas’.
The alliance has alarmed India, which in recent years has shifted its
strategy away from supporting Myanmar’s opposition movement towards
cementing ties with the junta. New Delhi has offered Myanmar
favourable trade relations and cooperation against ethnic insurgents
along the Indo-Myanmarese frontier. India also appears to be
exploiting a rift between Maung Aye and the head of Myanmar’s powerful
military intelligence service, Lieutenant-General Khin Nyunt, viewed
as far more pro-Chinese than the army chief. New Delhi has engaged in
a charm offensive to encourage Maung Aye to take a more independent
foreign-policy stance.
Intelligence analysts say that China’s economic political and military
influence in the country has already become so strong that it would be
hard for Yangon radically to reorient its foreign policy But the
demise of Myanmar’s elder generation of military leaders could present
opportunities for India to woo Myanmar away from China.
Beijing and Yangon
Myanmar emerged as a key Chinese ally on 6 August 1988, when the two
countries signed an agreement establishing official trade across the
common border hitherto – isolated Myanmar’s first such agreement with
a neighbour. Significantly, the signing took place while Myanmar was
in turmoil. Two days later, millions of people across the country took
to the streets to demand an end to army rule and a restoration of the
democracy the country enjoyed prior to the first military coup in
1962.
China was eager to find a trading outlet to the Indian Ocean for its
landlocked inland provinces of Yunnan and Sichuan, via Myanmar. The
Myanmarese rail-heads of Myitkyina and Lashio in north-eastern
Myanmar, as well as the Irrawaddy River, were potential conduits. But
the relevant border areas were at the time controlled by the insurgent
Communist Party of Burma (CPB), which China had previously supported.
The CPB’s grip weakened in 1989, when the party’s hilltribe rank and
file mutinied against the ageing, Maoist and mainly Myanmarese party
leadership. Subsequently, the CPB split along ethnic lines into four
regional armies all of which then signed cease-fire agreements with
the government. By 1990, trade between the two countries was
flourishing and Myanmar had become China’s principal political and
military ally in South-east Asia. China poured arms into Myanmar to
shore up the military government.
Myanmar’s strategic significance
The isolation and condemnation experienced by both countries in the
wake of the Yangon massacre of 1988 and the violent suppression of the
Tiananmen Square protests the following year helped to draw them
closer together. But China’s calculations were also strategic. Close
to the key shipping lanes of the Indian Ocean and South-east Asia,
Myanmar could help China to extend its military reach into a region of
vital importance to Asian economies The bulk of Japan’s Middle East
oil imports, for example, pass through the area. China also wanted to
check India’s growing strategic influence.
By late 1991, Chinese experts were helping to upgrade Myanmar’s
infrastructure, including its badly maintained roads and railways.
Chinese military advisers also arrived that year, the first foreign
military personnel to be stationed in Myanmar since the 1950s. Myanmar
was becoming a de facto Chinese client state. Ironically, shrewd
diplomacy and flourishing bilateral trade had accomplished for China
what the insurgent CPB had failed to achieve.
One of China’s motives for arming Myanmar was to help safeguard the
new trade routes through its potentially volatile neighbour.
Intelligence sources estimate the total value of Chinese arms
deliveries to Myanmar in the 1990s at $1.2 billion, with most of them
acquired at a discount or through barter deals or interest-free loans.
Military hardware delivered by China included:
100 Type 6911 medium battle tanks and more than 100 Type 63 light
tanks (of which only around 60 are thought to be serviceable);
250 Type 85 armoured personnel carriers, multiple-launch rocket
systems, howitzers, anti-aircraft guns, HN-5 surface-to-air missiles,
mortars, assault rifles, recoilless guns, rocket-propelled grenade
launchers and heavy trucks;
Chengdu F-7M Airguard jet fighters, FT-7 jet trainers, A-5M ground-
attack aircraft and SAC Y-81) transport aircraft; and
Hainan-class patrol boats, Houxin-class guided-missile fast-attack
craft, minesweepers and small gunboats.
In the past year, China has also delivered 12 Karakoram-8 trainers and
1 ground-attack aircraft, which are produced in a joint venture with
Pakistan. The latest batch arrived in January.
India’s concerns
India has been particularly concerned by Chinese support for the
upgrading of Myanmar’s naval facilities. These include at least four
electronic listening posts along the Bay of Bengal and in the Andaman
Sea: Man-aung, Hainggyi, Zadetkyi island and the strategically
important Coco Islands just north of India’s Andaman Islands. Chinese
technicians have been spotted at the naval bases at Monkey Point, near
Yangon, and Kyaikkami, south of the port city of Moulmein. There is
also a Chinese-built radar station on Saganthit island near Mergui in
south-eastern Myanmar.
Although China’s presence in the Bay of Bengal is currently limited to
instructors and technicians, the new radar equipment is Chinese-made
and probably operated, at least in part, by Chinese technicians,
enabling Beijing’s intelligence agencies to monitor this sensitive
maritime region.
China and Myanmar have pledged to share intelligence of potential use
to both countries.
In May 1998, the outspoken Indian defence minister, George Fernandes,
caused uproar by accusing Beijing of helping Myanmar to install
surveillance and communications equipment on the Coco Islands. Myanmar
and China denied the accusations, but New Delhi’s concerns were well
founded. In August 1993, Indian coastguards caught three boats
‘fishing’ close to the Andamans, where last year the Indian navy
established a new Far Eastern Naval Command in a move viewed as an
attempt to counter Chinese influence in Myanmar. The trawlers were
flying Myamarese flags, but the crew of 55 was Chinese. There was no
fishing equipment on board – only radio-communication and depth-
sounding equipment. The Chinese embassy in New Delhi intervened and
the crew was released. At the time, the incident was discreetly buried
in the Defence Ministry’s files in New Delhi. But when China’s designs
became obvious, the more hawkish government that came to power in
India in 1996 began to pay closer attention to developments in Sino-
Myanmarese relations.
New Delhi’s counter-strategy
At first, India had tried to counter China’s influence in Myanmar by
supporting the country’s pro-democracy forces. But around 1993, India
began to re-evaluate this strategy, concerned that it had only served
to push Yangon closer to Beijing. According to a senior Indian
official, Myanmarese generals signalled to New Delhi that it should
take a greater interest in development work to reduce Yangon’s heavy
dependence on China.
During his two-day visit to Myanmar in January this year, Malik
discussed plans for curbing insurgent groups based in Myanmar that
have been active in northeastern India. Maung Aye then went to the
north-eastern Indian town of Shillong – an unusual visit by a foreign
leader to a provincial capital – where he held talks with senior
officials from the Indian trade, energy, defence, home and foreign-
affairs ministries. After this exchange, India began to provide
military support equipment to Myanmar. Most of the uniforms used by
Myanmarese troops along the common border now come from India. New
Delhi is also reported to have leased helicopters to the country’s
army. Malik paid a follow-up visit to Yangon in July.
