ANGELINA IN BURMA
Angelina Jolie visits as a UN ambassador, but raises eyebrows with a handshake,
BANGKOK, THAILAND— When Angelina Jolie was first building up her bona fides as a globe-trotting humanitarian, she looked to refugees who’d fled Burma’s brutal army.
That was 2002. Jolie knelt in bamboo huts with victims of a decades-old jungle war. In camps along the Thai-Burma border, she said her Los Angeles friends fretted she’d “come back needing therapy.” Still, she declared that “there’s a fight to be had . . . to look after each other and right wrongs around the world.” How times have changed. On July 29, Jolie flew to Burma’s capital. She was greeted by a man on the other side of that still- burning jungle war. He is an ex-general named Shwe Mann, who gained notoriety by leading bloody strikes along Burma’s eastern border — the same sort of offensives that created the refugee camps Jolie visited.
Now, that ex-general, one of Burma’s most powerful figures, is posting photos on Facebook of Jolie grinning by his side.
This unexpected turn of events is emblematic of modern Burma’s abrupt image makeover. Not so long ago, the West regarded Burma as a tyrannical state controlled by men such as Shwe Mann.
Leaked U.S. documents report that “like most Burmese field commanders, Shwe Mann used forced civilian porters, including women and children, on a massive scale during operations against Karen insurgents” in the late 1980s. The Karen are a mountain-dwelling ethnic group in eastern Burma.
From a nation condemned and sanctioned, Burma is now depicted by the White House as an inspiring turnaround story. Hillary Clinton, who credits herself with speeding this reversal, has said it’s “sometimes hard to resist getting breathless” about Burma’s progress.
But Burma remains mired in poverty, dysfunction and authoritarianism. Most Western diplomats are sticking to an optimistic refrain: holding hands with Burma’s powerful inner circle is worth the rewards, even if that means engaging with men who have bloody pasts.