Dissident group accuses Myanmar guards of beating, killing detainees after protest crackdown

The Jakarta Post

YANGON (AP): Guards at detention centers in Myanmar beat, kicked and slashed protesters rounded up during the crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrations, sometimes leaving their victims to die of their injuries, a dissident group said.

At the United Nations, meanwhile, the Security Council issued its first-ever statement on Myanmar, saying Thursday it "strongly deplores" the violent crackdown by the country's military rulers and called for a "genuine dialogue" between the government and the pro-democracy opposition.

The U.N. said its special envoy to Myanmar, Ibrahim Gambari, would fly back to the region next week for consultations with key governments on efforts to promote talks between Myanmar's junta and the democratic opposition.

Gambari will begin his consultations in Thailand on Monday and then travel to Malaysia, Indonesia, India, China and Japan, "with a view to returning to Myanmar shortly thereafter," U.N. deputy spokeswoman Marie Okabe said. She gave no date.

Gambari met with the junta's leaders earlier this month during a four-day trip to Myanmar after troops brutally suppressed pro-democracy demonstrations. But the U.N. chief said after Gambari's visit that he could not call the trip "a success."

Myanmar's repressive military junta has said 10 people were killed and nearly 2,100 arrested in last month's demonstrations, with 700 later released. Diplomats and dissidents say the death toll is likely much higher and up to 6,000 people were seized, including thousands of monks who led the rallies.

At least a dozen freed prisoners described brutal treatment at detention centers, including one who said "dozens" of detainees were killed, the Democratic Voice of Burma , a Norway-based short-wave radio station and Web site run by dissident journalists, said in a report Thursday.

"They beat everyone, including women and girls," the dissident group quoted an unidentified female detainee as saying. "I was beaten myself. Monks were targeted and they were not only beaten but also verbally abused by security officers."

"I heard people shouting and crying from the interrogation room and then, I saw an army medical surgeon carrying people away," the woman said. The group said she was held at the Government Technical Institute detention center in Yangon for five days following the crackdown.

DVB, which has supplied reliable information in the past, also reported that a 48-year-old detainee, U Than Aung, died Sept. 30 at a detention center in Yangon. He was arrested on Sept. 27, beaten in custody which left him with severe internal injuries, and died when he was not given immediate medical attention, the group said, citing sources close to the institute.

There was no way to independently confirm the reports attributed to freed prisoners.

In an interview with The Associated Press, another released prisoner, Zaw Myint, 45, said he was arrested Sept. 26 on a Yangon street after a soldier bashed his face with the butt of his gun, leaving a bloody gash across his cheek.

Zaw Myint said he was denied treatment for three days and then stitched up by a doctor at Yangon's notorious Insein prison, after the physician had treated several wounded prisoners.

"He used the same needle to treat all patients. And I saw him give injections to wounded people using the same syringe," said Zaw Myint, who was released after a week in custody. He said was "extremely worried" about having contracted HIV as a result of the treatment. Rights groups say that Myanmar's prisons have soaring rates of HIV-AIDS.

DVB also released video of an unidentified man who said "dozens" of detainees died. Another man was quoted as saying he saw two people die from severe beatings at Yangon City Hall. Authorities failed to give a boy medical treatment for a gunshot wound and even refused to let him drink water from a toilet before he died, the man was quoted as saying.

Human rights groups have long accused the military government of abuse and torture of prisoners. The Thailand-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, comprised of around 100 former inmates, has put out a report describing homosexual rape, electric shocks to the genitals, near drowning, burning with hot wax and other abuse.

A compromise statement approved Thursday by all 15 U.N. Security Council members - including close Myanmar ally China - emphasized "the importance of the early release of all political prisoners and remaining detainees."

The United States, Britain and France proposed a stronger text that would have condemned the violence and called for the immediate release of the political prisoners and detainees, singling out the detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

But the text was watered down to get approval from China. The United States and other countries have pushed for international sanctions, but China said that only a more conciliatory approach would work.