Yerg wrote: ↑Tue Mar 02, 2021 4:58 am

phuketrichard wrote: ↑Mon Mar 01, 2021 8:13 pm She cant be president, ( before and never) because of the 2008 constitution which blocks anyone whose spouse or sons is overseas citizen from leading the country.

That reminds me of the doco. But there were other things. She refused to deal with the ethnic cleansing. She refused to refute it or condemn it. Take the woman’s Nobel prize away now. If she didn’t stop it, she’s fucking complicit.

Jakarta, Indonesia – As Foreign Ministers from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) meet virtually to discuss the situation in Myanmar, one of the region’s most experienced diplomats told Al Jazeera how ASEAN can help resolve the crisis in Myanmar.

Dr Marty Natalegawa was Indonesia’s Foreign Minister from 2009 to 2014, including during Indonesia’s time as chair of ASEAN in 2011. Earlier, he was the director-general for ASEAN Cooperation in Indonesia’s Department of Foreign Affairs.

The brutal takeover by the military, renews the debate about how the country should be addressed, Burma or Myanmar. In the past, the country’s electoral commission had told Aung San Suu Kyi to stop calling the country Burma and instead call it Myanmar, its official name.

In a statement published in The New Light of Myanmar, the electoral commission had chided Suu Kyi, “As it is prescribed in the constitution that ‘the state shall be known as The Republic of the Union of Myanmar,’ no one has the right to call the country Burma.”
Aung San Suu Kyi is in her right to do so, and should continue doing so, in light of worldwide condemnation of the country’s military regime. The electoral commission informed the National League for Democracy (NLD) “to address the name of the state as prescribed in the constitution … and respect the constitution.”

Several Western countries, including Britain and the United States, continue to call the country Burma in unofficial statements of support for the democracy movement in the country. “The United States removed sanctions on Burma over the past decade based on progress toward democracy,” said President Joe Biden in a statement following the recent coup by the military. “The reversal of that progress will necessitate an immediate review of our sanction laws.”

There is a strong emotional and moral connotation to the name Burma. It should continue to be used until effective democracy returns to the country and a mechanism is chosen to make a decision on what to call the country. If calling the country Burma enrages the military so be it. It will still be a small price they have to pay for the brutality that for decades they have unleashed on the country.

The planned special meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations comes in the wake of worsening violence in Burma. The country’s new military rulers over the weekend escalated their use of deadly force and mass arrests to try to quash protests against the Feb. 1 coup that ousted the elected government led by Aung San Suu Kyi.