Myanmar accuses ‘powerful countries’ of aiding ‘opportunists’

UN: Myanmar Foreign Minister U Nyan Win on Monday defended his government’s crackdown on pro-democracy protesters, blaming the turmoil on “political opportunists” backed by “powerful countries.”

Articulating his government’s most detailed analysis of the current unrest, he told the UN General Assembly that “political opportunists” backed by “some powerful countries,” which he did not name, were stirring the trouble.

“The situation would not have deteriorated had the initial protest of a small group of activists against the rise in fuel prices not been exploited by political opportunists,” he told the UN General Assembly here.

He said those “opportunists ... aided and abetted by some powerful countries” also took advantage of protests “staged initially by a small group of Buddhist clergy demanding apology for maltreatment of fellow monks by local authorities.”

The minister asserted that Myanmar security forces showed “utmost restraint” and did not intervene for nearly a month.

He said authorities were compelled to declare a curfew “when the mob became unruly and provocative.”

“When protestors ignored their warning, they (security forces) had to take action to restore the situation. Normalcy has now returned in Myanmar,” he added.

Last week tens of thousands of Buddhist monks and political activists took to the streets of Yangon, the country’s largest city, and other towns, in Myanmar’s largest anti-government protests in almost 20 years.

The regime crushed the mass rallies by sending in troops, who killed at least 13 people and possibly many more, raided and locked down monasteries and arrested hundreds of people whose fate remains unknown.

Nyan Win portrayed the turmoil as part of “neo-colonialist attempts” to impose Western-style democracy on Myanmar.

The strategy, he said, involves launching media campaigns and “spreading disinformation that the country concerned is committing gross human rights violations” and portraying these drives as “a fight for democracy.”

And US President George W. Bush’s deputy national security adviser, Jim Jeffrey, was to meet with China’s ambassador to Washington, Zhou Wenzhong, to discuss Sino-US cooperation on the crisis, said Perino.

“The United States is committed to working with countries around the world to make sure the region moves Burma towards peaceful transition to democracy,” said Perino, Bush’s chief spokeswoman.

Meanwhile A Japanese envoy pressed Myanmar’s junta for a meeting with democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi during talks over the death of a journalist covering mass protests, the foreign ministry said Tuesday.

Deputy Foreign Minister Mitoji Yabunaka also demanded the return of a video camera the journalist was carrying at the moment he was shot dead as security forces cracked down on the anti-government rallies.

He also asked to meet Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been detained for 12 of the past 18 years, a Japanese foreign ministry official said, adding the junta had not given any consent yet.

New York, Tuesday, Reuters, AFP