Another Black Day In Burma's History...

[Jet Gorgon]

OK, I lied. It works! Just click on the black screen and the photos come up. Truly lovely vista.

[Tywais]

OK, I lied. It works! Just click on the black screen and the photos come up. Truly lovely vista.

I think this is what you meant to do, extracted images from .ppt

[Jet Gorgon]

Um, ya, Tywais. Thank you. That is what I wanted to do. So how did you do that, Smartypants?

[Tywais]

Um, ya, Tywais. Thank you. That is what I wanted to do. So how did you do that, Smartypants?

Back in forum support - right click on image in powerpoint, save picture as - remember where you saved it and the name, then use the Attachments controls below - select Browse and choose the image, hit UPLOAD then when done, click on Manage Current Attachments and click on the picture name to insert it into the post.

[Jet Gorgon]

Ooooh, I missed that manage current attachments thing. Thanks for the directions and posting the pics, Tywais.

I hope members like the images. Seems ethereal to me.

Edited January 16, 2007 by Jet Gorgon

[gbt71fa]

yes the international community has let down Aung San Suu Kyi along with most of the Burmese people, now if only they had some oil .........

LOL!

Yep. George W (W stands for 'war monger') would be there in a flash, if there was a 'key' energy resource involved. He would 'save' the Burmese from the tyrannical dictator.

All this aside, since there is no chance of George W Jnr getting involved (thank god), the only immediate way out is a revolt by the Burmese. As usual, another war is at hand...sooner or later. At least the yanks may not be involved with & therefore not add to this debacle.

You uneducated twit. The only country that is pushing Burma right now IS the U.S. under George Bush. They are the ones pushing for action against the Burmese government in the U.N. Read something besides the Bangkok Post before you make an idiotic statement. Look it up...the one country that is pushing for change in Burma is the U.S. It is scary that you breathe the same air as the rest of us.

[mark lamai]

Russia and China veto a UN resolution recently.

ASEAN meeting sends a slightly tougher message to Burma about The Lady.

IMHO

tourism doesn't matter one way or the other.

the generals can survive anything as long as China supports them.

its that simple.

china is building the roads into burma for more trade.

china can see the huge resources available in Burma as well as a large market for their cheap goods.

the other investors from Singapore, Thailand etc don't matter much.

cut the China connection and the generals will fall, its that simple.

---------------------------------

imagine the road from China through Burma and into India/Bangladesh when finished.

now that is what you call a trade route.

wouldn't you want to control it?

Thailand is funding the road into Burma from Mae Sot.

Thai people are buying land there for farming and import back into Thailand.

Burma in the future will easily eclipse Thailand as an economy,

more land, smarter people and about same population.

[Jet Gorgon]

Burma in the future will easily eclipse Thailand as an economy,

more land, smarter people and about same population.

I would love to see Burma prosper. But, dunno. Reckon it'll be the same as Laos and Cambodia, a three-tiered economy, where there's the people (95% or so, still dirt poor), the farang NGOs (rich) and the people who work with the NGOs or tourists, and govt officials (cash flashers).

[Rinrada]

I would love to see Burma prosper. But, dunno. Reckon it'll be the same as Laos and Cambodia, a three-tiered economy, where there's the people (95% or so, still dirt poor), the farang NGOs (rich) and the people who work with the NGOs or tourists, and govt officials (cash flashers).

Three tiered economy...blast from the Past....

Yep I remember when we used to have something like that as well over "ere.....

from memory it was...cried (called)..........the UPPER Class...the Middle Class and the.....summit class.....ALL gone now of course ...init ...

It just takes time but only if people are prepared to make the attempt ...and..change things.......

[Jet Gorgon]

I would love to see Burma prosper. But, dunno. Reckon it'll be the same as Laos and Cambodia, a three-tiered economy, where there's the people (95% or so, still dirt poor), the farang NGOs (rich) and the people who work with the NGOs or tourists, and govt officials (cash flashers).

Three tiered economy...blast from the Past....

Yep I remember when we used to have something like that as well over "ere.....

from memory it was...cried (called)..........the UPPER Class...the Middle Class and the.....summit class.....ALL gone now of course ...init ...

It just takes time but only if people are prepared to make the attempt ...and..change things.......

Summit class. Geez, Rinrada, that's so modernly PC, init? Anyway, thanks for the wakeup boot to me brain.

[Cool Water Palace]

I've been disappointed to see so little on this forum about Burma and its refugees in Thailand, except during the tsunami. But today I happened to come across this post on a Zimbabwean exiles website:

http://www.swradioafrica.com/pages/letters170107.htm

and thought it relevant.

The point of the quote was about the power of letter writing.

Friends,

In case you doubted whether letter-writing to Myanmar was worthwhile, read below about the Open Heart campaign. However, be careful in your own letters to Myanmar, should you refer to the Open Heart campaign, that you do not give the impression that the campaign is an Amnesty International one. It is NOT. But it does provide encouragement to those of us outside the prison that is Myanmar to use our freedom to gain freedom for the Myanmarese (a slogan from Aung San Suu Kyi, by the way).

