Wed Sep 26, 11:43 PM ET

YANGON - Myanmar security forces raided a monastery and arrested at least 100 Buddhist monks on Thursday, tightening their grip after a violent crackdown on mass protests that left at least four people dead.

The country's ruling generals reasserted their control after a string of demonstrations led by the revered monks, whose presence helped bring as many as 100,000 people onto the streets to rally against the junta.

Witnesses said security forces stormed a monastery overnight in the eastern part of Yangon, the country's main city. Windows were smashed and bullet casings littered the ground, they said.

At least 100 monks were believed taken. Some who avoided arrest returned after daybreak, bleeding from wounds to their shaven heads. A few said they had got away by climbing into trees around the monastery.

Witnesses said a second monastery nearby was also raided, but there were no other details.

The raid came just hours after the regime, facing the biggest wave of public anger in 20 years, made good on its vow to end the demonstrations that have erupted in cities across this poor and isolated nation.

Defying calls from the international community to pull back its troops, police and security forces beat protesters and opened fire to halt the rolling wave of demonstrations in Yangon.

Two monks were beaten to death and a third was shot dead while wrestling with a soldier to try to take away his weapon, senior Myanmar officials told AFP. A fourth person was shot dead, a hospital source said.

It was the first time the generals have used violence since the protests began, although there was no mass crackdown like that in 1988, when at least 3,000 people were killed to put down demonstrations.

But the international community voiced outrage at the junta, who have ruled the nation formerly known as Burma in one form or another since 1962.

"France will not accept the gagging of Myanmar's opposition," French President Nicolas Sarkozy said after meeting the head of Myanmar's self-proclaimed government in exile, Sein Win, in Paris.

The European Union and the United States said they were "deeply troubled" by the crackdown. The UN Security Council urged the junta to allow a UN envoy to visit.

There were several calls for China, Myanmar's main trading partner and chief ally, to use its influence with the secretive regime. China has publicly said it will not intervene but that it wants stability in the country.

Yangon and the second city Mandalay remain under a dusk-to-dawn curfew. Yangon's streets were deserted on Thursday morning, and commuter buses avoided passing by the site where Wednesday's clashes occurred.

Shop doors were closed, but inside people could be seen huddling around short-wave radios, hoping to catch some news from foreign media about the clampdown.

The unrest began last month when the junta drastically raised the price of fuel overnight. The move left many here unable to afford even transport to their jobs.

The initial protests -- rare enough in a country where the military quickly crushes any show of dissent -- began with only a handful of demonstrators.

But hundreds of people lined the streets to cheer them on. After the monks joined the movement, numbers swelled and around 100,000 people have marched in Yangon daily since Monday.

Wed Sep 26, 10:53 PM ET

YANGON - Myanmar's generals launched pre-dawn raids on activist monasteries on Thursday, ignoring increasingly desperate international calls for restraint in their crackdown on the biggest anti-junta protests in 20 years.

Facing the most serious challenge to its authority since troops gunned down an estimated 3,000 protesters in 1988, the junta admitted one man was killed and three wounded when soldiers fired warning shots and tear gas at crowds on Wednesday.

Protest leaders, most of them from the revered Buddhist monkhood, said at least five monks were killed as soldiers and riot police tried to disperse the biggest crowds in a month of marches against grinding poverty and 45 years of military rule.

More bloodshed seemed inevitable as monks on Burmese-language foreign radio stations urged the clergy not to yield.

"We would like to call on the student monks to keep on struggling peacefully," one said on the Burmese-language service of the BBC. "Five monks have sacrificed their lives for our religion."

Some witnesses said as many as 100,000 people packed downtown Yangon, the former Burma's main city, on Wednesday and the streets echoed with a deafening roar of anger at the use of violence against the maroon-robed monks.

But the raids suggested the generals, who have lived with Western sanctions for years and frustrate their co-members of a Southeast Asian grouping with their refusals to heed calls for change, were not listening to the diplomatic clamor.

