No Comparison

If Hun Sen really wants to help his friend Thaksin Shinawatra, he should find a more suitable person to compare him with than Aung San Suu Kyi

The Thai government managed to fend off an army of red-shirted supporters of ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) summit in late October, but had less luck dealing with another champion of Thaksin’s cause—Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen.

Hun Sen, a former Khmer Rouge commander known for his provocative remarks, sparked a diplomatic firestorm when he compared Thaksin to Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese opposition leader whose name has become a byword for courageous resistance to political persecution.

“Many people talk about Aung San Suu Kyi in Burma, so why not talk about Thaksin? That cannot be referred to as interfering,” Hun Sen said at the summit in the Thai resort town of Hua Hin.

Perhaps we should be grateful that Suu Kyi was mentioned at all, since her fate as a prisoner of Burma’s ruling generals went largely unnoticed at this latest gathering of Asean leaders. But even so, it’s difficult to stomach this attempt to portray Thaksin as Thailand’s Suu Kyi—a comparison that was even more insulting to the people of Burma than it was to the summit’s hosts.

What do Thaksin and Suu Kyi have in common? Apart from the fact that they are both reviled by the ruling elites of their respective countries, not very much. Indeed, their differences are far more numerous and speak volumes about them as individuals.

Let’s look at a few of the ways in which they differ:

Suu Kyi has dedicated the past 21 years of her life to the struggle for democracy; Thaksin used his years in power to systematically dismantle the democracy that put him there in the first place. During his time as the head of the Thai government, he muzzled the press, launched a “war on drugs” in which more than 2,000 people were killed, and added fuel to the fire of insurgency in Thailand’s predominantly Muslim south with his strong-arm tactics.

Suu Kyi has spent a total of 14 years in detention because she has refused to abandon her country; Thaksin skipped bail and fled Thailand soon after he was indicted on corruption charges. He now spends his days hopping around the globe on passports of convenience, staying one step ahead of extradition procedures.

Suu Kyi has been an indomitable foe of Burma’s oppressive regime; Thaksin courted the junta by offering loans, increasing border trade and sending numerous delegations to Rangoon. Often, his state-funded largesse to the Burmese generals was part of a deal to win contracts for his own business interests, including Shin Corp, the family-owned company that he eventually sold for US $1.88 billion.

When Thaksin wasn’t profiting economically from his ties with Burma’s brutal rulers, he was increasing his political capital by cracking down on Burmese living in Thailand. His crude appeals to Thai nationalism made life miserable for hundreds of thousands of Burmese migrants and refugees fleeing poverty and oppression under military rule.

To be fair to Hun Sen, he wasn’t the first to make the outrageous comparison between Suu Kyi and Thaksin. That dishonor goes to Thaksin himself, who in 2006 was briefly forced to stay in his heavily guarded home because of a bomb threat.

With a degree of shamelessness that only the obscenely rich and powerful can possess, he said he could commiserate with Suu Kyi because his experience was so similar to hers.

But can missing a day of shopping really compare with the sacrifices that Suu Kyi has made for her country over the past two decades? For most of this time, she has been almost entirely cut off from her family and the rest of the outside world.