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Myanmar Student Exile Hold Protest



Myanmar Student Exiles Hold Protest

By THAKSINA KHAIKAEW
 .c The Associated Press 

BANGKOK, Thailand (AP) - Marking the 10th anniversary of an anti-government
uprising that was brutally crushed, hundreds of exiled students from Myanmar
renewed their calls Saturday for an end to their nation's military rule. 

About 300 students chanted outside their embassy in Bangkok and waved posters
of Aung San Suu Kyi, a prominent opposition leader and Nobel laureate Suu Kyi.
She and her National League for Democracy party have set an Aug. 21 deadline,
demanding the government of Myanmar, also known as Burma, allow an opposition-
dominated Parliament elected in 1990 to finally convene. 

In Myanmar's capital of Yangon, witnesses said there was a visible increase in
security checkpoints. But no tanks or soldiers were seen. Yangon was calm, and
schools and businesses were open. 

Opposition groups, however, marked the anniversary of the Aug. 8, 1988, pro-
democracy uprising, in which an estimated 3,000 people died. Suu Kyi, winner
of the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize, urged her countrymen in a videotaped message
seen in Bangkok on Friday to not give up hope that the military, which has
ruled since 1962, would relinquish power. 

``We will win,'' said Suu Kyi, who has spent most of the past decade under
house arrest or other form of imprisonment. ``Do not lose heart. We will never
give up, so don't give up.'' 

In a speech reported in official newspapers, Lt. Gen. Khin Nyunt, a member of
Myanmar's ruling State Peace and Development Council, accused internal
traitors of trying to break the country apart ``under the pretext of democracy
and human rights.'' 

The government also announced that it had complied with Suu Kyi's request to
remove its security detail from her compound. 

AP-NY-08-08-98 2313EDT