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Burma Information Network- Japan (www.burmainfo.org) |
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( Tokyo ) Ryuhei Kawada, a member of the Japan 's House of Councilors (upper house), has released a second video message on YouTube calling on Japan 's government to truly support freedom for Burma .
Press
Release |
Embargoed For: December 14, 2007 (1pm JST)
Contact: , Kanae Doi
(Tokyo) Ryuhei Kawada, a member of the Japan 's House of Councilors (upper house), has released a video message on YouTube calling for people to join him in supporting freedom for Burma .
The video can be viewed at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v73YVeRtStY (From the YouTube homepage, search with "Kawada Burma")
A Japanese video was also released: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biXxofor1Cg
This past September in Burma, tens of thousands of people led by Buddhist monks demonstrated on the streets. The ruling regime cracked down on the demonstrators by force, and hundreds of people including Japanese journalist Kenji Nagai were killed or injured. In a new report released on December 7, Human Rights Watch said that "many more people were killed in the violent government crackdown than the Burmese government has admitted."
UN Special Rapporteur Sergio Pinheiro, who visited Burma in to investigate the human rights situation during and since the crackdown, stated in his report released on December 7 that there were more than 30 fatalities in Rangoon alone, 74 cases of enforced disappearance, and between 500 and 1000 still detained. Pinheiro also stated that allegations of the burning of a large number of bodies were "very disturbing."
UN Envoy Ibrahim Gambari has visited Burma twice to urge the military regime to begin a substantive dialogue with the pro-democracy opposition, but there has been no substantive progress.
In the video message, Mr. Kawada points out that Burma's regime spends more than half of the state budget for its military, and that only a fraction of the state budget is spent on health. The Japanese government has provided a large amount of aid to the military regime: In fact it has been the largest donor to Burma every year since 1979.
At the end of his message, Mr. Kawada observes: "The Japanese government should not give financial aid to the military regime. Instead, it should support refugees from Burma or provide education to Burmese people living in Japan."
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