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United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged a further easing of economic and political sanctions against Burma Monday, during an unprecedented speech to the country’s parliament.

Ban praised President Thein Sein for ushering in a string of dramatic and unexpected reforms since taking office a year ago.

Last week, the European Union suspended most of its sanctions, except arms sales, following the examples of Australia and Canada, while the United States maintained sanctions on trade.

The U.N. chief urged the international community to do more to support reform efforts in Burma, also known as Myanmar.

“I urge the international community to go even further in lifting, suspending, or easing trade restrictions and other sanctions,” he said. “Second, Myanmar needs a substantial increase in international development assistance as well as foreign direct investment.”

The U.N. chief also praised democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s leadership.  Her National League for Democracy Monday backed off a demand for changes to a constitutional oath required of members of parliament.

“We decided to compromise in this situation because we don’t want to become a political problem. Some people may think the NLD has given in, but let them think what they want,”  Aung San Suu Kyi explained in response to a reporter’s question about why they made the compromise.

NLD members could take the oath as early as Wednesday.  The oath requires politicians to say they will “safeguard” the military-drafted constitution as they are sworn in. The NLD members opposed it because they want to amend the charter.

The constitution sets aside a quarter of all seats in parliament for the military and allows it to take over government if there is an “emergency.”

Earlier Monday Ban held meetings with President Thein Sein.  Tuesday he is scheduled to meet for the first time with Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.  

Ban last visited Burma in 2009 when the military government was still in power, holding Aung San Suu Kyi under house arrest, and refusing to let her see the U.N. leader.

The democracy leader was released shortly after the controversial 2010 election that brought the nominally civilian government to power.  

The NLD boycotted the 2010 election because their leader was not allowed to run, but participated in April’s by-elections where Aung San Suu Kyi and 42 of her fellow NLD party members won seats.

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UN Chief Encourages Further Easing of Burma Sanctions

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What Makes an Effective International Financial Safety Net?

Financial markets have so far been accommodative of the government’s borrowing plans. The expansion of expenditures stemming from the stimulus packages combined with a decline in revenues due to the economic crisis has led to an increase in the fiscal deficit and, consequently, government debt ratios, which have reached 45 percent of GDP in September. Because Thailand entered the crisis with a relatively strong fiscal position, the cyclical increase in debt levels is not by itself a concern as long as Thailand’s historical fiscal performance is maintained in the future.

Social and political stability

Thailand is a foreigner friendly and welcoming Buddhist country. The country’s form of government is a constitutional monarchy, with a high reverence for the Thai Monarchy, and devotion to the teachings of Buddhism. And although the vast majority of the people in Thailand are Buddhist, all religions are welcome, and His Majesty the King is the patron of all religions.

Thailand’s Growing economy

Economically, this country of 65 million people is characterized by steady growth, strong exports and a vibrant domestic consumer market. Abundant natural resources and a skilled and cost-effective work force help attract foreign investors, and enable them to prosper and develop industry in Thailand.

Sufficient infrastructure

Thailand has good infrastructure with modernized transportation facilities, as well as upgraded communications and IT networks that ensure optimum business and living conditions. State-of-the-art industrial estates boast sophisticated facilities and superior services.

Thailand’s geographical advantage favors transforming Thailand to be the energy hub of the region

The course of Thailand’s electricity industry development has set forth a goal of greater efficiency – both on the supply side and demand side. The aim is to ensure the optimization of energy resources and minimization of environmental impacts, with an ultimate goal of sustainable energy development. On the other hand, the industry has also had to properly adjust to economic and social changes as well as national energy policies and strategies over the past decades.
For some time, the government has encouraged more private participation in the electricity generation business in order to reduce the public investment burden and enhance greater competition in the industry.

In compliance with the national policy, EGAT established and listed the Electricity Generating Public Company Limited (EGCO), the country’s first independent power producer (IPP), in 1992 to mobilize funds from the stock market for its power investment, followed by the privatization of Ratchaburi Electricity Generating Holding Public Company Limited (RATCH), EGAT’s subsidiary founded in 2000.

