REVERSE CHRONOLOGY OF ORGANIZATION ACTIVITY

August 2008: We have received additional intelligence that both confirms and expands our last report, about how Russia is guiding the SPDC’s nuclear development and more generally its military modernization. This intelligence is from new sources.

In our associated press statement, we also comment on the upcoming visit to Burma by United Nations Special Envoy Gambari, and the new Burma law passed by the United States, the Tom Lantos Block Burmese JADE (Junta's Anti-Democratic Efforts) Act of 2008.

July 2008: The Olympics are fast approaching. The fact that the Games are being held in China has brought great attention, including on idea that there is such a thing as an Olympic Spirit. This raises the question: What is it meant to be, what is it in reality, and, is this something that we should celebrate?

June 2008: We have new, disturbing, and detailed intelligence about the assistance Russia is providing Burma’s dictatorship, the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), on its nuclear program and more generally its military modernization. This new information both confirms earlier intelligence that we have published, and expands what is known about the overall program.

This report was also translated into Burmese, and published on the Burma Digest website.

We have two new articles. The first, What new world order?, is about the lack of an international response to the Burmese junta’s decision to deny humanitarian relief for the victims of Cyclone Nargis, and instead to allow them to die of starvation and disease.

The second, The Chinese Dictatorship’s Olympics, is about the reduction in pressure on China, focused on the upcoming Beijing Games, that occurred in response to the earthquake in Sichuan Province, and with which reduction we completely disagree.

Right: Victims of Cyclone Nargis. Photo source: Delta Tears via Free Burma Rangers

May 2008: Because of SPDC intransigence, the world has been struggling to deliver humanitarian aid to Burma. The aid community: saviors or enablers? explores the issues that must be addressed if we are to help the people of the country, but not their tyrants.

Our statement in response to the fact that the SPDC has been stealing votes, and foreign aid - The wrong people in Burma are dying.

Our analysis of the situation in Burma at the advent of the constitutional referendum and in the wake of Cyclone Nargis: Freedom for Burma: is this it?

We were interviewed by the American television network, ABC, about the reasons for the SPDC's restrictions on international disaster relief, with an excerpt broadcast on World News Tonight.

March 2008: We have prepared an analysis of the many advocacy initiatives now underway, on behalf of Tibet, Darfur and Burma, using the Olympics as a pressure point against China.

February 2008: A tribute to Padoh Mahn Sha Lar Hpan, and a related comment.

We have a major new article, Insurrection in Burma. The associated press statement has a short comment about the new Rambo film.

We also note the welcome death of yet another dictator, Suharto of Indonesia, likely one of the ten worst mass murderers of all time. The only thing that makes his demise bittersweet is that like Pinochet of Chile he was never punished for his crimes, and his family and cronies were allowed to retain the proceeds of his regime's monumental corruption.

Some commentators, and foreign governments, including the U.S., have attempted to justify Suharto by saying that he led Indonesia through a period of strong economic development. Such plaudits are completely fallacious. His "development" was based on the rape of the country's natural environment, and the wealth accumulated by his cronies will undermine democracy for generations to come. These commentators are also attempting to use a flawed ends and means rational, saying effectively that while he was a mass murderer this was somehow OK, due to the development. Mass murder is Never OK. Unethical means are not acceptable even for supposedly ethical ends. For democracy to prevail, the rule of law cannot be compromised.

November 2007: An analysis of the two months since the crackdown began against the popular uprising in Burma - “Those who are not afraid to die, come in front!”

Digital Direct Action against the Chinese Olympics

October 2007: An article that examines the strategy and tactics that the people of Burma and their international supporters can use to defeat the SPDC: An epic struggle, Part 2.

A general commentary on the situation in Burna: An epic struggle.

This was also published in The Nation (Thailand).

We have posted three compilations of photography from the Free Burma Rangers.These should remind everyone that the crimes of the SPDC extend well beyond the crackdown on the pro-democracy movement. For so many reasons, but foremost to end the scorched earth campaign against Burma’s ethnic nationalities, Than Shwe and his fellow generals must go.

September 2007: The demonstrations in Burma were smaller yesterday (Sept. 28) because of the government crackdown. The most important element of this is the suppression of the monks. Free the monks!

Our statement, End the bloodshed!, about the murderous crackdown by the SPDC on non-violent demonstrators; and a related article, Why the world won't help, which explains why the international community refuses to offer the people of Burma any "real" assistance.

Both Free the monks! and End the bloodshed! were printed by The Nation (Thailand).

The demonstrations in Burma are now huge, more than 100,000 people each in a number of different cities. The monks of the country, who have been leading the demonstrations (since the student leaders were arrested), put out a call for the general public to join them. There is only one step left to go to freedom, as described in our statement: Water on stone.

Preparation for murder, our statement about reports that the SPDC is making plans to slaughter peaceful demonstrators in Burma.

Burma needs a coup. This entire statement was printed as a letter to the editor in The Nation (Thailand).

Also, we assisted in the production of a news documentary about the popular uprising in Burma, for Associated Press Television News.

