Press Release: Laos Groups Issue Appeal Before Communist Party Congress

World

Cached:  http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/WO1103/S00611/laos-groups-issue-appeal-before-communist-party-congress.htm

Thursday, 17 March 2011, 10:20 am
Press Release: Center for Public Policy Analysis

Laos Groups Issue Appeal Before Communist Party Congress

The Center for Public Policy Analysis and a coalition of Lao and Hmong non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have issued an international appeal urging Laos to release political and religious dissidents, and jailed Americans, prior to the beginning of the ninth Lao Communist party congress in the coming days. The appeal also requests that the Lao government halt illegal logging by Vietnamese military companies in Laos and release nearly 8,000 Lao Hmong political refugees and asylum seekers forcibly repatriated from Thailand to Laos in December of 2009.

“We are concerned about ongoing human rights violations in Laos and the continued imprisonment of Lao political and religious dissidents as well as Hmong refugees,” said Philip Smith, Executive Director of the Center for Public Policy Analysis ( CPPA ) in Washington, D.C. http://www.centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org

“The Lao communist party is losing more credibility with the Laotian people, in part, because it continues to take a closed-door, monopolistic approach to governing and it has repeatedly failed to provide international access to, or release, prisoners of conscience as well as Lao Hmong refugees;.” Smith said.

The communist party Congress in Laos is slated to begin on Thursday, March 17, and is reportedly closed to independent journalists and the news media as well as foreign diplomats.

“There needs to be transparency by the Lao communist government and a voice for the voiceless, suffering people of Laos,” said Khampoua Naovarangsy ( Khamphoua Naovarangsy ) an internet blogger and press freedom advocate for the Laos Institute for Democracy (LIFD).

“We are very concerned about the arrest and beating again of Christian Pastor Wanna in Laos as well as other independent Lao and Hmong Christians, Buddhist and Animist religious believers who seek to worship independently from the Lao Communist Party’s monitoring and control,” said Boon Boulaphanh, of the Laotian Community of Minnesota (LCM).

“We are appealing to the Lao government to immediately release the peaceful Lao student leaders, Pastor Wanna, and others who seek political reform and religious freedom in Laos,” said Bounthanh Rathigna, President of the United League for Democracy in Laos, Inc. (ULDL).

“The Lao and Hmong-American community is appealing to Laos to immediately release the Laotian student protesters and thousands of Lao Hmong refugees recently forced back to Laos,” said Christy Lee, of Hmong Advance, Inc. and Hmong Advancement, Inc. “We want the one-party communist regime in Laos to stop its terrible human rights and religious freedom violations against the Lao Hmong refugees and its own freedom-loving Laotian people; We are especially concerned that Lao and Hmong Christians, and independent Animist believers, are now being arrested, tortured and killed in Laos.”

Excerpts from the seven point international appeal state:

“We appeal to the Lao government and Communist Party authorities to release all political and religious dissidents, as well as some 8,000 Lao Hmong refugees and asylum seekers, as a gesture of goodwill prior to the start of the Nineth Communist Party Congress of the Lao People’s Revolutionary Party,”

“Our eight point international appeal requests that the Lao government and Communist Party, Lao People’s Revolutionary Party:

• First, release the imprisoned members of the Lao Students Movement for Democracy leaders of the October 26, 1999, peaceful anti-government protests in Vientiane;

• Second, provide unfettered international access, and third country resettlement, to some 8,000 Lao Hmong refugees and asylum seekers forcibly repatriated from Thailand to Laos in December of 2009;

• Third, release the Lao Hmong translator, and guide, arrested in 2003 and still jailed for assisting two European journalists, Thierry Falise and Vincent Reynaud, and American pastor, Naw Karl Mua, seeking to provide press coverage about the plight of those Laotian and Hmong in Laos suffering political and religious freedom violations;

• Fourth, cease the religious freedom violations, persecution and harassment of independent Laotian and Hmong Christian, Animist and Buddhist believers, including Laotian Christian Pastor Wanna, who has been repeatedly arrested and beaten along with other Lao Christian believers;

• Fifth, abide by the resolutions of the European Parliament and U.S. Congress urging the Lao government to cease human rights violations and abide by international law;

• Sixth, provide international access to, and release, the three American citizens, from St. Paul, Minnesota, arrested in August 2007, and still imprisoned in Laos, including Hakit Yang, Cong Shi Neng Yang, and Trillion Yunhaison;

• Seventh, provide international access to, and release, the group of Laotian political refugees forcibly repatriated from Thailand to Laos who were alleged to have been involved in the July 4, 200, Ban Vang Tao cross-border raid by some 60 anti-Lao government insurgents;

• Eight, and finally, cease the ongoing illegal logging in Laos by Vietnamese military owned companies’ of the Vietnam Peoples Army that serious threatens the environment and national sovereignty of Laos as well as the human rights of many of the forest-dwelling minority peoples, including the Lao Hmong, Khmu, Mien, Yao and other minority Laotians.

