Taipei — EVA Airways Corp. (EVA), Taiwan’s second largest carrier, announced Thursday it will operate three Taipei-Yangon flights per week starting Oct. 9 to reflect increasing trade and travel exchanges between Taiwan and Myanmar. (more…)

At a Singapore investment conference this week, Burmese officials renewed their call for foreign oil and gas companies to explore 23 new offshore blocks. (more…)

Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg says that European Union economic sanctions against Burma will likely be ended permanently in the next few years when democratic reform is deemed “irreversible.” (more…)

Washington – The U.S. Senate Finance Committee on Wednesday voted to keep pressure on Myanmar to continue economic and political reforms by extending a U.S. ban on imports from the resource-rich Southeast Asian nation for three more years. (more…)

(Commentary) – On a dark and rainy morning on July 19, 1947, hit men sent by Galon U Saw shot past the People’s Volunteer Organizations guards and sprayed bullets into the Governor’s Executive Council, as Aung San, the architect of Burma’s imminent freedom, rose to his feet; instantly killing almost the entire pre-independence cabinet. (more…)

The government should review the Myanmar-China oil and gas pipeline projects as the economic return to society as the income from the right-of-way is “unjustifiably small”, according to an opposition MP and an activist. (more…)

American oil and gas companies are now free to suck out Burma’s resources along with global corporations. President Obama gave US companies the green light to invest in Burma and work with the notorious State-owned MOGE, the Myanma Oil and Gas Enterprise on Wednesday. (more…)

Mai Ja Yang—While Burma’s nominally civilian government has received widespread praise from the international community for releasing a large number of political prisoners earlier this year, including famed student leaders Min Ko Naing and Ko Ko Gyi, a surge in the arrest of Kachin civilians has gone largely unreported. (more…)

UN aid workers say the health situation in Burma’s northern Arakan (Rakhine) State is becoming “desperate.” (more…)

MPs in Burma’s Lower House are pushing for stronger anti-corruption laws at all levels of government. (more…)

Refugee rights activists say Bangladesh is acting against international humanitarian law in turning back Rohingya refugees from Myanmar. However, Dhaka says it is doing nothing wrong and must put its own people first. (more…)

Thailand’s state-controlled energy company PTT said it will invest up to $3bn in Myanmar as part of its ambitious global expansion, in one of the most substantial foreign investments since the reformist government of Thein Sein took power 16 months ago. (more…)

Fast food giants Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) and McDonalds could soon be on the menu in Burma, industry experts said on Monday. (more…)

A U.S. Senate investigation into lax controls at HSBC found a number of transactions involving Myanmar slipped through the bank, despite U.S. sanctions that restricted bank transactions involving the country. (more…)

Burma’s crumbling public transport system is set for a major overhaul with 3,000 new buses to be imported from Japan this year under a joint initiative. (more…)

Much fanfare greeted the arrival at Narita in September 2010 of the first Burmese refugees to take advantage of Japan’s decision to join the U.N.’s third-country resettlement program. Japan was the first Asian country to join the program, it was emphasized, under which the country would take in “less than 100″ refugees from camps along the Thai-Myanmar border each year. Some refugee advocates even dared to believe that the move might mark the start of a trend toward a more humanitarian approach to applications for refugee status by those fleeing conflict or poverty. (more…)

Washington — The United States on Monday urged Myanmar to ensure transparency and human rights as US companies made a rare trip to explore business in a nation coming off decades of sanctions. (more…)

A U.S.-based advocacy group says Burmese democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi will travel to New York in September to receive its Global Citizen Award. (more…)

In the past few months, various media reports have quoted some concerns and opinions of KESAN regarding the ongoing peace process in Burma. This statement clarifies and expands upon these issues. (more…)

Burma is vulnerable to natural disasters and humanitarian crises. The worst recent natural disaster, Cyclone Nargis, struck Burma on May 2-3, 2008. Around 140,000 people lost their lives and 2.4 million people were severely affected. On Oct. 22, 2010, in Arakan State, Cyclone Giri left 45 people dead and affected the lives of some 260,000 people. (more…)