The success of India’s new strategy appears to have been reflected in
the outcome of Maung Aye’s trip to China in June. The trip was partly
aimed at finalising plans for a trade route between China and Myanmar.
Intelligence sources in Myanmar say that the idea was to use a fleet
of barges to transport goods from Bhamo on the Irrawaddy river, close
to the Chinese border, to Minhla, some 1,000 kilometres down-river.
From Minhla, a road is being built across the Arakan Yoma mountain
range, running via An to Kyaukpyu on the coast. Kyaukpyu has been
chosen as the site for a new deepwater port.
But it now seems certain that although Maung Aye agreed to strengthen
trade relations, he did not permit the degree of Chinese access to the
trade route for which Beijing had hoped. Details of the agreement
reached in Beijing remain sketchy During Maung Aye’s earlier talks
with Malik, however, India urged caution and it appears that Maung Aye
paid heed.
Myanmar’s military government is caught in a dilemma. When no other
country was prepared to support or trade with Yangon, it had to accept
Chinese aid. But what began as a modest trade agreement has developed
into heavy political and military dependence. Moreover, tens of
thousands of illegal Chinese immigrants have moved across the border
over the past ten years and taken over local businesses in northern
Myanmar, causing friction with the local population. Some communal
clashes have already taken place between immigrants and local
tribesmen in the area. Maung Aye, a staunch Myanmarese nationalist, is
said to be more concerned about these demographic changes than defence
and trade agreements with China.
Major political changes in Myanmar are unlikely as long as the
country’s two most important leaders are still alive. Ageing strongman
Ne Win, who established army rule in Yangon in 1962, is Still regarded
as the ‘Godfather’ of the Burmese military establishment. General Than
Shwe, 67, is the present chairman of the junta. But Ne Win turned 89
in May, and Than Shwe’s health is deteriorating rapidly. In May this
year, Than Shwe wrote a letter to the junta recommending his own
retirement.
Without Ne Win pulling strings from behind the scenes, and with Than
Shwe no longer junta chairman, observers believe that the rivalry
between Maung Aye and the intelligence-service chief, Khin Nyunt,
could turn into an open power struggle. Given their opposing opinions
on foreign policy, the outcome of that struggle could also determine
Myanmar’s place in the context of broader regional security.
This article first appeared in IISS Strategic Comments, July 2000
Southeast Asia
Jun 5, 2010
Myanmar’s nuclear bombshell
By Bertil Lintner
BANGKOK – Myanmar’s ruling generals have started a secret program to
develop nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles to deliver them in a
high-stakes bid to deter perceived hostile foreign powers, according
to an investigative report by the Democratic Voice of Burma that will
be aired later on Friday by television news network al-Jazeera.
Asia Times Online contributor Bertil Lintner was involved in reviewing
materials during extensive authentication processes
conducted by international arms experts and others during the report’s
five-year production. In the strategic footsteps of North Korea,
Myanmar’s leaders are also building a complex network of tunnels,
bunkers and other underground installations where they and their
military hardware would be hidden against any external aerial attack,
including presumably from the United States.
Based on testimonies and photographs supplied by high-ranking military
defectors, the documentary will show for the first time how Myanmar
has developed the capacity and is now using laser isotope separation,
a technique for developing nuclear weapons. It will also show how
machinery and equipment has been acquired to develop ballistic
missiles.
That Myanmar is now trying to develop nuclear weapons and has become
engaged in a military partnership with North Korea will dramatically
change the region’s security dynamic. Myanmar is a member of the
Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), a 10-nation grouping
whose members jointly signed the 1995 Southeast Asian Nuclear-Weapon-
Free Zone Treaty, also known as the Bangkok Treaty.
The nuclear bid will also put the already diplomatically isolated
country on a collision course with the US. US Senator Jim Webb, who
has earlier led a diplomatic drive to ”engage” the junta, abruptly
canceled his scheduled June 4 trip to Myanmar when he learned about
the upcoming documentary. The explosive revelations about Myanmar’s
nuclear initiative are expected to freeze Washington’s recent warming
towards the generals.
It is possible that the junta’s grandiose schemes could amount to
little more than a monumental waste of state resources. According to
one international arms expert familiar with the materials on Myanmar’s
program, the laser isotope separation method now being employed by
Myanmar’s insufficiently trained scientists ”is probably one of the
worst that is yet to be invented. The major countries of the world
have spent billions of dollars trying to make the process work without
success.”
There is thus a risk that the generals will further undermine the
country’s already wobbly economic fundamentals on ill-conceived
weapons projects, ones that may yield little more than lots of
radioactive holes in the ground and some crude Scud-type missiles.
Western military experts assert that any sophisticated bunker-buster
bomb could easily penetrate the newly built network of tunnels and
other underground facilities, constructed near the new capital of
Naypyidaw. In light of the country’s lack of technical know-how,
Myanmar’s desired nuclear bomb may also turn out to be a huge white
elephant. It is not even certain that its homegrown missiles will fly.
At least that is the conclusion of weapons’ experts who have closely
examined the materials that will be presented in al-Jazeera’s
investigative report.
The program was produced over five-years by the Democratic Voice of
Burma, or DVB, a Norway-based radio and TV station run by Myanmar
exiles. They have made their case based on leaked photographs,
documents and testimonies from key military defectors. The documentary
was directed by London-based Australian journalist Evan Williams.
Nuclear turncoat
The report’s main source, Sai Thein Win, is a former Myanmar army
major who recently defected to the West, bringing with him a trove of
information never seen before outside of the country. His
documentation has been scrutinized by, among others, Robert Kelley, a
former US weapons scientist at the Los Alamos facility where work is
conducted towards the design of nuclear weapons.
From 1992 to 1993 and 2001 to 2005, Kelley also served as one of the
directors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). “Sai Thein
Win reminds us to some degree of Mordecai Vanunu, an Israeli
technician at the Dimona nuclear site in the Negev desert … Sai is
providing similar information,” said Kelley.
Vanunu blew the whistle on Israel’s nuclear program, and, according to
Kelley, Sai Thein Win has “provided photographs of items that would
appear to be very useful in a nuclear program as they are specific to
nuclear issues. They could be seen as for other things, but they look
like they were designed for a nuclear program.”
Geoff Forden, another international arms expert, says Myanmar appears
to be “pursuing at least two different paths towards acquiring a
missile production capability. One is a more or less indigenous path.
The less indigenous comes from the fact that they have sent a number
of Myanmar military officers to Moscow for training in engineering
related to missile design and production.”
Sai Thein Win was among the Myanmar army officers sent to Russia and
he has produced photographs of himself taken during his training
there. He also has pictures of a top secret nuclear facility located
11 kilometers from Thabeikkyin, a small town near the Irrawaddy River
in northern Myanmar.
