Hundreds of Buddhist monks in Burma held government officials hostage for more than five hours yesterday in a further escalation of the protests against the military regime's crippling increase in fuel prices two weeks ago.
Angry young monks surrounded the largest monastery in the provincial town Pakokku, trapping about 20 officials inside after they apparently came to apologise for soldiers firing shots to break up a demonstration the previous day.
The tense stand-off was eventually ended after a senior abbot intervened to secure the hostages' freedom, but not before the angry monks had burned four of the officials' cars.
Protests across the country have continued almost daily since the price of petrol and diesel was almost doubled, and that of cooking gas increased five-fold without warning, worsening the economic hardship already endured by most Burmese.
The arrests of 13 leaders of the 88 Generation Student Group and more than 100 others, and the beatings of demonstrators by pro-junta militia who have been mobilised on the streets of the commercial capital, Rangoon, has done little to dampen the mood of anger.
World leaders, including George Bush and Gordon Brown, have condemned the military's crackdown and demanded the release of those seized.
Laura Bush, the US first lady, has called on the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, to voice his dismay over the Burmese military's actions.
The involvement of the monks in the latest protests touches a chord with many in devoutly Buddhist Burma. Rumours sweeping the country that a number of monks were injured in Wednesday's protests provoked widespread outrage.
Up to 500 monks from Pakokku, north-west of Rangoon, staged the protest, reading Buddhist scriptures and waving banners. Shops and schools in the town closed and residents came out to cheer on the demonstrators.
Soldiers were dispatched to break up the protest, significantly the first time the military has been used to quell the unrest. Shots were fired over the heads of the monks and their supporters, three of whom were injured when they were beaten. Three monks were reportedly arrested.
Military officials went yesterday to the Mahawithutayama monastery, the town's largest, to appeal to the abbot to stop monks joining the demonstrations and apologize for the manner in which the earlier protest was ended.
Attacking monks is fraught with danger for the regime as it bears echoes of the 1988 protests in Rangoon, which gathered momentum after monks joined students in protests that eventually led to a vicious military crackdown and the massacre of 3,000 people.