Dictator Watch is exuberant at the departure from the Bush Administration of Alberto Gonzalez and Karl Rove. Together with the exits of Rumsfeld, Libby and Wolfowitz, this leaves only puppetmaster Cheney and puppet Bush from the anti-democratic cabal still in place. Their efforts to eviscerate the United States Constitution and to turn the country into a one party state have been defeated. The American system of democracy, for all its flaws, has repelled this extremely serious threat. Now we just have to suffer through a lame duck Bush for one more year. Let's hope America's political parties, and the electorate, do a better job with their selections in 2008.

August 2007: We have a new article, about recent events inside Burma: Starved into Submission. The article begins with a number of links to other new articles and videos about Burma, which have not been widely publicized.

Dictator Watch has now learned of two additional surface-to-surface missile facilities in Burma. We also have information about the role Singapore is playing in the SPDC’s efforts to procure military materiel, and the junta’s program to send officers to Russia for training in nuclear science.

We were interviewed by BBC's Burmese service regarding this report.

July 2007: Dictator Watch has learned of two clear and present dangers to international security and peace, emanating from Burma and its ruling military junta, the SPDC. The first is a developing, clandestine trade in refined uranium. The second is the construction of launch facilities in Eastern Burma for ballistic missiles of North Korean origin, which are targeted at Thailand.

We have posted two new photo exhibits of internally displaced persons in Eastern Burma.

Please visit http://www.youtube.com/noolympics for videos about the boycott against the Beijing Olympics.

Right: An ill child at a clinic in Eastern Burma.

May 2007: We have received new intelligence about a secret agreement between Burma and North Korea.

Also, recent events have revealed that Burma's junta, the SPDC, has a weakness. Its primary international supporter, China, is now vulnerable to pressure due to the fact that it will host the 2008 Olympics. This is an opportunity that people working for freedom in Burma must grasp: Free Burma! Boycott China's Genocide Olympics!

March 2007: We were interviewed for the website Burma Digest, and provided an overview of the military junta's nuclear program, and also information about previously secret Dictator Watch initiatives. We were also asked to comment for the daily radio broadcast by the Voice of America into Burma on the Iranian Foreign Minister's second visit to the country in two months, during which trip the two countries announced their intention to cooperate on energy projects. We would note that Iran, and also North Korea, are currently subject to United Nations Security Council sanctions. If, as our sources tell us, Burma's junta, the SPDC, is selling refined uranium to both countries, it is breaking these sanctions. This assuredly warrants the Security Council's investigation.

Images of suspected uranium mine and refinery in Burma.

We have a new article, Lessons from the American Revolution, and a related press release, A Lesson in Revolution.

January 2007: An analysis of the vetoes by China and Russia of the Security Council resolution on Burma: The "United Nations."

Our first press release of the year, Burma Nuclear Proliferation Intel, and three related statements:

Analysis of Burma's Nuclear Program
Prospects for United Nations Security Council Action on Burma
The People of Burma

We also note the deaths of three more dictators:

Augusto Pinochet - It's great that he finally died, but terrible that the Chilean government never held him to account for his crimes against humanity. There can be no justice, for the victims of such tyrants, or society at large, until they have been punished. The fact that Pinochet was not punished will make it much more difficult for Chile to escape the legacies of his misrule.

Saparmurat Niyazov - It will be interesting to see how Turkmenistan, under complete thrall to Niyazov's personality cult, responds to his passing. His cronies will try to maintain the status quo, but since there was no heir apparent, as in North Korea, the darkness over the country, the fog of brainwashing that clouded people's vision, should begin to lift.

Saddam Hussein - Someone commented that he had it too easy; his death was over in a second. He should have had to rot the rest of his life away in prison. But his death also ends a disgusting chapter in Iraq's history, which the country can and will move forward from; and it also means conclusively that there is no possibility that he will escape and return to power.

December 2006: We have two guest articles by David O'Hanlon: United States Interests and Burma; and Karen Myths.

We also have a number of new photo essays, including:

Freedom Fighters of the Karen National Liberation Army, by Kirran Shah

Three compilations of recent Free Burma Ranger photography: Burma Army positions; internally displaced persons; and Burma Army atrocities. (Caution, the last includes strong images.)

We were interviewed by BBC's Burmese service about our information that Burma and North Korea are working together on nuclear proliferation. Both of last month's articles were published on numerous websites of the World News Network. And we had a letter to the editor in the Nation (Thailand) decrying the actions of foreign speculators who have been engaged in the manipulation of the Thai currency.

November 2006: We received secret information relevant to a critical threat to international security: Nuclear Proliferation and Burma, the Hidden Connection.

We also have a new article about the crisis in North Korea, where we disagree, strongly, with the conventional wisdom on the subject: China - The Reat Threat, Boycott China! As the title makes clear, we blame China for North Korea's nuclear test, and are calling for a boycott of goods manufactured in the nation in the upcoming holiday season and beyond. We further ask that other organizations dedicated to freedom in China, and Tibet, and also freedom for its client dictatorships including North Korea, Burma, and the Sudan, support and publicize this boycott as well.

October 2006: Our statement on the five year anniversary of the Dictator Watch website, Actions Speak Louder Than Words; and a follow-up to our statement about the coup in Thailand, The Role of the Military in a Democracy.

