Hunt For Burma Hotel Bomber

[cdnvic]

Myanmar junta hunt for hotel bombers

Published on Oct 22 , 2005

Rangoon - Burma's military rulers said Saturday they were hunting down the people behind a small bomb blast outside the luxury Traders Hotel, official media reported.

"The authorities concerned are trying to expose the culprits of the explosion," the official New Light of Myanmar newspaper said, in a three-sentence report on the blast.

The small bomb went off Friday evening near the sign for the Traders Hotel, on a busy street in downtown Rangoon [Yangon], but caused no injuries and little damage, according to security officers.

It left a small hole in the sidewalk near the shrubs outside the hotel.

Security forces quickly cordoned off the hotel and blocked the street, but a few hours later they reopened the road and the security presence was less visible.

Employees at the hotel, popular with travelling business people and well-heeled tourists, have refused to answer questions about the blast.

Burma [Myanmar] has battled ethnic rebel armies for decades, mostly in outlying border areas, but has suffered sporadic bombings in its cities for the past year.

The most recent and the deadliest was a coordinated attack on May 7, when 23 people were killed in a series of near-simultaneous bombings that hit two upscale shopping malls and a convention hall.

The junta blamed those attacks on an unlikely alliance of ethnic rebel groups, pro-democracy organisations and student groups, who have denied involvement./Agence France Presse