Asia
More than 200 NGOs call for UN arms embargo on Myanmar
More than 200 global organizations urged the U.N. Security Council on Wednesday to impose an arms embargo on Myanmar, saying the time for statements has passed and immediate action is needed to help protect peaceful protesters against military rule and other opponents of the junta.
A statement by the non-governmental organizations said the military “has demonstrated a callous disregard for human life” since their Feb. 1 coup, killing at least 769 people including 51 children as young as six years old and detaining several thousand activists, journalists, civil servants and politicians. Hundreds of others have disappeared, it said.
Also Read: Pro-democracy forces in Myanmar create "People's Defence Force"
“No government should sell a single bullet to the junta under these circumstances,” the NGOs said. “Imposing a global arms embargo on Myanmar is the minimum necessary step the Security Council should take in response to the military’s escalating violence.”
The organizations urged the United Kingdom, the Security Council nation in charge of drafting resolutions on Myanmar, “to begin negotiations on a resolution authorizing an arms embargo as soon as possible.” This “will demonstrate to the junta that there will be no more business as usual,” they said.
Myanmar for five decades had languished under strict military rule that led to international isolation and sanctions. As the generals loosened their grip, culminating in Aung San Suu Kyi’s rise to leadership in 2015 elections, the international community responded by lifting most sanctions and pouring investment into the country. The coup took place following November elections, which Suu Kyi’s party won overwhelmingly and the military contests as fraudulent.
The 15-member Security Council has issued several statements since the coup demanding the restoration of democracy and the release of all detainees including Suu Kyi, strongly condemning the use of violence against peaceful protesters and the deaths of hundreds of civilians and calling on the military “to exercise utmost restraint” and “on all sides to refrain from violence.”
It has also stressed “the need to fully respect human rights and to pursue dialogue and reconciliation,” and backed diplomatic efforts by the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations and U.N. special envoy Christine Schraner Burgener to find a solution.
“The time for statements has passed,” the NGOs said. “The Security Council should take its consensus on Myanmar to a new level and agree on immediate and substantive action.”
They said a U.N. global arms embargo against Myanmar should bar the direct or indirect supply, sale or transfer of “all weapons, munitions, and other military-related equipment, including dual-use goods such as vehicles and communications and surveillance equipment.” Training, intelligence and other military assistance should also be banned, they said.
Amnesty International’s Senior U.N. Advocate Lawrence Moss told a virtual news conference launching the statement that many countries supply weapons to Myanmar.
Citing Amnesty’s research and information from other trusted sources, he said Russia has been supplying combat aircraft and attack helicopters to Myanmar while China has been supplying combat aircraft, naval weapons, armored vehicles, surveillance drones and aiding Myanmar’s indigenous naval industry. In addition, he said, Chinese weapons, small arms and armored vehicles have been diverted to ethnic armed groups, especially the Kachin Independence Army.
Also Read:Myanmar’s military disappearing young men to crush uprising
Moss said Ukraine has also supplied Myanmar’s military with armored vehicles and is involved in the joint production of armored vehicles in Myanmar, Turkey has provided shotguns and shotgun cartridges, India has provided armored vehicles, troop carriers and naval equipment including a submarine with torpedoes, and Serbia has recorded transfers of small quantities of artillery systems and small arms.
Israel had supplied frigates and armored vehicles to Myanmar along with police training but that stopped in 2017 though it may still be providing surveillance equipment, Moss said. South Korea transferred an amphibious assault system in 2019 but announced a halt to further military exports after the coup.
Human Rights Watch’s U.N. Director Louis Charbonneau said: “This is the beginning of what we hope will be an escalation of advocacy to make it extremely difficult, if not impossible, for the Security Council, wringing its hands, sticking with inaction and the occasional statement of concern.”
But getting the Security Council to adopt a resolution authorizing an arms embargo faces an uphill struggle, especially with China and Russia’s general opposition to sanctions.
China’s U.N. Ambassador Zhang Jun, whose country holds the council presidency this month, told a news conference Monday that China is “a friendly neighbor of Myanmar” and is putting more emphasis on diplomatic efforts. It is “not in favor of imposing sanctions” which may hinder diplomacy and lead to suffering of ordinary people, Zhang said.
Amnesty’s Moss countered that an “arms embargo would not hurt the ordinary people of Myanmar in any way, shape or form... and I hope that China will consider that.”
Simon Adams, executive director of the Global Center for the Responsibility to Protect, said Myanmar’s “murderous, military-led regime” shouldn’t be allowed to buy bombs or even “camouflage underwear” and “should be treated like the pariahs that they are.”
“I think all of us share concern that the country could become a failed state, armed conflict could intensify, and so an arms embargo now is also a kind of preventive against a refugee crisis that flows across borders in the region, and an armed conflict which serves nobody’s interests,” Adams said.
Also Read: UN calls for return to democracy in Myanmar, end to violence
Myra Dahgaypaw, managing director of the U.S. Campaign for Burma who recalled fleeing from past military airstrikes, said an arms embargo won’t solve all the country’s problems but “it will significantly increase the safety of the people on the ground, including the ethnic and the religious minorities.”
“Today I just want to tell the U.N. Security Council that the people of Burma need your help, and they need it urgently,” she said. “Please don’t let the efforts, the struggle and the resilience of the people on the ground who are trying to survive go in vain.”
Malaysia bans entry of travellers from Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka
After banning Indian nationals from entering Malaysia, the government today extended the ban to cover travellers from Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka.
Senior Minister (Security Cluster) Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob said the ban covered all categories of long-term social visit pass holders, business travellers and social visitors.
"However, exemptions are given to holders of diplomatic and official passports as provided for under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations 1961," he said in a statement today on the Movement Control Order (MCO), Conditional MCO (CMCO) and Recovery MCO (RMCO).
