On Myanmar -- The only country that made me cry

Sudarsono says elections in Myanmar wouldn’t reduce Army’s role


JAKARTA, Bloomberg
Defense Minister Juwono Sudarsono said forcing Myanmar to hold elections wouldn't reduce the role of the military, even as the United Nations asked the ruling junta to agree to a timetable for political change.

The world can't force a system “that is alien to the local culture,” Sudarsono, 65, said in an interview in Jakarta. “For all its faults, the military at the moment remains the unifying force and covers most of the levers of power, political, economic and also cultural.”

International pressure on Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, has increased after General Than Shwe's regime cracked down on the biggest anti-government demonstrations in almost 20 years in September, resulting in more than 100 deaths, according to the UN. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations, of which Myanmar is a member, has refused to impose sanctions on the military, which has been shunned by western nations over its human rights record.

“I don't think ASEAN is very serious about addressing the issue of Myanmar,” said Hiro Katsumata, an analyst at Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies.

In the interview, Sudarsono said that elections in Burma could be one way of moving toward democracy. “But it must be followed by (the new government) having the levers of power, political, administrative as well as economic,” Sudarsono said.

ASEAN is keen to keep Myanmar in its fold and avoid allowing China to expand its influence in the Indian Ocean, Katsumata said.

“If Myanmar is spurned by ASEAN and looks toward China ASEAN will loose out in its geopolitical interest and influence,'' Katsumata said.

Myanmar, which has been ruled by the junta for 45 years, shares its border with China, India and ASEAN members such as Thailand. The nation walked out of the Non-Aligned Movement in 1979 and only returned when Indonesia took over chairmanship of the organization in 1992.

“We have been engaging Myanmar persuasively and quietly to implement its own road to democracy as distinct from the west's sanctions,'' said Ali Alatas, an adviser to President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and a former foreign minister. Still, “both the sanctions approach as well as the ASEAN approach have failed to move the Myanmar government.''

Myanmar has been under international sanctions since it rejected the results of elections in 1990 won by Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party. Suu Kyi, 62, has spent 12 years detention since then.

“There is a need for a transition period in which, in some way, the military would play a power-sharing role and gradually get out of the picture, as happened in Indonesia,'' said Alatas, who was the UN's special envoy to Myanmar in 2005. Indonesia was controlled by its military from 1965 to 1998.

Lawmakers from seven countries urged ASEAN to impose sanctions on Myanmar and also called on the group to adopt a strong charter at its summit in Singapore this month to better deal with Myanmar.

A draft of the charter obtained by Bloomberg News calls for an extension of ASEAN's four-decade-old policy of decision by consensus and non-interference in individual country's affairs.

November 15, 2007