OPEN LETTER TO H.E. PINHEIRO

SHAN DEMOCRATIC UNION (SDU)

OPEN LETTER TO H.E. PINHEIRO

H.E. Paulo Sergio Pinheiro
Special Investigator for Burma
UN Commission on Human Rights

Your Excellency

The SDU-Shan Democratic Union welcomes your visit to Burma.

We are also aware that the ruling Burmese junta, the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), will attempt to use Your Excellency's visit to bolster its blanket denial of the rapes in the Shan State. It will take you to villages and will get villagers to deny that rapes have taken place.

Regarding this, as a Shan leader, Khun Tun Oo said in a radio interview that it is certain that nobody will dare to talk about the rape cases because they will be in trouble if they do so. We hope and believe that Your Excellency will keep in mind the helplessness of the people -- the ordinary folks -- in the face of a government that does not govern, a government that represses, harasses, and brutally intimidates the people on a daily basis.

Your Excellency is no doubt clearly aware that the SPDC does not rule with the consent of the people and holds on to power by coercion and harsh repression alone. It believes in holding onto power in perpetuity and at all cost.

Aware of the SPDC's unpopularity and its inability to govern well and to the benefit of the country -- that the SPDC state is a failed state -- the international community, including the United Nations, have urged the SPDC to make peace with its population or citizens, and to negotiate with the democratic opposition led by Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and the ethnic nationalities.

The opposition, including the ethnic nationalities, are prepared to negotiate in good faith with the SPDC, whatever its crimes, if the SPDC is willing to become part of the solution.

It is hoped that Your Excellency will let it be known to the SPDC that it is time, to quote Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, for a quick change in Burma, and that the current "failed state" status quo is damaging to the country and in reality benefits no one. It is time to move on.

We pray that Your Excellency will be firm with the SPDC, and as a high U.N. official, charged with investigating human rights abuses in Burma, will not let the people down.

Shan Democratic Union

Date: 17 October, 2002

Contact: Sai Wansai
E-mail: s.wansai@onlinehome.de