Ending secretive selection of China’s top leaders doesn’t guarantee peaceful rise NEW HAVEN: The spectacular fall of one of China’s leading politicians, the Chongqing party secretary Bo Xilai, reminds foreign policy watchers about the uncertainty that lurks behind the impressive gates of Zhongnanhai. As we look forward to the next decade, the greatest uncertainty – and the greatest risk – in Sino-US relations is what happens in Chinese domestic politics. Domestic politics drives foreign policy in all political systems. In China, national politicians have to worry not just about winning the next election, but about keeping the Chinese Communist Party in power. Behind the headlines we read every day about China’s rise is a country with a political leadership that is extremely insecure, constantly fretting that it might be reaching the end of its reign. It’s also a country with a dysfunctional policy process dominated by powerful interest groups, many of them within the state itself.

The biggest danger isn’t China’s growing economic or military strength. It’s the internal fragility that could drive it to make threats that leaders can’t back down from for fear of loss of internal support – and the possibility of overexpansion, driven by parochial interest groups that would benefit in the short term. I worry that the nature of the Chinese political system challenges the restrained approach to foreign policy laid down by Deng Xiaoping during the 1980s, making it hard for the country to sustain its peaceful rise. Insecurity has been particularly acute since 1989 Tiananmen crisis. Confronting protracted demonstrations in 130-plus cities, the leadership split over how to handle dissent, and the People’s Liberation Army use of force saved the regime. A serious risk for China’s regime is splits at the top of the Chinese Communist Party. China today isn’t seething with unrest. Despite the impressive number – 180,000 in 2010 by the government’s own count – most demonstrations are local, small in scale. But jittery leaders track demonstrations closely, probably more worried than they need to be. A more serious risk to the regime is splits at the top of the Chinese Communist Party. Leninist authoritarian systems fall from the top down. China is ruled by a collective leadership of the nine members of the Politburo Standing Committee. Since the Tiananmen crisis, the nine have worked hard to maintain a public façade of unity, successfully hiding from public view the competition that inevitably exists at the top.

They hide the contest for power behind a veil of secrecy because they fear that knowledge of divisions at the top might embolden subordinates or citizens to speak out with new demands in exchange for support. Splits at the top can create a “political opportunity structure” that allows people to demonstrate without fear of punishment. If leaders start trying to differentiate themselves, create public personas and mobilize support from the society at large – as Bo Xilai tried to do –that threatens to unravel the regime. Yet the temptation to reach out beyond the inner circle to build a public following always exists. Even Mao Zedong himself did it when he felt that the bureaucracy was blocking his initiatives – that’s what the Cultural Revolution was all about.

The new media environment is making it more difficult to prevent individual leaders from playing to the public. With thousands of commercial media outlets and 500 million Chinese following the news on the internet, it’s just too easy, too tempting to play to the crowd. Prime Minister Wen Jiabao is a media politician, but as a lame duck about to retire next fall, is not too threatening. But when Bo campaigned publicly for the Politburo Standing Committee by staking out a position as a law-and-order populist and neo-Maoist – a desperate move because he was unlikely to get on the Standing Committee otherwise – he threatened everyone else at the top. And they brought him down. Open competition at the top may frighten CCP elite, but doesn’t have to threaten survival of party rule. Open competition at the top feels frightening and destabilizing to the CCP elite, but it doesn’t have to threaten the survival of party rule.

The leaders simply must find a way to manage the competition and prevent it from becoming an all-out war that could destroy the regime. One solution would be to allow open competition for the top posts in an election by the Central Committee, the body of several hundred government, party and military officials that already has the formal power to select CCP leaders.