He said this category of travellers could enter Malaysia subject to the existing Standard Operating Procedure (SOP).
The government had earlier banned visitors from India following an alarming spike in COVID-19 cases in that country.
India's virus surge damages Modi's image of competence
India’s hospitals were packed with coronavirus patients, relatives of the sick scrambled to find supplies of oxygen, and crematoriums were running near full capacity to handle the dead.
Yet despite those clear signs of an overwhelming health crisis, Prime Minister Narendra Modi pressed ahead with a densely packed campaign rally.
“I have never seen such a huge crowd before!” he roared to his supporters in West Bengal state on April 17, before key local elections. “Wherever I can see, I can only see people. I can see nothing else.”
As another deadly wave of COVID-19 infections was swamping India, Modi's government refused to cancel a giant Hindu festival. Cricket matches, attended by tens of thousands, carried on, too.
The catastrophic surge has badly dented Modi’s political image after he drew praise last year for moving quickly to lock down India’s nearly 1.4 billion people. Now, he’s been called a “super-spreader” by the vice president of the Indian Medical Association, Dr. Navjot Dahiya.
With deaths mounting and a touted vaccine rollout faltering badly, Modi has pushed much of the responsibility for fighting the virus onto poorly equipped and unprepared state governments and even onto patients themselves, critics say.
“It is a crime against humanity,” author and activist Arundhati Roy said of Modi’s handling of the virus. “Foreign governments are rushing to help. But as long as decision-making remains with Modi, who has shown himself to be incapable of working with experts or looking beyond securing narrow political gain, it will be like pouring aid into a sieve.”
The 70-year-old, whose image as a technocrat brought him deep approval from a middle class weary of corruption and bureaucratic dysfunction, has been accused of stifling dissent and choosing politics over public health.
When the official COVID-19 death toll crossed 200,000 — a number experts say is a severe undercount — Modi was silent.
His government says it is on a “war footing,” ramping up hospital capacity, supplies of oxygen and drugs.
“The present COVID pandemic is a once-in-a-century crisis,” Information and Broadcasting Minister Prakash Javadekar told The Associated Press. “All efforts are being made to overcome the situation by the central government in close coordination with the state governments and society at large.”
When Modi won national elections in 2014, he presented himself as someone who could unlock economic growth by merging business-friendly policies with a Hindu nationalist ideology.
Critics saw him as craving power over the national welfare and catering to his Hindu nationalist base. They blamed him — although courts exonerated him — in the bloody 2002 anti-Muslim riots in Gujarat state, where he was chief minister.
The economy tumbled after his government overhauled India’s cash supply and introduced a goods and services tax. Yet, he easily won reelection in 2019 on a wave of nationalism following clashes with archrival Pakistan.
Despite a second term marred by a souring economy, widening social strife, and deadly clashes with neighboring China, “Modi has proven to be incredibly politically resilient,” said Milan Vaishnav, director of the South Asia program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
When the coronavirus hit, Vaishnav said Modi took an approach different from former President Donald Trump and current Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.
“He never called the virus a hoax. He took it seriously. He encouraged mask-wearing, social distancing. He encouraged the sorts of things health authorities everywhere have been calling for,” he added.
The strict lockdown, imposed on four hours’ notice, stranded tens of millions of migrant workers who were left jobless and fled to villages with many dying along the way. But experts say the decision helped contain the virus and bought time for the government.
Cases rose when the country started reopening in June 2020, and the government developed emergency infrastructure plans. When the wave receded and reported cases plummeted over the winter, many officials saw it as a triumph. States dismantled makeshift hospitals and delayed adding ICU beds and ventilators.
The government had sought to create 162 oxygen plants earlier, but has only built 38. It says 105 more will be built this month.
The fragile health care system was not upgraded enough, said Gautam Menon, a science professor at Ashoka University, “and with the current surge, we’re seeing precisely the consequences of not doing this.”
When cases ebbed in January, Modi crowed about India’s success, telling the World Economic Forum that the country “has saved humanity from a big disaster by containing corona effectively.”
His ruling Bharatiya Janata Party hailed his “visionary leadership,” making India a “proud and victorious nation in the fight against COVID.”
In mid-March, tens of thousands attended cricket matches against England at Narendra Modi stadium in Gujarat, an event that swelled national pride even amid warnings that infections were climbing.
On March 21, advertisements on the front pages of newspapers read, “Beautiful Clean Safe,” as Modi and a political ally welcomed Hindu devotees to the Kumbh Mela, a pilgrimage to the Ganges River that drew millions throughout April.
By contrast, in March 2020, his government blamed a Muslim gathering of 3,000 for an initial spike in infections in a move that triggered violence and boycotts, even as courts dismissed the accusations.
Critics have blasted the BJP for holding election rallies packed with tens of thousands of unmasked supporters, particularly in West Bengal. Other parties also campaigned to large crowds. Bowing to criticism, Modi began appearing over video instead of live, but the crowds remained.
Though his party was defeated in the state, analysts say he still enjoys popularity nationwide.
Meanwhile, India’s vaccination campaign begun in January has sputtered amid perceptions the virus was defeated. Only 10% of the population has received one shot and fewer than 2% have gotten both since it began in January.
The latest effort to inoculate those between 18 and 44 has been left to states and the private sector — an approach that critics say will make it easier for the government to pass blame when problems arise. Already, several states have said they don’t have enough vaccine to even start.
The surge has sparked assistance from overseas, a reversal of India’s earlier success at “vaccine diplomacy” when it exported 64 million doses. Some say Modi’s flagship self-sufficiency campaign, known as “Make in India,” is being undermined.
“India has long sought to project itself as a strong nation that need not be dependent on any other. Its immediate need for international assistance flies in the face of that image,” said Michael Kugelman of the Asia Program at the Washington-based Wilson Center.
