Dr. Kyi May Kaung's statement on new US -Burma policy

This has been submitted to Sen. Jim Webb's office and placed on the official record of the Sept 30th, 2009 Hearing in the Dirkson Building, DC.


"We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the oppressed. Sometimes we must interfere. . . There is so much injustice and suffering crying out for our attention . . . writers and poets, prisoners in so many lands governed by the left and by the right." Elie Wiesel, Nobel Peace Prize Acceptance Speech, 1986, Oslo.

Senator Webb,

I was disappointed by your Hearing yesterday, which I saw as rather one-sided. No representatives of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, her lawyer Jared Genser, representatives of the National League for Democracy, or the NCGUB (the Exile Government, elected to their constituencies in Burma in the 1990 elections), Burmese refugees and dissidents, Burmese monk survivors of the 2007 Saffron Revolution, the US Campaign for Burma, scholars who have not advocated removing sanctions, representatives of major non-profits working for change in Burma, other stakeholders or known strong supporters of Aung San Suu Kyi such as Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Barbara Boxer, Diane Feinstein or Mitch McConnell were either not invited or not present. Here is Sen. McConnell’s “two tests for the new US policy from his website: http://mcconnell.senate.gov/record.cfm?id=318402&start=1
I request that you place this Statement on the official record of the Hearing of September 30th, 2009.
You conducted the Hearing single-handed and was noticeably harsher in your questions towards Kurt Campbell, who explicated the new US policy and took a measured approach, and towards Professor David Williams, who was the only one among the witnesses who mentioned gross human rights violations in Burma and the stepped up military campaigns against the ethic minorities, being conducted right now as military attacks against the Kokang Chinese, the Rohingya in the west, the Kachin in the north and in addition to the on-going longest civil war against the Karen in the east. In many cases it was the Naypyidaw (former Rangoon government) which violated the ceasefires.
Professor Williams said, “Before the 2010 elections, the mountains will flow with blood.” The continuous and constantly increasing stream of refugees into all the neighboring countries are evidence of this.
Dr. Williams also testified that he thought after 2010 it would not be a civilian government, though it would be civilianized. As Burmese, we have seen too much of the trick of army brass changing into civilian clothes and continuing in power, directly or from behind the scenes, to think much of the promises of the 2010 so-called “election.” Professor Williams concluded by saying “This effort won’t shift the game, it will only give the game away.”
I am relieved that the US State Department’s new Burma policy will in fact be a limited engagement policy, subject to concrete and substantial changes (political and economic reforms of a structural nature) on the part of the Burmese military regime, and that the US government reserves the right to impose or extend sanctions whenever it sees fit.
Please allow me to tell you who I am and my qualifications for talking about Burma.
I am a Burmese-born scholar and long time democracy advocate who has been studying Burma all her adult life. My 1994 Ph.D. dissertation from the University of Pennsylvania was on the detrimental effects of a highly centralized command economy and the political economy of Burma in relation to those of Zaire, the then Soviet Union, India and the People’s Republic of China. I studied the design of political-economic systems and the rundown economies produced by having a dictatorship or one party system. My thesis is on Scholarly Commons http://repository.upenn.edu/dissertations/AAI3116650/
available from Proquest http://repository.upenn.edu/dissertations/index.221.html
and a summary available from Asian Survey
http://caliber.ucpress.net/toc/as/35/11
I also study the economic relationship between nations and I was the first to start pointing out in 2002 that to study Burma we also need to look at China and India. Today, I am happy to see this view is being increasingly taken up, including by you at yesterday’s Hearing.
In addition I have publicly debated David Steinberg and others about sanctions and Burma several times since 2002. Here are some links –
http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/3917
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/hardtalk/7026645.stm
For the BBC Hardtalk interview, I went at the request of the NCGUB or National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma or the Exile Government, as one of the members of their Technical Advisory Network.