This is how it sometimes was done in the Soviet Union and is now done in Vietnam: The top vote-getter becomes party secretary, second best becomes premier, and third best becomes president. It would be the next step in the institutionalization of CCP leadership politics. The party almost allowed the Central Committee to hold an open election of the top posts in 2002 when it had to choose the anointed successor for the first time – Hu Jintao had been chosen by Deng Xiaoping. But scared by the possibility of a loss of control, the party took only a baby step in that direction: It held the election as an informal straw poll to gauge appeal of potential leaders and used information from the popularity contest to craft a slate of nominees acceptable to the Central Committee selectors.

The fall of Bo Xilai appears to have encouraged the advocates of economic and political reform to start speaking out in the hopes that their ideas might be taken up at the 18th CCP Congress in the fall. A second burst of reform in China could buoy prospects for Sino-US cooperation. If the economic reformers win, the private sector, which has a strong stake in economic interdependence with the US and the rest of the world, would have a stronger voice, and the state monopolies which use technology standards and policies like indigenous innovation to protect the market for themselves, would be weakened. Steps to strengthen China’s legal system – an important theme of the reformist platform – would encourage Americans to see China as once again “moving in the right direction.” A reform-minded leadership might also exercise greater restraint over the international security and propaganda bureaucracies that have run amok over the past decade in ways that have harmed China’s international reputation and relationships as well as its popularity at home. A China with open institutionalized competition for political power might still be an assertive China. Yet a China with more open institutionalized competition for political power might still be an assertive China.

Tough stands on hot-button issues like Japan, Taiwan, Tibet, Xinjiang and South China Sea play well with a nationalist public and the political elite in the Central Committee. Politicians would take care to protect their nationalist flank as they pursue economic and political reforms that threaten vested interests like state corporations. Nor is there any reason to expect a Politburo Standing Committee selected by an open competition to be more effective at exercising supervision over bureaucracies like the State Oceanographic Administration in over-reaching and provoking fights. Earlier last month the oceanographic administration sent two ships to the Diaoyutai Island, Senkaku in Japanese, provoking a clash with the Japanese coast guard; the agency’s spokesman made a statement that the action was purely to assert Chinese sovereignty over the islands. And if the People’s Liberation Army remains a powerful bloc in the Central Committee and ultimate guarantor of CCP rule, there is no reason to anticipate a cut in defense budgets.  Political succession has always been the Achilles heel of authoritarian systems. Bo is unlikely to be the last Chinese politician to use the media to build a public following.

Trying to keep leadership competition under wraps within a black box is a losing proposition. More open competition for power within the party could open up new possibilities for reform that would have positive spillovers for China’s foreign relations. But it’s no guarantee of a China with the political legitimacy and institutional wherewithal to rise peacefully.  Susan Shirk is Ho Miu Lam Professor and chair of the 21st Century China Program at the School of International Relations and Pacific Studies, University of California, San Diego. She served as US deputy assistant secretary of state with responsibility for China 1997-2000. Her most recent books are China: Fragile Superpower and Changing Media, Changing China.

This article is based on her presentation at the first annual conference of the Johnson Center for the Study of American Diplomacy, held in honor of Henry Kissinger at Yale University in March 2012.

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Power Shift in China – Part III

For a sense of how the China market upends some of the truisms of the luxury car market, take a look at Jaguar’s backloaded new sedan.

The new model — unveiled at the Beijing Auto Show on Monday by Jaguar Land Rover, a unit of India’s Tata Motors — puts an emphasis on the back seat.

Jaguar’s XJ Ultimate, a variant of its XJ line, comes with two iPads embedded in leather-trimmed docks in the backs of the front seat, along with wireless keyboards. The leather-and-wood rear interior also offers an aluminum table between the two seats that lifts to reveal two Champagne flutes, plus a hidden Champagne chiller beside it “to keep the Champagne at the coolest temperature,” said Ian Callum, Jaguar’s director of design.

At the same time, Jaguar is scaling back under the hood. The auto maker unveiled a two-liter, four-cylinder engine as well as a three-liter V6 engine, both at the lower end, “designed with China in mind,” said Bob Grace, Jaguar Land Rover’s China head.

