{"id":33560,"date":"2014-09-27T03:03:18","date_gmt":"2014-09-27T07:03:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=33560"},"modified":"2014-09-28T00:13:34","modified_gmt":"2014-09-28T04:13:34","slug":"buddhist-bin-laden-of-burma-ven-ashin-wirathu-thero-arrives-in-sri-lanka-as-bodhu-bala-senas-guest-despite-muslim-organizations-protesting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=33560","title":{"rendered":"“Buddhist Bin Laden of Burma” Ven Ashin Wirathu Thero Arrives in Sri Lanka as Bodhu Bala Sena’s Guest Despite Muslim Organizations Protesting."},"content":{"rendered":"

Burma\u2019s Controversial Buddhist monk Ven Ashin Wirathu Thero arrived in Colombo on Friday September 26th night as the honoured guest of Sri Lanka\u2019s Bodhu Bala Sena organization.Ashin Wirathu is the leader of Burma\/Myanmar\u2019s \u201c969 Movement\u201d that has been conductiong a vitriolic and violent campaign against the Muslim minorities in the country.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Bodhu Bala Sena\u2019s Chief Execitive Officer Dilantha Withanage has confirmed to the media that Wiratu was respectfully welcomed at the Colombo airport.<\/p>\n

A large group of Bodhu Bala Sena members gathered at the Katunayake International Airport to welcome Ashin Wirathu who is scheduled to deliver the keynte address at the Bodhu Bala Sena\u2019s \u201cGreat Sangha Council\u201d conclave to be held on Sunday September 28th<\/p>\n

Ashin Wirathu has been referred to in some western news reports as the “Buddhist Bin Laden of Burma”.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Muslim organizations and political parties were fearful that the visit of Wirathu described by the \u201cTime\u201d magazine as the \u201cFace of Buddhist terror\u201dcould lead to an outbreak of anti \u2013 muslim violence in Sri Lanka. Urgent representations were made to President Mahinda Rajapaksa that Ashin Wirathu should not be granted a visa to enter Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n

Despite these protests and entreaties the controversial anti \u2013Muslim Burmese Bhikku has been allowed to enter Sri Lanka and be welcomed by his ethno teligious fascist counterparts in Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n

Speaking to BBC Sandeshaya, General Secretary of the BBS – Ven. GalabodaAththe Gnanasara Thera said that Wirathu Thera has not been convicted for any violent offence and that no one could oppose the visit of a Buddhist leader.
\n“Wirathu Thera has not been convicted of any violence. No one can object to a Buddhist leader such as the Thera. Everyone should keep in mind that this is a Sinhalese-Buddhist country. We highly welcome the Thera\u201d, he added.<\/p>\n

**************************************<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Extremism Rises Among Myanmar Buddhists<\/strong>
\nBy THOMAS FULLER
\nPublished: June 20, 2013 <\/strong><\/p>\n


\nTAUNGGYI, Myanmar \u2014<\/strong> After a ritual prayer atoning for past sins, Ashin Wirathu, a Buddhist monk with a rock-star following in Myanmar, sat before an overflowing crowd of thousands of devotees and launched into a rant against what he called \u201cthe enemy\u201d \u2014 the country\u2019s Muslim minority. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou can be full of kindness and love, but you cannot sleep next to a mad dog,\u201d Ashin Wirathu said, referring to Muslims. <\/p>\n

\u201cI call them troublemakers, because they are troublemakers,\u201d Ashin Wirathu told a reporter after his two-hour sermon. \u201cI am proud to be called a radical Buddhist.\u201d <\/p>\n

The world has grown accustomed to a gentle image of Buddhism defined by the self-effacing words of the Dalai Lama, the global popularity of Buddhist-inspired meditation and postcard-perfect scenes from Southeast Asia and beyond of crimson-robed, barefoot monks receiving alms from villagers at dawn. <\/p>\n