September 2006: Thaksin Shinawatra, the wannabe dictator of Thailand, is now conclusively gone!!! Our statement regarding his fall: Thailand's Middle Way.

This statement was used as a feature editorial in the Nation (Thailand) on the one week anniversary of the coup.

Our statement in response to Burma being formally added to the agenda of the United Nations Security Council: Are You Ready to Act?

We also had a letter in the Nation (Thailand) recently about the alleged bomb plot against caretaker PM Thaksin. In addition, yet another dictator, Alfredo Stroessner of Paraguay, has died. Good riddance.

August 2006: A Fractured Movement?, our analysis of certain important fault lines in the Burma democracy movement, which make the goal of achieving freedom for the country more remote than ever.

To emphasize just how important this goal remains, and why such differences of opinion, and strategy, must be addressed, please review the latest photography from the humanitarian relief missions of the Free Burma Rangers.

June 2006: Asymmetry in Strategy: our analysis of the qualitative differences between the strategy of SPDC dictator Than Shwe, and the strategy of the Burma Democracy Movement, with related comments on the immorality of international diplomats.

May 2006: In response to a series of events that occurred in Burma in the last month and a half, we issued a new statement: The Revolution in Burma Begins Now!

We also prepared three compilations of photography from the Free Burma Rangers, from the humanitarian relief mission reports that they have published since the end of last year.

We are also pleased that the tyrant King of Nepal has yielded to popular pressure and allowed the Nepalese Parliament to be reestablished. Popular pressure against dictatorial political regimes appears to be breaking out all over the world.

April 2006: The dry season offensive by the Burma Army is building to a head and there are now more than nine thousand people who have had to flee for their lives. To this we say: The Crisis in Burma Demands Intervention!

We posted the article by Htun Aung Gyaw that was censored by the National League for Democracy and the Mizzima website: The Breaking of the Dead End. We did this in the interests of free speech. This post does not imply that we agree with everything in the article. We also have a new photography exhibit, of images of the humanitarian crisis now underway in Eastern Burma.

Right: A murder victim of the SPDC. Possibly a porter who could no longer carry his load. One thing is clear, until the dictatorship is eliminated, the body count of innocent victims will continue to rise.

We also note that another dictator, Slobodan Milosevic, of the now defunct Yugoslav Federation, has died; and that the former dictator of Liberia, Charlers Taylor, has been arrested and is awaiting trial for crimes against humanity.

To Than Shwe and Maung Aye: Yor own day of reckoning is coming!

Lastly, we have a statement regarding the fall of Thaksin Shinawatra: Congratulations to the People of Thailand. (This statement was also printed in the Nation newspaper inThailand.)

March 2006: We have a comment about a recent event, of censorship, that illuminates two of the factors holding back a new popular uprising in Burma: National Endowment for Hypocrisy.

As our March Situation Report reveals, the SPDC dry season offensive is now underway, with significant conflict and Burma Army atrocities occurring in Karen State. We have also responded to a list of questions about Burma that were posed by an American university student, and appended to our answers an analysis of the prospects for a popular uprising in the country.

The answers to a second set of questions, about the philosophy of Dictator Watch, posed by a Bulgarian activist, have been posted on Activism 101.

January 2006: Our statement on the resignation of Razali Ismail, United Nations Special Envoy for Burma. (This was also posted by Narinjara.com)

2006 is the year for freedom in Burma! We have posted a new statement dedicated to this end: Revolutionary Fatigue, or Freedom?; and also a new article, False Positives, about the Bush Administration's assault on a foundation of the U.S. legal system, the right not to be falsely accused of a crime.

December 2005: Our analysis of the prospective mechanics of a popular uprising in Burma - Freedom for Burma: Now means NOW!!!; and further illustration of why the military junta, the SPDC, must be brought down as soon as possible - The Life of the Karen: Insight into Burmese Oppression of the Karen. (Note: this article was originally prepared as a brief for a member of Sweden's Parliament.)

October 2005: Convincing the United States Government, a new article that describes a major two year campaign to get the U.S. to back democracy in Burma with sincerity, i.e., to support pro-democracy and indigenous resistance groups on the ground inside the country. This campaign failed – the U.S. is not sincere – and the article explains why.

The article also argues that the people of Burma must do more to help themselves. To this end we are posting the African National Congress publication, Guide to Underground Work, which has already been distributed on a number of Burma lists.

Lastly, we have posted the latest mission report and photography from the Free Burma Rangers.

September 2005: Announcing Activism 101, a major new initiative of Dictator Watch.

July 2005: Lull before the Storm, an appraisal of the current situation in Burma, and of its implications for the democracy movement; accompanied by two photo exhitits of internally displaced persons: IDP children, and IDP encampments at night.

Concerning other parts of the world, we offer belated congratulations to the people of the Ukraine and of Kyrgystan, who have cast their dictators aside and won their freedom. What a tremendous accomplishment! Well done! Of course, now the hard work begins. A just democracy does not come easily.

For the people of Burma, it is now your turn. This is the year for Burma to be free!

We also note that the dictator of Togo, Gnassingbe Eyadema, has died; and also one of the leading religious dictators: Pope John Paul II.

