Thaksin chided for siding with Rangoon

Thaksin chided for siding with Rangoon

A non-Burman coalition issued a statement yesterday (10 June) criticising Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra for supporting Rangoon's ongoing offensive along the border areas. 

"What (he) said on 8 June that the border areas would return to peace after the annihilation of the ethnic nationalities by the SPDC amounts to championing its genocidal program," claimed the statement that was received by S.H.A.N. this morning. 

The communique, released by the Five State Alliance, comprising Arakan, Chin, Karen, Karenni and Shan, also alleged that the current offensive was part of Rangoon's "genocidal campaign." 

"As we have conclusively discovered during our operations how the SPDC has been implicated in the drug production and trafficking of its subsidiary armed groups, we have designated it as an accomplice in drugs," it charged. 

The answer to the problem, it concluded, is to immediately transfer power to the National League for Democracy and ethnic representatives that had won in the 1990 general elections. 

The National Democratic Front, an umbrella organization of armed ethnic nationalities, also accused that Rangoon was "stirring up xenophobia" against Thailand "in an effort "to delay meaningful discussions with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi." 

Aung San Suu Kyi, leader of the National League for Democracy, was released on 6 May. Rangoon, however, is yet to indicate when the "meaningful discussions" will begin. 

Flash 

The confusion of the Wa side, that led to the firing and shelling on Burmese troops in Hwe Yao, opposite Chiangmai's Wianghaeng District, ended after an hour, 12:00-13:00, and fighting had resumed between the Shan State Army and Burmese-Wa alliance, said the SSA source. 

"Fun's over," he commented. "Now we settle down to the real business of licking them."