Press Release
Statement of Philippine Senator Aquilino Pimentel, AIPMC Vice-President,
at the International Conference of Japanese Diet Members and ASEAN Parliamentarians,
Yotsuya Kumin Centre, Tokyo, Japan
May 22, 2007

DEMOCRACY WORKS FOR ASEAN COUNTRIES:
IT SHOULD WORK FOR BURMA, TOO

Mr. Chairman, Distinguished Members of the Diet, Friends and Supporters of Burma, Ladies and Gentlemen:

Let me once again thank all of you for manifesting your interest in addressing Burmas plight by your attendance at this conference.

Today we will suggest some ways to assist Burma in her democratization.

Why democratize?

But why does Burma need to democratize?

Burma needs to democratize because, among other things, it has been ruled since 17 years ago by a military junta that has forcibly replaced the freely elected government in 1990.

Burma needs to democratize because it is not fair that the military junta should in effect be allowed to continue forcing itself upon the hapless peoples of the country simply because they have the gun.

Burma needs to democratize because the barbaric rule of the military junta is creating a humanitarian crisis for its people and threatens the stability of the region.

Refugees

Today, for instance, Burma is the worlds third largest source of refugees after Afghanistan and Iraq. By the end of 2005, some 700,000 Burmese refugees had fled their country.

The refugees are hobbled by all sorts of ailments. They also meet instances of mistreatment at the hands of immigration and government agencies of neighboring countries when crossing borders. And after they successfully enter the countries of asylum, many children and elderly men and women fall ill, sometimes fatally, due to the rigors of the escape, the lack of hygienic living conditions, lack of food and other necessities.

It goes without saying that most of the children who make it across the Burmese borders alive are then raised in refugee camps. That means being deprived of the basic needs of education, health and social care that other children in the more fortunate countries could expect to come their way as a matter of course.

Conflict and drugs

Burma is also the battle ground of the worlds longest-running war. The regime has been prolonging a war against the ethnic Karen by targeting unarmed civilian communities. The effects of the turmoil impacts on neighboring countries and inevitably affect the region's stability. The war has been dragging on in this ASEAN front yard for roughly 60 years.

Burma continues to be the main amphetamine producer in Southeast Asia and the second largest opium producer in the world. Thus, individual ASEAN States face a public health crisis arising from drug abuse and addiction brought about mainly by drugs produced in and trafficked from Burma.

Going Nuclear?

More recently, Burma has threatened to embark on a nuclear program. Russia plans to help the military junta in Burma to build a 10-mega watt nuclear reactor.

Should the plans push through, it would be a recipe for disaster in a country like Burma where there is no rule of law that demands accountability of its rulers and where education, health and safety are not priorities of the government.

Regional stability threatened

Moreover, the mismanagement of Burmas internal affairs by the military junta has created scores of trans-national security problems that undermine the stability of the region, itself. The military junta, for instance, has done almost nothing to address the dire internal health situation and the social disasters they have caused.

The people of Burma, for instance, are struggling to cope with the ravages of infectious diseases such as HIV/AIDS. As mentioned earlier, millions of Burmese have made an exodus to neighboring countries to escape the harsh life inflicted upon them. The lack of proper health care and the misallocation of resources to address just this health issue alone within Burma trouble the neighboring countries which receive daily streams of Burmese asylum seekers. Inevitably, the untreated illnesses of the refugees are unwittingly transmitted to their hosts.

Red Cross shut down

Ironically, the military junta limits the scale of international humanitarian assistance that seeks to curb the spread of diseases. Many offices of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Burma have had to shut down their operations due to the meddlesome restrictions of the junta. This is true also of other international aid agencies.

It is fitting to interject here that the whole world applauds the generous humanitarian aid that Japan has extended and is extending to the ill fated people of Burma.

