COVENTRY TWP.: Three Buddhist monks sat before a shrine inside a home on Chaffin Road and prayed for peace and for the people of Myanmar.

The prayers from Ashin Wareinda, 41; Nandathara Mehm, 48; and Monseik Mon, 40, were offered Thursday as more violence was reported in Myanmar (formerly known as Burma), where security forces fired into crowds of pro-democracy demonstrators, killing nine people.

''We protect you with our prayers,'' said Wareinda, who has lived in Akron for about nine years.

About 300 Mon people and 250 other Burmese people live in the Akron area, according to Goran Debelnogich, director of resettlement at the International Institute of Akron.

The three monks are part of a community of about 150 Mon Buddhists who gather to worship at the home in Coventry Township.

News of the demonstrations and shootings in their homeland was disturbing to them. Most members of their community still have parents and other family members in Myanmar. But since the civil disturbances broke out this week, the monks have been unable to make phone calls into the country.

On Monday, six Akron-area Buddhist monks, as well as nine monks from Fort Wayne, Ind., met in front of the United Nations building in New York City to pray and meditate for the people and monks in their homeland.

The Mon people, who emigrated to Akron to escape persecution, are from an area of Myanmar that was an independent country until about 250 years ago. Every year in February, the Akron Mon community and other groups around the world gather for Mon National Day.

This week's news reports indicated that the military government in Myanmar had raided Buddhist monasteries and arrested dozens of monks.

Wareinda said he understands the problems began when monks marched and prayed over economic conditions in the country, where prices of fuel had been increased.

''We don't want to see people grieving,'' Wareinda said. The prayers of the monks in Myanmar were not against the government but for the people, he said.

Though Wareinda does not believe that things will get better in his homeland, he hopes and prays for change. Someday, he said, he would like to return to a free Myanmar.

But for now, he and the other monks on Chaffin Road offer their prayers for peace along with fellow monks around the world.

''Don't worry and be at peace,'' he said.