G8 urges release of Aung San Suu Kyi

by Mungpi
Saturday, 11 July 2009 00:28

New Delhi (mizzima) - The world’s major industrial countries, known as the G8, has called for the immediate release of Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi saying her continued detention would undermine the credibility of the junta’s proposed general elections in 2010.

Members of the G8 - Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom, and United States – in a joint statement from its summit in Italy said they welcomed the UN Secretary General’s visit to Burma.

But the group in a statement reiterated their “call on the Government of Myanmar [Burma] to release all political prisoners, including Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, whose continued detention would undermine the credibility of elections planned for 2010.”

The statement said the group also shares the World Body Chief’s view that the Burmese Government has lost an important opportunity to respond to the concerns of the international community by refusing Ban Ki-moon a meeting with detained Burmese Nobel Peace Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

The group urged that the Burmese junta implement a fully inclusive process of dialogue and national reconciliation, which will lead to transparent, fair and democratic multiparty elections in 2010.

But the group pledged that they “remain prepared to respond positively to substantive political progress undertaken by Myanmar [Burma].”

The G8 statement was immediately welcomed by a campaign group, the Burma Campaign UK, saying the statement has brought the issue of Burma’s political prisoners high up on the international agenda.

“It is particularly good to have Russia saying these things, as they strongly defend the dictatorship. However, words must be turned into action. We’d like to see the G8 supporting a global arms embargo on Burma,” said Mark Farmaner, Director of Burma Campaign UK, in a statement on Friday.

But the Campaign expressed concern over the G8 statement’s mention of the junta’s 2010 election plans, saying whether or not Aung San Suu Kyi is in jail or under house arrest, the international community should not endorse the junta’s elections and constitution as it is designed to legitimise military rule in the Southeast Asian nation.

The Campaign also said for a fully inclusive process of dialogue and national reconciliation to take place, the Burmese junta must abandon its plans for elections in 2010 and tear up its new constitution, which intends to entrench military rule, and grants no freedom and human rights.

The Group of Eight is currently into the 2009 G8 Summit at L'Aquila in Italy, from July 8 to 10, where the agenda includes the global economic crisis and a boost to growth, relaunching international trade, welfare policies, climate changes, development in poor countries and in Africa, food security and safety, access to water, health, and the resolution of regional crises for discussion.