Geneva: Two reporters Htet Myat Thu and Win Htut Oo were killed by junta soldiers during a military raid in the Mon State of Myanmar on August 21, 2024.
Burmese media outlets reported that the junta soldiers raided the house of the 27-year-old Htet Myat Thu in Kyaikto township in search of pro-democracy armed insurgents, but ended up indiscriminately firing on the people there. Htet Myat ThuThu was killed in the firing. He was a reporter with the Voice of Thanbyuzayat. 28-year-old Win Htut Oo, a freelance contributor to a broadcast news agency, the Democratic Voice of Burma, was also killed in the incident.
Press Emblem Campaign (PEC), the Geneva-based global media safety and rights body, today demanded a fair probe into the incident that led to the death of the two reporters.
“Myanmar remains one of the most dangerous countries for media workers. The military-ruled southeast Asian nation earlier witnessed the death of journalist Myat Thu Tun due to military atrocities this year. We urge the military chief Min Aung Hlaing to take serious note over the Kyaikto incident and book the soldiers found to be responsible for the killing of Htet Myat Thu and Win Htut Oo,” said PEC president Blaise Lempen, adding that the military authorities must adequately compensate all bereaved families of journo-victims.
PEC’s southeast Asian representative Nava Thakuria revealed that ever since the current military group seized political power from the Aung San Suu Kyi-led elected government in Naypyidaw through a coup on February 1, 2021, most of the Burmese journalists fled the country.
The junta had arrested 175 journalists in the last three years and 50 of them remain in military custody. In the last incident, the armed forces did not even hand over the bodies to their relatives but cremated them urgently at Taunggalay cemetery, he added.
– global bihari bureau
