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Yangon (AP) - The military junta in Myanmar released more than 600 arrested demonstrators on Wednesday.
The state television announced.
The news portals “Myanmar Now” and “Eleven Myanmar” reported that they were mostly students who had previously been detained in police stations and prisons.
A reason for the move was initially not known.
Meanwhile, the daily mass protests were suspended on Wednesday.
Instead, the country sank into silence - most of the people stayed at home, the streets were empty.
The released students took part in the protests against the military coup in early February.
Photos showed them sitting in buses and being celebrated by people on the side of the road.
A journalist for the American news agency AP who was arrested last month is also free again.
Thein Zaw informed his employers of his release by phone after a second court hearing, AP said.
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According to the latest estimates by the prisoners' aid organization AAPP, at least 275 people have been killed since the coup and more than 2,800 have been arrested, at least temporarily.
For weeks the police and the military have been responding to resistance with massive violence.
On Tuesday at least five people were shot dead in Mandalay in the north of the country, including a seven-year-old girl who was sitting on his father's lap, said a resident of the German press agency.
Soldiers broke into the family home in the Chanmyathazi district.
There they would have aimed at the father, but hit the child in the stomach, wrote "Myanmar Now".
In New York, the UN expressed its "deep concern over the continuing violence against children" and called for the lives of young people to be protected.
According to estimates by the children's aid organization Unicef, at least 23 children have been killed and eleven more seriously injured since the coup.
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On Wednesday, numerous people in former Burma responded with a "silent strike" to the violence and attempts by the junta to get the economy going again.
Most of the shops remained closed, and the streets were largely empty even in the largest city of Yangon (formerly: Rangoon).
"This is another way to fight the military," said Lin Aung from the Tamwe district of the German press agency.
"I have a garage, but it's closed today."
© dpa-infocom, dpa: 210324-99-949012 / 2
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Movement of civil disobedience to silent strike