(12/30/88) 36 Students Go Back Burm

[waterly@xxxxxxxxx]

Subject: (12/30/88) 36 Students Go Back Burma

                           The Reuter Library Report

                      December  30, 1988, Friday, PM cycle



HEADLINE: 36 BURMESE DISSIDENTS LEAVE THAILAND FOR HOME

DATELINE: BANGKOK, Dec 30

 
   Thirty-six dissident Burmese students flew back to Rangoon on Friday, one day
before the deadline of an amnesty for people who fled the military crackdown, a 
Burmese embassy official said.

   The students, who flew from Thailand on a Burmese military plane, were among 
several thousand young Burmese who joined rebel camps along the Thai border
after the September crackdown against pro-democracy demonstrators.

   Burma's ruling military set December 31 as the deadline of an amnesty
guarantee for dissidents. 
   A spokesman at the Burmese embassy said 19 students declined the government's
offer of transportaion home and remained at a repatriation centre in Thailand's 
border province of Tak.

   On Monday, 80 students returned from the repatriation centre to Burma.

   The voluntary repatriation programme was arranged at a meeting of Thai army
chief General Chavalit Yongchaiyudh and Burmese leader  Saw Maung  in Rangoon
two weeks ago.

   Thai officials said the centre in Tak would remain open one month beyond the 
amnesty deadline.

   Students who remained at the repatriation centre said they would not return
to Rangoon until the curfew was lifted, schools were reopened and general
elections promised by the military were held.