-More than 100 demonstrators are currently in prison for haing participated in the protests two weeks ago against the rise in fuel prices. We are disappointed that Norwegian authorities have not issued an official condemnation of these arrests, that violate the basic human rights of the Burmese people, says Inger Lise Husøy, right, the Director of the Norwegian Burma Committee (NBK). (28-AUG-07)

Based on today’s press release from NBK, this article has been translated and edited for publication here by HRH F / Niels Jacob Harbitz. Photo of Husøy: HRH F / Harbitz.

NBK has sent a letter today to Jonas Gahr Støre, the Norwegian Minister of Foreign Affairs, in which Norwegian authorities are encouraged to issue an official protest of this week’s arrests of peaceful demonstrators in Burma. The authorities of both Sweden and Denmark, and also a host of other European countries and the EU, have been quick to condemn what is happening in Burma. Such reactions are symbolic, but still important to show the military junta that the international community is monitoring the situation in Burma.

-The people want change
-We also urge Norwegian authorities to actively promote an initiative from 92 MPs from the 1990 elections in Burma. This group of MPs has made a concete plan for political reforms in Burma and asks the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to get involved in the process to make the junta open up for dalogue with the opposition and ethnic minorities. The junta is in the process of implementing its own so-called roadmap for democracy, a completely misleading name to legitimate further miitary rule in Burma. The development in recent weeks clearly demonstrate the people’s need and wish for political change in Burma, says Husøy.

The elections in 1990 were the first free elections in Burma since the introduction of military dictatorship in 1962. The National League for Democracy (NLD), lead by the Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, won an overwhelming victory. The junta, however, has never allowed the NLD to form a government.