Banged up in Burma

And here, in my view, we have the essence of what went wrong: Ross has no feel for Asia. Can a man live in Asia for twenty years and still have no feel for it? Yes indeed. Ross sincerely loves Aisa, but he remains eternally, unselfconsciously, Australian and expat.

So this is a story of what Ross did, without meaning or even knowing, to annoy Tin Tun Oo.

First, Tin Tun Oo was and is the majority shareholder of Myanmar Consolidated Media. He saw that the company was profitable and, not unreasonably, suggested to Ross that a dividend might be in order. He also suggested that he, Tin Tun Oo, should be made Chief Executive of the group. He was backed by the Minister for Information. Ross, backed by his fellow Australian minority shareholder Bill Clough (of the Clough engineering and oil interests - Clough has a $30 million investment in Burmese oil exploration) turned him down. The time was not ripe for a dividend, he said. Ross also said he thought it would be a good idea if the Myanmar Times were to become a daily so it could go head-to-head with the government's New Light of Myanmar. Ross was told that Tin Tun Oo would not be signing his application for a renewal of his business visa.

Then in November 2010 Tin Tun Oo decided to stand in the elections on the USDP ticket, the military's favourite party. Ross filled the Myanmar Times with coverage of the opposition candidates, and Tin Tun Oo lost, one of a handful of USDP candidates to be humiliated like this. Possibly he was not best pleased.

And then Ross heard rumours that he, Ross, was now regarded by certain influential figures as one of them, a Myanmar-person, in recognition of which the Myanmar Times would be allowed to go daily and Tin Tun Oo would be replaced.

And now Ross really blundered. In the last days of January 2011, after the Khine Zar Win affair and before the trip to Japan, he ran an advertisement in both editions of the Myanmar Times. Advertisements don't have to go past the censors. And they don't usually look like this one. In his uncensored double-page spread Ross, speaking for the Myanmar Times, welcomed the new government that would shortly take over and committed his newspapers to the new Burma. "We stand by the principle that we have to be accountable to the law and to our readers." It was, in fact, an editorial disguised as an advertisement.

The glory-box for that edition, the list of senior staff and management that newspapers carry on the editorial page, made no mention of Tin Tun Oo.

A week later Ross flew out to Japan. On his return to Yangon on 10 February the Immigration booth at the airport had a pink slip of paper taped to the wall with his name on it.

Ross's incarceration prompted international media attention and some frenzied activity in Yangon. Bill Clough flew in and met with Tin Tun Oo on February 13, and as a result Tin Tun Oo was made Chief Executive Officer of Myanmar Consolidated Media and Editor-in-Chief of the Burmese edition of the Times (circulation 28,000). Clough became Acting Managing Director of the group and Editor-in-Chief of the English edition (circulation 3,000), filling in for Ross. Clough apologized to Tin Tun Oo and to the Minister for Information. Ross, in his cell, was given his own letter of apology ready for signing.

But the international reaction to Ross's arrest seems to have caught Tin Tun Oo and the Information Minister by surprise. The Australian embassy became involved. According to rumours, the new Prime Minister of Burma was not pleased. The last foreigner to die in a Burmese jail – the last Western foreigner – was Leo Nichols, back in 1996. The generals probably hadn't thought of Nichols as a foreigner – he was Anglo-Burmese, and he was guilty of bankrolling Aung San Suu Kyi – but his death, largely from willful neglect, caused strained relations with the several Scandinavian countries for whom Nichols was Honorary Consul-General. Australia and Burma have managed to preserve quite cordial relations, and the top generals probably didn't want a repeat of the Nichols affair.

Tin Tun Oo now became Ross's most assiduous friend. He attended every court hearing, he insisted to the media that Ross was innocent, and he offered to stand bail. The judge refused: the charge, he said, was non-bailable.

Khine Zar Win, meanwhile, was still trying to withdraw her allegations, without which Ross would not be facing any charges. The police refused to allow her to do so, although to the best of my knowledge they never gave any explanation.

And then suddenly the judge changed his mind and bail was granted. Ross, he said, had a heart condition.

After his release Ross told the Myanmar Times staff that he and Tin Tun Oo had had their differences in the past, and perhaps would have more in the future, but they were looking forward to working together again. Tin Tun Oo has agreed they should work together towards getting a daily license so they can compete head-on against the New Light of Myanmar. Ross has agreed that Tin Tun Oo should get a pay rise.

It has been, Ross says, a humbling experience.