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Foreign Volunteer Told to Leave Burma

A foreign volunteer working with a Burmese nongovernmental organization (NGO) has left the country after receiving repeated warnings from the authorities over a series of interviews she conducted with ethnic leaders and senior politicians.

Sources from Rangoon’s NGO community told The Irrawaddy that personnel from the Special Branch of Burma’s police force told Inga Gruss, a German volunteer with local NGO Myanmar Egress, twice last month to leave the country.

“The authorities told her she should leave after they followed her activities and checked her passport,” said an NGO staffer who spoke on condition of anonymity.

According to the source, Gruss was first approached by the police while staying at a guesthouse in downtown Rangoon. She later moved to Thamada Hotel, where the offices of Myanmar Egress are located.

“Her final warning came on June 15 at Thamada Hotel,” said the source. She reportedly left the country sometime last week.

Gruss, who had been in Burma since April on a tourist visa, was working as a volunteer with Myanmar Egress, an NGO that is registered as an educational institution. She is also a social science researcher, focusing on religion, state and Burma’s Kachin people.
“The authorities probably suspected her of being a journalist,” said a Burmese researcher in Rangoon. “They became suspicious after she met veteran politicians, including ethnic leaders, for her research.”

According to its Web site, Myanmar Egress was co-founded in 2005 by Nay Win Maung, publisher of Living Color magazine and The Voice journal, and Kyaw Yin Hlaing, a Burmese scholar based in Hong Kong.

In a report published on June 13, The Washington Post described Nay Win Maung as “a son of a military officer [who] was brought up among Burma’s military elites, giving him good connections to military insiders. His magazines can access government-related news and exclusive information.”

These connections have also helped Myanmar Egress. “It got permission from the authorities to do Cyclone Nargis relief work that other private relief workers did not get,” said the Burmese researcher. “But [Gruss’] case shows that there are limits to their tolerance.”

Kerstin Jung, webmaster for the Nargis Action Group Myanmar, a relief group operating under Myanmar Egress, confirmed that Gruss was no longer in the country, but was unable to provide any further details.

At least 10 foreign journalists have been forced out of Burma or banned from entering since Cyclone Nargis struck on May 2-3, according to Reporters Sans Frontières.

South Korean journalist Lee Yu Kyong was expelled by authorities on June 22 after visiting the Rangoon headquarters of Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy.

A Canadian woman working for the International Committee of the Red Cross was also deported recently after she made a field trip to Shan State, in eastern Burma.

Earlier this year, officials cautioned international NGOs against conducting surveys and doing unauthorized research, calling it a “very sensitive issue,” according to a report of a meeting between government officials and representatives of foreign NGOs held on January 11.