March 12, 2021 07:55:30 pm
Amnesty International reported Thursday that the Myanmar military (the Tatmadaw) is increasingly adopting lethal tactics and weapons, ordinarily employed on the battlefield, against peaceful protesters of the February coup.
Officers are reported to be using weapons such as semi-automatic rifles, sniper rifles, and light machine guns, which are not appropriate for policing. These are coupled with indiscriminate use of reckless and contentious “crowd control” measures such as tear gas, water cannons, rubber bullets, and “pepperball” launchers.
Amnesty’s Crisis Evidence Lab has examined and verified more than 50 videos from the ongoing crackdown confirming that security forces are implementing systematically planned strategies inclusive of the use of lethal force. It terms the killings of protesters, the numbers of which are reaching at least a dozen every week, as “extra-judicial executions” that are being carried out in a “planned, premeditated and coordinated manner”.