Three Brotherhood Alliance strongly condemns executions of four democracy activists

By DMG 27 Jul 2022

DMG Newsroom
27 July 2022, Sittwe

The Three Brotherhood Alliance — the Arakan Army, Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) and Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) — in a statement on July 27 strongly condemned the recent executions of four political dissidents.

Ko Phyo Zeyar Thaw, a former National League for Democracy (NLD) lawmaker; the veteran politician and pro-democracy activist Ko Kyaw Min Yu aka Ko Jimmy; Ko Hla Myo Aung aka Ko Myo; and Ko Aung Thura Zaw were executed by the regime recently.

Such a death sentence is against the norms of current world politics, as well as the UN Declaration of Human Rights, International Citizen’s Rights, and the Five-Point Consensus on Myanmar agreed upon by the Jakarta Summit of ASEAN leaders, the statement said.

The statement also said the execution of people with different political views will intensify the anger of the public, adding that the military council will be responsible for all subsequent problems that arise.

The Three Brotherhood Alliance said the executions were deeply contrary to the path of national reconciliation proposed by the military junta.

The Arakan Army (AA) on July 25 issued a statement of its own about the executions. In it, the AA said it was deeply worried about the possible consequences of the regime’s decision to execute the men, who were sentenced to death in January. The statement said the junta had “stupidly carried out [the executions] despite requests from diplomatic and political circles not to carry out the executions, which is a wrong thing to do, at a wrong time.”

Condemnation of the executions has been widespread both domestically and internationally in the aftermath of an announcement in junta-controlled media on Monday that the four activists had been killed.