Monks’ Protest Is Challenging Burmese Junta

SETH MYDANS
NYT, September 24

BANGKOK, Monday, Sept. 24 — The largest street protests in two decades against Myanmar’s military rulers gained momentum Sunday as thousands of onlookers cheered huge columns of Buddhist monks and shouted support for the detained pro-democracy leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.

Winding for a sixth day through rainy streets, the protest swelled to 10,000 monks in the main city of Yangon, formerly Rangoon, according to witnesses and other accounts relayed from the closed country, including some clandestinely shot videos.

It came one day after a group of several hundred monks paid respects to Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi at the gate of her home, the first time she has been seen in public in more than four years.

The link between the clergy and the leader of the country’s pro-democracy movement, the beginnings of large-scale public participation in the marches and a call by some monks for a wider protest raised the stakes for the government.

So far, it has mostly allowed the monks free reign in the streets, apparently fearing a public backlash if it cracks down on them in this Buddhist nation.

Monks were reported to be parading through a number of cities on Sunday, notably the country’s second largest city, Mandalay, where an estimated 10,000 people, including 4,000 monks, had marched Saturday.

Myanmar’s military government has sealed off the country to foreign journalists but information about the protests has been increasingly flowing out through wire service reports, exile groups in Thailand with contacts inside Myanmar, and through the photographs, videos and audio files, carried rapidly by technologies, including the Internet, that the government has failed to squelch.

The state-controlled press has carried no reports about the monks’ demonstrations.

Since the military crushed a peaceful nationwide uprising in 1988, killing an estimated 3,000 civilians, the country, formerly known as Burma, has sunk further into poverty and repression and become a symbol for the outside world of the harsh military subjugation of a people.

Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991, has been locked inside her home for 12 of the last 18 years, and the government has arrested thousands of political prisoners.

The United States and Europe have led a tightening economic boycott that has been undermined by trade and assistance from Myanmar’s neighbors, mainly China but also India and some Southeast Asian nations. The United States has diplomatic relations with Myanmar but no ambassador. President Bush, his wife, Laura, and a roster of Hollywood celebrities have spoken out recently about Myanmar, and the abuses of human and political rights by the military junta are expected to take a high profile at the United Nations session starting this week.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, asked about Myanmar as she arrived at the United Nations on Sunday, told reporters that the Bush administration was closely monitoring how the government deals with the protests.

“The Burmese people deserve better,” she said. “They deserve a life to be able to live in freedom, just as everyone does. And the brutality of this regime is well known, and so we will be speaking about that and I think the president will be speaking about it with many of his colleagues.”

The public display of discontent in Myanmar mirrors that of the previous uprising — anger over a brutal and incompetent military government that has turned one of Southeast Asia’s best endowed and most sophisticated nations into one of its most repressed and destitute.

Surreptitiously shot photographs and videos recorded on Sunday showed thousands of civilians marching quickly through the streets side by side with the monks, emboldened by the continuing demonstrations into a rare show of defiance.

Some pictures showed people joining hands in a protective cordon as they walked beside the monks in their dark red robes. Others showed Buddhist nuns with shaved heads marching through the streets as onlookers applauded.

In audio recordings people shouted “Do-aye” — “It is our task” — a slogan of determination that was also heard on the streets in 1988.

The photographs and videos themselves represented acts of courage in a closed and repressive country that has tried to quash the spread of information.

But modern communications technology has brought the protests into the world’s eye in a way that was not possible in 1988.

Both the government and protesters have so far sought to avoid the kind of confrontation that led to widespread bloodshed in the 1988 uprising, which was led mostly by students.

“The monks are the highest moral authority in the Burmese culture,” said Soe Aung, a spokesman for a coalition of exile groups based in Thailand. “If something happens to the monks, the situation will spread much faster than what happened to the students in 1988.”

This gingerly approach by authorities — and the challenges it poses — were demonstrated on Saturday when guards removed barriers to allow about 500 monks to walk down the tree shaded street where Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi lives.

She met them at the iron gate outside her home and witnesses told wire services that she was in tears as she greeted the monks, who chanted prayers as they faced the security officers with riot shields who sealed off her home.

On Sunday, witness accounts relayed by exile groups reported that members of the public shouted their support for her and that some of the protesting monks also shouted, “Release Suu Kyi!”

Uniformed police officers and soldiers have stayed in the background throughout a month of building protests. But witnesses said plainclothes police officers trailed the marchers and some, armed with shotguns, were posted along the route.

The Associated Press reported that police officers turned back a small group of monks who tried to march for a second day to the home of Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi.

Although she has been sealed off from the public and has been allowed almost no visitors, Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi, 62, remains a martyr and rallying symbol for the population.

