Pitak Siam’s failure | New Mandala

Pitak Siam’s failure | New Mandala

Aim Sinpeng, Guest Contributor, 26 November 2012

“There is no real democracy in Thailand. Elected politicians come from vote-buying, fraud and corruption. We can’t wait for these crooks to be voted out…it may take 100 years to get rid of them. We need to act now…We need to topple this government and freeze democracy for 5 years in order to begin real political reforms.” vowed Seh Ai, leader of the newly formed conservative, anti-government coalition, Pitak Siam.

This weekend the Pitak Siam Organisation (PSO) declared their D-Day where thousands of supporters would gather in the heart of Bangkok to oust elected government of Yingluck Shinawatra. Their “warm-up” rally in late October 2012, which drew an estimated 35,000 demonstrators, suggests anti-government momentum was gathering strength and that time might be “ripe” for what General Boonlert, or Seh Ai, called the last step of his two-stepped ladder. The PSO leaders hoped this D-Day would attract enough supporters to delegitimize the current government and eventually prompt a military intervention.

On 24 November 2012, more than 20,000 supporters turned up to major rally sites in the heart of Bangkok. Prime Minister Yingluck invoked the Internal Security Act (ISA) ahead of the rally, while deputy prime minister Chalerm Yoobamrung cleverly employed deterrence tactics, such as road blocks and checkpoints to hinder protesters from reaching the rally sites. After a somewhat violent morning, where clashes with the authorities led to a few arrests (now released) and use of tear gas, General Boonlert called it quits just before 6pm, stating that the government’s dirty and violent tactics made it unviable for the rallies to continue. He also stepped down as Pitak Siam’s leader.

But this rally is not about the Yingluck government, or the Red Shirts for that matter. Rather, it is an attempt of the former Yellow Shirt forces to recalibrate an identity and position in Thai society. The decline of the movement beginning in 2009, has led to the breakup of its leadership, nasty back-stabbing and significant loss of support. Since the coming to power of yet another Thaksin-aligned party, Pheua Thai, Yellow Shirt forces have continued their activities with mixed success through smaller-scale, albeit targeted, opposition be it via the constitutional court, the military or the privy council. Pitak Siam rallies in late 2012 exemplify a renewed effort to build opposition alliances across various groups and mimic the Yellow Shirt’s pre-coup success.

The Pitak Siam Organisation is the re-incarnation of the 2006 Yellow Shirt Movement, with largely the same supporters and alliances, but with new leadership structure and re-organisation. Pitak Siam brought back former Yellow Shirt-aligned groups that have left the movement following the 193-day rally in 2008, such as Dr. Tul’s Multi Colored Shirts, the Thai Patriot Networks, some sections of the Assembly of the Poor and state enterprise unions, under the guidance of Somsak Kosaisuk, a former People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) leader. Pitak Siam endorsed a new leader, a retired army general Boonlert Kaewprasit, in an attempt to elicit support from “old soldiers [who] never die” and entice the current military top brass, which has clearly softened their stance towards the Yingluck government in the past few months. The PAD retreated its role into the back seat, which makes sense given the unpopularity of Sonthi Limthongkul among key groups of PAD’s former alliances. Even so, Pitak Siam admitted using ASTV as one of the main media outlets and relying heavily on Santi Asoke’s Dharma Forces for organisation. The PAD leaders reckoned more than 50 percent of the Pitak Siam supporters are PAD members.

The PSO justify their rallies with three key reasons: 1) the current government turned their eyes blind to, and in some cases supported, lese majeste activities; 2) the Yingluck government is a nominee of Thaksin; 3) continuous and widespread corruption both in terms of government policies and state projects. These are the same grievances the Yellow Shirts trumpeted in the pre-coup period as well as during the Samak-Somchai governments. The leadership hoped to reignite the fire inside those who either loathe Thaksin and/or are fiercely protective of the monarchy. They have purposely sidelined issues that have proved unpopular in previous rallies, such as national sovereignty, and Khao Pra Viharn and kept to the basic, “Nation, Religion, Monarchy”. WIth this in mind the rhetoric is robust. ”The crisis, the disaster and the tragedy of this government and its politicians is unprecedented. It’s the biggest threat to our nation. Our demonstrations represent the real power of the people. We have the right to protest and demand our rights, as citizens, back,” said Prasong Soonsiri to the cheering crowd at Nang Leong racecourse.

Yet the real purpose of the Pitak Siam rallies is three-fold. First, the new grouping needs to gauge the size of their supporters to determine the likelihood of future rounds of large-scale mobilisation. Earlier rounds of opposition rallies in 2012, organised by the Multi-Colored Shirts and the Siam Prachapiwat Group, for instance, were able to turn out a maximum of a thousand protesters. Overestimating its own support-base, an expensive lesson the PAD learned in 2010, can lead to movement overreach.

Second, Pitak Siam rallies are meant to lure back old Yellow Shirt supporters and to attract new ones. Campaigns against the Yingluck government’s policies, such as the rice pledging scheme, 300 baht minimum wage and ongoing state infrastructure projects, which have been waged by other opposition groups, are incorporated into Pitak Siam’s protest platforms. These are aimed to gain support among disaffected farmers, community rights activists and business owners.

Third, the new leadership of Seh Ai, endorsed by Yellow Shirt old-timers, such as Pramote Nakorntap, Prasong Soonsiri, and several retired generals and high-ranking civil servants, was strategic. Seh Ai was not an active Yellow Shirt in the past and could conceivably represented some degree of “neutrality” in terms of leadership – a much needed factor given how much bad blood within the various opposition groups over the years. More importantly, as an army general himself, if Seh Ai succeeded in turning out mass rallies against Yingluck government, Pitak Siam would be able to signal strong mass support for military intervention that would overthrow the government. When asked during a Thai PBS interview whether Pitak Siam is calling for a coup, Seh Ai said: “A military coup requires popular support to succeed. If we [Pitak Siam] are able to show the military that we have a lot of supporters then we hope the military would know what to do. The military are there to serve the people…they must stand by the people. If we do well, the military will take our side.”

At this stage, the Pitak Siam rallies failed on a number of fronts, be it in terms of leadership, numbers and coordination among various groups. Nonetheless their continued opposition to the “Thaksin regime” and zealous efforts to preserve their vision of royalist-conservative Thailand will not be abated.

Aim Sinpeng is a doctoral candidate at the University of British Columbia, Canada

Protect Siam: What’s new? | New Mandala

Protect Siam: What’s new? | New Mandala

Nick Nostitz, Guest Contributor, 1 November 2012 

 

 

Recently the new anti-government group “Pitak Siam”, or in its English name “Protect Siam”, under its leader General Boonlert “Sae Ai” Kaewprasit rallied at the Royal Turf Club.

It was quite obvious though that this is an attempt to regroup the same alliance whose protests led to the 2006 military coup against the Thaksin Shinawatra government and in 2008 to the ouster of the Somchai Wongsawat- led People Power Party government.

Many old acquaintances were there – several second generation People’s Alliance for Democracy leaders, members of the Group of 40 Senators, General Pathompong Kesornsuk, Dr. Tul, and several groups allied with the Siam Sammakhi network, such as Boworn Yasinthorn, leader of the “Network of Monarchy Protection Volunteers”. The Democrat Party claimed that it was not involved in Pitak Siam, nevertheless, in the days prior to the rally on Sunday, 28 October 2012, the event was heavily advertised on the Democrat Party’s Satellite TV station Blue Sky.

One of its presenters compared the coming Pitak Siam rally with Sondhi Limthongkul’s rally in Lumpini Park back in late 2005 being the spark for the 2006 PAD mass protests. Also guards that were at the recent Democrat Party rally in Lumpini were at the Pitak Siam rally on duty. Santi Asoke’s Dhamma Army organised the food.

One interesting aspect was that Prasong Songsiri made an open appearance at the rally, even spoke on the stage, as far as I know the first time in the political turmoil of the past 7 years.

A group of 52 former members of the Communist Part of Thailand who were stationed in the Khonkaen area during the insurgency took part in the rally as well. I asked them why they now allied themselves with with ultra-royalist forces while in the 1970s they were fighting them. They said that they have changed, and now support the monarchy.

The number of protesters surprised all observers. Initially 2000 to 3000 protesters were expected, but in the end about 10,000 showed up. Estimates of 20,000 are exaggerated — the stadium was not almost full, the center, opposite the stage was full, but towards the upper ranks and the side wings the crowd ranged from thin to non-existent. Also police estimates of 6000 were too low. As usual, I go with Special Branch estimates, which I have found over the last years the most reliable, and mostly correspond with my own impressions as well.

