Yangon, Burma (Myanmar) - Hundreds of riot police and soldiers ringed a monument in downtown Yangon on Saturday as officials gathered to commemorate the shooting death 61 years ago of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's father.

Myanmar independence hero Gen. Aung San and other government leaders were assassinated by gunmen during a Cabinet meeting on July 19, 1947, shortly after Britain granted independence to the Southeast Asian colony.

Flags were flown at half staff in the capital to mark the day, a state holiday. Unlike past years, foreign diplomats were not invited to the tightly guarded wreath-laying ceremony at the Martyr's Monument located near the famed Shwedagon pagoda.

Opposition activists have suggested that the ruling military junta is trying to downgrade the importance of Aung San's legacy as a way of undercutting the popularity of his daughter, who remains under house arrest.

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The Beijing, China Olympics start on August 8, 2008. This is also the 20 year anniversary of the military regime slaughtering over 3,000 peaceful protesters in Burma. It is difficult to know just how many were killed, it could be higher. No one counted...
Tens of thousands of people across Burma rose up in peaceful demonstration against the military regime. Monks, Students, Civil Servants, Workers, Lawyers, Men, Women, Children all marched through the streets in defiance of the military brutality and demanding democracy. They were met with gunfire.
The regime ordered it's soldiers to fire into the crowds. As people lay dead and dying the regimes men forced many protestors back into lakes where they drowned whilst being fired upon by the soldiers. It was the bloodiest day in Burma's history and the thousands of deaths that day made it even worse than the Tiananmen Square massacre in China a year later. Only there were no camera crews there to film it.

China is one of the main arms supplier's of the Burmese military regime. Join in not supporting the Beijing Olympics starting on 08/08/08. Don't watch it.