Spanish man flees ancient Myanmar city over tattoo

Spanish man flees ancient Myanmar city over tattoo

Authority took couple to police station after group of locals and monks reported Buddha image on calf

By Kyaw Ye Lynn

YANGON, Myanmar (AA) – A Spanish tourist couple has been told to leave Myanmar’s ancient city of Bagan due to fears for their safety, after locals spotted a Buddha tattoo on the husband’s calf.

An official told Anadolu Agency on Monday that the couple had been marched to a police station Sunday evening after a group of local people and Buddhist monks reported the Buddha tattoo on Cesar Hernendez’s right leg to police in Nyaung Oo Township.

“We inform the official from Spain embassy about this, and put them on a bus to [commercial capital] Yangon Sunday night,” said Aung San Win, director general at the Ministry of Religious Affairs and Culture.

“It is not a deportation. We just advised him to leave Bagan for his safety,” he said by phone.

He added that the couple entered the country July 7 and it had yet to be confirmed if the couple had left.

The Spanish Embassy in Yangon was closed late Tuesday when Anadolu Agency tried to confirm the couple's situation.

Images and tattoos of the Buddha are not banned in Myanmar, however nationalism is on the rise in the predominantly Buddhist country, and it has previously been sensitive about the use of the Buddha's image

A New Zealand bar manager and his two Myanmar colleagues were sentenced to two-and-a-half years jail in March 2015 for posting an image of a headphone wearing Buddha on Facebook as part of a bar promotion

The trio spent more than a year in prison before being released in a presidential amnesty earlier this year.


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