May 2005: Acts of Desperation, our statement on the May 7th bombings in Rangoon; and two new photo exhibits describing the current situation faced by the Shan people of Burma:

- SPDC Abuses in Eastern Shan State
- Fear and Insecurity in Eastern Shan State

Acts of Desperation was posted by the Mizzima News Agency, printed in the Arakan Post (#8), and featured on the new Burma Indymedia website.

April 2005 No Surrender! We responded to a report about Burma commissioned by the European Union, which concluded that the country will always be a dictatorship and that we in the democracy movement, and the people of Burma, should just give up.

We also posted a new collection of photography from the Free Burma Rangers.


Internally displaced persons at a hide site in Toungoo District, Karen State, Burma, January 2005.

March 2005 We released three related statements on the current situation in Burma:

- The United Nations and Burma
- The United States and Burma
- The Tipping Point

The last article was also published in the Speaking Freely column of Asia Times Online. In addition, we were interviewed by the Democratic Voice of Burma about it, which interview was twice broadcast into Burma.

We also prepared a new photo exhibit, about an internally displaced person crisis affecting the Karen people, that began following an attack by the Burma Army in January.

We have further been engaged in extensive fieldwork and private advocacy. We are working to extend Green Empowerment's solar electrification projects for Karen in-country medical clinics; and we are advising on efforts to assist child soldiers who escape from the Burma Army (where they have been forced to serve), including making a submission to the United Nations on this subject.

January 2005 To clear up a lot of fuzzy thinking, about Iraq and other totalitarian states where it may — or may not — be appropriate for a foreign party to intervene and end the repression, we prepared a new article: The Logic of Military Intervention. We also posted five photo essays from the Free Burma Rangers about renewed Burma Army offensives against internally displaced persons in Karen and Karenni states, and photography of Phase 2 of the Green Empowerment solar electrification project for in-country Karen medical clinics.

December 2004 In response to a torrent of news out Burma, we prepared Strategy for Burma, an analysis for the democracy movement on how we can take advantage of opportunities that now exist and implement a comprehensive and powerful strategy to drive the dictatorship out. As part of this, we are repeating our offer to moderate Burma strategy forums for any interested groups, using the suggestions in the analysis as a guide.

November 2004 We have caught up with some of our past-due updates, by posting a number of new photography shows, including exhibits detailing humanitarian relief programs that were conducted in Burma as recently as last month.


Shan internally displaced children in Burma

Also, for anyone who found George Bush's tally in the 2004 U.S. presidential election difficult to fathom, Freedom From Form provides a comprehensive and fundamental explanation of why and how such a result could have occurred.

The election “demonstrates a hard truth about persuasion. The people who are best at influencing us, such as to vote for them, are not the best educators, the people who can best explain the intricacies of complex issues and present well-reasoned arguments. Rather, they are the masters of situational form, the people who are most adept at rhetoric and behavioral manipulation. In almost all cases involving large groups of people, the latter will be more persuasive, will attract more followers, than the former.”

- Freedom From Form, Nations and Government chapter

October 2004 In the aftermath of the arrest of Prime Minister Khin Nyunt by the other top generals of Burma's military dictatorship, the SPDC, we released an analysis of its import for the democracy movement: Who will be the first to shake Soe Win's hand? (Lieutenant General Soe Win is the new Prime Minister, and also reportedly the man who arranged the ambush of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi on May 30, 2003.) This article argues, contrary to conventional wisdom, that the purge, which is not yet finished - the SPDC is shutting down Military Intelligence - is not a setback for the democracy movement. Rather, it is an opportunity: an opportunity that we must exploit.

Following the article's release, we were interviewed about it for the Voice of America's Burmese radio service.

We have also revised our Real Change Requires Chaos public forum (see second following paragraph) to concentrate solely on Burma, and would like to organize with interested individuals and groups to hold it in other locations. The forum can be held on its own or as part of a larger Burma program. It is comprised of a single thirty minute presentation, followed by questions and answers - a wide-ranging and open discussion - for up to additional hour. Its goal is to originate and plan new initiatives to achieve the democracy movement's objectives.

We will publicize the results of each forum (with the confidentiality of the participants preserved). The entire series is designed to provide a way to refine and redirect the movement’s strategic and tactical planning.

We hosted a new public forum, titled Real Change Requires Chaos, discussing Dictator Watch's social change theory, which is grounded in chaos theory, and using as the forum's principal examples the need to remove the military dictatorship in Burma and to change humanity's destructive relationship with nature. This forum was held at the University of Colorado in Boulder, and also at the nearby town of Nederland. It was very well received.

In addition, we were interviewed for Denver Community Television's contemporary affairs program, Speaking Out.

We issued an article, Development in Burma, to coincide with the conference, Managing Economic Transitions: The Role of Global Institutions and Lessons for Burma/Myanmar, held in Washington, D.C. This article was also well received. We were interviewed about it by the BBC's Burmese radio service, and it was also posted on the Speaking Freely feature of Asia Times Online.

June - September 2004 We have been engaged in extensive fieldwork for the last four months, during which time we were unable to update the website. The following describes some of our activities during this period. Other items will be listed in October's update.

