Total War in Burma: Part 1
Brian Guerin
Ignoring democratically expressed calls for a moratorium on international investment in Burma, transnational oil
companies Total (France) and Unocal (US) have chosen to invest in a regime with one of the most deplorable human
rights and environmental records in the world. [1] In 1948, Burma, a South East Asian country with 48 million
multi-ethnic people, won independence from Britain after more than 60 years as a colony. A new constitution
established a system of government based on a democratically elected parliament.
In 1962, a group of military officers, led by army chief-of-staff General Ne Win, staged a coup, and a military junta
has, in one guise or another, ruled the country with ruthlessness and absolute impunity ever since. The junta
suspended the constitution and instituted authoritarian rule under the Revolutionary Council (RC). Government
ministers and ethnicleaders were jailed and parliamentary democracy came to an abrupt end. In 1988, Burma
erupted into a series of demonstrations and strikes protesting the existing extreme political oppression and economic hardships. The government initially responded with arrests, detentions, and excessive force resulting in some deaths.
These demonstrations culminated in a massive rally on August 8 in which hundreds of thousands of people marched
to demand a change in government. These peaceful demonstrations were violently crushed by army troops who fired relentlessly on the unarmed crowds in Rangoon and other cities killing more than ten thousand students, civilian and Buddhist monk protesters throughout the country. Afterwards, thousands more were arrested. [2]
On September 18, 1988, army chief-of-staff General Saw Maung staged another military coup which imposed martial
law and transferred control of the country to the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC). In 1989, the
SLORC changed the name of the country to Myanmar (and also changed the names of several cities) claiming that the
new names were for the benefit of the minority, non-Burman segments of the population. One of the more significant political parties, of over 200 that emerged in 1988 and 1989, was the National League for Democracy (NLD) led by the Burmese human rights activist Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. She is the daughter of Burma's national hero, General Aung
San. Alarmed by her popularity, the SLORC put her under house arrest in July 1989. In the multi-party election held
in May 1990, the NLD won a landslide victory, sweeping 392 of 485 parliamentary seats (or 80% of the seats) despite
having a leader under house arrest and very little access to the media. However, the SLORC refused to transfer power
to the NLD claiming that transfer of power to a civilian government could not take place until a new constitution is
brought into effect — something that has yet to happen. [3] Since the 1988 coup, the Burmese military have been
engaged in a huge programme of forced population displacement.
In 1992, Pagan, the ancient capital of Burma, was emptied of its population of more than four thousand people, who
were forcibly expelled by the Burmese military to make way for tourist facilities. The thatched shacks replacing their
former houses, are made of straw and poor quality bamboo, and are located far away from the new dual carriageway
built to ferry tourists to the new hotels and apartment complexes. Those who dared object to their removal were
beaten, or arrested and disappeared. The treatment of the population of Pagan was mild compared to that visited on
the population of the current capital, Rangoon, where up to a million people have been forced from their homes. [4] Throughout Burma, up to three million people have been forcibly displaced to so-called ‘satellite zones,’ where under
the direct control of the military, the dreaded Tatmataw, they construct bridges, military camps, irrigation systems
and oil and gas pipelines.
In these camps, ‘porterage,’ a colonial euphemism signifying forced menial labour, is enforced by the Burmese armed
forces who have replaced the British imperial overseers of the past. [5], [6], [7] The infamous Burmese railroad has
been rebuilt and extended by this indentured labour. Every village along the railtrack had to give its labour 'voluntarily', regardless of age or state of health. If people protested that, as peasant farmers, their labour was all they had to keep
them and their families alive, they were fined and their possessions confiscated. If an entire village objected, the head
man was beaten or killed and all the houses razed. "I saw one old man accidentally drop his load into the river," a
former civil servant told me in a nearby safe area controlled by the Karen National Union. "As he tried to retrieve it,
the soldiers shot him in the head. I could see the water turn red with his blood, then the river carried him away."
A man who escaped with his wife told me: "I saw people dying because of landslides or fever. Some of the bodies were
never found, only the head or a foot. They didn't bother to bury the bodies properly, with a funeral. They just dug a
hole and left them there."
