Myanmar President Thein Sein appealed Monday for the lifting of European Union sanctions against his country, currently suspended.

"What we lack is capital and modern technologies... all these are because of the economic sanctions for the last 20 years," he told journalists following talks with Austrian President Heinz Fischer.

 Myanmar on Saturday dismissed an independent report that alleged security forces used white phosphorus in a crackdown on a copper mine protest last year, which left dozens of people injured.

The pre-dawn raid on protest camps at the Chinese-backed mine in northern Myanmar in November was the toughest clampdown on demonstrators since a reformist government came to power in early 2011.

Almost 6,000 Rohingya boat people fleeing communal violence in western Myanmar have illegally entered Thai waters since October, an army spokesman said Thursday.

Of the 5,899 Rohingya who entered Thai territory, 1,752 are now in Thai immigration holding centers, police stations or welfare shelters, according to the military's Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC).

Medical aid agency Doctors Without Borders warned Thursday of a "humanitarian emergency" in strife-hit western Myanmar with tens of thousands of people unable to access urgently needed medical care.

Doctors Without Borders (Medecins Sans Frontieres) said its teams on the ground in Rakhine State faced threats, hostility and accusations of a bias towards the Rohingya Muslim minority group.

Myanmar's government and Kachin rebels met Monday for new peace talks hosted by China, seeking an elusive breakthrough in efforts to end a conflict that has overshadowed dramatic political reforms.

A government delegation led by Minister of the President's Office Aung Min met with Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) leaders in a hotel in the Chinese border town of Ruili.

Democracy champion Aung San Suu Kyi revealed her love of JK Rowling's Harry Potter books as she waxed lyrical about her favorite reads at Myanmar's first international literary festival on Saturday.

The Nobel laureate, who spent years under house arrest under Myanmar's former junta, joked that her "courage" in the face of state repression paled in comparison to the heroes of the best-selling fantasy series.

Dozens of renowned international and local writers gathered Friday at Myanmar's first international literary festival to celebrate the country's new-found freedom of expression.

Authors hailed the festival -- supported by Nobel Peace Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi -- as a breakthrough for creativity after years lost to stifling censorship rules under the generals who ruled the country for decades.

Myanmar may be best known for its decades of junta rule, but behind the bamboo curtain maverick entrepreneurs have toiled for years to put the nation on the map for the quality of its wine.

Vines cascade down terraces overlooking the vast mirror of Inle Lake in northeastern Myanmar, an unlikely setting for a budding wine industry tempting the tastebuds of tourists now flocking to the country as it opens up.

Thailand will turn away any more Rohingya boat people from neighboring Myanmar who try to land on its shores, a top official said Monday after an influx of refugees fleeing sectarian unrest.

"The Thai navy from now on will be stricter with them and will no longer allow them to land," National Security Council secretary-general Paradorn Pattanathabutr told AFP.

Myanmar on Monday announced a deal with international lenders to cancel nearly $6 billion of its debt, another milestone in the rapid transformation of the former junta-ruled nation.

The former pariah state also cleared its arrears to the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) with the help of a bridge loan from Japan, removing another key hurdle for the resumption of international aid.