Funeral for monk shot by soldiers highlights Myanmar army’s delicate relationship to Buddhist clergy

BANGKOK (AP) — Hundreds of people attended the funeral on Thursday of a senior monk who was fatally shot by soldiers in an incident that could undermine the cozy relationship that Myanmar’s military government has tried to maintain with the country’s Buddhist clergy.

The body of 78-year-old monk Bhaddanta Munindarbhivamsa was carried on a vehicle in the design of a Karaweik barge — an ornate vessel with a golden image of a mythical bird at its bow — through crowds from a temple in the city of Bago where it had been kept for the past week for mourners to pay their respects.

The mock barge was accompanied by more than a hundred other vehicles and a long procession of monks and devotees to a newly built pyre at a cemetery on the outskirts of the city for cremation.

Buddhist clergy are extremely influential in Myanmar, an overwhelmingly Buddhist nation in which the religion is deeply entwined with tradition and culture.

The killing of Bhaddanta Munindarbhivamsa, a retired member of the State Sangha Mahanayaka Committee, the monastic organization overseeing the Buddhist clergy, drew outrage, especially because the military government initially lied and blamed it on resistance fighters opposed to army rule.

Myanmar’s military junta came to power in February 2021 after the army ousted the democratically elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi. After security forces used deadly force to suppress nonviolent protests, armed resistance arose and the country is now in a civil war.

The military, which likes to portray itself as the guardian of Buddhism, has worked hard to keep the clergy on its side to try to bolster its legitimacy, devoting resources to construction and repair of religious structures and donating money and gifts to