" ေဒၚစု " သို႕မဟုတ္ ဒုနဲ႕ေဒးနဲ႕ နံေစာ္သူ

ႏိုင္ငံေတာ္တည္ၿငိမ္ေရး၊ ရပ္ရြာေအးခ်မ္းသာယာေရးႏွင့္တရာဥပေဒစိုးမိုးေရး ဆိုတာဟာ လက္ရွိ ပကတိ အေျခအေနေတြအရ အလိုအပ္ဆံုး ႏိုင္ငံေရးဦးတည္ခ်က္ျဖစ္ပါတယ္။ ဒီနိုင္ငံေရး ဦးတည္အခ်က္ အတိုင္း အမွန္တကယ္ ျဖစ္ေပၚလာေအာင္ ႏုိင္ငံေတာ္ရဲ႕ ေဒသတိုင္း၊ က႑တိုင္း၊ လူမ်ိဳးတိုင္း၊ အလႊာတိုင္း ကလည္း ဦးလည္မသုန္အားသြန္ ခြန္စိုက္ ေန႔မအား ညမနား ႀကိဳးစားေဆာက္ရြက္ေနၾကတာ အားလံုး မ်က္၀ါးထင္ထင္ ျမင္ေတြ႕ေနခဲ႕ၾကရၿပီး ျဖစ္ပါတယ္။

ဒါေပမဲ႕ ဒီႏိုင္ငံေရး ဦးတည္းခ်က္ကို နားမလည္တဲ႕ သူေတြ ဒါမွမဟုတ္ တမင္သက္သက္ ေဘးထိုင္ ဘုေျပာၿပီး ကန္႕လန္႕ကန္႕လန္႕လုပ္ေနတဲ႕ သူေတြရွိေနတာလည္း ႏိုင္ငံေတာ္ေရွ႕ခရီးအတြက္ အေႏွာင့္အယွက္ အတားအဆီးေတြျဖစ္လို႕ ဥပေဒႏွင့္အညီ အေရးယူေဆာင္ရြက္ဘို႕လည္း လိုပါတယ္။

" ေဒၚစု "လို႕ေခၚေနၾကတဲ႕ " ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္ " ကို ႏိုင္ငံေတာ္ရဲ႕လိုအပ္ခ်က္အရ တားဆီးမိန္႕ထုတ္ၿပီး ေနအိမ္မွာ အက်ယ္ခ်ဳပ္ထားခဲ့တာ လွည္းေန ေလွေအာင္း၊ ျမင္း ေဇာင္း မက်န္ အားလံုးအသိ တစ္္ကမၻာလံုး အသိျဖစ္ပါတယ္။

ေဒၚစု (သို႕မဟုတ္) ေဒၚေအာင္ဆန္းစုၾကည္ကို တားဆီးမိန္႕ မထုတ္ခင္တုန္းက ကန္႕သတ္မိန္႕ ထုတ္ထားခဲ့ပါေသးတယ္။ ေနာက္မွ ဆက္ၿပီး တားဆီးမိန္႕ထုတ္ခဲ့တာျဖစ္ပါတယ္။ တားဆီးမိန္႕မွာ တားဆီးထားတဲ႕ အခ်က္ သံုးခ်က္ ရွိပါတယ္။ ဒီအခ်က္ေတြကို ေဒၚစုက လိုက္နာဖို႕ တာ၀န္ရွိပါတယ္။ အဲဒိအခ်က္ သံုးခ်က္က--
(၁) ႏိုင္ငံျခားသံ႐ံုးမ်ား၊ ႏုိင္ငံေရးပါတီမ်ား၊ ႏုိင္ငံေရးပါတီမ်ားႏွင့္ အဆက္အသြယ္ရွိသူမ်ားႏွင့္ မဆက္သြယ္ရ။
(၂) ေနအိမ္ျပင္ပသို႕ လံုး၀ထြက္ခြာျခင္း မျပဳရ။
(၃) စာျဖင့္ေသာ္လည္းေကာင္း၊ စကားေၾကးနန္းျဖင့္ေသာ္လည္းေကာင္း လံုး၀ ဆက္သြယ္ျခင္း မျပဳရ။
ဆိုတဲ႕ အခ်က္ေတြျဖစ္ပါတယ္။ ဒါေတြဟာ ပညတ္ခ်က္ေတြ ျဖစ္ပါတယ္။ ပညတ္ထားတာ အဓိပၸါယ္ ရွိပါတယ္။ ပညတ္ထားတဲ႕ လူမသိဘဲနဲ႕ '' ခိုး '' ေတြ႕ရင္ '' ခိုး '' လုပ္ရင္ အျပစ္ရွိပါတယ္။

ၿပီးခဲ႕တဲ႕ ေမလ (၆) ရက္ေန႕က ကန္႕သတ္မိန္႕၊ တားဆီးမိန္႕ေတြနဲ႕ ေနေနရတဲ႕ ေဒၚစုရဲ႕ ေနအိမ္အတြင္းကို အေမရိကန္ႏိုင္ငံသာ John Willian Yettaw က တိတ္တဆိတ္ လွ်ိဳ႕၀ွက္ၿပီး ၀င္ေရာက္ ေနထိုင္ခဲ့ပါတယ္။ ဒီလို ၀င္ေနတာကို ေဒၚစုဘက္က ရိုးသားမယ္ဆိုရင္ သက္ဆိုင္ရာ လံုျခံဳေရးအဖြဲ႕ေတြကို အသိေပး ရမွာျဖစ္ပါတယ္။

သတင္းစာမွာ တီဗီြမွာေတြ႕ရတဲ႕ သတင္းေတြ၊ ဓါတ္ပံုေတြရဲ႕ အေနအထားအရ အိမ္ထဲက လွမ္းေအာ္ရင္ အျပင္က တာ၀န္ယူေနတဲ႕ လံုျခံဳေရး၀န္ထမ္းေတြ အားလံုး သဲသဲကြဲကြဲ ပီီပီျပင္ျပင္ ၾကည္ၾကည္
လင္လင္ ေကာင္းေကာင္းၾကားႏိုင္တဲ႕ အကြာအေ၀းမွာ ရွိပါတယ္။ ဒါေပမဲ႕ " ေဒၚစု "က ဒီလို မလုပ္ခဲ့ပါဘူး။ တိတ္တဆိတ္ လွ်ိဳ႕၀ွက္၀င္ေရာက္ေနထိုင္သူကို တရားမ၀င္ ခုိလႈံခြင့္ ေပးထားခဲ့ပါတယ္။ ဒီအခ်က္ကလည္း ေဒၚစုရဲ႕ မာန္ႀကီးမႈကို တစိတ္တပိုင္း ေဖာ္ျပ ေနပါတယ္။

မာန္ႀကီးတာက သူရဲ႕ကို္ယ္ေရးကိုယ္တာ ကိစၥပါ။ ဒါေပမဲ႕ တားဆီးမိန္႕ကို သိသိႀကီးနဲ႕ ခ်ိဳးေဖာက္တာကိုေတာ့ လစ္လ်ဴရွဳလို႕ ဒီ ၂၀၀၉ ခုႏွစ္ ႏွစ္ဦးပိုင္း ေလာက္က ေဂ်ာက္ဂ်က္တို႕အဖြဲ႕ရဲ႕ သီခ်င္း တစ္မ်ိဳး အေတာ္နာမည္ႀကီးခဲ့ပါတယ္။ သီခ်င္းစာသားေတြကလည္း လူငယ္ပရိတ္သတ္ေတြၾကားမွာ စိမ့္၀င္ ပ်ံႏွံ႕သြားခဲ့ပါတယ္။ " ဘူေလးလဲ " တို႕ " အမွန္ေလးပါ " တို႕ဆိုတဲ႕ စာသားေတြကို ေျပာင္းျပန္ လွန္ၿပီး ေျပာဆိုသြားခဲ့တဲ႕ စာသားေတြကိုလည္း သတိျပဳမိၾကမယ္ထင္ပါတယ္။

'' ေဒၚစု '' နာမည္ကိုလည္း စကားလိ္မ္ သေဘာနဲ႕ တစ္မ်ိဳး ေျပာၾကည့္ရင္ '' ဒုေစာ္ '' လို႕ေျပာလို႕ ရႏိုိင္ပါတယ္။ ဒါဆိုရင္ ဒုစရိုက္ေတြနဲ႕ နံေစာ္ေနသူလို႕ အဓိပၸါယ္မ်ား ႐ိွေနမလားလို႕ ေတြးမိပါတယ္။

Cartoons

Time bomb in express train exposed at Nay Pyi Taw Pyinmana Station..

NAY PYI TAW, 24 May—Informed by a duty-conscious public member that a 2.5" x 2.5" bomb wrapped up in green tape was planted in the roof of the lavatory of upper-class carriage No (5) of Nay Pyi Taw-Yangon down train No. (32) at platform (1) in Nay Pyi Taw Pyinmana Station at about 3.50 am today, station security members defused the bomb at 7.15 am. It was a time bomb improvised with two detonators, a TNT explosive block with a small hole in the middle of it, two 1.5-volt national brand dry cells, one dry cell cover, and a table clock. Information has been received that terrorists-cuminsurgents are resorting to various means to commit bomb blasts in such cities as Nay Pyi Taw, Yangon and Mandalay to provoke public panic and casualties of the people.

Similarly, according to the information, ABSDF, which has been declared a terrorist group, formed the Committee for Promoting People Activities (CPPA). It is now plotting to commit subversive acts such as attaching anti-government posters to the walls of buildings around Insein Market and in other busy places in Insein Township, Yangon; and planting mines with the intention that they will explode if the posters are taken off. And it has sent two bombers into
thenationfor destructive acts.

Apart from ABSDF, other insurgent groups are planning to incite mass protests, and explode bombs in the crowds.

