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YANGON: International pressure on Myanmar’s military junta to halt its repression of pro-democracy supporters increased, with Asian countries joining Western world in condemning the lethal force.
Asian neighbours have also been speaking out to urge an end to the violence. Indonesian President Joko Widodo said he would ask Brunei’s Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah, the chairman of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), to call an urgent meeting.
Backing Indonesia’s call for a meeting, Malaysian Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin said he was appalled by the persistent use of lethal violence against unarmed civilians. Philippine foreign minister Teodoro Locsin said that ASEAN had to act.
Singapore has also spoken out against the violence and the coup that triggered it, calling for the release of Suu Kyi.
Opponents of Myanmar’s coup have planned more protests today Saturday as two more people were killed when soldiers opened fire overnight in the northern ruby mining town of Mogok.
The killing took the death toll since the Feb. 1 coup to 237, according to a tally by the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners activist group. The bloodshed has not quelled the anger over the ouster of the elected government and the detention of its leader, Aung San Suu Kyi.
“We protest where there are no police or military, then when we hear they’re coming, we disperse quickly,” a protestor told an international news agency. “I don’t want to lose a single one of my comrades but we’ll protest any way we can until our revolution prevails,” he added.
In other towns, people have been gathering at night to hold up candles and protest banners and pose for photographs before melting away. Authorities have tightened restrictions on internet services, making information increasingly difficult to verify, and clamped down on private media.
Meanwhile, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned what he denounced as the military’s continuing brutal violence. A “firm, unified international response” was urgently needed, his spokesman quoted him as saying.
U.N. rapporteur Tom Andrews called for sanctions to what he called the generals’ ruthless attacks on the people. “The world must respond by cutting their access to money and weapons. Now,” he wrote on Twitter.
