Protest rages on despite crackdown
Protesters returned to the streets of Myanmar yesterday despite the shooting of a young woman the previous day, with some deploying humour to emphasise their peaceful opposition to this month's military takeover.
Mya Thwate Thwate Khaing, 19, was the first known serious casualty of the protests and her wounding rallied support for the movement seeking to reverse the Feb. 1 coup and free elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi and her allies from detention.
There were no reports of violence yesterday and in many places protests took on a festive air, with bare-chested body builders, women in ball gowns and wedding dresses, farmers in tractors and people with their pets.
Thousands joined protsters in the main city of Yangon, while in the capital, Naypyitaw, hundreds of government workers marched in support of a growing civil disobedience campaign.
A group of police in Kayah state in the east marched in uniform with a sign that said "We don't want dictatorship", according to pictures published in media.
The military, which has imposed restrictions on gatherings and a night curfew in the biggest cities, justified its takeover on the grounds of fraud in a Nov. 8 election that Suu Kyi's NLD party won by a landslide. The electoral commission dismissed the army's complaints.
Western countries have condemned the coup but taken little concrete action to press for the restoration of democracy.
The US State Department said it was reviewing assistance to Myanmar to ensure those responsible for the coup faced "significant consequences".
UN human rights investigator Thomas Andrews voiced concern at the use of lethal force. The United Nations main human rights body is set to consider a resolution on Friday that would condemn the coup in Myanmar and demand urgent access, a text shows.
Avinash Paliwal, a senior lecturer at London University's School of Oriental and African Studies, said Myanmar would not be as isolated now as it was in the past, with China, India, Southeast Asian neighbours and Japan unlikely to cut ties.
Underscoring that Asian stance, the prime minister of neighbouring Thailand, Prayuth Chan-ocha, himself a former army chief who seized power in a 2014 coup, said he had received a letter from Myanmar's new junta leader, army chief Min Aung Hlaing, asking for help to support democracy.
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