Dead end for UN envoy to Burma

By Larry Jagan
Mizzima News
March 11, 2008

The United Nations Special Advisor to Burma, Ibrahim Gambari, has left Rangoon empty-handed after a five-day visit.

He is now on his way to Senegal in Africa to brief the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

"There has been no progress on any of the substantive issues raised by the envoy," a Western diplomat in Rangoon told Mizzima.

According to an Asian diplomat who closely follows Burmese affairs, "There is no other interpretation possible. This visit was an abject failure."

"This probably means the end of Mr Gambari's efforts to mediate in Burma's national reconciliation process," he added.

But Ban Ki-moon has already tried to counter this obvious conclusion. "There was some progress but we have not been able to achieve as much we had hoped," Ban told reporters at UN headquarters in New York before he left for Africa.

His top priority during his trip was to press the regime to include Aung San Suu Kyi and the pro-democracy opposition in the political process, he told Mizzima in an exclusive interview by phone during his short stop-over in Singapore, before he flew onto Rangoon last week.

"I will continue to press the Myanmar [Burmese] government to engage with Aung San Suu Kyi in a substantive dialogue in order to produce a positive outcome that will promote an all-inclusive and transparent process," he said.

This was the envoy's third visit to Burma since the brutal crackdown on monk-led mass demonstrations last September. More importantly, it followed the Burmese government's completion of the country's new constitution and its announcement of plans to hold a referendum in May and new multi-party elections in 2010.

"Than Shwe's decision to set a time-table for the road-map was a strategic move to block both Maung Aye – his deputy -- from assuming power later, and the international community, especially Gambari, from playing a role in the process," said the Asian diplomat.

The UN envoy knew he faced a daunting task trying to persuade the regime to heed the international community's concerns, but remained undeterred when he spoke to Mizzima on the eve of his visit.

"I will continue my consultations in Myanmar and follow up on a number of recommendations I left with the government during my last trip in November 2007," he said.

"These include immediate steps to address the human rights situation; progress on time-bound dialogue between the government and Aung San Suu Kyi; the forthcoming referendum and the electoral process; economic and humanitarian issues; as well as a more regularised process of engagement with the Secretary General's good offices," he explained.

Gambari knew he had a tough task ahead of him. The recommendations he made last time he was in Rangoon have been virtually ignored or only partially implemented. These included the appointment of a liaison minister to meet regularly with the detained opposition leader – but few meetings have actually taken place.

Gambari also suggested that it was essential for Aung San Suu Kyi to meet other members of her party, especially the central executive committee, and anyone else she may want to consult. This request also obviously fell on deaf ears. The opposition leader has only been allowed to meet NLD members twice since Gambari's last visit.

Gambari had also asked the junta for permission to set up his own office in Rangoon, with regular contact with the detained opposition leader, according to UN sources.

But instead of Gambari making any headway on these issues, he found the regime totally intransigent, and unprepared to listen, let alone make any concessions. In two meetings with the government spokesman, the Information Minister General Kyaw Hsan effectively humiliated the envoy.

In the first meeting the minister chided him for not being impartial and being a stooge of the West. At the same time he dismissed all the envoy's recommendations as pointless and unnecessary, especially the need for the UN to have its own liaison office in Rangoon.

Essentially the regime's message to the UN was crystal clear: "supporting criticism and sanctions instead of providing assistance means hindering and disrupting the country's efforts to achieve democracy."

"To speak frankly, the road we have been taking is the correct and most suitable one for our country," Kyaw Hsan told Gambari in their second meeting broadcast on state television.

"We are firmly convinced that it is the best way and it will ensure a smooth and peaceful transition to democracy for our country," Kyaw Hsan, a Brigadier General, said.

The door is always open to the UN to continue its mediation efforts, he also told the UN envoy. But warned him: "We are anticipating …Your Excellency's constructive reporting when you arrive back home."

That effectively means the junta only wants the UN envoy to endorse the roadmap and the announced time-table as it is. Gambari was urged by Chinese authorities to accept the constitution and the roadmap when he visited Beijing lat month, according to a UN insider.

But there are other signs that the regime is not in the least interested in the UN's offer of mediation. Last month, when Ban Ki-moon and Kofi Annan were negotiating and mediating in Kenya's political crisis, a foreign news agency article on the subject in the Myanmar Times was spiked by the censors. The only story they could run was a report that said the unrest had led to a sharp fall in tea production, according to a Western diplomat who knows the editors well.

Now that Gambari has left Rangoon without any apparent concessions, the UN will have to seriously ponder its next step.

"For me, failure is not an option, otherwise the UN would have failed and this will have negative consequences for the role of the organisation in terms of mediation, conflict prevention and peaceful resolution of conflicts not only in Myanmar but throughout the world," Gambari told Mizzima prior to his latest visit.