They dispatched military trucks to two monasteries in Yangon and arrested up to 200 of the monks accused of coordinating the demonstrations, witnesses said. Other sources said they also raided monasteries in the northeast.

Monks have been central to the protests that grew out of sporadic marches against a huge rise in fuel prices last month, as the Buddhist priesthood, the country's highest moral authority, goes head-to-head with the might of the military.

After a second night of dusk-to-dawn curfew, the streets of Yangon were unusually quiet early on Thursday, with a fraction of the normal traffic, witnesses said.

Soldiers had been moved from the downtown Sule Pagoda, the end-point of many of the marches, although armed police sat inside the locked shrine. Wooden barricades topped with barbed wire remained outside City Hall next door.

Police also arrested two senior members of the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) from their homes, the party's spokesman said.

U.S.-RUSSIA CLASHES

The raids, arrests and likelihood of further violence against demonstrators who had marched peacefully until troops and police were poured into central Yangon suggested the generals would not deviate from the course they had plotted.

The international outrage was loud by any standards.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called it a "tragedy" and urged the generals to allow a U.N. envoy to visit and meet detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

"The regime has reacted brutally to people who were simply protesting peacefully," Rice said on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly in New York.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said he would dispatch special envoy Ibrahim Gambari to Southeast Asia to await permission from the generals to enter Myanmar.

History also suggests the generals will not be moved by threats from France and Britain, former imperial powers, that individuals would be held responsible for bloodshed. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said the "age of impunity" was over.

There was no evidence of a united international approach.

The United States and the 27-nation European Union called on the generals to end violence and start a dialogue with pro-democracy leaders, including Nobel laureate Suu Kyi, and ethnic minority groups.

Foreign ministers of the Group of Eight industrial nations agreed on a similar formula but without a call for sanctions, in deference to Russia.

Participants said Rice and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov clashed over the sanctions issue.

China and Russia, which have friendlier relations with the Myanmar authorities, have so far blocked any U.N. moves.

The United States and France called on China to use its influence to convince the junta to stop the crackdown.

Diplomats say China has privately been speaking with the Myanmar generals to convey international concern, but Beijing has so far refrained from any public criticism.

Wed Sep 26, 10:41 PM ET

UNITED NATIONS - After initial resistance from China, the U.N. Security Council issued a statement of concern about Myanmar's violent crackdown on Buddhist monks Wednesday and urged the military regime to let in a special envoy.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's special envoy, Ibrahim Gambari, was expected to leave for the region immediately after briefing the emergency council meeting on the fatal violence.

Council diplomats said China, which has close economic ties to Myanmar, didn't want any document issued after the closed-door session but relented and agreed to a brief statement, which was read to reporters by France's U.N. Ambassador Jean-Maurice Ripert.

"Members of the council have expressed their concern vis a vis the situation, and have urged restraint, especially from the government of Myanmar," the statement said.

The junta's forces opened fire on anti-government protesters in the center of the country's largest city, Yangon, killing at least one person. Dissident groups have claimed the casualty count is higher, with as many as five people killed, including monks.

Ban called on Myanmar's government to exercise its "utmost restraint" and later met one-on-one with Myanmar's Foreign Minister Nyan Win. On his way to the meeting, a reporter asked about the five reported deaths and Win replied: "You asked if five people died and we said no."

The council's statement said it "welcomed the decision by the secretary-general to urgently dispatch his special envoy to the region and underlines the importance that Mr. Gambari be received by the authorities of Myanmar as soon as possible."

The United States and the council's European Union members — Britain, France, Italy and Belgium — had condemned the attacks and called on the country's military rulers to stop the violence and open a dialogue with pro-democracy leaders.

"What's going on in Burma is outrageous," U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said after a luncheon meeting of ministers from the eight major industrialized nations. "The regime needs to stop using violence against peaceful people and get to a dialogue so that they can have reconciliation."

China and Russia contend that the situation in Myanmar is an internal affair and doesn't threaten international peace and security — as required for Security Council action — so getting them to agree to the press statement was considered a positive step.

