A bomb blast in downtown Yangon on Wednesday evening injured five teenage boys who were collecting bottles for recycling, residents of Myanmar’s largest city who witnessed it said.
The boys inadvertently detonated the bomb after picking up and opening a bag that was sitting on the roadside, residents said.
“One of them was unable to move anything below his knee joint, as shrapnel from the bomb tore flesh from his lower leg down to the bone,” one witness told RFA Burmese. “Three of them were left in critical condition.”
No one has claimed responsibility for the bombing. Rebel groups have carried out similar attacks in cities to undermine the junta’s rule since the military’s February 2021 coup d’etat.
Tensions are high over the junta’s plan to begin military conscription at the start of next month.
The blast took place at around 8 pm at the Taw Win pedestrian overpass – known locally as Sule Bridge – on Sule Pagoda Road in the center of Yangon’s Kyauktada township, said the residents who, like others interviewed for this report, spoke to RFA Burmese on condition of anonymity due to security concerns.
An official from an area medical volunteer group known as Zeya Maggin told RFA that all five were initially taken to Yangon General Hospital for treatment, but transferred to No. 2 Military Hospital in Yangon’s Dagon township at around 11 pm.
At the time of the transfer, only one of the teenagers remained in critical condition due to a “severe head injury,” he said.
Patients injured in a bomb blast near Sule Bridge are transported to Yangon Hospital. Blurring in photo is from source. (Citizen Journalist)
Wounded in the blast were San Kyay Bar, 11, Pho Lapyae, 11, Kyaw Kyaw 14, Phyo Thet Paing, 14, and Pho Thauk Kyar, 16 – all of whom hail from other townships.
Attempts by RFA to contact the hospitals and the junta’s spokesperson for Yangon region by telephone for further details went unanswered Thursday. The junta’s information team had yet to make a public announcement or issue a press statement about the incident by the time of publishing.
Political commentator Than Soe Naing called on the public to remain vigilant amid a spate of recent bomb blasts in Myanmar’s urban areas. On March 1, four pedestrians were killed in bomb blasts in Yangon’s Hlaingtharyar and Insein townships.
“When such explosions occur in urban areas, [it’s devastating but] there is no possible way to avoid such incidents,” he said. “I believe it’s imperative for us, as citizens, to exercise caution.”
Translated by Kalyar Lwin. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster.
A false claim has emerged in Korean-language social media posts that the interim head of South Korea’s largest medical association parroted remarks of the North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
The post carried an image of Kim with a fake quote superimposed on it. The image of Kim cited by the claim was actually released in September 2017 with a statement criticizing then-U.S. President Donald Trump. No part of his statement matches what the head of the medical association said.
The claim was shared on South Korea’s popular online forum Ppomppu, with more than 2.6 million members on Feb. 22.
“Direct challenge, stern warning … I’ve seen similar comments before quite often,” the claim reads.
The post was accompanied by three images.
The first two images at the top show what appears to be Kim Taek-woo, interim head of South Korea’s largest medical association, speaking at a press conference.
A caption under the photos reads: “If even a single doctor is penalized in terms of their license in relation to this incident, we will regard this as a direct challenge against doctors and sternly warn that we may enter into action that will be difficult to handle.”
Screenshot of Ppomppu’s post, taken on March 19, 2024.
The third image shows Kim Jong Un, with wording under it saying: “We regard this as a direct challenge and sternly warn that we may enter into action that will be difficult to handle.”
Screenshot of Ppomppu’s post, taken on March 19, 2024.
Some social media users noted the similarity of remarks and accused Kim Taek-woo of being under North Korean influence.
“He is a pinko,” one user wrote, using a derogatory term to refer to North Korean or communist sympathizers.
“Seems like he was coached [by North Korea],” another user said.
The claim spread amid a major protest by medical personnel in South Korea led by the medical association and other groups. Thousands of South Korean doctors have resigned to protest a government proposal to raise the medical school enrollment quota to address shortages and an aging population.
These striking trainees ignored a government ultimatum set for Feb. 29 to resume work or face legal consequences. Subsequently, on March 5, the government announced its intention to begin notifying the striking medical professionals that their licenses would be suspended.
Kim Jong Un’s remarks
A Google reverse image search found the photo of Kim Jong Un corresponds to one released by North Korea’s state-run Korean Central News Agency on Sept. 22, 2017.
An identical photo was also published by Reuters that day.
