Obama leaves Asia empty-handed but raises hopes

by Larry Jagan

Friday, 20 November 2009 18:38

Bangkok (Mizzima) - (Analysis) The United States President, Barack Obama’s has left Asia empty-handed on all the key issues facing the White House. There was little movement on the intractable problems of Burma and North Korea, while thorny bilateral issues with China, Japan and South Korea fared little better. But at least Washington was able to tell Asia’s leaders first-hand that the US approach to the region has changed.

More critically, the new American administration clearly demonstrated it wants to re-engage with South East Asia after eight years of President Bush’s hesitant attitude. The first-ever US-ASEAN summit last weekend in Singapore was another high-profile example of this trend. But it is the shift in policy towards Burma which is the most significant change of all. Analysts and activists alike though are now questioning whether this new strategy is going to produce any concrete results - or fail like all previous international efforts to mediate between the junta and the pro-democracy politicians and parties seem to have.

In recent months the US has begun to talk directly with the generals, which previous administrations had shunned such a move. There has been a series of meetings between senior US diplomats and Burmese government ministers, including the Prime Minister, Thein Sein - in Burma, New York and elsewhere. The most critical meetings were when Assistant Secretary of State, Kurt Campbell visited Burma in early November.

Many expect him to make a follow-up visit before the end of the year. He told members of the National League for Democracy (NLD) led by the detained opposition leader, Aung San Suu Kyi that he would be back in Burma very soon.

So far there are no real signs that this is going to happen, and western diplomats in Rangoon are skeptical that a return visit is on the cards in the near future. The main problem is that Burma’s top military leader Than Shwe seems to have cooled on the idea of rapprochement with Washington.

“The ball is now very much in the Burmese court,” said Sean Turnell a Burma expert at Macquarie University in Australia. “Obama's hand has been extended - will they respond in kind or with the clenched fist,” he told Mizzima.

The US position is crystal clear - previous US policy which relied almost exclusively on sanctions and isolating the regime has failed miserably. It is now time for a new approach, the US secretary of state Hilary Clinton boldly announced earlier this year, one where sanctions were maintained but supplemented by a dialogue with Burma’s military leaders.

There are some observers who believe that actually the US may have misjudged the regime’s interest in cooperating with Washington, while others feel the US is still too absorbed with the fate of the detained opposition leader, Aung San Suu Kyi to be able to have a meaningful dialogue with the generals. The real underlying issue now, is what Washington sees as its end-game.

“The US must decide whether their intervention is to free Aung San Suu Kyi, or help make the situation for the vast majority better than it was,” a senior editor in Rangoon told Mizzima on condition of anonymity. Scot Marciel, the deputy US assistant under-secretary for Asia and Ambassador to ASEAN, who also accompanied Campbell to Burma a few weeks ago, told Mizzima in Bangkok after the visit: “We feel that there are more than 50 million people in the country who deserve the efforts of the international community to try to help bring about progress and we’re very committed to that.”

“Dialogue is not an end in itself,” Marciel stressed. “There has to be concrete results.”

This is where all previous efforts to engage the regime have come unstuck. Far too often the key aim seems to have been to free Suu Kyi from detention, with some lip-service being given to releasing all political prisoners. The UN envoy to Burma, Razali Ismail, still sees the Nobel Laureate’s release in May 2002, in which he played an instrumental role behind the scenes, as the pinnacle of his mission.

If the US consciously takes the same view, their efforts to start a dialogue between Suu Kyi and the generals will fare no better than the numerous attempts, largely led by the UN, in the past two decades to do the same. “The two sides are on entirely different wave-lengths and there is a huge amount of mutual distrust,” said Thant Myint U, a former UN official, now historian and author of the award-winning book on Burma, “A River Of Lost Footsteps”.

“At best we're at a confidence-building stage,” he told Mizzima. “If we aim for a break-through on the most difficult issues - such as relations between the junta and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi - I'm afraid we're bound for a big disappointment.”

He believes the international community must take a much longer-term approach, in the interest of bringing about real improvements for the ordinary Burmese people. But time is running out - elections will be held next year no matter what, and changes to the constitution, approved in last year’s sham referendum, are out of the question. And unless there are significant incentives for the junta leaders to appease the Americans, it may be too late to influence what happens in the coming months.

“Than Shwe may feel there is no need to make any concessions, unless he wants to please the Americans,” according to the former British ambassador to Thailand and Vietnam, and now Burma watcher, Derek Tonkin. “It could now be only six months to the elections,” he warned.

The joint statement after the US-ASEAN summit last week, in which neither Aung San Suu Kyi nor political prisoners were expressly mentioned, is a good yard-stick of the new international consensus that has merged with this new American tact.

The statement emphasized two things: that the 2010 elections must be conducted in a free, fair, inclusive and transparent manner in order to be credible to the international community; and urged junta “to help create the conditions for credible elections, including by initiating a dialogue with all stakeholders to ensure that the process is fully inclusive.”