“She has been out of contact with virtually everyone, but her symbolic importance cannot be underestimated,” said Basil Fernando, director of the Asian Human Rights Commission. “Symbolically, her reintroduction into the political life of the country at such a dire moment is of enormous importance.”

The daughter of an assassinated independence hero, Aung San, she came to prominence when she became a leader in the pro-democracy demonstrations of 1988.

Her political party, the National League for Democracy, won a landslide victory in parliamentary elections in 1990, although the junta, fearing her charismatic appeal, had already placed her under house arrest.

The military government annulled the election results and held on to power. But it miscalculated the public mood again in 2002 when it released her from house arrest and allowed her to tour the country, visiting party offices.

She drew increasingly large and enthusiastic crowds until a band of government-backed thugs attacked a convoy in which she was traveling, killing several people. The government seized her again and placed under even stricter house arrest, cutting off her telephone and deepening her isolation.

The latest protests began Aug. 19 in response to sharp, unannounced fuel price increases of up to 500 percent, immediately raising the prices of goods and transportation.

They were led at first by former student protesters and other activists, but most of the leaders had been arrested or were in hiding when the monks began their protests last Tuesday.

The monks were apparently motivated at first by an attack on a small demonstration at which security officers fired shots into the air and beat a number of monks.

Since then, the monks’ protests have spread from city to city and have become more overtly political.

On Saturday, an organization of clergy called the All Burma Monks Alliance, called for a widening of the protests in a statement that said, “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.”

It went on, “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.”



Burma's Junta Imposes Curfew, Bans Gatherings

By Edward Cody
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, September 26

BANGKOK, Sept. 25 -- Burma's military rulers imposed a nighttime curfew and banned assemblies Tuesday after thousands of Buddhist monks defied warnings and mounted another day of pro-democracy protests to the cheers of crowds in the streets of Rangoon.

Although Tuesday's demonstration was allowed to proceed peacefully, several truckloads of soldiers and armed police were seen taking up positions in Burma's largest city late in the day, according to news agency reports and videos e-mailed out of the isolated Southeast Asian country.

The ban on assemblies and the appearance of reinforcements, including anti-riot troops carrying shields and truncheons, suggested that the military junta may be preparing to crack down despite appeals from around the world that it avoid using force and enter into negotiations with its opponents.

Addressing the annual U.N. General Assembly, President Bush announced that he will impose new economic restrictions on Burmese leaders and their financial backers and expand a U.S. visa ban on those deemed responsible for "the most egregious violations of human rights" as well as their families.

After a day of protest by an estimated 10,000 monks and lay supporters, some shouting "Democracy, democracy," junta supporters were seen driving around Rangoon warning via loudspeakers that "action" would be taken against anybody who continued to support the demonstrations, news agency reports said. Others announced a 9 p.m.-to-5 a.m. curfew in Rangoon and Mandalay, Burma's two largest cities, and said gatherings of five or more people were banned, setting the stage for confrontation if the monks continue to protest, the reports said.

"A crackdown is imminent," predicted Bertil Lintner, a veteran Burma specialist based in neighboring Thailand.

Similar protests in 1988 were put down by soldiers firing weapons into crowds of demonstrators, killing several thousand. But this time, security forces have remained in the background during more than a week of sustained anti-government agitation that has built into the most serious challenge to the military junta since the 1988 disturbances.

The junta warned on government-controlled television Monday night that security forces could step in if the current wave of demonstrations did not come to a halt. The threat followed a day-long protest march in Rangoon estimated to have included more than 50,000 people, perhaps up to 100,000, which was much larger than previous demonstrations and several times larger than Tuesday's march.

At the same time, the religious affairs minister, Brig. Gen. Thura Myint Maung, ordered senior Buddhist leaders to rein in younger monks leading the charge in the streets. "If the monks go against the rules and regulations in the authority of Buddhist teachings, we will take action under existing laws," state television quoted him as saying.

In what could be a taste of things to come, several hundred monks protesting in the northwestern city of Sittwe were attacked with tear gas and roughed up by security forces, the Reuters news agency reported. Others were reportedly arrested, sparking anger among their fellow monks in Rangoon.

