Tag Archives: Yangon

Thousands take to the streets in Myanmar as five more protesters killed

(Reuters) – Myanmar security forces killed three people in the main city of Yangon on Monday, witnesses and media reported, as activists called on ethnic minority forces in the diverse nation to back their campaign against military rule.

After the bloodiest day since the Feb. 1 military coup with 114 deaths on Saturday, thousands of people took to the streets in towns across the country, determined to show their opposition to the relapse into military rule after a decade of democratic reform.

A man was killed and several were wounded when security forces fired in one Yangon neighborhood, media and a witness said.

“He was shot in the head,” witness Thiha Soe told Reuters.

“They were shooting at everything on the road, even a Red Cross team. It’s still going on as I’m speaking to you.”

Police and a junta spokesman did not answer calls seeking comment. Myanmar’s Red Cross said in a message it was checking the report.

Two people were killed in another Yangon district when security forces moved in to clear protesters’ barricades, a resident said.

“We can confirm two were killed in our ward,” said the resident of the South Dagon neighborhood who asked to be identified as just Win.

“About 15 members of the security forces came and shot all around,” said Win, adding that the security forces were using grenades to clear barricades.

Based on a tally by the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners advocacy group, 462 civilians have been killed since the coup.

But despite the violence, crowds turned out in the central towns of Bago, Minhla, Khin-U, Pinlebu and Taze, Mawlamyine in the south, Demoso in the east and Hsipaw and Mytitkyina in the north, according to media and social media posts.

The General Strike Committee of Nationalities, a main protest group, called in an open letter on Facebook for ethnic minority forces to help those standing up to the “unfair oppression” of the military.

“It is necessary for the ethnic armed organizations to collectively protect the people,” the protest group said.

‘INTERNAL PROBLEM, PLEASE’

Insurgents from different ethnic minority groups have battled the central government for decades over greater autonomy. Though many groups have agreed to ceasefires, fighting has flared in recent days between the army and forces in both the east and north.

Heavy clashes erupted on the weekend near the Thai border between the army and fighters from Myanmar’s oldest ethnic minority force, the Karen National Union (KNU).

About 3,000 villagers fled to Thailand when military jets bombed a KNU area, killing three civilians, after a KNU force overran an army outpost and killed 10 people, an activist group and media said.

Tens of thousands of Karen have lived in camps in Thailand for decades and Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha said he wanted Myanmar’s latest problems to remain there.

“Please, let this be an internal problem. We don’t want to have an exodus, evacuation into our territory but we will observe human rights too,” Prayuth told reporters in Bangkok.

In Myanmar’s north, fighting erupted on Sunday in the jade-mining area of Hpakant when Kachin Independence Army (KIA) fighters attacked a police station, Kachinwaves media reported.

There were no reports of casualties.

Both the KNU and KIA have expressed support for the anti-coup movement and called on the army stop the violence against civilian protesters.

‘MASS MURDER’

Myanmar’s military has for decades justified its grip on power by saying it is the only institution capable of preserving national unity. It seized power saying that November elections won by Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi’s party were fraudulent, an assertion dismissed by the election commission.

Suu Kyi remains in detention at an undisclosed location and many other figures in her party are also in custody.

At least six children between the ages 10 and 16 were among those killed in the bloodshed on Saturday, according to news reports and witnesses.

U.N. Special Rapporteur for Myanmar Tom Andrews said the army was carrying out “mass murder” and called on the world to isolate the junta and block its access to weapons.

But foreign criticism and sanctions imposed by some Western countries have failed to sway the generals.

Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, the junta leader, said during a parade to mark Armed Forces Day on Saturday that the military would protect the people and strive for democracy.

Countries including the United States, Britain, Germany and the European Union again condemned the violence.

“It’s terrible, it’s absolutely outrageous,” U.S. President Joe Biden told reporters in Delaware.

The EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, called on the generals to stand down from what he called a “senseless path” of violence against their own people.

(Reporting by Reuters Staff; Writing by Ed Davies, Robert Birsel; Editing by Stephen Coates, Gerry Doyle and Nick Macfie)

Protests surge in Yangon as Myanmar forces trap youth protesters

(Reuters) – Thousands of people took to the streets of Myanmar’s biggest city in defiance of a night curfew on Monday, chanting in anger after security forces besieged hundreds of young anti-coup protesters in one neighborhood.

