Myanmar: Government Warns Protesters

Reuters (“Myanmar junta threatens action against protesters“):

Fears of a repeat of 1988’s bloody crackdown by Myanmar’s ruling generals grew on Tuesday after the junta threatened action against monks at the centre of the biggest anti-government demonstrations in nearly 20 years.

The Burma Campaign UK said its sources in Yangon had reported soldiers being ordered to shave their heads in possible preparation for infiltrating the massed ranks of Buddhist monks marching for an end to 45 years of unbroken military rule.

The London-based activist group said the junta had also ordered 3,000 maroon monastic robes, again with the probable intention of having soldiers masquerade as monks to stir up trouble and create a pretext for a crackdown.

In 1988, the last time the Southeast Asian nation’s people took to the streets in the tens of thousands, agents provocateurs were seen stirring up the crowds, thereby giving the military the excuse to come in and restore order.

AFP (“Myanmar junta warns against more protests“):

Myanmar’s military regime warned its people Tuesday not to join a swelling nationwide protest movement that has escalated into the most potent threat to their hardline rule in nearly 20 years.

Local government officials using loudspeakers rode trucks through central Yangon warning against new anti-junta protests, a day after Buddhist monks led 100,000 people onto the streets of the country’s biggest city.

State media bluntly ordered the monks to stay clear of politics, mirroring government threats of a crackdown carried on state television late Monday.

Analysts said Chinese pressure has helped prevent a bloody crackdown on anti-government protests but China cannot restrain its allies in Yangon indefinitely.

AP (“Narrow Vision Marks Myanmar Generals“):

To much of the world and many of their own citizens, Myanmar’s military rulers are tyrants stubbornly standing in the way of democracy by refusing to hand over power to the political party of detained Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, which won a 1990 general election.

But they claim to be binding a fractious nation together and safeguarding against anarchy that could come from many contending ethnic groups. And they see themselves as paragons of development.

Myanmar’s military rulers are at once both familiar faces and men of mystery.

(Emphasis mine.)