The UN Human Rights envoy urged Rangoon on Friday to show greater political resolve to reform the country, calling for an open dialogue with all parties and the creation of a freer political environment. 

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The US State Department defended its annual human trafficking report against accusations that it is a political tool used by Washington to pressure target countries, with one author Friday insisting its findings are impartial. 

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Aung San Suu Kyi’s supporters plan protests around the world to mark her 60th birthday Sunday, demonstrating outside Myanmar‘s embassies in a dozen countries to demand her release from two years’ house arrest. 

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Officials, former leaders and prominent organisations in Europe added their voices Friday to a call on Myanmar‘s ruling junta to release democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi as she prepared to mark her 60th birthday under house arrest.  (more…)

Hopes and expectations are high among Burmese refugees, as the survey comes to an end striving to find out a durable solution to their living condition. 

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Police on Thursday arrested 110 illegal immigrants from Myanmar in northern Thailand, a local newspaper reported on Friday. 

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Malaysia‘s former premier Mahathir Mohamad, who while in power was an important ally of Myanmar‘s junta, on Friday called on the ruling generals to release democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi. 

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Myanmar will have to tell fellow Southeast Asian nations next month whether it will insist on taking its turn to lead ASEAN in 2006, the regional group’s secretary-general said in an interview aired Friday. 

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Government bungling makes cars a rare luxury 

For outsiders used to the gridlocked cities of South-East Asia, Yangon‘s leafy and uncongested boulevards make a pleasant change. For locals, however, they are just another reminder of the incompetence of their military rulers. The 5m inhabitants of the city own just 152,533 cars, say official statistics, or three cars for every 100 people. By contrast, some 3m vehicles ply the roads of Bangkok, in neighbouring Thailand. Myanmar‘s relative poverty must account for much of the difference, of course. But that poverty stems, in large part, from ludicrous government policies such as those governing the import and sale of cars.  (more…)