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NYTcoverage "gunmen"/ "intruders"



Subject: Re: NYTcoverage "gunmen"/ "intruders"

On first look, its amazing the qualification/description/designation of
these individuals in a small military commando fashion who staged the
embassy takeover. "Free radicals", commandos, freedom fighters,
"gunmen", "rebels", terrorists; watch how different press groups attempt
to define and pigeon-hole this latest incident.

"Intruders"

 The NYTimes is really looking hard not to call these people for what
they are, because they dont know?

ds
> 
> By REUTERS
>  ANGKOK, Thailand -- Gunmen took at least 30 hostages at the Myanmar Embassy
> on Friday and threatened to start killing them, the police said.
> 
> The intruders, whose hostages include Myanmar diplomats and several other
> foreigners, threatened to start shooting one hostage every half-hour,
> starting Saturday morning, if their demand for a helicopter to take them to
> the Thai-Myanmar border was not met.
> 
> The BBC quoted a man who said he was the leader of the group as saying the
> killing would start with Burmese hostages first.
> 
> But the deadline passed without incident.
> 
> A Thai official said 13 Myanmar citizens, including the first and second
> secretaries of the embassy, and a Japanese were being held. The Thai police
> said 15 or 16 Thais were also in the compound.
> 
> Antoine Marcotte, 31, who identified himself as a Canadian from Montreal,
> said on Friday afternoon by telephone from the embassy that the other foreign
> hostages included three Frenchmen, three Canadians, a German, an American, an
> Australian and several Malaysians and Singaporeans.
> 
> Negotiations, which ended late Friday after the gunmen cut the embassy's
> telephone lines, resumed this morning, with Thai negotiators and the
> attackers yelling over the embassy's high walls.
> 
> A Bangkok police official, Lieut. Gen. Wannarat Kajarak, said a helicopter
> was on its way to the embassy. Several hostages were released or escaped.
> 
> The hostage takers had earlier said they were prepared to cut down trees and
> a flagpole in the small embassy grounds, in downtown Bangkok, to enable a
> helicopter to land and take them to the border with some hostages.
> 
> The police said that 12 attackers stormed the embassy on Friday morning and
> that they were armed with grenades and rifles.
> 
> They then issued a fax in which they called themselves the Vigorous Burmese
> Student Warriors and demanded that the military Government of Myanmar free
> political prisoners, start a dialogue with the opposition and convene a
> democratic parliament.
> 
> The group said after seizing the embassy that it wanted to talk to the Thai
> authorities and that no one had been killed. But when the police arranged to
> have a Myanmar dissident negotiate through a loudspeaker, the response from
> the embassy was three shots.
> 
> A spokesman for the State Department, James P. Rubin, said the United States
> strongly condemned "this terrorist attack," regardless of the motives and
> demands of the gunmen.
> 
> About 300 heavily armed police officers, including members of an
> antiterrorist squad, surrounded the embassy, and nearby roads were cordoned
> off. Sharpshooters were atop a tall building next to the embassy, but were
> ordered to hold their fire to allow for talks.
> 
> The BBC quoted the man who identified himself as the leader as having said he
> had ordered his men to shoot if they saw any threatening movement nearby. The
> deputy police chief of Thailand said he was not aware of the gunmen's
> threatening to kill hostages.
> 
> "I am not aware of what the men inside said to the media," the deputy chief,
> Lieut. Gen. Wannarat Kocharak, said. "But at this moment, they only demand a
> helicopter to fly them to the border, and negotiators have not accepted that
> demand yet."
> 
> A Thai police officer who was freed by the attackers told reporters the
> attackers had said they had eight AK-47 rifles and 20 grenades.
> 
> The statement from the group claiming responsibility said it was not
> connected with other Myanmar dissident student organizations, the country's
> opposition or international support groups.
> 
> "This action is our own movement and our own ideas," the statement said.
> 
> Many student dissidents fled to Thailand after the military killed thousands
> in 1988 in crushing an uprising for democracy.