New Delhi - A Burmese armed student rebel group, Vigorous Burmese Students Warrior (VBSW), on Tuesday claimed responsibility for the bomb blast on Monday in a suburban township in Burma's former capital Rangoon.

VBSW in a statement, posted on a Burmese blog in exile, on Tuesday said they had triggered the bomb blast at the office of the Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA) on Monday, July 1.

"As a continuation of VBSW's operation, the attacked the USDA office in Rangoon's Shwepyithar Township is apart of our unit no. 18's handiwork," the Burmese statement posted on http://drlunswe.blogspot.com/, said.

The statement further said, they have been launching an operation against Burma's military rulers and that it had exploded two bombs on April 20, targetting vehicles owned by USDA officials, which were parked in front of the 'ABC' restaurant in downtown Rangoon.

The VBSW members, who claim to be operating inside Burma's business hub Rangoon, were, however, unreachable for confirmation of the authenticity of the statement.

On Monday, a small bomb exploded in the office of the USDA, a pro-junta civil organization, in northern Suburb of Rangoon.

While the existence of the Student Warrior group cannot be proved, the statement allegedly by them said, they are genuinely opposed to the military junta's continued rule in Burma and have resolved to carry out attacks on them.

It, however, said, "In our operation against the junta's political activities, military and economy, we have vowed not to harm innocent civilians."

The VBSW had earlier claimed responsibility for several similar bomb blasts including a deadly blast at the Panorama restaurant in Rangoon's Pasodan Street in December 2004.

So far, Burma's military junta, has made no official accusation against any groups regarding the blast, but merely stated that "authorities are investigating the incident," in its state-run newspaper, New Light of Myanmar.

But the paper urged the people, "to pay special attention to the saboteurs who will be active assuming various forms in public places and to expose them by reporting to officials in time."

http://www.mizzima.com/news/746-warriors-claim-responsibility-for-rangoon-blast

 

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Student ‘warriors’ group claims responsibility for bombings

Burmese military intelligence officers have stepped up security in Rangoon and other cities following the reappearance of a shadowy rebel movement, the Vigorous Burmese Student Warriors, writes Edward Loxton for The First Post.

After keeping the authorities guessing about the identity of bombers who attacked an office of a hated junta-backed civic movement, the Union Solidarity and Development Association, on July 1, the so-called 'warriors' emailed a message claiming responsibility.

The warriors also took responsibility for a bomb attack in April when two explosive devices rocked central Rangoon, killing a woman and injuring several people. Nobody was hurt in the attack on the USDA office.

Before the warriors made their claim an executive member of Burma's main opposition party, the National League for Democracy, was arrested in connection with the July 1 blast. The NLD confirmed today that Khin Maung, 62, was arrested at his Rangoon home on the day of the bombing.

Little is known about the student warriors, who first hit the headlines in 1999, when several of the group's members raided the Burmese embassy in Bangkok and took 89 people hostage. The Thai government - sympathetic at that time to the Burmese opposition's democratic aims - negotiated the release of the hostages and flew the rebels in a helicopter to the Thai-Burmese border, where they slipped out of sight in Karen-controlled territory.

Since then, several small bomb blasts in various parts of Burma and even some attacks on government officials have been attributed to the warriors. One Rangoon source told me today: "I think the frustration and anger has reached such a pitch in Burma now that we can expect to hear more from the warriors."

FIRST POSTED JULY 4, 2008
http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk/burma,,student-warriors-group-claims-responsibility-for-bombings,33961

 

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Vigorous Burmese Student Warriors

The Vigorous Burmese Student Warriors is a small band of Myanmar anti-government students, led by a man known as Johnny. The group is thought to be linked to the Maneeloy refugee resettlement site in western Thailand. On 01 October 1999 members of the previously unknown group, armed with AK-47 assault rifles and grenades, stormed the stormed Myanmar's (Burma's) Bangkok embassy and seized 38 hostages. In this first act of violence by Burmese exiles in Thailand, the gunmen demanded that Myanmar's State Peace and Development Council, or SPDC (formerly known as the State Law and Order Restoration Council, or SLORC) free all political prisoners and enter talks with the pro-democracy National League for Democracy (NLD). The leader of the NLD, Aung San Suu Kyi, is opposed to violence and issued a statement condemning the embassy raid. The five gunmen released their hostages on 02 October 1999 and were allowed to flee to the Thai-Burma border by helicopter in a deal with the Thai authorities. They found sanctuary with the God's Army breakaway faction of the Karen National Union, close to the Thai-Myanmar border. In December 1999 the group's leaders held a news conference at a God's Army rebel camp in Ka Mar Pa Law, inside Myanmar opposite Thailand's Ratchaburi province, 95 kilometers (59 miles) west of Bangkok.

http://www.fas.org/irp/world/para/vbsw.htm

 

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The Vigorous Burmese Student Warriors (VBSW) is an organization opposed to the ruling military junta in Burma. Considered by some a terrorist organization, in October 1999 they gained notoriety by raiding and holding hostages at the consulate of Burma in Bangkok, Thailand.

Since the thwarted 1990 elections in Burma, many former student radicals have fled the country into neighboring Thailand. In August 1999, the VBSW formed as a branch organization opposed to the strategy of peaceful protest of the All Burma Students Democratic Front. On October 1, 1999, a group of five members raided the Burmese consulate in Bangkok and took 89 people hostage. The group demanded that negotiations be opened between the National League for Democracy and the Burmese government, and that a Parliament be convened based on the results of the 1990 election. However, they soon relaxed their demands and began to let the hostages go, and the Thai government eventually allowed the VBSW members to flee by helicopter to the border with Burma.[1]

Sources
Embassy gunmen flee BBC News, 2 October 1999.

References

[1] Kushner, Harvey W. (2003), “Vigorous Burmese Student Warriors”, Encyclopedia of Terrorism, Sage Publications, pp. 395-396

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vigorous_Burmese_Student_Warriors