24.3 (Fall 2000) Burma: Human Rights, Forgotten Wars, and Survival

Italy was outraged and the world was shocked over the Cermis cable car tragedy of February 1998, during which an American low- flying military plane sliced through the cables holding a car full of skiiers, plunging all 20 of them to their deaths. Prime Minister Prodi called it an act of tragic recklessness. Outrage was renewed a year later when the pilot was acquitted by a U.S. military court. Europe resounded with an outcry against low-level flying in general and the American handling of the Cermis situation in particular.

Angel Ysaguirre, 32, was born in Belize and lived there with his family until they emigrated to Miami when he was 12. He remembers playing outside during the September 10th Belize Independence Day celebrations as a child when suddenly he heard the traditional Garifuna drums and saw a group of people approaching. He froze in terror for several minutes, certain that he would be harmed. He'd been told the Garifuna held supernatural powers and that they were Obea worshippers. He thought that a simple look from a Garifuna could put an evil spell on you.

The Ceramics of Ráquira, Colombia: Gender, Work, and Economic Change

As Heike Behrend and Ute Luig make clear in their introduction, this book is not a sequential account of the development of spirit possession cults throughout history, nor is it a desperate attempt to keep them alive.

General Ne Win overthrew Burma's short-lived democratic government in 1962's military coup, and, in an effort to move toward a socialist economy, instituted a new economic plan dubbed the "Burmese Way to Socialism." As part of this plan, Ne Win nationalized business and created government monopolies on staple goods such as rice and salt. More notably, in order to keep food prices low for urban workers and to procure cheap rice for export, Ne Win instituted a policy forcing farmers to sell their rice to the state at fixed prices.

An unusual beam of light slashes briefly through the dark forest. Immediately, two alimaongs (Higaonon warriors) investigate.

The Pa-O are one of the ethnic minorities of Burma. They live primarily in the Taunggyi area of southwestern Shan State. A smaller number live in the Thaton area of Mon State in Lower Burma.

On June 19, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the Massachusetts Burma Law. While this ruling is a setback for Free Burma advocates, it is not a fatal blow to the movement.

Kaybah!" yells ImaTufu to her toddler, who is veering too close to the fire. Chabo turns and looks at his mother, moves away from the hot coals, and continues his tottering journey across camp to carry a knife to his father. It's early December in the Ituri Forest of what until recently was northeastern Zaire, and the rainy season is almost over. Everyone is in camp because it has been too wet to forage for food. Taking the knife, Kebe picks up his son, gives him a burbling kiss on the belly, and plops the giggling child onto his lap.

Upland minority people in Thailand -- the `hilltribes' -- have traditionally lived on the edges of Thai society. Despite the volume of information being collected about tribal people, the demographic characteristics of these various upland minority groups remain largely unknown because existing data are both inaccessible and inaccurate. While the nine hilltribes of upper northern Thailand are a diverse group, both ethnically and culturally, they share a common history of marginalization. 40 to 60 percent are denied citizenship rights even though they were born in Thailand.

News reports of the atrocities committed against the East Timorese people by the Indonesian government have been a sporadic feature of national news reports and human rights activism over the past year. Yet throughout the Indonesian invasion of East Timor in August of 1999 and the subsequent international intervention, the news coverage of East Timor's plight has delivered only an impoverished portrayal of this conflict divorced from its historical context.

Many sociologists, anthropologists, and even Burmese politicians have maintained that Burmese women face less gender discrimination than do their sisters in other Southeast Asian countries. Burma's relative isolation for nearly forty years has helped perpetuate this myth, even as women's groups in exile make concerted efforts to debunk it. Despite Burma's ratification of the Convention on Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), discrimination is apparent in virtually every facet of women's lives.

PT International Nickel Indonesia (Inco) is a majority-owned subsidiary of the world's largest nickel miner, Inco of Canada.1 Inco started exploring for nickel in Indonesia in 1967 and began actual commercial mining in 1978.

For centuries, the Makah tribe has lived off of the sea, both physically and spiritually. In 1855 they signed a treaty with the federal government ceding their claim to land on the Olympic Peninsula in exchange for whaling and fishing rights, a trade-off designed to ensure the preservation of the central focus of Makah culture. At the time of the signing, one tribal negotiator said, "You can have the land. All I need is a plot of land for my house and to bury me. But if you take away our sea, we will die."

A Massachusetts bill intended to promote human rights in Burma turned into a court battle over states rights and the authority of the federal government to conduct foreign affairs. On June 19, 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously struck down Massachusetts's so-called "Burma Laws" in Crosby v. NFTC.

Case Overview

In 1996, approximately 1500 people lived in Camp 5, a refugee camp located in the jungle on the Thai-Burmese border. The camp was open and self-administered, with refugee-run schools, two churches, and one Buddhist monastery.

Nan province is in the upper north of Thailand on the border with Laos and is home to large populations of tribal peoples.

Introduction