Saturday, December 26, 2009

Chinese border town emerges as new front line in fight against human trafficking

Zaw Aung, 29, said he regularly crosses from Burma into China in search of work. Burmese women also are brought over for marriages with Chinese men -- some forced, some arranged through "matchmakers." (Keith B. Richburg/the Washington Post)

By Keith B. Richburg
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, December 26, 2009

This booming little border town in China's southwestern Yunnan province, where the economic prosperity of China is separated from the destitution of Burma by nothing more than a flimsy, rusted metal fence, has emerged as the new front line in the worldwide fight against human trafficking.

On any given afternoon, a steady stream of people scale the six-foot-high fence, unperturbed by the Chinese border guards posted just a hundred yards away. Amid the Burmese men looking for day labor, or women coming to sell their vegetables in the wealthier Chinese markets, is traffic far less benign:

Burmese women being brought over for marriages with Chinese men -- some forced, some voluntarily arranged through "matchmakers." Babies being brought into China to be sold. And Chinese women from poorer inland areas being moved in the opposite direction, often ending up in Southeast Asia's sex industry.

In the shadowy world of human trafficking, say government officials and advisers with foreign aid agencies, China has become a source country, a destination country and a transit country all at once.

"Some of the Yunnan women and girls think they'll get a better job in Thailand," said Kathleen Speake, chief technical adviser for the United Nations' International Labor Office in Beijing. Burmese "are coming into China. We're looking at being trafficked for adoption, and women being trafficked for marriage."

No firm numbers are available on the extent of trafficking. Kirsten di Martino, a project officer in Beijing for UNICEF, said that from 2000 to 2007, China's public security bureau investigated 44,000 cases of trafficking, rescuing about 130,000 women and children. But, she added, "this is just the tip of the iceberg."

China, she said, "is very big, and has a lot of border -- and has a whole lot of problems."

Here in Ruili, two criminal gangs were cracked and 14 women rescued in the first half of the year, said Meng Yilian, who works for the newly formed group China-Myanmar Cooperation Against Human Trafficking. Burma is also known as Myanmar.
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A legally suspect vocation

"In the villages bordering Myanmar, there are some people working as matchmakers, " she said. "And some of them are human traffickers. It's hard to tell who are the matchmakers and who are the traffickers."

Matchmaking, which falls into a legally murky terrain, is rooted in Chinese tradition, which allows a man to make a gift to a woman's family in exchange for marriage.

In this border area, matchmakers are not hard to find. From Ruili, a gravel road leads west, running parallel to the Burmese border and past ethnic Dai villagers working in paddy fields. In Mang Sai village, the matchmaker is a heavy-set 28-year-old woman who said she has been in the business seven or eight years and had "successfully made 20 matches," including two involving Chinese buyers and Burmese girls.

The matchmaker -- she requested that her name be withheld because her profession is legally suspect -- said a local Chinese girl will cost as much as 50,000 renminbi, about $7,300. But a girl from Burma, she said, costs just 20,000 renminbi, or just under $3,000.


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Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Obama has powerful tool to pressure Myanmar



By FOSTER KLUG (AP) – 1 day ago

WASHINGTON — If talks with Myanmar over democratic reforms fail, the Obama administration could tie up large amounts of money that the country's ruling generals stash in international banks from the sale of natural gas.

So far the administration has been hesitant to go that route.

But pressuring banks to avoid doing business with Myanmar's leaders could be a powerful economic weapon — one that already is being used elsewhere. It's an approach, for example, that has been used to try to push North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons ambitions.

Congress already has provided the power for the administration to go after the banks and some rights groups want President Barack Obama to use it right away, or at least if direct talks fail.

U.S. officials have just started face-to-face negotiations and want to give them more time to show results. Imposing the banking sanctions would be expensive and time-consuming, and Myanmar isn't a top priority on a crowded foreign policy agenda that includes Afghanistan and Iran.

Still, the administration has warned of tougher action if engagement breaks down with Myanmar, also known as Burma. And the mere threat could add force to the U.S. negotiating position.

"We will reserve the option of tightening sanctions on the regime and its supporters to respond to events in Burma," Obama's top diplomat for East Asia, Kurt Campbell, told lawmakers in September.

Myanmar has one of the most repressive governments in the world and has been controlled by the military since 1962. For years, the United States has used punishing sanctions to try to force change on the country, with little success. Former President George W. Bush's administration favored shunning Myanmar, and Bush's wife, Laura, and many in Congress were strong advocates of the nascent democracy movement there.

Now, the Obama administration has reversed the isolation policy in favor of engagement, which it hopes will persuade the generals to grant greater freedoms to opposition parties and minorities and to free political prisoners.

Myanmar has since made a few symbolic gestures of good will, letting detained democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi meet with Campbell, for instance, and releasing some political prisoners. At the same time, it has continued to persecute ethnic minorities, journalists and student activists.

Obama himself spoke of a possibly stronger position on Myanmar in his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech. There will be engagement and diplomacy with Myanmar, he said, "but there must be consequences when those things fail."

Activists say financial measures that hinder Myanmar's ruling generals' ability to access the international banking system might do what broader economic sanctions have failed to do.

"What the Burmese government values is not its commerce with the outside world but the financial proceeds of that commerce," said Tom Malinowski of Human Rights Watch. "Once the Burmese government deposits the checks in its bank accounts, there's a lot the United States government can do to prevent that money from being used in the international banking system."

Treasury officials have targeted 40 people and 44 entities since the Myanmar junta killed and arrested protesters during demonstrations in 2007. Being added to the sanctions list prevents people from making transactions in the banking system of the United States.

But a 2008 law grants the Treasury Department authority to impose conditions on banking relationships, meaning sanctions could affect activities of international banks.

Myanmar has lucrative natural gas deals with its neighbors and with some European and U.S. companies, with revenues going into foreign banks. Under its new authority, the U.S. can let these banks know it has concerns about their association with Myanmar that could hurt these banks' ability to work with U.S. financial institutions, said Jennifer Quigley, advocacy director for the U.S. Campaign for Burma.

Supporters of the banking sanctions often raise North Korea, saying that the United States effectively froze the North out of the international banking system in 2005, hurting leader Kim Jong Il.

For the moment, the Obama administration is urging patience as it pursues talks.

Next year's elections in Myanmar will provide a good look at the junta's intentions. A big question will be whether high-level U.S.-Myanmar talks lead to true participation by minorities and opposition groups or merely let the generals consolidate power.


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အီရန္ ေရြးေကာက္ပြဲမွာ မဲခုိး အႏုိင္ရယူခဲ့တဲ့ အာဏာရွင္ အစုိးရ ကုိ တႏုိင္ငံလုံးဆန္႔က်င္ ဆႏၵၿပေနၾက

အီရန္မွာ ဘာသာေရးေခါင္ေဆာင္ၾကီး စ်ာပန မွ အစုိးရကုိ ဆန္႔က်င္သည့္ ဆႏၵၿပပြဲသုိ႔ အသြင္ကူးေၿပာင္း
We Support Iran's Democracy Movement for Freedom and Justice. We Express Our Solidarity With Iranian Opposition Protesters. You Are All Brave Men and Women Of Iran. Brave Iranians Continue Your Justified Fight Against Dictators.
(WFWW)
-WFWW(ဒူဘုိင္း)-
၁၂.၂၁.၂၀၀၉

အီရန္မွာ အတုိက္အခံေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ားကုိ ေထာက္ခံခဲ့တဲ့ အထင္ကရ အီရန္ဘာသာေရး ေခါင္းေဆာင္ၾကီး တစ္ဦးၿဖစ္သူ အယာတုိလာ ဟုိစိန္ အလီ မြန္တာဇာယီ ရဲ႕ စ်ာပနကုိ လာေရာက္ ဂါရ၀ၿပဳ ပုိ႔ေဆာင္သူမ်ားက အီရန္ သမၼတ မာမြတ္ဒ္ အာမာဒီနီဂ်က္ဒ္ ကုိ ဆန္႔က်င္ဆႏၵၿပခဲ့ၾကေၾကာင္း သိရွိရပါသည္။ သမၼတ အာမာဒီနီဂ်က္ဒ္ ျပန္အေရြးခံရတဲ့ကိစၥ ႏွင့္ မဲလိမ္ခဲ့မႈေတြအေပၚ ကန္႔ကြက္ ဆႏၵျပၾကသူမ်ားကုိ အစိုးရက အၾကမ္းဖက္ႏွိမ္ႏွင္းခဲ့မႈႏွင့္ ပတ္သက္ၿပီး အီရန္ဘာသာေရး ေခါင္းေဆာင္ အယာတုိလာဟုိစိန္ အလီ မြန္တာဇာယီ က ၿပင္းထန္စြာရွဳံ႕ခ် ခဲ့သူၿဖစ္ပါတယ္။ လက္ရွိသမၼတ မာမြတ္အာမာဒီနီ ဂ်က္ဒ္ဟာ တုိင္းျပည္နဲ႔ ျပည္သူလူထုကုိ လိမ္လည္ခဲ့တယ္၊ သူ႔ရဲ႕ လုပ္ရပ္ေတြဟာ အစၥလာမ္ဘာသာေရး၊ ကုိယ္က်င့္တရား၊ တရားမွ်တမႈေတြနဲ႔ ဆန္႔က်င္ၿပီး လုပ္ေဆာင္ ေနတယ္လုိ႔ ရွဳံ႕ခ်ခဲ့ပါတယ္။

အယာတုိလာဟုိစိန္ အလီ မြန္တာဇာယီ ရဲ႕ စ်ာပနကုိ သိန္းနဲ႔ခ်ီတဲ့ အီရန္ၿပည္သူမ်ားက လုိက္ပါ ပုိ႔ေဆာင္ခဲ့ၾကေၾကာင္း၊ စ်ာပန ကုိ လုိက္ပါပုိ႔ေဆာင္ သူမ်ားက “ အာဏာရွင္ က်ဆုံးပါေစ၊ အာမာဒီနီဂ်က္ဒ္ အာဏာရွင္အစုိးရ ေမာင္းထုတ္ၾက၊ ဘာသာေရးေခါင္းေဆာင္ၾကီး ခါေမနီ လူသတ္သမား” လုိ႔ ေၾကြးေၾကာ္ဆႏၵၿပ ခဲ့ၾကေၾကာင္းသိရပါသည္။ ဆႏၵၿပပြဲဟာ အၿခားၿမိဳ႕ ေတြမွာလည္း ၿဖစ္ပြားခဲ့ေၾကာင္းလည္း သိရပါသည္။ အတုိက္အခံပါတီေခါင္းေဆာင္ မူဆာဘီက အီရန္ၿပည္သူမ်ား အေနၿဖင့္ အမွန္တရားဘက္က ရပ္တည္ခဲ့ၿပီး၊ အာဏာရွင္စံနစ္ ကုိ ဆန္႔က်င္ခဲ့တဲ့ အီရန္ဘာသာေရးေခါင္းေဆာင္ အယာတုိလာဟုိစိန္ အလီ မြန္တာဇာယီ ရဲ႕ စ်ာပနကုိ ေနာက္ဆုံး လာေရာက္ ဂါရ၀ၿပဳၾကဖုိ႔ တုိက္တြန္းႏွဳိးေဆာ္ထားခဲ့သည္။ အာဏာရွင္ ဆန္႔က်င္ေရး လႈပ္ရွားမႈ တြင္ ဆႏၵၿပ သူမ်ားက အစိမ္းေရာင္ အမွတ္အသားမ်ား ၀တ္ဆင္ၿပီး ဆႏၵၿပ ခဲ့ေၾကာင္းသိရွိရပါသည္။


အရည္အခ်င္း အဓိက ေရြးခ်ယ္ပါ NLD



-ၿမတ္စုိး-
၁၂.၁၉.၂၀၀၉
မဇၥိ်မ

ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံမွာ အင္အားအေကာင္းဆံုး ပါတီ ၿဖစ္တဲ့ အမ်ဳိးသား ဒီမိုကေရစီ အဖြဲ႔ခ်ဳပ္ (NLD) မွာ လက္ရွိ အႏွစ္ ၂၀ ေက်ာ္ၾကာ တာဝန္ထမ္းေဆာင္ခဲ့ၾကတဲ့ ပါတီထိပ္တန္း ေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ားက ေခါင္းေဆာင္မႈ အေၿပာင္းအလဲ ၿပဳလုပ္ဖုိ႔ ဆုံးၿဖတ္ခ်က္ခ်ခဲ့တာဟာ မွန္ကန္တဲ့သင့္ေလွ်ာ္တဲ့ လုပ္ရပ္ၿဖစ္ပါတယ္။

ပါတီ ေသြးသစ္ေလာင္းမႈ လုိ႔ေခၚေခၚ၊ မ်ိဳးဆက္သစ္ လူငယ္မ်ားကုိ စိတ္ခ် ယုံၾကည္မႈရွိရွိ လက္ဆင့္ကမ္း ပုခုံးေၿပာင္း တာဝန္ေပးမႈ လုိ႔ပဲေခၚေခၚ ဒီဆုံးၿဖတ္ခ်က္က အေရးပါပါတယ္။

ဒီေနရာမွာ အသက္အရြယ္ႀကီးရင့္ လာၾကၿပီၿဖစ္တဲ့ ပါတီထိပ္တန္း ေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ားဟာ ပါတီကုိ အႏွစ္ ၂၀ ေက်ာ္ ဘက္ေပါင္းစုံက ဝိုင္းဝန္း တုိက္ခိုက္ေနသည့္ၾကားမွ မွန္ကန္တဲ့ လမ္းေၾကာင္းေပၚမွာရွိေအာင္ ထိန္းသိမ္း ေပးထားႏုိင္ခဲ့သလုိ၊ အနာဂတ္ ေခါင္းေဆာင္မႈသစ္ ေအာက္မွာလည္း ပါတီကုိ ဆက္လက္ရွင္သန္ ေအာင္ တာဝန္ ထမ္းေဆာင္ေရးဟာလည္း ႀကီးမားတဲ့ စိန္ေခၚမႈႀကီးတခု ျဖစ္ပါတယ္။

လူႀကီးပုိင္းမ်ားက တာဝန္ေက်ခဲ့သလုိ NLD မ်ိဳးဆက္သစ္ ေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ား တာဝန္ေက်ရေတာ့မည့္ အခ်ိန္အခါ ျဖစ္ပါတယ္။

ဒီေတာ့ တာဝန္နဲ႔ ထိုက္တန္ေအာင္ အသင့္အေနအထား ျပင္ဆင္မႈမ်ားကုိ ျပဳလုပ္ ၾကရေတာ့မွာပါ။ အရည္အခ်င္းရွိတဲ့ လူငယ္မ်ား အေနျဖင့္ ေနာက္ကြယ္ မွာေနမည့္အစား၊ ယွဥ္ၿပိဳင္ အေရြးခ်ယ္ခံလုိသူမ်ားဟာ မိမိတုိ႔ ကုိယ္တုိင္ ရဲရဲဝံ့ဝံ့ေ႔ရွထြက္ကာ လက္ရွိပါတီ ထိပ္တန္း ေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ားထံသုိ႔ အမည္စာရင္း တင္သြင္း သင့္ပါတယ္။ မူဝါဒမ်ားခ်ျပၿပီး ပါတီအတြင္း မဲဆြယ္ စည္း႐ုံးသင့္တယ္။

သုိ႔ေပေသာ္ျငားလည္း ေလာေလာဆယ္ ပါတီ ေခါင္းေဆာင္သစ္မ်ားကုိ ေရြးခ်ယ္မႈ အပုိင္းမွာ အခက္အခဲမ်ားစြာ ရွိေနေပမယ္ဆိုတာကို သိပါတယ္။

NLD ျပန္ၾကားေရး တာဝန္ခံ ဦးခင္ေမာင္ေဆြက လက္ရွိ CEC အဖြဲ႕အား ျပန္လည္ဖြဲ႔စည္းမည္ ဆုိရင္ ေအာက္ေျခမွ ပါတီဝင္ေတြကေန ေရြးေကာက္တင္ေျမႇာက္ျခင္းႏွင့္ ဗဟုိအဆင့္ကေနျပီး ေရြးခ်ယ္ ယာယီ တာဝန္ေပးျခင္းဟု ႏွစ္မ်ဳိးရွိေၾကာင္း၊ ယခု လက္ရွိအေျခ အေနတြင္ ေအာက္ေျခမွ ေရြးခ်ယ္တင္ေျမႇာက္ျခင္းသည္ မျဖစ္ႏုိင္ေၾကာင္း ေျပာၾကားထားသည္။

သူေျပာတာကို ျငင္းဖို႔ရာ ခက္ပါတယ္။ တဖက္က အတိုက္အခံ အင္အားကို မ်က္ေျခမျပတ္ ေစာင့္ၾကည့္ ေလ့လာျပီး နည္းမ်ဳးိစံုသံုး ၿဖိဳခြဲခဲ့တဲ့ ေအာက္မွာ ေနခဲ့ရတဲ့ ခါးသီးတဲ့ အေတြ႔အႀကံဳက ရွိေနပါတယ္။

အခက္အခဲမ်ားအရ မည္သုိ႔ပင္ ေရြးခ်ယ္ေစမႈ အရည္အခ်င္းရွိေသာ ေခါင္းေဆာင္သစ္မ်ား ေပၚေပါက္လာေရးသည္ ပဓာန က်ပါတယ္။ ျမန္မာ့ ႏုိင္ငံေရး ထုံးတမ္းစဥ္လာအရ ေခါင္းေဆာင္ ေရြးခ်ယ္မႈပုိင္းကုိ စီးပြားေရး ရႉ႕ေထာင့္ၿဖင့္ ၾကည့္လွ်င္ Inputs ကုိသာ ဦးစားေပး ၾကည့္ေလ့ ရွိၾကသည္။

ဆုိလုိသည္မွာ ဘယ္သူ႔သားသမီး (သုိ႔) ေဆြမ်ိဳး၊ ႏုိင္ငံေရး အက်ဥ္းသားေဟာင္း၊ အရာရွိေဟာင္း စသည္ၿဖင့္ စသျဖင့္ မိန္ရာဟင္းေကာင္း၊ ခင္ရာေဆြမ်ိဳး စကားပုံလုိ ၾကည့္ၿပီးဆုံးၿဖတ္ေလ့ ရွိၾကသည္။ Outputs/ Results လုိ႔ေခၚသည့္ ရလာဒ္ထြက္ေပၚမႈ၊ ေအာင္ၿမင္ခဲ့မႈ၊ လုပ္ေဆာင္ႏုိင္မႈ အရည္အခ်င္းကိုၾကည့္ၿပီး ေရြးခ်ယ္မႈ အားနည္းတတ္သည္။ အရည္အခ်င္း ရွိေသာ မွန္မွန္ကန္ကန္ ေခါင္းေဆာင္မႈမ်ိဳး ေပၚေပါက္ဖုိ႔ ဆုံးၿဖတ္ေရြးခ်ယ္ ေပးသင့္ပါသည္။

NLD ထိပ္တန္းေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ားအေနၿဖင့္ ဆယ္စုႏွစ္ ၂ ခုအတြင္း ျပည္တြင္းျပည္ပ၌ ႀကံဳေတြ႔ခဲ့မႈမ်ား၊ မွားယြင္းခဲ့မႈမ်ားကုိ သင္ခန္းစာ ယူသင့္ပါသည္။

ပါတီရဲ႕ ေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ားဟာ ႏုိင္ငံတကာ သံတမန္မ်ား၊ ေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ားႏွင့္ ထိေတြ႔ ဆက္ဆံၾကရမွာမုိ႔ တက္ၾကြမႈရွိေနယုံၿဖင့္ မလုံေလာက္ပါ။ ႏုိင္ငံေရး၊ စီးပြားေရး၊ သံတမန္ ဆက္ဆံေရး၊ လူထုဆက္ဆံေရးမ်ား ၌ပါ အရည္အခ်င္းမ်ား ရွိၾကရပါလိမ့္မည္။

တနည္းအားၿဖင့္ အျမင္ က်ယ္က်ယ္ျပန္႔ၿပန္႔ ရွိရန္ကို ဆိုလိုျခင္း ျဖစ္သည္။ အမ်ား ျပည္သူ၏ ေလးစား ယံုၾကည္မႈ ရွိဖုိ႔လည္း လုိပါသည္။ အရည္အခ်င္းရွိရွိၿဖင့္ မွန္ကန္စြာေတြးေခၚပါမွ အခ်ိန္အခါ အေျခအေန ႏွင့္ လိုက္ေလ်ာညီစြာ ျပဳျပင္ ေျပာင္းလဲႏုိင္ေပလိမ့္မည္။ မွန္ကန္ေသာ လုပ္ေဆာင္မႈမ်ား၊ ဆုံးၿဖတ္ခ်က္မ်ား ႏွင့္ မူဝါဒမ်ား ကို ခ်မွတ္ႏုိင္ ေပလိမ့္မည္။

NLD ဝင္မ်ား၊ မ်ိဳးဆက္သစ္မ်ား အေနၿဖင့္ ေအာင္ၿမင္ၿခင္း တံခါးကုိ တြန္းဖြင့္ၾကဖုိ႔ မွန္ကန္ေသာ ေခါင္းေဆာင္မႈ ေရြးခ်ယ္ေပးဖုိ႔ လုိေပသည္။ NLD ၏ အနာဂတ္ သည္ NLD အဖြဲ႔ဝင္မ်ား ေရြးခ်ယ္ေပးမည့္ ေခါင္းေဆာင္မႈအသစ္ အေပၚတြင္သာ မႈတည္ေနသည္။


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ခမာနီေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ား ကုိ သင္ခန္းစာယူပါ

Source: ဘန္ေကာက္ပုိ႔စ္ - "UN-backed court issues K.Rouge genocide charges"

