AlertNet Blogs - Amy Leung

Myanmar uses militia to crush protests

Wed, 10 Oct 2007 17:27:00 GMT

Contrary to what you might think from international media reports on the crackdown in Myanmar, it is not just brave monks and protesters who are speaking out.

There are people on the inside - soldiers, police and government officials - who are also risking their lives to give evidence about the regime's actions.

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Hunger stalks Myanmar's children, as food prices soar

Thu, 04 Oct 2007 11:59:00 GMT

Last week, from the top floors of the luxury towers near Yangon's Sule Pagoda, we watched hundreds of soldiers descend from their trucks, form lines and start shooting.

Within ten minutes, they had cleared a perimeter around the pagoda. And they carried on for the rest of the day until they'd forced everyone from the streets - from the stalls where they cook and sell food for a pittance, from the blankets where they hawk Chinese-made T-shirts, from their only sources of livelihood.

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Myanmar battles dengue epidemic

Wed, 12 Sep 2007 13:24:00 GMT

Five-year-old May May Hlaing came down with a fever on Tuesday. She started vomiting on Wednesday. Her parents rushed her to the Yangon Children's Hospital on Thursday morning. She never saw one of the 17 paediatricians at the hospital who were overwhelmed with the numbers of children turning up. She died of dengue fever in her mother's arms before night.

Dengue is caused by a mosquito called Aedes egypti. In some countries there are control programmes. In army-ruled Myanmar, where more than half the government's budget is spent on the military, and less than 0.4 percent is spent on health care ($0.50 per person), there is no such programme. Not surprisingly dengue outbreaks hit the impoverished country hard and fast.

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