Western embassies appealed to the ruling military junta to allow the protesters to leave Sanchaung, where they were cornered at the end of another day of bloodshed in Myanmar in which at least three protesters were killed elsewhere in the country.

“Free the students in Sanchaung,” people chanted in the streets in districts across the former capital, where daily protests have taken place for more than a month against the Feb. 1 coup which overthrew elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

In some areas, police used stun grenades and fired shots to try to disperse protesters, witnesses said.

Live video from Sanchaung on social media showed protesters running between the houses as stun grenades detonated.

“Almost 200 young protesters are still blocked by the police and soldiers there. Local and international community needs to help them now! Please,” one protest leader, Maung Saungkha, said on Twitter.

The U.S. Embassy said in a statement: “We call on those security forces to withdraw and allow people to go home safely.” The United Nations office in Myanmar and the British Embassy made a similar appeal.

In Geneva, the U.N. human rights office voiced deep concern about the fate of the protesters trapped in Sanchaung. Rights chief Michelle Bachelet said they should be allowed to leave safely and without reprisals.

A spokesman for the junta did not answer calls requesting comment.

Police said they would scrutinize family registration lists in the area to check for outsiders – threatening action against anyone caught concealing them.

State television MRTV said: “The government’s patience has run out and while trying to minimize casualties in stopping riots, most people seek complete stability are calling for more effective measures against riots.”

According to the United Nations, more than 50 people have been killed by security forces in the junta’s attempts to end the protests demanding the release of Suu Kyi and other detainees and respect for the election she won last year.

AT LEAST THREE DEAD

Two protesters died of gunshot wounds to the head in the northern town of Myitkyina on Monday, witnesses said. At least one person was killed at a protest in the town of Phyar Pon in the Irrawaddy Delta, a political activist and local media said.

Earlier, protesters in some places had waved flags fashioned from htamain (women’s sarongs) or hung them up on lines across the street to mark International Women’s Day. Walking beneath women’s sarongs is traditionally considered bad luck for men.

MRTV said such a display was severely insulting to religion in largely Buddhist Myanmar.

The army took power citing fraud in the ballot last November that was won by Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD) – an accusation rejected by the electoral commission. It has promised another election, but without giving a date.

The military has brushed off condemnation of its actions and appears to be digging in to weather the crisis, as it has in past periods of army rule.

In a clampdown on independent media that has been covering the protests, state television announced the licenses of five outlets had been withdrawn.

Shops, businesses and factories closed across Yangon on Monday after at least nine unions covering sectors including construction, agriculture and manufacturing called on all Myanmar people to stop work to reverse the coup.

“The time to take action in defense of our democracy is now,” they said in a statement.

Security forces had moved in to occupy hospitals on Sunday night.

The United States and some other Western countries have imposed limited sanctions on the junta and Australia on Sunday cut defense ties.

The European Union is preparing to widen its sanctions on the army to target businesses they run and the measures could be agreed by EU foreign ministers on March 22, according to diplomats and two internal documents seen by Reuters.

In Sweden, H&M, the world’s second-biggest fashion retailer, said it had paused placing orders with direct suppliers in Myanmar – saying it was shocked at the use of deadly forces against protesters, but also worried about instability.

Among those the military has detained is Suu Kyi’s Australian former financial advisor. State television quoted junta leader General Min Aung Hlaing as saying the detention led to the discovery of secret financial information from the former government.

Reuters was unable to contact Sean Turnell for comment. The army has not announced charges against him.

Thailand’s state broadcaster PBS said areas had been set aside along the border with Myanmar to house any refugees fleeing the unrest.

(Reporting by Reuters Staff; Writing by Martin Petty, Poppy McPherson and Raju Gopalakrishnan; Editing by Lincoln Feast and Angus MacSwan)

Nearly 40 killed in violent day of protests against Myanmar coup, U.N. envoy says

(Reuters) – Thirty-eight people were killed in Myanmar as the military quelled protests in several towns and cities on Wednesday, the United Nations said, the most violent day since demonstrations against last month’s military coup first broke out.

Police and soldiers opened fire with live rounds with little warning, witnesses said.

The bloodshed occurred one day after neighboring countries had called for restraint in the aftermath of the military’s overthrow of the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi.

