BANGKOK — Documents smuggled out of Myanmar by an army defector indicate its military regime is trying to develop nuclear weapons and long-range missiles, and North Korea is probably assisting the program, an expatriate media group said Friday. The Norway-based Democratic Voice of Burma said the defector had been involved in the nuclear program and smuggled out extensive files and photographs describing experiments with uranium and specialized equipment needed to build a nuclear reactor and develop enrichment capabilities.

BANGKOK – A U.S. senator on Thursday postponed a trip to Myanmar, saying it is a bad time to visit because of new allegations that its military regime is collaborating with North Korea to develop a nuclear program. A statement issued by the office of Sen. Jim Webb, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Subcommittee on East Asia and Pacific Affairs, said the allegations had not been substantiated, but there were also concerns that Myanmar had broken a U.N. embargo on buying arms from North Korea. "Until there is further clarification on these matters, I believe it would be unwise and potentially

Updated: May 30, 2010, 12:22 am / 0 comments Published: May 30, 2010, 6:41 am Story tools: LargerSmallerSave Print Email Get Alerts Newsletters NEWShare this story: Buzz up! None of the four teens stands significantly more than 5 feet tall. None has been in America for more than a year or two. They don't speak a lot of English, either. What the four boys — Pray Reh, Nga Reh, Thy Reh and Win Htoo — do possess is a desire to keep going. They keep showing up four days a week at the West Side Rowing Club for two-hour practices. And they keep their coach, Dennis Call, coming back for each practice. "I'm not really sure how much they understand me, but they've caught on. They caught on to the basics quickly," Call said of the

08:06 PDT YANGON, Myanmar (AP) -- The party of detained Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi quietly commemorated the anniversary Thursday of its victory in elections 20 years ago and stood by its decision not to register for new polls to be held later this year. A faction of the party, however, has split off to participate in the balloting. About 70 party members gathered at the residence of party Vice Chairman Tin Oo to celebrate the party's 1990 victory. "We will continue our struggle for democracy and we will continue to carry out our political activities," Tin Win, a senior National League for Democracy leader, said at the quiet celebration. The NLD cannot officially hold gatherings at its headquarters since it was disbanded for refusing to register as a political party. It won Myanmar's last elections in 1990, but the military junta never allowed it to take power. It declined to re-register for elections planned for this year as stipulated by new election laws. The NLD says the new laws are unfair and undemocratic because Suu Kyi and other people convicted of political offenses are barred from taking part in the vote. But a faction of Suu Kyi's party applied Thursday for party registration with the Election Commission, said Than Nyein, a former senior NLD member who is expected to serve as the new party's chairman. The faction calls itself the National Democratic Force. Through her lawyer, Nyan Win, Suu Kyi expressed dissatisfaction with the new group's decision to register. The exact date of the elections has not been announced. Critics say the elections will be engineered so that military officers, many of whom have already shed their uniforms to enter politics, would be assured of victory. Read more:

AFP) – Myanmar state media urged revellers at annual water festivities to be on guard Friday after bomb blasts killed eight people at a park in the military-ruled country's biggest city. People should "remain vigilant against potential atrocities" and inform the authorities if they see anything suspicious, the English-language New Light of Myanmar newspaper said. Officials had initially reported that nine people died Thursday in three explosions near Kandawgyi Lake in the former capital Yangon,
but later said they had miscounted the number of fatalities. State media said 170 people were wounded in the park, where thousands of people were gathered for water-throwing festivities to mark the Buddhist New Year. It was the worst bomb attack in Yangon since a series of blasts in May 2005 at two supermarkets and a convention centre killed 23 people. The junta blamed those explosions on exile groups. Thursday's blasts came as the country prepares for elections planned for this year that critics have dismissed as a sham due to the effective barring of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi because she is a serving prisoner. The United States condemned Thursday's attacks and said it was unsure about the motivation. "We condemn any kind of violence that victimises innocent civilians," said State Department spokesman Philip Crowley. "Our thoughts and prayers go out to those who were the victims of this bombing," he said. Washington maintains sanctions on the regime but initiated a cautious dialogue with the junta last year, concluding that the previous US policy of trying to isolate the regime had failed. Hundreds of revellers returned to the same park Friday on the final day of the Thingyan New Year festival, watched by dozens of police officers. State television said late Thursday that an investigation had begun to find the "destructionists" behind the explosions. Myanmar has been hit by several bomb blasts in recent years, which the junta has blamed on armed exile groups or ethnic rebels. The military has ruled Myanmar since 1962, partly justifying its grip on power by the need to fend off ethnic rebellions that have plagued remote border areas for decades. Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) won a landslide victory in 1990 elections, but the junta never allowed it to take office. The Nobel peace laureate, who advocates non-violent resistance, has been under house arrest almost constantly since. Armed minorities in Karen and Shan states continue to fight the government along the country's eastern border, alleging they are subject to neglect and mistreatment. The regime recently stepped up its decades-long campaign against the rebels in an apparent attempt to crush them before the polls, expected before early November this year.

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Members of the National League for Democracy said Monday that they would not register to vote after they met in Yangon, Myanmar’s main city. BANGKOK — After months of internal debate, members of the party of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the long-detained pro-democracy leader, defied Myanmar’s junta by announcing Monday that they would boycott the country’s first elections in two decades.  Photo News ( Thar Htet ... BCJP News )
The move raises questions about both the future of the Burmese opposition and the credibility of the vote. According to election laws the junta released earlier this month, the decision means that the party that has served as the mainstay of the country’s democratic movement for two decades, the National League for Democracy, will be automatically dissolved. Western governments, including the United States and Britain, had said that Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi’s participation and that of her party were prerequisites for legitimate elections. On Monday, U Win Tin, a founding member and strategist for the party, said that more than 100 delegates were unanimous in their decision. “We will ask the people around us not to vote in the election: Please boycott,” he said in a telephone interview. He said that the party would try to continue political activities after it is disbanded. “We will work for the people,” he said. The party had been split over whether to participate in the elections, forced to choose between participation that would undercut its principles and a boycott that would dissolve it. Last week, Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi said through a spokesman that she viewed the election process as “unjust” and that she felt that the party should not take part.