Financing the Dictatorship

Over 90% of the world’s rubies come from Burma. Virtually all the the world’s jade does as well. If they are lucky, the miners earn about 41p (80 cents) for a twelve-hour shift in very dangerous conditions where the mines often collapse.

Not surprisingly, the military junta has substantial ownership in the exporting business.

The Daily Telegraph has an article about this, even though their reporter had very little access due to the tight controls. Gem auctions are by invitation only.

I’d boycott Burmese gemstones, but if you really can’t afford something you really can’t call it a boycott.

Neutrality Has Its Limits

The Red Cross has a policy of neutrality, so it does not make statements with regard to the various nefarious regimes around the world. It is has finally found a situation so bad that it has found it necessary to denounce the repeated violations of international humanitarian law. It does not surprise me that the regime in question is the ruling junta in Burma.

The statement issued by the president of the International Committee of the Red Cross , Jakob Kellenberger, particularly addresses the issue of portering:

Under the prison system set up by the government, every year thousands of detainees have been forced to support the armed forces by serving as porters. This institutionalized and widespread practice has frequently led to the abuse of detainees and exposed them to the dangers of armed conflict. Many detainees used as porters have suffered from exhaustion and malnutrition and been subjected to degrading treatment. Some have been murdered.

It has also addressed the destruction of the economy and acts of violence:

The Myanmar armed forces have committed repeated abuses against men, women and children living in communities affected by armed conflict along the Thai-Myanmar border. These have included the large-scale destruction of food supplies and of means of production. The armed forces have severely restricted the population’s freedom of movement in these areas, making it impossible for many villagers to work in their fields. This has had a significant impact on the economy, aggravating an already precarious humanitarian situation. Furthermore, the armed forces have committed numerous acts of violence against people living in these areas, including murder, and subjected them to arbitrary arrest and detention. They have also forced villagers to directly support military operations or to leave their homes.

On top of all this, the authorities refuse to talk seriously to Red Cross officials and directly restrict its work.

Business as Usual in Burma

Even though she’s been the elected leader of Burma since 1990, Aung San Suu Kyi has been outside of her house for a total of one hour since May 2003. Now the junta led by Than Shwe has extended her house arrest for another year.

It’s not often I agree with Bill Clinton or Jimmy Carter, but they were among 59 world political leaders and former leaders who signed a letter to Than Shwe calling for Suu Kyi’s release. The US State Department also called for her release.

Not that this matters one bit to the Senior General and de facto head of state in Burma. He has welcomed China’s view that it considers the detention of Aung San Suu Kyi a Burmese internal affair. But then you have to consider the source. It’ s not exactly surprising that an oppressive socialist state with a sorry human right record would support a similar regime.

Than Shwe’s health has not been good. Now 74, he has been been receiving medical treatment regularly in Singapore.  I suppose I’m not suppose to wish him a quick dispatch to hell, but then I don’t always wish for the things I should. I’m not up on Burmese internal power struggles enough to know who is waiting in the wings to keep Suu Kyi under house arrest when Shwe finds out there’s no such thing as reincarnation. I’m sure someone will come to the forefront to also continue oppressing the Christian ethnic groups and maintain the dominance of Bamar people.

No X Rating For the Bible

The Television and Licensing Authority (TELA)  in Hong Kong has declined to classify the Bible as an indecent publication. It has made this decision in the face of over 2,000 complaints.

The complaint were made to protest against an article in a student newpaper being labels indecent after it mentioned incest and bestiality. Some students set up a website which apparently cites biblical passages that allegedly have more sex and violence content than the offending article. I looked at the website, but it is all in Chinese, so I’ll just have to take the word of The Sunday Telelgraph. The website apparently also has a downloadable form to complain about the Bible to TELA.

Ibidah on the ISS

It was an issue that had to rise eventually.  How does a Muslim pray facing Makkah if he’s circling the earth sixteen times a day?

Malaysia has been given a slot on a Russian mission to the International Space Station in October, in exchange for an arms deal. Not only are there the daily prayers issues, but the mission falls during Ramadan. How do you fast during daylight hours if the sun rises and sets 16 times day? Then there is the matter of bringing a separate supply of halal food for the evening, whenever that is.

Two other Muslims have been in space before and they worked out their faith issues on their own. The Malaysian government isn’t quite so committed to religious freedom. They have commissioned Islamic scholars to study the matter and pronounce upon how Islamic requirements will be fulfilled.  As noted in The Times:

Malaysia insists. . . that maintaining Islamic beliefs “is mandatory for Muslims in every situation, time and place”. Mustafa Abdul Rahman, the head of its Department of Islamic Development said: “Circumstances on the ISS that are different from circumstance on Earth are not an obstacle for an astronaut to fulfil a Muslim’s obligations.”

I wonder what will happen if a Muslim ends up on a Mars mission.

Children With a Future

Only the most loyal supporters of Kim Jong-il are placed in diplomatic positions within the North Korean government. Ironically, as soon as they are posted overseas they become suspects. Kim knows that as soon as they leave the isolation of Korea, they will be tainted with ideas that are contrary to his psychotic ideology.

