Al Jazeera says at least 40 people were killed, whereas Western media is claiming 100+. Zarni is asking for Biden to release Myanmar’s frozen assets so that Myanmar’s “democratic resistance” can purchase more weapons.
And the second is China’s recent resumption of its backing of the military. China decided that they are going to back the military, because the democratic resistance is at least notionally backed by the United States and the European Union.
Related:
Myanmar military confirms air raid that killed dozens in Sagaing:
“During that opening ceremony, we conducted the attack. PDF members were killed,” Zaw Min Tun told the military broadcaster Myawaddy, referring to the civilian militias known as People’s Defence Forces.
…
Some media reports put the toll at more than 100 but Al Jazeera was unable to verify the figure. If confirmed, the attack on Pa Zi Gyi would be the deadliest in the country since the military toppled Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government in a coup in February 2021.
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“According to our ground information we hit the place of their weapons’ storage and that exploded and people died due to that,” he added.
Myanmar Strikes Concert (at Rebel Army Base): How & Why the West Lies
US-backed Proxy War Against China Rages in Myanmar
U.S., allies may be planning Ukraine proxy war model for Myanmar
Notes on Zarni:
Maung Zarni (aka Zarni) is a UK-based exiled Burmese scholar and activist, co-founder and general secretary of FORSEA (www.foresea.co). Zarni learned community organising from his businessman-father and educator-mother in Mandalay, during the rule of General Ne Win in the 1970’s. He left for the United States on the eve of Burma’s 1988 nationwide uprisings. There he worked with Burmese dissidents already in exile and learned progressive politics including environmental and feminist activism from American peers.
In 1995, Zarni co-founded the Free Burma Coalition, using the Internet to build support for a worldwide consumer-boycott and divestment for the Burmese opposition led by Aung San Suu Kyi.
Based in Berkeley, Zarni also set up Institutional and Community Development Burma to enable university admissions and scholarships for political refugees studying development, conflict resolution and politics, in major universities in Britain such as the London School of Economics, as well as universities in the Philippines and South Africa.
In 2003, Zarni became disillusioned with Suu Kyi’s leadership and the West’s democracy rhetoric and began advocating strategic engagement with Burma’s military leadership. In 2004, he initiated Track II negotiations with the support of maverick US State Department officials, between the Burmese military and outside actors such as British officials, ILO, and Germany’s Green Party foundation [Heinrich Böll Foundation].
Zarni studied chemistry and physics at the University of Mandalay. He has an MA in science education from the University of California and a PhD from the University of Wisconsin, (with a thesis entitled “Knowledge, Control and Power: The Politics of Education in Burma under military rule,1962-88”). He counts among his mentors the former US military interrogator of Nazi SS officers, the late Robert Lewis Koehl, and the neo-Marxist sociologist Michel W. Apple. Zarni has been a tenure-track assistant professor in the United States, and an associate professorship in Brunei. He is a non-resident Fellow with (Genocide) Documentation Center Cambodia (DC-Cam) and an adviser to Genocide Watch, USA.
He has held research, leadership and visiting fellowships, including at the Rockefeller Foundation’s Next Generation Leadership, Georgetown Leadership Seminar, Harvard, LSE, and Oxford. He has written extensively on activism, human security, racism and genocide, published in leading media outlets worldwide and academic journals, appeared on CNN, BBC, and other major networks, and debated at the Oxford Union.
His study for the University of Washington School of Law, “The Slow Burning Genocide of Myanmar’s Rohingya” (Spring, 2014), alerted the world to a genocide. In 2018, Zarni co-founded the Free Rohingya Coalition which he serves as its strategic adviser and initiated the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal on Myanmar in 2017.
In 2015 he received a “Cultivation of Harmony” award from the Parliament of the World’s Religions, and was shortlisted in 2017 for Sweden’s Right Livelihood Award. In 2018, Bangladesh’s teacher association called Zarni “the conscience of a Buddhist Burmese society”. Named a “Top-Five” blogger in the region by Southeast Asia Globe, Zarni blogs at http://www.maungzarni.net .
Ms. Cat’s Chronicles 