The eight-point international appeal was issued by the CPPA, LIFD, ULDL, LCM, the Lao Veterans of America, Inc., Hmong Advance, Inc., Hmong Advancement, Inc., and others.

On January 19, 2010, the CPPA and a coalition of Lao and Hmong organizations issued a 12 point communique also urging Laos to release jailed American citizens, dissidents and Hmong refugees. *http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20100719006805/en/Laos-Communiqué-Urges-Release-Jailed-Americans-Dissidents*

–

Contact:  Helen Cruz or Philip Smith

Tele. (202) 543-1444

info@centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org

Center for Public Policy Analysis

2020 Pennsylvania Ave., NW

Suite #220

Washigton, D.C. 20006  USA

http://www.cppa-dc.org

ENDS

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Politburo changes expected in Laos

Cached:  http://www.nationmultimedia.com/2011/03/17/national/Politburo-changes-expected-in-Laos-30151079.html

By Supalak Ganjanakhundee
The Nation
Published on March 17, 2011

Secretary general Choummaly Sayasone

Laos’ ruling People’s Revolutionary Party will today convene a five-day congress to choose a new set of leaders and map out a strategic plan for development over the next five years.

It will be the ninth congress of the party that has ruled the country since its revolutionary victory in 1975 and remained committed to Marxist-Leninist political economy.

Laos is one of only five communist regimes left in the world.

The congress will see some changes to the 11-member politburo, the party’s decision-making core, as some members will step down, a party source said.

Secretary general Choummaly Sayasone will likely retain his position as head of the party and bring some new faces into the inner circle to tighten his grip on power, the source said.

The most watched figure is Bouasone Bouphavanh, who lost the premiership in late December because of family problems. There is speculation over whether he will retain his position in the politburo. Horse-trading among the elite is in progress.

The current prime minister, Thongsing Thammavong, also sits in the politburo.

The congress will proceed under the theme of “enhancing the cohesive solidarity of the Lao nation and unity within the party”, said Deputy Prime Minister Somsavat Lengsavad.

Somsavat, also a member of the politburo, is head of the congress secretariat.

The party will continue with its goal of lifting the country from underdevelopment by 2020 and advancing further towards the destination of socialism, he said.

At the end of the congress on Monday, the 576 delegates who represent 191,700 party members in the country will choose a new central committee. The committee will elect the politburo and executive positions of the party, Somsavat said.

It is unclear whether the party will expand the size of its executive bodies, he said.

There are currently 55 members in the central committee, including the 11 politburo members.

The party congress will also adopt the seventh Socio-Economic Development Plan (2011-2015) as a master guideline for the country’s development over the next five years.

Risk of meltdown – Japan nuclear emergency workers to return to plant

 

Cache.boston.com:  http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2011/03/16/japan_suspends_work_at_stricken_nuclear_plant/?p1=News_links

 

By Eric Talmadge and Shino Yuasa Associated Press / March 16, 2011

FUKUSHIMA, Japan—Emergency workers forced to retreat from a tsunami-stricken Japanese nuclear power plant when radiation levels soared prepared to return Wednesday night after emissions dropped to safer levels.

The pullback cost precious time in the fight to prevent a nuclear meltdown, further escalating a crisis spawned by last week’s devastating earthquake and tsunami that pulverized Japan’s northeastern coast and likely killed more than 10,000 people.

It was unclear what happened in the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant’s overheating reactors after late morning, when the workers stopped pumping in seawater trying to cool their fuel rods. Officials gave only sparse information about the reactors.

But conditions at the plant appeared to be worsening. White steam-like clouds drifted up from one reactor which, the government said, likely emitted the burst of radiation that led to the workers’ withdrawal. The plant’s operator reported a fire at another reactor for the second time in two days.

