IV. International
(10-16-07)
.
APEC
(Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation) was founded
in Australia in
1989; 21-member economies represent 60% of US exports,
60% of the world GPA, almost half of the global trade,
and 2.7 billion consumers.
. Senior
General Than Shwe announced he was willing to talk with
detained democracy activist Aung Son Suu Kyi but only if
she stops calling for international sanctions, and not
urged her countrymen to confront the military regime,
state television and radio – conditions set by junta
leaders during meeting with special UN envoy.
. North
Korea pledged to derail its nuclear program and disable
all activities to its main reactor complex by year’s
end, then signed a wide-ranging reconciliation pact with
South Korea promising to finally seek a peace treaty to
replace the 1953 cease-fire that ended the Korean War.
.
A crowd of 3,000 people,
with 6 monks at the front, faced the riot police and
soldiers across barbed wire. Beyond those shone the
great gold dome of the Sule Pagoda. When 8 trucks of
soldiers drew up, the crowd began to run. Seconds later,
without warning, there were several cracks of automatic
gunfire.
.
Diehard protesters in
Burma
waved the peacock flag of the pro-democracy movement on
a solitary march on 9/29 through the eerily quiet
streets of Rangoon where many dissidents were resigned
to defeat without international intervention.
. There were
one hundred shot dead outside a Myanmar school.
Activists were burned alive at government crematoria.
Buddhist monks were floating face-down in rivers.
. China
said it is working hard to stem the violence in Burma
and argued against efforts of activists to link
participation in the Beijing-based 2008 summer
Olympics to China’s handling of Burma..
. China coal
producers offered supplies to Korean utilities at prices
7.5% higher than those agreed to in May with Japanese
rivals because shortages of the fuel have worsened, said
buyers involved in trade talks. Sellers, including
China National Corp Group, sought $73 a metric ton
from buyers.
.
Officials have abandoned efforts to retrieve the bodies
of 172 coal miners from a flooded mine in E. China,
family members said, deepening their anger at what they
see as callous treatment by the government and the
mining company.
.
In 1990, about 1 million
registered foreign residents lived in
Japan;
by 2004, that figure had nearly doubled it just below 2
million. Most say the actual numbers are probably higher
because not all foreigners register.
.
The pressure to let in more immigrants is building.
Population experts project that by 2050, Japan’s
population, about 128 million, will shrink to 98
million, about 40% of whom will be 65 or older. Japan
will lose more than 4 million workers.
.
Japan put its first satellite into a lunar orbit,
placing the country a step ahead of China and India in
an increasingly heated space race in Asia. The probe
will gradually move closer to the moon’s surface before
conducting a year-log observational mission.
.
The Federation of
Korean Industries, South Korea’s main
business lobby group, issued a statement 2 weeks ago
criticizing the Fair Trade Commission’s plan to
tighten price regulations on market-dominant companies
for being anti-market.
.
The amount of money paid as compensation for development
projects by the central and provincial governments last
year rose by 73% to 30 trillion won ($32.8
billion) from the previous year. A total of 26 trillion
won was paid to purchase land for new towns,
roads and other projects.
.
In the first half of this year, 137 businesses that are
franchise members of credit card companies were caught
refusing to accept credit cards or asking the consumers
to pay the commissions the merchants were supposed to
pay, the top local financial watchdog said.
.
At the Moei river in
Thailand,
there is sticky sunshine, jungle and world’s media in
waiting. Yet there is no flood of refugees from the
border in Burma. From Rangoon, there are disturbing
reports of monks fleeing the city, of thousands more
locked up in windowless improvised prisons with little
to drink or eat.
.
To the handful of monks still remaining at Ngwe Kya Yam
Monastery – bruised, scared and in shock, it must have
seemed that everything was over. The soldiers and police
made their first swoop in the early hours, cracking
skulls, firing rubber bullets and dragging away more
than 70 monks to secret detention centers.
.
Controversial politician
Chalerm Yoobamrung threatened to leave the People
Power Party if it refuses to field his 2 sons as
candidates in the December 23 elections.
.
Pres. Nguyen Minh Triet
of Vietnam
applauded plan by Gillman Group, Fidelity Ventures
and partners from US to invest $5 billion in a
recreational complex in the southern province of
Be Rea-Veng Tae.
.