-ၿမတ္စုိး-
၁၂.၁၆.၂၀၀၉

တခ်ိန္က ၿမန္မာအာဏာရွင္မ်ားကုိ အတုယူအားက်ခဲ့ၾကတဲ့ ကေမၻာဒီးယားႏုိင္ငံမွ ခမာနီ ေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ားကုိ ၎တုိ႔ အာဏာရွိစဥ္ကာလအတြင္း ျဖစ္ပြားခဲ့ေသာ လူအစုလိုက္အၿပံဳလိုက္ သတ္ျဖတ္ခဲ့မႈတြင္ ပါ၀င္ပတ္သက္မႈျဖင့္ ကုလသမဂၢ က ေထာက္ခံမႈေပးထားေသာ ကေမၻာဒီးယားအထူးခံု႐ံုးတခုက တရားစြဲဆို လိုက္ၿပီၿဖစ္ေၾကာင္း ဗုဒၶဟူးေန႔ ထုိင္းႏုိင္ငံထုတ္ ဘန္ေကာက္ပုိ႔စ္ သတင္းစာတြင္ ေရးသားေဖာ္ၿပထားသည္။

ခမာနီေခါင္းေဆာင္ အဆင့္ ႏွစ္ ရာထူးတာ၀န္ထမ္းေဆာင္ခဲ့တဲ့ Nuon Chea ႏွင့္ ႏုိင္ငံၿခားေရး ၀န္ၾကီးအၿဖစ္ တာ၀န္ ထမ္းေဆာင္ခဲ့သူ Leng Sary တုိ႔ႏွစ္ဦးကုိ ၁၉၇၅-၁၉၇၉ ခုႏွစ္ ကာလ ခမာနီ ကြန္ၿမဴနစ္တုိ႔ အာဏာရရွိခဲ့စဥ္ အတြင္း ကေမၻာဒီးယား မွာရွိတ့ဲ ဗီယက္နမ္ လူမ်ဳိးမ်ား ႏွင့္ မြတ္စလင္မ္ ခ်မ္ ေတြကို အစုလိုက္အၿပံဳလိုက္ သတ္ျဖတ္ခဲ့မႈ တြင္ ပါ၀င္ပတ္သက္မႈျဖင့္တရားစြဲဆုိခဲ့ၿခင္းၿဖစ္သည္ဟု သတင္းမ်ားတြင္ေဖာ္ၿပထားသည္။ သူတုိ႔နွစ္ဦးဟာ ခမာနီ ကြန္ၿမဴနစ္တုိ႔ အာဏာရရွိခဲ့စဥ္အတြင္း အလြန္သေဘာထားတင္းမာသူမ်ားၿဖစ္ၿပီး၊ လူသားမဆန္တဲ့ ရက္စက္မႈမ်ားအေပၚ တာ၀န္ရွိခဲ့ၾကတယ္လုိ႔ ေဖာ္ၿပထားပါသည္။

သူတုိ႔ႏွစ္ဦးစလုံးကုိ ယခင္က စစ္ရာဇ၀တ္မႈ ႏွင့္ လူသားမ်ားအေပၚၿပစ္မႈက်ဴးလြန္မႈတုိ႔ၿဖင့္ လည္း တရားစြဲဆုိထားၿပီးၿဖစ္သည္။

ကေမၻာဒီးယား၌ ခမာနီအစိုးရအုပ္ခ်ဳပ္စဥ္ကာလ (၁၉၇၅-၇၉) အတြင္း အစားအစာငတ္မြတ္မႈ၊ ဆင္းရဲမြဲေတမႈ၊ ေရာဂါကူးစက္ ခံရမႈ၊ တရားဥပေဒမဲ့ ေသဒဏ္စီရင္ခဲ့မႈ၊ လူသားမဆန္စြာ ညွင္းပန္းႏွိပ္စက္ခဲ့မႈ၊ လူသားမ်ားအားအစုလိုက္အၿပံဳလိုက္သတ္ျဖတ္ခဲ့မႈ တို႔ေၾကာင့္ လူေပါင္း (၂) သန္းနီးပါး ေသဆံုးခဲ့့ရၿပီး၊ ယင္းအမႈမ်ားတြင္ ပါ၀င္ပက္သက္ ခဲ့ၾကေသာ ခမာနီ အၾကီးအကဲမ်ား ၿဖစ္ၾကသည့္ ပုိေပါ့၊ ခယူဆန္ဖန္၊ နာမည္ဆိုးႏွင့္လူသိမ်ားေသာ Tuol Sleng လွ်ဳိ႕၀ွက္အက်ဥ္းေထာင္ အႀကီးအကဲ ဒက္ခ်္ (Kaing Guek Eav, known by the alias Duch) အပါအ၀င္ ခမာနီေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ား ကုိ ကုလသမဂၢ က ေထာက္ခံမႈေပးထားေသာ ကေမၻာဒီးယား အထူးခံု႐ံုးတခုက တရားမွ်တမႈ ရွိေအာင္ တရားစြဲဆို အေရးယူမႈမ်ား ၿပဳလုပ္လွ်က္ ရွိပါသည္။

အာဏာရွင္မ်ားအေနၿဖင့္ မိမိတုိ႔ အာဏာရွိစဥ္အတြင္း လူသားမ်ားအေပၚ က်ဴးလြန္ခဲ့ေသာ ၿပစ္မႈမ်ား အေပၚ အကာအကြယ္ ရယူႏုိင္ၾကေပမဲ့၊ ေနာင္တခ်ိန္မွာ တရားမွ်တမႈရွိေအာင္ စီရင္ဆုံးၿဖတ္ၿခင္းကုိ ရင္ဆုိင္ၾကရ ပါလိမ့္မယ္ ဆုိတာ ခမာနီေခါင္းေဆာင္မ်ား၏ ေနာက္ဆုံးေန႔ မ်ားက သက္ေသထူေနပါသည္။




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Monday, December 21, 2009

US could pressure Myanmar with bank sanctions


The Associated Press, Washington | Tue, 12/22/2009 7:46 AM | World

The Obama administration has ready a powerful economic weapon if talks with Myanmar fail to achieve democratic reforms: pressuring banks to avoid doing business with the country's ruling generals.

A similar approach has been used to push North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons. In Myanmar's case, targeting international banks could effectively tie up the large amounts of money the generals get from selling natural gas.

The U.S. Congress has already provided the power to go after the banks; some rights groups want President Barack Obama to use it soon, or at least if direct talks fail.

So far, however, the administration has been hesitant. It has just started face-to-face negotiations and wants to give them more time to show results. Imposing the banking sanctions would be expensive and time-consuming, and Myanmar isn't a top priority on a crowded foreign policy agenda that includes Afghanistan and Iran.

Still, the administration has warned of tougher action if engagement breaks down with Myanmar, also known as Burma. And the mere threat could add force to the U.S. negotiating position.

"We will reserve the option of tightening sanctions on the regime and its supporters to respond to events in Burma," Obama's top diplomat for East Asia, Kurt Campbell, told lawmakers in September.

Myanmar has one of the most repressive governments in the world and has been controlled by the military since 1962. For years, the United States has used punishing sanctions to try to force change on the country, with little success. Former President George W. Bush's administration favored shunning Myanmar, and Bush's wife, Laura, and many in Congress were strong advocates of the nascent democracy movement there.

Now, the Obama administration has reversed the isolation policy in favor of engagement, which it hopes will persuade the generals to grant greater freedoms to opposition parties and minorities and to free political prisoners.

Myanmar has since made a few symbolic gestures of good will, letting detained democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi meet with Campbell, for instance, and releasing some political prisoners. At the same time, it has continued to persecute ethnic minorities, journalists and student activists.

Obama himself spoke of a possibly stronger position on Myanmar in his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech. There will be engagement and diplomacy with Myanmar, he said, "but there must be consequences when those things fail."

Activists say those consequences should include the application of a law that allows the United States to use financial measures to hinder Myanmar's ability to access the international banking system.

"What the Burmese government values is not its commerce with the outside world but the financial proceeds of that commerce," Tom Malinowski of Human Rights Watch said. "Once the Burmese government deposits the checks in its bank accounts, there's a lot the United States government can do to prevent that money from being used in the international banking system."

The United States already imposes many sanctions on Myanmar. Treasury officials have targeted 40 people and 44 entities since the junta killed and arrested protesters during demonstrations in 2007. Being added to the sanctions list prevents people from making transactions in the banking system of the United States, the world's largest economy.

A 2008 law, however, allows another level of sanctions that grants Treasury the authority to impose conditions on banking relationships. U.S. officials will not comment on future policy decisions, but Treasury says it is looking at all potential sanctions, including the banking provision, "to apply the tools best calibrated to address the threat presented."

The United States cannot easily block the lucrative natural gas deals Myanmar does with its neighbors and with European and U.S. companies. But the bank measure would let foreign banks know that the United States has worries about their association with Myanmar money and will be wary of their contact with U.S. financial institutions until those worries are cleared up, according to Jennifer Quigley, advocacy director for the U.S. Campaign for Burma.

Supporters of the banking sanctions often raise North Korea, saying that the United States effectively froze the North out of the international banking system, hurting leader Kim Jong Il.

For the moment, the Obama administration is urging patience as it pursues talks.

Next year's elections in Myanmar will provide a good look at the junta's intentions. A big question will be whether high-level U.S.-Myanmar talks lead to the junta's allowing true participation by minorities and opposition groups or merely let the generals consolidate power.


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ESCAP brings Nobel Laureate Stiglitz to Myanmar to advise on economic policy and rural poverty reduction



Press Release
UNESCAP News Services
Date: 3 December 2009
Note to Editor No: N/42/2009

Meeting government ministers at ESCAP development forum on 15 December

Bangkok (UN/ESCAP Information Services) -- Nobel laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz will visit Myanmar at the invitation of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) to advise on development policies and poverty reduction, especially in the rural area.

Prof. Stiglitz will speak at a round table and development forum organized by ESCAP with Myanmar’s Ministry of National Planning and Economic Development and Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation on 15 December in the capital, Napyitaw. The forum will bring together the two Ministers from Myanmar, U Soe Tha and U Htay Oo, in a dialogue with Prof. Stiglitz and other eminent experts to discuss strategies for poverty reduction in light of Asia’s regional and sub-regional experiences.

The event, Economic Policies for Growth and Poverty Reduction: Lessons from the Region and Beyond, is part of a series launched by Noeleen Hezyer, UN Under-Secretary-General and Executive Secretary of ESCAP, during her visit to Myanmar last July.

"Prof. Stiglitz will share his ideas on what kind of economic decision making is critical for growth in the rural economy and poverty reduction," says Dr. Heyzer. "I hope that this visit will be able to open up a new space in economic decision making and policy formulations. The focus is on how we reach the poorest people in Myanmar. We hope to bring the best thinking and lessons from the region and beyond."
“Growth that does not benefit all of society is not ultimately sustainable,” Prof. Stiglitz says ahead of his visit. “It’s important that government take policy measures that include all sectors of the population, especially in rural areas.”

As chief economist of the World Bank (1997-2000), Prof. Stiglitz played a key role in the publication “Rethinking the Asian Miracle,” which examined the reasons behind the dramatic growth of eight Asian economies. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2001.

The seminar on 15 December will be organized in two segments. The first segment will be devoted to expert discussions on different facets of enhancing the rural economy of Myanmar. The second segment will be a High-level Roundtable on effecting change in Myanmar’s rural economy. Senior officials and experts from Myanmar will engage in a conversation with eminent experts. The focus is on “Economic Policies and Decision-making for Poverty Reduction: Reaching the Bottom Half”.

For more information, please contact:

UN/ESCAP Information Services: unisbkk.unescap@un.org,
or stiglitzpress@gmail.com
* *** *
Headquartered in Bangkok, United Nations ESCAP is the largest of the UN's five Regional Commissions in terms of its membership, population served and area covered. The only inter-governmental forum covering the entire Asia-Pacific region, ESCAP works to promote sustainable and inclusive economic and social progress. More information on ESCAP is available at www.unescap.org



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Wednesday, December 16, 2009

ကိုပင္ေဟဂင္အစီရင္ခံစာ- ဆင္းရဲမြဲေတမႈ ေၾကာင့္ ၿမန္မာၿပည္သူမ်ား အသက္ဆုံးရွဳံးခဲ့ရ

နားဂစ္မုန္တုိင္း တုိက္ခုိက္ၿပီး ခုိကုိးရာမဲ့ၿဖစ္ခဲ့ေသာၿမန္မာၿပည္သူမ်ားႏွင့္ ဆင္းရဲမြဲေတမႈအေၿခအေန
The Figures
The UN Human Development Report 2006 has ranked Burma in its Human Poverty Index table at 130 out of 177 countries, well below some other South East Asian countries such as Thailand (74) and Malaysia (61), though above Laos at 133 and close to Cambodia at 129. In 2004 the World Bank concluded that Burma is "trapped in abject poverty despite its rich resources base. Although there has been notable moderate growth in the economy, the trickle-down effect of this growth did not reach the poor. The country's poverty and development indicators have lagged behind those of its neighbours". An estimated 30 percent of the population ( or approximately 15 million people) live below the poverty line and inflation is running at a rate of between 30 and 40 percent a year.
-ၿမတ္စုိး-
၁၂.၁၀.၂၀၀၉

ဒိန္းမတ္ႏိုင္ငံ ကိုပင္ေဟဂင္ၿမိဳ႕တြင္ က်င္းပေနသည့္ ကမၻာ့ကုလသမဂၢ ရာသီဥတုေၿပာင္းလဲမႈ ဆုိင္ရာ ကြန္ဖရင့္၌ တင္သြင္းေသာ အစီရင္ခံစာ တေစာင္တြင္ ၁၉၉၀ မွ ၂၀၀၈ ခုႏွစ္အတြင္း ရာသီဥတုေၾကာင့္ အဆိုးရြားဆံုး ထိခိုက္ခဲ့ ရေသာ ႏိုင္ငံမ်ားတြင္ ဘဂၤလာေဒ့ရွ္၊ ျမန္မာႏွင့္ ဟြန္ ဒူးရပ္စ္ ႏိုင္ငံတို႔ ပါဝင္သည္ဟု ေရးသားေဖာ္ၿပထားသည္။ ထုိအစီရင္ခံစာကုိ ကမၻာ့ရာသီဥတု ေၿပာင္းလဲမႈ သက္ေရာက္မႈမ်ားအား ဆယ္စုႏွစ္ ၂ စုၾကာ ေလ့လာထားသည့္ ဘာလင္အေျခစိုက္ ကမၻာ့ရာသီဥတု ေစာင့္ၾကည့္ေရး အဖြဲ႔ၾကီးက သုေတသန ၿပဳခဲ့ၿခင္းၿဖစ္သည္။

၂၀၀၈ ခုႏွစ္ ေမလတြင္ ၿမန္မာႏုိင္ငံ ဧရာဝတီျမစ္ဝကြ်န္းေပၚ ေဒသကို နာဂစ္ဆိုင္ကလံုး မုန္တိုင္း ဝင္ေရာက္ ဖ်က္ဆီး ခဲ့မႈေၾကာင့္ လူေပါင္း ၈၅၀၀၀ ေသဆံုး၍ ေငြေၾကးဆံုးရံႈးမႈ တန္ဖိုး စုစုေပါင္း အေမရိကန္ ေဒၚလာ ၄ ဘီလ်ံ ရွိခဲ့သည္ဟု ၿမန္မာစစ္အစုိးက ထုတ္ၿပန္ေၾကညာခဲ့ ေသာ္လည္း ၊ ကုလသမဂၢက သုေတသနၿပဳ ထားေသာ အစီရင္ခံစာအရ လူေပါင္း ၁၃၄၀၀၀ မွ် ေသဆံုး၊ ေပ်ာက္ဆံုးခဲ့၍ လူေပါင္း ၂ ဒႆမ ၄ သန္း အိုးအိမ္မ်ား ပ်က္စီးဆံုးရံႈးၿပီး မုန္တိုင္းဒဏ္ခံခဲ့ရသည္ဟု ဆိုသည္။



ဒီလုိ လူအေၿမာက္အမ်ား ေသဆုံးမႈ၊ ေပ်ာက္ဆုံးမႈ၊ အုိးမဲ့အိမ္မဲ့ပ်က္စီးဆုံးရွဳံးခဲ့မႈဟာ ၿမန္မာႏုိင္ငံ ရဲ႕ ဆင္းရဲမြဲေတမႈအေၿခအေန မ်ားေၾကာင့္ၿဖစ္ၿပီး၊ ၂၀၀၇ ခုႏွစ္က တင္သြင္းခဲ့ေသာ ကမၻာ့ ကုလသမဂၢ ဆင္းရဲမြဲေတမႈ တုိက္ဖ်က္ေရး ႏွင့္ စားနပ္ရိကၡာ ကူညီေထာက္ပံ့ေပးေရး အဖြဲ႔အစည္းရဲ႕ အစီရင္ခံစာ အရ ၿမန္မာႏုိင္ငံ လူဦးေရ ရဲ႕ ၃၂.၇ ရာခုိင္ႏွဳန္းဟာ ဆင္ရဲမြဲေတမႈ ေအာက္မွာ ေနထုိင္ေနရေၾကာင္း ေဖာ္ၿပ ထားပါသည္။ ယင္း အစီရင္ခံစာ အရ ၿမန္မာႏုိင္ငံတြင္ ဆင္းရဲမြဲေတမႈေအာက္မွာ ေနထုိင္သူ လူဦးေရ ၁၅ သန္းေက်ာ္ ေနထုိင္ေနၾကရေၾကာင္း ခန္႔မွန္း ေဖာ္ၿပထားပါသည္။

၂၀၀၆ ခုႏွစ္ ကမၻာ့ကုလသမဂၢရဲ႕ UNDP အဖြဲ႔ၾကီးက ထုတ္ၿပန္ေသာ လူသားအရင္းအၿမစ္ ဖြံ႔ၿဖိဳးမႈ အစီရင္ခံစာ မွာေတာ့ ၿမန္မာႏုိင္ငံဟာ ႏုိင္ငံေပါင္း ၁၈၂ ႏုိင္ငံမွာ အဆင့္ ၁၃၈ ေနရာမွာ ရွိၾကာင္း ေဖာ္ၿပထားၿပီး၊ လူသားမ်ား ဆုိင္ရာ ဆင္းရဲမြဲေတမႈ မွာ ႏုိင္ငံေပါင္း ၁၇၇ ႏုိင္ငံ အနက္ အဆင့္ ၁၃၀ မွာရွိေၾကာင္း ေဖာ္ၿပထားပါသည္။ ၂၀၀၄ ခုႏွစ္မွာ ထုတ္ၿပန္ခဲ့တဲ့ ကမၻာ့ဘဏ္ရဲ႕ အစီရင္ခံစာမွာေတာ့ ၿမန္မာႏုိင္ငံမွာ ဆင္းရဲမြဲေတမႈေအာက္မွေနထုိင္ရသူဟာ စုစုေပါင္း လူဦးေရရဲ႕ ၃၀ ရာခုိင္ႏွဳန္းေက်ာ္ ခန္႔ရွိတယ္လုိ႔ ခန္႔မွန္းတြက္ဆခဲ့ၾကပါသည္။ ၿမန္မာႏုိင္ငံ ဆင္းရဲမြဲေတမႈ ႏွင့္ပက္သက္ၿပီး ႏုိင္ငံတကာ အဖြဲ႔အစည္းမ်ားရဲ႔ အစီရင္ခံစာမ်ားဟာ ကြဲလႊဲခ်က္(သုိ႔) အၿငင္းပြားဖြယ္ရာကြာၿခားခ်က္မ်ား မရွိခဲ့ပါ။

ကမၻာ့ကုလသမဂၢ ရာသီဥတုေၿပာင္းလဲမႈ ဆုိင္ရာ ကြန္ဖရင့္တြင္ တင္ၿပခဲ့ေသာ အစီရင္ခံစာမ်ားအရ “အုပ္ခ်ဳပ္စီမံခန္႔ခြဲမႈ ညံ့ဖ်င္းမႈေၾကာင့္ ၿမန္မာၿပည္သူမ်ားဟာ ဆယ္စုႏွစ္ေပါင္းမ်ားစြာ ဆင္းရဲမြဲေတမႈ ေအာက္မွာ ေနထုိင္ေနရၿပီး၊ ထုိသုိ႔ဆင္းရဲမႈ ေအာက္မွာ ေနထုိင္ၾကရၿခင္းေၾကာင့္ ရာသီဥတုအႏၲရာယ္ကို အထူးသျဖင့္ ပို၍ပင္ ခံႏိုင္ရည္မရွိေၾကာင္း ေတြ႔ရသည္'' ဟု ေဖာ္ျပထားသည္။ ဆင္းရဲေသာ ႏိုင္ငံမ်ား မွာလည္း ရာသီဥတု အႏၲရာယ္ကို မၾကာခဏ ခံခဲ့ၾကရၿပီး၊ ခုိကုိးရာမဲ့ၿဖစ္ကာ အသက္ဆုံးရွဳံးမႈမ်ားစြာရွိခဲ့ သည္ဟုလည္း အစီရင္ခံစာထဲတြင္ ေဖာ္ၿပထား ပါသည္။

References:

UNDP- Human Development Report 2009
WorldBank
Voices for Burma(London)

Friday, December 4, 2009

ItaliaspeedTV - Chrysler film dedicated to Aung San Suu Kyi



In an innovative new TV film breaking today, the Chrysler brand has joined with Lancia Automobiles and the international community in the movement to call for the release of Aung San Suu Kyi, Burma...

