Burma - crackdown - karen rebels - monks - Rangoon
Rebels claim attack in Southeast
Sunday 30 September 2007
As the gov't moves troops toward protest-hit Rangoon, ethnic Karen rebels are stepping up their attacks.
Sunday 30 September 2007
By France24.comImages of the violence in Burma have been sent out of the country in secret via the Internet. Read FRANCE 24’s article here.
Ethnic rebels in southeastern Burma said Sunday they had attacked a column of troops on their way to reinforce the military government’s crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Rangoon and other Burmese cities, FRANCE 24’s Cyril Payen reports.
The rebels ambushed a column of 300 government troops on Saturday, killing four soldiers, they said. Payen had seen the same column earlier in the day.
“It was the 206th battalion of the army here in Burma who left the area... heading for Rangoon to reinforce the military crackdown there,” he said.
Payen filed the report from the jungle headquarters of the Karen National Union in the mountains of southeastern Burma.
The group has been fighting the government for half a century, for the rights of the Karen people, one of Burma’s many ethnic minorities. Human rights activists say the military regime has repressed the Karens for decades.
The rebels told Payen they mounted the ambush in support for the monks and democracy activists protesting in the cities.
According to Payen, other groups of rebels intend to mount similar attacks in the coming days.
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