ေငြလြဲ တဲ့သူ အဖမ္းခံရ ---- Money transfer agents arrested in Rangoon

Sources from Rangoon say that the military junta is arresting money transfer agents. The military has charged that the “October Saffron revolution” was financed by foreign money. Military intelligence agents (Sa Ya Pha) have been closely monitoring money transfer agents since last week. They are also shadowing the agents and arresting both agents and recipients. An anonymous Burmese who transferred money to his home said that his brothers and an agent from Rangoon were arrested during the transaction.

Thousands of Burmese left Burma after the 8.8.88 uprising and work overseas. A majority of them work in Japan, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia and South Korea. Some of them resettled in the US and some western countries. More than 90% of overseas Burmese send their hard earned money back home to support their families. They do not use junta controlled banks since the official exchange rate is much lower than market rate. ( Official rate 1$= 6 kyats, market rate 1 $= 1300 kyats). Almost all of them rely on informal money transfer agents (Hundi system) to transfer money back home. A lot of families rely on money sent from overseas relatives and most of those families are having trouble making ends meet. We are warning all overseas Burmese who are thinking about sending money to home to take extra caution. The ultimate solution is to get rid of the military government and establish a reliable national banking system.