Sunday, September 30, 2007

An Opportunity to Spread Democracy

YANGON, Myanmar—Myanmar's government unexpectedly allowed the country's leading opposition figure, Aung San Suu Kyi, to leave house arrest briefly on Sunday and meet with a U.N. envoy trying to persuade the junta to ease its crackdown against a pro-democracy uprising.

But thousands of troops locked down Myanmar's largest cities, and scores of people were arrested overnight, further weakening the flagging movement. And Ibrahim Gambari, the U.N.'s special envoy to Myanmar, failed to see either the junta leader or his deputy in his scheduled meetings. The diplomat was returning late Sunday to the military government's headquarters for a possible third meeting.

  Mercury News

Too bad. If they had oil, we could help, spreading democracy being so important to us and all. And I know a lot of fundamentalist Christians who would jump at the chance to take their Bibles to Burma to convert Buddhists, because, to quote one of them, “You can’t get to heaven through the Buddha.”

Unfortunately, all Bush can offer at the moment is words.

"Every civilized nation has a responsibility to stand up for people suffering under a brutal military regime," Bush said in a statement yesterday. "By its own account, the junta has already killed at least nine non-violent demonstrators."

  Bloomberg

And, in fact, I don’t think the kettle will welcome condemnation from the pot.

At least 10 dead as US soldiers fire on school protest
By Phil Reeves in Fallujah, Iraq - 30 April 2003


....but hey, do what you want....you will anyway.


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