Democracy rally held in Myanmar

In a rare public demonstration in Myanmar, hundreds of people marched today in the country’s largest city to protest steep increases in fuel costs that have driven up the prices of transportation and commodities, according to witnesses and news reports.

The protesters in Yangon dispersed after being confronted by a militant youth group organized by the government that apparently took some of them away in cars, The Associated Press reported.

It was the latest in a series of small demonstrations against inflation, price increases and deteriorating living conditions in a country where public protest has been all but choked off by intimidation and arrests.

The march followed the overnight arrests of 13 dissidents who led an earlier protest against the price increases, including the leaders of the 88 Generation Students Group.

That group is named for a popular uprising in 1988, sparked partly by an increase in the price of rice, that led to the killings of hundreds of people and the emergence of the junta that now rules Myanmar, the former Burma.

In an unusual public announcement, the government said in state-run newspapers today that the dissidents had been arrested for “agitation to cause civil unrest” and that they could face up to 20 years in prison.

Those arrested included Min Ko Naing, one of the country’s most prominent dissidents, who spent 16 years in prison until his release in November 2004, since which he has been arrested and released again.

“The government is repeating the same mistakes of 1988,” said Aung Zaw, an exile from Myanmar living in Thailand who edits Irrawaddy Magazine, a political journal focusing largely on Myanmar issues.

“No announcement, no prior consultation.”

Prices of gasoline, diesel fuel and cooking gas more than doubled last week, delivering a punishing blow to Myanmar’s population, much of which lives hand-to-mouth.

“People cannot go to work, bus fares have been raised, children cannot go to school because their parents cannot afford to pay for their transport,” said Soe Aung, a member of a Thailand- based opposition group who has contact with dissidents in Myanmar.

“There have been in recent months other demonstrations by people who say, ‘Why don’t we have regular electricity, why have the commodity prices gone up high, very high?”’ Soe Aung said.

In 1990, the junta held elections that it lost and later annulled. It has detained the pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi under house arrest for most of the 17 years since then.

Critics say the junta’s economic mismanagement has turned a nation rich in natural resources into one of the poorest in Asia. Myanmar, which was once a leading exporter of rice, also has some of Asia’s largest reserves of natural gas.

In contrast to 1988, the junta appears well-prepared to isolate agitators and deal with unrest in the streets. It has moved college campuses far from Yangon, the commercial capital, to disperse the students who have historically been at the root of political protest.

Last year it moved the capital out of Yangon, also suddenly and without official explanation, to Naypyidaw, nine hours away from Yangon by train. One theory is that the move was partly intended to isolate civil servants, whose participation swelled the protests in 1988.

The fuel price protest today had been announced in advance, and according to Reuters, the government deployed armed police officers on the streets of Yangon early in the day.

In addition, truckloads of men from the civilian militia known as the Union Solidarity and Development Association network, carrying brooms and spades, took up positions in the city center pretending to be road sweepers, the news agency reported.

As in the 1988 protests, demonstrators, who numbered about 300, called on onlookers to join them, witnesses said.

“We are marching to highlight the economic hardship that Myanmar people are facing now which has been exacerbated by the fuel price hike,” a protester who identified himself only as Mimi told onlookers, according to The Associated Press.

According to Reuters, onlookers applauded but did not join the march.