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News of Burma's Monks Protests and revolution

1. Great photos here: http://mmedwatch.blogspot.com/
2. YouTube Video of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's words in 2002 (in Burmese; Highly relevant and recommended): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=coN5SR4J4AU&watch_response

Sept 27, 2007

1.   Photos show 'death' of Japanese man in Burma
2.   Telegraph:'Several dead' as Burma violence escalates
3.   Photographer killed in Burma protests
4.   China's crucial role in Burma crisis
5.   AP: Myanmar Soldiers Fire Weapons Into Crowd
6.   Myanmar forces raid monasteries, killing at least 1
7.   Bangkok Post: Burma military arrests monks in midnight raids
8.   Reuters: No outright condemnation from UN after soldiers kill monks in Burma
9.   BBC: Burma's saffron army
10. Russia warns against pressure on Myanmar


Photos show 'death' of Japanese man in Burma

By Matthew Moore
 
These extraordinary pictures from Rangoon, the Burmese capital, appear to show the death of a Japanese photographer during the regime's crackdown against pro-democracy protesters.

The first image shows a prone photographer - apparently injured - taking pictures of fleeing protesters as government troops approach.

A soldier stands over him, pointing a gun at his chest.

In the second image, apparently taken just moments later, the photographer lies flat on the floor, his mouth contorted in pain. The soldier has moved on.

The Japanese Embassy in Rangoon later announced it had been informed of the death of one of its citizens. Officials were heading to a hospital to confirm the report.

According to NHK, Japan's public broadcaster, the dead photographer had been hit by "stray bullets".

The military have fired into sections of the crowd in the city with semi-automatic weapons to disperse the demonstrations.

Troops who cleared the streets of central Rangoon told protesters they had 10 minutes to go home or be shot. Many who fled left their bloodied sandals behind.

At one monastery shots were fired in the air and tear gas was used against a crowd of about 1,500 supporters.

'Several dead' as Burma violence escalates

Exclusive report by Graeme Jenkins in Rangoon
 
Burmese troops today opened fire on pro-democracy protesters leaving several people dead, as the violent military clampdown escalates.

Photos show 'death' of Japanese man

Your view: What should the world do?

Richard Spencer: China's dilemma over Burma's protest

Reports that a Japanese photographer was one of those killed emerged after government troops warned protesters to leave the streets or face "extreme action".

Following the ultimatum, witnesses said dozens of protesters were wounded or beaten at several locations in the capital Rangoon.

The Japanese embassy was notified that a Japanese national - believed to have been a photographer - was killed in the clashes. It has sent its officials to a local hospital to confirm the report.

It is feared that the ruling junta may be deliberately targeting foreign journalists as part of a drive to keep news of the clampdown from reaching the outside world.

A British diplomat said at least four people "had been shot quite seriously" on Tarami Street in the city.

He also claimed there was evidence of "severe beating" of monks at the Ngwe Cha Yan monastery.

Large crowds had once again thronged the landmark Sule pagoda this morning, angered by a series of dawn raids on Rangoon's Buddhist monasteries.

But they were confronted by more than 200 troops who fired warning shots before marching from the pagoda shouting orders through loudspeakers.

"We will give 10 minutes," the troops shouted, according to reports. "If you fail to leave, we will take extreme action.

"Everyone on the roads and in the streets, everyone must leave immediately."

Most of the demonstrators scattered or were herded onto military trucks as troops blocked the streets beating batons against their shields.

The ultimatum came after Burmese ally China called on "all parties" to "exercise restraint... to ensure the situation does not escalate."

A Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman did not condemn the crackdown but said: "Burma's stability should not be affected, neither should peace and stability in the region."

	Shoes discarded by protesters after they were charged by troops

There were reports of shots being fired near Rangoon central railway station as well as in South Okkalapa, where tear gas was administered on crowds.

Protesters had congregated for a tenth day of action despite troops detaining around 200 monks and hundreds of their supporters this morning.

The raids targeted the most rebellious of the city's monasteries in a further attempt to quell unrest despite a worldwide diplomatic call for the state to show restraint.

Demonstrations turned ugly yesterday when police used violence to disperse thousands of monks and ordinary citizens marching together for democracy.

People in the crowd applauded when trucks carrying soldiers passed through and shouted "hero!" in mockery.

But men, women and children were sent scrambling for cover seconds later as troops responded with a long burst of automatic gunfire.

By the end of the day, two monks and a civilian were reported to have been killed and dozens injured by soldiers and armed police wielding batons and rifles.

One of the monks was beaten to death with rifle butts, witnesses said. The true death toll may be much higher.

Western leaders called for tough new sanctions on the regime to stop the bloodshed but with Burma's allies Russia and China able to veto any resolution by the United Nations Security Council, the chances of immediate action appear slim.

All day, gunfire crackled over Rangoon and tear gas hung over the city's holiest Buddhist sites. Despite the presence of soldiers outside the main monasteries, tens of thousands of monks and their supporters marched through the city. Tens of thousands more milled about on the crowded pavements offering tacit support.

Similar peaceful protests took place elsewhere in the country including Mandalay and Sittwe.

The Sule Pagoda in Rangoon, the scene of a massacre during similar demonstrations in 1988, was the main focus for yesterday's protests.

Soldiers armed with automatic weapons were lined up along the roads leading to the huge gold dome which sits at an intersection in the city centre. From a nearby rooftop long processions of protesters could be seen approaching from the north.

The red robes of the monks made a broad stripe down the middle of their mostly white-shirted supporters, walking at their side to offer symbolic protection against the bullets. Bystanders bowed down at the monks' feet.

The protesters passed under the noses of the soldiers guarding the pagoda.

A witness described how one monk stood alone in the open space before the troops and persuaded some followers to sit with him on the ground, in open contempt of the guns.

Others played cat and mouse, dashing from one side of the road to the other across the line of fire.

Later, another large group of protesters approached the pagoda from the south and advanced to within 30 yards of the soldiers.

No one here doubts that a massacre could happen at any moment. But in their anger, and their love for the monks, thousands of people have overcome all fear.

Earlier, men in police uniforms attempted to stifle the protest before it set off, as it has every day, from the Shwedagon Pagoda around noon.

As a column of monks appeared with flags, the security forces with their shields, batons and rifles moved in swiftly to set up a security cordon.

A group of women began wailing and praying. They were almost hysterical in their grief. They said they had seen two adolescent monks shot down just 20 yards away. All that could be seen at the spot were some red robes.

To the mounting distress of the women, the security forces seized a monk with a flag who was acting as a standard bearer and held him as a hostage to protect themselves from the angry crowd behind a flimsy barbed wire barricade.

Several more monks and supporters were bundled into trucks and driven away.

The women sought sanctuary inside a monastery but found that a group of soldiers appeared to have been billeted there overnight.

The men in their green overalls, standing alertly with their rifles in hand, had tears in their eyes too. Apparently they were also distressed by what had happened.

Outside, groups of monks and protesters stood beyond the security cordon singing their mantra: "We spread our love and kindness to everybody."

"Let us live and be without anger or violence," they sang on, and applause broke out.

The soldiers at the barricades levelled their rifles. Soon stones started to be thrown from the crowd at the security forces, who cocked their weapons and fixed their bayonets. Tear gas was fired and the crack of rifle fire rang out.

Like most of yesterday's shooting it appeared to have been directed into the air and the stand-off lasted for many hours. During a lull a man shouted at the troops: "We are all Buddhists! If you kill a monk you will suffer in hell!"

As loud thunder rolled around the cloudy sky, the protesters in the street and the young monks watching over the walls of their monasteries applauded.

There is no doubt that the people who braved the soldiers and their guns will be back on the streets today.

"We strive for our liberation," said one monk.

Information appearing on telegraph.co.uk is the copyright of Telegraph Media Group Limited and must not be reproduced in any medium without licence. For the full copyright statement see Copyright

Photographer killed in Burma protests

September 27, 2007 - 9:08PM

This story was found at: http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2007/09/27/1190486478760.html

Myanmar Soldiers Fire Weapons Into Crowd

Thursday, September 27, 2007

(09-27) 05:18 PDT YANGON, Myanmar (AP) --

Soldiers fired automatic weapons into a crowd of anti-government protesters Thursday as tens of thousands defied the ruling military junta's crackdown with a 10th straight day of demonstrations.

A Japanese Foreign Ministry official told The Associated Press that several people, including a Japanese national, were found dead following Thursday's protests.

The information was transmitted by Myanmar's Foreign Ministry to the Japanese Embassy in Yangon, the official said on condition of anonymity citing protocol.

The chaos came a day after the government launched a crackdown in Yangon that it said killed at least one man. Dissidents outside Myanmar reported receiving news of up to eight deaths Wednesday.

Some reports said the dead included Buddhist monks, who are widely revered in Myanmar, and the emergence of such martyrs could stoke public anger against the regime and escalate the violence.

As part of the crackdown, monasteries were raided overnight by pro-junta forces in which monks were reportedly beaten and more than 100 were arrested.

The monks have spearheaded the largest challenge to the military junta in the isolated Southeast Asian nation since a failed uprising in 1988. In that crisis, soldiers shot into crowds of peaceful demonstrators, killing some 3,000 people.

Witnesses told the AP that five men were arrested and severely beaten Thursday after soldiers fired into a crowd near a bridge across the Pazundaung River on the east side of downtown Yangon.

Shots were fired after several thousand protesters on the west side of the river ignored orders to disband.

In other parts of the city, some protesters shouted "Give us freedom, give us freedom!" at soldiers. Thousands ran through the streets after warning shots were fired into crowds that had swollen to 70,000. Bloody sandals were left lying in the road.

As the stiffest challenge to the generals in two decades, the crisis that began Aug. 19 with protests of a fuel price increase has drawn increasing international pressure on the regime, especially from its chief economic and diplomatic ally, China.

"China hopes that all parties in Myanmar exercise restraint and properly handle the current issue so as to ensure the situation there does not escalate and get complicated," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said Thursday at a twice-weekly media briefing.

European Union diplomats agreed to consider imposing more economic sanctions on Myanmar. Sanctions were first imposed in 1996 and include a ban on travel to Europe for top government officials, an assets freeze and a ban on arms sales to Myanmar.

The United States called on Myanmar's military leaders to open a dialogue with peaceful protesters and urged China to do what it can to prevent further bloodshed.

"We all need to agree on the fact that the Burmese government has got to stop thinking that this can be solved by police and military, and start thinking about the need for genuine reconciliation with the broad spectrum of political activists in the country," said U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill in Beijing.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who was sending a special envoy to the region, urged the junta "to exercise utmost restraint toward the peaceful demonstrations taking place, as such action can only undermine the prospects for peace, prosperity and stability in Myanmar."

Myanmar's state-run newspaper blamed "saboteurs inside and outside the nation" for causing the protests in Yangon, and said the demonstrations were much smaller than the media are reporting.

"Saboteurs from inside and outside the nation and some foreign radio stations, who are jealous of national peace and development, have been making instigative acts through lies to cause internal instability and civil commotion," The New Light of Myanmar, which serves as a mouthpiece for the military government said Thursday.

Also Thursday, security forces arrested Myint Thein, the spokesman for opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's political party, family members said.

Several other monasteries that are considered hotbeds of the pro-democracy movement were raided by security forces before dawn in an apparent attempt to prevent the demonstrations spearheaded by the Buddhist clergy.

A monk at Ngwe Kyar Yan monastery pointed to bloodstains on the concrete floor and said a number of monks were beaten and at least 100 of its 150 monks taken away in vehicles. Shots were fired in the air during the chaotic raid, he said on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.

"Soldiers slammed the monastery gate with the car, breaking the lock and forcing it into the monastery," the monk said. "They smashed the doors down, broke windows and furniture. When monks resisted, they shot at the monks and used tear gas and beat up the monks and dragged into trucks."

Empty bullet shells, broken doors, furniture and glass peppered the bloodstained, concrete floor of the monastery.

A female lay disciple said a number of monks also were arrested at the Moe Gaung monastery, which was being guarded by soldiers. Both monasteries are located in Yangon's northern suburbs.

Dramatic images of Wednesday's protests, many transmitted by dissidents using cell phones and the Internet, riveted world attention on the escalating faceoff between the military regime and its opponents.

Associated Press writers Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo, Jan Sliva in Brussels, Belgium, and Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations contributed to this story.

