Burmese Language
US wary of Burma reshuffle
The United States reacted cautiously Tuesday after Burma’s prime minister, General Thein Sein, and 22 other ministers last week retired from their military posts and the premier created a new party.
“It may be seen as a possible positive step, but we’ll be guided by the actions that Burma takes,” state department spokesman Philip Crowley told reporters.
President Barack Obama’s administration, which has begun engaging diplomatically with Burma, said it will judge the regime on “whether it opens up,” whether or not the resignations amount to “wolves changing to sheep’s clothing.”
On 26 April, General Thein Sein and some 22 other ministers retired from their military posts in a move seen as converting the leadership to civilian status ahead of elections due this year.
Four days after the announcements, state media reported that Thein Sein applied to form a new political party, the Union Solidarity and Development Party.
“What Burma needs to do is to open up real, genuine political space, not just for ex-generals, but also for all people who want to participate constructively in Burmese society,” Crowley said.
“That’s what they need to do, and that’s what they have been reluctant to do,” he added.
Crowley recalled US criticism of a new election law which he said fell short of international standards.
Under new election laws unveiled March 10, Myanmar opposition icon Aung San Suu Kyi faced exclusion from her own party and was barred from standing in the polls along with other political prisoners.
“Burma has to open up political space. It has to have a meaningful dialogue with, you know, all of its ethnic groups within Burma,” Crowley said.
“If these individuals transforming themselves from generals to civilians can open up that space, then that we would truly see as a positive step,” he said.
Tags: Elections, thein sein, US
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They are SNAKES: Like their kicked-out mentor, Ne Win!!!
same old army generals with diffrent dress n diffrent titles. from general to U now
Obama administartion is like a fresh graduate, excited, enthsiatic but no accomplishment except screw up. He will end up his presidency by strenghthening rouge nations and create terrorist world. He is Jimmy Carter ver 1.1.
It will be difficult at this point for the Obama administration to make up for the lost time which their inane Burma dialogue policies have wasted at this critical turning point in Burmese history.
Attempting dialogue with the SPDC was like feeding a cow to a pack of wolves and then saying “from now on, we would like you to eat only vegetables”.
President Obama should have been better informed, and whoever was his advisor on Burma should be fired immediately, even if it was Hillary Clinton.
Even as Aung San Suu Kyi was elected, imprisoned, and awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, she knew that the outside world was ignorant to the suffering in Burma, and that the corporations of the free world were drooling to get their greedy paws on Burmese natural resources. Even worse, she knew that many Burmese citizens who were caught-up at that time with the economy and their own political rights, were unaware of the unending human rights atrocities which were being ordered by the SLORC and committed by the Burma army against innocent ethnic minority CITIZENS of Burma.
I think Daw Suu must have also (correctly) seen the Nobel prize as a preemptive move by the Nobel Committee to preserve the “peace” in Burma by nullifying her calls for massive nonviolent Gandhian protests which the SLORC/SPDC would have ruthlessly put-down with uber-violence.
After twenty years, the free world corporations are still drooling, and the SPDC has perfected the arts of political repression and ethnic persecution to make Burma the perfect storm of greed, fear, revenge, and corruption.
It would be foolish to think that the SPDC and the puppet democracy they will command after this election will EVER give up their power to the Burmese citizens whom they oppress. It is equally foolish to believe they will EVER give the Burmese people more than crumbs of the economy and the massive wealth they steal from Burma’s resources.
Least acknowledged and most importantly, it is extremely doubtful that the SPDC’s lust for perpetual revenge, persecution and enslavement of Burmese ethnic minority CITIZENS behind the Bamboo Curtain will EVER be satiated.
Nonetheless, based on the Nobel Peace Prizes awarded to Al Gore and Barack Obama, watch for Than Shwe to be the front-runner for next years’ Nobel Peace Prize.
(Invest in Burmese stone-cutting futures, all those statues of Buddha will be getting re-carved to Than Shwe’s likeness)
Obama got Peace Prize for Mullahs and Dictactors, not for democractic struggles.
You can change your clothes but you can never change who you are, Thitsaphout Than Shwe and Thein Sein are changing deck chairs and their ship is going down with all hands apparently they have never seen the Titanic. Thitsaphout Than Shwe’s illegal regime is guilty of murder torture rape slavery, and unlawful imprisonment. These are crimes the world just can’t ignore the people of Burma deserve justice, Than Shwe and Thein Sein and their compatriot’s in crime must stand trial for crimes against humanity. Military intervention in Burma seems to be the only answer to stop Than Shwe’s inhumanity to his own people.