The Burma Campaign UK
is calling for a boycott of all Lonely Planet (LP) publications until
Lonely Planet withdraws its Burma guide from the market.
The Burma Campaign say that the development of
hotels, transport and tourist attractions to encourage visitors to Burma
is directly linked to mass human rights abuses. There are well-documented
mass human rights abuses directly linked to the development of tourist
infrastructure and the tourism industry. The United Nation's International
Labour Organisation reports that “the military treat the civilian
population as an unlimited pool of unpaid forced labourers and servants
at their disposal. The practice of forced labour is to encourage private
investment in infrastructure development, public sector works and tourism
projects.”
Independent tourists are required to exchange $200 when entering the
country, while many hotels, domestic airlines and other 'dollar only'
retail outlets are fully or jointly owned by the regime or its associates
– so local people see none of this money. Tourism currently benefits
only a tiny percentage of Burma's 48 million people. Eighty per cent
live in rural areas and do not in the main benefit from current forms
of tourism.
Millions of men, women and children are forced to labour, under the
harshest conditions, on infrastructure projects across Burma each year.
Many thousands more have been forced from their homes to make way for
tourism developments or as part of so-called 'beautification'
projects.
Added to this, tourist dollars go straight into the hands of the dictatorship.
For these reasons Aung San Suu Kyi, the British Government and the European
Union have asked tourists not to visit Burma. Against the weight of this
advice, Lonely Planet publications continue to promote tourism to Burma
through their Burma guide.
Rough Guides has already adopted an ethical stance with regard to Burma.
They say: “There are occasional instances where any benefits (from
tourism) are overshadowed by the nature of the social and political climate.
Apartheid South Africa was an example. Burma, with its brutal
dictatorship, state control of the economy and forced labour used to build
its tourist infrastructure, is another. As long as the military regime
remains in power and Aung San Suu Kyi – leader of the democratically elected
National League for Democracy – requests that tourists do not visit, Rough
Guides will not publish a guide to the country.”
What do you think? Do you have a view? Write in and let and tell the
Beetle.