There are now more ordinary people on the streets

Burmese soldiers have again fired shots as they attempt to disperse thousands of anti-government protesters in the main city, Rangoon.

Witnesses said it was not clear whether bullets were fired into the crowd or above their heads, but at least one person has reportedly been killed.

The military has been broadcasting warnings that the protesters should go home or face "serious action".

The fresh protests follow reports of overnight raids on six monasteries.

According to witnesses soldiers smashed windows and doors and beat the sleeping monks. Some escaped but hundreds of monks were taken away in military trucks.

Two members of the National League for Democracy, the party led by pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, were also arrested overnight.

Key flashpoints in Rangoon   Enlarge Image

Around midday, thousands of people poured onto the streets of Rangoon in an apparently spontaneous show of defiance. They began singing nationalist songs and hurling abuse at the soldiers driving by in trucks.

The soldiers responded with gunfire.

"They have shot several times into the crowd," one witness told the BBC. "One person was injured... they used tear gas... Now the injured person is carried off into a car to be taken to hospital... they [the soldiers] are using force on us."

There are fewer monks on the streets - since so many were arrested - and there are large numbers of ordinary people instead, reports the BBC's Chris Hogg in Bangkok.

The junta are using dirty tactics - they don't fire guns but beat people with rifle butts   BBC News website reader   Accounts from Burma Protests in pictures British money in Burma

It means the military may have fewer qualms about firing on the crowd, he reports. Monks are held in high esteem in Buddhist Burma.

The British embassy has told the BBC that four people were shot in the north of Rangoon. Four army vehicles were surrounded and the soldiers opened fire in response, the embassy said. Earlier reports said the victims had been killed, but the embassy later said their condition was not known.

The Japanese news agency Kyodo is reporting that the Burmese government has told Japan's embassy in Rangoon that a Japanese photographer has been killed.

A hotel in which foreign journalists have been staying in Rangoon has been surrounded and ransacked, our correspondent reports.

Security forces have set up barbed wire barricades around Shwedagon Pagoda and Rangoon city hall, two of the focal points for the demonstrations.

The British ambassador in Rangoon, Mark Canning, said soldiers and police had stepped up their presence.

"There are truckloads of troops in a number of locations - more than there seemed to be yesterday," he told the BBC.

"There are fire trucks, water cannons positioned in a number of places - there are about three of them outside city hall. There are a number of prison vans also to be seen in certain places."

Leaflets have been circulated throughout Rangoon urging people to come out and show solidarity with the monks.

On Wednesday, five people were reported to have been killed when police broke up protests. The military government has confirmed one death.

UN debate

There are no indications yet that the military government is ready to listen to the many calls for restraint being made around the world, says the BBC's South East Asia correspondent Jonathan Head.

On Wednesday, the UN Security Council held an emergency meeting in New York and called on the military junta to show restraint - a call also made by China on Thursday.

The US and the European Union wanted the council to consider imposing sanctions - but that was rejected by China as not "helpful".

China's crucial role in crisis Burma's shadowy leaders Burma's saffron army

Instead, Council members "expressed their concern vis-a-vis the situation, and have urged restraint, especially from the government of Myanmar," said France's UN ambassador Jean-Maurice Ripert.

They welcomed a plan to send UN special envoy Ibrahim Gambari to the region, and called on the Burmese authorities to receive him "as soon as possible".

China and Russia have argued that the situation in Burma is a purely internal matter. Both vetoed a UN resolution critical of Burma's rulers in January.

Analysts fear a repeat of the violence in 1988, when troops opened fire on unarmed protesters, killing thousands.

The protests were triggered by the government's decision to double the price of fuel last month, hitting people hard in the impoverished nation.

Attacks on the monks by security forces have inflamed public anger

This year's session of the UN General Assembly has been overshadowed by the worsening political crisis in Burma.

It figured prominently in the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's opening speech.

US President George Bush announced a tightening of US economic sanctions and a ministerial meeting involving the Americans and the 27 European Union countries called for UN Security Council action.

An informal gathering of the Security Council ensued.

It heard a briefing on the crisis from Ban Ki-moon's special representative or envoy, Ibrahim Gambari, just before he left for the region, urgently despatched by the secretary general, in the hope that he can get into Burma and speak to all sides.

But apart from registering concern and displeasure it is hard to see what practical impact these steps will have.

Chinese influence

The US and the EU have long imposed a variety of sanctions against Burma's military regime but, paradoxically, this means that they have relatively few levers to pull to influence Rangoon.

The countries that matter more to Burma are India and Russia; both of whom have trading relations with the military regime.

Russia even plans to sell Burma a nuclear research reactor.

But it is Burma's biggest neighbour, China, that plays the most crucial role, and as a permanent member of the UN Security Council it can help to limit the relative isolation that the Rangoon regime faces.

China's UN ambassador said sanctions would not be helpful

Both China and Russia, for that matter, vetoed a UN Security Council resolution last January that was critical of Burma's rulers.

China has key strategic interests in the stability of Burma and accordingly strong ties with Rangoon.

This has prompted the Indian government to seek stronger ties of its own with Burma's military regime in order to counter-balance China's growing influence.

Energy resources

It is Burma's energy resources - oil and off-shore gas fields - that make it such an attractive partner for Russian, Chinese, Indian and even South Korean firms.

The scramble for Burma's energy resources make it almost impossible to isolate the regime.

Indeed, over time, as US and European ties to Burma have declined, those of China, Russia and India have increased.

China, then, is very much the key player; but Beijing faces conflicting pressures.

It has to match its energy and strategic interests - access to the Indian Ocean for example - with its desire for stability and its concern for its own reputation abroad, especially with the Beijing Olympics fast approaching.

Wednesday's informal Security Council meeting served in part to gauge the Beijing government's current position.

China's UN ambassador, Wang Guangya, reaffirmed China's predictable position that this crisis was not a threat to international peace and that sanctions would not be helpful.

Held accountable

Formal action is one thing. But might China's concern with regional stability encourage Beijing to whisper some tough words in the Burmese leadership's ear?

That is clearly what Western diplomats are hoping for.

In the short-term, sanctions may not have a great impact on Burma's rulers.

But efforts are underway to impress upon them that there could be long-term consequences if the crisis spirals out of control.

The British ambassador to the UN, John Sawers, echoing a comment from the British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, issued a blunt warning to Burma's generals, noting, as he put it, that "the age of impunity is dead".

This is an explicit threat to the country's military rulers that they will ultimately be held accountable for their actions.

Myanmar forces raid monasteries, killing at least 1

Myanmar security forces raided two Buddhist monasteries Thursday, beating up and hauling away more than 70 monks after a day of violent confrontation with monk-led protesters that drew international appeals for restraint.

The security forces in the isolated Southeast Asian nation fired at protesters for the first time Wednesday in street protests that have brewed over the past month into the biggest rallies against Myanmar's military rulers since 1988. At least one man was killed and others wounded in chaotic clashes in Yangon.

The protesters, led by thousands of monks in cinnamon robes, have been demanding more democratic freedoms, the release of political activists and economic reforms in the impoverished nation.

Early Thursday, security forces arrested Myint Thein, the spokesman for opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's political party, family members said. An executive of her National League for Democracy, Hla Pe, was also arrested, according to exiled league member Ko Maung Maung.

An Asian diplomat who spoke on condition of anonymity told The Associated Press on Thursday that Nobel Peace Prize laureate Suu Kyi remained at her Yangon residence where she has been detained for 12 years.

Rumors had circulated that she had been taken away to Yangon's notorious Insein prison.

The diplomat said that junta had deployed more security forces around Suu Kyi's house and on the road leading to her residential compound and that more than 100 soldiers were now inside the compound.

"The sign of increasing security forces make me confident that she is still there," the diplomat said. He said others told him that they had seen the diminutive opposition leader in her home Wednesday night.

The diplomat also said flyers were spreading around the nation's largest city of Yangon on Thursday, encouraging more civilians to join the protests.

Several monasteries that are considered hotbeds of the pro-democracy movement were raided by security forces before dawn in an apparent attempt to prevent the demonstrations spearheaded by the Buddhist clergy.

A monk at the Ngwe Kyar Yan monastery, pointing to bloodstains on the concrete floor, said a number of monks were beaten and at least 70 of its 150 monks taken away in vehicles. Shots were fired in the air during the chaotic raid, he said on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.

A female lay disciple said a number of monks were also arrested at the Moe Gaung monastery which was being guarded by soldiers. Both monasteries are located in Yangon's northern suburbs.

Dramatic images of Wednesday's protests, many transmitted by dissidents using cell phones and the Internet, riveted world attention on the escalating faceoff between the military regime and its opponents.

The United States called on Myanmar's military leaders Thursday to open a dialogue with peaceful protesters in the reclusive Asian nation and urged China to do what it can to prevent further bloodshed.

"We all need to agree on the fact that the Burmese government has got to stop thinking that this can be solved by police and military, and start thinking about the need for genuine reconciliation with the broad spectrum of political activists in the country," said US Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill in Beijing.

On Wednesday, protesters in Yangon, Myanmar's biggest city, pelted police with bottles and rocks. Onlookers helped monks escape arrest by bundling them into taxis and other vehicles and shouting "Go, go, go, run!"

The government said one man was killed when police opened fire during the ninth consecutive day of demonstrations, but dissidents outside Myanmar reported receiving news of up to eight deaths.

Some reports said the dead included monks, who are widely revered in Myanmar, and the emergence of such martyr figures could stoke public anger against the regime and escalate the violence.

As the stiffest challenge to the generals in two decades, the crisis that began Aug. 19 with protests over a fuel price hike has drawn increasing international pressure on the isolated regime.

The United States and the European Union issued a joint statement decrying the assault on peaceful demonstrators and calling on the junta to open talks with democracy activists, including Suu Kyi.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who was sending a special envoy to the region, urged the junta "to exercise utmost restraint toward the peaceful demonstrations taking place, as such action can only undermine the prospects for peace, prosperity and stability in Myanmar."

Myanmar's government said security forces fired Wednesday when a crowd that included what it called "so-called monks" refused to disperse at the Sule Pagoda and tried to grab weapons from officers. It said police used "minimum force."

The junta statement said a 30-year-old man was killed by a police bullet. It said two men and a woman also were hurt when police fired, but did not specify their injuries.

Exiled Myanmar journalists and democracy activists released reports of higher death tolls, but the accounts could not be independently confirmed.

The protests are the biggest challenge to the junta since a failed 1988 democracy uprising. In that crisis, soldiers shot into crowds of peaceful demonstrators, killing some 3,000 people.

Burma military arrests monks in midnight raids
Yangon - Burma's military regime rounded up more than a hundred monks in raids of Yangon temples after midnight and stationed hundreds of troops at key sites in the former capital in preparation for more protests Thursday.

Informed sources said authorities raided several temples early Thursday morning and rounded up an unknown number of monks in an effort to prevent more protest marches on Thursday.

Barricades and troops were in place Thursday morning at key sites in Rangoon, including the Shwedagon and Sule pagodas and Bogyoke Street, the main rallying spots for the past nine days of monk-led protests in the city.

The military finally cracked down on the monks' barefoot rebellion on Wednesday, beating back monks and their laymen followers from the Shwedagon and Sule pagoda and firing warning shots at the crowds, numbering in the thousands.

The government has claimed that only one person died in the melee and two were injured. Other sources said as many as five died, including monks, and more than 100 were injured.

It was still unclear Thursday morning whether the monks would take to the streets for a tenth day. Past protests have started about noon, after the monks have taken food and started their midday fast.

There have been reports of similar monk-led protests taking place in other Burma cities such as Mandalay and Sittwe.

Burma's monks, said to number 400,000, have a long history of political activism. The monkhood played a pivotal role in Burma's independence struggle from Great Britain in 1947 and the anti-military demonstrations of 1988, that ended in bloodshed. (dpa)

No outright condemnation from UN after soldiers kill monks in Burma

THE UN Security Council last night pressed Burma's leaders to permit a special UN envoy to visit the south-east Asian country as they urged "utmost restraint" be shown towards peaceful protesters.

The divided 15-member body stopped short of issuing a formal statement of condemnation as the United States and European Union did earlier yesterday.

The US and the 27 member states of the EU want the council to consider sanctions and demanded that the junta open a dialogue with the jailed opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and ethnic minorities.

China and Russia, which have friendly relations with the Burmese authorities, have so far blocked any UN sanctions.