ABSDF behind the destructive campaigns is a member group of FDB (Forum for Democratic in Burma), which is organizing members of antigovernment groups for explosive courses and anti-government courses. Authorities concerned are taking measures in cooperation with the people to expose the two bombers. Authorities today reminded the people that they should give information in time if they notice someone suspicious in their societies, environs and work places.

For people to take good care of their health to become good citizens

Good health is an invaluable asset to humans, and fitness of the people is of the greatest benefit to the State as well.

Ministry of Health is striving for health and fitness of the people by setting two objects – ensuring the longevity of each and every citizen and ensuring the people to be free
from any disease.
Worldwide, more than 1.5 billion people are suffering from hypertension. A person needs to eat healthy food to be free from hypertension. Healthy food contains energy, protein and vitamins essential to the human body without much fat and salt.
By eating too salty, sweet and oily foods, a person can get obese and overweight, thereby suffering from hypertension. Having more cholesterol and sugar in blood than necessary can surely cause hypertension.
Being obese, overweight or paunchy is detrimental to one’s health. And an obese person
is likely to suffer from hypertension two to six times higher than a person with average weight.
Having a healthy, balanced diet and doing regular physical exercise are the best way to prevent against being obese and overweight.
Therefore, in order to live long and to be free from any disease, all the people are urged to eat wholesome food and take good care of their health contributing to their health. Only then, will they become the citizens who are physically and mentally fit and strong to serve the best interests of theState.

Love your mother country

Our country is not a developed one yet, so what should
we do, then? We all have to work harder and harder till we
achieve our goal. We have to strive for generating better
opportunities for younger generations.

Love your mother country

These days, I happen to read articles of journals. In the articles, the writers made their opinions in a frank way. So, I thank them for their works that inspired me to write this article. In addressing any form of issues, there must be correct views, correct thoughts, correct actions and correct decisions. One will never get along with others so long as one does not have right views. One will have to exercise caution and broaden one’s horizons if one wants to have right views. Moreover, being Buddhists, the people have to believe in wholesome and unwholesome actions and good and evil results of actions.
Here, I do not mean a person has to give up his efforts just as fortune does not smile on him, but he has to do some activities that can help him have an element of luck in pursuing his goals. We the people were born of parents of various national races in Myanmar owing to the good deeds we did in our past lives. We should not put blame on our parents and the results of our past deeds for our being born in Myanmar. Instead, we should highlight the strong points of being born here in various spheres including religious, social, economic and health aspects. There are so many points reflecting that Myanmar, our country where Theravada Buddhism shines, is definitely worth living. In the hereafter, human beings will be born in celestial and higher celestial abodes or in the hell.
Myanmar is exactly the sole land where people can study and follow the Teachings of the Buddha to avert sufferings in the hell and to attain Nirvana. Recall the prayers and religious verses you learnt from your parents and grandparents in your youth, and you will all notice that the prayers and religious verses comprise many methods to lead a peaceful and healthy life, do business, and get along with family members and societies. If in doubt, say the prayers and verses of Buddhism, and then you will come to know well and believe that there are so many satisfactory things in life. In addition, the lifestyle of Myanmar people is endowed with a lot of worldly values. Traditional festivities and festivals are celebrated in each of the Myanmar months. We Myanmar people can easily enjoy the loving-kindness of our parents and grandparents, obey the sermons of venerable monks, and enjoy pervasive delight, ecstasy and insight at meditation centres. Surely, Myanmar people have the unique opportunity to visit and pay reverence to the Shwedagon Pagoda. There is no reason that those Myanmar citizens who are in foreign countries for various reasons can disregard and betray the motherland. I want every such citizen to come back to the mother country without fail after making further studies and profits. They all have the rights to return home. I wish all the Myanmar people would make provision in line with the Teachings of the Buddha for their hereafters, leading a peaceful life in the motherland till their last days. I have been to some foreign countries, embracing many kinds of opportunities, but I have no words to fully express the delights that came from the bottom of my heart when I arrived back at Yangon International Airport of the mother country. For me, Myanmar, the country where there are my residence and family, is exactly the land I love and cherish most.
Our country is not a developed one yet, so what should we do, then? We all have to work harder and harder till we achieve our goal. We have to strive for generating better opportunities for younger generations. Instead of speaking ill of Myanmar through anti-government foreign radio stations, some Myanmar people living abroad should send relief supplies to Nargis victims. Make self criticism if you have provided relief aid such as snacks, some money, medicines and household utensils. Myanmar youths living in foreign countries should provide relief for the victims, instead of giving just lip service. If they had donated US dollars, yuans, yens and pounds saving at the rate of one unit a week, they would have provided a lot of aid for the victims by now, a year after the cyclone. There are a large number of orphanages, homes for the aged and youths training centres in Myanmar to which they can make significant contributions. Edible oil cannot be produced by milling a sesame grain only, but they can serve the interests of the nation to some extent if they collaborate in that regard.
And there are many things they can learn to know how to serve the interests of their country. If they study thoroughly the historical background, religious faith, culture and historic events of Myanmar, then they will come to respect and admire the mother country and own race. In Myanmar, there are many things they can study in their spare time, and many centres they can extend a helping hand to. Therefore, I would like to make a positive suggestion that instead of having a go at the motherland, the expatriates read religious books and listen to religious sermons. They should count the beads just for one round, reciting the Buddha’s supreme attribute “Araham”, or say prayers for the wellbeing of others. Then, they will be able to lead a peaceful life and do well in working out their difficulties and in their businesses. I wish they would spare a specific period of time to do meritorious deeds. They will be able to enjoy the fruits in this very life in proportion to the good deeds they have done. Furthermore, their worries and anxieties will dwindle away and they will be able to start a new life and realize that Myanmar is a pleasant and lovely land. For me, I love the motherland beyond words. Besides, I wish they would understand that Myanmar is a land where they can seize golden opportunities such as they will come to be brave enough to cope with their deaths and ups and downs by making some religious provision; they can practise concentration and meditation and perform meritorious deeds to cease their sufferings in next existences, they can share joys and sorrows with their beloved spouses, children and grandchildren, and they can deal with true friends and relatives in peace. I wish,
- Myanmar expatriates would love the
motherland,
- those with painful experiences and negative
attitude would view the objective conditions as
they really are by following the Teachings of the
Buddha for some time,
- they would return to their motherland and
serve national interests,
- they would share the experiences and knowledge
they have gained in foreign countries,
- they would be able to demonstrate their
nationalistic spirit and skills in the international
community,
- they would enjoy the traditions and customs of
the nation,
- they would import good methods, concepts and
technical know-how of other countries,
- they would come to love and serve the interest
of the motherland with a prosperous future,
- they would be able to safeguard pleasant and
peaceful Myanmar,
- they would work hard joining hands to enable
the motherland to exist perpetually and stand
tall in the global community, and
- they would love the mother country with a
sense of serving the national interests and
adoration and reliance on the country.

ကိုယ့္ၾကမၼာ ကိုယ္ဖန္တီးမည္

ေဒၚစုၾကည္ႏွင့္ NLD ပါတီ၏ ႏိုင္ငံေရး လႈပ္႐ွားမႈမ်ားသည္ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံႏွင့္ ႏိုင္ငံသူ၊ ႏိုင္ငံသားမ်ား အားလုံးအတြက္ အက်ဳိး ျဖစ္ထြန္းမႈ ဟူ၍ မည္သည့္ အခ်ိန္အခါကမွ် မရွိခဲ့ေပ။ ဆိုးက်ဳိးမ်ားႏွင့္ ဒုကၡ ပင္လယ္တြင္း သက္ဆင္းရန္သာ အေၾကာင္းဖန္ေစ ခဲ့သည္။ NLD ပါတီ ဟူ၍ စတင္ေပၚေပါက္ လာခဲ့သည္မွ ယေန႔ အခ်ိန္အထိ ျပည္သူမ်ား အတြက္ ဟူ၍ တစ္လုံး တစ္ပါဒမွ် ထည့္သြင္း စဥ္းစားခဲ့ျခင္း မရွိ။ သက္ညွာ ေထာက္ထား ခဲ့ျခင္း မ႐ွိ။ အမ်ဳိးမ်ဳိး အဖုံဖုံ စိတ္အေႏွာင့္အယွက္ ျဖစ္ေစရန္သာ လုပ္ေဆာင္ ခဲ့ၾကသည္။

ေအးခ်မ္းသာယာစြာ ေနထိုင္လိုၾကေသာ ျပည္သူမ်ားအတြက္ ေဒၚစုၾကည္ႏွင့္ NLD ပါတီသည္ ဆူပူ၊ အၾကမ္းဖက္မႈမ်ားကိုသာ ျဖစ္ေပၚ ေစခဲ့သည္။ တရားဥပေဒ စိုးမိုးမႈႏွင့္ တည္ၿငိမ္မႈကို ျမတ္ႏိုးေသာ ျပည္သူမ်ား အတြက္ ႏိုင္ငံအတြင္း ပဋိပကၡ မ်ားကိုသာ ျဖစ္ပြား ေစခဲ့သည္။ ႏိုင္ငံေတာ္ ေရွ႕ဆက္သြားရမည့္ မူ၀ါဒမ်ားႏွင့္ ဖြ႔ံၿဖဳိး တုိးတက္ေရး လုပ္ငန္းစဥ္မ်ား အတြက္ ေႏွာင့္ေႏွးမႈမ်ား ကိုသာ ျဖစ္ေစခဲ့သည္။ ေဒၚစုၾကည္ႏွင့္ NLD ပါတီသည္ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံအတြင္း လူ႔အခြင့္အေရး အျပည့္အ၀ ရရွိေစေရး၊ ဒီမိုကေရစီ ေဖာ္ေဆာင္ေရး စသည္ျဖင့္ အသံမ်ဳိးစုံ ထြက္လ်က္ ျပည္ဖ်က္ ၾက၏။ ပါးစပ္ကသာ ျပည္သူ႔အတြက္ဟု ဆိုေသာ္လည္း လက္ေတြ႔တြင္ ေဒၚစုၾကည္ ေကာင္းစားသြား၏။

