COX’S BAZAR, Bangladesh/YANGON: About 1,000 Rohingya Muslims fleeing escalating violence in Myanmar’s northwestern Rakhine state had been halted at the Naf river on the border with Bangladesh, Bangladeshi security officials said on Saturday.
The death toll from attacks staged by Rohingya insurgents on Friday has climbed to 89, including 77 insurgents and 12 members of the security forces, Myanmar army said.
The attacks marked a dramatic escalation of a conflict that has simmered since a similar offensive in October that prompted a big military sweep beset by allegations of serious human rights abuses.
At least one fresh attack had taken place on Saturday, according to a Myanmar security source.
National leader Aung San Suu Kyi condemned the early morning raids — in which Rohingya insurgents wielding guns, sticks and home-made bombs assaulted 30 police stations and an army base — while the government evacuated staff and villagers to safety.
The treatment of approximately 1.1 million Muslim Rohingya has emerged as the biggest challenge for the Nobel Peace Prize laureate’s 16-month old administration. Suu Kyi has been accused of not speaking out for the persecuted minority and of defending the army’s brutal counter-offensive after the October attacks.
In a sign that both sides were bracing for more violence, about 1,000 Rohingya arrived at the Naf river separating Myanmar and Bangladesh and got stranded there, a Bangladeshi border guard and Mohammad Ali Hossain, deputy commissioner of Cox’s Bazar district near the Myanmar border, told Reuters.
“Many Rohingya people are trying to enter the country, but we have a zero tolerance policy — no one will be allowed,” said Hossain.
Bangladeshi officials regularly advocate a hard-line approach to refugees in official interviews, but typically end up letting the refugees through. There are hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh and 87,000 have arrived since October.
The Myanmar army operation last year was heavily criticized amid reports of civilian killings, rape and arson, sparking allegations by the United Nations of crimes against humanity. Suu Kyi is blocking UN-mandated probe into the allegations.
Observers worry that the attacks will spark an even more aggressive army response than last year and trigger communal clashes between Muslims and Buddhist ethnic Rakhines.
“25 Aug attack in N Rakine utmost concern! Violence must stop in Rakhine. Heartfelt sorrow 4 deaths. Beg all sides 2 take restraint! Everyone!” said Yanghee Lee, the UN special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar on Twitter.
In a statement late on Friday, Suu Kyi “strongly condemned” “brutal attacks by terrorists on security forces in Rakhine State.”
“I would like to commend the members of the police and security forces who have acted with great courage in the face of many challenges,” she added.
The government evacuated officials from the home ministry, teachers as well as hundreds of non-Rohingya villagers to army bases and main police stations, the government said.
“The government made six evacuation checkpoints. Some will be evacuated by helicopters and some will be taken out by the security forces,” a military source based in Rakhine told Reuters.
The source said the army and police were battling the militants, who staged at least one fresh attack on security forces and destroyed a bridge on Saturday morning.
“They are fighting now, the situation will be tense again today, although there was no fighting at night,” said the source.
Rohingya fleeing Myanmar violence stranded on Bangladesh border: officials
Rohingya fleeing Myanmar violence stranded on Bangladesh border: officials
DHL cargo plane crashes into a house in Lithuania, killing at least 1
- The Lithuanian airport authority identified the aircraft as a “DHL cargo plane
VILNIUS: A DHL cargo plane crashed into a house Monday morning near the Lithuanian capital, killing at least one person.
Lithuanian’s public broadcaster LRT, quoting an emergency official, said two people had been taken to the hospital after the crash, and one was later pronounced dead. LRT said the aircraft smashed into a two-story home near the airport.
The Lithuanian airport authority identified the aircraft as a “DHL cargo plane flying from Leipzig, Germany, to Vilnius Airport.”
It posted on the social platform X that city services including a fire truck were on site.
DHL Group, headquartered in Bonn, Germany, did not immediately return a call for comment.
The DHL aircraft was operated by Swiftair, a Madrid-based contractor. The carrier could not be immediately reached.
The Boeing 737 was 31 years old, which is considered by experts to be an older airframe, though that’s not unusual for cargo flights.
UN chief slams land mine threat days after US decision to supply Ukraine
- The outgoing US administration is aiming to give Ukraine an upper hand before President-elect Donald Trump enters office
- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called the mines ‘very important’ to halting Russian attacks
SIEM REAP, Cambodia: The UN Secretary-General on Monday slammed the “renewed threat” of anti-personnel land mines, days after the United States said it would supply the weapons to Ukrainian forces battling Russia’s invasion.
