NNT BANGKOK, 8 August 2013 (NNT) – Norway and Thailand are joining hands providing educational opportunities to Burmese students, granting them 60 scholarships to study at Mahidol University. “Norwegian Scholarships on Capacity Building for Institutions in Myanmar” is...

The White House

Office of the Press Secretary

“For Immediate Release”

Dear Mr. Speaker: (Dear Mr. President:)

I hereby report that I have issued an Executive Order (the “order”) pursuant to the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701 et seq.) (IEEPA) and the Tom Lantos Block Burmese JADE (Junta’s Anti-Democratic Efforts) Act of 2008 (Public Law 110-286) (the “JADE Act”) that takes additional steps with respect to the national emergency declared in Executive Order 13047 of May 20, 1997, as modified in scope in Executive Order 13448 of October 18, 2007, and Executive Order 13619 of July 11, 2012, and relied upon for additional steps taken in Executive Order 13310 of July 28, 2003, Executive Order 13448 of October 18, 2007, Executive Order 13464 of April 30, 2008, and Executive Order 13619 of July 11, 2012.

By Nang Mya Nadi
DVB

Thai authorities in the last week have rounded up three leading members of a Burmese human trafficking gang responsible for selling hundreds of their fellow countrymen into slavery and murdering dozens of people.

According to the Burmese embassy in Bangkok’s labour attaché Naing Htun, combined forces from the Royal Thai Police and the Department of Special Investigation (DSI) nabbed the group’s leader Ko Myo last week after capturing one of his top aides on 31 July.

Another of the gang’s henchman was reportedly arrested on Tuesday, while officials continue to search for an unidentified Burmese national associated with the outfit.

Phuket Gazette

PHUKET: The Nine Armies’ War started in 1785 when the Burmese, taking advantage of internal strife and the overthrowing of King Taksin in Siam, invaded the country with forces numbering approximately 150,000 soldiers, divided into nine army groups.

One of those armies marched straight for Thalang, then the largest town in Phuket, and laid siege to it. During that time, the governor of Thalang and the only person who can organize the town’s defenses, passed away in the most untimely manner.

With the town in danger of being sacked, the governor’s wife, Lady Chan, along with her sister, Khun Mook, rallied the town’s fighting men and organized the defense of Thalang.

By Hla Hla Htay (AFP)

YANGON — Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi urged further progress on democratic reforms in a speech to thousands Thursday marking the anniversary of a huge popular uprising in 1988, the largest ever such commemoration.

Some 5,000 people crammed into a convention centre and thousands more watched large television screens outside to witness a landmark ceremony recalling the mass student protests 25 years ago that were brutally crushed by the then-junta.

The event, attended by members of the opposition and ruling parties, diplomats and Buddhist monks, comes amid sweeping changes in Myanmar since the end of outright military dictatorship two years ago.

By Melissa Crouch, Guest Contributor

Today is a day of mixed feelings for all those involved in Burma’s democracy movement. 8 August marks the 25th anniversary of the democracy uprising in Burma that was brutally crushed by the military regime.

The sweeping electoral victory of the National League for Democracy (NLD) that followed in 1990 was blatantly denied by the military. Many of the NLD’s elected members were locked away in prison under brutal conditions. The leader of the NLD, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, spent many years under house arrest.

In those dark years, a process of drafting a new constitution was initiated by the military. This was neither an inclusive, open nor participatory process. Proceedings were under strict control of the military. Any criticism of the constitution-making process was criminalised.

By AFP

YANGON aUGUST 8- Myanmar activists Thursday held their first march through Yangon to mark the anniversary of a bloody crackdown on democracy rallies 25 years ago, in commemorations aimed at propelling reforms after the end of junta rule.

Hundreds of people watched some 50 campaigners march through downtown Yangon to recall one of the bloodiest incidents in the modern history of Myanmar, which has seen striking political changes since the end of outright military dictatorship two years ago.

“I think that we can now walk on the path to democracy because of the 1988 revolution. The transition is the consequence of that uprising,” said Tun Tun Oo, a 49 year old businessman who was a student protester involved in the 1988 rallies.

Sullivan reported from New Delhi

YANGON, Myanmar (AP) — Twenty-five years later, you can still see the fear in the eyes of the doctors — two young men carrying a schoolgirl, her blouse drenched in blood, through streets where soldiers were brutally crushing pro-democracy protests.

The photograph, thrust to prominence when it ran on the cover of Newsweek, came to symbolize the defeat of a 1988 uprising in the nation then called Burma. The revolt’s end cemented the power of the military, sent thousands of activists to prison and helped bring a future Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Aung San Suu Kyi, to prominence.

Only now, a generation after the events of the day known as “8.8.88,” is Win Zaw beginning to talk about it all.