YANGON, Myanmar -- One of Myanmar's leading Buddhist nationalist monks, U Pamaukka, made a startling vow before several hundred protesters gathered in a sports field on Dec. 29.
He would leave the monkhood and join the army if that was what it would take to defend the lives of two Burmese migrant workers who had just been sentenced to death in Thailand, he said.
"I can bravely say from here that I can disrobe and [I] dare to pick up the gun," he told the cheering crowd in Yangon's Tamwe district.
After Myanmar's Nov. 8 national elections left the country's radical Buddhists in the cold, the conviction in Thai courts of migrant workers Zaw Lin and Win Zaw Htun for the 2014 murder of two British backpackers on the Thai island of Koh Tao has given the Buddhist groups an opportunity to stir up nationalist sentiments and try to revive support for their cause. (Courtesy of Nikkei Asian Review)
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