Info:

http://www.chrysler.com/en/



သတင္းမွားမ်ားႏွင့္လူ႔အဖြဲ႔အစည္း

ဒုတိယကမၻာစစ္အတြင္း ၿမန္မာၿပည္လြတ္ေၿမာက္ေရးမွာပါ၀င္ခဲ့တဲ့ ကရင္ေတာ္လွန္ေရးသမားမ်ား
စစ္သုံးပန္းမ်ားအၿဖစ္ေသမင္းတမန္ ကုိပုိ႔ခံခဲ့ရသလားေတာ့မသိဘူး။ သူတုိ႔သမုိင္းေတြ က်ေနာ္တုိ႔ေဖာ္ထုတ္ဖုိ႔လုိတယ္။

ေဆာင္းပါး
ေဇာ္မင္း (လူ႔ေဘာင္သစ္)
အဂၤါေန႔၊ ဒီဇင္ဘာလ 01 ရက္ 2009 ခုႏွစ္ 13 နာရီ 46 မိနစ္

က်ေနာ္တို႔ ငယ္ငယ္တုန္းကစလို႔ အခုအခ်ိန္အထိ သတင္းမွားမ်ား၊ သတင္းထိန္ခ်န္ျခင္းမ်ားႏွင့္ ေနထုိင္ၾကီးျပင္းလာခဲ့ၾကရသည္။ အခုကာလကေတာ့ ျမန္မာ့လူ႔အဖြဲ႔အစည္းအတြင္းမွာ ဒီမိုကေရစီ စကားလံုးက ထိပ္ဆံုးမွာ ေနရာယူထားသည္။ ဒီမိုကေရစီေခတ္ကို သြားၾကမည္။ ထို႔ေၾကာင့္ ဒီမိုကေရစီႏွင့္ ပတ္သက္စပ္လ်ဥ္းေသာ အေျပာအဆို၊ အေရးအသား၊ ေၾကညာခ်က္မ်ား၊ လုပ္ေဆာင္ခ်က္မ်ား ဆတက္ထမ္းပိုး တိုးတက္မ်ားျပားလာေနသည္ကိုလည္း ေတြ႔ႏုိင္သည္။ ဒါကေတာ့ ေကာင္းသည့္အခ်က္ ျဖစ္သည္။ သို႔ေသာ္ ထိုေကာင္းသည့္ အခ်က္မ်ားထဲတြင္ သတင္းမွားမ်ား၊ ထိန္ခ်န္မႈမ်ား ပါေနသည္။

ႏုိင္ငံေရးျဖစ္စဥ္ေတြကို မေျပာမီ ငယ္ငယ္တုန္းက ေန႔တဓူဝ ၾကားသိေနခဲ့ရပံုမ်ားကို ေျပာလိုသည္။ လြန္ခဲ့သည့္ ႏွစ္ေပါင္း ၃ဝ ေက်ာ္တုန္းက ရပ္ကြပ္ထဲတြင္ လူၾကီးတဦးက က်ေနာ္တို႔ကေလးမ်ားကို ေျပာဖူးတာတခု အမွတ္ရသည္။ ဇာတ္လမ္းက ဒီလို။

ထုိင္းႏုိင္ငံတြင္ ထုိင္းအမ်ဳိးသမီးတဦးႏွင့္ အိမ္ေထာင္က်ေနေသာ ျမန္မာအမ်ဳိးသားတဦးသည္ တကၠစီေမာင္း၍ အသက္ေမြးသည္။ သူ႔တကၠစီကား ေရွ႕မွန္တြင္ ျမန္မာဘာသာစကားျဖင့္ 'ေအာင္ေဇယ်' ဟု သေဘၤာေဆးျဖင့္ ေရးထားသည္ဟု ဆိုသည္။ ဤသို႔ ေရးထားျခင္း၌ အေၾကာင္းကေတာ့ ေမာ္ေတာ္ပီကယ္ (ယာဥ္ထိန္းရဲ) မ်ား ပုိက္ဆံေတာင္းျခင္းမွ လြတ္ကင္းရန္ဟု ဆိုျပန္သည္။

ထိုသူ၌ တကၠစီကုိ ပုိက္ဆံေတာင္းရန္တားေသာ ေမာ္ေတာ္ပီကယ္သည္ မွန္ေပၚတြင္ ေရးထားေသာ 'ေအာင္ေဇယ်' ဟူေသာ ျမန္မာစာလံုးကို ေတြ႔ေတြ႔ခ်င္း အေတာ္ေလးၿဖံဳသြားသည္ဟု ဆိုျပန္သည္။ ထို႔အတြက္ ပုိက္္ဆံမေတာင္းေတာ့ဘဲ လႊတ္လုိက္ရသည္ဟု ေျပာသည္။ ဘာျဖစ္လို႔လဲဆိုေတာ့ အေလာင္းဘုရားဟု ျမန္မာသမုိင္းတြင္ ထင္ရွားေသာ ရွင္ဘုရင္ ဦးေအာင္ေဇယ်ကို ထုိင္းပုလိပ္မ်ား သိပ္ေၾကာက္ေသာေၾကာင့္ဟု ဆိုသည္။ ဦးေအာင္ေဇယ်ကို ေၾကာက္ရေသာ အေၾကာင္းက အယုဒၶယၿမိဳ႕ေတာ္ကို တုိက္ခုိက္ဖ်က္ဆီး ေအာင္ႏုိင္ေသာေၾကာင့္ဟု ရွင္းျပသည္။

က်ေနာ္တို႔ ကေလးမ်ားကေတာ့ ဇာတိမာန္မ်ားေၾကာင့္ ဝမ္းသာလုိက္သည့္ျဖစ္ျခင္း။ ယိုးဒယားေတြ၊ ထုိင္းလူမ်ဳိးေတြက ျမန္မာလူမ်ဳိးေတြကို အခုအထိ ေၾကာက္ၾကရတယ္ေပါ့။ ျဖစ္ႏုိင္တယ္၊ မျဖစ္ႏုိင္ဘူး ဆိုတာကိုေတာ့ ငယ္စဥ္အခ်ိန္က ခြဲျခမ္းစိတ္ျဖာျခင္း မျပဳႏုိင္ခဲ့ပါ။ ထုိင္းပုလိပ္ေတြဟာ ျမန္မာဘာသာျဖင့္ ေရးထားေသာ ကားမွန္ေပၚက 'ေအာင္ေဇယ်' ဆိုသည့္ စကားလံုးကို ဖတ္တတ္သလား၊ မဖတ္တတ္ဘူးလား ဆိုတာလည္း ဂ႐ုမစုိက္မိခဲ့။

အခုလက္ေတြ႔ဘဝ ထုိင္းႏုိင္ငံမွာ ေနလာတာ ႏွစ္ေပါင္းမ်ားစြာ ရိွပါၿပီ။ အကယ္၍ ျမန္မာလူမ်ဳိး တကၠစီသမားတဦးက ထုိင္းေျမၾကီးေပၚမွာ အဲသလိုလုပ္ရင္ ထုိင္းပုလိပ္ေတြက ေအာင္ေဇယ်ဆိုတဲ့ နာမည္ကို ေၾကာက္မလား၊ မေၾကာက္လား ဆိုတာေတာ့ အခုလက္ရိွ ထုိင္းႏုိင္ငံတြင္ ေနထုိင္ေနေသာ ျမန္မာျပည္သား အားလံုးအသိပင္။ ထိုသတင္းမွားကို က်ေနာ္တို႔ ကေလးမ်ားက ဝမ္းသာအားရ ရိွခဲ့ဖူးသည္။ ယံုလည္း ယံုၾကည္ခဲ့ၾကသည္။ ထိုင္းဆိုတာ ငယ္ႏုိင္ပါဆိုသည့္ အေတြးေၾကာင့္ ဆိုရင္လည္း မမွား။ က်ေနာ္တို႔ သမိုင္းစာအုပ္မ်ားကလည္း ထုိင္းႏုိင္ငံကို ေရွးတုန္းက ဘယ္လိုဘယ္ပံု အၾကိမ္ၾကိမ္ ေအာင္ျမင္ခဲ့တယ္လို႔ ကေလးေတြကို ေက်ာင္းမွာ သင္ထားတာကလည္း တဖက္မွာ ရိွေနတာကိုး။ ဒါကို အမီွျပဳၿပီး မာန္တက္ခဲ့ၾကတယ္ဆိုလည္း မမွားပါ။ ဒါ့ေၾကာင့္ က်ေနာ္တို႔ကေလးဘဝက ျမန္မာေတြဆိုရင္ ထုိင္းေတြက ထုိင္းေျမၾကီးေပၚမွာေတာင္ ေၾကာက္ၾကရတယ္ဆိုတာကို ျဖစ္ႏုိင္မျဖစ္ႏိုင္ မစဥ္းစားဖူးခဲ့။ မာန္ေတြ တက္ခ်က္ကေတာ့ အဲသလို။ သတင္းမွားေတြကို ႐ိုက္သြင္းခံခဲ့ရတဲ့ အက်ဳိးဆက္လို႔ ဆိုႏုိင္သည္။ ယိုးဒယားကို ဘယ္အခ်ိန္ တက္သိမ္းသိမ္း ရသည္ဟူေသာ အစြဲက ျမန္မာဗိုလ္ခ်ဳပ္ေတြကို အသာထား ျမန္မာအရပ္သူ အရပ္သားမ်ား အၾကားတြင္ေတာင္ ရိွခဲ့သည္။

ေနာက္ဇာတ္လမ္းတခုကေတာ့ ျမန္မာဘုရင္ေတြ အာသံတို႔၊ မဏိပူရတို႔ကို မၾကာခဏ စစ္ႏုိင္ေလ့ရိွခဲ့သည့္ သမုိင္းေၾကာင္း ျဖစ္သည္။ ျမန္မာဘုရင္ေတြ စစ္ႏုိင္ေတာ့ သူတို႔အလိုက် ဘုန္းဘယ္ေလာက္ၾကီးေၾကာင္း တင္ျပဖို႔ နန္းေတာ္တြင္းက ပညာရိွ စာေရးဆရာမ်ားက အာသံႏုိင္ေမာ္ကြန္း၊ မဏိပူႏုိင္ေမာ္ကြန္းေတြ ေရးသားၿပီး ဘုရင္ေတြကို ဆက္သရသည္။ ထိုစဥ္က ဘုရင္ပုိင္ သတင္းစာေတြ၊ ဂ်ာနယ္ေတြ မရိွေသးတာ ေတာ္ေတာ့သည္။ သို႔မဟုတ္ပါက ဘယ္ေလာက္မ်ား ေဖာင္းေဖာင္းျမည္ေအာင္ ေရးၾကဦးမလဲ မသိ။

၁၉၉၆ ခုႏွစ္ ေဆာင္းတြင္းကာလတခုမွာ က်ေနာ္ မဏိပူရျပည္နယ္ အင္ဖားၿမိဳ႕တြင္ ေခတၱေနထုိင္ခဲ့ဖူးသည္။ ရံဖန္ရံခါ အင္ဖားတကၠသိုလ္ ေမာ္ကြန္းထိန္း ပါေမာကၡႏွင့္ စကားလက္ဆံု ေျပာျဖစ္သည္။ တၾကိမ္တြင္ က်ေနာ္က သူ႔ကို ေမးသည္။ အခုလက္ရိွ မဏိပူရျပည္နယ္တြင္ ကသည္းလူမ်ဳိး (မဏီပူရီ) လူဦးေရ ဘယ္ေလာက္ရိွသလဲဟု ျဖစ္သည္။ ပါေမာကၡၾကီးက လက္ရိွတြင္ ၂ သန္းစြန္းစြန္းခန္႔ ရိွသည္ဟု တြက္ျပသည္။ ထို႔ေၾကာင့္ ျမန္မာဘုရင္မ်ား လက္စြမ္းျပခဲ့ေသာ လြန္ခဲ့သည့္ ႏွစ္ေပါင္း ၂ဝဝ-၃ဝဝ ေလာက္တုန္းက မဏိပူရ ၿမိဳ႕ျပႏုိင္ငံငယ္ေလးမွာ အလြန္ဆံုးရိွလွ လူဦးေရ ၁ သိန္း၊ ၂ သိန္းခန္႔သာ ရိွႏုိင္သည္ဟုသာ အၾကမ္းဖ်ဥ္းသေဘာ စဥ္းစားမိသည္။ ထိုလူဦးေရတြင္ အမ်ဳိးသမီး၊ ကေလးႏွင့္ သက္ၾကီးရြယ္အိုမ်ားကို ဖယ္လုိက္ပါက စစ္တုိက္ႏုိင္ေသာ၊ စစ္သားလုပ္ႏုိင္ေသာ လူဦးေရသည္ ဘယ္ေလာက္ရိွမည္နည္း။ ဝုိင္း၍သာ စဥ္းစားၾကပါကုန္။

ကိုယ့္ထက္ လူဦးေရ အဆမတန္နည္းေသာ ႏိုင္ငံငယ္တခုကို စစ္ႏုိင္တာ တကယ္တမ္းမွာ မာန္မတက္ထုိက္ဟု ျမင္မိသည္။ သို႔ေသာ္ က်ေနာ္တို႔ သိခဲ့ၾကားခဲ့၊ သင္ခဲ့ရသည္မွာ ျမန္မာဘုရင္မ်ားသည္ ဘုန္းလက္႐ံုး ၾကီးမားေသာေၾကာင့္ မင္းေပါင္းစံုက ေလးစားခန္႔ျငားရသည္ဆိုသည့္ သတင္း အင္ေဖာ္ေမးရွင္းသာ ျဖစ္သည္။ သို႔ေသာ္ သမုိင္းတြင္ ျမန္မာဘုရင္မ်ားသည္ ကိုယ့္ထက္အင္အားၾကီးေသာ မဂိုအင္ပုိင္ယာထဲက ၿမိဳ႕ၾကီးၾကီး တၿမိဳ႕ကိုေတာင္မွ မသိမ္းႏုိင္ခဲ့ပါ။ အလားတူ တ႐ုတ္ႏုိင္ငံ မဟာတံတုိင္းၾကီး အေျခထိေရာက္ေအာင္ပင္ စစ္မခ်ီတက္ႏုိင္ခဲ့ပါ။ တ႐ုတ္ဘုရင္ အဆက္ဆက္က ျမန္မာျပည္ကို သူတို႔၏ ဘ႑ာဆက္ နယ္ေျမတခု အျဖစ္သာ အသိအမွတ္ျပဳသည္။

ယိုးဒယားကို ႏုိင္သည္။ အာသံ၊ မဏိပူရကို ႏုိင္သည္။ ရခုိင္ကို ႏုိင္သည္။ မြန္ကို ႏုိင္သည္။ ရွမ္းေစာ္ဘြားေတြကို ႏုိင္သည္။ လာအို (လင္းဇင္း) ကိုလည္း ႏုိင္သည္။ ဘာေၾကာင့္ ႏုိင္သလဲဆိုေတာ့ တုတ္ေခတ္၊ ဓားေခတ္၊ လွံေခတ္မွာ ကိုယ့္ထက္ အင္အားနည္းေသာေၾကာင့္ (သို႔) အင္အားနည္းေနေသာ အခါတြင္မွသာ ႏုိင္ျခင္းျဖစ္သည္။ ကုိယ့္ထက္ အင္အားၾကီးေသာ၊ စစ္တုိက္တတ္ေသာ မြန္ဂိုတာတာေတြ ဝင္လာေတာ့ ပုဂံျပည္ၾကီး ပ်က္ရတာကို သင္ခန္းစာယူဖို႔ ေမ့ေနတတ္သည္။ ထိုသို႔ေသာ သတင္း အင္ေဖာ္ေမးရွင္းက်ေတာ့ မိွန္ထားလုိက္သည္။ ေရွးုဘုရင္ေတြရဲ႕ ဘုန္းလက္႐ံုး အိပ္မက္ထဲမွာ ေနေနရင္း၊ ေနာက္ဆံုး အဂၤလိပ္ဝင္လာေတာ့ တျပည္လံုး သူတပါး လက္ေအာက္မွာ ကိုလိုနီ ျဖစ္ခဲ့ရသည္ မဟုတ္ေလာ။ သို႔ေသာ္ မာန္ကေတာ့ မေလွ်ာ့ေသး။

မေလွ်ာ့ေသးတဲ့ အေၾကာင္းကို ဖက္္ဆစ္ဂ်ပန္ ေတာ္လွန္ေရး သမုိင္းေၾကာင္းတြင္ ေတြ႔ရျပန္သည္။ ဖက္ဆစ္ဂ်ပန္မ်ားကို စြမ္းစြမ္းတမံ တြန္းလွန္ခဲ့သူတို႔မွာ ရဲေဘာ္သံုးက်ိပ္ ဦးေဆာင္ေသာ ဗမာ့ကာကြယ္ေရး တပ္မေတာ္သာ ျဖစ္သည္ဟု ဗိုလ္ခ်ဳပ္ေနဝင္းက သမုိင္းသတင္းကို အတင္းအဓမၼ ေရးေစခဲ့သည္။ အျခား အေရးပါေသာ လူပုဂၢိဳလ္မ်ား၊ အဖြဲ႔အစည္းမ်ားကို သမုိင္းတင္ခြင့္မေပးဘဲ ထိမ္ခ်န္ခဲ့သည္။ ျမန္မာသမုိင္းပညာရွင္မ်ားမွာ သမုိင္းကို သမုိင္းလို လြတ္လြတ္လပ္လပ္ တင္ျပေရးသား ထုတ္ေဖာ္ခြင့္ မရခဲ့။ မရခဲ့သည္မွာ လြတ္လပ္ေရး ရကတည္းက အခုအထိပင္။ လက္ဝဲအုပ္စုကလည္း ဖက္ဆစ္ဂ်ပန္ ေတာ္လွန္ေရးတြင္ ႏုိင္ငံေရးအရ သူတို႔ကသာ ဦးေဆာင္ခဲ့သည္ဟု ဆိုၾကသည္။ သို႔ေသာ္ ျမန္မာေခါင္းေဆာင္ အေတာ္မ်ားမ်ားသည္ မိမိႏွင့္မတည့္သူ အပါအဝင္ အျခားပါဝင္ခဲ့သည့္ ဇာတ္ေကာင္မ်ား၏ က႑ကို ခ်န္လွပ္ထားေလ့ရိွသည္။ သမုိင္းအရ သတင္းေမွာင္ခ်ထားသည့္ သေဘာမ်ဳိးဟု ဆိုႏုိင္သည္။

ေနာက္တခ်က္ကလည္း သမုိင္းပညာရွင္မ်ား၊ စာေရးဆရာမ်ားအေနျဖင့္ ဗိုလ္ခ်ဳပ္ေအာင္ဆန္းက ရဲေဘာ္သံုးက်ိပ္ကို ဦးေဆာင္ခဲ့ၿပီး ဗမာ့တပ္မေတာ္ကို တည္ေထာင္ခဲ့ေသာေၾကာင့္ ဗိုလ္ေနဝင္းကို ေဝဖန္ခ်င္တာပင္ ဗိုလ္ေနဝင္းလည္း ရဲေဘာ္သံုးက်ိပ္ဝင္ျဖစ္ေနေတာ့ ဗိုလ္ခ်ဳပ္ေအာင္ဆန္းကို အားနာၿပီး ရဲေဘာ္သံုးက်ိပ္ အားနည္းခဲ့တာေတြအေပၚ ေျပာမထြက္တာေတြ အမ်ားၾကီး ရိွခဲ့ပံုရသည္။ အမ်ဳိးသား ဇာတိမာန္ ထိခုိက္မည္ကိုလည္း စိုးရိမ္ဟန္ ရိွေကာင္းရိွႏုိင္သည္။ ဇာတိမာန္ဆိုတာ လူမ်ဳိးတုိင္း၌ ရိွသည္။ ရိွလည္း ရိွသင့္သည္။ သို႔ေသာ္ မွန္ကန္တဲ့ လမ္းေၾကာင္းေပၚကေနသာ တည္ရိွသင့္သည္။ ဇာတိမာန္ဆိုသည္မွာ အနာစိမ္းကို လက္သည္းႏွင့္ဆိတ္သလို ဆိတ္ေနဖို႔ မလိုပါ။

ဂ်ပန္ေတြ ျမန္မာျပည္ကို ထုိင္းႏုိင္ငံမွတဆင့္ ဝင္လာေတာ့ ဂ်ပန္တပ္အင္အား ၃ သိန္းေက်ာ္ ရိွသည္။ အဂၤလိပ္ေတြ အိႏိၵယကို ဆုတ္ေျပးရသည္။ ဂ်ပန္တို႔ရဲ႕ စစ္ေနာက္ေက်ာပုိင္းကို ဝင္ေရာက္တုိက္ခုိက္ေသာ ဗိုလ္မႉးခ်ဳပ္ဝင္းဂိတ္၏ ခ်င္းဒစ္ (ျခေသၤ့) ကြန္မင္ဒို ေျပာက္က်ားတပ္မ်ား၏ အခန္းက႑ကို ျမန္မာေက်ာင္းသားတို႔ ေလ့လာခြင့္၊ သိခြင့္မရခဲ့။ မဟာမိတ္ တပ္ေပါင္းစုက ေလေၾကာင္းခ်ီတပ္မ်ား၊ အေျမာက္တပ္မ်ား၊ သံခ်ပ္ကာတပ္မ်ား အလံုးအရင္းျဖင့္ ဂ်ပန္ေတြကို တုိက္ခဲ့တာ ျမန္မာေက်ာင္းသားတို႔ မသင္ခဲ့ရ၊ မသိခဲ့ရ။ မဟာမိတ္ တပ္ေပါင္းစု၏ တုိက္ခုိက္မႈေၾကာင့္ က်ဆံုးခဲ့ရေသာ ျမန္မာျပည္ စစ္မ်က္ႏွာရိွ ဂ်ပန္စစ္သား အေရအတြက္သည္ ၁ သိန္း ၈ ေသာင္းေက်ာ္ ရိွသည္ဟု မဟာမိတ္ စစ္မွတ္တမ္းမ်ားက ဆိုထားသည္။ သို႔ေသာ္ ထုိအခ်က္ကုိ ျမန္မာေက်ာင္းသားတို႔ မသင္ခဲ့ရ။