He claims this is the headquarters of the army’s nuclear battalion and
that it is there the regime is trying to build a nuclear reactor and
enrich uranium for weapons. Missile development, he says, is carried
out at another facility near Myaing, southwest of Mandalay, in central
Myanmar.
Machinery for the Myaing plant has been supplied by two German firms,
which also sent engineers to install the equipment. The Germans, Sai
Thein Win says, were told that “the factories were educational
institutions … those poor German engineers don’t know, didn’t know
that we were aiming to use those machines in producing rocket parts or
some parts for military use.”
How useful those machines will be for missile development is
questionable. Despite their training in Russia, the Myanmar engineers
handling them have little or no knowledge of producing sophisticated
weapons, according to experts who say the generals’ apparent dream of
having a nuclear reactor may also be just that: a pipedream.
Another high-ranking Myanmar military official also provided DVB’s
researchers with classified information related to the country’s
nuclear and missile program. He, however, fell out of view while in
Singapore some time last year and his current whereabouts is now
unknown.
Myanmar was one of the first countries in the region to launch a
nuclear research program. In 1956, the country’s then-democratic
government set up the Union of Burma Atomic Energy Center in the
former capital Yangon. Unrelated to the country’s defense industries,
it came to a halt when the military seized power in 1962. The new
military power-holders, led by General Ne Win, did not trust the old
technocrats and saw little use in having a nuclear program designed
for peaceful purposes.
In 2001, Myanmar’s present ruling junta aimed to revitalize the
country’s nuclear ambitions. An agreement was signed with Russia ‘s
Atomic Energy Ministry, which announced plans to build a 10-megawatt
nuclear research reactor in central Myanmar. That same year, Myanmar
established a Department of Atomic Energy, believed to be the
brainchild of the Minister for Science and Technology, U Thaung, a
graduate of the Defense Services Academy and former ambassador to the
US. At the time, US-trained nuclear scientist Thein Po Saw was
identified as a leading advocate for nuclear technology in Myanmar.
Reports since then have been murky, including speculation that the
deal was shelved due to Myanmar’s lack of finances. The Russian
reactor was never delivered, but in May 2007 Russia ‘s atomic energy
agency, Rosatom, again announced it would build Myanmar ‘s nuclear-
research reactor. Under the initial 2001 agreement, Myanmar nationals,
most military personnel, were sent to Russia for training. Nearly 10
years later, Russia has yet to deliver the reactor because Myanmar
“refused to allow inspection by the IAEA”, according to DVB.
North Korean ally
Myanmar thus appears to have embarked on its own indigenous program to
build a nuclear research reactor. Unconfirmed reports circulated on
the Internet claim that North Korea is assisting the Myanmar
authorities in the endeavor. Diplomatic relations between North Korea
and Myanmar, which were severed in 1983 when North Korean agents
detonated a bomb in Yangon, were officially restored in April 2007.
Only days later, a North Korean freighter, the Kang Nam I, docked at
Thilawa port near the old capital. Heavy crates were unloaded under
strict secrecy and tight security. A journalist working for a Japanese
news agency was detained and interrogated for attempting to photograph
the unloading.
Last year, the Kang Nam I was back in the news when, destined for
Myanmar, it was turned back by US naval warships. At the time, it was
thought to be carrying material banned under UN Security Council
resolutions aimed at preventing North Korea from exporting material
related to the production and development of weapons of mass
destruction (WMD).
North Korea’s role in Myanmar ‘s nascent nuclear program is still a
matter of conjecture. But in May this year, a seven-member UN panel
monitoring implementation of sanctions against North Korea said its
research indicated that Pyongyang is involved in banned nuclear and
ballistic activities in Iran, Syria and Myanmar.
The experts in the documentary said they were looking into “suspicious
activity in Myanmar”, including the presence of Namchongang Trading,
one of the North Korean companies sanctioned by the UN. North Korean
tunneling experts are also known to have provided crucial assistance
to the construction of Myanmar’s underground facilities.
According to an unnamed Myanmar army engineer, who was also
interviewed for the DVB documentary, “a batch of eight North Koreans
came each time and [were] sent back, [then] another eight came and
were sent back. At the Defense Industry factories, there are at least
eight to 16 of them … they act as technical advisers.”
In November 2008, Gen Shwe Mann, the third-highest ranking official in
Myanmar’s military hierarchy, paid a secret visit to Pyongyang.
Traveling with an entourage of military officers, he visited a radar
base and a factory making Scud missiles, and signed a memorandum of
understanding with the North Koreans to enhance military cooperation
between the two countries.
A photo file and other details of the visit were leaked to Myanmar
exiles and were soon available on the Internet, prompting the
authorities to carry out a purge within its own ranks. On January 7
this year, one Foreign Ministry official and a retired military
officer were sentenced to death for leaking the material.
Military insecurity
Aung Lin Htut, a former intelligence officer attached to the Myanmar
Embassy in Washington until he defected in 2004, claims that soon
after General Than Shwe came to power in 1992 he “thought that if we
followed the North Korean example we would not need to take into
account America or even need to care about China. In other words, when
they have nuclear energy and weapons other countries … won’t dare
touch Myanmar.”
The tunnels and bunkers – some of which are large enough to
accommodate hundreds of soldiers – should be seen in the same light,
Aung Lin Htut has argued. “It is for their own safety that the
government has invested heavily into those tunnel projects,” he said.
The generals may fear not only an outside attack, which is highly
unlikely according to security experts, but also another popular
uprising. In 1988, millions of people took to the streets to demand an
end to military dictatorship. In 2007, tens of thousands of Buddhist
monks led marches for national reconciliation and a dialogue between
the military government and the pro-democracy movement.
On both occasions, the generals responded with military force and
brutally suppressed the popular movements. But the generals were
shaken and apparently saw the need to move themselves and vital
military facilities underground and away from populated areas, as also
seen in the junta’s bizarre and sudden move to the new capital
Naypyidaw in November 2005.
For other reasons, North Korea reacted similarly after the war on the
Korean Peninsula. North Korea is believed to have one of the world’s
most extensive complexes of tunnels, storage facilities – and even
weapons’ factories – all hidden from the prying eyes of real and
imagined enemies.
That is likely why Myanmar’s generals see Pyongyang as a role model
and why relations between the two countries have warmed since the
1990s – hardly by coincidence at the same time the US has become one
of Myanmar’s fiercest critics. In 2005, then-secretary of state
Condoleezza Rice branded Myanmar, along with Belarus, Cuba, North
Korea, Iran and Zimbabwe as “outposts of tyranny”, and the US
tightened financial sanctions against the regime and its supporters.
The present US administration of President Barack Obama adopted a more
conciliatory approach, sending emissaries to Myanmar to “engage” the
generals and nudge them towards democracy. But sources close to the
decision-making process in Washington also believe that concern over
Myanmar’s WMD programs – and increasingly close ties with North Korea
– should be equally important considerations in any new US policy
towards Myanmar.
