Sunday 30 September 2007
Yangon, Myanmar - Die-hard protesters waved the peacock flag of the crushed pro-democracy movement on a solitary march Saturday through the eerily quiet streets of Myanmar's largest city, where many dissidents said they were resigned to defeat without international intervention.
Housewives and shop owners taunted troops but quickly disappeared into alleyways. According to diplomats briefed by witnesses, residents of three neighborhoods blocked soldiers from entering the monasteries in a crackdown on Buddhist monks, who led the largest in a month of demonstrations. The soldiers left threatening to return with reinforcements.
The top U.N. envoy on Myanmar, Ibrahim Gambari, arrived in the country but many protesters said they were nonetheless seeing a repeat of the global reaction to a 1988 pro-democracy uprising, when the world stood by as protesters were gunned down in the streets.
"Gambari is coming, but I don't think it will make much of a difference," said one hotel worker, who like other residents asked not to be named, fearing retaliation. "We have to find a solution ourselves."
On Sunday, a senior Japanese official headed for Myanmar to press the military government to move toward democracy and to protest the killing of Japanese journalist Kenji Nagai during the crackdown on protesters. Deputy Foreign Minister Mitoji Yabunaka was to arrive in Yangon by Sunday evening, according to a ministry official who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with policy.
Soldiers and police have been posted on almost all corners in the cities of Yangon and Mandalay. Shopping malls, grocery stores and public parks were closed and few people dared to venture out of their homes.
A young woman who took part in a massive demonstration in Yangon Thursday said she didn't think "we have any more hope to win." She was separated from her boyfriend when police broke up the protest by firing into crowds and has not seen him since.
"The monks are the ones who give us courage," she said. Most of the clerics are now besieged in their monasteries behind locked gates and barbed wire.
Gambari was taken immediately to Naypyitaw, the remote, bunker-like capital where the country's military leaders are based. The White House urged the junta to allow him to have access to Aung San Suu Kyi - the Nobel Peace Prize laureate who is under house arrest - and ordinary Myanmar residents.
The demonstrations began last month as people angry over massive fuel price hikes took to the streets - then mushroomed into the tens of thousands after the monks began marching.
The junta, which has a long history of snuffing out dissent, started cracking down Wednesday, when the first of at least 10 deaths was reported, and then let loose on Thursday, shooting into a crowd of protesters and clubbing them with batons.
The crackdown triggered an unprecedented verbal flaying of Myanmar's generals from almost every corner of the world - even some criticism from No. 1 ally China.
But little else that might stay the junta's heavy hand is seen in the foreseeable future.
The United States, which exercises meager leverage, froze any assets that 14 Myanmar leaders may have in U.S. financial institutions and prohibited American citizens from doing business with them. The leaders, including Than Shwe, are believed to have few if any such connections.
The United Nations has compiled a lengthy record of failure in trying to broker reconciliation between the junta and Suu Kyi. Gambari's efforts have been stymied, while his predecessor, Razali Ismail, was snubbed or sometimes barred from entry by the State Peace and Development Council, as the ruling junta is formally known.
The United States, Japan and others have turned a hopeful eye on China - Myanmar's biggest trading partner - as the most likely outside catalyst for change.
But China, India and Russia do not seem prepared to go beyond words in their dealings with the junta, ruling out sanctions as they jostle for a chance to get at Myanmar's bountiful and largely untapped natural resources, especially its oil and gas.
"Unless and until Beijing, Delhi and Moscow stand in unison in pressuring the SPDC for change, little will change," says Thitinan Pongsudhirak, a political scientist at Bangkok's Chulalongkorn University.
Some Chinese academics and diplomats say the international community may be overestimating what Beijing can do.
"I actually don't think China can influence Burma at all except through diplomacy. China's influence is not at all decisive," said Peking University Southeast Asia expert Liang Yingming.
India has switched from a vocal opponent of the junta to one currying favor with the generals as it struggles to corner energy supplies for its own rapidly expanding economy.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or ASEAN, a 10-member bloc which includes Myanmar, also has given no indication that it is considering an expulsion or any other action.
As governments heap criticism on the junta, Myanmar and foreign activists continue to call for concrete, urgent action.
"The world cannot fail the people of Burma again," said the National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma, an exile group based in Washington. "Selfless sacrifices deserve more than words and lip-service. They want effective intervention before it is too late."
Myanmar Tries to Cut Internet, Cell Access
By Henry Chu and Maggie Farley
The Los Angeles Times
Saturday 29 September 2007
In a bid to keep news of its crackdown from the world, the military regime tries to block communications, but the images still flow.
New Delhi - Attempting to stop the flow of violent images that have galvanized international condemnation of Myanmar, the country's military government Friday tried to shut down access to the Internet and cellphone service.
On the third day of the clampdown on largely peaceful protests, authorities closed Internet cafes and suspended two key service providers, but embassies and companies linked by satellite to the Web remained online.
The protests pose the stiffest challenge to the government since 1988, when thousands of pro-democracy protesters were massacred in Yangon, the country's principal city.
Soe Myint, a longtime dissident and India-based editor of the Myanmar-focused website Mizzima News, said that though cellphone service had been disrupted, some protesters were able to communicate with text messages.
Photographs and video continued to trickle out, and this morning, Reuters news agency said, Internet service was restored briefly but failed again.
