Burma and the Steel Orchid

The Steel Orchid was, apparently, the descriptive title given to Aung San Suu Kyi by one interviewing magazine, around the time she last saw her husband, Michael Aris (NB: this is "information" taken from my viewing of the film The Lady, that I previously wrote about).

Effectively imprisoned for 15 of the 21 years leading up to her most recent release (November 2010), she is now - once again - heading the campaign for democracy in Burma through her party, the National League for Diplomacy.

Despite the ongoing human rights abuses in her country, there are various reasons for hope. Although the "nominally civilian government" (so-called in New Internationalist's January 2012 issue and on the BBC rundown) continues to be a front for the military junta, things seem to be improving. A number of political prisoners have been released (although NI notes that over 1,600 remain imprisoned) and there have been visits by the US and UK foreign secretaries in the last few months - Hilary Clinton in November 2011 and William Hague in January 2012 (just a couple of days ago). Both visits represent the end of a 55 year "lock-out" against Burma because of its military dictatorship masquerading as independence.

While one must feel optimism, even hope, at these signs, the remnant of Burma's human rights abuses would still give any one cause to question their long-term positivity. William Hague went so far as to "warn" Burma of how it would be judged by the rest of the world if changes did not continue to be made. Later he commented that while there are, indeed, positive signs it would be a mistake to decrease global pressure on Burma for continued reform.

So much for the politics...

Economically speaking, the reason for Burma's sudden burst of - apparently sincere - reform, is the presence of China within their borders. Having been the target of a vast array of economic sanctions for many years Burma has had few trade partners - again within the film, the Japanese business delegation spoke of their willingness to trade but ONLY if a gesture of goodwill were made (this request ultimately resulting in the suspension of Suu Kyi's house arrest). Similarly, it is the vast power of neighbouring China that has at least kept the government officials' heads above water.

But in the case of the Myitsone damn, negotiate with China's state-owned Power Investment Corporation, even Burma's government must have balked at the scale of destruction with no come back - simply put, the 6000 megawatt damn, costing $3.6bn would have been an obvious blight on the Burmese landscape, with almost all of the power produced going to China. And with the scrapping of the project, what choice does Burma have but to turn back to the rest of the world and start to make reparation and reform to avoid economic collapse?

With the death of Aung San - Suu Kyi's father for whom she is named - Burma marks the beginning of the military junta era. While it is by no means necessary for her to rule for democracy to prevail, I for one do wonder if it would be the most healing form of symmetry to return Burma to the global stage.

And with William Hague's admonition to keep up the pressure, I wonder what we can do. His first point was that more needed to be done before sanctions could be lifted; his second that the country's prisons should be accessible by international monitors to assess the quality of prisoner treatment - and that is without even considering whether or not prisoner incarceration is warranted.

With this in mind, I refer the reader to the UK charity Burma Campaign -www.burmacampaign.org.uk where there is currently a web-based campagin underway, urging UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to push for the release of all Burma's political prisoners.
(There are other campaigns and actions available including the charity's mailing list).