AFP : Myanmar junta rounds up forei

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Myanmar junta rounds up foreign opponents as tensions rise
Sun 09 Aug 98 - 16:17 GMT 

YANGON, Aug 9 (AFP) - Myanmar's junta Sunday rounded up 18 foreigners as
they attempted to promote human rights and democracy amid escalating
political tensions in the isolated state.

"Foreigners who were distributing the pamphlets in downtown Yangon were
reported to the police by citizens and taken to the police stations for
questioning and they are being detained while the investigation continues,"
a junta spokesman said in a statement.

The detainees included six US nationals, three Thais, three Malaysians,
three Indonesians, two Filipinos and one Australian, he added. Ten were
male, eight female.

The Thai foreign ministry identified its nationals as Jaran Ditapichai, 52,
a lecturer at Bangkok's Rangsit University, Sawas Upahat, 37, of the
non-government organisation (NGO) Forum of the Poor, and Chanakan
Phandemwong, 22, a student at Thammasart University in Bangkok.

Sources said the Australian was a female academic and activist from Sydney
but no further details were available of the identities of the detainees.

The foreigners were "apprehended attempting to incite unrest in Yangon,"
the junta spokesman said.

"Various pamphlets and related materials aimed at inciting public unrest
were found in their hotel rooms," he added, saying "despite these efforts
for agitation" the country remained calm.

The detainees were picked up at "seven or eight" separate points, he told
AFP by telephone.

"Some of them were throwing them (pamphlets) out the window of a taxi on
the highway," he added.

"They threw them out of window where there were lots of crowds.

"Some were in the street, on foot, handing them out."

The group arrived in Yangon from Bangkok Friday and was due to depart
Sunday, before attending a press conference in the Thai capital the
following day.

A Thai foreign ministry spokesman said the three detained Thais had been
arrested at Yangon's airport, along with three of the others, as they
prepared to fly back to Bangkok.

The activists earlier told journalists and others of their plans, including
the times they would appear at various sites around Yangon Sunday to hand
out the business card-sized pamphlets giving "goodwill messages in Burmese
and English."

"We have not forgotten you," the cards said in part.

"We support your hopes for human rights and democracy."

Security was increased in Yangon after the group, which called itself
simply "a multi-national peace-making team," said it would hand out
leaflets in support of democracy and human rights, witnesses said.

In Bangkok exiled Myanmar students maintained an anti-junta protest outside
Myanmar's embassy for the fifth day in a row as pressure grew for the
military government to convene parliament.

The demostrators rejected police requests to disperse and said they would
remain there until Myanmar's parliament was convened, with some pledging to
launch hunger strikes.

"They keep telling us to leave but we are staying," said one of the protest
leaders, Kyaw Mint.

"We will stay until at least August 22 and will see what happens then," he
added, referring to an August 21 deadline set by the leading opposition
National League for Democracy (NLD) to convene parliament or face
unspecified consequences.

Opposition groups based outside Myanmar have called for a mass campaign of
civil disobedience and warned of confrontation if the junta does not meet
the NLD demand.

The NLD won 1990 polls by a landslide but the junta refused to give up
power.

The increased pressure came as the oppposition Saturday marked the 10th
anniversary of a military crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators which
left thousands dead, according to unofficial tolls.

Many of the demonstrators in Bangkok were students who fled to Thailand
following the crackdown.

Residents and foreign diplomats in Yangon said the capital was calm Sunday
and that conditions had generally returned to normal after being unusually
quiet during the crackdown anniversary, apparently because of concern about
possible unrest.

The junta, meanwhile, announced it had released a British-Australian
national who had served just under three months of his five year sentence
for illegal entry and "terrorist" activities.

James Mawdsley, 25, was pardoned after the junta received a letter from his
parents, TV Myanmar said late Saturday.

The pardon was granted Thursday, the same day Mawdsley left Yangon
accompanied by his father, apparently for London.

He was arrested on April 30 near the Thai border shortly after crossing
into Myanmar without a visa or passport.

"We got rid of one foreigner yesterday," quipped a Yangon official.

"And today we've got 18 more."