Humanitarian aid

In this context, I take the liberty of using the European Community definition of the term humanitarian aid to avoid confusion. It says: The aim of humanitarian aid is to provide help to people in third (world) countries, who have been victims of natural disasters (earthquakes, floods, droughts, hurricanes), or man-made disasters (wars, conflicts, outbreaks of fighting) or structural crises (severe political, economic or social breakdowns). The focus is mainly on providing goods and services (e.g. food supplies, medicine, vaccinations, water conveyance, psychological support, minesweeping, clothes, shelter, rehabilitation). xxx Its sole aim is to prevent or relieve human suffering. This assistance is directed mainly towards vulnerable people xxx. A key point is that it is accorded to victims without discrimination on the grounds of race, religion, sex, age, nationality or political affiliation. Humanitarian aid decisions are to be taken impartially and solely according to the victims' needs and interests. Rehab of flooded areas Measured by this definition, the aid granted this year by Japan to rehabilitate the October 2006 flooded areas of Kyaukse District in the Mandalay Division is a humanitarian aid. Last year, Japan has also granted munificent assistance to Burmese hospitals. The aid to the hospitals may not fall strictly speaking within the definition of humanitarian aid as defined by the European Community. Still, I believe that the assistance may, in fact, be appreciated by the people of Burma.

Examples

From the list of projects funded by the Japanese government in 2006, I focused on 10 such items.

I refer to the funds given by Japanese government to the Myanmar regime last year (1) to acquire medical equipment for hospitals; (2) to combat polio and malaria; (3) to provide safe water supply, and (4) to improve maternal and child health care services. The 10 projects cost something like US$3,466,282.

Normally, there should be nothing wrong with the kind of assistance mentioned above that Japan has extended to Burma. The problem is that the circumstances obtaining in Burma today are as discussed earlier - far from normal.

Assist the people, not their oppressors

At this point, I beg the indulgence of the participants of this conference to advert to a facet of our experience in the struggle against the martial law regime in my country.

I would like to mention that when we were fighting for our liberties against the martial law regime, we begged our friends from abroad in this wise: If you want to help us, please do not give any assistance to the martial law government that would only strengthen it at the expense of our struggle for freedom and democracy. Your humanitarian aid, however, is most welcome. But please give it directly to the people who need it; not to the government that would use it merely to placate the very people who it actually oppresses.

We even asked the US specifically not to give economic and military aid to the Marcos regime.

Non-humanitarian

It is from this perspective that I ask that you will please forgive me if I expressed my doubts that the upgrading of the facilities of the Rangoon International Airport or the construction of the Baluchaung hydro-power plants, roads, bridges, and even schools and dormitories and the sponsoring of film festivals or judo sports contests could be excused as humanitarian assistance. Neither could the assistance granted by Japan to Burma last year for national planning and economic development nor the grants for cultural purposes or the funds for the production of liquor from buckwheat be deemed humanitarian aid.

In passing, let me say that the problem is that the kind of 'aid' mentioned above tends to strengthen the ruling junta more directly without in any way adjusting or correcting the unjust political structure that perpetuates the oppression of the Burmese people.

Change needed urgently

That said, the case for the immediate democratization of Burma imposes itself for our consideration. I suggest that this is not an impossible task. Burmas fellow ASEAN members also had problems with authoritarian rulers in the not-too-distant past.

Indonesia, for instance, was once faced with a predicament similar to that which now burdens Burma. But it has since come a long way and in 2004 conducted its first direct presidential elections. My colleague from Indonesia, Ms Nursyahbani will elaborate on this point.

The economic success stories of Singapore and Malaysia and the scintillating example of Cambodia in their audacious assimilation of the democratic spirit and the manifest stirrings for freedom and democracy that are palpable in the people in the rest of ASEAN are sufficient evidence that democratizing Burma is the right thing to do.

Philippine unwelcome interlude

There is one other democratic experiment that I would like to cite briefly. And that is our democratic experience in my own country, the Philippines. Our ASEAN colleagues, however, may not find it a convenient model for emulation. The reason is that we, in the Philippines, have had democratic governance since the turn of the last century, an experience that other ASEAN countries do not have.

Still, I suggest that Burma can learn from it because as I intimated earlier we had an unwelcome interlude in democratic governance in 1972 when President Ferdinand Marcos placed the country under martial law.

