Finland is prioritising Education, Health, and Gender as part of its development plan for Myanmar. Mizzima’s Editor-in-Chief Soe Myint was in Helsinki at the invitation of Finland’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs for World Press Freedom Day on 3 May. Here he was able to conduct an exclusive interview with Ms. Lenita Toivakka, Minister for Foreign Trade and Development.
You mentioned about education, health and gender and women’s empowerment as key priorities for development. When it comes to Myanmar how about support to the media specifically because we have an emerging media process in the country. Do you have any programs now?
I think we don’t have that kind of program now for supporting free media in Myanmar. We have different kinds of programs and I know that our support is going to increase and will be higher than it has been recent years so Finnish support to Myanmar is increasing in different sectors. And the main sectors we are really going to focus on includes empowering women developing cooperation with a partner country. Then there is education, quality education, how to manage your resources better, then there is support for your democratic development. (Courtesy of Mizzima)
May 3, 2016
Japan’s Kishida meets Suu Kyi, expresses full support for new government
Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida met Tuesday with Myanmar’s state counselor and de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi and expressed Tokyo’s full support for the country’s new administration.
Kishida became the first Japanese Cabinet member to meet the Nobel Peace Prize laureate, who also holds the post of foreign minister, since the new administration was launched in the Southeast Asian country in March.
At a joint news conference after the meeting, Kishida said both the public and private sectors of Japan will be fully behind the Myanmar government. (Courtesy of The Japan Times)
Kishida became the first Japanese Cabinet member to meet the Nobel Peace Prize laureate, who also holds the post of foreign minister, since the new administration was launched in the Southeast Asian country in March.
At a joint news conference after the meeting, Kishida said both the public and private sectors of Japan will be fully behind the Myanmar government. (Courtesy of The Japan Times)
Myanmar: Everything will change
It's an unprecedented upswing for Myanmar's media. At the center: journalist U Myint Kyaw. He's fighting for imprisoned colleagues, is sitting on the newly-formed Press Council and is training a new generation.
"I remember it well. It was October 2012 and a journalist accidentally took a photo of a policeman," recalls U Myint Kyaw. "He wanted to photograph an intersection and by chance the officer ended up in the picture." But that was already enough. The reporter was arrested. From prison he called the Myanmar Journalist Network (MJN) for help. At the time, U Myint Kyaw was Secretary General of the newly founded network. He spent two hours negotiating with the police before managing to convince them that the photo was simply a mistake. The journalist was finally released. "The police refused to believe him," says the 52-year-old. "But because we're an association, we carry more weight in situations like these." (Courtesy of dw.com)
"I remember it well. It was October 2012 and a journalist accidentally took a photo of a policeman," recalls U Myint Kyaw. "He wanted to photograph an intersection and by chance the officer ended up in the picture." But that was already enough. The reporter was arrested. From prison he called the Myanmar Journalist Network (MJN) for help. At the time, U Myint Kyaw was Secretary General of the newly founded network. He spent two hours negotiating with the police before managing to convince them that the photo was simply a mistake. The journalist was finally released. "The police refused to believe him," says the 52-year-old. "But because we're an association, we carry more weight in situations like these." (Courtesy of dw.com)
‘Drug-Addicted People Should Not Be Treated as Criminals’
In 2014, a number of civil society organizations and researchers concerned over the health and well-being of drugs users and impoverished small-scale opium farmers set up the Drug Policy Advocacy Group (DPAG). The network advocates a shift away from Burma’s current, punitive drug laws to legislation that decriminalizes drug use and subsistence poppy farming, and which provides health care for users and helps farmers to gradually substitute their poppy crop.
Last month, Dr. Nang Pann Ei Kham, a medical doctor and coordinator of the Rangoon-based DPAG, oversaw a public workshop organized by DPAG members, which included civil society organizations such as the Myanmar Opium Farmers Forum, National Drug Users Network Myanmar and the Myanmar Anti-Narcotics Association. Members of the Myanmar National Human Rights Commission and police officers of the Central Committee for Drug Abuse Control (CCDAC) also attended the event.
During an interview with Myanmar Now, Dr. Nang Pann Ei Kham stressed the need to reform Burma’s drug laws in order to address widespread drug addiction in northern Burma and to help tens of thousands of poor opium farmers find an alternative livelihood. (Courtesy of Irrawaddy)
Last month, Dr. Nang Pann Ei Kham, a medical doctor and coordinator of the Rangoon-based DPAG, oversaw a public workshop organized by DPAG members, which included civil society organizations such as the Myanmar Opium Farmers Forum, National Drug Users Network Myanmar and the Myanmar Anti-Narcotics Association. Members of the Myanmar National Human Rights Commission and police officers of the Central Committee for Drug Abuse Control (CCDAC) also attended the event.