The protests started Aug. 19, set off by a stiff rise in fuel prices. But they have escalated since then into a head-on political challenge against the military leadership that has run Burma, also called Myanmar, for most of the past half-century. Spearheaded by the Buddhist monks who are revered by Burma's approximately 50 million inhabitants, the demonstrations in recent days also have broadened to embrace lay students and members of the National League for Democracy, the political party headed by Nobel Peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

The military junta has kept Suu Kyi under virtual house arrest and prevented her party from taking power despite its victory in elections in 1990. Reuters reported Tuesday that Suu Kyi, who has become a symbol for many of the protesters of their longing for democracy, was taken to a prison Sunday in an attempt to prevent her from emerging as a leader of the new antigovernment campaign. In a brief appearance at the gate of her home Saturday, she drew cheers from hundreds of protesters who were allowed to approach her residence.

The junta and its leader, Gen. Than Shwe, have been urged to abandon their exclusive grip on power as public concern over the increasingly tense situation surges across Asia and beyond.

"Americans are outraged by the situation in Burma, where a military junta has imposed a 19-year reign of fear," Bush said at the United Nations. "Basic freedoms of speech, assembly and worship are severely restricted. Ethnic minorities are persecuted. Forced child labor, human trafficking and rape are common. The regime is holding more than 1,000 political prisoners, including Aung San Suu Kyi, whose party was elected overwhelmingly by the Burmese people in 1990."

Bush called on other nations "to use their diplomatic and economic leverage to help the Burmese people reclaim their freedom." Although he did not mention any country by name, it was a message aimed particularly at China, the key trading partner and ally of the Burmese government.

China has not joined the chorus of condemnation. Instead, it reiterated its refusal to pressure for change in public. A Foreign Ministry spokesman said the Chinese government hopes Burma's rulers can "maintain stability and resolve the issue in its own way," according to news agency reports from Beijing.

The United States imposed stringent economic sanctions on Burma in 1997 and amplified them in 2003. But some human rights activists who closely track the issue said the latest sanctions may be more effective if the administration follows its own model in cutting off illicit money held by North Korea in foreign banks. Bush and White House officials did not discuss in detail how the new restrictions would work but said they would target specific individuals as opposed to the general sanctions now on the books.

Tom Malinowski of Human Rights Watch has consulted with administration officials on the matter. "Even though the generals in Burma are profoundly isolated from their own people and the world, they still have to bank somewhere and that makes them vulnerable," he said. "There's a vulnerability that's never been exploited by the international community. If they can't bank anywhere, they can't buy things, including guns."

Malinowski added that leaders of the junta may be surprised to find their access to cash cut off.

"It will have an impact," he said, "when the wife of the leading general walks into his bedroom in the morning and starts screaming at him, 'What happened to our money?' "

Burma has occupied a prominent spot on the White House radar screen since first lady Laura Bush became personally upset about the situation. In recent weeks, she has called on U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to urge more action on Burma and summoned reporters to condemn the government -- unusually public moves by the first lady.

"What we're trying to do is . . . ratchet up the pressure on this regime, to get them to understand that there is a time now for a political transition and that they should be using the turmoil in the country as a vehicle for planning and achieving that transition, rather than trying to crack down on it and turn the clock back to a time that the Burmese people are no longer willing to tolerate," said national security adviser Stephen J. Hadley.

Staff writer Peter Baker at the United Nations contributed to this report.

Myanmar Raids Monasteries Before Dawn

NYT, SETH MYDANS

BANGKOK, Sept. 27 — Beginning the second day of their crackdown on nationwide protests in Myanmar before dawn today, security forces raided at least two Buddhist monasteries, beating and arresting dozens of monks, according to reports from the capital, Yangon.

Facing its most serious challenge since taking power in 1988, the ruling junta is attempting to contain the uprising by tens of thousands of monks who have been at the heart of more than a week of huge demonstrations against economic hardships and the political repression of the military junta.

On Wednesday, in a chaotic day of huge demonstrations, shooting, teargas and running confrontations between protesters and the military, many people were reported injured and half a dozen were reported to have been killed, most of them by gunshots.

The Associated Press reported that more shots were fired today at one of several monasteries raided early in the day, Ngwe Kyar Yan, where one monk said a number of monks were beaten and at least 70 of its 150 monks were arrested.

A female lay disciple said a number of monks were arrested at a second monastery, Moe Guang, which was being guarded, like a number of other monasteries, by a contingent of armed security personnel.

The government began its violent crackdown Wednesday after tolerating more than a month of ever-larger protests in cities around the country, clubbing and tear gassing protesters, firing shots into the air and arresting hundreds of the monks and their supporters. The government of Myanmar began a violent crackdown on Wednesday after tolerating more than a month of ever larger protests in cities around the country. Security forces clubbed and tear-gassed protesters, fired shots into the air and arrested hundreds of the monks who are at the heart of the demonstrations.

A government announcement said security forces in Yangon, the country’s main city, fired at demonstrators who failed to disperse, killing one man. Foreign news agencies and exile groups reported death tolls ranging from two to eight people.

