Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – The European Parliament on Thursday passed a resolution condemning the Burmese regime’s plan to hold a national election “under undemocratic conditions and on the basis of rules which exclude the main democratic opposition”, the parliament’s spokesman said in Strasbourg, France.
The strongly worded resolution passed by a majority of 736-member European Union body also called for Burma’s new electoral laws to be repealed because they “make the holding of free and transparent elections impossible”.
The resolution criticised Burma’s new constitution, infamously ratified in May 2008 in what is commonly referred to as a sham referendum held as much of the country lay in ruins from the devastating impact of Cyclone Nargis. The resolution “deplores the fact that, under the new constitution, the military will be guaranteed at least 25 per cent of the seats in parliament and will have the power to suspend civil liberties and legislative authority in the interests of national security”.
The passage of the resolution is seen by many observers to be an important victory for the advocacy group Burma Campaign UK (Campaign) based in London, which has worked with rights groups across Europe to shift European policy to a stance more critical of the Burmese regime’s new constitution and its elections plans.
The Campaign’s Zoya Phan called the resolution “a significant step for human rights in Burma and one of the strongest statements about Burma to be issued by the European parliament”. She added that she was particularly pleased with the resolution because it called for the leaders of EU member states to publicly support the UN’s creation of a commission of inquiry into war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by the regime in Burma.
As someone who grew up in a refugee camp in Thailand, Zoya Phan told Mizzima she felt the resolution’s call for the European Commission (the EU’s executive body) to restore funding for refugees on the Thailand-Burma border and immediately start funding cross-border aid was very important.
Zoya Phan said that with regard to EU’s Burma policy there was often a disconnect between the commission and the elected politicians in the parliament. According to her, “it can be difficult because often there is a struggle to ensure that the European Commission is accountable and follows the strong stance the members of the European Parliament have taken”.
Matthew Morgan, a Canadian PhD student studying western policy towards Burma at Toronto’s York University, told Mizzima the Campaign’s concerns came as no surprise. He said: “The drawback of the European Commission is that you have a massive unelected bureaucracy in Brussels carrying out the polices of the EU and this can result in a situation where the will of European civil society and in fact a majority of Europe’s people, are subverted by a handful of very powerful bureaucrats under the spell of European oil firms such as Total”.
Morgan added that the role of the Campaign and its allies across Europe was to ensure that “these strong resolutions coming from the European parliament calling for democracy in Burma are put into practice and aren’t just empty statements”.
Meanwhile, the EU resolution responded to the recent crackdown by the Bangladeshi government against Burmese refugees from the Muslim Arakanese Rohingya minority. The resolution called on the Bangladeshi government to allow Rohingya to be officially registered as refugees, something that the Bangladeshi authorities have largely prevented. The effect of the often brutal Bangladeshi policies on the Rohingya was highlighted by a recent report issued by the Arakan Project.
The resolution also called on the Burmese regime “to halt all forms of persecution of the Rohingya and fully to respect their fundamental rights as a religious and ethnic minority”.
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