NY solidarity action: ‘Down with military gov’t’

NEW YORK — “We don’t want military government!” 250 protesters shouted in English and Burmese at a Feb. 20 rally here against the Feb. 1 military coup in Myanmar. “Military generals. Criminals! Criminals!” The action was held in the Jackson Heights neighborhood of Queens.

The protest also called for the release of Aung San Suu Kyi, the head of the government and the National League for Democracy, and hundreds of others arrested since the coup.

“The military rulers oppress and try to divide the people of Burma,” Khaing Hsu Wai, 26, told the Militant at the protest. “But in the fight against the military coup we are all united.” She was referring to the many ethnic groups that face discrimination in Myanmar.

Among these groups are the Rohingya, who have been brutalized by the army, a policy defended by the Suu Kyi government.

Some opponents of the coup at the protest called for Washington and the U.N. to send troops and intervene. “I don’t want the U.S. Army to come,” said Aung Bobo Lwin, who is from the Karen ethnic minority. “We want to create a democracy. We have to solve our problems ourselves.”