ဒုတိယကမၻာစစ္ကာလ မဟာမိတ္တပ္ဖြဲ႔မ်ား၏ တိုက္ပြဲ

ဗိုလ္ေနဝင္းလက္ထက္ ေက်ာင္းသင္ခန္းစာမ်ားတြင္ ဗိုလ္မႉးၾကီးဗထူး တဦးကိုသာ ဂ်ပန္ကို ေစာစီးစြာ ေတာ္လွန္သူအျဖစ္ ေက်ာင္းသားမ်ားကို သင္ၾကားေစခဲ့သည္။ ဂ်ပန္ကို ေစာစီးစြာ ေတာ္လွန္ခဲ့ေသာ ရခုိင္ေတာ္လွန္ေရးသမားမ်ားအေၾကာင္း က်ေနာ္တို႔ ေက်ာင္းတြင္ မသင္ခဲ့ရ။ ဂ်ပန္တို႔၏ စစ္ေနာက္ေက်ာပုိင္းကို ခ်င္းတပ္မ်ားႏွင့္အတူ ရြပ္ရြပ္ခြ်ံခြ်ံ တုိက္ခုိက္ခဲ့ေသာ ကခ်င္၊ ခ်င္း၊ ကရင္၊ ေဂၚရခါး၊ ျမန္မာ အစရိွေသာ စစ္သားမ်ားအေၾကာင္း မသင္ခဲ့ရ။ စစ္ေတာင္းျမစ္ဝွမ္း တေလွ်ာက္တြင္ ကရင္ေျပာက္က်ားမ်ား၏ တုိက္ခုိက္မႈေၾကာင့္ ဂ်ပန္စစ္သား ၂ ေသာင္းေက်ာ္ ေခ်မႈန္းခံရသည္ကို ျမန္မာေက်ာင္းသားတို႔ ေက်ာင္းတြင္ မသင္ခဲ့ရ။ အေၾကာင္းကေတာ့ ထိုသူမ်ားမွာ ရဲေဘာ္သံုးက်ိပ္၏ ေခါင္းေဆာင္မႈေအာက္မွာ မရိွခဲ့ေသာေၾကာင့္ဟု မွတ္ခ်က္ခ်ႏုိင္သည္။

ဂ်ပန္စစ္မွတ္တမ္းမ်ားအရ ေရာဂါဘယေၾကာင့္ ေသဆံုးခဲ့ေသာ ဂ်ပန္စစ္သား အေရအတြက္မွာ ၄ ေသာင္းေက်ာ္၊ ၅ ေသာင္းနီးပါး ရိွသည္ဟု သိရသည္။ ဗမာ့တပ္မေတာ္က ဂ်ပန္ကို ေတာ္လွန္ခဲ့သည္မွာ ၁၉၄၅ မတ္လ ၂၇ ရက္ေန႔ ျဖစ္သည္။ မတ္လ ၂ဝ ရက္ေန႔တြင္ အထက္ဘက္မွ တုိက္ခုိက္၍ စံုဆင္းလာေသာ မဟာမိတ္တပ္မ်ားက မႏၲေလးကို သိမ္းထားႏွင့္ၿပီး ျဖစ္သည္။ ျမန္မာျပည္ စစ္မ်က္ႏွာတြင္ တာဝန္ထမ္းေဆာင္ခဲ့ေသာ ဂ်ပန္စစ္သား ၃ သိန္းတြင္ ၅ ေသာင္းခန္႔သာ အသက္ရွင္၍ ဂ်ပန္ျပည္သို႔ ျပန္ေရာက္ခဲ့သည္။

ရဲေဘာ္သံုးက်ိပ္ ဦးေဆာင္ေသာ ဂ်ပန္ေတာ္လွန္ေရးကိုသာ ေက်ာင္းမ်ားတြင္ သင္ေစသည္က သမုိင္းျဖစ္စဥ္အတြင္း သတင္း အင္ေဖာ္ေမးရွင္းကို လိုသလို ပံုသြင္းယူျခင္းသာ ျဖစ္သည္။ ရဲေဘာ္သံုးက်ိပ္ကို အျပစ္တင္ေနသည္ မဟုတ္။ ဗိုလ္ခ်ဳပ္ေအာင္ဆန္းႏွင့္ ရဲေဘာ္သံုးက်ိပ္ ဦးေဆာင္ေသာ ဗမာ့တပ္မေတာ္လည္း သူ႔ေထာင့္သူ႔ေနရာက သမုိင္းေပး တာဝန္မ်ားကို စြမ္းစြမ္းတမံ ထမ္းေဆာင္ခဲ့သည္။ အုပ္ခ်ဳပ္သူ အဆက္ဆက္၌ သမုိင္းကို ေမွ်ာ့ၾကိဳးတေခ်ာင္းကဲ့သို႔ အသံုးခ်ခဲ့ျခင္းကို ဆိုလိုရင္းျဖစ္သည္။

ငါတို႔တပ္က မဟုတ္ရင္၊ ငါတို႔ပါတီက မဟုတ္ရင္၊ ငါတုိ႔သမဂၢက မဟုတ္ရင္၊ ငါတို႔အဖြဲ႔အစည္းက မဟုတ္ရင္ အျဖစ္အပ်က္ေတြ သမုိင္းေၾကာင္းေတြ မွန္ေနေသာ္လည္း မိွန္ထားလုိက္၊ လူအသိမခံေစနဲ႔ဆိုတဲ့ စိတ္ဓာတ္မ်ဳိးဟာ အခုအထိ အားေကာင္းၿပီး ေနရာအေတာ္မ်ားမ်ားမွာ ေတြ႔ေနရေသးသည္။ လူထုကို ပညာေပးေနတဲ့ စာေပနဲ႔ မီဒီယာ အသုိင္းအဝုိင္းမွာေတာင္ ရိွေနေသးတာလည္း ေတြ႔ျမင္ေနရသည္။

တပ္က လူအခ်င္းခ်င္းသည္ပင္လွ်င္ အုပ္စုကြဲလာပါက သမုိင္းမွာ ေဖ်ာက္ဖ်က္ခံရသည္။ ဗိုလ္ခ်ဳပ္ေအာင္ဆန္းပံုေတြ ေငြစကၠဴေပၚမွာ မရိွေတာ့။ ဗိုလ္ခ်ဳပ္ၾကီးတင္ဦး (အန္အယ္ဒီ ဒုဥကၠ႒) ႏွင့္ ဗိုလ္ခ်ဳပ္မႉးၾကီး ေစာေမာင္တို႔၏ ဓာတ္ပံုမ်ား တပ္မေတာ္ျပခန္းမွာ ခ်ိတ္မထားေတာ့။ ႏုိင္ငံေရး အဖြဲ႔အစည္းအခ်ဳိ႕တြင္လည္း ဤနည္းႏွင္ႏွင္ပင္။ အေၾကာင္းေၾကာင္းေၾကာင့္ အဖြဲ႔အစည္းတြင္ မရိွေတာ့သည့္ (သို႔) ႏုတ္ထြက္သြားသည့္ ေခါင္းေဆာင္ အခ်ဳိ႕၏ ဓာတ္ပံုမ်ား၊ မွတ္တမ္းမ်ားကို ဝဘ္ဆုိဒ္မ်ားတြင္ ထည့္သြင္းထားျခင္း မရိွသည္ဘဲ ထိန္ခ်န္ထားသည္ကိုလည္း ဝမ္းနည္းဖြယ္ရာ ေတြ႔ရသည္။ လုပ္ပုိင္ခြင့္ ရိွသူမ်ားက သမုိင္းကို လိုသလို ေရးေနၾကသည့္ သေဘာပင္။

လက္ရိွကာလမွာလည္း ျပည္တြင္းထုတ္ ဂ်ာနယ္အခ်ဳိ႕သည္ ၂ဝဝ၈ ဖြဲ႔စည္းပံု အေျခခံဥပေဒ၊ ၂ဝ၁ဝ ေရြးေကာက္ပြဲ အစရိွသည္တို႔အတြက္ သတင္းမွားမ်ားကို အာဏာရွင္မ်ားအၾကိဳက္ ပါးပါးနပ္နပ္ တင္ေနၾကသည္။ အက်ဳိးစီးပြားတခုအတြက္ ကိုယ္ျဖစ္ေစခ်င္သည့္ လုိင္းမ်ားကို လူထုအၾကား ခ်ျပေနသည္။ ဒီမိုကေရစီတန္ဖိုးႏွင့္ ဒီမိုကေရစီ ခရီးရွည္အတြက္ ေဆာင္ရြက္ရမည့္ ကိစၥမ်ားကို မွန္မွန္ကန္ကန္ မတင္ျပဘဲ ေမွ်ာ့ၾကိဳးကဲ့သို႔ အသံုးခ်ေနသည္။ စစ္တပ္အုပ္ခ်ဳပ္မႈေအာက္တြင္ လြတ္လြတ္လပ္လပ္ ေရးခြင့္မတာေၾကာင့္ စာေစာင္ဂ်ာနယ္ အမ်ားစုဟာ ဥာဏ္ကိုလႊာၿပီး လူထုကို တင္ျပေနရသည္။ သို႔ေသာ္ ေရွးျမန္မာဘုရင္မ်ား၏ ဘုန္းေတာ္ဘြဲ႔ႏွင့္ ေမာ္ကြန္းမ်ားကို ေရးသားသကဲ့သို႔ အာဏာရွင္တို႔ဘက္ကို လုိက္၍ ေရးသားေနသည့္ စာေပသမား၊ ဂ်ာနယ္သမား အခ်ဳိ႕ကိုလည္း ထင္ထင္ရွားရွား ေတြ႔ေနရသည္။

မ်ဳိးဆက္သစ္မ်ားသည္ တုိင္းျပည္၏ အနာဂတ္အတြက္ အေရးၾကီးသည္ဟု ႐ႈျမင္ပါက အျမင္က်ယ္ေသာ၊ တန္ဖိုးျမင့္ေသာ မ်ဳိးဆက္သစ္မ်ား တိုးပြားလာရန္အတြက္ လူ႔အဖြဲ႔အစည္းအတြင္း သတင္းမွားမ်ား၊ သတင္းထိန္ခ်န္ျခင္းမ်ား ျပဳလုပ္ေနျခင္းကို ရပ္ဆုိင္းၾကပါလို႔ တုိက္တြန္းလုိက္သည္။

(၃ဝ ရက္ ႏိုဝင္ဘာလ၊ ၂ဝဝ၉ ခုႏွစ္)












အာဖဂန္ကုိ သင္ခန္းစာယူပါ။


"The greatest test of respect comes when a leader creates major change in an organization"
(John C. Maxwell)

ေဆာင္းပါး-(မဇၥ်ိမ)
ျမတ္စုိး
၁၁.၂၆.၂၀၀၉

အာဖဂန္နစၥတန္ႏုိင္ငံမွာ ထပ္မံ ေရြးခ်ယ္ခံရတဲ့ သမၼတဟာမစ္ ခါဇုိင္းဟာ အစုိးရ ဒုတိယသက္တမ္းကုိ ထမ္းေဆာင္ဖုိ႔ က်မ္းသစၥာ က်ိမ္ဆုိခဲ့ပါတယ္။ သမၼတ ခါဇုိင္းက အာဖဂန္ရဲ႕ သမုိင္းမွာ က႑သစ္ ဖြင့္လွစ္ေရး၊ အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈ ပေပ်ာက္ေရး၊ ေကာင္းမြန္တဲ့ စီမံအုပ္ခ်ဳပ္မႈစနစ္ ထြန္းကားေအာင္ ေဆာင္ရြက္ေရးႏွင့္ အာဖဂန္ လုံၿခံဳေရးကို တာဝန္ယူရာမွာ တုိးတက္ေကာင္းမြန္ေအာင္ ျပဳလုပ္မယ္လုိ႔ ကတိျပဳခဲ့တယ္။

အာဖဂန္ သမၼတ က်မ္းသစၥာ က်ိမ္ဆုိပြဲကုိ အေမရိကန္ ႏုိင္ငံျခားေရးဝန္ၾကီး ဟီလာရီ တက္ေရာက္ခဲ့တယ္။ အေမရိကန္နဲ႔ ၿဗိတိန္ ႏုိင္ငံျခားေရးဝန္ၾကီးေတြကေတာ့ သမၼတ ခါဇုိင္း အစုိးရအေနနဲ႔ အေျပာထက္ လက္ေတြ႔က်က် လုပ္ေဆာင္ဖုိ႔သာ လုိပါတယ္။ သမၼတ ခါဇုိင္း အစုိးရအေနနဲ႔ အေျပာနဲ႔လက္ေတြ႔ ကုိက္ညီေအာင္ မျပဳလုပ္ဘူးဆုိရင္ အကူအညီေတြဟာ ရပ္ဆုိင္းသြားႏုိင္တယ္လုိ႔ သတိေပး ေျပာဆုိခဲ့ၾကတယ္။ တကယ္လုိ႔သာ သမၼတ ဟာမစ္ခါဇိုင္းဟာ အာဖဂန္မွာ ရင္ဆုိင္ေနရတဲ့ စိန္ေခၚမႈ ျပႆနာေတြကုိ မွန္မွန္ကန္ကန္နဲ႔ အျမန္ဆုံး မေျဖရွင္းေပးႏုိင္ရင္ ျပည္သူေတြက သူ႔အစုိးရအေပၚ ေထာက္ခံမႈနဲ႔ ယုံၾကည္စိတ္ခ်မႈေတြ ရရွိမွာ မဟုတ္တဲ့အျပင္၊ ႏုိင္ငံတကာရဲ႕ ေထာက္ခံမႈလည္း ရရွိႏုိင္မွာ မဟုတ္ပါဘူး။ အကူအညီ ေထာက္ပ့ံေနတဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံေတြရွိ အတုိက္အခံ ပါတီေတြက အစုိးရေတြကို ဖိအားေပးမႈေတြနဲ႔ ရင္ဆုိင္ေနရတယ္။

သမၼတခါဇုိင္း အရင္ဆုံး အလ်င္အျမန္ ေျဖရွင္းရမွာက အစုိးရအဖြဲ႔အတြင္း အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈကုိ အေရးယူ ေဆာင္ရြက္ေပးရဖုိ႔ ျဖစ္တယ္။ တနည္းအားျဖင့္ အစုိးရကုိ သန္႔စင္ေရးပင္ ျဖစ္တယ္။ အတုိက္အခံပါတီ ႏုိင္ငံေရး ေခါင္းေဆာင္ေတြနဲ႔ အာဖဂန္ႏုိင္ငံ ျပန္လည္ထူေထာင္ေရးအတြက္ ေထာက္ပံ့ကူညီေနတဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံအစုိးရေတြက ခါဇိုင္း အစုိးရ အဖြဲ႔ဝင္ေတြမွာ အက်င့္ပ်က္ အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈေတြ ရွိခဲ့တာေၾကာင့္၊ ဒီလုိ အက်င့္ပ်က္ အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈေတြကုိ စုံစမ္းေဖာ္ထုတ္ စစ္ေဆးအေရးယူမႈေတြကို ျပဳလုပ္ႏုိင္ေအာင္ လြတ္လပ္ၿပီး ျပည္သူက ၾကည္ညိဳေလးစားတဲ့ ပုဂၢိဳလ္ေတြ ပါဝင္တဲ့ အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈ တုိက္ဖ်က္ေရး ေကာ္မတီတရပ္ကုိ ဖြဲ႔စည္းဖုိ႔ အဆုိျပဳခဲ့တယ္။

အစုိးရဝန္ၾကီးေတြနဲ႔ သူတုိ႔ရဲ႕ မိသားစုဝင္ေတြဟာ သူတုိ႔ရဲ႕ ပုိင္ဆုိင္မႈေတြကုိ ရွင္းရွင္းလင္းလင္းနဲ႔ ထင္သာျမင္သာရွိဖုိ႔ တရားဝင္ ေဖာ္ျပေပးရမယ္၊ အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈ တုိက္ဖ်က္ေရး ေကာ္မတီကို ပုိင္ဆုိင္မႈေတြကုိ မွတ္တမ္းတင္ သတင္းပုိ႔ရမယ္။ ဒီေကာ္မတီက အခ်ိန္မေရြး စုံစမ္းစစ္ေဆးခြင့္နဲ႔ အေရးယူခြင့္ ရွိရမယ္လုိ႔ အဆုိျပဳေတာင္းဆုိခဲ့ၾကတယ္။ သမၼတ ခါဇုိင္း အစုိးရအတြင္း အက်င့္ပ်က္ အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈ ရွိသူေတြထဲမွာ တခ်ိန္က တာလီဘန္ ဘာသာေရး အစြန္းေရာက္ အစုိးရကုိ ဆန္႔က်င္တုိက္ပြဲဝင္ခဲ့ၾကတဲ့ အတုိက္အခံ ေခါင္းေဆာင္ေတြလည္း ပါဝင္ၾကတယ္။

ၿပီးခဲ့တဲ့ အပတ္ အဂၤါေန႔က ဂ်ာမဏီမွာ ႐ုံးစုိက္တည္ေထာင္ထားတဲ့ အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈ တုိက္ဖ်က္ေရးအဖြဲ႔ Transparency International က ထုတ္ျပန္ခဲ့တဲ့ အစီရင္ခံစာမွာ ဆုိမားလီးယား ႏုိင္ငံၿပီးရင္ အာဖဂန္ ႏုိင္ငံဟာ အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈ အဆုိးဆုံးႏုိင္ငံ ျဖစ္တယ္။ ၂ဝဝ၉ ခုႏွစ္အတြက္ ထုတ္ေဝတဲ့ အဆုိပါ အစီရင္ခံစာဟာ ကမၻာ့ႏုိင္ငံေပါင္း ၁၈ဝ ကုိ စာရင္းျပဳစုထားျခင္းျဖစ္ၿပီး အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈ အဆိုးဆုံးႏိုင္ငံေတြအျဖစ္ နံပါတ္ ၁၈ဝ မွာ ဆိုမာလီ၊ အာဖဂန္နစၥတန္က ၁၇၉၊ ျမန္မာ ၁၇၈၊ ဆူဒန္နဲ႔ အီရတ္ႏိုင္ငံက ၁၇၆ အဆင့္အျဖစ္ ကမၻာေပၚရွိ အက်င့္ပ်က္ ျခစားမႈ အမ်ားဆုံး ႏုိင္ငံမ်ားျဖစ္ေၾကာင္း အစီရင္ခံစာထဲမွာ ေဖာ္ျပပါရွိတယ္။

ဆုိမာလီ၊ အာဖဂန္၊ ဇင္ဘာေဘြ၊ ျမန္မာနဲ႔ အီရတ္ ႏုိင္ငံေတြဟာ အဘက္ဘက္က က်႐ႈံးေနတဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံေတြ (Failed States)၊ အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈ အဆုိးဆုံးႏုိင္ငံေတြ၊ အၾကမ္းဖက္မႈ အမ်ားဆုံးႏုိင္ငံေတြ၊ လူ႔အခြင့္အေရး ခ်ဳိးေဖာက္ခံရမႈ အမ်ားဆုံး ႏုိင္ငံေတြ စတဲ့ နာမည္ပ်က္စာရင္းထဲမွာ က်ေရာက္ေနတဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံေတြအျဖစ္ ႏုိင္ငံတကာ အဖြဲ႔အစည္းေတြ၊ ကုလသမဂၢ အဖြဲ႔အစည္းေတြက သတ္မွတ္ထားပါတယ္။

အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈဟာ ႏုိင္ငံတုိင္းမွာ ျဖစ္ေလ့ျဖစ္ထ ရွိတယ္။ ဆင္းရဲတဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံျဖစ္ျဖစ္၊ ခ်မ္းသာတဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံျဖစ္ျဖစ္ အနည္းနဲ႔ အမ်ားဆုိသလုိ ရွိေနတတ္တာပါ။ အထူးသျဖင့္ စစ္ပြဲေတြရွိေနတဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံ၊ ၿငိမ္းခ်မ္းေရး တည္ၿငိမ္မႈမရွိတဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံ၊ ထင္သာျမင္သာမႈမရွိတဲ့ ဥပေဒေတြ ျပ႒ာန္းၿပီး အာဏာကုိ အလႊဲသုံးစားလုပ္ေနတဲ့ တုိင္းျပည္ေတြမွာေတာ့ အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈကုိ တုိက္ဖ်က္ဖုိ႔ ခက္ခဲတယ္လုိ႔ အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈ တုိက္ဖ်က္ေရးအဖြဲ႔ Transparency International က ထုတ္ျပန္ခဲ့တဲ့ အစီရင္ခံစာမွာ ေဖာ္ျပထားတယ္။

ဆုိမာလီ၊ အာဖဂန္၊ ျမန္မာနဲ႔ အီရတ္ ႏုိင္ငံေတြမွာ လာဘ္ေပးလာဘ္ယူမႈဟာ အစုိးရဌာနနဲ႔ ဌာနဆုိင္ရာ အၾကီးအကဲေတြအၾကား ယဥ္ေက်းမႈ၊ ဓေလ့ထုံးတမ္းစဥ္လာအျဖစ္ တည္ရွိေနသလုိ၊ အာဏာအလႊဲသုံးစား ျပဳလုပ္ေနမႈ၊ ထင္သာျမင္သာမရွိတဲ့ ဥပေဒေတြေၾကာင့္ အဂတိ လုိက္စားမႈကုိ တုိက္ဖ်က္ဖုိ႔ ခက္ခဲတယ္။ အစုိးရေတြအတြင္း အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈေတြေၾကာင့္ ဒီႏုိင္ငံေတြရဲ႕ စီးပြားေရးဖြံ႔ၿဖိဳးမႈ ေႏွးေကြးလာေစႏုိင္ေၾကာင္း Transparency International က သုံးသပ္ထားပါတယ္။