Best wishes,

Brian

**********************************************************************

Inter Press Service: Defiant public blitz on junta with letters - Marwaan Macan-Markar Mon 8 Jan 2007 Filed under: News, Inside Burma

Bangkok: A handwritten letter to a military dictator may sound like an ineffective and risky way of conveying defiance especially in this age of Internet, where e-mails, blogs and websites have combined to threaten political authority in a number of countries.

But in Burma, where a strict censorship regime is in force, and where access to information technology is limited, the good, old-fashioned letter is taken recourse to by the country’s long-suffering people to express growing dissatisfaction with Rangoon’s junta.

A letter-writing campaign, launched in the first week of the New Year, saw tens of thousands of people in and around Rangoon seeking the special envelopes and sheets of paper meant for this drive, say the organisers, a highly respected group of former university students, known as the ‘88-Generation Students’.

‘’This is an effort to break the silence. To get people to openly write about their grievances to the military government,'’ adds Naing Aung, secretary-general of the Forum for Democracy in Burma, a group of Burmese political exiles who work closely with the 88-Generation. ‘’It is not enough to just complain. This is to get people to show their courage by standing up and openly identifying themselves as critics.'’

The month-long letter-writing drive, known as the ‘Open Heart’ campaign, is the latest effort by the 88-Generation to ‘’raise the people’s voices,'’

Naing Aung explained in an interview. ‘’It is a peaceful way of expressing the public’s views, because protests are banned, the media is censored, and there are no elections.'’

Yet this effort, where the people are encouraged to directly address Burma’s strongman, Than Shwe, with the problems they face, comes with a high personal risk, including a jail term, if it provokes the ire of the junta.

The State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), as the junta is officially known, currently holds over 1,100 people in jails for expressing their thoughts on a range of subjects. These political prisoners include opposition parliamentarians, Buddhist monks, journalists, writers, students and political activists.

The 88-Generation, who derive their name from being students who led a pro-democracy protest in 1988, which was brutally crushed by the military regime, mounted this effort on the success of three other campaigns conducted last year. The first was a signature campaign in October, calling for the public to endorse a plea for the SPDC to release all political prisoners, including detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi. An estimated 60,000 people signed that petition.

Such a rare sign of public dissent in a climate of increasing oppression was followed by an equally impressive show of public support when the 88-Generation resorted to two more creative ways to register discontent. One was the ‘White Expression’ campaign, where members of the public were asked to wear white clothes as a mark of honesty and purity. The other: a multiple religious prayer meeting, where people were encouraged to hold silent prayers, including candle light vigils, in temples, churches and mosques.

Burmese political activists are welcoming this shift in the public mood as a further indicator of the deepening frustration across the South-east Asian nation that is run by a regime that is seen as incompetent, corrupt and oppressive.

Last year saw the price of rice, a staple dish in the Burmese diet, rise by 30 percent. Yet at the same time Than Shwe’s daughter was married in a lavish event where champagne flowed, the bride was decked in diamonds and pearls and the newly wed reportedly receiving gifts worth millions of dollars.

‘’The people want to cooperate in this campaign because of the growing suffering. Some people don’t care what will happen to them because they are just angry,'’ Zaw Min, spokesman for the Democratic Party for a New Society, an opposition party banned by the SPDC, told IPS. ‘’People are increasingly identifying themselves as they express their opinion.'’

It is an emerging political undercurrent that has also struck journalists working for the Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), a radio and television station that has its headquarters in Oslo and is run by Burmese political exiles. ‘’More and more people inside Burma are voicing their anger through our programmes,'’ Than Win Htut, a DVB senior reporter told IPS. ‘’Some have even walked for half a day to get to a telephone from their village to criticise the SPDC’s inefficiency or abuse of power.'’

Such momentum has been taking shape over the past two to three years, he adds. ‘’The people are feeling more confident to complain about the SPDC unlike earlier. There is clearly a change in attitudes.'’

Among the factors that have triggered this rising tide of discontent is the arrest of the country’s former intelligence chief and Prime Minister Gen.

Khin Nyunt and his allies within the regime, say Burma analysts. Khin Nyunt, who received a 44-year suspended sentence in July 2005, had close contacts with the country’s business community and was viewed by some quarters inside Burma and by South-east Asian governments as a moderate.

‘’The economy has shrunk noticeably since the purge of Khin Nyunt,'’ Debbie Stothard of the Alternate ASEAN (Association of South-east Asian Nations) Network on Burma, a regional human rights lobby, told IPS. ‘’The business people who had benefited lost out. And the sense of dissatisfaction grew wider, with many becoming fed up with Than Shwe, who has diverted money to his own small clique.'’

‘’The sense of outrage and anger is growing,'’ she added. ‘’There is a feeling that change is very possible and that is why more and more people are taking risks to speak out,'’ she said.

[Cool Water Palace]

PS This contribution adds to my previous post.

