Myanmar’s ousted leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, has been remanded in custody until Wednesday, not Monday as previously thought, her lawyer told media, as protesters began gathering again to demand her release and an end to military rule.
Security forces in Myanmar deployed armored vehicles in major cities two weeks after the military overthrew Suu Kyi’s government and detained her on charges of illegally importing six walkie-talkie radios.
Her detention was due to expire on Monday but her lawyer, Khin Maung Zaw, told media a judge at a court in the capital, Naypyitaw, had said she was remanded until Feb. 17.
“Whether it is fair or not, you can decide yourself,” Khin Maung Zaw said.
A member of the lawyer’s team said the judge had spoken to Suu Kyi via video conferencing and she had asked if she could hire a lawyer.
The Feb. 1 coup and the arrest of Suu Kyi and others have sparked the biggest protests in Myanmar in more than a decade.
Hundreds of thousands have taken to the streets across the country for 10 days to denounce the coup, which derailed the Southeast Asian country’s tentative transition to democracy, and to call for Suu Kyi’s release.
The unrest has revived memories of bloody outbreaks of opposition to almost half a century of direct army rule, which ended when the military began a process of withdrawing from civilian politics in 2011.
Violence this time has been limited but on Sunday, police opened fire to disperse protesters at a power plant in northern Myanmar although it was unclear if they were using rubber bullets or live rounds and there was no word on casualties.
As well as the demonstrations around the country, the military is facing a strike by government workers, part of a civil disobedience movement that is crippling many functions of government.
More than a dozen police trucks with four water cannon vehicles were deployed on Monday near the Sule Pagoda in central Yangon, which has been one of the main demonstration sites in the commercial capital, as groups of protesters began gathering peacefully outside the central bank and the Chinese embassy.
At the bank, several hundred protesters held up signs calling for colleagues to join the CDM – the civil disobedience movement – and stating their refusal to accept the coup.
An armored vehicle and about six trucks carrying soldiers were parked nearby, a witness said.
Domestic media showed protesters gathering in the capital, Naypyitaw, many carrying pictures of Suu Kyi with the message: “we want our leader.”
Suu Kyi, 75, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991 for campaigning for democracy and spent nearly 15 years under house arrest.
The government and army could not be reached for comment.
Shortly after midnight, residents reported an Internet outage until about 9 a.m., when connections were restored.
In the early days after the coup, the Internet was cut across the country.
The army has been carrying out nightly arrests and on Saturday gave itself sweeping powers to detain people and search private property. On Sunday, it published penal code amendments aimed at stifling dissent.
“It’s as if the generals have declared war on the people,” UN Special Rapporteur Tom Andrews said on Twitter.
“Late night raids; mounting arrests; more rights stripped away; another Internet shutdown; military convoys entering communities. These are signs of desperation. Attention generals: You WILL be held accountable.”
Western embassies – from the European Union, Britain, Canada and 11 other nations – issued a statement late on Sunday calling on security forces to “refrain from violence against demonstrators and civilians, who are protesting the overthrow of their legitimate government.”
The amendments to the penal code set out a 20-year prison term for inciting hatred of the government or military or hindering the security forces engaged in preserving state stability.
Hindering the security forces carrying out their duties is punishable by seven years in prison while spreading fear, fake news or agitating against government employees gets three years, according to the amendments posted on a military website.
In the latest sign of disruption by workers, the Department of Civil Aviation said in a statement many staff had stopped coming to work since Feb. 8, causing flight delays.
Some trains have also stopped running, media reported.
The junta has ordered civil servants back to work, threatening action.
At least 400 people have been detained since the coup, the monitoring group Assistance Association for Political Prisoners said.
Suu Kyi’s party won a 2015 election and another on Nov. 8 but the military said the vote was marred by fraud and used that complaint to justify their coup. The electoral commission dismissed accusations of fraud.
Aung San Suu Kyi’s detention extended as Myanmar protests continue
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Aung San Suu Kyi’s detention extended as Myanmar protests continue
- Security forces deploy armored vehicles in major cities after the military overthrew Aung San Suu Kyi’s government
- Hundreds of thousands have taken to the streets across the country
A British-Palestinian doctor was denied entry to France for a Senate meeting about the war in Gaza
Abu Sitta posted on social networks that he was denied entry in France because of a one-year ban by Germany on his entry to Europe
PARIS: A well-known British-Palestinian surgeon who volunteered in Gaza hospitals said he was denied entry to France on Saturday to speak at a French Senate meeting about the Israel-Hamas war. Authorities wouldn’t give a reason for the decision.
