YANGON: A close ally of detained Myanmar democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi died of leukaemia on Monday, a party source told AFP, days after being released from junta custody on health grounds.
Zaw Myint Maung, 72, who spent around two decades in prison for defying Myanmar’s military, was a close confidante of Suu Kyi and a lynchpin of the National League for Democracy (NLD).
He was arrested following the military’s latest coup in 2021 and jailed for corruption. He was recently released on health grounds.
“We got confirmation of his death. It’s a big loss for us as he was one of our NLD vice-chairmen,” a senior party source told AFP, requesting anonymity to speak to the media.
The source said Zaw Myint Maung had died of leukaemia.
“Although we were prepared we might lose him one day, we are sorry for losing him in this difficult situation. We have to move forward for democracy with the leaders we have.”
Zaw Myint Maung was detained along with other senior NLD figures following the 2021 coup that upended a 10-year experiment with democracy and returned the Southeast Asian nation to military rule.
In 1988 he led a doctors’ strike as part of huge pro-democracy uprisings that thrust Suu Kyi into the spotlight in Myanmar — then called Burma.
In 1989 he left his job in a university biochemistry department and joined the NLD.
The military later imprisoned him for around two decades for his activism.
After the generals enacted democratic reforms and the NLD won a landslide in the 2015 elections, he became the chief minister of the Mandalay region.
The year before the putsch Suu Kyi described him as a “real hardcore and a comrade who has been together with us since the very beginning [of our party].”
The 2021 coup sparked widespread armed opposition to military rule that the junta has failed to crush more than three years later.
Almost three million people have been forced from their homes by the conflict, according to the United Nations.
The junta’s crackdown on dissent has decimated the senior ranks of the NLD.
Months after the coup Nyan Win, a former NLD spokesman and Suu Kyi confidante died of Covid-19 while being held in military custody for sedition.
In 2022 another former lawmaker was executed by the junta in Myanmar’s first use of capital punishment in decades.
In March last year, the junta dissolved the NLD for failing to re-register under a tough new military-drafted electoral law, removing it from polls it has indicated it may hold in 2025.
Suu Kyi, 79, is serving a 27-year prison sentence on charges ranging from corruption to not respecting Covid-19 pandemic restrictions.
Rights groups say her closed-door trial was a sham designed to remove her from the political scene.
Last month Italian media reported that Pope Francis has offered refuge on Vatican territory to Suu Kyi, who led the government ousted by the military in 2021.
Close ally of Myanmar’s Suu Kyi dies of leukaemia: source
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Close ally of Myanmar’s Suu Kyi dies of leukaemia: source
US ‘totally stupid’ to attack Iran during talks: UN ambassador
- “War was not our option. War was imposed on Iran,” Bahreini told UN correspondents
- “Nobody should expect Iran to show restraint in front of aggression”
GENEVA: The United States made a “totally stupid decision” to attack Iran while in negotiations, and betrayed Gulf nations by trashing their diplomatic efforts, Tehran’s UN ambassador said Tuesday.
Ali Bahreini, Iran’s ambassador in Geneva, insisted Tehran had no problem with its neighbors, but could not let US bases in the Gulf be used as launchpads for attacks on Iran.
“War was not our option. War was imposed on Iran,” Bahreini told UN correspondents.
“Nobody should expect Iran to show restraint in front of aggression.
“We will continue our defense until the point that this aggression is stopped,” he said.
On February 26, Washington and Tehran held indirect negotiations in Geneva on Iran’s nuclear program — with the Omani mediators reporting “significant progress.”
Bahreini was present for part of those talks and said “everybody was optimistic” and the US team “agreed to continue negotiations” in Vienna this week.
But Bahreini said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had convinced US President Donald Trump to destroy diplomacy and attack Iran, with strikes starting on Saturday.
“It was a totally stupid decision. They will know in the future how stupid this decision has been. Both of them will understand, because Iran will firmly determine the situation and the destiny of this war,” he said.
“All our neighbors are now disappointed with the betrayal of the United States because everybody was working for diplomacy, particularly Oman.
“The US betrayed everybody.”
- ‘Not a regional war’ -
Tehran has launched strikes against countries in the region that host US bases.
“I cannot accept labelling what we are doing as reprisal. What we are doing is a kind of self-defense,” said Bahreini.
The ambassador said Iran’s problem was not with its neighbors, describing the Gulf countries as friends.
“We are in daily dialogue with our neighbors to convey to them the message that this war is not a war against our neighbors.
“This is not a regional war.
“But we cannot ignore the fact that the US bases in their lands are operational against us.
“In no way we can allow those bases to be used to make military operations against Iran.”
He said Iran’s operations were “exclusively” against US military targets, and said “there has been very serious order given to our military forces not to make any harm to civilians.”
Trump claimed Tuesday that the Iranian leadership “want to talk” but Bahreini insisted no approach had been made to Washington, saying “there hasn’t been any contact from our side” since the war erupted.