Last night, China made its opposition clear. "We believe that sanctions are not helpful for the situation," Wang Guangya, its UN ambassador said after the emergency council meeting.

The council have proposed sending the UN under-secretary-general, Ibrahim Gambari, to Burma. Speaking after the meeting, France's ambassador, Jean- Maurice Ripert, this month's council president, said the council underlined "the importance that Mr Gambari be received in Burma as soon as possible".

Seething crowds of Buddhist monks and civilians filled the streets of Burma's main city of Rangoon yesterday, defying warning shots, tear gas and baton charges meant to quell the biggest anti-junta protests in 20 years. At least two monks and a civilian were killed, hospital and monastery sources said, as decades of pent-up frustration at 45 years of unbroken military rule produced the largest crowds yet during a month of protests.

Some witnesses estimated 100,000 people took to the streets despite fears of a repeat of the ruthless suppression of Burma's last major uprising in 1988, when soldiers opened fire, killing an estimated 3,000 people.

"They are marching down the streets, with the monks in the middle and ordinary people either side. They are shielding them, forming a human chain," one witness said over almost deafening roars of anger at security forces.

Other protesters carried flags emblazoned with the fighting peacock, a key symbol of the democracy movement in Burma. As darkness fell, however, people dispersed ahead of a dusk-to-dawn curfew. The streets were almost deserted.

The demonstrations started on 19 August after the government raised fuel prices in one of Asia's poorest countries. But they are based in deep-rooted dissatisfaction with the repressive military rule that has gripped the country since 1962.

Zalmay Khalilzad, the US ambassador, said it was vital that Mr Gambari, who is flying to the region shortly, be admitted immediately. "It is very important that this be done on an urgent basis," Mr Khalilzad said. "It would not be good for Mr Gambari to visit grave sites after many more Burmese have been killed."

Voices from the frontline - the Burmese blogs

THERE are a lot of people in the emergency ward in the hospital and people are dying there. One witness told me that there were three monks that were brought in by a taxi driver and one of the monks died at the table.

Thian, Rangoon

AT ABOUT 10 o'clock the riot police blocked the road, but the monks pushed through the blockade and climbed the Shwedagon pagoda from the eastern side. After eating there, they came down in a line. At that point they were rounded up and charged with batons by the police. The monks responded merely by reciting prayers. People fled from the scene and it was mainly women who were targeted and beaten. The mob was dispersed and some people were arrested. Near the eastern stairway, tear gas was used to disperse the crowd. The monks - together with monks from Thingangyun - are said to march towards downtown. About 30 monks were badly hurt and hospitalised.

Anonymous eyewitness, Rangoon

ONE of the soldiers was shooting into the crowd near by the Sualae Pagoda. People can see that the solider is not a professional, because so many of his bullets went up into the sky, and also into the restaurant and a man was hit.

Ko-htike, Rangoon

I JUST talked to my sister, who lives in Rangoon. She knows someone at the local hospital in Rangoon. They have been treating three monks, who were taken to the hospital by taxi drivers. The monks had been beaten up with the back of rifles. One monk had a deep wound exposing his brain, and he has already died. The other two are being treated under intensive care. Many more people died today, but there is no information about it. Many taxi drivers who are at the site of the violence take injured monks to nearest hospitals. The junta are using dirty tactics - they don't fire guns, but beat people with the back of their rifles. The monks defiantly did not fight back, endured the pain and died.

Sanda, Stocksund, Sweden

POLICE were beating monks and nuns in Shwedagon Pagoda this morning and then putting them on to trucks. There were two prison vans and two fire engines. More army and police forces are in Kandawgyi park near Shwedagon Pagoda. People have been waiting at Sule Pagoda since early in the morning, and there are six army trucks near the City Hall, but I haven't seen any soldiers. The uniformed and plain-clothes police in front of the City Hall hold photos of monks leading the protests. We heard that over 50 monks and many students were arrested.

Cherry, Rangoon

ONE of the monks who took part in the protests came to us and told us about his experiences. He said: "We are not afraid, we haven't committed a crime, we just say prayers and take part in the protests. We haven't accepted money from onlookers although they offered us a lot. We just accept water. People clapped, smiled and cheered us." The monk seemed very happy, excited and proud. But I'm worried for them. They care for us and we pray for them not to get harmed.

Mya, Rangoon

NOW the military junta is reducing the internet connection bandwidth and we have to wait for a long time to see a page. Security forces block the route of demonstrations. Yesterday night, the junta announced to people in Rangoon and Mandalay not to leave their houses 9pm to 5am. I think the junta will cut off communication such as internet and telephone lines so that no information can be leaked to the outside world.

David, Rangoon

RIOT police and soldiers are beating monks and other protesters at the east gate of Shwedagon Pagoda. They are starting a crackdown by all means. Police forces are stationed at Sule Pagoda as well. Regardless of this, just after noon, about 1,000 monks from a nearby monastery started a march to the Shwedagon Pagoda.

Thila, Rangoon

BRUTAL REGIME LIVING A FANTASY IN THEIR MAKE-BELIEVE CAPITAL

MOST members of the Burmese junta are believed to be holed up in the country's new capital, Naypyidaw, 200 miles north of Rangoon.

The junta - headed by General Than Shwe - is made up mostly of unsophisticated former field commanders suspicious of the outside world, of each other and of well-educated Burmese like their pro-democracy leader, Aung San Suu Kyi. The government has kept her under house arrest for 12 of the past 18 years.

"They are extremely hunkered-down, delusional, paranoid and probably afraid at the moment about what could possibly happen," said David Mathieson, an expert on Burma with Human Rights Watch.

In November 2005 they relocated the capital to Naypyidaw, a city constructed specially for the purpose. The move appeared to be defensive - an effort to protect the junta from a hostile population and world.

"It is a fantasy land of male military vanity, the embodiment of their own delusions of grandeur," Mathieson said of the new capital. It is a wasteland of broad, empty avenues, monumental buildings, military installations and at least one golf course.

The junta heads a military establishment estimated to have more than 400,000 troops in uniform, and it holds to the tenet that only the military can bind the country together and develop its economy.

By Sarah Buckley BBC News

 

Sept: 26

Latest protest's photos posted here: http://www.moemaka.com/
BBC Videos of the protests: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7011884.stm

Daly Telegraph: Monks injured after beating from Burma troops
BBC: Burmese riot police attack monks
AP: Buddhist Monks Defy Assembly Ban
NY Times: Police Clash with Monks in Myanmar
Reuters: Myanmar troops fire shots to disperse crowds
Mercury News: Burma cops fire warning shots, fail to quell protest
Globe Wire Services: Soldiers arrest monks attempting to march at shrine
BBC: Chinese dilemma over Burma protests
AP: China Nudges Myanmar on Protests

 

Police wielding high-velocity rifles have been deploying in Rangoon

Several thousand Burmese monks and other protesters have begun new marches in Rangoon despite a bloody crackdown by police at the city's holiest shrine.

Police beat and arrested demonstrators at Shwedagon Pagoda and warning shots were fired at another site as a ninth day of marching got under way.

One march started for the city centre while another headed for the home of opposition head Aung San Suu Kyi.

Police and troops are surrounding key Buddhist sites around the city.

The riot police started to beat up the monks   unidentified monk speaking at Shwedagon Pagoda

Analysts fear a repeat of the violence in 1988, when troops opened fire on unarmed protesters, killing thousands.

In a further sign that the military authorities are cracking down, two key dissidents were arrested late on Tuesday night.

The atmosphere in Rangoon is described by witnesses as extremely tense, the BBC's Jonathan Head reports from Bangkok.

The mood among the crowds of bystanders is becoming very angry over the treatment of the monks, our South East Asia correspondent reports.

'Covered in blood'

Several thousand monks headed for central Rangoon, some of them wearing surgical masks in anticipation of the security forces using tear gas.

KEY PROTEST SITES 1. Shwedagon pagoda. Holiest site in Rangoon 2. Sule pagoda. Downtown focal point for marches

Defying a ban on all public gatherings of more than five people, they were cheered and applauded by thousands of bystanders.

Earlier, at Shwedagon Pagoda, riot police beat their shields with their batons and yelled at protesters before charging the crowd.

A number of the monks and nuns were left covered in blood and appeared to be seriously injured, and some shots were also heard, witnesses say.

"The riot police started to beat up the monks," one monk at Shwedagon Pagoda told the BBC.

"We were peacefully chanting prayers. They used tear gas and some monks were hit. Some monks were injured."

Demonstrators were dragged away in trucks as dozens were arrested.

At the Sule Pagoda, security forces fired shots over the heads of protesters as supporters of the monks there chanted "You are fools!"

Two of the country's most prominent dissidents, U Win Naing and popular comedian Zaganar, were arrested overnight.

'Different situation'

Aung Naing Oo, a former student leader in Burma who was involved in the 1988 uprising and who now lives in exile in the UK, believes the junta cannot stop the 2007 protesters.

"Nobody knew what was happening in 1988," he told the Today programme on BBC Radio Four.

"There was only very little information about the killings. Now with the internet and the whole world watching I think its a totally different story now and I think the other important difference is that in 1988 it was the students that were leading the demonstrations, but now it is the monks. Monks are highly revered in the country."

The junta broke its silence over the mounting protests late on Monday, saying it was ready to "take action".

US President George W Bush has announced a tightening of existing US economic sanctions against it.

America already has an arms ban on Burma, a ban on all exports, a ban on new investment and a ban on financial services.

The protests were triggered by the government's decision to double the price of fuel last month, hitting people hard in the impoverished nation.

Buddhist Monks Defy Assembly Ban

Wednesday, September 26, 2007

(09-26) 01:48 PDT YANGON, Myanmar (AP) --

Security forces fired warning shots and tear gas canisters while hauling Buddhist monks away in trucks Wednesday as they tried to stop anti-government demonstrations in defiance of a ban on assembly.

About 300 monks and activists were arrested across Yangon, according to an exile dissident group, and reporters saw a number of monks — who are highly revered in Myanmar — being dragged into trucks.

The junta had banned all public gatherings of more than five people and imposed a nighttime curfew following eight days of anti-government marches led by monks in Yangon and other areas of the country, including the biggest protests in nearly two decades.

A march toward the center of Yangon followed a tense confrontation at the city's famed Shwedagon Pagoda between the protesters and riot police who fired warning shots into the air, beat some monks and dragged others away into waiting trucks.

The latest developments could further alienate already isolated Myanmar from the international community and put pressure on China, Myanmar's top economic and diplomatic supporter, which is keen to burnish its international image before next year's Olympics in Beijing.

But if the junta backs down, it risks appearing weak and emboldening protesters, which could escalate the tension.

When faced with a similar crisis in 1988, the government harshly put down a student-led democracy uprising. Security forces fired into crowds of peaceful demonstrators and killed thousands, traumatizing the nation.

The potential for a violent crackdown already had aroused international concern, with pleas for the junta to deal peacefully with the situation coming from government and religious leaders worldwide. They included the Dalai Lama and South Africa's Archbishop Desmond Tutu, both Nobel Peace Prize laureates like detained Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

On Wednesday, about 5,000 monks and 5,000 students along with members of the party headed by detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi set off from Shwedagon to the Sule Pagoda in the heart of Myanmar's largest city but were blocked by military trucks along the route.

Other protesters at the Sule Pagoda were confronted by warning shots.

Some carried flags emblazoned with the fighting peacock, a key symbol of the democracy movement in Myanmar. The march proceeded quietly with protesters praying rather than chanting.

About 100 monks stayed behind at the eastern gate of the Shwedagon, refusing to obey orders to disperse after riot police there failed to dislodge them despite employing tear gas, batons and warning shots.

Witnesses said an angry mob at the pagoda burned two police motorcycles.

A branch of Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy exiled in Thailand said the arrests in Yangon numbered 300, most of them in a western suburb of the city. The number could not be independently confirmed.

In Myanmar's second largest city of Mandalay, more than 100 soldiers armed with assault rifles deployed around the Mahamuni Paya Pagoda

"We are so afraid; the soldiers are ready to fire on civilians at any time," a man near the pagoda said, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.

Authorities announced the ban on gatherings and a 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. curfew through loudspeakers on vehicles cruising the streets of Yangon and Mandalay Tuesday. The announcement said the measures would be in effect for 60 days.

Myanmar's imposition of new restrictions after a week of relative inaction by the military government throws down a challenge to its opponents, testing their mettle when faced with almost certain arrest.