“It’s horrific, it’s a massacre. No words can describe the situation and our feelings,” youth activist Thinzar Shunlei Yi told Reuters via a messaging app.

The dead included four children, an aid agency said. Hundreds of protesters were arrested, local media reported.

“Today it was the bloodiest day since the coup happened on the 1st of February. We had today — only today — 38 people died. We have now more than over 50 people died since the coup started, and many are wounded,” United Nations special envoy on Myanmar, Christine Schraner Burgener, said in New York.

A spokesman for the ruling military council did not answer telephone calls seeking comment.

Schraner Burgener said that in conversations with Myanmar’s deputy military chief Soe Win, she had warned him that the military was likely to face strong measures from some countries and isolation in retaliation for the coup.

“The answer was: ‘We are used to sanctions, and we survived’,” she told reporters in New York. “When I also warned they will go (into) isolation, the answer was: ‘We have to learn to walk with only few friends’.”

The U.N. Security Council is due to discuss the situation on Friday in a closed meeting, diplomats said.

SUSTAINED SHOOTING

Ko Bo Kyi, joint secretary of Myanmar’s Assistance Association for Political Prisoners rights group, had said earlier the military killed at least 18. But the toll rose by the end of the day.

In the main city Yangon, witnesses said at least eight people were killed, seven of them when security forces opened sustained fire in a neighborhood in the north of the city in the early evening.

“I heard so much continuous firing. I lay down on the ground, they shot a lot,” protester Kaung Pyae Sone Tun, 23, told Reuters.

In Washington, U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price said the United States was “appalled” by the increase in violence. The administration of President Joe Biden was evaluating “appropriate” measures to respond and any actions would be targeted at Myanmar’s military, he added.

The United States has conveyed to China that it is looking for Beijing to play a constructive role in Myanmar, the spokesman said.

The European Union said the shootings of unarmed civilians and medical workers were clear breaches of international law. It also said the military was stepping up repression of the media, with a growing number of journalists arrested and charged.

In the central town of Monywa, six people were killed, the Monywa Gazette reported. Others were killed in the second-biggest city Mandalay, the northern town of Hpakant and the central town of Myingyan.

Save the Children said in a statement four children were among the dead, including a 14-year-old boy who Radio Free Asia reported was shot dead by a soldier on a passing convoy of military trucks. The soldiers loaded his body onto a truck and left the scene, according to the report.

‘WE SHALL OVERCOME’

Security forces breaking up protests in Yangon detained about 300 protesters, the Myanmar Now news agency reported.

Video posted on social media showed lines of young men, hands on heads, filing into army trucks as police and soldiers stood guard. Reuters was unable to verify the footage.

Images of a 19-year-old woman, one of two shot dead in Mandalay, showed her wearing a T-shirt that read “Everything will be OK”.

Police in Yangon ordered three medics out of an ambulance, shot up the windscreen and then kicked and beat the workers with gun butts and batons, video broadcast by U.S.-funded Radio Free Asia showed. Reuters was unable to verify the video independently.

Democracy activist Esther Ze Naw told Reuters that the sacrifices of those who died would not be in vain.

“We shall overcome this and win,” she said.

On Tuesday, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) failed to make a breakthrough in a virtual foreign ministers’ meeting on Myanmar.

While united in a call for restraint, only four members – Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Singapore – called for the release of Suu Kyi and other detainees.

“We expressed ASEAN’s readiness to assist Myanmar in a positive, peaceful and constructive manner,” the ASEAN chair, Brunei, said in a statement.

Myanmar’s state media said the military-appointed foreign minister, Wunna Maung Lwin, attended and “apprised the meeting of voting irregularities” in the November election.

The military justified the coup by saying its complaints of voter fraud in the Nov. 8 vote were ignored. Suu Kyi’s party won by a landslide, earning a second term.

The election commission said the vote was fair.

Junta leader Senior General Min Aung Hlaing has pledged to hold new elections but given no time frame. U.N. envoy Schraner Burgener said his deputy Soe Win told her that “after a year they want to have another election.”

Suu Kyi, 75, has been held incommunicado since the coup but appeared at a court hearing via video conferencing this week and looked in good health, a lawyer said.

