Transcript: Episode #292: A Sanctioned Resistance
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Host 0:17
If this is your first time listening to our podcast, welcome our programming brings a diversity of voices connected to Myanmar to share their perspectives, thoughts and reflections about what has been happening there since the military coup in 2021 all of our guests share one thing in common, a deep personal stake in the ongoing crisis, and it is an honor for us to be able to bring their voices into your earbuds. But however difficult it may be to hear some of their stories, we hope that you will come away with a deeper and more nuanced understanding of what is happening there.
Brad 1:02
You I and welcome back. My guest today is Enrique Visser from the century, and we are going to be taking a look at sanctions from a slightly different perspective, in a more sort of abstract framework sense, but also in examining the mechanisms behind sanctions, the ways in which sanctions can and cannot be successful, and the ways in which sanctions can be and are being skirted by various organizations, with regard to Myanmar. But before we get into all of that, Enrico, thank you very much for for joining us, and I'd like to give you the opportunity to introduce yourself and explain a little bit more about the century and what you do.
Anrike Visser 2:41
Thanks for having me. So I'm Enrique fisser, and I'm a Senior Policy Advisor at the century and I lead all our engagement with both European governments and international financial institutions like the IMF and the World Bank. So the century has a long history of investigating violent kleptocracies, as we call them, mainly in Africa. And more recently, we opened a program in Myanmar together with justice for Myanmar before the organization, though I lived in the country, starting in 2017 until a few months after the coup. And my background is in financial regulation for the Netherlands government, so I work a lot on economic statecraft and geo economics, including sanctions.
Brad 3:33
Okay? And that's so that's a really interesting thing. So just before we we look at the Myanmar situation, can you explain a little bit about what economic statecraft is. Because when we think of statecraft, we kind of think in the in the more typical concept of, you know, politicians passing legislation. We think of diplomats, we think of all these very stereotypical elements. But how does does economic policy really sort of fit into that?
Anrike Visser 4:01
Yeah, that's a very good question, I think. Over the last couple of years, especially since the full invasion, invasion of Ukraine, economic statecraft has gotten a lot more intention and a lot more importance. And there's a wide range of of tools available, of which sanctions is just one, and we have restrictive measures, but also inducements and positive kind of trade opportunities that are available if a country does comply with some of the policy goals. But I think especially in active conflicts, also like like Myanmar or recent coup d'etat, it's really become a tool that is used a lot more often now, since the last couple of years.
Brad 4:49
Interesting. And so I want to know whether or how effective you think these, these things have been, because there is a sort of. Uh, escalation of, I don't know what we would call that escalation of of inter country relations, where on the very bottom level, you know, countries can have statements back and forth. They can establish an embassy. They can have effectively meaningless ceremonial back and forth, whether positive or negative. And then we slowly start escalating that, and we start looking at things like, well, we'll have a free trade agreement, we'll have open migration policies, we'll have aid programs, we'll have, you know, student exchange programs and and, you know, massive sort of cross investment. And then, of course, at the very far end of of the escalation, you have military intervention, rights, blockades and embargoes, and, you know, worst comes to worst, actual sort of military invasion on the ground. So there is a sort of scale, and I want to sort of understand that economic range, which sort of sits in the middle. It's it's whether it's positive or whether it's negative. It's not quite so forceful as boots on the ground. We are going to forcefully enact our will because we are powerful enough to do that. But it's much more impactful than just sending letters back and forth and making speeches and either praising each other on paper or criticizing each other on paper, but not doing anything that actually affects the actions of a foreign state. So within that scope, that sort of middle ground where economic policy comes into it, how effective do you think that that has been in achieving positive outcomes? And I think the Netherlands, that obviously you're coming from the Netherlands. I think the Netherlands, you know, has a relatively good reputation internationally, is trying to achieve positive outcomes in the countries that the Netherlands interacts with. How effective do you think the judicious application of these economic policies has been in getting those outcomes?
Anrike Visser 6:55
Yeah, well, I think the Netherlands by itself, won't be very impactful. You know, we're very small country. We only have 18 million people, even though we are a major trading hub and shipping port for the European continent. But I think combining it and working together with European member states, with the US, Canada, Australia, UK, we often, or they often, try, to impose sanctions simultaneously, which they don't often or not always succeed in. But I think when teaming up with an international coalition of like minded people trying to support or promote human rights, that becomes relatively effectively. I would say there's a lot of improvements to be had to make sure they are really impactful, and we can talk about some of those steps later on, but I just want to stay a little bit with the escalatory framework that you mentioned. And I think you're right in the sense that sanctions, or economic statecraft in general, is not a tool in its own and it's always combined with diplomacy and with with AIDS and other types of involvements. But I think in a situation like Myanmar, where the junta depends on arms and funding coming from abroad. It is an important measure to try to stop the abilities of of a bad actor to be able to conduct these atrocities. I think just statements or diplomacy alone is not effective enough, and governments really should try to be more forceful, maybe when some of the other options, like military interventions are not available or not willing by the by the local populations.
Brad 8:54
And it sort of feels like there are two main directions that these things can go in, whether it's the diplomacy level, whether it's the economic level, it feels like you're either pushing someone away or you're pulling them close. I don't know whether the two can be done, sort of in concert, but it seems like there are some states where we say, hey, this state is not acting in a way that we think is appropriate, but what we want to do is try to pull them closer. We want to try and incentivize them positively and say, Look, we will let you sit at the table. We will give you these opportunities if you play nice. And then there are other states. North Korea comes to mind, where the prevalent attitude is to say, No, isolate them because they are not going to play nice. Although North Korea does continue to be a recipient of international aid. So do you feel then that because in your response, you seem to lean towards talking about sanctions as a necessary tool, but do you think that that contrary position, that that gifting, if you will, of investment of. Economic opportunities, of foreign aid, of things like this, trying to coax someone closer to the international family. Do you think that that approach can also be successful, a in general, and B, in cases where we're talking about a military dictatorship?
Anrike Visser 10:17
Yeah, the best sanctions or economic statecraft strategies always communicate clearly both sides of the coin, so we have both. These are some of the behaviors that we would like you to stop, and sanctions should be imposed as a behavioral tool, and they should communicate clearly what the goal is and when, when it is achieved and when a sanction can be lifted. So just in a sanction itself already has this inducement at the end that if you stop this bad behavior, we will just lift it. Often, this is not communicated clearly, though, and I think there's a lot of misunderstanding of this, but then also at the same time, yeah, for example, in Myanmar, not everything is stopped, right? There are still some engagement. There are still some Western companies, unlike in Russia, where we've been a lot more forceful, even though there's still some left, or North Korea, as you mentioned, but it's really this. I think the best one is where you have both. But at some point when the atrocities become so bad, when you've tried to incentivize good behavior for a long time and it has failed, like in the case with Myanmar, I think the open period from 2016 to 2021 was clearly an incentivizing period, even though there were ethnic cleansing and genocide going on and already horrible behavior, there was More. There were a few sanctions, but there were more incentivizing measures, trying to be patient, trying to coax them, trying to show economic benefits, both for the country and, of course, everybody in it, including for military companies. But I think that strategy completely failed in the Myanmar case, and then I think it is the time to be more forceful and to make sure that any of the funding or money that goes into the country cannot be misused to conduct these atrocities.
