-UN Chief condemns killing of Myanmar civilians during ‘brutal’ crackdown
DM Monitoring
YANGON: Myanmar security forces opened fire on Sunday, witnesses said, at people gathered for the funeral of one of the 114 people killed Saturday, the bloodiest day of protests since the military coup on Feb. 1. There were no immediate reports of casualties in the firing on the funeral in the town of Bago, near the commercial capital Yangon, according to three local people.
“While we are singing the revolution song for him, security forces just arrived and shot at us,” said a woman called Aye, who was at the service for Thae Maung Maung, a 20-year-old student who was shot on Saturday. “People, including us, run away as they opened fire.”
Three people were killed in firing on Sunday in separate incidents elsewhere, witnesses and news reports said. One person was killed when troops opened fire overnight on a group of protesters near the capital Naypyitaw, Myanmar Now news reported.
So far on Sunday there were no reports of large-scale protests in Yangon or in the country’s second city, Mandalay, which bore the brunt of the casualties on Saturday, Myanmar’s Armed Forces Day. Funerals were held in many places. At least six children between the ages of 10 and 16 were among those killed on Saturday, according to news reports and witnesses. Protesters call the victims “Fallen Stars”.
The bloodshed drew renewed Western condemnation. The U.N. Special Rapporteur for Myanmar said the army was carrying out “mass murder” and called on the world to isolate the junta and halt its access to weapons.United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has condemned “in the strongest terms,” the killing of dozens of civilians, including children and young people, by security forces in Myanmar on Saturday.
In a statement issued by Deputy Spokesman Farhan Haq, the UN chief said, “the continuing military crackdown…is unacceptable and demands a firm, unified and resolute international response”? Foreign criticism and sanctions imposed by some Western nations have failed so far to sway the military leaders, as have almost daily protests around the country since the junta took power and detained elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
“We salute our heroes who sacrificed lives during this revolution and We Must Win This REVOLUTION,” one of the main protest groups, the General Strike Committee of Nationalities (GSCN), posted on Facebook. Heavy fighting has also erupted between the army and the ethnic armed groups that control swathes of the country.
