Military blitz as internet cut off
Myanmar crackdown
YANGON: Myanmar’s coup leaders have cut the country’s internet service and deployed troops around the country as part of a brutal crackdown on anti-coup protests, just hours after security forces fired to disperse a demonstration in the country’s north.
The junta has escalated its efforts to quell a burgeoning civil disobedience campaign, which is demanding a return of the country’s ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
The internet shutdown and a request from the UN for an observer to be allowed in came soon after images shared on social media platforms showed military vehicles and soldiers moving through some parts of the country.
Monitoring group NetBlocks said the “state-ordered information blackout” had taken Myanmar almost entirely offline.
Troops in Myitkyina fired tear gas then shot at a crowd who gathered in the northern city to stop a rumoured shutdown of the electricity grid.
A journalist at the scene said it was unclear whether police had used rubber bullets or live rounds.
Local media outlets said at least five journalists monitoring the protest had been detained, and pictures were published of protesters who were badly wounded.
A joint statement from the US, British and EU ambassadors urged the Myanmar generals not to harm civilians.
“We call on security forces to refrain from violence against demonstrators, who are protesting the overthrow of their legitimate government,” they said in the statement.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres echoed the call, pushing authorities to “ensure the right of peaceful assembly is fully respected”.
Through his spokesman, Mr Guterres also asked the military to “urgently” allow Swiss diplomat Christine Schraner Burgener to visit Myanmar “to assess the situation first hand”.
The US embassy advised American citizens to shelter in place and not risk defying an overnight curfew imposed by the military regime.
UN special rapporteur Tom Andrews said the junta’s bid to rein in the country’s burgeoning protest movement was a sign of “desperation” and amounted to a declaration of war against its own people.
“Attention generals: You WILL be held accountable,” he wrote on Twitter.
Much of the country has been in uproar since soldiers detained Ms Suu Kyi and her top political allies on February 1, ending a decade-old fledgling democracy after generations of junta rule.
The Nobel laureate spent years under house arrest during an earlier dictatorship and has not been seen in public since she was detained.
An internet blackout last weekend failed to quell resistance that has seen huge crowds throng big urban centres and isolated frontier villages alike.
Striking workers who spearheaded the campaign are among at least 400 people to have been detained since the coup. But fear of arrest did not deter big crowds from returning to streets around the country for a ninth straight day.