Some Modi supporters are lashing out. When BJP lawmaker Kesar Singh Gangwar died of the virus in Uttar Pradesh state, his son said Modi’s office didn't help.
“What kind of government is this? What kind of PM is Modi?” said Vishal Gangwar. “If he cannot provide treatment to a lawmaker of his own party, what is happening to a common man is anybody’s guess.”
To circumvent such criticism, the government ordered Twitter to remove posts criticizing his pandemic response. In BJP-run Uttar Pradesh, authorities recently charged a man over a tweet pleading for oxygen for his dying grandfather, accusing him of “circulating a rumor," as top officials deny widespread oxygen shortages.
“To blame social media or users for either critiquing or begging for help is just — I mean, what are their priorities? To help people or silence criticism?” said digital rights activist Nikhil Pahwa.
The level of urban and middle class anger at Modi is unprecedented, political analyst Vaishnav said, although it is blunted by supporters who believe he can do no wrong.
“He shouldn’t be expected to solve all problems by himself. The government machinery which existed before him, full of corruption, is to blame,” said Sunil Saini, a driver in New Delhi. “My vote will go to Modi the next time too.”
Pro-democracy forces in Myanmar create "People's Defence Force"
The parallel government launched by pro-democracy forces in Myanmar following a military coup to rival the ruling junta said Wednesday that it has established what it calls "People's Defence Force."
The National Unity Government said the defense force aims to protect supporters and others from violence by the military, but did not say whether it would engage in an armed struggle with the military in earnest.
The statement, issued under its prime minister's name, did not provide details about the force, either.
The National Unity Government has set its sights on creating a federal army with armed ethnic minorities that are seeking greater autonomy and in conflict with the military in the Southeast Asian country.
The National Unity Government said it has a responsibility to stop terrorism committed by the military and end a 70-year civil war, adding that it has already taken up arms and been fighting "terrorist" elements in multiple cities.
The junta has issued arrest warrants against senior officials of the parallel government, saying they will be tried for treason, which is punishable by death.
Violence against anti-coup protesters and others by Myanmar's security forces since the Feb. 1 coup had killed 769 people as of Tuesday, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, a rights group monitoring the situation in Myanmar.
Myanmar’s military disappearing young men to crush uprising
Myanmar’s security forces moved in and the street lamps went black. In house after house, people shut off their lights. Darkness swallowed the block.
Huddled inside her home in this neighborhood of Yangon, 19-year-old Shwe dared to peek out her window into the inky night. A flashlight shone back, and a man’s voice ordered her not to look.
Two gunshots rang out. Then a man’s scream: “HELP!” When the military’s trucks finally rolled away, Shwe and her family emerged to look for her 15-year-old brother, worried about frequent abductions by security forces.
“I could feel my blood thumping,” she says. “I had a feeling that he might be taken.”
Across the country, Myanmar’s security forces are arresting and forcibly disappearing thousands of people, especially boys and young men, in a sweeping bid to break the back of a three-month uprising against a military takeover. In most cases, the families of those taken do not know where they are, according to an Associated Press analysis of more than 3,500 arrests since February.
UNICEF, the U.N. children’s agency, is aware of around 1,000 cases of children or young people who have been arbitrarily arrested and detained, many without access to lawyers or their families. Though it is difficult to get exact data, UNICEF says the majority are boys.
It is a technique the military has long used to instill fear and to crush pro-democracy movements. The boys and young men are taken from homes, businesses and streets, under the cover of night and sometimes in the brightness of day.
Some end up dead. Many are imprisoned and sometimes tortured. Many more are missing.
“We’ve definitely moved into a situation of mass enforced disappearances,” says Matthew Smith, cofounder of the human rights group Fortify Rights, which has collected evidence of detainees being killed in custody. “We’re documenting and seeing widespread and systematic arbitrary arrests.”
The AP is withholding Shwe’s full name, along with those of several others, to protect them from retaliation by the military.
The autobody shop in Shwe’s neighborhood was a regular hangout for local boys. On the night of March 21, her brother had gone there to chill out like he usually did.
As Shwe approached the shop, she saw it had been ransacked. Frantic, she and her father scoured the building for any sign of their beloved boy.
But he was gone, and the floor was covered in blood.
Ever since the military seized control in February, the conflict in Myanmar has become increasingly bloody. Security forces have killed more than 700 people, including a boy as young as 9.
In the meantime, the faces of the missing have flooded the Internet in growing numbers. Online videos show soldiers and police beating and kicking young men as they’re shoved into vans, even forcing captives to crawl on all fours and hop like frogs.
Recently, photos of young people detained by security forces also have begun circulating online and on military-controlled Myawaddy TV, their faces bloodied, with clear markings of beatings and possible torture. The military’s openness in broadcasting such photos and brutalizing people in daylight is one more sign that its goal is to intimidate.
At least 3,500 people have been detained since the military takeover began, more than three-quarters of whom are male, according to an analysis of data collected by the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, which monitors deaths and arrests. Of the 419 men whose ages were recorded in the group’s database, nearly two-thirds are under age 30, and 78 are teenagers.
Nearly 2,700 of the detainees are being held at undisclosed locations, according to an AAPP spokesman. The group says its numbers are likely an undercount.
“The military are trying to turn civilians, striking workers, and children into enemies,” says Ko Bo Kyi, AAPP’s joint secretary. “They think if they can kill off the boys and young men, then they can kill off the revolution.”
After receiving questions from The Associated Press, the military, known as the Tatmadaw, called a Zoom press conference, during which it dubbed the AAPP a “baseless organization,” suggested its data was inaccurate, and denied security forces are targeting young men.
“The security forces are not arresting based on genders and ages,” said Capt. Aye Thazin Myint, a military spokeswoman. “They are only detaining anyone who is rioting, protesting, causing unrest, or any actions along those lines.”