During an interview with Myanmar Now, Dr. Nang Pann Ei Kham stressed the need to reform Burma’s drug laws in order to address widespread drug addiction in northern Burma and to help tens of thousands of poor opium farmers find an alternative livelihood. (Courtesy of Irrawaddy)
India’s security concerns
Traditionally, India has had an erratic relationship with Myanmar that posited our operational requirements to cozy up with the Myanmar junta (to take on the North East-centric insurgent elements on the Myanmar side of the border), at odds with our more internationalist and avowedly diplomatic stance of supporting the pro-democracy strain of Aung San Suu Kyi’s struggle. The confusion from this moral dichotomy drove the Myanmar junta into the willing arms of the Chinese with whom it shares a 2185 km border – China suffered no such moral compunctions and with its famed realpolitik approach, prioritized the geo-political relevance of the ‘second coast’ on the Indian Ocean, captive natural resources of Myanmar and a hungry market for Chinese exports, to establish its own multihued hegemony. So, in Myanmar’slong spell of international isolation and seclusion, China became it principal partner of relevance and legitimacy.
Strategically, Myanmar made imminent sense for the Chinese with a pliant junta-regime and a geography that afforded a potential ‘pearl’port-base in Sittwe to provide logistics for the critical SLOC’s (Shipping Sea Lanes of Communication). This was part of the China’s global strategy of ‘String of Pearls’ that envisaged, intermittent ports along the Asian coastline, with the Dragon’sfirm trade/naval footprint, from the Hainan Island in the South China Sea up to Sudan in Africa. Even creative engineering solutionslike a canal through the Kra Isthmus in Thailand bypassing the restive, narrow and vulnerable Straits of Malacca was mooted by the Chinese to secure its trade and energy options, superimposing the relevance of Myanmar in the Chinese strategic jigsaw.
For the Myanmar junta, international legitimacy aside, Myanmar had the ongoing infamy ofhosting one of the world’s ‘longest running insurgencies’. There are over 135 Government recognized ethnic groups,with the predominance of the Bamars at approx. 65 per cent – leading to fears of ‘Burmainsation’,that led to armed ethnicity-based insurgent groups of various Myanmar’s minorities. These local insurgent groups imposed taxes in their respective domains and dabbled in drug trafficking to facilitate the purchase of weaponry from the black markets of Cambodia, China and Thailand. Given the lack of international support options for a junta-style-Government, it becamefertile ground for tactical arrangements, intrigues and bloody suppressions – just the kind of environment that the Chinese revel in and exploit to create a vassal nation. Chinese are past masters in the game of checks and balances to ensure perpetual control and it tactically managed covert relationships with some of Myanmar’s ethnic-based insurgent groups (especially those with shared Chinese ethnicity) to ensure a counter-lever to the Tatmadaw (as the Myanmar Military or juntais locally known). (Courtesy of dailyexcelsior.com)
Strategically, Myanmar made imminent sense for the Chinese with a pliant junta-regime and a geography that afforded a potential ‘pearl’port-base in Sittwe to provide logistics for the critical SLOC’s (Shipping Sea Lanes of Communication). This was part of the China’s global strategy of ‘String of Pearls’ that envisaged, intermittent ports along the Asian coastline, with the Dragon’sfirm trade/naval footprint, from the Hainan Island in the South China Sea up to Sudan in Africa. Even creative engineering solutionslike a canal through the Kra Isthmus in Thailand bypassing the restive, narrow and vulnerable Straits of Malacca was mooted by the Chinese to secure its trade and energy options, superimposing the relevance of Myanmar in the Chinese strategic jigsaw.
