Potential Exists for Dialogue Towards Nationwide Ceasefire but Concrete Action Needed

On 31 August Burma’s parliament approved the creation of a peace committee aimed at ending the conflict that has been going on for decades in Burma’s ethnic states. The committee has been named the “Committee for Eternal Stability and Peace in the Union of Burma” and will have a mission to mediate between the regime and ethnic armed groups currently engaged in conflict with the regime. The committee members have not yet been identified but Dr. Aye Maung, chairman of Rakhine Nationalities Development Party and a member of parliament, suggested that Daw Aung San Suu Kyi should serve on the committee. However, at this point “it was not clear whether Suu Kyi will be allowed to participate in the committee or even whether Suu Kyi herself wanted to join or not.” […]

Statement of the Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in Myanmar

I have just concluded my five-day mission to Myanmar – my fourth visit to the country since I was appointed in March 2008 and my first since February 2010. I would like to thank the Government of Myanmar […]

NLD Statement: No.15/08/11

ျပည္ေထာင္စုသမၼတ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံေတာ္ ႏိုင္ငံေတာ္သမၼတ ဦးသိန္းစိန္ႏွင့္ အမ်ဳိးသားဒီမိုကေရစီအဖြဲ႕ခ်ဳပ္ အေထြေထြအတြင္းေရးမွဴး ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္တို႕သည္ ၂၀၁၁ ခုႏွစ္ ၾသဂုတ္လ (၁၉) ရက္ေန႕ ညေန (၄)နာရီတြင္ သမၼတအိမ္ေတာ္ရွိ […]

Diverse Groups Raise Concerns About Development Projects on the Irrawaddy River

On 12 August, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi met with the regime’s minister of social welfare, relief, and resettlement, Aung Kyi, in Rangoon for the second time in less than a month. After the meeting the two issued a joint statement noting that they had agreed to cooperate and “to work in reciprocal basis by avoiding the contradicting attitudes.” However, it is clear that Daw Suu intends to continue to operate independently on behalf of the people of Burma, even where doing so contradicts the position of the regime. Just two days after the 12 August meeting Daw Suu defied the regime, traveling outside of Rangoon to meet supporters in Pegu and neighbouring Thanatpin despite the regime’s warning that such a trip could trigger “riots.”

Additionally, the day before her meeting with Aung Kyi, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi issued a letter expressing her opinion on one of the most contentious issues currently facing Burma, the issue of development projects, in particular dams along the Irrawaddy River […]

Statement of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Personal Appeal to Save the Irrawaddy River

Today, the lrrawaddy is under threat. tack of sound planning, the failure to enforce necessary conservation laws, and a poor ecological awareness have created diverse problems. The plains forests on the banks of the river are in danger of disappearing as illegal logging and charcoal production proceed at an alarming pace […]

Lithuanian Foreign Minister Talks to Burma/Myanmar Opposition Leader, Expresses Support for Democratic Forces

On 11 August on the initiative of Lithuanian Minister of Foreign Affairs Audronius Ažubalis a phone conversation with Burma/Myanmar opposition leader and Secretary General of the National League for Democracy Aung San Suu Kyi took place. During the conversation A.Ažubalis expressed support for democratic forces of Burma/Myanmar […]

Letter to US Secretary of State Clinton letter to Clinton about Rape as a Weapon of War and UN Commission of Inquiry in Burma

A bipartisan group of 13 women senators sent a letter to US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton. The Senators expressed their concern about the recent reports of the use of rape as a weapon of war in the ongoing armed conflict between the Burma Army and ethnic armed groups, and urged Secretary Clinton to pursue the establishment of an international Commission of Inquiry into war crimes and crimes against humanity in Burma […]

Burma: 23rd Anniversary of Student Uprising

During the “8.8.88” uprising more than 3,000 students and young people were killed by the Burmese military during pro-democracy protests on 8 August 1988. But the event led to elections in 1990 […]

Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and Ethnic Nationalities: Nationwide Ceasefire and Genuine Dialogue Necessary for National Reconciliation

On 25 July, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi met with the military regime’s representative, Aung Kyi at a state-run guesthouse. This was the tenth meeting between Daw Suu and the regime’s Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement Minister, appointed as liaison to the democracy leader. After the 70-minute meeting, Aung Kyi read a statement that failed to give any details about what was discussed, but declared that both sides were happy about the meeting. However, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s serious demeanor and body language suggested otherwise.

Khin Ohmar, Coordinator of Burma Partnership and Chairperson of the Network for Democracy and Development, told the Irrawaddy, “I don’t think the government is honest about this meeting. It is just window dressing. They want the international community to know that they have started a dialogue toward national reconciliation. They are using Aung San Suu Kyi.” This meeting was nothing more than an attempt by the regime to convince ASEAN that they are deserving of the bloc’s chairmanship in 2014. When ASEAN makes its decision, likely to be at the Summit in Bali in November, the bloc must not consider this meeting as a sign of serious dialogue and must certainly not reward the regime for such empty actions […]

Canadian Ambassador presented Honorary Doctorate Law degrees to Suu Kyi

Canadian Ambassador to Burma, Ron Hoffmann, presented two honorary doctorate law degrees to the Burmese democracy leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi on behalf of two universities in Canada – shortly before a meeting with Burma’s new President Thein Sein taking place in Naypyidaw. The two accolades delivered by the ambassador two weeks ago in Rangoon are from Carleton university of Ottawa and Memorial University of Newfoundland […]