It was not clear what the penalty for defying the curfew would be. But breaking the section of the law restricting gatherings carries a possible jail term of two years.

A comedian famed for his anti-government jibes became the first well-known activist rounded up after the curfew was imposed.

Zarganar, who uses only one name, was taken away from his home by authorities shortly after midnight, with family members saying authorities told them the 45-year-old had been "called in for temporary questioning."

Zarganar, along with actor Kyaw Thu and poet Aung Way, led a committee that provided food and other necessities to the Buddhist monks who have spearheaded the protests. He earlier had been imprisoned twice and his comedy routines were banned for their satirical jokes about the regime.

The fates of the actor and poet were not immediately known.

President Bush on Tuesday announced new U.S. sanctions against Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, accusing the military dictatorship of imposing "a 19-year reign of fear" that denies basic freedoms of speech, assembly and worship.

"Americans are outraged by the situation in Burma," Bush said in an address to the U.N. General Assembly in New York.

Bush said the U.S. would tighten economic sanctions on leaders of the regime and their financial backers, and impose an expanded visa ban on those responsible for human rights violations and their families.

The European Union also threatened to strengthen existing sanctions against the regime if it uses violence to put down the demonstrations.

The protests could bring increased scrutiny on China's close relations with Myanmar. China is the country's major trading partner and Chinese energy companies are investing in exploration of natural gas in Myanmar.

Myanmar has about 19 trillion cubic feet of proven natural gas reserves, only about 0.3 percent of the world's total reserves, according to BP's Statistical Review of World Energy at the end of 2006. Although it doesn't currently export gas to China, its supply could potentially help feed a rapidly growing Chinese economy hungry for energy.

The current protests began Aug. 19 after the government hiked fuel prices in one of Asia's poorest countries. But they are based in deep-rooted dissatisfaction with the repressive military rule that has gripped the country since 1962.

The protests were faltering when the monks took the lead last week, assuming the role of a moral conscience they played in previous struggles against British colonialism and military dictators.

At least 35,000 Buddhist monks and sympathizers defied official warnings Tuesday and staged another anti-government march.

"The protest is not merely for the well-being of people but also for monks struggling for democracy and for people to have an opportunity to determine their own future," one monk told The Associated Press. "People do not tolerate the military government any longer." He spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of official reprisals.

On Monday, a massive monk-led protest drew as many as 100,000 people in Yangon — the biggest street protest since the failed 1988 uprising.

The head of the country's official Buddhist organization, or Sangha, issued a directive Monday ordering monks to stick to learning and propagating the faith, saying young monks were being "compelled by a group of destructive elements within and without to break the law," the state-run New Light of Myanmar newspaper said.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2007/09/25/international/i234258D01.DTL

Sept: 25

NY Times: Bush Announces Tighter Sanctions on Myanmar
Guardian Unlimited: Brown calls for immediate action on Burma
Voa: Thousands of Burmese Monks Resume Protests in Defiance of Government Warnings
Daly Telegraph: Burma's generals threaten protest clampdown
The Age: Burma monks defy threats from military
Herald Sun: Monks chant outside UN offices
The Sun: Riot fears at Burma march
Bangkok Post: Monks fear crackdown
AFP: Yangon bloggers outsmart Myanmar censors
Asia Sentinel: Burma’s Monks versus the Military
BBC Q&A: Protests in Burma

Buddhist monks and civilians march through the Burmese capital in the biggest challenge to Burma's military rule in nearly two decades

Bush Announces Tighter Sanctions on Myanmar

By CHRISTINE HAUSER

NEW YORK, Sept. 25 — President Bush announced today that the United States was taking a series of steps to tighten economic sanctions on Myanmar's leaders and their backers and would impose a visa ban on the leaders and their families.

Mr. Bush, who has spoken out frequently on Myanmar, was addressing the opening day of the United Nations General Assembly here in New York. His remarks coincided with the eighth day of peaceful antigovernment protests in Myanmar, led by Buddhist monks in the main city of Yangon and in other cities.

"Americans are outraged by the situation in Burma where a military junta has imposed a 19-year reign of fear," said Mr. Bush, using the former name of the country.

The protests in Myanmar are taking place under the shadow of the possibility of a violent crackdown. In 1988, some 3,000 people were killed when the military crushed larger pro-democracy protests. Although some reports have said that truckloads of soldiers moved into position at one point during the protests in Yangon today, the day's protests have dispersed without incident.

Since 1988, Myanmar has become the focus of international condemnation for its abuses of human and political rights and its treatment of the pro-democracy leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been under house arrest in Yangon for 12 of the past 18 years.

The United States has pressed for the release of Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi. Myanmar's leaders, Mr. Bush said today, are "holding more than a thousand political prisoners", including Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi, whose party had been elected overwhelmingly.

"The people's desire to freedom is unmistakable," Mr. Bush said.

"This morning I am announcing a series of steps to help bring peaceful change to Burma," he said. "The United States will tighten economic sanctions on the leaders of the regime and their financial backers," he said. "We will impose and expand a visa ban on those responsible for the most egregious violations of human rights, as well as their family members."

Mr. Bush said that the United States would also work to support humanitarian groups working to alleviate suffering there, and he urged other countries to use diplomatic and economic leverage to help Myanmar's people "reclaim their freedom."

Mr. Bush, who made human rights a focal point of his speech that ranged from criticisms of Zimbabwe, Cuba, Sudan, pointed out what he described as a lack of basic freedoms in Myanmar, including the freedom to speak, assemble and worship.

His speech did not mention the range of looming issues that have preoccupied his administration recently, and which have been the subject of some of his recent statements, such as the conflict in Iraq and the nuclear weapons program that his administration says Iran is developing.

Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad , is due to speak at the United Nations later today.

According to news reports from inside Myanmar, which is mostly sealed off to foreign reporters, about 4,000 monks gathered today, cheered on by several thousand supporters. A smaller number were reported marching in the country's second largest city, Mandalay.

The country's rulers have been coming under increasing pressure from the United States, which has imposed sanctions on Myanmar for years, including a ban on all Burmese products.

Brown calls for immediate action on Burma

Deborah Summers and Hélène Mulholland
Tuesday September 25, 2007
Guardian Unlimited

 

Thousands of Burmese Monks Resume Protests in Defiance of Government Warnings

Ramirez report (MP3) - Download 656K
Listen to Ramirez report (MP3)

Thousands of monks and other protesters have been marching again in Burma, despite warnings from the military government for them to stop their weeklong peaceful demonstrations. VOA's Luis Ramirez reports from our Southeast Asia bureau in Bangkok.
 

Buddhist monks gather and pray at Shwedagon pagoda before taking the street in a march protesting against the military government in Rangoon, Burma, 25 Sep 2007

Soldiers took up positions around Rangoon's Shwedagon Pagoda, a Buddhist shrine that has become the focal point of the demonstrations.  

Witnesses say thousands of monks marched through Rangoon for an eighth day Tuesday, joined by thousands of supporters. Marches were reported in other cities also.

The state media have warned people to end the protests or face possible military action.

Some rights activists say the military government may see itself as having no choice but to crack down on the demonstrators. Debbie Stothard is with the ALTSEAN Regional Human Rights Network in Bangkok.

"If they allow the protests to continue, even under controlled circumstances, it will actually help build momentum in the movement and embolden more and more people to come out and stand for their rights," Stothard said. "If they crack down harshly on the monks, there will be such a public backlash that they will have their backs to the wall."

The government has refused to negotiate or bow to the demands of the monks, who want an apology for the beating and arrest of several monks at a protest three weeks ago. They also want the junta to roll back the steep fuel price increases that touched off the demonstrations in the first place, and for the government to release political prisoners.

Stothard says the demonstrations have persisted and spread in part because of new technologies - such as camera phones and Web-casting - to relay news.

"We actually are seeing an unprecedented wave of media technology being used in Burma and we're seeing this not just in Rangoon but also in Mandalay, in other parts, other states and divisions in Burma," she said. "So, the eyes of the international community are firmly on Burma but this information is also being broadcast back into Burma to the general population through radio services such as the Voice of America and other radio stations and that has actually helped the people of Burma to be better informed."

International pressure is mounting on Burma's government, considered one of the most repressive in the world. The United States has called on the government to exercise restraint in the face of the protests and to release those who have been imprisoned for peacefully expressing their views.

President Bush is going to announce new sanctions against Burma when he speaks at the U.N. General Assembly. Officials say the new measures will include a ban on U.S. visas for key Burmese officials and their families.

The U.N. secretary-general on Monday urged the junta to continue to exercise restraint. He said he hopes the Burmese leaders will seize this opportunity to engage in dialogue.

On Tuesday, the Chinese government, which has long been an ally of Burma, called for stability and economic development in the country.

Burma's generals threaten protest clampdown

Thousands of Burmese monks and civilians today ignored threats from the country's military regime by taking part in another day of street protests.

Burma protests: Q&A

In pictures: Monks and civilians protest in Rangoon

Audio: Why Burma's monks are taking to the streets

Burma's rulers had threatened to act against the monks behind the week-long pro-democracy demonstration, but at least 10,000 people could be seen marching through the capital Rangoon this morning.

Numbers are expected to swell later.

Yesterday, Burmese civilians joined the monks en masse and up to 100,000 people thronged the streets of the capital, one of world's most repressed cities.

The protest now represents the biggest challenge to the dictatorship in 20 years and looks set to come to a head soon, with the world waiting to see how the regime will respond.

US President George W Bush is expected to ratchet up the pressure by announcing new visa restrictions and financial sanctions against the regime and its financial backers.

Today military trucks were seen touring the capital, their attached loudspeakers blaring warnings to those thinking of joining the demonstration.

No specific threats were made, but the military junta has a recorded of crushing dissent with violence.

"People are not to follow, encourage or take part in these marches. Action will be taken against those who violate this order," the loudspeakers blared.

Last night Brigadier General Thura Myint Maung, minister for religious affairs, told state-owned radio that "actions will be taken against the monks' protest marches according to the law if they cannot be stopped by religious teachings."

The minister blamed the protests on "destructive elements who do not want to see peace, stability and progress in the country."

Yesterday's march began in saturating humidity and continued through torrential rain.

Many people closed their umbrellas in solidarity with the drenched monks leading them and walked through the streets of Rangoon in high spirits with their clothes stuck to their skin.

Onlookers waved from the balconies of the dilapidated and mossy colonial buildings. Facing further protests, the military junta at last broke its silence, threatening to "take action" against the monks.

Chanting Buddhist mantras for peace and love as they went, they were clapped and cheered every step of the way between the city's three holiest pagodas.

It is a sanction equivalent to ex-communication. Fears grew that a brutal clampdown is imminent.

"I'm very afraid that they will kill these people," said one old man who had joined the protest.

"The monks are our light. I am very afraid that they will kill the monks."

The last time Burma rose against its tyrants, in 1988, the monks were in the vanguard.

The generals crushed their protest, shooting an estimated 3,000 people dead. As the junta threatened 'action', rumours swirled that a crackdown is imminent.

According to a previously unknown group representing doctors, the regime has cleared space in the Rangoon General Hospital for casualties.

At the rundown hospital, the Daily Telegraph found only 10 per cent occupancy on several wards but there was no security presence and a nurse claimed that there were simply no patients.

Large bodies of troops are out of sight in city centre garrisons and there are greater than usual numbers posted on the outskirts.

Space has been cleared at Rangoon's notorious Insein Jail, where a new wing also lies vacant.

Another rumour speaks eloquently of the people's view of their rulers.

According to this account, the municipal government has placed a large order for insecticide to use against the protestors.

Yet on Rangoon's handsome colonial streets there was not a security man in sight, much less a menacing tank to warn off crowds.

Until the junta gave its warning, state news organisations had topped their agenda with news of the national women's football team and a report on a committee that designs traffic regulations.

Rangoon is not the only city rising up. In Mandalay, the heart of Burmese Buddhism, 15,000 monks and an unknown number of laymen marched.

There were also demonstrations in at least seven other towns.

Little is known about the Buddhist Monks' Alliance, a previously unknown group which claims to lead the phase of protests that erupted a week ago.

Earlier, smaller, protests that started following huge fuel price rises last month were led by the secular "88 Generation" opposition group.
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Most of them are now in jail or on the run.

"The second wave, started by the monks, has caught everyone off guard," one foreign analyst said.

