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.

Tue Oct 2, 12:13 AM ET

LASHIO, Myanmar - UN envoy Ibrahim Gambari was again kept waiting for a meeting with Myanmar's junta leader Than Shwe on Tuesday, as the regime said it was not to blame for a deadly crackdown on mass street protests.

Gambari, trying to see the reclusive general since the weekend to express international outrage over the bloodshed, was instead brought to a carefully orchestrated public rally in support of the government.

It was his third attempt to meet Than Shwe since arriving at the weekend, after security forces effectively stopped the protests with a crackdown that left at least 13 people dead and hundreds if not thousands behind bars.

Diplomats have warned the death toll could be far higher, as activists struggle to assess the scope of the crackdown and to find hundreds of dissidents, monks and ordinary civilians who were arrested or went missing.

The demonstrations were the biggest in two decades against the junta, which has ruled Myanmar with an iron fist for 45 years and has usually acted quickly to stifle any sign of dissent.

Speaking at the annual gathering of world leaders at the United Nations in New York, Foreign Minister Nyan Win blamed the unrest on political "opportunists" and said the junta was not responsible for the violence.

He said security forces had shown "utmost restraint" in handling the protests, which began as small-scale marches in mid-August but drew 100,000 people into the streets last week after Buddhist monks joined the movement.

"The situation would not have deteriorated had the initial protest of a small group of activists against the rise in fuel prices not been exploited by political opportunists," Nyan Win said.

He said they had been "aided and abetted by some powerful countries" and that the regime had first tried to warn demonstrators by instituting a dusk-to-dawn curfew.

"When protesters ignored their warning, they (security forces) had to take action to restore the situation," he said. "Normalcy has now returned in Myanmar."

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon dispatched Gambari, a Nigerian-born diplomat, to underline international concern and attempt to get the regime to ease the crackdown.

Gambari has already been allowed to meet with detained democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi as well as senior officials, but the government has dragged its feet in arranging talks with Than Shwe in the capital, Naypyidaw.

As he waited for a hoped-for meeting on Tuesday, the envoy found himself in the city of Lashio, where Deputy Foreign Minister Kyaw Thu escorted him to a pro-government rally with tens of thousands of people in attendance.

Witnesses said many in the crowd were members of local ethnic minority groups who could not understand the speeches given in the majority Myanmar language. Some appeared to be dozing off.

"Myanmar is poised to introduce a new political system that will ensure that the next constitutionally elected government cannot be manipulated by anyone inside or outside the country," one speaker told the crowd.

Gambari stayed for about 10 minutes.

Meanwhile Japanese Deputy Foreign Minister Mitoji Yabunaka was holding talks in Naypyidaw with top military officials over the death of a Japanese journalist killed while covering the protests last week.

Yabunaka demanded the return of a video camera the journalist was carrying at the moment he was shot dead, the foreign ministry said in Tokyo.

The United States on Monday again expressed serious concerns about "continued reports of violence and intimidation" in Myanmar, where protests first erupted in August after a massive hike in fuel prices.

Rights group Amnesty International has urged the UN Security Council to impose an immediate arms embargo on Myanmar as punishment for the brutal crackdown, saying China had been the main source of weapons.

Tue Oct 2, 12:13 AM ET

YANGON - U.N. envoy Ibrahim Gambari was set to meet Myanmar junta supremo Than Shwe on Tuesday to try to persuade him to end a crackdown on the biggest democracy protests in 20 years and talk to opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

But despite agreeing to see Gambari, the generals appear deaf to the international calls for restraint, posting troops and police across Yangon and dispatching pro-junta gangs to raid homes in search of monks and dissidents on the run.

"They are going from apartment to apartment, shaking things inside, threatening the people. You have a climate of terror all over the city," a Bangkok-based Myanmar expert with many friends in Yangon said.

"They can beat people, they can take them away, they can threaten them," he said of the feared Union Solidarity and Development Association, the junta's political party in waiting for eventually planned elections.

Gambari flew to the former Burma's new jungle capital to convey international outrage at last week's crushing of monk-led protests against decades of military rule and deepening poverty.

After three days in the country, during which he met three minister-generals and Suu Kyi, who remains under house arrest, Gambari was told he would be able to meet Senior General Than Shwe on Tuesday, the United Nations said in New York.

His precise whereabouts, however, were a mystery. "We have no idea where he is at the moment," a U.N. official said in Yangon.

The U.N. Security Council, which endorsed the former Nigerian foreign minister's emergency visit, is hoping the mission will kick start some sort of dialogue between the junta -- the latest face of 45 years of military rule -- and Suu Kyi.

