The Thai-Burmese border opens again today after a five-month closure that seems to have produced most of the results sought by the generals in Rangoon.
Border traders, angered by the loss of business and the need to find new routes, heaped more and more pressure on the government as the months passed by. Damrong Kachornmasbut, of the provincial chamber of commerce in Ranong, told this newspaper at the weekend that border traders had been losing about 10 million baht a day.Consumers had to pay more because traders slapped on extra charges for having to work harder for their money.
The government worked overtime to persuade the generals in Rangoon to change their minds over the closure. The army chief who refused to comply with the government's accommodation of Burma lost his job, and the foreign minister used every possible occasion since May to raise the border issue with his Burmese counterpart.
The junta shut down trade routes opposite Chiang Rai, Tak and Ranong on May 20 to protest against Thailand's allegedly secret support of ethnic rebels resisting Rangoon's rule from border areas. The closure followed one of the most tense stand-offs between Thai and Burmese forces on the ground in recent years.The three checkpoints are opportunity gates for Thai traders and lifelines for Burmese consumers. The one in Tak's Mae Sot district is probably the biggest conduit in both respects, enabling staple foods to make their way to Burmese living near the border, and on the overland route to Rangoon.Trading activities at checkpoints have figured prominently in the conduct of Thai-Burmese relations for decades.
But while the past Democrat-led government was a participant in this exchange, by closing the door on Rangoon and reopening it when politically expedient, the present Thai Rak Thai-led administration has not. Over the past five months, Thailand has kept the door open at all three checkpoints, observers said.Moreover, two other events have struck a chord with impartial observers and critics, although the government has tried hard to delink them from its bid to change Rangoon's mind.
One was the transfer of Gen Surayud Chulanont, a staunch critic of Rangoon, from the vitally important position of army commander to the less powerful position of supreme commander of the armed forces.The other was the marching orders given to some 14 Burmese dissident students and political activists operating from the western border district of Sangkhla Buri in Kanchanaburi to cross back into Burma.
Security watchers and human rights advocates are convinced the two events, in part because of their timing, were linked to the government's bid to bring an end to the border closure.
The reshuffle of the top brass results in a more Rangoon-friendly army. Gen Somdhat Attanand, the new army chief, has promised to follow the government line closely. Unlike Gen Surayud, he has no direct field experience close to Burma.Gen Somdhat also has let it be known that the army would not allow Burmese ethnic groups to disrupt ties with Rangoon.
``We may not see soldiers round up dissident armed groups from Burma but we can expect them to closely monitor and probably restrict their movements,'' a military watcher said.``The army with Gen Somdhat at the helm has a softer policy towards Burma and will listen to government direction.''
Time and again, Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and his ministers have tried to convince the public that the government does not consider the reopening of the border as the only means to improving ties between the two countries.But, as most observers have seen, the reality on the ground is totally different. The government has been under pressure from border traders, and diplomacy specialists.
In a bid to remedy the situation, Foreign Minister Surakiart Sathirathai held four rounds of talks on the issue with his Burmese counterpart, Win Aung, over four months.The ministers first met in Brunei in late July on the sidelines of the annual meeting of foreign ministers of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, before holding follow-up discussions in Rangoon a week later. The pair met again in Johannesburg in September while attending a United Nations conference on the environment, and in Bangkok three weeks ago, when Win Aung visited the country officially and was given the privileged treatment accorded to Foreign Ministry guests.These meetings however brought no clear answer from Rangoon on its timetable for reopening the border.
It took a visit to Rangoon last Tuesday by Tej Bunnag, the permanent secretary for foreign affairs, for the Burmese government to come out with a date for the reopening.That this level of meeting was chosen for the delivery of such an important message is significant. Was it a bid to save the faces of the higher-ups should the border be closed again? Or are observers to understand that there is more goodwill, and less politics of interest, between Thailand and Burma at the sub- ministerial level?
Whatever the case, the fact that the date was announced in Rangoon underlines the junta's determination to have the last word in a long, drawn-out battle. The generals probably wanted to insist that they were justified in closing the border in the first place.
While Thailand would dispute any such claim, there has been no satisfactory explanation as to why Thai reporters selected for the trip to Rangoon last Tuesday were prevented from boarding the plane at the last minute.But that is history. Since the trip, the government has again been talking about long-term cooperation with Burma, with drug-busting high on the agenda, followed by the investigation into the killing of school children in Ratchaburi, and the repatriation of Burmese working illegally in Thailand. Suspects in the Ratchaburi killing are believed to be at large across the border in Burma.
Even in the expected honeymoon period following the reopening of the border, efforts to settle these sticky issues will test bilateral relations and the skill of the present government in handling the leadership in Burma.