ေဒၚစုၾကည္သည္ ေျပာင္ေျပာင္တင္းတင္းပင္ ျပည္ပ ၾသဇာခံ၊ ျပည္ပ အလိုက် အဖ်က္လုပ္ရပ္ေတြ လုပ္ေသာေၾကာင့္ ႏိုင္ငံတကာမွ ခ်ီးျမွင္၍ ရရွိခဲ့ေသာ ဆုေငြ စုစုေပါင္းမွာ အနည္းဆုံး အေမရိကန္ ေဒၚလာ (၄,၅၇၇,၀၀၀) ရွိၿပီ ျဖစ္သည္။ ထို႔ထက္ ပိုမ်ားေကာင္း မ်ားႏို္င္ပါေသးသည္။ ေဒၚစုၾကည္သည္ ရသမွ် ေဒၚလာေငြမ်ားကို အဂၤလန္တြင္ စုေဆာင္း ထားရွိသည္။ “ဘယ္သူေသေသ ငေတမာရင္ ၿပီးေရာ” ဟူသည့္ လူတန္းစားမ်ဳိး ျဖစ္ေသာ ေဒၚစုၾကည္သည္ သူမ၏ ညဥ္အတိုင္း ေရွ႕ဆက္ ၿပီးလည္း သူမ ေကာင္းက်ဳိးအတြက္ ႏိုင္ငံေတာ္ကို အသုံးခ်၊ ေရာင္းစား ေနဦးမည္ ျဖစ္သည္။

ယခုလည္း ေဒၚစုၾကည္သည္ “ႏိုင္ငံေတာ္အား ေႏွာင့္ယွက္ ဖ်က္ဆီးလိုသူမ်ား ေဘးအႏၱရာယ္မွ ကာကြယ္ ေစာင့္ေရွာက္သည့္ ဥပေဒပုဒ္မ (၂၂) ၏ စည္းမ်ဥ္း/ကမ္းမ်ားကို ခ်ဳိးေဖာက္သည့္ ျပစ္မႈ က်ဳးလြန္ေသာေၾကာင့္ တရားဥပေဒ ႏွင့္အညီ ႏိုင္ငံေတာ္ က စီရင္ ေဆာင္ရြက္ ေနသည္ကို NLD ပါတီ၀င္မ်ားက အေၾကာင္း အမ်ဳိးမ်ဳိးျပ တားဆီးၾက၏။ “ၾကမ္းပိုးလိပ္ျဖစ္၊ လိပ္ၾကမ္းပိုး ျဖစ္ေအာင္ ေျပာဆိုၾကေသာ” ေဒၚစုၾကည္၏ ေ႐ွ႕ေနမ်ားက အမႈမွန္မွ သူမအား ဖုံးကြယ္ ေပးေန၏။

“ဘုမသိ၊ ဘမသိႏွင့္ သူမ်ား ေယာင္လို႔ေယာင္၊ အေမာင္ ေတာင္မွန္း ေျမာက္မွန္းမသိ” ဟူေသာ လူတန္းစား အ႐ူးမ်ားက ဒီမိုကေရစီႏွင့္ ၎တို႔ ေခါင္းေဆာင္အတြက္ တိုက္ပြဲ၀င္သည္ဟု ဆိုကာ အင္းစိန္ေထာင္ေရွ႕ ကိုးယိုးကိုးယားႏွင့္ အ႐ူးထၾက၏။

အတိုင္အေဖာက္ ညီလြန္းလွေသာ ျပည္တြင္း႐ွိ အဆိုးျမင္၀ါဒီမ်ား၊ ျပည္ပမွ မီဒီယာ သမားမ်ား၊ အဖ်က္သမားမ်ားႏွင့္ ျပည္ေျပး အုပ္စုမ်ားက ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံ အေပၚ ႏုိင္ငံတကာမွ အျပစ္တင္ စကားမ်ား ေျပာၾကား လာေအာင္ ေဆာ္ၾသ ၾကျပန္၏။

ဤအေရးကို အေၾကာင္းျပလွ်က္ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံကို အေရးယူ ပိတ္ဆို႔မႈမ်ား ျပဳလုပ္ၾကရန္၊ ရင္းႏွီး ျမဳပ္ႏွံမႈမ်ား မျပဳၾက ေစရန္၊ ကမၻာလွည့္ ခရီးသည္မ်ား မလာေရာက္ၾကေစရန္ ေတာင္းဆိုၾကသည္။ ေဒၚစုၾကည္ႏွင့္ NLD ပါတီ အဖြဲ႔၀င္မ်ား၏ ဤနည္းျဖင့္ ျမန္မာျပည္ ဖ်က္ဆီးသည့္ လုပ္႐ိုးလုပ္စဥ္ လမ္းစဥ္က ႐ိုးေနၿပီ ျဖစ္သည္။

ႏိုင္ငံတကာ၏ စီးပြားေရး ပိတ္ဆို႔မႈမ်ားေၾကာင့္ ျမန္မာ့ စီးပြားေရး ဆုတ္ယုတ္ ပ်က္သုဥ္း သြားသည္ဟူ၍ မည္သည့္ အခါကမွ် မ႐ွိခဲ့။ ၎တို႔က မည္မွ်ပင္ စီးပြားေရး ပိတ္ဆို႔မႈမ်ား ျပဳလုပ္ေသာ္လည္း သယံဇာတ ေပါႂကြယ္၀ေသာ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံအတြက္ စိုးရိမ္စရာ မရွိခဲ့ သကဲ့သို႔ ပူပင္စရာလည္း မလိုခဲ့ေပ။ ျပည္ပမွ ရင္းႏွီးျမဳပ္ႏွံမႈမ်ား မလာေရာက္ ၾကေသာ္လည္း ကိုယ့္ ျပည္တြင္း၌ တြင္သာ စီးပြားေရး ျဖစ္ထြန္းေအာင္ စြမ္းေဆာင္ ႏုိင္ခဲ့သည္။ ကိုယ့္အား ကိုယ့္ကိုးကာ ကုိယ့္ေျခေထာက္ေပၚ ကုိယ္ရပ္တည္ ႏိုင္ေအာင္ ႀကဳိးပမ္းခဲ့ေသာ ျမန္မာႏို္င္ငံအတြက္ ယခုတစ္ဖန္ တားဆီး ပိတ္ဆို႔မႈမ်ား ထပ္မံ ႀကဳံလာ ျပန္လွ်င္လည္း အေရးထား စဥ္းစားမည္ မဟုတ္ေပ။

လတ္တေလာ ေဒၚစုၾကည္ အေရးကိစၥႏွင့္ ပတ္သက္၍လည္း ႏိုင္ငံတကာမွ ပုဂၢဳိလ္မ်ားက မည္သို႔ပင္ ေျပာဆို ေနၾက ေစကာမူ မည္သည့္ ႏိုင္ငံ၊ မည္သည့္ ပုဂၢိဳလ္၏ ၀င္ေရာက္ စြက္ဖက္မႈ ကိုမွ် လက္ခံ စဥ္းစားမည္ မဟုတ္ေပ။ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံသည္ လြတ္လပ္၍ အခ်ဳပ္အျခာ အာဏာပိုင္ ႏိုင္ငံတစ္ခု ျဖစ္သည္ႏွင့္ အညီ ကိုယ့္ၾကမၼာ ကိုယ္ဖန္တီး ႏို္င္ခြင့္ရွိသည္။ မိမိႏိုင္ငံ၏ ျပည္တြင္းေရးကို မိမိဘာသာ ေျဖရွင္း ေဆာင္ရြက္မည္။ ထို႔အတြက္ ေဒၚစုၾကည္၏ အေရးကိစၥႏွင့္ ပတ္သက္၍ မည္သူတစ္ဦး၊ တစ္ေယာက္၏ ေျပာၾကား ေစခိုင္းမႈ ကိုမွ် အေရးယူ ေဆာင္ရြက္မည္ မဟုတ္။

ဥပေဒႏွင့္မညီ၊ ဥပေဒကို ခ်ဳိးေဖာက္ေသာ လုပ္ရပ္မ်ားႏွင့္ တိုင္းျပည္ႏွင့္လူမ်ဳိး ေပ်ာက္ကြယ္ ပ်က္သုဥ္းေအာင္ လုပ္ေဆာင္ ေနသည့္ ေဒၚစုၾကည္ႏွင့္ အေပါင္းအပါမ်ား အားလုံးကို တရားဥပေဒႏွင့္ အညီ စီရင္ ေဆာင္ရြက္သြားမည္ ျဖစ္သည္။ သို႔မွသာ ျမန္မာ့ လြတ္လပ္ေရးႏွင့္ အခ်ဳပ္အျခာ အာဏာ တည္တံ့ခိုင္ၿမဲမည္။ တိုင္းျပည္ႏွင့္ လူမ်ဳိး ကမၻာတည္သေရြ႕ အဓြန္႔ရွည္မည္ ျဖစ္္ပါေတာ့သည္။

မင္းျမတ္

သိၾကားမင္းလည္း မကယ္ႏုိင္ပါ

အခုတေလာမွာ ျဖစ္ပ်က္ေနတဲ႔ အန္အယ္လ္ဒီ မယ္ေတာ္ႀကီး ေဒၚစုၾကည္ သတင္းကေတာ႔ ေက်ာ္မေကာင္း ၾကားမေကာင္း ျဖစ္ေနတာ လူတိုင္းသိၾကမွာပါ။ တကယ္တမ္း ၾကည္႔ရရင္ သူ႔ကံနဲ႔သူ၊ သူ႔အျပစ္နဲ႔သူ အက်ိဳးေပး သြားတာပါပဲ။ လူဆိုတာ ကေတာ႔ ကိုယ္လုပ္ရင္ ကိုယ္ခံရဲတဲ႔ သတၱိရွိရပါမယ္။ ကိုယ္႔အျဖစ္ ကိုယ္ရွက္ၿပီး မလံုတာနဲ႔ဘဲ တျခားသူေတြကို လႊဲခ်ၿပီး ၀ါးလံုး ရွည္ရွည္နဲ႔ ေလွ်ာက္ရမ္းေနသူ ေတြကေတာ႔ စံုလံုးကန္း သူေတြပါပဲ။

