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NEWS - Myanmar Military Gives Oppos



Myanmar Military Gives Opposition New Warning

          Reuters
          09-JUL-98

          YANGON, July 9 (Reuters) - Myanmar's
          military government on Thursday issued a
          new warning to the opposition that their
          activities would land them in trouble. 

          State-run newspapers said: ``There is ample
          evidence that the National League for
          Democracy (NLD) (has) committed political,
          economic and social conspiracies with
          reliance on the international colonialist bloc.''

          The papers, regarded as a mouthpiece of
          the ruling government, said Myanmar would
          not be shaken by opposition attempts to stir
          disorder in the country ``through concoctions
          and rumours.'' 

          A government statement obtained by
          Reuters on Wednesday accused the
          opposition of spreading rumours that violent
          unrest could be expected in Myanmar on
          Martyr's Day on July 19 and on August 8, the
          10th anniversary of student street protests in
          1988 which the military crushed. 

          On Tuesday, security officials stopped NLD
          leader Aung San Suu Kyi and three other
          NLD party members travelling with her by car
          at Shwe Mya Yar village, about 80 km (50
          miles) north of Yangon. 

          The junta prevented Suu Kyi from continuing
          further north to Min Hla township to meet
          another party member, saying it was for her
          own security and to prevent her from
          creating political unrest. 

          But the military said local authorities had
          arranged to bring the party member from Min
          Hla township to Shwe Mya Yar village to
          meet Suu Kyi on Wednesday. 

          Suu Kyi, the 1993 Nobel Peace laureate who
          was released by the military from six years of
          house arrest in mid-1995, and the NLD won
          a 1990 election, but the military ignored the
          result. 

          The NLD have been calling for the
          government to convene a parliament
          consisting of the winners of the 1990 election
          before August 21. 

          A Yangon-based diplomat said this week the
          opposition had turned up the heat on the
          government to test how far it would go to
          curb the NLD's activities. 

          But the diplomat said that the situation in the
          Myanmar capital Yangon remained calm with
          no signs of stepped up security.