YANGON: Myanmar police have arrested two radical Buddhist nationalists and are seeking several more after they clashed with Muslims in the country’s commercial capital Yangon, underscoring the authorities’ growing concern over rising religious tensions.
The arrests came after nationalists led by the Patriotic Monks Union (PMU) raided flats on Tuesday in a Yangon district with a large Muslim population, igniting scuffles that were only broken up when police fired shots into the air. Two weeks ago, the same people had forced the closure of two Muslim schools.
“We have arrested two people, and are still looking for the rest of them,” said an officer in charge the police station in Yangon’s Mingalar Taung Nyunt district, where this week’s scuffles took place.
Brig. Gen. Mya Win, commander of Yangon’s regional police security command, said extra security forces had been deployed and the police were on high alert to prevent communal violence.
“We are patrolling around Muslim areas and have taken security measures around places of worship,” he said.
Leaders of the nationalist PMU said they were acting independently of the Ma Ba Tha, a larger radical Buddhist and anti-Muslim organization that counts among its leaders the firebrand monk Wirathu.
Ma Ba Tha holds its nationwide congress in Yangon, a city of more than 5 million that has been a focus of foreign investment since a former military government ceded power in 2012, in two weeks and is expecting about 10,000 monks to attend.
In both incidents, PMU monks and lay sympathizers targeted Muslim areas after attending a trial of fellow nationalists facing charges of inciting violence during a protest in front of the United States embassy in Yangon last year.
“We didn’t want any confrontation with the nationalists so we allowed them to shut down our schools,” said Tin Shwe, the chairman of the Muslim schools, referring to an incident on April 28. Tin Shwe, and a lawmaker from the ruling National League for Democracy, said the nationalists came to the schools with local administrators and policemen.
On Tuesday the group, again accompanied by local authorities and police, searched a building in a different part of Yangon shortly before midnight, claiming some Rohingya Muslims were staying there illegally.
Local residents confronted the nationalists, gathered in front of the building, prompting police officers to fire warning shots to break up the crowd.
A Yangon court issued the arrest warrant against seven people, including two monks, charging them with inciting communal violence, which carries a penalty of up to two years in prison.
At a news conference on Tuesday, organized shortly before the arrest warrants were issued, the nationalists vowed to keep fighting Muslim influence in the country, citing government reluctance to “protect race and religion” in Myanmar.
“We are protecting our people because government authorities are reluctant to do that. Even though many people hate us, we are not creating problems,” U Thuseikta, a monk and a senior official of the PMU, told reporters.
Tin Shwe, the Muslim community leader, said: “We want to get equal treatment and be protected by the government — we voted for them with our hands.”
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Myanmar arrests Buddhist nationalists accused of stoking tensions with Muslims
Myanmar arrests Buddhist nationalists accused of stoking tensions with Muslims
French court rejects bid to reopen probe into black man’s death in custody
PARIS: France’s top court on Wednesday ruled against reopening an investigation into the 2016 death of a young black man in police custody, confirming a previous decision to dismiss the case against three arresting officers.
The Court of Cassation’s decision definitively closes the case nearly a decade after the death of 24-year-old Adama Traore following his arrest in the Paris suburb of Beaumont-sur-Oise, a fatality that triggered national outcry over police brutality and racism.
Traore’s family was contesting a 2024 appeal court ruling confirming a prior decision to drop the case, after an investigation led to no charges against the military policemen — or gendarmes — involved and therefore no case in court.
A lawyer representing his family announced after Wednesday’s ruling they would take the case to the European Court of Human Rights to “have France convicted.”
Three gendarmes pursued the young man on July 19, 2016, when temperatures reached nearly 37C, pinning him down in an apartment, after which he told officers he was “having trouble breathing.”
He then fainted during the journey to a gendarmerie station, where he died.
’Probably’ not fatal
In 2023, French investigating magistrates dropped the case against the three gendarmes, in a ruling that was upheld on appeal in 2024.
