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Sneaking into Myanmar
Posted by newscoma | Posted in Around The Globe | Posted on 29-09-2007
The world, my friends, is changing.
I keep watching this and I have been all week as I know many of you have as well.
Thousands of monks had provided the backbone of the protests, but they were besieged in their monasteries, penned in by locked gates and barbed wire surrounding the compounds in the two biggest cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Troops stood guard outside and blocked nearby roads to keep the clergymen isolated.
Many Yangon residents seemed pessimistic over the crackdown, fearing it fatally weakened a movement that began nearly six weeks ago as small protests over fuel price hikes and grew into demonstrations by tens of thousands demanding an end to 45 years of military rule.
The corralling of monks was a serious blow. They carry high moral authority in this predominantly Buddhist nation of 54 million people and the protests had mushroomed when the clergymen joined in.
This has been all over the news all week. But, from a news business perspective, I can’t help but be in awe of the changes that we are seeing in news coverage.
Guys, I started with acetate and cut and pasting measure copy that we ran, on paper, through a wax machine. Images like this in an immediate fashion about the conflict in Myanmar is amazing.
And this was posted today on CNN:
United Nations envoy to Myanmar Ibrahim Gambari arrived Saturday for talks with senior government officials aimed at finding a peaceful resolution to ongoing clashes between the military’s ruling junta and pro-democracy activists, a Western diplomat told CNN.
This is important on a whole lot of different levels.
Editorial note: The video I linked to does show the shooting of a Japanese photographer. If you go see this, keep that in mind.
Bad link fixed. Sorry about that.