Some of those snatched by security forces were protesting. Some have links to the military’s rival political party, most notably Aung San Suu Kyi, who led the elected government that the military toppled and is now under house arrest. Others are taken for no discernable reason. They are typically charged with Section 505(A) of the Penal Code, which, in part, criminalizes comments that “cause fear” or spread “false news.”
Both the military and police — who fall under the Tatmadaw’s command via the Ministry of Home Affairs — have been involved in the arrests and disappearances, sometimes working in tandem, according to interviews with detainees and families. Experts believe that suggests a coordinated strategy.
“The Myanmar police force and the Tatmadaw moved in in a very deliberate way, in a coordinated way, in similar ways, in disparate locations, which to us would indicate that they were working according to orders,” says Smith of Fortify Rights. “It would appear as though there was ... some national level communication and coordination taking place.”
Manny Maung, a Myanmar researcher for Human Rights Watch, says one woman she spoke with described being viciously beaten by police until what looked like a senior military official told them to stop.
“They’re definitely following orders from military officials,” Maung says. “And whether they’re coordinating — they’re certainly turning up to places together.”
So desperate for information are the loved ones of the lost that some families have resorted to a grim experiment: They send food into the prisons and hope if it isn’t sent back out, that means their relatives are still inside.
Myanmar human rights activist Wai Hnin Pwint Thon is intimately acquainted with the Tatmadaw’s tactics. Her father, famed political activist Mya Aye, was arrested during a 1988 uprising against military rule, and the family waited months before they learned he was in prison.
He was arrested again on the first day of this year’s military takeover. For two months, the military gave Wai Hnin Pwint Thon’s family no information on his whereabouts. On April 1, the family learned he was being held at Yangon’s notorious Insein prison.
“I can’t imagine families of young people who are 19, 20, 21, in prison… We are this worried and we’re used to this situation,” she says. “I’m trying to hold onto hope, but the situation is getting worse every day.”
Mee, a 27-year-old villager in the northern region of Mandalay, watched as children on motorbikes raced past her house toward the woods. Not long after, the village elders arrived with a dire warning: All the boys must leave and get somewhere safe. The soldiers might be coming.
Just two hours later, Mee says, the elders asked the girls to hide, too.
The military’s scare tactics have proven enormously effective. In villages and cities across the country, residents regularly take turns holding night watches, banging pots and pans or yelling to neighbors from the street if soldiers or police are spotted.
“I am more afraid of being arrested than getting shot,” says one 29-year-old man who was arrested, beaten and later released, and who spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid retribution. “I have a chance of dying on the spot with just one shot. But being arrested, I am afraid that they would torture me.”
Fearing for her life on that March afternoon, Mee and hundreds of fellow villagers fled to pineapple farms in the surrounding hills. When she arrived, she saw scores of people from other villages hiding in the forest.
That night, as mosquitos swarmed and sounds from the forest haunted them, the women stayed inside a small bamboo tent while the boys took turns standing guard. No one slept.
Mee was terrified but not surprised. Many of the villagers had run from the military and hidden in the woods before.
“It’s heartbreaking,” she says.
For decades, the Tatmadaw has used arbitrary arrests, disappearances, forced labor and other abuses to crush pro-democracy movements and suppress minorities, including its notoriously brutal 2017 campaign of persecution against Rohingya Muslims.
“Sometimes communities are asked to provide a number of young men on a ‘voluntary’ basis; sometimes they are taken,” Laetitia van den Assum, a former diplomat and a member of the Advisory Commission on Rakhine State, said in an e-mail.
Arbitrary arrests continue across the country daily. Just two weeks earlier, a few minutes away from Mee’s village, 24-year-old philosophy student Ko Ko was walking home from a protest with a friend when they were arrested. His parents learned of their imprisonment from friends of friends, not officials.
More than a month later, his parents still haven’t heard from their only son, says Han, a neighbor. He’s part of an unlucky cohort: at least 44 people taken from the town are yet to be released, Han says.
While many of the young men in Mee’s village returned home after two nights in the pineapple fields, some continue to sleep there. Mee has since gone back to her village.
Whenever she sees a soldier, she runs. But her fear has largely given way to fury.
“I was angry that night, and I am still angry,” she says. “It’s so frustrating that the people who are supposed to be protecting our lives, our safety, our livelihoods and our homes are the people who are chasing us and killing us. … We are helpless.”
The glass was shattering, and there was nowhere left for the 21-year-old university student to run. The soldiers were smashing through the front doors of the house in Mandalay.
The chaos of such raids is usually followed by a sinister silence, with the families of the taken rarely hearing from officials. But the accounts of some survivors who dare to speak about their ordeals help fill the void of what often happens next.
The student, who asked that his name be withheld out of fear of retaliation, had taken refuge in the house along with around 100 others after security forces stormed a rally they were attending. The soldiers had thrown tear gas at them, forcing them to flee.
Now he and a half dozen others were cornered in a bathroom on the home’s second level. Downstairs, the security forces used a slingshot and the butt of a gun to break through the doors.
The soldiers began beating the boys they found inside, so viciously that a few of their heads cracked open. They urinated on one young man.
The student watched as the glass above the bathroom door imploded. “They are here!” the soldiers yelled, then burst in, guns drawn.
He bowed his head, since anyone who looked at the soldiers was kicked. The soldiers kicked him anyway, twice in the waist, and hit him twice in the head. As he was marched down the stairs, he saw a soldier with a gun standing on nearly every step.
He and around 30 other young men were arrested and ushered into a prison van. Both the military and police were there. The soldiers threatened to burn the van and tauntingly offered the detainees juice before throwing it at them.
When they arrived at the prison, the young man saw 400 to 500 people in the temporary holding area. The next day, he was charged with Section 505(A) of the penal code. He and around 50 others spent nine days jammed into one room.