There are 400,000 monks in Burma, although it is principally younger and junior figures who have joined the movement so far.

Their protests begin every afternoon from Rangoon's greatest shrine, the huge gold-plated Shwedagon Pagoda, which towers above a forest of ornate spires.

Their slogans are religious mantras.

"We meet hate head-on with love," they chant, and, "We send our love to all the people in the world. We should not kill each other."

Yesterday the monks received messages of support worldwide.

At the Labour Party conference in Bournemouth, Gordon Brown said: "A message should go out to anyone facing persecution, anywhere from Burma and Zimbabwe: human rights are universal and no injustice can last forever."

The White House urged Burma's military rulers to show "restraint" in dealing with mass protests and said it hoped for dialogue between the regime and the demonstrators.

Mark Canning, Britain's ambassador to Burma, said: "The chance is on balance some sort of violent reaction, which will make things much worse, but we hope that doesn't happen."

"The government has behaved with commendable restraint so far, they obviously realise the sensitivity of the situation and realise violence would make things much worse."

As the procession wound through Rangoon, it met supporters waiting on crowded pavements.

And on either side of the monks' column stood a crocodile of supporters holding hands, offering symbolic protection against whatever might come next.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Burma monks defy threats from military
The Age

A sea of 100,000 people have marched in Burma for a second straight day, defying the junta's warnings that force could be used to end the biggest anti-government protests in 20 years.

Some 30,000 monks again took to the streets of Burma's main city Rangoon, their leaders chanting "democracy, democracy".

About 70,000 supporters joined them, despite warnings from the military regime that force could be used to end the long-running protest campaign.

In a gesture of defiance, some waved the bright red fighting peacock flag - the emblem of the student unions that spearheaded a mass uprising in 1988. That rebellion was eventually crushed by the army with the loss of an estimated 3,000 lives.

In an ominous reminder of what was a watershed moment in Burma's history, vehicles mounted with loudspeakers toured the city early on Tuesday, blaring out warnings of action under a law allowing the use of military force to break up illegal protests.

"People are not to follow, encourage or take part in these marches. Action will be taken against those who violate this order," the broadcasts said.

The warnings also accused factions within the deeply revered Buddhist monkhood of instigating protest marches "with intent to incite unrest".

But no security forces were visible despite the stiff warnings.

During Tuesday's rally, thousands of monks, cheered on by supporters, marched out from the city's soaring Shwedagon Pagoda - Burma's holiest shrine and the symbolic heart of a growing campaign against 45 years of unbroken military rule.

Some 700 staged a similar show of defiance in the country's second largest city of Mandalay.

"The protest is not merely for the well being of people but also for monks struggling for democracy and for people to have an opportunity to determine their own future," one monk in Rangoon said.

"People do not tolerate the military government any longer."

The monks led the crowd in chanting: "May we be free of torture, may there be peace in hearts and minds as our kindness spreads around the world".

The international community has pleaded with the generals to avoid another bloodbath, but the chilling message behind the legal language of the warnings was lost on nobody in the city of five million people.

"I'm really worried about the possible outbreak of violence," one street vendor said.

"We know from experience that these people never hesitate to do what they want."

It was the second straight day that some 100,000 have taken to the streets.

After Monday's crowd dispersed, state radio quoted Religious Affairs Minister Brigadier-General Thura Myint Maung as saying action would be taken against senior monks if they did not control their charges.

He was also quoted as telling the State Monks Council the protests were incited by "destructive elements who do not want to see peace, stability and progress in the country" - the junta code for the political opposition.

For the first time since protests against soaring fuel prices began a month ago, a small number of soldiers was deployed outside the gilded Shwedagon on Tuesday.

China, the closest the junta has to a friend, is calling for "stability" in Burma but says it will abide by its long-term policy of non-interference in the domestic affairs of its allies.

That was despite mounting calls for China - along with India and Burma's fellow members of the ASEAN group of Southeast Asian nations - to pressure the junta to exercise restraint.

"I think the voices that the Burmese military leadership hear the loudest are the voices of China and India much more than the voices of ASEAN, and they certainly don't focus very much on the voices of Western countries," Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said.

Gareth Evans, the head of the International Crisis Group think-tank and a former Australian foreign minister, said: "The regime has a long history of violent reactions to peaceful demonstrations.

"If serious loss of life is to be averted, those UN members with influence over the government are going to have to come together fast," he said in a reference to China, Russia and India.

Others urged the generals to address the grievances of Burma's 53 million people who, in the past 50 years, have watched their country go from being one of Asia's brightest prospects to one of its most desperate.

US President George W Bush was due to announce new sanctions and call for support for political change in a speech at the United Nations.

UN special envoy Ibrahim Gambari said he was praying the generals opted for compromise and dialogue with the monks and opposition party of detained democracy icon and Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi rather than sending in the troops.

"For the sake of the people of Myanmar (Burma), for the sake of neighbouring countries and for the sake of Myanmar's place in the world, we certainly hope that the same reaction that took place in 1988 will not be the case now," he told CNN.

On the streets of Rangoon, the mood was one of jubilation as years of pent-up frustration were allowed into the open - and trepidation at the possible consequence from generals caught on the horns of a major dilemma.

The Burma Campaign UK said its sources had reported the junta ordering 3,000 maroon monastic robes and telling soldiers to shave their heads, possibly to infiltrate the monks.

In 1988, agents provocateurs were seen stirring up the crowds, giving the military the pretext to restore order.

Although more than 150 people have been arrested since the protests started on August 19, the junta has so far remained reluctant to put soldiers on the streets, perhaps mindful of the 1988 bloodshed.

© 2007 Reuters, Click for Restrictions
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Herald Sun: Monks chant outside UN offices

As demonstrations in Burma continue to gather pace, the BBC looks at what triggered the protests, who is involved and what they could mean for the country's military leaders.

What sparked the protests?

On 15 August the government decided to increase the price of fuel. Both petrol and diesel doubled in price, while the cost of compressed gas - used to power buses - increased five-fold.

The hikes hit Burma's people hard, forcing up the price of public transport and triggering a knock-on effect for staples such as rice and cooking oil.

Pro-democracy activists led the initial demonstrations in Burma's main city, Rangoon. When about 400 people marched on 19 August, it was the largest demonstration in the military-ruled nation for several years.

The authorities moved swiftly to quell the protests, rapidly arresting dozens of activists. Nonetheless, protests continued around the country. Numbers were small, but demonstrations were held in Rangoon, Sittwe and other towns.

Why are monks involved?

The monks started participating in large numbers after troops used force to break up a peaceful rally in the central town of Pakokku on 5 September.

At least three monks were hurt. The next day, monks in Pakokku briefly took government officials hostage. They gave the government until 17 September to apologise, but no apology was forthcoming.

When the deadline expired, the monks began to protest in much greater numbers and also withdrew their religious services from the military and their families.

There have been protests every day since the deadline, both in Rangoon and elsewhere, and they are getting bigger by the day. Tens of thousands of monks are now involved.

The participation of the monks is significant because there are hundreds of thousands of them and they are highly revered. The clergy has historically been prominent in political protests in Burma.

Because of the clergy's influence, the government has tried hard to woo many senior abbots. The fact that these abbots have chosen to remain silent is a sign for many people that they condone the protests.

Analysts believe that any violence against the monks could trigger a national uprising.

Is it still about an apology?

For some of the monks, yes. But for others, it has now gone far beyond that.

A group called the Alliance of All Burmese Buddhist Monks has emerged to co-ordinate the protests, and on 21 September it issued a statement describing the military government as "the enemy of the people".

They pledged to continue their protests until they had "wiped the military dictatorship from the land of Burma", and they have called on people across Burma to join them.

One rally marched past the house of detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, clearly linking the monks' movement with a desire for a change of government.

Are others joining in?

In the initial days of the protests, the public did not appear to be involved - commentators suggested that they were too scared of retaliation.

But this has gradually changed as the demonstrations have grown in size.

Footage of one protest showed people lining the route as the monks marched, forming a chain to protect them from any retaliation from soldiers.

And on 24 September, thousands of people responded to a call from the monks and joined a massive protest in Rangoon.

Key members of the opposition party, the National League for Democracy (NLD) are now said to be joining the protests, after initially distancing themselves from the action.

When did Burma last see protests like these?

The last time Burma saw anything on this scale was during the popular uprising of August 1988.

These protests were triggered by the government's decision in 1987 to devalue the currency, wiping out many people's savings.

Demonstrations began among students and then gradually spread to monks and the public. These culminated in a national uprising on 8 August 1988, when hundreds of thousands of people marched to demand a change of government.

The government sent troops to brutally suppress the protests. At least 3,000 people are believed to have died.

What is the government saying?

The government has said very little and its troops have so far shown restraint.

Some analysts say that this is partly because the leaders are based in the new capital, Nay Pyi Taw, rather than the old capital Rangoon, so they have not had to contend with the protests on their own doorstep.

Other analysts say they may have been warned to maintain stability by China, Burma's key ally and trading partner.

But the parallels with the uprising in 1988 will not have escaped the authorities, and many analysts fear that some sort of reaction is only a matter of time.

Sept. 24:

Military junta threatens monks in Burma
Timesonline: 100,000 join Saffron Revolution' in Burma
Reuters: Myanmar anti-junta protests biggest in 20 years
Reuters: Monk-led protests grow in Myanmar
Economist.com: Monks and the military
Reuters: Mass monk protests put Myanmar junta in a dilemma
Irrawaddy: Dalai Lama Supports Burmese Monks; South African Churches Send Encouragement
Guardian Unlimited: Gardian Q&A
Celebrities aid monk protesters in Burma

Old new:

1. Sky News: Monks Meet Burma Democracy Leader (Sept 22); 2. AFP: Democracy icon Suu Kyi greets Myanmar monks (Sept 22)
3. AFP10,000 Myanmar Monks Protest in Mandalay (Sept 22); 4. Washington Post Editorial: Burma Stirs: Will the rest of the world stand by? (Sept 21); 5. Irrawaddy: Monks Issue Call for Public to Join Demonstrations (Sept 21); 6. AP: Myanmar Protests Enter 4th Day (Sept. 21); 7. The Independence: Monks intensify protests on the streets of Rangoon; 8. AP: Monks Put Myanmar Junta in Tight Spot (Sept. 21) 9. BBC: Burma junta faces monks' challenge (Sept. 20) 10. DVB: Gambari advises dialogue over recent crackdown (Sept. 21) 11. Reuters: Myanmar junta scared of monks' cold shoulder (Sept 20) 12. AP: Onlookers protect protesting monks in Myanmar (Sept 20); 13. The Guardian: Buddhist monk rally steps up pressure on Burma's junta (Sept 20); 14. AP: Myanmar Monks Keep Up Protests (Sept 20) 15. Bangkok Post: Burmese monks challenge junta (Sept 20); 16. Reuters: Monks on march again in restive Myanmar city (Sept 19); 17. Reuters: Tear gas used against Myanmar protest, monks hit (Sept 18); 18. AP: More Than 1,000 Monks Protest in Myanmar (Sept 18)

As demonstrations in Burma continue to gather pace, the BBC looks at what triggered the protests, who is involved and what they could mean for the country's military leaders.

What sparked the protests?

On 15 August the government decided to increase the price of fuel. Both petrol and diesel doubled in price, while the cost of compressed gas - used to power buses - increased five-fold.

The hikes hit Burma's people hard, forcing up the price of public transport and triggering a knock-on effect for staples such as rice and cooking oil.

Burmese people are angry about the sudden fuel price increase

Pro-democracy activists led the initial demonstrations in Burma's main city, Rangoon. When about 400 people marched on 19 August, it was the largest demonstration in the military-ruled nation for several years.  

The authorities moved swiftly to quell the protests, rapidly arresting dozens of activists. Nonetheless, protests continued around the country. Numbers were small, but demonstrations were held in Rangoon, Sittwe and other towns.

Why are monks involved?

The monks started participating in large numbers after troops used force to break up a peaceful rally in the central town of Pakokku on 5 September.

At least three monks were hurt. The next day, monks in Pakokku briefly took government officials hostage. They gave the government until 17 September to apologise, but no apology was forthcoming.

When the deadline expired, the monks began to protest in much greater numbers and also withdrew their religious services from the military and their families.

There have been protests every day since the deadline, both in Rangoon and elsewhere, and they are getting bigger by the day. Tens of thousands of monks are now involved.