သမၼတ ခါဇုိင္း အစုိးရအေနနဲ႔ အာဖဂန္ႏုိင္ငံ အသြင္ကူးေျပာင္းေရးကာလမွာ ျဖစ္ပြားေနတဲ့ ျပည္တြင္းစစ္ပြဲေတြ၊ အာဏာလြန္ဆြဲမႈေတြ၊ ႏုိင္ငံေရးေခါင္းေဆာင္ေတြ ျပင္ဆင္မႈ အားနည္းတာေတြ၊ အစုိးရမဟုတ္တဲ့ လူမႈေထာက္ပံ့ အကူအညီေပးေရး အဖြဲ႔ေတြနဲ႔ အစုိးရဝန္ၾကီးဌာနေတြအတြင္း ထင္သာျမင္သာတဲ့ တာဝန္ယူမႈ (Transparency and Accountability) မရွိတာေတြ၊ နည္းပါးေနတဲ့ လူ႔စြမ္းအား အရင္းအျမစ္ (Lack of Human Capacity) ေတြေၾကာင့္ အဂတိလုိက္စားမႈကုိ တုိက္ဖ်က္ဖုိ႔နဲ႔ အသြင္ကူးေျပာင္းေရး ကာလကုိ ေအာင္ျမင္စြာ ျဖတ္သန္းႏုိင္ဖုိ႔ စိန္ေခၚမႈမ်ားစြာနဲ႔ ဆက္လက္ရင္ဆုိင္ၾကရလိမ့္မယ္လုိ႔ သုံးသပ္ထားၾကတယ္။

တကယ္ေတာ့ ဒီစိမ္ေခၚမႈေတြကုိ အသြင္ကူးေျပာင္းေရး ကာလကုိ ျဖတ္သန္းေနတဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံတုိင္းမွာ ရင္ဆုိင္ၾကရမွာပါ။ ကာလရွည္ၾကာစြာ အျမစ္တည္ေနတဲ့ နာတာရွည္ အက်ပ္အတည္း၊ ျပႆနာေတြကုိ အဖြဲ႔အစည္း တဖြဲ႔တည္း၊ ပါတီတပါတီတည္း၊ အစုိးရတရပ္တည္းက ေျဖရွင္းႏုိင္ဖုိ႔ မျဖစ္ႏုိင္ပါဘူး။ သမၼတ ခါဇုိင္းကေတာ့ ဒီစိမ္ေခၚမႈေတြကုိ စုေပါင္းေျဖရွင္းႏုိင္ဖုိ႔ သူ႔ရဲ႕ အတုိက္အခံေတြနဲ႔ ေတြ႔ဆုံေဆြးေႏြးဖုိ႔ ကမ္းလွမ္းဖိတ္ေခၚထားတယ္။ ဒါဟာ တုိင္းျပည္ကုိ မွန္ကန္တဲ့ လမ္းေၾကာင္းေပၚ ျပန္လည္ေလွ်ာက္လွမ္းဖုိ႔ မွန္မွန္ကန္ကန္ ဆုံးျဖတ္ခဲ့တဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံေရးမူဝါဒ ျဖစ္တယ္။

ႏုိင္ငံေရးဆုိတာက ေဒသနယ္ပယ္ကုိ အေၾကာင္းျပဳ၍လည္းေကာင္း၊ ပတ္ဝန္းက်င္ကုိ အေၾကာင္းျပဳ၍လည္းေကာင္း ႏုိင္ငံေရးဆုံးျဖတ္ခ်က္ေတြ ခ်မွတ္ေလ့ရွိၾကတယ္။ ပထဝီႏုိင္ငံေရး၊ ေဒသတြင္းႏုိင္ငံေရး အေျခအေနေတြဟာ ႏုိင္ငံျခားေရးမူဝါဒမွာ အေရးပါတဲ့ အေျခခံအေၾကာင္းအရင္း ျဖစ္သလုိ၊ ႏုိင္ငံေရးဆုံးျဖတ္ခ်က္၊ ႏုိင္ငံေရးမူဝါဒ ခ်မွတ္ရာမွာလည္း ပကတိအရွိတရားအေပၚ အေျခခံရမယ့္ လမ္းညႊန္ခ်က္ေတြ ျဖစ္လာပါတယ္။

အာဖဂန္ႏုိင္ငံမွာ လူမ်ဳိးေရး၊ ဘာသာေရး အစြန္းေရာက္မႈေတြ၊ ႏုိင္ငံျခားသားမုန္းတီးမႈေတြ၊ အဂိတလုိက္စားမႈေတြ၊ အၾကမ္းဖက္တုိက္ခုိက္မႈေတြ၊ လူ႔အခြင့္အေရး ခ်ဳိးေဖာက္မႈေတြေၾကာင့္ တုိင္းျပည္ဟာ စိမ္ေခၚမႈေပါင္း မ်ားစြာနဲ႔ ရင္ဆုိင္ေနရၿပီး၊ ႏုိင္ငံတကာမွာ အဆုိးရြားဆုံး အဆင့္ကုိ ေရာက္ရွိေနတယ္။ အာဖဂန္ဟာ ေဒသတြင္းႏုိင္ငံ တႏုိင္ငံျဖစ္တာေၾကာင့္ ေဒသတြင္းႏုိင္ငံေရး အေျခအေနေတြဟာ ႏုိင္ငံျခားေရး မူဝါဒမွာ အေရးပါတဲ့ အေျခခံအေၾကာင္းအရင္း ျဖစ္သလုိ၊ ႏုိင္ငံေရးဆုံးျဖတ္ခ်က္ ခ်မွတ္ရာမွာလည္း ေလ့လာၿပီး သင္ခန္းစာယူသင့္တယ္။

ပုဂၢိဳလ္အစြဲ ဓေလ့လႊမ္းမုိးမႈေတြ၊ လူမ်ဳိးေရးအစြဲၾကီးမႈေတြ၊ စစ္ေခါင္းေဆာင္ေတြမွာ ႏုိင္ငံျခားသားေတြကုိ မုန္းတီးမႈေတြ၊ အာဏာအလႊဲသုံးစားလုပ္မႈေတြ ရွိေနတဲ့ ျမန္မာႏုိင္ငံရွိ ႏုိင္ငံေရး ယဥ္ေက်းမႈမွာလည္း လက္ရွိ ရင္ဆုိင္ေနရတဲ့ နာတာရွည္ ျပႆနာေတြကုိ အဖြဲ႔အစည္း တဖြဲ႔တည္း၊ ပါတီတပါတီတည္း၊ အစုိးရတရပ္တည္းက ေျဖရွင္းႏုိင္ဖုိ႔က မျဖစ္ႏုိင္ပါဘူး။ ဒီလုိ လမ္းမွားေရာက္ေနတဲ့၊ တယူသန္ အယူအဆ လႊမ္းမုိးေနတဲ့၊ ျပႆနာေတြ၊ အက်ပ္အတည္းေတြ၊ စိမ္ေခၚမႈေတြနဲ႔ ရင္ဆုိင္ေနရတဲ့ ျမန္မာ့ႏုိင္ငံေရးကုိ စုေပါင္းေတြ႔ဆုံေဆြးေႏြးၿပီး လက္ေတြ႔က်က် အေျဖရွာၾကမွသာ တုိင္းျပည္ဟာ မွန္ကန္တဲ့ လမ္းေၾကာင္းေပၚ ေလွ်ာက္လွမ္းႏုိင္မွာ ျဖစ္ပါတယ္။

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Friday, November 20, 2009

Corruption threatens global economic recovery, greatly challenges countries in conflict



Berlin, 17 November 2009

As the world economy begins to register a tentative recovery and some nations continue to wrestle with ongoing conflict and insecurity, it is clear that no region of the world is immune to the perils of corruption, according to Transparency International’s 2009 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI), a measure of domestic, public sector corruption released today.

“At a time when massive stimulus packages, fast-track disbursements of public funds and attempts to secure peace are being implemented around the world, it is essential to identify where corruption blocks good governance and accountability, in order to break its corrosive cycle” said Huguette Labelle, Chair of Transparency International (TI).

The vast majority of the 180 countries included in the 2009 index score below five on a scale from 0 (perceived to be highly corrupt) to 10 (perceived to have low levels of corruption). The CPI measures the perceived levels of public sector corruption in a given country and is a composite index, drawing on 13 different expert and business surveys. The 2009 edition scores 180 countries, the same number as the 2008 CPI.

Fragile, unstable states that are scarred by war and ongoing conflict linger at the bottom of the index. These are: Somalia, with a score of 1.1, Afghanistan at 1.3, Myanmar at 1.4 and Sudan tied with Iraq at 1.5. These results demonstrate that countries which are perceived as the most corrupt are also those plagued by long-standing conflicts, which have torn apart their governance infrastructure.

When essential institutions are weak or non-existent, corruption spirals out of control and the plundering of public resources feeds insecurity and impunity. Corruption also makes normal a seeping loss of trust in the very institutions and nascent governments charged with ensuring survival and stability.

Countries at the bottom of the index cannot be shut out from development efforts. Instead, what the index points to is the need to strengthen their institutions. Investors and donors should be equally vigilant of their operations and as accountable for their own actions as they are in demanding transparency and accountability from beneficiary countries.

“Stemming corruption requires strong oversight by parliaments, a well performing judiciary, independent and properly resourced audit and anti-corruption agencies, vigorous law enforcement, transparency in public budgets, revenue and aid flows, as well as space for independent media and a vibrant civil society,” said Labelle. “The international community must find efficient ways to help war-torn countries to develop and sustain their own institutions.”

Highest scorers in the 2009 CPI are New Zealand at 9.4, Denmark at 9.3, Singapore and Sweden tied at 9.2 and Switzerland at 9.0. These scores reflect political stability, long-established conflict of interest regulations and solid, functioning public institutions.

Overall results in the 2009 index are of great concern because corruption continues to lurk where opacity rules, where institutions still need strengthening and where governments have not implemented anti-corruption legal frameworks.

Even industrialised countries cannot be complacent: the supply of bribery and the facilitation of corruption often involve businesses based in their countries. Financial secrecy jurisdictions, linked to many countries that top the CPI, severely undermine efforts to tackle corruption and recover stolen assets.

“Corrupt money must not find safe haven. It is time to put an end to excuses,” said Labelle. “The OECD’s work in this area is welcome, but there must be more bilateral treaties on information exchange to fully end the secrecy regime. At the same time, companies must cease operating in renegade financial centres.”

Bribery, cartels and other corrupt practices undermine competition and contribute to massive loss of resources for development in all countries, especially the poorest ones. Between 1990 and 2005, more than 283 private international cartels were exposed that cost consumers around the world an estimated US $300 billion in overcharges, as documented in a recent TI report.

With the vast majority of countries in the 2009 index scoring below five, the corruption challenge is undeniable. The Group of 20 has made strong commitments to ensure that integrity and transparency form the cornerstone of a newfound regulatory structure. As the G20 tackles financial sector and economic reforms, it is critical to address corruption as a substantial threat to a sustainable economic future. The G20 must also remain committed to gaining public support for essential reforms by making institutions such as the Financial Stability Board and decisions about investments in infrastructure, transparent and open to civil society input.

Globally and nationally, institutions of oversight and legal frameworks that are actually enforced, coupled with smarter, more effective regulation, will ensure lower levels of corruption. This will lead to a much needed increase of trust in public institutions, sustained economic growth and more effective development assistance. Most importantly, it will alleviate the enormous scale of human suffering in the countries that perform most poorly in the Corruption Perceptions Index.

To view the CPI 2009 Table click here.

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Transparency International is the global civil society organisation leading the fight against corruption.
Media contact(s):
Gypsy Guillén Kaiser
+49 30 34 38 20 19 or + 49 30 34 38 20 662
press@transparency.org





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Thursday, November 19, 2009

ယြမ္ေငြႏွင့္ တ႐ုတ္-အေမရိကန္ ကုန္သြယ္မႈ ျပႆနာ

-ျမတ္စုိး-
၁၁.၁၇.၂၀၀၉
မဇၥိ်မ

ဂလုိဘယ္လုိက္ေဇးရွင္းေခတ္လုိ႔ ေခၚဆုိတဲ့ နယ္ျခားမဲ့ ကမၻာ့ကုန္သြယ္မႈနဲ႔ စီးပြားေရးဆုိင္ရာ ကူးလူးဆက္ဆံေရး ကြန္ယက္စနစ္ ေခတ္ၾကီးအတြင္းမွာ ႏုိင္ငံေတြရဲ႕ ေငြေၾကးဆုိင္ရာ မူဝါဒေတြဟာ ကမၻာ့စီးပြားေရးကုိ ဘယ္လုိ လာေရာက္ထိခုိက္ႏုိင္လာမလဲဆုိတဲ့ အေတြးအျမင္ကုိ စီးပြားေရးပညာရွင္ အေတာ္မ်ားမ်ားက ေရးသားခဲ့ပါတယ္။

ဒီေဆာင္ပါးမွာေတာ့ နယ္ျခားမဲ့ ကမၻာ့ကုန္သြယ္မႈနဲ႔ စီးပြားေရးဆုိင္ရာ ကူးလူးဆက္ဆံေရး ကြန္ယက္စနစ္အတြင္း ျဖစ္ေပၚေနတဲ့ ေဒၚလာနဲ႔ ယြမ္ေငြ အတက္အက်ေၾကာင့္ ကမၻာ့စီးပြားေရးကုိ ဘယ္လုိ ထိခုိက္သြားေနလဲဆုိတဲ့ အေမရိကန္ စီးပြားေရး ပညာရွင္ ႏွစ္ဦးရဲ႕ သုံးသပ္ခ်က္ေတြကုိ တင္ျပသြားပါမယ္။

၂၀၀၈ ခုႏွစ္မွာ စီးပြားေရး ႏုိဘယ္ဆုရရွိခဲ့တဲ့ အေမရိကန္ ႏုိင္ငံသား ေပါခ႐ူမန္ (Paul Krugman) နဲ႔ အေမရိကန္ အစုိးရမွာ စီးပြားေရးနဲ႔ ကုန္သြယ္မႈဆုိင္ရာ အၾကီးအကဲေဟာင္းအျဖစ္ တာဝန္ထမ္းေဆာင္ခဲ့တဲ့ ပါေမာကၡ ပီတာေမာရီစီ (Peter Morici) တုိ႔က တ႐ုတ္ေငြေၾကး ယြမ္ကုိ တန္ဖုိးေလွ်ာ့ခ်ေအာင္ ၾကိဳးစားေနတဲ့ တ႐ုတ္အစုိးရရဲ႕ ေငြေၾကးဆုိင္ရာ ထိန္းခ်ဳပ္မႈ မူဝါဒဟာ ကမၻာ့ကုန္သြယ္ေရးမွာ အခက္အခဲေတြ၊ စီးပြားေရးဖြံ႔ၿဖိဳးမႈ ေႏွးေကြးမႈေတြကုိ ျဖစ္ေပၚလာေစႏုိင္ေၾကာင္း သတင္းစာေတြထဲမွာ သတိေပး ေရးသားလုိက္ပါတယ္။

၂၀၀၇ ခုႏွစ္ ဒီဇင္ဘာလက စတင္ၿပီး ကမၻာ့စီးပြားေရး ဆုတ္ယုတ္မႈနဲ႔ ရင္ဆုိင္ခဲ့ရၿပီးေနာက္ ဘာလင္၊ တုိက်ဳိ၊ ဘန္ေကာက္၊ နယူးေဒလီ စတဲ့ ကမၻာ့ေငြေၾကးေစ်းကြက္ေတြမွာ ေငြေၾကးႏႈန္း ျပန္လည္တုိးျမႇင့္ခဲ့ၿပီး၊ ေဒၚလာေငြေစ်းႏႈန္း က်ဆင္းသြားခဲ့ပါတယ္။ ေဒၚလာေစ်းႏႈန္း က်ဆင္းခဲ့မႈေၾကာင့္ ေရနံစိမ္းေစ်းႏႈန္းေတြ ျမင့္တက္ခဲ့ေပမယ့္၊ တ႐ုတ္အစုိးရကေတာ့ ယြမ္ေငြ တန္ဖုိးကုိ ဆက္လက္ေလွ်ာ့ခ် ထိန္းခ်ဳပ္ေနတာေၾကာင့္ ကမၻာ့ေငြေၾကး ေစ်းကြက္စံနစ္ထက္ ကုိယ္က်ိဳးကာကြယ္ေရး ေငြေၾကးဆုိင္ရာ မူဝါဒကုိ က်င့္သုံးေနတယ္လုိ႔ ကမၻာ့စီးပြားေရး ပညာရွင္ေတြက ေထာက္ျပခဲ့ၾကတယ္။

Source:Bloomberg

တ႐ုတ္နဲ႔ ကုန္သြယ္ေနတဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံေတြမွာ တ႐ုတ္ ယြမ္ေငြေၾကာင့္ ကုန္သြယ္မႈေတြမွာ လုိေငြျပလာခဲ့ပါတယ္။ ႏုိင္ငံျခား တုိင္းျပည္ေတြကေန ကုန္ပစၥည္းေတြဟာ တ႐ုတ္ႏုိင္ငံဆီကုိ တင္ပုိ႔ေရာင္းခ်မႈ ေလ်ာ့နည္းလာေစၿပီး၊ တ႐ုတ္နဲ႔ ကုန္သြယ္ေနတဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံေတြမွာ ကုန္ပစၥည္းထုတ္လုပ္မႈ သိသာစြာ ေလ်ာ့က်လာေစခဲ့တယ္လုိ႔ ေထာက္ျပၾကပါတယ္။ တ႐ုတ္နဲ႔ ကုန္သြယ္တဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံေတြမွာ ကုန္ထုတ္လုပ္မႈ ေလ်ာ့က်လာခဲ့ျခင္း၊ အလုပ္လက္မဲ့ တုိးျမင့္လာျခင္း၊ ဝယ္လုိအား က်ဆင္းလာျခင္း စတာေတြေၾကာင့္ ကမၻာ့စီးပြားေရး ျပန္လည္နာလန္ထူလာႏုိင္ဖုိ႔ အေတာ္ၾကာေနလိမ့္ဦးမယ္လုိ႔ ပညာရွင္ႏွစ္ဦးက ေဟာကိန္းထုတ္ ေျပာဆုိခဲ့ၾကပါတယ္။

အျပန္အလွန္ အက်ဳိးသက္ေရာက္မႈအရ တ႐ုတ္အစုိးရရဲ႕ ေငြေၾကးတန္ဖုိး ေလွ်ာ့ခ်မႈ မူဝါဒဟာ တ႐ုတ္ႏုိင္ငံရဲ႕ ထုတ္ကုန္တင္ပုိ႔မႈ (Exports) ကုိ ေလ်ာ့က်လာေစႏုိင္တာေၾကာင့္ တ႐ုတ္ႏုိင္ငံရဲ႕ စီးပြားေရးကုိ ျပန္လည္ၿပီး ထိခုိက္လာေစမွာျဖစ္ေၾကာင္းနဲ႔ ဒီအခ်က္ကုိ တ႐ုတ္အစုိးရအေနနဲ႔ အေလးအနက္ စဥ္စားသင့္ေၾကာင္း သတိေပး ေရးသားခဲ့ၾကပါတယ္။ တကမၻာလုံး စီးပြားေရးကုိ အႏၲရာယ္ က်ေရာက္ေစႏုိင္တဲ့ ေငြတန္ဖုိးေလွ်ာ့ခ်တဲ့ ေငြေၾကးဆုိင္ရာ ထိန္းခ်ဳပ္မႈ မူဝါဒကုိ စီးပြားေရးပုံစံအရ ကစားမႈမ်ဳိး တ႐ုတ္အစုိးရအေနနဲ႔ မျပဳလုပ္သင့္ေၾကာင္း အၾကံေပးခဲ့ၾကပါတယ္။

လက္ရွိ တ႐ုတ္ ယြမ္ေငြတန္ဖုိး ေလွ်ာ့ခ်တဲ့ စီးပြားေရးေငြေၾကးဆုိင္ရာ မူဝါဒေၾကာင့္ အေမရိကန္ အပါအဝင္ ဥေရာပႏုိင္ငံေတြ၊ အိမ္နီးခ်င္းႏုိင္ငံေတြနဲ႔ စီးပြားေရးကုန္သြယ္မႈမွာ တ႐ုတ္ႏုိင္ငံက ပုိေငြ (Surplus) ျပသေနေပမယ့္၊ ဒီႏုိင္ငံေတြမွာေတာ့ ကုန္သြယ္မႈ လုိေငြ (Deficit) ေတြ ျပသေနေၾကာင္းနဲ႔ ႏုိင္ငံျခား သြင္းကုန္ပစၥည္းေတြ တ႐ုတ္ႏုိင္ငံမွာ ေရာင္းခ်တဲ့အခါ တန္ဖုိးၾကီးလာေစမႈေၾကာင့္ တင္သြင္းေရာင္းခ်မႈ ေလ်ာ့နည္းလာေစခဲ့ေၾကာင္း ပညာရွင္ႏွစ္ဦးက ေထာက္ျပပါတယ္။

၂၀၀၀ -၂၀၀၉ စီးပြားေရး ဆုိင္ရာ အညႊန္းၿပ ကိန္းဂဏန္း အခ်က္အလက္မ်ား

မၾကာေသးခင္က ထုတ္ျပန္ခဲ့တဲ့ အေမရိကန္-တ႐ုတ္ ႏွစ္ႏုိင္ငံ ကုန္သြယ္ေရး စာရင္း အစီရင္ခံခ်က္အရ အေမရိကန္နဲ႔ တ႐ုတ္ကုန္သြယ္မႈမွာ ၂ဝဝဝ ခုႏွစ္တုန္းက တ႐ုတ္ႏုိင္ငံဟာ ပုိေငြ (Surplus) ၂၈ ဘီလီယံ ရွိခဲ့ၿပီး၊ အေမရိကန္ကေတာ့ ၄၂၂ ဘီလီယံ လုိေငြ (Deficit) ျပခဲ့ပါတယ္။ ဒါေပမဲ့ ၂၀၀၉ ခုႏွစ္မွာ တ႐ုတ္က ပုိေငြ (Surplus) ၂၆၇ ဘီလီယံနဲ႔ အေမရိကန္က လိုေငြ ၈၅၃ ဘီလီယံ (Deficit) ျပခဲ့ေၾကာင္း ေဖာ္ျပထားပါတယ္။

