UN Envoy Warns Myanmar’s Military Junta Not To Attack Protesters

The United Nations special envoy has warned Myanmar’s army of “severe consequences” for any harsh response to protesters demonstrating against this month’s coup in a call with the military leadership, a U.N. spokesman said.

Despite the deployment of armoured vehicles and soldiers to some major cities at the weekend, protesters have kept up demonstrations to denounce the Feb. 1 takeover and demand the release of detained leader Aung San Suu Kyi and others.

Protests on Monday were smaller than the hundreds of thousands who had joined earlier demonstrations but broke out in many parts of the Southeast Asian country, where the coup has halted a decade of unsteady transition to democracy.

Small crowds gathered in two places in the main city of Yangon on Tuesday – at a traditional protest site near the main university campus and at the central bank, where protesters hoped to press staff to join a civil disobedience movement.

The army cut off the internet for a second consecutive night early on Tuesday though it was again restored at about 9 a.m. (0230 GMT)

U.N. Special Envoy Christine Schraner Burgener spoke on Monday to the deputy head of the junta in what has become a rare channel of communication between Myanmar’s army and the outside world.