Burma Opposition Said to Yield to Army

AFTER a week of arrests in Burma, the last few opposition leaders not in jail have given in to Army demands that they abandon claims to an overwhelming mandate to rule, a Burmese source said yesterday. All but four leaders of the National League for Democracy (NLD) have been arrested in the military government's most sweeping crackdown since the party won a landslide election victory five months ago.

The source, a member of the Burmese exile community in Bangkok, said that Myint Myint Khin, a senior member of the NLD, signed Friday an order of the ruling State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC), yielding to its plans for drawing up a constitution.

Diplomats in Rangoon said they had been unable to confirm the report. NLD officials were unavailable for comment.

The diplomats said that the NLD's apparent capitulation amounted to surrender of its claim that it had won a popular mandate to form a civilian government.

The NLD, which survived months of harassment and the arrest of its leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, to win Burma's first general elections in three decades, has since tried to wrest power from the Army. But the SLORC has barred any parliament from meeting.