"It is a huge breakthrough," Yvonne Terlingen, U.N. representative for Amnesty International, told the AP. "It is unprecedented that the Security Council made a statement about human rights in Myanmar — and that is very important."

China's U.N. Ambassador Wang Guangya told reporters after the meeting that the most important thing is to see that the Myanmar authorities "restore stability," and to get Gambari into the country as soon as possible.

"China is a neighbor to Myanmar, so we more than anyone else wish to see that Myanmar will achieve stability, national reconciliation, and we want to see them making progress on the road of democratization," he said. "We hope that the government and people there could just sort out their differences."

Wang said that he believed sanctions would not be helpful. He added that "these problems now at this stage (do) not constitute a threat to international and regional peace and stability."

Russia's U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin supported the council statement, adding, "we are concerned about the developments and regret the loss of life."

In January, China and Russia cast a rare double veto on a U.S.-sponsored resolution calling on Myanmar's military government to release all political prisoners, speed up progress toward democracy and stop attacks against ethnic minorities.

U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said the United States supported the statement and Gambari's mission. Asked about China's reaction, he said, "We have called on them to use their influence, and we hope that they will."

Myanmar's junta took power in 1988 after crushing the democracy movement led by Aung San Suu Kyi. In 1990, it refused to hand over power when Suu Kyi's party, the National League for Democracy, won a landslide election victory. Since then, Suu Kyi has been in and out of detention, kept in near-solitary confinement at her home.

The current protests began Aug. 19 after the government hiked fuel prices in one of Asia's poorest countries. But they are based in deep-rooted dissatisfaction with the repressive military rule that has gripped the country since 1962. The protests were faltering when Buddhist monks took the lead last week.

Wed Sep 26, 10:39 PM ET

YANGON, Myanmar - Myanmar security forces opened fire on Buddhist monks and other pro-democracy demonstrators Wednesday for the first time in a month of anti-government protests, killing at least one man and wounding others in chaotic confrontations across Yangon.

Dramatic images of the protests, many transmitted from the secretive Southeast Asian nation by dissidents using cell phones and the Internet, riveted world attention on the escalating faceoff between the military regime and its opponents.

Clouds of tear gas and smoke from fires hung over streets, and defiant protesters and even bystanders pelted police with bottles and rocks in some places. Onlookers helped monks escape arrest by bundling them into taxis and other vehicles and shouting "Go, go, go, run!"

The government said one man was killed when police opened fire during the ninth consecutive day of demonstrations, but dissidents outside Myanmar reported receiving news of up to eight deaths.

Some reports said the dead included monks, who are widely revered in Myanmar, and the emergence of such martyr figures could stoke public anger against the regime and escalate the violence.

Early Thursday, security forces raided two prominent Buddhist monasteries, beating up and hauling away more than 70 monks. And Myint Thein, the spokesman for detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's political party, was arrested, family members said.

As the stiffest challenge to the generals in two decades, the crisis that began Aug. 19 with protests over a fuel price hike has drawn increasing international pressure on the isolated regime, especially from its chief economic and diplomatic ally, China.

The United States and the European Union issued a joint statement decrying the assault on peaceful demonstrators and calling on the junta to open talks with democracy activists, including Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace laureate.

"What's going on in Burma is outrageous," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said.

The U.N. Security Council met in private to be briefed on developments, and issued a brief statement expressing concern about the violent response to demonstrations.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who was sending a special envoy to the region, urged the junta "to exercise utmost restraint toward the peaceful demonstrations taking place, as such action can only undermine the prospects for peace, prosperity and stability in Myanmar."

There was no sign the government had any intention of backing down, and monks said the violence would not deter them from pressing on with what has become the most sustained anti-junta protest since a failed 1988 democracy uprising. In that crisis, soldiers shot into crowds of peaceful demonstrators, killing thousands.

John Dale, an associate faculty member of George Mason University's Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution, said the involvement of monks had made it clear the demonstrations would not peter out and it was surprising the military held back this long.

