Reuters-Myanmar blocks roads, but a

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Subject: Reuters-Myanmar blocks roads, but allows NLD commemoration 

Myanmar blocks roads, but allows NLD commemoration
07:00 a.m. Jul 19, 1999 Eastern

YANGON, July 19 (Reuters) - Myanmar's military put road blocks around the
National League for Democracy (NLD) party headquarters on Monday to vet
attendance at a ceremony to mark the 1947 assassination of party leader Aung
San Suu Kyi's father.

Security personnel allowed some 400 people with invitations to attend the
ceremony in the capital marking the 52nd anniversary of the death of Aung
San, Myanmar's national hero and founding father. No incidents were
reported.

Aung San was assassinated on July 19, 1947, six months before independence
from Britain. The day has been commemorated as ``Martyrs' Day'' ever since.

The NLD said in a statement read at the meeting it would seek to resolve the
country's political crisis through peaceful dialogue.

The NLD and Suu Kyi have been locked in a long and bitter standoff with the
ruling generals over the junta's failure to recognise the result of
Myanmar's last election in 1990, which the party won by a landslide.

The military's efforts to silence the party since through arrests and
intimidation have provoked U.S. and EU sanctions.

The NLD said it remained ready for dialogue. ``We... resolve to seek answers
to solve the political problems by holding talks peacefully through
political means,'' party vice chairman Tin Oo said at the ceremony.

The military has said it was willing to resume contacts that began last year
but insisted the NLD must first renounce a committee it set up last year to
represent the parliament which was never allowed to form.

Yangon has poured cold-water on international mediation efforts -- including
a visit earlier this month by a mission from the European Union -- saying it
can solve its own problems.

At the weekend, commentaries in the military-controlled official media
stepped up attacks on the NLD and Suu Kyi, blaming it for the current
political stalemate.

The commentaries charged that ageing members of the party's executive
committee were not brave enough to stand up to Suu Kyi, who has been
vilified in the official media for stubbornness.
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