One of the second generation PAD leaders present described the event to me as “warming up the engine”. Given the number of protesters, more than any recent PAD, Siam Samkkhi or Blue Sky event, we may be in for more interesting times.

Why Burma is of Growing Importance to China | The Irrawaddy Magazine

Why Burma is of Growing Importance to China | The Irrawaddy Magazine
WILLIAM BOOT, November 27, 2012

Burma’s strategic importance to China will grow as Beijing’s dependency on the Middle East increases and the United States’ declines. That’s the message in a new assessment of trends in oil production and consumption over the next two decades by the International Energy Agency (IEA).

Iraq supplied only five percent of China’s oil imports in 2011—around 275,000 barrels per day—but this will increase to more than eight million barrels per day by 2035, IEA Chief Economist Fatih Birol forecast in a study on consumption trends. This will come on top of rising Chinese imports from Saudi Arabia.

Burma’s significance in this is as a conduit for Middle East oil bound for Chinese refineries.
One oil pipeline now being built through Burma into neighboring China’s southwest Yunnan Province by China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) will begin pumping Middle East oil from around the middle of next year.

When it reaches full capacity the pipeline will carry up to 23 million metric tons per year, Beijing’s Global Times newspaper reported. That’s not a huge amount per se but could be the vanguard of much bigger transshipments of Middle East crude through Burma in the future.

CNPC is spending a total of US $4.7 billion on the current pipeline and a dedicated transshipment terminal at Kyaukphyu, Arakan (Rakhine) State, to handle oil tankers from the Middle East.

“If the Burma pipeline scheme isn’t undermined by armed turmoil by militias operating in some of Burma’s northern regions then it is quite likely that the Chinese NOCs [National Oil Companies] will want to build more pipelines through the country,” regional independent energy industries analyst Collin Reynolds told The Irrawaddy.

“If China is going to increase its imports of oil from Mideast countries it also is going to want to take whatever steps it can to limit the risks of using the sea route through the Malacca [Melaka] Strait. That’s why the Chinese have invested in Burma as an alternative and they are also going to want to protect that route also.”

India has also been expressing concerns about the increased presence of Chinese Navy vessels in the Indian Ocean.

The CNPC and the China National Offshore Oil Corporation are investing billions of dollars in Iraqi oil fields, said the IEA, leading Iraq to soon emerge as the world’s biggest oil producer after Saudi Arabia—with China its biggest customer.

“Increasing oil imports from Iraq is very possible and beneficial for China. Compared with other countries in the Middle East, Iraq is relatively stable at present, but we still should be aware of the risks,” Lin Boqiang, the director of the China Center for Energy Economic Research at Xiamen University, told the China Daily.

China’s domestic oil production is expected to peak at 220 million tons per year by 2020, but if China’s economy continues to expand at seven percent or more a year its oil consumption would then reach over 650 million tons a year, the Sinopec’s Economics and Development Research Institute has forecast.

The IEA report said China’s growing emphasis in Middle East oil will force it and other countries of the region to “focus on the security of the strategic routes” those tankers take.

Beijing is especially concerned with the narrow bottleneck of the Malacca Strait between Malaysia and Indonesia through which all its vessels must navigate via Singapore en route to East Asia. The Chinese are worried that the Strait could easily be blocked in a political  crisis.

Beijing’s emerging geopolitical reliance on Burma is becoming a concern as anger grows within the Southeast Asian nation over a perceived view of Chinese firms riding roughshod over local interests.

In the case of the oil pipeline, Burma would receive a maximum of $36.8 million a year in transit fees, according to CNPC’s partners Myanmar Oil & Gas Enterprise (MOGE) and the Ministry of Energy. A flat right-of-way fee of $13.8 million will be supplemented by $1 per ton of oil pumped—a deal criticized by human rights groups as far too cheap.

NGOs allege numerous cases of social disruption, forced community relocations and land theft along the pipeline route which runs in tandem with a separate natural gas pipeline.

CNPC claims to have donated $6 million to “help the locals improve education and healthcare standards,” Global Times reported. CNPC has also agreed to contribute $2 million per year of the pipeline’s life to “further help develop villages along the pipeline.”

However, Chinese firms—mostly NOCs—have not endeared themselves to Burmese communities where they operate on contracts agreed secretly with the likes of MOGE or front firms belonging to the Burmese military leadership.

These are contracts which could cost Burma dearly in compensation if they are canceled, Burma’s President’s Office Minister Aung Min admitted this week during meetings with objectors to an expansion of the Monya copper mine in Saigaing Division.

The mine is jointly owned by Wanbao Company of China and the Union of Myanmar Economic Holdings.

Aung Min was seen telling protestors that the Burmese government was “afraid” to upset Chinese businesses because of the possible financial consequences. This applied in particular to the Myitsone hydroelectric dam, construction of which has been officially suspended by President Thein Sein on environmental grounds.

“It would need a stronger Burmese government to take on CNPC and its oil shipments strategy,” said Reynolds.

Korn compares Thai government to Hitler: has he lost his mind? | Asia Provocateur

Korn compares Thai government to Hitler: has he lost his mind? | Asia Provocateur

Asia Provocateur, 25 November 2012

About 18months ago I interviewed Thailand's then Finance Minister, Democrat Party Deputy Leader Korn Chatikavanij - my interviews with him can be found here and here.

On the two occasions that I met Korn I found him to be erudite, articulate and willing to engage on a number of subjects and policy details.

A dual-British/Thai national, the UK-born Korn attended Winchester College and later studied politics, philosophy and economics at Oxford. Urbane, well-educated and with a cosmopolitan air, it's hard not to be impressed by Korn, not least because at roughly 6ft 4inches tall, he has quite an imposing physical presence as well. While I disagreed with him on a number of subjects I found him personally charming and certainly likeable.

So, his comments on his Facebook page today (see screen grab in Thai just below) come as a complete shock.

In a rambling monologue Korn complains about the government's handling of this weekend's Pitak Siam protests. Utilising that tried and tested logical fallacy - the false equivalence  - he states that the government used the police to assault the protesters and that the Red Shirts abandoned their own principles by supporting such actions.

Of course the simple facts that Pitak Siam's publicly stated aims were to destroy democracy and create conditions for a military coup are oddly missing from Korn's narrative. Also the fact that the Pitak Siam protesters drove a large truck directly into police lines and attacked them with sticks and other weapons. Then there's the tiny inconvenient detail that the present ruling government party, Pheu Thai, has an overwhelming parliamentary majority, something his party has not achieved in its 66years of existence. Absent too is that when the government he served in were faced with Red Shirt protesters in 2010 they sent Army snipers onto the streets and shot nurses and school children.

But it was the final part of Korn's rambling comment that raises questions about his mental state.

Using an arcane Adolf Hitler quote (is it only me who finds it odd Korn could quote Hitler so readily?) Korn states that

"The Red Shirt government thinks and behaves like this [like Hitler] - therefore they will end up the same as/not different from Hitler."

To make this bizarre claim is straight out of the nuttiest Thai extremist handbook. The Second World War killed almost 70million people, unleashing unspeakable horrors and crimes on the world. Hitler committed the worst of these crimes, including the terrible slaughter of 6million Jewish men, women and children and 12million Soviet civilians.

It is an utter obscenity for Korn to make a comparison between firing a dozen or so tear gas grenades at violent protesters and Hitler's genocidal slaughter of millions. He should not only be widely ridiculed for making this comparison but condemned as well.

I am quite right to question his sanity in such circumstances and can only hope he sees the error of his ways and offers an immediate retraction and apology.

Philippines, Vietnam protest map in China passport | Asia News – Politics, Media, Education | Asian Correspondent

Philippines, Vietnam protest map in China passport | Asia News – Politics, Media, Education | Asian Correspondent
AP News, Nov 23, 2012


MANILA, Philippines (AP) — A map that China has incorporated into its passports has drawn diplomatic fury because it appears to claim the entire South China Sea, ignoring competing claims from the Philippines, Vietnam and other countries.

Philippine Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario told reporters in Manila that he sent a note to the Chinese Embassy that his country “strongly protests” Beijing’s inclusion of an image showing China’s claimed maritime borders in its new passport.

Del Rosario says China’s claims include an area that is “clearly part of the Philippines’ territory and maritime domain.”

