Emboldened Myanmar monks challenge junta rule (Photo: AFP TV)Hundreds of monks briefly protested again on Friday in North Okkalapa, a northern suburb of Rangoon, Burma's former capital and still its largest city.
September 24, 2007
Dominic Faulder
Posted by The Nation (Thailand)
It marked the fourth day of peaceful protests against the perceived misrule and economic ineptitude of Burma's ruling junta, the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), which has been led for 15 years by Senior General Than Shwe, 74.
"This is possibly the beginning of the end," said a Burmese journalist in Rangoon. "It's movement, and that is what is significant."
A much larger group of marching monks was applauded on Thursday by onlookers outside City Hall on Sule Pagoda Road in the heart of Rangoon.
An underground network of monks has been fanning unrest across Burma after a five-fold increase in fuel prices was imposed a month ago without warning.
Some monks are causing humiliation by refusing to minister to soldiers and their families. This revives a tactic first used in Mandalay in August 1990 after the military shot and killed a handful of young monks, and forcibly disrobed hundreds more.
One injured monk may have succumbed to wounds in the latest round of unrest - the most widespread and sustained in Burma for nearly two decades.
The generals may be rattled. Exiled Burmese are attaching significance to the SPDC's decision to cancel a quarterly meeting of some 20 regional commanders and their aides scheduled for today at the new capital, Naypyidaw, where Than Shwe now resides in regal glory but increasing isolation. Matters on the agenda included final adjustments to a long delayed new constitution, which has been drafted since the early 1990s.
Some analysts believe Burma is finally approaching a possible "tipping point" not seen since the military put a brutal end to a six-week, nationwide pro-democracy uprising on September 18, 1988, which left an estimated 3,000 unarmed civilians dead.
"If this goes on, more people are going to join them," predicts David Scott Mathieson, who monitors Burma for New York-based Human Rights Watch. "They are calling for peaceful dialogue and reform. This is not just Rangoon. The monks are responding to the needs of the people."
"It is getting very interesting," concurs Sunai Pasuk, a leading Thai human-rights activist. "Instead of political activists leading, we are seeing ordinary people coming out - housewives first and now monks."
"People are encouraged, and I think they will keep going. They know they are suffering from this government and not from a past life," says Win Min, a Burmese researcher at Chiang Mai University, Thailand.
Burma's failed democratic flowering in 1988 was also triggered by economic hardship and national mismanagement. As with the recent sudden fuel-cost increases, demonstrations were sparked in September 1987 by the abrupt demonetisation of most bank notes, effectively robbing ordinary Burmese of their savings overnight. The discontent snowballed into to a nationwide pro-democracy uprising on August 8, 1988 - known to Burmese as "8/8/88"
Leaked summaries of recent United Nations Development Programme studies suggest that the standard of living of ordinary Burmese has steadily declined with the military's economic mismanagement, even though Burma is the most resource rich country in Southeast Asia. Burmese have to spend virtually all their income on food, whereas their neighbouring Thais spend less than 40 per cent.
In recent weeks, the vitriolic official press has attempted to pin the blame for the floundering economy on Western sanctions, Burma's imprisoned democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi, and "The Generation of '88" - student leaders from 1988. The latter have recently been thrown back into prison after failing to cajole the SPDC into dialogue.
If the economy is again approaching 1987-1988 levels, monks are uniquely positioned to know. Each morning they collect alms from the public for their own sustenance. "What they used to get from four or five houses, now takes 30 to 35," says Aung Naing Oo, a Burmese analyst in exile who himself once lived in a monastery.
The revered Burmese Buddhist brotherhood, or sangha, contains an estimated 400,000 to 500,000 monks and novices, which is roughly equivalent to the entire Burmese military. In recent years, Burmese monasteries have been drawn back into their traditional role of filling social needs. They run everything from HIV/Aids clinics to orphanages and schools.
"People are starving and can't afford to send their kids to school," says Aung Naing Oo, noting the Phaung Daw Oo, a prominent monastery in Mandalay, has swollen to 7,000 students. "A population of 10 monks would have another 35 people to feed," he says.
Aung Naing Oo warns that violent suppression could trigger anti-Chinese sentiments, particularly in Mandalay and northern Burma, which has seen a strong wave of Chinese migration post-1988. "If anything happens, it could turn into anti-Chinese riots," he says.
Beijing is currently the Burmese junta's best friend. It quashed a censure motion against the rogue regime in the UN Security Council early in the year. With the recent opening of a tribunal in Phnom Penh to indict an earlier ally, the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, China may be more than usually vulnerable to criticism about its support for governments which disregard the interests of their people.
