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Myanmar Denies Religious Restrictio



Subject: Myanmar Denies Religious Restriction

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<font size=3D5><b>Myanmar Denies Religious Restriction <br>
<br>
</font></b><font size=3D3><i>By Grant Peck<br>
</i>Associated Press Writer<br>
Saturday, September 11, 1999; 10:53 a.m. EDT <br>
BANGKOK, Thailand (AP) -- The government of Myanmar on Saturday dismissed
as unfounded charges by the U.S. State Department that it uses force to
propagate Buddhism, the dominant religion, and denies human rights and
political freedom to some Buddhist monks. <br>
The charges were made Thursday in the State Department's Annual Report on
International Religious Freedom, published for the first time this year
to meet the mandate of a new law. <br>
The government ``systematically restricted efforts by Buddhist clergy to
promote human rights and political freedom, and, according to multiple
detailed credible reports, government authorities in some ethnic minority
areas coercively promoted Buddhism over other religions,'' said the
report's section on Myanmar, also called Burma. <br>
A statement by the Myanmar government spokesman said it ``is regretful
that the U.S. State Department is not aware that Buddhism does not
force-promote its faith.'' <br>
``It is against the fundamental belief of Buddhism to do such things and
in Myanmar, Buddhism is practiced devotedly,'' said the statement, faxed
to The Associated Press in Bangkok, Thailand. <br>
It also said that under Buddhist law, monks are supposed to refrain from
political and commercial activities. <br>
The State Department took particular note of allegations of abuses
against the Christian Chin ethnic minority. <br>
``Government security forces continued efforts to induce members of the
Chin ethnic minority to convert to Buddhism and prevent Christian Chin
from proselytizing by highly coercive means, including religiously
selective exemptions from forced labor, and by arresting, detaining,
interrogating, and physically abusing Christian clergy,'' it said. <br>
It also claimed that members of the Muslim Rohingya minority in Arakan
State, on the country's western coast, ``continued to experience severe
legal, economic, and social discrimination.'' <br>
The Myanmar government statement charged that ``without substantial
evidence, it is improper to accuse other nations or governments just
based on hearsay. There is an American idiom which is quite appropriate
for this case: `People living in glass houses should not throw stones,'''
it said. <br>
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=A9 Copyright 1999 The Associated Press<br>
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