အထူးသျဖင္႔ လူထဲမွာေတာင္မွ ေခါင္းေဆာင္ျဖစ္ရင္ ပုိၿပီးေတာ႔ အသိဥာဏ္ ရွိရဦးမွာပါ။ ဒါေပမယ္႔ ေဒၚစုၾကည္ ကိစၥကေတာ႔ တကယ္ကို လက္ညႈိးထိုးစရာ ကိစၥႀကီးပါ။ အသက္ပဲ (၆၀) ေက်ာ္ေနၿပီ။ ဒီလို ေလာ္လီတဲ႔ သတင္းေတြ ထြက္လာတာ အသက္ႀကီးၿပီး အခ်ိန္မစီး တာကုိ ျပသသြား ျခင္းပဲ ျဖစ္ပါတယ္။

ဒီေလာက္ ႏိုင္ငံေရး အျဖစ္အပ်က္ေတြ ၾကားမွာေတာင္ (သူမအတြက္ေတာ႔ Romantic ဆန္တဲ႔ အခ်စ္ဇာတ္လမ္း ေလးေပါ႔) လူမႈေရး၊ စာရိတၱ ပ်က္ျပားမႈက ရုတ္တရတ္ ျဖစ္ေပၚလာ ပါေသးတယ္။ ရွက္တတ္ရင္ လဲေသလိုက္လို႔လဲ ေျပာခ်င္ပါေတာ႔ တယ္။ တကယ္႔ကို (မေကာင္းတဲ႔ေနရာမွာ) စံတင္ ေလာက္စရာပါပဲ။ ဒါကို NLD ငရူးေတြက အျဖစ္မွန္ေတြက ဒီေလာက္ ဗူးေပၚသလို ေပၚတာေတာင္မွ မဟုတ္ပါဘူးလို႔ ျငင္းခ်င္ ေနၾကပါေသးတယ္။ သူတို႔ေတြ ဘယ္ေလာက္ပဲ ျငင္းျငင္း အေၾကာင္းမထူး ေတာ႔ပါဘူး။

ေဒၚစုၾကည္အေနနဲ႔ကလည္း အေမရိကန္ ႏိုင္ငံသား ၀င္ေရာက္တဲ႔ ကိစၥကိုေတာ႔ အသာတၾကည္ လက္ခံၿပီးေတာ႔ ယခင္က မစၥတာဂမ္ဘာရီက ၄င္းရဲ႕အိမ္ေရွ႕မွာ ေပၚေပၚထင္ထင္ ၀င္ေတြ႔ခြင္႔ ေတာင္းတာကိုေတာ႔ အိုင္တင္ခံ ေနခဲ႔ပါတယ္။ ဒါေၾကာင္႔ ဒီကိစၥဟာ ရိိုးရိုးသားသား ပါလို႔ ထင္မွတ္စရာ တစက္မွ မရွိပါဘူး။ ေနာက္ၿပီး သူမဖန္တီးခဲ႔တဲ႔ ပိတ္ေလးပိတ္ ကိုလည္း ႏိုင္ငံေတာ္က ျပန္ဖြင္႔ေပးခဲ႔ဖို႔ ေျပာခဲ႔ပါတယ္။ ဒါေပမယ္႔ ေဒၚစုၾကည္က ေခါင္းေရွာင္ၿပီး ပိတ္ေလးပိတ္နဲ႔ သူမနဲ႔ လံုး၀မသက္ဆိုင ပါဘူးလို႔ ေျပာၾကားခဲ႔ပါတယ္။ အခုလည္း ႏိုင္ငံျခားသား ၀င္ေရာက္တဲ႔ ကိစၥနဲ႔ ပတ္သတ္ၿပီး အေမရိကန္က သူမကို ထပ္မံ စစ္ေဆးဖို႔ ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံအေပၚ ပိတ္ဆို႔မႈ သက္တမ္း ထပ္တိုး လိုက္ပါတယ္။ ဒါကိုၾကည္႔ၿပီးေတာ႔ သူမရဲ႔ မရိုးသားတဲ႔ အံု႔ပုန္း စိတ္ဓာတ္ က္ိုေတြ႔ၾကရမွာပါ။

ျမန္မာႏိုင္ငံ အေနနဲ႔ကလည္း ဒီေလာက္ ရွက္စရာေကာင္းတဲ႔ လူမႈေရး ေဖာက္ဖ်က္မႈကို ပိုၿပီးေတာ႔ လက္မခံ ႏိုင္ပါဘူး။ တရား ဥပေဒအရ အျပစ္ရွိ သူေတြကို မွန္မွန္ကန္ကန္ အေရးယူ သြားမွာျဖစ္ပါတယ္။ “ရာဇ၀တ္ေဘး ေျပးမလြတ္” ဆိုတဲ႔ စကားပံု အတုိင္း အျပစ္ရွိသူဟာ ဘယ္ေလာက္ပဲ သူရဲ႕အျပစ္ကို ဖံုးဖိ ေပမယ္႔လည္း အခ်ည္းအႏွီးပါပဲ။ ဘယ္နည္းလမ္း နဲ႔မဆို အမႈ လြတ္ေအာင္လည္း ေရွာင္ၾကဥ္လို႔ဲ မရပါဘူး။ အဆံုးစြန္ဆံုးထိ ေျပာရရင္ တရားခံကို မိုးေပၚက နတ္ေတြ၊ ျဗဟၼာေတြ၊ သိၾကားေတြ ဆင္းၿပီး မကယ္ႏိုင္ပါဘူး။ သနားလြန္းလို႔ ဆင္းကယ္မိ ရင္ေတာင္မွ လက္ေလွ်ာ႔ၿပီး ျပန္သြားရမယ္ ထင္ပါတယ္။

အတိုက္အခံပါတီ ေခါင္းေဆာင္ႀကီး ေဒၚစုၾကည္ကလည္း ေယာက်ၤားကိစၥနဲ႔ ပတ္သတ္ၿပီး ေတာ္ေတာ႔ကို မႈိုင္းမိေနရွာပံု ရပါတယ္။ ေခါင္းေဆာင္ ကိုယ္တုိင္က ေရွ႕ေဆာင္လမ္းျပ လုပ္ၿပီး မိုက္ရူးရဲဆန္ ထင္တိုင္းၾကဲျပ ေနရင္ ေနာက္လိုက္ ေတြကလဲ “ဒီပုပ္ထဲက ဒီပဲေတြပဲ ျဖစ္ေတာ႔မွာေပါ႔။ “ေရွ႕ႏြား တစ္သိုက္ ေျဖာင္႔ေျဖာင္႔ သြားမွ ၊ ေနာက္ႏြား တစ္သိုက္ကလည္း ေျဖာင္႔ေျဖာင္႔လိုက္” မွာျဖစ္ပါ တယ္။

အခု ကိစၥကေတာ႔ သူမကို အက်ယ္ခ်ဳပ္ ခ်ဳပ္ထားတဲ႔ ေရွ႕အမႈေတာင္ မၿပီးေသး။ လူမႈေရး ေလာ္လီတဲ႔ ေနာက္ထပ္အမႈက ထပ္ေပၚလာ တာကေတာ႔ အမွန္တကယ္ လြန္လြန္းပါတယ္။ “အသက္တစ္ရာ မေနရ ေသာ္လည္း အမႈတစ္ရာ ရင္ဆိုင္ရ” ဆိုတဲ႔စကားပံုနဲ႔ ေဒၚစုၾကည္နဲ႔ ကေတာ႔ ေတာ္ေတာ႔ကို လုိက္ဖက္လြန္း လွပါေပတယ္။ တကယ္လို႔ ဒီအမႈမၿပီးခင္ကို ေနာက္ထပ္အမႈ ထပ္လာရင္ေတာ႔ အထက္က စကားပံုလိုဘဲ စံခ်ိန္ခ်ိဳး ႏုိင္တဲ႔အတြက္ ကမၻာ႔ ကုလသမဂၢ အဖြဲ႔အစည္းကေန ႏိုဘယ္ဆု အသစ္တစ္ခု ခ်ီးျမွင္႔ဖို႔အတြက္ သတ္မွတ္ ေပးၾကပါဦးလို႔ အႀကံေပးခ်င္ပါတယ္။

ယခုလို ေခါင္းေဆာင္က ေဖာက္ၿပီးေတာ႔ စံုလံုးကန္း ေနမွေတာ႔ ၄င္းဦးေဆာင္တဲ႔ NLD ရဲ႔ အျဖစ္ကေတာ႔ အေမွာင္ထဲမွာ စမ္းတ၀ါး၀ါးနဲ႔ ေလွ်ာက္ေနရမွာပါပဲ။ သူတို႔ အေနနဲ႔ကေတာ႔ ဒီကိစၥေတြက သူ႔အလုိလို ျဖစ္ေပၚလာေၾကာင္း၊ သူတို႔ရဲ႕ စံထားေလာက္တဲ႔ ေခါင္းေဆာင္ ေဒၚစုၾကည္ ဘက္ကေန ဖံုးကြယ္ေပးၿပီး မဟုတ္မမွန္ စကားေတြကို အရူးခ်ီးပန္း ေျပာေနရံုမွအပ တျခားနည္းလမ္း ရွိေတာ႔မည္ မထင္ပါ။ ဒါေၾကာင္႔ ေနာက္ထပ္ ႏိုင္ငံေရး ျပႆနာေတြ ျဖစ္လာရင္လည္း ဒီလိုဘဲ သူတုိ႔အျပစ္ ကိုဖံုးၿပီး ဖင္မႏိုင္ ေခါင္းမႏိုင္နဲ႔ အရူးခ်ီးပန္း ဆက္ေျပာေန ဦးမွာလားလို႔ ေမးလိုက္ခ်င္ ပါေတာ႔တယ္။

