Mandalay: Two anti-coup protesters were shot dead by riot police who fired live rounds in Mandalay, Myanmar’s second-largest city, local media reported. One of the victims was shot in the head and died on the spot, according to Frontier Myanmar magazine. Another was shot in the chest and died en route to the hospital.
Many other serious injuries were also reported. The shootings occurred near Mandalay’s Yadanabon dock, where tear gas and rubber bullets were used on protesters. Security forces had been increasing their pressure against the protesters, using water cannons, tear gas, slingshots and rubber bullets against demonstrators and striking dock workers in Mandalay. At least five people were hurt by rubber bullets and had to be carried away in ambulances, according to reports.
Some 500 police and soldiers descended on the area near Yadanabon dock after dock workers joined the civil disobedience movement, refusing to work until the junta reinstates the democratically elected government. Protesters and residents were forced to flee the neighborhood amid the violence, as security forces chased after them.
A group of journalists was forced to flee after being hit with tear gas and slingshot projectiles. Gunshots were heard as more than two dozen police officers with shields and helmets marched past railway workers’ housing. Numerous videos posted on social media showed muzzle flashes as shots were heard, and some police shot slingshots and threw rocks at the buildings. Marching chants of “left, right, left, right” could be heard along with shouts of “shoot, shoot”.
Also, anti-coup protesters in Myanmar’s two largest cities paid tribute to a young woman who died a day earlier after being shot by police during a rally against the military takeover. An impromptu memorial created under an elevated roadway in Yangon attracted around 1,000 protesters. Reacting to the Mandalay shooting, the EU’s high representative and vice president Josep Borrell tweeted that he “strongly condemn(s) the violence”. Singapore, Myanmar’s largest investor, also said it was “dismayed.”
UN rapporteur Tom Andrews had said that he was alarmed by reports of soldiers being transported into Yangon, Myanmar’s biggest city. “In the past, such troop movements preceded killings, disappearances, and detentions on a mass scale,” he said in a statement issued by the UN Human Rights office in Geneva. “I am terrified that given the confluence of these two developments - planned mass protests and troops converging - we could be on the precipice of the military committing even greater crimes against the people of Myanmar.”