Brad 12:34
Because, of course, I presume that when we're when we're trying to do positive engagement, we're trying to incentivize people that would be dependent upon you having faith that the person on the other end is actually being genuine, is actually being transparent, is actually truly committed to the specific goals and the specific outcomes that you're trying to incentivize. And presumably, then when we're looking at the junta, because we know from their track record of behavior how little they care about international agreements, how little they care about domestic agreements, how little they care about the agreements that they made with ethnic armed organizations, and the Constitution that they themselves wrote that puts them in a situation where, I'm guessing you would not be willing to take a risk and say, Well, we're going to give you a certain amount of patronage in hopes that this is going to positively incentivize you to change your behavior. And I assume it'd be very difficult to talk to any financial institution and convince them to take that kind of a risk.
Anrike Visser 13:39
Yeah, there's a little bit of a nuance here, and it's a very interesting example that you mentioned. So even with positive inducements or positive gifts, as you called them, before, which I really liked, you can always impose conditions or milestones to be succeeded at some point and make future funding dependent on reaching those milestones. For example, this is what loans from the International Monetary Fund often have. They come with an anti corruption framework or government improvements and but I think they should be enforced more forcefully, and when we see that some of these conditions are promised to be fulfilled and they keep being postponed, we have to put our foot down and say, Okay, no more, especially when you don't have transparency and you don't know where the funding ends up. So there's a little bit of faith at the start, but then it's also about show me really what you do with the money, and show me that you are investing and building schools and doing the right things, and that the economy is growing and then we can expand. But yeah, there should always be also these conditionalities in post when, when doing inducements.
Brad 14:59
Okay, I find it interesting that you're using the term inducement and I assume that that is a term of art that is used within the in the industry. But to me, inducementism is just a polite word for a bribe. That's usually how I've heard that word. So terminology is fun, but anyway.
Anrike Visser 15:23
It's a term I didn't come up with it. I wish I could take credit for it, but yeah, that's the term you have to move.
Brad 15:32
Yeah, the terminology that we come across, I remember having a conversation with someone who was, he was using the word modalities, who's like, oh, we can. We can move money, and we can, we can, you know, utilize this modality to get the money from A to B. And I'm like, I don't know what you like, do you mean PayPal as a modality, or, like, Western use? Like, no. And so after about five minutes, he said, Okay, we're laundering money. That's basically what we're doing. This is just a polite word that people in the industry use to say we're moving money to a place it should not go. So, oh, can just say that. So terminology is it's something that I always find very fascinating, how different communities have built up their own little vocabularies. But anyway, so looking then at at the sanctions, right, looking at what, what we're doing. As far as Myanmar is concerned, this comes back to something that you touched on earlier. So you said that you the Netherlands alone is not in a position to really be impactful, right? Obviously, you know, the Netherlands is not insignificant economically, especially in an international context. As you mentioned, that the trade that goes through the Netherlands is quite, quite significant, but the Netherlands alone is not enough to make that impact. So you seek to create a sort of a unified front with a bunch of other countries who are ideologically aligned, who will agree to match sanctions. The problem is, then, does that actually work? If you get together, say, you know, 2030 countries, that's fine. There are 193 UN member states. Last time I counted, even if you have 20 countries, even if you have 50 countries, is that going to necessarily be sufficient to enact a regime of sanctions that is going to be impactful? Or have you just left too many gaps open internationally for those sanctions to truly have an effect?
Anrike Visser 17:30
I think it depends on the sector. And this is another point that I think a strategy, sanction strategy, should really have this kind of awareness. What you mentioned like, what are the right sectors? Where can we have the right impact? For example, when it comes to arms, there are certain high level, sophisticated arms that the US produces that, for example, China has less access to, or Russian is less adept at creating those so when it comes to arms, that's a sector that's really impactful. But another example is just the the buying power that the US and the European Union have. I think the majority of teak and timber is being sold and ends up in in these markets as like a lot of gold and gems other sectors, like Jade, as you know, of course, doesn't go to the West as much, so it really depends on the on the sector. But I do think we shouldn't underestimate the impact that sanctions can have. And there's some statistics that indicates that at least some abilities of the junta over these last three years have been reduced, which is, it doesn't help the people of Myanmar, per se, in that we end the dictatorship right away, but I would already be happy if they have less Access to arms and less funding and make these atrocities more difficult for them to continue doing.
Brad 19:07
And so another question, then also comes up, because you talk about sectors, it sanctions seem to be very much based on trade. What happens when you have a state that is not particularly dependent on foreign imports, where, if you have a state that is, I don't know, just to bring up a an anachronistic hypothetical. If we look at, you know, Japan the way it existed prior to the Americans forcefully opening Japan up to trade with incredibly limited contact with the outside world and incredibly limited importation of goods. If you have a relatively isolationist regime, do sanctions have any ability to work?
Anrike Visser 19:51
Yeah. The funny thing is that even if a country is is isolated, the elite and the junta and the bad act. Shares often try to put their assets in safety in foreign jurisdictions. So it's very common for for a regime to to have bank accounts in Thailand, in Singapore, or send their children to school in the West, or go on shopping trips in Dubai, and they want to be able to have a yacht, and so it definitely hurts them, and even more importantly, perhaps also the cronies or organized crime that is kind of part of the network and that supports them and keeps them in power. They also need to be able to access bank accounts abroad or for licit or illicit activities, in that sense, if we think about drug trade, for example. So they're often like a junta cannot survive without any access to foreign bank accounts or any assets, and they don't want to, and they complain when some of these things are cut off to them.
Brad 21:05
But it it sort of raises this issue, because I take that point, and I think that's very fair, and I think with Myanmar specifically, we did see this quite clearly. I think one of the daughters of one of the high ranking generals was, was the next pick to to be a high ranking sort of official within UNESCO. And that opportunity was taken away. A lot of very prestigious universities internationally started rejecting the children of of high level generals and things. And that's well and good, but we still see the children of high level North Korean officials going to schools in Switzerland, right? We still see that they're able to do this. They're able to go internationally, despite the fact that that North Korea is probably one of the most heavily sanctioned countries in the world, the elites do seem to have a particular skill at getting what they want to get and still being able to get a get around it by issuing, you know, fake documents, you know, changing the identities of their children and and sort of finding back roads, and probably also through bribery. So if we're relying on the high level elite and their families and their comfort and their convenience and their ability to travel freely, are we actually able to do that? Are we able to actually restrict that? Because previously, you were talking about things like restricting the military's access to guns and ammunition and things of this kind, and that's excellent, and we need to do that. But if we're targeting the comfort and convenience of the cronies of the generals and of their families, is it actually likely that we can achieve that, or are they going to be able to continue skirting those sanctions the way that it appears that high level authorities in these countries often do.
