TOC condemns violent crackdown on peaceful Burma protesters
LATEST: Burma seals off key monasteries – BBC
LATEST: S’porean man shot and kicked by Myanmar riot police – Straits Times
In recent weeks, the world has witnessed the largest peaceful street protests against the military government to take place in Burma since the brutal 1988 military crackdown on students. The number of protesters reached a new high of over 100,000 on 24 September.
On 26 September, the military government declared a dawn to dusk curfew. Despite this, monks and ordinary Burmese citizens continued to take to the streets in protest. In response, Burma police fired tear gas into crowds of protesters and used their batons to beat the unarmed citizens, which included students and monks.
theonlinecitizen (TOC) strongly condemns the military regime’s violent response to peaceful protesters and calls on the Burma government to refrain from any further crackdown.
TOC applauds the hundreds of thousands of brave Burmese civilians who are risking life and limb to peacefully voice out their disgust with the failed policies and the brutal and undemocratic behaviour of the military government.
We note that the ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Myanmar Caucus (AIPMC) has expressed its “sheer disappointment and concern” about the use of brutal force by the military regime in Burma. TOC agrees with AIPMC’s president, Zaid Ibrahim, who said, “The reaction of Myanmar’s authorities towards the peaceful protesters is totally unacceptable. The junta have really crossed the line now and AIPMC strongly calls on the regime to immediately stop the use of harmful means to disperse the crowds.”
We also note that the Singapore Government has stated that it is “deeply concerned by reports of clashes between protestors and security forces in Yangon” and has “urge(d) the Myanmar authorities to exercise utmost restraint”.
TOC calls on the Singapore Government, the current chairman of ASEAN, to coordinate with fellow ASEAN members to take immediate and concrete steps to intervene in the situation to prevent further violence against civilians. ASEAN member states should not be seen to be standing idly by as the Burmese junta continues to use disproportionate force and violence against defenceless civilians.
Finally, TOC appeals to the governments of India and China to use their strong influence to caution Burma‘s military government not to crack down violently on their own citizens in their effort to hold on to power.
The Editorial Team
theonlinecitizen
ASEAN Vision 2020
“We envision the ASEAN region to be, in 2020, in full reality, a Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality, as envisaged in the Kuala Lumpur Declaration of 1971.
ASEAN shall have, by the year 2020, established a peaceful and stable Southeast Asia where each nation is at peace with itself and where the causes for conflict have been eliminated, through abiding respect for justice and the rule of law and through the strengthening of national and regional resilience.”
“We envision our nations being governed with the consent and greater participation of the people with its focus on the welfare and dignity of the human person and the good of the community.”
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Andrew Loh
ASEAN’s principle of “non-interference” is ridiculous. It is a tacit approval of despotic and murderous regimes killing their own people – as the Burmese one has been doing.
It is time for ASEAN, under the Chairmanship of Singapore currently, to grow some backbone and take concrete action.
For a start, Singapore should take the lead, since it is the Chair, and issue a clear, direct, unequivocal statement.
Stop hiding behind excuses and lame semantics!
Kew Kah Fatt
I support crackdown.
It is either the protesters overthrow the government or the army maintaining its rule over the country.
Bloodshed is a must to solve complex problem.
This is the reason why PAP government tell the police not to issue permit to demonstrators.
Darren
http://www.straitstimes.com/Latest%2BNews/World/STIStory_162107.html :
UNITED NATIONS – THE Association of South-east Asian Nations (Asean) voiced ‘revulsion’ on Thursday at the killings in Yangon and sternly demanded that fellow member Myanmar stop using violence against demonstrators.
In unusually blunt language for the group, the nine other foreign ministers said they were ‘appalled to receive reports of automatic weapons being used’ on crowds and demanded the Myanmar government ‘immediately desist from the use of violence against demonstrators’.
Want to know who helped them make the automatic weapons? See fourth article in http://www.burmalibrary.org/reg.burma/archives/199807/msg00515.html
MadHatter
To: Darren.
Thank you for raising that point. It’s something my friends and I have been wondering about for a while.
Does anyone right now remember how Myanmar, despite its patchy track record, end up so close to the ASEAN community.
Or why?
All I can say is, to those in the know and had a hand in it despite all the tell-tail signs, may you Gods have mercy on you someday.
Kai Xiong
When you have no consent of the governed and have to resort to coercion and worse, violence to maintain your authority, it is time to step aside. That will be your only way of redemption.
Solidarity with the monks
ASEAN has been talking big about the upcoming charter… human rights commission… etc but when it comes to an actual situation, it has demonstrated how impotent it is………
What ASEAN really can do
1) Negotiate with the generals to go into exile in a foreign country or another ASEAN country and plan a safe exit out of Myanmar to the country of exile
2) Freeze the assets of the generals within ASEAN
3) Cancel the visas and expatriate family members of the generals, who are living in other ASEAN countries namely Singapore, back to Myanmar
Save us the talk ASEAN, Time for some action….
