Teresa Kok

By Santha Oorjitham

KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 8 (Bernama)—Asean lawmakers are working hard to get the “Myanmar situation” on the agenda of the 11th Asean Summit here next week.

At the very least, they want the issue to be on the informal agenda when leaders of the 10-member regional grouping gather at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre from Dec 12 to 14.

Teresa Kok, Secretary of the Asean Inter-Parliamentary Myanmar Caucus (AIPMC), told Bernama that delegates from six Asean countries (Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines and Myanmar) will be delivering a statement issued by the AIPMC’s Conference on Good Governance, Democracy and Asean to their respective foreign ministers. The delegates include senators, members of parliament and diplomats.

Caucus President Datuk Zaid Ibrahim said he would be making an effort to see both Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi and Foreign Minister Datuk Seri Syed Hamid Albar this week to show them the statement from the caucus.

At the conference in Kuala Lumpur on Dec 2 and 3, about 80 participants including lawmakers and diplomats had denounced the Myanmar military government’s “human rights abuses and refusal to engage in meaningful democratic reforms” and called for discussion of the issue to be included in the agenda of Asean summit and the ministerial meetings.

The caucus was formed last year to work for the release of Myanmar’s opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and other political detainees, as well as towards representative democracy in the country.

In a telephone interview from Bangkok, Thai Senator Jon Ungphakorn said Thailand’s Senate Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Senator Kraisak Choonhaven would be meeting Thai Foreign Minister Kantathi Suphamonkhon to express the views of last week’s conference.

The former human rights activist said he was not “very hopeful” that the Thai delegation would push for the issue to be tabled at the summit.

“But some governments are quite keen. The Philippines has been at the forefront, especially their parliamentarians who have passed a number of motions on this in both houses.”

He also predicted that the Malaysian, Singaporean and possibly Indonesian delegations might support discussion of the “Myanmar situation” at the summit.

However, Kok, who is the MP for Seputeh, admitted that it was unlikely that the issue would be on the official agenda of the summit.

“But if pressure is mounted, maybe they will discuss it informally, on the sidelines,” she said, noting that the United Nations Security Council had decided to discuss human rights in Myanmar.

“All this discussion and international pressure is very much needed,” she said.

The United Nations Secretary-General’s special envoy for Myanmar, Tan Sri Razali Ismail, however, was not hopeful that Myanmar would be on the summit’s agenda.

“Asean governments have not done much (on the issue) recently anyway. I do not expect much movement on that score,” the former president of the UN General Assembly said.—BERNAMA