We issued the statement, Betrayal by Europe, our concise reflection on the European Union's willingness to attend the October 8-9 Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) in Hanoi, in which the dictators of Burma will also participate. Europe backed down in the face of Asian blackmail, and agreed to attend, even though none of the conditions that they set for their participation in the meeting, starting with the release of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, have been met.

We helped publicize the report by the Karen Women's Organisation, Shattering Silences, about the systematic use of rape as a weapon of war by the Burma Army, using as the heading for our statement the last words of one of the rape victims: “I am not willing to live in this world anymore.”

We have had some involvement in the ongoing ceasefire negotiations between the Karen National Union and Burma's dictators, the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), including being the organization to announce the offer from East Timor to provide a neutral venue for the talks. We have released two interviews with the head of the KNU Information Department regarding the talks:

East Timor offers to host KNU - SPDC ceasefire talks
KNU ceasefire with the SPDC

We also released an interview about KNU perspectives on the positions of the United Nations and the European Union towards Burma:

KNU on the positions of the UN and the EU

This interview refers to a letter we initiated from the KNU to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan. We also assisted in the preparation of a letter to Kofi Annan from the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (Burma)

More generally, we have been advising the Karen on the internal organization issues that they face as they prepare to participate in what one day will be a free and democratic Burma. We have suggested that now is the time to clean house and that they should focus on internal unity and strive to speak with one voice. We participated - the only non-Karen organization to do so - in the Third Annual Karen National Unity Seminar.

We also visited Burmese political prisoners held at Bangkok's Immigration Detention Center (IDC), and provided assistance and forwarded messages. These prisoners were described in our statement, Persons of No Concern.

Under the administration of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, Thailand is repressing Burma democracy activists, including forcing all activists resident in urban areas to move to rural internment centers, and arresting anyone who demonstrates at Burma's Bangkok embassy. (Under prior Thai governments, such individuals were allowed to demonstrate - their democratic rights of freedom of expression and association were assured.) The United Nations High Commissoner for Refugees (UNHCR) in turn has ignored the detainees' plight, even though UNHCR has an office at the IDC, preferring instead a position of complicity with PM Thaksin. We initiated a pressure campaign on the UNHCR to get it to fulfill its protection mandate - many of the detainees have been registered by the UN as Persons of Concern - with the result that some individuals have been released.

And, we had a letter in the Nation (Thailand) about why the countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) support Burma's military regime.

May 2004 Fighting off great pressure, the National League for Democracy resisted attending the sham National Convention of Burma's dictatorship, the State Peace and Development Council. We must now reward their bravery, by forcing the SPDC's remaining international supporters, beginning with the United Nations, the European Union and Australia, to change their policy and act FOR democracy. To this end we have posted an analysis - Burma: It is time for the U.N. and the E.U. to act!.

We have also posted three new summary relief mission reports, with photography, from the Free Burma Rangers; and we have posted an article, You Die Today, So I Can Live Tomorrow: Confronting the Stalin Myth, about the difficulty of gaining justice in Russia for Stalin's crimes against humanity, which should also serve as a warning for pro-democracy advocates in all nations that are or have been subject to dictatorial repression.

April 2004 We are at a turning point in the effort to achieve democracy in Burma, but we can only take advantage of it if the international community grasps the opportunity. Those parties which have promoted engagement with the military junta, including the United Nations, the European Union, and Australia, must recognize, in the wake of the junta's recent actions, that their strategy does not work. Instead, they should join the United States in a strong and unified approach to pressure the dictatorship and also its regional supporters.

Note: The Nation newspaper (Thailand) was kind enough to print this comment as a letter to the editor.

In addition to the above analysis, we have three new posts: a report, with photos, of a Free Burma Rangers relief mission into Arakhan State; a report of a Lahu Free Burma Rangers relief mission into the Eastern Shan States; and a photo essay of solar energy training and installations provided for eleven clinics in Karen State.

March 2004 We have posted a new update about the internally displaced person crisis in Eastern Burma; a report of a Free Burma Rangers relief mission into Toungoo District, Karen State; and an update on the condition of a young Karen girl, Naw Moo Day Wah, who was shot by the Burma Army in October 2002.

Photo right: A Karen man surveys the ruins of his home and of his life. He is yet another victim of the campaign of ethnic cleansing by the Burmese dictatorship, the State Peace and Development Council (some peace!, some development!).

February 2004 Our latest press release: The world stands by and does nothing: the crisis in Eastern Burma; and the January mission report from the Free Burma Rangers relief mission to Northern Karen State. FBR has determined that the crisis underway in Eastern Burma is of a greater scale than previously known. There are now some 5,700 internally displaced persons from the Burma Army's new campaign of ethnic cleansing in Northern Karen and Southern Karenni States (to make way for the development of a wolfram and silver mine), although this figure does not include IDPs hiding further north in Karenni State, which figure is unknown. The Burma Army has been intensifying attacks in the northernmost district of Karen State and also Southern Karenni State, and relief teams are unable to enter these areas to provide assistance and to document the crisis.

