US embassy cable - 05BANGKOK7015

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 BANGKOK 007015 
 
SIPDIS 
 
FOR EAP/MLS, DRL/PHD, DRL/IL 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/09/2015 
TAGS: PHUM, PREF, PGOV, PREL, ELAB, TH, BM 
SUBJECT: EXILED BURMESE LABOR LEADER RETURNS TO THAILAND 
DESPITE APPARENT THREAT 
 
Classified By: Economic Counselor Michael Delaney for Reason 1.4 (b,d) 
 
1. (C) Summary:  In the past week, the Embassy has been 
sorting out an unusual story involving U Maung Maung, the 
exiled Burmese trade union leader, and his return to Thailand 
on November 3 despite an apparent warning by Thai officials 
that he would not be allowed to re-enter the country.  Maung 
Maung, the son of NLD senior official U Nyunt Wei, has been 
labeled a "terrorist" by the Burmese government, which has 
blamed him for a May 7 series of bombings in Rangoon.  He was 
returning to Thailand from the U.S. after a trip to Poland. 
While he was in transit to Tokyo, his colleagues were 
strongly urged by a Thai consular official in Washington to 
dissuade him from returning to Thailand.  While Maung Maung 
extended his stopover in Tokyo to consider his options, his 
colleagues in Thailand were informed by their Thai contacts 
of a threat to Maung Maung's life - presumably originating 
from the Burmese government.  The Thai MFA confirmed to 
Embassy that threat information had been received and that 
Maung Maung would be denied entrance into Thailand despite 
possessing a valid visa.  The MFA would not explain the 
reasoning for this action.  Nonetheless, Maung Maung 
re-entered Thailand on November 3 through Chiang Mai airport, 
apparently assisted by unnamed Thai officials acting without 
the MFA's knowledge.  Maung Maung later told Embassy that he 
intends to remain in Thailand, although he expects the rest 
of the RTG to soon discover his presence here.  End Summary. 
 
 
2. (C) The exiled Burmese opposition leader U Maung Maung 
returned to Thailand from the U.S. on November 3 despite an 
unusual warning from the Thai Embassy in Washington that he 
would be prevented from entering the country.  Maung Maung is 
Secretary General of both the Federation of Trade Unions of 
 
SIPDIS 
Burma (FTUB) and the National Council of the Union of Burma 
(NCUB).  He is also the son of U Nyunt Wei, a senior leader 
and adviser to Aung San Suu Kyi in Burma's opposition 
National League of Democracy (NLD) party.  FTUB officials in 
Bangkok first contacted the U.S. Embassy on October 31, 
saying that Maung Maung was already in transit from the U.S. 
to Bangkok, via Tokyo, when a Thai consular officer warned 
FTUB members in the U.S. that Maung Maung would be denied 
entrance to Thailand despite holding a valid Thai visa in his 
U.S.-issued refugee travel document.  When informed by the 
FTUB that Maung Maung was already en route to Thailand, the 
Thai diplomat requested Maung Maung's flight information, 
which the FTUB refused to provide.  FTUB members in Bangkok 
then asked the U.S. Embassy to assist them in communicating 
with Maung Maung during his stopover in Tokyo to urge him to 
return to the U.S.  Laboff passed the message to Maung Maung 
through United Airlines staff, which managed to reach him due 
to a flight delay which forced him to stay overnight in a 
Tokyo hotel.  Maung Maung then chose to remain in Japan while 
his re-entry to Thailand remained uncertain. 
 
3. (C) On November 1, FTUB members told Laboff that unnamed 
members of Thailand's National Security Council (NSC) warned 
them that the RTG had intercepted communications indicating 
that a person of Burmese origin had been sent to Thailand to 
assassinate Maung Maung.  The FTUB members described their 
sources as long-time NSC members sympathetic to the Burmese 
opposition.  The NSC members provided the FTUB with the name 
and general location (the Chiang Mai area) of the Burmese 
person they were seeking.  The FTUB noted that Maung Maung 
has received similar threats in the past, but never with such 
specific details.  They also noted that the RTG government 
had, to this point, allowed Maung Maung to operate freely in 
Thailand since his expulsion from Burma in 1989, and had 
never before tried to prevent his return to Thailand during 
his periodic travels abroad.  (Maung Maung's travel in this 
instance was to visit Poland in August to attend the 25th 
anniversary of the Solidarity movement.  He then traveled to 
the U.S. for a multi-week stay, and to renew his Thai visa, 
before his planned return to Thailand.) 
 
