Four monasteries in Pakokku, Magwe division, which received government food donations have passed the offerings on to the poor and refused to give blessings to the officials.
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Rumors are spreading within Burma and as far abroad as Singapore that the health of junta chief Snr-Gen Than Shwe is deteriorating, with many people suggesting he’s experiencing bad karma because of his brutal crackdown on peacefully demonstrating monks in September.
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Sittwe: Continuing to give vent to their grievances, many monks in Arakan State are boycotting the regime held Buddhist religious examinations by refusing to enroll their names. The defiance is in support of the monk alliance that has called the boycott.
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Sittwe:  In a bid to demean monks in the aftermath of the demonstrations Burmese military junta authorities in Arakan State have been widely referring to monks with the nickname “orange”, rather than using the appropriate term, said a monk from Sittwe.
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In 1994 a visionary American appeared on the Thai-Burmese border, preaching non-violence to students from Burma who more than five years before had fled a crackdown on a pro-democracy uprising and were committed to armed struggle against their country’s military rulers.
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Police officers assigned to Shwedagon pagoda have been given a salary increase to counter discontent among the officers following the crackdown on protestors in September.
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A 13-year-old Karen boy was blinded and his 8-year-old sister was severely injured when a land mine exploded near his village.
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Shan New Year celebrations from December 7 to10 in several towns in Shan State will be monitored closely by Burmese junta authorities. A signed letter is mandatory that the celebrations will not become intermingled with any political activity, according to sources from the Shan communities in Shan State.
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Peeling shrimp for 14 hours a day can break the most weathered of workers, but not Som, a Myanmar migrant toiling in a Thai factory side-by-side with her family.
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Tighter Western sanctions imposed on army-ruled Myanmar after its bloody crackdown on democracy protests will have little direct impact on the economy, the International Monetary Fund said in a report.
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Daewoo Bows to Burmese Pressure to Sell Gas to China
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In rank display of bad governance and arm twisting the Burmese military regime instead of providing for the upkeep of utility services have been forcibly collecting funds from residents in Myit Kyi Na town of Kachin state in northern Burma for road construction.
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The release of Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi will be a key factor in the Philippines’ decision to ratify a new charter for a regional grouping, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has said.
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China should rethink its policy of supporting the Burmese military government, especially in light of the recent arms shipments, say Burma observers.
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Myanmar’s military killed 31 people who can be identified by name during a crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators more than double the amount acknowledged by authorities, a U.N. investigator who visited the country said Friday.
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The U.N. refugee agency has welcomed the European Commission’s (EC) donation of 3.9 million euros (over USD $ 5.7 million) over the next two years to end the plight of refugees from Burma languishing in the southeastern part of Bangladesh over a long period of time.
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Myanmar’s nightmare under its military rulers continues and shows no signs of coming to an end in the near future. After initially seizing control of the country in the early 1960s, the then leader of the junta, General Ne Win, decided to turn Myanmar into his own version of an “exceptional” country, but the people rebelled in 1988 and, for once, the military rule appeared shaky. Not for long, however, as the generals hit back hard, killing 3,000 people. (more…)

A Burmese dissident magazine based in Thailand relies on thousands of Burmese contacts reporting from inside the sealed country
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Many more people were killed and detained in the violent government crackdown on monks and other peaceful protestors in September 2007 than the Burmese government has admitted, Human Rights Watch said today in a new report. Since the crackdown, the military regime has brought to bear the full force of its authoritarian apparatus to intimidate all opposition, hunting down protest leaders in night raids and defrocking monks.
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