SPDC authorities increase surveillance and patrols in Mon State

September 25, 2008

HURFOM : Police officers, soldiers and members of SPDC-sponsored civilian groups have increased surveillance and patrols in Mon State, report sources in Moulmein and Mudon Township. Officials are especially targeting monks and students, and have posted sentries at Moulmein University and Kyaik Than Lan Pagoda. The authorities’ increased watchfulness comes as the one-year anniversary of the Saffron Protests approaches.

“The police are in both uniforms and plain clothes, and are patrolling the University and big pagoda in Moulmein. There are about fifty police officers and soldiers patrolling in each place, and they keep watch twenty-four hours a day. The reason the sentries are there is because this time last year monks and student gathered and protested.”

Police in the University area are in plain clothes, abandoning their uniforms in an attempt to blend in. Though the officers’ attempt to keep their identities secret is not working in many cases, they are effectively intimidating students. “Both police and soldier are standing sentry at the University’s entry gate. They are making the students paranoid and sometimes we are too afraid to pass through the gate. This makes it difficult to continue studying, and I want to go home,” said a first year student.

“Sometimes the police have looked at us suspiciously, and even searched us without asking permission. we feel like prisoners – we have done nothing wrong but the authorities assume we are causing trouble. It’s making some students frustrated and upset,” said another University student.

Officials from the police and Union Solidarity Develop Association, a regime-supported civilian group, recently spoke with a university professor and ordered him and other professors to watch students and report on the situation. A tutor at the university said, “Students feel very restricted. Police and soldiers and USDA keep watch as if there is a rebellion, and if they are suspicious they can detain students immediately. We’re not happy about that, and we don’t want to watch the students for the authorities, but we are ordered to.”

The increased watchfulness of authorities can be felt elsewhere in Moulmein, and both uniformed and plain clothes sentries have been posted throughout the city, including the train and bus stations. There have also been reports of a marked increase in the watchfulness of authorities elsewhere in Mon State. “The authorities in some villages in Mudon Township have ordered USDA members to watch the situation in their villages. Some members have also been posted as sentries,” said a youth from Ninelain village. “Even people who are not in the USDA are sometimes made to be sentries.”

Written by HURFOM · Filed Under News