Dr. Ghassan Abu Sitta was placed in a holding zone in the Charles de Gaulle airport and will be expelled, according to French Sen. Raymonde Poncet Monge, who had invited him to speak at the Senate.
‘’It’s a disgrace,’’ she posted on X.
Abu Sitta posted on social networks that he was denied entry in France because of a one-year ban by Germany on his entry to Europe. Germany denied him entry last month, and France and Germany are part of Europe’s border-free Schengen zone. He posted Saturday that he was being sent back to London.
The French Foreign Ministry, Interior Ministry, local police and the Paris airport authority would not comment on what happened or give an explanation.
Abu Sitta had been invited by France’s left-wing Ecologists group in the Senate to speak at a colloquium Saturday about the situation in Gaza, according to the Senate press service. The gathering included testimony from medics, journalists and international legal experts with Gaza-related experience.
Last month Abu Sitta was denied entry to Germany to take part in a pro-Palestinian conference. He said he was stopped at passport control, held for several hours and then told he had to return to the UK He said airport police told him he was refused entry due to “the safety of the people at the conference and public order.”
Abu Sitta, who recently volunteered with Doctors Without Borders in Gaza, has worked during multiple conflicts in the Palestinian territories, beginning in the late 1980s during the first Palestinian uprising. He has also worked in other conflict zones, including in Iraq, Syria and Yemen.
France has seen tensions related to the Mideast conflict almost daily since the deadly Oct. 7 Hamas incursion into Israel. In recent days and weeks police have cleared out students at French campuses holding demonstrations and sit-ins similar to those in the United States.
Afghanistan’s only female diplomat resigns in India after gold smuggling allegations
- Zakia Wardak, the Afghan consul-general for Mumbai, announced her resignation on her official account on the social media platform X
- According to Indian media reports, she has not been arrested because of her diplomatic immunity
ISLAMABAD: Afghanistan’s diplomat in India, who was appointed before the Taliban seized power in 2021 and said she was the only woman in the country’s diplomatic service, has resigned after reports emerged of her being detained for allegedly smuggling gold.
Zakia Wardak, the Afghan consul-general for Mumbai, announced her resignation on her official account on the social media platform X on Saturday after Indian media reported last week that she was briefly detained at the city’s airport on allegations of smuggling 25 bricks of gold, each weighing 1 kilogram (2.2 pounds), from Dubai.
According to Indian media reports, she has not been arrested because of her diplomatic immunity.
In a statement, Wardak made no mention of her reported detention or gold smuggling allegations but said, “I am deeply sorry that as the only woman present in Afghanistan’s diplomatic apparatus, instead of receiving constructive support to maintain this position, I faced waves of organized attacks aimed at destroying me.”
“Over the past year, I have encountered numerous personal attacks and defamation not only directed toward myself but also toward her close family and extended relatives,” she added.
Wardak said the attacks have “severely impacted my ability to effectively operate in my role and have demonstrated the challenges faced by women in Afghan society.”
The Taliban Foreign Ministry did not immediately return calls for comment on Wardak’s resignation. It wasn’t immediately possible to confirm whether she was the country’s only female diplomat.
She was appointed consul-general of Afghanistan in Mumbai during the former government and was the first Afghan female diplomat to collaborate with the Taliban.
The Taliban — who took over Afghanistan in 2021 during the final weeks of US and NATO withdrawal from the country — have barred women from most areas of public life and stopped girls from going to school beyond the sixth grade as part of harsh measures they imposed despite initial promises of a more moderate rule.
They are also restricting women’s access to work, travel and health care if they are unmarried or don’t have a male guardian, and arresting those who don’t comply with the Taliban’s interpretation of hijab, or Islamic headscarf.
Russia puts Ukraine's Zelensky on wanted list, TASS reports
- Russia has issued arrest warrants for a number of Ukrainian and other European politicians
MOSCOW: Russia has opened a criminal case against Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and put him on a wanted list, the state news agency TASS reported on Saturday, citing the Interior Ministry's database.
The entry it cited gave no further details.
Russia has issued arrest warrants for a number of Ukrainian and other European politicians since the start of the conflict with Ukraine in February 2022.
Russian police in February put Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, Lithuania's culture minister and members of the previous Latvian parliament on a wanted list for destroying Soviet-era monuments.