၂၀၀၀ ခုႏွစ္မွာ တ႐ုတ္အစုိးရ လက္ထဲမွာ အရန္ထားရွိတဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံျခားေငြေၾကး ပမာဏဟာ ၁၆၆ ဘီလီယံ ရွိခဲ့ၿပီး၊ အေမရိကန္ အစုိးရမွာေတာ့ ၃၁ ဘီလီယံပဲ ရွိခဲ့တယ္။ ၂၀၀၉ ခုႏွစ္မွာ တ႐ုတ္အစုိးရ လက္ထဲမွာ ႏုိင္ငံျခား အရန္ေငြေၾကး ၂.၂၇၃ ထီြလီယံအထိ တုိးျမင့္လာၿပီး၊ အေမရိကန္အစုိးရ လက္ထဲမွာေတာ့ ႏုိင္ငံၿခား အရန္ေငြေၾကးဟာ ၂၀၀၉ ခုႏွစ္ ေအာက္တုိဘာလမွာ ၄၇ ဘီလီယံပဲ ရွိခဲ့ပါတယ္။

တ႐ုတ္အစုိးရရဲ႕ အရန္ထားရွိတဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံျခားေငြေၾကးရဲ႕ အမ်ားစုဟာ အေမရိကန္ အစုိးရက အာမခံထားရွိၿပီး ေခ်းယူထားတဲ့ ေငြေခ်းလတ္မွတ္ေတြ ျဖစ္ပါတယ္။ အေမရိကန္က တ႐ုတ္ႏုိင္ငံဆီကုိ ျပန္ဆပ္ဖုိ႔ အေၾကြး ဘီလီယံ ၈ဝဝ ေက်ာ္ ရွိေနတယ္။ အေမရိကန္က တႏွစ္ကုိ ဘီလီယံ ၅၀ အတုိးေငြကုိ ျပန္ဆပ္မယ္လုိ႔လည္း ကတိျပဳထားခဲ့ပါတယ္။ ဒါေပမဲ့လည္း အေမရိကန္ ရင္ဆုိင္ေနရတဲ့ စီးပြားေရး ျပႆနာေတြ၊ ဘ႑ာေရး လုိေငြျပသေနမႈေၾကာင့္ တ႐ုတ္အစုိးရက သူတုိ႔ေခ်းေငြေတြကုိ ျပန္ရရွိဖုိ႔ စုိးရိမ္မကင္း ျဖစ္ေနပါတယ္။

၂၀၀၀ ခုႏွစ္မွာ တ႐ုတ္ႏုိင္ငံရဲ႕ ကုန္ထုတ္လုပ္မႈ (GDP) ဟာ ၁.၂ ထီြလီယံရွိခဲ့ၿပီး၊ အေမရိကန္ရဲ႕ ကုန္ထုတ္လုပ္မႈဟာ ၉.၈ ထြီလီယံရွိခဲ့ပါတယ္။ ၂၀၀၉ ခုႏွစ္မွာ တ႐ုတ္ႏုိင္ငံ ကုန္ထုတ္လုပ္မႈ (GDP) ဟာ ၄.၃ ထြီလီယံနဲ႔ အေမရိကန္ႏုိင္ငံရဲ႕ ကုန္ထုတ္လုပ္မႈဟာ ၁၄.၂ ထြီလီယံ ရွိခဲ့ေၾကာင္း ကုန္သြယ္မႈဆုိင္ရာ အစီရင္ခံစာထဲမွာ ေဖာ္ျပထားပါတယ္။

တ႐ုတ္ႏုိင္ငံမွာ ဘီလီယံနာ ခ်မ္းသာသူဦးေရဟာ ၈ ဦးကေန ၂၀၀၉ ခုႏွစ္မွာ ၇၉ ဦးအထိ တုိးလာခဲ့ေပမယ့္၊ အေမရိကန္မွာေတာ့ ဘီလီယံနာ ၂၉၈ ဦး ရွိရာကေန ၃၅၉ ဦးပဲ ရွိခဲ့လုိ႔ ဘီလီယံနာ ခ်မ္းသာသူဦးေရဟာ အေမရိကန္မွာ ၂၀ ရာခုိင္ႏႈန္းသာ တုိးတက္ခဲ့တာ ေတြ႔ခဲ့ရပါတယ္။ ၂၀၀၀ ခုႏွစ္မွာ ကမၻာ့ကုမၸဏီၾကီးေပါင္း ၅၀၀ မွာ တ႐ုတ္ႏုိင္ငံမွ ကုမၸဏီၾကီး ၈ ခု၊ အေမရိကန္ ကုမၸဏီေပါင္း ၁၈၀ အမည္စာရင္းထဲမွာ ပါဝင္ခဲ့ပါတယ္။ ဒါေပမဲ့ ၂၀၀၉ ခုႏွစ္မွာေတာ့ တ႐ုတ္ကုမၸဏီၾကီး ၃၇ ခု၊ အေမရိကန္ ကုမၸဏီၾကီး ၁၄၀ စာရင္းထဲ ေဖာ္ျပျခင္း ခံခဲ့ရတယ္။

ေငြေၾကးထိမ္းခ်ဳပ္မႈေၾကာင့္ ျဖစ္ေပၚလာမည့္ ကုန္သြယ္မႈ ဆုိင္ရာ ျပႆနာမ်ား

အျပည္ျပည္ဆုိင္ရာ ေငြေၾကးရန္ပုံေငြအဖြဲ႔ (I.M.F) ၊ အာရွႏုိင္ငံေတြ အပါအဝင္ ႏုိင္ငံတကာ အစုိးရေတြက လက္ရွိ ရင္ဆုိင္ေနရတဲ့ ကမၻာ့စီးပြားေရး အက်ပ္အတည္းကေန ျပန္လည္နာလန္ထူလာေအာင္နဲ႔ ေဒသတြင္း ကုန္သြယ္မႈ ဖြံ႔ၿဖိဳးလာေစဖုိ႔ တ႐ုတ္ယြမ္ေငြကုိ တန္ဖုိးျမႇင့္ေပးဖုိ႔ ဖိအားေပးေနေပမယ့္၊ တ႐ုတ္အစုိးရကေတာ့ သူ႔ႏုိင္ငံအတြင္း စီးပြားေရး ဦးေမာ့လာတဲ့အထိ ဆက္လက္တင္းခံဖုိ႔ ရွိေနပါတယ္။ ဒီလုိသာ တင္းခံဦးမယ္ဆုိရင္ ႏုိင္ငံတကာ ကုန္သြယ္မႈမွာ အဟန္႔အတား၊ တားဆီးပိတ္ပင္မႈေတြကုိ ရင္ဆုိင္လာရႏုိင္ပါတယ္။

ခ်မွတ္လာမယ့္ ကုိယ္က်ဳိးကာကြယ္ေရး စီးပြားေရး မူဝါဒေတြေၾကာင့္ ဖြ႔ံၿဖိဳးဆဲႏုိင္ငံေတြအတြက္ စီးပြားေရး တုိးတက္မႈေတြ ေႏွးေကြးလာႏုိင္ပါတယ္။ မဖြ႔ံၿဖိဳးေသးတဲ့ ႏုိင္ငံငယ္ေတြအတြက္ စီးပြားေရး၊ ႏုိင္ငံေရး ျပႆနာေတြနဲ႔ ရင္ဆုိင္လာရလိမ့္မယ္လုိ႔ ကမၻာ့စီးပြားေရး ပညာရွင္ေတြက သုံးသပ္ထားၾကပါတယ္။ ဒါေပမဲ့ ကုန္သြယ္မႈမွာ ေငြေစ်းႏႈန္း ကုိက္ညီေအာင္ မထားရွိႏုိင္၊ မေျဖရွင္းႏုိင္ခဲ့ျခင္းေၾကာင့္ တ႐ုတ္ႏုိင္ငံအေပၚ ကုန္သြယ္ေရး ပိတ္ဆုိ႔မႈခံရလုိ႔ ၂၀၀၅ -၂၀၀၈ ခုႏွစ္ကာလမွာ တ႐ုတ္အစုိးရက ယြမ္းေငြတန္ဖုိးကုိ ၁၇ ရာခုိင္ႏႈန္း တုိးျမႇင့္ေပးခဲ့ဖူးပါတယ္။

ယြမ္ေငြႏွင့္ တ႐ုတ္-ျမန္မာ ႏွစ္ႏုိင္ငံ ကုန္သြယ္မႈ တေစ့တေစာင္း

ပမာဏ အလြန္ၾကီးမားတဲ့ အေမရိကန္-တ႐ုတ္ ကုန္သြယ္မႈမွာ ယြမ္ေငြေၾကးတန္ဖုိး အတက္အက်က ႏွစ္ႏုိင္ငံ ကုန္သြယ္မႈနဲ႔ ကမၻာ့စီးပြားေရး ကုန္သြယ္မႈေတြကုိပါ အဟန္႔အတား၊ အတားအဆီးေတြ၊ ျပႆနာေတြကုိ ျဖစ္ေပၚလာေစႏုိင္သလုိ နယ္ျခားမဲ့ ကမၻာ့ကုန္သြယ္မႈနဲ႔ စီးပြားေရးဆုိင္ရာ ကူးလူးဆက္ဆံေရး ကြန္ယက္စနစ္မွာ ဒီယြမ္ေငြတန္ဖုိး အတက္အက်ဟာလည္း အိမ္နီးခ်င္း ႏုိင္ငံေတြျဖစ္တဲ့ တ႐ုတ္-ျမန္မာ စီးပြားေရးနဲ႔ ကုန္သြယ္မႈေတြကုိပါ သက္ေရာက္ေနပါတယ္။

တ႐ုတ္-ျမန္မာ နယ္စပ္ကုန္သြယ္မႈမွာ တ႐ုတ္ေငြေစ်းကို ေျပာရမယ္ဆိုရင္ေတာ့ ေစ်းႏႈန္းဟာ ေန႔စဥ္နဲ႔အမွ် အေျပာင္းအလဲ ရွိေနတတ္ပါတယ္။ ေန႔စဥ္ဆိုတဲ့ ေနရာမွေတာင္ တရက္ထဲမွာတင္ အခ်ိန္မေရြး ေျပာင္းလဲေနတတ္ပါတယ္။ အုိလံပစ္လုိ ပြဲေတာ္ေတြ၊ ႏွစ္သစ္ကူးပိတ္ရက္ေတြမွာ ေငြေစ်းအတက္အက် အၿမဲရွိတတ္ပါတယ္။ ဒီလုိအခ်ိန္အခါေတြမွာ တ႐ုတ္ထုတ္ကုန္ေတြကုိ ႏုိင္ငံျခားကုိ တင္ပုိ႔ေလ့ရွိျခင္း၊ ႏုိင္ငံျခားသြင္းကုန္ေတြကုိ တ႐ုတ္ျပည္ဆီ မဝင္ႏုိင္ေအာင္ ဟန္႔တာမႈမ်ဳိး ျပဳေလ့ရွိပါတယ္။ ဆုိလုိတာက ေငြေၾကး အတက္အက်နဲ႔ ကုန္သြယ္မႈကုိ ထိန္းခ်ဳပ္ေစျခင္းပါ။

၂၀၀၈ ခုႏွစ္ တ႐ုတ္အစုိးရက တရားဝင္ ထုတ္ျပန္တဲ့ ကုန္သြယ္မႈ စာရင္းဇယားအရ တ႐ုတ္-ျမန္မာ ကုန္သြယ္မႈ ပမာဏဟာ စုစုေပါင္း ၂.၆၂၆ ဘီလီယံရွိခဲ့ၿပီး၊ တ႐ုတ္ဘက္က တင္ပုိ႔ကုန္ ပမာဏကေတာ့ ၁.၉၇၈ ဘီလီယံေတာင္ ရွိခဲ့တယ္လုိ႔ ေဖာ္ျပခဲ့ပါတယ္။ တ႐ုတ္ရဲ႕ ကုန္ပစၥည္းေတြသာ ျမန္မာႏုိင္ငံေစ်းကြက္မွာ ေရာင္းခ်ႏုိင္ခဲ့ၿပီး၊ ယြမ္ေငြတန္ဖုိးေၾကာင့္ ျမန္မာႏုိင္ငံက တင္ပုိ႔ကုန္ နည္းပါးခဲ့ပါတယ္။

ျမန္မာႏုိင္ငံမွာ ေငြေၾကးစနစ္ ခုိင္မာမႈ မရွိျခင္း၊ ပုိ႔ကုန္ အရည္အေသြး ျမင့္မားမႈ မရွိသေရြ႔လည္း တ႐ုတ္-ျမန္မာ ႏွစ္ႏုိင္ငံ ကုန္သြယ္မႈမွာ အမ်ားၾကီး ကြာဟာမႈ ရွိေနပါလိမ့္မယ္။ ဒါ့အျပင္ တ႐ုတ္အစုိးရ၏ ယြမ္ေငြတန္ဖုိး ထိန္းခ်ဳပ္ေနမႈေၾကာင့္လည္း ႏွစ္ႏုိင္ငံ ကုန္သြယ္မႈမွာ လုိေငြျပေနမႈ ႏွစ္အတန္ၾကာ ရွိေနခဲ့ပါတယ္။ တ႐ုတ္ႏုိင္ငံအစုိးရဟာ အိမ္နီးခ်င္းႏုိင္ငံေတြနဲ႔ ကုန္သြယ္မႈ ျပဳရာမွာလည္း ေငြေၾကးတန္ဖုိး အတက္အက်ကုိ လုိသလုိ ထိန္းခ်ဳပ္ၿပီး ကုိယ္က်ဳိးစီးပြားၾကည့္ကာ ကုန္သြယ္မႈ ျပဳေလ့ရွိပါတယ္။

လက္ေတြ႔က်က်၊ အေျမာ္အျမင္ရွိရွိ အေျဖရွာျခင္း မရွိ၊ အက်ဳိးတူ ႏွစ္ႏုိင္ငံ ပူးေပါင္းေဆာင္ရြက္မႈ မရွိ၊ ထင္သာျမင္သာတဲ့ ခုိင္မာတဲ့ ေငြေၾကးစနစ္ မရွိ၊ ပြင့္လင္းလြတ္လပ္မႈ ရွိတဲ့ ႏုိ္ငံေရး၊ စီးပြားေရးစနစ္ မရွိသေရြ႔ တ႐ုတ္-ျမန္မာ နယ္စပ္ကုန္သြယ္မႈမွာလည္း ျမန္မာႏုိင္ငံဘက္က ဆက္ၿပီး လုိေငြျပေနပါလိမ့္မယ္။

(ေဆာင္းပါးရွင္ ျမတ္စုိးသည္ ၂၀၀၆ ခုႏွစ္တြင္ အေမရိကန္ႏုိင္ငံ အင္ဒီယားနားတကၠသုိလ္မွ စီးပြားေရး စီမံခန္႔ခြဲအုပ္ခ်ဳပ္မႈ ဘာသာရပ္ျဖင့္ မဟာဝိဇၨာဘြဲ႔ ရရွိခဲ့သည္။)

(ကုိးကား)

- ေပါခရူမန္၊ “World Out of Balance” ၊ နယူးေယာက္တုိင္းမ္စ္၊ ႏုိင္ဝင္ဘာ ၁၅. ၂၀၀၉။
- ပါေမာကၡ ပီတာေမာရီစီ၊ “China’s yuan, not the dollar, is too cheap”၊ ႐ုိက္တာ၊ ႏုိဝင္ဘာ ၁၅ .၂၀၀၉။
- အျပည္ျပည္ဆုိင္ရာ ေငြေၾကးရန္ပုံေငြ အဖြဲ႔ (I.M.F) အစီရင္ခံစာ။








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Monday, November 16, 2009

'I see China's future in you







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Sunday, November 15, 2009

Obama tells Myanmar junta to free Suu Kyi



By VIJAY JOSHI,
Associated Press Writer

SINGAPORE – President Barack Obama on Sunday told Myanmar's junta to free pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi during an unusual face-to-face interaction with a top leader of the ruling military.

Obama delivered the strong message during his summit with leaders of 10 Southeast Asian nations, which included Myanmar Prime Minister Gen. Thein Sein.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs told reporters that Obama called on Myanmar to free his fellow Nobel Peace laureate Suu Kyi and other political prisoners, and end oppression of minorities.

"Obama brought that up directly with that government," Gibbs said, indicating that the president addressed Thein Sein.

For decades, Western governments have avoided direct contacts with leaders of Myanmar because of the regime's poor human rights record and suppression of democracy.

A joint statement issued after the summit — the first ever between a U.S. president and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations — devoted a paragraph on Myanmar, a major irritant in relations between the two sides.

But the statement did not call for the release of political prisoners, including Suu Kyi, who has spent 14 of the last 20 years under detention by the military regime. It only urged Myanmar to ensure that the elections it intends to hold in 2010 are "conducted in a free, fair, inclusive and transparent manner."

However, a direct appeal from Obama carries more weight as he is the most powerful leader to have conveyed the message directly to a top Myanmar official.

Thein Sein did not address leaders' concerns about Suu Kyi, said Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak. "We expected a bit more but it was not forthcoming. We hope (democracy) ... in Myanmar will become a reality sooner than later," he told reporters.

He said a reference to Suu Kyi was not included in the statement because there was no consensus.

White House aides said ASEAN was unlikely to include an explicitly critical statement on one of its members, since it would amount to Myanmar criticizing itself. That's why Obama raised the issue directly in his remarks to the group, said the aides.

Obama, in a broad policy speech in Tokyo on Saturday, also made a point of mentioning Suu Kyi by name.

Before the summit, the 11 leaders gathered for a photo shoot for a few minutes, but Obama and Thein Sein stayed far from each other and made no contact of any sort.

The Myanmar government has said the 2010 elections are another step toward democracy, but has not clarified whether Suu Kyi will be allowed to participate. The junta refused to honor the result of the last elections in 1990 when Suu Kyi's party won by a landslide.

Although the United States recently eased its policy toward Myanmar by initiating talks with the generals, it has made clear economic sanctions won't be lifted unless Suu Kyi is released.

Earlier this month, two senior U.S. diplomats went to Myanmar for talks, and also had a private meeting with Suu Kyi. It was the highest-level U.S. visit to Myanmar in 14 years.

Sunday's U.S.-ASEAN summit — held just after the 21-nation Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum — is the outcome of the new thinking in Washington that ignoring Myanmar will not yield any results, and relations with Southeast Asia should not be held hostage by the junta.

Associated Press writers Charles Hutzler, Jennifer Loven and Eileen Ng contributed to this report.




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Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Clinton Urges Asian Pressure on Burma for Free Elections


By David Gollust
Singapore
11 November 2009

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is urging Asian countries to join the United States in pressing Burmese authorities to make elections planned for next year free, fair and credible. Clinton briefed fellow foreign ministers from the APEC Pacific-rim countries in Singapore on the Obama administration's efforts to engage the Burmese military government.

Clinton says bringing stability to Burma through political reform should be a shared objective of that country's neighbors, including regional powers India and China.

At a news conference after a day of meetings with fellow foreign ministers of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, Clinton said the region already suffers from spill-over effects of Burma's political problems.

"Left alone, the internal problems within Burma are not confined within Burma's borders," she said. "We have seen refugee flows out of Burma. People taking to boats, ending up in Malaysia, ending up in Indonesia, ending up in Australia, crossing the border into Thailand. That instability is not good for anyone."

The Obama administration sent two senior envoys last week to Burma to begin a promised attempt at dialogue with authorities there.

Clinton said she has no illusions that bringing change to Burma will be easy or quick and said U.S. sanctions against the military government will remain in place until, as she put it, "we see meaningful progress in key areas."

The United States has demanded the release of detained Burmese democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, though Clinton said under questioning the future role of the Nobel peace laureate in the country's political life is for the Burmese to decide.

"We think this has to be resolved within the Burmese people themselves, so we are not setting or dictating any conditions," she said. "We want to help facilitate the space and opportunity for the Burmese people to work out the challenges they face in having free and credible elections and setting forth a plan for a more prosperous and peaceful future."

Aung San Suu Kyi, whose National League for Democracy Party won elections in 1990, but was barred from taking office, was allowed to meet last week with the visiting U.S. diplomats.

A senior U.S. official who briefed reporters said Aung San Suu Kyi is supportive of the U.S. outreach effort. He said the release of Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been under various forms of detention for much of the past two decades, is "absolutely" necessary if the United States is to move forward with any fundamental engagement with Burma.

U.S. President Barack Obama attends a summit-level session of the 21 APEC countries here early next week and will also have a meeting Sunday with the 10 leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian nations.

Burma is an ASEAN member country and its Prime Minister Thien Sein is expected to take part in the session with Mr. Obama, though the White House says they will not have a one-on-one meeting.



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Clinton urges Myanmar to begin planning 2010 vote


By David Alexander
Reuters
Wednesday, November 11, 2009; 8:00 AM

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Wednesday urged Myanmar to begin planning for its 2010 elections and said Southeast Asian nations could play an important role in ensuring the vote is "free, fair and credible."

Clinton, speaking at a news conference on the sidelines of the APEC meetings in Singapore, said Washington would like to see the reclusive military-led government of the former Burma begin internal consultations soon about the country's political future.

