Bangkok: Thailand today said it supported the United Nation's initiative to bring about political reconciliation in Myanmar and will raise the issue at this week's ASEAN ministerial meeting.

Thai Foreign Minister Noppadon Pattama told visiting UN Deputy Secretary-General Asha-Rose Migiro that Bangkok will seek a discussion on Myanmar at the annual foreign ministers’ conclave of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) that opens in Singapore today.

The UN official requested Thailand to be active in promoting the process of democratic transition in Myanmar where the military rulers have announced a constitutional referendum in May this year in preparation for a national election in 2010.

However, the announcement has been met with scepticism by pro-democracy Myanmarese activists, including the National League for Democracy (NLD) party of detained Nobel Peace Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

The Thai foreign minister told the UN Deputy Secretary General that Bangkok supports the return to Myanmar by the UN Secretary General's special envoy on Myanmar, Ibrahim Gambari. Mr Gambari was in Myanmar twice last year following last September's bloody crackdown on peaceful anti-government protests in Yangon.

At its last annual summit in 2007, the 10-nation ASEAN that includes Myanmar besides Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Brunei, Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, urged Myanmar to accelerate the process of national reconciliation.

''We expressed concern on the pace of the national reconciliation process and urged Myanmar to show tangible progress that would lead to a peaceful transition to democracy in the near future,'' said the final communiqué issued by the 40th ASEAN Summit held in the Philippines in August 2007.

The 2007 summit also expressed concern over the detention of all political opponents of Myanmar's military regime and had called for their early release.

Source : UNI