Myanmar police have fired stun grenades to disperse protesters in the city of Yangon, witnesses said, as foreign ministers of neighbouring countries were due to hold talks with the military in an effort to quell the deadly violence.
The talks on Tuesday will come two days after the bloodiest day of unrest since the military removed Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government a month ago, unleashing anger and mass street protests across Myanmar.
Protesters – many wearing hard hats, thick gloves and goggles and holding makeshift shields – had gathered behind barricades in different parts of Yangon to chant slogans against military rule.
“If we’re oppressed, there will be explosion. If we’re hit, we’ll hit back,” the crowd chanted at one Yangon protest before police moved in to break up it up with stun grenades, witnesses said. There were no reports of any injuries.
“There is an anxious feeling,” said a 24-year-old demonstrator in a hardhat at Myaynigone Intersection. “No one knows what’s going to happen.”
Moments later police began firing stun grenades at the crowd she was in. In between the shots she said: “They are trying to scare us to get us to disperse.” Crowds also gathered in other parts of the country, media reported.
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Other sections of main roads in downtown Yangon were eerily silent yet tense, with armed riot police stationed in the middle of major junctions. Around Sule Pagoda, a rallying point for demonstrators in recent weeks, small numbers of pedestrians quickly passed.
At least 21 protesters have been killed since the turmoil began. The army said one policemen was killed.
Hundreds of people have been arrested since the coup, according to activists. Among them is a journalist for the Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), who livestreamed the arrival of security forces outside his apartment on Monday in the coastal town of Myeik, where he had been filming protests.
Loud bangs could be heard during Kaung Myat Hlaing’s live stream, which was hosted on DVB’s official Facebook page. “If you are shooting like this, how will I come down?” he shouted at the security forces outside.
DVB said it had “no knowledge of where he was taken away, and which military authority took him”, adding that Kaung Myat Hlaing’s latest reports were on a weekend military crackdown in Myeik, as well as on Monday’s demonstrations.
The outlet demanded Tuesday that the military release Kaung Myat Hlaing, as well as other journalists detained since the 1 February putsch. “They are all doing their professional jobs as journalists,” it said.
The coup halted Myanmar’s tentative steps towards democracy after nearly 50 years of military rule, and has drawn condemnation and sanctions from the United States and other western countries, and sparked concern among its neighbours.
Singapore foreign minister Vivian Balakrishnan said his counterparts in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) would be frank when they meet by video call on Tuesday and would tell a representative of Myanmar’s military they were appalled by the violence.
In a television interview late on Monday, Balakrishnan said Asean would encourage dialogue between Aung San Suu Kyi and the junta. “They need to talk, and we need to help bring them together,” he said.
The Asean grouping includes Myanmar, Singapore, the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Malaysia, Brunei and Vietnam.
The military justified the coup saying its complaints of fraud in a November election won by Aung San Suu Kyi’s party were ignored. The election commission said the vote was fair.
Junta leader Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, in remarks read on state television by a newscaster, said protest leaders and “instigators” would be punished, and threatened action against civil servants refusing to work.
Min Aung Hlaing has pledged to hold new elections and hand power to the winner but has given no time frame.
Asean’s effort to engage with Myanmar’s military has been criticised by some, with a committee of ousted Myanmar lawmakers declaring the junta a “terrorist” group and saying Asean’s engagement would give it legitimacy.
Sa Sa, the committee’s anointed envoy to the United Nations, said Asean should have no dealings with “this illegitimate military-led regime”.
Aung San Suu Kyi, 75, appeared at a court hearing via video link on Monday and looked in good health, one of her lawyers said. Two more charges were added to those filed against her after the coup, the lawyer said.
The Nobel peace laureate has not been seen in public since her government was toppled and she was detained along with other party leaders.
The United States warned Myanmar’s military on Monday that it would take more action if security forces killed unarmed people and attacked journalists and activists, which state department spokesperson Ned Price called “abhorrent violence”.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the Biden administration was preparing further measures against those responsible for the coup.
With Reuters and Agence France-Presse
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