One of the negotiators recently sent to Myanmar, US Assistant
Secretary of State for East Asia Kurt Campbell, is interviewed in the
DVB documentary. When asked about Myanmar’s new security-related
polices and initiatives, he replies rather cryptically:
Some of it is sensitive so really can’t be discussed in great detail,
but I will say we have seen enough to cause us some anxiety about
certain kinds of military and other kinds of relationships between
North Korea and Burma [Myanmar]. We have been very clear with the
authorities about what our red lines are … we always worry about
nuclear proliferation and there are signs that there has been some
flirtation around these matters.
According to internal documents presented by the DVB, the total cost
of Myanmar’s tunneling projects and WMD programs is astronomical,
running into billions of US dollars. This appears to be one reason why
several Myanmar military officers have defected to the West – and
brought with them the evidence that will be seen by global audiences
on Friday.
Bertil Lintner is a former correspondent with the Far Eastern Economic
Review and the author of Great Leader, Dear Leader: Demystifying North
Korea Under the Kim Clan. He is currently a writer with Asia Pacific
Media Services.
(Copyright 2010 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights reserved.
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South Asia
Aug 25, 2010
Behold, beware Myanmar’s fourth empire
By Bertil Lintner
BANGKOK – Myanmar’s government has announced democratic elections will
be held on November 7 and Western pundits are busy speculating whether
the polls will lead to a new, more open era in the troubled country’s
modern history. A far more important and potentially sinister plan is
unfolding as the country’s military rulers seek to consolidate a
vision of empire that affords them a permanent grip on the country and
its many nationalities.
A new nation is being built, one that military leaders view as the
coming of the Fourth Myanmar Empire. In line with that vision, two
decades ago the military gave the country a new name, changing
it from Burma to Myanmar. Now, a grand new capital known as Naypyidaw,
or “Abode of Kings”, has been erected in what used to be wasteland in
the central part of the country.
Myanmar’s armed forces are among Southeast Asia’s largest, and, if
their empire dream is ever realized, they will be equipped with
missiles and perhaps even nuclear devices. The creation of a new
parliament, which will be housed in a gigantic edifice built in
traditional Myanmar style in the new capital, is also part of the
grand plan. Sharing power with pro-democracy parties, even “moderate”
ones, however, is not.
Significantly, the upcoming election has been used to pressure nearly
a dozen former rebel groups, which for the past two decades have had
ceasefire agreements with the government, to finally give up their
autonomous status and convert their respective armies into “Border
Guard Forces” under the command of the Myanmar army. Their political
wings may then be recognized as political parties, which will be
allowed to participate in the November election, but on the same terms
as all other parties that have registered for the polls.
Registration, a cumbersome process that involves paying a 50,000 kyat
registration fee for each candidate, must be completed by August 30.
That fee equals US$500 per head, a huge sum for most ordinary Myanmar
citizens. Only the junta’s own political mass organization, the Union
Solidarity and Development Party and its affiliated National Unity
Party, have had the resources to field candidates for all seats
nationwide.
Revisionist history
The way forward for Myanmar first became clear on Armed Forces Day
2006. Traditionally held each year on March 27, the holiday was
originally meant to commemorate the day in 1945 when the country’s
nationalists, led by Aung San, shifted sides to join the Allied powers
and turned their weapons against their former patron and benefactor,
the Imperial Japanese Army.
The 2006 event represented the first time the parade was held at
Naypyidaw, to where the government was formally moved in 2005.
Addressing a crowd of 12,000 soldiers, junta leader Gen Than Shwe
proclaimed: “Our tatmadaw [armed forces] should be a worthy heir to
the traditions of the capable tatmadaws established by noble kings
Anawratha, Bayinnaung and Alaungpaya.”
None of those kings had fought against the Imperial Japanese Army, but
Anawratha had in 1044 founded the First Myanmar, or Burmese, Empire
and established his capital at the temple city of Pagan on the banks
of the Irrawaddy river, southwest of today’s Mandalay. He conquered
Thaton, the capital of the Mon – major rivals of the Burmans for
control of the central plains – and expanded his empire down to the
Andaman Sea.
Bayinnaung was the country’s most celebrated warrior king. He reigned
from 1551 to 1581 and conquered territories north of Pagan, parts of
the Shan plateau in the east, and pushed as far east as Chiang Mai, in
today’s northern Thailand, and Vientiane in Laos. He was the most
prominent ruler of the Second Myanmar Empire and ruled from Pegu in
the central plains.
Alaungpaya reigned in the 18th century and was the first king of the
Konbaung Dynasty, or the third and last of the Myanmar empires.
Alaungpaya also fought the Mon, and his successor, Hsinbyushin, sacked
the Thai capital of Ayutthaya in 1767, a deed for which the Thais,
judging by their history books, have never forgiven the Burmese.
The Konbaung kings were defeated by the British in the three Anglo-
Myanmar wars of the 19th century and the country became a British
colony. In 1885, Mandalay, the last of several capitals of the
Konbaung Dynasty fell and its king, Thibaw, was led away by the
British in front of the mourning and wailing crowd who had come to
take farewell of the last monarch of an independent Myanmar state. He
was sent, with his once-powerful wife, Supayalat, and their children
into exile in Ratanagiri in India, where he died in 1916.
Fast forward to the present and standing at Naypyidaw’s parade ground
are newly erected, larger-than-life statues of the three warrior
kings, who Than Shwe evidently sees as his empire-building role
models. He has also bid to form a unitary state that is fundamentally
different in nature from Aung San’s concept of ”unity in diversity”,
federalism and some kind of parliamentary democracy. In Than Shwe’s
”Myanmar” everybody is a ”Myanmar” and subjects of the present
rulers.
Notably there are no portraits of independence hero Aung San in
Naypyidaw. But building a new capital has always been a major
prerogative of the rulers of all three previous Myanmar empires – and
the founders of the Fourth Empire are no exception. The size of the
new capital’s buildings and width of its streets and avenues reflect
their vision of grandeur.
The November election, assimilation of rebel groups and subjugation of
other opposition forces are together the final stage in a
transformative process that arguably began in 1989, when the junta
changed the name of the country. The generals insisted that Myanmar is
the correct name for the country because it includes both Burmans and
minorities.
That argument, however, has caused confusion in academic circles. An
official history of the country’s nationalist movement, published by
the government in 1976, stated that ”Myanmar” meant only the old
kingdom of Mandalay, while ”Burma” (bama in Burmese) is ”the country
where different nationalities such as the Kachin, Karen, Kayah, Chin,
Pa-O, Palaung, Mon, Myanma, Rakhine, Shan reside reside.”
Significantly, Aung San and his comrades called their movement Dohbama
Asiayone, ”Our Burma Association”, and not Dohmyanmar Asiayone.
Now the ruling military junta claims that the opposite is true. The
official mouthpiece Working People’s Daily, now known as the New Light
of Myanmar, stated on May 27, 1989, the day the name change was made
official: “Bama … is one of the national groups of the Union only …
myanma means all the national racial groups who are resident of the
union such as Kachin, Kayah, Karen, Chin, Mon, Rakhine, Bama and
Shan.”
