ASEAN Political Security Community Blueprint

This Blueprint envisages ASEAN to be a rules-based Community of shared values and norms; a cohesive, peaceful, stable and resilient region with shared responsibility for comprehensive security; as well as a dynamic and outward-looking region in an increasingly integrated and interdependent world. The Blueprint provides a roadmap and timetable to establish the APSC by 2015. […]

ASEAN Charter

The constitution of the Association of Southeast Asia Nations (ASEAN), that came into force December 2008. Download the Charter in English or Burmese.

The 2008 Myanmar Constitution: Analysis and Assessment

International constitutional scholar, Yash Ghai, presents an analysis of the SPDC’s 2008 Constitution.

Village Agency: Rural rights and resistance in militarized Karen State

Citing the personal testimonies of over 110 villagers living in Karen State, this report seeks to challenge common portrayals of villagers as helpless victims, and provide a forum for these individuals to speak for themselves about the context of abuse in which they live and their own efforts to resist this abuse. By highlighting the […]

Khoe Kay: Biodiversity in Peril

This is the first biodiversity survey of the Salween River in Karen State, and documents 194 plant species and 200 animals, including 42 endangered species. Based on surveys conducted for three months at Khoe Kay, a bend in the river near the Weigyi dam site, it includes comprehensive charts and unique photographs. Download the report.

2008 Constitution

The full text of the State Peace and Development Council’s (SPDC) 2008 Constitution in English and Burmese.

Crimes Against Humanity in Eastern Myanmar

This report focuses on violations of international human rights and humanitarian law committed by the military in Karen State and Pegu Division between 2005 through 2007. Download the report in English and Spanish.

Vote to Nowhere: The May 2008 Constitutional Referendum in Burma

A report that shows how the 2008 constitutional referendum was carried out in an environment of severe restrictions on access to information, repressive media restrictions, an almost total ban on freedom of expression, assembly, and association, and the continuing widespread detention of political activists. It highlights government arrests, harassment and attacks on activists opposed to […]

ASEAN Economic Community Blueprint

This Blueprint is the coherent master plan guiding the establishment of the ASEAN Economic Community by 2015, which will transform ASEAN into a region with free movement of goods, services, investment, skilled labour, and freer flow of capital. Download

Opportunities and Pitfalls: Preparing for Burma’s Economic Transition

The Burma Project/Southeast Initiative has published Opportunities and Pitfalls: Preparing for Burma’s Economic Transition, a report by Yuki Akimoto.

Opportunities and Pitfalls covers key topics addressed at the conference regarding Burma’s prospective economic transition and the role of IFIs. The report contains case studies of other countries that have dealt with IFIs and their prescriptions for development, highlighting issues and circumstances that Burma shares with those countries.

Forward-looking and accessible, this report promises to stir practical debate about how Burma should manage the challenges of working with IFIs when these institutions become fully engaged there […]