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Myanmar:
New premier, same old woes
By Richard
S Ehrlich
BANGKOK - Reeling from bomb blasts,
international sanctions and demands to free democracy
leader Aung San Suu Kyi from detention, Myanmar has
suddenly changed its secretive leadership, promoting
General Khin Nyunt, its crafty intelligence chief, to
become prime minister. But the reshuffle in Yangon - or
an attempt by the regime literally to erect a facade of
prosperity - is unlikely to make much difference to the
people of the poverty-racked country.
Amid the
turmoil, Myanmar's fragile economy is melting under
relentless sanctions, boycotts and other pressure.
"The economy is grim because of the sanctions,"
an Australian executive, who works for a Myanmar company
in Yangon, said in an interview. "My salary was cut 30
percent. Everybody is hurting."
He said life in
Yangon is "seedy", with prostitution and poverty
spreading while the government plans a Potemkin village
facade of modern buildings along a highway linked to the
capital's international airport, so arriving investors
and other visitors will be fooled by the image of
wealth.
Washington last month clamped economic
sanctions on Yangon and forbade remittances from the US
to the country. This pulverized Myanmar's banking and
international transactions because much of its
import-export business was denominated in US dollars and
fed through US bank transfers.
"By denying these
rulers the hard currency they use to fund their
repression, we are providing strong incentives for
democratic change and human rights in Burma [Myanmar],"
said US President George W Bush.
The Freedom and
Democracy Act also allows Bush to fund anti-government
Myanmar activists and hamper the regime's leaders by
rejecting their applications for US visas.
Critics say that the US sanctions immediately
hit poor textile workers whose jobs were slashed because
Myanmar's biggest exports to the US included garments
and other cloth items. The junta meanwhile indicated
that it would use euros, along with yen and other
currencies, for international deals to circumvent the
ban on US cash flows.
While the US and others,
notably the European Union, were piling on sanctions,
another Myanmar-related saga was making its way through
the US court system. Unocal has spent much of August
reacting to a Los Angeles court ruling that the
California-based oil corporation must stand trial on
September 22 in California for allegedly allowing troops
who were protecting its Yadana pipeline to kill, rape
and enslave villagers during the 1990s.
"Prior
to its involvement in the pipeline project, Unocal had
specific knowledge that the use of forced labor was
likely and nevertheless chose to proceed," Los Angeles
Judge Victoria Chaney reportedly stated in a court
document released on July 31. Unocal has denied any
responsibility for such crimes.
Back in Yangon,
the ruling State Peace and Development Council on Monday
named General Khin Nyunt as Myanmar's new prime
minister, crowning his past 20 years as head of the
powerful and often sinister Defense Services
Intelligence Directorate.
"In order to be able
to carry out the interests of the state and the entire
people more effectively, the State Peace and Development
Council [junta] has appointed General Khin Nyunt as the
state prime minister with effect from today," the regime
announced on local radio and television without
elaborating.
Diplomats, investors and citizens
are looking to see how Khin Nyunt, formerly the junta's
"first secretary" and third-most-powerful general, will
manipulate the self-appointed regime. Diplomats
described Khin Nyunt as a somewhat politically savvy
pragmatist who wants gradually to liberalize Myanmar's
ailing economy and internal political life, while
broadening international relations beyond the country's
tight links with China.
"At the very least, it
may lead to Aung San Suu Kyi being released in the next
few weeks," reported the British Broadcasting Corp,
which closely monitors the former British colony, known
as Burma until the junta officially changed the
country's name in 1989.
Khin Nyunt, born in
1940, is a familiar personality among Southeast Asian
leaders and has visited Thailand and other countries to
tackle criticism of the regime and probe for lucrative
business deals.
In 1998, Associated Press
reported that Khin Nyunt and his wife, Dr Khin Win Shwe,
shocked conservative Myanmar society by signing an
advertisement in the New Light of Myanmar newspaper
announcing that one of their sons, Dr Ye Naing Win, "was
disowned by the parents for his inexcusable deed". The
ad asked the public not to inquire about why they
disowned him, but gossip in Yangon revealed the son had
married a Singaporean woman.
Under a law passed
by the junta, a Myanmar citizen married to a foreigner
cannot hold government office. The stigmatized Myanmar
citizen's parents would also be immediately disqualified
from any government position. When the law was
introduced, it was widely seen as aimed at disqualifying
Suu Kyi from ruling Myanmar because she was married to a
British citizen who has since died.
To make way
for Khin Nyunt's promotion, anti-US hardliner General
Than Shwe stepped down from his post as prime minister,
without any immediate public explanation. Than Shwe was
the undisputed "chairman" of a regime that has scorned
Washington for allegedly goading and financing Myanmar's
desperate pro-democracy dissidents.
Than Shwe,
in his late 60s, was said by some Myanmar-watchers to be
ailing and possibly anxious to retire. But Western
analysts said that he remains commander-in-chief of the
military and may start orchestrating events away from
the international spotlight.
The opaque
political change in Myanmar will become clearer in the
upcoming weeks when the new lineup displays its
policies, makes speeches and meets delegations. Other
generals and ministers were slotted into various lower
positions in the junta's reshuffle, while others
retired.
Under Than Shwe's harsh leadership, the
world's most famous political prisoner, Suu Kyi, became
trapped in "protective custody" because of a clash in
northern Myanmar nearly three months ago. The junta and
Suu Kyi's supporters blamed each other for the violence
that erupted on May 30 during her tour of northern
Myanmar, which left several people dead and many of her
supporters imprisoned.
Suu Kyi's National League
for Democracy (NLD) party scored a landslide election
victory in 1990 but the military rejected her attempt to
rule. She has spent more than half of the past 14 years
under house arrest in her two-story home on the shore of
a small lake in the capital, Yangon.
Myanmar has
frequently accused the United States of propping up Suu
Kyi to destabilize the country in an effort to seize its
vast, untapped natural resources.
"Even today,
America has been conspiring against Myanmar," the
regime's New Light of Myanmar newspaper reported last
Friday. The US has insisted that Myanmar "is a country
that is violating human rights, has no religious freedom
and democracy, is using forced labor, has the largest
number of human-trafficking cases, is producing the
largest amount of narcotic drugs, and has not cooperated
with the US in eliminating narcotic drugs. All the
accusations are false," the government's paper added.
In recent weeks, bombs have exploded at various
venues in Yangon and elsewhere.
"The security
personnel had exposed and arrested 12 terrorists from
inside the country who had committed the bomb attacks,
together with explosives," the New Light of Myanmar
reported on Monday. "They had plans to contact the NLD
[to help] in creating civil unrest, but I'm not sure
whether the NLD leaders, including Aung San Suu Kyi,
were aware of the plans," the military's deputy
intelligence chief, Major-General Kyaw Win, was quoted
as saying.
The alleged bombers reportedly
possessed explosives concealed in lunchboxes and pencil
cases, along with a mobile phone.
The military
has ruled Burma/Myanmar since 1962 in one form or
another, but in 1988 the current handful of generals
gained power after crushing pro-democracy demonstrations
in widespread clashes that left more than 1,000 people
dead.
(Copyright 2003 Richard S Ehrlich.)
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