At the same time, place names, especially in Shan State, were changed
to sound more ”Myanmar”: Pang Tara, Kengtung, Lai-Hka, Hsenwi and
Hsipaw – place names that have a meaning in the Shan language – were
renamed Pindaya, Kyaington, Laycha, Theinli and Thibaw, which sound
Burmese but have no meaning in any language.
Cultural revolution
Dutch Burma scholar Gustaaf Houtman calls this development the
”Myanmafication of Burma”, which he describes as a move away from the
original idea of a multiethnic federation – agreed to by Aung San and
the leaders of the ethnic minorities before independence in 1948 – to
the new ”Myanmar” identity propagated by the military. The 1989 name
changes marked the beginning of this cultural revolution, which
included a military-appointed commission tasked with rewriting the
country’s history to better suit the agenda of the present power-
holders.
New museums have been built across the country to educate the public
about the central role the military purportedly has played throughout
centuries of Myanmar history. School textbooks are continuously
rewritten to serve the same purpose. Many TV soap operas have the same
theme, where the country’s many ethnic groups unite under the
leadership of a militaristic 19th century king to oppose the onslaught
of Western colonialists.
Soon 330 elected members of parliament, along with 110 non-elected
representatives of the armed forces, will soon take their seats in the
enormous new building that has been erected in Naypyidaw to practice
”discipline-flourishing democracy”, as the generals have termed their
unique vision of the country’s future political system.
If the May 2008 referendum for the new constitution, on which the
country’s new political system is based, is anything to go by, the
outcome of the November election is preordained. The new constitution
was approved in a referendum by more than 90% of the electorate, the
authorities announced. No campaigning was allowed and the press was
forbidden to report on the barely 10% who voted against.
On August 19, Myanmar’s tightly controlled media published an official
notification stating that candidates wishing to address the public
must apply for permission at least seven days in advance. Candidates
are also prohibited from ”causing any disturbances in public places
and disrupting traffic”.
In case lawmakers cause trouble after they have been elected, Article
396 of the new constitution ensures that they can be dismissed for
”misbehavior”. And if the ”democratic” situation really gets out of
hand, Article 413 gives the president the right to hand over executive
as well as judicial powers to the commander-in-chief of the Defense
Services.
All is thus set for the rise of the Fourth Myanmar Empire. According
to a report released this month by the US-based non-governmental
organization the National Democratic Institute, Myanmar’s new
constitution has established “a structure designed to perpetuate
military rule”, not to change it. Than Shwe may retire, but that is no
guarantee for a new democratic or any less authoritarian order.
So far, no credible outside observer has been able to identify any
”young Turks” bent on enacting genuine democratic reforms lurking in
the wings. And despite much wishful thinking by foreign analysts and
commentators, Than Shwe biographer Benedict Rogers argues that all the
structures that have been put in place signal that the military is
geared to remain in power for the foreseeable future.
When Myanmar’s old strongman, Gen Ne Win, was alive, several analysts
and experts predicted that the country would change for the better
once he passed from the scene. He retired from direct power in 1988
and indeed Myanmar did change after Ne Win. But the next generation of
military leaders led by Than Shwe turned out to be even more
repressive – and obsessed with the role of historical kings. Not even
Ne Win shifted the site of the national capital and sought to acquire
weapons of mass destruction. Nor did he divine to revive and reinvent
the glory and power of bygone Myanmar empires.
Bertil Lintner is a former correspondent with the Far Eastern Economic
Review and currently a writer with Asia Pacific Media Services.
(Copyright 2010 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights reserved.
Please contact us about sales, syndication and republishing.)
Southeast Asia
Jun 30, 2010
Deception and denials in Myanmar
By Bertil Lintner
BANGKOK – Myanmar’s military government issued pro-forma denials after
al-Jazeera aired an investigative report by the Oslo-based Democratic
Voice of Burma (DVB) alleging that Myanmar is attempting to develop
nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles. But as the international
community weighs the evidence, the regime could soon face United
Nations-imposed sanctions for its military dealings with North Korea.
On June 11, a week after the television network showed the program,
Myanmar’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement claiming that “anti-
government groups” in collusion with the international media had made
the allegation with the goal of “hindering Myanmar’s democratic
process and tarnishing the political image of the government”. Myanmar
“is a developing
nation” which “lacks adequate infrastructure, technology and finance
to develop nuclear weapons”, the statement continued.
The North Koreans issued a similar denial, blaming the United States
for the report. Ten days after the Myanmar denial, the official Korean
Central News Agency reported: “The United States is now making much
fuss, floating the sheer fiction that the Democratic People’s Republic
of Korea [North Korea] is helping Myanmar in its ‘nuclear
development’, not content with labeling the DPRK ‘provocative’ and
‘bellicose’.”
In its next sentence, the report denounced US State Department
spokesman Philip J Crowley for what Pyongyang seemed to consider an
equally serious crime. Crowley, the KCNA stated, had been “making
false reports that the DPRK conducted unlicensed TV relay broadcasts
about the World Cup matches”.
While the North Korean statement could be dismissed as comical, the
Myanmar Foreign Ministry’s denial is more revealing. It did not
mention Myanmar’s program to develop ballistic missiles or the
extensive network of bunkers, culverts and underground storage
facilities for the military that has been constructed near the new
capital Naypyidaw and elsewhere where the North Koreans have
reportedly been active.
More intriguingly, the Foreign Ministry found it necessary to deny
reports that a North Korean ship that docked in Myanmar on April 12
this year was carrying military-related material. The ship, the
ministry said, “was on a routine trip to unload cement and to take on
10,000 tons of Myanmar rice”.
However, if carrying only innocuous civilian goods, as the statement
maintains, there would seemingly have been no reason for authorities
to cut electricity around the area when the Chong Gen, a North Korean
ship flying the Mongolian flag of convenience, docked on the outskirts
of Yangon.
According to intelligence sources, security was tight as military
personnel offloaded heavy material, including Korean-made air defense
radars. The ship left the port with a return cargo of rice and sugar,
which could mean that it was, at least in part, a barter deal. On
January 31 this year, another North Korean ship, the Yang M V Han A,
reportedly delivered missile components also at Yangon’s Thilawa
port.
Rogue ties
In November 2008, General Shwe Mann, the third-highest ranking member
of the ruling junta, the State Peace and Development Council, paid a
visit to North Korea. It was supposed to be a secret trip, but the
visit was leaked to Myanmar exiles and reports of his rounds appeared
on several Internet news sites. During the visit, Shwe Mann was taken
to a missile factory and an air defense radar facility and a
memorandum of understanding was signed to outline the nature of
cooperation between the two countries, which only recently
reestablished diplomatic relations.
