After the Singapore ASEAN Foreign Ministers’ Meeting last month, the Foreign Minister, Datuk Abdullah Ahmad Badawi said that Burma does not deserve to be ostracised because of its poor human rights record. He said this was not the approach to help the country return to the mainstream of global activity as any move to push Burma to a corner would only serve to further isolate the country.
However, while ASEAN governments do not want to ostracise the military junta ruling Burma, the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC), they should not reward SLORC for its poor human rights record by admitting Burma into ASEAN this year.
ASEAN has already brought SLORC into the ASEAN framework by admitting it as an observer last year which had given wrong signals to the Burmese military junta that with ASEAN backing, it could defy regional and international opinion about having to observe the most fundamental respect for human rights and democratic freedoms of its citizenry.
In retrospect, SLORC's admission as an observer in ASEAN had not helped one iota to bring Burma to "join the mainstream of global activity". SLORC had continued to defy the annual United Nations General Assembly resolution calling for democratisation and to respect human rights of its people.
In fact, the human rights record of SLORC had worsened since it had acquired observer status in ASEAN, and in the context of the failure of the ASEAN constructive engagement policy in the past seven years to achieve any tangible or measurable progress in democratic reforms or national reconciliation, ASEAN must respect regional and international opinion highly critical of the admission of Burma into ASEAN this year.
Amnesty International, for instance, had branded 1996 as the worst year for human rights in Burma this decade and "the worst since a military crackdown in 1988", reporting that more than 2,000 people were arrested last year for activities which were deemed to be anti- government and that severe restrictions were imposed on the speech and movements of pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
ASEAN must safeguard its international reputation and credibility by ensuring that its admission of SLORC would not incur world-wide opprobrium and disrepute for the regional organisation because of Burma's abominable human rights record.
What ASEAN should do is to prepare for Burma's eventual admission in the near future by first making a success of its "constructive engagement" policy by creating the conditions for democratic reforms and national reconciliation in Burma.
ASEAN countries should encourage SLORC to respond positively to the new initiative by Aung San Suu Kyi on the anniversary of Burma’s Union Day calling for “preliminary” national convention between the opposition, the military and the ethnic minority groups, and to begin a process of national dialogue and reconciliation in Burma.
So as to salvage its seven-year "constructive engagement" policy, ASEAN should set up a special committee to assist in the process of democratic reforms and national reconciliation in Burma, and convince SLORC to have trust in the ASEAN nations who are "friends and not enemies of Burma" in helping to bring all the three parties in Burma to the negotiations table.
If SLORC is admitted into ASEAN at the ASEAN Foreign Ministers’s Conference in Kuala Lumpur in July this year, and this encouraged the military leaders to embark on a more hardline, uncompromising and repressive course of action against pro-democracy activists and ethnic minorities, all the ASEAN leaders who had supported Burma’s entry into ASEAN would have to accept international responsibility for such renewal of human rights violations and atrocities.