ဖူးသစ္ခက္

Case against Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Daw Khin Khin Win, Ma Win Ma Ma and American Citizen Mr John William Yettaw heard for third day

NAY PYI TAW, 20 May—Criminal Case No. 47/2009 filed against Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Daw Khin Khin Win, Ma Win Ma Ma and American Citizen Mr John William Yettaw went on for the third day at the court of Yangon North District today. In his statement, prosecution witness olice Captain Sa Kyaw Win of the Special Investigation Department (Foreign Affairs Division) said that under the instructions given by his superiors, he went to Beauty Land Hotel (2) at 188/192 on 33rd Street, Ward (1), Kyauktada Township where Mr John William Yettaw had stayed at about 10.05 am on 6 May; that together with Chairman of Ward (1) Peace and Development Council in Kyauktada Township U Myo Thein and Head of 100-houses U Htay Oo, he searched Mr John William Yettaw’s room named “Diamond” on the fifth floor of the hotel; they found his black rucksack in the room, and examined it in the presence of witnesses and seized 61 objects from the rucksack that hotel manager U Kyaw Thu handed the objects at the hotel; that in the interrogation process, he asked Mr John William Yettaw if the objects were his; that in response, Mr John William Yettaw said “yes” and put his signature; that Mr John William Yettaw said that in addition to the objects, there were three 100-dollar notes in the telephone directory in his room; that so he, together with witnesses, searched the room for the second time at 6.20 pm the same day; that as said by Mr John William Yettaw, they found the three 0-dollar
notes in the telephone directory, and manager U Kyaw Thu handed the notes, and he confiscated them; and Mr John William Yettaw wrote down and signed the search form. In the afternoon, another prosecution witness Police Captain Tin Zaw Tun, head of Bahan Township Police Force, was questioned. He said that together with Nga-htet-kyi Ward (West) PDC of Bahan Township
U Zaw Tin and Kyaikkasan Ward PDC U Khin Nyunt went to the residence of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi at 7.20 am on 7 May; that her house was located at 54/56 on University Avenue, Shwedaunggya Ward, Bahan Township; that they went to her house with the warrant to search the house issued by the judge of Bahan Township court; that he informed Daw Aung San Suu Kyi in advance and searched the house with her permission; that showing her the warrant and then the photo of Mr John William Yettaw and asked her if she knew him; that then she replied that she did; that he also asked if Mr John William Yettaw had arrived at her house; that Daw Aung San Suu Kyi replied that Mr John William Yettaw arrived in her home on 4 May morning and left on the night of 5 May; that she also said that Mr John William Yettaw left some of his belongings in the house; that then she showed the items one by one and he listed them; that she also said that there also were some books Mr John William Yettaw left in his first visit and handed them and so he confiscated them; that when asked if there was anything else he had left, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi said that there were some letters Mr John William Yettaw's daughter had sent and they had been torn; that then she handed them all, and he listed them in the search form and confiscated them; that the seizures were two black chadors usually worn by Muslim women, two black scarves, two long skirts, one red torch light, six colour pencils in a plastic bag, three pairs of sunglasses, two signal lights, a pair of swimming glasses, one two-pin plug, two pieces of circuit wire, one recharger, a black bag with a zip in it that was used to keep the pparatuses, a plastic ba with a zip in it, two pairs of grey stockings, five parts of an English book, and a bag with pieces of torn paper sheets in it. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi signed the search form and said she was responsible for the items seized, and showed the place where Mr John William Yettaw slept. Asked why Mr John William Yettaw left two chadors, she replied that he left them as gifts for her. Then, Ma Aye Tharaphu Kyaw and Ma Phyo Pa Pa Aung were asked to wear the dresses and sun glasses in court, and prosecution witness Police Captain Tin Zaw Tun was asked by the prosecution officer whether he could identify who they were. The prosecution witness replied that he could not. After questioning prosecution witness Police Captain Tin Zaw Tun the proceedings were adjourned until 10 am on 21 May.

Trial against Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Daw Khin Khin Win, Ma Win Ma Ma and American Citizen Mr John William Yettaw continues

NAY PYI TAW, 19 May—The case against Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Daw Khin Khin Win, Ma Win Ma Ma and American Citizen Mr John William Yettaw continued at the court of Yangon North District today. Criminal Case No 47/2009 filed by Yangon North District Court under Section 22 and Section 109 of the 1975 Law to Safeguard the State Against the Dangers of Those Desiring to Cause Subversive Acts continued for the second day today. In the case, plaintiff witness Pol Lt-Col Maung Maung Khin was questioned first at 10 am. In his statement, he said that he had to interrogate the American citizen who had entered secretly the residence of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi; that the American citizen was Mr John William Yettaw from Detroit, Michigan; that according to Mr John William Yettaw's statement, he arrived in Myanmar holding the visa issued by the Myanmar Embassy in Thailand on 2 May; that then he was putting up at Beauty Land Hotel (2); that at 11 pm on 3 May, he entered the residence of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi through the drain on the Inya Lake side on University Avenue; that after getting to the compound, he entered the residence; that Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and her two female ousemates received him, and served him drinking water, biscuits and cookies; that they also served him eals two times; that he had investigated the case in which Mr John William Yettaw entered
the house compound from the Inya Lake side on 30 November 2008; that according to the accused, he learnt that the former left the book "Book of Mormon" near the backdoor at that time; that so he reported to his superiors and searched the house and seized it; that Mr John William Yettaw was arrested together with a camera; that documentary photos bore witness that he stayed in the house of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi; that in addition, a video documentary also featuring him was seized; and that 21 objects including the camera were seized from Mr John William Yettaw, and 23 objects including the above-mentioned book were seized from the house of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. When questioned by the court, plaintiff witness Police Inspector Than Naing from Police Battalion (7) stated that he had performed his duties around old Kanthaya Hospital near Tadabyu bus-stop on Pyay Road since the morning of 4th May; that he was reported by Police Lance Corporal Myo Lwin at 5.30 pm on 6 May that a suspicious object was floating in Inya Lake; that when he went to the bank and had a look at it, he found the object about 100 yards off the bank; that it was found out that together with the object was a foreigner;
that they pulled him out of the water and asked who he was, and he replied that he was Mr John William Yettaw; that found together with him were two empty five-liter drinking water bottles, two small bags, a camera thoroughly wrapped up in plastic, a pair of pliers, a screw driver, a pair of folding pliers with laser, six memory cards, a torch light with dry cells, 28 separate dry cells, a hat, a white shirt with long sleeves, a pair of trousers, seven paper sheets stating English words, two paper sheets stating printed words, two envelopes, an American passport stating the name of Yettaw, two 100-US dollar notes, 93 1000-kyat notes, two 10-US dollar notes, a 50-kyat note, and 10 visiting cards; and that the memory cards in the camera featured a picture of General Aung San, a picture of a fighting peacock, and a bookshelf. Then, prosecution witness Lance Corporal Myo Lwin of police battalion (7) was examined and he stated the same as plaintiff witness Police Inspector Than Naing. When prosecution witness Police Captain Maung Maung Myint of Special Branch (operation) was examined, he stated that, at about 5 am on 6 May, police inspector Than Naing of platoon (3), police battalion (7), handed over to him Mr. John William Yettaw, an American citizen who had left Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's house by swimming across Inya Lake, that, in the presence of witnesses U Tha Sein, Chairman of Ward (4) Peace and Development Council, and U Soe Myint, he seized the things found on Mr. John William Yettaw and that he listed the objects confiscated after showing them one by one to Mr. John William Yettaw. At 10 am today, prosecution witnesses Police Lt-Col Maung Maung Khin, Police Inspector Than Naing, Police Lance Corporal Myo Lwin, Police Captain Maung Maung Myint and witness U Tha Sein were examined. U Kyi Win, U Nyan Win, U Hla Myo Myint and Daw Khin Htay Kywe and HGP U Khin Maung Oo, advocates for Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Daw Khin Khin Win, Ma Win Ma Ma and Mr. John William Yettaw, also appeared in court to defend their clients. The hearing ended in the evening and was adjourned till 20 May.

Kayah State marks 63rd Fire Brigade Day

Kayah State celebrated the 63rd Founding Anniversary of the Fire ridge Day at its office on 5 May. Chairman of Kayah State Peace and Development Council Brig-Gen Win Myint addressed the ceremony and watched the demonstration of a firefighting drill. He also delivered a speech at the World Red Cross Day commemorative ceremony at the city hall of Loikaw on 8 May. On the morning of 10 May, the chairman of Kayah State PDC and officials attended the Kayah traditional costumes show and viewed Kayah traditional foods and demonstrations of traditional costumes. The wife of the chairman of Kayah State PDC presented
certificates of honour, gifts and bouquets to the presenters.