However, the full extent of the North Korean presence in Myanmar is
still a matter of conjecture. The first report of a delegation from
Myanmar making a secret visit to Pyongyang dates to November 2000,
where the two sides held talks with high-ranking officials of North
Korea’s Ministry of the People’s Armed Forces. In June 2001, a high-
level North Korean delegation led by Vice Foreign Minister Park Kil-
yon paid a return visit to Yangon, where it met Myanmar’s Deputy
Defense Minister Khin Maung Win and reportedly discussed defense-
industry cooperation.
In 2003, the first group of North Korean technicians were spotted at
naval facilities near the then-capital Yangon. North Korean planes
were also seen landing at military airfields in central Myanmar. Three
years later, North Korean tunneling experts arrived at Naypyidaw, and
Myanmar military sources began to leak photographs of the North
Koreans as well as the underground installations they were involved in
digging under and near the new capital.
On June 24, the DVB reported that a new radar and missile base had
been completed near Mohnyin in Myanmar’s northern Kachin State. It is
not clear in which direction the installations are pointed, as Mohnyin
is located on the railway line that cuts through Kachin State and is
approximately equidistant between the Indian and Chinese borders.
Work on similar radar and missile bases has been reported from
Kengtung in eastern Shan State, 160 kilometers north of the Thai
border town of Mae Sai. Since Myanmar is not known to have imported
radars and missile components from any country other than North Korea,
the installations would appear to be one of the first visible outcomes
of a decade of military cooperation.
Until recently reports of such cooperation were met with skepticism
among analysts because Myanmar had severed diplomatic relations with
North Korea in 1983 after three secret agents planted a bomb at
Yangon’s Martyrs’ Mausoleum and killed 18 visiting South Korean
officials, including then-deputy prime minister So Suk-chun and three
other government ministers. But the two pariah states seem to have
built a bond around their common antagonism with the United States.
Expert confirmation
The DVB investigative report shed new light on the nature of this
secretive cooperation and of Myanmar’s nuclear ambitions. Photographs
and documents smuggled out of the country by a defector from the
Myanmar army, Major Sai Thein Win, were scrutinized by international
arms experts and found to be credible.
Among the experts was Robert Kelley, a former Los Alamos weapons
scientist who was a director with the International Atomic Energy
Agency (IAEA) from 1992 to 1993 and again from 2001 to 2005. Now based
in Vienna, he conducted weapons inspections in Libya, Iraq, and South
Africa, as well as compliance inspections in Egypt, Turkey, South
Korea, Taiwan, Syria, Tanzania, Pakistan, India, and Congo, among
others.
Kelley concluded after a careful study of material produced by Sai
Thein Win and other Myanmar military defectors: “Our assessment of
multiple sources is that Burma [Myanmar] is really developing nuclear
technology, that it has built specialized equipment and facilities,
and it has issued orders to cadre to build a program.”
It remains to be proven that the North Koreans are involved in
Myanmar’s fledgling nuclear program. Even if they are, it is not clear
how advanced Myanmar’s program may be. Many skeptics assume the
project is an illusion of grandeur bordering on megalomania among
Myanmar’s ruling generals.
North Korean involvement in Myanmar’s missile program is more certain,
but even so it is unclear that the country’s largely unskilled
technicians would be able to produce a missile that works. One
intelligence source described it as more of a “phallic fantasy”, a
large projectile that Myanmar’s generals would like to show off at the
annual March 27 Armed Forces Day parade. “Just imagine how proud they
would be to see a truck towing a big and impressive missile past the
grandstand,” the source said.
Western intelligence sources are aware of the current presence of 30
to 40 North Korean missile technicians at a facility near Minhla on
the Irrawaddy River in Magwe Division. At least some of the
technicians reportedly arrived overland by bus from China, to make it
appear as if they were Chinese tourists.
According to a Myanmar source with knowledge of the area: “There are
several defense industries, DI, around Minhla. More importantly, these
are not very far from the Sidotara Dam and suspected DI-20, Pwintbyu
and Myaing. In other words, there are many military activities in that
area.”
In power-starved Myanmar, it is logical that defense production
facilities have been situated near a power-generating dam. Myaing is
where Sai Thein Win worked as deputy commander of a top-secret
military factory before he defected earlier this year. While Myanmar
authorities have denied his testimonies publicly, intelligence agents
swooped on his home town of Kyaukme in Shan State soon after the DVB
report was aired internationally. His family has been interrogated,
but so far no one has been arrested.
On the contrary, the Shan Herald Agency for News, an exile-run news
group in Chiang Mai in northern Thailand, reports that Sai Thein Win
has become somewhat of a local hero since he went public with his
revelations. “Among the security officials who visited Kyaukme, one
was also reported to have said that he admired Sai’s courage and his
‘well done expose’,” the news group reported.
If accurately reported, that sentiment would reflect one reason why
Sai Thein Win decided to defect: Myanmar’s experiments with nuclear
technology and missiles amount to little more than a waste of money in
a country that desperately needs more funds dedicated to public health
and education.
Meanwhile, the regime’s budding cooperation with North Korea threatens
to cost the country more internationally. US Senator Jim Webb, a
staunch advocate of engagement with Myanmar’s ruling generals, was
forced to cancel his scheduled visit to the country when he learned al-
Jazeera would air the DVB report while he was there.
As it becomes increasingly apparent that both countries have violated
United Nations Security Council Resolution 1874, which bans North
Korea from exporting all types of weapons, Myanmar could soon be
penalized with more international sanctions. The prospect of that
happening – and already deep dissatisfaction over the close
relationship with a pariah regime like Pyongyang, which is even more
isolated than the one in Naypyidaw – is reportedly stoking resentment
among the Myanmar officer corps.
Other officers like Sai Thein Win may therefore be waiting in the
wings for an opportunity to defect and shed more light on Myanmar’s
deep and dark nuclear secrets.
Bertil Lintner is a former correspondent with the Far Eastern Economic
Review and the author of Great Leader, Dear Leader: Demystifying North
Korea Under the Kim Clan. He is currently a writer with Asia Pacific
Media Services.
(Copyright 2010 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights reserved.
Please contact us about sales, syndication and republishing.)
UN ignores Burma junta’s drugs role
Friday, 24 September 2010
Comments (6)
A Thai policeman guards over a methamphetamine haul (Reuters)
By BERTIL LINTNER
Published: 28 June 2010
The UN’s annual day against drugs is usually celebrated with claims of
great strides in the campaign to eradicate the worldwide production of
narcotics and fanciful reports on how governments around the globe are
successfully cooperating in this noble effort. This year, however, it
seems that at least some realism has seeped into the largely
fictitious picture of the situation in the drug-producing countries
that the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) usually presents to the
outside world.
Burma’s drug production has surged over the past year, Gary Lewis, a
representative of the UNODC, told reporters in Bangkok two days before
the annual event. Burma, he said, had experienced a “steep and
dramatic” increase in opium cultivation, with 31,700 hectares, or
78,300 acres, of land under poppy cultivation in 2009, up by almost
half since 2006.
