Tue Oct 2, 12:44 AM ET

YANGON, Myanmar - A U.N. envoy met with Myanmar's military leader Tuesday in a bid to end the country's political crisis, as the junta's foreign minister defended a deadly crackdown on democracy advocates that has provoked global revulsion.

Ibrahim Gambari, the U.N.'s special envoy to Myanmar, met with Senior Gen. Than Shwe in the junta's remote new capital, Naypyitaw, said a foreign diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, citing protocol. No details of the meeting were available.

Security forces lightened their presence in Yangon, the country's main city, which remained quiet after troops and police brutally quelled mass protests last week. Dissident groups say up to 200 protesters were slain, compared to the regime's report of 10 deaths, and 6,000 detained.

Gambari has been in the country since Saturday with the express purpose of seeing Than Shwe about the violence. The leader had avoided him until Tuesday.

Than Shwe doesn't normally bother with the usual diplomatic protocol and is not an easy man to meet with. In previous sparring with the United Nations and other international bodies over human rights abuses, the regime has repeatedly snubbed envoys and ignored diplomatic overtures.

Instead of the meeting Gambari sought Monday, he was sent to a remote northern town for an academic conference on relations between the European Union and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, diplomats reported, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The town of Lashio, where the conference was held, is 240 miles north of Naypyitaw, the secure, isolated city carved out of the jungle where Than Shwe moved the capital in 2005.

U.N. associate spokesman Farhan Haq earlier said Gambari would urge the junta "to cease the repression of peaceful protest, release detainees, and move more credibly and inclusively in the direction of democratic reform, human rights and national reconciliation."

State Department spokesman Tom Casey said the U.S. wanted to see Gambari convey a clear message on behalf of the international community "about the need for Burma's leaders to engage in a real and serious political dialogue with all relative parties."

He said that included talking with Aung San Suu Kyi, the opposition leader and Nobel peace laureate who has been under house arrest for years. Diplomats say Than Shwe has an intense hatred for her.

Casey also urged China, India and other nations around Myanmar to do more to pressure the junta to change.

In Yangon, soldiers on Monday dismantled roadblocks in the middle of the city and moved to the outskirts, but riot police still checked cars and buses and monitored the streets from helicopters.

Most shops stayed closed and traffic was lighter than usual. After keeping Buddhist monasteries sealed off for several days because of their prominent role in the protests, authorities let some monks go out to collect food donations, but soldiers kept watch on them.

Protests against the government ignited Aug. 19 after it hiked fuel prices, but public anger ballooned into mass demonstrations led by Buddhist monks against 45 years of military dictatorship.

Soldiers responded last week by shooting at unarmed demonstrators. The government says 10 people were killed, but dissident groups say anywhere from several dozen to as many as 200 died in the crackdown.

Opposition groups also say several thousand people were arrested, including many monks who were dragged out of their monasteries and locked up. Many demonstrators were reported held in makeshift prisons at old factories, a race track and universities around Yangon.

It was impossible to independently verify the reports in the tightly controlled nation. Some 70 detainees were released Monday in Yangon, according to Irrawaddy, a Thailand-based news magazine.

Many people who ventured out Monday in Yangon felt the junta had defeated the biggest pro-democracy demonstrations since 1988, when another brutal crackdown killed an estimated 3,000 protesters.

"The people are angry but afraid. Many are poor and struggling in life so they don't join the protests anymore. The monks are weak because they were subjected to attacks," said Theta, a 30-year-old university graduate who drives a taxi and gave only his first name.

He and others who agreed to talk about the protests spoke on condition their identities not be revealed, fearing retaliation by security forces.

"The people are enraged, but they could not do anything because they're facing guns," said a 68-year-old teacher. "I think the protests are over because there is no hope pressing them."

An Asian diplomat said Monday that all the arrested monks had been defrocked — stripped of their highly revered status — and were likely to face long jail terms. He spoke on condition of anonymity, citing protocol.

The Shwedagon and Sule pagodas, the two main flash points of the unrest in Yangon were reopened Monday, but there were few visitors. A foreign diplomat said a crucial bridge at Hlaingtharyar leading into Yangon was barricaded by troops.

Internet access remained restricted and cell phone service was sporadic for a fourth day. Both conduits were used by dissidents to get information out about the demonstrations until the junta launched its crackdown Wednesday.

Than Shwe, a former postal clerk who began his army career fighting insurgencies by Myanmar's ethnic minorities, has had an iron grip on power since 1992, having ousted or co-opted any challengers within the military.

Not well educated, he rarely makes public appearances, and there is no record of him traveling to a Western country.

Diplomats who have met him say he has a streak of xenophobia common to Myanmar's military and an almost visceral hatred of Suu Kyi, who has become an international symbol of the yearning for democracy in Myanmar.

In 2004, Than Shwe ousted his main rival, Gen. Khin Nyunt, the powerful head of intelligence, who favored some dialogue with Suu Kyi.

He has also been reported to be deeply attached to the predictions of astrologers and views himself as a throwback to the old kings of Burma. Now in declining health at 74, he suffers from hypertension and diabetes.