MYANMAR: The North Korean Connection

MYANMAR: The North Korean Connection

By C. S. Kuppuswamy

The warming up of relations between Myanmar and North Korea have come to limelight by the attendance of some senior Myanmar military officers at a ceremony held at Yangon in February 2010 to mark the 68^th birthday of Kim Jong Il. The official media had widely covered this event with photographs of the North Korean Ambassador to Myanmar and Lt Gen Tin Aye (No.5 in the Myanmar military hierarchy).

The diplomatic ties between Myanmar and North Korea were severed in 1983 because of an attempt by North Korean agents to assassinate the visiting South Korean President. Though the relations were restored only in 2007, analysts believe that the clandestine military ties may have been reestablished as early as in 1999, when Burmese officials paid a low profile visit to the North Korean capital.

The Economist (June 27, 2009) had reported that “Kang Nam 1” (a North Korean ship) was shadowed by an American ship while it was chugging slowly around China’s coast on its way to a port in Myanmar. “Some reports say the Kang Nam 1 was carrying missile parts; others that it was shipping mostly small arms to the Junta in Myanmar. Mr. Kim has some times used Myanmar to trans-ship missile parts, and who knows what else to Iran”.

There were some media reports of senior military officers of Myanmar visiting North Korea in the latter half of 2008 presumably for procurement of weapons, missiles and rockets.

General Thuru Shwe Mann (as Chief of Staff Army, Navy and Air Force) had made a secret trip to North Korea last year (2009) with a high level delegation. Among the sites they visited were secret tunnel complexes built into the sides of the mountains to store and shield jet aircraft, missiles, tanks, and possibly nuclear and chemical weapons. The media report added that a Memorandum of Understanding was signed by Thuru Shwe Mann and his North Korean counterpart, General Kim Kyok-sik, officially formalizing military cooperation between Myanmar and North Korea.

A BBC news report 07 January 2010 said that “two Burmese officials have been sentenced to death for leaking details of secret government visits to North Korea and Russia. The officials were also found guilty of leaking information about military tunnels allegedly built in Burma by North Korea”. Though this report mentioned of visits in 2006 and 2008, The Irrawaddy News Magazine claims to have exposed the visit of Shwe Mann in 2009.

The nuclear aspirations of Myanmar is one of the reasons for this bonhomie with North Korea (Please see Paper 2263 dated 05-06-2007 titled “MYANMAR: Going Nuclear?” (http://www.southasiaanalysis.org/papers23/paper2263.html) posted on this site). There are reports to indicate that while Russia may be providing the reactor and the know-how, North Korea along with China and Pakistan are supplying the material.

Myanmar is reportedly having significant uranium deposits in Magwe, Taungdwingyi, Kyaukphygon and some other locations in Taintharyi division in the south. The Russian reactor is also to be located in Magwe in Central Myanmar. It is of significance to note that Myanmar is a signatory to the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

There are a spate of reports to indicate that North Korea is helping Myanmar in a big way to build underground tunnels and caves for storage of weapons, command posts and shelters for aircrafts and tanks. The main tunnel complex along with some nuclear installations is reported to be at Naung Laing in Mandalay division in Northern Myanmar. Photographs of these tunnel complexes can be seen on Google Earth.

The United States is wary of the growing relations between Myanmar (the out post of tyranny) and North Korea (a component of the Axis of Evil). As early as in 2007 the US had told Myanmar of its incapability to ensure the required nuclear safety standards and prevent proliferation. The US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, during her last visit to Bangkok for the ASEAN Regional Forum meeting in July 2009 said “We know that there also growing concerns about military cooperation between North Korea and Burma, which we take seriously”. US Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell who visited Myanmar in November 2009 is believed to have conveyed the US concerns of the increasing military ties between Myanmar and North Korea. The Washington Post, quoting US officials, reported that the Obama administration had launched an aggressive campaign to convince the Junta to stop buying North Korean military technology.

A source book on allegation of cooperation between Myanmar (Burma) and North Korea on Nuclear Projects (http://www.fas.org/man/eprint/burma.pdf) gives elaborate details of this ongoing cooperation with commentaries, news reports, maps, locations and photographs.

While US and the IAEA may have to exert and ensure the prevention of proliferation in South East Asia, India should be equally concerned because of the perils involved for the Indian Ocean Region by this nexus of China, Myanmar and North Korea.

(Some inputs for this paper have been extracted from the article “Burma-North Korea Ties Pose a New Headache for US” by Aung Zaw in the Irrawaddy News Magazine on March3, 2010, with the permission of the author)