Despite threats and warnings by the authorities, and despite the beginnings of a violent response, tens of thousands of chanting, cheering protesters flooded the streets, witnesses reported. Monks were in the lead, like religious storm troopers, as one foreign diplomat described the scene.

In response to the violence, the United Nations Security Council called an emergency meeting on Wednesday to discuss the crisis, but China blocked a Council resolution, backed by the United States and European nations, to condemn the government crackdown.

However, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon announced that the United Nations was “urgently dispatching” a special envoy to Myanmar, formerly known as Burma.

A spokesman for President Bush, in New York City for the opening of the United Nations General Assembly, denounced the crackdown and urged restraint. A day before, White House officials had expressed hope that Mr. Bush’s announcement of new sanctions directed against the military government’s leaders would intensify pressure on them not to use violence against the protesters.

“The United States is very troubled by the action of the junta against the Burmese people,” the spokesman, Gordon D. Johndroe, said Wednesday afternoon. “We call on them to show restraint and to move to a peaceful transition to democracy.”

Though the crowds in Yangon, formerly Rangoon, were large and energetic on Wednesday, they were smaller than on previous days, apparently in part because of the deployment of armed soldiers to prevent monks from leaving some of the main temples.

But it appeared that an attempt by the military to halt the protests through warnings, troop deployments and initial bursts of violence had not succeeded.

Political analysts said the next steps in the crackdown might be yet more aggressive and widespread.

The foreign diplomat described an amazing scene on Wednesday as a column of 8,000 to 10,000 people flooded past his embassy following a group of about 800 monks.
They were trailed by four truckloads of military men, watching but not taking action. The diplomat, in keeping with his embassy’s policy, spoke on condition of anonymity.

According to news reports and telephone interviews from Myanmar, which is sealed off to foreign reporters, the day’s activities began with a confrontation at the giant gold-spired Shwedagon Pagoda, which has been one of the focal points of the demonstrations.

In the first reported violence in nine days of demonstrations by monks in Yangon, police officers with riot shields dispersed up to 100 monks who were trying to enter the temple, firing tear gas and warning shots and knocking some monks to the ground. As many as 200 monks were reported to have been arrested at the pagoda.

Several hundred monks then walked through downtown Yangon to the Sule Pagoda, another site of the demonstrations, where truckloads of soldiers were seen arriving Tuesday. A violent confrontation was reported there; more shots were fired and a number of arrests were made.

On a broad avenue near the temple, hundreds of people sat facing a row of soldiers, calling out to them, “The people’s armed forces, our armed forces!” and “The armed forces should not kill their own people!”

In Mandalay, Myanmar’s second largest city, more than 800 monks, nuns and other demonstrators were confronted by some 100 soldiers who tried to stop them from marching from the Mahamuni Paya Pagoda, which they had tried to enter earlier, The Associated Press reported.

The demonstrations in Yangon have grown from several hundred people protesting a fuel price rise in mid-August to as many as 100,000 on Sunday, led by tens of thousands of monks in the largest and most sustained protests since 1988.

That earlier peaceful uprising was crushed by the military, which shot into crowds, killing an estimated 3,000 people. It was during the turmoil that the current military junta took power in Myanmar, and it has maintained its grip by arresting dissidents, quashing political opposition and using force and intimidation to control the population.

Now, emboldened by the presence of the monks, huge crowds have joined the demonstrations in protests that reflect years of discontent over economic hardship and political repression.

At first, the government held back as the protests grew. It issued its first warning on Monday night, when the religious affairs minister said the government was prepared to take action against the protesting monks.

On Tuesday night, the government announced a dusk-to-dawn curfew, banned gatherings of more than five people and placed the cities of Yangon and Mandalay under what amounts to martial law. Troops began taking up positions at strategic locations around Yangon and tried to seal off five of the largest and most active monasteries.

As the protests grew, public figures began to come forward, and on Tuesday the government arrested the first of them, a popular comedian, Zarganar, who had urged people to join the demonstrations. He had irritated the government in the past with his veiled political gibes.

The crackdown on Wednesday came in the face of warnings and pleas to the junta from around the world to refrain from the kind of violence that had made the country’s ruling generals international pariahs.

At the United Nations, President Bush on Tuesday announced a largely symbolic tightening of American sanctions against Myanmar’s government. The European Union threatened to tighten its own sanctions if violence was used. On Wednesday, the British prime minister, Gordon Brown, said the first step after any meeting of the Security Council should be to send a United Nations envoy to Myanmar.

The Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, and Desmond Tutu, the former archbishop of Cape Town and antiapartheid campaigner, have spoken out in support of their fellow Nobel Peace Prize laureate Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese pro-democracy leader, who has been held under house arrest for 12 of the last 18 years.

The junta was also hearing the message directly from diplomats based in Yangon. The British ambassador, Mark Canning, said he met with a government official on Tuesday to urge restraint.

“You need to look very carefully at the underlying political and economic hardships,” he said he told the official. “The government must also understand what this is about — not fuel prices, but decades of dissatisfaction.”
Steven Lee Myers contributed reporting from New York.



The Monks Are Cut Off, and Burmese Clashes Ebb

SETH MYDAN
NYT

BANGKOK, Sept. 28 — Myanmar’s armed forces appeared on Friday to have sealed tens of thousands of protesting monks inside their monasteries, but they continued to attack bands of demonstrators who challenged them in the main city, Yangon.

Witnesses and diplomats reached by telephone inside the country said troops were confronting and attacking smaller groups of civilians around Yangon, chasing them through narrow streets and sometimes firing at protesters and arresting them.

“Today has been quieter than previous days, meaning far fewer protesters came out, but the military is being very quick to use violence, tear gas, guns and clubs to break it up,” said Shari Villarosa, the chief diplomat at the United States Embassy.

Diplomats said that there was no way to know the toll of dead and wounded in Yangon or other cities, but that it was certainly far higher than the junta says.

Bob Davis, Australia’s ambassador to Myanmar, said that based on unconfirmed reports, he was sure the death toll was “several multiples of the 10 acknowledged by the authorities.”

“I am afraid we believe the loss of life is far greater than is being reported,” Prime Minister Gordon Brown of Britain said.

Human rights and exile groups with contacts in Myanmar said they had fewer clashes to report on Friday, at least partly because of an apparent government clampdown on Internet and telephone communications.

Brutal attacks on monasteries and a heavy military presence outside their gates appeared to have choked off, at least for now, the huge demonstrations led by monks that are the most serious challenge to the military junta since it took power in 1988.

Exile groups passed on many vivid reports about brutality toward monks, many of whom were reportedly driven away in trucks. Soldiers were said to have prevented others from leaving the monasteries.

“Wednesday night, numerous monasteries were raided,” Ms. Villarosa said, “and we have reports that many monks were beaten and arrested, and we have pictures where whole monasteries have been trashed,” including images of blood and broken glass.

With the monks contained, another Western diplomat said, the demonstrations seemed to have lost their focus, and soldiers were quick to pounce on any group that appeared on the streets.

“Troops are chasing protesters and beating them and taking them away in trucks,” said the diplomat, speaking anonymously under embassy policy. “There are pockets of protesters left. They are unorganized, and it’s all very small-scale.”

Even if the junta clears the streets, it seems to have turned most of the world against it. The crackdown has drawn far more intense criticism than in 1988, when the military responded to protests by killing thousands.

Nor was it clear how the junta would recover any legitimacy at home. “The military is doing their best to frighten people into going back, but they are not doing anything about the underlying grievances,” Ms. Villarosa said. “Whether they will ultimately be successful, I doubt, because the grievances are real.”

Heavy pressure from the United Nations has forced the military to allow a visit from a special United Nations envoy, Ibrahim Gambari. He is expected to reach Myanmar on Saturday.

In Washington, President Bush thanked China, Myanmar’s leading trade partner, for helping persuade the junta to allow the visit.

In Tokyo, Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda said that he had spoken with his Chinese counterpart, Wen Jiabao, and that they had agreed to work on international efforts to solve the crisis.

“I asked that China, given its close ties with Myanmar, exercise its influence, and Prime Minister Wen said he would make such efforts,” Mr. Fukuda said.

Reuters reported that Japan would send an envoy to Myanmar to investigate the death of a videojournalist, Kenji Nagai. A videotape shows that Mr. Nagai, who was killed Thursday while filming protests near the Sule Pagoda in Yangon, may have been shot at close range.

The current crisis began on Aug. 19, after the government increased fuel prices overnight by as much as 500 percent without any announcement or explanation. The increases ignited scattered protests led at first by longtime dissidents, most of whom had been involved in the protests of 1988. The demonstrations revealed the deep discontent and anger over the junta’s economic mismanagement.

In 45 years of military rule — and 19 years under this junta — Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, has become a ragged, suffering nation, one of the poorest and most repressed in Asia.

The crowds grew much larger after Sept. 18, when huge columns of monks filled the streets and residents joined them by the tens of thousands. The demonstrations swelled to as many as 100,000 monks and supporters in Yangon alone.

