LFM News Service 10-5-18

Exports to the US worth $205.6 million
Myanmar’s exports to the United States surpassed imports from April to July of current mini-budget period (April to September), according to the data of the Ministry of Commerce, state media reported.  Read More

Myanmar's leprosy village offers outcasts a place to call home
A colony of people who fled their homes because of discrimination nestles alongside a hospital trying to eradicate the disease. But the stigma against deformity runs deep.  Read More

First Tourists Arrive on New Free-Visa System, 21 Western Countries to be Added
As an initial phase of implementing its new tourism strategy, the tourism ministry launched a free-visa system for tourists from Japan, South Korean and China’s Hong Kong and Macau on Monday. The move is likely to be followed in the coming years by the lifting of visa requirements for citizens of another 21 countries—especially western countries—in an effort to counter the fall in tourist arrivals to the country since the 2017 Rohingya crisis.  Read More

Iconic Shwedagon Pagoda gets facelift
Shwedagon Pagoda has endured the vagaries of nature and people, towering stoically over Yangon with its quiet, majestic charm despite earthquakes, cyclones, invasions, wars, foreign occupations and internal strife that struck the country since it was built hundreds of years ago.  Read More

Suu Kyi, Military Chief, EAO Leaders to Sit Down Together This Month
State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar military chief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing and selected leaders of the country’s ethnic armed organizations will meet this month to discuss ways of resolving the deadlocks that have left the peace process stalled, an official from one of the EAOs said.  Read More