Junta Uses Scare Tactics to Cow Residents, No Word on U.N.'s Democracy Mission

Myanmar's junta broadcast warnings from trucks that soldiers were searching for protesters, while a U.N. envoy remained tightlipped Wednesday about his mission to convince the military rulers to end their crackdown on democracy advocates.

Military vehicles patrolled the streets of Yangon overnight and blared from loudspeakers that soldiers were searching for protesters: "We have photographs. We are going to make arrests!"

After day broke, an eerie quiet prevailed in Yangon, as some semblance of normality returned to Myanmar's biggest city, with some shops opening and light traffic plying on roads.

However, "people are terrified, and the underlying forces of discontent have not been addressed," Shari Villarosa, the acting U.S. ambassador in Myanmar, said in a telephone interview.

"People have been unhappy for a long time," she told The Associated Press in Bangkok, Thailand. "Since the events of last week, there's now the unhappiness combined with anger, and fear."

Simmering hatred for the military's 45-year rule exploded in mid-August after it hiked fuel prices by as much as 500 percent, a crushing burden in this impoverished nation. The marches soon ballooned into mass pro-democracy demonstrations led by the nation's revered Buddhist monks.

The military crushed the protests on Sept. 26 and 27 with live ammunition, tear gas and by beating up demonstrators. Hundreds of people were carted off to detention camps. The government says 10 people were killed in the violence. But dissident groups put the death toll at up to 200. They say 6,000 people were detained.

The U.N.'s special envoy, Ibrahim Gambari, went to Myanmar on Saturday to convey the international community's outrage at the junta's actions. He also hoped to persuade the junta to take the people's aspirations seriously.

Gambari was in transit in Singapore Wednesday after his four-day mission, during which he met junta leader Senior Gen. Than Shwe, his deputies. He also talked to detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi twice.

Gambari avoided the media in Singapore, refusing to answer questions by reporters gathered at his hotel. He was not expected to issue any statement until he had briefed the U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Friday.

The junta also has not commented on Gambari's visit.
The United Nations has only released photos of Gambari and a somber, haggard-looking Suu Kyi - who has spent nearly 12 of the last 18 years under house arrest - shaking hands during their meeting in a state guest house in Yangon.

In Singapore, Gambari met with Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, the chairman of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations bloc of which Myanmar is a member.

A Singapore government statement said Lee told Gambari that ASEAN "is fully behind his mission" to bring about "a political solution for national reconciliation and a peaceful transition to democracy."
Sumber: The Jakarta Post, 3/10/07