From: tun@PHY.UCSF.EDU
Newsgroups: soc.culture.asean
Subject: burma boycott
Date: 7 Apr 92 00:34:57 GMT

Date:         Sun, 5 Apr 1992 18:16:47 PDT
Reply-To: Southeast Asia Discussion List <SEASIA-L%MSU.bitnet@UCSFVM.UCSF.EDU>
From: "Indonesia Publications/Task Force" <apakabar%IGC.ORG@UCSFVM.UCSF.EDU>
Subject:      Burma Boycott
X-To:         seasia-l@msu.edu
To: Multiple recipients of list SEASIA-L <SEASIA-L@MSU.ucsf.EDU>
Status: RO

   IPS, Hong Kong, April 2 - The call for a trade and investment boycott
against Burma is growing louder in several Asian countries as investment
capital from the region continues to grow.
   ASEAN is already re-examining its policy of "constructive engagement."
   But in Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea, the call for an economic
boycott is only just beginning to be heard.
   Western foreign aid to Burma worth around $500 million a year was
suspended shortly after the 1988 violent crackdown on pro- democracy
demonstrations. But investment from Asia, particularly in logging,
mining and oil exploration, has more than made up for the loss.
   Investment from Asia and the West has pushed up Burma's foreign
reserves from a paltry $12 million in 1988 to over $900 million in 1991.
Human rights activists say most of this money is put to military use.
   Church and human rights groups in Hong Kong have stepped up calls for
a trade and investment boycott to stop Asian countries propping up the
Rangoon regime.
   Burton Levin, a former U.S. ambassador to Burma and now head of the
Asia Society in Hong Kong, believes the only way to put pressure on the
Rangoon government is to make sure it does not use foreign capital to
oppress its own people.
   "Foreign investment in most countries acts as a catalyst to promote
change but the regime is so single-minded that whatever money they
obtain from foreign sources they pour straight into the army while the
rest of the country is collapsing," Levin says.
   Sanctions will mean foreign investors will have to stop shoring up
the regime "and it will strengthen the realization even within the army
that the leadership is a pariah and has to go," says Levin who retired
as ambassador in October 1990 after serving three-and-a- half years in
Rangoon.
   Thailand with its logging and fishing concessions has by far the
biggest Asian investment in Burma. But other East Asian countries such
as South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore have made substantial
investments since 1988.
   Singapore companies are involved in oil, shipping and light
manufacturing while also running a number of department stores.
   The South Korean electronics giant, Daewoo, has several joint
ventures with the Burmese government to produce television sets,
refrigerators and other consumer electronics. South Korean companies
have also obtained logging, mining and oil concessions.
   Hong Kong government trade figures show the British colony's trade
with Burma has doubled in just two years to almost $51 million in 1991.
   Timber supplies from Burma rose by 34 percent last year to $27.4
billion and accounted for over 90 percent of Hong Kong's imports from
the country.
   According to the "Burma Rights Movement for Action," which is
actively pressing Asian investors to withdraw from Burma, such
investments have helped keep the military regime in power.
   The State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) which came to
power in 1988 was virtually bankrupt by the end of its first year, with
foreign debts of $5.98 billion -- or almost 70 percent of GNP. The debt
required some $238 million a year to service.
   SLORC turned to foreign investors to bring in much-needed foreign
currency, passing a new foreign investment law in November 1988 aimed at
opening up the country. It provided tax holidays, the right to remit
hard currency and guarantees against nationalization.
   "If foreign governments had kept up the pressure, it would have been
only a matter of time before SLORC ran out of bullets," said the Burma
Rights Movement.
   Burma's official defense budget has more than doubled since 1988.
Official statistics put defence expenditure at 32 percent of Burma's
budget for the fiscal year ending March 1991.
   The Burma rights groups says the massive arms build-up is aimed
solely at controlling Burma's civilian population and fighting ethnic
minority insurgencies.
   Such arguments may be beginning to sink in. Alan Ng of Hong Kong's
Chung Tai Company which imports Burmese timber said he believed his
company should not be trading with Burma. "If we have some other way to
buy (hardwood), in my opinion we should do so," he said.