There have been street protests, a cyclone and appalling loss of life, yet Burma’s junta remains untouched, winning a 92% ‘vote of confidence’ amid the devastation. The Guardian’s Cathy Scott-Clark and Adrian Levy report from the leader’s hideaway:
Two matching pairs of soft cotton slippers are laid outside the sliding glass doors. Lilies in the adjoining palm grove fill the air with a heavy perfume. This seaside villa on Burma’s west coast – made from polished hardwood, marble and mother-of-pearl – is the holiday hideaway of Senior General Than Shwe, head of the latest incarnation of a junta that has clung to Burma like bindweed for five decades.
It is hard to reconcile the quiet luxury of this villa, its infinity pool overlooking five miles of Ngwe Saung (Silver Beach), with the devastation in the Irrawaddy delta region just a few miles to the south, where cyclone Nargis struck on May 3, killing thousands and destroying a million-plus bamboo-and-wood homes. The Ngwe Saung villa is a haven for the Senior General and his family, and for his fellow generals who share a holiday camp just along the beach. Here, Than Shwe could relax after brutally crushing the uprising by the nation’s monks in Rangoon last September. His villa survived the cyclone.
Cushioned by luxury, serviced by junior officers terrified of imparting bad news, the junta rarely gets to learn of the hardships facing their battered people, Lord Malloch-Brown, foreign office minister, argued this month. He was one of many diplomats and international leaders who criticised the regime for delaying or blocking relief to victims of the cyclone.
[Photo: Myanmar ruler Senior General Than Shwe attends Armed Forces Day ceremonies on Sunday March 27, 2005, in Yangon. AP]
Similar Posts:
- Reaching out to two and a half million
- Aung San Suu Kyi: 5,000 days in captivity
- Not such a hero after all
- Cyclone Nargis hits Burma
- In Burma, assassination of a rebel leader
0 Responses to “At home with the General”
Leave a Reply