Reuters reported Myanmar's president asked opposition leader Ms Aung San Suu Kyi to head an investigation into the planned expansion of a copper mine that has led to evictions and protests that were forcibly put down by riot police this week.
Activists said that at least 50 people were injured including more than 20 Buddhist monks after riot police raided camps set up round the Monywa mine in the North West Sagaing region by villagers protesting the evictions.
Riot police used teargas, water cannon and according to activists incendiary devices local media described as phosphorous bombs. Many of the injured suffered serious burns.
The president's office said that he had set up a commission led by Ms Suu Kyi with a broad remit to look into whether the expansion of the mine should go ahead and into measures taken to control the protests.
The committee will encompass a broad cross section of interests including three local villagers and an official from the military owned Union of Myanmar Economic Holdings Limited, a partner in the copper mine project alongside a unit of China North Industries Corporation, a Chinese weapons manufacturer. It should report by the end of December.
Mr Phil Robertson deputy Asia director at US based Human Rights Watch had called for a speedy official investigation. He said that a hospital ward full of horribly burned Buddhist monks and other protesters deserve to know who attacked them while they were sleeping and what the government is going to do about it. The crackdown is a fundamental test case for the government's commitment to peaceful assembly and willingness to demand accountability for abuses.
Anger has been growing at the heavy handed police intervention at the mine, reminiscent of the way dissent was stifled under the junta that ruled Myanmar for half a century until it stepped aside allowing Thein Sein's quasi civilian, reformist government to take office in March 2011.
Local residents said that the USD 1 billion mine expansion entails the unlawful confiscation of more than 7,800 acres of land. They said in September that four of 26 villages at the project site had been displaced along with monasteries and schools.
Around 40 monks accompanied by about 60 other people held a peaceful march on Saturday around the Sule Pagoda in the commercial capital, Yangon, a focal point for monk led protests in 2007 that were brutally put down by the junta. At least 100 monks demonstrated in the second city, Mandalay.
Ms Suu Kyi who led the fight for democracy under the junta and is now a member of parliament said that she had asked the authorities to release any monks who had been detained but had been told no arrests had been made. I think the people have the right to know why such violent measures were taken. I think it is needed to apologise to the monks."
Mr San Yuu Sagaing Region Police Colonel said that "Since we ourselves are Buddhists, we have no intention at all to do anything that will hurt the region and the monks. We would like to ask for your kindness and request you in the most humble manners to forgive us for what we did."
