Myanmar Junta: 'You Are No Longer Monks'

Japanese reporter among dead as troops scatter protesters

(NEWSER) - Burmese troop forcibly scattered some 70,000 protesters for a second day today, with gunfire claiming the lives of at least nine—even as leaders around the world called for restraint. One of the dead is reportedly a Japanese photographer, spawning fears that the junta is targeting journalists to prevent news coverage. More»

Junta warns of action against protests

(NEWSER) - Pro-democracy protests in Myanmar continued for an eighth day today, with tens of thousands of Buddhist monks, joined by students, taking to the streets in Yangon in defiance of government orders. The ruling junta threatened Monday night to crack down on the demonstrations, instructing the monks to return to their monasteries, the AP reports. More»

(NEWSER) - A closed-door court in Burma has sentenced 14 members of a noted pro-democracy organization to 65 years each. Family members and defense lawyers were not permitted at the trial, and relatives only heard of the sentence from prison officials. The activists were members of 88 Generation Students, a group formed out of the crushed 1988 democracy uprising; many played a part in last year's mass protests against the Burmese junta. More»

Buddhist movement gets bolder; some suggest stockpiling weapons

(NEWSER) - After seeing nonviolent protesters killed or detained in last year’s protests against the ruling junta, younger segments of Burma’s Buddhist monks are becoming more radical, embracing armed resistance and overt dissent, the Christian Science Monitor reports. "We need weapons,” one young monk said. “That is the only way we can bring down this regime." More»

Government 'lying,' rights group says

(NEWSER) - The quashing of pro-democracy demonstrations in September was significantly bloodier than the Burmese junta claims, says a Human Rights Watch report released today. Although the government acknowledges only 10 deaths during the suppression of the protests, 20 killings have been verified by eyewitnesses in Yangon alone, and the rights group projects a much higher total, CNN reports. More»