When Karl Marx prophesied 150 years ago that "history repeats itself," he wasn't talking about human rights abuses in Asia. But today his words resonate as we face a nearly identical repeat of Southeast Asia's most unconscionable "development" project, right next door in Burma. And the Petroleum Authority of Thailand (PTT) is again poised to be complicit in human rights abuses.

Fortunately, there is still time to change course.

In the 1990s, the Yadana natural gas pipeline was constructed from the Andaman Sea across Tenasserim Division in southeast Burma, landing on the Thai side in Kanchanaburi Province. It involved multinational oil and gas corporations Total of France and the U.S.-based Unocal Corporation, the state-owned oil and gas enterprise in Burma (MOGE), and the now partially state-owned PTT Exploration and Production Company Ltd. (PTTEP), which at that point was wholly owned by the Thai government. In 1995, PTTEP signed a 30-year sales agreement with Burma to purchase the Yadana gas, setting off construction of the 260 kilometer gas pipeline.

Then the pipeline abuses began.

In Burma, the pipeline area was heavily militarized. Forced labor was used on project infrastructure, there was rape, extrajudicial killings, land confiscation, displacement, and other actions that violated the basic human rights of thousands of people. The corporations involved in this project were aware the abuses were happening in connection with their investments and did nothing to stop them, making them complicit.

With no access to justice in Burma, villagers sued Unocal and Total in US and French courts, respectively. The corporations paid out large financial settlements. A door had opened to hold non-state actors legally accountable for human rights abuses committed abroad, and the world took notice. PTTEP, however, was spared legal scrutiny due to a lack of international accountability mechanisms and the lack of political will in Thailand to hold the company accountable. The world took notice of this, too.

A particularly tragic element was that Thailand didn't actually need the energy produced by the Yadana gas. The National Economic and Social Advisory Council (NESAC) found that the Electricity Governing Authority of Thailand (EGAT) overestimated ten of eleven yearly forecasts of Thailand's electricity demand, in some cases by as much as 40 percent. So much for "supply and demand" economics. This means that innocent people died in Burma so that Thailand might have a wasteful and expensive surplus of energy.

This tragedy was recognized by Thai officials. In 1997, using phrases like "[our] greed for natural resources," former Deputy Foreign Minister Sukhumbhand Paribatra stated " I regret very strongly that a company, the Petroleum Authority of Thailand...was part of a deal which bought gas from Burma...I think that - for better or worse - we have blood on our hands."

Apparently blood washes off easily.

Fast forwarding to today, PTT is actively pursuing at least two large natural gas deposits in Burma, as both a purchaser and developer. In 2004, Daewoo International of South Korea discovered part of what is now considered Southeast Asia's largest natural gas deposit in Burma's Bay of Bengal. This gas project is dubbed Shwe - meaning gold in Burmese - and is being developed by Korean and Indian companies in partnership with the military regime in Burma. Potential buyers of the gas are lining up in a fierce bidding war, including India, China, Korea, Japan, and of course, Thailand. This gas will most likely be sold to China, but that hasn't stopped PTT's bidding efforts.

Like Yadana, PTT has put in a bid to buy the gas and pipe it across Burma for consumption in Thailand. Meanwhile, PTT has also been busy exploring for commercially viable natural gas deposits in Burma's Gulf of Martaban, which last month resulted in the discovery of a "high amount of natural gas," according to a company spokesman. A pipeline from there is likely, too.

Yet Thailand's energy needs are again thought to be overestimated, this time in the 2007 Power Development Plan (PDP) recently released by the Ministry of Energy (MOE), which is a 15 year forecast. The report is not widely available but has already come under fire. Analysts point to inaccurate estimations of energy demand, a lack of Thai public participation in the process, and a concerning ignorance to global warming and the serious need to plan for alternative energy sources.

By EGAT's own admission, Thailand's energy reserve margin in 2006 was at least 7 percent higher than the international standard, which in economic terms is enormous.

While this scenario is costing the Thai people and the environment hugely, to say nothing of Burma, certain stakeholders benefit just fine. EGAT, for one, has a vested interest in maintaining the status quo in terms of energy sources (i.e. fossil fuels), and in terms of keeping a "high demand."

Currently, Thailand's energy producers are the same people estimating energy demand. This is a blatant conflict of interest.

