23:11 30 June 2013

Japan, Mekong nations to cooperate in infrastructure development

BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN, June 30, Kyodo

Foreign ministers from Japan and the five nations along the Mekong River agreed at a meeting Sunday in Brunei to strengthen ties and jointly tackle challenges to prepare for an ASEAN-wide integration.
Japan's Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida expressed support for bolstering the linkages among the nations by promoting development of basic infrastructure such as roads, according to Japan's Foreign Ministry.
Japan pledged about 600 billion yen in official development aid and 2.3 trillion yen for projects to build the infrastructure at the previous meeting among the six nations.
The foreign ministers also agreed to enhance cooperation in disaster prevention measures, the ministry said.
Amid China's greater influence over the region, the meeting was aimed at encouraging development and forging stronger ties between Japan and the five nations along the river -- Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam -- which have lagged behind more advanced members of the ASEAN.
Japan and the five nations also agreed to hold a summit meeting in December when leaders from ASEAN gather in Japan.
==Kyodo

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Al Jazeera Investigates

The Hidden Genocide

This is the story of a people fleeing the land where they were born - the Muslim Rohingya of Myanmar. Al Jazeera Investigates Last Modified: 09 Dec 2012 09:33 inShare3 Email Print Share Feedback

Earlier this year a Buddhist woman was raped and murdered in western Myanmar. The authorities charged three Muslim men. A week later, 10 Muslims were murdered in a revenge attack. What happened next was hidden from the outside world. Bloodshed pitted Buddhists against minority Rohingya Muslims. Many Rohingya fled their homes, which were burned down in what they said was a deliberate attempt by the predominantly Buddhist government to drive them out of the country. "They were shooting and we were also fighting. The fields were filled with bodies and soaked with blood," says Mohammed Islam, who fled with his family to Bangladesh. There are 400,000 Rohingya languishing in Bangladesh. For more than three decades, waves of refugees have fled Myanmar. But the government of Bangladesh considers the Rohingya to be illegal immigrants, as does the government of Myanmar. They have no legal rights and nowhere to go. This is a story of a people fleeing the land where they were born, of a people deprived of citizenship in their homeland. It is the story of the Rohingya of western Myanmar, whose very existence as a people is denied. Professor William Schabas, the former president of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, says: "When you see measures preventing births, trying to deny the identity of the people, hoping to see that they really are eventually, that they no longer exist; denying their history, denying the legitimacy of their right to live where they live, these are all warning signs that mean it's not frivolous to envisage the use of the term genocide."

http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/aljazeerainvestigates/2012/12/2012125122215836351.html