Anrike Visser 23:06
Well, I think I'm not familiar with the North Korean children, and if they are sanctioned, necessarily, if they are in Europe or and in Switzerland, which, which is not part of the EU, but independently and often follows EU sanctions. They shouldn't be allowed to go to school there if they pay in euros, or if they sanction by the US and they pay in dollars. So indeed, if it's a case, as you mentioned, where they have fake documents, where they evade sanctions that are imposed to them, or there is willful blindness on the case of the university or the school, and both instances definitely happen, right? So I think this is where the point of enforcement really comes up. We have seen many cases where the West does enable some form of illicit activity or sanction circumvention, and a problem that we focus on a lot is also making sure there are sufficient and severe and swift consequences for those enablers in the West, because this shouldn't be allowed. And actually, in the case of of Myanmar, there's a there's an example of an Austrian arms manufacturer. And already, before the coup, they continue to supply unmanned vehicles to the to the junta, to the Navy, even though the EU had an arms embargo in place. And then after the coup, we saw they continued shipping parts. So that is an example, and we've raised this issue with the European Union and with the Austrian government as well, where it was already a violation for years, Myanmar now published that even though these were dual use. These products. So in theory, they could have been used for civilian reasons, but they ended up with the Navy, which, of course, was engaged in horrible activities in in Rakhine, and could, in theory, use those, those drones, for that. So that's an example where, if there's no enforcement, if there's no consequences, then it's just a paper tiger and and they continue to have access to to the west, even though they shouldn't.
Brad 25:33
It's interesting. And I think going back to to a comment that you made there, that you were you were making that distinction whether North Korea is sanctioned and whether those children are sanctioned. So I think, I think that's a really important point for us to focus on. I think this is a good time to pose the question, essentially, what is a sanction? Because when we think of sanctions in the in the conventional sense, a lot of people have this understanding that a sanction means that a certain country as a whole has been declared non grata, and we do not as a country, and we bind all of other companies and all of the citizens within our country to not engage with this target country or with any people From that target country, or with any products and companies from that target country, in a very clear sense. And I think in the American sphere, you know, there's this idea that, you know, Cuban cigars are illegal in the United States. I believe they no longer are, but for a period they were. And I think that that gives us this impression that when we say we're sanctioning a foreign country, that means that any product, any good that originates in that country, is intrinsically off limits, even if it's something as insignificant as just a cigar, it's like, well, no, it's Cuban, and therefore you can't have it. But how do sanctions actually work?
Anrike Visser 26:57
Yeah, this is how sanctions, what you described, were imposed in the past, we called them comprehensive sanctions, where indeed they could target an entire country, and in that sense, we find that they are less effective and they harm the civilian population a lot. So current sanctions are targeted network sanctions specifically where we go for specific companies and individuals active in certain human rights abuses or undermining democracy, and we target those specifically and try to prevent civilian harm. And I know in the Myanmar case. The Myanmar people are very brave. For example, there are some sectors where associations or unions have called for sanctions, like the garment sector, but in our assessment, the tax and revenue going to the junta was very small, while they employ 10s of 1000s of women and girls. So in that sense, we decided not to advocate for sanctions on on those sectors, because it becomes really difficult for people to rise up against the junta if they are fighting for their own survival. So that's why sanctions are now differently. And you ask me, what do they mean specifically? So when we target an individual, they are prohibited from traveling, let's say to the European Union, and their assets in the European Union or in Euro are frozen. They don't have access to it anymore, and maybe for the Myanmar case, Euro is not that important, but if we talk about USD, that is still very important for the Myanmar economy. So lots of people have USD bank accounts, and that's a very strong impact if those assets are frozen. And the same goes for sanctions on companies. Trade with those companies is prohibited.
Brad 29:06
I just want to clarify something here. So you you said the European Union can freeze the Euro assets, that that's the very as a sentence that strikes me very strangely so if I open a bank account in Luxembourg and I store euros in that bank account and I store US dollars in a different bank account that's also opened in Luxembourg, are you saying that the European Union has the ability to freeze the bank account that contains euros but does not have the ability to freeze the other bank account?
Anrike Visser 29:39
Yes, but the US can submit and they will freeze the USD bank account as well. And often yes and often, banks have also in their own policy that they will will stop trade or transactions with a USD or your bank account if they if it involves. Sanctions individuals or sanctioned entities to prevent also any negative blowback on them if they continue to do trade with with these people.
Brad 30:09
It's still just hang this is really this is messing with my head. So if I have a stack of US dollars, and I walk into a Dutch bank, I open a bank account, I give them my stack of US dollars. They put that electronically into my bank account, and I walked back into that bank branch later, and I tried to withdraw that the US government could have put pressure on a bank that was never involved in any international transaction with USD. They just converted my USD cash into electronic data on my bank account and then converted it back into it back into cash. But because we're dealing with a currency that is owned by the US, they can put pressure on a bank outside of their jurisdiction that has never sent money electronic, or that never sent my money electronically through New York to freeze that asset.
Anrike Visser 31:00
I even want to go one step further at the moment, you walk into the bank branch with a stack of US dollars, they should assess whether they want to allow you access to their bank accounts, and they have to conduct an assessment if you are not a sanctioned individual, you have to provide your copy of a passport, and they will do customer due diligence, as they call it, and they will verify if you're not a sanctioned individual, if you're not on any terrorist watch list, before they will admit the US dollars into into their account.
Brad 31:40
But presumably, there's no situation where I would walk in, I would put us dollars on the paper, on the table, and say I would like to deposit this. They do due diligence. They say, Hey, you're sanctioned by the US. We're not going to accept this. And then I take away my US dollars, I put euro on the table, and they say, Well, you're not sanctioned in the EU, so that's fine. We'll let you open a bank account. I presume that that would never occur.
Anrike Visser 32:02
In theory, they could, well, if they are not sanctioned by the European Union, they do have access to the European markets, and that's why we often see a problem with a person being sanctioned, or a company being sanctioned by the US, but not by the EU. And then, in theory, they could indeed use the euro currency the European market, set up companies in the European Union and continue to do business, just making sure that they don't touch any dollars or any any US companies. And in theory, I understand why it's often difficult for governments to impose sanctions simultaneously. But if you look at the number of sanctions across jurisdictions. For example, the US and Canada have imposed more than 200 sanctions. The EU about half of that, and the UK only about a third. Then it really becomes less effective and less strong of a measure. Still, some banks have in their own private policies. They are private companies. They can set their own risk appetite. They call it, if you want to use another term and terminology that they don't allow this because of this kind of risk, but in theory, legally, they they could.
Brad 33:28
Yes, I mean, that's that's just incredible. And so then, so does that mean that if we all get together and we all lay sanctions, if we do not get the United States to sign on to those sanctions, we are in a very difficult position, like, effectively, if, if I want to use European banking, and all of the European Union has sanctioned me, but I want to go to the European Union, I say, look, I only want to process my assets in US dollars. I could effectively operate and use EU infrastructure, and as long as the United States does not sign on to those sanctions, as long as they do not join the regime, I my financials are pretty safe, as long as I stick to using US dollars. Is that? Is that a viable strategy?