His wife, Min, said, "I feel for the children. They are too young to anticipate danger, so they are vulnerable. They are
the ones who die first." I asked her if she knew why she was being forced to work in this way. "We were told nothing,"
she said. "We overheard we were building a railway so that a French oil company could run a pipeline through, and
foreigners came to look over the site." The oil company is Total, the French State oil Corporation, whose headquarters
are located in Paris. Its businesses cover the entire oil and gas chain, from crude oil and natural gas exploration and production to power generation, transportation, refining, petroleum product marketing, and international crude oil
and product trading. Total is also a large-scale chemicals manufacturer. It is one of the six oil "supermajors" in
existence today. [8], [9] The Yadana Gas Pipeline Project represents the single largest foreign investment project in
Burma. [10]
In partnership with the American Unocal company, Total constructed a $1 billion pipeline to carry offshore natural gas
from the huge Yadana field lying off the Burmese coast. Natural gas deposits were first discovered offshore near Burma
in the Andaman Sea in 1982. In the late 1980s, the Burmese government sought investors for a pipeline planned from the
Yadana field across Burma to Thailand. In 1991, the government reached a preliminary agreement, formalized later, to
deliver gas to the Petroleum Authority of Thailand (PTT). PTT signed a gas sales agreement, or GSA, with the Yadana consortium under which the Thai state gas company would be supplied with a daily contracted gas quantity of
525MMcf/d (million cubic feet of gas a day) under a take-or-pay regime—PTT had to pay for the gas whether it used
it or not.
In fact, there are already major gas reserves in the Gulf of Thailand. When the GSA with the Yadana consortium was
signed there had not been any exploration in the Joint Development Area that Thailand shares with Malaysia. Regardless,
the PTT agreed to pay significantly more for the gas from Burma than it was paying for gas produced in Thailand (Burmese
gas currently costs PTT about 18 percent more than Thai gas). [11] The gas pipeline runs undersea for 218 miles, and
41 miles across southern Burma's Tenasserim division to Thailand. This enormous plunder of Burmese resources would
hardly be possible without the active collaboration of the Thai Government, and in particular the Thai military, who are actively policing the border with Burma. Thailand’s Petroleum Authority will be the only importer and consumer of the Yadana gas. The deal is little different from the logging, mining and fishing concessions which the Thai military have negotiated with Burma since this process of 'development' in Thailand has virtually eliminated its own principal natural resources. [12], [13] In 1992, Total agreed to develop the field with Myanmar Oil and Gas Enterprise (MOGE). Unocal,
a U.S. oil company, joined the venture in 1993. [14], [15]
In fact, the Yadana pipline is simply part of an extensive network of oil and gas investments being constructed by
Unocal across Southeast Asia: in Thailand, Burma, Indonesia, and Vietnam. [16], [17] After extensive negotiations,
the Yadana field consortium - known as the Moattama Gas Transportation Company - was formally incorporated in
December 1994. In February 1995, Unocal signed a contract with SLORC to extract and transport natural gas using
a pipeline from the Yadana Field located 43 miles off Burma's coast. The field is estimated to have six trillion cubic feet
of gas with a market value of $6.5 billion. Daily gas production levels are estimated at 650 million cubic feet. [18] Moattama’s stakeholders include Total (31.24%), Unocal (28.26%), PTT (25.5 %) and MOGE (15%). Unocal's current
net share of payments to SLORC to gain the concession is about $10 million. According to Total Oil, since completion
of the Yadana field, 15-20% of Thailand’s gas demand is now provided by Burma. The French corporation has also
openly stated that the pipeline firmly integrates both Burma and Thailand together as part of a wider South-East Asian economic sphere. [19]
One part of the unspoken arrangement between Thailand and Burma in regard to the Yadana field deal is that the Thai military forcibly return Burmese refugees. Thailand’s strategy is similar to that pursued in the 1980’s with Cambodia
under the Khmer Rouge. In April 1993, Thai troops burned down two refugee camps in an operation, reported the
Bangkok Nation, 'probably related to the gas pipeline'. Thousands of ethnic Mon refugees have since been forced back
into Burma, many straight into the hands of the SLORC military. On the border, where the pipeline enters Thailand,
SLORC troops wore Total pens in their uniforms. 'Total is coming,' said one of them, with a broad smile. [20] A second consortium consisting of Unocal, Mitsui of Japan and Total have signed a Memorandum of Understanding with SLORC
to be the joint venture partners in the "Three-In One" project. This project consists of building an offshoot pipeline to Rangoon - connecting it to a power plant - and building a power plant and urea fertilizer plant near Rangoon. [21], [22]
