The number of people who have been given the death penalty by Myanmar’s military-installed administration has risen to 139, and it is being used as a tactic to stifle resistance. According to High Commissioner Volker Turk, at least seven college students received death sentences on Wednesday. According to rumours, up to four further young campaigners received sentences on Thursday.
According to Amnesty International, Myanmar’s secret military tribunals ‘failed to sustain any degree of openness contrary to the most fundamental due process or fair trial principles’. In February of last year, the military overthrew Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected administration. Widespread, nonviolent protests against the army’s involvement were put down with brutal force.
The Students’ Union of Dagon University in Yangon, the country’s largest city, announced Thursday on its Facebook page that seven university students had been sentenced to death. They were accused of links to an urban guerrilla group opposed to military rule and convicted of murder for allegedly shooting a bank manager. In July, the government hanged four political activists, in the first executions in at least three decades.
Western countries and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, which attempted to diffuse the issue with a five-point plan that the military administration has failed to follow, both condemned the hangings. ‘By turning to the use of death sentences as a political tool to crush opposition, the military confirms its disdain for the efforts by ASEAN and the international community at large to end violence and create the conditions for a political dialogue to lead Myanmar out of a human rights crisis created by the military,’ Turk said.
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