Myanmar wants US government to remove sanctions faster

Myanmar wants the US to lift sanctions faster after Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said some restrictions on investment and financial services would be eased, according to an adviser to President Thein Sein.

“They should do more if they want to see us reaching the mission faster,” Nay Zin Latt told Bloomberg News yesterday in an emailed response to questions. “The government is doing its job, which is national reconciliation and being a democratic society. This is the time giving more carrots will work more.”

The US will allow companies to invest in certain sectors of Southeast Asia’s fourth-smallest economy, Clinton said on April 4, without offering specifics. They may include telecommunications, agriculture, tourism and banking, according to two senior administration officials who briefed reporters the same day. Nothing has been decided, they said.

 

The criticism reflects a growing debate over whether sanctions are still needed to encourage democracy, and which ones would bolster reformers at the expense of hardliners opposed to change. China last week joined Southeast Asian nations in calling on the US and European Union to lift all sanctions against the former military dictatorship.

Clinton’s comments came after April 1 by-elections in which former political prisoner Aung San Suu Kyi’s party won 43 of 45 legislative seats. Myanmar’s 664-member parliament is still dominated by Thein Sein’s Union Solidarity and Development Party and the military, which is automatically granted 25 per cent of the seats under the constitution.

Clinton said the US would appoint an ambassador to Myanmar, allow more aid and non-profit groups to operate in the country, and permit visits by certain government officials. It would also start “a targetted easing of our ban on the export of US financial services and investment,” she said.

“Sanctions and prohibitions will stay in place on individuals and institutions that remain on the wrong side of these historic reform efforts,” Clinton said, without naming anyone. “This reform process has a long way to go,” she said.