Defying international warnings and condemnation, the government crackdown began Wednesday morning with raids on several monasteries and the appearance of an aggressive armed force on the streets.

NYT, September 29

U.S. Steps Up Confrontation With Myanmar’s Rulers

By DAVID E. SANGER and STEVEN LEE MYERS

WASHINGTON, Sept. 28 — The Bush administration stepped up its confrontation with the ruling junta in Myanmar on Friday, and officials said they were searching for ways to persuade China and other nations to cut off lending, investment and trade into the country.

But in a sign of how limited Washington’s leverage is against the country, which has long been the target of American sanctions, officials said they were concerned that China, a trading partner and neighbor of Myanmar, would block any serious effort to destabilize the Burmese government.

The administration seems to regard the violent crackdown on Burmese monks as a long-hoped-for opportunity to get other Southeast Asian nations to rethink their insistence that they should not interfere with the internal politics of their neighbors. The hope is that American pressure might force the Burmese leaders into a political process that would drive them from power, if not from the country.

“What we are trying to do is speed their demise,” said a senior American official. “The question is, do we have the diplomatic and economic influence to hit a bank shot here,” by persuading Beijing, in particular, that its dealings with Myanmar could embarrass it as the 2008 Olympics approach.

Another senior official said the administration would try to persuade China to offer sanctuary to the leaders of the junta, in hopes it would get them out of the country. Other ideas include getting China and India to halt investment in new oil and gas projects, cutting off bank lending in places like Singapore to freeze Burmese accounts.

The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were discussing internal policy deliberations.

Many of the techniques are modeled on the sanctions designed against North Korea. Officials were surprised at how quickly banks ceased dealing with that country as soon as they realized it could affect their access to the American banking system.

“International institutions take our list seriously,” one of the officials said, referring to banks. The official added, “They quickly realize the downside of dealing with these people is greater than the upside.”

At least for the moment, officials said, the junta leaders seemed to be gaining some ground over the protesters, cutting off their access to the Internet, so that photographs and video of the street confrontations would not circulate around the world.

The government does face international criticism, though. The United Nations, under pressure from the Bush administration and European leaders, is sending a special envoy, Ibrahim Gambari, to Myanmar, which agreed to allow him to visit after China intervened, officials said.

In a meeting on Thursday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice confronted a midlevel Burmese diplomat, according to officials who were present, telling him it was “bizarre” that he was defending his government while pictures emerged of troops shooting unarmed monks.

On Friday, Ms. Rice expressed disappointment that the United Nations Security Council could not act more forcefully, largely because of opposition from China.

“I will say on Burma that given what is going on in the streets in Rangoon, I would have hope that the Security Council would have taken stronger action,” Ms. Rice said in New York, referring to the country’s capital, Yangon, by its traditional name. American policy does not recognize the military government’s changing of the country’s name to Myanmar and continues to refer to it as Burma.

The Bush administration’s efforts have received praise from an unexpected quarter: human rights advocates.

“To the extent the international community is not moving, it is not the fault of the United States,” said Jeremy Woodrum, a co-founder of the U.S. Campaign for Burma, an advocacy organization in Washington. He credited President Bush with forcing through statements critical of Myanmar’s leaders this week by the United Nations Security Council and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

Officials said Mr. Bush saw the events in Myanmar as a chance to reinforce his push for democracy around the world. “It’s a legacy moment,” a senior American diplomat said.

Mr. Bush discussed how to respond to the military crackdown in a video conference on Friday with Prime Minister Gordon Brown of Britain, who promised to seek tougher sanctions through the European Union. The State Department also announced that it had barred “more than three dozen” senior officials and their family members from entering the United States.

On Thursday, the Treasury Department announced a list of 14 of Myanmar’s leaders who now face sanctions. One of the senior officials said that the list would be expanded next week to include more officials.

Few Burmese leaders have ever traveled to the United States, but President Bush pointedly included family members when he announced the visa bans. The State Department did not specify who was on the list, though it almost certainly includes those on the Treasury Department’s list.

The officials warned that it could easily be expanded to include Burmese officials’ children or grandchildren who might be visiting or studying in the United States.

One of the senior officials said that the administration was also considering the fate of the only major American investment in Myanmar, a Chevron energy stake, which was grandfathered in when the Clinton administration imposed sanctions on the country in 1997.

Chevron owns a share of a gas field and pipeline project that was initially acquired by Unocal. The project also includes Total from France, PTT Exploration and Production of Thailand and Myanmar’s Myanma Oil and Gas Enterprise.

A spokesman for Chevron, Donald Campbell, declined to comment on whether the new sanctions or any other under consideration would affect the company’s investment.

