By Colum Lynch and Michael Abramowitz
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, December 28, 2008; A16
UNITED NATIONS -- International sanctions and Laura Bush's personal intervention did not make Burma's generals ease their political oppression. Neither did quiet diplomacy, nor the devastation of a cyclone.
So the United Nations is attempting a new approach: It is trying to entice the generals with fresh promises of development money.
According to senior U.N. officials, special envoy Ibrahim Gambari has proposed that nations offer Burma financial incentives to free more than 2,000 political prisoners, including Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, and to open the country to democratic change.
In the months ahead, the U.N. leadership will press the Obama administration to relax U.S. policy on Burma and to open the door to a return of international financial institutions, including the World Bank. The bank left in 1987 because Burma, which is officially known as Myanmar, did not implement economic and political reforms.
"It cannot be business as usual. We need new thinking on how to engage with Myanmar in a way that will bring tangible results," Gambari said in an interview, adding that the United Nations cannot rely simply on "the power of persuasion with too little in the [diplomatic] toolbox."
But critics characterize the strategy as a desperate attempt to salvage a diplomatic process that has so deteriorated that Suu Kyi and Senior Gen. Than Shwe, Burma's military ruler, declined to meet with Gambari during his last trip there, in August. Gambari, critics say, is simply grasping to show progress in moving a regime that has no intention of embracing democratic reform.
The United States and Britain have resisted financial perks, arguing that Burma should not be rewarded for bad behavior. They are not "under any illusions that sanctions would solve Burma's problems," said Jared Genser, Suu Kyi's Washington-based attorney and president of the advocacy group Freedom Now. But "if you flood them with development assistance, it will only go to the junta's favored few," Genser said.
Gambari outlined his strategy in a confidential paper he presented last month to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. In it, according to senior U.N. officials who have seen the document, Gambari endorses building on the relations Burma established with the outside world after Cyclone Nargis struck the country in May. He also calls for an increase in development assistance to Burma and proposes that wealthy countries expand the nation's access to foreign investment, the officials added.
One key initiative involves the establishment of an Economic and Social Forum to serve as a vehicle for channeling money and coordinating international development efforts. To prevent Burma from steering assistance to its supporters in the government, the United Nations has begun discussing with Denmark, Japan, the Netherlands and Norway how to ensure that money would go to the neediest Burmese.
Gambari and other top U.N. officials are also urging countries with influence over Burma, especially China and India, to lean on the government to release political prisoners and to provide a political opening for the opposition in upcoming elections. "What we need is for the U.S. and the U.K. to be softer and for the Chinese and the Indians to be harder," one senior U.N. official said.
Gambari reportedly hopes to detail the United Nations' latest thinking to Burmese leaders early next year, but only if the country's ruling general agrees to meet with him. If Gambari's strategy receives a positive response, Ban, the first U.N. chief to visit Burma in more than 40 years, would make his second trip to the country.
Burma has been ruled by a military dictatorship since 1962, when Gen. Ne Win expelled foreigners and broke with the outside world in pursuit of "Burmese socialism." Pro-democracy demonstrations 20 years ago offered the promise of a new government elected by the people, but the generals put Suu Kyi under house arrest in July 1989 and ignored national elections in 1990 that her party, the National League for Democracy, won in a landslide.
Burma has one of the world's worst living standards, despite holding sizable oil and natural gas reserves and the world's largest deposits of precious gems. Nargis, which killed more than 100,000 people and left 2.4 million homeless, only added to the challenges.
The Burmese leadership has recently consolidated its power in advance of national elections in 2010. As Burma buckled from Nargis's blow, the military pushed through a referendum on a new constitution that would effectively exclude the National League for Democracy from the election.
The Bush administration's position is that it makes no sense to engage with the Burmese government until the generals signal that they are interested in reconciling with the opposition. That could include, for instance, releasing Suu Kyi from house arrest or freeing other political prisoners.
"We have not been against dialogue, but we have felt that dialogue needed to be preconditioned," said Dennis Wilder, senior director for Asian affairs on the National Security Council. "We just feel that it's egregious that for two decades Aung San Suu Kyi has been under house arrest. We find it very hard to perceive a direct dialogue with the Burmese under those circumstances."
In recent years, the administration has tried to ratchet up pressure on Burma through sanctions aimed at restricting the income of the military rulers and their associates. In the summer, Congress banned the import of Burmese jade, a key source of income for Burma's government.
At the same time, the United States stepped up humanitarian efforts in the wake of Nargis, sending about $75 million in aid both inside the country and to refugee camps on the border with Thailand.
All these efforts appear to have made little headway with the generals, who have increased arrests of dissidents in recent months, according to U.S. officials and human rights advocates. Bush administration officials suspect that Burmese authorities are stalling in the hopes that they might be able to work with the administration of President-elect Barack Obama, who has repeatedly made clear his interest in opening dialogues with countries scorned by Bush.
But Burma is far from a priority for the incoming administration, and it is not certain that new officials would change course.
Obama, Vice President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Secretary of State-designate Hillary Rodham Clinton co-sponsored the jade bill, and few expect that they will move to relax sanctions soon after taking office.
The Obama transition team declined last week to comment on the Gambari strategy or a new thrust in U.S.-Burma relations.
Some international diplomats note that the United Nations' push to bring about political change in Burma has been undercut by the inability of influential governments, principally the United States and China, to agree on a strategy.
"One of the main problems is that we are split and the junta can play us against one another," said Kjell Magne Bondevik, a former Norwegian prime minister.
"China and India today have huge investments in Burma, with no preconditions as far as I know on delivering democracy," Bondevik said.
Some U.N. delegates remain skeptical that Gambari would be able to deliver on promises of increased assistance. "I don't think any country now is in a position to offer financial incentives to Myanmar, in view of the financial crisis," said a senior diplomat from a neighboring country.