All Asian leaders and Washington are now singing from the same hymn book. ASEAN leaders, led by Thailand’s Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva (as the current chairman of the regional grouping), have repeatedly advised the junta leaders that the elections had to credible.

China too is on board with this approach. “China adheres to the principle of national reconciliation and unity, by promoting political dialogue and consultation between the Government and the opposition,” said the Chinese academic and Burma watcher, Dr Li Xuecheng at the Chinese Institute of Strategic Studies. “China is willing to work together with all the relevant parties, including opposition political parties, to make the 2010 elections a success,” Li told Mizzima.

But while there seems to be general agreement that national reconciliation and inclusive elections are essential if Burma is ease its international isolation, there is no blue-print for what that means in reality. “The Obama administration has yet to spell-out what they mean by free and fair elections,” David Steinberg a professor at Georgetown University in Washington and author of numerous books and academic articles on Burma told Mizzima.

“Does that mean Aung San Suu Kyi being allowed to run or campaign? The NLD being able to contest the elections? Fair campaigning and the open printing and distributing of campaign literature?” he asked. “Unfortunately everything still remains open to interpretation.”

For years Suu Kyi has said her freedom was far less important than establishing a genuine dialogue between the pro-democracy movement and the junta. The US may now have also signed up to this approach. But words alone are not enough. “Senior General Than Shwe will never reveal his hand, he will never disclose his wish list,” said a senior Burmese academic. “Rather, it is up to Daw Aung San Su Kyi to imagine what he wants so she will not hurt his strategy for the future,” he said.

For her part Suu Kyi continues to try to coax the reclusive generals into talking directly to her. Her latest letter to Than Shwe asking for a meeting was a sincere offer for talks to explore ways she might be able help the national conciliation process. “It shows she has changed and is prepared to compromise and not constantly take the high moral ground,” said Justin Wintle, the British writer, who wrote the biography of Suu Kyi, “Perfect Hostage”.

“This process, encouraged by the US change of policy, is the most exciting thing to happen in Burma for years - there is now a real possibility of dialogue,” he added.

But others are less sanguine. “Daw Suu's latest letter is unlikely to mollify Than Shwe all that much,” Tonkin warns. “It is set at the ‘we are equals’ level where Than Shwe unfortunately has all the power and is operating from a position of strength, not weakness.”

Many analysts inside Burma fear that the process may prove to be dead in the water unless Suu Kyi is able to offer Than Shwe something tangible which would allay his fears that she was not intent on disrupting the forthcoming elections. There are some who say she should resign from the National League for Democracy as a gesture of goodwill - and perhaps follow the approach of Nelson Mandela in South Africa, or Xanna Gusmao in Timor Leste.

But there is an alternative - the Sonia Gandhi syndrome. The Italian-born wife of the assassinated Indian Prime Minister and leader of the Congress party refused to become Prime Minister or take a ministerial post in the Congress government when it won the national elections a few years ago. She did so to avert a bitter and protracted constitutional wrangle with the opposition Hindu-fundamentalist party the BJP. But she remained the leader of the party, and so a powerful influence behind the scenes - later she became a back-bencher.

This is an option Suu Kyi could take now - assure the senior general that she did not want to contest the elections or be considered for political office. She could offer her services to help the transition to a civilian government. There is little doubt that Than Shwe will not let her run anyway or even be involved in the campaigning.

“I would say she will not be allowed to campaign before the elections, and under the constitution she cannot run, and I see no way the junta will change that constitution in any provision prior to the new Hluttaw [parliament] being seated,” Steinberg told Mizzima.

The future is likely to become clearer in the next few weeks - after the State Peace and Development Council [SPDC] quarterly meeting and the United Solidarity and Development Association [USDA] Congress in Naypyidaw next week. The USDA is expected to announce the formation of its political party, and the electoral law is expected to be rolled out in the coming weeks. An interim cabinet - which has already been dubbed as the interim government -- is also to be announced before the end of the year, according to Burmese government sources.

During this time the international community and Asian leaders in particular, will be watching to see what signs there are, if any, that the opposition will be involved in the process. At the very minimum Suu Kyi must be allowed to meet all the other NLD central executive members, as requested in her latest letter to Than Shwe. But the only clear sign that the regime is taking any notice of the US and ASEAN’s concern on board, would be a meeting between her and Than Shwe.

“The ball is firmly in Than Shwe’s court,” said the economist and Burma specialist, Sean Turnell at Macquarie University in Australia. “But it was a blow that he avoided seeing the US delegation earlier this month.”

“He's using various underlings to keep the music playing in the hope he can get away with doing nothing beyond entrenching his power, legacy and his family's security,” Turnell told Mizzima. “I think he wants to have nothing to do with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi - but may be prepared to go through the motions if it buys him time.”