Asean must change its Burma policy
Source : Sean Miguel Esagtawski, Bangkok Post (Feb 17)
It is time for Asean to rethink Burma's continued membership. The new prime minister of Thailand should also fulfil his party's slogan of "Think new, act new" by proposing an initiative to make Burma an outcast both regionally and internationally.
Thaksin Shinawatra should not visit Burma, nor should his defence minister, Gen Chavalit Yongchaiyudh, who was equally notorious for alleged logging concession dealings with the Burmese Slorc (State Law and Order Restoration Council).
The recent border skirmishes that saw three innocent Thai citizens killed by Burmese mortars, may be just a testing of Thai waters under the new government.
Or is it the junta's way of telling their good old chum to come visit and pay his dues?Undeniably, the Burmese military is notorious the world over for its drug trade. Thailand, the chief proposer that the pariah state be admitted into the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, has learned several expensive and painful lessons from its nave diplomacy towards Burma.
Granting membership to a rogue Burmese Slorc has proven that Asean's "constructive engagement" policy is futile. Even its modified "flexible engagement" has not succeeded in bringing Burma up acceptable standards, certainly not on a par with three other new members: Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.
While all the rest of the member nations have been trying to build regional economic strength to raise Asean's negotiating power on the world stage, the Burmese leech has been sucking Asean's blood for too long.
Thailand, in particular, has been most severely affected by the Burmese drug trade. The already impoverished state of the Thai economy has been exacerbated by the infiltration of all forms of drugs produced inside Burma.
Rangoon must suppress the production of drugs and trafficking in its territory; stop violating human rights and silencing political dissidents.
If Slorc fails to do so-with the repetitive excuse that it cannot absolutely control the territories dominated by its ethnic minorities-then we should all help arm these minorities to fight for their independence and selectively admit individual states as free members of the world community.