Burma: UN condemns violence against demonstrators, striking railway workers targeted by a raid

Burmese security forces launched a raid in Yangon against striking railway workers opposed to the junta on March 10, 2021. AFP - STR

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Several hundred Burmese police and soldiers launched a raid on Wednesday March 10 in Rangoon against striking railway workers opposed to the military junta.

The Security Council in a unanimous declaration "strongly condemns the violence" of the military.

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According to the

Frontier Myanmar

newspaper

more than 1,000 state-housed railway workers have been evicted from their homes for participating in the strike movement launched a month ago.

Expulsion under the threat of being shot them and their families if they did not leave: Many police officers and soldiers had been deployed as early as six in the morning around the buildings where the employees reside, in eastern Yangon. 

In the north of the economic capital, around 100 people were arrested in the Okkalapa neighborhood, according to a rescuer who says some were beaten and injured.

About a thousand soldiers and police surrounded the neighborhood.

The police then started the evacuation, as this area is state owned and the railway workers are public sector employees.

The police told the railway workers that they had to leave because they participate in the civil disobedience movement and as they do not work and stay at home, they are no longer allowed to stay in these homes.

The information and photos of their evacuation were taken up everywhere on social networks, suddenly people were aware of what was happening to them.

The population got organized, groups of volunteers looked for places to relocate them.

And at this point, thanks to donor funding, funds that were raised by volunteers, the vast majority of families have found a home in Yangon.

Other railway workers were able to be relocated with close relatives in the suburbs of Yangon.

BURMA _Son DIF EVENING Naw Betty Han journalist "the Burmese in solidarity with the striking railway workers"

Jelena tomic

The soldiers targeted this neighborhood, because the railway workers were on the front line to support the civil disobedience movement, from February 8.

On February 25, they announced to the population that they would not receive a salary for the month of February.

The population is very grateful to them for this and supports them,

”explains journalist Naw Betty Han.

The second reason is that the soldiers announced in the media under their control that they would replace the striking railway workers with soldiers.

But it is impossible, because not everyone is able to drive a train, so it is very difficult to replace train conductors.

The railway workers are essential for the military and I think they want to put pressure on them.

I am sure that this kind of operation will happen again and that those responsible for the military coup will target other sectors such as doctors and the medical sector in the coming days

, ”said Naw Betty Han.

Unanimous condemnation at the UN

The UN Security Council "

strongly condemns the violence against peaceful demonstrators, including women, youth and children 

" in Burma, in a statement accepted on Wednesday March 10 unanimously by its members, including China, according to diplomats.

This declaration, the second manifestation in a little over a month of a rare unity of the Security Council on Burma.

Without taking up these terms of " 

coup d'état

 " and without mentioning the possibility of international sanctions if the repression continues, as foreseen in the first versions of the declaration negotiated since Friday, the text is however very critical of the generals. who overthrew civil power in early February.

According to the Association for Assistance to Political Prisoners, nearly 2,000 people have been arrested since the start of the coup, and 60 civilians killed.

This Tuesday, the death was announced, shortly after his arrest, of a second official of the NLD, the party of Aung San Suu Kyi.

Several deputies ousted from the NLD said on Facebook that they had appointed one of their officials, Mahn Win Khaing Than, to replace the former president of the country and the former head of government Aung San Suu Kyi, who are still kept in secrecy by the military. 

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