dejunter burma

source: romandie.com

A mosque and shops were attacked Tuesday in a town in central Burma one month after deadly violence between Buddhists and Muslims, officials said, adding that ten people were injured.
According to the initial information received by the Burmese police, a mosque and shops around were attacked Oakkan, about 100 km north of Rangoon, said government spokesman Ye Htut on his Facebook page.
The violence broke out after a woman accidentally bumped a novice monk eleven years then dropped the bowl for collecting the offerings that crashed, said a statement posted on the website of the Ministry of Information and read on state television Tuesday night.
Security forces had to make fire warnings to disperse the crowd threw stones on a religious building, destroying store fronts, he said, adding that 25 stores were affected.
During the violence, ten people were injured, eight slightly, he still said, ensuring that the police had taken control of the situation.
In March, religious riots killed 43 people in Meiktila, also in the center of the country, after a dispute between a Muslim and Buddhist merchant customers.
The city had fallen for three days in the chaos and entire neighborhoods were burned until the army to intervene under the state of emergency.
The following day, mosques were destroyed in several cities in a region north of Rangoon, near Oakkan while extremist monks distilled nationalist discourse.
In 2012, in the west of the country this time, clashes between ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and Muslims in the stateless Rohingya minority had about 200 dead and 140,000 displaced.
These events have revealed a latent Islamophobia background in a predominantly Buddhist country where officially live 4% Muslim.

Source: Asia-Pacific world

The Burma began a "campaign of ethnic cleansing" against the stateless Rohingya Muslim minority, Monday, April 22 accusing the organization of defense of human rights Human Rights Watch (HRW), citing evidence of mass graves and die investments labor.

Some eight hundred thousand Rohingya, denied citizenship by former junta live confined in the Rakhine State in the west, where two waves of violence between ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and Muslims have at least one hundred eighty deaths in 2012 according to official figures. The Rohingya, considered by the United Nations Organization as one of the most persecuted minorities were victims of "crimes against humanity", including murder and deportation, according to the HRW report entitled "Everything you can do is pray. "

"Burmese officials, community leaders and Buddhist monks organized and encouraged" Rakhine attacks against Muslim villages in October 2012, with the "support of the security forces," he added. "The Burmese government s' is engaged in a campaign of ethnic cleansing against the Rohingya continues today through the refusal of the assistance and movement restrictions, "insisted Phil Robertson , deputy Asia director of the organization.

If the term "ethnic cleansing" has no formal legal definition, note the organization, it usually describes the policy of ethnic or religious group for draining an area of the presence of another group by methods violent and terror-inspiring. Over one hundred and twenty-five thousand people, mostly Rohingya, have been displaced by the violence of last year and are still living in makeshift camps. They are denied access to humanitarian aid and can not return home, HRW denounces.

The report, based on more than a hundred interviews, evidence also suggests the existence of at least four mass graves, and accused the security forces of having wanted to hide evidence of crimes. Thus, in June 2012, the government would have a truck spilled eighteen corpses near a camp for displaced Rohingya in order for their to fear for them to leave permanently, according to HRW. Thousands of Rohingya considered illegal immigrants by many Burmese who do not hide outright hostility towards them, took the sea from June 2012 to escape the violence, mainly destined for Malaysia . Other Muslims were targeted in March in the center of the country by violence that killed forty-three dead.

source: lenouvelobs

source: cnn

The leader of the Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, arrived in Japan on Saturday morning for a tour of nearly a week, his first trip to the country for 27 years, to seek support for the process of Tokyo democratization process in the country. | Toshifumi Kitamura
The leader of the Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, arrived in Japan on Saturday morning for a tour of nearly a week, his first trip to the country for 27 years, to seek support for the process of Tokyo democratization progress in his country.
The woman, 67, leader of the National League for Democracy (NLD), was invited to come to the islands by the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs hopes to strengthen its ties with the holder of the Nobel Peace influential not only in Burma, but also globally, said the Japanese officials.

"Welcome to Japan," he shouted to reporters his early arrival at the airport in Tokyo-Narita.
"Arigato gozaimasu (thank you)," she answered them in Japanese, smiling.
"I respect her as if she was my mother and I came to tell him that she perseveres and I support it," said a television Burmese living in Japan waiting patiently in the lobby of the airport in the company of some 150 countrymen.
Since the beginning of the transition to democracy in Burma in March 2011, Tokyo has stepped up its efforts to help the country to carry out important reforms and push economic development.
Japanese companies are vying to establish themselves in Burma, where they are as good and plentiful labor.
Aung San Suu Kyi is expected to call on Japan to invest in his country during scheduled meetings with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Foreign Minister, Fumio Kishida, as well as the leaders of both houses of parliament and business leaders.
During his stay, Aung San Suu Kyi will travel to Kyoto (west) to give lectures and participate in traditional manfestations as the tea ceremony in the former capital where she stayed as a guest-researcher from 1985 to 1986 .
It has subsequently been adopted by the government of his country.
It was only after the transition to democracy in 2011 as the "Lady of Rangoon" could make his first trip abroad since 24 years, from Thailand in May 2012. Then she went to Europe, via Norway, Great Britain and France, and the United States, India and South Korea.
Relations with Suu Kyi Japan back on them at the time of his father, General Aung San, who led the independence movement against the British colonialists. End of 1940 he spent seven months in Japan where he got the money and weapons from the Japanese Imperial Army.
Two years later he established a government backed by Tokyo but reversal of history, he obtained in 1945 with the British to drive the Japanese occupation troops.

