| AlethiaSi |
09-28-2007 09:44 AM |
Myanmar breaks up rallies, cuts internet...
Quote:
YANGON, Myanmar - Soldiers clubbed activists in the streets and fired warning shots Friday, moving decisively to break up demonstrations in Myanmar before they could gain momentum. Troops occupied Buddhist monasteries and cut public Internet access, raising concerns that the crackdown on civilians that has killed at least 10 people was set to intensify.
Troops also fired tear gas to break up a demonstration of about 2,000 people in the largest city, Yangon, witnesses said. Five protesters were seen being dragged into a truck and driven away. The clash in an area near the Sule Pagoda was the most serious of the several sporadic — though smaller — protests that were reported.
By sealing monasteries, the government seemed intent on clearing the streets of monks, who have spearheaded the demonstrations and are revered by most of their Myanmar countrymen. This could embolden troops to crack down harder on remaining civilian protesters.
Efforts to squelch the demonstrations appeared to be working. Daily protests drawing tens of thousands of people had grown into the stiffest challenge to the ruling military junta in two decades, a crisis that began Aug. 19 with rallies against a fuel price increase, then escalated dramatically when monks joined in.
Security forces first moved against the anti-government protesters on Wednesday, when the first of the 10 deaths was reported. Images of bloodied protesters and fleeing crowds have riveted world attention on the escalating crisis, prompting many governments to urge the junta in Myanmar, also known as Burma, to end the violence.
The United States imposed new sanctions on the junta's leaders, and the United Nations dispatched a special envoy, who is expected to arrive Saturday.
Earlier Friday, soldiers and riot police moved quickly to disperse a crowd of 300 that started marching in Yangon, sealing the surrounding neighborhood and ordering them to disperse. Elsewhere, they fired warning shots to scatter a group of 200.
Bob Davis, Australia's ambassador to Myanmar, said he had heard unconfirmed reports that "several multiples of the 10 acknowledged by the authorities" may have been killed by troops in Yangon. Scores have been arrested, carted away in trucks at night or pummeled with batons in recent days, witnesses and diplomats said, with the junta ignoring all international appeals for restraint.
"The military was out in force before they even gathered and moved quickly as small groups appeared breaking them up with gunfire, tear gas and clubs," said Shari Villarosa, the top U.S. diplomat in Myanmar.
"It's tragic. These were peaceful demonstrators, very well behaved."
British Ambassador Mark Canning told BBC-TV that "there have been a lot of arrests," with up to 50 people detained at one time.
Video emerged of a striking image — the shooting death Thursday of a man identified as Japanese journalist Kenji Nagai of the video agency APF News.
The Democratic Voice of Burma released video of security forces opening fire on protesters, including a man falling forward after apparently being shot at point-blank range, and the opposition shortwave radio station based in Norway said the victim was Nagai, 50.
Another image posted on the Web site of Japanese TV network Fuji showed Nagai lying in the street, camera still in hand, with a soldier pointing his rifle down at him.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations expressed "revulsion" at the violence in Myanmar and told the junta "to exercise utmost restraint and seek a political solution." Demonstrations against the junta were seen in Malaysia, Thailand, Japan and elsewhere.
But by Myanmar standards, the crackdown has so far been muted, in part because the regime knows that killing monks could trigger a maelstrom of fury.
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