January 2004 We are tracking and documenting a developing humanitarian crisis in Eastern Burma, and we also released a New Years' call to action for the entire Burma democracy mevement.
- January 20th update on the crisis;
- Emergency in eastern Burma: press release, photography;
- New humanitarian crisis in Burma; and Democracy in Burma: It's Now or Never!

November 2003 We have posted a new paper: "The Karen People of Burma, and the Karen National Union," prepared with the cooperation of the KNU. Notably, this paper describes the systematic campaign of genocide to which the Karen (and also the Karenni and the Shan) have been subjected. The United Nations, and the signatory nations of the 1948 UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, are obliged to intervene and end the genocide being committed in Burma. Further, Burma's neighbors, through extending the dictatorship both economic and military support, thereby perpetuating its rule, are complicit in this genocide.

October 2003 Empathy, Sympathy and Objectivity - continuing comments on press coverage of Burma, and the activities of diplomats therefor (which comments also apply more generally to the actions of journalists and diplomats in all dictatorship to democracy social change situations); summary mission reports for three humanitarian missions to Northern Karen State by the Free Burma Rangers; and a full mission report of an FBR mission to Eastern Shan State. The second summary report includes information on a seventeen year-old girl who was raped and murdered. The Shan State report contains information on a woman who was gang-raped by twenty Burmese soldiers; intelligence on the narcotics trade; and other information about human rights abuses committed by the Burmese dictatorship, including forced labor and religious persecution.

September 2003 We won't forget, and we won't be fooled again - our statement calling on the people of Burma never to forget which foreign governments assisted their SPDC oppressors, and to punish such nations by denying them economic opportunities in Burma once it is free, and precautionary comments regarding the deluge of pro-dictatorship commentary to be expected now that Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is once again under house arrest (as if this were a positive development!); and summary mission reports for five humanitarian relief missions by the Free Burma Rangers.

August 2003 Follow the Money - why the government of Thailand backs the Burmese military dictatorship; a recent letter to the Bangkok Post about this issue; and photo essays about assistance programs for Karen child soldiers (so they can attend school), and escaped child soldiers from the Burma Army. Also, although we are currently busy working to realize democracy in Burma, we remain committed to anti-dictatorship struggles in other parts of the world. For example, we recently joined other NGOs to sign a statement calling for international military sanctions against Indonesia in response to developments in Aceh and West Papua. This included a call for an arms embargo of Indonesia and the recall of all weapons previously supplied to the Indonesian military, an end to all cooperation with the Indonesian military and police, and a call to pressure the Indonesian government to end military operations in Aceh and Papua. We are extremely disturbed by Australia's revitalized support for the Indonesian military, in particular for its special operations unit, Kopassus, which was responsible for great war crimes in East Timor and throughout Indonesia under dictator Suharto, and which has never been held accountable.

The Burma Freedom and Democracy Act: the beginning of the end for the SPDC; a photo essay of a Dictator Watch food relief program for Burmese IDP mothers and their children; three stories from young Karen war orphans, in their own words, about how the Burma Army murdered their fathers, and how they have struggled to survive since this happened; and a remembrance and warning regarding the Preah Vihar incident in June 1979, when the Thai government refouled some forty-five thousand Cambodian refugees, thousands of whom subsequently died.

July 2003 Burma Relief Mission, and Analysis of Prime Minister Thaksin of Thailand; Free Burma Rangers relief mission report; four photo shows from inside Burma - Life on the Run in Karen State, Burned Villages, Wounded Children, and Murder Victims.

June 2003 Relief Mission, Mine Victim, and Additional Analysis of Burma: our latest press release. This release describes a report, with photography, of a new relief mission into Burma, which among other things provided medical aid to over 1,200 internally displaced persons; a report, with photography, of a Karen man who was severely injured by a landmine in April this year, and for whom we are trying to raise donations; and our continuing analysis of the opportunity for the Burma democracy movement precipitated by the dictatorship's ambush of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.

Let the People of Burma Decide: our action plan in response to the SPDC's May 30th ambush of democracy leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.

May 2003 We published an article, with photography, about a road-building forced labor project in Burma. This article also proposes that the forced relocation camps where the forced laborers live can more accurately be described as “concentration camps.”

April 2003 A Dictator Watch contributor was attacked at the Thai border with Burma. We published three short stories, with photos, of SPDC crimes against humanity committed against the Karen people in Dooplaya District, Karen State, Burma. We issued a press note on a recent humanitarian mission to Burma, into the South-Eastern Shan States, and posted to the site photography from and a summary report for this mission.



March 2003 We issued a press release titled War in Iraq, and Child Soldiers and a Humanitarian Mission in Burma, with a short statement of our position on the Iraq war and announcing: an interview with escaped Burmese child soldiers; a photo essay and mission summary (detailing dozens of crimes against humanity) for a relief mission into Burma from December 30 - January 20; that the Thai National Human Rights Commission is now investigating the circumstances described in the report The Fifth-Five That Disappeared; and the publication of a new article - the Future of the Earth. We also continue to work with the East Timor Action Network in its effort to ensure that the United States military does not resume cooperation with the Indonesian military; and with the Free Burma Coalition in its boycotts of American companies that import goods from Burma. We are pleased to announce that both May Department Stores and Saks Fifth Avenue have ceased sourcing goods from Burma

February 2003 We issued a press release titled Questions for Thailand, announcing three new reports documenting examples of Thailand's support for the Burmese dictatorship: The Fifty-Five That Disappeared; Sixty-Three Lives That Do Not Matter; and The Yielding of Thai Sovereignty. We also published a new photo essay, Reasons to be a Refugee, describing the characteristics of “Black Zones” and the conditions of porters, internally displaced persons and refugees. Also, our documentation effort was the subject of a six minute feature on Radio Free Asia's Burmese service. Lastly, the clinic described in the Saving Lives link has now been fully funded.