Kengtung in Shan State (East) benefiting from smooth transport and agricultural farms

On our tour of Kengtung, where the office of Shan State (East) is based, through Tarkaw Bridge
linking Shan State (South) and Shan State (East), along with small towns such as Mongpyin, Tontah,Pankyu and Myonge, we enjoyed natural scenes of highland paddy fields, some were still green and some, yellowish, like a picture. The road comprises gentle slopes. Just aswe were greeted by the signboard saying “Welcome to Kengtung”, we felt relaxed and.
Standing at an altitude of 2710 feet, Kengtung, a multicultural town, has an area of 2100.45 square miles and a population of 242,167.
With favourable conditions for agricultural farming, Kengtungß is the commercial hub of the
region and enjoys food surplus. There, housing estates are well organized with houses, departmental buildings, markets, schools and hospitals, thus reflecting the living standard of local people getting higher.
In an interview, a local as well as Assistant U Aung Htay Kywe said, “We work together with the Township General Administration Department to keep our township and pleasant. We
also collaborate with related departments for renovation of the roads, supply of safe water, and
health care.” I noticed that the main roads in Kengtung were wide and were kept clean. In particular, Kengtung- Tachilek Road and Kengtung-Mongla Road were as fine as the main roads in Yangon and Mandalay. Moreover, the newly-built road to Kengtung Airport was found grand. The fine roads inside and outside Kengtung reflected the smooth transport of the region. Conducting me round Naungkun Market, U Aung Htay Kywe of the township DAC and Chief
Engineer U Myo Min Than explained that the market used to be messedwith illegal sellers; and that then the committee was renovating it. I saw that Myoma, Naungnwan, Yankham and Naungpan markets were bustling with trade activities. Chief Engineer U Myo Min Than said that in 2008-2009 fiscal year they managed to upgrade seven rural into tarred roads and construct rural gravel roads; and that the region's transport had improved a lot. He said that in order to supply safe water to urban people, Kwephyan and Nang Khin Nwe water supply enterprises have set up 960 taps in the region. We went around the town and saw Naungton Lake in the centre of the town. Around the lake are shade trees such as Yaytamar (cedrela febrifuga) and gold mohur trees. And it is fenced with a brick wall. So, it is free from rubbish and the water is clear. Then, we drove onto the Thittabin Mountain. On both sides along the road are large trees. Whe got to the summit, we were surprised by a large Kanyin (dipterocarpus alatus) tree. The stone plaque said that it was grown in the time of King Alaung Mintragyi in 1115 Myanmar Era. So, it is now 256 years old. It is 218 feet high and is 36 feet and eight inches in circumference. We took some documentary photos of Kengtung from the compound of the Myanma Posts and Telecommunications on the top of the mountain. Kengtung is differently pleasant from other hilly towns. Unlike in the past,Kengtung has got many infrastructural buildings for development in the time of the Tatmadaw government. Now, it is enjoying significant development with smooth transport,thriving agricultural farms, and marked increase in trade as fruits of the guidance of the Head of State that all parts of the Union will enjoy equitable development.

Lt-Gen Tha Aye inspects regional development tasks in Sagaing Division

May—Lt-Gen Tha Aye of the Ministry of Defence, together with Chairman of Sagaing Division Peace and Development Council Commander of North West Command Maj-Gen Myint Soe and personnel visited Government Technical College (Shwebo) of Ministry of Science and Technology on 13 May. Lt-Gen Tha Aye later visited Yokepyo Traditional Medicine Factory in Monywa sub industrial zone (Shwebo). Lt-Gen Tha Aye then met with chairman and personnel of Monywa Industrial zone (Shwebo). Lt-Gen Tha Aye inspected renovation tasks of Maha Nanda Lake in Pauk-kaung village-tract of Shwebo Township being carried out by Irrigation Department. Lt-Gen Tha Aye also inspected beautifying tasks and progress of Shwebo in a motorcade. Lt-Gen Tha Aye also visited Ayadaw-2 Water Pumping Project near Magyisauk village in Ayadaw Township, Monywa District being implemented by Water Resources Utilization Department of Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation. Lt-Gen Tha Aye then inspected irrigation of water from rtesian well No.1 of Water Resources Utilization Department in Myaynat village of Ayadaw Township. Lt-Gen Tha Aye and party inspected construction of Union Highway from Homes for the Aged to Kyweye Junction in a motorcade and visited Aung Theikdi
briquette factory of Thiha Tun Co Ltd in Obotaung village, Monywa. Lt-Gen Tha Aye also inspected upgrading of road at the corner of Kanthya Street and Kywe-ye Street on Union Highway. Afterwards, Lt-Gen Tha Aye visited foundry and machine tools factory of Thiha Tun Co Ltd in which he inspected production of different kinds of machine tools, power tillers and automobiles. On arrival at physic-nuts grinding mill of Monywa Division Peace and Development Council, Lt-Gen Tha Aye inspected grinding of physic-nuts and
manufacturing of natural fertilizer from the wastes of physic-nuts. Lt-Gen Tha Aye then met with industrialists of Monywa Industrial Zone and stressed the needs for higher output of the factories.

63rd Fire Brigade Day marked in Mandalay

A ceremony to mark the 63rd Fire Brigade Day was held at Aungmyay Mantalar Sport Ground in Aungmyay Thazan Township, Mandalay on 5 May. It was attended by Chairman of Mandalay Division Peace and Development Council Commander of Central Command Maj-Gen Tin Ngwe, Chairman of Mandalay City Development Committee Mayor Brig-Gen Phone Zaw Han, the deputy commander, the deputy chief justice of Supreme Court (Upper Myanmar) and members, division level departmental officials, the principal of Central Fire Service Training School and those from Mandalay Division Fire Service Department and guests. After making an opening speech, the commander presented prizes to the prize-winners. Next, the commander and officials viewed the demonstration of putting out the fires of fire brigade members and presented prizes to them.

Government, People and Tatmadaw working in concert to improve public socio-economy

The opening ceremony of Shweli (1) Hydropower Plant situated near Mantat Village, 17 miles to the southwest of Namkham, Shan State (North), took place on 16 May with an
address by Prime Minister General Thein Sein. From 1988 to date, besides regional hydro-power plants, a total of 13 hydropower plants covering the power grids of the whole
nation have been built. And there are 35 ongoing hydropower projects. Out of the three large-scale hydropower projects to be implemented along the Shweli River, the Shweli (1) project is the very first one that has been completed under the cooperation between Myanmar and the People’s Republic of China. This project reflects not only friendship
but also mutual cooperation between the two nations. At present, Shweli (1) Hydropower Plant with 600 megawatts of generating capacity is the largest power station in Myanmar. Up to date, all the hydropower plants across the nation can generate more than 1,400 megawatts of electricity and 35 ongoing projects will generate over 32,900 megawatts.Generating capacity of the power plants around the nation now accounts for only over three percent of that of the whole nation. On completion of the ongoing projects, Myanmar, in not-too-distant future, will be the nation that will be able to not only fulfil domestic electricity needs but also sell power surpluses to foreign countries. As the government is striving to satisfy the nation’s increasing demand of electricity, the people on their part are to help develop the national economy by improving their own businesses realizing the goodwill effort of the government. With the government, the people and the
Tatmadaw working harmoniously for development of all regions of the Union, the nation will surely be able to achieve its desired goal.

Silk Air Travel Fair Programme introduced

The Silk Air Travel Fair Programme was introduced at a ceremony held at SKY Bistro 20th Floor Sakura Tower in Kyauktada Township here this morning. Golileo Travelport Assistant General Manager Mr Thanat Nualsuwaln and Silk Air Manager Mr Yew Latip Atwil formally opened the ceremony. This was followed by the launch of sales of air tickets for Yangon- Singapore round trip by 30 per cent discount. Under the Silk Air Travel Fair Programme, passengers who purchase air ticks of Silk Air line from 16 to 18 May will enjoy the right to obtain air tickets free of charge through a lucky draw programme. Air tickets are available at SKY Bistro 20th Floor Sakura Tower, Amtra Travel 393304, 393305, Columbus Travel 229245, 255123, Htoo Travel 548554, 557890, Nice Fare Travel 393088, 245378, Saw Porn Phan Travel 373234, 224883, Sun Flower Travel 243993, 255338 and Than Than Travel 255034, 255035.

China, Austria to strengthen economic cooperation in face of financial crisis

May—Chinese top legislator Wu Bangguo and Austrian Acting Chancellor Josef Proll met here on Saturday, with both sides agreeing to expand bilateral trade and economic cooperation in the fight against the ongoing world financial crisis. Wu, chairman of the
Standing Committee of China’s National People’s Congress (NPC), said China’s development has provided even greater room for expanding economic and technological cooperation with Austria. Proll said the financial crisis had incurred a serious impact on Austria’s economy. In the process of addressing the consequences of the financial crisis, the Austrian government places great importance on strengthening economic and technological relations with China. China witnessed an economic growth of 6.1 percent
in the first quarter of this year, while Austria’s economy contracted 2.8 percent in the same period. Noting that the two economies are highly complementary, Wu said China has a huge market and Austria has advanced technologies in many fields. He said China is ready to expand cooperation with Austria in such areas as energy efficiency, environment
protection, water conservancy, eco-agriculture, auto parts and clean energy, so as to foster new growth spots of both economies.

Lt-Gen Tha Aye inspects development tasks in Sagaing Div

Lt-Gen Tha Aye of the Ministry of Defence met with military officers, other ranks and their families at Phaungpyin township battalion on 12 May. Lt-Gen Tha Aye together with Chairman of Sagaing Division Peace and Development Council Commander of orth-West Command Maj-Gen Myint Soe and officials visited Phaungpyin People's Hospital and
provided cash assistance to the patients. The district chairman briefed on preventive
measures against the erosion of Kyunshwewah ward and tasks to be carried out and the commander gave a supplementary report. Lt-Gen Tha Aye gave Lt-Gen Tha Aye inspects development tasks in Sagaing Div Vehicles of field trip teams with loads of farming equipment seen on their departure. Being an agro-based country, Myanmar is striving for development of the agriculture sector applying various ways and means. As a result of
implementing dams and river water pumping projects, the number of sown acreage has
increased due to cultivation of double and mixed cropping all the year round. The increasing agricultural capacity necessary instructions and oversaw maintenance tasks.
Next, Lt-Gen Tha Aye and party attended the opening ceremony of Konauktaung village No 14 Post-Primary School. Afterwards, the township chairman, the assistant township education officer and members of school board of trustees formally opened the new school and the commander, the signboard of the school. Next, Lt-Gen Tha Aye, the commander and officials grew Gankaw and Padauk trees to mark the opening of the new school. Lt-Gen Tha Aye dealt with the emergence of the new school and academic matters resulted from the cooperation of the State and the local people at the ceremony to hand over the new school to the Ministry of Education. Afterwards, the member of school board of trustees handed over related documents to the Ministry of Education through the division education officer. Next, Lt-Gen Tha Aye presented the stationery for the students
through the schoolhead in-charge. Meeting with local people in Hawsaung village,
Lt-Gen Tha Aye made arrangements to fulfil the requirements in the sectors of education, health, social welfare and agriculture Upon arrival at Phaungpyin-Pinlebu motor road,
the chairman of Katha district, the division senior engineer and the district senior engineer reported on road works to Lt-Gen Tha Aye. After hearing the reports, Lt-Gen Tha Aye gave necessary instructions on timely completion of the roads. After meeting with the local people from Thazi and Khauksin villages along Phaungpyin-Pinlebu motor road, Lt-Gen Tha Aye presented bio battery and related florescent lamps to officials and attended to the needs. At the briefing hall of Nama river crossing bridge construction site, the assistant engineer of Development Affairs Department reported to Lt- Gen Tha Aye on progress in building the bridge and future tasks to be carried out and the commander gave a supplementary report. After hearing the reports, Lt-Gen Tha Aye attended to the needs.
Next, Lt-Gen Tha Aye met with division selected volleyball players and gave encouragement to them. After meeting with townselders, members of social organizations and the local people in Pinlebu township and Kantbalu township, Lt- Gen Tha Aye attended to the needs of the villages and presented cash assistance to trainees red cross
members. After inspecting the forest department on Kyunhla-Kantbalu motor road, Lt-Gen Tha Aye paid homage to Maha Shwesigyi Pagoda in Kantbalu township and made cash donations at the pagoda.

