China backs off on Myanmar

One day after endorsing a unanimous United Nations security council resolution urging Myanmar to rein in its violent tactics and engage in genuine dialogue with political opposition, China’s foreign minister said Myanmar’s political issues are purely its own.
Yesterday’s non-binding resolution was the first action taken by the security council in response to Myanmar’s violent repression [...]

Junta throttles info export

The military government that rules Myanmar is seizing telephones and internet-capable computers.
Images of the regime’s brutal reprisals against Buddhist monks and pro-democracy demonstrators have been spread around the world in recent days.
Last week the country’s public internet link was severed, though embassy internet connections and satellite telephones continued to operate. Now those links are gone [...]

Friday

Ecuador, Myanmar, drugs.
Music: Speedy J – “Ginger”; Pizzy Elliot – “Could You Be Loved” (Mungolian Jetset Remix)

US meets with Myanmar regime

A US ambassador met today with a representative of Myanmar’s military government. Shari Villarosa, the top-ranking American diplomat to the region, travelled to the remote jungle redoubt of Naypitaw, where the dictatorship that rules Myanmar (formerly Burma) has anchored itself.
Ms Villarosa has frequently expressed criticisms of the brutal and inept tactics of the ruling junta, [...]

Wednesday

North Korea, Iraq, and Myanmar.
Roundup will be available as a podcast soon.

Myanmar’s Internet link broken

The main public Internet link between Myanmar (also known as Burma) and the outside world is down. An official with Myanmar Post and Telecoms blames a damaged cable under the sea.
Embassy internet connections, however, remain viable.
The country’s loss of Internet connectivity came this morning amid an intensifying repression against pro-democracy protestors. Government soldiers have killed [...]

Myanmar troops kill nine

Nine people have been killed in Yangon by government soldiers, according to Myanmar’s state-controlled television station. The dead include eight pro-democracy protestors and a Japanese cameraman.
The station says 11 demonstrators and 31 soldiers have been injured.
Buddhist monks have led hundreds of thousands of pro-democracy protestors in street demonstrations over the past 10 days.
Following government raids [...]

China, Russia, undermine UN condemnation of crackdown

China and Russia have blocked a UN security council effort to condemn the violent repression of protestors in Myanmar (also known as Burma).
Wang Guangya, the Chinese ambassador to the UN, said that Myanmar’s problems are its own, and that a UN statement of condemnation would not be useful.
Any recognition by the security council that the [...]

Hundreds arrested, shots fired, as junta begins crackdown in Myanmar

The eastern gate of Shwedagon Pagoda in Yangon
The military junta that rules Myanmar arrested at least 200 Buddhist monks today in response to pro-democracy demonstrations that have brought hundreds of thousands of people into the streets over the past week.
During the night, government soldiers used a 9pm–5am curfew to barricade pagodas used as gathering places [...]

Monks ignore threats from junta

Up to 100,000 people in Myanmar’s major cities have taken to the streets again today to protest the military dictatorship that rules their country.
The government of Myanmar (also known as Burma) said earlier today that it may break up street protests in Yangon with military force.
Loudspeakers mounted on vehicles trawled the streets of Yangon (formerly [...]