“North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un makes a statement regarding U.S. President Donald Trump’s speech at the U.N. general assembly, in this undated photo released by North Korea’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) in Pyongyang September 22, 2017,” reads the caption of the photo.
At that time Trump threatened to “totally destroy North Korea” and branded the North Korean leader “Rocket Man.”
A review of the statement, published by KCNA in both English and Korean, found no part matching the caption seen in the image cited by social media posts.
Kim Taek-woo’s remarks
A keyword search on Google found that Kim Taek-woo did make such remarks during a press briefing on Feb. 17 in response to warnings by the South Korean government it may cancel protesting doctors’ medical licenses if they did not return to work.
The clip of the briefing was published by the South Korean broadcaster YTN on Feb. 17.
The corresponding part begins at the 22-second mark of the clip.
Other South Korean news reports also featured his statement as seen here and here.
Edited by Malcolm Foster.
Asia Fact Check Lab, or AFCL, was established to counter disinformation in today’s complex media environment. We publish fact-checks, media-watches and in-depth reports that aim to sharpen and deepen our readers’ understanding of current affairs and public issues. If you like our content, you can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram and X.
For the second time in three months, a belligerent and resentful crowd of locals in Indonesia’s Aceh province made authorities move dozens of newly arrived Rohingya refugees from their shelter by storming the facility, officials said Wednesday.
After their boat had capsized near West Aceh regency last week, following a long journey from Bangladesh, the 75 traumatized Rohingya were placed in the temporary shelter in the village of Suak Nie. They seemed scared and sobbed, as seen in a widely circulated video, before officials led them to a vehicle to relocate them.
Villagers from Suak Nie said they were protesting because the local government had not moved the Rohingya away after five days as promised, said Mawardi, the West Aceh Regional Police spokesperson.
A human rights group official said fake news and misinformation starting around October had fueled locals’ resentment against the Rohingya, who are a persecuted Muslim minority from Myanmar.
“People held a demonstration because they received information from the local government that the Rohingya would only be sheltered for five days, but [their stay] had already exceeded that limit,” Mawardi, who goes by a single name, told BenarNews.
The temporary move was for the refugees’ safety, said Muhammad Hidayat Isa, communications head for West Aceh regency.
“The refugees have been moved to the backyard of the West Aceh regent’s office complex to avoid unnecessary unrest,” Hidayat told BenarNews.
An official from the United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, also confirmed the incident that took place in West Aceh and the events in the video, which were shared widely on social media.
“Yes, the expulsion [from the temporary shelter] really happened as circulated on social media,” Faisal Rahman, a protection associate at UNHCR, told BenarNews.
On the run
The stateless Rohingya have been fleeing violence and oppression in their homeland in Myanmar for years.
Following a 2017 military offensive in Myanmar’s Rakhine state that the U.N. described as a “textbook example of ethnic cleansing,” about 740,000 Rohingya fled across the border to Bangladesh.
Usually, many Rohingya refugees who end up in Indonesia have left the Cox’s Bazar camps in southwestern Bangladesh seeking a better life in Muslim-majority countries in Southeast Asia.
Aceh, at the westernmost tip of Sumatra island, is a semi-autonomous and religiously conservative province.
A newly arrived Rohingya refugee draws water from a well at the former Red Cross Indonesia office building in a temporary shelter in Suak Nie village, West Aceh, Aceh province, Indonesia, March 22, 2024. [Zahlul Akbar/AFP]
The 75 refugees rescued from the sea last week had been housed in an Indonesian Red Cross (PMI) building in Suak Nie, which lies in Johan Pahlawan district, Faisal said.
According to Ali, a resident of the village and a participant in Tuesday’s actions, UNHCR and the local government had made no efforts to move the Rohingya despite promising the villagers they would be there for only five days.
More than five days had passed, Ali, who wanted to be identified by only one name for security reasons, told state news agency Antara.
“Want [them] to be moved to the regent’s hall or regent’s office, please; the important thing is that there are no more Rohingya refugees in our village,” Antara quoted Ali as saying on Tuesday.
This latest batch of refugees had arrived from refugee camps in Bangladesh in a wooden boat that capsized at sea near Meulaboh city, in West Aceh regency, on March 20.
On that day, rescue officials could only bring ashore six passengers, but the next day the search team rescued 69 additional Rohingya who had been clinging to their wooden boat.
Survivors claimed the boat was carrying around 150 passengers, with UNHCR officials saying they feared more than 70 Rohingya may be missing or dead. Over the weekend and on Monday, the bodies of 11 Rohingya were found at sea not far from where the boat overturned.
