Myanmar says it won't be pressured on ASEAN

Myanmar says it won't be pressured on ASEAN

Achmad Sukarsono, Reuters/Jakarta

Myanmar, under renewed pressure over its human rights record, said on Thursday it would not discuss democratic reforms at a meeting of Asian and African leaders in Indonesia that the junta's top general is attending.

Foreign Minister Nyan Win said the military-ruled Southeast Asian nation would also not be pressured on whether it would take the leadership of the region's main political grouping next year.

"We've come to discuss about the Afro-Asia commemorative summit. No need to discuss about the internal situation," he told reporters after meeting Indonesian counterpart Hassan Wirayuda.

Myanmar has faced growing pressure to give up its turn at chairing the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in 2006, after others in the grouping said they were increasingly frustrated by Yangon's slow pace of democratic reform and its treatment of political prisoners.

"This is our own decision," Nyan Win said in response to questions on the issue from reporters.

ASEAN foreign ministers sidestepped the issue at a gathering in the Philippines this month by postponing a decision on whether Myanmar should chair the group.

But Thai Foreign Minister Kantathi Suphamongkhon, who also met Hassan on Thursday, said ASEAN had been working hard to convey the concerns of the world to Yangon.

"They have emphasized that they feel very strongly that ASEAN unity comes first. They will not be an obstacle to ASEAN unity. I am convinced the chairmanship situation will be resolved in a very good way," he told reporters.

The United States and Europe have threatened not to attend any ASEAN meetings hosted by Myanmar. Washington has also said it might withhold funding to several development projects in the region, particularly in poorer Southeast Asian nations.

Europe and the United States have shunned Myanmar and slapped sanctions on Yangon since the military government's latest detention of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi in May 2003.

Myanmar's hardline leader, Senior General Than Shwe, is due to arrive in Jakarta on Thursday for the inter-regional summit.

Analysts and diplomats in Yangon say Than Shwe is expected to seek bilateral meetings with ASEAN counterparts on the sidelines of the summit to discuss the issue of the chairmanship.

The grouping's rotating chairmanship is based on alphabetical order. Laos currently chairs the group.

Singapore and several other ASEAN members have shown signs of impatience with Yangon's slow reform progress, in a rare breach of the group's long-held principle of non-interference in members' internal affairs.

Yangon has promised to bring the country back to democracy through a seven-stage roadmap laid out in 2003 by then prime minister Khin Nyunt, who was purged last October.

ASEAN comprises Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.