4. (C) After receiving this information from the FTUB, 
Emboffs verified that Maung Maung had a U.S.-issued refugee 
travel document which would allow him to return to the U.S. 
if he were prevented from entering Thailand.  Laboff also 
contacted Thai MFA officials to determine Maung Maung's visa 
status and to inquire about any RTG intentions to prohibit 
his return.  The MFA's North America Division political desk 
officer did not immediately know of any effort to refuse 
entry to Maung Maung, but advised that Burmese Prime Minister 
Soe Win was then in Thailand attending a regional economic 
forum.  The desk officer surmised that Maung Maung may have 
been prohibited from returning to Thailand during PM Soe 
Win's visit, and pledged to seek a fuller explanation for the 
Embassy. 
 
5. (C) On November 4, the MFA desk officer called Laboff to 
report that Maung Maung indeed had been informally warned by 
Thai consular officials not to return to Thailand, although 
his visa technically remained valid.  When asked for the 
reason behind the warning, the desk officer said it involved 
intelligence information related to a threat to Maung Maung's 
safety.  The desk officer said he could not provide further 
details, but noted that it was well known that the Burmese 
government on August 28 had publicly named Maung Maung as the 
"mastermind" of the deadly series of bombings in Rangoon on 
May 7.  The desk officer said he also knew that the FTUB had 
various "friends" in the RTG that had already warned them of 
a threat to Maung Maung's life.  Asked if Maung Maung would 
be allowed into the country if he arrived at Bangkok's 
airport with a valid visa, the desk officer replied, "No, he 
will be detained."  He said he could not answer further 
questions about the reasons for, or duration of, such a 
detention.  He declined to speak further on the issue. 
 
6. (C) Shortly thereafter, Laboff received a call from the 
FTUB advising that Maung Maung had already arrived in 
Thailand and wanted to meet to discuss his situation.  In a 
meeting arranged in a hotel close to the Embassy, Maung Maung 
appeared with a colleague from the FTUB and an American 
advisor, John Osolink, Jr.  (Osolink previously headed the 
Bangkok office of the Asian American Free Labor Institute, 
now known as the AFL-CIO Solidarity Center.  Osolink has been 
accused in the official Myanmar press of promoting Maung 
Maung's rise as a labor leader with FTUB.)  Maung Maung told 
Laboff that he had arrived in Thailand earlier that day with 
assistance from "friendly" NSC officials, who arranged for 
him to fly from Tokyo to Chiang Mai instead of Bangkok, later 
transporting him to Bangkok on a domestic flight.  Maung 
Maung said he intended to remain in Bangkok for a few days 
before traveling to Mae Sot, Tak province, along the Burmese 
border.  Maung Maung said the NSC officials had no further 
information on the alleged threat to his life.  He said he 
expected the rest of the government, including the MFA, to 
eventually learn of his presence in Thailand through flight 
records, but that his NSC contacts were confident he would 
not be detained now that his legal arrival was a 'fait 
accompli'.  He requested that his presence in Thailand be 
kept quiet for now, however, "to avoid angering the Thai 
authorities."  He added that the NSC officials were seeking 
to learn how the Thai Embassy in Washington had been 
instructed to warn against his travel.  They had already 
determined that there was no official directive in the MFA's 
cable traffic, and that Maung Maung had not been added to any 
immigration watch list. 
 
7. (C) Comment:  We were initially skeptical of the 
sensational aspects of the FTUB account, but the MFA's 
confirmation of key points - namely, the alleged threat and 
efforts to bar Maung Maung's entry - gave us pause.  The 
Burmese government has indeed ratcheted up its rhetoric on 
Maung Maung since the Rangoon bomb blasts in May.  Two 
American labor consultants, who consecutively succeeded 
Osolink as head of the AFL-CIO Solidarity Center in Bangkok, 
lend credence to the FTUB's information.  One is a former 
Congressional HIRC staffer who has lived in Thailand and 
known Maung Maung for eight years.  "We know Maung Maung has 
excellent access to members of the NSC," he said.  "Those 
members," he added, "are trying to counter others, led by 
Deputy Prime Minister Chavalit, who are closer to the Burmese 
government, and it is not surprising that one faction doesn't 
know what the other is doing - the MFA being the last to find 
out." 
BOYCE