Tag: Myanmar

The military junta that controls Myanmar nominally transferred power to an interim government on Thursday ahead of a planned election in December and January. A state of emergency that was due to expire Thursday after seven extensions was lifted, Zaw Min Tun, a government spokesman, told state media. The decree had given legislative, judicial, and executive powers to Min Aung Hlang as head of the ruling military council. But state media reported late Thursday that martial law and a state of emergency would be imposed in more than 60 townships…

Rohingya rights groups on Thursday decried “regional inaction and global neglect” over the plight of the Muslim minority from Myanmar after more than 400 refugees were feared drowned when two boats sank this month after setting sail from Bangladesh. Last week, the U.N. refugee agency said that while details remained unclear, it had collected reports from family members and others about two separate boat tragedies on May 9 and May 10 in which 427 people may have died. It said both boats left from Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, where about 1…

BANGKOK – A month after a deadly earthquake triggered the collapse of a high-rise construction site in Bangkok, labor rights groups say the disaster has exposed long-standing flaws in Thailand’s construction sector – particularly its failure to protect the migrant workers who keep it running. On the day of the quake, more than 100 workers were inside a 32-story unfinished tower when tremors from a 7.7-magnitude earthquake in neighboring Myanmar shook the Thai capital, causing the building to crumble. Many of those trapped were migrant workers from Myanmar, drawn to…

Myanmar’s ousted civilian government called for international intervention, accusing the military regime of committing “war crimes” by killing nearly 400 people within a month, despite the junta’s declaration of a ceasefire on April 2. From April 3 to May 13, junta airstrikes across 11 of Myanmar’s 14 territories have killed a total of 182 people and injured 298, said the National League for Democracy, or NLD, the party that won a landslide in the 2020 election but was ousted in a coup the following year. The majority of attacks have…

A junta jet bombed a rebel-controlled village in western Myanmar on Tuesday, killing more than a dozen civilians, an official from the Arakan Army, or AA, and residents told Radio Free Asia. The AA, which controls 14 of Rakhine State’s 17 townships, has faced escalating junta assaults involving airstrikes, village burnings, travel restrictions, and the blocking of vital supplies such as food and medicine. In AA-controlled Rathedaung township, a junta jet bombed Htun Ya Wai village just after 10 a.m., a person close to the AA told RFA. “13 dead…

Junta forces bombed a school in central Myanmar, killing more than a dozen children, the country’s exiled civilian administration told Radio Free Asia on Monday. A jet fired at Sagaing region’s Oe Htein Kwin village in Tabayin township, which is under rebel control. “As far as we know now, 17 young students have died and more than 20 were injured. Some are still missing because of the bomb, so the death toll could be higher,” said Nay Bone Latt, a spokesperson for the prime minister’s office of the National Unity…

Myanmar’s military launched attacks on four villages in northern Myanmar controlled by an insurgent group, according to a statement published by rebels on Friday, despite both armies agreeing to a ceasefire extension only days earlier. A junta plane attacked villages in Shan state’s Nawnghkio township, bombing Ya Pyin and Tha Yet Cho from Monday to Thursday, according to a statement from the Ta’ang National Liberation Army, or TNLA, which controls the area. International rights groups and insurgents have criticized junta forces for repeatedly violating their own ceasefire declared on April…

Junta airstrikes on villages in southeast Myanmar destroyed a hospital and forced over 8,000 residents from their homes, leaving them in urgent need of aid, according to an insurgent administration opposing the military. Junta forces on Monday extended their ceasefire until the end of May, citing the need to help restoration efforts following the country’s 7.7 magnitude earthquake. Military forces have launched hundreds of attacks across the country since then, killing more than 200 people. Heavy artillery fired at the Bago region and Mon state border have left thousands in…

Read RFA coverage of this topic in Burmese. Myanmar residents forced to flee their homes for camps across the border in Thailand are facing growing hardship amid cuts to international aid, with more than 108,000 people now struggling to access stable food supplies, civil society organizations told Radio Free Asia on Wednesday. Predominantly ethnic Karen from eastern Myanmar’s Kayin state, facing brutal village burnings and airstrikes by the junta, have fled en masse to camps in Thailand, where many have lived for years seeking refugee status with no access to…

Read RFA coverage of this topic in Burmese. Myanmar’s military junta on Tuesday extended a post-quake ceasefire that critics say exists in name only amid a floundering effort to help disaster victims. The junta, which seized power in a 2021 coup and is at war with dozens of resistance groups nationwide, initially declared a ceasefire from April 2-30 following the Mar. 28 earthquake. The magnitude 7.7 quake devastated the central Sagaing and Mandalay regions and killed more than 3,700 people. The military government said the ceasefire was extended until the…