The Vietnamese government said it had also sent a diplomatic note to the Chinese embassy in Hanoi, demanding that Beijing remove the “erroneous content” printed in the passport.
In Beijing, the Foreign Ministry said the new passport was issued based on international standards.

“The outline map of China on the passport is not directed against any particular country,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said Thursday.

China maintains it has ancient claims to all of the South China Sea, despite much of it being within the exclusive economic zones of Southeast Asian neighbors. The potentially oil- and gas-rich South China Sea islands and waters also are claimed by the Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan, Brunei and Malaysia.

There are concerns that the disputes could escalate into violence. China and the Philippines had a tense maritime standoff at a shoal west of the main Philippine island of Luzon early this year.

The United States, which has said it takes no sides in the territorial spats but that it considers ensuring safe maritime traffic in the waters to be in its national interest, has backed a call for a “code of conduct” to prevent clashes in the disputed territories. But it remains unclear if and when China will sit down with rival claimants to draft such a legally binding nonaggression pact.

The Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia and Vietnam are scheduled to meet Dec. 12 to discuss claims in the South China Sea and the role of China.

Toxic leaks fuel Thai villagers’ fight against gold mine | Asia News – Politics, Media, Education | Asian Correspondent

Toxic leaks fuel Thai villagers’ fight against gold mine | Asia News – Politics, Media, Education | Asian Correspondent
  The Isaan Record, Nov 22, 2012

LOEI – In the past month, the walls of a gold mine’s tailings pond in Na Nong Bong, Loei have collapsed not once but three times. The tailings pond, which holds the waste water used to dissolve the gold from the ore, contains extremely high levels of cyanide and other chemicals used in the extraction process. As such, the community members from the neighboring village, located just one kilometer from the Tungkum Limited mine, are channeling their fear of the effects into their ongoing fight to close the mine.

People Who Love Their Hometown (PWLTH), a community organization comprised of concerned villagers, has been fighting to close the mine since 2006 in attempts to mitigate the contamination of their food and water. Since the gold mine began its operations, the villagers have experienced lower crop yields, skin rashes, and high levels of cyanide and arsenic in their blood which they attribute to contamination from mining operations. As such, the leak from the tailings pond, which contains cyanide and other dangerous chemicals, has given them greater cause for concern.

“On the 28th of October, the day the wall collapsed for the second time,” explained one of the leaders of PWLTH, “We found that that the water leaked out into some of the farms that were growing yard long beans. The farmers couldn’t harvest because there was water in their fields. We didn’t know whether or not the water was dangerous or not.”

The villagers were the first to report the leak to the government offices after a member of PWLTH found unexpected water in his field. The villagers sent a report to the Provincial Industry Office (PIO) as well as the Department of Primary Industry and Mining (DPIM) and then contacted the Tambon Administration Organization (TAO) to survey the area.

On October 30th, the TAO sent a committee to investigate the broken wall as well as the quality of the water that leaked from the pond.  The TAO reported, “TKL has admitted the wall did collapse and that they have been continuously repairing the damage to the wall of the tailings pond.”

The community, however, is still not fully convinced that there will be no lasting effects from the leak.

“It is necessary for the company to warn the people,” said one of the leaders from PWLTH. “We don’t know whether or not this water is dangerous, because no tests have been done on the water. But we are scared of what the effects might be.”

In response to the villagers’ report, the DPIM issued an order to the company to shut down operations until the situation was resolved. The company appealed to the PIO, however, claiming that they were working in accordance with Article 58 of the Mineral Act and, furthermore, that they needed to continue mining in order to acquire specific rocks needed to repair the break that can only come through the crushing process. At present, the mining company, which has assured the government they are working to fortify the tailings pond wall, is still operating.

The leak comes at a particularly pivotal moment for PWLTH, as Tungkum Limited will be holding a public scoping forum on the 22nd of this month. The forum, which has been postponed four times already due to protests staged by the community organization, is one step in the process of obtaining concessions for opening a new mining site near the existing one. The members of PWLTH, however, hope that the news of the tailings pond leak will strengthen their case for the decommissioning of the current mine as well as halting concessions for the newly proposed mine.

Tungkum Limited, which has been in hot water with its shareholders and the Stock Exchange of Thailand over the past year for alleged financial mismanagement, now has more to worry about.

How Asia sees Obama’s pivot to the Pacific | Asia News – Politics, Media, Education | Asian Correspondent

How Asia sees Obama’s pivot to the Pacific | Asia News – Politics, Media, Education | Asian Correspondent
AP News Nov 20, 2012

TOKYO (AP) — A lot has happened in Asia while the United States was off fighting its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and most of it can be summed up in one word — China. Fueled by China’s amazing growth and the promise of its huge and expanding consumer market, the Asia-Pacific region is now, as experts like to say, the global economy’s center of gravity. Sorry, Europe.

But prosperity requires stability.

As President Barack Obama tours the region to push his year-old pivot to the Pacific policy, the big question on everybody’s mind is how much of a role Washington, with its mighty military and immense diplomatic clout, can play in keeping the Pacific — well, pacific. Here’s a look at how different countries perceive the U.S. Pacific policy and how it impacts them:
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CHINA: HOW NOT TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON

As far as Beijing is concerned, Obama’s pivot was pulled right out of the old Cold War containment playbook. Afraid of China’s rise, Beijing believes, Washington is trying to enflame new tensions by isolating it and emboldening the countries that China has territorial disputes with, which is just about everybody with whom it shares a border.

“Using China’s rise and the ‘China threat’ theory, the U.S. wants to convince China’s neighbors that the Asia-Pacific needs Washington’s presence and protection in order to ‘unite’ them to strike a ‘strategic rebalance’ against China in the region,” security scholar Wang Yusheng wrote recently in the China Daily.

It’s a strategy that’s bound to lose, Beijing says.

China sees its rise as inevitable and unstoppable and believes its neighbors will ultimately opt for stronger ties while gradually excluding the U.S. Beijing also views its economic dominance as an unalloyed good. And as it tests out its first aircraft carrier, stealth jets, cyber capabilities and high-tech missiles, it is in an increasingly strong position to deny Washington access to its shores and some key Pacific sea lanes, which could be a problem if Obama’s pivot ever has to go from push to shove.
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JAPAN: ALREADY FEELING THE PINCH

Without a doubt, Japan is Washington’s most faithful security partner in the Pacific. And it’s the most pinched by China’s rise.

For months, Japan and China have been in an increasingly tense dispute over a group of small, uninhabited islands in the East China Sea. The near-constant presence of Chinese ships around them has stretched the Japanese Coast Guard to its limits. Japan’s air force says Chinese surveillance flights in the area have increased significantly.

Wary of getting caught up in the volatile brew of nationalism, historical animosity and populist politics that is fueling the flare-up, the U.S. has been careful not to take sides. Instead, it has urged the two countries to work out their problems among themselves, diplomatically.

That has confounded many in Japan, which hosts 52,000 U.S. troops under a treaty signed in 1960 that obliges the U.S. to defend territories under Japanese administration. Washington has repeatedly affirmed that includes the isles at the center of the current tensions with China. Tokyo would have preferred at least some moral support to its claim.

“It’s strange,” said Kazuhiko Togo, a former senior diplomat who now heads the Institute for World Affairs at Kyoto Sangyo University. “I trust the U.S. as our ally, but we need to address this issue of U.S. ‘neutrality.’”
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MEANWHILE, IN THE SOUTH CHINA SEA…

Washington took a similarly standoffish stance early this year in the dispute between China, Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam and Taiwan over the South China Sea islands, believed to be rich in gas and oil and straddling busy shipping routes.

The Philippines — America’s closest ally in that dispute — eventually pulled its ships out of the hotly contested Scarborough Shoal, but Chinese vessels have remained.

Manila-based political analyst Ramon Casiple said the disputes have left America’s allies more aware of their own vulnerabilities and what they can — or can’t — expect from the U.S.

“America’s treading a very fine line,” Casiple said. “It has to reassure its allies that at the end of the day the U.S. would be there for them.” He added that the U.S. has made it clear it is not willing to risk a major confrontation in which its options would be limited “to either intervene or lose influence.”

There is, however, one other thing it might do in the meantime.

When U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta visited Vietnam in June, he hinted the Navy would like access to Cam Ranh, a deep water port facing the contested waters of the South China Sea. Hanoi’s counter-proposal?

Lift a ban on selling it lethal weapons.
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TAIWAN: LEFT OUT IN THE COLD

Best friends forever? Not so much.

