December
7, 2007 Myanmar Toll
'Much Greater' than Junta Admits: Rights Group
Bangkok
Many more people were killed in a September crackdown on peaceful
anti-government protesters than Myanmar's military regime admits,
Human Rights Watch said Friday.
The rights group said that although it would be impossible to tell
the exact toll without full and independent access to Myanmar, it
could document the killings of 20 people in Yangon and believed the
death toll was much higher.
The military government said 15 people died after troops broke up
the country's biggest mass protests in nearly two decades.
Security forces shot at the monk-led protesters with live ammunition
and rubber bullets, beat marchers and detained thousands of people,
the body said after an investigation in which it interviewed more
than 100 witnesses in Myanmar and Thailand.
It added that monks, students and other civilians were among those
killed.
One of the witnesses the rights group interviewed was Thazin Aye,
17, who described a Sep 27 military raid on a high school.
"The informers pointed to the grass," Thazin Aye was quoted as
saying. "Seven young people were hiding there. They got up and ran,
but the soldiers started firing into their backs. Three or four of
the young boys, aged around 20 to 22, were gunned down straight
away. The others tried to run but were caught and taken away in the
military cars."
A monk named U Khanda also described a Sep 27 raid on his monastery.
"They were throwing tear gas and firing their automatic guns into
the buildings of the monastery and used their batons to beat the
monks whenever they saw them," he said.
The New York-based group said the military's clampdown on the least
sign of dissent is continuing, mostly out of sight of the
international community.
It criticized the reaction to the protest by neighbors and allies
with influence over Myanmar, notably China, India, Russia, Thailand
and other members of the Association of South-East Asian Nations
members. It also criticized Japan for acting timidly despite the
killing of a Japanese journalist by security forces.
The rights body called for harsher international pressure, including
in the UN Security Council, on the junta for undertaking reforms.
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