Hope or dread in Burma? Visit from Clinton

Hillary Clinton: "We came, we saw, he died, ha ha ha!" The goal is US empire. Who's next?

BALI, Indonesia (AP) - Seizing an opportunity for historic progress in repressive Burma (Myanmar), Pres. B.S. Obama is dispatching Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton to the long-isolated nation next month in an attempt to accelerate fledgling reforms.

The move is the most dramatic sign yet of an evolving relationship between the United States and Myanmar, also known as Burma, which has suffered under brutal military rule for decades. Obama said Friday there had been "flickers of progress" since new civilian leadership took power in March.

(AP) More

Responding to signs of reform, Myanmar's main opposition party, led by Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, decided on Friday to register again for future elections after boycotting last year's voting.

"If Burma continues to travel down the road of democratic reform, it can forge a new relationship with the United States of America," Obama said as he announced Clinton's trip while on a diplomatic mission to southeast Asia. Clinton will be the first U.S. secretary of state to visit Myanmar in more than 50 years. More

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Thai Elephant steps on Burmese landmine

Elephant tears (Tasos_49/Digifancanon/Flickr)

(Telegraph.co.uk) Soraida Salwala of the Friends of the Asian Elephant conservation group in northern Thailand says the pachyderm's left foot was severely hurt in Sunday's blast in Burma's Kayin state.

Salwala said Tuesday that the elephant named Pa Hae Po was taken by truck to the group's hospital in the Thai city of Lampang and is expected to recover.

The elephant is the 14th such injury to be treated at the hospital since it began operating in 1993. He joins three other landmine victims that remain hospitalized at the facility. Rights groups say both the Burma army and rebels have laid mines during decades of conflict.

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Buddha's Kapilavastu relics to go from India to Sri Lanka

The relics were excavated in the 19th century by Alexander Cunningham, the first director of the Archaeological Survey of India. The place of excavation, now called Piprahwa in Bihar, was known as Kapilavastu earlier [leading to Indian claims that the Buddha was born in India proper rather than in an outlying region, be it in what is now Afghanistan or Nepal]. Indian and Sri Lankan officials on Saturday unveiled a 16-foot tall [statue of the] Buddha in the Sarnath style from the Gupta period, installed at the entrance to the International Buddhist Museum complex...

Burma tilts towards civil war

Brian McCartan (Asia Times Online); image by Danno91

Myanmar (Burma) moved closer to civil war in recent weeks after fighting broke out in Kachin State, a former ceasefire area in the remote northern region.

Myanmar's newly elected government now faces ethnic insurgencies on three separate fronts, threatening internal and border security.

There is also the potential for more insurgent groups to take up arms and push their claims against the government. The escalating conflict is not going all the military's way and risks further stunting Myanmar's development and international confidence in its supposed democratic transition.

In the southeast, a revolt by formerly allied troops of the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) on November 7, 2010, election day, resulted in the temporary seizure of two important border towns and the some 20,000 refugees fleeing into Thailand.

Although the government was able to retake the towns, fighting continued in the area and the group allied itself with the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), the armed wing of the Karen National Union (KNU). More