Elsewhere in the world, the luxury auto market is a power game, as auto makers compete to put more powerful engines into high-end vehicles and emphasize the driving and handling experience. But that emphasis doesn’t work as well in China because well-to-do car owners often employ drivers. Analysts criticize other auto makers, such as Ford Motor Co., for being slow to adjust for local tastes.

Jaguar Land Rover has big China ambitions. In recent weeks it struck a deal with China’s Chery Automotive to form a manufacturing joint venture here. That requires government approval, which could be slow in coming.

– Carlos Tejada. Follow him on Twitter @CRTejada

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After keeping its currency tightly linked to the US dollar for years, China in July 2005 revalued its currency by 2 % against the US dollar and moved to an exchange rate system that references a basket of currencies.

One demographic consequence of the “one child” policy is that China is now one of the most rapidly aging countries in the world.

The country’s per capita income was at $6,567 (IMF, 98th) in 2009.

Nevertheless, key bottlenecks continue to constrain growth.

China is the world’s largest producer of rice and is among the principal sources of wheat, corn (maize), tobacco, soybeans, peanuts (groundnuts), and cotton.

The technological level and quality standards of its industry as a whole are still fairly low, notwithstanding a marked change since 2000, spurred in part by foreign investment.

China’s increasing integration with the international economy and its growing efforts to use market forces to govern the domestic allocation of goods have exacerbated this problem.

The growth in both outbound investment from, and inbound investment to, China reflects the nation’s rising economic power and attractiveness as an investment destination.

But “this is just a beginning.

China is aiming to be the world’s largest new energy vehicle market by 2020 with 5 million cars.

China’s challenge in the early 21st century will be to balance its highly centralized political system with an increasingly decentralized economic system.

Since the late 1970s, China has decollectivized agriculture, yielding tremendous gains in production.

In terms of cash crops, China ranks first in cotton and tobacco and is an important producer of oilseeds, silk, tea, ramie, jute, hemp, sugarcane, and sugar beets.

Due to improved technology, the fishing industry has grown considerably since the late 1970s.

Coal is the most abundant mineral (China ranks first in coal production); high-quality, easily mined coal is found throughout the country, but especially in the north and northeast.

China is among the world’s four top producers of antimony, magnesium, tin, tungsten, and zinc, and ranks second (after the United States) in the production of salt, sixth in gold, and eighth in lead ore.

Major industrial products are textiles, chemicals, fertilizers, machinery (especially for agriculture), processed foods, iron and steel, building materials, plastics, toys, and electronics.

Great inland cities include Beijing and the river ports of Nanjing, Chongqing, and Wuhan.

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Auto Show: Got Back? Jaguar Amps Up Rear for China

Burmese democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s political party, set to be seated Monday for the first time in parliament, says it will not attend the swearing in because of a dispute over language in the oath of office.

The Nobel laureate was one of 43 office seekers from her National League for Democracy party elected to parliament in landslide polls April 1.  

Officials confirmed Sunday the NLD contingent will not be present until oath language requiring them to protect a constitution written by the country’s former military junta is changed.  The opposition party wants the word “safeguard” changed to “respect,” but the ruling party of President Thein Sein has so far refused to do so.

Aung San Suu Kyi, speaking Sunday, stopped short of calling her party’s action a boycott.

“We are not boycotting, but we are just waiting for the right time to go. Discussion is still going on.”

Before the April 1 by-elections, Aung San Suu Kyi said one of her priorities as a legislator would be to amend the 2008 constitution, under which a full quarter of the seats in parliament are reserved for unelected members of the military.

The latest dispute cast a shadow over rapidly-thawing ties between Burma, isolated under a half-century of military rule, and the international community, which has pledged to ease long-standing economic sanctions in return for democratic reforms promised by the new, nominally civilian government.

Buoyed by recent overtures from the government, Aung San Suu Kyi has supported European and U.S. moves to begin lifting some sanctions. She has also announced plans for her first trip abroad in 24 years, after spending much of the past two decades under house arrest ordered by the former military government.

Some information for this report was provided by AFP.