September 24, 2007
Dominic Faulder
Posted by The Nation (Thailand)
It marked the fourth day of peaceful protests against the perceived misrule and economic ineptitude of Burma's ruling junta, the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), which has been led for 15 years by Senior General Than Shwe, 74.
"This is possibly the beginning of the end," said a Burmese journalist in Rangoon. "It's movement, and that is what is significant."
A much larger group of marching monks was applauded on Thursday by onlookers outside City Hall on Sule Pagoda Road in the heart of Rangoon.
An underground network of monks has been fanning unrest across Burma after a five-fold increase in fuel prices was imposed a month ago without warning.
Some monks are causing humiliation by refusing to minister to soldiers and their families. This revives a tactic first used in Mandalay in August 1990 after the military shot and killed a handful of young monks, and forcibly disrobed hundreds more.
One injured monk may have succumbed to wounds in the latest round of unrest - the most widespread and sustained in Burma for nearly two decades.
The generals may be rattled. Exiled Burmese are attaching significance to the SPDC's decision to cancel a quarterly meeting of some 20 regional commanders and their aides scheduled for today at the new capital, Naypyidaw, where Than Shwe now resides in regal glory but increasing isolation. Matters on the agenda included final adjustments to a long delayed new constitution, which has been drafted since the early 1990s.
Some analysts believe Burma is finally approaching a possible "tipping point" not seen since the military put a brutal end to a six-week, nationwide pro-democracy uprising on September 18, 1988, which left an estimated 3,000 unarmed civilians dead.
"If this goes on, more people are going to join them," predicts David Scott Mathieson, who monitors Burma for New York-based Human Rights Watch. "They are calling for peaceful dialogue and reform. This is not just Rangoon. The monks are responding to the needs of the people."
"It is getting very interesting," concurs Sunai Pasuk, a leading Thai human-rights activist. "Instead of political activists leading, we are seeing ordinary people coming out - housewives first and now monks."
"People are encouraged, and I think they will keep going. They know they are suffering from this government and not from a past life," says Win Min, a Burmese researcher at Chiang Mai University, Thailand.
Burma's failed democratic flowering in 1988 was also triggered by economic hardship and national mismanagement. As with the recent sudden fuel-cost increases, demonstrations were sparked in September 1987 by the abrupt demonetisation of most bank notes, effectively robbing ordinary Burmese of their savings overnight. The discontent snowballed into to a nationwide pro-democracy uprising on August 8, 1988 - known to Burmese as "8/8/88"
Leaked summaries of recent United Nations Development Programme studies suggest that the standard of living of ordinary Burmese has steadily declined with the military's economic mismanagement, even though Burma is the most resource rich country in Southeast Asia. Burmese have to spend virtually all their income on food, whereas their neighbouring Thais spend less than 40 per cent.
In recent weeks, the vitriolic official press has attempted to pin the blame for the floundering economy on Western sanctions, Burma's imprisoned democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi, and "The Generation of '88" - student leaders from 1988. The latter have recently been thrown back into prison after failing to cajole the SPDC into dialogue.
If the economy is again approaching 1987-1988 levels, monks are uniquely positioned to know. Each morning they collect alms from the public for their own sustenance. "What they used to get from four or five houses, now takes 30 to 35," says Aung Naing Oo, a Burmese analyst in exile who himself once lived in a monastery.
The revered Burmese Buddhist brotherhood, or sangha, contains an estimated 400,000 to 500,000 monks and novices, which is roughly equivalent to the entire Burmese military. In recent years, Burmese monasteries have been drawn back into their traditional role of filling social needs. They run everything from HIV/Aids clinics to orphanages and schools.
"People are starving and can't afford to send their kids to school," says Aung Naing Oo, noting the Phaung Daw Oo, a prominent monastery in Mandalay, has swollen to 7,000 students. "A population of 10 monks would have another 35 people to feed," he says.
Aung Naing Oo warns that violent suppression could trigger anti-Chinese sentiments, particularly in Mandalay and northern Burma, which has seen a strong wave of Chinese migration post-1988. "If anything happens, it could turn into anti-Chinese riots," he says.
Beijing is currently the Burmese junta's best friend. It quashed a censure motion against the rogue regime in the UN Security Council early in the year. With the recent opening of a tribunal in Phnom Penh to indict an earlier ally, the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, China may be more than usually vulnerable to criticism about its support for governments which disregard the interests of their people.
4 comments:
Khmer Monks cannot protest because ah Tep Vong and Ah Yuon agents are hiding in pagoda to kill our monks.
Ah Tep and his gangs should stand KRT too.
Well it is Cambodian monks turn to do religious salvation for good of the society.
Yeahh Monks of Tep Vong knew how to shoot and t'aikwando
Monks protesting? Where on earth did that came from? I say run their asses over with an armor tank and done with it.
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