"Now that it's turned violent, there's high risk activity," Dale said. "The regime signaled they are sincerely prepared to use violence."

The junta issued an edict late Tuesday banning gatherings of more than five people, but the order was ignored by democracy activists and the public alike Wednesday.

The number of protesters seemed a bit less than on Tuesday, but thousands massed at the golden Shwedagon Pagoda, including monks in cinnamon robes, students, members of Suu Kyi's democracy movement and activists waving flags emblazoned with the fighting peacock — a symbol of Myanmar's democracy movement. Large crowds of bystanders also gathered to watch.

Police fired tear gas and made some arrests trying unsuccessfully to scatter the demonstrators. Protesters marched off toward the Sule Pagoda in the heart of Yangon, but were later blocked by military trucks and security officers with riot shields, clubs and guns. Groups of marchers then fanned out into other streets, chased by security forces.

Officers fired warning shots and tear gas trying to disperse the main group and began dragging monks into army trucks — the first mass arrests since protests against the military dictatorship erupted Aug. 19.

Reporters saw some monks beaten, and an exile dissident group said about 300 monks and other protesters had been arrested in small clashes across Myanmar's biggest city.

There were reports of destruction of property but it was unclear whether it was done by demonstrators or pro-junta thugs who were seen among the soldiers and police. Witnesses said a mob burned two police motorcycles.

Myanmar's government said security forces fired when a crowd that included what it called "so-called monks" refused to disperse at the Sule Pagoda and tried to grab weapons from officers. It said police used "minimum force."

The junta statement, read on state radio and television Wednesday night, said a 30-year-old man was killed by a police bullet. It said two men aged 25 and 27 and a 47-year-old woman also were hurt when police fired, but did not specify their injuries.

Witnesses known to The Associated Press reported seeing two women and one young man with gunshot wounds.

Exiled Myanmar journalists and democracy activists released reports of higher death tolls, but the accounts could not be independently confirmed.

Khim Maung Win, deputy editor of the Democratic Voice of Burma, an opposition-run shortwave radio service based in Norway, said five monks and three civilians were reported killed and at least four seriously injured.

Zin Linn, information minister for the Washington-based National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma, which is Myanmar's self-styled government-in-exile, said at least five monks were killed.

An organization of exiled political activists in Thailand, the National League for Democracy-Liberated Area, said three monks had been confirmed dead and about 17 wounded.

Such reports, as well as photos and video taken covertly and then sent over the Internet and by other means, have helped keep the momentum of the protests going. Transmitted back into the country, the dissident views counter reports from state-controlled media ridiculing demonstrators.

Voice of Burma's chief editor, Aye Chan Naing, said activists were using the Internet and cell phones to funnel news out of Myanmar. He declined to discuss details because that could help the military disrupt the messages, saying the junta already had cut some cell phone service.

Naing said activists sometimes transmitted video one frame at a time over the Web and also hid information within seemingly innocuous e-mails.

During the marches in Yangon, bystanders joined with protesters to stand up to security forces, driving them back with a barrage of bricks and bottles that scattered debris and broken glass on the street.

Demonstrators tried to shame one group of soldiers by chanting: "You are the army of the people, we are feeding you! Be just to us!"

When words failed to move the 70 soldiers and the crews of two fire trucks being used for crowd control, people began hurling stones and the line gave way to allow protesters through, many of them monks headed back to their monasteries.

"They will kill us, monks and nuns. Maybe we should go back to normal life as before," said a young nun, her back pressed against the back of a building near the scenes of chaos. But a student watching the arrival of the demonstrators said, "If they are brave, we must be brave. They risk their lives for us."

The two asked that their names not be used for fear of reprisals.

Wed Sep 26, 7:33 PM ET

UNITED NATIONS - The U.N. Security Council on Wednesday urged Myanmar to admit a top U.N. envoy immediately, but China immediately ruled out calls for sanctions or a U.N. condemnation of the ruling junta's use of force.

The United States and the 27-member European Union had asked the council to consider punitive measures and demanded that the junta in the former Burma open a dialogue with jailed opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and ethnic minorities.