Thailand relies heavily on natural gas. Too heavily. A recent study by the consulting firm ERM-Siam, commissioned by the Thai government, shows natural gas may not even be the cheapest fuel for power generation in Thailand as its price correlates with unstable global oil prices. Nevermind that, though.

According to Supara Janchitfah, "EGAT and related agencies still go about their business in the same old way, using the same old arguments."

This is a global phenomenon. The Oil & Gas Journal reports that a staggering 10,000 miles of pipelines will be laid on our planet in 2007, 75 percent of which will be for natural gas. Of all the world's regions, Asia will lead this year in new natural gas pipelines, constructing nearly 3,000 miles worth.

The largest gas project currently being developed in Burma is the Shwe project (pronounced Shh-way) mentioned above. It has elicited an international opposition - the Shwe Gas Movement - led by people from Arakan State in western Burma. The movement is demanding the gas project stop until local people can be included in development decisions, decisions that will seriously - and in some cases fatally - affect their lives. These demands are not pulled from thin air, but reflect international standards and a basic affirmation of human dignity and freedom. In other words, the movement is demanding corporate responsibility and accountability and the recognition and protection of their human rights. So far, no corporations have been willing to engage them, despite repeated efforts, and the regime in Burma continues to violate their human rights.

If PTT constructed a Shwe pipeline from western Burma to Thailand it would be at least four times the length of the previous Yadana pipeline, with the potential for a correspondingly gross number of attendant human rights abuses. Likewise, a PTT pipeline from the Gulf of Martaban would mirror Yadana in the most uncomfortable of ways.

Already there is an unfortunate international skepticism of Thailand regarding the military coup, increasing violence in the South, and human rights abuses at home. Can the Kingdom afford to be complicit in human rights abuses in Burma?

With or without Thailand, the abuses in Burma are widespread and systematic, meaning they are part of the state's larger plan to keep the diverse 54 million people in check. Just ask the more than 1,200 political prisoners enduring prison conditions that make Guantanamo look like day care. The Burma military's policies openly target the ethnic nationalities comprising 40% of the population. Just ask the thousands of ethnic women who have been selective victims of brutal rape by the Burma army, or the over 30,000 Karen villagers who last year fled the attacks of the Burma army in the eastern part of the country (and continue to do so). These numbers are rising steadily. There is no independent judiciary in Burma, no free press, not one elected official; forced labor, child soldiers, and landmines abound; international laws and standards are flouted. The Nobel Laureate Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, whose National League for Democracy won a landslide victory in 1990 elections that the military refused to recognize, remains in house arrest, despite a recent UN call for her release.

What is Thailand's answer to all of this? Investment. Thailand's gas imports from Burma exceed US$1.5 billion per annum, providing the military regime in Burma with approximately 30% of its hard currency. But that currency is not spent improving lives in Burma. As just one example, in 2006, Burma ranked last in the world in public health expenditures, according to the 2006 UN Human Development Report, and the country consistently ranks among the world's least developed. Rather than use gas revenues to change that, the regime's elite are busy growing increasingly wealthy and stockpiling expensive military hardware from India and China while millions of Burmese languish and, in tragic irony, flee into Thailand and India.

Marx's quote from 1852 actually suggests that history repeats itself "the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce." The Yadana gas pipeline was a tragedy. Thailand's involvement was a tragedy. The human rights abuses were a tragedy. PTT is at a crossroads, and if it continues investing in Burma's oil and gas industry, it will do so in spite of the many victims of human rights abuses and in spite of Thailand's own development. It will be a mockery, a foolish show, a ridiculous sham. In other words, a farce.

The good news for Thailand is that it doesn't have to be this way. The government and PTT can actually act to help change things for the better, influencing the regime in Burma to end its brutal "war" rather than lining its pockets with hard currency. Despite the problems with Thailand's own energy sector, will it take the noble course and officially condemn development-related human rights abuses in Burma? Or will PTT simply sign more contracts to facilitate unnecessary imports, moving Thailand closer to a bubble economy while enriching a brutal regime?

Matthew Smith is a Project Coordinator of the Burma Project with Earth Rights International (ERI), an NGO based in Washington D.C. ERI represented plaintiffs in Doe v. Unocal Corporation.