Anrike Visser 34:26
No, you would have to go to a US Bank.
Brad 34:29
Okay, so EU would still stop it. Okay, yes. Okay, yeah, cool.
Anrike Visser 34:33
European company is prohibited of doing interactions. But if they go to a US Bank, and they have US dollars, and in they're only sanctioned by the EU, in theory, they could continue to do business again. Many banks have a policy that they don't do any business. They just don't want the risk, and they often know that it might take a few months and then the others will will follow. But in. Theories that's that's possible. It's interesting that you mentioned, if the US doesn't impose sanctions, there are some countries that have a lot more trade with the European Union, or are former colonies, or have a lot of migrants and families, a lot of aid relationships going back and forth. So sometimes the EU is the the jurisdiction that has more power, even though the US dollar is, of course, the international currency still, still being used. But it depends on the on the country that we're talking about.
Brad 35:36
And it's very interesting. And so, so let's then focus on Asia. So traditionally, in the European sphere, and this is, this is significantly less so the case today. But if we go back a couple of decades, of course, famously, the Swiss banks were the ones that you went to if you wanted to operate sort of under the radar, as it were. But in in the Asian sphere, it seems that traditionally, the the junta have been using Singaporean banks, and that even immediately after the coup, there were a lot of calls for Singapore to start restricting the assets of the military leadership, and also for Singapore to not, you know, put investments into into Myanmar, which obviously would be funneled directly to the military and their cronies. So what is the current situation with Singapore banks, vis a vis, you know, sanctioned individuals and the military?
Anrike Visser 36:33
Yeah, at least for military procurement. We know this, this push on the Singaporean government has been effective for some sense. The UN Special Rapporteur on Myanmar just released a report on the use of regional banks and found that it decreased by a lot, I think, around 90% the use of Singaporean banks. We did see, though, that a lot of those transactions were rerouted now to use Thai banks. So even overall, the entire ability to buy arms reduced by 30% because it does take the junta time to set up new corporations, to find new proxies. Maybe the risks are higher. People are less inclined because of the attention. The costs are being raised by proxies to operate. So they lost about 30% but a lot of the rest now went via Thailand. So now the UN Special Rapporteur is really working closely with the Thai government to try to close this new trade route for arms as well.
Brad 37:51
And so then the obvious big question is, is it just as effective like is? Is doing all of this through Thailand now that the Singaporeans have have made life difficult, is it just as effective? And therefore, if, for example, the Thai banks were also closed off to the military, as you say, at least for the purposes of procurement, could they then just as easily jump to Vietnamese or Cambodian or potentially even Chinese financial institutions or Russian or is it? Is it that the Thai option is just not as good as the Singapore option? It's still a net loss for them to have to rely on the Thai system, and jumping to yet another country's financial institutions would be an even bigger loss.
Anrike Visser 38:38
Yeah, with this change from Singapore to Thailand, we saw a decrease of 30% but you're right. I think these both are still major financial centers. And of course, Singapore is bigger, but Thailand is also a big financial center in the region. If you would have to use instead smaller countries like Vietnam or Cambodia, it might become even more difficult. There's less access, there's more scrutiny. The money laundering checks are stronger on these countries because they have less supervision. So and with every hop to another center, they lose a little bit of their ability to conduct business, and the cost rise, and it's always you know, our goals shouldn't be and can't be. As anybody who has worked in law enforcement knows that we are going to eradicate fully all transactions, any crime around the world. You will never see 100% eradication, but with every enforcement action, you can reduce it a lot. So this is, I think, what our goal should be, not to be, just to stay realistic with the terms of impact that we have.
Brad 39:54
Okay, so I think that's fair. So ultimately, then it does mean. That putting pressure on these foreign governments, in this case, Singapore and now Thailand, it is beneficial. It is causing, piece by piece by piece, the the degrees of freedom, financial freedom, that the military want to have to procure the things that they're trying to procure. It is making it harder and harder for them to do that, even if it's quite a quite a slow road. Is there a faster way to do that? Is it possible to maybe preemptively jump in and get ahead of it? And ask countries like Vietnam, who you know still have a very heavy investment in in my tail, in Myanmar, ask countries like them to preemptively make a declaration that they will not allow procure military procurement to to flow through their financial institutions. Is that something that you might be looking at?
Anrike Visser 40:53
Yeah, that is, and that's an interesting point. I definitely think there is ongoing diplomacy, maybe behind the scenes, maybe in private with ASEAN or with Vietnam specifically, um, but we've also seen, like in the case with with Singapore, that it took quite some evidence before they publicly acknowledged there was a problem, and they they committed to doing something about it. So especially maybe other more restrictive governments in the area under which I would include Vietnam, to be frank, might be less inclined to counter the junta, so it might take a lot more pressure, or might not be effective at all. I think Singapore and Thailand are more open to to these types of discussion than maybe a Vietnam would. But then again, the abilities and the access to the international financial system that Vietnam has is also less so. That's why, of course, at June time, in first instance, decided to go for Singapore and decided to use tight transactions, because these are the more fast transactions going between the countries, and it's easier to hide your illicit transactions in that in that batch.
Brad 42:21
Interesting. It makes, I mean, it makes sense. And I think, I think your assessment of Vietnam is quite, you know, realistic, unfortunately. But this, then, you know, brings us to the very obvious issue when it comes to sanctioning, or one of the very obvious issues that when it comes to sanctioning, and that is, how do you deal with these bad actors? Because if you, if you have countries, let's say Cambodia, right? Cambodia is a sort of, sort of ally of Myanmar that also, you know, quite a repressive dictatorship and and there is connection there. We don't need to get sort of too deep into that. But Cambodia is not particularly economically impactful. This is not a country that is going to be able to put sort of major investment projects into play. They're not really all that important when it comes to making financial institutions available. But when we look at countries like China, when we look at countries like Russia, and I know I always use those two as the whipping boy, but they keep coming up in these circles and discussions when we have countries that are of that size, and even even Russia now struggling as they are as a result of the war and as a result of the sanctions, still a very sizable economy and still a very sizable industry, when you have countries like that that you are not going to bring on side, that you are not going to be able to bring into a sanctions regime, that you are not going to ideologically convince does it? Does it sort of feel like there's never going to be a way to make the sanctions fully work, because they always have that option of going back to these countries and saying, Well, can you, can you give us a loan? Can Can we negotiate some sort of investment? Can we use your financial institutions? Can we use your currency as a medium of exchange, something like that? This? Are they sizable enough to to nullify the effects of the sanctions that other countries are placing?
