What’s going on in Burma? – RTÉ: Today with Pat Kenny
February 3rd, 2012
On the line from Burma earlier today..
http://www.rte.ie/radio1/todaywithpatkenny/2012-02-03.html - audio link on right-hand side of page
Than Shwe: Karma chameleon – The Irrawaddy
January 27th, 2012
Did Burma’s generals change their ways because their leader feared the karmic consequences of his actions while in power?
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=22937
BANGKOK — “I’ve puzzled over that,” said Sen. John McCain, when asked his opinion on why Burma’s government has undertaken several landmark reforms in recent months.
Observers have been surprised by the changes—such as the freeing of political prisoners, relaxed press curbs and a newfound environmental and social awareness—described by McCain as unimaginable one year ago. The Burmese government says the new course is irreversible, while outside observers believe the reforms to be real, though many, like McCain, are no more than “cautiously optimistic” and remind that more needs to be done—such as fair elections, a free press and peace in ethnic borderlands.
Many exiled Burmese and even some recently freed political prisoners remain skeptical, reminding anyone who cares to listen that Burma’s 2008 Constitution vests ultimate authority with the country’s military, and that even if Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy (NLD) win all 40 Lower House seats in a by-election slated for April 1, it will not affect power structures inside Burma.
Behind the scenes, an 11-man National Defense and Security Council (NDSC) is said to be exercising real control, leaving President Thein Sein as the moderate-sounding front man attempting to launder the reputation of a cabal of military strongmen nationalists, who want Western sanctions lifted and to reduce the influence of an increasingly powerful China on their country. (more…)
US Calls for International Observers at Burma By-elections – The Irrawaddy
January 23rd, 2012
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=22902
BANGKOK—A US delegation fronted by Sen. John McCain and Sen. Joseph Lieberman will request that the Burmese government allow international observers to oversee April by-elections, which, if deemed free and fair, will almost certainly see the US remove some sanctions on the Burmese government.
“Obviously we will have to look carefully at the process of the elections,” said McCain, who conceded that Burma’s reforms in recent months—including the release of several hundred political prisoners—are “a dramatic change in policy and behaviour in as short a time as a year ago,” he said.
McCain confirmed that the delegation, which arrived in Burma on Sunday, would ask Burma’s government to allow international observation of the April by-elections, in response to a question about the issue from this correspondent. (more…)
Time for Burma’s exiles to go home? – The Diplomat
January 19th, 2012
http://the-diplomat.com/2012/01/19/time-for-burma-exiles-to-go-home/
Some await more reforms and a government role for Aung San Suu Kyi, as Burma’s foreign-based media eye up the home market. India-based Mizzima is hoping to set up an office in Burma, according to editor, Sein Win, who said “We’ll wait for the publication of the new press law, maybe in February or March. I’m hopeful they will abandon the censorship board.”
In the years since the Burmese authorities crushed a 1988 student-led uprising, killing perhaps 3,000 in the process, many of the country’s opposition figures have been jailed or worked from abroad – or sometimes both. Some of those jailed were freed, only to be swept up in a junta dragnet after the 2007 Saffron protests, which also saw the jailing of hundreds of monks.
As a result of Burma’s historic persecution of dissidents, hundreds – perhaps thousands – live abroad, along with hundreds of thousands of other refugees and several million migrant workers scattered across Southeast Asia. Bangkok, New Delhi, London, Washington DC, Brussels are all bases for Burmese dissidents, with a mini industry-sized network of NGOs, media, refugee support agencies, clinics – not to mention armed opposition groups – all operating along the Thailand-Burma border.
Could all that be about to change? Since taking office in March 2011, President Thein Sein has, it seems, steered his military-backed government on a reform route – reaching a truce with the country’s longest standing ethnic militia, relaxing censorship laws, allowing the formation of trade unions and, with limits, the holding of public demonstrations. (more…)
An end to one of the world’s longest wars? Myanmar rebels cautious – Christian Science Monitor
January 12th, 2012
BANGKOK – After a six-decade war between the government of Myanmar (Burma) and one of the country’s ethnic minority militias, a historic peace is in reach after ceasefire talks today.
The deal would mark the end of one of the world’s longest wars – the Myanmar Army and a Karen ethnic minority’s army have fought since 1949 – and is being taken as another signal that the Myanmar government may be sincere about reforming its old authoritarian ways. But members of the Karen ethnic minority aren’t celebrating just yet.
