Myanmar students in peaceful march to protest political role of military

[Jonathan Fairfield]

Myanmar students in peaceful march to protest political role of military

Students in Myanmar led a peaceful march of between 50 and 200 protesters on Tuesday, urging Myanmar’s military to remove itself from politics, days after lawmakers voted down a measure to scrap the military's effective legislative veto.

Myanmar emerged from 49 years of military rule in 2011 and now has a quasi-civilian government, but its 2008 constitution reserves a quarter of parliamentary seats for unelected members of the military.

Any proposed change to the constitution must win support from at least 75 percent of lawmakers, giving the military an effective veto power.

Thursday's change would have cut the support threshold to 70 percent, but the measure failed, as had been expected. Even if accepted it would still have needed to win support at a national referendum.

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/06/30/us-myanmar-rally-idUSKCN0PA1HE20150630

[dcpo]

I wonder if they'll be arrested...