Ho Chi Minh stock
exchange is selecting a brokerage to test a new remote
trading system which is expected to be in place by end
of Q1 of 2008.
.
The government has approved check payment of
state employee salaries to bank accounts starting Jan 1,
2008 as a measure to fight corruption and reduce use of
cash.
.
Dubbed as “Knock out
Tigdas,” the mass immunization, which is part of the
Philippine government’s plan by 2008 aims to
vaccinate children ages 9 months to 4-years old
regardless of the immunization status. The vaccination
will be done on a door-to-door basis by 3-men teams.
.
The Philippine Chamber of Commerce & Industry
(PCCI) has tied up with academia to boost Philippine
human resource, including measures to address the
mismatch in skills and labor market demands within the
next five years.
.
After successfully bidding out the right to develop its
lots in Japan, RP is setting its sights on other real
estate assets to sell under build-order-transfer (BOT)
agreement. The Dept of Finance (DoF) said the government
is looking at state-owned properties in Malaysia,
Thailand and US that would be auctioned off to
interested developers.
. Burma’s
new capital (Naypidaw) was built in the wasteland and
jungle 200 miles north of the old capital (Rangoon). It
means “abode of kings,” and kings are precisely what
Burmese generals see themselves as, even as they faced
the largest uprising in 20 years.
.
When the army seized
power in 1962, the country underwent a transformation
entirely different from its neighbors in Thailand,
South Vietnam,
Indonesia and Pakistan, where the military was also
central. The Burmese army seized not only political but
economic power. The “Burmese way to Socialism” meant
confiscation of most private property and handing them
over to the military-run state corporations.
.
The new generals’ town
(Maymyo) and their heavily fortified new capital are
only the most extensive example of how isolated Burma’s
military men and their families are from the population.
An army pass assures the holder seat on a train or an
airplane and is above traffic laws. The military is far
better equipped now than at any time in Burma’s modern
history due to its massive procurement of arms from
China.
.
The
US has pumped about $10
billion into
Pakistan
since 2001, the vast majority of it for the military.
But the aid does not seem to have won the US many
friends here. Nor has it successfully prepared the
Pakistani army to battle the insurgents. The militants
have rockets and advanced weapons, while the Frontier
Corps has sandals and a bolt-action rifle.
.
Pakistan’s top court ordered the suspension of 2 police
chiefs and a municipal official over a crackdown that
wounded dozens of journalists and lawyers during
protests in Islamabad against Gen. Pervez Musharraf’s
presidential election bid, which he won on 10/6 which
the Supreme Court could still nullify.
.
Pres Musharraf picked his trusted former spy chief to
succeed him as leader of the army and signaled that
exiled former P.M. Benazir Bhutto would be able to
return to Pakistan this month without facing charges.
. Pakistan’s
government is losing its war against emboldened
insurgent forces, giving al-Quaeda and the Taliban more
territory in which to operate and allowing the groups to
plot increasingly ambitious attacks, said Pakistani and
Western security officials.
. Sri Lanka
stands at an important crossroad in the war that killed
70,000 since 1983 when the Tigers began fighting for a
northeastern homeland for the Tamil minority.
This summer the government claimed to have routed them
from the east for the first time in 14 years.
. The
historic event of producing fertilizer for the first
time by Sri Lanka Phospate Ltd. was inaugurated on
10-15-07 at the Eppawala site which bring revenue to the
government.
.
The Ministry of Disaster Mgnt & Human Rights said
that several key issues raised by the UN High
Commissioner for Human Rights (Louise Arbour), were
areas which the govt has already initiated action.
.
It’s been called
Bangladesh’s
war on corruption, a revolution once persistently ranked
as the most kleptocratic in the world. It’s a place
where extorting cash is so ingrained in the social
fabric that even the Bureau of Anti-Corruption
accepted a bribe.
.
Two former rival politicians, who have dominated this
country’s politics for 16 years, are behind bars
awaiting trial for allegedly siphoning off million of
dollars from the government. Also incarcerated on graft,
tax-evasion and corruption charges are 170 members of
the ruling elite, along with an estimated 15,000
political under-bosses,
local government officials and businessmen.
.
Bangladesh’s military-backed government, which assumed
power 1-11-07 following months of unrest, is responsible
for the crackdown. It declared emergency rule, banning
political activity and protests, and said it would root
out corruption by any means necessary before allowing
elections to be held in 2008.
