Military threatens to use lethal force in general strike
YANGON, Myanmar — A call for a general strike Monday by demonstrators in Myanmar protesting the military’s Feb. 1 seizure of power has been met by the ruling junta with a thinly veiled threat to use lethal force, raising the possibility of major clashes.
The call for a general strike was made Sunday by the Civil Disobedience Movement, a loosely organized group leading resistance to the army’s takeover. It asked people to gather together for the Five Twos — referring to the digits in Monday’s date — to make a “Spring Revolution.”
State television broadcaster MRTV late Sunday carried a public announcement from the junta, formally called the State Administration Council, warning against the general strike.
“It is found that the protesters have raised their incitement towards riot and anarchy mob on the day of 22 February. Protesters are now inciting the people, especially emotional teenagers and youths, to a confrontation path where they will suffer the loss of life,” it said in an English language text shown onscreen. The spoken announcement in Burmese repeated the message.
Another part of the statement blamed protesters whose numbers allegedly included criminal gangs for violence at demonstrations, with the result that “the security force members had to fire back.” Three protesters have been fatally shot so far.
The protest movement has embraced nonviolence and has only occasionally gotten into shoving matches with police and thrown bottles at them when provoked.
In Yangon, the country’s biggest city and commercial capital, trucks cruised the streets Sunday night blaring announcements that people should not attend protests Monday and must honor a ban on gatherings of five or more people. The ban was issued shortly after the coup but not enforced in Yangon, which for the past two weeks has been the scene of large daily demonstrations.
Many social media postings ahead of the scheduled nightly 1 a.m. cutoff of internet access service said security forces had set up roadblocks at strategic points in the city. Information on Twitter accounts that have proven reliable in the past said the normal blocking of internet access from 1 a.m. to 9 a.m. would be extended to noon in Yangon.
Earlier Sunday, crowds in Myanmar’s capital attended a funeral for the young woman who was the first person confirmed to have been killed in the protests, while demonstrators also mourned two other protesters who were shot dead on Saturday. Mya Thwet Thwet Khine, 19, was shot in the head by police on Feb. 9 at a protest in Naypyitaw and died Friday.
Elsewhere in Myanmar, protesters against the coup that ousted the nation’s leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, again gathered at rallies across the nation.