Word: westernized
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...resources, and most of the country's natural wealth - from jade and timber to hydropower and natural gas - is concentrated in the tribal regions. The planned route for a Chinese-financed project of dual natural-gas and oil pipelines, for instance, begins in an ethnically troubled part of western Burma's Arakan state and runs past the part of Shan state where fighting raged last month in Kokang. Construction of the Shwe pipeline project, the biggest ever foreign investment commitment to Burma, was supposed to begin this month, but ethnic skirmishes may imperil that schedule. Reports are also trickling...
...nature of battle in Burma. At the KIA's self-styled Pentagon, a collection of simple concrete buildings on a breezy hilltop, members of other ethnic groups have come to be schooled in military tactics from one of the most tenacious rebel militias. One youth leader from the western state of Arakan spoke to me in smooth, American-inflected English. "I need to do something practical," he said. "I need to prepare for war. Politics in this country is crap. It's just a way for the SPDC to stay in power...
...Western official, closely connected to efforts to reach out to the Taliban, blamed the failure squarely on President Karzai. In Kandahar and Helmand, which are now major Taliban strongholds, the official says, Karzai personally appointed many "violent and predatory" district officials and police chiefs from his own extended tribe. "When the police started robbing and pillaging," the Western official says, "the villagers had no choice but to turn to the local [Taliban] commanders for protection...
...cutoff in new Western funds to the program has crippled whatever chances the amnesty project had of coaxing in Taliban fighters. The Kandahar office says it now operates with a budget of $700 a month and has only reeled in 537 disaffected Taliban in nearly two years. "We can only offer them $20 for their weapon. They can get far more than that in the bazaar," says Kandahar director Haji Agha Lalai. "We should be able to give them a job, rent money, but we can't." This paltry offering cannot compete with the wages and benefits that a Taliban...
...Australia; in 2008, there were only 161 during the whole year. On September 11 and September 12, two boats carrying 148 asylum-seekers were discovered off the northwest coast of Australia. On September 16, another boat carrying 58 people was intercepted 265 miles (420 km) north of Broome in Western Australia. Just the day before, the Australian government announced that in co-operation with Indonesian authorities 1000 potential asylum-seekers were blocked from coming to Australia this year. Those caught were following a familiar passage: a flight to Indonesia, a payment of $10,000-$15,000 to a smuggler...