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Burmese Democracy Party to Skip Swearing In

North Korea’s third attempt to launch a satellite into orbit has failed. Journalists in North Korea to observe the launch were put in the odd position of monitoring their internet connections and reporting the failure to their hosts. Four hours later, North Korea took the unusual step of broadcasting the failure on state-run television. “The North’s admission marked a surprising reversal of the usual national narrative, which portrays a self-reliant country that thwarts larger imperialist powers with its military and technological might,” reports Chico Harlan for the Washington Post. Analysts in South Korea, Japan and the US scrutinize every aspect of the launch and speculate how the government uses such launches as propaganda tools and cover for ballistic missile technology, how North Koreans could be acquiring more news via Chinese sources, how the announcement signals new transparency, and how the failed launch might weaken new leader, the son of Kim Jong Il. Judging by global assessment, the failed launch was humiliating and the world will watch how the regime and North Koreans react to such humiliation. – YaleGlobal Kim regime can’t keep satellite failure secret with internet, foreign mediaChico HarlanThe Washington Post, 13 April 2012Special correspondent Yoonjung Seo contributed to this report.

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In a First, North Korea Tells Its People About a Failure

Walking through the streets of Hong Kong with its endless rows of jeweler stores packed full of Chinese shoppers, it may seem like the bling business is sparkling.

Chow Tai Fook Jewellery Group Ltd., controlled by Hong Kong billionaire Cheng Yu-tung, made waves through a US$2.8 billion initial public offering last December, educating investors all over the world of the insatiable Chinese appetite for gold.

But after hitting its record high in late January, Chow Tai Fook’s share price has come down by around 21%. Its rival, Luk Fook Holdings (International) Ltd., is down 16% year-to-date.

The stocks have been pummeled by slowing growth in Hong Kong retail sales for the December to February period. In January, retail sales in Hong Kong rose 14.9% year-on-year – which, for an economy heavily reliant by discretionary spending by visitors from across the border, just didn’t quite cut it. As  a comparison, December’s year-on-year increase was 23.5%.

Seasonal factors played a role. Brokerage UOB KayHian said in a note that the proximity of the Lunar New Year this year to Christmas slowed visitor arrivals to Hong Kong. An exceptionally cold January also delayed the traveling plans of some visitors.

But Citigroup sees signs of a recovery in retail sales in March. Figures for the month will be released in the next few days. CIMB believes a slowdown is only natural, after the spectacular run jewelers enjoyed over the past two years, and that there are no grounds to think Chinese people’s appetite for jewelry is abating.

See more on this story at Deal Journal

China has generally implemented reforms in a gradualist or piecemeal fashion.

Economic development has been more rapid in coastal provinces than in the interior, and approximately 200 million rural laborers and their dependents have relocated to urban areas to find work.

The People’s Republic of China is the world’s second largest economy after the United States by both nominal GDP ($5 trillion in 2009) and by purchasing power parity ($8.77 trillion in 2009).

Nevertheless, key bottlenecks continue to constrain growth.

The two sectors have differed in many respects.

A report by UBS in 2009 concluded that China has experienced total factor productivity growth of 4 per cent per year since 1990, one of the fastest improvements in world economic history.

By the early 1990s these subsidies began to be eliminated, in large part due to China’s admission into the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, which carried with it requirements for further economic liberalization and deregulation.

On top of this, foreign direct investment (FDI) this year was set to “surpass $100 billion”, compared to $90 billion last year, ministry officials predicted.

In 2009, global ODI volume reached $1.1 trillion, and China contributed about 5.1 percent of the total.

China is aiming to be the world’s largest new energy vehicle market by 2020 with 5 million cars.

Although China is still a developing country with a relatively low per capita income, it has experienced tremendous economic growth since the late 1970s.

Agriculture is by far the leading occupation, involving over 50% of the population, although extensive rough, high terrain and large arid areas – especially in the west and north – limit cultivation to only about 10% of the land surface.

