Burmese Activist Urges Stronger U.S. Sanctions

Maung Maung, a Burmese activist who charted democracy protests from the Thai-Burmese border this summer, yesterday urged the Congressional Human Rights Caucus to pursue stronger sanctions against the country's military government, saying the generals had not succeeded in suppressing the uprising.

In an interview Wednesday night, Maung Maung said that thousands of Buddhist monks sent home to their villages from seminaries in the cities after the military junta's lethal crackdown had begun protesting again, in small but organized groups. Their targets, as before, are elevated fuel prices and the lack of democratic freedoms.

"They went back [home] with this thing in their hearts, and they are now in areas where they can move faster than the military," he said.

Maung Maung, secretary general of the National Council of the Union of Burma, has been helping organize resistance to the government since he went into exile in 1988. He left after being fired from the Ministry of Mines for organizing union members to protest in the streets, he said.

On Wednesday, about 100 monks demonstrated in Pakkaku, in central Burma, against a steep rise in fuel prices. On Oct. 26, about 250 people from all walks of life protested near Mudon, in the south, to pressure the government to release all political prisoners.

Maung Maung said 3,000 people were detained during the August-September demonstrations. "Prominent leaders of the '88 student movement have been arrested," he added. "Yet the majority are still in place within Rangoon and in communication with the rest of the movement." Hundreds of protesters arrived in camps on the Thai border in August and September to exchange ideas before returning, he said.

"The clock of injustice is ticking. It is only a matter of time for the regime," Maung Maung told the human rights caucus. He asked the United States to help by squeezing the military government financially and by using advanced technology to monitor human rights violations by Burmese forces. The Bush administration this month widened sanctions.

Maung Maung commended caucus co-chairman Tom Lantos (D-Calif.) and Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) for helping refer a bill on the Burmese jade trade to the Judiciary and the Ways and Means committees.

If the bill is enacted, a list of Burmese officials will be prohibited from entering the United States and their U.S.-related assets will be frozen, according to a lawyer familiar with the bill. American institutions or individuals helping them will also be subject to confiscation of assets and be deprived of any tax credit equal to the sum of income earned from Burmese enterprises. Any gems originating in Burma will be banned from import into the United States.

In the interview Wednesday, Maung Maung said the country's revenue from gas, rubies, teak, timber, rice, gas, uranium and diamonds is being pilfered for the personal enrichment of junta members or their families.

The Union of Myanmar Economic Holdings, a company set up and owned by the military, has a monopoly on the country's gem-mining business. The enterprise's profits go directly to the military, Maung Maung said. "Even the air, they own it," he added.

Tay Za, a businessman who is close to Burma's top general, is busy trying to acquire nuclear technology, purportedly for medical uses, Maung Maung said.

Tay Za also owns Air Pagan, an airline established this year. "Shortly afterward, the previous Myanmar International Airways collapsed," Maung Maung said. "This is how they do things."

Still, there is disgruntlement among the military. Of the country's 400,000 troops, 4,000 deserted this year, including some senior officers, Maung Maung said, and only 1,000 personnel have been recruited recently.

By his account, senior officers are beginning to grumble about social issues and about the way the military is being run, as they see only the top echelons growing affluent. "Soldiers have no footwear at the front lines, while officers who are high up are very rich," he said.