Anrike Visser 44:19
Well, I want to look at like a country like China. They might not subscribe to the model that the West imposes in terms of sanctions, and they might not agree with the Human Rights narrative that is often voiced by Western governments. And on the other hand, China does care about a stable and safe and secure Myanmar, they have vast economic interest in the countries, an oil pipeline, a port that they are building, and they want to remain access to the ocean. So I think if you we train. Change the narrative and say, Okay, can we work together and maybe talk about how to reduce the violence in the country? That is definitely something that I think we could talk to China about. As we do have the same goals, they might be more able to use the diplomacy that they have. They have a lot stronger relationships than the West, at this time, with the junta. So maybe where the US government or the Europeans have less diplomatic influence, the Chinese have have other influence that they that they could use. So sometimes it's not just about the effectiveness of sanctions in that sense. And we already talked about some sectors that do depend on Western governments where evasion is less realistic and less feasible. But I think just working together with a wider coalition of partners does make sense, and we even saw the Chinese, not the government, but the Bank of China. When there were sanctions on Myanmar oil and gas enterprise, they did stop some Euro transactions just because they didn't want to take the risk. I don't know, and it's not public knowledge, if they continue doing that and with with other companies. But of course, they also don't want to, want to create trouble for themselves. So I think it's important to see where, where's their overlap? How can we work together if we have the same goals?
Brad 46:37
Interesting, and it's actually quite surprising to me to see that China does have those that that willingness to at least move in this direction. I mean, I completely agree with you. They have vested interest in Myanmar being stable, but they they haven't, from my perspective, they haven't seemed willing yet to openly and officially turn on the military and say the the junta is not a path to stability and is therefore not a path to resource exploitation opportunities. And therefore China, as a country does not, does not support and is not in favor of the junta taking control of the country. They don't seem to be willing to take that step, although I would argue it is definitely in their interest to do so. But let's then look at, uh, sanctions by sector, because that that's a theme that's been coming up here. You're you're talking about sanctioning specific sectors. Moe Myanmar, oil and gas enterprise was a really big one, and I know that for a very long time there were specific exceptions carved out in American sanctions regimes for Moe GE much to the frustration of a lot of lobbyists and activists who are trying to get serious sanctions passed. I know from other people that I occasionally collaborate with, that the Myanmar garment industry, which is actually a very sizable sector within the Myanmar economy, went through a period not long after the coup, when a lot of Western companies pulled out, and they sort of made a big announcement saying, well, for ethical reasons, we're not going to be involved h&m Zara, companies like this, saying we don't want to be involved in Myanmar, because there's an ongoing crisis, there's a civil war. We don't want to be funneling money to the wrong people, who usually are the ones who own the companies, own the factories. And then in subsequent months and subsequent years, they quietly went back into the country, and I actually know one reporter who's investigating this and emailed one of these companies. I can't remember which ones. I'm not going to name any specific company, but the response was basically boilerplate, saying, well, we feel that it's more ethical to try and put some money in the pockets of Myanmar, people who are struggling and trying to find work, and there's nothing that we really can really can really do to to impact the outcome of of the ongoing crisis. So, you know, our harm mitigation strategy is to reinvest, which basically was just an excuse for them to continue getting access to cheap labor. So it seems that a lot of the more important sectors in Myanmar managed to sort of avoid sanctions, and that a lot of the sanctions that were coming out, but we saw sanctions being placed on specific cronies, specific generals, companies that are associated with those individuals, conglomerates, right? But not on entire sectors, not on entire industries. And therefore, it feels like the very substantial actions that could have been taken to to really put a shock on the economy and the flow of money to the military were just not taken. Can you can you talk us through why that might be? Why are people laying sanctions, but trying to be so restrictive with what sanctions they place? And. And being so delicate about the major and therefore most impactful sectors of the economy.
Anrike Visser 50:06
Well, I think we don't want to hurt the regular people in indeed of the country. And the garment sector is a is a good example, because I think there's a little bit of revenue and income tax going to the authorities, of course, and in some instances, the land that is being rented is affiliated with crony businesses or with Myanmar military interest. But overall, even though it's it's a big sector, the percentage of the amount going to the authorities is relatively small, and it's more an economic sector that in the sense that it's producing jobs and having support for everyday people. So I know some of the associations have called for sanctions on the garment sector, but this is actually not something that that I'm in favor of. I think the people of Myanmar already face very, very difficult time, and due to economic mismanagement of the Central Bank, which is now being led not by economists, but by generals and and majors and the forced exchange rates on imported and exporters, I think life is very, very difficult already for people in the country, so I wouldn't advocate for sanctioning a sector that is relatively small. On the other hand, the example that you mentioned, the Myanmar oil and gas enterprise, Moe gi the European Union sanctioned that quite early on, which I think makes makes sense, because even beforehand, we saw that a lot of the income from Moe G was used on budget and went to an account controlled by the by the military, and this was even under the brief semi civilian period. So this has always been an entity that is very, very important. Lots of money goes to the to the junta. Now, after a long time, we managed to convince the US to prevent financial services being offered to moe gay, but they didn't sanction the entire entity, which I think is a is a big miss, if we talk about effectiveness and impact.
Brad 52:26
That's interesting. And so I'm just wondering, with the garment sector being what it is, I think Moe is the significantly more important one, but with sectors like the garment sector, and then also sort of ancillary sectors, like you're mentioning before teak, you were mentioning before Jade, these types of sectors, you're saying that the amount of money that gets to the military is relatively small, and I think that's a very important piece of information. But I'm also wondering how reliable are the figures that we have for this. Because when I when I, when I think about these sectors, I think, you know, there are a lot of informal sectors, and there are a lot of illegal sectors. I think that the six main illegal industries in Myanmar are the drugs, weapons, human smuggling, rare animal smuggling, gemstones and wood. And especially with the wood industry, like I was shocked when I discovered that the scale of of illegal timber and the scale of illegal gemstones is more than an order of magnitude greater than the revenue that is generated by the manufacture and trafficking of drugs in the country. It's, it's, it doesn't even compare. So these industries are enormous, but these industries are also very often informal, very often unregulated, very often straight up criminal, and can be run by eaos. They can be run by local communities, what have you. And so if we're trying to target industries like this, number one, is it possible to target industries like this, considering how much illicit activity is going on domestically. And number two, is it possible for us to ever really have a clear picture of how the money in these industries is flowing and who is actually benefiting from it domestically?
Anrike Visser 54:14
Good question. So I think for the Teague sector, it is definitely a sector that, in my opinion, should be sanctioned. And it is sanctioned because a lot of it, at some point has to go through the state owned Myanmar timber enterprise. So there is a significant part of the trade that is that goes to in terms of revenue to the authorities. Of course, since we have the sanctions, there's a lot of attempts to circumvent them, and especially in terms of the certificates that are provided, we've seen many cases where a company claims that the trees are felt or are collected before. For the coup attempt, which I very highly, highly doubt. And there are reports that Teague from Myanmar, which is the best teak around the world, and it ends up in yachts and being used in hardwood floors. It still continues to arrive in Western markets until this day, and Myanmar provides 40% of the global supply in teak, and it is indeed illegally being smuggled into the European Union and into into the US. So the problem is that companies often rely, or they feel they can rely, on basically a fake piece of paper, a fake certificate that says this is legal. Words, don't worry about it. But I think now, three years after the coup has happened and these sanctions have been in place, this shouldn't be enough, and this isn't enough, but I think jurisdictions really have to enforce and make sure that there's consequences. They have to confiscate Mia martique. They have to investigate the certificates being provided. They have to prevent it from being sold and even impose a fine. And unless these activities are happening, it won't deter illegal actors if they very easily with just a fake piece of paper, can continue operating.
