https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/28/worl ... tests.htmlMilitary Crackdown in Myanmar Escalates With Killing of Protesters
At least 18 people were killed during protests, according to the United Nations, with security forces opening fire on crowds.
Military forces in Myanmar opened fire on crowds of peaceful demonstrators in several cities on Sunday, killing at least 18 people, the United Nations said, in a violent escalation of the junta’s efforts to suppress weeks of mass protests against its month-old coup.
Videos and photographs captured images of bodies in the street and people running from the police as tear gas and smoke filled the air. The sheer ferocity of Sunday’s crackdown — soldiers appeared to shoot at unarmed people in the streets at random and rounded up groups of demonstrators before marches could begin — drew sharp rebukes internationally.
The forceful response of the military signaled a new ruthless resolve to quash unrest after a month in which thousands have turned out regularly to protest a Feb. 1 coup. The demonstrations and civil disobedience movement have challenged the primacy of a military notorious for its brutality after having crushed democracy movements in 1988 and 2007 by shooting peaceful protesters.
“We strongly condemn the escalating violence against protests in Myanmar and call on the military to immediately halt the use of force against peaceful protesters,” said Ravina Shamdasani, a spokeswoman with the U.N. human rights office.
Myanmar (Burma)
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Myanmar (Burma)
The situation continues to deteriorate.
“Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.” —John Adams
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Re: Myanmar (Burma)
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-56222987Myanmar coup: UN ambassador fired after anti-army speech
Myanmar's military rulers say they have fired the country's ambassador to the United Nations, a day after he called for help to remove the army from power.
In an emotional speech, Kyaw Moe Tun said no-one should co-operate with the military until it handed back power to the democratically elected government.
UN sources told Reuters that as they do not recognise the junta, Kyaw Moe Tun remains Myanmar's UN ambassador.
<snip>
Speaking at the UN General Assembly on Friday, Kyaw Moe Tun urged the international community to use "any means necessary to take action" against the military to help "restore the democracy", saying he was representing Ms Suu Kyi's ousted government.
"We need further strongest possible action from the international community to immediately end the military coup, to stop oppressing the innocent people, to return the state power to the people and to restore the democracy," he said.
The speech was met with applause and Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the new US envoy to the body, was among those praising his remarks as "courageous".
In a further show of defiance, Kyaw Moe Tun held up three fingers, a gesture against authoritarian rule that has been adopted by anti-coup protesters in the country.
Myanmar's state television announced his removal on Saturday, saying he had "betrayed the country and spoken for an unofficial organization which doesn't represent the country and had abused the power and responsibilities of an ambassador".
Speaking on condition of anonymity, a UN official told Reuters that as they do not officially recognise the junta as Myanmar's new government, they consider Kyaw Moe Tun to be still in post as the country's UN ambassador.
In a separate, official statement, UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric also said: "We have not received any communication concerning changes to the representation of Myanmar at the United Nations in New York."
“Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.” —John Adams
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Re: Myanmar (Burma)
Seen a lot of videos, situation looks worse and worse as it goes on. But anyway, this happened today...
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-myan ... SKCN2AW2MDExclusive: U.S. blocked Myanmar junta attempt to empty $1 billion New York Fed account - sources
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Myanmar’s military rulers attempted to move about $1 billion held at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York days after seizing power on Feb. 1, prompting U.S. officials to put a freeze on the funds, according to three people familiar with the matter, including one U.S. government official.
The transaction on Feb. 4 in the name of the Central Bank of Myanmar was first blocked by Fed safeguards. U.S. government officials then stalled on approving the transfer until an executive order issued by President Joe Biden gave them legal authority to block it indefinitely, the sources said.
A spokesman for the New York Fed declined to comment on specific account holders. The U.S. Treasury Department also declined to comment.
The attempt, which has not been previously reported, came after Myanmar’s military installed a new central bank governor and detained reformist officials during the coup.
It marked an apparent effort by Myanmar’s generals to limit exposure to international sanctions after they arrested elected officials, including de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who had won a national election in November. The army seized power alleging fraud, claims that the electoral commission has dismissed.
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“Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.” —John Adams
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Re: Myanmar (Burma)
Andrew Solender
@AndrewSolender
NEW: House votes 398-14 to pass a resolution condemning the Myanmar coup and calling for new sanctions/restrictions.
14 Republicans voted NO: Greene, Boebert, Biggs, Gaetz, Massie, Miller (Ill.), Roy, Buck, Hice, Mooney, Perry, Harris, Budd, Moore (Ala.)