"We're seeking ... a process inside Burma that would inspire a dialogue among all of the stakeholders so that there could be a growing consensus within Burma itself about the way forward," she said.

Clinton's remarks came a week after U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell traveled to Myanmar on Washington's highest-level visit to the country in 14 years.
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The exploratory mission was aimed at explaining the results of a U.S. policy review toward Myanmar. The Obama administration decided in September to pursue deeper engagement with Myanmar to try to spur democratic reforms.

Clinton said U.S. economic sanctions on Myanmar would remain in place until Washington sees what it believes is "meaningful progress in key areas."

A U.S. State Department official said later that freeing Aung San Suu Kyi, the detained leader of the opposition National League for Democracy, was one necessary step.

"It would be an essential precondition for the United States to move forward with any ... fundamental engagement that would include sanctions lifting with the regime," the official said on condition of anonymity.

U.S. officials said they hoped Myanmar's leaders would begin a dialogue soon with internal groups that have an interest in the country's political future.

"That dialogue has to be an open dialogue that includes internal stakeholders," one State Department official said. "We would very much like to see ... not just the handpicked parties of the government, but also the ethnic groups, the NLD and the so-called third-way groups."

The official said the United States had begun consultations on Myanmar with India, China, Thailand and other neighboring nations with an interest in Myanmar's stability.

The official said Washington hoped China would encourage Myanmar to launch an internal dialogue. "China has a powerful interest in ensuring Burma remains a stable country," he said.

Clinton urged the Association of Southeast Asian Nations to "reach out to the Burmese leadership, persuade them that it is time to start planning for free, fair and credible elections in 2010, 2010 is nearly here, (and) that it would be useful to have validation of those elections."

Clinton emphasized that when Myanmar is left alone, it's problems spill over its borders and affect its neighbors.

"We see refugee flows out of Burma, people taking the boat, ending up in Malaysia, ending up in Indonesia, ending up in Australia, crossing the border into Thailand," she said. "That instability is not good for anyone."

"Any country that does business in Burma wants to be sure that their investments and their business are safe and the best way to ensure that is to move toward democracy and the kind of stability that democracy creates," Clinton said.




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Saturday, November 7, 2009

Japan urges Myanmar to release Suu Kyi before poll


By Yoko Nishikawa
Reuters

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan urged Myanmar on Saturday to release detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi before next year's election, adding it was ready to provide more aid if democratisation in the country advanced.

The comments came a few days after a U.S. delegation made a landmark visit to Myanmar as part of a new policy of engagement by the Obama administration.

"It is extremely important that Aung San Suu Kyi and other political prisoners are all released before the general election to be held in 2010," Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama told Myanmar's visiting prime minister, according to a Japanese Foreign Ministry spokesman.

Hatoyama also urged General Thein Sein to ensure all stakeholders could take part in the election.

Japan has distanced itself from the policy of Western powers, which have imposed tough sanctions on Myanmar, and from that of China, which has pumped billions of dollars into the country.

It has prefered engagement and dialogue to push for democratisation of the authoritarian military-run state, and welcomed Washington's recent move, saying it was getting closer to Tokyo's approach.

The talk between Hatoyama and General Thein Sein took place on the sidelines of the Tokyo summit among Japan and five Mekong region countries -- Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam.

It was the first time since 2003 a Myanmar leader had visited Japan.

Hatoyama acknowledged signs of improvement in the democratisation process in the country formerly known as Burma, and welcomed improving ties between Washington and Myanmar.

"Based on recent positive moves, Japan will gradually expand its assistance to Myanmar in areas of humanitarian assistance, including those through NGOs, and human development assistance," Hatoyama was quoted as telling General Thein Sein.

"If the general election in 2010 is conducted in a manner we expect, Japan will be in a position to strengthen its assistance to Myanmar," he added.

In the fiscal year that ended in March 2008, Japan provided 1.18 billion yen ($13.13 million) in grant aid and 1.64 billion yen in technical assistance to Myanmar.

(Editing by Andrew Roche)




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Thursday, November 5, 2009

U.S. Presses Myanmar for a More Open Government

Scot Marciel, the U.S. deputy assistant secretary of state, in Bangkok Thursday.

By a WALL STREET JOURNAL Staff Reporter

U.S. diplomats returned from a rare trip to Myanmar facing a new challenge: How to nurture a budding dialogue with the country's secretive military regime without boosting its legitimacy in the eyes of the outside world.

Speaking to reporters in Bangkok on Thursday, U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Scot Marciel, said that he and another top administration official stressed the need for a more open government in Myanmar, including free and fair elections next year, during meetings with senior government officials and opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi on Tuesday and Wednesday.

But he said it was unclear whether the junta would be willing to take significant steps -- such as freeing Ms. Suu Kyi and other political prisoners -- that the U.S. and other Western nations are pushing in advance of the elections, the first to be held in Myanmar since 1990.

Such measures would be necessary, he said, before the U.S. would consider further conciliatory moves such as removing its longstanding sanctions against the country. "We're willing to move in terms of our bilateral relationship, but we're only going to do it if there's real progress," he said.

The trip was the highest-ranking U.S. delegation to Myanmar in 14 years, and part of a new Obama administration initiative designed to restore U.S. influence there after years of frosty relations. The country's military regime, which seized power in 1962, is widely criticized for human rights violations and is increasingly viewed as a potential source of instability in the region as it builds up its military power.

U.S. officials say they are particularly concerned about recent indications Myanmar is expanding its ties with North Korea, including unverified reports it may be pursuing a program of nuclear proliferation. They say further discussions with the regime could help shed light on those concerns while also potentially opening the door for a bigger role for opposition groups in the country's government.

More discussions are expected, including a possible meeting between President Obama and senior Myanmar officials during an economic summit in Singapore later this month.

But skeptics fear the dialogue will yield little given the regime's history of ignoring outside pressure and inducements. The meetings could also backfire by enhancing the prestige of Myanmar's leaders, especially if they succeed in wresting more concessions from the American side.

The American officials "are setting themselves up for a trap here," says John Dale, an assistant professor and Myanmar expert at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va. He and other Myanmar experts believe the regime desperately wants to gain international acceptance and is hoping to use negotiations with American representatives to lend credibility to the coming elections, which dissidents believe will only cement the junta's lock on power.

If U.S. officials are "at the table long enough, it helps them claim the elections are legitimate," he says.

Attempts to reach representatives of the Myanmar government, which rarely speaks to foreign journalists, were unsuccessful.

Part of the problem with the U.S. mission, critics say, is that it's unclear what would constitute sufficient progress to merit more rapprochement from the American side. On Thursday, Mr. Marciel said the elections, whose date remains uncertain, wouldn't be credible if they didn't include representatives from the opposition groups that won the last national vote in 1990— an outcome the regime subsequently ignored. But it was unclear whether that meant Ms. Suu Kyi herself should participate, or if the U.S. would accept some other compromise.

It was also unclear whether other steps the U.S. and international advocates are seeking -- such as the involvement of independent election monitors and the removal of curbs on local media -- would necessarily help lead to a fair outcome.

The vote will occur under a constitution that many advocates believe will guarantee an unfair result. Approved by Myanmar residents in a 2008 referendum amid widespread reports of intimidation, it reserves many government posts and 25% of parliamentary seats for military officers, and allows the president to hand over power to the military in emergencies. It also effectively bars Ms. Suu Kyi from seeking elected office because her two sons are foreign citizens.

Mr. Marciel said he thought the constitution was "flawed" but didn't elaborate on whether it would have to be scrapped for a fair election to be held. He also declined to speak in detail about the latest meetings with Ms. Suu Kyi.

Backers of the U.S. effort -- including Ms. Suu Kyi herself -- believe that talking with the junta is better than doing nothing, even if the odds of success are slim. And U.S. officials insist they harbor no illusions about their effort's likelihood of success.

"The elections could be an opportunity" to improve Myanmar's situation, but only if they're done right," Mr. Marciel said. "We will see progress if and when it happens."




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Tuesday, November 3, 2009

Burma: International Religious Freedom Report 2009



Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor
International Religious Freedom Report 2009
October 26, 2009

Highly repressive, authoritarian military regimes have ruled the country since 1962. In May 2008 the Government announced voters had approved a new draft Constitution in a nationwide referendum. Democracy activists and the international community widely criticized the referendum as seriously flawed. The new Constitution provides for freedom of religion; however, it also grants broad exceptions that allow the regime to restrict those rights at will. Although authorities generally permitted most adherents of registered religious groups to worship as they choose, the Government imposed restrictions on certain religious activities and frequently abused the right to freedom of religion.

There was no change in the Government’s limited degree of respect for religious freedom during the reporting period. Religious activities and organizations were subject to restrictions on freedom of expression, association, and assembly. The Government continued to monitor meetings and activities of virtually all organizations, including religious organizations. The Government continued to systematically restrict efforts by Buddhist clergy to promote human rights and political freedom. Many of the Buddhist monks arrested in the violent crackdown that followed pro-democracy demonstrations in September 2007, including prominent activist monk U Gambira, remained in prison serving long sentences. The Government also actively promoted Theravada Buddhism over other religions, particularly among members of ethnic minorities. Christian and Islamic groups continued to struggle to obtain permission to repair existing places of worship or build new ones. The regime continued to closely monitor Muslim activities. Restrictions on worship for other non-Buddhist minority groups also continued. Although there were no new reports of forced conversions of non-Buddhists, the Government applied pressure on students and lower-income youth to convert to Buddhism. Adherence or conversion to Buddhism is generally a prerequisite for promotion to senior government and military ranks.

During the reporting period, social tensions continued between the Buddhist majority and the Christian and Muslim minorities. Widespread prejudice existed against citizens of South Asian origin, many of whom are Muslims. Although official religious discrimination was limited, de facto preferences for Buddhism remained.

The U.S. Government advocated religious freedom with all sectors of society, including government officials, religious leaders, private citizens, scholars, diplomats of other governments, and international business and media representatives. Embassy representatives offered support to local nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and religious leaders and acted as conduits for information exchanges with otherwise isolated human rights NGOs and religious leaders. Since 1999, the U.S. Secretary of State has designated Burma as a "Country of Particular Concern" under the International Religious Freedom Act for particularly severe violations of religious freedom. The U.S. Government has a wide array of sanctions in place against the country for its violations of human rights. The passage and signing into law in July 2008 of the Tom Lantos Block Burmese Junta Anti-Democratic Efforts (JADE) Act further strengthened these sanctions.

Section I. Religious Demography

The country has an area of 261,970 square miles and a population the International Monetary Fund estimates at 50 million. The majority follow Theravada Buddhism, although in practice popular Burmese Buddhism coexists with astrology, numerology, fortune telling, and veneration of indigenous pre-Buddhist era deities called "nats." Buddhist monks, including novices, number more than 400,000 and depend on the laity for their material needs, including clothing and daily donations of food. The country has a much smaller number of Buddhist nuns. The principal minority religious groups include Christians (primarily Baptists, Roman Catholics, and Anglicans, along with several small Protestant denominations), Muslims (mostly Sunni), Hindus, and practitioners of traditional Chinese and indigenous religions. According to official statistics, almost 90 percent of the population practices Buddhism, 4 percent Christianity, and 4 percent Islam. These statistics almost certainly underestimate the non-Buddhist proportion of the population. Independent scholarly researchers place the Muslim population at between 6 and 10 percent. A tiny Jewish community in Rangoon has a synagogue but no resident rabbi and lacks enough resident believers to constitute a minyan, the quorum needed for certain religious rites.

The country is ethnically diverse, with some correlation between ethnicity and religion. Theravada Buddhism is the dominant religion among the majority Burman ethnic group and among the Shan, Arakanese, and Mon ethnic minorities in the east, west, and south. Christianity is the dominant religion among the Kachin ethnic group of the north and the Chin and Naga ethnic groups of the west, some of whom also continue to practice traditional indigenous religions. Protestant groups report recent rapid growth among animist communities in Chin State. Christianity is also practiced widely among the Karen and Karenni ethnic groups of the south and east, although many Karen and Karenni are Buddhist and some Karen are Muslim. Burmese citizens of Indian origin, who are concentrated in major cities and in the south central region, predominantly practice Hinduism, though some ethnic Indians are Christian. Islam is practiced widely in Rakhine State, where it is the dominant religion of the Rohingya minority, and in Rangoon, Irrawaddy, Magwe, and Mandalay Divisions, where some Burmans, Indians, and ethnic Bengalis practice Islam. Chinese ethnic minorities generally practice traditional Chinese religions. Traditional indigenous beliefs are practiced widely among smaller ethnic groups in the highland regions. Practices drawn from those indigenous beliefs persist in popular Buddhist rituals, especially in rural areas.

Section II. Status of Government Respect for Religious Freedom

Legal/Policy Framework

Highly authoritarian military regimes have ruled the country since 1962. Since independence in 1948, many of the ethnic minority areas have served as bases for armed resistance against the Government. Although the Government negotiated cease-fire agreements with most armed ethnic groups after 1989, active Shan, Karen, and Karenni insurgencies continued. Successive civilian and military governments have tended to view religious freedom in the context of perceived threats to national unity or central authority.

The current military government, the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), has governed without a constitution or legislature since 1988. In May 2008, the Government announced that its draft Constitution had been approved with 92 percent of the vote in a nationwide referendum. According to the Constitution, the SPDC will continue to "exercise state sovereignty" until the Parliament is convened sometime after the scheduled 2010 elections. The law governing the referendum stated that citizens and most ethnic minorities were eligible to vote; however, it excluded members of religious orders and individuals serving prison terms, including political prisoners.

Many diplomatic observers and human rights organizations criticized the lack of fairness and transparency of the referendum and questioned the validity of the results.

The new Constitution provides for freedom of religion; however, it also grants broad exceptions that allow the regime to restrict these rights "subject to public order, morality, health, and other provisions of the Constitution." It specifically recognizes the "special position of Buddhism as the faith practiced by the great majority of citizens," but also recognizes Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and animism as religions "existing" in the country. It states that the Government shall "render assistance and protect the religions it recognizes."

The Constitution prohibits discrimination on the basis of religion. Most adherents of recognized religious groups generally are allowed to worship as they choose; however, the Government imposes restrictions on certain religious activities and frequently abuses the right to religious freedom. The Constitution protects the right to seek redress for violations of freedoms but does not specify how such claims will be addressed. Moreover, anti-discrimination laws do not apply to ethnic groups not formally recognized under the 1982 Citizenship Law, such as the stateless Muslim Rohingyas in northern Rakhine State.

In addition, the Constitution forbids the "abuse of religion for political purposes" and asserts that any act that promotes discord may be punishable by law. It bars members of religious orders from running for public office. Burmese law criminalizes the "defamation" of religion for political purposes. The regime commonly employed nonreligious laws to target those involved in religious and political activism, including the Electronic Transactions Act, Immigration Act, and Unlawful Associations Act.

Although the country has no official state religion, successive military and civilian governments have supported and associated themselves conspicuously with Theravada Buddhism. In 1961the Government’s push to make Buddhism the state religion failed due to countrywide protests by religious minorities. In practice, the Government continues to show a preference for Theravada Buddhism through official propaganda and state-sponsored activities, including donations to monasteries and pagodas, encouragement of education at Buddhist monastic schools in rural areas, and support for Buddhist missionary activities. Promotions within the military and the civil service are reserved for followers of Buddhism. The Ministry of Religious Affairs includes the powerful Department for the Promotion and Propagation of Sasana (Buddhist teaching).

State-controlled news media frequently depict government officials and their family members paying homage to Buddhist monks; offering donations at pagodas; officiating at ceremonies to open, improve, restore, or maintain pagodas; and organizing ostensibly voluntary "people’s donations" of money, food, and uncompensated labor to build or refurbish Buddhist shrines nationwide. State-owned newspapers routinely feature front-page banner slogans quoting from Buddhist scriptures. The Government has published books of Buddhist religious instruction.

The Government controls the organization and restricts the activities and expression of the Buddhist clergy (Sangha), although some monks have resisted such control. Based on the 1990 Sangha Organization Law, the Government has banned any organization of Buddhist monks other than the nine state-recognized monastic orders. Violations of this ban are punishable by immediate public defrocking and criminal penalties. The nine recognized orders submit to the authority of the State Monk Coordination Committee ("Sangha Maha Nayaka Committee" or SMNC), the members of which are indirectly elected by monks.

The Ministry of Religious Affairs Department for the Perpetuation and Propagation of the Sasana oversees the Government’s relations with Buddhist monks and schools. The Government continues to fund two state Sangha universities in Rangoon and Mandalay that train Buddhist monks under the purview of the SMNC. The state-funded International Theravada Buddhist Missionary University (ITBMU) in Rangoon, which opened in 1998, has a stated purpose "to share the country’s knowledge of Buddhism with the people of the world."

Buddhist doctrine remains part of the state-mandated curriculum in all government-run elementary schools. Students at these schools can opt out of instruction in Buddhism and sometimes do, but all are required to recite a Buddhist prayer daily. Some Muslim students are allowed to leave the classroom during this recitation, but at other schools non-Buddhists are forced to recite the prayer.

Official public holidays include numerous Buddhist holy days, as well as a few Christian, Hindu, and Islamic religious holidays. The Government observes the following religious holidays as national holidays: the Full Moon Day of Tabaung, the four-day Thingyan (water festival), Buddhist New Year’s Day, the Full Moon Day of Kason, the Full Moon Day of Waso, the Full Moon Day of Thadinkyut, the Full Moon Day of Tazaungmone, Christmas, Idul Alhwaha, and Deepa Vali.

Since the 1960s, Christian and Islamic groups have had difficulty importing religious literature. All publications, religious and secular, remain subject to control and censorship. It is illegal to import translations of the Bible in indigenous languages. Officials have occasionally allowed local printing or photocopying of limited quantities of religious materials, including the Qur’an (with the notation that they are for private use only) in indigenous languages without prior approval by government censors.

Virtually all organizations, religious or not, must register with the Government. Religious organizations register with the Ministry of Home Affairs with an endorsement from the Ministry for Religious Affairs. A government directive exempts "genuine" religious organizations from official registration; however, in practice, only registered organizations can buy or sell property or open bank accounts. Due to these requirements, most religious organizations seek registration. Leaders of registered religious groups also have more freedom to travel than those of unregistered organizations.

The Government discouraged proselytizing by non-Buddhist clergy. These restrictions most affected missionary religions, including some Christian denominations and Islam. The Government generally has not allowed permanent foreign religious missions to operate in the country since the mid‑1960s, when it expelled nearly all foreign missionaries and nationalized almost all private schools and hospitals. The Government is not known to have paid any compensation in connection with these extensive confiscations.

Citizens and permanent residents were required to carry government‑issued National Registration Cards (NRCs) that often indicated religious affiliation and ethnicity. There appeared to be no consistent criteria governing whether a person’s religion was indicated on the identification card. Citizens also were required to indicate their religion on certain official application forms for documents such as passports, although passports themselves did not indicate the bearer's religion.

Restrictions on Religious Freedom

The Government selectively enforced existing legal restrictions on religious freedom. During the reporting period, the SPDC continued to rule by decree and was not bound by any constitutional or statutory provision concerning discrimination based on religion, race, gender, disability, language, or social status. Religious activities and organizations were subject to restrictions on freedom of expression and association. The Government’s pervasive internal security apparatus imposed de facto restrictions on collective and individual worship through infiltration and monitoring of meetings and activities of virtually all organizations. The Government subjected all media, including religious publications, and on occasion sermons, to control and censorship. The Government at times interfered with the meetings of religious groups.

According to state-owned media reports, the Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA), a government-sponsored mass organization in which participation often is compulsory, organized courses on Buddhist culture that millions of people attended. It was not possible to verify this claim independently.

Churches in Chin State often needed to request permission to hold religious ceremonies two to three months in advance, although authorities generally approved these requests.

Authorities frequently refused to approve requests for gatherings to celebrate traditional Christian and Islamic holidays and restricted the number of Muslims who could gather in one place. For instance, in satellite towns surrounding Rangoon, Muslims were only allowed to gather for worship and religious training during major Muslim holidays.

The Government continued to discriminate against members of minority religious groups, restricting educational activities, proselytizing, and restoration or construction of churches and mosques.

Government authorities continued to prohibit Christian clergy from proselytizing in some areas. Christian groups reported that several times during the reporting period local authorities denied applications for residency permits for known Christian ministers attempting to move to a new township. The groups indicated this was not a widespread practice but depended on the individual community and local authority. In some instances, local authorities reportedly confiscated NRCs of new converts to Christianity. Nonetheless, Christian groups reported that church membership grew, even in predominantly Buddhist regions.

State censorship authorities continued to enforce special restrictions on local publication of the Bible, Qur'an, and other Christian and Islamic texts. The most onerous restriction was a list of more than 100 prohibited words the censors would not allow in Christian or Islamic literature, forbidden as "indigenous terms" or derived from the Pali language long used in Buddhist literature. Some Christian and Islamic groups in the country have used these words since the colonial period. Organizations that translate and publish non-Buddhist religious texts appealed the restrictions. In addition, censors sometimes objected to passages of the Bible's Old Testament and the Qur'an that they interpreted as endorsing violence against nonbelievers. There have been no reports of arrests or prosecutions for possession of any religious literature in recent years.

Authorities restricted the quantity of Bibles and Qur'ans imported into the country. Individuals continued to carry Bibles and Qur'ans into the country in small quantities for personal use. There were no reports that authorities intercepted or confiscated Qur'ans at border entry points.

Some Christian theological seminaries and Bible schools continued to operate, along with several Islamic madrassahs. Some of these institutions did not register with the Myanmar Council of Churches but were able to conduct affairs without government interference. The Government allowed some members of foreign religious groups to enter the country to provide humanitarian assistance, as it had done after Cyclone Nargis in May 2008.

Some Muslims paid large bribes to receive NRCs and passports. Authorities often refused to issue NRCs to Muslims who claimed to belong to one of the country's recognized indigenous ethnic groups, such as the Shan or Karen.

