The UN’s special envoy to Burma resumed meetings with the military government on Sunday despite the junta’s rejection of his efforts to speed up the country’s return to democracy.
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Sources in Rangoon say the U.N. Special Envoy to Burma, Ibrahim Gambari, met again today with opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
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Security has been tightened in most of the townships in Rangoon. Soldiers were seen patrolling the city in FAW military trucks imported from China and Hino TE 11 in many townships in Rangoon. Troops were deployed in some crowded and major intersections, local residents said.
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Burma’s military junta has spoken: there will be no role for the United Nations in determining the course of the country’s political transition to what it calls a “disciplined democracy.”
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Sagaing, Myanmar There is an old joke in Myanmar about the man with chronic toothache who travels to neighboring Thailand to see a dentist.
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With a twinkle in his eye and the cheeky grin of a man half his age, 84-year-old Taw Paya does what few in Burma are prepared to do: speak out openly against the ruling military junta.
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Political prisoner and National League for Democracy member Ko Win Tin died on 6 March aged 35 while serving a 27-year prison term in Tharawaddy prison, Bago division.
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Two National League for Democracy members from Hlaing township in Rangoon were arrested on Saturday for possession of DVDs of the film Rambo.
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More than 30 police officers in Bago township were arrested on 2 March due to suspicions that an information leak had sabotaged a raid on illegal lottery sellers.
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Burma’s military government is organizing a census of Burmese families in southern Shan State with a view to forcing migrant workers to return to their hometowns to vote in May, say family members of workers employed in Thailand.
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As the exiled Democratic Voice of Burma matures into a seasoned news organization, serving audiences in Burma and abroad, some exiled politicians criticized its “independence” last week, calling for more advocacy views and opinions representing political opposition groups.
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Dulci Donata opened Home of Joy to serve ethnic minorities fleeing violence.
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Burma Authorizes Singapore Dollar Accounts at Banks
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Construction of the oil pipeline from Myanmar to southwest China’s Yunnan Province is still under discussion, the state-run news agency Xinhua reported Monday, citing a top provincial official. The long-awaited pipeline is expected to provide an alternative route for China’s crude imports from the Middle East and Africa and ease the country’s worries of its over-dependence on energy transportation through the Strait of Malacca.
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The Association of Southeast Asian Nations could rapidly slip into irrelevance if the organization does not rapidly reinvent itself, the group’s secretary-general warned.
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India and Myanmar have expressed strong desire that the common border between the two countries should be a region and symbol of peace and harmony so that the benefits out of various infrastructure projects and economic cooperation between the two countries can be fully realized. Both sides have agreed to work closely for achieving these objectives and, in this context, discussed various institutional mechanisms to strengthen security cooperation.
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It should not come as a surprise that Burmese military rulers gave the cold shoulder to UN special envoy Ibrahim Gambari, who arrived in Rangoon on Thursday hoping to change the mindset of the ruling junta.
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Burma’s rulers and democratic opposition forces have limited experience with a free and independent media. This is definitely worrying for a future democratic Burma. (more…)

Scorched-Earth Terror Campaign Against Civilians Continues
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Since 2005, a Burmese refugee, Min Wa has been detained in Bangladesh prison after he was arrested by the border security forces of Bangladesh BDR when some local people misinformed the Bangladesh authorities that Min Wa had a gun. His wife Ma Aye May said that after his arrest, Bangladesh authorities sent him to prison and have detained him since then without any trial.
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