WHO says no evidence of further community level spread

May—There is still no evidence of community-level spread of the new flu H1N1 virus outside North America, Keiji Fukuda, WHO acting assistant director-general, told reporters. “We continue to see a number of infections related to travel in a number of different countries ... and a little bit of movement of the virus going south. “We do not have any evidence that the virus has taken hold and has led to community-level transmissions in any other country right now (outside North America). “It is not that surveillance has to be strong just in the southern hemisphere. It
has to be strong everywhere. Right now we really just don’t know how this will go,” Fukuda said.
There have been 1,025 laboratory cases, including 26 deaths, and the cases have been seen in 20 countries, he said. Fukuda said the WHO had concerns about the infection travelling to the
southern hemisphere because winter is setting in when flu viruses typically thrive. He said the spectrum of illness was from very mild cases to cases which end in fatalities. The WHO rates the flu
outbreak as Phase 5 on a six-phase scale.

Regional development tasks in Gyobingauk, Okpo, Letpadan, Hmawby townships

Deputy Minister for Energy Brig-Gen Than Htay on 2 May looked into upgrading of the villageto- village road linking Thegon Village and Hlegon Village on Gyobingauk Township,
Bago Divison (West) and met with local people. After making a speech, the deputy minister made cash donations for upgrading the road. On arrival at Thayetpinseik Village in Okpo Township, the deputy minister attended the ceremony to open the tube-well and water tank and formally opened the facilities. After that, Deputy Minister Brig-Gen Than Htay donated cash for rural water supply. Later, he attended the ceremony to donate computers held at Magyikwin Village BEHS in Letpadan Township and made a speech on the occasion. On 3 May, the deputy
minister inspected the upgrading of earth road linking Myaukchawgon Village and Nyaunggon
Village in Hmawby Township and renovation of Nyaunggon Village BEPS and made cash donations
for the school.

Senior General Than Shwe calls for speeding up projects, regular maintenance of facilities Special Projects Implementation Committee meeting concludes

The Special Projects Implementation Committee held Meeting (1/2009) at the Office of the Commander-in-Chief (Army), here, yesterday. Chairman of Special Projects Implementation
Committee Chairman of the State Peace and Development Council Commander-in-Chief of Defence Services Senior General Than Shwe gave necessary guidance. Also present at the meeting were Vice- Chairman of Special Projects Implementation Committee Vice-Chairman of SPDC Deputy Commander-in-Chief of Defence Services Commander-in-Chief (Army) Vice-Senior General Maung Aye, Members of Special Projects Implementation Committee Member of SPDC General Thura Shwe Mann, Prime Minister General Thein Sein, Secretary of Special Projects Implementation Committee Secretary-1 of SPDC General Thiha Thura Tin Aung Myint Oo, Members of SPIC Lt-Gen Tin Aye, the Commander-in-Chief (Navy), the Commander-in- Chief (Air), senior military officers, ministers, deputy ministers, heads of departments and officials. Minister for Electric Power No. 1 Col Zaw Min reported on the accomplishment of the tasks for the implementation of nine projects and another 35 under implementation permitted by the Special Projects Implementation Committee and Bawgata Hydropower Project for which permission was sought from the SPIC. Bawgata Hydropower Project the Hydropower Implementation Department is going to implement is about 10 miles north-east of Kyaukkyi, Bago Division. The project with a capacity of 168 megawatt will generate 500 million kilowatt/hours yearly. The already-built projects are Zawgyi, Zaungtu, haphanseik, Monchaung, Paunglong, Yenwe, Khabaung, Kyaingtaung and Shweli-1. Minister for Electric Power No. 2 Maj-Gen Khin Maung Myint reported on the projects implemented, ongoing ones and those to be implemented out of the grid and main power station projects. Now, grid and main power station projects are being implemented to distribute the electricity to be generated by the ongoing hydropower projects to the power supply system. In the meantime, power cables are being installed and sub-power stations, constructed to distribute the electricity from the power supply system to the people. The two ongoing grid projects are the project for relocation of Hlinethaya- Athoke 230 KV (Gazindaw) grids across the Ayeyawady River and the 36.34 miles long Myaungmya-Labutta 66 KV Grid Project. And the ongoing sub-power station projects are the project for installation of one 66KV Switch Bay in 66 KV Myaungmya Subpower Station, and Labutta 66/11 KV, 10 MVA Sub-power Station. The 20 future grid projects include Saidin-
Buthidaung-Maungtaw 66 KV Grid Project, Saidin-Kanzauk 66 KV Grid Project, Ahtet Buywa-Buywa 132 KV Double Grid Project, Buywa-Tanyaung 132 KV Double Grid Project,
Tanyaung-Chauk 132 KV Grid Project, Tanyaung- Man 132 KV Grid Project, Nyaungbingyi-Chaungku (Pauk) 230 KV Grid Project, Chaungku (Pauk)-Pauk 66 KV Double Grid Project,
Chaungku (Pauk)-Kyaw 66 KV Grid Project, T h a p h a n s e i k - Hngetpyawdaing 132 KV
Grid Project, Ahtet Hsedawgyi-Hsedawgyi 132 KV Grid Project, Ahtet Yeywa-Shwesaryan
230 KV Grid Project. In addition, 30 more main power stations will be built. The generators in
Hlawga, Ywama, Ahlon and Thakayta gas-fired power plants in Yangon and those gas-fired ower stations including Kyunchaung, Mann and Shwedaung power stations will be under
major repair. Minister for Transport Maj-Gen Thein Swe gave an account of Nay Pyi Taw
International Airport Project. One 12,000' x 200' runway, one 12,000' x 100' runway, four 650' x 100' taxiways, four 550' x 100' taxiways, one 1200' x 1200' apron, one airport building, one airline control tower, and related structures are being constructed in three phases in order that Nay Pyi Taw International Airport will have all characters of an international level airport.
Minister for Energy Brig-Gen Lun Thi reported on energy projects. Minister for Rail Transportation Maj-Gen Aung Min reported on M i n b u - A n - S i t t w a y Railroad Project, and the project to upgrade the three Myanma locomotive factories to produce locomotives and carriages on a wider scale. Minbu-An-Sittway Railroad Project will link Minbu in Magway
Division and Sittway in Rakhine State. The project is on Kyangin-Pakokku railroad section. The 257 miles long project will pass through Hsingaung, Padan, Natyaygantaung, An, Minbya, MraukU and Kyauktaw townships passing through tunnels and culverts. On completion of the
project, local people of Rakhine State can travel to various parts of the nation. It will make significant contribution towards improvement of various sectors. It will have 51 stations and
1285 large and small bridges. Locomotive Factory (Insein), Diesel Locomotive Factory (Ywahtaung) and Locomotive Shed (Myitnge) will conduct major and minor repairs to the present locomotives, produce new locomotives, replace old engines with new ones, produce
carriages and cargo wagons, and conduct major repair to present carriages and cargo wagons.
In order to complete the construction of the National Railway Network, the Ministry of Rail Transportation is implementing Kyangin- Pakokku Railroad Project, Katha-Bhamo Railroad Project, Pyawbwe-Natmauk- Magway Railroad Project, Namsang- Kengtung Railroad Project, and Dawei- Myeik Railroad Project. In response to the report, Senior General Than Shwe in his
concluding remarks called for speeding up the projects and regular maintenance to the facilities.
The meeting ended in the afternoon.

Minister receives Thai guests

May—Minister for Electric Power No. 1 Col Zaw Min received Permanent Secretary of Ministry of Energy of Thailand (MOEN) Dr Pornchai Rujiprapa, Acting Managing Director of Mr Prutichai
Chonglertvanichkul of EGAT International Company Ltd and General Manager Mr Zhang Goulai of Sinohydro Corporation Limited at his office, here on 1 May. Present on the occasion were
Deputy Minister U Myo Myint, directorsgeneral and managing directors of the departments and enterprises under the ministry and officials. Their meeting focused on cooperation in implementation of Hatgyi hydropower project.

Apply ICT for national development

The Myanmar ICT Exhibition (2009) was held at the Tatmadaw Convention Hall on U Wisara Road in Dagon Township from 1 to 3 May. Information and communication technologies play a major role in the development of a nation. Nowadays, the nations developed in high technologies are trying to interfere in the domestic affairs of the ones with less technological development.
For a nation in the present-day world to be able to stand long on its own strength, it needs to have human resources well versed in modern science and technology. Holding ICT exhibitions will enable the people to keep in touch with the latest information technologies and products. They offer the people a chance to learn about new technologies. Moreover, they will make the
youth become more interested in technologies, especially in information technology. Myanmar ICT exhibitions will enable the people to learn about modern technologies developing with the passage of time and contribute towards national development.

