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AP: Mail Bomb Goes Off in Burma
- Subject: AP: Mail Bomb Goes Off in Burma
- From: Winston_Lee@xxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 07 Apr 1997 10:33:00
Mail Bomb Goes Off in
Burma
Monday, April 7, 1997 12:56 pm EDT
RANGOON, Burma (AP) -- A bombing at the home of
one of
Burma's ruling generals fueled speculation Monday
of a rift in the
top ranks of the military government.
The government said the bomb exploded Sunday night
at the
house of Lt. Gen. Tin Oo, the army chief of staff.
The explosion
killed his daughter, Cho Lei Oo, 34, wife of an
army major and
mother of two children.
According to a government statement, a mail bomb
was
suspected in the ``terrorist bomb explosion.''
Ethnic and student rebel groups denied
responsibility for the blast,
saying the attack suggested an internal power
struggle between
Gen. Maung Aye, a former field commander allied
with Tin Oo,
and the powerful head of military intelligence,
Lt. Gen Khin Nyunt.
Those claims could not be proven.
Sunday's attack was the second time in five months
that Tin Oo
has been the apparent target of bombs. On
Christmas Day, two
blasts tore through a Rangoon pagoda he had
visited hours earlier.
Five people were killed and 17 injured.
The bombing came amid a major government offensive
against
student and ethnic Karen National Union rebels and
followed
attacks by Buddhist monks last month against
minority Muslims.
Man Sha, vice secretary-general of the Karen
National Union,
attributed the attack to a rivalry within the
ruling State Law and
Order Restoration Council.
``Inside their army, they're having more and more
power
struggles,'' he told The Associated Press in
Bangkok.
The government made no initial accusations in the
bombing. The
regime has blamed past bombings on communists,
rebel groups
and Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi's
pro-democracy movement.
``This is an act of cowardice. I'm deeply sorry
about it,'' a vice
chairman of Suu Kyi's beleaguered National League
for
Democracy, Tin Oo, told The Associated Press in
Bangkok by
telephone. He is not related to the general.
Opposition groups have denied responsibility for
past bombings
and accused the military of staging them as a
pretext for
crackdowns.
A veteran of campaigns against ethnic and
communist insurgents,
Lt. Gen. Tin Oo has threatened in public speeches
to ``annihilate''
opponents of the regime. But he rarely speaks
publicly of politics
and is a popular commander with the troops.
Several soldiers were seen outside the closed
gates of his
compound Monday morning. No damage to the
one-story
building could be seen from the street.
In a separate incident, the government news agency
reported that
289 diehard members of the defunct Burma Communist
Party
rebel group surrendered Sunday at a ceremony in
Maungtaw, 350
miles northwest of Rangoon. There was no apparent
connection
with the bombing.
Most BCP rebels stopped fighting after mainstream
leaders signed
a cease-fire in 1989.
The military has ruled Burma since 1962. The
current generation
of rulers came to power in 1988. The government
has gunned
down thousands of anti-government protesters.
The military warned Burmese citizens Sunday to
refrain from
political agitation during the New Year's
festival. The festivities,
which culminate April 17, are celebrated in large
part by citizens
dousing each other with water.
? Copyright 1997 The Associated Press
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