Photos showing Burma’s top Catholic authority, Cardinal Charles Bo, sharing a Christmas cake with the head of the bloody military junta that runs the country sparked outrage from internet users on Friday.
Cardinal Bo met with the head of the board, General Min Aung Hlaing on Thursday to listen to Christmas songs and “discuss peaceful and prosperous affairs,” the government newspaper New Light of Myanmar reported.
Bo, who was promoted to cardinal by Pope Francis in 2015, later posted a photo on his Twitter account with the general, smiling, as they cut a Christmas cake together.
In Burma, which is experiencing a deep political crisis since the coup that ended the Aung San Suu Kyi government in February, the repression by the military junta would have left more than 1,300 dead, according to a human rights NGO.
Several armed militias have risen up against the junta, and there were fighting in areas with a Christian majority such as Chin State, where the US government claimed that hundreds of houses and a Christian church were burned in October.
“They burn Christian churches and he agrees to meet him,” commented a netizen on a social network, referring to Cardinal Bo and General Min Aung Hlaing.
“This does not represent Catholics. Why cut a cake with a murderer like that?” Asked another.