Given the dearth of American investment and trade with Myanmar, the financial levers appear limited, officials acknowledged.

But the United States has stepped up pressure in other ways: Voice of America and Radio Free Asia doubled their broadcasting into the country in Burmese to five hours a day.

Officials hope to increase that, and also to shift funds to help support nongovernmental organizations and purchase cellphones to help disseminate information, especially now that the government has shut down Myanmar’s Internet connections.

Ultimately, though, the officials said the greatest hope for forcing the military government to negotiate its own demise, in effect, rested with the country’s neighbors, especially China.

President Bush used an Oval Office meeting with China’s foreign minister on Thursday to press for strong action, but American officials say the Chinese are reluctant to act against a significant trading partner or set a precedent for undermining a single-party government that represses dissent.

Still, the White House press secretary, Dana M. Perino, said Friday that Mr. Bush was pleased with the outcome of his meeting with the foreign minister, Yang Jeichi. “I think that the Chinese were helpful in allowing to make sure the U.N. special envoy was allowed to get there, to Burma,” she said.

Helene Cooper contributed reporting from New York.



U.S. Urges China to Help Curb Violence in Burma, Prepare for Transition

Michael Abramowitz
Washington Post
Saturday, September 29

Senior Bush administration officials have pressed Chinese officials in private conversations this week to use their leverage with Burmese authorities to limit the violence and help manage a transition to a new government in Burma, which is experiencing its most serious and violent demonstrations in two decades, U.S. officials said yesterday.

The Chinese have deflected the entreaties by describing Burma's turmoil as an internal matter. But one senior U.S. official said the Chinese have been "shocked" by the world's reaction to the confrontation between the government and protesters. He added that he believes they are "reconsidering the amount of support" China provides to the Burmese government.

China, which has extensive commercial interests in Burma, has received a blunt message from the United States: "You wanted to become a big power -- part of being a big power is you will be held responsible for you client states," said this official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was discussing private meetings. U.S. officials have also urged China to consider some form of refuge for Burmese leaders, to help speed a transition to a new government, this official said.

The White House is focusing its diplomacy on China largely because it has little independent influence over the military-led government in Burma, which has engaged this week in a crackdown on protesters led by Buddhist monks.

The administration is calculating that Beijing, a major protector of Burma, will not want to risk world opprobrium if widespread bloodshed is caused by its long-time ally. Officials said China is nervous about prospects that the 2008 Olympics in Beijing could be tarnished if the situation in Burma is not stabilized peacefully.

The anti-government protests, which started in August, have become a cause c¿l¿bre in Washington in the wake of this week's crackdown. House and Senate leaders drafted resolutions yesterday condemning the military government, with little of the normal partisan bickering that often accompanies foreign policy debates on Capitol Hill.

The administration, meanwhile, announced sanctions this week aimed at squeezing the government's military leaders and their associates. On Thursday, the Treasury Department imposed new financial sanctions on 14 senior Burmese officials linked to egregious human rights abuses.

Yesterday, the State Department announced that three dozen Burmese military and government officials and their families will be barred from visiting the United States. The U.S. government is also doubling the amount of Burmese-language broadcasts beamed into a country where the authorities have been trying to cut off Internet and other forms of communication with the outside world, an official said.

President Bush has stepped up his rhetoric, calling on other countries to press Burma, which is also known as Myanmar. He has been joined by first lady Laura Bush, who has adopted the pro-democracy cause in Burma in a rare foray into foreign policy and has issued repeated public statements criticizing the government. Both Bushes have been heavily influenced by private meetings with Burmese dissidents and other activists, current and former administration officials say.

"President Bush calls on all nations, especially those nations closest to Burma that have the most influence with the regime, to support the aspirations of the Burmese people, and to join in condemning the junta's use of violence . . .," the first lady said in a statement last night. "The United States stands with the people of Burma. . . . We cannot -- and will not -- turn our attention from courageous people who stand up for democracy and justice."

Bush met with Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi in the Oval Office on Thursday for an unscheduled meeting on Burma after the diplomat came to the White House to see national security adviser Stephen J. Hadley. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice raised the subject of Burma in her own meeting with the foreign minister earlier in the week, and the United States' top diplomat on Asia, Christopher R. Hill, has also discussed the issue in Beijing, where he is attending talks on North Korea's nuclear weapons program, a senior official said.

U.S. officials have limited knowledge about events inside Burma -- including the death toll, so far -- and depend, in large measure, on news reports and information from refugees, exiles and others in neighboring countries. The United States does have a mission in Burma, but the ability of diplomats there to report has been limited in recent days, officials said.