source:

Residents of Meiktila, watch the March 21, 2013 houses and a mosque on fire in religious violence

(Photo Soe Than Win. AFP)

Three Burmese Muslims, accused of causing a fight behind religious violence that killed 43 victims in March, were sentenced to 14 years in prison, said Friday the official press.

Three, the owner of a shop, his wife and an employee, aged 23, 24 and 21, were arrested after the riots that rocked the city of Meiktila (center).

They are accused of violently struck a Buddhist client after an argument. A few hours later, the city was handed over to Muslim rioters and whole neighborhoods were destroyed.

"After this event, there were problems and led to violence in Meiktila," said the state-owned daily The Mirror, stating that they had been convicted of assault in particular.

A police source confirmed the on-site prison. "They are all three Muslims," ​​he said.

Mosques in several cities in central Canada were destroyed after the riots. A crisis poses a major challenge to the government of President Thein Sein, facing a wave of sectarian tensions.

The former general, who has stepped up reforms since the dissolution of the junta in March 2011, has since denounced the "religious extremists", but no Buddhist monks authors Islamophobic discourse has been arrested.

source release

A Burmese officer in Yangon April 2, 2013 (Photo Soe Than Win. AFP)

Poor relation of the security forces under the junta, the Burmese police are now under pressure to fulfill its role of policing, torn between those who expose his muscular interventions and those who criticize him culpable inaction.

The transition is hard for the police in this country now wants to take the attributes of democracy after a half century of military rule.

There was not so long ago, the demonstrations were dispersed by heavily armed soldiers. But since the junta gave way to a reformist regime in 2011, the use of force is presented as the "last resort" and policing responsibility of an impoverished police.

"We have never been properly equipped," said an officer on condition of anonymity, claiming 20-year career. Uniforms, helmets, walkie-talkies, bulletproof vests, vehicles, training: any lack.

"No one cared about the police under the military government. Nobody cares not today. But we are the first to be accused. "

And challenges are legion As the company is testing the limits of his new freedom. End of 2012, the dispersion of opponents to a Chinese copper mine in the center of the country has turned into a disaster. Dozens of civilians and Buddhist monks were seriously injured by phosphorus.

Scenes that Burmese and international community believed elapsed, but are primarily the product of incompetence, says Jim Della-Giacoma, expert of the International Crisis Group (ICG).

"They took what they believed to be harmless smoke bombs in a military arsenal, and learned the worst way they contained phosphorus," he told AFP.

The police, however, been accused of inaction or complicity, by organizations defending human rights after the violence broke out between Buddhists and Muslims for nearly a year.

Human Rights Watch said that security forces have committed murders and abuses in Rakhine State (West) last year. And calls for an explanation of their inability to Meiktila (center), where 43 people were killed in March.

"They were there looking," laments Win Htein, MP for the city for the National League for Democracy (opposition). "I do not know if the police did nothing because they did not order, or if they have been slow to react because they were accused in the repression of the copper mine" .

Each time, the government had to resort to emergency rule and the army to restore calm.

"The local police forces are not trained for riot control," admitted to AFP Ye Htut, a spokesman of President Thein Sein. "When the rioters come in five or six places at the same time, they can not control the situation."

The international community has, it seems, became aware of a potentially dangerous weakness for the country. The European Union, which makes this kind of training in many countries, has recently made proposals to the government.

"We need non-lethal weapons to control riots (...), for there to be fewer injuries in dispersion operations," agrees a senior officer. "We want to meet international standards. But we do with our means. "

The issue is fundamental. Thein Sein, a former general and prime minister under the junta, is credited with dramatic reforms. But any burrs forces rekindles the flame of skeptics.

The police need a political doctrine and a thorough reorganization, provides in this regard Jim Della-Giacoma. It will "actually get rid of the authoritarian mentality and become a police service rather than strength."

source: lenouvelobs

The Burma has launched an investigation into the fire that killed three teenagers in a Muslim religious school, said Wednesday the state media, while the authorities are trying to appease those who fear that the drama is related to recent violence interfaith.

A commission of inquiry of seven members will "reveal the cause of the fire and submit its report" by Friday, said the New Light of Myanmar.

Thirteen boys died Tuesday in a fire at a building in downtown Yangon housing a school and a mosque, where 70 people spent the night.

Police immediately put the claim on behalf of an electrical problem and pointed to the negligence of two teachers responsible for students that night, which would not have reacted after the alarm signal transformer.