Muslims across the country, as well as some ethnic minority groups such as Chinese and Indians, often were required to obtain permission in advance from the township authorities to leave their hometowns. Authorities generally did not grant permission to Rohingya or Muslim Rakhine to travel for any purpose; however, permission was sometimes obtained through bribery. Non-Rakhine Muslims were granted more freedom to travel. Muslims residing in Rangoon could visit beach resort areas in Thandwe, Rakhine State, but could not return to Rangoon without the signature of the Regional Military Commander. Some were able to bribe local officials to allow them to return. Muslims residing outside Rakhine State often were barred from return travel to their homes if they visited other parts of Rakhine State.

Authorities did not allow Muslim government employees, including village headmen, to grow beards and dismissed some who already had beards.

Muslims in Rakhine State, particularly those of the Rohingya minority group, continued to experience the severest forms of legal, economic, educational, and social discrimination. The Government denied citizenship status to Rohingyas because their ancestors allegedly did not reside in the country at the start of British colonial rule, as the country’s citizenship law requires. The Rohingya asserted that their presence in the area predates the British arrival by several centuries. In November 2008, the U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women urged the Government to review its 1982 Citizenship Law. After completing missions to the country in August 2008 and February 2009, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar specifically noted the Rohingya in his call for the Government to repeal discriminatory legislation and practices. Many of the approximately 21,000 Rohingya Muslims registered in two refugee camps in Bangladesh and the approximately 200,000 Rohingya Muslims living outside those refugee camps refused to return to the country because they feared human rights abuses, including religious persecution.

Rohingya Muslims were not eligible for NRCs. Although essentially treated as illegal foreigners, they were not issued Foreigner Registration Cards (FRCs). Instead, the Government continued a program with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) that issued Temporary Registration Cards (TRCs) to stateless persons in northern Rakhine State, the majority of them Rohingyas. At the end of the reporting period, the UNHCR estimated that approximately 385,000 stateless persons over the age of 10 possessed TRCs. Authorities insisted that Muslim men applying for TRCs submit photos without beards. From March 7-12, 2009, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees visited the country, including Rakhine State, and pledged to expand the organization’s efforts to meet current humanitarian needs.

Without citizenship status, Rohingyas did not have access to secondary education in state-run schools because the Government reserved secondary education for citizens. Muslim students from Rakhine State who completed high school were not permitted to travel outside the state to attend college or university. Authorities continued to bar graduation of Muslim university students who did not possess NRCs. These students were permitted to attend classes and sit for examinations, but they could not receive diplomas because they did not have NRCs, which they could not obtain unless they claimed a "foreign" ethnic minority affiliation. Rohingyas were also unable to obtain employment in any civil service positions.

In 2006 a prominent Muslim religious organization asked the Rakhine State Peace and Development Council Chairman, the Regional Military Commander, and the Ministry of Religious Affairs to lift marriage restrictions for Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine State. At the end of the reporting period, they had not yet received a response.

Some Muslims also had difficulty obtaining birth certificates. A local official in Sittwe, Rakhine State, reportedly issued a verbal order in 2005 prohibiting the issuance of birth certificates to Muslim babies born in the area. In Rangoon, Muslims usually obtained birth certificates for newborns, but local authorities refused to allow parents to record the names of the babies on their household registers. Rohingya Muslims who returned to Rakhine State faced difficulty when attempting to register births of their children.

There are still original-resident Muslims living in Thandwe, Rakhine State, but newcomers who are Muslim are not allowed to buy property or reside in the township. Authorities do not permit Muslims to live in Gwa or Taungup.

The Government allowed members of all religious groups to establish and maintain links with coreligionists in other countries and to travel abroad for religious purposes, subject to the country’s restrictive passport and visa issuance practices, foreign exchange controls, and government monitoring, which extended to all international activities by all citizens regardless of religion. The Government sometimes expedited its burdensome passport issuance procedures for Muslims making the Hajj or Buddhists going on pilgrimage to Bodhgaya, India, although it limited the number of pilgrims. An estimated 2,000 Muslims went on the Hajj in 2008, 500 fewer than in 2007. More than 1,000 Buddhists made pilgrimages to Bodhgaya in 2008.

Non-Buddhists continued to experience employment discrimination at upper levels of the public sector. Few have ever been promoted to the level of director general or higher. There is no stated policy of religious exclusion or discrimination within the Burmese military, but there were no non-Buddhists who held senior positions in the armed forces, although a few Christians reportedly achieved the rank of lieutenant colonel. The Central Executive Committee of the National League for Democracy (NLD), the largest opposition group, did not include non-Buddhists either, although there is widespread support for the NLD among most religious groups. The Government discouraged Muslims from enlisting in the military, and Christian or Muslim military officers who aspired to promotion beyond the rank of major were encouraged by their superiors to convert to Buddhism. Some Muslims who wished to join the military reportedly had to list "Buddhist" as their religion on their applications, although they were not required to convert.

The Ministry of Religious Affairs has stipulated in the past that permission to construct or repair religious buildings "depends upon the population of the location;" however, there appeared to be no correlation between the construction of pagodas and the demand for additional places of Buddhist worship. The Government openly supports Buddhist seminaries and permits them to construct large campuses. Buddhist groups generally have not experienced difficulty in obtaining permission to build new pagodas, monasteries, or community religious halls.

In most regions, Christian and Islamic groups that sought to build small places of worship on side streets or other inconspicuous locations were able to do so only with informal approval from local authorities. When local authorities or conditions changed, approvals have been rescinded and, in some cases, authorities have demolished existing religious buildings. Formal requests encountered long delays, generally were denied, and even when approved could subsequently be reversed by a more senior authority.

Christian groups continued to have trouble obtaining permission to buy land or build new churches in most regions. In some cases authorities refused because they claimed the churches did not possess proper property deeds, but access to official land title was extremely difficult due to the country’s complex land law and government titles to most land. In some areas, permission to repair existing places of worship was easier to acquire. In Chin State, authorities have not granted permission to build a new church since 2003.

In February 2009 authorities in Kachin State halted the construction of a Christian orphanage supported by the Shatapru Baptist Church in Myitkyina because it had not obtained official permission for the building, according to media reports. Church sources told the press that they had asked for permission but proceeded with construction since there were no official procedures or guidelines to obtain permission.

It remained extremely difficult for Muslims to acquire permission to build new or repair existing mosques, although internal renovations were allowed in some cases. Historic mosques in Mawlamyine, Mon State and Sittwe, Rakhine State, as well as other areas, continued to deteriorate because authorities would not allow routine maintenance. A number of restrictions are in place on the construction or renovation of mosques and religious schools in northern Rakhine State. In some parts of Rakhine State, authorities cordoned off mosques and forbade Muslims to worship in them. The Government's border security forces continued to conduct arbitrary "inspections" of mosques in northern Rakhine State, demanding that mosque officials show permits to operate the mosques. In some cases, when mosque officials could not produce the permits, officials reportedly ordered congregation members to destroy the mosques.

In the wake of Cyclone Nargis, authorities permitted the caretaker of Rangoon's only synagogue to repair storm damage and restore other parts of the building.

Abuses of Religious Freedom

The Government continued its efforts to control the Buddhist clergy (Sangha). It tried Sangha members for "activities inconsistent with and detrimental to Buddhism" and imposed on the Sangha a code of conduct enforced by criminal penalties. The Government did not hesitate to arrest and imprison lower-level Buddhist monks who opposed the Government. In prison, monks were defrocked and treated as laypersons. In general, they were not allowed to shave their heads and were not given food compatible with the monastic code. Like other political prisoners, they were often beaten and forced to do hard labor.

The Government also subjected the Sangha to special restrictions on freedom of expression and association. Members of the Sangha were not allowed to preach sermons pertaining to politics. Religious lectures could not contain any words, phrases, or stories reflecting political views. The regime told Sangha members to distance themselves from politics, political parties, or members of political parties. The Government prohibited any organization of the Sangha other than the nine monastic orders that fall under the authority of the State Clergy Coordination Committee. The Government prohibited all clergy from being members of any political party.

According to the Assistance Association of Political Prisoners in Burma (AAPP), at the end of the reporting period approximately 200 monks were imprisoned, many of them arrested after the September 2007 peaceful pro-democracy demonstrations. During the reporting period, the Government transferred some of the monks, as well as other political prisoners, to remote jails away from their family members, limiting their access to basic necessities and medicines that visiting relatives generally provide.

The Government took no action to investigate or punish those responsible for extrajudicial killings of at least 30 persons during the regime’s violent suppression of September 2007 demonstrations. The Government did not investigate reports that security forces took large numbers of residents and monks from their homes and monasteries during numerous nighttime raids following the protests.

AAPP-Burma estimated that security forces raided at least 52 monasteries between September 26 and December 31, 2007, in retaliation for the monk-led demonstrations. Opposition activists and members of the clergy reported soldiers forcibly entered the monasteries at night and deployed tear gas, fired rubber bullets, and beat monks with batons and bamboo sticks. International NGOs estimated that at least 150 monks were arrested between September and October 2007.

On April 22, 2009, authorities arrested NLD members U Chit Phay and U Aung Soe Wai from Twuntay Township at their homes after the two had led a prayer meeting for the release of activist leader Aung San Suu Kyi. Similar to the well-known Tuesday Prayer Group that meets weekly at Rangoon’s Shwedagon Pagoda, a group of about 50 NLD members had convened to pray April 21 at a pagoda in Zee Phyu Gone village. Shortly thereafter, officials charged both men under Section 295a of the Penal Code, which prohibits acts and speech intended to offend religious beliefs. The charge carries a prison sentence of up to two years.

In March 2009 U Gambira’s brother and brother-in-law, Aung Ko Ko Lwin and Moe Htet Hylan, were sentenced to five years' imprisonment with hard labor under the Immigration Act. Authorities arrested them after they allegedly made plans to commemorate the one-year anniversary of the formation of the All Burma Monks Alliance (ABMA), in which U Gambira reportedly played a leading role.

On February 20, 2009, state media announced a general amnesty for more than 6,313 prisoners, including several monks. Among the prisoners released were seven Rangoon monks arrested in 2003 for refusing to accept alms from then-Prime Minister Khin Nyunt. AAPP-Burma also confirmed the release of U Kaythara (also known as U Kyaw Min Thet), U Ingura (U Aye Tun Thar), U Thireina (U Kyaw Moe), U Marlaina (U Min Zaw Aung), U Ardatesa (U Aung Ko), U Takekanateya (U Maung Zaw), U Damitika (U Tun Tun), U Nandathiri (U Htay Ye Tun), and U Sandima (U Zaw Min Htet). Authorities also freed Daw Ponena Mee, at 80 years old, the oldest imprisoned nun.

Human rights observers believed the leader of Maggin Monastery, Sayada Aindakaat, remained in detention, as well as other monks arrested in 2007, including U Sanda Wara.

On January 28, 2009, prison officials reportedly ordered an inmate to beat monk U Kelatha at Henzada Prison, Irrawaddy Division, for wearing his prison uniform in the style of monk robes. Authorities had arrested U Kelatha after the September 2007 demonstrations and sentenced him to 35 years in prison.

On January 22, 2009, monk U Arnanda of Thita Tharaphu Monastery, North Okkalapa Township, died in Insein Prison of unknown causes. He was 61 years old.

On January 17, 2009, authorities transferred U Gambira from Mandalay Obo Prison to Hkamti Prison in Sagaing Division, about 1,200 miles north of Rangoon. U Gambira reportedly staged a hunger strike the week before. On November 21, 2008, authorities convicted U Gambira of several charges, including offenses under the Electronics Transactions Act, Immigration Act, and Unlawful Associations Act. Officials sentenced him to 68 years in prison. U Gambira and his brother were held without charge until January 2008. Authorities arrested him on November 5, 2007, and his younger brother Ko Aung Kyaw Kyaw on October 17, 2007.

In January 2009 it was widely reported that authorities threatened some Christian house churches in Rangoon with closure if they did not halt regular services. Authorities also forced leaders of those house churches to sign pledges that they would cease worship. At least eight house churches were closed in Rangoon. According to foreign press reports, Muslim clergy in Rangoon were likewise told to stop worship services and readings of the Qur'an at gatherings in private homes.

In November 2008 the Government handed down sentences to several activists, including monks. According to Human Rights Defenders and Promoters (HRDP), authorities sentenced U Thadamma to two years' imprisonment for alleged participation in the 2007 pro-democracy protests. In addition, authorities sentenced six unnamed monks from Ngwe Kyar Yan Monastery to 11 and a half years in prison. During the crackdown that followed the demonstrations, security forces conducted a pre-dawn raid at the Ngwe Kyar Yan monastery in Rangoon and removed an estimated 70 monks. Journalists and foreign diplomatic representatives visited Ngwe Kyar Yan monastery in Rangoon and found bamboo batons, riot control munitions, broken windows, and pools of blood on the floor of the monastery’s dormitory.

Also in November 2008 the international and exile press reported that nine Muslim activists were sentenced in Rakhine State. These arrests have not been confirmed.

In the weeks before the 2008 anniversary of the September 2007 protests and crackdown, security forces temporarily occupied some monasteries in the cities of Rangoon and Mandalay and in Rakhine State that were suspected of involvement in pro-democracy activities.

In September 2008 on the eve of the one-year anniversary of the 2007 protests, state media reported that the State Monk Coordination Committee issued a directive to all monasteries and colleges in Chauk, Magwe Division, warning monks not to participate in political activities.

AAPP reported that on September 5, 2008, authorities raided Marlayon monastery. In the early morning, 20 persons allegedly entered the monastery, ordered monks to lie on the floor, searched the buildings, and removed the abbot. A few days later the abbot publicly denied the account.

On August 23, 2008, authorities arrested monks U Damathara and U Nandara, both from the Thardu monastery in Rangoon. Officials did not acknowledge their arrests, although human rights observers believed they may have been detained as a precaution against future protests. They likely remained in custody.

In August 2008 the State Monk Coordination Committee publicly reminded monks of a 2006 directive that banned monks in Rangoon Division from leaving their monasteries between 10 p.m. and 4 a.m. According to sources, authorities did not strictly enforce this policy.

In August 2008 authorities sentenced nine monks to two years’ imprisonment for "the deliberate and malicious…outraging of religious feelings." On July 15, 2008, police arrested the monks at Rangoon Central Railway Station.

On March 30, 2008 the army arrested 11 Muslim community leaders in Maungdaw, Rakhine State. Among those arrested were the president of the Maungdaw District Myanmar Muslim League, U Than Tun (aka Muhammad Solin), community leader Dr. Tun Aung, and local businessman, U Niramad. While authorities did not provide any explanation for the arrests, local residents reported to the media they believed the arrests were the result of the regime’s paranoia about alleged organized Muslim political activity in the area. It was believed that the 11 leaders continued to be held at the end of the reporting period, although no information on their condition has been released.

In October 2007 authorities detained approximately 90 monks, including the head monk of the Ngwe Kyar Yan Monastery, at a monastery in the Kaba Aye monastery complex, where authorities interrogated them. Many novices had departed earlier to avoid arrest, and parents had retrieved other novices.
On September 26, 2007, soldiers and police raided at least six large monasteries in Rangoon and arrested an estimated 100 monks, including Sayada Aindakaat, the leader of Maggin Monastery.

Beginning in 2004 and continuing through the reporting period, a group of Buddhist laypersons known as the Tuesday Prayer Group attempted to gather every Tuesday at Rangoon's Shwedagon Pagoda to pray for the release of Aung San Suu Kyi. Authorities sometimes used the pro-regime USDA to block the group from entering the pagoda grounds and make them pray outside the entrance or to shout and clap to drown out their prayers.

On the morning of October 12, 2007, authorities briefly detained Tuesday Prayer Group leader Naw Ohn Hla. Authorities released her later that day but confined her to her Rangoon neighborhood for one year, preventing her from leading the Tuesday Prayer Group.

In January 2007 USDA members verbally and physically attacked Naw Ohn Hla and the Tuesday Prayer Group as they tried to enter Rangoon’s Shwedagon Pagoda. Witnesses reported that approximately 100 men in plain clothes surrounded Naw Ohn Hla and demanded that she and the other members immediately depart. When they refused, witnesses reported that USDA members beat several of the Prayer Group members. Uniformed police at the scene did not attempt to stop the attack, and authorities did not investigate the incident or pursue a complaint Naw Ohn Hla filed.

In July 2006 authorities from Thandwe, Rakhine State, arrested Abbot Wila Tha and his assistant, Than Kakesa, from the Buddhist monastery of U Shwe Maw village, Taungup Township, closed the monastery, and forced 59 monks and novices to leave. Local sources claimed the reason for the arrest was that the abbot refused to accept donations from or conduct religious ceremonies for the authorities. Authorities claimed that the abbot was endangering local stability by talking to monks and novices about democracy, that he was a supporter of the NLD, and that he had supported the visit of Aung San Suu Kyi several years earlier.

There continued to be credible reports from various regions of the country that government officials compelled persons, Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike, especially in rural areas, to contribute money, food, or materials to state-sponsored projects to build, renovate, or maintain Buddhist religious shrines or monuments. The Government denied that it used coercion and called these contributions "voluntary donations" consistent with Buddhist ideas of earning merit.

Forced Religious Conversion

Although authorities appear to have moved away from a campaign of forced conversion, there continued to be evidence that other means were being used to entice non‑Buddhists to convert to Buddhism. Authorities pressured Christian Chin to attend Buddhist seminaries and monasteries and encouraged them to convert to Buddhism. Christian Chin reported that local authorities operated a high school that only Buddhist students could attend and promised government jobs to the graduates. Christians had to convert to Buddhism to attend the school. An exile Chin human rights group claimed local government officials placed the children of Chin Christians in Buddhist monasteries, where they were given religious instruction and converted to Buddhism without their parents’ knowledge or consent. Reports suggested that the Government also sought to induce members of the Naga ethnic group in Sagaing Division to convert to Buddhism through similar means.

There were no reports of forced religious conversion of U.S. minor citizens who had been abducted or illegally removed from the United States or who had not been allowed to be returned to the United States.

Section III. Status of Societal Respect for Religious Freedom

Preferential treatment for Buddhists and widespread prejudice against ethnic South Asians, particularly ethnic Rohingya Muslims, were key sources of social tensions between the Buddhist majority and Christian and Muslim minorities. There were no reports of anti-Semitic acts.

The Government tightly controlled the limited number of private academic institutions and their curricula. Similar controls extended to Buddhist monastery‑based schools, Christian seminaries, and Muslim madrassahs. During the reporting period, the Government cracked down on private tutoring and attempted to ban the practice. Aung Pe, a private teacher and NLD supporter, remained in prison, reportedly in poor health, and was serving a three year sentence for an alleged violation in 2005 of the Private Tuition Act.

Since 1994, when Buddhist members split from the Karen National Union (KNU) to organize the pro-government Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), there have been armed conflicts between the DKBA and the predominantly Christian anti-government KNU. Although the DKBA reportedly includes some Christians and there are many Buddhists in the KNU, the armed conflict between the two Karen groups has had strong religious overtones. There were also unverified reports DKBA members continued to expel villagers who converted to Christianity.

Section IV. U.S. Government Policy

Government restrictions on speech, press, assembly, and movement, including diplomatic travel, made it difficult to obtain timely and accurate information on human rights in the country, including freedom of religion. Information about abuses often becomes available only months or years after events and it frequently is difficult or impossible to verify.

The U.S. Government continued to promote religious freedom in its contact with all sectors of society as part of its overall policy to promote human rights. During the reporting period, U.S. Embassy officials discussed the importance of improving religious freedom with government and military authorities, private citizens, scholars, representatives of other governments, and international business and media representatives. Embassy representatives met regularly with leaders of Buddhist, Christian, Jewish, and Muslim religious groups, including ethnic minority religious leaders, members of the faculties of schools of theology, and other religiously affiliated organizations and NGOs. These meetings included regular invitations to the U.S. Chargé d'Affaires' residence to build understanding and tolerance among the groups.

Through outreach and travel, when not blocked by regime officials, Embassy representatives offered support to local NGOs and religious leaders and exchanged information with otherwise isolated human rights NGOs and religious leaders. Members of many of Burma’s ethnic groups and religions participated in English language and current events studies at the Embassy’s American Center. The American Center regularly translated statements and reports by the U.S. Government and NGOs on violations of religious freedom in the country and distributed them via its frequently visited library. The U.S. Government continued to support the UNHCR effort to work with the Ministry of Immigration and Population to issue TRCs, fairly and without bribes or unreasonable requirements, to undocumented Rohingyas. In addition, the Embassy worked closely with Buddhist, Islamic, and Christian NGOs involved in education and teacher training.

The country was first designated a CPC in 1999 and most recently was re-designated on January 16, 2009. As the action under the International Religious Freedom Act, the Secretary of State designated the existing ongoing arms embargo referenced in 22 CFR 126.1(1), pursuant to section 402(c)(5) of the Act. The U.S. Government has a wide array of financial and trade sanctions in place against the country for violations of human rights. The passage and signing into law in July 2008 of the Tom Lantos Block Burmese Junta Anti-Democratic Efforts (JADE) Act further strengthened these sanctions. The United States has also opposed all assistance to the Government by international financial institutions and urged the governments of other countries to take similar actions. U.S. sanctions include a ban on imports from the country, a ban on the export of financial services to the country, a ban on bilateral aid to the Government, a ban on the export of arms to the country, and a suspension of General System of Preferences benefits and Overseas Private Investment Corporation and U.S. Export-Import Bank financial services in support of U.S. investment and exports to the country. The U.S. Government also ended active promotion of trade with the country, limited the issuance of visas to high-ranking government and military officials and their immediate family members, and froze SPDC assets in the United States. U.S. citizens have been prohibited from engaging in new investment activities in the country since May 1997.