They had been tasked with probing whether the three arresting officers used disproportionate force against Traore during a police operation targeting his brother, Bagui.
According to the magistrates, Traore’s death was caused by heatstroke that “probably” would not have been fatal without the officers’ intervention — though it concluded their actions were within legal bounds.
His family however has accused the gendarmes of failing to help the young man, who was found by rescue services unconscious and handcuffed behind his back.
In their appeal, Traore’s family criticized the justice system for not carrying out a reconstitution of events as part of the investigation.
But prosecutors requested that the appeal be dismissed.
Internal investigations
Activists have repeatedly accused French police of violence and racism, but few cases make it to criminal court in France as most are dealt with internally.
In January, several thousand people protested in Paris over the death in custody of a Mauritanian immigrant worker, El Hacen Diarra, 35, who died after passing out at a police station following his violent arrest.
Paris police launched an internal investigation after video filmed by neighbors, shared on social media, showed a policeman punching what appears to be a man on the ground as another officer stands by and watches.
In 2024, a judge gave suspended jail sentences to three officers who inflicted irreversible rectal injuries to a black man, Theo Luhaka, during a stop-and-search in 2017.
Prosecutors have also called for a police officer to be tried over the 2023 killing of a teenager at a traffic stop, in a case that sparked nationwide protests.
A court is to rule in March whether he will face a criminal trial over the killing of 17-year-old Nahel M.
Europe’s top rights court in June condemned France over its police discriminating against a young man during identity checks, in the first such ruling against the country over alleged racial profiling.
The Court of Cassation’s decision definitively closes the case nearly a decade after the death of 24-year-old Adama Traore following his arrest in the Paris suburb of Beaumont-sur-Oise, a fatality that triggered national outcry over police brutality and racism.
Traore’s family was contesting a 2024 appeal court ruling confirming a prior decision to drop the case, after an investigation led to no charges against the military policemen — or gendarmes — involved and therefore no case in court.
A lawyer representing his family announced after Wednesday’s ruling they would take the case to the European Court of Human Rights to “have France convicted.”
Three gendarmes pursued the young man on July 19, 2016, when temperatures reached nearly 37C, pinning him down in an apartment, after which he told officers he was “having trouble breathing.”
He then fainted during the journey to a gendarmerie station, where he died.
’Probably’ not fatal
In 2023, French investigating magistrates dropped the case against the three gendarmes, in a ruling that was upheld on appeal in 2024.
They had been tasked with probing whether the three arresting officers used disproportionate force against Traore during a police operation targeting his brother, Bagui.
According to the magistrates, Traore’s death was caused by heatstroke that “probably” would not have been fatal without the officers’ intervention — though it concluded their actions were within legal bounds.
His family however has accused the gendarmes of failing to help the young man, who was found by rescue services unconscious and handcuffed behind his back.
In their appeal, Traore’s family criticized the justice system for not carrying out a reconstitution of events as part of the investigation.
But prosecutors requested that the appeal be dismissed.
Internal investigations
Activists have repeatedly accused French police of violence and racism, but few cases make it to criminal court in France as most are dealt with internally.
In January, several thousand people protested in Paris over the death in custody of a Mauritanian immigrant worker, El Hacen Diarra, 35, who died after passing out at a police station following his violent arrest.
Paris police launched an internal investigation after video filmed by neighbors, shared on social media, showed a policeman punching what appears to be a man on the ground as another officer stands by and watches.
In 2024, a judge gave suspended jail sentences to three officers who inflicted irreversible rectal injuries to a black man, Theo Luhaka, during a stop-and-search in 2017.
Prosecutors have also called for a police officer to be tried over the 2023 killing of a teenager at a traffic stop, in a case that sparked nationwide protests.
A court is to rule in March whether he will face a criminal trial over the killing of 17-year-old Nahel M.
Europe’s top rights court in June condemned France over its police discriminating against a young man during identity checks, in the first such ruling against the country over alleged racial profiling.
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