Suu Kyi to head probe into copper mine

Future of disputed project to be assessed

MONYWA, Myanmar, Dec 1, (Agencies): Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi will lead a probe into a crackdown on a protest against a Chinese-backed copper mine which will also assess the future of the disputed project, the president’s office said on Saturday.

The 30-strong non-parliamentary commission will investigate the “social and environmental issues” behind the protests, some of the most serious since a reform-minded government took over last year.

The Nobel laureate sought on Friday to mediate an end to the stand-off at the mine in Monywa, northern Myanmar, which saw scores of villagers and monks injured in the toughest clampdown on demonstrators since President Thein Sein came to power.

The commission will “investigate the truth” of the pre-dawn raid by riot police and assess whether the “copper mining project is being implemented in accord with inter- complained when Myanmar pulled back on a dam project in which China had an interest.

In other comments during her trip to Monywa, Suu Kyi said she would work for the country’s benefit but called on people to be “open-minded.”

“To walk the democratic system is a tough path,” she said. “It’s not straight.”

Though mine protesters may not be satisfied by those words, they at least know that they have Suu Kyi’s attention. The Nobel Peace laureate has gotten less involved in other conflicts.

War

Since taking her seat in the legislature in April, Suu Kyi has not set foot in northern Kachin state, where a war is raging between rebels and the army that has forced than 75,000 people to flee. She also has yet to visit the western state of Rakhine, where two waves of sectarian violence between ethnic Rakhine national norms”, a statement on the presidential office website, signed by Thein Sein, said late on Saturday.

In addition to probing the crackdown the commission will advise whether “to continue the copper mining project and whether to stop foreign investment”, the statement said, without providing further details.

Activists are calling for work at the mine — a joint venture between Chinese firm Wanbao and militaryowned Myanmar Economic Holdings — to be suspended to allow impact studies amid allegations of mass evictions and pollution.

The commission will be made up of prominent activists, lawmakers and other officials.

Buddhist monks marched in Myanmar’s two biggest cities on Saturday to protest at police violence during a crackdown on demonstrators at a copper mine, while Nobel Peace laureate Aung Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims has killed nearly 200 people and driven 110,000 people from their homes since June.

Suu Kyi has urged calm in both crises, but she not attempted to mediate, either.

“When entire communities of Rohingya and Muslims were wiped out in the state-backed ethnic cleansing in Rakhine state .... she didn’t even bother to tour the violence-struck” region, said Maung Zarni, a Myanmar expert and visiting fellow at the London School of Economics. “Why not?”

The answer, it seems, is that Suu Kyi has evolved into a pragmatic politician, one who must pursue personal and party goals without upsetting her new relationship with Myanmar’s new power brokers, including Thein Sein. The army still wields enormous power in this Southeast Asian nation, and Suu Kyi has argued she must work with them on the path to national reconcilia- San Suu Kyi and a rights group called for an official inquiry.

Activists said at least 50 people had been injured on Thursday, including more than 20 monks who had ended up in hospital, after riot police raided camps set up round the Monywa copper mine by villagers protesting against their forced eviction to make way for an expansion of the project.

Police used tear gas, water cannon and, according to activists, incendiary devices that local media described as “phosphorous bombs”. Many of the injured suffered serious burns.

Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at US-based Human Rights Watch, called for a speedy, impartial investigation by the government.

“A hospital ward full of horribly burned Buddhist monks and other protesters deserve to know who attacked them while they were sleeping and what the government is going to do about it,” he said. tion.

One of the most prominent signs of Suu Kyi’s pragmatism has been her failure to speak out strongly against what rights groups say is the widespread repression of the Rohingya minority.

Although she has condemned the recent unrest, she has pointedly refused to take sides, saying violence has been committed by both Buddhists and Muslims.

The Rohingya, though, are among the most persecuted people in the world, largely denied citizenship by Myanmar and rejected by Bangladesh. They have borne the brunt of the recent violence, which Zarni and others argue is part of an effort by ethnic Rakhine to drive Muslims out of the state. The vast majority of the 110,000 displaced are Rohingya, many of whom lost homes in arson attacks.

But Suu Kyi is well aware of her movement’s desire to sweep national elections in 2015.