Russia also issued an arrest warrant for the International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor who last year prepared a warrant for President Vladimir Putin on war crimes charges.
A Chinese driver is praised for helping reduce casualties in a highway collapse that killed 48
- Reacting swiftly, Wang, a former soldier, positioned his truck to block the highway, effectively stopping dozens of vehicles from advancing into danger
- His wife got out of the truck to alert other drivers about the situation
BEIJING: A Chinese truck driver was praised in local media Saturday for parking his vehicle across a highway and preventing more cars from tumbling down a slope after a section of the road in the country’s mountainous south collapsed and killed at least 48 people.
Wang Xiangnan was driving Wednesday along the highway in Guangdong province, a vital economic hub in southern China. At around 2 a.m., Wang saw several vehicles moving in the opposite direction of the four-lane highway and a fellow driver soon informed him about the collapse, local media reported.
Reacting swiftly, Wang, a former soldier, positioned his truck to block the highway, effectively stopping dozens of vehicles from advancing into danger, Jiupai News quoted Wang as saying. Meanwhile, his wife got out of the truck to alert other drivers about the situation, it said.
“I didn’t think too much. I just wanted to stop the vehicles,” Wang told the Chinese news outlet.
Wang’s courageous actions not only garnered praise from Chinese social media users but also recognition from the China Worker Development Foundation.
The foundation announced Friday that in partnership with a car company it had awarded Wang 10,000 yuan ($1,414). A charity project linked to tech giant Alibaba Group Holding also gave an equal amount to Wang, newspaper Dahe Daily reported. Wang told the newspaper he would donate the money to the families of the collapse victims.
Local media also reported that another man had knelt down to prevent cars from proceeding on the highway.
The accident came after a month of heavy rains in Guangdong. Some of the 23 vehicles that plunged into the deep ravine burst in flames, sending up thick clouds of smoke.
About 30 people were hospitalized. On Saturday, one was discharged from the hospital, state broadcaster CCTV reported. The others were improving, but one remains in serious condition.
On Saturday, the Meizhou city government in Guangdong said in a statement that authorities would conduct citywide checks on expressways, railways and roads in mountainous areas. A team led by the provincial governor is investigating the cause of the collapse, Southcn.com reported.
The Chinese government had sent a vice premier to oversee recovery efforts and urged better safety measures following calls by President Xi Jinping and the Communist Party’s No. 2 official, Premier Li Qiang, to swiftly handle the tragedy.
The dispatch of Zhang Guoqing, who is also a member of one of the ruling Communist Party’s leading bodies, illustrates the concern over a possible public backlash over the disaster, the latest in a series of deadly infrastructure failures.
Russia says it shot down four US-made long range missiles over Crimea
- The ATACMS missiles, with a range up to 300km were used for the first time in the early hours of April 17
MOSCOW: The Russian defense ministry said on Saturday its air defense forces shot down four US-produced long-range missiles over the Crimea peninsular, weapons known as Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) that Washington has shipped to Ukraine in recent weeks.
The ministry said later that Russian aircraft and air defense systems had downed a total of 15 ATACMS in the past week.
On Tuesday, Russian officials said Ukraine had attacked Crimea with ATACMS in an attempt to pierce Russian air defenses of the annexed peninsula but that six had been shot down.
A US official said in Washington last month that the United States secretly shipped long-range missiles to Ukraine in recent weeks.
The ATACMS missiles, with a range up to 300km were used for the first time in the early hours of April 17, launched against a Russian airfield in Crimea that was about 165 km (103 miles) from the Ukrainian front lines, the official said.
The Pentagon initially opposed the long-range missile deployment, concerned that taking the missiles from the American stockpile would hurt US military readiness.
There were also concerns that Ukraine would use them to attack targets deep inside Russia, a step which could lead to an escalation of the war toward a direct confrontation between Russia and the United States.
Separately on Saturday, the Russian defense ministry said that in the last week its forces had destroyed a military train carrying equipment and arms produced in the West and supplied to Ukraine by NATO.
The scale of the damage, exact date and location were not disclosed.
Reuters is not immediately able to corroborate battlefield accounts from either side.
On Thursday, British Foreign Secretary David Cameron promised 3 billion pounds ($3.7 billion) of annual military aid for Ukraine for “as long as it takes,” adding that London had no objection to its weapons being used inside Russia, drawing a strong rebuke from Moscow.