"We believe that sanctions (are) not helpful for the situation down there," China's U.N. Ambassador Wang Guangya told reporters.

While expressing concern at events, Wang said the situation in Myanmar did not "constitute a threat to international peace and security," the main mandate of the Security Council and the reason China in the past has prevented council action.

Council members, after an emergency session, "expressed their concern vis-a-vis the situation, and have urged restraint, especially from the government of Myanmar," said French Ambassador Jean-Maurice Ripert, the current council president.

"They welcomed the decision by the secretary-general to urgently dispatch his special envoy to the region and underline the importance that Mr. (Ibrahim) Gambari be received by the authorities of Myanmar as soon as possible," Ripert said.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Gambari, a U.N. undersecretary-general, would leave for the region immediately while he waited for Myanmar to admit him.

A report by Gambari, particularly a negative one, would keep the issue before the council. China and Russia, which have friendly relations with the Myanmar authorities, in January vetoed a U.S.-drafted resolution calling on the junta to stop persecution of minority and opposition groups.

Backing the mission, U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad told reporters, "It would not be good for Mr. Gambari to visit grave sites after many more Burmese have been killed."

WARNING SHOTS, THREE DEAD

Hospital sources in Myanmar said at least three people, including two monks, were shot dead as security forces fired warning shots and used tear gas and baton charges to try to quell the biggest anti-junta protests in two decades.

Gambari, according to British Ambassador John Sawers, spoke to council members of "a fork in the road for the Burmese authorities -- whether they go backwards to the period of violence and oppression or whether they can find a way forward to negotiate a new future for that country."

Earlier, the United States and the European Union, in a statement said, "We condemn all violence against peaceful demonstrators and remind the country's leaders of their personal responsibilities (for) their actions."

"We call on the Security Council to discuss this situation urgently and to consider further steps including sanctions," they said in a statement after the 27 EU foreign ministers met U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly.

Foreign ministers of the Group of Eight industrial nations, meeting separately, agreed on a similar formula but without a call for sanctions, in deference to Russia. Participants said Rice and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov clashed over the sanctions issue.

The EU-U.S. statement called on China, India and members of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) to use their influence to press the Myanmar government to open a dialogue with opponents.

In the first critical comment by an Asian leader, Thai Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont urged the military rulers in Myanmar to avoid violence.

"I'm trying my best to convince the Burmese: 'Don't use the harsh measures'," he told the Asia Society in New York.

The European Union and the United States already have targeted asset freezes and visa bans on key members of the Myanmar leadership.

EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner said those measures could be expanded to more officials involved in repression. Other sanctions could include "some ban on logging, for instance, because there it seems a lot of money is being made," she said.

The London-based environmental group Global Witness estimates that 1.5 million tons of timber worth $350 million were shipped illegally from Myanmar into China in 2005.

The crisis has been a major theme of the General Assembly's annual gathering of world leaders, which opened on Tuesday. President George W. Bush, in his speech to the assembly, announced new sanctions against the junta.

Wed Sep 26, 5:46 PM ET

OSLO, Norway - Cell phones and the Internet are playing a crucial role in telling the world about Myanmar's pro-democracy protests, with video footage sometimes transmitted one frame at a time. Reporters Without Borders said Wednesday the junta has cut some cell phone service.

On the other side of the world in Oslo, a shoestring radio and television network called the Democratic Voice of Burma has been at the forefront of receiving and broadcasting such cyber dispatches by satellite TV and shortwave radio.

Chief editor Aye Chan Naing said the station, founded in 1992 by exiled Myanmar students, is able to pass on nearly real-time images and information about anti-government protests — unlike in 1988, when a similar uprising was shut down in a bloodbath that left more than 3,000 dead.

On Wednesday, the military opened fire after a month of mostly peaceful demonstrations by tens of thousands led by Buddhist monks, and the government confirmed at least one demonstrator killed and three wounded. Activists reported the death toll was five.

