YANGON, Myanmar: Seven Myanmar students were sentenced to three months in jail with hard labor for burning portraits of officials in protest over campus safety, a student activist said Wednesday, the latest draconian response to rippling discontent with authorities.
Those jailed were among dozens enacting a mock funeral on December 28 calling for more security at a Mandalay university in central Myanmar after a student’s murder near its campus.
They burned paper coffins and portraits of the city’s chief minister, Myanmar’s security and home affairs ministers, and the head of the university, calling for increased security around the students’ compound.
Three people were arrested during the protest and four others were detained a few days later, when they rallied for their peers’ release.
The seven students were each sentenced to a total of three months in prison with hard labor for protesting without permission and arson, student leader Ei Mon Khin told AFP by phone from the court.
“They will be taken to Obo prison in Mandalay later,” she said.
Time served will be deducted from their sentences, meaning they face a further one and a half months in jail.
This is one of several recent examples of a heavy-handed response to protests by authorities.
On Tuesday police fired rubber bullets and tear gas to disperse a crowd of several thousand in eastern Kayah state, the latest in a string of rallies against a statue of Aung San, father of civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
He is widely revered by the majority ethnic Bamar (Burmese) population as an independence hero, but is viewed critically among many ethnic minority groups, who see him as a symbol of Bamar domination.
Police agreed Tuesday evening to release dozens of arrested protesters in return for a suspension of the rallies while talks take place, state-run Global New Light of Myanmar reported, a development welcomed by rights groups.
“The Myanmar authorities have a long history of using excessive and lethal force against peaceful protesters,” said Fortify Rights CEO Matthew Smith.
“The government needs to break the trend now.”
Myanmar students sentenced to hard labor over protest
Myanmar students sentenced to hard labor over protest
- They burned paper coffins and portraits of the city’s chief minister, Myanmar’s security and home affairs ministers, and the head of a university
- “The Myanmar authorities have a long history of using excessive and lethal force against peaceful protesters,” a rights group CEO said
Zelensky says Russia using Belarus territory to circumvent Ukrainian defenses
- While President Lukashenko has vowed to commit no troops to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, he allowed Russia to use Belarusian territory to launch its February 2022 invasion of Ukraine
KYIV: President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Friday that Russia was using ordinary apartment blocks on the territory of its ally Belarus to attack Ukrainian targets and circumvent Kyiv’s defenses.
The Kremlin used Belarusian territory to launch its February 2022 invasion of Ukraine and Belarus remains a steadfast ally, though longstanding President Alexander Lukashenko has vowed to commit no troops to the conflict.
“We note that the Russians are trying to bypass our defensive interceptor positions through the territory of neighboring Belarus. This is risky for Belarus,” Zelensky wrote on Telegram after a military staff meeting.
“It is unfortunate that Belarus is surrendering its sovereignty in favor of Russia’s aggressive ambitions.”
Zelensky said Ukrainian intelligence had observed that Belarus was deploying equipment to carry out its attacks “in Belarusian settlements near the border, including on residential buildings.
“Antennae and other equipment are located on the roofs of ordinary five-story apartment buildings, which help guide ‘Shaheds’ (Russian drones) to targets in our western regions. This is an absolute disregard for human lives, and it is important that Minsk stops playing with this.”
The Russian and Belarusian defense ministries did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Zelensky said the staff meeting also discussed ways of financing interceptor drones, which officials in Kyiv see as the best economically viable means of tackling Russian drone attacks, which have grown in intensity in recent months.
The president said the Ukrainian military’s general staff had been charged with working out changes to strategy in fending off air attacks “to defend infrastructure and frontline positions.”
Lukashenko this month said Russia’s Oreshnik ballistic missile system, described by Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin as impossible to intercept, had been deployed to Belarus and entered active combat duty.
An assessment by two US researchers, reported by Reuters on Friday, said Moscow was likely stationing the nuclear-capable hypersonic Oreshnik at a former air base in eastern Belarus, a development that could bolster Russia’s ability to deliver missiles across Europe.