But over the past year, images of rampaging Burmese Buddhists carrying swords and the vituperative sermons of monks like Ashin Wirathu have underlined the rise of extreme Buddhism in Myanmar \u2014 and revealed a darker side of the country\u2019s greater freedoms after decades of military rule. Buddhist lynch mobs have killed more than 200 Muslims and forced more than 150,000 people, mostly Muslims, from their homes. <\/p>\n

Ashin Wirathu denies any role in the riots. But his critics say that at the very least his anti-Muslim preaching is helping to inspire the violence. <\/p>\n

What began last year on the fringes of Burmese society has grown into a nationwide movement whose agenda now includes boycotts of Muslim-made goods. Its message is spreading through regular sermons across the country that draw thousands of people and through widely distributed DVDs of those talks. <\/p>\n

Buddhist monasteries associated with the movement are also opening community centers and a Sunday school program for 60,000 Buddhist children nationwide. <\/p>\n

The hate-filled speeches and violence have endangered Myanmar\u2019s path to democracy, raising questions about the government\u2019s ability to keep the country\u2019s towns and cities safe and its willingness to crack down or prosecute Buddhists in a Buddhist-majority country. The killings have also reverberated
\nin Muslim countries across the region, tarnishing what was almost universally seen abroad as a remarkable and rare peaceful transition from military rule to democracy. <\/p>\n

In May, the Indonesian authorities foiled what they said was a plot to bomb the Myanmar Embassy in Jakarta in retaliation for the assaults on Muslims. <\/p>\n

Ashin Wirathu, the spiritual leader of the radical movement, skates a thin line between free speech and incitement, taking advantage of loosened restrictions on expression during a fragile time of transition. He was himself jailed for eight years by the now-defunct military junta for inciting hatred. Last year, as part of a release of hundreds of political prisoners, he was freed. <\/p>\n

In his recent sermon, he described the reported massacre of schoolchildren and other Muslim inhabitants in the central city of Meiktila in March, documented by a human rights group, as a show of strength.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we are weak,\u201d he said, \u201cour land will become Muslim.\u201d<\/p>\n

Buddhism would seem to have a secure place in Myanmar. Nine in 10 people are Buddhist, as are nearly all the top leaders in the business world, the government, the military and the police. Estimates of the Muslim minority range from 4 percent to 8 percent of Myanmar\u2019s roughly 55 million people while the rest are mostly Christian or Hindu. <\/p>\n

But Ashin Wirathu, who describes himself as a nationalist, says Buddhism is under siege by Muslims who are having more children than Buddhists and buying up Buddhist-owned land. In part, he is tapping into historical grievances that date from British colonial days when Indians, many of them Muslims, were brought into the country as civil servants and soldiers. <\/p>\n

The muscular and nationalist messages he has spread have alarmed Buddhists in other countries.
\nThe Dalai Lama, after the riots in March, said killing in the name of religion was \u201cunthinkable\u201d and urged Myanmar\u2019s Buddhists to contemplate the face of the Buddha for guidance. <\/p>\n

Phra Paisal Visalo, a Buddhist scholar and prominent monk in neighboring Thailand, says the notion of \u201cus and them\u201d promoted by Myanmar\u2019s radical monks is anathema to Buddhism. But he lamented that his criticism and that of other leading Buddhists outside the country have had \u201cvery little impact.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cMyanmar monks are quite isolated and have a thin relationship with Buddhists in other parts of the world,\u201d Phra Paisal said.<\/p>\n

One exception is Sri Lanka, another country historically bedeviled by ethnic strife. Burmese monks have been inspired by the assertive political role played by monks from Sri Lanka\u2019s Sinhalese majority. <\/strong><\/p>\n

As Myanmar has grown more polarized, there have been nascent signs of a backlash against the anti-Muslim preaching. <\/p>\n

Among the most disappointed with the outbreaks of violence and hateful rhetoric are some of the leaders of the 2007 Saffron Revolution, a peaceful uprising led by Buddhist monks against military rule. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe were not expecting this violence when we chanted for peace and reconciliation in 2007,\u201d said the abbot of Pauk Jadi monastery, Ashin Nyana Nika, 55, who attended a meeting earlier this month sponsored by Muslim groups to discuss the issue. (Ashin is the honorific for Burmese monks.) Ashin Sanda Wara, the head of a monastic school in Yangon, says the monks in the country are divided nearly equally between moderates and extremists. <\/p>\n

