Tutu, Havel ask for U.N. Intervention in Myanmar by Los Angeles Times / Witness 10:31am 22nd Oct, 2005   October 21, 2005    "Tutu, Havel Ask U.N. Intervention in Myanmar", by Richard Paddock. (LA Times)    Human rights activists seek a nonmilitary response to restore democracy and deliver aid to nation called a "threat to the peace."    Bangkok, Thailand: - Branding Myanmar"s military regime a "threat to the peace," a global coalition of human rights advocates is urging the United Nations to intervene in the Southeast Asian nation to restore democracy, deliver humanitarian aid and win the release of political prisoners.    Led by retired Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa and former Czech President Vaclav Havel, activists are calling on the U.N. Security Council to adopt a resolution that would pave the way for nonmilitary intervention in Myanmar, also known as Burma.    In a 70-page report that accuses the regime of using forced labor, rape, "ethnic cleansing" and child soldiers to control its population, Tutu and Havel make the case that abuses by Myanmar are more egregious than in countries where the United Nations intervened during the 1990s, including Sierra Leone, Haiti and Cambodia.    "If a government violates the fundamental rights of its own people, that can not be left as a domestic issue," said Tutu in a telephone interview from his home in Cape Town, South Africa. "I believe that we have an almost open-and-shut case for the intervention of the United Nations."    Tutu, 74, the 1984 winner of the Nobel Peace Prize for his struggle against apartheid, and Havel, 69, the Czech playwright who helped end the era of Soviet domination, called on the Security Council to pass a resolution requiring Myanmar to work with the U.N. to achieve national reconciliation and restore a democratically elected government.    The proposed resolution also calls for the immediate release of pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi and 1,100 other political prisoners and urges Myanmar to give unhindered access to international aid workers so they can deliver assistance in the impoverished country.    So far, the proposal has not won enough support from the 15-member Security Council to get on its agenda. Among those unwilling to discuss the measure is China, one of Myanmar"s biggest investors and supporters. The United States, a vocal critic of the regime, supports the plan.    Myanmar has been ruled by the military for virtually all of the last 43 years. In 1988, the regime killed hundreds of pro-democracy demonstrators, a precursor to the Tiananmen Square massacre in Beijing the following year.    In 1990, the regime held elections and the main opposition party, the National League for Democracy, won more than 80% of the vote. However, the military refused to hand over power.    On Monday, party leader Suu Kyi will mark her 10th year in detention out of the last 16 years. Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991, she is being held in virtual isolation at her house in the capital, Yangon, also known as Rangoon. Now 60, she is the only Peace Prize winner in custody anywhere in the world.    The Tutu-Havel report, titled "Threat to the Peace" and prepared by the global law firm DLA Piper Rudnick Gray Cary, alleges numerous human rights violations, including the rape of ethnic minority women and the spread of HIV by soldiers; widespread forced labor; destruction of more than 2,700 villages; massive forced relocations; and the torture and killing of political prisoners.    As many as 70,000 children have been forced to become soldiers, more than in any other country, the report says, and more than 700,000 refugees have fled across the border into Thailand and other countries.    Myanmar is a leading producer of opium and amphetamine, and its heroin trade has made it a primary contributor to the spread of AIDS in Southeast Asia, the report charges. Strains of human immunodeficiency virus that originated in Myanmar have spread to neighboring countries, it says.    More than 75% of the population lives below the poverty line, according to the report.    "The government is responsible for a decline in the economic situation so alarming that Burma is now one of the poorest countries in the world, providing its people little or no access to healthcare or education," it says.    The report concludes that the country "threatens the peace and stability of the region" and that the situation meets all the Security Council criteria used in the past for intervention.    The Myanmar regime, which often ignores international criticism, has denounced the report. The government declared that it was "based on false information provided by some rebel remnants and the expatriate dissidents who are surviving on politically motivated aid of some Western nations."    "These are vast exaggerations or mere outright distortions," the regime said in a statement. "The truth is that the government does not condone human rights violations and is in fact the guarantor of human rights in the country."    Myanmar"s reaction suggests that the regime is concerned about the efforts by human rights activists to get the Security Council involved.    So far, Myanmar"s allies on the Security Council have kept the issue from being heard.    "I can not get Myanmar on the agenda at the Security Council," British Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry said in an interview. "I have tried for the last six months. Some members say it is a matter of internal security and domestic affairs, and unless the government of Burma is prepared to go along with it, then you would not make progress."    For years, there have been two competing but ineffective, approaches to Myanmar. The U.S. has imposed economic sanctions, contributing to the country"s financial decline but failing to topple the regime. Neighbors such as China, India and Thailand have advocated engagement with the regime while developing economic ties, but this strategy has produced no significant concessions.    The U.N. has had no success in promoting political change or winning the release of Suu Kyi through negotiations. The world body"s special envoy to Myanmar, Razali Ismail, has not even been allowed to enter the country since March 2004.    In the face of global criticism, Myanmar has pursued a strategy of promising change while delivering little. It has claimed for years that it is working toward democracy, but no elections have been held since 1990, and military officers hold virtually every top position in government. The drafting of a new constitution has been in progress for more than 12 years.    Tutu said the situation in Myanmar was similar to that of South Africa under apartheid two decades ago: a small ruling minority, facing economic sanctions, imposing its will on the majority while the nation"s most popular leader (Nelson Mandela in South Africa) languishes in detention.    