There were only two toilets. They were allowed out of the cell twice a day to clean themselves. The same water was used for showering, drinking, washing dishes and using the toilet.
When the young man learned he was being transferred to the main prison, he wanted to cry. A few days before his arrest, he had been looking at missing persons posts on social media. Now he realized most of those people were probably in prison like him.
The young man had good reason to be frightened.
“People are disappearing and turning up dead,” says Maung, of Human Rights Watch. “We have had primary reports, also, of torture while they’re in custody.”
The group found that some people detained inside Insein prison were subjected to beatings, stress positions and severe interrogation tactics, up until March 4, Maung says. After that, guards began taking prisoners to second locations and torturing them, then returning them to Insein.
In Mandalay, the young man’s family was sick with worry. Some of his friends told them he had been arrested; the authorities never called them.
His family sent food into the prison for him. But even when it wasn’t returned, they couldn’t be sure he was inside. They heard reports about protesters being tortured. His sisters cried constantly.
Thirteen days after his arrest, the young man was allowed ten minutes to speak with his sister.
A week later, an official ordered him to pack his things. In shock, he realized he was being released.
There was no time to say goodbye to his friends. The officials took videos and photos of him and around 20 others, and told them to sign statements promising they wouldn’t break the law again. Then they were set free.
He didn’t feel lucky — he felt horrible. He didn’t understand why he’d been singled out for release while his friends were still stuck inside.
“None of us really feel safe living our normal lives now. For me now, I have reservations walking alone outside even in my neighborhood,” he says. “And also, I feel worried to see the parents of my friends in the neighborhood, because I am out — and their children are not.”
Back in Yangon, Shwe stared at the puddles of blood on the floor of the shop where her baby brother had been. It looked as if the security forces had half-heartedly tried to wash it away, but red pools remained.
Maybe the blood wasn’t his, she told herself.
Shwe’s brother and three other young men from the shop had been hauled away. Neighbors told the family that both police and soldiers were there. The neighbors said the security forces may have targeted the boys because they spotted someone inside the shop with a steel dart slingshot.
At 2 a.m., a police officer called to say Shwe’s brother was at a military hospital and had been shot in the hand. They later learned security forces had shot another young man’s finger during the raid.
Shwe says her family told the police that her brother was underage. The officer, she says, reassured them that because he was a minor, he probably wouldn’t be charged.
Around 7 a.m., the family went to the hospital to bring him food. But their pleas to see him were rejected. Shwe and her family were later told that he was being moved to a prison hospital.
Then, on the night of March 27, came the news that stunned them: Her brother and the three others had been charged with possession of weapons, and sentenced to three years in prison.
They were allowed one brief phone call with him when he was first in the hospital, and nothing since. Shwe remembers hearing her brother tell their anguished mother, “Thar ah sin pyay tal.” I am OK.
Shwe has no idea if that is still true. She worries for her brother, a quiet boy who loves playing games. She worries, too, for their mother, who cries and cries, and for their father, who aches for his only son.
For now, they can do little more than wait and hope: That he won’t be beaten. That he will get a pardon. That the people of Myanmar will soon feel safe again.
“Even though we are all in distress, we try to look on the bright side that at least we know where he is,” she says. “We are lucky that he was only abducted.”
Indian government faces lockdown calls, contempt charges
India’s government faced calls for a strict lockdown to slow a devastating surge in new coronaviorus cases, and a court in New Delhi on Wednesday will decide whether to punish officials for failing to end a 2-week-old erratic supply of oxygen to overstretched hospitals.
With 382,315 new confirmed cases, India’s tally has risen to more than 20.6 million since the pandemic began. The Health Ministry on Wednesday also reported 3,780 deaths in the last 24 hours, bringing the total to 226,188. Experts believe both figures are an undercount.
Also Read:India’s virus surge damages Modi’s image of competence
Rahul Gandhi, a leader of the opposition Congress party, said this week “a lockdown is now the only option because of a complete lack of strategy by the Indian government.”
The New Delhi High Court will decide whether to press contempt charges against officials for defying its order to meet oxygen requirements of more than 40 hospitals in the capital. Those found guilty face six months in prison or a fine.
The court summoned two Home Ministry officials for Wednesday’s hearing.
“You can put your head in the sand like an ostrich, we will not. We are not going to take no for an answer,” Justices Vipin Sanghi and Rekha Palli said.
The grim reality is that hospitals are reducing the number of beds and asking patients to move elsewhere, the judges said. The court is hearing petitions filed by several hospitals and nursing homes struggling with irregular oxygen supplies.
Raghav Chaddha, a spokesman for the Aam Aadmi Party governing New Delhi, said hospitals were getting only 40% of their 700 metric tons (772 U.S. tons) requirements through the federal government, and the local government was arranging additional supplies to meet the shortfall and setting up new oxygen plants.
Also Read: India reports over 380,000 new cases, tally at 20,665,148
The latest wave of infections since April has pushed India’s health care to the brink with people begging for oxygen cylinders and hospital beds on social media and news channels.
Bodies have been piling up at cremation grounds and in graveyards with relatives waiting for hours for the last rites.
Dileep Kumar, a student, said he was asked by hospital authorities to shift his father to another hospital in Ghaziabad, a town on the outskirts of New Delhi, after it ran out of oxygen on Tuesday.
Authorities are scrambling to add more beds, sending oxygen from one corner of the country to another, and scaling up manufacturing of the few drugs effective against COVID-19.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government is reluctant to impose a national lockdown for fear of the economic fallout. Modi said last month that it should be the last resort.
But nearly a dozen states have imposed curbs on their own.
The most populous state of Uttar Pradesh, with 200 million people, implemented a five-day lockdown this week. The country’s second and third most populated states of Maharashtra and Bihar are also under lockdown with varying curbs.
