The Burmese junta carried out the execution of four prisoners, the first in more than 30 years, despite local and international pressure to commute the sentences to life imprisonment. The four condemned had seen their appeal rejected at the beginning of June.
The convicts, including an active pro-democracy activist, were charged with ” brutal and inhuman acts of terror “, according to Global New Light of Myanmar. According to the official gazette, the executions followed “ prison procedures “, without specifying either how or when they were carried out.
Two of them, Ko Jimmy and Phyo Zeyar Thaw, are symbols of the struggle for democracy, and their arrest caused a stir. Phyo Zeya Thaw is a former MP for Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party. He had been arrested in November and sentenced to death in January for violating the anti-terrorism law. Last week, Phyo Zeyar Thaw’s wife said that even if the execution did not take place, her fight for the rest of her life would be to destroy the junta, reports our correspondent in Yangon Juliette Verlin. A feeling shared by the armed resistance since the coup d’etat of 1er February 2021.
Reprisals
The other two prisoners executed, Hla Myo Aung and Aung Thura Za, are two men accused of killing a woman they suspected of being a junta informant. The ruling army is continuing a bloody crackdown on its opponents with more than 2,000 civilians killed and more than 15,000 arrested since the coup, according to a local NGO.
In Yangon, a banner had been unfurled on a road bridge in the city center, which read: “ If the death sentences are upheld, we will retaliate “. Today, everyone expects the execution to mark a new stage in the spiral of violence that the country has known for more than a year.