New Delhi, India – The street protests roiling military-ruled Myanmar turned deadly Wednesday when at least one anti-government demonstrator was killed after security forces cracked down violently on the growing unrest, according to news and witness accounts trickling out of the closed-off country.
Dozens of protesters, many of them Buddhist monks clad in burgundy robes, were said to have been beaten and dragged off by authorities as they rallied in Yangon, Myanmar’s main city, for the ninth consecutive day. Protests were also reported in Mandalay, the second-largest city in Myanmar, also known as Burma.
The ruling military junta acknowledged that one man had been killed and three wounded during the standoff in Yangon, but witnesses and overseas dissident groups told news agencies that as many as five people had died of gunshot wounds or other causes.
“They are marching down the streets, with the monks in the middle and ordinary people on either side. They are shielding them, forming a human chain,” one witness told Reuters news service as the crowd behind roared its anger at government forces.
By nightfall, Yangon’s streets appeared deserted under a curfew.
“If these stories are accurate, the U.S. is very troubled that the regime would treat the Burmese people this way,” White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said. “We call on the junta to proceed in a peaceful transition to democracy.”
President Bush announced new sanctions Tuesday against Myanmar. On Wednesday, France’s foreign minister, Bernard Kouchner, said that the European Union could join the U.S. and impose trade and financial restrictions on the country’s rulers, but that sanctions were not enough.
“The generals care little about world attention and compassion. What we need now is political pressure from countries of the region,” Kouchner said. “It’s our only chance to decisively help the Burmese.”
The protests in Myanmar, which has been under military rule for 45 years, were sparked by a rise in fuel prices, which hit residents hard. Led by monks, who hold strong moral authority in society, the crowds have grown over the past eight days and presented the military junta with its largest and most sustained challenge since 1988, when the government crushed protesters by firing on them, killing as many as 3,000 and arousing international outrage.
Television footage from Wednesday’s protests showed clerics and civilians marching through Yangon’s streets.
The demonstrators’ defiance of a ban on public assembly by a government known for treating dissent ruthlessly attests to the depth of anger coursing through society, analysts said.
“Things have been bad for a long time, but this petrol price hike has really pushed people over the edge,” said Adrian Vickers, a professor of Southeast Asian studies at the University of Sydney.
“The monkhood is large,” he added, “and it’s the only alternative organization to the government in that there are monasteries everywhere, and once you start that rolling, it’ll be hard to stop.”
Because of the exalted position that clerics occupy, the government has trod carefully, but that restraint ended Wednesday.
In its statement, the government said that one 30-year-old man had been killed by a ricocheting projectile and that two men and a woman were injured in the crush of people.
“The authorities concerned are handling the situation with care,” a news reader on state TV was quoted as saying, adding that “destructive elements” were intent on breaking the law.
