Myanmar’s Long History of Revolutionary Poets
K Za Win, Kyi Lin Aye, Khet Thi
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By The Irrawaddy 15 May 2021
Poet Khet Thi was arrested by some 100 junta troops on the evening of May 8. The following day, he was dead. His wife reportedly had to ask the authorities for permission to collect his body, whose internal organs had been removed for autopsy, from Monywa Hospital.
The 45-year-old poet was arrested for alleged possession of explosives, but no evidence was found at his home. He was the third poet to be killed by junta forces in Sagaing Region’s Monywa in just two months. Poets K Za Win, 39, and Kyi Lin Aye, 36, were shot dead in crackdowns in March.
The Republic P-47 proved to be a formidable ground-attack aircraft and in RAF service was especially devastating during the fighting in Burma in 1945. There, the Thunderbolt was deployed using the ‘cab rank’ system that proved so effective for the Hawker Typhoons during the Battle for Normandy. Flying standing patrols close to the front line, as and when they were needed the Thunderbolts would be directed to specific targets by ground controllers deployed among the Army units in contact with the enemy. The effects of the aerial bombardment the Thunderbolts unleashed was all too often devastating.
Though he only joined 34 Squadron in 1945, Angus Findon quickly found himself embroiled in the last battles of the Second World War – as the many entries in his pilot’s logbook testify. In particular, he and his fellow Thunderbolt pilots, often operating alongside RAF Spitfires, played a vital part in the Battle of the Sittang Bend.
Myanmar’s independence from British rule, formalized in 1948, kickstarted decades of change still being felt at every level of society. Progress has come in fits and starts, but before.
Myanmar Junta Forces Scour Forests in Search of Civilian Resistance
Myanmar Junta Forces Scour Forests in Search of Civilian Resistance
Villagers burn the dead body of villager who was killed during shootouts with junta forces near Kin Village in Kani Township on May 6.
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By The Irrawaddy 10 May 2021
About 23 villagers, including 14 civilian resistance force members, were arrested Monday after the junta’s troops scoured the forests in Sagaing Region’s Kani Township.
Among several townships in Sagaing, Magwe regions and Chin states resisting against the military regime, Kani has been one of the most prominent.
Civilians there have conducted a series of defense actions against the junta’s forces since April 2, taking up homemade percussion lock firearms to do battle. Percussion lock firearms use technology dating back to the early 19
March 29, 2021
One of the consequences of the European conquest of most of southern Asia was an insatiable interest in the region s geography. European-made maps at the time were full of blank spots or, at best, rough guesses of the exact location and height of certain mountains and the sources and accurate courses of major rivers. Ambitious individuals in the academic world sought to make their reputations by answering important geographical questions.
By the late 1880s Great Britain had already taken over northern Burma and France had seized northern Vietnam and Laos. That put both countries possessions on the border of Yunnan, at a time when Chinese central authority was in the throes of collapse. Both wanted to open Yunnan up to trade, so information on the province was at a premium. The only serious Western attempt so far to explore Yunnan was the French Mekong Expedition in 1868.