This time, the world has been watching through television and still images smuggled out of Myanmar over the Internet — sometimes, Naing said, one frame at a time. Dramatic images arrive via e-mails to exiled activists and via mobile phone calls to journalists outside the country, also known as Burma. Hundreds of images are simply posted on the Internet for anyone to see.

Those inside Myanmar receive information about the protests on shortwave radio broadcasts.

"This time, compared to 1988, there are lots of new technologies to get the news out of Burma ... People are able to take pictures, videos to evidence what is going on. It is quite amazing for Burma, which is a very poor country," said Vincent Brossel, director of the Asia desk for Reporters Without Borders. "Technology is the most useful weapon you can use in such types of pacifist struggles."

Aung Zaw, editor of the independent Irrawaddy Magazine in Thailand, said that in 1988, "it took days, sometimes weeks, even months" to get images out. "Now, it's so fast."

"The world doesn't know where Burma is. Now they see images about the situation and want to know more. That's a huge difference from 1988," he said.

At the Democratic Voice of Burma, Naing, a mild-mannered former dentistry student, said new technologies are crucial, although he declined to give details about exactly how his 30 to 40 "undercover reporters" inside Myanmar get news out. Journalists working openly could be arrested.

"We don't want to say too much about how we use the Internet. They must know we use it, but we don't want to draw too much attention," he said. "Mobile phones are essential. Mobile phones are the way they can report from the ground. This morning (the military) cut off some mobile phones, so we can't get a hold of some of our people."

Brossel said the junta was trying to staunch the flow of information by slowing Internet connections and cutting cell phone service.

Slow Internet connections on Wednesday made it hard to send photos and videos, Brossel said. Many Internet cafes — the main online providers in a country where few can go online at home — were closed, he said.

But Brossel said the opposition was fighting back with satellite telephones, which can bypass censors, firewalls and other restrictions.

Communication inside the country is also important, said Aung Din, Policy Director with the U.S. Campaign for Burma in Washington D.C.

"Students use cell phones to SMS each other to share information," he said, referring to text messages activists use to set up demonstrations or tell each other where soldiers are. "They also know how to take pictures and video with their phones, then download those and send them on the Internet," Din said.

Cell phones, although often confiscated, have proven invaluable, said Soe Aung, a spokesman for the National Council of the Union of Burma, a coalition of opposition groups based in Thailand.

Mary Callahan, a Myanmar expert at the University of Washington, said by e-mail that "In 1988, it was relatively simple for the military to shut down railroads, set up road checkpoints and cut phone lines, which made it quite difficult for protesters to organize. Now, of course, protesters can use both the Internet and cell phones to mobilize support internally and externally."

Din agreed, saying, "The junta can't control the technology totally, and it's a huge difference to deliver the information fast."

Wed Sep 26, 4:22 PM ET

YANGON - Myanmar security forces used batons, tear gas and live rounds Wednesday in a violent crackdown on mass protests against the military junta, killing at least four people including three Buddhist monks.

Up to 100,000 people defied heavy security to take to the streets of the main city Yangon, marching and shouting abuse at police despite blunt warnings from the ruling generals who are facing the most serious challenge to their rule in nearly two decades.

Two of the monks were beaten to death while another was shot when he tried to wrestle a gun away from a soldier and the weapon discharged, two senior Myanmar officials told AFP.

They said the monks were killed near Yangon's Shwedagon Pagoda, Myanmar's holiest site and a key rallying point for the clergy who have led nine days of protests which have spread across the Southeast Asian nation.

A fourth man, who was not a monk, was shot dead, a hospital source said.

The United Nations Security Council held emergency talks in New York late Wednesday to discuss the spiralling crisis, as international outrage over the violent crackdown mounted.

The UN's point man on Myanmar, special envoy Ibrahim Gambari, was to brief the closed-door meeting.

Earlier, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said he was sending Gambari to the region immediately and urged the junta to "cooperate fully" with his mission.