I have been closely associated with The Free Burma Coalition when it was working on sanctions, with The Burma Fund and the NCGUB. Most recently, (winter of 2008-2009) I worked on a Transition Plan for Burma, commissioned by the NCGUB. I compiled the plans and ideas of 6-7 internationally recognized scholars and Burma experts; several economists; including an expert on money and banking and economic development; a human geographer who has studied Burmese agriculture extensively and is alarmed about the mass landlessness taking place in Burma as the junta takes over the land of Cyclone Nargis victims; an MP of a western government friendly with Burma and constitutional scholars. I also looked at past papers prepared for the democracy movement since 1990. These consultants published and unpublished works are much more detailed and show a much better understanding of Burma than anything that David Steinberg or Thant Myint U have ever written. In fact these two and others in the same camp are widely known as regime apologists. Maybe that is why they were invited onto your panel.
To my knowledge (I stopped work on this project in mid-March 2009), none of the scholars and dissidents consulted advocated lifting sanctions. Most of the experts instead advocated structural reforms of a political and economic nature. The sentence “Sanctions will be gradually lifted” did work its way into the official report, after it had passed from my hands, but this can be seen as subject to concrete changes from the SPDC’s side, and in line with Daw Suu’s recent letter indicating her willingness to help lift sanctions and asking to be better informed. She cannot truly make an informed decision without access to the internet and other international media as she continues under a more severe house arrest since the sham trial conducted against her, towards the end of which you were allowed to see her.
My advice to you and Secretary Clinton and everyone working on this new policy is to be extremely careful that you are all not used by the junta, while Burma is left worse off than before 2010.
In my opinion you need to show you are not more motivated by playing to an American audience by going to secure American Mormon John Yettaw’s release, and talking about recovering the bones of US war dead from World War II in Burma, but not even issuing a statement or making any moves to help in the case of Burmese-born US Citizen Kyaw Zaw Lwin (Nyi Nyi Aung) who was arrested on Sept 3 as he arrived at Rangoon airport from Bangkok. See – Jonathan Hulland “As an American is Tortured in Burma, Where’s the Outrage?”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jonathan-hulland/as-an-american-is-torture_b_303297.html
This article was published two days ago and has already been widely cited and linked on the Internet.
Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, U Tin Oo of the NLD, Kyaw Zaw Lwin and all the more than 2000 political prisoners need to be free and able to freely organize and conduct their political activities. Otherwise 2010 will remain the farce it is.
I will be cc.ing this statement to Amnesty International and other organizations and individuals.
I commend you for your spearheading efforts, but much more needs to be done.
The SPDC needs to be held accountable for its actions. Otherwise you are sending the wrong message.
Sincerely,
Kyi May Kaung (Ph.D.)
Words and Images.

What follows is a comment I left on the Irrawaddy magazine website this morning, Oct 1, 2009.
Comment is queued for moderation at Irrawaddy site and sent to Wa Wa Maw (Kyaw Zaw Lwin’s fiancé) and other dissidents.

I went to the Hearing. This is a fairly accurate record of what was said. (article by Lalit K. Jha)
Only Professor Williams among the witnesses spoke of gross human rights violations in Burma, saying "frankly, the (junta's) constitution is the worse I have ever read."
Williams is a well-known constitutional scholar based at Indiana University.
This provoked a loud guffaw from the back of the small room, which was packed.
Senator Webb needs to have more people on his panels who are strong supporters of democracy in Burma, so as not to become another laughing stock.
He also needs to go to Rangoon and rescue Burmese-born US Citizen Kyaw Zaw Lwin who was arrested Sept 3 on arrival from Bangkok and has been tortured in prison. A living person is more important than World War II bones.
No mention was made by anyone at the Hearing about Kyaw Zaw Lwin's plight, which is a ramped up version of the sham trials of Daw Suu and Yettaw and is highly alarming -- in fact it is the junta thumbing its nose against US Government
Kyi May Kaung (Ph.D.)