Myanmar Bans Gatherings, Imposes Curfew

YANGON, Myanmar (AP) – The military government banned assemblies of more than five people and imposed curfews in Myanmar’s two largest cities on Tuesday, after thousands of Buddhist monks and sympathizers defied orders to stay out of politics and protested once again.

Truckloads of soldiers converged on Yangon after the monks, cheered on by supporters, marched out for an eighth day of peaceful protest from Yangon’s soaring Shwedagon Pagoda, while some 700 others staged a similar show of defiance in the country’s second largest city of Mandalay. “The protest is not merely for the well being of people but also for monks struggling for democracy and for people to have an opportunity to determine their own future,” one monk told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity fearing reprisals from officials.

“People do not tolerate the military government any longer.” President Bush on Tuesday announced new U.S. sanctions against Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, accusing the military dictatorship of imposing “a 19-year reign of fear” that denies basic freedoms of speech, assembly and worship.

(Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)