MRAUK U: A Myanmar military air strike killed more than 30 people at a hospital, aid workers said Thursday, as the junta wages a withering offensive ahead of elections. The junta has increased air strikes year-on-year since the start of Myanmar&#39;s civil war, conflict monitors say, after snatching power in a 2021 putsch ending a decade-long democratic experiment. The military has set polls starting December 28 -- touting the vote as an off-ramp to fighting -- but rebels have pledged to block it from territory they control, which the junta is battling to claw back. A military jet bombed on Wednesday the general hospital of Mrauk-U in western Rakhine state, bordering Bangladesh, two aid workers said. A junta spokesman could not be reached for comment. At least 20 bodies were visible on the ground outside the hospital overnight, while daybreak revealed rubble covering ward beds, masonry peppered by shrapnel and the nearby ground cratered. &quot;This is an inhuman act. It is vile and violent,&quot; said aid worker Wai Hun Aung, who arrived on the scene on Thursday morning. He said 31 people were killed and 68 wounded. A separatist force gave a toll of 33 dead. &quot;They are saying that they will hold elections on December 28,&quot; the aid worker added. &quot;Even at this time, they are brutally killing the people.&quot; Health workers and patients were killed, and &quot;hospital infrastructure was severely damaged, with operating rooms and the main inpatient ward completely destroyed,&quot; said World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on X. - Mass mourning -Carpenter Maung Bu Chay said the strike killed three of his wife, and his daughter-in-law and her father. &quot;When someone informed me they were in the completely destroyed building, I realised they hadn&#39;t survived,&quot; said the 61-year-old. &quot;I feel resentful about their act. I feel strong anger and defiance in my heart.&quot; Locals hammered together plywood coffins outside a funeral hall where bodies lay inside, as mourners wept on their knees in a frenzy of grief. Hla Maung Oo, the chair of a local committee that organises free funerals, said the death toll of 31 included a months-old infant. &quot;We don&#39;t want this to happen again,&quot; he said. &quot;It should not happen like this.&quot; Rakhine state is controlled almost in its entirety by the Arakan Army (AA), an ethnic minority separatist force active long before the military toppled the civilian government of democratic leader Aung San Suu Kyi. The separatist force&nbsp;said in a statement that 33 people were killed and 76 wounded in the strike. - State of decline -The Arakan Army has emerged as one of the most powerful opposition groups in the civil war ravaging Myanmar, alongside other ethnic minority fighters and pro-democracy partisans who took up arms after the coup. Scattered rebels initially struggled to make headway before a trio of groups led a joint offensive starting in 2023, backfooting the military and prompting it to bolster its ranks with conscripted troops. The AA was a key participant in the so-called &quot;Three Brotherhood Alliance&quot; but its two other factions this year agreed Chinese-brokered truces, leaving it as the last one standing. While the military-run election has been widely criticised by monitors including the United Nations, Beijing has emerged as a key backer, saying it should &quot;restore social stability&quot; to its neighbour. The AA has proven a powerful adversary for the junta and now controls all but three of Rakhine&#39;s 17 townships, according to conflict monitors. But the group&#39;s ambitions are largely limited to their Rakhine homeland, hemmed in by the coast of the Bay of Bengal and jungle-clad mountains to the north. The group has also been accused of atrocities including against the mostly Muslim Rohingya ethnic minority from the region. Meanwhile the military has blockaded Rakhine, contributing to a humanitarian crisis which has seen &quot;a dramatic rise in hunger and malnutrition&quot;, the World Food Programme said in August.

Asia

A Myanmar military air strike killed more than 30 people at a hospital, as the junta wages a withering offensive ahead of elections

