U.N. To Hear Of Repression In Burma
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
UNITED NATIONS – Undersecretary General Ibrahim Gambari, soon will brief the Security Council on his trip to Burma, opening a new diplomatic front between America and China, according to Turtle Bay diplomats assessing a surprise meeting yesterday between Mr. Gambari and jailed opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
Some analysts saw the hour-long meeting at a Rangoon government guest house as an indication to a new openness by junta leaders. Others called it a preemptive strike by the rulers, perhaps in coordination with their Beijing patrons, to prevent deeper Security Council involvement.
American diplomats and Washington-based supporters of Ms. Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy hoped Mr. Gamabari’s visit will lead to further involvement of the council.
“According to one source, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi urged Gambari to ask for the Security Council’s involvement in Burma to enforce and realize the negotiated political settlement,” the policy director of the U.S. Campaign for Burma, Aung Din, told The New York Sun, relying on Burmese opposition contacts. “We are not able to confirm” Ms. Suu Kyi’s request, he added.
Mr. Gambari’s meeting with Ms. Suu Kyi was “exactly what we were hoping for, “a spokesman for American U.N. Ambassador John Bolton, Richard Grenell, told the Sun. Washington is now “looking forward to having a council briefing,” he added.
One Turtle Bay-based diplomat said the undersecretary general for political affairs fully expected to brief the council. Mr. Gambari briefed the15-member body several months ago, he noted. But a European diplomat, who also asked for anonymity, said that several past attempts by America and Britain to raise the Burma issue at the council met with strong Chinese resistance.
Coming out of the meeting, which marked the first time in nearly three years that Nobel laureate Ms. Suu Kyi was allowed to see an outsider, Mr. Gambari told reporters, “She has a contribution to make and I hope she will be allowed to make it.”
During an earlier meeting, Burma’s strongman, General Than Shwe, agreed to “try to find common ground” with the NLD, said Mr. Gambari, who once represented Nigeria’s dictator, Sani Abacha, at the United Nations.