Eddie Cross

(a businessman - I think a supermarket owner, where pricing is a political act at the moment with inflation over 1000% (that's only officially), and the parallel exchange rate having multiplied 6 times in 6 months - now 6000000 to GBP in old money (a few months back they dropped 3 zeros because the machines could not cope so slogan: "Mugabe - from hero to zero"!). The official rate a few years back was 800. Or only 80?)

Bulawayo, 17th January 2007

Just recently some countries tried to take the issue of the Burmese Junta to the UN Security Council. The demands made by the resolution were not outrageous or unreasonable – just release political prisoners and allow normal political activity and restore some form of democracy.

In the subsequent debate and vote both China and Russia spoke and voted against the resolution – effectively killing it and once again frustrating the efforts of the global community to try and restore some form of decent and responsible government to the Burmese people. Both Russia and China are States that claim on paper that they are in favor of human and political rights. But when it comes to these as against economic interests and political influence, they take second place. Self-interest comes first. They should be ashamed of themselves.

Then the President of South Africa, writing in his weekly column in the magazine ANC Today, drew attention to the crisis in Somalia and called for African solidarity with the people of Somalia in their struggle to find themselves and a way forward. In respect to the crisis in Zimbabwe, a close neighbor and very much his responsibility in geopolitical and diplomatic terms, he shows no such concern or activity. His silence on the ongoing human and political crisis here is deafening.

It is not as if China, Russia and South Africa were defending a socialist state or leadership and expressing solidarity with the people of these countries, the leadership of Burma and Zimbabwe are corrupt military junta who are simply bent on enriching themselves, their cronies and their families. They are violating every tenet of international human and political rights and do not allow freedom of expression or assembly in their countries.

The rest of the article

http://www.swradioafrica.com/pages/eddie170107.htm

is about Zimbabwe, but the writer concludes:

As for our colleagues and comrades in this struggle in Burma – all we can say is hold your heads up high, we will win eventually and to Aung San Suu Kyi, we admire your courage and your sacrifice for your people. You are not alone – all freedom loving people stand with you in solidarity.

Edited January 18, 2007 by Cool Water Palace

[jumnien]

Really tragic when a military junta installs itself and gives the formerly elected leader restricted access to national media and then refuses to call elections.

[Lumock]

Thant Myint-U, the grandson of U Thant, the former Burmese Secretary General of the U.N., has written a book about Burma's history and has been giving interviews on the radio talk show circuit. They can be heard at:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6869058

and

http://www.wamu.org/programs/dr/ (toward bottom of page)

He knows Aung San Suu Kyi, she used to work for his grandfather and visit their house often in N.Y. He goes on to explain the events that led to Aung San Suu Kyi coming into a leadership position in the movement and her eventual house arrest status.

He gives a 'somewhat' insiders perspective of the mind-set of the military regime and looks at the 'big picture'. Besides the well talked about Aung San Suu Kyi situation, the regime is also fighting a civil war, though on a small scale. His point is, because the regime holds the best hand, a (workable) strategy (which has yet to be thought of) must be formulated that will change the regime's behavior......

[LaoPo]

BBC: Last Updated: Friday, 25 May 2007, 13:23 GMT 14:23 UK

Burma extends Suu Kyi's detention

Burma's military junta has extended the house arrest of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi by one year, officials say.

Government officials went to Ms Suu Kyi's house in Rangoon and read the detention order out to her.

The pro-democracy leader's latest period of detention, which began in May 2003, had been due to expire on Sunday.

Ms Suu Kyi has spent 11 of the last 18 years under house arrest. In 1990 her National League for Democracy won polls that were annulled by the army.

She has never been allowed to govern.

The extension order was widely expected, as under Burmese law Ms Suu Kyi's house arrest must be renewed every 12 months.

Last week, 59 world political leaders including former US Presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, and former South Korean President Kim Dae-Jung, called for her release in a letter to Burma's military ruler, General Than Shwe.

In November 2006, Ms Suu Kyi was allowed to leave her house to meet UN envoy Ibrahim Gambari for one hour.

Burma's military junta took power in 1988.

From:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6691935.stm

LaoPo

[Mid]

we'd do well to look closely at our western neighbours .......................................

[keebone]

Recently amnesty international released a report on worldwide oppression in which they devoted more to what goes on in the UK than they did to both Burma and Zimbabwe.

Good to see they got their priorities right

[Mid]

It is a shame that our government has not publicly spoken out or done more to secure Suu Kyi's release. Other Thais have long held her in great respect for her courage, humanitarian ideals, dedication and dignity. The world's most famous political prisoner is not known and revered as ''The Lady'' for nothing.

EDITORIAL

The Post Publishing Public Co., Ltd

[cdnvic]

A bunch of so-called Generals scared sh*tless of an old woman.

That and the fact that they need permission from regional warlords to move around their own country speaks to the level of joke that silly regime has risen to.

[Mid]

maybe their more afraid of the ideology she represents ................................

[cdnvic]

maybe their more afraid of the ideology she represents ................................

Can't lock her ideas in the house.