Except for the oasis farming in Xinjiang and Qinghai, some irrigated areas in Inner Mongolia and Gansu, and sheltered valleys in Tibet, agricultural production is restricted to the east.

Due to improved technology, the fishing industry has grown considerably since the late 1970s.

Oil fields discovered in the 1960s and after made China a net exporter, and by the early 1990s, China was the world’s fifth-ranked oil producer.

Alumina is found in many parts of the country; China is one of world’s largest producers of aluminum.

Coal is the single most important energy source in China; coal-fired thermal electric generators provide over 70% of the country’s electric power.

Most of China’s large cities, like Shanghai, Tianjin, and Guangzhou, are also the country’s main ports.

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Shine Comes Off Chinese Jewelers

In Malaysia, recent opinion polls indicate Prime Minister Najib Razak’s approval rating is rising after a series of political victories.  The prime minister’s political fortunes are fueling speculation he will soon call an early election.

With Najib’s approval rating at an all time high of 69 percent, this week his government formally abandoned the dreaded Internal Security Act (ISA), which allowed for detention without trial. And at a recent summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) he succeeded in winning support for his Global Movement of Moderates to help combat religious extremism and terrorism.

Najib has moved to improve relations with the West, culminating in the current visit to Malaysia by British Prime Minister David Cameron, the first since John Major came here in 1993, and an announcement that both countries plan to double bilateral trade.

Din Merican, an Associate Fellow with the Malaysian Institute for Economic Research cites several reasons for the image boost.  He notes divisions within the opposition camp headed by Anwar Ibrahim, an improved local economy and the effort to replace the restrictive security law as constributors to Malaysia’s improved image abroad. Merican says that has left Prime Minister Najib in a commanding position.

“His main achievements now so far are more on the foreign policy front. It gives Malaysia a new image as a moderate country, there are petty politicians here playing the race and religious issues but overall he is positioning himself and the country as a true moderate,” Merican said. “The effects of his foreign policy initiatives are being felt by David Cameron coming here.”

At home, Najib also won support from the Malaysian Bar Council, which has been at odds with the government over issues dating back to the 1980s and 1990s when the autocratic Mahathir Mohammad was at the nation’s helm.

Bar Council President Lim Chee Wee applauded the scrapping of the security act. But he says legislation written to replace those laws had raised concerns about the rights of those accused of terror-related crimes. He says this is now being addressed and reviewed with Malaysia’s Attorney-General.

“With these sorts of movements, what we’ve seen is civil society at the Malaysian bar we play a role in, making sure the government reacts to improving weaknesses in the system. Certainly in the last few years we’ve had three different chief justices — two of whom have retired — who have restored confidence and in the present chief justice certainly the bar has the full confidence that the judiciary will be independent.”

Also fueling intense media speculation of an early poll was the enthronement on Wednesday of the 84-year-old Sultan Abdul Halim Mu’adzam Shah as Malaysia’s new king in a lavish ceremony.

Malaysia has had an elected monarchy since independence from Britain in 1957. The monarchy, which is essentially a ceremonial position, rotates every five years among the rulers of the nine Malaysian states still headed by royalty.  This is Mr. Shah’s second term on the throne.

Diplomatic sources say the prime minister had wanted to wait until the king had been installed before deciding on whether or not to call an early poll.

However, both Lee and Merican say an early election is not a guarantee. Merican added that the prime minister is in a far more comfortable position than he was three years ago when he ousted his predecessor, Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, from power in a party room coup.

“Yeah, I think there is a lot of speculation over when the election will be held you know. Someone said maybe May, June,” Merican speculated. “This morning someone told me probably October but I think the only thing that’s certain is that by March 2013 he must hold the elections. So I think basically he will call the shots whenever he feels comfortable about it.”

Some members of Najib’s United Malays National Organization party say he must improve the party’s standing if he is to cement his position as an elected Malaysian leader. UMNO lost its cherished two-thirds majority in parliament in 2008. For the moment at least, all the indications are he remains on track to achieve just that.

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Malaysian PM’s Image Boost Could Lead to Early Elections