But of the two ex-British colonies, Tutu said, the situation in Myanmar is "a great deal worse."    "They are using rape as a weapon of war and deliberately infecting people with HIV, which fortunately we did not have at the time" in South Africa, he said. "They are using child soldiers and participating in the drug trade."    On his wall, Tutu said, he has two photos of Suu Kyi, whom he has never met but admires greatly.    "These men who are armed to the teeth are dead scared of her because she has this incredible thing: She has integrity," he said. "The people, who are the ultimate arbiter, look upon her as their leader. I look forward to attending her inauguration as president of Burma one day."    (Times staff writer Maggie Farley at the United Nations contributed to this report).    October 21, 2005    Act Now: Always on the Run (Witness)    "Always on the Run", produced by WITNESS partner organization, Burma Issues, tells the story of one of the world"s silent humanitarian crises--the forcible displacement of over a million people in eastern Burma. Over the past decade, Burma"s dictator Than Shwe has used military force, human rights abuses, and the destruction/burning of villages in a brutal anti-insurgency campaign that has left millions of Burmese people homeless in the country"s jungles. Child mortality and malnutrition rates in eastern Burma are now comparable to those among internally displaced person in the horn of Africa.    The United Nations Commission on Human Rights has condemned the atrocities in consecutive resolutions. Instead of ending the attacks and listening to the United Nations, soldiers of Than Shwe"s military regime continue the onslaught.     Tell Kofi Annan that forcible displacement in eastern Burma should be addressed by the only body in the United Nations that can take action: the UN Security Council.  The situation in Burma has deteriorated to the point where its political instability, widespread human rights violations, creation of over 700,000 refugees, displacement of over a million people internally, tolerance of the production and trafficking of illegal narcotics, and indifference to the transmission of HIV/AIDS from Burma to other parts of Asia, all pose a legitimate threat to international peace and security.     We demand that you bring Burma to the attention of the UN Security Council without further delay. An apt day to do so would be October 24th,  both "UN Day" and a date that marks a cumulative 10 years in solitary detention in Burma for Nobel Peace Prize recipient and leader of the National League for Democracy (NLD) and Burma"s democracy movement, Aung San Suu Kyi.    Act Now: Click on the link below to sign a petition to be forwarded to the United Nations.    Dear Secretary-General,    In your September 2003 report to the 58th Session of the United Nations General Assembly on the political situation in Burma (also known as Myanmar, as it was renamed by the ruling military junta in 1989), you encouraged the international community to facilitate a democratic transition in Burma by the year 2006. Today, that deadline fast approaches and there are no signs of political dialogue or cooperation in Burma, despite your promises to do your "utmost, together with all interested member states, to reinvigorate the process of national reconciliation."    On October 24, 2005, your fellow Nobel Peace Prize recipient and leader of the National League for Democracy (NLD) and Burma"s democracy movement, Aung San Suu Kyi, will have spent a cumulative 10 years in solitary detention in Burma. The political stalemate in Burma has not eased or ended, and the Burmese generals repeatedly ignore and reject UN attempts to facilitate and encourage political dialogue. In fact, both the UN Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in Burma, Paulo Sergio Pinheiro, and the Special Envoy from the Office of the Secretary General, Razali Ismail, have been barred from even entering Burma since 2003 and 2004, respectively.    It is ironic that October 24, 2005 is also the 60th anniversary of the United Nations, or "UN Day." In 1948, the year the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was proclaimed and adopted by the UN General Assembly, Burma was the first country to proclaim complete independence from British colonialism. Burma"s independence opened the global floodgates of decolonization and heralded the creation of a world of independent nation-states - a world of united nations. It is wholly appropriate that Burma now stands poised to usher in a new era of the United Nations, one that you called for yourself when you said, "We must move from an era of legislation to an era of implementation."    The issue of Burma is waiting to be addressed by the UN"s most powerful body, the Security Council. Nobel Peace Prize recipient Archbishop Desmond Tutu and former President of the Czech Republic Vaclav Havel have called on the Security Council to address Burma and pass a peaceful resolution that would allow for the vigorous engagement of the UN Secretary General in establishing and implementing a plan for national reconciliation in Burma. The resolution being recommended by Archbishop Tutu and President Havel would grant you the mandate of the Security Council, multiplying and magnifying the ways in which you may facilitate peaceful change in Burma. Their recommendations, which do not include calls for sanctions or the use of force, have the heartfelt endorsements of many Burmese who struggle for democracy and human rights in their country, such as the NLD, ethnic nationality parties elected in 1990, student leaders, and ethnic movements who have signed ceasefires with the Burmese army.    Such a resolution on Burma as that proposed by Archbishop Tutu and President Havel must be passed at the UN Security Council today because the situation in Burma has deteriorated to the point where its political instability, widespread human rights violations, creation of over 700,000 refugees, displacement of millions internally in Burma, tolerance of the production and trafficking of illegal narcotics, and indifference to the transmission of HIV/AIDS from Burma to other parts of Asia, all pose a legitimate threat to international peace and security.    We urge you to make good on your promise to the Burmese people and to the world to meet the deadline you set in 2003 to see progress in Burma by 2006, by responding positively and immediately to the call for the UN Security Council to address Burma. We demand that you bring Burma to the attention of the UN Security Council without further delay. Visit the related web page
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