Yangon - Myanmar's military junta this month arrested a US national of Myanmar decent and two ethnic Rakhine dissidents on suspicion of involvement in sabotage acts, a media report said Thursday. Myanmar authorities arrested Nyi Nyi Aung, a former Myanmar student activist and naturalized US citizen, September 3 at Yangon International Airport on charges of entering the country "to create unrest," the government-run New Light of Myanmar newspaper reported.
Ye Htet Soe and Tun Lin Kyaw, two dissidents from the western state of Rakhine, were detained on September 4 and 9, respectively, it said.
The article implied that the three men were under investigation for possible links to a spate of bombings in Yangon on September 17 that injured no one but embarrassed the military regime.
"The motive of the saboteurs was to attract the international attention on Myanmar at the time when the United Nations General Assembly is in progress," the government mouthpiece said.
Authorities claimed that the two Rakhine "saboteurs" were arrested with dynamite, satellite phones and electronic detonators and described them as members of the "All Arakan Students and Youth Congress, which is responsible for terrorist attacks in the country in cooperation with the All Burma Students' Democratic Front."
The front is one of Myanmar's oldest dissident groups, based on the Thai-Myanmar border and founded by students who fled the army's brutal crackdown on the pro-democracy movement in 1988.
According to the newspaper, the congress was formed in 1995 "to take military action and carry out terrorist attacks." The newspaper claimed the group had received military training from the Karen National Union insurgent group.
Nyi Nyi Aung fled to Thailand in 1988 to join the front, the paper claimed. In 1994, he was granted refugee status and immigrated to the United States, where he became a citizen in 2005.
He entered Myanmar nine time from 2005 to 2009, meeting with various dissident groups, the newspaper said.
"Putting them in contact with activists abroad to stage anti-government protests, he played an active part in exchanging information, providing financial assistance and breeding hardcores," it claimed.
Nyi Nyi Aung also had links with dissident monks and members of the opposition National League for Democracy, The New Light of Myanmar claimed, citing government sources.
"Steps are being taken to be able to take action against Nyi Nyi Aung, a citizen of a foreign country who, out of disloyalty to his motherland and people, planned to instigate unrest and launch terrorist attacks, and his internal contacts," the report said. "Further investigations are also being