(Reporting and writing by Reuters Staff; Editing by Angus MacSwan, Grant McCool and Rosalba O’Brien)

Supporters of Myanmar military coup rampage in Yangon

(Reuters) – Supporters of Myanmar’s military, some armed with knives and clubs, others firing catapults and throwing stones, attacked opponents of the Feb. 1 coup on Thursday, as protests against the new junta continued in the country’s largest city.

Myanmar has been in turmoil since the army seized power and detained civilian government leader Aung San Suu Kyi and much of her party leadership after the military complained of fraud in a November election.

Protests and strikes have taken place daily for about three weeks, and students had planned to come out again in the commercial hub Yangon on Thursday.

But before many coup opponents congregated, about 1,000 supporters of the military turned up for a rally in the city center.

Some threatened news photographers and media workers witnesses said, and scuffles soon escalated into more serious violence in several parts of the city.

Several people were set upon and beaten by groups of men, some armed with knives, others firing catapults and hurling stones, witnesses said. At least two people were stabbed, video footage showed.

In one incident, several men, one wielding a large knife, attacked a man outside a city-center hotel. Emergency workers helped the bloodied man after his attackers moved off but his condition was not known.

“Today’s events show who the terrorists are. They’re afraid of the people’s action for democracy,” activist Thin Zar Shun Lei Yi told Reuters.

“We’ll continue our peaceful protests against dictatorship.”

As dusk fell, dozens of riot police fired tear gas into a neighborhood in the city to disperse a crowd that had gathered at an administrative office to protest the appointment of a local official by the junta, according to a witness and live-streamed video.

The violence will compound worries about a country largely paralyzed by the protests and a civil disobedience campaign of strikes against the military.

Earlier, police blocked the gates of Yangon’s main university campus, stopping hundreds of students inside from coming out to demonstrate.

Facebook said that due to the risks evident from the “deadly violence” seen since the coup it had banned the Myanmar military from using its Facebook and Instagram platforms.

The spokesman for the ruling military council did not respond to a telephone call seeking comment.

Military chief General Min Aung Hlaing says authorities are using minimal force. Nevertheless, three protesters and one policeman have been killed in violence.

‘ABETTORS’

The United States, Britain and others have called for Suu Kyi’s release and the restoration of democracy and have imposed limited sanctions aimed at members of the junta and its business links.

The British Foreign Office said on Thursday it would sanction a further six military figures, adding to 19 previously listed and including Min Aung Hlaing, and that the trade ministry would work to ensure British businesses do not deal with Myanmar’s military-owned companies.

“Today’s package of measures sends a clear message to the military regime in Myanmar that those responsible for human rights violations will be held to account, and the authorities must hand back control to a government elected by the people of Myanmar,” Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said in a statement.

A rights group said as of Wednesday 728 people had been arrested, charged or sentenced in relation to the pro-democracy protests.

The army said its overthrow of the government was within the constitution after its complaints of fraud in the Nov. 8 election, swept by Suu Kyi’s party as expected, had been ignored. The election commission said the vote was fair.

The army has promised a new election after reviewing voter lists. It has not given a date but it imposed a one-year state of emergency when it seized power.

Suu Kyi has been detained incommunicado at her home in the capital Naypyitaw but her party says its November victory must be respected.

Veteran democracy activist Min Ko Naing said the military’s efforts to arrange to an election re-run, which include a new election commission, had to be stopped and any parties involved in it were “abettors”.

“We have to reject the actions of the military government to try to legitimize itself,” he said in a post on Facebook.

The question of a new election is at the center of a diplomatic effort by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), of which Myanmar is a member, aimed at easing the crisis.

Indonesia has taken the lead in the attempt and its foreign minister, Retno Marsudi, met her military-appointed Myanmar counterpart, Wunna Maung Lwin, for talks in Thailand on Wednesday.

But Indonesia’s intervention has raised suspicion among coup opponents who fear it will confer legitimacy on the junta and its bid to scrap the November vote and arrange a re-run.

Retno did not mention an election in comments to reporters after her talks but emphasized “an inclusive democratic transition process.”

A Reuters report this week cited sources as saying Indonesia was proposing that ASEAN members send monitors to ensure the generals stick to their promise of fair elections, which would imply accepting the November result was void.

Protesters gathered outside the Thai embassy in Yangon on Thursday chanting “respect our vote”.

(Reporting by Reuters Staff; Writing by Ed Davies and Rob Birsel; Editing by Angus MacSwan)