YANGON, Oct 8 (AFP): Myanmar's military junta has donated thousands of dollars as well as food and medicines to monasteries in Yangon, state media reported Monday, in an apparent gesture of reconciliation.
Buddhist monks had last month declared a boycott on donations from soldiers and their families as they spearheaded mass protests which brought as many as 100,000 people onto the streets of the nation's main city.
The monks were beaten and arrested when the ruling generals reacted to the biggest threat to their rule in 20 years with a bloody crackdown that left at least 13 people dead and more than 2,100 locked up.
The official New Light of Myanmar newspaper said Lieutenant General Myint Swe of the defence ministry Sunday distributed about 8,000 dollars in cash and huge amounts of rice, cooking oil, toothpaste and medicine to 50 monasteries and a nunnery in northern Yangon.
The paper, a government mouthpiece, said the donations were made on behalf of military members and their families, and were accepted by the monks.
In Buddhism, refusing to take alms is regarded as a snub akin to effective excommunication, and acceptance of the gifts would indicate the soldiers have been brought back into the faith.
During the weekend the military trumpeted its release of more than half of 2,171 people arrested in the crackdown and noted that nearly 400 of 533 monks detained had been "sent back to their respective monasteries."
State media reported that pornography and weapons, including one pistol and 13 slingshots, had been confiscated during raids on the monasteries.
The donations were latest in a series of gestures by the military aimed at easing domestic and international pressure on the regime.
Myanmar junta gifts food, cash to monks
FE Team | Published: October 09, 2007 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00
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