BANGKOK // Ibrahim Gambari, the United Nations special envoy to Myanmar, arrived in Yangon yesterday to try to revive talks between Myanmar's military rulers and the detained opposition leader, Aung San Suu Kyi. Mr Gambari is expected to meet senior members of the military government, opposition leaders, including Ms Suu Kyi, who is currently under house arrest in Yangon, and representatives of the country's ethnic minorities.
"Although it's a five-day working trip, he will stay as long as it is necessary to make progress on his top priorities," said a UN official close to Mr Gambari. "Meeting Aung San Suu Kyi and hearing her views is a crucial part of the visit," he said. "If he leaves early then that will be a sure sign that his mission has failed." The United Nations and the international community have urged Myanmar's ruling junta to include Ms Suu Kyi, her party, the National League for Democracy, and the country's ethnic minorities in any dialogue about a return to democracy. The NLD won elections in 1990, even though Ms Suu Kyi was under house arrest, but the junta refused to recognise the results and many of the party's activists were detained or fled into exile abroad.
Mr Gambari has met the opposition leader on his previous five visits, and diplomats in Yangon believe he must have already had permission from the regime to see her this time. The real test of the envoy's success though will be whether he will be able to meet the junta's top general, Than Shwe. The senior general has refused to meet him on his past few visits. "He is likely only to be allowed to meet the largely ceremonial prime minister, Thein Sein," said Win Min, a Myanmar academic based at Chiang Mai University in Thailand. "The top general obviously has no regard for him and believes it isn't necessary to talk directly to him."
For his part, Mr Gambari is likely to be hoping for a more successful visit than his last one in March, which even he described as disappointing. He left empty-handed, and had to endure a savage dressing down by Gen Kyaw Hsan, the information minister, who accused him of being ignorant, insensitive and irrelevant to Myanmar's future. The envoy's offer to provide international observers for a referendum on a new constitution in May was also rebuffed.
Since then the authorities have pushed through the new constitution as part of their "road map to democracy", which ensures the military will have a continued role in politics. "People were forced to vote for the constitution although most had not even read it," said Khin Omar, a Myanmar activist in Thailand who organised a troupe of clandestine monitors across the country for the referendum. "We found that voters were harassed and intimidated, and ballot boxes stuffed with 'yes' votes."
The vote went ahead in May, despite a major humanitarian crisis caused by Cyclone Nargis. More than 200,000 people died and hundreds of thousands of others were left homeless. The United Nations and Asean - the South East Asian bloc to which Myanmar belongs - have been co-ordinating a massive relief and reconstruction effort since. The Myanmar regime has realised it cannot handle the post-cyclone rebuilding without substantial international assistance. This may have made it more responsive to international offers to mediate between the military regime and the pro-democracy opposition. Two weeks ago, Tomas Ojea Quintana, the new UN special rapporteur for human rights in Myanmar, was allowed to make his inaugural mission. Myanmar's military rulers are keen to get the United Nations to endorse their "road map to democracy", originally announced in Aug 2003 by Gen Khin Nyunt, who was prime minister at the time. He was later arrested and is serving more than 40 years under house arrest for corruption. "This is the one thing that the special envoy cannot do," said a senior European diplomat dealing with Myanmar. "However there are elections planned for 2010, and Than Shwe must now implement the second stage of the road map - increased democratic space and political freedoms. This may offer some space for renewed discussions involving the pro-democracy opposition and the ethnic groups, which have signed ceasefire agreements with the military government." It seems that Than Shwe is pressing on with his plans to introduce a form of civilian government in the near future. The referendum was the third step in the process, but he skipped the period of democratic consolidation - release of political prisoners, freedom of expression, including easing censorship on the press and the nurturing of civil society. The armed ethnic rebel groups, which have ceasefire agreements with the government, were also supposed to hand over their weapons before the referendum was held. None of this happened, but it may be on the cards in the lead-up to planned elections in two years time. "In that case there could be an opportunity for the international community to play a constructive role in the process," according to a European diplomat who requested anonymity. "Mr Gambari's visit may be crucial to that process." The United Nations has significantly stepped up its efforts recently to encourage change in Myanmar, especially after Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary general, visited Myanmar a few weeks after the cyclone and chaired the first donors' pledging meeting in Yangon. He met the reclusive Than Shwe, and, despite reports to the opposite, did raise the UN and international community's concerns about Ms Suu Kyi and the referendum. Mr Gambari is hoping his boss's rapport with the senior general may make this trip - his sixth - easier than previous ones. But his previous visits have largely failed to produce tangible results, and diplomats in Yangon are not optimistic that this visit will be any more fruitful. ljagan@thenational.ae
