YANGON, Myanmar (AP) Dozens of Buddhist monks carrying banners that said "Get Out" and "Don't interfere in Myanmar's internal affairs" gathered outside the airport Wednesday to protest the arrival of a delegation from the world's biggest Islamic political bloc.
Secretary-General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu and several ministers from the Organization of
Islamic Cooperation, a grouping of 57 Islamic countries, will head directly to the capital, Naypyitaw, to meet top government officials to discuss sectarian violence that has gripped the predominantly Buddhist nation of 60 million.
More than 240 people have died and 240,000 others fled their homes in the last year, many of them Rohingya Muslims hunted down by Buddhist machete-wielding mobs, occasionally as security forces looked on.
The OIC team representing Indonesia, Malaysia, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Djibouti and Bangladesh is expected to meet large crowds of demonstrators when they continue onward Friday to the tense western state of Rakhine, scene of much of the bloodshed, where they will meet victims at crowded, rundown displacement camps.
Ark Hananto, part of the Indonesian delegation, said they were assured by government that security would be tight. While they realize there may be a backlash, the group decided it was important to not only offer expressions of concern and condemnation, but to meet directly with those affected.
