Research, editing : Gan Yung Chyan, KUCINTA SETIA
News on disease control, CCP, U.S., Myanmar, Taiwan
News (1) to (5) / Reporter : Luo Tingting / Editor: Wen Hui / https://www.ntdtv.com/gb/2021/12/16/a103295232.html
News (17) to (20) / Reporter : Chen Yufu / https://news.ltn.com.tw/news/politics/breakingnews/3770844
The SACM, an international human rights group, asked foreign governments and the UN to designate the junta as a terrorist organization.
On Tuesday (14 December 2021), the group said the regime has been committing acts of extreme criminal violence, intended to provoke a state of terror so people will submit to its agenda.
It cited this month’s burning to death of 11 male villagers in Sagaing Region and the ramming of a pickup truck into peaceful protesters in Yangon.
“People in Myanmar have been calling the military terrorists ever since the post-coup violence began in February,” said South Korean diplomat Yanghee Lee of the SACM, a former UN special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar. “They are right. Only terrorists could commit such beastly acts.”
The group also published a briefing paper on Tuesday demonstrating how the junta is a terrorist organization under national and international law.
It said the three requirements to define a terrorist act are that it is intentional and targeted civilians, that it is intended to provoke a state of terror in the population or to compel action by a government and that it is a serious criminal offense.
“The military’s behaviour clearly falls within the definition of terrorism contained in international counter-terrorism treaties and it should be treated as a terrorist organisation by the international community,” said council member Chris Sidoti, a former member of the UN fact-finding mission on Myanmar.
“That means cutting off its access to weapons and cash. All remaining funds, financial assets and economic or other resources available to it, whether directly or indirectly, must be immediately cut off.”
The NUG declared the military as a terrorist organization in June and vowed to use all justifiable means to uproot the “terrorist military council”.
“The NUG rightly discharged its authority to prescribe the Myanmar military as a terrorist organization. The United Nations and other governments should do the same,” said Marzuki Darusman, a SACM member who chaired the UN fact-finding mission.
News (24)
Hun Sen to his critics about meeting Myanmar Junta: "Don't bother me"
Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen slammed critics of his planned meeting with the Myanmar military junta’s leader with the retort “Don’t bother me,” insisting that his visit to the military-ruled country was aimed helping to repair the image of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
Hun Sun is scheduled to visit Myanmar and meet regime leader Senior General Min Aung Hlaing in early January 2022. The trip has come under fire as he will be the first head of a foreign government to see the coup leader, whose forces have killed more than 1,300 people since seizing power from the country’s elected government in February.
Cambodia is now the chair of ASEAN. Myanmar, a member of the regional bloc, has been in political and social turmoil since the coup as a majority of its people reject the takeover, even 11 months on. Relations between Myanmar and ASEAN turned sour recently after the bloc sidelined the regime’s leader from its summit for failing to take agreed-upon steps to resolve the crisis.
“Give me a chance to solve [the issue],” Hun Sen said on Wednesday, according to media outlet Cambodianess.
“ASEAN can’t be called ASEAN if there’re only nine members. ASEAN must save itself from the ASEAN 9 situation,” he said, referring to Myanmar’s exclusion from a summit recently held by the bloc, which is made up of 10 Southeast Asian nations.
He received Myanmar’s junta-appointed foreign minister last week in Phnom Penh.
Hun Sen’s visit raises questions over whether ASEAN’s unified stand on Myanmar will last. Prior to his confirmation of the visit last week, he hinted that he was ready to travel to Myanmar, whose leader he said had a right to attend ASEAN meetings.
Badly in need of recognition abroad and respect at home, the junta would likely take seriously a leader visit from Cambodia holding the ASEAN chair, as it was stung by the bloc’s decision to exclude Min Aung Hlaing from the summit. At the same time, Hun Sen has faced criticism that his visit will provide some legitimacy to the bloodstained regime.“Please do not bother me, give me time [to meet the leader of Myanmar]. I am not your teacher and you are not my teacher,” he said in response to critics of his visit, according to the Cambodian media.
