Dr Zarni, who is in Singapore this weekend to attend the Shangri-La Dialogue, a regional security conference, declared that the real turning point is one in favour of the ruling junta.
He said: 'Mr Ban went to Naypyidaw (Myanmar's new capital) with the intention of saving 2.5 million cyclone victims. But he ended up saving the regime's leadership by prematurely announcing a turning point.
'For Than Shwe, it was a way to defuse international pressure. It was a public-relations stunt.'
30 May 2008: Straits Times
AS FAR as Myanmar academic Maung Zarni is concerned, there has been no turning point at all in the Myanmar cyclone crisis.
Dr Zarni, 44, a visiting research fellow at Oxford University's department of international development, said: 'We're talking about relief effort that hasn't reached half of the 2.5 million victims after nearly four weeks, of which 40 per cent are children.'
For him, the 'turning point' - a term used by United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon after his meeting with Myanmar's Senior General Than Shwe last week - has been blown out of proportion by the UN chief.
The Myanmar leader promised Mr Ban that he would allow all foreign aid workers into the cyclone-stricken Irrawaddy delta, which has been off-limits to foreigners for weeks.
Pointing to the work of UN special envoys like Dr Ibrahim Gambari and Mr Razali Ismail, Dr Zarni said: 'The Myanmar people are not fooled. We've had so many foreigners coming to our country, pronouncing breakthroughs, turning points, a new leaf and a new chapter.
'But where are the results? We've been through this many times.'
Dr Zarni, who is in Singapore this weekend to attend the Shangri-La Dialogue, a regional security conference, declared that the real turning point is one in favour of the ruling junta.
He said: 'Mr Ban went to Naypyidaw (Myanmar's new capital) with the intention of saving 2.5 million cyclone victims. But he ended up saving the regime's leadership by prematurely announcing a turning point.
'For Than Shwe, it was a way to defuse international pressure. It was a public-relations stunt.'
The junta stalled on accepting foreign aid, said Dr Zarni, because they were concerned that the urban population, the opposition political parties and dissidents' groups would create disturbances during the constitutional referendum on May 10.
They might also not have known the actual extent of the devastation because their deputies were too afraid to tell them.
But even if they had known, said Dr Zarni, their decision to proceed with 'the highly discredited referendum' spoke volumes about their lack of concern for public welfare.
Still, he stressed, there were junior military officers who wanted to mobilise troops for relief efforts in the Irrawaddy delta area but were stopped by the junta leaders.
Dr Zarni, who founded the dissident group Free Burma Coalition in 1995, also had strong words for Asean, saying that its credibility had been called into question over its handling of the cyclone crisis.
The fact that Asean helped broker an international aid conference in Yangon on Sunday did not impress him.
'The meeting happened on the 22nd day after the cyclone hit, which means that for three weeks, Asean was paralysed and unable to take care of problems in its own backyard,' he said.
'Asean still has a long way to go as a regional grouping.'
The engagement that Asean had pursued with Myanmar for 11 years had failed because the grouping did not engage with the Myanmar people, but only with the junta leaders, he charged.
Still, the humanitarian cooperation between Myanmar and the international community through Asean could lead to more positive engagement, he hopes.
'It could foster people-people ties, and open the eyes of younger military officers in Myanmar to the fact that people and organisations in the international community are not all evil.
'The problem lies in the power structure in which they operate. There are good soldiers in the Myanmar military but the junta's callous leadership and militarist orientation are what is destroying the country,' he said.
'The Myanmar people are not fooled. We've had so many foreigners coming to our country, pronouncing breakthroughs, turning points, a new leaf and a new chapter. But where are the results?'
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