At one point, national broadcaster NHK showed military helicopters lifting off to survey radiation levels above the complex, preparing to dump water onto the most troubled reactors in a desperate effort to cool them down. The defense ministry said those flights were a drill. Later, it said it had decided against making an airborne drop because of the high radiation levels.

Officials are facing increasing criticism over poor communication and coordination.

“The anxiety and anger being felt by people in Fukushima have reached a boiling point,” the governor of Fukushima prefecture, Yuhei Sato, fumed in an interview with NHK. He criticized preparations for an evacuation if conditions worsen and said centers already housing people moved from nearby the plant do not have enough hot meals and basic necessities.

The nuclear crisis has triggered international alarm and partly overshadowed the human tragedy caused by Friday’s 9.0-magnitude earthquake and the subsequent tsunami, a blast of black seawater that pulverized Japan’s northeastern coastline. The quake was one of the strongest recorded in history.

Millions of people struggled for a fifth day with little food, water or heat, and already chilly temperatures turned to snow in many areas. Police say more than 452,000 people are staying in temporary shelters, often sleeping on the floor in school gymnasiums.

Nearly 3,700 people are officially listed as dead, but officials believe the toll will climb over 10,000 since several thousand more are listed as missing.

In an extremely rare address to the nation, Emperor Akihito expressed condolences and urged Japan not to give up.

“It is important that each of us shares the difficult days that lie ahead,” said Akihito, 77, a figure deeply respected across the country. “I pray that we will all take care of each other and overcome this tragedy.”

He also expressed his worries over the nuclear crisis, saying: “With the help of those involved I hope things will not get worse.”

Since the quake and wave hit, authorities have been struggling to avert an environmental catastrophe at the Fukushima Dai-ichi complex, 140 miles (220 kilometers) north of Tokyo. The tsunami knocked out the backup diesel generators needed to keep nuclear fuel cool at the plant’s six reactors, setting off the atomic crisis.

In the city of Fukushima, about 40 miles (60 kilometers) inland from the nuclear complex, hundreds of harried government workers, police officers and others struggled to stay on top of the situation in a makeshift command center.

An entire floor of one of the prefecture’s office buildings had been taken over by people tracking evacuations, power needs, death tolls and food supplies.

In one room, uniformed soldiers evaluated radiation readings on maps posted across a wall. In another, senior officials were in meetings throughout the day, while nuclear power industry representatives held impromptu briefings before rows of media cameras.

Wednesday’s radiation spike was believed to have come from Unit 3, where workers are struggling with a fuel storage pond believed to be leaking radiation, as well as possible damage to the containment vessel — the thick concrete armor built around the reactor — that would allow radiation to escape.

“The workers cannot carry out even minimal work at the plant now,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said Wednesday morning at briefing aired on television, as smoke billowed above the complex. “Because of the radiation risk we are on standby.”

With no workers on site, efforts to cool the reactors likely ceased altogether, said Michael Friedlander, a former nuclear power plant operator who worked at a General Electric boiling water reactor in the United States similar to the stricken ones in Japan.

“They’re in right now is what’s called a feed-and-bleed mode. In order to keep the core covered and keep the reactor cool they have to feed in water,” said Friedlander, who is currently based in Hong Kong. “It’s something that they physically have to be present to do.”

Elevated levels of radiation were detected well outside the 20-mile (30-kilometer) emergency area around the plants. In Ibaraki prefecture, just south of Fukushima, officials said radiation levels were about 300 times normal levels by late morning. It would take three years of constant exposure to these higher levels to raise a person’s risk of cancer.

A little radiation was also detected in Tokyo, triggering panic buying of food and water.

Given the reported radiation levels, John Price, an Australian-based nuclear safety expert, said he saw few health risks for the general public so far. He was concerned for the workers, who he said were almost certainly working in full body suits and breathing through respirators. The workers at the forefront of the fight — a core team of about 180 — had been regularly rotated in and out of the danger zone to minimize their radiation exposure.

Price said he was surprised by how little information the Japanese were sharing.

“We don’t know even the fundamentals of what’s happening, what’s wrong, what isn’t working. We’re all guessing,” he said. “I would have thought they would put on a panel of experts every two hours.”

Edano said the government expects to ask the U.S. military for help, though he did not elaborate. He said the government is still considering whether to accept offers of help from other countries.