More and more Buddhist monks have been joining the marches

The participation of the monks is significant because there are hundreds of thousands of them and they are highly revered. The clergy has historically been prominent in political protests in Burma.  

Because of the clergy's influence, the government has tried hard to woo many senior abbots. The fact that these abbots have chosen to remain silent is a sign for many people that they condone the protests.

Analysts believe that any violence against the monks could trigger a national uprising.

Is it still about an apology?

For some of the monks, yes. But for others, it has now gone far beyond that.

A group called the Alliance of All Burmese Buddhist Monks has emerged to co-ordinate the protests, and on 21 September it issued a statement describing the military government as "the enemy of the people".

They pledged to continue their protests until they had "wiped the military dictatorship from the land of Burma", and they have called on people across Burma to join them.

One rally marched past the house of detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, clearly linking the monks' movement with a desire for a change of government.

Are others joining in?

In the initial days of the protests, the public did not appear to be involved - commentators suggested that they were too scared of retaliation.

But this has gradually changed as the demonstrations have grown in size.

Footage of one protest showed people lining the route as the monks marched, forming a chain to protect them from any retaliation from soldiers.

Aung San Suu Kyi was able to greet the monks over the weekend

And on 24 September, thousands of people responded to a call from the monks and joined a massive protest in Rangoon.  

Key members of the opposition party, the National League for Democracy (NLD) are now said to be joining the protests, after initially distancing themselves from the action.

When did Burma last see protests like these?

The last time Burma saw anything on this scale was during the popular uprising of August 1988.

These protests were triggered by the government's decision in 1987 to devalue the currency, wiping out many people's savings.

Demonstrations began among students and then gradually spread to monks and the public. These culminated in a national uprising on 8 August 1988, when hundreds of thousands of people marched to demand a change of government.

The government sent troops to brutally suppress the protests. At least 3,000 people are believed to have died.

What is the government saying?

The government has said very little and its troops have so far shown restraint.

Some analysts say that this is partly because the leaders are based in the new capital, Nay Pyi Taw, rather than the old capital Rangoon, so they have not had to contend with the protests on their own doorstep.

Other analysts say they may have been warned to maintain stability by China, Burma's key ally and trading partner.

But the parallels with the uprising in 1988 will not have escaped the authorities, and many analysts fear that some sort of reaction is only a matter of time.
 

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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article2521951.ece?token=null&offset=12

100,000 join Saffron Revolution' in Burma

After heavy-handed efforts to put down demonstrations earlier this month, the junta has recently been more restrained, on Saturday even allowing marchers to walk past the house where pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi has been imprisoned for many years. Her National League for Democracy (NLD) won democratic elections in 1990 but were never allowed to take power.

The Bangkok Post reported that the many out-of-town monks taking part in the marches had been ordered back to their provinces today by the Sangha Nayaka committee, which exerts military control over the clergy, but were so far defying the instruction to go home.

The newspaper also said that civilians joining the march were being beaten up by pro-government activists, in what may be fresh signs of a crackdown.

There were international expressions of support for the protests. In Britain, Gordon Brown's spokesman said: "We deplore the continued repression of ordinary citizens by the Burmese regime and we are deeply concerned by reports of further acts of violence perpetrated this week by security officials against peaceful demonstrators."

Mr Brown has previously condemned the Burmese military government, demanded the release of political prisoners including Ms Suu Kyi, and called for a transition to democracy.

Condoleezza Rice, the US Secretary of State, said that Washington was watching the situation in Burma "very carefully", and that President Bush would discuss the military regime's "brutality" when he meets other leaders at a forthcoming UN General Assembly.

A White House spokesman urged Myanmar's military rulers to show "restraint", and said it hoped for dialogue between the regime and the demonstrators.

Today's march began at the Shwedagon pagoda, the country's most holy Buddhist site, and wound through the streets of the former capital under cloudy skies. One large group passed the former campus of Rangoon University, once a hotbed of opposition protest.

"The streets are packed," said one witness, after five streams of monks, one nearly a mile long, converged on the Sule Pagoda in the city centre.

For the first time the marchers included members of parliament elected in 1990 from the NLD.

"There's no prospect now of the monks just deciding to abandon this," said the Western diplomat. "They are getting braver every day, and their demands are getting greater every day, and it's much more overtly political. It's about Aung San Suu Kyi, it's about reform."
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Monks Meet Burma Democracy Leader

Updated: 15:44, Saturday September 22, 2007

Buddhist monks protesting against the military government in Burma have been allowed to march past the house of detained democracy leader Aung Sun Suu Kyi, who reportedly stepped out to greet them.

The Nobel Peace Prize winner has been kept under house arrest for 11 of the past 18 years, and continuously since May 2003.

The 62-year-old is the leader of the National League for Democracy party, which won a 1990 general election but was not allowed to take power by the military

Ms Suu Kyi reportedly greeted the monks at her house.

There have been protests against the ruling military's economic policies over the past month in Burma, which is called Myanmar by the government.

Police had unexpectedly let more than 500 monks through at a roadblock on Rangoon's University Avenue, where Ms Suu Kyi's house is located.

However, observers have said there is a risk of violent confrontation, as the ruling junta seems increasingly forced to decide whether to crack down or to compromise with the demonstrators.

The number of protesters has reportedly grown as monks have taken to spearheading the protests.

The regime is known for favouring force over talk, and has never backed down in previous confrontations with the pro-democracy movement.

The current government came to power in 1988 after brutally suppressing mass pro-democracy demonstrations that had sought an end to military rule that began in 1962.

Thousands were shot dead by solders, effectively terrorising much of the country's population into submission.

A 45-year-old monk told a crowd in the country's largest city, Rangoon: "Today is extraordinary.

"We walked past lay disciple Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's house today. We are pleased and glad to see her looking fit and well.

"She came out to the gate and paid obeisance to us and later waved at the crowd when we left."

The word "Daw" is an honorific title used in referring to older women.

------------------------------------------------------

Democracy icon Suu Kyi greets Myanmar monks

YANGON (AFP) - Detained Myanmar democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi stepped out of her home in tears Saturday to greet Buddhist monks marching past the compound where she is confined by the military junta, witnesses said.

Armed guards usually block the road leading to the rambling lakeside house, but in an unprecedented move, they allowed about 1,000 monks to walk past the home where she was been detained for most of the last 18 years.

Under rainy skies, Aung San Suu Kyi walked out with two other women and cried as she paid her respects to the monks as they marched past in the mid-afternoon, the witnesses said.

The monks stopped outside her home for about 15 minutes and chanted a Buddhist prayer: "May we be completely free from all danger, may we be completely free from all grief, may we be completely free from poverty, may we have peace in heart and mind."

The witnesses said she did not appear to speak to the monks, who have been leading a series of protests against the military government since Monday.

About 20 uniformed security police had opened a roadblock near Aung San Suu Kyi's house and did not interrupt the monks as they chanted, they added.

After the monks left, the security officials again closed the roadblock.

The 62-year-old Nobel peace prize winner has virtually no contact with the outside world, apart from a live-in maid and periodic visits from her personal doctor.

Her National League for Democracy party won a landslide victory in elections in 1990, but the miltary has never recognised the result.

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Burma Stirs
Will the rest of the world stand by?
Saturday, September 22, 2007; Page A16

FOR YEARS, jaded diplomats and academics have rebuffed Burma's democracy activists with one question: Why don't the people of Burma rise up? For the past month, they have been doing exactly that, against unimaginable odds and with unimaginable courage. So now a different question arises: Is the world -- its leaders, diplomats, academics and others -- going to stand on the sidelines or offer some help?

Yesterday, more than 1,000 Buddhist monks marched peacefully along the rain-soaked streets of Burma's largest city, with thousands of spectators encouraging their protest. At the head of the procession a monk carried an alms bowl turned upside down, symbolically refusing to accept any more support from the military regime, one of the world's most repressive. In an overwhelmingly Buddhist Southeast Asian nation of 50 million people, this was a withering rebuke. The echoes of the last great uprising, in 1988, must be alarming the country's corrupt ruling generals -- the roots in economic discontent and the slow stirrings from students to monks to the general population and from the capital to smaller cities across the nation.

The regime -- so frightened of its own people that it had already transplanted its capital in the dead of night, to a desolate inland spot, on the advice of an astrologer -- has responded in some ways more desperately than it did in 1988. Though the monks have for the most part not been blocked, virtually every student leader is in prison, many tortured. Cousins, siblings and even children of demonstrators have been swept up, too. Anyone with a camera is suspect, as the regime seeks to block news of the protests from traveling. Yet brave Burmese with cellphones continue to relay photographs, and brave unarmed civilians continue to interpose themselves between protesters and regime vigilantes.

The global response thus far has been lackadaisical. The U.N. Security Council held a briefing Thursday, but the U.S. representative emerged with no message of particular urgency. U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's special envoy has yet to announce a date to visit Burma. Some talk about the need for more studies of the humanitarian situation inside Burma -- as if the humanitarian disaster, and even more its cause in political misrule, were not already well known.

What needs to be done is clear. The regime must release all political prisoners, starting with Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, so that a negotiation toward democracy can begin. President Bush, who has spoken eloquently of Burma's struggle for freedom, needs to engage in strenuous diplomacy -- above all with China -- to make clear that this is a U.S. priority. And China, which has more influence in Burma than any other country has, needs to decide whether it wants to host the 2008 Olympics as the enabler of one of the world's nastiest regimes or as a peacemaker.
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10,000 Myanmar Monks Protest in Mandalay

Saturday September 22, 2007 11:01 AM

YANGON, Myanmar (AP) - About 10,000 Buddhist monks marched through Myanmar's central city of Mandalay on Saturday, witnesses said, in one of the largest demonstrations against the country's repressive military regime since a democratic uprising in 1988.

Monks from various monasteries started their march in Mandalay - a hotbed for activist monks - while about 1,000 Buddhist monks began marching from Yangon's Shwedagon Pagoda, the country's most revered shrine and a historic center for protest movements. From there, witnesses said, they planned to march to downtown Yangon, which is the nation's largest city.

It was the fifth straight day the monks have marched in Yangon and the numbers showed the anti-government protest were growing in size. Emboldened by the monks, some 800 civilians walked along with them in the drizzling rain through the heart of the commercial district to support the most dramatic anti-government protests the isolated Southeast Asian nation has seen in years.

The monk's activities have given new life to a protest movement that began a month ago after the government raised fuel prices, sparking demonstrations against policies that are causing economic hardship.

Meanwhile, Buddhist monks in the country urged the public for the first time to join in protesting the ``evil military despotism,'' stepping up their campaign against the junta after days of peaceful marches.

``In order to banish the common enemy evil regime from Burmese soil forever, united masses of people need to join hands with the united clergy forces,'' The All Burma Monks Alliance said the statement, received by The Associated Press Saturday.

Little is known of the group or its membership, but its communiques have spread widely by word of mouth and through opposition media in exile.

Some monks have started a religious boycott of the junta, symbolized by their holding their black begging bowls upside down as they march. In the Myanmar language, the word for boycott comes from the words for holding the bowl upside down.

``We pronounce the evil military despotism, which is impoverishing and pauperizing our people of all walks including the clergy, as the common enemy of all our citizens,'' the statement read, which was translated from Burmese by Burma Net, a news site that covers Myanmar.

A day earlier, some 1,500 barefoot Buddhist monks marched through the rain-flooded streets of Myanmar's biggest city, drawing even more public sympathy to ongoing anti-government protests that have put the ruling military on the defensive.

The protest movement began Aug. 19 after the government raised fuel prices, but has its basis in long pent-up dissatisfaction with the repressive military regime. Using arrests and intimidation, the government had managed to keep demonstrations limited in size and impact, but they gained new life when the monks joined.

The government has been handling the situation gingerly, aware that forcibly breaking up the monks' protest in predominantly Buddhist Myanmar would likely cause public outrage.

The protests at the Shwedagon pagoda resonate with many people, as it is best remembered as the site of a vast Aug. 26, 1988, rally where independence hero Gen. Aung San's daughter Aung San Suu Kyi, took up leadership of a pro-democracy movement.

The 1988 pro-democracy demonstrations were crushed by the military, and Suu Kyi has spent nearly 12 of the past 18 years in detention.

Monks Issue Call for Public to Join Demonstrations

by Violet Cho
September 21, 2007

Burmese Buddhist monks called on students and civilians to join hands with them in public protests against the military regime which has ruled the country for almost 20 years.