Myanmar junta air strike on hospital kills 31, aid workers say

KUALA LAMPUR: Malaysian authorities have recovered at least seven bodies after a boat carrying migrants capsized near the Thai border, a maritime agency official said on Sunday. Officials believe the boat was carrying undocumented migrants who departed from Myanmar, part of a group of at least 300 people that had split between several vessels. The boat that capsized near Thailand&#39;s Tarutao Island and just north of Malaysia&#39;s island resort of Langkawi was carrying some 90 people, Kedah state police chief Adzli Abu Shah told Malaysian media. Romli Mustafa, director of the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency in the northern states of Kedah and Perlis, said in a statement that three survivors were found on Sunday in the waters around Langkawi as well as six bodies, taking the overall death toll to seven. At least 13 people have been rescued alive. Romli said the bodies recovered Sunday were of a girl and five women, without disclosing their nationality or ethnicity. A body found on Saturday is believed to be of a woman from Myanmar&#39;s persecuted Rohingya minority, Adzli told the Bernama national news agency. The search and rescue effort ended for the day and will resume on Monday, Romli added, saying it was possible more survivors or victims could be found at sea. The boat likely went down three days ago, according to the state police chief. Two other vessels, believed to be carrying some of the group of 300 migrants who had departed from Myanmar, have also been reported missing, Adzli was quoted as saying by the Free Malaysia Today news website. He said preliminary investigations showed that the group boarded a large vessel that carried them into waters close to Malaysia. &quot;As they neared the border they were instructed to transfer onto three smaller boats, each carrying around 100 people,&quot; he told Bernama. &quot;We have requested the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency and the Marine Police to launch search and rescue operations and to look for the other missing boats,&quot; Adzli said, quoted by the New Straits Times. The Malaysian police force did not respond to AFP&#39;s requests for comment. Relatively affluent Malaysia is home to millions of migrants from poorer parts of Asia, many of them undocumented, working in industries including construction and agriculture. But the crossings, facilitated by human trafficking syndicates, are often hazardous, leading to boats capsizing. &quot;Cross-border syndicates are now increasingly active in exploiting migrants by making them victims of human trafficking using high-risk sea routes,&quot; Romli said. Syndicates charge up to $3,500 per person for passage into the country, Malaysian media said. In one of the worst months, in December 2021, more than 20 migrants drowned in several incidents off the Malaysian coast.

At least seven migrants, mostly women and a child, died after a boat from Myanmar capsized near Malaysia’s Langkawi Island. Authorities rescued survivors and continue searching for missing vessels linked to suspected human trafficking syndicates.

Migrant shipwreck off Malaysia kills at least seven

Reuters

BANGKOK: Myanmar civil society groups said on Tuesday they are suing the Norwegian telecoms giant Telenor, alleging it shared customer data with the Southeast Asian nation&rsquo;s ruling military that allowed the junta to track, imprison and kill civilians. The firm, which is majority-owned by the Norwegian government, sold its business in Myanmar after the 2021 military coup that unseated an elected government, to avoid European Union sanctions after pressure from the junta to activate intercept surveillance technology. The claimants allege Telenor, which was one of the largest foreign investors in the Southeast Asian nation, handed over data from some of its 18 million customers to comply with requests from the military before selling to a new majority-owner with a history of business ties to the military. Telenor said in a statement to Reuters that it did not see anything in the legal notice that had not already been addressed including in previous police and court investigations in Norway. It said the company found itself in a &quot;terrible and tragic situation&quot; in Myanmar with &quot;no good options&quot; as disobeying orders from the junta would have &quot;been perceived as terrorism and sabotage, and would have put employees in direct danger.&quot; &quot;Like all operators in any country, Telenor Myanmar was legally required to provide traffic data to the authorities,&quot; the company said. Joseph Wilde-Ramsing of the Center for Research on Multinational Corporations (SOMO), a nonprofit organisation working with the civil society groups, said the data handed over included &quot;call logs and location data that could be used to track down the junta&#39;s political opponents and their family members&quot;. In a statement, the groups said they had sent a pre-action letter to Telenor, the first step in bringing a lawsuit, a copy of which was seen by Reuters. They said the sale of Telenor to majority-owner Shwe Byain Phyu in March 2022 effectively granted the military &quot;unfettered access&quot; to customer data. Shwe Byain Phyu did not immediately respond to requests for comment, nor did Myanmar&rsquo;s military government. LAWMAKER EXECUTEDMyanmar has been in crisis since the coup and ensuing military crackdown on protests, which sparked a nationwide armed rebellion. The junta has killed almost 7,000 people and arrested close to 30,000, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, a nonprofit monitoring group. The military denies accusations it has targeted civilians and says it is fighting &quot;terrorists&quot;. The civil society groups bringing the lawsuit, Defend Myanmar Democracy and the Myanmar Internet Project, said several people were arbitrarily detained and tortured in custody after their Telenor data was shared and at least one person was killed. Phoe Zeya Thaw, a popular hip hop artist and lawmaker, was executed alongside three other activists accused of helping carry out &quot;terror acts&quot; in 2022, prompting an international outcry. The lawmaker&rsquo;s wife, Tha Zin, who is among the claimants, said in the statement she was &ldquo;terribly disturbed and shocked&rdquo; by Telenor&rsquo;s link to his arrest, which she said came a few weeks after the firm passed data from his cell phone to the military. The statement did not cite specific evidence but a lawyer at Simonsen Vogt Wiig, the firm representing the groups, said the decision to hand over data went &quot;all the way to the top&quot; of Telenor. Ko Ye, another claimant in the lawsuit, told Reuters many Myanmar people chose to use Telenor&#39;s network because they believed it was the safest option due to its international connections. &quot;Those corporations they have to respect our rights. Our data is part of our rights, they cannot do whatever they want,&quot; he said.