After Than Shwe, Gambari was expected to have a second meeting with the 62-year-old Nobel peace laureate Suu Kyi, French U.N. Ambassador Jean-Maurice Ripert said, kindling hopes of some sort of "shuttle diplomacy."

"He should be able to set up a structure for further talks that will involve all aspects, especially on how to get all the parties in Myanmar to talk together," said Razali Ismail, Gambari's predecessor as U.N. point man on Myanmar.

"If he can get that agreement, it will be a significant achievement," Razali told Reuters.

DEATH TOLL CONFUSION

State media say 10 people were killed when troops opened fire last week to clear protesters from the streets of Yangon, the former capital and main city, although Western governments say the toll is likely to be far higher.

In truth, nobody knows how many died in the crackdown, which many feared would descend into a repeat of 1988, a nationwide uprising crushed over several months with the loss an estimated 3,000 lives.

"I don't think even the generals have any idea what the real death toll is at the moment," a Hong Kong-based Myanmar human rights expert said.

Buddhist monks say six of their brethren were killed in clashes with security forces and night raids on monasteries in Yangon, in which hundreds of monks were carted off. Many were kicked and beaten, people in the neighborhoods said.

One shocking picture of the body of a maroon-robed man -- almost certainly a monk -- lying in a ditch is on dissident news Web sites and there are unconfirmed reports of monks caged at a technical institute in north Yangon going on hunger strike.

At the United Nations, Myanmar Foreign Minister Nyan Win, accused "political opportunists" of trying to create a showdown with foreign help so that they could exploit the ensuing chaos.

In a speech to the annual General Assembly, he said "normalcy" had returned and urged the international community to refrain from measures he said would add fuel to the fire.

INTERNET OFF

In a sign the junta was confident it had squeezed the life out of the uprising, barbed-wire barricades have been removed from Yangon's Shwedagon and Sule Pagodas, the focal points of last week's monk-led mass protests.

However, soldiers remain at street corners to prevent even small crowds of demonstrators assembling. Government security men are searching bags for cameras, and the Internet, through which images of the crackdown have reached the world, remained cut.

The streets were almost empty of monks collecting their morning alms, witnesses said. The only ones out were very old or in their young teens.

One of the poorest countries in Asia, Myanmar was once the world's largest rice exporter and has an abundance of timber, gems, oil and natural gas but has suffered from decades of isolation and control by the military.

The protests began with small marches against fuel price rises in mid-August but intensified when soldiers shot over the heads of protesting monks, causing monasteries to mobilize.

Mon Oct 1, 9:38 PM ET

UNITED NATIONS - Myanmar's foreign minister on Monday accused elements inside and outside the country of trying to derail its move toward democracy and defended the crackdown on an "unruly and provocative" mob as essential to restore order.

"Normalcy has now returned in Myanmar," Foreign Minister U Nyan Win told the U.N. General Assembly's ministerial meeting.

Protests against Myanmar's government ignited in August over fuel prices hikes, 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. On Monday, the main city of Yangon was quiet and security forces lightened their presence.

Win accused "neo-colonialists" — a clear reference to the United States, Britain and other Western nations — of conducting a concerted campaign against Myanmar by imposing economic sanctions and spreading disinformation that the government is committing gross human rights violations.

Such campaigns, Win said, eventually culminate in the invasion of countries and overthrow of governments.

"Recent events make clear that there are elements within and outside the country who wish to derail the ongoing process (toward democracy) so that they can take advantage of the chaos that would follow," Win said.

Win made no mention of the deaths or injuries in the crackdown against the pro-democracy demonstrators by the country's security forces. Dissident groups say up to 200 protesters were slain, compared to the regime's report of 10 deaths, and 6,000 detained.

Win said "cooperation with the United Nations is a cornerstone of Myamar's foreign policy," citing his government's decision to allow U.N. envoy Ibrahim Gambari to visit this week.

He insisted Myamar was advancing on the path to democracy, citing plans for a new constitution. Critics call the process a sham because the junta hand-picked most delegates to a national convention that drew up guidelines for the new constitution and has barred the opposition.

"The Myanmar government is fully aware of its responsibility to lead the nation in the process of transformation to a disciplined democracy," Win said. "We have laid down a road map and will work conscientiously to achieve our goals."

Mon Oct 1, 8:01 PM ET

UNITED NATIONS - Myanmar Foreign Minister U Nyan Win on Monday blamed the military crackdown against anti-government protesters in his country on "political opportunists" backed by "some powerful countries".

"The situation would not have deteriorated had the initial protest of a small group of activists against the rise in fuel prices not been exploited by political opportunists," he told the UN General Assembly here.