Friday's images showed protesters challenging and fleeing advancing riot police and soldiers amid dark fumes in Yangon, also known as Rangoon.
One young man ripped open his shirt and shouted angrily at the security forces ranged in front of him, as if daring them to shoot.
"Modern technology has become the generals' worst enemy. There were only rusty phones, if you could get through [in 1988]," said Bertil Lintner, a Myanmar expert and author of several books on the country.
Graphic video also emerged of what appeared to be a soldier firing point-blank at veteran Japanese photojournalist Kenji Nagai, who was killed Thursday. Nagai was shown lying on the ground, his camera still held up in his hand, as a soldier pointed his rifle at him. Tokyo has demanded an explanation from the Myanmar government.
Nagai was one of nine fatalities that were acknowledged by state media during protests Thursday in Yangon against 45 years of autocratic and brutal military rule. One death was reported Wednesday
Diplomats and activist groups in exile say the death toll is surely higher, possibly 100 to 200 people, their bodies quickly carted away by army or police trucks to prevent an accurate count.
"We really cannot know," Myint said. "We may not know for some time."
The streets of Yangon were quieter Friday as the military regime confined protesting monks to their monasteries and broke up smaller crowds of demonstrators with batons and warning shots.
Witnesses and dissident groups said that scattered rallies in central Yangon attracted as many as 5,000 people at a time, far fewer than the tens of thousands who marched during 10 previous days of protest. Security forces, however, were taking no chances, firing tear gas and clubbing and dragging off activists.
"There have been clashes during the day, and there have been . . . running skirmishes," British Ambassador Mark Canning told the British Broadcasting Corp. from Myanmar, also known as Burma. "There have been several gunshots. We don't know if they caused casualties."
Myint said there were indications that security forces might be trying to minimize fatalities Friday. "Today they apparently didn't shoot into the crowds," he said. "They used rubber bullets. But there are people who are injured. We don't have any confirmation on that yet."
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed "grave concern" about the continued crackdown. "The authorities in Myanmar must exercise restraint, engage without delay in dialogue, release detained leaders, and initiate a national reconciliation process," he said.
A special United Nations envoy, Ibrahim Gambari, is expected to arrive in Myanmar today. He hopes to meet with the military regime's leadership, a U.N. spokesman said, and has also asked to see pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, an influential and respected opposition figure who is considered key to any solution to the conflict. The Nobel Peace Prize laureate has been under detention for much of the last 18 years.
Gambari intends to urge the government to stop using force and to convey the heightened level of the world's concern about the violent crackdown. But it is not clear whether the government of the Southeast Asian nation accepted his visit only because of pressure from its strategic ally, China.
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said that she would liked to have seen the U.N. Security Council issue a strong condemnation of Myanmar's actions - a move that was blocked by China and Russia - but that Gambari's visit was a "very good step."
"Ultimately, there has to be a process that gets Burma on a political course so that there can be reconciliation of the Burmese people," she said. "There needs to be immediately a stop to the violence against innocent people."
Thant Myint-U, the grandson of former U.N. Secretary-General U Thant and the author of "The River of Lost Footsteps: Histories of Burma," said that the country's two decades of isolation make the government very difficult to influence.
"The military leadership is quite happy with the status quo, an inert country that is not engaged with the outside world," he said.
Security forces appeared determined to keep Yangon's streets clear of protesters. They blockaded roads into the city and sealed off the Buddhist monasteries whose monks had been spearheading the demonstrations and rallying people to their side. Scores of monks reportedly have been beaten and arrested over the last few days.
Without the leadership of the monks, who hold an exalted position in Burmese society, and with police and troops out in force, protesters gathered in significantly reduced numbers in three or four different parts of Yangon, web editor Myint said.
Witnesses said the security forces moved in aggressively to quell a demonstration of about 2,000 people near the symbolic Sule Pagoda in the heart of Yangon. Soldiers converged on the site and ordered the crowd to disperse within 10 minutes, saying, "otherwise we will fire."
With the flow of information increasingly constricted, it was impossible to say with certainty what was happening in other districts in Yangon, particularly in suburbs where anti-government sentiment has run high. Myint said that some residents had dragged trees and other obstacles into the streets to hinder soldiers and vehicles. There were reports that troops from other parts of the country were being sent to Yangon. Demonstrations also have been reported in Mandalay, the country's second city, and smaller towns.
Dissident groups and sources in the country said that divisions may be emerging among the generals who form the core of the regime. Speculation centers on a possible disagreement between the senior leader, Gen. Than Shwe, and one of his deputies, Gen. Maung Ae, over the use of force, with the former in favor of firing on the crowds and the latter opposed. Some junior commanders also are said to have been reluctant to strike hard against the monks.
But the regime's tight hold on domestic media, suspicion of foreign reporters and secretive ways have ensured that little is known about what goes on in government or in the military.
The regime appears eager to keep a lid on demonstrations before Gambari's arrival. Some activists abroad say that his visit could encourage more protesters to take to the streets, but others fear that the military's intimidation tactics are having their desired effect.
"The military was more brutal than we expected. They killed the monks while the world was watching," said U Aung Htoo of the Burma Lawyers Council, based in Thailand.
"It was a strong message from the military that they would kill anybody."
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