Business

Myanmar civil society groups are suing Norway’s Telenor, alleging it shared customer data with the military, enabling arrests and killings after the 2021 coup. Telenor denies wrongdoing, citing legal obligations and threats to employee safety.

Myanmar groups to sue Telenor over data sharing with junta

UNITED NATIONS: Rohingya Muslims pleaded with the international community at the first United Nations high-level meeting on the plight of the ethnic minority to prevent the mass killings taking place in Myanmar and to help those in the persecuted group lead normal lives. &ldquo;This is a historic occasion for Myanmar, but this is long overdue,&rdquo; Wai Wai Nu, the Rohingya founder and executive director of the Women&rsquo;s Peace Network-Myanmar, told ministers and ambassadors from many of the UN&rsquo;s 193-member nations in the General Assembly Hall. The Rohingya and other minorities in Myanmar have suffered decades of displacement, oppression and violence, while seeing no action in response to determinations that they are victims of genocide, she said. &ldquo;That cycle must end today,&quot; Wai Wai Nu said. Buddhist-majority Myanmar has long considered the Rohingya Muslim minority to be &ldquo;Bengalis&rdquo; from Bangladesh, even though their families have lived in the country for generations. Nearly all have been denied citizenship since 1982. In August 2017, attacks by a Rohingya insurgent group on Myanmar security personnel triggered a brutal campaign by the military that drove at least 740,000 Rohingya to Bangladesh. The military is accused of mass rape, killings and burning villages, and the scale of its operation led to accusations of ethnic cleansing and genocide from the international community, including the UN. Myanmar has been wracked by violence since the military ousted the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February 2021 and brutally suppressed nonviolent protests. That triggered armed resistance and fighting across the country by pro-democracy guerrillas and ethnic minority armed forces seeking to oust the military rulers, including in western Rakhine state, where tens of thousands of Rohingyas still live, many confined to camps. The United States in 2022 said it had determined that members of the Myanmar military committed crimes against humanity and genocide against the Rohingya. UN refugee chief Filippo Grandi, who recently visited Myanmar, told the high-level meeting on Tuesday that Bangladesh is now hosting close to 1.2 million Rohingya refugees, and since fighting reignited in Rakhine in 2024 between the military and the Arakan Army, an additional 150,000 have sought safety in the neighbouring country. The Arakan Army, the well-armed military wing of the Rakhine ethnic minority, which seeks autonomy, now controls almost all of Rakhine state, Grandi said, and the situation of the Rohingya there has not improved. They still face discrimination, the burning of their villages, exclusion from work, a ban on moving freely, restricted education and health care and the threat of arrest, he said. &ldquo;They are subjected to forced labor and forced recruitment&rdquo;, and &ldquo;their lives are defined every day by racism and fear,&quot; Grandi said. Julie Bishop, the UN special envoy for Myanmar, said there was little sign that the political crisis could be settled, with no agreed ceasefire, pathway to peace or political solution. The government is preparing for elections starting in late December, but UN human rights chief Volker Turk said they will not reflect the will of the people or create a foundation for lasting peace. The election will be held under military control, the Rohingya can&rsquo;t vote because they have been deprived of citizenship, and ethnic Rakhine parties have been disqualified from running. Rofik Huson, founder of the Arakan Youth Peace Network, told the assembly that despite decades of persecution, the Rohingya&rsquo;s &ldquo;deepest wish&rdquo; is to live in their ancestral homeland, Myanmar, in peace and security. &ldquo;Yet, the past decade has shown that it&rsquo;s not possible for us without international support, without international pressure,&rdquo; he said. He called for the creation of a UN-supervised safe zone in northern Rakhine state along the border with Bangladesh. Maung Sawyeddollah, founder of the Rohingya Student Network, speaking in an impassioned voice, said that without self-determination for the Rohingya and international protection in Rakhine, there can be no lasting peace. &ldquo;The UN must mobilize resources to empower Rohingya,&quot; he told world leaders. General Assembly President Annalena Baerbock, who chaired the meeting, ended it saying, &ldquo;Today is just a starting point, we have to do more.&rdquo; She promised an action-oriented follow-up.

Rohingya leaders at the UN urged global action to end decades of persecution in Myanmar, calling for protection, citizenship, and justice. Ongoing violence and discrimination continue to displace thousands and deny them basic rights.

Articles tagged with "Myanmar"

Myanmar junta air strike on hospital kills 31, aid workers say

Migrant shipwreck off Malaysia kills at least seven

Myanmar groups to sue Telenor over data sharing with junta

Rohingya Muslims plead for help at the UN to stop killings in Myanmar