PRINCE CHARLES MEETS BURMESE STUDENTS

Round the clock security at USDA offices

In the wake of the bomb blast in the Shwepyitha office of the Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA), members have been deployed in rotation round the clock for security.There was a low intensity bomb explosion in the USDA Ward level office on Sittang Street, No. 6 Ward, Shwepyitha Township, near the Township Peace and Development Council Office on July 1. Security was beefed up at all USDA offices in Rangoon Division the very next day. "Security in all USDA offices have been tightened in Rangoon Division," a weekly journal reporter told Mizzima on condition of anonymity. There is heightened security in USDA offices in Seikan, Dagon and other townships, he added. "Security personnel were deployed at all crowded places, key buildings and Ward level USDA offices on July 7 since 6 a.m. Over 10 USDA members are assigned for security duty at each USDA Ward level office in South Dagon, Hlaingtharyar, Dagon Satellite Town and Shwepyithar Townships," a local resident from Rangoon said. Rangoon Mayor and Rangoon Division USDA chief Brig. Gen. Aung Thein Lin met Rangoon based journalists on July 2 and said that special security measures were imposed to prevent bomb blasts and other attempts at sabotage. The day after the bomb blast, the Thai border based 'Vigorous Burmese Student Warriors' (VBSW) claimed responsibility in a statement. In the state-run newspaper, the regime said that the ground floor entrance, window panes, tables, chairs, typewriter sand telephones in the USDA office were damaged in the explosion but no one was injured. The Shwepyitha bomb blast is the fifth in a series of bomb explosions this year in three cities. A bomb blast in January this year near the Naypyidaw Pyinmana railway station killed a woman and another bomb exploded near Rangoon railway station injuring at least one person. A bomb blast in a bus near Phyu town, Pegu Division killed the bus conductor while another bomb exploded in Kyauktada Township, Rangoon Division on April 20 but no one was injured.

REGIME MAKES EASY DOLLARS FROM NARGIS CYCLONE

YANGON, July 10 ( -- Myanmar is planning to turn stem roots and branches of cyclone-downed trees in Yangon municipal area into sculpture products for auction, China's Xinhua news agency quoted a report in the local weekly 7-Day News Thursday.A total of 45 professional sculptors from two areas of the country are being selected and invited for the move, the report said, adding that they are from Dapain and Bago.A cyclone storm, that swept Myanmar in early May, blew down over 13,000 old-aged trees and shade-providing ones. Some of these downed trees and debris pressed and rested on houses, while residents dragged down lamp-posts and blocked roads in the city.So far after the disaster, almost all of the downed trees and debris on the roads had been cleared and accumulated on vacant plots in the city from where stem roots and branches are being sorted out for making sculpture products to be auctioned to domestic and foreign business entrepreneurs for foreign currency.These stem roots and branches of downed trees are of 30 to 100 years of age.Meanwhile, the Myanmar authorities have been planting 30,000 shade-providing trees by using forced labors to replace collapsed ones and so far 6,000 downed trees have been put upright in the Yangon municipal areas.