Kim is right. Like in Plato’s Cave, North Koreans have been living in chains believing that a really bad puppet show is reality. North Korea is so out of step with the rest of the world and so impoverished, anyone escaping its borders must feel like they are suddenly thrust into the sunlight after being immersed in total darkness.

Kim is so afraid of defections (and not unreasonably so) that Pyongyang has order the children of diplomats to return. It used to be that diplomats were only allowed to take one child out of the country. This was suspended in 2002, but has now been reinstated.

The only problem is that very few children have been sent home. This has only heightened the overall suspicion of diplomats.  The strongest opposition to the return has come from diplomats in China. Not a single child from China has been returned to neighbouring North Korea.

Deadly Anachronism

You may think Communist guerrillas are a thing of the past. Communism is so yesterday. Even the Chinese are becoming capitalist. North Korea and Cuba and just backwater mini-states that no one really cares about, all of Kim Jong Il’s huffing and puffing aside.

Only someone forgot to tell the NPA. The New People’s Army has been fighting in the Philippines for 50 years, trying to establish a Marxist-Leninist-Maoist government. If nothing else, they’re persisitent.

The Sunday Times has a somewhat sympathetic article about the NPA. It includes all the bad things done by President Arroyo and her persecution of leftists. The NPA are a little out of date and a little misunderstood.

My own view of the NPA is a bit different. My family has long had connections with the Philippines and with Christian ministries, something the NPA, being Marx-Leninist, isn’t real positive about.

When I was in the Philippines in 1981, my father was taken deeping into the Bicol region to preach an evangelistic meeting. There were about 500 conversions that night and a local pastor was sent in to start a church. The NPA told the pastor to stop preaching and leave the area. He refused. He was warned two more times. He refused. Then they beheaded him.

So hopefully you’ll forgive me if I’m not as sympathetic toward the NPA.

Plans for Eradication

“There shall be no home where the Christian religion is practised.”

That is the opening line of a document human rights groups have shown The Sunday Telegraph. It is believed to be a secret document leaked from a Burmese government ministry. It is entitled “Programme to destroy the Christian religion in Burma”. It includes point-by-point details on how to drive Christians out of the state.

It’s really not any secret that the junta wants to get rid of Christians. They have been bulldozing and burning churches for years. They have mercilessly attacked predominently Christian ethnic groups, the best known of whom are the Karen and Chin people. This is something I have blogged about and Meandered about for a long time now.

For the military regime, Buddhism is not a tolerant religion. In the unique form practiced by the Bamar (the majority ethnic group in Burma), the Theravada school combined with Nat worship, it is mandatory. It is a means of control.

The Burmese document says, “The Christian religion is very gentle – identify and utilise its weakness.” But that’s where the junta is wrong. Christianity’s gentleness is not its weakness.
“Because,” as St Paul says, “the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.”

They also don’t know that the Lord told St Paul, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Christians have faced more determined and skillful persecution than the two-bit Burmese dictatorship. They may be able to attack individuals, churches, villages, and ethnic groups, but they cannot extinguish the fire of the Holy Spirit brought to Burma by missionaries like Adoniram Judson.

Pray for Burma. Pray for the Christians of Burma.

An Honest Veto

I meant to publish this a few days ago, but somehow I didn’t notice that it had gotten stuck in draft mode.

As I mentioned last month, the US proposed a resolution in the UN Security Council criticising the human rights situation in Burma. Whilst I questioned some of the moral high ground in proposing the resolution, the view expressed in it should be irrefutable.

Unless, of course, you are China or Russia. In a double veto, something not seen in the Security Council since 1972, both countries blocked the resolution. But then if you are an arms supplier to the Burma junta, perhaps the veto is an avoidance of hypocrisy. Someone is finally standing up and saying, “Hey, we like human rights abuses. We may not have invented them, but by golly, we’ve come close to perfecting them.”

Futility

The US is going to try to get a resolution through the UN Security Council about Burma. According to the State Department:

We remain concerned about the deteriorating humanitarian and political situation in Burma, which poses a threat to stability in the region. We believe the time has come for the Security Council to take action to express its deep concern about Burma and its strong support for the Secretary General’s “good offices” mandate, which is intended to encourage the Burmese leadership to take concrete steps toward greater freedom and improved humanitarian conditions for the Burmese people.

Even though I have long been concerned about the situations in Burma, this provokes several, perhaps conflicting, responses.

First of all, what sort of action is it to “express deep concern”? Do they not realise the Burmese leaders have an idea that most decent people and their governments think they are horrid little men? Bad, bad junta! We don’t like you! So there!

Second is the hypocricy of “Let’s ignore the killing of our own babies and go after somebody else’s human rights abuses.” Other people might suggest that the US is involved in more human rights abuses than just the issue of abortion, depending on varying views of foreign and domestic policy. I’ll leave that for now and stick with a universal obvious.

Third is the fact that Burma isn’t high enough on anyone’s agenda to actually do anything. It isn’t a part of the axis of evil. Locals might argue that bulldozers and military force obliterating Christian villages are weapons of mass destruction, but they barely register on the international political Richter scale.

And fourth is whether doing anything would actually do anything, least of all anything positive. Christians haven’t fared very well under recent attempts by “Coalition” forces to implement regime change.

Pray for Burma.