Growing number of refugee boats
This incident occurred amid the increasing arrival of Rohingya refugee boats in Indonesia, starting last October.
In 2023 alone, more than 2,300 Rohingya refugees had arrived in Indonesia, according to the UNHCR and the International Organization for Migration.
They have been accommodated in locations across Aceh, UNHCR said.
A newly arrived Rohingya refugee receives medical treatment at a temporary refugee in Suak Nie village, West Aceh, Aceh province, Indonesia, on March 22, 2024. [Zahlul Akbar/AFP]
Azharul Husna, a coordinator at of the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (KontraS Aceh), condemned the actions of residents forcibly evicting Rohingya refugees.
She said the latest incident and a similar one in January resulted from a steady and deliberate spread of false information about the Rohingya on social media – such as they were living a tad too comfortably in refugee camps, were becoming colonizers, and were involved in sexually harassing locals.
“This has created a stigma against Rohingya refugees,” Husna told BenarNews.
“As a society that has gone through the experience of the longest war, the biggest tsunami disaster and enjoyed the abundant love of the world’s citizens, aren’t we the ones who understand and can best feel the pain of the Rohingya people?”
Nurdin Hasan in Banda Aceh, Indonesia, contributed to this article.
BenarNews is an online news outlet affiliated to Radio Free Asia.
HILLSBORO, OR / ACCESSWIRE / March 28, 2024 / It was an exciting day at the Rice Northwest Museum of Rocks & Minerals, Hillsboro, Oregon,when artist Naomi Sarna’s 703-carat L’Heure Bleu tanzanite carving set a GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS title as the world’s largest cut tanzanite, on March 9.
A standing room only crowd witnessed the "weigh in" as Guinness World Records adjudicator, Michael Empric, verified and announced the results. Gemstone experts, Jessie English, J.S. English Appraisals and Madeline Saunders, Oregon Estate Jewelry, were the official witnesses for the weighing. Rice Museum board president Gail Spann and museum director, Kim Vagner were also on hand for this historic event.
"As the Director of the Rice Museum of Rocks & Minerals board, and long-time supporter of this wonderful ‘gem’ in Hillsboro, I couldn’t have been more delighted that we hosted Naomi Sarna on her adventure with Guinness World Records that was enjoyed by many attendees! We are lucky to have such talent grace our Museum’s doorstep," said Gail Copus Spann, president, board of directors, Rice Museum of Rocks and Minerals.
Several years ago, artist Naomi Sarna was invited to travel to the Tanzanite mines located in the foothills of Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania. She was asked to create a carving for an international competition. The mines are on the ancestral land of the Maasai and it is the only place in the world where this blue-violet gemstone is found. While there Sarna was asked to do humanitarian work, so she taught Maasai women how to make wire-wrap jewelry from tanzanite. Touched by the community, the poverty and the eye disease she witnessed, Sarna decided that she when she sells her award-winning tanzanite L’Heure Bleu carving, she will donate the profits to the world-renowned Portland-based Casey Eye Institute to provide eyecare to the Maasai. Dr. Andreas Lauer, Chair of the Casey Eye Institute came as its representative and just as the weighing ceremony took place, doctors from the Institute were touching down in Tanzania for a cataract conference!
"The Casey Eye Institute is in Naomi’s debt. In the future, patients, their families and the Maasai community will feel her passion and love as they express it through their smiles and joy from improved vision," commented Dr. Andreas K. Lauer, director, Casey Eye Institute.
"The Guinness World Records brings international recognition and attention to my tanzanite carving L’Heure Bleu. This recognition gives great strength to my promise to help the Maasai with their vision difficulties. This is the cornerstone for our future hopes to provide eye care to the Maasai in Tanzania," stated artist Naomi Sarna.
While she was in Tanzania, Sarna was presented with several tanzanite crystals eventually selecting the piece that she hand-carved into the 703-carat L’Heure Bleu. It won a First-Place Spectrum Award for carving from the American Gem Trade Association. It sits on a Sterling Silver base inspired by the winds of Tanzania’s Great Rift Valley.
Authorities in some parts of China have announced a ban on the burning of “ghost money” and other paper offerings for departed loved ones ahead of the annual grave-tending festival of Qingming next week, calling the practice “feudal superstition” and sparking an outcry on social media.
Bans on the burning of “ghost money” and on the sale of “superstitious feudal” goods have been issued by authorities in the northern city of Tianjin, in Nenjiang city in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang and in Nantong city in the eastern province of Jiangsu, among other locations, the party-backed Legal Daily newspaper reported on March 27.
