A kinder, gentler Burma: for the right price, Washington lobbyists can put a positive face on the most oppressive foreign junta.

For the right price, Washington lobbyists can put a positive face on the most oppressive foreign junta

Despite what many people think, lobbying is hard work. Consider, for instance, the heroic struggles of Jefferson-Waterman International, a D.C.-based firm whose legal efforts on behalf of the Burmese government make president Clinton's legal defense look like a piece of cake. For a mere $400,000 a year, Jefferson-Waterman undertakes to sweeten the reputation of Burma's military junta, the State Law and Order Council -- affectionately known as SLORC.

It's not an easy job, as one might infer from recent news stories concerning Burma's political activities. The State Department calls SLORC "a highly authoritarian military regime" whose security forces regularly terrorize the citizenry with extrajudicial killings, torture, and rape. The SLORC keeps Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung Suu Kyi under a state of virtual house arrest and severely restricts her National League for Democracy (NLD) and other opposition parties. (This is necessary since the opposition swept national elections in 1990 with more than 80 percent of the vote, thereby leaving the SLORC, no choice but to annul the balloting.) SLORC is also complicit in the drug trade: Burma is the principal source of heroin that reaches American streets.

Now, many PR professionals would fold under the challenge of representing such a colorful client. Not the folks at Jefferson-Waterman. Among the many services its lobbyists -- including Ann Wrobleski, who served as assistant secretary of state for narcotics control under Reagan -- perform on behalf of the junta, Jefferson-Waterman launched an Internet newsletter, the Myanmar Monitor, whose stated purpose "is to provide a broad and balanced view of Burma." To fully appreciate the magnitude of this task, it is helpful to contrast the political and social developments in Burma since last May, when the Myanmar Monitor was inaugurated, with how those events were reported in the newsletter.

May - July 1997

Events in Burma:

In May, soldiers detain 36 opposition members and press eight into service as military porters in areas held by ethnic insurgents. One of the opposition members dies as a result. That same month, the SLORC arrests around 50 NLD supporters and detains hundreds more in order to prevent the opposition from gathering at Suu. Kyi's home to commemorate the seventh anniversary of its 1990 election victory.

In early June, opposition leader U Tin Shwe dies in Rangoon's notorious Insein prison, where prisoners are routinely subjected to prolonged solitary confinement and otherwise kept in what are called "doggie cells." Later in the month, authorities sentence three opposition members to 10-year jail sentences on trumped up charges of "unlawful association" with foreigners.

The International Labor Organization cites Burma for failing to honor internationally recognized worker rights. No surprise here since the SLORC bans free trade unions, tolerates child labor, and uses forced labor to build and maintain infrastructure projects -- what the junta calls people's "contributions" to the revolution.

Coverage in the Myanmar Monitor:

In May, the MM attacks U.S. sanctions as "shortsighted" and reports that Burma's leaders are "feeling sorry for U.S. companies, which will lose out on future returns from investments." The newsletter also quotes an unnamed British civil engineer residing in Burma as saying that before people "try to punish [the SLORC], they should listen to all sides of the story, not just one, which by the way, has its own agenda and its own spin."

The following month, the MM puts out a special edition claiming that a cousin of Suu Kyi had planned to assassinate government leaders and blow up foreign embassies, all with the help of U.S. groups such as the American Refugee Committee and the Center for International Private Enterprise. The SLORC's Lt. Gen. Khin Nyunt is quoted as saying that the U.S. government is providing "assistance to underground, armed groups and terrorists groups." MM readers wanting to obtain a full text of Khin Nyunt's remarks are urged to call the newsletter's offices.

MM spends much of the period promoting tourism to Burma, which provides the SLORC with badly needed foreign reserves. One story asserts that tourists will encounter a country where "Loving, kindness, sympathy, tolerance, benevolence, mutual regard, respect, and humanitarianism evolve out of Buddha's teachings."

August - October 1997

Events in Burma:

In September, authorities allow the NLD to hold its first party conference since 1990. Soon thereafter, the SLORC again bans opposition gatherings. The state-controlled media steps up its attacks on Suu Kyi, calling her "confrontational" and "uncompromising"

On the world stage, Burma remains an international pariah. British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook announces that the country will be banned from the 1998 Asia-Europe meeting in London because "it is one of the few governments in the world whose members are prepared to profit out of the drug trade."

International human rights groups also attack the SLORC. Images Asia issues a detailed report charging that Burmese children as young as 14 are forced to join the army after attending a military-style school called "Brave Young Leaves"

Coverage in the Myanmar Monitor:

In its September 5 issue the MM prints a commentary marveling at the way the SLORC has "somehow managed to unify the country, restored social order and brought stability back to the nation"

"Political Reform Marches On," an MM headline blares in late October. According to the newsletter, unnamed "international analysts and commentators have noticed a possible easing of tensions" between the SLORC and Suu Kyi. MM also dutifully reports that the government's foreign minister believes his country is "enjoying peace and stability, with a dynamic economy and strong social cohesion."

The MM continues to zealously promote tourism to Burma. In August, MM reports that its editors "have traveled to Myanmar and find its attractions charming" Yet another issue courts the PC crowd with tales of "eco-tourism" in Burma: "Myanmar tourism development will be undertaken with environmental conscientiousness to avoid negative impacts on the natural wilderness."

November 1997 - February 1998

Events in Burma:

In November, the SLORC tries to improve the government's reputation by renaming itself the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC).

Meanwhile, the human rights situation continues to deteriorate. In January, a Buddhist group charges the government with executing three monks and destroying thousands of monasteries during the previous few months. A report from Danish Doctors for Human Rights says that two-thirds of the 125,000 Burmese refugees living in refugee camps in Thailand had been tortured or mistreated by SLORC forces.

The State Department "decertifies" Burma as an ally in the war on drugs for the seventh consecutive year. "Drug money helps keep the Burmese junta afloat, providing cash for hotels, discos and even major infrastructure projects," reports the Christian Science Monitor in February.

Coverage in the Myanmar Monitor:

The MM portrays the creation of the SPDC as a democratic milestone ranking in importance with the proclamation of the Magna Carta. The story says formation of the new junta "represents the second phase in the Myanmar Government's three-step development of a full democracy. SLORC represented the first phase of the democratization process." In early January, the MM quotes an unnamed foreign diplomat as saying, "Political dialogue is possible if the opposition party gets weaker."

Though the MM has repeatedly asserted that U.S. sanctions on Burma have no real impact, it suggests that they be lifted none the less. "I would like to tell my American friends that sanctions will hurt you more than us," the newsletter quotes a government official as saying.

The MM responds to criticism of the junta's drug record with a special report on "Narcotics Control in Myanmar." The article points to a vast range of "real achievements" in the junta's supposed anti-drug campaign and concludes that the generals are determined "to eliminate narcotics productions."

Although the creativity of Jefferson-Waterman's PR efforts is needed a marvel, on should also keep in mind that, for just slightly more egregious propagandizing, Tokyo Rose was convicted of war crimes.

KEN SILVERSTEIN is co-editor of Counterpunch, a Washington, D.C.-based investigative newsletter, and author of Washington on $10 Million a Day: How Lobbyists Plunder the Nation.