U.S. State Department Counselor Derek Chollet urged Cambodia last week not to make any concessions to Myanmar’s military junta when Phnom Penh chairs ASEAN.
News (25)
ASEAN leaders to hold digital summit with Biden in 2022
Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is now in Southeast Asia. During his meeting with the Malaysian foreign minister on Wednesday, the secretary said the U.S. was looking at what additional steps to take against Myanmar’s regime and said ASEAN leaders had been invited to hold talks at a summit with US President Joe Biden in Washington in the coming months.
News (26)
Three civilian resistance fighters were also killed during the operations against regime forces in Sagaing Region, according to the People’s Defense Force (PDF).
On Wednesday morning, members of the Mingin People’s Defense Force used landmines to ambush a military detachment of 70 junta troops, including militia trained and armed by the military, in Mingin Township, according to a spokesperson for the resistance group.
The Mingin-PDF claimed 10 regime personnel were killed in the ambush.
After the ambush, regime forces entered Peikkayar Village and burned down the house of ousted NLD lawmaker U Aung Tun Lwin.
The regime forces also faced a second landmine attack by the Mingin-PDF after leaving the village. In the attack, 10 regime forces were killed and many others wounded, the Mingin-PDF said.
On the previous day, regime forces reportedly burned houses including the home of a former elected village administrator during raids on Htongyi, Thitkhaungtee and Winwa villages in Mingin Township.
Two civilians were reportedly injured by landmines planted by regime forces while returning home to put out the fire. A married couple were killed and burned together with a house during the raids, according to the local PDF.
Thousands of residents of about five villages in Mingin Township have fled their homes due to the junta’s raids, according to the Mingin-PDF.
On Wednesday morning, the Sheinmagar-PDF claimed to have killed four regime troops including the head of a police station, while PDFs ambushed regime forces with six landmines on the Sheinmagar highway in Wetlet Township, Sagaing Region.
A junta vehicle overturned in the mine attack, the group said.
The Wetlet-PDF also said that a civilian resistance fighter died during a mission against regime forces in Wetlet Township, Sagaing Region on Tuesday.
At noon on Wednesday, three junta soldiers were killed and two others were seriously wounded when Taze-PDF members ambushed 15 soldiers patrolling on foot in Taze Township, Sagaing Region.
Those injured and the bodies of those killed were evacuated from the area in a civilian vehicle, the Taze-PDF said.
It said it also ambushed a vehicle carrying members of a military-trained and armed Pyu Saw Htee group using landmines in Taze Township on Tuesday evening.
There were many militia casualties in the ambush, according to the Taze-PDF.
Taze People Comrades, a civilian resistance group, also claimed to have killed two regime troops and injured six others during a mine attack in the township on Monday.
On Wednesday, the military regime made a rare confession via a junta-controlled state newspaper, confirming the deaths of two junta police and some other injuries in attacks by the PDF in Taze.
The regime said its troops were attacked with landmines while returning after inspecting the murders of five villagers in Ywarthayar Village in Taze on Monday evening.
The Kani-PDF also claimed to have killed around 10 junta soldiers during an attack on a military flotilla of vessels stranded on a sandbank in the Chindwin River in Kani Township, Sagaing Region on Monday at midnight.
While being attacked by the PDF with heavy explosives, the military flotilla was also hit by mines on a raft sent towards it by the members of the defense force, the Kani-PDF said.
The Kani-PDF also said that one of its members was accidently killed in an explosion while planting landmines to attack regime forces in the township on Tuesday evening.
On Tuesday morning, at least 20 junta soldiers were reportedly killed when the People’s Army to Fight Dictatorship ambushed three military vehicles using eight mines in Sagaing Township, Sagaing Region.
