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YANGON : Military-run Myanmar claimed Friday it was taking another step on its "road map" to democracy by drafting a new charter, and accused the United States of training monks who led protests last month.
The government named 54 people to a committee tasked with writing a new constitution, following more than a decade of talks on the guidelines for the charter, the official New Light of Myanmar paper said.
The announcement came as the regime was under global pressure over its bloody crackdown on peaceful protests led by Buddhist monks in late September, when at least 13 people were killed and 3,000 detained.
Anti-government rallies began in August following a massive hike in fuel prices and snowballed into the biggest challenge to the iron-fisted regime in nearly two decades.
In the wake of the violence, the United States and the European Union tightened sanctions on the country while the United Nations is pressuring the regime to open talks with democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who is under house arrest.
UN envoy Ibrahim Gambari is travelling around Asia to build regional pressure on the government.
He called Thursday for a carrot-and-stick approach, saying that in addition to tough action the regime should be offered incentives to reform.
But the state newspaper Friday lashed out at the United States, accusing Washington of training monks and forcing them to stage the protests against the government.
"The embassy of a big power secretly gave training courses to young monks and novices," the paper said.
"The people don't accept the one-sided instructions of the US ordering (the) Myanmar government," it said.
A Yangon-based diplomat said the formation of the charter committee was "a gesture" aimed at defusing the global pressure on the military government.
"The government feels compelled to show some progress on its road map to democracy in a bid to ease international pressure," said the Asian diplomat, who declined to be named.
Under the regime's "road map" to democracy, the new constitution is to be voted on by the public in a referendum, with the process eventually leading to elections.
The formation of the charter committee followed the conclusion of 14 years of talks in early September on drafting guidelines for a new constitution in the country formerly known as Burma.
But the international community branded the charter talks a sham because the military regime kept Aung San Suu Kyi's opposition party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), out of the process.
The government has set no timetable for the rest of the charter process, and analysts have said the new constitution will only enshrine the military's role in government.
Myanmar has been ruled by the military since 1962.
"We are only seeing the formation of the committee. The government has yet to spell out any details. We simply don't know how long the government will spend on drafting the new constitution," said the Yangon-based Asian diplomat.
According to charter guidelines, Aung San Suu Kyi would be blocked from running for president by a clause that bars candidates married to foreigners. She was married to Briton Michael Aris, who died in 1999.
The 62-year-old Nobel peace prize winner has spent most of the past 18 years under house arrest in Yangon. - AFP/ch
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