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Myanmar security forces on Wednesday (March 10) launched a raid on the compound of striking railway workers’ staff who oppose the military junta when ousted lawmakers appointed an interim vice president to take over from politicians. detained.
Railway personnel in Yangon are part of a civil disobedience movement that has paralyzed government business and included strikes at banks, factories and shops since the army overthrew the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in a coup on 1 February.
Images posted on social media showed security forces near the railway staff compound. A person involved in the strike said by phone that they feared imminent repression.
“I think they are going to arrest us. Please help us,” said the person, who asked to be identified only as Ma Su instead of her full name.
In a Facebook live broadcast from the area, people chanted: “Are we staff united? Yes, we are united” and one commentator claimed that the police were trying to remove the barricades and threatened to shoot.
Details could not be independently verified. Police and army officials did not respond to requests for comment.
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On Tuesday, Zaw Myat Linn, a Suu Kyi National League for Democracy (NLD) official, died in custody after being arrested, the second party figure to die in custody in two days.
“He has been continuously participating in the protests,” said Ba Myo Thein, a member of the dissolved upper house of parliament. The cause of death was unclear. In a Facebook live feed before his arrest, Zaw Myat Linn urged people to continue fighting the army, “even if it costs us our lives.”
In a symbolic gesture, an announcement posted on the NLD’s Facebook page on Tuesday said that the ousted lawmakers had appointed Mahn Win Khaing Than, who was the speaker of the upper house, as acting vice president to carry out the duties of the arrested president. Win Myint and leader Suu Kyi. Mahn Win Khaing Than’s whereabouts were unknown.
On Tuesday, the police also cracked down on independent media, raiding the offices of two media outlets and detaining two journalists. At least 35 journalists have been arrested since the February 1 coup, Myanmar Now reported, of whom 19 have been released.
WE “REPULSED” BY THE USE OF LETHAL FORCE
Daily protests against the coup are being organized across the country, and security forces have cracked down with increasing force.
More than 60 protesters have been killed and 1,900 people have been arrested since the coup, said the Association for Assistance to Political Prisoners, an advocacy group.
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Some policemen have rejected orders to fire on unarmed protesters and have fled to neighboring India, according to an interview with an officer and classified documents from the Indian police.
“As the civil disobedience movement is gaining momentum and protests by anti-coup protesters in different locations, we are being instructed to fire on protesters,” four officers said in a joint statement to police in the Indian city of Mizoram.
“In such a scenario, we don’t have the guts to shoot our own people who are peaceful protesters,” they said.
The United States is “disgusted” by the continued use of deadly force by the Myanmar military against its people and continues to urge the military to exercise “the utmost restraint,” State Department spokesman Ned Price said Tuesday.
Anti-coup protesters stand behind a line of women’s clothing hung across a road to deter security personnel from entering the protest area in Yangon, Myanmar, on March 9, 2021. (AP Photo)
The military has justified the coup by saying that the November elections won by the NLD were marred by fraud, a claim rejected by the electoral commission. He has promised a new election, but has not said when it could be held.
International powers have condemned the takeover, which derailed a slow transition to democracy in a country that has been ruled by the military for long periods since independence from Great Britain in 1947.
The board said on Tuesday it was withdrawing its ambassador to Britain a day after it urged the army in a statement to release Suu Kyi, state media reported.
MRTV news channel said that Kyaw Swar Min, one of several ambassadors who publicly parted ways with the military line, had issued the statement without following orders.
The army has ignored condemnation of their actions, as it has in past periods of army rule, when outbreaks of protest were forcibly suppressed.
