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We’re just days away from 2010 – a defining year for Burma, as we witness the
opposition composed of ethnics and pro democracy movement. have to admit that they
have been soundly beaten. First, they lost is in the battle fields and very lately in the
diplomatic arena, where the Junta scored a major victory of recognition without yielding
an inch from the Western countries who claims to be the defender of Democracy and
Human Rights. Now, the Junta is going to be legitimized by its phony elections.
The Burmese regime has claimed to hold a new election in 2010 to facilitate a formation
of a civil-military government in accordance with the military-orchestrated constitution
with a rigged referendum. The prospect of the new election is a moral and strategic
dilemma to the democratic movement, especially the NLD and its supporters who are
entrenched in upholding their eighteen-year-old election. Will the moderates group
participate or not seems to be the key factor in deciding the authenticity of the elections.
That is why the Euro Burma Office, Director said, “For the people inside, they cannot
avoid casting votes and if they don’t have their own candidates, then they will have to
choose the Junta’s candidates. Or better if they could set up their own parties, hoping
some of their candidates will win some seats. It’s up to each locality to decide for itself,
and is not a question of opportunity or survival but depends on planning. It’s not the
resistance armies that will suffer if fighting resumes, but it is the people who suffer,
because when there is war, the Burma Army always pick on the people, not the
resistance.”
This is but one way of encouraging the moderates. View internationally, the Burmese
pro-democracy movement was merely a moral case and moral concern which is usually
inferior to strategic needs in international relations and one could be compared to the
Free Tibet Campaign that seems to share the same fate. Both movements have been
remarkably successful in awareness campaigns and then come to a full stop. They
managed to mobilize international support in transnational causes but failed to realise
that it has to be followed up by pursuing the international authorities. The actual policy
making depends on the willingness and capability of the international powers and the
international system. Sadly, both the Diaspora democracy movement and the ethnics
leaders could not comprehend the situation and have little or no knowledge about
economic incentives and the country`s resources to play with, that are so crucial in the
international scene. Lamentably the opposition groups are unable to learn the lessons
from Iraq where US allotted $100 if compared to Burma not even $10 including the care
of refugees and IDPs.
President Obama and his strategic advisors acknowledge that the extension of US
power has reached a critical threshold. The US has become a declining power in the
face of a rising China, Russia and India. The US economy is largely interdependent with
the Asian economy. The combination of Japanese and Chinese ownership of US debt
has reached 45%t of US Treasury securities. In addition, the military gap is narrowing. A
study conducted by the RAND Corporation, an influential think-tank, concludes the
Chinese military could defeat US forces in the Taiwan Strait, if the US attempted to deter
a Chinese offensive to reclaim Taiwan. Russia has fielded its latest S-400 air-defence
system far superior than the US’s second-generation Patriot missile system. Hence
Obama realizes that the most effective approach to totalitarian countries is the utilization
of ‘soft power,’ which calls for friendliness rather than coercion and the end result was
that the Junta’s representative Thein Sein sat smiling besides Obama in S`pore. The
other Western countries like the EU are bound to follow the American lead.
For one thing, Obama clearly wants to distinguish himself from George W. Bush, who
badly tainted the human rights agenda by linking it to the war in Iraq and by adopting an
overly moralistic, evangelical tone about democracy. Will P resident Obama be forcefully
advocating democracy abroad if he believes that negotiating about human rights behind
the scenes works better than bullying in public, since it permits nasty regimes to save
face while, at least theoretically, allowing them to quietly make concessions? It seems
that the president seems to believe that, no matter how brutal a government he is
dealing with, he can find common cause.
Though the Bush administration established a deputy national security adviser for global
democracy strategy, Obama’s National Security Council structure has explicitly
downgraded the role of democracy specialists. And some parts of the government seem
to be backing away from even the word “Democracy.” What more proof is wanted when
Obama’s administration became the first since 1991 not to meet with the Dalai Lama,
even privately, when the Tibetan leader was in Washington last October?
On matters of democracy and human rights, past presidents have wielded the bully
pulpit to impressive effect, sometimes winning the release of high-profile dissidents e.g.
after Bush highlighted the case of Ayman Nour, the most prominent Egyptian dissident,
in early 2005, Hosni Mubarak’s government released him from jail even though he is
locked up again. After much rhetoric of Obama and Clinton about the new Burma policy,
the American delegate lead by Assistant Secretary of East Asia and Pacific Kurt
Campbell who went to Burma never uttered a word for the release of Daw Aung San
Suu Kyi. Sadly the American Nobel Laureate has failed his duty to the Burmese Nobel
Laureate.