The Federation of All Burma Young Monks Unions issued a statement on Thursday saying, "It is time for the Burmese people to work with monks and courageously demonstrate their genuine aspirations."

This was the first official call by protesting monks for the public to take part in their demonstration marches which have spread across the country during the past week. Previously, the monks asked the public not to join their protests.

Students should lift their own "fighting peacock flag," a symbol of struggle against the military regime, in the demonstrations, the statement said.

An 88 Generation Students group leader, Tun Myint Aung, told The Irrawaddy on Friday: "We strongly welcome this statement by the monks because it's a very good approach calling on everyone from different parts of society to join hands and work for the liberation of the people."

If students and monks take the lead, together with masses of civilians, the people can effectively express their feelings and desires, he said.

A leading Burmese poet, Aung Way, said the artist community should also join in solidarity with the monks and people.

"It's time for all Burmese artists and poets to join together with the monks who have taken the lead in the protests against the regime," Aung Way said.
 
The statement also called on monks throughout Burma to rally together in unity and to expand the protests throughout the country.

Monks began their protest demonstrations in Rangoon and other cities on Tuesday after the junta failed to offer an apology for violence used against monks in Pakkoku on September 6. Monks have marched with their alms bowls turned upside down, a symbol of a boycott of alms from the military regime and its supporters.

Starting on August 19, the 88 Generation Students group and other pro-democracy activists began protest demonstrations in Rangoon and other cities.
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Myanmar junta scared of monks' cold shoulder

By Aung Hla Tun

YANGON (Reuters) - In a growing campaign against decades of military rule in Myanmar, thousands of Buddhist monks are doing nothing -- literally -- and the generals are getting worried.

In more and more monasteries across the former Burma, maroon-robed monks are invoking a 2,500-year-old Buddhist rite and refusing to accept alms from members of the military and their families or perform any religious duties for them.

The boycott is taken very seriously in the deeply devout Buddhist country, as the spurned alms-giver is denied one of the main routes to the merit that will eventually help him or her to achieve nirvana, or release from the cycle of rebirth.

Known as "patam nikkuijana kamma" in Pali, the ancient language of the Theravada Buddhist priesthood, it means "turning over of the alms bowl".

Politically, it is also extremely significant as the monks were major players in a nationwide uprising against decades of military rule in 1988. Then, the army was sent in to crush the unrest with the loss of an estimated 3,000 lives.

Two years later, during a similar boycott sparked by the junta's refusal to honour the results of elections it lost by a landslide, some soldiers had to welcome the birth of children or bury loved ones without the blessing of priests.

The boycott is similar to the Christian notion of excommunication, although can be reversed at any point if the perceived wrong-doers mend their ways.

"Only under the most compelling moral circumstances will a monk refuse the alms that have been offered, as to do so is to refuse to acknowledge the alms-giver as a part of the religious community," the Asian Human Rights Commission said.

"However, the view of monks in Burma today is that such an extraordinary moment has arrived."

The boycott has gathered momentum since its launch on Tuesday in response to the junta's refusal to apologise publicly for soldiers firing warning shots over the heads of monks -- and beating some of them up -- in the town of Pakokku two weeks ago.

The ban is thought to have originated in Mandalay, home to 300,000 monks and the epicentre of the monastic tradition, despite heavy pressure on abbots in the central city.

Word has quickly spread from town to town.

"According to our code of practices and ethics, every monk is supposed to take part in this kind of boycott once they learn that some other monks have imposed it," one young monk in Yangon, the commercial capital, told Reuters this week. "We can expect similar marches in the remaining monasteries and cities."

The junta has countered the boycott, which has been broadcast on Myanmar-language foreign radio stations, with front-page coverage in official media of men in uniform giving alms to -- and having them accepted by -- senior monks.

One middle-aged cleric said the priesthood was simply catching up with something he had been doing for 17 years.

"I have imposed it on them since 1990, and I'll keep it on," he said.

Onlookers protect protesting monks in Myanmar

Having gathered at the golden hilltop Shwedagon pagoda, the country's most revered shrine, the monks marched to Sule pagoda in downtown Yangon and then rallied briefly outside the U.S. Embassy. Washington is one of the junta's major foreign critics.

With no destination evident, the monks marched through many of Yangon's main thoroughfares, attracting supporters as they carried on. Thousands of people walked alongside or behind them as they marched past Scott's Market, the city's main market that is also a magnet for tourists.

It was the third straight day the monks have marched in Yangon. Their activities have given new life to a protest movement that began a month ago after the government raised fuel prices, sparking demonstrations against policies that are causing economic hardship.

As they marched calmly in long processions though the city streets, onlookers accorded the monks respect by making the traditional Buddhist gesture of hands clasped together in front of bowed heads. They also offered snacks and drinks to the marchers, while others kept the streets clean by picked up water bottles.

Such open expressions of support had been lacking at smaller demonstrations carried out by laymen over the past month.

At the head of the procession were monks carrying religious flags and one carrying a begging bowl upside down, a symbol of protest. About 1,000 mostly young bystanders marched alongside, arms linked, to prevent any intrusion. No uniformed security personnel were in sight, though dozens of plainclothesmen stood by without interfering.

The monks had gathered at the Shwedagon in early afternoon, where they were able to enter the temple to say prayers. As they marched, the monks chanted sermons.

In the Buddhist fashion of avoiding direct secular entanglements, the monks are making no explicit anti-government gestures, but their message is unmistakable to fellow citizens, because their normal duties outside their monasteries involve making morning rounds with begging bowls, individually or in small groups.

On Wednesday, a large crowd cheered as monks briefly occupied Sule pagoda, during one of several marches around the country. The monks pushed past closed gates to occupy the temple for 30 minutes before returning peacefully to their monasteries, witnesses said.

At least four separate marches by monks took place Wednesday in Yangon, along with protests in at least two other cities, Sittwe and Mandalay.

The saffron-robed monks have become the leaders of a movement launched on Aug. 19, when a few hundred ordinary citizens marched to protest a government increase in fuel prices. Several hundred activists have been detained.

Angry over being beaten at an early demonstration, monks threatened to take to the streets unless the military junta apologized. The regime remained silent so they launched protests around the country Tuesday that have grown from several hundred monks to several thousand.

Monks also are refusing alms from the military and their families — embarrassing the junta. Some monks have started a religious boycott of the junta, symbolized by their holding their black begging bowls upside down as they march. In the Myanmar language, the word for boycott comes from the words for holding the bowl upside down.

Monks, who are highly respected in Myanmar and integral to almost all aspects of daily life, have historically been at the forefront of protests — first against British colonialism and later military dictatorship. They played a prominent part in a failed 1988 pro-democracy uprising that sought an end to military rule, imposed since 1962.

The protests also reflect long pent-up opposition to the repressive military regime, and have become the most sustained challenge to the junta since a wave of student demonstrations that were put down by force in December 1996.

The junta's crackdown on the protesters have drawn increasing criticism from world leaders, including U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and U.S. President George W. Bush, who also have called for the government to release opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace laureate, has been under house arrest for more than 11 of the past 18 years.

The state-run newspaper, the New Light of Myanmar, claimed Wednesday that bogus monks, "instigators" and foreign radio station reports were helping to swell the crowds at protests.

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Buddhist monk rally steps up pressure on Burma's junta

Jonathan Watts in Beijing
Thursday September 20, 2007
The Guardian

Hundreds of Burmese Buddhist monks marched on a street in Yangon to protest against the military junta's alleged violence against Buddhist monks at Pakoku, the upper part of Myanmar Hundreds of monks march on a street in Yangon to protest against the military junta's alleged violence against Buddhist monks at Pakoku. Photograph: EPA
 
More than 2,000 Buddhist monks took to the streets of Burma again yesterday in the most sustained and widespread protest against the military junta for more than 10 years. The authorities made a rare admission that security forces had fired tear gas and warning shots to quell the unrest, which has spread across several cities over the past month.

The situation has prompted one exile group to urge China to use its influence to prevent violence.

Yesterday in Yangon about 500 monks forced their way through closed gates and occupied the Sule pagoda, after marching through the capital in disciplined ranks. According to foreign news reports, they were encouraged by crowds of civilians who clapped, cheered and chanted slogans of support.

Demonstrations are rare in Burma, where the ruling generals have used repressive measures to maintain power without elections since a military coup in 1988. The last big protest rallies ended that year when soldiers killed an estimated 3,000 civilians, many of them monks and students.

In Sittwe, 350 miles west of the capital, reporters say that this week between 700 and 1,000 monks staged a sit-in at a police station to demand the release of two men sentenced to two years' jail for giving water to the monks last month during a rally against soaring fuel prices. Officials reportedly agreed to release the pair within three days.

Peaceful demonstrations were also reported in Mandalay, where more than 1,000 saffron-robed protesters took to the streets, and in the Yangon suburbs of Ahlone and South Okkalapa, where about 100 chanting monks joined the movement.

Pressure was also stepped up outside Burma. Many exiles believe China is the key to a solution. In protests outside Chinese diplomatic missions on Tuesday activists called on the Beijing government to use its influence to free political prisoners and end violence against minorities.

"This regime has survived to this day because of Chinese government support - financial, diplomatic and military," Aung Din, of the US Campaign for Burma in Washington, told Reuters.

Ahead of the Olympics next year, activists hope international pressure can be applied on Beijing to improve the situation in Burma. China supplies Burma with weapons, is its biggest trading partner and joined Russia this year to block proposals for punitive measures through the UN security council.

The Burmese authorities showed restraint yesterday compared with their earlier more confrontational posture.

On Tuesday soldiers scattered a rally with warning shots. Reportedly authorities have used civilian gangs and the Union Solidarity and Development Association social network to beat and intimidate protesters in the past month.

The state-controlled media said a show of force was necessary because the rally of about 1,000 monks and others had turned violent. "Some protesters, including six monks holding sticks and swords, hit the officials with their weapons," said the New Light of Myanmar, a government-run newspaper. "The protesters became very violent. So in order to control the situation the officials threw a tear gas bomb into the group and opened fire in the air to threaten them."

Compared with the largely civilian rallies last month there have been few arrests. This is seen as sign of the huge influence of Buddhism in Burma. Ominously for the junta, some monks are telling their followers that the ruling generals are a force of evil.

In a spiritual boycott, they are reportedly refusing to accept alms from anyone involved with the top level of the military, which is a threat in a country where people believe they cannot reach nirvana without recognition of such good deeds.

The level of support for the boycott is unclear. Public anger was stirred by a change in economic policy on August 15, when the government introduced a fivefold increase in the price of natural gas and a 67% price rise for petrol.

Profile

Burma, also known as Myanmar, has a population of 47 million people, composed of several indigenous groups and minorities of Chinese, Indians and Bangladeshis.

It has a territory of 261,218 sq miles and borders China, Laos, Thailand, Bangladesh and India.

Burma gained independence in 1948 after being under British rule from 1885. It is one of the region's poorest countries due to 45 years of continuous military rule and poor economic management.

Multi-party elections in 1990 resulted in a landslide victory for the main opposition party - the National League for Democracy - but the ruling junta refused to hand over power. The NLD's leader and Nobel peace prize winner, Aung San Suu Kyi, has been under house arrest almost continuously since then.
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Myanmar Monks Keep Up Protests

(09-20) 04:27 PDT YANGON, Myanmar (AP) --

Almost 1,000 Buddhist monks, protected by onlookers, marched through Myanmar's biggest city for a third straight day Thursday and pledged to keep alive the most sustained protests against the military government in at least a decade.

Their march took them to the golden hilltop Shwedagon pagoda — the country's most revered shrine — and to the Sule pagoda in downtown Yangon and past the city's main market, including a brief stop outside the U.S. Embassy. Washington is one of the junta's key critics.

The effort drew thousands of onlookers and supporters. As the procession wound down, the monks said they would demonstrate again on upcoming sabbath days.

Speaking in front of a crowd that appeared to number as many as 5,000 at the march's end at Sule pagoda, an unidentified monk said that because the government was "unjust and selfish," people's lives were getting worse.

"We will stage our marches every sabbath day," another monk said. "We will gather at the eastern gate of Shwedagon after lunch at 1 p.m."

The next sabbath day falls on Sept. 26.

Monks, who are highly respected in Myanmar, have energized a protest movement that began a month ago after the government raised fuel prices, sparking anger over economic hardship in the impoverished Southeast Asian nation.

