Operators are being urged to boycott next year’s
Association of Southeast Asian Nations’ Tourism Forum if
current plans to hold it in Burma go ahead.
Burma Campaign UK spokesman Mark Farmaner said the
country’s poor human rights record should be taken into
account before the country is automatically given the
association’s chair and the chance to host the ensuing
conference in January.
Instead he called on ASEAN members to break the rules and award
the chair to Burma’s
successor, the Philippines, while urging operators to boycott
any attempt to hold the 2006 forum in the country’s capital,
Yangon.
Farmaner said: “We would ask people to think very carefully
before committing to going as it will support the country.
“If people go out there they will find it is run by a military
dictatorship that kills and rapes its own people.”
He added under the current regime 50% of the country’s
budget is spent on the military while health and education spending
has been slashed. It is also believed poison gas has been used
against certain tribes.
Somak head of product Rob Haynes said despite the forum’s
usefulness for the operator and having attended it this year, he
would not go to Burma.
He said: “It is a vital conference in terms of planning our
programme but you must look at your conscience and decide there are
certain places you don’t want to go.”
An ASEAN spokesman was unavailable for comment.
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