January 2003 We released photography of refugees of the Burmese dictatorship's new offensive against the Karen ethnic group, including commentary thereon; and publicized ongoing harassment and intimidation by the Thai authorities of humanitarian workers along the Thai/Burma border.

December 2002 The release of the Dictator Watch Manifesto; two additional chapters of Freedom From Form, Education, and Ethics, are now on the site; and many other ongoing efforts. We joined a number of groups to pressure the US government not to reestablish relations with the Indonesian military (specifically, not to provide funding therefor in the 2003 budget), in part because it has not been punished, or reformed, for the atrocities it committed in East Timor (the war crimes trials were a joke); two western activists were recently arrested in Aceh and are still being held; and due to the military's suspected involvement in the murder of a Free Papua leader and two American schoolteachers, among others. For Burma, there is another boycott success (the boycott was led by the Free Burma Coalition): Burlington Coats Factory announced that it would stop sourcing from the country. Lastly, we're happy to report that Pepsi dumped Britney, hopefully the beginning of her demise as a symbol of the perversion that is modern culture. Now, if everyone would just stop drinking Pepsi and all the other caffeine sugar waters.

November 2002 We published two exclusive photo series taken inside Burma, one of horrific war crimes and the other of the dictatorship's drug trade into Thailand, along with an accompanying press release; and, we updated, including with new photography, our exhibit of earlier images from Burma (taken near the Unocal/TotalFinaElf pipeline) published on the site in September.


August-September 2002 We issued our first formal foreign policy analysis, on the relations between nations, entitled Interference and Intervention; we were offered photography from inside Burma, which was taken near the Unocal/TotalFinaElf pipeline; we posted photography of atrocities inside Burma; we posted an article about torture in Burma, by the Chin Forum Information Service; we helped fund two Thai/Burma border clinics; we loaded onto the site three currently topical chapters from Freedon From Form - Introduction to Social Solutions, Activism, and Religion; we updated the religious dictatorship link with additional outrages (scroll down to Islam and Hinduism); and we released the following article on American Independent Media Center websites: Tiger Woods and Britney Spears: Products, or Prostitutes? Also, in great news, Children's Place announced that they will stop buying goods from Burma (see June-July below), and Premier Oil from the UK announced the divestment of their Burmese operations. The latter action leaves Unocal and TotalFinaElf as the remaining western oil companies providing significant support to the dictatorship. With sufficient pressure, we will get them out too. (Please help with this.)

Photo right: Karen internally displaced persons arriving at the Thai border, in heavy rain. They were refused entry, and forced to return into Burma. The girl was being carried because she had malaria and could not walk. Did she live, or die? There is no way to know.

June-July 2002 A busy period. We displayed our Burma at War photography show at the invitation of Amnesty International, as part of their Human Rights Square at the Festival Mundial in Tilburg, Holland. We began an effort to establish a medical clinic for internally-displaced persons hiding in a dangerous area along the Thai/Burma border. We wrote a new letter to Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. However, our attempts to have it delivered to her personally failed, so we published it as an open letter. We also had a letter printed in the Bangkok Post about the hidden complexities of the relationship between the Thai and Burmese governments. We prepared a new installment for our Names and Addresses campaign, about real estate developers. And lastly, we are participating in the Free Burma Coalition's boycott of Children's Place stores, since they source goods from Burma.



At the Festival Mundial. Can you guess what this is?

May 2002 Contrary to conventional thought, we do not believe that the release from house arrest of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is a breakthrough for the Burmese democracy movement. The second installment of our “names” campaign, an update on cloning and a review of agricultural biotechnology, was published in the Earth First! Journal. And, we signed on to three letters prepared by the East Timor Acton Network, demanding that the U.S. behave responsibly toward the newly free East Timor and its old colonial master Indonesia.

March 2002 We examined a touchy subject, the idea of military intervention in Burma, proving that there is no issue we will not consider. Intellectual honesty above all!

February 2002 We began a collaboration with the Earth First! Journal, published in the current edition, to identify, systematically, by industry and other groups, the specific individuals responsible for environmental destruction around the world. The first installment is about the cloning industry. We issued an open letter to Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Burma’s democracy leader, calling on her to consider ending her secret dialogue with the military dictatorship. We were interviewed by the BBC for their weekly Burma Perspectives radio broadcast, and asked to defend our position in this letter.

January 2002 After twenty-five years of thinking about the basic theme, and almost eleven years of work, Freedom From Form is now, finally, done. Whew!