Still, one senior official said the accounts he is seeing suggest "a regime under severe stress." He said the U.S. government is receiving unconfirmed reports that division-level military commanders in Burma are refusing orders to participate in the crackdown. Another official said that it is impossible to predict what will happen but that there is "overwhelming dislike" of the government among civilians.

U.S. officials were cautious in their assessment of the diplomatic road ahead. One acknowledged that there have been only "pretty tepid" statements from China and India, but officials were encouraged by a condemnation this week from neighboring members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. State Department officials quietly raised the possibility of introducing another U.N. Security Council resolution on Burma if they do not see stronger action from China and India.

Rep. Tom Lantos (D-Calif.), the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said he agrees with the administration that China is key to resolving the situation. "There is no doubt in my mind that if the Chinese authorities decided to put pressure on Burma, things will change instantaneously," he said.

Staff writer Robin Wright contributed to this report.

NYT, October 1
U.N. Envoy Tries to Ease Tensions in Myanmar

SETH MYDANS

BANGKOK, Sept. 30 — A United Nations envoy to Myanmar met Sunday with the detained opposition leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and with several members of the military junta that last week crushed a peaceful pro-democracy uprising, the United Nations said.

The envoy, Ibrahim Gambari, spent more than an hour at a government guesthouse in the main city, Yangon, with Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been under house arrest for 12 of the past 18 years. He spent Saturday and Sunday nights in the administrative capital, Naypyidaw, 200 miles north of Yangon, where he met with government officials but not the top two leaders.

Soldiers patrolled the quiet streets of Yangon on Sunday after days of the military’s violent crackdown on demonstrations, led by Buddhist monks, that had grown over more than a week to as many as 100,000 people.

More arrests were reported overnight and hundreds of monks remained in detention after leading the biggest challenge to the junta since it took power 19 years ago. Human rights groups and diplomats said the death toll was far higher than the 10 reported by the junta.

At least four local journalists, including Min Zaw, the Burmese correspondent for the Japanese daily Tokyo Shimbun, have been arrested, and several others are missing and presumed arrested, news media organizations said.

About 10 Burmese reporters have been physically attacked or prevented from working, including reporters for the foreign news agencies Reuters and Agence France-Presse, according to Reporters Without Borders and the Burma Media Association.

“The crackdown appears to have terrified people enough to stay out of the streets,” said the chief representative of the United States in Myanmar, Shari Villarosa. She said that some monasteries appeared to be deserted Sunday and that “one can only wonder what has happened to all the monks.”

Ms. Villarosa said the military must now seek a peaceful resolution through a dialogue with the opposition “rather than just relying on gunfire, which has succeeded in clearing the streets but does not address the underlying grievances of the people.”

Mr. Gambari traveled to Myanmar as the representative of a world that has watched in outrage as a military government that has ruled through force ordered troops to fire into crowds of demonstrators.

Some analysts doubted that the visit could have a significant effect on a ruling clique that has resisted all international efforts to modify its behavior.

Visits by United Nations envoys have failed to bring reconciliation between the junta and the opposition or secure the release of Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi. Mr. Gambari visited her a year ago, the last time she had been seen by any senior foreign diplomat.

“Reconciliation is now farther away than ever from reality,” said Aung Naing Oo, a Burmese political analyst who is based in Thailand. “The military’s violent response took the lid off the anger and pent-up frustration that has accumulated over the past 19 years and it will be difficult for the military administration to put things back in order.”

Analysts said a key to modifying Myanmar’s behavior would be pressure from China, its main trading partner and its political buffer between the outside world.

On Saturday, China’s prime minister, Wen Jiabao, said China was “very much concerned about the current situation.” He urged all parties in Myanmar to “use peaceful means to restore its stability as soon as possible.”

But there was no indication that China would join efforts to boycott or sanction Myanmar.

On Sunday, a senior Japanese official headed to Myanmar to protest the shooting death of a Japanese photographer, Kenji Nagai, 50, as he covered a military assault on protesters.

His killing drew outrage in Japan, which is Myanmar’s largest aid donor, giving about $25 million last year. But Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda said he would refrain for now from withdrawing aid or taking other steps.

Video of the shooting, posted on YouTube, shows a helmeted soldier running up behind Mr. Nagai and apparently pushing him to the ground before shooting him and running on. Mr. Nagai then momentarily raised his arms, camera in hand, and then lay still.

Several days ago, the authorities shut down access to the Internet, and the police reportedly began to search pedestrians and to confiscate cameras in a continuing effort to halt the flow of video images and photographs.

The United Nations’ World Food Program reported that it had received assurances that it could resume delivering aid to hundreds of thousands of people who had been cut off by government restrictions on transportation.