Myanmar takes "positive step" with ILO on forced labour

Feb 27, 2007, 4:19 GMT

Bangkok/Yangon - In what was hailed as a 'very positive step,' Myanmar's ruling junta has agreed to set up a mechanism with the International Labour Organization (ILO) that will enable victims of forced labour to seek redress, ILO officials said Tuesday.

The agreement between the ILO and Myanmar was reached Monday night in Geneva.

'It's a very positive step as it could allow us to begin addressing in a concrete way this problem,' said Richard Horsey, ILO Liaison Officer in Yangon.

The ILO has been pressuring Myanmar for more than a year to set up a mechanism whereby complaints of forced labour can be made to their office in Yangon without fear of imprisonment and intimidation of the complainants by the authorities, as has happened in the past.

The ILO was to decide at its next session in Geneva starting on March 8 whether to take the issue to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) if Myanmar continued to refuse to agree to the mechanism.

Myanmar's ruling junta at the ILO's last session objected to several clauses in the Understanding on the mechanism but suddenly dropped their opposition Monday night. 'The Understanding provides that alleged victims of forced labour in Myanmar will have full freedom to submit complaints to the ILO Liaison Officer in Yangon,' said an ILO press statement made available in Bangkok.

'The Liaison Officer will then make a confidential preliminary assessment as to whether a case involves forced labour, in order that such cases can be investigated by the Myanmar authorities and appropriate action taken against the perpetrators,' it added.

The mechanism, which will implemented on a trial basis for 12 months, will be unique to Myanmar, which has been criticized for a litany of alleged abuses of human and labour rights over the past two decades.

Under the agreement, Myanmar's regime guarantees that no retaliatory action will be taken against complainants and allows the ILO liason officer to travel within the country to meet complainants about forced labour.

The mechanism, while unlikely to end forced labour in Myanmar, could undermine the sense of 'impunity' local authorities have enjoyed in the past in conscripting villagers for corvee labour or dangerous jobs in war zones for the government, experts said.

The mechanism was proposed by the ILO after several people who had registered complaints about forced labour in Myanmar were imprisoned by the government.

Myanmar has been ruled by the self-styled State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), a military junta, since 1988 when an army crackdown on a nationwide pro-democracy movement left more than 3,000 people dead.

The regime earned itself international condemnation for refusing to hand over power to the National League for Democracy (NLD), led by Nobel peace prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, after it won the 1990 general election by a landslide.