ZenPundit
Thursday, October 04, 2007
BLOGGING ON BURMA
Wizards of Oz, Enterprise Resilience Management Blog, Thomas P.M. Barnett, TDAXP, Hidden Unities, Pundita, Agam's Gecko, Democracy Project , Simulated Laughter -New!
Free Burma!
Wizards of Oz, Enterprise Resilience Management Blog, Thomas P.M. Barnett, TDAXP, Hidden Unities, Pundita, Agam's Gecko, Democracy Project , Simulated Laughter -New!
Free Burma!
Labels: burma, democracy, foreign policy, state terrorism
¶ 7:39 PM 5 comments
WANTED! FOR CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY
Senior General Than Shwe of Burma
Than Shwe and all members of the instrumentalities under his authority as commander-in-chief and Chairman of the State Peace and Development Council, are accused of crimes including, but not limited to, actions defined under Article II. and Article II. of The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide:
"Article II: In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group;(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
Article III: The following acts shall be punishable:
(a) Genocide;(b) Conspiracy to commit genocide;(c) Direct and public incitement to commit genocide;(d) Attempt to commit genocide;(e) Complicity in genocide. "
The mass and systemic suppression and extrajudicial murder of Buddhist monks and ongoing ethnic cleansing campaigns against the Karen minority qualify for a referral to the UNSC for the establishment of an international tribunal to investigate, indict and try Burmese leaders suspected of crimes against humanity and genocide.
Senior General Than Shwe of Burma
Than Shwe and all members of the instrumentalities under his authority as commander-in-chief and Chairman of the State Peace and Development Council, are accused of crimes including, but not limited to, actions defined under Article II. and Article II. of The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide:
"Article II: In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group;(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
Article III: The following acts shall be punishable:
(a) Genocide;(b) Conspiracy to commit genocide;(c) Direct and public incitement to commit genocide;(d) Attempt to commit genocide;(e) Complicity in genocide. "
The mass and systemic suppression and extrajudicial murder of Buddhist monks and ongoing ethnic cleansing campaigns against the Karen minority qualify for a referral to the UNSC for the establishment of an international tribunal to investigate, indict and try Burmese leaders suspected of crimes against humanity and genocide.
Labels: burma, foreign policy, genocide, international law
¶ 12:00 AM 0 comments
Monday, October 01, 2007
WIKI-ING THE BURMESE JUNTA INTO THE DOCK?
The Burmese government is now engaged in wholesale massacres of it's Buddhist opposition:
"Burma: Thousands dead in massacre of the monks dumped in the jungle" -The Daily Mail
" Thousands of protesters are dead and the bodies of hundreds of executed monks have been dumped in the jungle, a former intelligence officer for Burma's ruling junta has revealed. The most senior official to defect so far, Hla Win, said: "Many more people have been killed in recent days than you've heard about. The bodies can be counted in several thousand." Mr Win, who spoke out as a Swedish diplomat predicted that the revolt has failed, said he fled when he was ordered to take part in a massacre of holy men. He has now reached the border with Thailand. "
eddie of Hidden Unities sent me the following article from TIME:
"But while the junta can control the street, the monasteries and even the web, they can't control the sky. On Friday the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), working with Burmese groups, released a new analysis of high-resolution satellite images that pinpointed evidence of human rights violations in the eastern Burma. For the first time in Burma, scientists were able to use orbital satellites to confirm on-the-ground reports of burned villages and forced relocations of civilians by the military. The technique has already been used to document human rights abuses in Zimbabwe and Darfur, but in Burma, a closed country that often seems like a modern-day version of Orwell's 1984, it's almost like turning Big Brother against itself. "We are sending a message to the military junta that we are watching from the sky," said Aung Din, policy director for the U.S. Campaign for Burma. "
What if NGO's, IGO's and national governments geographically divided Burma into "observation zones" and used government and commercial spy satellites to accumulate evidence of crimes against humanity by the military regime, making these images available on a public wiki ? An open-source pressure campaign for the prosecution of Burmese leaders before a special tribunal or the ICC ?