As China has gotten stronger and more important to the U.S. economy, Washington has become extremely wary of engaging Taiwan as a full security partner — a big pullback from the 1950s and the 1960s, when the two had a formal defense treaty and the U.S. based thousands of troops on what it considered a — if not the — key forward base to keep China at bay.

Today, cooperation is limited to some intelligence sharing, the training of Taiwanese air force personnel in the U.S., occasional security consultations and very restricted arms sales — definitely not the kind of advanced F-16 fighters and diesel submarines the Taiwanese military really wants.

Even so, political scientist Alexander Huang of Taipei’s Tamkang University says Taiwan can play a role in Obama’s pivot — but only if Washington decides to make a clear commitment.
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THE KOREAS: STEALTH OVER SEOUL?

Ah, North Korea.

It’s got a new leader, about whom, typically, the world knows almost nothing, a nuclear weapons/ballistic missile program that it likes to trot out every so often to raise regional tensions and a belligerent attitude toward the U.S.
But Obama has a friend in Seoul.

Back in the 1950s, the U.S. fought on Seoul’s side in the Korean War — and contemplated nuking China before it was over. China still supports the North, and Washington continues to have about 28,500 troops in the South. South Korea also buys about 70 percent of its weapons from the United States, and a big payday for an American company might come soon after Obama’s inauguration, when South Korea is expected to formally announce the winner in a $7.6 billion project to build 60 sophisticated fighter jets.

The deal will be South Korea’s biggest-ever weapons procurement. The top contender is believed to be Lockheed Martin’s stealthy F-35 Joint Strike Fighter — which after a long run of development problems and cost overruns could certainly use a multi-billion dollar boost. Boeing and European aerospace giant EADS are also in the running.
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AUSTRALIA: LIVING WITH THE US MARINES

Australia got one of the first waves from the pivot when the U.S. announced last year it would begin rotating up to 2,500 U.S. Marines through the northern city of Darwin. Now the U.S. is seeking access to an Australian navy base south of the western city of Perth and to bombing ranges in the northern Outback.

Some experts fear the relationship may be moving too fast.

On one hand there is broad support for Australia’s defense relationship with the U.S., so having American Marines was seen as a natural step. But it has also raised concerns that Washington will push for more — something Australia might not be ready for. After all China is central to Australia’s economy, buying a bulk of its mineral and coal resources.

“What worries us is the way in which it seems to confirm that the United States and China are increasingly viewing each other as strategic rivals,” said Hugh White, professor of strategic studies at Australian National University.

“We worry about the idea of the U.S.-China relationship becoming more adversarial,” he said. “America wants to remain the dominant power in Asia, and China wants to become the dominant power in Asia.

“What the rest of us all want is for neither of them to be the dominant power in Asia.”
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AP writers Christopher Bodeen in Beijing, Peter Enav in Taipei, Taiwan, Jim Gomez in Manila, Philippines, Hyung-jin Kim in Seoul, South Korea, Elaine Kurtenbach in Tokyo, Chris Brummitt in Hanoi, Vietnam, Jocelyn Gecker in Bangkok and Kristen Gelineau in Sydney contributed to this report.

President Obama rejuvenates Rangoon University of Burma | Asia News – Politics, Media, Education | Asian Correspondent

President Obama rejuvenates Rangoon University of Burma | Asia News – Politics, Media, Education | Asian Correspondent
Zin Linn, Nov 20, 2012

People of Burma have satisfied with the choice of a venue made by the U.S. President Barack Obama to deliver an important speech to their country. Mr. Obama chose the convocation hall of the University of Rangoon as his podium to make a fresh record with the country. The university he singled out has a remarkable political environment that intertwined with the country’s destiny.

In contemporary history of Burma, Rangoon University is famous for integral to civil disobedience throughout its olden times. The historic nationwide students-led strikes against the British colonialism in 1920, 1936 and 1938 respectively initiated at campus of the then University of Rangoon. Anti-colonial movements were fully ignited by leaders like Aung San, U Nu, Kyaw Nyein, Ba Swe and U Thant were all alumni of Rangoon University.  The practice of mass demonstration initiated by the university students sustained also after the country’s independence. Remarkable student-led protests were occurred in 1956, 1958, 1959, 1962, 1974, 1988 and 1996 respectively.

President Obama said: “I came here because of my respect for this university.  It was here at this school where opposition to colonial rule first took hold.  It was here that Aung San edited a magazine before leading an independence movement.  It was here that U Thant learned the ways of the world before guiding it at the United Nations.  Here, scholarship thrived during the last century and students demanded their basic human rights.  Now, your Parliament has at last passed a resolution to revitalize this university and it must reclaim its greatness, because the future of this country will be determined by the education of its youth.”

By choosing the University of Rangoon as his dais, Obama helped the campus to be liberated. This university had been taken into custody for decades under the previous dictatorial regimes. The university has regained its liberation after Obama’s visit and it indicates that modern education for young generations has to come sooner.

On the other hand, regarding Obama’s visit, 51 political prisoners were released on 19 November, according to Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (Burma). Among them were members of the Human Rights Defenders and Promoters Network – Myint Aye and Yan Shwe and Zaw Zaw Aung – who were sentenced to a minimum of life imprisonment.

 Some members from ethnic armed resistance groups were also released. They are Saw Sai Aung Than from the Shan State Army, Tin Oo and Saw Pho Cho from the Karen National Union, Marid Mon Aung and Bar Yar Nar from the Kachin Independence Army respectively.

However, old and new student generations enjoy happiness seeing the redecorating of the Rangoon University Campus which had been under negligence by the successive military regimes. It seems the existing Parliament also convinces the important of education as the promising future of the country. The Parliament has already passed a resolution to rejuvenate the Rangoon University. So, people of Burma probably thank Mr. Obama who helps recovering of their historic university in due course.

“The education of its youth will determine the future of this country”, President Obama predicts.

Obama also pledges to help Burma’s education by extending student-exchange programs in the near future.

“Just as education is the key to America’s future, it is going to be the key to your future as well.  And so we look forward to working with you, as we have with many of your neighbors, to extend that opportunity and to deepen exchanges among our students.  We want students from this country to travel to the United States and learn from us, and we want U.S. students to come here and learn from you,” Obama emphasizes during a significant speech delivered at the legendary University of Rangoon in Burma.

ASEAN MPs urge Obama to raise human rights topic during Burma trip | Asia News – Politics, Media, Education | Asian Correspondent

ASEAN MPs urge Obama to raise human rights topic during Burma trip | Asia News – Politics, Media, Education | Asian Correspondent
Zin Linn, Nov 16, 2012

The ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Myanmar Caucus (AIPMC) today released an immediate press statement welcoming U.S. President Barack Obama’s plans to visit Rangoon next week.  Nevertheless, the caucus urged the President to make use of his visit pressing on key demands and raise human rights concerns with the Burmese government.

The statement says that Washington is a dynamic force to open the engagement chapter with Nay Pyi Taw. It takes art as a key supporter in the reform process in Burma. Washington has eased sanctions, appointed its first ambassador in 22 years, and opened a USAID mission in Burma. These ‘rewards’ have offered regarding the reforms initiated by the Thein Sein government.  But there is also consideration of Washington’s ‘Asian pivot’ and the United States’ bid to reassert itself in the Asia Pacific region, AIPMC said.

According to Jim Kuhnhenn of Associated Press, the Obama administration regards the political changes in Myanmar (Burma) as possibly diluting the influence of China in a country that has a strategic location between South Asia and Southeast Asia, regions of growing economic importance.

But exiled Myanmar activists and human rights groups are likely to criticize an Obama visit as premature and one that rewards Thein Sein before his political and economic reforms have been consolidated. The military is still dominant and implicated in rights abuses. It has failed to prevent vicious outbreaks of communal violence in the west of the country that have left scores dead.

While in Burma, Obama will meet with President Thein Sein and also with Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, the White House said.

AIPMC expects that the key objectives of Obama’s visit should be to improve human rights and democracy. The visit should not only be seen as adding further legitimacy to the government of President Thein Sein, rather than its efforts to perform key reform measures.

“Yes, the situation is complicated; there are concerns that pushing the Thein Sein government to move too quickly with reform measures could provoke a backlash from military hardliners; and it is commendable that President Obama has embarked on this trip in an effort to ensure the reform process does not backslide, but it is also important that fundamental ideals are not surrendered in the drive for economic and political gains,” Eva Kusuma Sundari, AIPMC President and Indonesian Member of Parliament, said.

