August 12: The 5th Column

Burma’s ruling military junta is making headlines again. The hardline regime’s continued detention of Aung San Suu Kyi and its failure to move towards democratic reform roused United States Secretary of State Colin Powell’s rebuke during July’s Asean Regional Forum in Jakarta, underscoring America’s enduring irritation with the junta. Meanwhile, the
European Union plans to dispatch an envoy to Rangoon in a last-gasp effort to rescue the October Asia-Europe meeting in Hanoi. The EU has threatened to boycott the annual meeting if Burma participates.

But two items have been mysteriously absent from these upbraidings. One concerns the general inability of the United Nations’ special envoy to Burma, Razali Ismail from Malaysia, to broker a truce to the political stalemate more than four years into his mission. The other is the lack of a UN-sponsored independent investigation into the May 2003 bloody attack on Suu Kyi’s convoy, which resulted in the killing of as many as 100 of her supporters. The U.S. State Department has said government-sponsored “thugs” led the attack.

The U.S. and the EU had high hopes for Razali, who replaced Alvaro de Soto as the UN envoy in April 2000. Regionally, his close rapport with then-Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad was widely viewed as a diplomatic asset. Mahathir had pushed hard for Burma’s 1997 entrance into Asean, and it was thought Razali could use that social capital to push the junta towards reform.

But the junta’s continued intransigence and human-rights abuses likely caused Mahathir in July 2003 to take a diplomatic U-turn and broach the possibility of ousting Burma from the regional grouping. Razali’s general ineffectiveness likely is linked to Mahathir’s change in temperament, leading the Burmese regime to spurn Razali’s recent advances. On a number of occasions, the junta has even denied Razali’s requests to enter the country for meetings.

At the start of Razali’s mission, many thought democratic change was on the horizon after it was revealed that he had been leading secret national reconciliation talks between senior junta members and Suu Kyi. That euphoria has since evaporated.

In Razali’s defence, the military government was never going to be an amenable lot to deal with. The generals have made promises they haven’t kept, and the recent staging of a national convention to prepare a new constitution nominally aimed at moving the country towards a democratic transition has proved to be more theatre than substance.

Ultimately, political change in Burma will need to come from within. American-led investment and trade sanctions have severely weakened the Burmese economy, but the trickle-down effect has hit Burma’s citizens more than its generals. National morale is also so low that some local Burmese quietly pine for U.S. military intervention. On the heels of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, some optimistic corners in Rangoon held out hope that Burma’s plight might attract the attention of the interventionist Bush administration. Some continue to see this as acceptable, despite the strong possibility of civilian casualties. The reality, however, is that
America is highly unlikely to put its military on the line in a situation without any U.S. strategic interests. Indeed, such hopes in Rangoon only show the desperation of people who can’t see realistic measures they can take on their own.

In July, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said he was reassessing his strategy towards Burma, and that he had consulted with Western governments to discuss new levers to press the junta into action. These levers may include pressuring the EU to adopt an import ban similar to Washington’s, as the current unilateral approach has proven inadequate in damaging the junta. More importantly, the UN could try to coax regional actors, such as Thailand, to lead the push for change in Burma. Thus far, Thailand has given the Burmese junta the benefit of the doubt concerning its alleged sincerity towards reform. But with a resurgent HIV/Aids epidemic looming, a continued spillover of Burmese migrants into Thailand as well as a drug scourge fuelled largely by narcotics from Burma, Thailand might be persuaded that the time is right to begin carving out a solution in Burma.

While foreign military intervention is highly doubtful, other strategies do exist that could effect change in Burma. One bold step in that direction would be the replacement of Razali Ismail with a new UN representative better able to strong-arm Burma’s generals.

The writer is a former correspondent for the Chiang Mai-based Irrawaddy newsmagazine