UPDATE:
Free Burma! is a central site for "International Bloggers Day for Burma -October 4 "
BURMA LINKS:
The Glittering Eye New!
Swedish Meatballs Confidential New!
Pundita and here
Hidden Unities as well as here
Jules Crittenden
Agam's Gecko
The Burmese government is now engaged in wholesale massacres of it's Buddhist opposition:
"Burma: Thousands dead in massacre of the monks dumped in the jungle" -The Daily Mail
" Thousands of protesters are dead and the bodies of hundreds of executed monks have been dumped in the jungle, a former intelligence officer for Burma's ruling junta has revealed. The most senior official to defect so far, Hla Win, said: "Many more people have been killed in recent days than you've heard about. The bodies can be counted in several thousand." Mr Win, who spoke out as a Swedish diplomat predicted that the revolt has failed, said he fled when he was ordered to take part in a massacre of holy men. He has now reached the border with Thailand. "
eddie of Hidden Unities sent me the following article from TIME:
"But while the junta can control the street, the monasteries and even the web, they can't control the sky. On Friday the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), working with Burmese groups, released a new analysis of high-resolution satellite images that pinpointed evidence of human rights violations in the eastern Burma. For the first time in Burma, scientists were able to use orbital satellites to confirm on-the-ground reports of burned villages and forced relocations of civilians by the military. The technique has already been used to document human rights abuses in Zimbabwe and Darfur, but in Burma, a closed country that often seems like a modern-day version of Orwell's 1984, it's almost like turning Big Brother against itself. "We are sending a message to the military junta that we are watching from the sky," said Aung Din, policy director for the U.S. Campaign for Burma. "
What if NGO's, IGO's and national governments geographically divided Burma into "observation zones" and used government and commercial spy satellites to accumulate evidence of crimes against humanity by the military regime, making these images available on a public wiki ? An open-source pressure campaign for the prosecution of Burmese leaders before a special tribunal or the ICC ?
UPDATE:
Free Burma! is a central site for "International Bloggers Day for Burma -October 4 "
BURMA LINKS:
The Glittering Eye New!
Swedish Meatballs Confidential New!
Pundita and here
Hidden Unities as well as here
Jules Crittenden
Agam's Gecko
Labels: asia, burma, democracy, dictator, IMINT, open-source
¶ 7:54 AM 3 comments
Thursday, September 27, 2007
THE BURMA RISING
As you are no doubt aware, Buddhist monks have led the largest protests against Burma's military-socialist junta, which has misruled Burma in various guises for almost sixty years, since the student democracy movement was crushed in 1988. Given the track record of this exceptionally brutal regime, only intense international pressure from the US, the EU and especially, Burma's major economic trading partner and supplier of military equipment, China,prevent an epic massacre.
As my blogging time is sharply constricted at present, I can recommend others who have been following these developments:
Pundita: Burma: Oh ho! The aged emperor is isolated!, Hello, CNN, we're trying to prevent a massacre, Diamonds are a dictator's best friend; beware the white heads!
Duck of Minerva: Crackdown, Photos from Myanmar
As you are no doubt aware, Buddhist monks have led the largest protests against Burma's military-socialist junta, which has misruled Burma in various guises for almost sixty years, since the student democracy movement was crushed in 1988. Given the track record of this exceptionally brutal regime, only intense international pressure from the US, the EU and especially, Burma's major economic trading partner and supplier of military equipment, China,prevent an epic massacre.
As my blogging time is sharply constricted at present, I can recommend others who have been following these developments:
Pundita: Burma: Oh ho! The aged emperor is isolated!, Hello, CNN, we're trying to prevent a massacre, Diamonds are a dictator's best friend; beware the white heads!
Duck of Minerva: Crackdown, Photos from Myanmar
Labels: burma, democracy, foreign policy
¶ 6:57 AM 4 comments