“We should all be expecting concrete commitments and deliverable achievements from President Obama’s visit. We are hopeful that this first ever visit to Myanmar by a US president can offer a real boost to the reformers in the government and help them persevere with this difficult transition,” she added.

The caucus also urges in its press statement that major achievements of this visit needs to include the release of remaining political prisoners; it is notable that, according to civil society groups, there were no political detainees among the 452 prisoners released yesterday in a government amnesty.

AIPMC also encourages Obama to work towards securing a commitment from Nay-Pyi-Taw to enter into political dialogue with non-state armed groups and allowing further humanitarian access to Rakhine and Kachin states, as well as agreement to allow the U.N.  AIPMC also recommends setting up of an office for High Commissioner for Refugees in Burma.

According to Son Chhay, AIPMC Vice President and Cambodian Member of Parliament, land grabbing and human rights abuses are on the rise as a result of the new investments coming into Burma. There is little transparency and ordinary citizens have no access to equalize through the legal system.

“Like in Cambodia, there is no truly independent judiciary or police force – without these you cannot have the rule of law,” Son Chhay said.

Son Chhay also says via statement that during this visit, Obama gets a chance to see the realities of an impoverished country moving at a snail’s pace in the course of harsh dictatorship while concurrently struggling to go through the forces of global capitalism and an influx of international aid and development loans.

“Hopefully he will be able to see enough to be persuaded to revise his understanding of the wider situation and identify properly what the country’s pressing needs really are, and the best way to support this reform process,” he said.

Panglong Initiative alone can make peaceful Burma | Asia News – Politics, Media, Education | Asian Correspondent

Panglong Initiative alone can make peaceful Burma | Asia News – Politics, Media, Education | Asian Correspondent
Zin Linn Nov 14, 2012

Speaking ahead of an imperative ‘Shan Conference’ to be held on 26-28 November, the leader of the Restoration Council of Shan State / Shan State Army (RCSS/SSA) Lt-Gen Yawdserk said the way to lasting peace in Burma is a federal democratic system, according to the Shan Herald Agency for News (S.H.A.N.).

“The country needs to adopt a federal system, genuine democracy and the right of the people to have a say in the amendment of the constitution,” he told SHAN on Monday. “Amendment should not be the exclusive prerogative of the 75 plus percent.”

Burma will have to celebrate its 65th anniversary of independence in 2013. The country gained its independence by overthrowing the British colonial rule on 4 January 1948. In fact, Burma’s independence is a consequence of the ‘Historic Panglong Agreement’ between General Aung San and the leaders of Chin, Kachin and Shan ethnic groups pledging an authentic federal union of Burma. However, Burma’s consecutive decision-makers have ignored the political treaty between Burmese and the ethnic leaders of independence.

Even with the President Thein Sein government, the treaty has been put aside since the cabinet is dominated by ex-generals. Moreover, Burma’s new 2008 Constitution distributes many troubles for political parties, ethnic cease-fire groups and exiled dissident factions seeking some common initiative between ethnic groups and the current government.

To clear up the interconnected ethnic problems, the existing government must review the mistakes of past rulings and the political aspirations of the ethnic communities. The original argument of the nation’s ethnic political mayhem is the successive military-backed governments’ antagonism to a democratic federal union. The late dictator, Ne Win, who seized power in a military coup in 1962, opposed sharing equal authority in a series of heated debates in the then legislative body.

Ne Win supported a unitary state over a genuine federal union. The Military Council headed by Ne Win declared that the military coup had taken place because of the “federation topic,” which he said could lead to the disintegration of the nation. Equality of ethnic minorities with the Burmese majority was to him out of the question. When Ne Win seized power, he demolished the 1948 Constitution.  At the same time, the Panglong Agreement, which promised autonomy of the ethnic states, was broken and nullified.

The result of the 1947 agreement proved unconstructive when it reached ten years in 1958, after gaining independence from the British in 1948. Many ethnic armed rebellions broke out to stand up for autonomy. The 1947 constitution had granted the right of secession to Karenni and Shan States.

Despite the fact that the Supreme Executive Council of the United Hill Peoples was making an effort to amend the union constitution in 1961-62 to reconstruct a true federal union with the Premier U Nu’s Government of Burma, Burma Army led by Gen. Ne Win made a military coup on 2 March in 1962 and smashed the Panglong agreement. In that way, all ethnic states including Shan had been occupied by the treacherous Burma Army.

In actual fact, it is a fair demand for self-sufficiency among the respective ethnic minorities. No government should use guns to govern ethnic minorities. If one looks back to 1960-61, many leaders from ethnic states criticized the weakness of the constitution as well as the government’s failure to provide room for the political autonomy of the ethnic minorities.

They pointed the finger at the central government for not allowing the representatives of ethnic states to manage their own affairs in areas of economy, judiciary, education, and customs and so on. The central government ruled the ethnic areas as vassal states.

According to the military drafted and approved constitution’s Article 436, most of the provisions can be amended by a vote of more than 75% of the representatives of the joint Upper and Lower House assembly (666 seats). The military occupies 25% of the seats in each house (110, 56).

President Thein Sein meets with ‘Peace Donor Support Group’ on 12 June. (Photo: www.president-office.gov.mm)

Lt-Gen Yawdserk told SHAN on Monday that any peace dialogue must begin with Panglong, the 1947 treaty between pre-independence Burma and Shan-Chin-Kachin areas, collectively known then as Frontier Areas.

“We are of the same mind as the Kachins. Any dialogue for peace must begin with Panglong”, he said. “Because all the problems we are facing now started with someone reneging on it. We must take a look at it first, and if we find there is need to improve on it, we do it.”

Without addressing and honoring the ethnic people’s demand for self-determination, the latest parliament-based government seems unable to stop political and civil strife throughout ethnic areas. In reality, ethnic people’s demand for equal rights is not a new one but already mentioned in the 1947-Panglong agreement.

Many ethnic leaders asserted that they don’t have faith in the new 2008 constitution. They consider that it will not create a genuine federal union since the Burmese armed forces take 25 percent of all seats in the existing parliament. So, the current constitution will not grant the democratic freedom and the fundamental rights for the ethnic groups of the nation. In brief, if existing government sincerely wished for proper peace, it must begin with Panglong initiative which is accepted by mainstream ethnic people.

The President has pledged during the presidential inaugural ceremony that he would mainly work in support of good governance, national reconciliation, poverty alleviation and establishing a long-lasting peaceful society.  However, he looks as if he has no chance to honor self-determination of the ethnic population since the military shows no consideration on the subject.

A Cambodia's history of violence | The Phnom Penh Post

A Cambodia's history of violence | The Phnom Penh Post
David Boyle and May Titthara, 14 November 2012

 
 Free Trade Union President Chea Mony (R) places incense by a photograph of his brother, slain labour rights leader Chea Vichea, at a memorial service held on the anniversary of his death in Jan. 2012. Photograph: Pha Lina/Phnom Penh Post

Systematic extra-judicial killings were directed and executed for decades by death squads established under Prime Minister Hun Sen’s regime and run by men who are now some of the highest-ranking members of government, a report released yesterday by Human Rights Watch (HRW) alleges.

The report, Tell Them That I Want to Kill Them, unearths hundreds of cases of political killings investigated by the United Nations, the US Federal Bureau of Investigation, rights groups and the media that are linked to individuals including chief of the Ministry of Interior’s criminal department Mok Chito and Central Security Directorate chief Sok Phal.

From the “A-teams” or death squads established in the 1980s to the grenade attacks on opposition parties in the 1990s, the bloody 1997 coup d’etat to the killing of Chut Wutty this year, the report outlines how alleged murderers have been promoted in the Cambodian People's Party-led government rather than prosecuted.

The government has said the report is a baseless, politically timed stunt intended to try and derail the ASEAN summit that begins on Thursday.

Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said the farcical explanation for the death of fierce anti-logging activist Chut Wutty — an official investigation revealed he was shot by a military police officer who was then, accidentally, killed with his own gun by a man trying to disarm him — showed murders were rewarded by the Cambodian People's Party (CPP).

“The fact that, for instance, Mok Chito is tapped to go down to lead the investigation and come up with a story to try to explain away the Chut Wutty murder shows that these people are still the go-to people for the CPP,” Robertson said.