He considers himself in the moderate camp. But as a measure of the deeply ingrained suspicions toward Muslims in the society, he said he was \u201cafraid of Muslims because their population is increasing so rapidly.\u201d <\/p>\n

Ashin Wirathu has tapped into that anxiety, which some describe as the \u201cdemographic pressures\u201d coming from neighboring Bangladesh. There is wide disdain in Myanmar for a group of about one million stateless Muslims, who call themselves Rohingya, some of whom migrated from Bangladesh. <\/p>\n

Clashes between the Rohingya and Buddhists last year in western Myanmar roiled the Buddhist community and appear to have played a role in later outbreaks of violence throughout the country. Ashin Wirathu said they served as his inspiration to spread his teachings. <\/p>\n

The theme song to Ashin Wirathu\u2019s movement speaks of people who \u201clive in our land, drink our water, and are ungrateful to us.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cWe will build a fence with our bones if necessary,\u201d runs the song\u2019s refrain. Muslims are not explicitly mentioned in the song but Ashin Wirathu said the lyrics refer to them.<\/p>\n

Pamphlets handed out at his sermon demonizing Muslims said that \u201cMyanmar is currently facing a most dangerous and fearful poison that is severe enough to eradicate all civilization.\u201d <\/p>\n

Many in Myanmar speculate, without offering proof, that Ashin Wirathu is allied with hard-line Buddhist elements in the country who want to harness the nationalism of his movement to rally support ahead of elections in 2015. Ashin Wirathu denies any such links. <\/p>\n

But the government has done little to rein him in. During Ashin Wirathu\u2019s visit here in Taunggyi, traffic policemen cleared intersections for his motorcade. <\/p>\n

Once inside the monastery, as part of a highly choreographed visit, his followers led a procession through crowds of followers who prostrated themselves as he passed. <\/p>\n

Ashin Wirathu\u2019s movement calls itself 969, three digits that monks say symbolize the virtues of the Buddha, Buddhist practices and the Buddhist community. <\/p>\n

Stickers with the movement\u2019s logo are now ubiquitous nationwide on cars, motorcycles and shops. The movement has also begun a signature campaign calling for a ban on interfaith marriages, and pamphlets are distributed at sermons listing Muslim brands and shops to be avoided. <\/p>\n

In Mawlamyine, a multicultural city southeast of Yangon, a monastery linked to the 969 movement has established the courses of Buddhist instruction for children, which it calls \u201cSunday dhamma schools.\u201d Leaders of the monasteries there seek to portray their campaign as a sort of Buddhist revivalist movement. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe main thing is that our religion and our nationality don\u2019t disappear,\u201d said Ashin Zadila, a senior monk at the Myazedi Nanoo monastery outside the city. <\/p>\n

Yet despite efforts at describing the movement as nonthreatening, many Muslims are worried.
\nTwo hours before Ashin Wirathu rolled into Taunggyi in a motorcade that included 60 honking motorcycles, Tun Tun Naing, a Muslim vendor in the city\u2019s central market, spoke of the visit in a whisper. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m really frightened,\u201d he said, stopping in midsentence when customers entered his shop. \u201cWe tell the children not to go outside unless absolutely necessary.\u201d <\/p>\n

Courtesy: The New York Times<\/em><\/p>\n

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Burma\u2019s Controversial Buddhist monk Ven Ashin Wirathu Thero arrived in Colombo on Friday September 26th night as the honoured guest of Sri Lanka\u2019s Bodhu Bala Sena organization.Ashin Wirathu is the leader of Burma\/Myanmar\u2019s \u201c969 Movement\u201d that has been conductiong a vitriolic and violent campaign against the Muslim minorities in the country. Bodhu Bala Sena\u2019s Chief …<\/p>\n

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