Asean Presses Myanmar to Allow Its Observers at 2010 Election

Originally appeared in Bloomberg

July 20, 2010

Southeast Asian nations offered to send observers to the first election in two decades in Myanmar, whose military rulers have come under fire in the U.S. for excluding detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

The proposal was made during a meeting last night of foreign ministers from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Hanoi. Myanmar Foreign Minister Nyan Win responded positively, Singapore’s Foreign Minister George Yeo told reporters today.

“We suggested quite strongly to our Myanmar colleagues that they consider having Asean observers at elections, bringing in members of the family into what is really their own domestic affair,” Yeo said in Hanoi. “I think the foreign minister will put it back to his government.”

Myanmar has yet to disclose an election date. Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy, which won the country’s last elections in 1990, was disbanded after announcing plans to boycott the poll. She has spent more than 14 of the past 20 years in detention, with her latest stint beginning in May 2003.

U.S. envoy Kurt Campbell said in May that Myanmar’s planned elections would lack credibility unless the military regime permits greater participation.

“We would be keen to ensure the election is as Myanmar itself said, a free, fair, democratic and inclusive one,” Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa said in an interview in Hanoi today. “We were informed that once the registration process of the political parties is completed, the election date would be announced.”

Policy of Engagement

Regulations announced in March prohibit Suu Kyi and about 2,100 political prisoners from standing for election. Campbell’s May trip to Myanmar was part of the Obama administration’s policy of engagement with a regime that remains subject to U.S. sanctions.

Yeo said that the election process was likely to bring about some change in Myanmar.

“Once the generals take off their uniforms and they have to win votes and kiss babies and tend to local needs, their behavior will change and the economy will gradually open up,” Yeo said. “We don’t see a sharp break from what it is today but we see an important turning which will lead Myanmar into a different situation.”

Myanmar’s foreign minister reiterated that the country has no nuclear weapons program nor any ambition to start one, Yeo said.

View the original article