Also Read:‘Horrible’ weeks ahead as India’s virus catastrophe worsens
Efforts to scale up the vaccination drive are hampered by the shortage of doses. India, a country of 1.4 billion, has so far administered 160 million doses.
The global community is extending a helping hand. The United States, Britain, Germany and several other nations are rushing therapeutics, rapid virus tests and oxygen to India, along with some materials needed for India to boost its domestic production of COVID-19 vaccines.
Myanmar’s military disappearing young men to crush uprising
Myanmar’s security forces moved in and the street lamps went black. In house after house, people shut off their lights. Darkness swallowed the block.
Huddled inside her home in this neighborhood of Yangon, 19-year-old Shwe dared to peek out her window into the inky night. A flashlight shone back, and a man’s voice ordered her not to look.
Two gunshots rang out. Then a man’s scream: “HELP!” When the military’s trucks finally rolled away, Shwe and her family emerged to look for her 15-year-old brother, worried about frequent abductions by security forces.
“I could feel my blood thumping,” she says. “I had a feeling that he might be taken.”
Across the country, Myanmar’s security forces are arresting and forcibly disappearing thousands of people, especially boys and young men, in a sweeping bid to break the back of a three-month uprising against a military takeover. In most cases, the families of those taken do not know where they are, according to an Associated Press analysis of more than 3,500 arrests since February.
Also Read:UN calls for return to democracy in Myanmar, end to violence
UNICEF, the U.N. children’s agency, is aware of around 1,000 cases of children or young people who have been arbitrarily arrested and detained, many without access to lawyers or their families. Though it is difficult to get exact data, UNICEF says the majority are boys.
It is a technique the military has long used to instill fear and to crush pro-democracy movements. The boys and young men are taken from homes, businesses and streets, under the cover of night and sometimes in the brightness of day.
Some end up dead. Many are imprisoned and sometimes tortured. Many more are missing.
“We’ve definitely moved into a situation of mass enforced disappearances,” says Matthew Smith, cofounder of the human rights group Fortify Rights, which has collected evidence of detainees being killed in custody. “We’re documenting and seeing widespread and systematic arbitrary arrests.”
The AP is withholding Shwe’s full name, along with those of several others, to protect them from retaliation by the military.
The autobody shop in Shwe’s neighborhood was a regular hangout for local boys. On the night of March 21, her brother had gone there to chill out like he usually did.
As Shwe approached the shop, she saw it had been ransacked. Frantic, she and her father scoured the building for any sign of their beloved boy.
But he was gone, and the floor was covered in blood.
Ever since the military seized control in February, the conflict in Myanmar has become increasingly bloody. Security forces have killed more than 700 people, including a boy as young as 9.
In the meantime, the faces of the missing have flooded the Internet in growing numbers. Online videos show soldiers and police beating and kicking young men as they’re shoved into vans, even forcing captives to crawl on all fours and hop like frogs.
Recently, photos of young people detained by security forces also have begun circulating online and on military-controlled Myawaddy TV, their faces bloodied, with clear markings of beatings and possible torture. The military’s openness in broadcasting such photos and brutalizing people in daylight is one more sign that its goal is to intimidate.
At least 3,500 people have been detained since the military takeover began, more than three-quarters of whom are male, according to an analysis of data collected by the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, which monitors deaths and arrests. Of the 419 men whose ages were recorded in the group’s database, nearly two-thirds are under age 30, and 78 are teenagers.
Nearly 2,700 of the detainees are being held at undisclosed locations, according to an AAPP spokesman. The group says its numbers are likely an undercount.
“The military are trying to turn civilians, striking workers, and children into enemies,” says Ko Bo Kyi, AAPP’s joint secretary. “They think if they can kill off the boys and young men, then they can kill off the revolution.”
After receiving questions from The Associated Press, the military, known as the Tatmadaw, called a Zoom press conference, during which it dubbed the AAPP a “baseless organization,” suggested its data was inaccurate, and denied security forces are targeting young men.
“The security forces are not arresting based on genders and ages,” said Capt. Aye Thazin Myint, a military spokeswoman. “They are only detaining anyone who is rioting, protesting, causing unrest, or any actions along those lines.”
Some of those snatched by security forces were protesting. Some have links to the military’s rival political party, most notably Aung San Suu Kyi, who led the elected government that the military toppled and is now under house arrest. Others are taken for no discernable reason. They are typically charged with Section 505(A) of the Penal Code, which, in part, criminalizes comments that “cause fear” or spread “false news.”
Both the military and police — who fall under the Tatmadaw’s command via the Ministry of Home Affairs — have been involved in the arrests and disappearances, sometimes working in tandem, according to interviews with detainees and families. Experts believe that suggests a coordinated strategy.
“The Myanmar police force and the Tatmadaw moved in in a very deliberate way, in a coordinated way, in similar ways, in disparate locations, which to us would indicate that they were working according to orders,” says Smith of Fortify Rights. “It would appear as though there was ... some national level communication and coordination taking place.”
Manny Maung, a Myanmar researcher for Human Rights Watch, says one woman she spoke with described being viciously beaten by police until what looked like a senior military official told them to stop.
“They’re definitely following orders from military officials,” Maung says. “And whether they’re coordinating — they’re certainly turning up to places together.”
So desperate for information are the loved ones of the lost that some families have resorted to a grim experiment: They send food into the prisons and hope if it isn’t sent back out, that means their relatives are still inside.
Myanmar human rights activist Wai Hnin Pwint Thon is intimately acquainted with the Tatmadaw’s tactics. Her father, famed political activist Mya Aye, was arrested during a 1988 uprising against military rule, and the family waited months before they learned he was in prison.
He was arrested again on the first day of this year’s military takeover. For two months, the military gave Wai Hnin Pwint Thon’s family no information on his whereabouts. On April 1, the family learned he was being held at Yangon’s notorious Insein prison.