He said those "opportunists ... aided and abetted by some powerful countries" also took advantage of protests "staged initially by a small group of Buddhist clergy demanding apology for maltreatment of fellow monks by local authorities."

The minister asserted that Myanmar security forces showed "utmost restraint" and did not intervene for nearly a month.

He said authorities were then compelled to declare a curfew "when the mob became unruly and provocative."

"When protestors ignored their warning, they (security forces) had to take action to restore the situation. Normalcy has now returned in Myanmar," he added.

Nyan Win portrayed the turmoil as part of "neo-colonialist attempts" to impose Western-style democracy on Myanmar.

Mon Oct 1, 2:57 PM ET

BANGKOK, Thailand - One hundred shot dead outside a Myanmar school. Activists burned alive at government crematoriums. A Buddhist monk floating face down in a river.

After last week's brutal crackdown by the military, horror stories are filling Myanmar blogs and dissident sites. But the tight security of the repressive regime makes it impossible to verify just how many people are dead, detained or missing.

"There are huge difficulties. It's a closed police state," said David Mathieson, a consultant with Human Rights Watch in Thailand. "Many of the witnesses have been arrested and are being held in areas we don't have access to. Other eyewitness are too afraid."

Authorities have acknowledged that government troops shot dead nine demonstrators and a Japanese cameraman in Yangon. But witness accounts range from several dozen deaths to as many as 200.

"We do believe the death toll is higher than acknowledged by the government," Shari Villarosa, the top U.S. diplomat in Myanmar, told The Associated Press Monday. "We are doing our best to get more precise, more detailed information, not only in terms of deaths but also arrests."

Villarosa said her staff had visited up to 15 monasteries around Yangon and every single one was empty. She put the number of arrested demonstrators — monks and civilians — in the thousands.

"I know the monks are not in their monasteries," she said. "Where are they? How many are dead? How many are arrested?"

She said the true death toll may never be known in a Buddhist country where bodies are cremated.

"We're not going to find graves like they did in Yugoslavia ... We have seen few dead bodies. The bodies are removed promptly. We don't know where they are being taken," Villarosa said.

Dissident groups have been collecting accounts from witnesses and the families of victims, and investigating reports of dead bodies turning up at hospitals and cemeteries in and around Yangon.

The U.S. Campaign For Burma, a Washington-based pro-democracy group, says more than 100 people were killed in downtown Yangon after truckloads of government troops fired automatic weapons last Thursday at thousands of demonstrators. It also claims that 100 students and parents were killed the same day at a high school in Tamwe, in northeastern Yangon, after troops shot at them as school let out.

The Democratic Voice of Burma, a Norway-based dissident news organization, has received reports of soldiers burning protesters alive at the Yae Way cemetery crematorium on the outskirts of Yangon. The group also shot video Sunday of a dead monk, badly beaten and floating face down in a Yangon river.

The Democratic Voice of Burma has put the death toll at 138, based on a list compiled by the 88 Student Generation, a pro-democracy group operating in Myanmar.

"This 138 figure is quite credible because it's based on names of victims," Aye Chan Naing, the chief editor, told the AP Monday. "I also think the figure is accurate because of the pictures coming from inside Burma. The way they were shooting into the crowds with machine guns means dozens of people could have died."

The Democratic Voice of Burma also estimates that about 6,000 demonstrators — including at least 1,400 monks from seven now-empty monasteries — are being held at makeshift detention centers set up at universities, old factories and a race track in Yangon. There are already an estimated 1,100 political prisoners languishing in Myanmar's jails.

The military junta did not respond to AP requests for comment Monday. It is impossible to independently verify the death toll because Myanmar is virtually off-limits to journalists.

Lars Bromley of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington said his agency has ordered up satellite images of four Myanmar cities, including Yangon, since the crackdown. He said satellite imagery — along with clear skies and exact locations from witnesses — could help locate massacre sites, and also give some sense of the military presence around cities and monasteries.

"If there are several suspected burial sites, we could help narrow it down or identify the site," said Bromley, who last week uncovered evidence that Myanmar's military destroyed border villages and forcibly relocated ethnic minorities in eastern Myanmar last year. "But we need a little information to go on."

Most analysts said the fallout from the protests was not surprising, given the regime's history of brutality. It may be impossible to ever verify how many people are dead or detained.

"We cannot say exactly and we are unlikely to know for sure," Win Hlaing of the dissident group National League for Democracy-Liberated Area said of the death toll. "(But) the junta never declares the real number of people killed."

Myanmar's military also opened fire on the country's 1988 democratic uprising. Human Rights Watch estimates that at least 3,000 protesters were killed, but other reports cite up to 10,000. The media, diplomats and activists have been denied access to documents that could shed light on the shootings.

