Bomber dies in circus blast

Karen National Union denies involvement

A young activist has blown himself up while preparing to plant a bomb in or near a crowded circus tent in a Burmese provincial town, writes Edward Loxton for The First Post. The bomber, described by Burmese authorities as an “insurgent” of the separatist Karen National Union, was one of two people who died in a series of three bomb attacks across Burma in the past four days. The other two bombs exploded at the main railway stations in Rangoon and Burma’s new capital, Naypyidaw. A middle-aged woman died in the Naypyidaw blast.

The Naypyidaw bomb exploded before dawn on Friday, indicating that the attack was intended as a demonstration of opposition and warning to the regime. But the circus tent attack, in the town of Pyu, north of Rangoon, could have caused great carnage if the bomb had exploded while crowds were gathering for a performance, local sources said.

The regime mouthpiece, The New Light of Myanmar, carried a photograph of the bomber’s mutilated body and of a revolver and several rounds of ammunition which the authorities said he had been carrying. The newspaper claimed the attacks were the work of “terrorist saboteurs” sent into Burma from abroad, although it described the dead man as a Karen insurgent who had been serving with the Third Brigade of the Karen National Union’s military wing, which has been fighting a guerrilla war with the Burmese army for the past 50 years.

A Karen National Union spokesman denied his movement had anything to do with the bomb attacks. The New Light of Myanmar made a point of identifying the weapon found on the body of the Pyu bombing as an American-made revolver. When Burma was last hit by a series of bomb blasts, in May 2005, Information Minister Kyaw Hsan blamed agents of a “world-famous organisation of a certain superpower”. The “superpower” was taken to be the United States and the “world-famous organisation” was understood to mean the Central Intelligence Agency.

LAST UPDATED 3:10 PM, JANUARY 14, 2008