“I can’t imagine families of young people who are 19, 20, 21, in prison… We are this worried and we’re used to this situation,” she says. “I’m trying to hold onto hope, but the situation is getting worse every day.”
Mee, a 27-year-old villager in the northern region of Mandalay, watched as children on motorbikes raced past her house toward the woods. Not long after, the village elders arrived with a dire warning: All the boys must leave and get somewhere safe. The soldiers might be coming.
Just two hours later, Mee says, the elders asked the girls to hide, too.
The military’s scare tactics have proven enormously effective. In villages and cities across the country, residents regularly take turns holding night watches, banging pots and pans or yelling to neighbors from the street if soldiers or police are spotted.
“I am more afraid of being arrested than getting shot,” says one 29-year-old man who was arrested, beaten and later released, and who spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid retribution. “I have a chance of dying on the spot with just one shot. But being arrested, I am afraid that they would torture me.”
Fearing for her life on that March afternoon, Mee and hundreds of fellow villagers fled to pineapple farms in the surrounding hills. When she arrived, she saw scores of people from other villages hiding in the forest.
That night, as mosquitos swarmed and sounds from the forest haunted them, the women stayed inside a small bamboo tent while the boys took turns standing guard. No one slept.
Mee was terrified but not surprised. Many of the villagers had run from the military and hidden in the woods before.
“It’s heartbreaking,” she says.
Also Read:UN report says Myanmar poverty could double from coup chaos
For decades, the Tatmadaw has used arbitrary arrests, disappearances, forced labor and other abuses to crush pro-democracy movements and suppress minorities, including its notoriously brutal 2017 campaign of persecution against Rohingya Muslims.
“Sometimes communities are asked to provide a number of young men on a ‘voluntary’ basis; sometimes they are taken,” Laetitia van den Assum, a former diplomat and a member of the Advisory Commission on Rakhine State, said in an e-mail.
Arbitrary arrests continue across the country daily. Just two weeks earlier, a few minutes away from Mee’s village, 24-year-old philosophy student Ko Ko was walking home from a protest with a friend when they were arrested. His parents learned of their imprisonment from friends of friends, not officials.
More than a month later, his parents still haven’t heard from their only son, says Han, a neighbor. He’s part of an unlucky cohort: at least 44 people taken from the town are yet to be released, Han says.
While many of the young men in Mee’s village returned home after two nights in the pineapple fields, some continue to sleep there. Mee has since gone back to her village.
Whenever she sees a soldier, she runs. But her fear has largely given way to fury.
“I was angry that night, and I am still angry,” she says. “It’s so frustrating that the people who are supposed to be protecting our lives, our safety, our livelihoods and our homes are the people who are chasing us and killing us. … We are helpless.”
The glass was shattering, and there was nowhere left for the 21-year-old university student to run. The soldiers were smashing through the front doors of the house in Mandalay.
The chaos of such raids is usually followed by a sinister silence, with the families of the taken rarely hearing from officials. But the accounts of some survivors who dare to speak about their ordeals help fill the void of what often happens next.
The student, who asked that his name be withheld out of fear of retaliation, had taken refuge in the house along with around 100 others after security forces stormed a rally they were attending. The soldiers had thrown tear gas at them, forcing them to flee.
Now he and a half dozen others were cornered in a bathroom on the home’s second level. Downstairs, the security forces used a slingshot and the butt of a gun to break through the doors.
The soldiers began beating the boys they found inside, so viciously that a few of their heads cracked open. They urinated on one young man.
The student watched as the glass above the bathroom door imploded. “They are here!” the soldiers yelled, then burst in, guns drawn.
He bowed his head, since anyone who looked at the soldiers was kicked. The soldiers kicked him anyway, twice in the waist, and hit him twice in the head. As he was marched down the stairs, he saw a soldier with a gun standing on nearly every step.
He and around 30 other young men were arrested and ushered into a prison van. Both the military and police were there. The soldiers threatened to burn the van and tauntingly offered the detainees juice before throwing it at them.
When they arrived at the prison, the young man saw 400 to 500 people in the temporary holding area. The next day, he was charged with Section 505(A) of the penal code. He and around 50 others spent nine days jammed into one room.
There were only two toilets. They were allowed out of the cell twice a day to clean themselves. The same water was used for showering, drinking, washing dishes and using the toilet.
When the young man learned he was being transferred to the main prison, he wanted to cry. A few days before his arrest, he had been looking at missing persons posts on social media. Now he realized most of those people were probably in prison like him.
The young man had good reason to be frightened.
“People are disappearing and turning up dead,” says Maung, of Human Rights Watch. “We have had primary reports, also, of torture while they’re in custody.”
The group found that some people detained inside Insein prison were subjected to beatings, stress positions and severe interrogation tactics, up until March 4, Maung says. After that, guards began taking prisoners to second locations and torturing them, then returning them to Insein.
In Mandalay, the young man’s family was sick with worry. Some of his friends told them he had been arrested; the authorities never called them.
His family sent food into the prison for him. But even when it wasn’t returned, they couldn’t be sure he was inside. They heard reports about protesters being tortured. His sisters cried constantly.
Thirteen days after his arrest, the young man was allowed ten minutes to speak with his sister.
A week later, an official ordered him to pack his things. In shock, he realized he was being released.
There was no time to say goodbye to his friends. The officials took videos and photos of him and around 20 others, and told them to sign statements promising they wouldn’t break the law again. Then they were set free.
He didn’t feel lucky — he felt horrible. He didn’t understand why he’d been singled out for release while his friends were still stuck inside.
“None of us really feel safe living our normal lives now. For me now, I have reservations walking alone outside even in my neighborhood,” he says. “And also, I feel worried to see the parents of my friends in the neighborhood, because I am out — and their children are not.”