A & I Minister participates in 65th Session of ESCAP

A Myanmar delegation led by Minister for Agriculture and Irrigation Maj-Gen Htay Oo had
participated in the 65th Session of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific-
ESCAP held at the UN Conference Centre in Bangkok, Thailand, from 23 to 29 April. The delegations from 48 member nations of the ESCAP also attended the meeting. The senior officials’ meeting of the ESCAP was held from 23 to 26 April and the ministerial meeting, from
27 to 29 April. The 65th Session of the ESCAP was opened with opening remarks by Prime Minister of Thailand Mr Abhisit Vejjajiva and Secretary of the Economic and Social A & I Minister participates in 65th Session of ESCAP Commission of the ESCAP Dr. Noeleen Heyzer read out the message of Secretary- General of the UN Mr Ban Ki-moon. The ministerial
meeting of the ESCAP focused on “Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security in the Asia and
Pacific Region” and Minister Maj-Gen Htay Oo participated in the meeting. On 29 April,
Minister Maj-Gen Htay Oo held talks with Dr Noeleen Heyzer, Assistant Secretary-General of the UN, and discussed matters on cooperation between Myanmar and the ESCAP in the development of the agricultural sector of Myanmar and food security in the region. The Myanmar delegation arrived back here on 30 April.

Ambassador of the Republic of Sudan Mr. Mirghani Mohamed Salih met with President of the
Union of Myanmar Federation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry U Win Myint, Vice-
Presidents U Zaw Min Win and U Aung Lwin, General Secretary Dr Maung Maung Lay, CEC
members U Tin Win, U Aung Than Oo and U Sein Lwin, Chairman of Myanmar Rice and Paddy
Producers Association U Sein Win Hlaing and representatives of Myanmar Rubber Cultivator and Producers Association at the UMFCCI Office on 29 April afternoon. They discussed
promotion of bilateral trade between the two countries, exporting of rice, timber, rubber and aquatic products to Sudan and exchange of visits of entrepreneurs between two countries.

The Government of the Union of Myanmar Ministry of Livestock and Fisheries Livestock Breeding and Veterinary Department Warning on Swine flu

1. Swine flu in humans: Swine flu has been detected in the people in Mexico, the US, Canada and New Zealand from 17 April to date. A total of 160 persons were killed in the infection of virus.
2. Symptoms in swine: The symptoms of the swine flu are sudden illness, mopping, coughing, runny nose, sneezing, difficult breathing, red eyes,inflammation, loss appetite. These symptoms can also be found in normal coughing and other sickness due to the weather changes.
3. Points to be followed in prevention against swine flu (a) If found symptoms of sickness in pigs, they are to be kept in quarantine, and inform the LBVD.
(b) Take care of bio security in the farm where a large number of pigs are raised
(c) Wash hands and legs clean after cleaning the pigsty
(d) Use face masks and gloves when handling the unhealthy pigs
(e) Ban the sale of unhealthy pigs in the markets.
(f) Do not raise the pigs of unknown origin, especially those smuggled
from other country
(g) If pork is cooked at 70°C and above, there will be no infection.
4. Prevention of swine flu: There is no case of swine flu in Myanmar. It is necessary for pig breeders and those who keep pigs on commercial scale and seller to participate in the preventive measures against the disease in cooperation with Myanmar Livestock Breeding Federation, Development Committees and local authorities.

Warning on global human flu

1. Swine flu in humans: Swine flu has been detected in the people in
Mexico, the US, Canada and New Zealand from 17 April to date. A total of 160
persons were killed in infection of virus.
2. The flu is caused by a new virus. It is mixed with four genes and can
spread quickly. Now there are cases of such flu in some countries. Regarding the
disease, the World Health Organization announced that it is international public
health State of emergency. The Ministry of Health is undertaking preventive
measures against transmitting to humans through avian flu. In some countries
there was an outbreak of swine flu among the people. The Ministry of Health is
carrying out the tasks to fight against the disease.
3. The symptoms of swine flu are body heat, runny nose, coughing, aching,
headache, lethargy, difficult breathing. They are like the symptoms of other
diseases. If these symptoms appear, do not go to crowded public places such as
worksites and schools. Take a rest at home. Make contact with the nearest health
centres. Go to the hospital when one has high fever, long coughing, difficult
breathing and lethargy. If the disease is serious, go to the hospital immediately.
Wear surgical masks in order not to spread the disease.
4. It is found that the disease spread from people to people. Like SARS, it
can become a pandemic. Therefore, the people are requested to keep the
following points.
(a) Using handkerchief when coughing
(b) Washing the hands with soap properly
(c) Carrying out personal hygiene measures
(d) Sleeping well
(e) Eating nutritious food
(f) Taking exercises
(g) Breathing fresh air
5. In order to prevent flu infection, those who take care of the people
infected with flu, wear surgical masks.
6. The Ministry of Health has made arrangements for prevention of the
spread of such flu from other countries. News and information will be announced
in time and the people are requested to follow the notice of the ministry.

Better transport for progress of local trading

The government has been building infrastructures in transport and communications, economic, education and health sectors in states and divisions including border areas for equitable development. Ensuring secure and smooth transport contributes towards the speedy flow of
commodities and development of trading in the respective regions. That is why the government is building a road and bridge network nationwide. Despite heights and gorges in Shan State, new motor roads and railroads are being built overcoming all difficulties. At the same time airports, runways and bridges across the rivers are being upgraded for better transport in the region.
The 600-foot Shweli Bridge (Namhkam) built on Mandalay-Lashio-Namhkam- Bhamo Road was inaugurated in Namhkam Township, Shan State (North) last month. It is a reinforced concrete Bailey Bridge, the 222nd one which is 180 feet and above built by the Ministry of Construction. It is also the 15th such facility in Shan State. With the completion of the bridge,
transport of Mandalay-Lashio-Namhkam- Bhamo Road will become smooth and secure and local products can be transported easily and speedily. Better transport means development of trade in the respective regions. Inauguration of a lot of roads and bridges in the country will bring about improvement of economic, education, health and social aspectsof local people.

Foreign Affairs Minister attends Ministerial Meeting of Coordinating Bureau of NAM

A Myanmar delegation led by Minister for Foreign Affairs U Nyan Win arrived back here via Bangkok by air yesterday evening after attending the Ministerial Meeting of the Coordinating Bureau of Non-Aligned Movement held in Havana of Cuba from 27 to 30 April. At the opening
ceremony on 29 April morning, Cuban President Mr Raul Castro Ruz delivered an address. Over
700 delegates from 119 NAM member countries, 14 observer states, six international organizations and 29 invited countries attended the meeting. Minister U Nyan Win attended the meeting on 29 and 30 April in his capacity as one of the Vice- Chairmen elected from the
Asian group. On 30 April, Minister U Nyan Win delivered an address that the rapid pace
of globalization and the global economic uncertainty were posing daunting challenges to the
developing countries. Measures taken by the developed countries in reviving their economy
should not be at the expense of the developing countries. As a result of current financial and economic crises, domestic production and exports have dramatically declined. The crisis also caused trade imbalances between developed and developing countries due to protectionism and
restrictive measures applied by the developed countries on the developing ones. Therefore, it is necessary to increase trade and investment among the member countries of NAM.The minister said that taking advantage of the financial crisis and in the name of democracy and human
rights, some industrialized countries have been imposing economic restrictions on third world countries with the aim of exerting political pressures. Democracy is a universal value based on the will of the people to determine their own future. There is no single model of Democracy. He stressed the need to lift unilateral sanctions imposed on developing countries as they were against the international law and counterproductive to the promotion of democracy and human rights of the country concerned. The minister also urged developed countries to provide urgently needed medicines, financial and technical assistance to the developing countries in prevention and fight against recent outbreak of swine flu epidemic originated in Mexico. Minister U Nyan
Win appraised the meeting with positive developments achieved in the implementation of Sevenstep Road Map to democratization in Myanmar and the status of reconstruction works
undertaken for the victims of Cyclone Nargis. On 27 April afternoon, Minister U Nyan Win met
with Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs of Cuba Mr Marcos Rodriguez Costa and exchanged views on strengthening of bilateral relations and mutual cooperation in the international fora. He attended a welcoming reception hosted by Minister of Foreign Affairs of Cuba Mr Bruno Rodriguez Parrilla on 29 April evening. The Ministerial Meeting was held in conjunction with the 15th Non-Aligned Summit to be held in Egypt in July 2009. The Ministerial Meeting adopted a Final Document to be submitted to the 15th NAM Summit as well as declarations on the current
financial and economic crisis, solidarity with Swine Flu affected Mexico and on Palestine and on
Zimbabwe. The Myanmar delegation also attended the Senior Officials Meeting of the NAM Coordinating Bureau held on 27 and 28 April. The Senior Officials Meeting had discussed
global issues, regional and sub-regional issues, and development, social and human rights issues
contained in the draft Final Declaration to be submitted to the 15th Summit of the NAM to be held in Egypt in July 2009.

Factories in Bago Division (West) focus on boosting production

Minister for Industry-2 Vice-Admiral Soe Thein viewed assembling of automobiles and production procedures at Press Shop with the use of Press Machines at Assembly Line and Painting Booth of Myanmar Double Cab Assembling Factory at No. 2 Automobile Factory
(Htonbo) on 1 May. In his instruction, the minister said that as necessary assistance has been provided to the factory for gaining production momentum, it is necessary to manufacture the quality products meeting the target. Yesterday, the minister inspected production process at Battery Factory and looked into operating of Waste Water Treatment Plant. The minister also inspected production of hydropower turbines at No. 1 Machine and Machine Tools Factory (Nyaungchedauk) and machinery for the industrial training schools. Later, he viewed production
process of the factory.