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Junta move a ruse: Suu Kyi party

SINGAPORE: Nobel Peace Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD) has expressed “concern” over the Myanmar junta’s move to hold a referendum on a new “undemocratic constitution” and general elections on that basis.

And, the National Council of the Union of Burma (NCUB), an umbrella group of Myanmar dissidents in exile, has cautioned that the international community “should not be fooled by this time-buying tactic” of the military ruler, Senior General Than Shwe, and his State Peace and Development Council (SPDC).

However, Singapore, Chair of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), on Sunday said the SPDC’s move was “a positive development.” The comment was laced with an explicit “hope that the Myanmar Government will ensure that the political process is an inclusive one that would lead to peaceful national reconciliation in the country.”

Myanmar is a member of the 10-nation ASEAN; and the hope of an “inclusive process” is the diplomatic code in regional circles for the suggestion that the SPDC allow the NLD and Ms. Suu Kyi, still under house arrest, to participate in any democracy-restoring exercise.

The centrepieces of the SPDC’s plans, unveiled on Saturday are: a referendum on a new constitution in May, follow-up multi-party elections in 2010, reservation of 25 per cent parliamentary seats for the military, and the junta’s right to nominate key ministers and veto Parliament decisions and also impose martial law, if considered necessary.

NLD spokesman U. Nyan Win told The Hindu from Yangon there was “no discussion about this referendum [plan]” and the elections in the four rounds of talks the SPDC’s liaison officer, appointed by Sr. Gen. Than Shwe, held with Ms. Suu Kyi since last October.

Mr. Nyan Win said the NLD was “very concerned [and] very surprised” at this turn of events.

“It is very early to say” what course the party should now chart, he said. NCUB spokesman Soe Aung, told The Hindu from Prague that the SPDC should “first release Ms. Suu Kyi and ethnic leaders [from prison] and stop the military offensive [against ‘insurgents’] in eastern Burma.”

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