Tortured to death: Myanmar mass killings revealed

Ns News Online Desk: The Myanmar military carried out a series of mass killings of civilians in July that resulted in the deaths of at least 40 men, a BBC investigation has found.Eyewitnesses and survivors said that soldiers, some as young as 17, rounded up villagers before separating the men and killing them. Video footage and images from the incidents appear to show most of those killed were tortured first and buried in shallow graves.

The killings took place in July, in four separate incidents in Kani Township – an opposition stronghold in Sagaing District in Central Myanmar.

It’s thought the killings were a collective punishment for attacks by militia groups demanding a return to democracy following a military coup in February. A spokesman for the military government did not deny the allegations.

The military has faced resistance from civilians since it seized control of the country, which is also called Burma, deposing a democratically-elected government led by Aung San Suu Kyi.

The BBC spoke to 11 witnesses in Kani and compared their accounts with mobile phone footage and photographs collected by Myanmar Witness, a UK-based NGO that investigates human rights abuses in the country.

The killings appeared to be a collective punishment for attacks on the military by civilian militia groups in the area, who are demanding that democracy is restored. Fighting between the military and the local branches of the People’s Defence Force – a collective name for civilian militia groups – had intensified in the area in the months before the mass killings, including clashes near Zee Bin Dwin.