“Somebody like Mok Chito, who is known to have a long association with the most senior people in the government and is known to have a reputation as someone who has repeatedly got their hands dirty for the CPP as an enforcer type, this is the type of person that... when this person says what the story is, everybody salutes.”

Wutty was killed on April 26 while investigating illegal logging in the Cardamom Mountains.

The report quotes a senior operative under the State of Cambodia, the regime that ruled Cambodia immediately after the Khmer Rouge, detailing how a secret death squad called A-92 was directed by Sok Phal and Mok Chito.

“When [senior police officer] Mok Chito or my unit discovered something or a target, we first had to make a report to our superiors. They take the decision to kill. Mok Chito was involved in lots of killings,” the anonymous operative is quoted as saying.

“Sok Phal was in charge of internal security, while Luor Ramin was responsible for foreigners. A-teams reported to Sok Phal, who reported to Sin Sen. Sometimes they went directly to Sin Sen.”

Sok Phal said yesterday he was very surprised to hear of the allegations against him.

“It is the first time that I heard people accuse me; I am always helping people,” he said, requesting a copy of the report before he could comment further.

Mok Chito, who, according to the report, was referred to by one US diplomat as “the ultimate fox in the chicken coop”, said he was at the gym yesterday and then switched off his phone.

Many others who were subsequently promoted to high-level positions in the CPP and government are named as having been involved in extrajudicial killings or death squads.

They include You Sin Long, secretary-general of the National Authority for Combating Drugs; Heng Pov, who became Phnom Penh police chief and an adviser to Hun Sen until he was jailed on a slew of charges including extortion and murder; and Luor Ramin, who has also been promoted to the upper ranks of the NACD.

None of them could be reached yesterday, and Sin Sen died in 2008.
Information Minister Khieu Kanharith said on the sidelines of a meeting on Tuesday morning that Human Rights Watch was just trying to make noise ahead of ASEAN, and called such attempts standard practice for rights groups and protesters operating during international meets.

“First of all, he must give the proof to say that [these men] are responsible for all these things. I think for Human Rights Watch, it is just a personal vendetta between them and the present prime minister,” he said.

HRW references, among many other sources, a September 1993 United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia human rights report, which found 39 incidents of “killing political opponents” that resulted in 26 casualties and 25 killings intended to intimidate the public.

The death squads that HRW said performed these operations were dissolved after a failed 1994 coup attempt and eventually reintegrated into the police, today operating as two distinct units, Kamlang la’or (good forces) and Kamlang samngat (secret forces).

Time and time again, the report points to murders conducted with complete impunity. There were no subsequent arrests, instead, authorities frequently devised ludicrous conclusions, including outlandish claims of suicide, a trend the report suggests continues today.

When investigating the death of senior Funcinpec General Chao Sambath, who the UN reported was shot three times in the head by soldiers immediately following the 1997 coup d’etat, authorities concluded the deceased had committed suicide “by biting his own tongue”, the report states.

In another case, Khmer Krom monk Eang Sok Thoeun – who was found dead with his throat slit three times amid an official crackdown on monk protests – was also deemed to have committed suicide by police.

They then ordered his immediate burial and prohibited monks from conducting funeral proceedings.

The report highlights a speech in which Hun Sen suggests that an infamous 1997 grenade attack at a rally held by an opposition party led by Sam Rainsy, which left 16 dead and more than 150 injured, had been orchestrated by party leadership in order to blame the CPP.

Most recently, HRW points to the farcical and contradictory official accounts of how Chut Wutty and military police officer In Rattana were killed, a narrative that was finally settled by none other that Mok Chito.

The intimidation is also shown to have stretched to the media in cases such as the killing of journalist Khim Sambo, a reporter with the opposition-affiliated newspaper Moneaksekar Khmer, who was gunned down with his son in a drive-by shooting.

The grisly details of how bullets were extracted from the dead body of outspoken newspaper editor Thun Bun Ly’s body by a gloved soldier in 1996, almost immediately after he was killed in a crime that never led to a single arrest, are also recounted.

“It is not my job to hold the testicles of the co-prime ministers [Norodom Ranariddh and Hun Sen],” Bun Ly is quoted as having told an amused courtroom during a trial instigated against him because of critical articles he published.

Human Rights Watch also quoted Hing Bun Heang, former deputy head of the notorious Brigade 70, who told the Post after the 1997 grenade attack that he wanted to kill journalists who alleged Hun Sen’s bodyguards were involved.

“Tell them that I want to kill them... publish it, say that I, chief of the bodyguards, have said this. I want to kill... I am so angry,” Bun Heang is quoted as saying.

Hing Bun Heang is now commander of Hun Sen’s bodyguard unit and deputy commander-in-chief of the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces.

US Man Jailed for Thai Insult Urges Law Change | The Irrawaddy Magazine

US Man Jailed for Thai Insult Urges Law Change | The Irrawaddy Magazine
CHRIS BLAKE / AP WRITER, November 9, 2012

BANGKOK—A Thai-born American who spent more than a year in prison on charges of insulting Thailand’s king says the country’s harsh laws outlawing criticism of the monarchy are holding back its democratic development. He has vowed never to return until his motherland stops being so “thin-skinned” and allows full freedom of expression.

Joe Gordon, who was convicted last year of translating excerpts of an unauthorized biography of King Bhumibol Adulyadej from English into Thai and posting them online, said those jailed under Thai laws protecting the royal family often suffer abuse from prison guards and are treated “like animals.” While he now denies committing any crime, Gordon pleaded guilty and was sentenced to two and a half years in prison before receiving a royal pardon in July.

The punishment was a high-profile example of the severe sentences meted out here for defaming Thailand’s royal family, a crime known as “lese majeste.” The issue has drawn international attention and raised concern about freedom of speech in this Southeast Asian kingdom best known as the easygoing Land of Smiles, a tourist paradise that draws some 19 million visitors per year.

Gordon’s case also raised questions about the applicability of Thai law to acts committed by foreigners outside Thailand, since he posted the link while residing in the US state of Colorado.

“Freedom of expression is not harassment, and Thai people don’t understand that,” Gordon told The Associated Press before his planned departure from the country Thursday. He said in Thailand the attitude is “if you don’t believe and you don’t follow us in the way we are doing things, it means you are insulting us.”

Bhumibol, the world’s longest-reigning monarch, is revered in Thailand and is widely seen as a stabilizing force. But Thailand’s lese majeste laws are the harshest in the world. They mandate that people found guilty of defaming the monarchy—including the king, the queen and the heir to the throne—face three to 15 years behind bars.

Opponents say that lese majeste laws are often abused to punish political rivals. That has been especially true amid the political turmoil that has followed a 2006 military coup that unseated Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who among other things was accused of disrespect for the monarchy.

Supporters say the monarchy is an essential part of the Thai identity and defending it is a matter of national security.

Gordon, 55, is accused of posting links to a translation of the banned biography “The King Never Smiles” in 2007 while in Colorado.

“As an American citizen, I didn’t do anything wrong,” Gordon said. “It’s my freedom of expression on American soil.”

He acknowledges posting the links to the translated biography excerpts on his personal blog, but denies translating it. Either would be enough to face charges in Thailand, where authorities have warned that Facebook users around the world who “share” or “like” content that insults the Thai monarchy are committing a crime.

In the book, author Paul Handley retraces the king’s life, alleging that he has been a major stumbling block to the progress of democracy in Thailand as he consolidated royal power over his long reign.

Gordon, who was born Lerpong Wichaikammart in Thailand, has lived in the US for about 30 years, mostly in Colorado, and he became a naturalized citizen in Denver. He was arrested in Thailand in May 2011 after he returned to seek treatment for arthritis and high blood pressure.

He said he was in his apartment in northeastern Thailand when it was stormed by about 20 plainclothes police officers who confiscated his computer and accused him of wanting to turn Thailand, a constitutional monarchy, into a republic. It’s a charge that hardcore opponents have also leveled at Thaksin.

Gordon said an officer pointed to a poster of the Declaration of Independence—a gift from a relative—that he had hung on his wall. “He said ‘You want to change this country to be like this. You want a republican,’” Gordon recalled.

After being repeatedly denied bail, he pleaded guilty in October last year in hopes of obtaining a lenient sentence. The judge said at the time that the punishment, initially set at five years, was reduced because of Gordon’s plea.

“The only easy way to get out is to accept it,” Gordon said, explaining why he didn’t fight the charges.

During his 14 months in prison, Gordon said his health problems grew worse because of conditions he described as inhumane. He said the situation was worse for those accused of political crimes, such as lese majeste prisoners or those associated with the Red Shirt political movement, which is aligned with Thaksin.

