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Myanmar: Junta Threatens Action Against Opposition


AP
September 26, 2008

YANGON, MYANMAR: Myanmar's military government has threatened the party of detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi with legal action unless it retracts a statement criticizing the country's new constitution.

A spokesman for Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party, Nyan Win, said police chief Maj. Gen. Khin Yi and two other officials delivered the warning to six senior party leaders at a meeting Thursday (25 Sept).

The police chief said that a recent party statement saying that "the majority of the people do not accept this constitution, which was illegally approved by force" amounts to inciting the public, according to Nyan Win.

The party's statement charged that the authorities used coercion, intimidation, deception and misrepresentation to get voters' approval for the constitution in a national referendum held in May this year. The junta claimed the constitution won approval of 92% of the voters.

"The police chief told the party leaders that the facts mentioned in the recent party statement amount to instigating the people and legal action can be taken," Nyan Win said.

The party leaders refused to withdraw the statement, he said.

Suu Kyi's party also said that the constitution was not written by elected representatives but "unilaterally drawn up by the delegates hand-picked by the authorities."

The ruling generals had billed the May constitutional referendum as an important step in their "road map to democracy."

The plan promises voters in Myanmar first chance for voters to cast ballots since 1990. The country had been without a charter since the current junta seized power in 1988 and threw out the last constitution.

The National League for Democracy won elections in 1990, but the military refused to hand over power. Nobel Peace Prize laureate Suu Kyi has been detained for 13 of the last 19 years. (AP)

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