One of them is still being questioned by police and the other is on the run, said Wednesday Myint Aye, head of the district police.

In a context of great tension between Buddhists and Muslims after the riots that killed 43 people in March, some members of the Muslim community feared a spread of religious violence and doubts Tuesday on the accidental nature of the fire.

But some seem to have been convinced since. Ye Naung Thein, secretary of a major Muslim organizations in the country, after being questioned on Tuesday, and told AFP believes "100%" the explanations of the authorities.

"It is reasonable, and I do not see any external reason (the fire). It is due to weaknesses of teachers of the mosque to meet the alarm transformer, "he said Wednesday, hoping that the work of the commission would" sweep the rumors. "

Violence between Buddhists and Muslims took place from 20 to 22 March Meiktila, in the center of the country, before spreading to other areas. In total, 43 people were killed and 12,000 displaced.

The situation had calmed down a few days ago when President Thein Sein assured that the efforts of "religious extremists" to sow hatred would "not be tolerated".

Burma string of reforms since the departure of the military junta two years ago, but these riots have highlighted a disturbing tension between Buddhists and Muslims.

source: International Mail - Christine Chaumeau

For the first time in half a century, four private newspapers have appeared. But despite this additional sign of liberalization, barriers to freedom of information remain.

source: nytimes

A house belonging to Muslims ransacked during communal violence March 27, 2013 at Zeegone in central Burma. | AFP / Ye Aung Thu

The main Muslim organizations in Burma called active protection of the security forces against religious violence, accusing even passivity towards the rioters, in an open letter to the power obtained by AFP Thursday.

"The lives and property of the community of Islam , mosques and religious schools in Burma are not safe and the situation is alarming, "can be read in the text sent on March 26 to the presidency, according Nyunt Maung Shein, President of the Council of Islamic Affairs. "These violent attacks include arson and killings that deserve severe punishment," continued the four signatory parties, who accuse the security forces of "negligence" and passivity.

WEAKNESS OF PROTECTION

Violence between Buddhists and Muslims have killed 40 people last week in Meiktila in the center of the country. They have since expanded to other cities and if the death toll is unchanged, many mosques and homes were destroyed and neighborhoods under curfew. "Massacres and damage to religious buildings and properties are attributable to the weak protection and actions taken by the authorities ", accusing the authors of the letter. There are daily for several days in a large area north of Rangoon. Dozens of people were arrested.

Burma string of political and economic reforms since the departure of the military junta two years ago, but such violence is a challenge of the first order for the new regime. In 2012 already, clashes between the Buddhist Rakhine ethnic minorities and Muslims to the stateless Rohingya minority had more than 180 people dead and 110,000 displaced in the west.

This time, Muslims are referred Burmese citizens, sometimes come from more than a century 'of India , the current Bangladesh or China . A situation that worries the international community. The United States said Wednesday monitor how to apply to "restore order and maintain the peace respecting human rights and the law, "said a spokesman for the State Department.

source lacroix

The Burmese regime has warned Monday against "religious extremism", promising to do everything to restore order after violence between Buddhists and Muslims killed more than thirty people last week and threaten the political reform process.

"The government will punish all acts of terrorism including incentives to religious or racial attacks," according to a government statement broadcast on television.

"Today, the government is trying to move forward on democratic reform and development, people must refrain from all acts of terrorism and religious extremism of all (...)".

Dozens of people were arrested over the weekend for their alleged participation in the violence of the city of Meiktila (center), but also in other towns this close to the capital Naypyidaw area.

A simple dispute Wednesday between a Muslim vendor and customer escalated, leading to the destruction by fire of entire neighborhoods and mosques, while charred bodies lay in the streets.

These three days of violence in which groups of rioters, including Buddhist monks, have transformed the city into cut-throat, made according to the latest official figures 32 people dead and more than 9,000 displaced people.

Calm had returned there Monday, according to the MLA Win Htein. "The most difficult problem is to rebuild the relationship between Buddhists and Muslims," ​​he acknowledged, however.

The government of President Thein Sein, credited with numerous political reforms over the past two years, has not directly addressed since the riots.

Yet they show a very disturbing tension between the two communities. In 2012, clashes between the Buddhist Rakhine ethnic minorities and Muslims to the stateless Rohingya minority had already been more than 180 dead and 110,000 displaced people in western countries.

The statement said that the displaced will be resettled as soon as possible, depending on security conditions. "Discussions will be held to rebuild trust between the communities," he added, citing "workshops (...) to soothe the emotions."

On Sunday, Buddhist leaders, Muslim, Hindu and Christian had called for reconciliation in the official press.

In a country where the majority Burman considers Buddhism as an integral part of national identity, analysts have raised genuine religious divide poses a major challenge to reform regime, in power since the dissolution of the junta two years ago.

Tensions have even been seen in recent weeks in Rangoon.

The regional government has decided to close at 2100 restaurants and shops of the old capital which sell alcohol to prevent the spread of "rumors" by people under the influence of alcohol, according to an official on of anonymity.