LCC
A news video clip from Al-Jazeera: Life under Myanmar’s military government
Darren
http://www.straitstimes.com/Latest%2BNews/Singapore/STIStory_162156.html
Myanmar PM in long stay at S’pore hospital
Soe Win, the suspected mastermind of a deadly attack on opposition forces in Myanmar four years ago, has been at the Singapore General Hospital for three to four months, said the staffer.
Imagine you donate blood and it ends up in this bastard. Wonder who’s footing his SGH bill?
James Chia
It’s very strange. Why should the Singapore government allow a ruthless dictator to seek medical treatment here?
ABDUL SALIM HARUN
I’m truly disgusted by the barbaric cruelties done by the autocratic military regime in Myannmar. This people are just protesting peacefully and they get this kind of barbaric treatment? As a Singaporean and as an asian, i’m more disgusted with the Singapore Governtment, as the current Chair of ASEAN and its fellow members for not doing anything to stop this barbaric acts against the innocent people. YES, you have issued a strong statement, but a statement wont do anything to stop this bloodshed! The time has come for ASEAN Countries to act against this barbarians… Dont be like NATO, No Action, Talk Only! LONG LIVE DEMOCRACY! LONG LIVE THE BURMESE PEOPLE! You have my prayers and support.
Alex Ong (eX.A.K.R.)
As a Buddhist myself, whatever is happening in Burma (I refuse to use that dity name those false rulers use) has touched a very raw, very personal nerve in me. I’m now literally steaming mad and crazy from reading how that brutal regime has treated the monks. To quote New York Times:
“Other unconfirmed reports from exile groups described scenes of brutality and humiliation of monks and their superiors when soldiers entered the monasteries.
“We were told by a lot of residents that the soldiers came in very rudely and told them to kneel down,” Mr. Aung Zaw said. “Their senior abbot was beaten in front of the others. They were told to walk like dogs. That news quickly spread, and whether it is rumor or true, people got very, very angry.””
And what’s got me even more apalled was this article by The Irrawaddy on Singapore’s relationship with those so-called rulers.
If you call yourself a Buddhist, codemn this behaviour by:
1. boycotting all Burmese businesses connected with those so-called rulers
2. never patronise Penisula Plaza again
3. boycott every Singaporean property development that started after the Indonesian sand ban, for there is a chance they used Burmese sand
4. call on the Singapore government to come clean with it’s relations with those so-called rulers and totally cut off all ties with them in a verifiable way
I’m usually not too into this kind of things, and I often regard Chee Soon Juan as a hopeless, nonsense-babbling, and brainless opposition figure that is no better than the people he criticise, but for this once, I can actually agree with that guy. Stop these nonsense at once, for it cannot continue for any second longer!
James Chia
Is it true that some of the shops in Peninsula Plaza are run by spies connected with the military leaders?
yh
This is saddening.
But all similar regimes like this will eventually crumble and fall.
Let’s just hope they don’t bring along more people with them…
David
“The Myanmar junta has offered to be a “long-term supplier of sand, cement and granite to Singapore”. Since this offer has been announced so loudly by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, we can safely assume that the offer will be accepted.”
http://singaporepatriot.blogspot.com/2007/04/you-sell-us-sand-well-help-you.html
Is it wonder that Singapore gov doesn’t want to be hero but coward this time ? With so much to lose in building so-called ‘Trillion dollars economy’ with casinos building to be contruct, ferrari racing circuit…
Money sells too good than morality, and not to speak of millions dollars arms sale to Myanmar.
In time of crisis, we see a more compassionate society like US, and Britain western counterpart do the action, and ASEAN countries do all the talking. Remind me of HOng Kong film movie, when the end come, those police will appear after all battle end to claim the credit.
Ironically, whatever news and atrocities that say of Burma is just applicable to Singapore minus the violience and physically death. In Singapore, those just translated to financial death rather than physical death.
Where LKY who love to talk a lot … is he on holiday ? And where is our PM who always disappear in nick of crucial moment. Where are their million dollars moral authority ?
The poor monk has such high moral authority although they have peanut, then our leaders ought to have million times moral authority.
So can our expensive presidents, PM, SM, MM , and Ministers demostrate their moral authority now to the world. Don’t tell us that we shouldn’t be troublemaker, shouldn’t interference in our people’s business because perhaps this will be the same thing you tell us in future.
As a chairman of ASEAN , please act with moral authority and not Mrs Peanut in NKF saga.
Bacts
Now that the world has responded, so did junta. The reasons for the cut remain skeptical and worrying, when nothing goes in and no news comes out.
http://bacts.blogspot.com/2007/09/world-is-responding-at-last.html
http://bacts.blogspot.com/2007/09/access-to-web-appears-cut-in-myanmar.html
James Chia
David has reminded that Singapore government has a deal with Myanmar to import sand following the ban of export of sand by Indonesia. It will certainly make Singapore being even more hypocritical. I bet they will not do anything more than issuing official statements asking them for peaceful reconciliations.