There are six reactors at the plant. Units 1, 2 and 3, which were operating last week, shut down automatically when the quake hit. Since then, all three have been rocked by explosions. Compounding the problems, on Tuesday a fire broke out in Unit 4’s fuel storage pond, an area where used nuclear fuel is kept cool, causing radioactivity to be released into the atmosphere.

Units 4, 5 and 6 were shut at the time of the quake, but even offline reactors have nuclear fuel — either inside the reactors or in storage ponds — that need to be kept cool.

Meanwhile, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency estimated that 70 percent of the rods have been damaged at the No. 1 reactor.

Japan’s national news agency, Kyodo, said that 33 percent of the fuel rods at the No. 2 reactor were damaged and that the cores of both reactors were believed to have partially melted.

——

Yuasa reported from Tokyo. Associated Press writers Elaine Kurtenbach in Tokyo, David Stringer in Ofunato and Jocelyn Gecker in Bangkok contributed to this report.

© Copyright 2011 Associated Press. All rights reserved.

—

Risk of meltdown

SOURCES: Nuclear Energy Agency; American Nuclear Society; Nuclear Regulatory Commission; Scientific American; Nuclear Energy Institute JAVIER ZARRACINA, JAMES ABUNDIS, DAIGO FUJIWARA/GLOBE STAFF

SOURCES: Nuclear Energy Agency; American Nuclear Society; Nuclear Regulatory Commission; Scientific American; Nuclear Energy Institute JAVIER ZARRACINA, JAMES ABUNDIS, DAIGO FUJIWARA/GLOBE STAFF

SOURCES: Nuclear Energy Agency; American Nuclear Society; Nuclear Regulatory Commission; Scientific American; Nuclear Energy Institute JAVIER ZARRACINA, JAMES ABUNDIS, DAIGO FUJIWARA/GLOBE STAFF

SOURCES: Nuclear Energy Agency; American Nuclear Society; Nuclear Regulatory Commission; Scientific American; Nuclear Energy Institute JAVIER ZARRACINA, JAMES ABUNDIS, DAIGO FUJIWARA/GLOBE STAFF

 

 

 

 

 

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Nothing we could do but run . . .

eveningtimes.co.uk

Cached:  http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/news/editor-s-picks/nothing-we-could-do-but-run-1.1090758

Jasper Hamill

16 Mar 2011

Japanese people are staying calm in the face of disaster, making sure to help each other through the crisis that demolished several towns and could yet end in a terrifying nuclear meltdown.

Four days after the massive earthquake struck the archipelago, panicked residents living hundreds of miles around the Fukushima nuclear plant are frantically stocking up on food.

The quake and tsunami killed untold thousands and left many more without shelter or electricity and struggling to find water, fuel and food.

Adding to the misery, snow has started to fall in the country – a sight usually welcomed with joy by the nature-loving Japanese but now likely to intensify the pressure to keep people warm during freezing temperatures.

Japanese Emperor Akihito has admitted he is “deeply worried” about the crisis his country is facing.

Despite the harsh conditions, there has been no violence or looting of the sort seen in other countries after a natural disaster.

Instead the stoic Japanese are calmly searching for missing loved ones, grimly moving dead bodies and taking the first steps to clean up the streets which were so badly damaged by the unprecedented catastrophe.

Japanese society prides itself on its low levels of crime and community spirit. Its people are now coming together to rebuild their shattered country, even as nuclear disaster looms.

Osamu Hayasaka, 61, was collecting free drinks being handed out at a shop in Tagajo, strapping more on to his bicycle to hand out to vulnerable neighbours.

He said: “There are a lot of older people near where I live, so I’ll give them some of this.”

Even though his family of six has no power, barely any water and little food, he is not angry at the government and understands that officials have an enormous job ahead of them.

Japan is well used to disasters. Its 127million people are the only population to have been hit with a nuclear bomb and earthquakes – ranging from the 1923 quake, that killed 142,800, and another in 1995 that killed 6400 in Kobe.

The Japanese people have come together to rebuild their nation, showing a calm determination and resolve.

“We’ve got no clothes, no jobs, no home. We don’t know what we are going to do “

63-year-old Junko Niiruma

But the country’s spirit is once again being tested by what its Prime Minister has called its most severe crisis since the end of the Second World War.

Close to the nuclear power plants, citizens confined to their houses are nervous about their prospects, but elsewhere, a strange, determined calm has come over the survivors.