The Pale-PDF claimed that it attacked a military detachment of 40 junta soldiers by using remote-controlled mines in Pale Township, Sagaing Region on Tuesday morning. Military casualties are unknown.
One civilian resistance fighter was killed during a shootout with the regime forces near a village in Pale Township on Monday morning, according to the People’s Revolutionary Army, which joined the fighting.
On Monday night, a combined force of the Thaton People’s Guerillas and Karen National Liberation Army, the armed wing of the Karen National Union, raided regime forces stationed in a village in Thaton Township, Mon State.
The combined force used several 40mm rounds in attacking the regime forces, according to the Thaton People’s Guerrillas.
The group claimed to have killed three regime troops and injured seven others in the attack.
Military forces are now facing increasingly frequent and intense attacks from PDFs and many ethnic armed groups across the country.
Myanmar’s regime has continued to arbitrarily kill civilians, burn civilians alive, use civilian detainees as human shields, bombard residential areas and loot and burn houses, especially in Sagaing and Magwe regions and Chin, Shan and Kayah states, where the PDFs are most active.
By Tuesday, 1,339 people had been slain and another 10,946 people including elected government leaders detained by the junta since the February 1 coup, the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners said.
News (27)
Authorities adjust rehabilitation procedures for confirmed travelers staying in Singapore hotels
The Singapore Tourism Board (STB) has adjusted the rehabilitation procedures for travelers diagnosed with covid staying in hotels.
From 20 December 2021, travelers staying in the hotels will have a positive result of Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) test and rapid antigen test ART, or they will be listed as close contacts of the confirmed patient and receive a health risk. It is warned that their rehabilitation and isolation in hotel rooms will become the established rehabilitation model.
Singapore Tourism Board (STB) issued a statement saying that at present, most of the visitors entering Singapore have been vaccinated and the risk of severe illness is low. Even if they are diagnosed after arrival, they will recover on their own. Therefore, the authorities have adjusted the rehabilitation procedures. The new procedures are also more consistent with the rehabilitation procedures of local community cases.
However, the authorities will adopt more stringent epidemic prevention measures for confirmed infections and suspected cases of Omicron covid. Such confirmed or suspected patients will be sent to designated care and isolation facilities and will not be recuperated in hotel rooms. Their close contacts will also receive a quarantine order and must be quarantined in designated facilities.
STB stated that before obtaining more information about Omicron/Covi29, the authorities will adopt such a differentiated management approach to deal with the confirmed infections and suspected cases of Omicron covid.
News (28)
Brunei reports 9 new covid cases as it enters endemic phase of the pandemic
Brunei Darussalam adds 9 new covid cases on 15 December 2021 (Wednesday), as the country enters the Endemic Phase of its National COVID-19 Recovery Framework.
The total number of cases now rises to 15,372, according to the Minister of Health Dato Seri Setia Dr Hj Md Isham bin Hj Jaafar at a press conference.
The number of new cases is the result of a total of 3,781 laboratory tests conducted in the past 24 hours. Therefore, the rate of positive case today is 0.2%.
Among the cases being treated at the National Isolation Centre, there is no case is in Category 4 (requiring oxygen assistance and under close monitoring) and one case is in Category 5 (requiring assistance of artificial ventilation and
treated at the Intensive Care Unit).
Meanwhile, no deaths associated with covid have been recorded in the past 24 hours.
19 cases have recovered on 15 December 2021, bringing the total number of recovered cases in Brunei Darussalam to 15,046 cases and the total active cases are 226 cases.
Meanwhile, the bed occupancy rate in isolation centres nationwide is 5.2%.
As of 14 December 2021, the overall rate of the population who have received at least one dose of the covi vaccine is 94.2%; The rate of those who have received two doses of the covi vaccine is 90.5%; while the rate of those who have received three doses of the covi vaccine is 3.9%.
News (29) to (40) / Host : Li Muyang / Publisher : News Insights / https://www.ntdtv.com/gb/2021/12/16/a103295164.html
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