For the Myanmar junta, international legitimacy aside, Myanmar had the ongoing infamy ofhosting one of the world’s ‘longest running insurgencies’. There are over 135 Government recognized ethnic groups,with the predominance of the Bamars at approx. 65 per cent – leading to fears of ‘Burmainsation’,that led to armed ethnicity-based insurgent groups of various Myanmar’s minorities. These local insurgent groups imposed taxes in their respective domains and dabbled in drug trafficking to facilitate the purchase of weaponry from the black markets of Cambodia, China and Thailand. Given the lack of international support options for a junta-style-Government, it becamefertile ground for tactical arrangements, intrigues and bloody suppressions – just the kind of environment that the Chinese revel in and exploit to create a vassal nation. Chinese are past masters in the game of checks and balances to ensure perpetual control and it tactically managed covert relationships with some of Myanmar’s ethnic-based insurgent groups (especially those with shared Chinese ethnicity) to ensure a counter-lever to the Tatmadaw (as the Myanmar Military or juntais locally known). (Courtesy of dailyexcelsior.com)
ANP to submit urgent proposal for Rakhine war refugees
The Arakan National Party (ANP) will submit an urgent proposal to urge the government to initiate a peace process and give assistance to war refugees in Rakhine State, announced MP Khin Saw Wai of Yathetaung Constituency, who is also a member of the ANP, on April 30.
She continued that there are about 1,500 people who have become refugees due to the battles in Rakhine State between The Myanmar Defence Services (Tatmadaw) and the Arakan Army (AA).
The ANP said peace is needed immediately as schools will reopen in about one month.
“We plan to submit an urgent proposal to urge the government to restore peace and to provide resources such education, healthcare and social welfare for war refugees. We will implement the plan when we arrive in Nay Pyi Taw,” said Khin Saw Wai.
The ANP released a statement on April 23 urging the Rakhine State government to cooperate with the Union government to stop the clashes in Rakhine State. (Courtesy of Eleven Myanmar)
She continued that there are about 1,500 people who have become refugees due to the battles in Rakhine State between The Myanmar Defence Services (Tatmadaw) and the Arakan Army (AA).
The ANP said peace is needed immediately as schools will reopen in about one month.
“We plan to submit an urgent proposal to urge the government to restore peace and to provide resources such education, healthcare and social welfare for war refugees. We will implement the plan when we arrive in Nay Pyi Taw,” said Khin Saw Wai.
The ANP released a statement on April 23 urging the Rakhine State government to cooperate with the Union government to stop the clashes in Rakhine State. (Courtesy of Eleven Myanmar)
A Role Reversal for Myanmar and Thailand
Rarely do next-door neighbors move as rapidly in opposite political directions as Thailand and Myanmar have in recent years. After more than a half-century of military dictatorship, Myanmar has restored democratic rule, and now has a civilian-led government led by the former political prisoner Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy (NLD). Thailand, by contrast, has twice reverted from popular rule to military dictatorship in the past decade, owing to coups in 2006 and 2014. What accounts for these neighbors’ reversal of political fortune?
Myanmar initiated its shift toward democracy in 2003, when the country’s military dictatorship unveiled a seven-step roadmap. At first, the plan was ridiculed as another empty promise from the country’s brutish military junta. And, indeed, the generals locked up dissidents, shot protesting monks, and kept Suu Kyi and other NLD leaders under house arrest for another six years.
Brazil storm Christ the Redeemer
The Brazil Syndrome
Renowned economist Anders Åslund engages the views of Dani Rodrik, Nouriel Roubini, Joseph Stiglitz, and others on the growing turmoil in emerging markets.
PS On Point: Your review of the world’s leading opinions on global issues.
It is clear, however, that the regime’s leaders saw the writing on the wall. They knew that they could not continue to sustain their power through violence and oppression, as that would ultimately cause their regime to collapse under the weight of international sanctions and isolation. What they did not anticipate was the speed at which economic and political liberalization would gain momentum. Almost as soon as genuine economic and political reforms were launched in 2011, the costs of rolling back the effort became unthinkably high for Myanmar’s military. (Courtesy of Project Syndicate)
Myanmar initiated its shift toward democracy in 2003, when the country’s military dictatorship unveiled a seven-step roadmap. At first, the plan was ridiculed as another empty promise from the country’s brutish military junta. And, indeed, the generals locked up dissidents, shot protesting monks, and kept Suu Kyi and other NLD leaders under house arrest for another six years.
Brazil storm Christ the Redeemer
The Brazil Syndrome
Renowned economist Anders Åslund engages the views of Dani Rodrik, Nouriel Roubini, Joseph Stiglitz, and others on the growing turmoil in emerging markets.
PS On Point: Your review of the world’s leading opinions on global issues.
It is clear, however, that the regime’s leaders saw the writing on the wall. They knew that they could not continue to sustain their power through violence and oppression, as that would ultimately cause their regime to collapse under the weight of international sanctions and isolation. What they did not anticipate was the speed at which economic and political liberalization would gain momentum. Almost as soon as genuine economic and political reforms were launched in 2011, the costs of rolling back the effort became unthinkably high for Myanmar’s military. (Courtesy of Project Syndicate)
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