And so, to this day, the exact death toll remains shrouded in secrecy.

Mon Oct 1, 2:07 PM ET

WASHINGTON - The White House on Monday expressed serious concerns about "continued reports of violence and intimidation" in Myanmar and kept up pressure for its military rulers to give way to democratic rule.

At the same time, spokeswoman Dana Perino highlighted the importance of the diplomatic mission there by UN special envoy Ibrahim Gambari, sent to Myanmar to express outrage over the deadly crackdown on anti-government protests.

And US President George W. Bush's deputy national security adviser, Jim Jeffrey, was to meet with China's ambassador to Washington, Zhou Wenzhong, to discuss Sino-US cooperation on the crisis, said Perino.

"The United States is committed to working with countries around the world to make sure that the region moves Burma towards peaceful transition to democracy," said Perino, Bush's chief spokeswoman.

"There are continued reports of violence and intimidation coming out of Burma. That is of great concern to the president and Mrs Bush," said Perino.

In Myanmar's main city of Yangon, which bore the brunt of the campaign to shut down two weeks of anti-government rallies, the military presence lifted slightly and shops and Buddhist pagodas reopened.

Asked what violence she was referring to, Perino said that the junta's forces had "brutalized" protesters and some journalists last week and said "that could have a chilling effect on any type of protest."

"But they have a right to peacefully protest, and we would ask that the Burmese refrain from using violence against them," she said. Washington does not recognize the name Myanmar and continues to call the country Burma.

Perino expressed US support for Gambari, saying that Washington was "pleased" that the envoy was able to meet with Myanmar democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi.

"We understand he remains in Burma in order to see junta leader Than Shwe. We obviously think it's important that all of those meetings take place, that he be allowed to meet with everyone that he's asked to meet with," she said.

"We think it's important that the process of national reconciliation start, and part of that process is getting these meetings underway," said the spokeswoman.

Mon Oct 1, 7:06 AM ET

NEW DELHI - India's new army chief on Monday called a bloody crackdown by Myanmar's military junta against pro-democracy protests an "internal matter."

India's army, which is battling numerous insurgencies in the remote northeast bordering Myanmar, favours a "good relationship" with the military junta, said army chief Deepak Kapoor, who took charge on Sunday.

"We have a good relationship going with Myanmar and I am sure we will try and maintain that," Kapoor told reporters in New Delhi, adding the turmoil in Myanmar was "an internal matter."

The statement came a week after the United States tightened sanctions on Myanmar's military rulers and urged countries like China and India to do more to help end the crackdown on anti-government demonstrators.

New Delhi has been criticised for its low-key reaction to the authoritarian regime's brutal suppression of the month-long protests.

At least 13 people were killed last week during protests led by the highly influential Buddhist monks.

Meanwhile, an Indian opposition-led protest in New Delhi urged the government to "raise its voice" in support of the pro-democracy movement.

"All the countries are asking us why India is not saying or doing anything. We demand that the government stand up and speak (for democracy) with courage," said former defence minister George Fernandes.

He was flanked by activists waving placards reading "India, speak up for Burma!" (Myanmar's former name) and "Attacks on monks are an attack on humanity."

Others chanted "Long live Aung San Suu Kyi," carrying photographs of the detained democracy icon.

Fernandes was joined by refugees from Myanmar, swelling the protesters' numbers to about 450, according to the police. There are around 2,000 refugees from the country in New Delhi.

India last week expressed "concern" and urged dialogue to resolve differences between the junta and the pro-democracy protesters. It also called for accelerating the process of "broad-based national reconciliation and political reform."

But analysts say India is walking a diplomatic tightrope, juggling energy and strategic concerns with a commitment to democracy.

India, which rolled out the red carpet for military strongman Than Shwe in a 2004 visit, was until the mid-1990s a staunch supporter of Suu Kyi.

New Delhi kept the military junta at arms length after the 1988 crackdown on democracy protests, but changed track when it decided its security interests in the northeast were in jeopardy.

Since India began engaging the generals, there has been cooperation between Indian and Myanmar's security forces in flushing out the northeastern rebels.

Fali S. Nariman, an Indian constitutional expert at the protest, criticised what he described as "security achieved through suppression of human rights."

"When human rights of a people are involved you cannot dismiss it as an internal matter... Aung San Suu Kyi has become a legend. She has become a second (Nelson) Mandela," he said, referring to the South African freedom leader.

Besides security, India is also vying with China and other Asian countries for a share of Myanmar's vast energy resources -- triggering accusations that it is weakening US and European economic sanctions.