MANDALAY (UCAN): Some 100 monks led nationalist supporters into three Muslim quarters in south Dagon township, on the outskirts of Yangon, Myanmar, during the nights of May 14 and 15 and demanded that three temporary prayer sites, set up for Ramadan, be shut down. Under pressure, Muslim leaders closed down the prayer sites but have said the sites were allowed by the Yangon Division government.
 

MANDALAY (UCAN): Pope Francis has named 59-year-old Father Marco Tin Win as the next archbishop of archdiocese of Mandalay, Myanmar.
 
Father Tin Win, the vicar general, will succeed Archbishop Nicholas Mang Thang, who has reached the retirement age for bishops of 75-year-old.
 
Charles Cardinal Maung Bo of Yangon, welcomed the announcement, saying that the archbishop-elect brings with him decades of quality service to the Church in Myanmar.
 

MANDALAY UCAN): Around 130 Catholic young people in Mandalay, Myanmar, are benefiting from a new approach to education at a centre set up by Columban Father Neil Magill.
 
The young people, who are of  Kachin, Kayah, Karen, Chin, Burmese and Akha ethnicity, come from 10 dioceses and are taking a three-year residential course at the Mandalay Archdiocesan Higher Education Centre(HEC) in the compound of St. John’s Catholic Church in Mandalay. 
 

MANDALAY (UCAN): The parliament of the Union of Myanmar union parliament approved the formation of a 45-member committee to draft a bill to amend the country’s military-drafted 2008 constitution by a vote of 389 to 192 on February 19.
 
The plan was approved over the objections from military lawmakers and the main opposition Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP).
 

MANDALAY (UCAN): Bishop Raymond Sumlut Gam of Banmaw in Kachin State has asked Aung San Suu Kyi’s government to inform the public about the status of the China-backed Myitsone Dam project, following reports of increased Chinese pressure to restart it. The $29.8 billion project was suspended in September 2011.
 
“It is the right time to inform the public because a lack of transparency from the government is worrying the people,” Bishop Gam, an ethnic Kachin, said.
 

MANDALAY (UCAN): A court in Myanmar’s Kachin State fined Bernadette Ja Hkawng 10,000 kyats ($50) for violating the peaceful assembly law.
 
Police in Myitkyina, the capital of Kachin, charged Hkawng, who organised a protest on February 7 against the Myitsone Dam project, for using unauthorised slogans and a loudspeaker. 
 
“I work for the people not only in Kachin but also across the country, so I am ready to face any challenge,” Hkawng said.
 

While Aung San Suu Kyi’s government has a strained relationship with the west over its handling of the Rohingya crisis, China has shielded the country from international pressure and punitive action from the United Nations Security Council.
 
However, in exchange for its diplomatic protection, Beijing is now pressing Myanmar to revive the Myitsone Dam project, which has been suspended for seven years.
 

MANDALAY (UCAN): “Solving the problem with arms will not lead to a solution, so both sides need to go to the negotiable table (and work) towards stability and peace,” Bishop Alexander Pyone Cho of Pyay, said, as he called on all parties to return to the negotiation table as fighting escalates in Myanmar’s a Rakhine State.
 
The bishop said tensions remain high between the military and the Arakan Army.
 

MANDALAY (UCAN): Bishop Raymond Sumlut Gam of Banmaw, in Myanmar’s troubled Kachin State, has planned Christmas visits to camps for people displaced by violent clashes between rebels and government forces.
 
The bishop said he aims to give moral support to those in internally displaced person’s (IDP) camps.
 
“I’m going to give the message of holiness and patience to the IDPs who have longed to return to their homes after getting peace,” he said.