12th April 2021
The bloodshed continues and in Bagon alone 83 civilians were killed by the junta using rifle grenades and machine guns. Bodies were loaded onto a dump truck and bodies were also deposited at a Buddhist pagoda.
In an action not seen since the 1988 uprising, an Imam was pulled from his mosque at 4 am in Yangon, maltreated, then dressed in women’s clothes and lipstick and hung. Pictures of his hanging body were released by the military as a warning.
Meanwhile,
Three ethnic armed groups that support Myanmar’s anti-junta protest movement killed 14 police officers and burned their station to the ground in a dawn raid on Saturday in northern Shan state, witnesses told RFA.
The slain policemen included the chief of the Naungmon police station south of Lashio, the largest city in northern Shan state, a region near the border with China where ethnic fighters have been in conflict with the Myanmar military for decades.
“Fourteen policemen, including the patrol station chief, were killed, and seven others were injured,” said an aid worker who spoke to RFA’s Burmese Service on condition of anonymity for security reasons.
“The entire police station was burned down. The officers’ families are sheltering in local monastery, and all dead bodies are now at Lashio military hospital,” said the relief worker, who helped retrieve the bodies of the dead patrolmen.
Source Radio Free Asia 10th April 2021
Across the country, in Tamu, Sagaing region,
At least 18 members of Myanmar’s security forces were killed by activists on Saturday afternoon after a civilian was shot in Tamu, Sagaing Region, on the Indian border.
A young man, who was not protesting, was shot dead when he and two friends were riding a motorbike, according to a Tamu resident. Another man was shot dead during the crackdown on Saturday afternoon. Residents said firing lasted from Saturday noon until Sunday morning.
“One was shot in the head and the other was hit in the back,” the resident said.
“Police and soldiers used grenade launchers, machine guns and explosives against us. We also heard 19 soldiers were killed when grenades were thrown into a military truck,” according to a Tamu protester.
Another resident said they heard the soldiers were killed by the town’s civil defense forces.
The Kuki National Organization (KNO) armed group issued a statement on Saturday night, saying 18 soldiers were killed in action by residents, protesters and KNO troops.
Source the Irrawaddy 11th April 2021
Elsewhere resistance to the coup is hardening in many ways.
A parallel government is fast taking shape in Myanmar as the Committee Representing the National Parliament (CRPH) attempts to restore civilian rule following the military’s democracy-suspending coup on February 1.
A vision for a “National Unity Government” is coming into view, one that – if fully realized – could upend the country’s military-led tradition of centralist rule.
This marks efforts to formalize an alliance between deposed lawmakers with the National League for Democracy (NLD), urban-based protesters and ethnic armed organizations (EAOs) based in the country’s borderlands.
The longer-term aim of the anti-junta alliance is to overturn the Tatmadaw’s bloody rule and introduce a new national federal political system. The CRPH presented a federal democracy charter on April 1 that aims to provide a platform for all actors in the opposition, including ethnic minority groups, to agree and coalesce.
Most international partners may think it prudent to wait out how broad an umbrella government the CRPH can put together to see also if it has any chance of surviving when the junta starts attacking affiliated EAO positions in earnest.
A weak National Unity Government will be crushed. Now the CRPH is in the course of building a national unity government and has announced an inclusive vision for the way forward. We can expect more movement on this front in the coming days.
We need to understand that formally recognizing the national unity government is not a decision made lightly as the junta may react by breaking off diplomatic relations and expelling diplomats of any country that recognizes the CRPH.
Maintaining channels of communication with the junta will be important to have continued influence over the outcome of the contest in Myanmar, in particular for those great powers like the US, India and Japan who see the coup in Myanmar through the prism of a New Cold War that looks to be building up with China in Southeast and East Asia.
But we see that there is movement now: for the first time on Thursday, the Chinese embassy in Yangon has made contact with the CRPH to discuss the way forward. I think we should not get ah The CRPH needs to get its National Unity Government off the ground quickly and convince its Western backers with influence in the region to lean on the Thai government to provide the necessary support it needs.
One argument there is that a military victory by the junta will not bring stability to Myanmar as the resistance will continue and may even turn more violent as time progresses. The Tatmadaw were never able to control all of Myanmar, and they will not be able to now.
Source Asia Times 12th April 2012.
Min Ko Naing, a veteran of the 1988 uprising gave an interview to Radio Free Asia.
I am very sympathetic to them. (The CRPH). I have experienced the same things over 30 years ago. The revolution we pursued faced a brutal crackdown. They shot and killed so many people that the bodies were piling up in the street. At that time, we felt that we were totally lost. Now, I see the same things happening to young people. They don’t even have 500 or 1000 kyats in their pockets, but they are scraping by to keep things going. I’ve heard about them all.
As I have said earlier, the CRPH should first consolidate a public administration. Then, they should work on the people’s security and then their defense. They should go to the territories where they can be safe. There are all kinds of training available in these territories. These territories will become ‘free zones’ where they can continue the fight against the military together with ethnic minorities. Those who remain in the cities will continue their fight by guerilla protests. The important thing is to keep showing our resistance.
As we are establishing a federal union, the forces we employ should be federal army forces. How will we get there? We should take several steps. We don’t want that to take a long time. But we cannot skip the necessary steps. We should be quick and, at the same time, should meet certain standards. That’s why these young people should travel to the safe zones I have mentioned, and they should join training programs. I think you know what kind of training I am talking about. They need to join hands with ethnic armed groups in these free zones.
In the next few days, we are going to announce the formation of a National Unity Government (NUG). We have a shared vision of removing this terrorist military council. All sorts of organizations will be included in this government. We have been busy bees in the past few days. We have been negotiating with all the groups at home and abroad.
In addition to the widely known ethnic armed groups, we are recruiting civic groups, and prominent actors, and so on. When it comes out, you will see how strong it is and how much support we have from our allies around the world. We also have plans to broadcast public TV programs. We have plans to disseminate the information through SMS messages even if internet connections are totally shutdown.
Source Radio Free Asia 11th April 2021
And a final comment from the Asia Times.
The purpose of that army will be to stretch Tatmadaw forces, inflict pain and deny them a clear and swift victory while CDM continues across central Myanmar and undermines discipline in the police and the Tatmadaw.
The proposition is that with enough pain inflicted and with cracks appearing in the totalitarian control of the leadership over its forces as they are stretched and undersupplied, and these forces having to continue to crack down on and kill civilians, something gives and eventually we will see desertions and defections.
Source Asia Times 12th April 2021
All this is very ominous for the Tatmadaw. They may well still win, but it will come at a heavy price.
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