In remarks sent to a conference in Cambodia to review progress on the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Treaty, UN chief Antonio Guterres hailed the work of clearing and destroying land mines across the world.
“But the threat remains. This includes the renewed use of anti-personnel mines by some of the Parties to the Convention, as well as some Parties falling behind in their commitments to destroy these weapons,” he said in the statement.
He called on the 164 signatories — which include Ukraine but not Russia or the United States — to “meet their obligations and ensure compliance to the Convention.”
Guterres’ remarks were delivered by UN Under-Secretary General Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana.
AFP has contacted her office and a spokesman for Guterres to ask if the remarks were directed specifically at Ukraine.
The Ukrainian team at the conference did not respond to AFP questions about the US land mine supplies.
Washington’s announcement last week that it would send anti-personnel land mines to Kyiv was immediately criticized by human rights campaigners.
The outgoing US administration is aiming to give Ukraine an upper hand before President-elect Donald Trump enters office.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called the mines “very important” to halting Russian attacks.
The conference is being held in Cambodia, which was left one of the most heavily bombed and mined countries in the world after three decades of civil war from the 1960s.
Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet told the conference his country still needs to clear over 1,600 square kilometers (618 square miles) of contaminated land that is affecting the lives of more than one million people.
Around 20,000 people have been killed in Cambodia by land mines and unexploded ordnance since 1979, and twice as many have been injured.
The International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) said on Wednesday that at least 5,757 people had been casualties of land mines and explosive remnants of war across the world last year, 1,983 of whom were killed.
Civilians made up 84 percent of all recorded casualties, it said.
Philippines’ Marcos says threat of assassination ‘troubling’
- Security agencies at the weekend said they would step up their protocols
MANILA: Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos said on Monday he will not take lightly “troubling” threats against him, just days after his estranged vice president said she had asked someone to assassinate the president if she herself was killed.
In a video message during which he did not name Vice President Sara Duterte, his former running mate, Marcos said “such criminal plans should not be overlooked.”
Security agencies at the weekend said they would step up their protocols and investigate the statement, which Duterte made at a press conference. The vice president’s office has acknowledged a Reuters request for comment.
An average of 140 women and girls were killed by a partner or relative per day in 2023, the UN says
- The agencies reported approximately 51,100 women and girls were killed in 2023
- The rates were highest in Africa and the Americas and lowest in Asia and Europe
UNITED NATIONS: The deadliest place for women is at home and 140 women and girls on average were killed by an intimate partner or family member per day last year, two UN agencies reported Monday.
Globally, an intimate partner or family member was responsible for the deaths of approximately 51,100 women and girls during 2023, an increase from an estimated 48,800 victims in 2022, UN Women and the UN Office of Drugs and Crime said.
The report released on the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women said the increase was largely the result of more data being available from countries and not more killings.
But the two agencies stressed that “Women and girls everywhere continue to be affected by this extreme form of gender-based violence and no region is excluded.” And they said, “the home is the most dangerous place for women and girls.”
The highest number of intimate partner and family killings was in Africa – with an estimated 21,700 victims in 2023, the report said. Africa also had the highest number of victims relative to the size of its population — 2.9 victims per 100,000 people.
There were also high rates last year in the Americas with 1.6 female victims per 100,000 and in Oceania with 1.5 per 100,000, it said. Rates were significantly lower in Asia at 0.8 victims per 100,000 and Europe at 0.6 per 100,000.
According to the report, the intentional killing of women in the private sphere in Europe and the Americas is largely by intimate partners.
By contrast, the vast majority of male homicides take place outside homes and families, it said.
“Even though men and boys account for the vast majority of homicide victims, women and girls continue to be disproportionately affected by lethal violence in the private sphere,” the report said.
“An estimated 80 percent of all homicide victims in 2023 were men while 20 percent were women, but lethal violence within the family takes a much higher toll on women than men, with almost 60 percent of all women who were intentionally killed in 2023 being victims of intimate partner/family member homicide,” it said.
The report said that despite efforts to prevent the killing of women and girls by countries, their killings “remain at alarmingly high levels.”
“They are often the culmination of repeated episodes of gender-based violence, which means they are preventable through timely and effective interventions,” the two agencies said.
Russia says it downs seven Ukrainian missiles over Kursk region
Russia’s air defense systems destroyed seven Ukrainian missiles overnight over the Kursk region, governor of the Russian region that borders Ukraine said on Monday.
He said that air defense units also destroyed seven Ukrainian drones. He did not provide further details.
A pro-Russian military analyst Roman Alyokhin, who serves as an adviser to the governor, said on his Telegram messaging channel that “Kursk was subjected to a massive attack by foreign-made missiles” overnight.