Brad 56:25
And so I'm glad you bring that up, because we did actually do an interview a while ago specifically on teak, and the exact same things that you were saying came up that a lot of people say, Well, you know, teak being wood, and wood has to be dried. It has to be aged appropriately. And so it's it's in warehouses, as people say, Well, this teak wood was, as you say, felled back in 2018 2019 it's been sitting in a warehouse in Singapore, wherever, aging, drying. Nothing unusual about that. And now we're on selling it here in 2022 2023 2024 and and, of course, as you said, these, these certifications are very easy to forge, and there's not a lot of oversight. And, and it seems that a lot of these different industries, when there is oversight, the oversight is handled by completely different people. It's I may be wrong, but the impression that I get is that when a sanction is placed on a country or specific industries, specific sectors, specific whatever in that country, the decision to place that sanction may be centralized by the government, and the government may have, you know, one group within their foreign ministry who decides on imposing sanctions. But then when it comes down to the nitty gritty of making sure that those sanctions are being followed. There are, like, a patchwork of different organizations. It might be, you know, the port authorities, it might be customs. It might be people who specifically deal with wood, and it might be someone in the agricultural sector who's in a completely different department, different ministry, who's responsible for making sure that, for example, rice importation is coming from appropriate places, and has, you know, met all of the necessary requirements. And from their perspective, sanctions might just be one item on the list, because they're also looking for, well, is there a possibility that this grain has, you know, any infectious parasites on it? Is there a possibility that this grain has come from a country that we've blacklisted for, you know, completely different reasons, whether it's labor reasons, whether it's because we think that rice is contaminated by toxic runoff or what have you. And and so it seems that there isn't enough centralization and enough focus when it comes to enforcing these sanctions that it is very easy to forge a lot of these documents. It is very easy to skirt these sanctions. Just because humans are overloaded. Humans have a lot of things on their plate that they have to check, and sanctions are not necessarily the number one thing on the mind of the person who actually has to verify the importation of those goods. So and I may be mischaracterizing the industry, and I may be mischaracterizing the way that sanctions enforcement actually works. But from what you're saying, and from what our previous guests have said, it does seem that a lot of these sanctions may be very intelligent. They may be very wise sanctions. We say, Yes, you know, Jade, teak, whatever, these are industries where we know that they're very valuable industries. We know that the cronies are going to benefit a lot from these industries, and the military will benefit from these industries, and they're not hugely impactful for average, everyday workers. So we can place the sanction but then it also seems that the enforcement mechanisms that that exist are just not adequate to really make that sanction physically happen in the real world, is that, is that a fair way to characterize it? And do you think there's anything we can do about that?
Anrike Visser 59:51
If it is, yeah, you're spot on. I would say this is the main problem when it comes to sanctions. It's just the difficulty or the lack. Of resources made available to enforce them. And indeed, you can imagine that a port official who is inspecting a shipment and just receives an invoice, and it might even have the name of a transit company on there, like in Thailand or Singapore or Vietnam, and it doesn't have any links to to Myanmar on there, and it even has a certificate. This is legal wood. It's from long time ago, and it has been in Vietnam for two years, and now it's going to Europe. But on the other hand, I would say, you know, in the decade or so that I've been working in this sector, we have made a lot of improvements, and there are definitely challenges when it comes to identifying the right people behind a company, or these certification schemes that are that are not correct, or the enablers In our western countries that support these activities from continuing. But maybe I'm an optimist, maybe I'm naive, but I have seen a lot of improvements over the last decade or so. We now have, in some instances, databases where we have prices of goods, for example. So if we see that money laundering is taking place and a price just doesn't make sense, we can track those. There's a lot of new technology, a lot of tracking that is being made available. Still we're not there. But I just keep thinking back of of when I started, and nobody knew about sanctions, and it really took the war in Russia to even start thinking more about sanctions and financial crime, which was a very boring topic for many people. So I think we now, in some instances, have a lot better legislation in place. I think the European Union, for example, just adopted a package making it illegal for all these enablers to continue providing services. The US doesn't have this, so they still need to implement something similar. But then, in many cases, the next step, indeed, is enforcement and imposing fines. And I think we will get there, but you're right, it takes time, and it's a major, major gap until today.
Brad 1:02:27
I mean, it's quite it's quite unfortunate then. And this, of course, combines with, you know, the many middleman countries and the many unsavory actors who are going to, you know, voluntarily let things go through, because, as you say, when something arrives in the port, the Port Authority looks at the bill of lading. I think that's what the documents called. And then if the bill of lading says, this is an Indonesian shipping company that, like the vessel, is registered in, you know wherever, it doesn't matter. The vessel is registered in Thailand, but it's owned by an Indian shipping company, and it's the last port that it visited where it picked up the goods that it's transporting was Singapore. Is there anything on that document that you know someone who's who's trying to do their due diligence could actually look at and give them a reason to say, Hey, hang on. I need to double check something here, because, from from what I understand with the bill of lading, it doesn't necessarily give you a full chain of custody of the goods that are being shipped. It will tell you, you know, you'll know where the vessel is registered, because every vessel has to fly under a flag. You'll know the shipping company. You'll know what port these things were picked up in. But is there any way for the document to say something, or is it compulsory for a document to say something that someone in a port authority, or someone in customs, someone at the airport, someone somewhere, is going to say, Hang on, I have to give this additional scrutiny because this has transited through or has some connection to a country that I know that we have sanctions against, or is it completely hidden?
Anrike Visser 1:04:13
No, but I think in that sense, authority should never only rely on the information that they get from the company itself, right? Like it's, if I ask you, is everything above board? Of course, you're gonna say yes. So if that's your only source of information, you're gonna be in in a lot of difficulty. And have been so many amazing reports out there identifying specific companies, specific proxies, shell companies being used. And one example that that comes to mind, of course, is the the jet fuel sanctions that were imposed. And now, exactly a year ago, by the by the US. It took a few months and then amnesty had already identified. The new evasion tactics being rerouted using a Chinese flagged ship and a Vietnamese petroleum storage terminal operator, and then a few months later, they again confirmed that these activities were ongoing despite their earlier reporting, so that really, I hope that governments take this into account, that civil society and media have a lot of local information that maybe a single individual port official doesn't have, but is available in the in the public domain, and they should Definitely reach out to us, reach out to other organizations, and follow through on those media reports. And that's something that I think is also important, because even though this has been exposed now already since January, the US hasn't sanctioned those new companies identified. So really deter this has to be stepped up. It has to go faster. And you can't wait six months or a year after media or civil society exposes this, because then they know they're already publicly in the domain, and they just start setting up different trade routes. So it's really about working more closely together with civil society and stepping up the pace of sanctions to have an impact.
