By THE IRRAWADDY 4 April 2021

At least nine civilians and anti-regime protesters in Yangon who spoke to CNN on Friday remain in detention, although the junta told the US broadcaster that they had been released.

CNN reported on Saturday that Myanmar’s military authorities said they had been released but at least four women and a man remain in the Shwepyithar interrogation center, according to sources.

The witnesses recently told The Irrawaddy that seven civilians, including those who spoke to CNN reporter Clarissa Ward at Mingaladon market, were detained on Friday afternoon. Among the arrested were Ma Nay Zar Chi Shine, Ma Yin Thet Tin and Ma Phoo Mon Kyaw.

Two female protesters near Salminegone bazaar in Sawbwagyi Gone ward, Insein Township, were also detained after CNN’s visit on Friday.

According to a witness, personnel in plainclothes seized anyone seen protesting or speaking to CNN at Mingaladon market in Mingaladon Township after the reporters left on Friday.

A shopkeeper displaying a three-finger salute talks to. CNN’s reporter at Salminegone Bazaar in Yangon on Friday.
“We thought civilians were allowed to talk to CNN. But the security forces in civilian clothes had already been deployed to the market secretly,” the witness said.

On Friday morning, the CNN team visited the Salminegon bazaar in Insein after troops had been deployed to the area, a witness told The Irrawaddy.

When they saw the CNN team at the market, many traders and shoppers began protesting, banging pots and pans and shouting anti-regime slogans.

The protest swelled with drivers sounding horns and displaying three-finger salutes to the CNN crew.
As soon as the journalists left, a vehicle from the convoy returned and detained two female protesters, who were later reportedly released.

A lawyer who is assisting detainees told The Irrawaddy that he has been asked to help secure the release of two of the detainees from the CNN visit.

They’re also turning their rifles on anyone who tries to rescue shooting victims and treat their injuries. The message to medics, EMTs and nurses is clear: Leave the wounded on the ground or you might die too.



What began eight weeks ago as a coup — the military seizing total authority, dissolving elected officials’ power — has also become a protracted war on the masses. Police and soldiers have killed more than 500 civilians, some of them children, all to quell an uprising against army rule.

“We are not the enemy,” he said, “so why are soldiers shooting at us? All we want … is to save as many lives as possible.”

Targeting medical workers is not a fluke. It appears to be a strategy. It is difficult to determine just how many medics have been shot at, detained or threatened; several have been killed. Physicians for Human Rights believes these attacks are on the rise and William Ohkar Min, who is in touch with dozens of ambulance crews in Yangon, says they are growing more common.

-Troops in Myanmar opened fire on pro-democracy protesters on Wednesday, killing at least 15 people and wounding dozens, the latest victims of a campaign to crush opposition to the ruling military junta, activists and media said.

Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, leader of the army coup that ousted Myanmar’s elected government on Feb. 1, said the civil disobedience movement’s aim was “to destroy” the country.

But a London-based research group said the military was losing control.

In other unrest, a series of small blasts hit the commercial capital Yangon and a Chinese-owned factory was set on fire.

About 600 civilians have been killed by security forces in the turmoil since the coup, according to an activist group. Nationwide protests and strikes have persisted despite the bloodshed.

The military was now focusing its crackdown on rural areas,

The junta’s armed forces crushed a key protest stronghold in Bago’s Ma Ga Dit road in a pre-dawn attack on Friday resulting in what locals feared could be dozens of deaths, though it has not been possible to verify the exact number.

Soldiers have been stationed at the Zeyar Muni pagoda compound in the town and have taken dead bodies inside, Ye Htut, a protest group leader, told Myanmar Now based on his conversations with eyewitnesses.

There could be at least 57 dead bodies inside the pagoda compound as well as three bodies at a local morgue and one that was cremated immediately, the witnesses told him.

Myanmar’s junta on Friday refused to let a UN envoy visit, after she arrived in Bangkok in hopes of kick-starting diplomatic efforts to resolve the crisis in the country.

Christine Schraner Burgener, The UN special envoy for Myanmar, is on a tour of Asian countries aimed at charting a path out of the turmoil engulfing Thailand’s neighbour.

“Just arrived in BKK for talks. I regret that Tatmadaw answered me yesterday that they are not ready to receive me. I am ready for dialogue. Violence never leads to peaceful sustainable solutions,” Schraner Burgener said on her official Twitter account.

Since launching its coup on 1 February, the Myanmar military should have learned what voters also conveyed clearly at the ballot box in November: that the vast majority of the population does not want military rule and will do whatever it takes to prevent that outcome. Yet the military seems determined to impose its will, as shown by its use of ruthless violence against civilian protesters, medical first responders and the general urban population.

The upshot is that the coup has not yet succeeded and the regime has not been able to gain effective control of the government bureaucracy, or of local administration in the country. It is able to deploy violence, but not provide any semblance of law and order. This has important policy implications: close engagement with the CRPH, with those who are protesting in the streets, and with other legitimate representatives of the people, is vital. The military regime is not constitutional or otherwise legal, and countries and organisations should not pre-empt the situation by recognising its de facto authority when the coup is not a fait accompli.

But in the midst of all this horror, the transformative nature of the resistance against the military has to be acknowledged and applauded. A new generation of political action has emerged that has transcended old divisions and old prejudices, and gives great hope for a future Myanmar that embraces, and is at peace with, its diversity.

The actions of the regime are not just morally reprehensible. They are also extremely dangerous. Not only has the military been unable to consolidate its attempted coup and effectively govern the country, but also its actions may be creating a situation where the country becomes ungovernable. That should be of grave concern to the region and to the broader international community.

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.

Instead of engaging in journalism that serves viewers and the people of Myanmar, CNN made itself the story, misleadingly claiming exclusivity because “no other international journalists have been allowed into Myanmar”.

There was nothing stopping CNN from producing stories about the Myanmar coup before Ward’s trip.

To add insult to injury, Ward’s participation in this nightmare of a trip produced little to no information not previously reported by local journalists. CNN endangered 11 people and their families just to pursue celebrity-driven, parachute journalism that serves no purpose other than chasing higher ratings. Ward’s in-studio colleague gave it away when the first question he asked her on air was: “Tell us why it’s so important for you to be there.”

Both CNN and the Globe are now trying to justify their participation in a PR trip masterminded by Ari Ben-Menashe, an Israeli-Canadian lobbyist and alleged former arms dealer. The outlets have defended themselves by arguing that it was necessary for them to accept the military’s offer in order to cover the story of the Myanmar coup, that they could offer a “different perspective” on the story and that they could push back on the military’s claims harder and with less risk than journalists based in the country.

Both Ward and Mendelson are white women from North America who have positioned themselves as more capable of telling the story of a Southeast Asian nation better than those who have spent their entire lives there. While Mendelson has at least completed an internship in Myanmar before, Ward has almost no experience with the country.

It is the height of arrogance for these journalists, especially for Ward, who neither lives in nor focuses on Myanmar, to think they have anything unique to offer this story. It is also a reflection of the orientalism pervasive in the field of journalism that, time after time, it is white people who are chosen to speak for and about Asia and Asians. To have lack of experience counted as a marker of neutrality and objectivity, not as a disqualification, is a privilege apparently reserved for white people.