Myanmar accuses Suu Kyi’s party over bombing

NAYPYIDAW: Myanmar’s military rulers on Sunday accused two members of the pro-democracy opposition party of Aung San Suu Kyi over the bombing of pro-government offices in July.

The national police chief said officers had seized bomb-making equipment from two members of the National League of Democracy party, who had been arrested along with a human rights activist. “According to the information we have received, some NLD members were involved in attending training sessions for bombing... and possessing destructive tools such as gun-powder and detonators,” Khin Yee told a press conference in the remote capital Naypyidaw. The police chief did not say when the arrests took place.

The bombing was of a pro-junta Union Solidarity and Development Association office in Shwe Pyitha township in the northern economic hub of Yangon. It caused some damage but no one was hurt. NLD youth members Yan Shwe and Zaw Zaw Aung were arrested along with activist and former NLD member Myint Aye, who is accused of funding them. Another NLD youth member, Yan Naung Soe, remains at large, the police chief said.

He added trials were proceeding for 21 pro-democracy activists arrested in August last year after holding rallies that snowballed into mass protests against the regime. The group includes Min Ko Naing and Ko Ko Gyi, who were among the top student leaders of a pro-democracy uprising in 1988. Both have already served lengthy prison sentences.

Asked if the ruling junta would clamp down on NLD activities in the wake of the latest arrests, Information Minister Kyaw Hsan told reporters the government would monitor the movements of party members. “We will act according to their movements in the future,” Kyaw Hsan said.

The junta on Sunday denied that detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi is on a hunger strike. “At the request of Daw Suu Kyi, arrangements were made for her lawyer to visit her three times and her doctor once. The information we heard from them did not indicate that Daw Suu Kyi was going on hunger strike,” police chief Brigadier General Khin Yi told a news conference in the new capital Naypyitaw.

The opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) said on Friday its leader had refused food supplies delivered to her Yangon home for three weeks in protest against her detention and restrictions on visitors. agencies

Home | Foreign