Brad 1:06:33
And so this is another topic, because it because I do remember the jet fuel sanctions that we're actually fortunate enough to speak to amnesty when, when that was happening. That was really insightful interview. But the the other thing that I that I want to ask is because you're talking about these sanctions, and they're coming quite late, obviously, Moe GE was not sanctioned for a very long time, those jet fuel sanctions, you know, last year was still quite a long time after the coup, a suspiciously long time, especially because jet fuel is such a key, a key component of the military's entire strategy of using aerial assets to terrorize and bombard civilians, specifically targeting and murdering civilians. And I understand that the case that that was made that jet fuel is a dual use good, and it's very difficult to regulate something that has legitimate civilian uses. But it seems that a lot of these sanctions are coming quite late, and that a lot of the sanctions that happened before were not particularly impactful. They were not as effective. We were waiting for a very, very, very long time to have an international arms embargo, which is something that, you know, people were pushing for for for years. So the question is, Is there a problem where sanctions are being used as as an empty gesture, as a thing that a country can do, that they can announce, that makes it look like they're doing something significant. But when you actually analyze, it doesn't actually, it does, you know, it doesn't lead to anything. I think I remember there was a thing with Ukraine. Somebody was was saying, Oh, we're going to cut off trade with Australia. And there was a Ukrainian politician who looked at that and said, Well, that's that's kind of weird. We don't have trade with Australia, so that. It sounds very aggressive, but it doesn't actually do anything. Is that a problem that we're facing with sanctions in in the current world, where people pass sanctions but they don't, they're not passing sanctions that are impactful and powerful and significant and could potentially have negative economic repercussions back home, because trade is a two way street, and are rather just sort of trying to have a sanction for the sake of looking like they're doing something.
Anrike Visser 1:08:55
Yeah, identifying the right targets is definitely an important aspect, and we talked about this previously, there's definitely some low level soldiers or some battalions that were identified to be responsible for massacres or air strikes, and most of those won't have any assets, not in the West, but Let alone in not even in Thailand or Singapore. So the impact of those sanctions are maybe more symbolic still in those instances, I do understand why governments do it right, because you don't just want to say, I condemn this action and it's really bad and not then do anything. And often the only other available action is imposing sanctions, so I understand better safe than sorry, and at least close the loophole as far as you can, even though they are probably not used. But when we look at the overall goal or impact, I don't think the junta. Is affected if the 66 lighting Infantry Division is sanctioned because of a massacre they did in current state, for example?
Brad 1:10:09
Yeah, interesting, interesting. And so just on that, I think, I think leading to towards the end of the discussion here, outcomes then, because I think you're very accurate if we, if we sanction 66 Light Infantry Division, you know? Yeah, who cares? And and the light infantry divisions are a massive problem, not just the 66 but the 22nd 33rd 77th and 99th are responsible for a litany of war crimes and crimes against humanity, and it's very frustrating that we that we want to do something. Obviously, no one's committed to going in and using, you know, forces on the ground and invading Myanmar. Nobody wants to do that. No one's even even having that discussion on the table. But on the other hand, with the sanctions, how do we know that they're effective? It's one thing to cut off access to someone's, you know, passport and travel documentation, and say their persona non grata, they can't travel. But even that doesn't always happen. I think we saw a good example of that with Bashir, who had a an arrest warrant out by Interpol, and he was able to fly to South Africa, and because South Africa chose not to be compliant, but she came, visited South Africa, exited South Africa through the airport and was not arrested. So even that may not be 100% effective, if we freeze assets, we can count the dollars in the bank account that we froze. That's relatively easy and straightforward, but in terms of these less measurable results, if we're impacting a sector, are we able to quantify the impact that we have if we are trying to cause discomfort to the military, the leadership, the cronies, their families by saying, Well, you don't get to have fancy positions at UNESCO, you don't get to go to international universities, you don't get to travel, you don't get to buy property overseas. Is there any way that we can actually quantify and know for certain that the sanctions regimes are having an impact in the ability of the military to freely operate, to acquire jet fuel, to acquire ammunition, to acquire arms, or having an impact on the contentment of the military as an organization and starting to break their will. Is there any way that we can measure what we're doing?
Anrike Visser 1:12:30
Yeah, I want to take this into two different directions. I think it's important to imagine the impact of sanctions as a whole, I don't think it's realistic to say we will impose some sanctions. We will make life less comfortable for you, we will reduce some of the access that you have to funding and arms, and expect the junta to give up power. Right? That's a very high level, maybe unrealistic expectations of the of the impact of sanctions. They are fighting for their survival, as soon, probably as they give up power. Who knows if they will survive, if the PDFs won't come in and kill them, or there will be another coup from from the army internally. So they are not just fighting for their comfort comfort. They're fighting for their financial and physical survival in the long run. So sanctions. We, of course, want to do more than just have statements and try to talk to them, so we impose sanctions. But I don't think it's realistic to say, oh, on the one hand, you have your survival, but on the other hand, you can't go shopping in Dubai, and your kids can't go to a fancy school in Switzerland, but you'll take the risk to your to your own livelihood. So I think that's very important to to keep in mind. And then, yes, the impact of sanctions is difficult to measure in some instances because of lack of data, because governments don't want to admit that they have an impact. So it's very common for a for a government to say, I don't care about sanctions, or I'm not affected. But then you see that the economy is tanking that as in the case of Myanmar, there's 30% less military procurement they're able to conduct. That definitely puts a strain on the junta that is already struggling with having enough soldiers and is now forcing people to join the army against their will, so they rely heavily on on air strikes, and cutting the access to jet fuel or to missiles and bombs definitely has an impact, and we know that in this instance, it's it's 30% but again, for the overall success of ending the dictatorship. But this is really also where diplomacy and conversations and maybe pressure from China and other regimes are very important.
Brad 1:15:09
So it's really coming back to that very first element of our discussion, that the sanctions do not exist in a bubble, and they cannot be successful in a bubble. It has to be concerted effort between all all elements of was it statecraft? Is what you're saying? Yes, 100% Excellent. And so the final thing that I want to ask you, and I think this is, this is always, you know, the big question is, you know what? What is in the future? Because it's one thing to say, well, this is how things work. And it's one thing to say, this is what has been done so far, and that's and that's a wonderful overview of the facts as they exist. But the really impactful question is, what do you think we could be doing, or we should be doing in order to bring about the fastest end to this conflict, and how can sanctions play a role within that? Because you said, for example, that you don't feel that it's wise to to sanction the entire government sector, because it is going to hurt the civilians more so than it's going to hurt the military. So you clearly have a balance between you know you it seems that you're much more in favor of targeted sanctions. You're much more in favor of very carefully selecting your targets, rather than this very broad spectrum approach to sanctioning the entire nation. But we see that the military are still obtaining jet fuel, they're still obtaining weapons, they're still obtaining ammunition, and they still continuing their fight. So what do you think could be done or should be done to bring about the end of this conflict.
