Myanmar, Gas and the Soros-Funded Explosion of A Nation State

[longknife]

by Omnibus Dubitandum Posted on September 8, 2012
Myanmar, Gas and the Soros-Funded Explosion of A Nation State. | nsnbc

Early 2012 violent clashes between Muslim Rohingya and Buddhists broke out in Myanmar´s Rakhine State which is bordering to Bangladesh. In 2011 Myanmar ended 49 years of military rule. It is slowly implementing political, social, legal and economical reforms. It has been troubled by supposed ethnic conflicts for decades; Remnants of the British Divide and Conquer Strategy, aggravated by world war two andmodo-colonial influences. It is the most rich country in the greater Mekong region in terms of natural resources. Yet it is one of the lowest ranking on the Social Development Index. The end of military rule opened the doors for western corporations, NGOs, think-tanks, human rights organizations and to a greater influence of UN Agencies. Many of them, UN-agencies included, are associated to and sponsored by the likes of the self-proclaimed philanthropist and multi-billionaire George Soros. Together they establish a loosely associated network, consisting of new local players and well established international players who are notorious for exploding targeted nations into ethnic violence. Their philanthropy and advocacy for freedom, democracy and human rights has left a trail of ethnic violence, death and devastation from Bosnia and Kosovo to Nepal. Is Myanmar´sgeo-strategically significant location, a planned gas-pipeline, and its wealth in resources turning Myanmar into the next target for globalization and the strategic encirclement of China?

Something we never hear about in the main street media! Why is it that we find about something like this in a blog from India?

 

[waltky]

56 Killed, 2000 Homes Torched In Myanmar...

Myanmar official says 56 dead, almost 2,000 houses torched in latest ethnic violence
October 25, 2012 – At least 56 people were killed and nearly 2,000 homes destroyed in the latest outbreak of ethnic violence in western Myanmar, a government official said Thursday.

The 25 men and 31 women were reported dead in four Rakhine state townships in violence between the Buddhist Rakhine and Muslim Rohingya communities that re-erupted Sunday, local government spokesman Win Myaing said. He said some 1,900 homes had been burned down in fresh conflict, while 60 men and four women were injured. It was unclear how many of the victims were Rohingya people and how many were Rakhine.

In June, ethnic violence in the state left at least 90 people dead and destroyed more than 3,000 homes. Tens of thousands of people remain in refugee camps. The United States called for Myanmar authorities to take immediate action to halt the violence. The United Nations appealed for calm.

An Associated Press photographer who traveled to Kyauktaw, one of the affected townships 45 kilometers (75 miles) north of the Rakhine capital of Sittwe, said he saw 11 wounded people brought by ambulance to the local 25-bed hospital, most with gunshot wounds. One was declared dead after arrival. All the victims being treated were Rakhine, but that could reflect an inability or unwillingness of Rohingya victims to be treated there.

A male volunteer at the hospital, Min Oo, said by telephone that five bodies, including one of a woman, had also been brought there. He said the injured persons were brought by boat from Kyauktaw town 16 kilometers (10 miles) away, and taken from the jetty by the ambulances. An account by a Rakhine villager in the area suggested great confusion and tension. The villager said that when groups of Rakhine and the Rohingya had a confrontation, government soldiers shot into a crowd of Rakhine, even though, according to his claim, it had been dispersing. The villager would not give his name for fear of violent reprisals.

Read more: Myanmar official says 56 dead, almost 2,000 houses torched in latest ethnic violence | Fox News

See also:

UN Concerned About Outbreak of Violence in Western Burma
October 25, 2012 - The United Nations has expressed concern about the most recent outbreak of communal violence in five townships in Burma's Northern Rakhine region.

The spokesperson for U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon issued a statement Thursday, saying the widening mistrust between the communities is being exploited by militant and criminal elements, to cause large-scale loss of human lives, material destruction, displaced families as well as fear, humiliation and hatred. The U.N. statement calls on Burmese authorities to bring under control lawlessness and vigilante attacks and to put a stop to threats and extremist rhetoric.

New violence

Fighting and chaos appear to be taking hold in western Burma, where a deep-seeded conflict between Buddhists and Muslims has flared with deadly consequences. Rakhine state spokesman Win Myaing Thursday said at least 56 people have died since new fighting erupted Sunday, including 31 women. Dozens of others have been injured. Parts of the area also have been burned to the ground. Burmese officials said almost 2,000 homes have now been razed by fires, along with eight religious buildings, since these latest clashes erupted.

Survivors are telling harrowing tales of the violence, including one man who said his father, Sein Thar Aung, was seriously injured during Monday's fighting in the town of Mrauk Oo. "They (the Rohingya) were on the village road and we were on the outside one before a clash. He (SEIN THAR AUNG) was leading ahead of our group and then withdrawing back when a Kalar (Rohingya) jumped out from a house through a window and stabbed him with a spear,'' the man said.

