For example, it does not do the Burmese opposition any good to dismiss out of hand the improvements that have taken place in Burma, and it does not help the optimists in the international community to prematurely reward the Burmese leaders for actions that are preliminary and possibly ephemeral.
This is not a situation of mutual exclusivity. As US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said, engagement versus sanctions is a “false choice,” the two go hand-in-hand, and it is possible to analyze the events taking place in Burma today both in the context of decades of false promises by Burmese regimes and in recognition that the current political environment may in some respects—but not all—be different from the past.
The reality is that engagement has been recently effective to a certain extent, but has been effectively manipulated by the Burmese leaders in the past to prolong and extend their grip on power.
And while in the long run sanctions are clearly not in the best interests of the Burmese people, the new government leaders’ desperate attempts to get them lifted (now that many businesses have been privatized into the hands of their cronies), as well as to avoid a UN Commission of Inquiry into crimes against humanity in Burma, shows that these tools have played a part in motivating the generals and ex-generals to change.
The Burmese opposition must acknowledge that reform will not occur overnight and welcome each step towards a more democratic and humane government. But at the same time, the international community must demand more concrete and meaningful changes before lifting its pressure on the Burmese government.
Thus far the government has made the easy, mostly risk-free and reversible choices that were in its own best interests. When it begins to make the more difficult choices that demonstrate a realization that Burma belongs to its people, and not to a handful of self-appointed men in power, then it will be time to say that meaningful reform is underway and reward the new Burmese government for its achievements.
This is the message that we hope Norwegian international development minister Solheim will deliver when he makes another visit to Burma this week, and in preparation for his trip, we would suggest he keep in mind the words spoken by his own prime minister, Jens Stoltenberg, after self-described Christian fundamentalist Anders Behring Breivik went on a killing spree and murdered innocent children just outside of Oslo.
“You will not destroy our democracy, or our commitment to a better world… no one shall scare us out of being Norway,” Stoltenberg said, and pledged that his country would respond to the massacre with even more democracy.
The Norwegian prime minister’s vow to respond to attempts at oppression with calls for more democracy should not be limited to his own country. If his response had been a call for a broadening of the middle class in order to produce a larger number of enlightened citizens and thereby reduce the chance of further killings, or said that Norway shouldn’t institute legal reforms “too fast” for fear of provoking similar incidents, the citizens of Norway would have been understandably outraged.
So Solheim must now clear away the cloud of doubt created by his past statements and those of Deputy Foreign Minister Eide and reassert what the Burmese people have long believed—that Norway stands firmly behind them and will demand that the Burmese leadership demonstrate an irreversible commitment to attaining, without delay and as soon as possible, democracy and human rights for all the people of Burma.
Related articles: The Myth of the Democratizing Middle Class
Norway's Horror is Our Own
Norwegian Naïveté in Burma?
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