1 voted present: Gosar
“If everyone fought for their own convictions there would be no war.” ― Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace
Re: Myanmar (Burma)
I doubt any of them know any more about it than that it was a coup. They think that's a good thing; just sorry theirs didn't end as they would have preferred.
"Choose your leaders with wisdom and forethought. To be led by a coward is to be controlled by all that the coward fears… To be led by a liar is to ask to be told lies." -Octavia E. Butler
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https://asiatimes.com/2021/07/everyone- ... ecimation/‘Everyone is dying’: Myanmar on the brink of decimation
Myanmar desperately needs an international health intervention but its military regime seems content to let the people die
Two days ago, I spent six hours on encrypted apps with contacts inside the country trying to locate one – just one – oxygen concentrator for the mother of my friend, whom I will call “Ma Moon.”
Her mother’s oxygen saturation rate had dropped precipitously in one day from 95 to 70.
I do not know this for sure – in these circumstances, we know we cannot ask this question – but I think the family is being treated on a daily basis by doctors who have “gone underground” in a civil disobedience campaign.
Medical professionals are among the most respected individuals in the country, and so their decision to oppose the February 1 military coup d’etat that took down the elected civilian government carried immense weight among the population.
One estimate provided by public health experts in Myanmar predicts that 50% of Myanmar’s 55 million people will be infected within three weeks by either the Alpha or Delta variant of Covid-19.
One very reputable public health specialist expects that the population will be decimated by at least 10-15 million by the time Covid is done with Myanmar.
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“Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.” —John Adams
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Meet the Myanmar junta’s hi-so helpers
Burmese-Irish family is worldly, charming, and quietly equipping the military
PUBLISHED : 25 DEC 2021 AT 11:39
WRITER: BY HANNAH BEECH, THE NEW YORK TIMES
Three years ago, the Kyaw Thaung family partied at the Pegu Club. The venerable Burmese Irish clan had restored the teak-lined establishment to its 19th-century glory. The Pegu Club project befitted the family’s East-meets-West positioning and the optimism of a country newly engaging with the world.
As Myanmar’s military dictators ended decades of isolationism, the Kyaw Thaungs seemed to embody the perfect mix: an august family with a long history of charitable giving that was committed to the kind of business reforms needed to coax a corrupt, closed country into the global economy. But the main source of the family fortune, purported vaguely to be from property and import-export companies, was concealed behind a facade.
For all their efforts to differentiate themselves from the drug lords and business cronies who dominated Myanmar’s economy, the Kyaw Thaungs were quietly equipping one of the world’s most brutal militaries. Their partnership with the Tatmadaw, as the Myanmar military is known, deepened even as its generals committed ethnic cleansing against Rohingya Muslims.
The partnership continued into this year, when the army staged a coup and seized full power of the country, killing more than 1,300 civilians so far, in the estimate of a monitoring group.
Jonathan Kyaw Thaung, the scion, was the public face of the family. As he chased Tatmadaw contracts, he hobnobbed with the family of Senior Gen Min Aung Hlaing, the military chief who orchestrated the coup. He met with the Myanmar air force commander at the 2015 Paris Air Show, where the military leader checked out Pakistani fighter jets that ended up in the Tatmadaw’s arsenal. A Kyaw Thaung family business bid to help supply the military with spare parts for Russian attack helicopters that have been used to strafe civilian populations resistant to the coup.
https://www.bangkokpost.com/world/22376 ... so-helpers
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Myanmar junta executes democracy activists in first such killings in decades
Democracy figures, including a former lawmaker in Aung San Suu Kyi’s party, executed after being accused of carrying out ‘terror acts’
Rebecca Ratcliffe and Maung Moe
Mon 25 Jul 2022 05.35 BST
Myanmar’s junta has executed four prisoners, including a former lawmaker from Aung San Suu Kyi’s party, according to state media, in the country’s first use of capital punishment in decades.
The four men, including former legislator Phyo Zeya Thaw and prominent democracy activist Kyaw Min Yu, known as Jimmy, had been sentenced to death in January in closed trials.
On Monday, the junta-controlled Global New Light of Myanmar said that the sentences had been carried out. The men had been accused of conspiring to commit terror acts, it said. Local media reported that the families of the men had travelled to Insein Prison, in Yangon, demanding to see their loved one’s bodies
Aung Myo Min, human rights minister of the National Unity Government (NUG), which was formed by elected lawmakers, ethnic minority representatives and activists, said he was extremely saddened to hear of the executions. “What else do we need to prove how cruel the murderous Myanmar’s military is?”, he said.
Many in Myanmar turned their social media profile pictures black and red, in a show of mourning.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/ ... tate-media
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Myanmar (Burma)
fromthe UK, and i assume we have some interested viewers
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“Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.” —John Adams