The official opening ceremony of the Zoological Garden of Naypyitaw was presided over by First Secretary of Burma’s ruling junta, Lieutenant-General Thiha Thura Tin Aung Myint Oo, a handful of ministers and dozens of visiting diplomats who were in Naypyitaw, 350 kilometres north of Yangon, to attend Armed Forces Day celebrations on Thursday.

The zoo launch was also attended by thousands of people, eager to catch a glimpse of one of the few recreational attractions in Burma’s new military capital, where thousands of civil servants were forced to relocate to from Rangoon in late 2004 and early 2005.

The 240-hectare zoo boasts 243 animals indigenous to Burma and numerous imported animals such as penguins, kangaroos and white tigers. Zoo documents showed that the penguins had been donated by Thailand.

Nearly all of the animals were taken from Burma’s century-old Rangoon Zoo, which is now sadly depleted of animals and visitors.

Burma’s secretive military leaders shocked their Asian neighbours in November, 2004, when they announced their sudden decision to shift the country’s capital from Yangon to Naypyitaw, near Pyinmana in cental Burma.

The main reason given for the shift was that the new site was more centrally located, unlike Yangon (formerly Rangoon), a port city founded by the British colonialists.

Since shifting the capital to Naypyitaw, where a city is slowly emerging from the wilderness, Rangoon’s infrastructure and economy has been largely ignored, given rise to discontent that finally broke out in August and September of last year when a dramatic fuel price increase sparked protests in the streets of Rangoon.

The demonstrations, led by Buddhist monks, were crushed on September 25 to 27, leaving at least 31 people dead.