While recent days exhibited confusion and reluctance among people as to whether a silent strike campaign should be observed, March 24 proved different. Streets across the country, including cities and rural areas, were deserted, shops shuttered and markets closed.
The International Press Institute (IPI), a global network of editors, media executives and leading journalists for press freedom, today welcomed the release of Associated Press journalist Thein Zaw by a Myanmar court, according to a press release.
Thein Zaw, who was arrested on February 27 in Yangon and charged with breaching public order was released today following his second court appearance. The judge in the case also dismissed the charges against Zaw, who faced up to three years in prison.
People in many cities and townships of Myanmar are conducting a "silent strike" today to show public unity against the military junta.
Photos of roads and markets without people and the closure of businesses have gone viral online 24 March with comments claiming success with the stay-at-home protest.
Myanmar's military on Tuesday defended its seven-week crackdown that has left more than 260 democracy protesters dead, insisting it would not tolerate "anarchy".
The junta has unleashed deadly violence as it struggles to quell nationwide protests against the February 1 ousting of civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
In a news conference in the capital Naypyidaw, junta spokesman Brigadier General Zaw Min Tun put the death toll lower at 164.
"I am sad because these violent terrorist people who died are our nationals," he said.
A detained Australian adviser to Myanmar's deposed civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi is being investigated over violating the country's official secrets laws and immigration offences, a junta official said Tuesday.
Sean Turnell, an economist and university professor, was the first foreign national arrested following the February 1 coup that ousted the Nobel laureate from power.
Fifteen people have died and 400 are missing after a huge fire destroyed the shanty homes of tens of thousands of Rohingya in the world's biggest refugee settlement in Bangladesh, the UN said Tuesday.
Nearly one million of the persecuted Muslim minority -- many of whom escaped a 2017 military crackdown in Myanmar that UN investigators concluded was executed with "genocidal intent" -- live in squalid conditions at the network of camps in the southeastern Cox's Bazar district.
After the Myanmar military staged a coup on 1 February there is no sign to an end of protests
Civilians continued to show their opposition to the coup across the country from Myitkyina, Kachin State to Dawei of Tanintharyi region on 23 March.
Protests also took place in central Myanmar regions and Shan State, calling for the release of elected government leaders and the return of power to the civilian government.
Myanmar reported 28 new COVID-19 infections in the past 24 hours, bringing the total to 142,292 in the country, according to a statement from the Health and Sports Ministry on Tuesday, Xinhua reported.
The death toll stands at 3,204 with no new death recorded in the past 24 hours.
A total of 131,772 recovered patients have been discharged from hospitals as of Tuesday.