“When the doctor knows that your case is a lese majeste or you are a Redshirt or you are a political prisoner, they will not treat you, they will not give you medicine,” he said.

There have been allegations that other prisoners charged with lese majeste have not been able to get proper treatment, including a 62-year-old grandfather who died of cancer in prison.

Prison official Sorasit Chongcharoen denied that lese majeste prisoners were abused.
“Doctors and prison officials are giving fair treatment to every prisoner or detainee, regardless of their charges,” he said.

Gordon said the lese majeste law should be scrapped because it is too strict and rather than protecting the royal institution causes it more harm.

“If Thailand wants to move forward to catch up with globalization, they need to get rid of lese majeste and release all the political prisoners,” he said.

He said the country’s attitude toward controversial speech was holding it back.

“Thailand needs to learn to handle the truth. Have a thicker skin to move forward,” he said.
He said his experience in Thailand has left him emotionally scarred and he had no plans to return. He said he plans to stay in Los Angeles initially on his return to the US.

“I’m very aware now that Thailand is not really the land of smiles, and you have to be careful what you are doing in this country,” Gordon said. “It seems like on the surface a nice country, but if you dig deeper it is dangerous and can harm you.”

Burma: Trouble Brewing for China | asia sentinel

Burma: Trouble Brewing for China | asia sentinel
Bertil Lintner, YaleGlobal , 07 November 2012

Government tolerates freedom of expression, and the Burmese target Chinese investments
Following the Burmese government’s suspension of a controversial joint-venture hydroelectric dam project with China in the far north of the country, another flashpoint has emerged in relations between the two countries – a massive copper mine at Latpadaung, a mountain near Monywa northwest of Mandalay in Upper Burma.

The Myitsone hydroelectric project, being built to supply power to China, was cancelled in the face of strong local resistance. This time, local residents are protesting against a Chinese company. Wanbao Mining, a joint venture with the Burmese military’s main commercial enterprise, Union of Myanmar Economic Holdings, or UMEH. Wanbao has been accused of destroying cultivated fields, polluting nearby water sources and desecrating Buddhist shrines. No less than 3,150 hectares of land from 26 surrounding villages were confiscated for the project.

The public outcry could also force China to rethink its often insensitive – some would say aggressive – policies towards smaller countries in the region.

UMEH’s involvement is merely as a recipient of fees from Wanbao, a subsidiary of the North Industries Corporation, or Norinco, China’s main weapons manufacturer which is also involved in other business activities.

When the agreement between Norinco and the government of Burma was signed 10 June 2010, the Chinese company said on its website that Monywa is “abundant in copper mine resources with excellent mineral quality, which is of great significance to strengthening the strategic reserve of copper resources in our country, and to enhancing the influence of our country in Myanmar (Burma).”

That influence is now on the wane as Burma tries hard to distance itself from China - which for more than two decades has exerted considerable economic, political and even military influence over this Southeast Asian country - while improving political relations with the United States, the European Union and Japan. But after last year’s suspension of the US$3.6 billion joint venture Myitsone dam project in the northern Kachin State, which shocked the Chinese, Burma must tread carefully in dealing with Wanbao Mining. For the country’s new leaders, it is a dilemma: They cannot crack down on the movement in Monywa without risking its still tenuous relationship with the West. But a continuing struggle could impact relations with Burma’s powerful northern neighbor.

The campaign against the Chinese company is led by two unlikely local heroes: Thwe Thwe Win, 29, and Aye Net, 34. Neither of the two young women has more than the compulsory five-year primary education behind her, and more than a year ago, both were selling vegetables in the local market in Monywa.

“The Chinese company came and bulldozed our fields and the Chinese officials made rude gestures at us when we came to complain,” says Thwe Thwe Win in an interview in Monywa.

The police did nothing, except arrest the two women and some of their comrades. That ignited a mass movement, at a time when freedom of expression is becoming tolerated in Burma after decades of iron-fisted military rule and when anti-Chinese sentiment is rising across the country. Student and labor activists from the old capital Rangoon and elsewhere traveled to Monywa to show support. On 26 October, more than 1,000 local miners, Buddhist monks and members of the general public defied an order by local authorities restricting access to the mine and marched past roadblocks to make merit at a pagoda inside the mining area.

The two women vow not to give up until the project is scrapped and the Chinese company leaves Monywa.

Elsewhere in Burma, people are also complaining about how China treats their country. For more than 20 years, Chinese companies have stripped large swathes of the north of trees, denuding ecologically crucial watershed areas. Chinese merchants have also flooded Burma with cheap consumer goods and fake medicines, explains a local businessman in Rangoon. “China does produce goods of good quality, but only for export to the West,” he said. “Here, they sell only junk. This is an almost racial attitude towards us.”

Even within the ruling military, anti-Chinese feelings run high. Already in 2004, a document was compiled by Lieutenant Colonel Aung Kyaw Hla, a researcher at Burma’s Defence Services Academy located in Pyin Oo Lwin, an old hill station in the highlands northeast of Mandalay.

The 346-page top-secret, thesis, titled “A Study of Myanmar [Burma]-U.S. Relations,” outlines in Burmese the policies now being implemented to improve relations with Washington and lessen dependence on Beijing. The establishment of a more acceptable regime than the old junta after the November 2010 election has made it easier for the Burmese military to launch new policies and have those taken seriously by the international community.

The thesis bluntly states that having China as a diplomatic ally and economic patron has created a “national emergency” that threatens the country’s independence. Aung Kyaw Hla, probably a committee of army strategists rather than a single person, goes on to argue that although human rights are a concern in the West, the US would be willing to modify its policy to suit “strategic interests.” Although the author does not specify those interests, the thesis makes it clear that includes common ground with the US vis-à-vis China. The author cites Vietnam and Indonesia under former dictator Suharto as examples of US foreign-policy flexibility in weighing strategic interests against democratization.

If bilateral relations with the US were improved, the master plan suggests, Burma would also gain access to badly needed funds from the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and other global financial institutions. The country would then emerge from “regionalism,” where it currently depends on the goodwill and trade of immediate neighbors, including China, and “enter a new era of globalization.”

At the same time, China is clearly taking the new signals from Burma seriously. In February and March this year, the Beijing-based, Chinese-language weekly Economic Observer ran a series of articles about the suspension of the Myitsone dam trying to analyze what went wrong with China’s relations with Burma. “How could something like this happen?” columnist Qin Hui asked. The 14 October Global Times, a daily tabloid published under the auspices of The People’s Daily newspaper, said in a commentary that Chinese companies need to “attach more importance to grassroots voices” in carrying out investment projects such as the Monywa copper mine. According to Burmese journalists, reporters from The Global Times are calling them with questions about pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, which never happened before.

It’s too early to say whether Myitsone, and now Monywa, will become a turning point in China’s relations with Southeast Asia, paving the way for a more tactful relationship with countries such as Burma. But popular struggles against two Chinese megaprojects here have no doubt been wake-up calls for the leaders in Beijing. Even smaller countries – and a movement led by two former vegetable vendors in a town in the Burmese outback – are now brave enough to challenge the region’s most powerful economic and political player.

(Bertil Lintner is a Swedish journalist based in Thailand and the author of several works on Asia. He can be reached at lintner@asiapacificms.com. This is published with permission from the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization.)

What to do about Thailand's Rice Glut | asia sentinel

What to do about Thailand's Rice Glut | asia sentinel
Samarendu Mohanty, 06 November 2012

The government needs to reduce uncertainty in the global market

The Thai rice mortgage scheme continues to receive a fair amount of media bashing even after completing its one-year anniversary on Oct. 7. The debate on its impact on Thailand and the rest of the world continues to take center stage at a majority of rice conferences in the region. The media and rice gurus have all ganged up on this scheme because nobody expected this from Thailand.

This is the country that remained open for business during the 2007 rice crisis when India and Vietnam banned exports and provided some stability to a market that was chaotic and getting out of control. Despite all the negative publicity and criticism, Thai policymakers remain unruffled and publicly vow to continue with the program.

Questions come to mind: Is this the only country with such a program? Does it really create so much uncertainty in the global rice market?

To answer the first question, Thailand is not the only country with a price support program. As a matter of fact, most of the rice-growing countries in Asia have some form of price support program for farmers. These have different names and somewhat different operational mechanisms but all of them are designed to provide a guaranteed floor price for farmers.

