The New Nation - Internet Edition

AP, Yangon

Myanmar's military junta arrested three more activists Wednesday, witnesses said, surging ahead with a crackdown even as it hosted a U.N. human rights investigator and insisted that all arrests had stopped.

The latest to be nabbed were at least three people handing out anti-regime pamphlets at the busy Thiri Mingalar fruit and vegetable market in Yangon, shoppers and other witnesses said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they feared reprisals from the government.

"I saw at least three young men in white shirts being arrested by market security officials," said one of the witnesses, a market worker. The leaflets included a statement from the United Nations and one saying that forcing people to take part in pro-junta rallies violated the Geneva Conventions. The incident followed earlier arrests of two prominent dissidents. One came Tuesday as U.N. human rights envoy Paulo Sergio Pinheiro met with Cabinet ministers in the junta's remote, jungle capital Naypyitaw.