Reuters-Amnesty condemns Myanmar op

[hlaing@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

Amnesty condemns Myanmar opposition arrests 
12:23 a.m. Oct 08, 1998 Eastern 

BANGKOK, Oct 8 (Reuters) - Human rights watchdog Amnesty International has
condemned the arrest by Myanmar's military government of 54 opposition
supporters as ``outrageous.'' 

Amnesty, in a statement received by Reuters on Thursday, said the arrests
would ``do nothing to heal the wounds caused by 10 years of terrible human
rights violations.'' 

Myanmar said on Wednesday 54 people, including 23 members of the opposition
National League for Democracy (NLD), had been detained for sparking student
unrest and demonstrations in August and September. 

Amnesty called on the military to immediately release the 54 unless they
were tried fairly for ``recognisable criminal offences.'' 

``The organisation is further concerned that the 54 are at risk of torture,
which is common in Myanmar's detention centres,'' it said. 

Among those detained were activists of anti-government Myanmar exile groups
who had obtained funds and conspired with foreign organisations to incite
the disturbances, military government spokesman Colonel Thein Swe told a
news conference. 

Foreign organisations involved in the alleged plot were the New York-based
Open Society Institute (OSI) founded by billionaire George Soros, and the
Thai chapter of the Vatican City-based World Society of Jesuit Refugee
Services (JRS). 

NLD leader Aung San Suu Kyi and some party members, working with the
expatriate activist-backed All Burma Student's Union (ABSU) and the exiled
and foreign organisations, had joined forces to stir up the unrest, the
government said in a statement. 

But Amnesty said it had read the military's allegations and could find no
evidence that any of those named engaged in anything other than peaceful
civil disobedience in Myanmar. 

``It is appalling that the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) has
made these tendentious claims against the peaceful opposition party, the
NLD, meanwhile arbitrarily arresting dozens of people who are probably
prisoners of conscience,'' Amnesty said. 

``The NLD has always called for peaceful political change and dialogue with
the military,'' it added. 

The military has said several exiled Myanmar groups had been involved in
the conspiracy, including the National Coalition Government of the Union of
Burma, the Karen National Union guerrilla group, the All Burma Students
Democratic Front and the Alternative Asean Network of Burma. 

Suu Kyi and NLD officials have yet to comment on the government charges. 

The Myanmar military said on Wednesday the unrest, including student
protests at university campuses, a street demonstration by 18 foreigners
and car sit-in protests by Suu Kyi, were timed to coincide with an NLD
demand to convene a parliament of representatives elected in the May 1990
election. 

The military ignored the results of the 1990 election, which the NLD won by
a wide margin. 

The ruling State Peace and Development Council has flatly refused to call a
parliament and has cracked down hard on the NLD in recent months, detaining
hundreds of its supporters to try to stamp out the protests. 

The NLD has said that since May 27, the number of its MPs and members held
by the military totalled 967. It is not clear how many of these were still
in detention.