Judges to rule over pro-democracy activist’s fate after her lawyers filed petition against her detention (more…)

United Nations staff have been allowed to leave the Kokang region in northeastern Burma after being blocked by Burmese troops during recent fighting with an armed ethnic group. (more…)

New Delhi – The veteran ethnic Shan politician Shwe Ohn, who will contest the forthcoming 2010 general elections, said that he would forge an alliance with a group of persons known as the Third Force. (more…)

BEIJING — China is Myanmar’s closest ally — almost its only one. It is Myanmar’s chief defender in international forums, its major weapons supplier, its largest foreign investor and a crucial backer of its ruling military junta. (more…)

Chaing Mai – The Thai government has issued a passport to a Burmese boy born in Thailand so that he can join the origami plane competition to be held in Japan soon. (more…)

BANGKOK — The International Labour Organisation (ILO) is turning its attention to a western corner of military-ruled Burma to end the scourge of forced labor, which remains rampant in most parts of the Southeast Asian nation. (more…)

BEIJING – The United Nations refugee agency on Friday urged China to grant it access to the Myanmar border, where thousands of people have fled over the past week from fighting between Myanmar’s army and rebels.  (more…)

When it comes to the Burmese sector of the Golden Triangle, it is difficult to say who are the good guys and who are the bad guys. This is partly because they are all equally bad. As long as anybody can recall, the triangle has never been for the faint of heart. Wa headhunters, communist insurgents, opium warlords, heroin traffickers, Chinese crime syndicates and the Burmese military government – one of the most condemned regimes in the world – all play for keeps.

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THE recent decision by Burma’s government to sentence pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi to a further 18 months’ house arrest shows how difficult it is to deal with that country’s ruling generals. Yet the first steps toward a new approach may already have been taken. (more…)