The demonstrations also reflect long pent-up opposition to the military regime and have become the most sustained challenge to the junta since a wave of student demonstrations that were put down by force in December 1996.

During their procession Thursday, some monks carried religious flags and one held a begging bowl upside down — a symbol of protest. They chanted sermons associated with warding off misfortune and wishing for the well-being of all people.

Onlookers accorded the monks respect by making the traditional Buddhist gesture of hands clasped together in front of bowed heads. They also offered snacks and drinks to the marchers. About 1,000 mostly young bystanders marched alongside, arms linked, to prevent any intrusion.

No uniformed security personnel were in sight, though dozens of plainclothesmen stood by without interfering.

In the Buddhist fashion of avoiding direct secular entanglements, the monks as a group made no explicit anti-government gestures, but their message has been unmistakable to fellow citizens. The monks' normal duties outside their monasteries involve making morning rounds with begging bowls, individually or in small groups.

On Wednesday, monks briefly occupied the Sule pagoda, during one of several marches around the country. The monks pushed past closed gates to occupy the temple for 30 minutes before returning peacefully to their monasteries, witnesses said.

The saffron-robed monks have become the leaders of a movement launched on Aug. 19, when a few hundred ordinary citizens marched to protest a government increase in fuel prices.

Angry over being beaten at an early demonstration, monks threatened to take to the streets this week unless the military junta apologized. The regime remained silent, so they launched protests around the country Tuesday that have grown from several hundred monks to several thousand.

Monks also are refusing alms from the military and their families — an embarrassing gesture for the junta. Some monks have started a religious boycott of the junta, symbolized by their holding their black begging bowls upside down as they march. In the Myanmar language, the word for boycott come from the words for holding the bowl upside down.

Monks in Myanmar, which is also known as Burma, have historically been at the forefront of protests — first against British colonialism and later military dictatorship. They also played a prominent part in a failed 1988 pro-democracy uprising that sought an end to military rule, imposed since 1962.
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Bangkok Post: Burmese monks challenge junta

Rangoon (dpa) - Members of Burma's opposition party cheered when hundreds of defiant monks marched past their headquarters Thursday on the third day of the monks' anti-military protests in the former capital, said witnesses.

Diplomats said that by walking by the headquarters of opposition heroine Aung San Suu Kyi in Rangoon the marchers had raised the protests to a new level.

The National League for Democracy won 1990 elections by a landslide, but the result was ignored by the military. Aung San Suu Kyi currently is held under house arrest in Rangoon. The 500 or so monks went on to enter the Shwedagon Pagoda, which towers above the city, before parading downtown, where they dispersed at 4 pm.

A second march numbering some 400 monks proceeded towards the Shwedagon from a different direction and also ended downtown. Hundreds of ordinary citizens followed the processions of red-robed young men who are highly revered in this strongly Buddhist country.

A loose organization of monks has stepped up dignified protests this week after failing to extract an apology from the regime for its rough handling of a procession of monks in the north earlier this month.

More groups of monks were reported to have marched in the northern city of Mandalay in another show of open dissatisfaction with the military that has ruled since it seized power in 1962.

Hundreds of people are reported to have followed both lines of monks in the Rangoon marches, which in itself is a form of defiance in a country where the authorities have scant tolerance of dissent.

The highly unusual protests against economic hardship and inflation started when a few individuals staged protests some seven months ago.

The monkhood has now taken on the job of confronting the regime after the junta sharply lifted energy and transport prices a month ago without warning, causing deep problems for ordinary people who already struggle to survive.

As in Thailand, monks are revered in Burma, which makes it tricky for the authorities to crack down on them. Yet they have also traditionally been in the vanguard of moves against authoritarian governments, be they colonial or military.

Many of Burma's monks are young, feisty men with the guts to confront armed soldiers, strengthened by the knowledge that they are admired in the country for their moral toughness.

The protest marches have broken out in several locations this month, making it harder for the authorities to crack down. The monks have also driven home their displeasure with the regime by refusing to accepted alms from soldiers.

The regime attempted this week to paint the marching monks as deviants or fakes in stories in the state-controlled newspapers. Foreign and exiled observers are divided over whether these robed protestors will trigger the wider nationwide demonstrations that threatened to bring down the regime in 1988.
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Monks on march again in restive Myanmar city

By Aung Hla Tun
Reuters
Wednesday, September 19, 2007; 7:43 AM

YANGON (Reuters) - Nearly 1,000 Buddhist monks marched through the Myanmar city of Sittwe on Wednesday, a day after soldiers fired tear gas and warning shots to scatter a similar protest against the ruling generals, a witness said.

Urging thousands of bystanders not to join in, they staged a sit-in outside the local government offices to demand the release of two men sentenced to two years in jail for giving water to monks protesting against soaring fuel prices last month.

After several hours of talks, officials agreed to release the pair -- identified by a legal source as Maung Saw Thein, 40, and Han Min Lwin, 36 -- in three days. They are believed to be held in Yangon's infamous Insein prison.

The monks then dispersed to cheers from the crowds. Three or four small monk protests in Yangon also ended without incident.

The outcome was very different in Sittwe on Tuesday when soldiers fired tear gas and warning shots to disperse a crowd of 1,000 monks and demonstrators. One witness told Reuters three or four monks were hit and slapped as they were arrested.

In the junta's version of events -- a rare report of unrest in the former Burma's official papers -- nine policemen and a civilian official were injured as a small number of protesters attacked local government offices.

"Some protesters, including six monks holding sticks and swords, hit the officials with their weapons," the New Light of Myanmar said.

"In order to control the situation, the officials threw a tear gas bomb into the group and opened fire in the air to threaten them."

The increasing involvement of monks, key players in a 1988 mass uprising, is a sign of the dissent that broke out last month over shock fuel price rises intensifying.

MONKS ON THE MARCH

The military has been at pains to keep itself in the background, although soldiers did fire warning shots at one monk protest in the central town of Pakokku two weeks ago.

That action by the army -- held responsible for the deaths of up to 3,000 people when it crushed the 1988 uprising -- caused hundreds of young monks to seize government officials the next day and torch four of their vehicles.

Instead of using troops to break up protests, the generals have favored civilian gangs and members of its feared Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA) social network.

Although Tuesday's marches fell far short of a nationwide boycott, monks marched in seven towns and cities, including Yangon, the commercial centre and former capital.

Burma was one of Asia's brightest prospects when it won independence from Britain in 1948. After 45 years of unbroken military rule and economic mismanagement, it is now one of the region's poorest countries.

In Yangon, authorities closed the famed Shwedagon Pagoda, the nation's holiest shrine, minutes before hundreds of monks arrived for the formal launch of a campaign to refuse to accept alms from anyone connected to the regime.

Such a boycott is taken extremely seriously in the devoutly Buddhist country. Without such rites, a Buddhist loses all chance of attaining nirvana, or release from the cycle of rebirth.

Monks launched a similar religious boycott in 1990 shortly after the generals refused to honor the results of a general election they had lost by a landslide.

Myanmar exile groups also used the September 18 anniversary of the current's junta's inception to put pressure on China -- the closest the generals have to a friend.

Protesters at Chinese diplomatic missions across the United States urged Beijing to use its influence to get Myanmar to free political prisoners and end violence against minorities.

"This regime has survived to this day because of Chinese government support -- financial, diplomatic and military," said Aung Din of the U.S. Campaign for Burma in Washington.

China has sold Myanmar arms worth millions of dollars and is a big importer of its timber, minerals and oil.

(Additional reporting by Paul Eckert in Washington)
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Tear gas used against Myanmar protest, monks hit

By Aung Hla Tun
Reuters
Tuesday, September 18, 2007; 8:22 AM

YANGON (Reuters) - Authorities in military-ruled Myanmar fired tear gas on Tuesday to break up a protest of around 1,000 Buddhist monks and civilian demonstrators in the northwestern city of Sittwe, a witness said.

Three or four monks were arrested as the crowd scattered and were hit and slapped, the witness told Reuters.

The march, one of several in response to a call for a nationwide religious boycott of the former Burma's ruling military, started with 500 Buddhist monks but grew quickly as ordinary men and women -- some of them Muslims -- joined in.

There were no further details immediately available.

In Yangon, authorities closed the famed Shwedagon Pagoda, the Southeast Asian nation's holiest shrine, minutes before hundreds of monks arrived for the launch of a campaign to refuse to accept alms from anyone connected to the regime.

"We could not hold the formal ceremony to impose the religious boycott because we could not enter the Shwedagon compound," a 25-year-old monk told Reuters.

They then marched peacefully to the city centre, chanting prayers and holy scriptures but no political slogans.

Plainclothes police and members of the feared Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA) shadowed their route. The USDA has played a prominent role in breaking up protests against soaring fuel prices that began four weeks ago.

They videotaped and photographed the monks, who were also watched by hundreds of people, some of whom paid obeisance to them, witnesses said. There were no arrests.

One middle-aged monk said the boycott would go ahead.

"For me, I have imposed it on them since 1990 and I'll keep it on," he said.

A similar protest was held in Bago, 50 miles north of Yangon, where exiled groups reported 1,000 monks marching to the town's pagoda.

REFUSING ALMS

The Myanmar-language services of foreign broadcasters have said an alliance of monks had demanded an apology for soldiers firing shots to disperse a demonstration by monks in the town of Pakokku two weeks ago.

Such a boycott is taken extremely seriously in the devoutly Buddhist country. Without such rites, a Buddhist loses all chance of attaining nirvana, or release from the cycle of rebirth.

Although the army has run Myanmar since a 1962 coup, September 18 is the anniversary of the latest incarnation of the junta, which now goes by the name of State Peace and Development Council.

Monks launched a similar boycott in 1990 shortly after the generals refused to honor the results of a general election they had lost by a landslide.

Earlier the monasteries were key players in a nationwide uprising against military rule in 1988 and analysts say the generals have been at pains to treat the monks carefully this time around.

Official newspapers have given prominent coverage to men in uniform making donations in temples -- and having them accepted -- especially in Mandalay, the nation's second city and home to 300,000 monks.

More Than 1,000 Monks Protest in Myanmar

(09-18) 04:12 PDT YANGON, Myanmar (AP) --

More than 1,000 Buddhist monks marched peacefully in two cities Tuesday, the latest in a wave of recent anti-government protests that have rocked the country, witnesses said.

At least 400 monks, chanting prayers and walking in rows of two and three, marched in the Southeast Asian country's biggest city, Yangon, said witnesses who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.

After pro-junta toughs and plainclothes police barred them from entering Yangon's famous Shwedagon pagoda and then the Botataung pagoda, the monks sat in the street and chanted before ending the protest and returning to monasteries.

Thousands of onlookers cheered, clapped and offered water as the saffron-robed monks made the three-hour, 10-mile march.

"We are grateful to the monks for making good on their promise despite heavy security presence and obstacles," said a man who followed the monks throughout the march. He refused to give his name for fear of reprisals.

Unlike at earlier protests, junta supporters did not intervene. They did, however, snatch video cameras and cameras from some journalists and attempted to seize one journalist and force him into a truck, witnesses said.

Meanwhile, in the city of Bago about 50 miles away, about 1,000 monks peacefully marched to the Shwemawdaw pagoda, residents said.

No one was arrested in either march. Both ended peacefully.

The monks had given authorities a Monday deadline to apologize for beating hundreds of them two weeks ago as they marched peacefully in Pakokku, a center of Buddhist learning, to protest rising fuel and consumer prices. The apology never came.

As a result, monks threatened to launch nationwide marches Tuesday, to cut off contact with the military and their families, and to refuse alms from them — a humiliating gesture that would embarrass the junta.

The anti-government protests began Aug. 19 after the government raised fuel prices by as much as 500 percent, putting the squeeze on already impoverished citizens. The protests have continued despite the detention of more than 100 demonstrators and the rough treatment of others.

Monks have been at the forefront of political protests in Myanmar, also known as Burma, since British colonial times. Because they are so revered by the public, repressing them is politically risky. The junta is wary that demonstrations could gain momentum if monks keep protesting.

Tuesday's march also comes on the 19th anniversary of the coup in Myanmar, in which the current junta took over after crushing a failed pro-democracy rebellion that sought an end to military rule, imposed since 1962.

The junta held general elections in 1990, but refused to honor the results when pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party won. Suu Kyi has been detained under house arrest for more than 11 years.