All the low-lying parts of Ofunato, a city up the coast from Tagajo, were flattened. Cars and boats are scattered around the wrecked town as resident clear the streets, leaving neatly folded piles of clothes on the roadside. Junko Niiruma, 63, said: “We’ve got no clothes, no jobs, no home. We don’t know what we’re going to do.”

In Koriyama, an inland city hit by the earthquake – but not the tsunami – people queued in the car park of a closed supermarket to purchase limited supplies of toilet paper, tissues and soft drinks. “There is no panic,” manager Takahiro Shimazu said. “They line up quietly at the cash registers and everyone is co-operative.”

Mutsuko Ishino lives further north, in the seaside city of Hachinohe. Although her home survived, the salmon factory where she worked was destroyed.

She will start work on clearing up today. The 48-year-old said: “We will make sure this place returns to the way it used to be.

“Everyone will work together and clean up this mess.”

An American academic, Robert Dujarric, was stuck in a bullet train overnight after the earthquake. Instead of harassing employees with questions about when the train would move, passengers remained calm.

Mr Dujarric is the director of the Institute of Contemporary Japanese Studies at the Temple University campus in Tokyo.

He said: “Basically, if you have to spend 16 hours in a stationary train and an additional nine hours getting home, do it in Japan.” Two phrases offer some insight into the Japanese psyche.

One is “shikata ga nai,” which roughly translates as “it can’t be helped,” and is a common reaction to situations beyond one’s control. The other is “gaman” considered a virtue. It means to be patient and persevere in the face of suffering.

Academics have several explanations as to why the Japanese are resilient and disposed to group work.

Some suggest the work needed to grow rice on a crowed archipelago prone to natural disasters forced them to learn how to work together.

Glenda Roberts, an anthropology professor at Tokyo’s Waseda University, said: “It strikes me as a Buddhist attitude.

“Westerners might tend to see it as passivity, but it’s not that. It takes a lot of strength to stay calm in the face of terror.”

MP’s call to rescue stranded Brits now

Britain’s government should act now to get transport to rescue UK citizens stuck in the devastated Sendai region, a Labour MP said today.

Russell Brown, who represents Dumfries and Galloway, said a constituent’s son, wife and baby are stranded in a hotel in the Japanese city.

At Commons question time, he accused the Foreign Office of “not assisting with transport” as other European countries had done.

Mr Brown said: “None of us can imagine the plight of tens of thousands of people, including UK citizens, and what they’re experiencing in Japan.”

He said of his constituent’s relatives: “They are in a hotel where a bus turned up this morning and took away a number of European nationals … but the only advice being given by our Foreign Office regrettably is advice. They are not assisting with transport. Can something more be done?”

Foreign Office Minister Jeremy Browne said there had been a “hugely comprehensive response” to help British nationals in Japan.

He added: “We have supplemented what is already a large embassy with an additional 45 staff.

“We are trying to do everything possible in a chaotic and very difficult situation to help British nationals.”

He promised Mr Brown he would look into the specific case.

Foreign Secretary William Hague told MPs he had last night met Japan’s foreign minister Takeaki Matsumoto and conveyed the condolen-ces of the British people.

Mr Hague said: “We’ve also discussed the need to co-operate closely on ascertaining the whereabouts of British nationals in Japan.”

Laos gears up for closed-door party congress

monstersandcritics.com

Cached:  http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/asiapacific/news/article_1626477.php/Laos-gears-up-for-closed-door-party-congress

Mar 16, 2011, 11:05 GMT

Vientiane, Laos – A total of 576 delegates is to attend the ninth Congress of the Lao communist party from Thursday to Monday, which will be closed to press and diplomatic scrutiny, state media reported Wednesday.

The congress, held every five years, was expected to re-elect President Choummaly Sayasone as secretary general of the Lao People’s Revolutionary Party, diplomatic sources in Vientiane said.

The congress would discuss ‘upholding the leadership role and capacity of the party’ and ‘advancing further towards the destination of socialism’ among other topics, head of the congress secretariat Somsavat Lengsavad told the Vientiane Times.

‘There are no revolutionary developments expected – neither in politics nor in the economic field,‘ one Western diplomat said.

‘Neither foreign journalists nor diplomats will be allowed to attend the congress,’ said the diplomat, who requested anonymity. ‘This is a purely Lao affair.‘

Laos has been under one-party communist rule since December 1975.