YANGON, Myanmar (AP) – Tension in clashes between authorities and protesters against last week’s coup in Myanmar rose on Monday as police fired a cannon at peaceful protesters in the capital Naypyitaw.
On Sunday, in the city of Myawaddy on Myanmar’s eastern border with Thailand, police fired in an obvious effort to disperse an agitated crowd. There were no initial reports of injuries, but the Association for Assistance to Political Prisoners, an independent security group, said a woman was shot without providing further details.
There were no signs that the protesters or the army had backed down in their confrontation over who the country’s legitimate government was: Aung San Suu Kyi’s party for the National League for Democracy, which won a landslide victory in the November elections. past or the junta that formed a week ago and claims that the polls were affected by voting fraud.
Nonviolent protests demanding the release of detained Suu Kyi and the re-establishment of her government have spread across the country, raising awareness after authorities lifted a brief ban on Internet access on Sunday.
The state media seems to have ignored the protests, but videos and reports of the demonstrations were posted by social media users.
There were reports of new protests Monday in northern Kachin state, southeastern Mon state, Tachileik, a border town in eastern Shan state, Naypyitaw and Mandalay, the country’s second-largest city, where there were both marches and and a procession of motorcycles. .
The protests in Naypyitaw over the past few days have been particularly unusual, as a large part of the city’s population are civil servants and their families. The city was built especially under a previous military government, has a heavy military presence and has no tradition of protesting the former capital, Yangon.
A morning protest in Yangon, Myanmar’s largest city, grew rapidly, with more than a thousand protesters marching at a major intersection in the city center.
They chanted slogans, raised a three-fingered salute and carried placards saying “Reject the military coup” and “Justice for Myanmar.” Some smaller groups broke away from the main protest and headed to Sule Pagoda, a rallying point for major protests against previous governing juntas.
On Sunday, the golden dome pagoda served as a rallying point for tens of thousands of protesters, as did protesters against military rule during a massive 1988 uprising and again during a 2007 uprising led by Buddhist monks.
The military used deadly force to end both riots, with estimates of hundreds, if not thousands, of people killed in 1988. While riot police followed protests last week, soldiers were absent and there were no reports of clashes. major.
Growing protests are a sharp reminder of the long and bloody struggle for democracy in a country that the military led directly for more than five decades before it lost control in 2012. The Suu Kyi government, which also won the elections landslide in 2015, was led for the first time by civilians in decades, although its power was limited by a military constitution.
A general strike call was launched late Sunday by several activist groups in Yangon, but it was unclear whether it was widely disseminated or adopted by the informally organized civil disobedience movement at the forefront of the protests.
The Myanmar Political Detainee Assistance Association, an independent security group, says 165 people, mostly politicians, have been detained since the February 1 coup, with only 13 released.
A foreigner has been confirmed to be detained by authorities, Sean Turnell, an economist at Macquarie University in Australia, who was an adviser to the Suu Kyi government. He was detained on Saturday in unclear circumstances.
A statement issued Monday by the office of Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne said he was given consular support and described him as “a highly regarded adviser, a member of the academic community”.
“We certainly believe he should be released immediately,” he said.
The military has accused Suu Kyi’s government of failing to respond to complaints that the November elections last year were marred by fraud, although the election commission said it had found no evidence to support the allegations.
Suu Kyi’s elected lawmakers have called for international recognition as the country’s government after meeting online on Friday to declare themselves the only legitimate representatives of the people. The military banned them from convening parliament last week.