Narinjara News


Arakanese exiles hold demonstration in Dhaka

Dhaka, August 9: At least 80 exiles from Arakan State held a demonstration in front of the Bangladesh high court premise, in Dhaka, yesterday in honor of the 16th anniversary day of 8-8-88.

The 3 Arakanese organizations that participated in the demonstration  included the Working Committee for Demonstration Restoration in Burma  (WCDRB), Arakan League for Democracy (Exile) and the All Arakan Students  and Youth Congress (AASYC).

The demonstration was disrupted by the Bangladeshi police forces, who first  told the participants that could not shout their slogans too loudly and then ordered the crowd to move to a different location. The demonstration was, in the end, cut short when the police demanded it over.

A leader of WCDRB said, “ there has never been any intervention by local police in previous demonstrations by Burmese people in Dhaka. But this time the local police prohibited the shouting of slogans, disturbing of demonstration. I was not surprised by their action because the present relation between the Bangladesh government and the Burmese military government is very good."

The demonstrators included several demands in their protest; the immediate release of Daw Suu as well as all other political prisoners, and the start of an open dialogue between the democracy groups led by Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the genuine representatives of non-Burmese people and the SPDC military junta.

The demonstration started at 11am, but was over only 2 hours later.

8-8-88 is a very important day for the people of Burma, as an uprising on that day ended with the fall of the dictator Ne Win, who had been in rule for 30 years. During this now famous democracy movement, at least 3,000 people, including students, were killed by the present military government.#


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