Brawling Myanmar monks show Buddhist nationalists backing coup
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Monks were among a group that used slingshots to injure anti-coup protesters who went to Yangon’s Bingalar Monastery on Feb. 18 in pursuit of men dressed in robes who had earlier beaten up a demonstrator. The mob also used large sticks to smash cars blocking traffic nearby.
The monks and their supporters “couldn’t control their temper,” said Kaythara, the abbot of the nationalist Buddhist group Wirawintha, who knows the attackers but wasn’t present at the melee. He defended the military, known as the Tatmadaw, repeating its theory that now now-detained civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s party stole the November election through mass voter fraud.
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The violent incident shows a strain of religious nationalism that Myanmar’s generals are tapping into as they seek to gain legitimacy and quell post-coup demonstrations that have seen more than 60 people killed. That risks reinvigorating a movement with a history of sectarian violence in a nation already split between the military supporters and opponents.
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Pro-democracy monks were instrumental during anti-junta protests in the bloody 1988 uprising, and also helped lead 2007 demonstrations dubbed the Saffron Revolution for the color of their robes. Some of them have been at the forefront of the recent protests, leading demonstrators in major cities and holding posters calling for the immediate release of Suu Kyi and other detainees.
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2021/03/10/asia-pacific/myanmar-monks-military/
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