Anrike Visser 1:16:43
I hope in terms of of sanctions, and again, I don't think sanctions alone will be able to end the conflict, but if we want to increase increase the effectiveness of sanctions, I hope now that we've identified and sanctioned so many individuals and so many relevant sectors and companies that we really make sure that those sanctions have a bite to them. So in terms of closing the gaps, making sure that the US, EU, UK, Canada, Australia, all sanction the same individuals and not have a very unequal sanction regime. For example, doing more in terms of enforcement, collaborating better with civil society organizations who might have access to passports and information about companies that jurisdictions far away don't have if we do those things, I think the impact of the sanctions will be a lot bigger than it is today.
Brad 1:17:50
Excellent. And I think, I think as a really valuable point that you bring up with the civil society organizations, but I wonder whether you could expand on that a little bit. How, how can sanctioning regimes interact with civil society organizations? What role do civil society organizations potentially play, whether they're international or whether they're domestic? What role can they really play in collaborating with a sanctions regime?
Anrike Visser 1:18:16
Yeah, there's a very important role. The century often submits sanction doshays for consideration to different jurisdictions. And even when we don't do that, sometimes we are asked if we have more information about a certain entity, or maybe it's they know the person, and they know the passport number, but they don't know the date of birth. So in these instances, we if we have information, we like to help out to make sure that the sanction is really specific. Because when we have conversations with banks, we often hear that it's very difficult, especially in the Myanmar case, to identify the right person. We've seen some sanction designations that list an individual, but they don't have a date of birth. And you know better than I do how similar Myanmar names can be. So if we have just a similar name, we don't even know the date of birth, we don't have an address. It becomes almost impossible for banks to to freeze assets if they if they have them on their books.
Brad 1:19:24
Interesting. Okay, so it's more about making sure that that you just get the tools that you need, and that you're getting the information that you need to make the sanctions more effective. But then it almost feels like not doing that, like not interacting with those civil society organizations. It means that the sanctions are kind of stumbling in the dark, like it has a goal, but it doesn't necessarily have the necessary on the ground information to to get where it needs to go. Now that you've explained to me how civil society organizations can contribute, it feels that. It feels like it would be very difficult for a sanction to ever have succeeded without the civil society organization. Or am I sort of overstating the their importance?
Anrike Visser 1:20:08
Yeah, I don't want to underestimate the the capacity and the resources that a lot of sanction team have, and we have in the European Union, amazing sanction team. Some are better than than others, the US is also very, very strong. So I don't want to create the idea that the majority of sanctions are ineffective. That's not the case at all. But of course, like if you go through the trouble of identifying a person and and submitting a sanction designation, we want to make sure that you have all the information that's needed. And sometimes we see indeed that a date of birth is missing, or that only a nickname of a person is included and not their official name. So in these instances, we just want to make sure that we share all the information that we have, because civil society in Myanmar has lots of decades of experience operating under oppression and in exile, and the networks that exist are amazing. So there's a lot of information available if you if you know where to look.
Brad 1:21:14
And because it was, it only just occurred to me, as you were saying, that the Under normal circumstances, we would just call the country and we would say, Well, hey, can you, can you clarify this individual? Can you send us the necessary documentation? But when it is the country itself that is the target of those sanctions? Obviously you don't have the the conventional framework to to reach out and say, you know, Can Can you provide us with the necessary information with which we can then lay sanctions on you. Obviously, they wouldn't do that.
Anrike Visser 1:21:42
And if I just may add to that, because that's a very important point, and we see that junta is trying to do everything in its power to make it more difficult. So the corporate registry, for example, was taken offline in 2022 and we now don't know who is behind some new companies that were that were set up, some of them specifically to evade sanctions. So indeed, the junta is trying to do everything it can to make sanction designations as difficult as possible. So yeah, calling them up and saying, Hey, can you please tell me if the children of min online, have any other new companies that we're not aware of that? Yeah, they're not gonna pick up that call, I'm afraid.
Brad 1:22:28
Obviously. So I think we've covered quite a quite a bit of ground, and I think you've provided a really valuable insight into how sanctions work and how they don't work as well and how we can utilize them most effectively. And I want to thank you very much for your time.
Anrike Visser 1:22:47
Yeah, I just would like to add, you know the importance of also our work, what we do in working together with justice, for Myanmar, what the information we get from local media and civil society organizations. I think the century is good at creating those international links and talking to governments and submitting sanction doshays, but we work very closely with justice for Myanmar, and they are amazing, and we rely heavily on information from local media partners as well. And I missed the time that I used to work with them in the country and train them and create stories together, but I just want to acknowledge that they are the ones that should receive a lot more support from the international community, financial, training, capacity, just to keep doing this work under these difficult circumstances.
Host 1:23:53
I'll be honest, not only is asking for donations, my least favorite thing in the world to do, I find it pretty uncomfortable as well. Yet it is an unavoidable but necessary task in order to ensure that our platform can continue to bring you stories from post coup Myanmar and unfortunately, the truth of the matter is that there is a basic minimum cost to keep our engine humming. So please allow me to take a moment for that least favorite and uncomfortable thing to do and ask sincerely for your generosity in supporting our mission. If you found value in today's show and think others might as well, we ask that you take a moment to consider supporting our work. Thank you for taking the time to hear our spiel, and with that, it's off to work on the next episode. If you would like to join in our mission to support those in Myanmar who are being impacted by the military coup. We welcome your contribution in any form, currency or transfer method, Your donation will go on to support a wide range of humanitarian and media missions, aiding those local communities who need it. Most donations are directed to such causes as the Civil Disobedience movement, CDM, families of deceased victims. Internally displaced person IDP camps, food for impoverished communities, military defection campaigns, undercover journalists, refugee camps, monasteries and nunneries, education initiatives, the purchasing of protective equipment and medical supplies, COVID relief and more. We also make sure that our donation Fund supports a diverse range of religious and ethnic groups across the country. We invite you to visit our website to learn more about past projects as well as upcoming needs. You can give a general donation or earmark your contribution to a specific activity or project you would like to support, perhaps even something you heard about in this very episode. All of this humanitarian work is carried out by our non profit mission, Better Burma. Any donation you give on our Insight Myanmar website is directed towards this fund. Alternatively, you can also visit the Better Burma website, betterburma.org and donate directly there. In either case, your donation goes to the same cause in both websites, except credit card, you can also give via PayPal, by going to paypal.me/Better Burma. Additionally, we can take donations through Patreon, Venmo, GoFundMe and Cash App. Simply search Better Burma on each platform, and you'll find our account. You can also visit either website for specific links to these respective accounts, or email us at info@betterburma.org, that's Better Burma, one word spelled B, E T, T, E R, B, U, R, M, A.org. If you would like to give it another way, please contact us. We also invite you to check out our range of handicrafts that are sourced from vulnerable artisan communities across Myanmar. Available at alokacrafts.com any purchase will not only support these artists and communities, but also our nonprofit wider mission that's Aloka Crafts spelled, A, L, O, K, A, C, R, A, F, T, S, one word, alokacrafts.com Thank you so much for your kind consideration and support.