Zaw Htay, in the office of the president, tells VOA Burmese that the government is taking action. "In dealing with this situation, first the state government has imposed curfew. Next, the president recently ordered to send more security forces over there," Zaw Htay said. Curfews also are being imposed on four towns at the center of the violence -- Mrauk Oo, Myebon, Minbya and Kyauk Phyu. But some witnesses say the army has so far been unable to bring any calm, with others claiming that soldiers were firing randomly into crowds to break up the fighting.

International Reaction

 

[waltky]

Uncle Ferd says, "Well hey, considerin' all the people the Muslims have killed in the name of Allah - ain't turnabout fair play?

Burma's junta admits deadly attacks on Muslims
Saturday 27 October 2012 - Satellite images show huge swath of coastal town destroyed in a wave of violence that has left dozens dead

Thousands of Rohingya Muslims are believed to have fled Kyaukpyu, on Burma’s west coast, after their homes were destroyed in the latest clashes with Buddhists. Photograph: Human Rights Watch Burma's president, Thein Sein, has admitted his country's Rohingya Muslim population has been subjected to an unprecedented wave of ethnic violence. Whole villages and large sections of towns have been destroyed.

Thein Sein's admission follows release of shocking satellite images showing the scale of the destruction in one coastal town, where most – if not all – of the Muslim population appears to have been displaced and their homes wrecked. The pictures, acquired by Human Rights Watch, show destruction to the town of Kyaukpyu on the country's west coast. They reveal 14.4 hectares (35 acres) of destruction, in which some 811 buildings and houseboats have been destroyed.


The images confirm reports of massive violence in the town over 24 hours around 24 October, three days after the first wave of attacks. The incidents in Arakan province – also known as Rakhine – have displaced thousands of people in what appears to have been a wave of ethnic cleansing pitting Arakan Buddhists against Muslims. "There have been incidents of whole villages and parts of the towns being burned down," Thein Sein's spokesman said. A government official initially put the death toll at 112 but later revised it to 67.


Thein Sein's comments follow a warning from the office of UN general secretary Ban Ki-moon that ethnic violence was endangering political progress in Burma. The latest violence in Burma comes as the government is struggling to contain ethnic and religious tensions suppressed during nearly a half century of military rule that ended last year. Inter-ethnic violence broke out earlier this year, triggered by the rape and murder of a Buddhist woman by three Muslim men.

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[waltky]

Granny says, "Dat's right - dat's what it's always all about...

Power shift in Myanmar is all about oil
Thursday 19th November, 2015 - Writing in the New York Times in an article entitled, "Myanmar Generals Set the State for Their Own Exit", Thomas Fuller expressed his and the media's failure to recognize the total fraud that is Myanmarese democracy. "The official results are still being tabulated," he wrote, "but all signs, so far, point to that rarest of things: an authoritarian government peacefully giving up power after what outside election monitors have deemed a credible vote."

Fuller, who said nothing about the persecuted Rohingya minority and little about the other millions of Myanmarese who were denied the chance to vote, only managed to contribute to the seemingly baffling media euphoria about the country's alleged democracy. Reporting from Myanmar also known as Burma - Timothy McLaughlin dealt with the Rohingya subject directly; however, he offered a misleading sentiment that the oppressed minority, which was excluded from the vote, can see a 'glimmer of hope' in the outcome of the elections. According to results, the National League for Democracy (NLD), under the leadership of Aung San Suu Kyi, has won a stunning victory over its rivals in the ruling party, by garnering 348 seats, in contrast with only 40 seats obtained by the military-controlled party that has ruled Myanmar since 1962.

There is no real basis for that supposed 'glimmer of hope', aside from a non-binding statement made by an NLD official, Win Htein, that the Citizenship Act of 1982 "must be reviewed" an Act which served as the basis for discrimination against the Rohingya. Win Htein's comments are disingenuous, let alone non-committal, at best. The Citizenship Act "must be reviewed because it is too extreme... review that law and make necessary amendments so that we consider those people who are already in our country, maybe second generation, so they will be considered as citizens," he told Reuters. His comments promote the myth that the well over one million Rohingya are 'Bengalis", who came to his Myanmar only recently as hapless immigrants.

While Myanmar, like any other ASEAN country has its fair share of immigrants, the fact is that most Rohingya Muslims are native to the state of "Rohang" (originally a kingdom in itself), officially known as Rakhine or Arakan. Over the years, especially in the late 19th century and early 20th century, the original inhabitants of Arakan were joined by cheap or forced labor from Bengal and India, who permanently settled there. For decades, tension has brewed between Buddhists and Muslims in the region. Eventually, the majority, backed by a military junta, prevailed over the minority which had no serious regional or international backers. A rising tide of Buddhist nationalism has reached genocidal levels in recent years and is targeting not only Rohingya Muslims, but also Christian and other minority groups in the country.