The only difference is that some countries religiously implement these programs and procure all the rice offered by farmers at the announced support price whereas others procure only the amount needed for a strategic reserve. The critical aspect of these programs is the level at which the support price is set relative to the market price. If the support price is set much higher than the market price, the government will end up procuring a large amount of paddy similar to what we have witnessed in India in the last few years and in Thailand in the past 12 months.

The minimum support price (MSP) for rice in India made a quantum leap from 2007-08 to 2011-12 by more than 75 percent, whereas it took from 1994 to 2006 for the MSP to increase by a similar proportion. Similarly, the Thai mortgage scheme was reinstated by the Pheu Thai government at a price support level that is 30–40 percent higher than the market price.

The end result is that Indian procurement stocks grew by more than fourfold from 5.5 million tons in October 2007 to 26 million tons in September 2012. The Thai mortgage stocks in the past two seasons have gone beyond 10 million tons of rice. In both these countries, domestic market prices have gone up in response to rising support prices. Despite the steep rise in the MSP in India in the last few years, the level is still less than half of the mortgage price in Thailand. In 2011-12, the Indian MSP for paddy was US$0.20 per kilogram whereas the mortgage price for paddy in Thailand was $0.48 per kilogram. The combination of a lower MSP and weaker currency has enabled Indian traders to price broken and parboiled rice $100-150 per tonne cheaper than their Thai counterparts and this is taking away market share from Thailand. For the 2011-12 marketing year, Thailand was dethroned from its rank as the top exporter for the first time in the past three decades and India has taken over the top spot.

In response to the second question, the mortgage scheme does create more uncertainty in the global market because of greater government involvement in the rice business in the sense that the market does not know when mortgaged rice will be released and at what price.

This scheme was expected to create some problems in the market in the short run but the unexpected return of India to the non-basmati export market more than nullified the effects of the Thai mortgage scheme and even brought the market to its knees. However, over the longer term, the continuation of the mortgage scheme is likely to make global prices lower than what they would have been otherwise.

Where do we go from here?

There is no disagreement that this is a populist policy and has been brought back to appease rural voters. But populist policy is nothing new and there are numerous examples around the world that do not make any sense and cost billions of dollars to taxpayers. I personally believe that the Thai government has every right to support rice farmers if it wishes to. But the government should be prepared to pay for the rising cost of the program over time.

There will be year-to-year fluctuation depending on the global rice production situation. If the global situation is tight, then this scheme may not cost anything. But, the cost will rise quickly if the global supply situation improves.

However, as part of its responsibility for global food security, Thailand needs to take steps to reduce uncertainty in the global market by announcing a mechanism for the release of mortgaged stocks to the market in a way that the market knows when and how the stocks will be released. Another option could be slightly modifying the mortgage scheme so that farmers have the option of either mortgaging their rice or receiving the difference between the mortgage and market price and selling the actual paddy in the open market.

This would enable the government to support farmers, avoid an accumulation of mortgage stocks, and regain Thailand’s competitive position in the global market. This is exactly what the US did in the mid-1980s to continue to provide support to farmers, eliminate government stockpiling, and become competitive again in the global market by reforming its price support loan program, which was similar to the Thai rice mortgage scheme.

The Thai government may also want to think about direct cash transfers to farmers that are not linked to current production. Japan and South Korea have recently moved away from price support to direct payments and the government of India is pondering converting subsidies for food, petroleum, and fertilizer to direct cash transfers to beneficiaries.

(Samarendu Mohanty is head of the Social Sciences Division at the International Rice Research Institute in the Philippines. email s.mohanty@irri.org This is reprinted from his blog.)

Burma’s potential for a nationwide religious war | Asia News – Politics, Media, Education | Asian Correspondent

Burma’s potential for a nationwide religious war | Asia News – Politics, Media, Education | Asian Correspondent
Francis Wade, Nov 07, 2012

The violence in western Burma between Rohingya and Arakanese has evolved in recent weeks, and now there is a distinct possibility that a religious war is unfolding that could spread far beyond Arakan state. The most concerning sign is the recent attacks by Arakanese and security forces on Kaman Muslims, who had previously lived comfortably alongside Buddhist communities, and who have citizenship (the citizenship issue had been one of the main justifications used by Arakanese and the government for mistreatment of the Rohingya, who are stateless).

Earlier this month a group of monks in Sittwe, the Arakan state capital, released a statement calling for Arakanese to “expose sympathisers of Bengali Kalars [a derogatory term for Rohingya] as national traitors along with photos and spread the information to every township”. A similar message was circulated by monks in Karen state, in eastern Burma, which has a far smaller population of Muslims. It said that anyone who interacted with Muslims – marry, trade with, and so on – would receive “critical punishment”.

It is becoming increasingly hard to dismiss the violence as something local to western Burma. People in Arakan state appear eager to publicise that they are not Muslim: “Hindu boys we met working in the market had a tag hanging around their neck claiming they are Hindu with their home address (issued and signed by the ward leader), and they are not even full citizens,” a foreign NGO worker said of a recent visit to Sittwe in Arakan state.

I had some interesting correspondence recently with another Thailand-based NGO worker who traveled to Bangladesh in late October and met with journalists – Arakanese, Rohingya, and Bangladeshi –  and government officials. Below are some excerpts.

“Both Rohingya and Arakanese reporters gave current anecdotes about small groups on the ground (in plain clothes), operating with impunity by authorities, actively trying to stir up religious conflict. They told detailed stories of daylight attacks on religious buildings, including brazenly burning the Kuran and attacking temples and mosques.

“The Arakanese reporters seem nervous to write about these things as they fear attacks by their own people, but admitted that the authorities, especially the army, are openly trying to organise anti-Muslim activities and it is getting worse. They felt that many Arakanese leaders seem reluctant to carry out these activities again because of the damage they have already suffered and therefore the Tatmadaw [Burma army] is having to take even more aggressive measures to fuel this religious war.”

The NGO worker, who doesn’t want to be named, also recounted discrimination experienced by colleagues in Karen and Karenni state in October.

“Recently several of our partners went back into Karen and Karenni state to renew their Burmese ID’s. In two separate cases, in two separate areas, they said the question asked at the government office was whether they are Muslim. Also, after they “proved” they were not, the authorities explained they are now making a list of all Muslims in their areas. One office official said the list was being prepared to disenfranchise Muslims there.”

To be sure, a lot of the stories being circulated are anecdotal, but put together, it suggests an evolution of this conflict that should be of pressing concern to all stakeholders. Both sides have committee grave abuses, but attempts so far at reconciliation seem to be hitting a brick wall. If it is true however that a belief system, rather than an ethnicity, is now being targeted, then the ramifications could be far-reaching.

Global Peace Network: 'Unlawful' to Award Nobel Peace Prize to EU | Common Dreams

Global Peace Network: 'Unlawful' to Award Nobel Peace Prize to EU | Common Dreams
Common Dreams staff, November 5, 2012

In a letter Monday to the Nobel Foundation, the International Peace Bureau said awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to the European Union was "unlawful" since the EU is not a "champion of peace."



The IPB, a global network of 320 peace organizations, argues that all five Nobel prizes are awarded in accordance with the 1895 will of Alfred Nobel, which stated that the prize would be given to "the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses."

"The European Union ... clearly is not one of 'the champions of peace' Alfred Nobel had in mind and described in his will as 'the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses,'" the letter states. "The latest prize to EU may even be seen as directly contradicting the purpose to reach demilitarized international relations, the purpose Alfred Nobel had with his prize."

The award was announced on Oct. 12, lauding the EU "for over six decades contributed to the advancement of peace and reconciliation, democracy and human rights in Europe".
The IPB asked that the Nobel Foundation withhold the $1.19 million prize— a request that the committee  immediately rejected, Agence France-Press reports.

Geir Lundestad, secretary of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, told the AFP,  that the committee's objections have previously been presented "and won't impact the evolution of the prize."
The Centre for Research on Globalization, an independent research and media organization, today supported the IPB request, writing in a release, "The EU is not a peace project."

The CRG argued that "more than 25 million people across the EU are struck by mass employment," that countries such as Greece and Spain "are being battered with welfare cuts and misery to an extreme extent," and that the troika—the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the IMF—threatens the "most crisis-ridden member states" with funding cuts for schools, pensions, hospitals.

The Nobel Peace Prize is scheduled to be presented on Dec. 10 to European Parliament President Martin Schulz, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and EU President Herman Van Rompuy.