At the same time, the production of synthetic drugs such as
methamphetamine in the Burmese sector of the Golden Triangle has
increased equally dramatically. According to Thai military sources,
between 300 and 400 million pills will be produced this year, or
almost double the amount in 2009. The main market for all these drugs
is Thailand, but significant quantities are also smuggled into China,
Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia and India. Some Burmese heroin, but very
little methamphetamine, can also be found in Australia and North
America.
The reason for this surge, Lewis told reporters, is that ethnic armies
which once fought the Burmese army and now have entered into ceasefire
agreements with the government, are coming under pressure to convert
themselves into Border Guard Forces under central command. Most drugs
in Burma are produced in areas controlled by the United Wa State Army
(UWSA) and its allies, some of whom are smaller groups which also once
formed part of the now defunct Communist Party of Burma (CPB). The
UWSA and its allies are preparing for war: “They are getting ready to
fight. They are selling more and more drugs so they can buy weapons to
fight the government,” the Guardian last week quoted Lewis as saying.
Statements such as these show that the UNODC may have changed its
previous, glossy image of the UWSA and its allies — and so has the
Burmese government. It is often forgotten that the first huge increase
in Burma’s production of opium and its derivative heroin occurred
after the collapse of the CPB in 1989. In the wake of the 1988
uprising in the Burmese heartland, and the subsequent massacres in the
then capital Rangoon and elsewhere, more than 8,000 pro-democracy
activists fled the urban centres for the border areas near Thailand,
where a multitude of ethnic insurgencies not involved in the drug
trade were active. Significantly, the main drug gang operating along
the Thai border, Khun Sa and his private army, refused to shelter any
dissidents; his main interest was business, not to fight the Burmese
government.
The Burmese military now feared a renewed, politically dangerous
insurgency along its frontiers: a possible alliance between the ethnic
rebels and the pro-democracy activists from Rangoon and other towns
and cities. But these Thai-border-based groups – Karen, Mon, Karenni,
and Pa-O – were unable to provide the urban dissidents with more than
a handful of weapons. None of the ethnic armies could match the
strength of the CPB, which then fielded more than 15,000 soldiers and
controlled a 20,000-square-kilometre territory along the China-Burma
border in the northeast. Unlike the ethnic rebels, the CPB had vast
quantities of arms and ammunition supplied by China from 1968 to 1978,
when it was Beijing’s policy to support communist insurrections in
Southeast Asia. Although the aid had almost ceased by 1980, the CPB
still head enough munitions to last for at least ten years of
guerrilla warfare against the central government.
Despite the Burmese military’s claim of a “communist conspiracy”
behind the 1988 uprising – which then intelligence chief Khin Nyunt
concocted in a lengthy speech on 5 August 1989 – there was at that
time no linkage between the anti-totalitarian, pro-democracy movement
in central Burma, and the orthodox, Marxist-Leninist leadership of the
CPB. However, given the strong desire for revenge for the bloody
events of 1988, it is plausible to assume that the urban dissidents
would have accepted arms from any source. Thus, it became imperative
for the ruling military to neutralise as many of the border
insurgencies as possible, especially the CPB’s.
A situation which was potentially even more dangerous for the military
regime arose in March and April 1989 when the hill-tribe rank-and-file
of the CPB, led by the military commanders who also came from the
various ethnic minorities in the northeastern base area, mutinied
against the party’s ageing, mostly Burman political leadership. On 17
April 1989, ethnic Wa mutineers stormed party headquarters at
Panghsang and drove the old leaders and their families, about 300
people, across the border into China.
The former CPB army split along ethnic lines, and formed four
different, regional resistance armies, of which the now 30,000-strong
United Wa State Army (UWSA) was by far the most powerful. Suddenly,
there were no longer any communist insurgents in Burma, only ethnic
rebels, and the junta worried about potential collaboration between
the new, well-armed forces in the northeast and the minority groups
along the Thai border – and the urban dissidents who had taken refuge
there.
Within weeks of the CPB mutiny, Khin Nyunt helicoptered up to the
northeastern border areas, met the leaders of the mutiny, and made
them an offer. In exchange for ceasefire agreements with the
government, and to sever any ties with any other rebels, the UWSA and
other CPB mutineers were granted unofficial permission to engage in
any kind of business to sustain themselves – which in Burma’s remote
and underdeveloped hill areas inevitably meant opium production.
According to estimates by the US government, Burma’s opium production
soared from 836 tons in 1987 to 2,340 tons by 1995. Satellite imagery
showed that the area under poppy cultivation increased from 92,300
hectares to 154,000 during the same period. For the first time, heroin
refineries, which previously had been located only along the Thai
border, were established along the Chinese frontier, and the ceasefire
agreements with the government enabled the traffickers to move
narcotics freely along major roads and highways.
However, by the early 2000s, opium production began to decline after
the boom years immediately after the CPB mutiny, but by then huge
quantities of methamphetamines – in the past unknown in the Burmese
sector of the Golden Triangle – were produced in laboratories in areas
controlled by the UWSA and other former CPB groups. Burma remains one
of the world’s biggest producers of illicit narcotics, and its
production of opium and heroin is still significant, as the latest
figures from the UNODC show.
The political threat from the border areas was thwarted, the regime
was safe, and vast amounts of money derived from the drug trade were
invested in Burma’s legal economy. Some of Burma’s most profitable
business conglomerates and banks were established by drug barons
allied with the UWSA and other ceasefire groups. All along, the
Burmese military turned a blind eye to the traffic, and benefited from
it economically. Apart from being invested in various sectors of the
national economy, drug money also ended up in the pockets of many army
officers, some of whom became immensely wealthy.
But simply neutralising the border insurgencies was only the first
step; today, 20 years later, the government believes that the time has
come to integrate the former rebel armies, and the election that is
supposed to take place this year provided the ruling military with an
excellent opportunity to press this demand. The ceasefire groups have
been told to transform their armies into Border Guard Forces before
the election so their political wings can form legitimate political
parties to take part in the polls. But, as it turned out, the
ceasefire groups were not prepared to accept this offer.
In August last year, the Burmese army attacked Kokang in northeastern
Shan State, until then controlled by one of the smaller former CPB
forces, which had resisted the demand to accept the status as a Border
Guard Force. Huge amounts of drugs were seized in the operation
against the local militia in Kokang which, until it ceased being an
ally and broke with the government, had been praised by the
authorities for its “drug-suppression efforts.”
The UNODC and its predecessor, the UNFDAC (the UN Fund for Drug Abuse
Control), also used to praise the drug armies in similar terms. In
January 1991, UNFDAC’s Don MacIntosh was present at a drug-burning
show in northern Burma where he declared: “I am pleased to be in Shan
state and have the opportunity to [attend] this important drug
eradication exercise.” The ceremony was presided over by Peng Jiasheng
– the druglord who was chased out of Kokang in August last year.
