Arakan State News Summary (June 23-30, 2021)

By DMG 30 Jun 2021

23 June

• Donors are still needed for more than 1,300 students studying at the Palay (Pearl) Yadanar monastic school in Thandwe Township.
• Two of six prisoners who were being transferred from Taungup Township to Thandwe Prison in Arakan State tested positive for COVID-19, according to Thandwe Hospital Superintendent Dr. Ye Win Tun.
• The deputy commissioner of the Maungdaw District General Administration Department and one of his staff members tested positive for COVID-19, and five staff members who had come in contact with them were quarantined.

24 June

• Some wards in Ramree town were inundated by up to two feet of water after days of steady rains in Arakan State, residents said.
• About 80 unexploded shells and other ordnance were found by residents of Ngasanbaw village near the settlement in Rathedaung Township.
• The Sanyin camp for internally displaced people (IDPs) in Myebon Township, which was damaged by recent strong winds and heavy rains, is being rebuilt with the help of local and foreign donors, according to a camp official.
• The Shwe Karuna Foundation, which provides free medical treatment to cataract and kidney patients in Arakan State, is facing financial difficulties, according to foundation officials.
• Some children from camps for internally displaced people (IDPs) in Arakan State were suffering from skin rashes, redness and dengue fever, as well as nausea, fevers, and diarrhoea, according to civil society groups and IDP camp officials.
• Civil society organisations urged authorities to close border trade gates as the number of Covid-19 cases in Arakan State increased.
• The Arakan Liberation Army (ALA) said it was not its fault that U Nyunt Soe Aung aka U Me Kalaung, a 52-year-old resident of Ywar Gyi ward in Sittwe, was shot dead on June 19.
• Foodstuffs were donated to internally displaced people (IDPs) and trishaw drivers in Arakan State to mark the 77th birthday of Alotawpyae Sayadaw, a revered monk.
• A man was found dead on View Point Beach in Sittwe at about 4 p.m. The man was identified as U Than Tin, 72, a resident of Sanpya ward in the Arakan State capital.

25 June

• The Sittwe Township Court held another hearing in the case of former Arakan State Chief Minister U Nyi Pu, who has been charged with incitement, via video conferencing.
• Four Arakanese students who were charged under Section 505(b) of the Penal Code and Section 29 of the Disaster Management Law for staging an anti-war protest last year again appeared before the Sittwe Township Court.
• Displaced residents of Tinma village in Kyauktaw Township made an agreement with the military council to return home in October, villagers said.
• Ko Kyaw Than Hlaing, a former chairperson of the Arakan Social Association – Japan (ASAJ), was arrested at Yangon International Airport upon returning to Myanmar from Japan.
• A sailing competition that could not be held in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic returned this year in Manaung Township. The sailing competition had been held annually in Manaung for a decade prior to last year’s interruption.
• U Maung Myint Soe, 45, of Myothit ward in Kyauktaw Township, was arrested by the Arakan Army (AA) on suspicion of raping a young disabled woman in Kyauktaw, according to locals.

26 June

• A police lieutenant from the Anti-Narcotics Task Force in Maungdaw Township was among three people without travel histories who tested positive for coronavirus.
• Eight human rights groups called on the international community to take action on behalf of victims of torture by the Myanmar miliatry, using the occasion of International Day in Support of Victims of Torture to do so.
• As more and more cases of Covid-19 were reported in Arakan State, parents worried about their children’s health.
• Nan Khaing, a 35-year-old Mro ethnic man from Wet Kyein village in Maungdaw Township, died after he stepped on a landmine while cutting bamboo in the Mayu Mountains near the village.
• The Arakan Army (AA) raided a Tatmadaw military base at the Mahamuni Pagoda in Kyauktaw Township at around noon and confiscated some weapons, according to locals.

27 June

• A staff member from Myanmar Economic Bank in Maungdaw was found to be infected with Covid-19.
• Daw Hla Moe Kyi, 30, from Pauk Lay Taung village in Kyauktaw Township, who went missing in a boat collision on June 26 in Mrauk-U Township, was found dead.
• Maung Saw Tun, a 20-year-old man from Mrauk-U’s Sin Cha Seik quarter, was killed while sleeping alone in the middle of Ywa Haung Taw village, about five miles from Mrauk-U.
• Aiming to increase reading and literary knowledge of Arakanese youths, local youths opened a mobile library called Sapi Beach (Literature Beach) on Strand Road in Kyaukphyu.

28 June

• A police lance corporal from the Anti-Narcotics Task Force in Maungdaw was among four people from the township who tested positive for Covid-19.
• A diabetic woman in Sittwe became the first Arakan State fatality of the coronavirus’s third wave in the region.
• Four staff from the Thandwe Township Court tested positive for coronavirus.
• U Zaw Win Tun, chairman of an interim organising committee of the Arakan League for Democracy (ALD), was abducted by an unidentified group of armed men in Sittwe.

29 June

• Donors have not been able to visit the Wah Taung camp for internally displaced people near the Lemro River in Minbya Township for almost a year, and the IDPs are in dire need of food and shelter during the rainy season, camp officials said.
• A woman infected with Covid-19 and receiving medical treatment at Maungdaw District People’s Hospital suffered nerve damage and was reportedly unable to speak.
• Volume 1 of Sittwe Magazine, based in the Arakan State capital, was published.
• About 100 tonnes of timber reportedly intended for illegal export to Bangladesh were seized along with eight motorboats at the mouth of Naf River in Maungdaw over the past three months.
• Hearings before the Thandwe District Court in the cases of nine people charged under the Counter-Terrorism Law, which had been scheduled for June 29, were postponed due to a flare-up of Covid-19 cases in the region.
• Ko Kyaw Than Hlaing, a former chairperson of the Arakan Social Association – Japan (ASAJ) who was arrested at Yangon International Airport on June 25, was released.

30 June

• Another 15 people including six members of a Border Guard Force (BGF) tested positive for Covid-19 in Maungdaw town.
• A lawsuit under Section 505(a) of the Penal Code against three Taungup residents including a member of the Arakan League for Democracy (ALD) was dismissed, and the three men walked free along with hundreds of other prisoners released by Myanmar’s military regime.
• U Aye Tun Maung, an administrator of Aung Dai village in Sittwe was abducted by a group of unknown men near the township office of the General Administration Department.