October 2007

The is the greatest opportunity for meaningful transformation in Burma-Myanmar in 10 years. It is a historic moment that should not be lost. Read more.

By Jonathan PowerTFF Associate since 1991 Comments directly to JonatPower@aol.com October 5, 2007 LONDON – The kind of non-violent protest we are now witnessing in Burma/Myanmar doesn’t always bear edible fruit – see Ukraine where last weekend’s election has just confirmed the country’s inherent instability. Neither does this holier-than-thou approach always politically disarm the enemy. It did often enough for Gandhi and for Martin Luther King but it certainly didn’t for the students of Tiananmen Square who were brutally and unsparingly crushed, despite their success in opening up immense fissures in the ruling Communist Party elite. In Czechoslovakia in 1968 the unarmed demonstrators certainly demoralised the local Soviet soldiers and the satraps in the Czech administration. They also succeeded in bringing the economy almost to a halt but they did not undermine the hard men in Moscow who simply piled on the pressure until the resistance cracked. But we should...

the unarmed demonstrators certainly demoralised the local Soviet soldiers and the satraps in the Czech administration. They also succeeded in bringing the economy almost to a halt but they did not undermine the hard men in Moscow who simply piled on the pressure until the resistance cracked. But we should be sanguine about the chances of the saffron protestors. They don’t have an invincible force to overcome – or at least one of the muscle of the Soviet Union or China. Differences of opinion have already appeared among the military leaders. Moreover, external pressure has been piling up for years and has succeeded in isolating Myanmar in many important ways. The recent decision of Washington to go for the leaders’ private foreign bank accounts was long overdue. Not least, the Burmese protestors have the non-violent traditions of Buddhism to draw upon. This may be scorned by the generals, indeed by...

Jag saknar den starka röst som en gång kom från de alliansfria staternas organisation under kalla kriget. Personer som Julius Nyerere, Indira Gandhi och även Palme kunde kritisera med så mycket starkare moralisk och politisk tyngd än de röster som dessa dagar dominerar mediedebatten om Burma. Read more.

Mr Chairperson, Foreign Ministers, Excellencies, Panelists! Gandhi was fighting the UK Empire, meaning UK invasion and occupation.  One invasion, Viceroy Richard Wellesley in 1798 against the Sultan of Mysore, was also clearly anti-Muslim. The same year Napoleon’s mission civilisatrice invaded Egypt to make himself Sultan el-kebir, Great Ruler, but were thrown out in 1801. The English came in 1807 and Egypt was a colony till 1922. Gandhi fought an evil empire as seen by how they reacted to the Sepoy mutiny 150 years ago or to the 1919 Amritsar massacre. Churchill not only referred to him as a semi-naked fakir, but sincerely hoped he would fast himself to death. But in 1947 it was all over: first went India, then the rest of the empire, mainly due to Gandhi’s nonviolence. Today they are both, India and England, blossoming, India with a brilliant linguistic federalism and phenomenal economic growth, England heading the same way but still...