In more recent years, Jeremy Milsom, a former consultant to the UNODC,
has openly defended the UWSA leadership, including some of its most
notorious druglords. In his contribution to a book called Trouble in
the Triangle: Opium and Conflict in Burma, Milsom stated that “Wei
Xuegang [a Wa drugs baron who was close to intelligence chief Khin
Nyunt], is an interesting figure with respect to the WSR [Wa Special
Region]. Having helped the region immensely both in times of conflict
and more recently by being the principal provider of social and
economic development assistance to poor Wa farmers in the south, there
is considerable respect for him. To add to this view, according to
senior Wa sources, a condition of Wei Xuegang joining the UWSA in 1995
was that he not be involved in drug trafficking anymore and work with
the WCA [Wa Central Authority] to help phase out drugs.”
The last sentence is puzzling, to say the least, as Wei has been
involved with the UWSA since its formation in 1989. And, after giving
up his involvement in the drug trade, Wei appears to have became a
philanthropist, Milsom contends: “Ironically, Wei Xuegang has done
more to support impoverished poppy farmers break their dependence on
the crop than any other single person or institution in Burma, and
this has been done by putting past drug profits back into the people
as he perhaps tries to move into the mainstream economy.” To most
others, Wei is the driving force behind most of the drug production in
the Golden Triangle. He is wanted by both US and Thai authorities,
which have indicted him on drug trafficking charges.
Remarkably, Milsom treats all the leaders of the UWSA as if they were
representatives of the governments of Canada or Norway, taking all
their outlandish claims at face value. He even questions whether the
methamphetamine production in the Golden Triangle is controlled by the
UWSA and its officers. The UNODC, it seems, needs to check on its
personnel in Burma. Or, at the very least, encourage them to learn
more about the country – and the Was and the geopolitical complexities
of local insurgencies and the role of the drug trade in those
conflicts – before they depart for their “project zone.”
Until recently, the Burmese government routinely praised the same
druglords as well. Major General Thein Sein, then commander of the
Burmese army’s Golden Triangle Region Command, said in a speech before
local leaders at the drug-trafficking centre on Mong La on 9 May,
2001: “I was in Mong Ton and Mong Hsat for two weeks. U Wei Xuegang
and U Bao Youri from the Wa groups are real friends.”
Bao Youri is another UWSA leader who has been indicted by a US federal
court. Thein Sein is the current prime minister of Burma and the
country’s fourth-highest ranking general. Official complicity in the
drug trade is another question that the UN has ignored since it first
became involved in Burma in the late 1970s.
It is too early to say whether the new tunes from the UNODC will
result in any actual policy changes. But, at long last, the UNODC has
publicly acknowledged that Burma’s drug problem cannot be separated
from its decades-long ethnic conflicts. The UWSA and its allies may be
financing their respective armed forces with income from the drug
trade – but their very existence is also the direct result of the
ethnic strife and the anarchy that has been tearing Burma apart for
decades. It is about time the UNODC now recognises that no anti-drug
policy in Burma has any chance of success unless it is linked to a
real political solution to the civil war – and a meaningful democratic
process in the entire country. The alternative is what we have today:
never-ending internal ethnic and political conflicts, which will only
keep drugs flowing.
Author: BERTIL LINTNER Category: Analysis, News, Politics
Comments
June 28, 2010 at 9:21 am
PB Publico says:
From my experience in the Shan state for more than two decades, I have
been more than cinvinced that the military led by Ne Win and his
proteges never wanted to end the civil war. For, how else could they
grow and hold the political power? It was (and still is) their
expressed excuse for their coup in March, 1962, as well as holding
onto power today. And just look how the number of ehnic groups taking
up arms against them grow since then. We could visit Shan and Palaung
villages in the hills, even spending over nights there during weekends
before that date. We saw no insurgents any where in the Shan or the
Kachin state. And no army encampments visible on the east of
Naungchio.
The ideal state is a small military as border guards, and an ediquate,
well-trained civilian police force (trained in civil law) for civic
administration. We are a small and poor nation. (Nonesense we are a
resource-rich country.) Military anywhere, any time in history or now
is expensive and a big burden on the peaceable life of civilians who
must earn their living and, in addition, support the men, equipment
and munitions.
A peaceable, total settlement in Burma is long overdue.
We must discard the addhamma vada once and for all. And usher in a
dhamma vada for one and all.
My experience tells me that the ethnic minorities are just simple,
honest, peaceable people just like the way the the majority rural
Bhamas are. It is up to the greedey ones that must watch out and have
a little kindness on the poor lot.
You can’t blame the communists. For they are no more. You can’t blame
the imperialists. For imperalism is no more. You can’t blame Aung San
Suu Kyi. For she is a product of the chaos created by the greedy ones
who have been so far unwilling to engage in any peaceable settlement.
June 28, 2010 at 4:12 pm
EKA says:
What I have seen is that its not only ethnic groups producing drugs in
Burma. Tatmadaw units on fare outpost´s often support and sustain
there own livelihood by poppy production as the central army command
don´t support them with basic needs – or they do it of simple greed.
June 29, 2010 at 4:04 am
ba ba Aung says:
UNODC has already great efforts but not for Burmese dictator.
July 3, 2010 at 1:45 pmexcuse me says:
Aung San Suu Kyi is not creation of the greedy men.she is the creation
of neo-colonialists. without their promotion she would be a nothing.
July 11, 2010 at 2:33 am
Zo Sakamkei says:
Don’t blame only ethnic groups producing drugs in Burma.In Burma
histry nobody can’t do anything without ARMY JUNTA’S SUPPORT.
-After theytake the power in 1988,the JUNTA’s work togather with
KHUNSAR(before they said the HEROIN KING druglord in the world).
-Now they work togather with Bussinese in Burma the HEROIN
KINGS(Khunsar,Lawshithan,…etcs). In the pass time what theysaid these
people(Druglord) can you amazing.
-Now the Army junta joint with the Manipure saparatist Insugents the
drugs production in Indian border.
-It was toomuch we knew.
August 12, 2010 at 8:21 am
Tettoe Aung says:
If you have seen the TV series ‘The Wire’ then you’ll know that it’s
all in the game. Too much money is involved and you know who the BIG
drugs lords are, look no further than the SPDC and those generals who
careers have been in the Shan State. Who else will they trust? Why is
Daw Suu now in house arrest? Because she knows too much – this
happened after she visited the Wa areas. What happened to the list
that the late Johnnie and his comrades took form the Burmese embassy
in Bangkok when they raided it? Interested in whose names are on the
list? That’s drugs – you can be hanged for a few kilo if caught but
the proceeds of drugs money can create an ‘Asia World’ for a Garden
State (with no poppies flowers unfortunately). It’s all in a game!
…and I am Sid Harth
Conflict, History, Hot Off The Presses, News, Views and Reviews
24/09/2010
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