Found in both Buddhist and Taoist traditions, the offerings involve burning “spirit money” that loved ones can use to have a decent afterlife, as well as paper effigies of desirable goods including cars, beasts of burden, designer clothing and consumer electronics.
Some funeral goods stores also offer bureaucratic paperwork to help the deceased navigate the complex bureaucracy of the underworld.
Banknotes and other paper replicas burned by people for Qingming are seen at a shop in Nanning, capital of southern China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, April 1, 2017. (Reuters)
The bans come ahead of Qingming, during which the living make the trip to sweep and clean the graves of loved ones and leave offerings, sometimes eating a family meal at the graveside with portions for the departed.
According to the Legal Daily, similar bans have also appeared in Beijing, Shanghai, Harbin, Qingdao, Henan, Chongqing and Lanzhou in recent years, in a bid to crack down on “feudal superstitions.”
The Nantong ban warned of fines, administrative sentences and even criminal prosecutions for those found breaking the new rules.
Possible fears of public unrest
Beijing resident Guo Li said the authorities may fear public unrest at Qingming, as people had lost so many loved ones since the lifting of the three years of the zero-COVID policy in December 2022.
“There could be protests or petitions, so they are using these bans to stop people from pay their respects,” Guo said. “The pandemic caused many deaths, and a lot of people in smaller cities are accustomed to honoring the dead with paper money.”
The atheist ruling Chinese Communist Party has also warned media producers not to depict ghost stories and dramas based on magic, demons, and the Taoist underworld in recent years, despite a huge public appetite for such shows.
This year, there has been considerable pushback from social media, with many commentators complaining that the government is trying to control everything people do, even their expressions of mourning for loved ones.
A customer checks prices with a saleswoman next to offerings at a wholesale market where supplies for ceremonial rites for the dead are sold, in Mibeizhuang, Xiong county, in northern China’s Hebei province, March 24, 2019, ahead of the Qingming festival. (Jason Lee/Reuters)
Even the Legal Daily, the official newspaper of the Communist Party’s Central Legal and Political Affairs Commission, drew the line at banning the honoring of ancestors by tending to their graves and burning offerings to help them in the afterlife.
“Burning paper money is a long-standing traditional custom that continues to this day,” the paper said in an article on the bans. “On Tomb-Sweeping Day, the elderly and the young are brought to the graves of the ancestors, and wine, food, fruit, paper money, etc. are offered in front of the tomb to express longing for the ancestors.”
“Chinese people are influenced by traditional cultural psychology and have a strong sense of family,” the paper said. “Visiting the graves of ancestors is their special way of remembering their ancestors.”
It noted concerns over hill fires and air pollution caused by the mass burning of offerings, but said there was no “one size fits all” solution to the problem.
“This is too mechanical and needs to be carefully considered,” the article concluded.
It’s all about control
Social media comments appeared mostly to agree.
“They want to control everything yet they can’t manage anything well,” grumbled @Home_is_a_Ming_Dynasty_horse-racing_farm from Jiangsu province.
“Are you going to destroy the Four Olds all over again?” @User_7839112400 from Guangdong asked, in a reference to the destruction of objects and practices from traditional Chinese culture during the 1966-1976 Cultural Revolution.
“So they want to control that too,” commented @User_7430652639 from Shandong province, although @User_6278186707 called for the practice to be “banned nationwide.”
Jiangsu-based current affairs commentator Zhang Jianping said the bans were an expression of “unchecked power.”
A man burns ghost money to pay his respects to his ancestors in front of a gravestone during the Qingming Festival in Shanghai, China, April 4, 2017. (Johannes Eisele/AFP)
“This custom has existed for hundreds or thousands of years,” Zhang said. “It’s very random for them to intervene in that using administrative measures.”
“It’s similar to the way the authorities bulldozed the graves of our ancestors [ostensibly] to grow more food when I was a kid, yet people still died of starvation,” he said in an apparent reference to the Great Famine of 1959-1961. “These acts of unchecked power are still happening.”
A resident of Shanghai who gave only the surname Chen for fear of reprisals said he remembers when burning paper offerings was classed as “feudal superstition” during the Cultural Revolution.
“This is a Chinese cultural tradition they are messing with now, with the legacy left by our ancestors,” Chen said. “This is our way of paying tribute to 5,000 years of Chinese culture.”
Translated by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Roseanne Gerin.