The United States and the European Union called on authorities "to stop violence and to open a process of dialogue with pro-democracy leaders," including detained Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

The G8 grouping of the world's eight most industrialised nations condemned the violence and warned the generals that they would be held accountable for their actions.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, whose country is the former colonial power, said "the whole world is now watching Burma," and French President Nicolas Sarkozy called on French businesses to freeze their investments here.

After tolerating more than a week of protests, police opened fire and baton-charged protesters who had begun to gather at the Shwedagon Pagoda in the blazing noon sunshine.

Undeterred by the show of force, some 1,000 monks soon regrouped and paraded through the streets, to the delight of thousands of onlookers.

They roared approval for the monks and shouted at security forces: "You are fools! You are fools!"

Police and troops then fired a volley of warning shots and tear gas to try to break up the march.

In a sign of the resilience and determination of the protest movement, tens of thousands of monks massed once again, marching through the main market in a protest that lasted until the early evening.

At least 100 people were injured during the day and some 200 people were arrested, as many as half of them Buddhist monks, according to witnesses and diplomats.

State television news said that one 30-year-old protester had been killed, and another two men and one woman were injured, along with 10 police.

The report said security forces had used loudspeakers to ask the crowd to disperse but that the protesters had hurled stones and sticks at them, tried to steal their weapons, and set fire to two military motorcycles.

"Because of the difficult situation, the security forces opened fire to disperse the crowd, using just a little force against the violent protesters. Because they opened fire, the protesters dispersed," it said.

The party of pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi branded the assaults on the monks -- highly revered in the devoutly Buddhist nation -- "the greatest wrong in history."

Protesters ignored a ban on public gatherings issued Tuesday along with a dusk-to-dawn curfew, as the generals who have turned Myanmar into one of the world's poorest and most isolated nations tried to keep a lid on the unrest.

Wednesday was the first time violence has been used against the recent protests, and analysts said it could be a preview for an even more severe crackdown in coming days.

There are fears of a repeat of 1988, the last time demonstrators rallied in such numbers in the streets of Myanmar, formerly known as Burma. Then, around 3,000 people were killed by the security forces.

There were sketchy reports Wednesday of huge turnouts and further clashes with police in the central city of Mandalay and in Sittwe on the western coast where 15,000 people marched.

The unrest began last month when the junta dramatically raised the price of fuel overnight, deepening the misery in this already impoverished country.

The initial protests -- rare in a nation where the military quickly crushes any show of dissent -- began with only a handful of marching demonstrators.

But after the monks joined, the movement swelled, and around 100,000 people marched in Yangon on Monday and Tuesday.

Wed Sep 26, 3:08 PM ET

LONDON - The government warned its citizens on Wednesday against "all but essential travel" to Myanmar as the military junta there launched a bloody crackdown on protestors.

"We advise against all but essential travel to Burma (Myanmar) due to the unsettled political situation," the Foreign Office in London said.

"Protests against the government are taking place in cities across Burma and there have been reports of clashes between protestors and the security forces," it added.

Myanmar security forces used batons, tear gas and live rounds Wednesday in a violent crackdown on the mass protests, killing at least four people including three Buddhist monks, witnesses said.

The Foreign Office added that a curfew has been imposed between 6:00 pm and 6:00 am in Myanmar's largest city Yangon and Mandalay and gatherings of more than five people have been prohibited.

The ministry had previously urged travellers to be cautious as "the political situation remains unsettled".

Wed Sep 26, 1:39 PM ET

NEW YORK - The United States said Wednesday it was "very troubled" by Myanmar's deadly crackdown on anti-government protesters and urged "a peaceful transition" in Yangon from military rule to democracy.

"The United States is very troubled that the regime would treat the Burmese people this way. We call on the junta to proceed in a peaceful transition to democracy," said White House national security spokesman Gordon Johndroe.

Asked whether Washington considered earlier reports of violence in Myanmar to have been confirmed, Johndroe replied: "Yes."

Myanmar security forces used batons, tear gas and live rounds Wednesday in a violent crackdown on mass protests against the military junta, killing at least four people including three Buddhist monks.

