EDITORIAL - Impunity in Myanmar

If elections are approaching and the biggest threat to your rule is sure to win, what do you do? You keep the threat locked up until the elections are over, with the possibility of a longer stay behind bars in case she stirs up trouble.

Over the years the junta in Myanmar has found many ways of keeping Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi under detention. Earlier this year, with just days to go before the end of her last sentence, an American who needs psychiatric care gave the junta an excuse, however flimsy: John Yettaw swam toward Suu Kyi’s home and insisted on staying there for two days, violating the terms of her house arrest.

The other day a judge sentenced Yettaw to seven years of hard labor. Suu Kyi was given three years, which junta leader Than Shwe reduced to 18 months. But the reduced sentence still renders Suu Kyi unable to participate in the elections next year.

The 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations, which has seen its efforts at constructive engagement with Myanmar bear little fruit, issued a statement of “deep disappointment” over the verdict on Suu Kyi. Though the statement was rare from a grouping that has a policy of non-intervention in its members’ internal affairs, ASEAN also said it remained “constructively engaged” with Myanmar.

The junta has grown used to statements of condemnation from its fellow ASEAN members including the Philippines and has generally ignored them. Myanmar gave up its turn as ASEAN chair rather than implement democratic reforms. It turned away international aid even as 140,000 of its citizens died directly from Cyclone “Nargis” and then later from hunger and sickness resulting from the disaster last year.

Membership in ASEAN has given the junta a veneer of respectability in the international community, with the junta giving nothing in return. Over the years the junta has learned that it can get away with oppressing its 50 million people, regardless of global condemnation or sanctions. The impunity will end only if there is stronger, concerted international action.