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Non-Burman states are Burma's colonies, says Shan activist

Burma under military rule has maintained a colonial relationship with their non-Burman satellite regions in the name of 'national unity', said a Shan politician at the Conference on Decolonization held in The Hague on 20 January. 

Sai Wansai, General Secretary of the Shan Democratic Union and Shan representative to the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization, also known as the Shadow UN, said its Burma members especially "Karenni State and Shan States, are clear about their statuses as being de facto colonies or colonized peoples under alien occupation." 

He argued that the suspension of the 1947 Constitution in 1962 was in effect "a self-denunciation that Burma had overnight become an aggressor-nation instead of partner. Thus, in a legal-constitutional sense, the Union of Burma ceased to exit... The Burmese military regime has been attempting to hold the defunct union together with scant success by sheer military force, whilst the real and only solution is political." 
Sai Wansai a.k.a. Sai Myo Win however conceded that the entrenched status quo position of the United Nations' member states is the biggest barrier to overcome. "But quite a lot has happened within the past decades. Humanitarian intervention had taken place in Iraq, former Yugoslavia and East Timor... where military occupation and gross human rights violations are the order of the day for de facto colonized territories." 

He quoted UN Secretary General Kofi Annan to prove his point. In his article titled 'Two concepts of sovereignty', Annan writes: "This developing international norm in favor of intervention to protect civilians from wholesale slaughter will no doubt continue to pose profound challenges to the international community. In some quarters it will arouse distrust, suspicion, even hostility. But I believe on balance we should welcome it. Why? Because, despite all the difficulties of putting it into practice, it does show that humankind today is less willing than in the past to tolerate suffering in its midst, and more willing to do something about it." 

Wansai also suggestion serious violators of human rights should be denied legitimacy and proper action taken against such regimes. "States exist for the sole purpose of fulfilling three fundamental tasks: (1) to protect the population of the state; (2) to promote the economic, social and cultural welfare of that population; and (3) to represent the interest of that population externally, that is, internationally where a state or a government does not fulfill these functions over a period of time, but instead represses or even kills the people it is supposed to protect; destroys their culture, economically exploits them; or represents interests other than those of the people, then that state or government lacks legitimacy in respect to the whole population, or to that section of population which it oppresses." 

Wansai reported that his representation was well-received. "I will be working closely with Eduardo Welsh, Director of Programs on this issue to launch an international campaign," he said. 

Other prominent UNPO members are Tibet, East Turkestan, Chechnya, Aceh, East Timor, Kosovo and Taiwan. Other members from Burma are Chin and Mon. 

The United Nations General Assembly declared on 8 December 2000 that the period from 2001 to 2010 was to be the Second International Decade for the Eradication of Colonialism. 

The term 'colony', according to the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary, means A country or area settled or conquered by people from another country and controlled by that country.