Up to 100,000 people defied heavy security to take to the streets of the main city Yangon, marching and shouting abuse at police despite blunt warnings from the ruling generals who are facing the most serious challenge to their rule in nearly two decades.

Two of the monks were beaten to death while another was shot when he tried to wrestle a gun away from a soldier and the weapon discharged, two senior Myanmar officials told AFP.

They said the monks were killed near Yangon's Shwedagon Pagoda, Myanmar's holiest site and a key rallying point for the clergy leading the nine days of protests which have spread across the Southeast Asian nation.

A fourth man, who was not a monk, was shot dead, a hospital source said.

Wed Sep 26, 8:30 AM ET

YANGON - At least three monks were killed in clashes with Myanmar security forces who cracked down on anti-government protests in Yangon, two officials told AFP.

"According to the information that we received, at least three monks were killed," one Myanmar official told AFP on condition of anonymity.

One monk was killed when a gun went off as he tried to wrestle the weapon away from a soldier, while two others were beaten to death, the official said.

His account was confirmed by a second official, who said the toll was based on official reports of incidents that took place around the Shwedagon Pagoda, Myanmar's holiest site and a key rallying point for the monks.

Wed Sep 26, 8:21 AM ET

LONDON - Myanmar and Somalia have been ranked as the most corrupt nations in Transparency International's 2007 index, released Wednesday — adding pressure to the Southeast Asian country's military regime as it faces the biggest anti-government protests in nearly two decades.

Transparency International's 2007 Corruption Perceptions Index scored 180 countries based on the degree to which corruption is perceived among public officials and politicians.

Myanmar, also known as Burma, and Somalia received the lowest score of 1.4 out of 10.

Wed Sep 26, 6:00 AM ET

PARIS - The Myanmar military opened fire on crowds of protesters in Yangon, almost certainly causing casualties, a French diplomat in the city said Wednesday.

"Shots were fired by the security forces, first in the air, then at the demonstrators. We cannot know if many people were injured but we can be sure that blood was spilled," Emmanuel Mouriez, number two at the French embassy, told French radio RTL.

"We have several witness accounts describing people lying on the ground," he added.

Soldiers and police in junta-ruled Myanmar fired tear gas on about 1,000 protesters led by Buddhist monks early Wednesday as they started a march from a landmark Yangon pagoda, witnesses said.

Despite the crackdown, tens of thousands of protesters regrouped in downtown Yangon an hour later, according to witnesses.

Wed Sep 26, 2:25 AM ET

YANGON - Police baton-charged a crowd of around 700 anti-junta protesters including students and Buddhist monks who gathered in Myanmar's main city Yangon in defiance of a ban, witnesses said Wednesday.

The police charged the crowd that had congregated for a ninth straight day of protests, beating students and monks alike with batons outside the Shwedagon Pagoda, Myanmar's holiest shrine, witnesses said.

After the crowd ran away, armed soldiers used barbed wire to cordon off the area around the pagoda. About 500 monks were believed to be inside the pagoda, while others tried to get inside.

Police were not seen arresting any of the protesters.

The baton-charge marked the first time that security forces have used violence to break up the protesters, who have taken to the streets in growing numbers over the last week.

Wed Sep 26, 1:28 AM ET

YANGON - Noted pro-democracy politician Win Naing was arrested overnight at his home in Yangon, a friend and a western diplomat said Wednesday, as Myanmar's junta tightened security around the country.

"He was arrested around 2:30am," a friend told AFP.

A western diplomat said Win Naing was arrested after he was seen providing food and water to Buddhist monks who have spearheaded the largest anti-junta protests seen in the country in nearly 20 years.

Win Naing had been arrested on March 8 for organising a press conference for activists who staged a small protest in February against the crippling economic hardships faced by Myanmar's people.

The septuagenarian politician was then released after one night in jail.

"He has always placed the economy before politics," the diplomat told AFP.

One of Myanmar's top comedians, Zaganar, was also arrested during the night. He had also brought food and water to monks who had led 100,000 people in the streets on Monday and Tuesday.