General-Secretary of the Karen National Union (KNU) Army, Zipporah Sein, says that “we are happy to hear that the government wants to make an agreement,” but says that the deal being discussed in the Burmese town Pa’an has yet to be finalized. (more…)
Anwar verdict resets Malaysian politics – Asia Times
January 10th, 2012
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/NA11Ae01.html
Leader of Malaysia's Islamist party PAS Abdul Hadi Awang arrives at the court Monday morning (Photo: Simon Roughneen)
KUALA LUMPUR – A not-guilty verdict in a sex scandal case against Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim could prove a game-changer in the run-up to elections due by 2013 but thought by many analysts to be held this year.
After months of railing against what he deemed trumped-up and politicized charges, Anwar cut an understandably cheerful and relieved dash on Monday morning when speaking to perhaps 3,000 supporters outside the Kuala Lumpur court where he was acquitted of charges of sodomizing a male party aide in 2008. Sodomy is a criminal offense punishable by 20 years in prison in Malaysia, where Muslim citizens are subject to sharia law. (more…)
After sodomy acquittal, Malaysia’s Anwar pressing for power – Christian Science Monitor
January 10th, 2012
Opposition supporters outside Malaysia's High Court on Monday morning (Photo: Simon Roughneen)
In an unexpected conclusion to a two-year trial, a Malaysian court acquitted opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim on sodomy charges that he insisted were politically motivated.
KUALA LUMPUR, MALAYSIA
Monday’s surprise acquittal of Malaysia’s opposition leader in a sodomy trial that many viewed as politically motivated eases the prospect of unrest in the multi-ethnic country, one of southeast Asia’s largest tourist draws
The potential for trouble was highlighted by three small explosions near the courthouse on Monday morning, injuring several people, while a jubilant Anwar Ibrahim mingled with a raucous, fist-pumping crowd of several thousand supporters. (more…)
Irish Continue to Struggle Over Abuse Fallout as Nuncio Takes Up Post – National Catholic Register
January 7th, 2012
DUBLIN — As Archbishop Charles Brown takes up his new post of papal nuncio to Ireland, he will face what some see as unprecedented difficulties for the Church in Ireland.
After the publication of a series of reports outlining gruesome cases of sexual abuse by priests in Ireland over recent decades, coupled with a falloff in Church attendance, and less quantifiably, a perceptible decline in religious belief and practice, it’s little wonder that Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin predicted that his archdiocese faced its toughest challenge “since Catholic Emancipation,” the 1829 changes to British law that removed many of the discriminatory provisions against Catholics in the United Kingdom, of which Ireland was then a part.
Archbishop Martin was commenting on a drop in Mass attendance in Dublin to 14% and declining priest numbers, but the remarks were seen by many as appropriate to the wider Church in Ireland, which now operates within what Irish writer John Waters described to the Register as “the most anti-Catholic country in Europe.” (more…)
Conflicting signals on reform in Burma (Myanmar) – Christian Science Monitor/RTÉ World Report
January 6th, 2012
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-Pacific/2012/0105/Conflicting-signals-on-reform-in-Burma-Myanmar
9/1/12 radio report here http://www.rte.ie/news/av/2012/0108/worldreport.html#
BANGKOK – Burma’s opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi says she believes that her country will hold full democratic elections in her lifetime, a good sign for the country, which has long been notorious for its oppressive military rule.
Ms. Suu Kyi’s remarks came on the heels of three high profile visits to Burma (Myanmar): Both Hillary Clinton and billionaire businessman George Soros, longtime funder of exiled opposition groups, made the trip last month, and Britain’s Foreign Secretary William Hague arrived in Burma earlier today. (more…)
Thai court sentences American citizen to 2.5 years in prison for insulting monarchy – Christian Science Monitor
December 8th, 2011
Gordon's lawyer Anon Nampa, speaks to press outside the court after today's sentencing (Photo: Simon Roughneen)
BANGKOK - US citizen Joe Gordon was sentenced to 2-1/2 years jail today for translating a banned biography of the Thai king and posting it online while living in Colorado, drawing condemnation from free speech advocates and US officials.
Mr. Gordon is the latest to be charged on Thailand’s lèse-majesté laws, some of the strictest in the world, which include prohibitions on posting anti-monarchy slurs online and can mean a prison sentence of 3 to 15 years.
Exact figures are not available, but lèse-majesté cases and convictions have spiked in recent years amid political uncertainty since a 2006 military coup and concerns over what will happen when King Bhumibol Adulyadej’s long reign ends. (more…)
