Pubdate: Sat, 24 Aug 2002
Source: Quad-City Times (IA)
Section: Opinion
Copyright: 2002 Quad-City Times
Contact:  http://www.qctimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/857
Author: Arthur C. Donart

WHY DOES ATROCITY GO UNNOTICED?

Monday's editorial in the Bangkok Post was titled "Drugs and thugs along 
the boarder." Although the Burmese generals in Rangoon have closed the 
border between Thailand and Burma, there are scheduled talks aimed at 
reopening the border. The Post editorial makes several points that ought to 
also concern U.S. foreign policy makers.

First, the government in Rangoon has forced the ethnic Shan people from 
their traditional homes on the Thai boarder and replaced them with Wa 
people. This is the biggest forced migration since the Vietnam War. The 
international community did not stand idle when such ethnic cleansing 
happened in Bosnia; yet this atrocity seems to go largely unnoticed. Why?

The second point is that the newly arrived Wa leaders have set up their own 
rather autonomous state and armed force that is anything other than benign. 
"Wa leaders are known to run the world's largest drug cartels. They have 
taken over the former heroin networks of Khun Sa, and built strong 
trafficking ties with the Chinese triads," the Post reports. "They have 
built this huge drug trafficking network behind the armed protection of the 
Burmese dictators and with their personal approval."

Shouldn't this be of great concern to our foreign policy makers? Where do 
terrorists get their money if not from the drug trade? Isn't the connection 
between drug money and illegal arms sufficiently well established that 
these happenings ought to be a red flag waving to signal our own security 
gurus?

Perhaps the government in Iraq is not the only government that needs to be 
removed!

Arthur C. Donart

Bangkok, Thailand

(permanent address, Thomson, Ill.) 
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