Clinton pledges improved Burma ties if reforms continue

[dipsydoodle]

Source: BBC News 1 December 2011 Last updated at 11:37

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has pledged to improve ties with Burma if current reforms continue.

After meeting Burmese President Thein Sein, Mrs Clinton said the US would reward Burma's leaders if they kept "moving in the right direction".

The president hailed a "new chapter" in relations during talks with Mrs Clinton - the most senior US official to visit Burma in half a century.

The US maintains tight sanctions on senior leaders in Burma's hierarchy.


Read more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-15978893

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In other words we DO want your gas and at the same time need to keep you away from N. Korea.

Total, Chevron 'enriching Burma junta'

Oil giants Total and Chevron are propping up Burma's junta with billions of dollars hidden by the regime in Singapore, while trying to whitewash rights abuses, an environment group says.

Army security forces guarding a gas pipeline project backed by France's Total and US-based Chevron were linked to forced labour, killings, corruption and other violations, two reports by US-based EarthRights International said on Thursday.

"Total and Chevron's Yadana gas project has generated 4.83 billion dollars for the Burmese regime," one of the reports said, adding that the figures for the period 2000-2008 were the first ever detailed account of the revenues.

"The military elite are hiding billions of dollars of the peoples' revenue in Singapore while the country needlessly suffers under the lowest social spending in Asia," said Matthew Smith, a principal author of the reports.

http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-world/total-chevron-enriching-burma-junta-20090910-fivd.html