December 2001 We received our first guest article, Obeying the Dictators, by Jeff Larochelle. Thank you Jeff! We also received our second guest article, On the Burmese Economy, by U Thaung, presenting a unique perspective on why the military dictatorship in Burma will be so difficult to defeat, because of little-known historical events. We are still awaiting our first guest photo essay. C’mon all you Earth First!ers and dictatorship-globalization-corporate activists: send us some snaps. Let us publicize your actions to the world!

November 2001 We did our first widespread promotion for Dictator Watch, including publishing four papers, New York and Chaos, Complicity and Culpability, Chaos and Violence, and The Pro-Dictatorship Policy of the United States Government (see links below) on all of the more than sixty Independent Media Center websites worldwide. Among other responses, Quebec IMC featured two of the articles, and Finland IMC provided a translated abstract of one of them. Also, the Summary Prognosis for Burma from our articleBurma and Chaos-Updated was included in BurmaNet, the daily listserv for Burma activists worldwide. Attracted by this posting a Burmese author, U Thaung, wrote a review of the article, which was then broadcast into Burma on Radio Free Asia, and which was also published in the New Era Journal, a newspaper widely distributed along the Burma/Thai border. Lastly, we had another letter printed in the Bangkok Post, about the feudal basis of the “democratic” dictatorship in Thailand.

October 2001 The Burma at War photography show was exhibited at the Free Burma Coalition's Burma Action Conference at American University in Washington, D.C. (October 27-29) We also participated in the conference demo at the department store Hecht's, which sources goods from Burma.

October 2001 The Dictator Watch website was launched! This was accompanied by a series of articles:
- Introduction to Chaos Theory
- Chaos and Violence
- The Roots of Dictatorship (This is a succinct description of the evolution of human society.)
- Change, and the Dictator Watch Paradigm

Our appraisal of the terrorism in the United States:
- New York and Chaos
- Complicity and Culpability

and efforts related to our on-going activism against the dictatorship in Burma:
- Burma at War photography exhibit title article
- The Pro-Dictatorship Policy of the United States Government
- Burma and the United Nations: UNseat the Regime!
- Burma and Chaos-Updated

August 2001 Dictator Watch co-sponsored, with the East Timor Action Network, Amnesty International, the Indonesia Human Rights Network, School of the Americas Watch - Northeast, and the Catholic Peace Fellowship, a party and protest at the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia. The party was for the first democratic elections ever held in East Timor (that day - August 30th), and the protest was to oppose renewed engagement by the U.S. with Indonesia, particularly military cooperation. Some 100,000 East Timorese are currently being held captive in West Timor by armed gangs, with support from the Indonesian military. The U.S. military already bears substantial complicity in war crimes committed by the Indonesian military; it must not resume any association with them.


The Liberty Bell is in the glass-windowed building, with Independence Hall behind at left. Very apropos for DW. A steady stream of tourists passed the demo, which also included music, both folk and hip-hop!

August 2001 Dictator Watch had a letter printed in the Bangkok Post, regarding the travesty of the Thai Constitutional Court not finding Prime Minister Thaksin guilty of breaking the law on asset disclosure and therefore not barring him from political office for five years.

August 2001 Dictator Watch joined twenty-seven organizations in signing letters which were sent by the Free Burma Coalition to companies found to source retail or other products from Burma.

July 2001 We released a paper in response to the awarding of the 2008 Olympics to China: The Olympics and Dictatorship.

May 2001 Dictator Watch joined twenty-three organizations in calling for thirty garment/apparel companies to cut all product sourcing from Burma.

November 2000 Letters to the editor of the Philadelphia Inquirer concerning the U.S. Presidential election.

September 2000 Two papers released on the New York Independent Media Center website the week of the S8 demos at the United Nations Millennium Summit. We also participated in the demo at the Burma embassy.
- The Legitimization of Dictatorship
- Media Hypocrisy

August 2000 Dictator Watch demonstrated at the Republican National Convention in Philadelphia, where we helped organize the Free Burma participation in the Unity 2000 march.

July 2000 Two papers distributed at the Earth First! Round River Rendezvous in the Cherokee National Forest in Tennessee.
- Social Evolution and Chaos
- Regarding Earth First!

October 1999 We signed on to the amicus brief in support of the appeal of Massachusetts' Burma purchasing law to the U.S. Supreme Court.

October 1999 We offered into the public debate on Burma, and had conveyed to freedom fighters inside Burma itself, a short paper on the future of the democracy movement: Burma and Chaos. (We also participated in a Burma conference at Thammasat University in Bangkok, and distributed the paper to members of the Burmese Students Association resident at Maneeloy Camp.)

September 1999 The first formal Dictator Watch action: we demonstrated at the Burma Embassy in Bangkok on the “four 9's” (September 9, 1999), joining hundreds of exiled Burmese students and refugees in protest of the control of their nation by an illegal military dictatorship. We were also at the embassy in October when it was occupied by the Vigorous Burmese Student Warriors.

Jan - June 1997 The following two papers accompanied two different photography shows which were given at, among other places, Blackout Books in New York City, American University, and the universities of North Carolina, Indiana, Oklahoma, and Wisconsin (Madison and Milwaukee campuses).
- Constructive Engagement
- World Travelers and the Environment