We had a very difficult time trying to regain our democratic moorings. But in 1986, we did succeed to peacefully end the martial law regime and bring back the country to its democratic path.

No to non-humanitarian aid

If we succeeded in ousting the dictator, it was mainly due to the persistence of the Filipino people in pushing for the restoration of our liberties and the pressure exerted on Marcos by foreign governments. Many of those governments, including the United States of America, eventually threatened to hold back non-humanitarian aid military and economic if Marcos used force to stay in power. In the end, Marcos had to decamp from the presidential palace and go to exile in Hawaii.

Incidentally, we have just held our senatorial, congressional and local government elections last May 14. And while we have had almost a century of experience electing our leaders, still, I can honestly say that elections by themselves do not a democracy make. Democracy is, I think, always a work in progress.

Elections but a step

The elections are, therefore, but a step a most important one, no doubt - towards the establishment of genuine democracy in any country. But there are other obstacles to overcome democratically including massive poverty, poor maintenance of law and order, and bad governance. Nonetheless, we look to the elections in my country as a way to change or retain those who manage the affairs of government.

Never easy

That said, historically, the struggle for democracy has never been an easy one. Burmas situation validates the observation.

It is heartening to note, however, that the effort to democratize Burma is backed up by many countries and individuals from within ASEAN and is supported by other nations around the world. The sacrifices of Aung San Suu Kyi, and her comrades, have not gone unnoticed. In fact, their unceasing opposition to the ruling junta is well appreciated by freedom-loving citizens in every nook and corner of the globe and they continue to inspire us, in ASEAN, as well.

Common regional values

My dear friends: ASEAN is an organization that upholds regional values. Peace, economic growth, social progress and cultural development in the region are goals that the bloc wants to achieve.

At the moment, the junta that rules Burma mocks the goals of ASEAN by abhorring the Rule of Law, shunning the principles of justice and abusing the human rights of their own people.

ASEAN, however, is not deterred or discouraged by the haughty attitude of the Myanmar regime. With increasing pluralism and parliamentary activism in Indonesia, Philippines, Cambodia, Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia, among other States in the bloc, the core democratic values of ASEAN are now coming to the fore. We are showing the world that we can take our nations to greater heights by adhering to democratic principles rather than by negating them.

As far as the people of Burma are concerned, we believe that they are entitled to aspire for a better tomorrow. Like their counterparts in the rest of ASEAN, they deserve higher standards of life. They have the right to participate in working for solutions to whatever ails their country, to earn a decent living, to believe that as human beings, they ought to be free.

Appeal to Japan

It is incumbent, then, upon ASEAN to vigorously support the democratization of Burma in the hope that its aspirations for the region to enjoy regional peace, sustainable economic development and a comprehensive regional security would someday soon become a reality for all its member-states.

Thus, we appeal to Japan to continue with your efforts to help democratize Burma. We applaud and thank the Japanese leadership, particularly, for voting last year to place Burma on the United Nations Security Council agenda. While we did not attain what we hoped for a Security Council resolution calling on the Ruling Junta to restore the freedoms of the Burmese people we are still grateful that in that attempt we had the support of Japan, an indispensable leader of the ASEAN+3 regional bloc and other well-meaning nations.

It is our hope that before the year ends the UNSC will support the adoption of an appropriate resolution on Burma that calls for its democratization.

Thanks to Koizumi

As I end, may I take this opportunity to acknowledge the kind expression of support made by Japans former Prime Minister, the Honorable Junichiro Koizumi, for the release of Daw Suu Kyi. He recently signed an appeal to that end along with other global ex-presidents and ex-prime ministers.

Speaking up

Finally, I salute the courageous people of Burma because despite the dangers they face, they continue to act and speak up for democracy, justice and peace for their beloved country. They are unflinching in their search for freedom because they know that without it, all their other rights would be meaningless.

Liberty, it is said, is indivisible. As individuals who enjoy our basic freedoms in our own countries, we owe it to the people of Burma to help them attain their basic rights and liberties now.

Thank you.

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