The Rohingya population of Arakan, estimated at nearly 800,000, subsist between the nightmare of having no legal status (as they are still denied citizenship), little or no rights and the occasional ethnic purges carried out by their neighbors. While Buddhists also paid a price for the clashes, the stateless Rohingya, being isolated and defenseless, were the ones to carry the heaviest death toll and destruction. Writing in the Ecologist, Nafeez Ahmed cited alarming new findings conducted last October by the International State Crime Initiative (ISCI) at Queen Mary University in London, which "found that the Rohingya ..face 'the final stages of a genocidal process'." "Leaked government documents show that plans to inflict 'mass annihilation' have been prepared at the highest levels," he wrote.

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[longknife]

And I believe torrential rains there just caused a massive mudslide that killed some people - forgot the number. (So many deaths around the world today)

 

[waltky]

Jade mine landslide disaster in Myanmar...

Searchers pull bodies from rubble after Myanmar landslide
Tue, Nov 24, 2015 — Soldiers, police and volunteers pulled body after body from the rubble Monday, as the death toll from a landslide near several jade mines in northern Myanmar reached at least 113, a local official said. More than 100 others were missing.

The collapse early Saturday in Kachin state's mining community of Hpakant was the worst-such disaster in recent memory. The corpses were taken to a morgue, where friends and relatives broke down as they identified the victims. Some were buried at a cemetery and others were cremated. But there were stacks of unidentified bodies wrapped in blue plastic tarps.

Excavators dig dump soil to search bodies of miners as workers and rescue members gather in Hpakant, Kachin State, Myanmar. Soldiers, police and volunteers pulled body after body from the rubble in northern Myanmar on Monday, Nov. 23, 2015, as the death toll continued to rise from a landslide near several jade mines with many more missing.​

Kachin is home to some of the world's highest-quality jade, and the industry generated an estimated $31 billion last year, with most of the wealth going to individuals and companies tied to Myanmar's former military rulers, according to Global Witness, a group that investigates misuse of resource revenues.

Jade mine workers and rescue members carrying victims of a landslide walk on dump soil in Hpakant, Kachin State, Myanmar. Soldiers, police and volunteers pulled body after body from the rubble in northern Myanmar on Monday, Nov. 23, 2015, as the death toll continued to rise from a landslide near several jade mines with many more missing.​

Hpakant, 950 kilometers (600 miles) northeast of Myanmar's biggest city, Yangon, is the industry's epicenter. But it remains desperately poor, with bumpy dirt roads, constant electricity blackouts and sky-high heroin addiction rates. The accident occurred at a 60-meter (200-foot) -high mountain of earth and waste discarded by several mines.

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Bodies retrieved from Myanmar rubble
Tue, Nov 24, 2015 - BURIED AS THEY SLEPT: Officials yesterday said that Saturday’s landslide in the community of Hpakant buried more than 70 makeshift huts where miners lived

Soldiers, police and volunteers pulled body after body from the rubble in northern Myanmar yesterday, as the death toll from a landslide near several jade mines reached at least 113, a local official said, with more than 100 others missing. The collapse early Saturday in Kachin state’s mining community of Hpakant was the worst such disaster in recent memory. The corpses were taken to a nearby morgue, where friends and relatives broke down as they identified the victims. Some were buried at a local cemetery and others were cremated. However, there were stacks of unidentified bodies wrapped in blue plastic tarps.

People look over an area covered by a landslide at the Hpakant mining community in Kachin State, Myanmar, on Saturday.​

Kachin is home to some of the world’s highest-quality jade and the industry generated an estimated US$31 billion last year, with most of the wealth going to individuals and companies tied to Myanmar’s former military rulers, according to Global Witness, a group that investigates misuse of resource revenues. Hpakant, 950km northeast of Myanmar’s biggest city, Yangon, is the industry’s epicenter. However, it remains desperately poor, with bumpy dirt roads, constant electricity blackouts and sky-high heroin addiction rates. The accident occurred at a 60m-high mountain of earth and waste discarded by several mines.

Earlier, officials said the dead were mostly men who were picking through the waste and tailings in search of pieces of jade to sell. However, officials yesterday said the accident occurred at about 3am, burying more than 70 makeshift huts where the miners slept. Nilar Myint, a local township administrator, said that by yesterday the death toll had reached 113, with more than 100 others missing. Bodies continued to be pulled from the debris yesterday. “It’s not ending. It’s still on going. Local people in town are getting angry, because there are just too many bodies,” she said.

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