Halliburton was also involved in the deal, working on the offshore portion of the pipeline. Halliburton had an office in
Rangoon as early as 1990, two years after the military regime took power by cancelling the election victory of the
National League for Democracy. In the early 1990's, Halliburton Energy Services joined with Alfred McAlpine (UK) to
provide pre-commissioning services to the Yadana pipeline. In 1997, after Dick Cheney joined Halliburton, the Yadana
field developers hired European Marine Services (EMC) to lay the 365-kilometer offshore portion of the Yadana gas
pipeline. EMC is a 50-50 joint venture between Halliburton and Saipem of Italy. From July to October 1997, EMC
installed the 360-inch diameter line using its pipe-laying barges. [23] The pipeline area is inhabited by the Karen, Mon
and Tavoy peoples who have partial control of the region. The operation resulted in forced village relocation, the forced
labor of tens of thousands of local inhabitants, and constant fatalities at the hands of the SLORC troops. As a result of
these activities, the entire region is a war zone due to the ethnic peoples' need to defend themselves against SLORC
attacks, making the region highly unstable. [26]
The US State Department stated that the SLORC 'routinely' uses slave labour and 'will use the new railways to
transport soldiers and construction supplies into the pipeline area'. The oil companies denied the railway was linked
to the pipeline project, and although most supplies are likely to arrive by sea, there can be no doubt that the railway
allowed the generals to protect the companies' investment and their own cut from it. [27] The SLORC has been
routinely condemned by the US Congress and State Department, the European Parliament, the UN Human Rights Commission, the International Labor Organization, and Amnesty International. There can be no doubt that the SLORC has gained political legitimacy and continues to maintain financial solvency largely through its partnerships with foreign oil and
gas corporations. [28]
In 1993, Total was contacted by officials of the Burmese Government in exile, representing Aung San Suu Kyi's party,
the National League for Democracy. They provided the company with extensive evidence of slave labour along the route
of the pipeline. They also demonstrated how the profits from the project would invariably buy the arms and military
equipment to which about half of the SLORC's budgetary spending is devoted, thus helping to underwrite the repression
of the population. Total's response was it would 'continue'. UNOCAL has described reports of slave labour as 'fabrications'. [29] Aung San Suu Kyi, Nobel Peace Prize winner and leader of Burma’s democracy movement, has repeatedly called on
companies like TOTAL and Unocal to leave Burma. She has said that: “TOTAL has become the main supporter of the
Burmese military regime.” [30], [31] It is clear that the French government is supporting Total, regardless of its
publicly stated opposition to the military regime. In fact, the risk taken by Total for operating in Burma was
underwritten in 1994 by France’s State Export Credit Insurance Agency (COFACE). According to the French Ministry
of Foreign Affairs, this position is not contradictory, since the construction of the pipeline would contribute to the "development" of the region. [32], [33], [34]
In August 2000, a U.S. federal district court concluded that the Yadana pipeline consortium "knew the military had a
record of committing human rights abuses; that the Project hired the military to provide security for the project, a
military that forced villagers to work and entire villages to relocate for the benefit of the Project; that the military,
while forcing villagers to work and relocate, committed numerous acts of violence; and that Unocal knew or should
have known that the military did commit, was committing and would continue to commit these torturous acts." [35],
[36] In 2004, Oil giant Unocal settled out of court in two lawsuits filed in the United States by villagers in Myanmar
who alleged the company benefited from human rights abuses they suffered during the construction of the Yadana
gas pipeline. The 15 unnamed villagers had sued Unocal in 1996, claiming the company should be held liable for
murder, rape, torture, extortion, forced labor, and the forced relocation of whole villages perpetrated by the Myanmar
military during construction of the $1.2 billion pipeline. [37], [38], [39], [40], [41], [42] The entire deal will give the
military dictatorship about $400 million a year over 30 years. [43] Since the open suppression of democracy in 1990,
it is estimated that the ruling SLORC have received 65% of their financial backing from foreign oil companies. [44],
[45]
Part Two of this article can be found in the February Edition. More information about the situation in Burma and Total
Footnotes
[3] Ibid.
[23] Ibid.
[24] Ibid.
© The Tara Foundation, 2007
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