Back in Yangon, Shwe stared at the puddles of blood on the floor of the shop where her baby brother had been. It looked as if the security forces had half-heartedly tried to wash it away, but red pools remained.
Maybe the blood wasn’t his, she told herself.
Shwe’s brother and three other young men from the shop had been hauled away. Neighbors told the family that both police and soldiers were there. The neighbors said the security forces may have targeted the boys because they spotted someone inside the shop with a steel dart slingshot.
At 2 a.m., a police officer called to say Shwe’s brother was at a military hospital and had been shot in the hand. They later learned security forces had shot another young man’s finger during the raid.
Shwe says her family told the police that her brother was underage. The officer, she says, reassured them that because he was a minor, he probably wouldn’t be charged.
Around 7 a.m., the family went to the hospital to bring him food. But their pleas to see him were rejected. Shwe and her family were later told that he was being moved to a prison hospital.
Also Read: Myanmar airstrikes target ethnic forces on 2 fronts
Then, on the night of March 27, came the news that stunned them: Her brother and the three others had been charged with possession of weapons, and sentenced to three years in prison.
They were allowed one brief phone call with him when he was first in the hospital, and nothing since. Shwe remembers hearing her brother tell their anguished mother, “Thar ah sin pyay tal.” I am OK.
Shwe has no idea if that is still true. She worries for her brother, a quiet boy who loves playing games. She worries, too, for their mother, who cries and cries, and for their father, who aches for his only son.
For now, they can do little more than wait and hope: That he won’t be beaten. That he will get a pardon. That the people of Myanmar will soon feel safe again.
“Even though we are all in distress, we try to look on the bright side that at least we know where he is,” she says. “We are lucky that he was only abducted.”
India’s virus surge damages Modi’s image of competence
India’s hospitals were packed with coronavirus patients, relatives of the sick scrambled to find supplies of oxygen, and crematoriums were running near full capacity to handle the dead.
Yet despite those clear signs of an overwhelming health crisis, Prime Minister Narendra Modi pressed ahead with a densely packed campaign rally.
“I have never seen such a huge crowd before!” he roared to his supporters in West Bengal state on April 17, before key local elections. “Wherever I can see, I can only see people. I can see nothing else.”
Also Read: India reports over 380,000 new cases, tally at 20,665,148
As another deadly wave of COVID-19 infections was swamping India, Modi’s government refused to cancel a giant Hindu festival. Cricket matches, attended by tens of thousands, carried on, too.
The catastrophic surge has badly dented Modi’s political image after he drew praise last year for moving quickly to lock down India’s nearly 1.4 billion people. Now, he’s been called a “super-spreader” by the vice president of the Indian Medical Association, Dr. Navjot Dahiya.
With deaths mounting and a touted vaccine rollout faltering badly, Modi has pushed much of the responsibility for fighting the virus onto poorly equipped and unprepared state governments and even onto patients themselves, critics say.
“It is a crime against humanity,” author and activist Arundhati Roy said of Modi’s handling of the virus. “Foreign governments are rushing to help. But as long as decision-making remains with Modi, who has shown himself to be incapable of working with experts or looking beyond securing narrow political gain, it will be like pouring aid into a sieve.”
The 70-year-old, whose image as a technocrat brought him deep approval from a middle class weary of corruption and bureaucratic dysfunction, has been accused of stifling dissent and choosing politics over public health.
When the official COVID-19 death toll crossed 200,000 — a number experts say is a severe undercount — Modi was silent.
His government says it is on a “war footing,” ramping up hospital capacity, supplies of oxygen and drugs.
“The present COVID pandemic is a once-in-a-century crisis,” Information and Broadcasting Minister Prakash Javadekar told The Associated Press. “All efforts are being made to overcome the situation by the central government in close coordination with the state governments and society at large.”
When Modi won national elections in 2014, he presented himself as someone who could unlock economic growth by merging business-friendly policies with a Hindu nationalist ideology.
Critics saw him as craving power over the national welfare and catering to his Hindu nationalist base. They blamed him — although courts exonerated him — in the bloody 2002 anti-Muslim riots in Gujarat state, where he was chief minister.
The economy tumbled after his government overhauled India’s cash supply and introduced a goods and services tax. Yet, he easily won reelection in 2019 on a wave of nationalism following clashes with archrival Pakistan.
Despite a second term marred by a souring economy, widening social strife, and deadly clashes with neighboring China, “Modi has proven to be incredibly politically resilient,” said Milan Vaishnav, director of the South Asia program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
When the coronavirus hit, Vaishnav said Modi took an approach different from former President Donald Trump and current Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.
“He never called the virus a hoax. He took it seriously. He encouraged mask-wearing, social distancing. He encouraged the sorts of things health authorities everywhere have been calling for,” he added.
The strict lockdown, imposed on four hours’ notice, stranded tens of millions of migrant workers who were left jobless and fled to villages with many dying along the way. But experts say the decision helped contain the virus and bought time for the government.
Cases rose when the country started reopening in June 2020, and the government developed emergency infrastructure plans. When the wave receded and reported cases plummeted over the winter, many officials saw it as a triumph. States dismantled makeshift hospitals and delayed adding ICU beds and ventilators.
The government had sought to create 162 oxygen plants earlier, but has only built 38. It says 105 more will be built this month.
The fragile health care system was not upgraded enough, said Gautam Menon, a science professor at Ashoka University, “and with the current surge, we’re seeing precisely the consequences of not doing this.”
Also Read: India's COVID-19 tally crosses 20 million
When cases ebbed in January, Modi crowed about India’s success, telling the World Economic Forum that the country “has saved humanity from a big disaster by containing corona effectively.”
His ruling Bharatiya Janata Party hailed his “visionary leadership,” making India a “proud and victorious nation in the fight against COVID.”
In mid-March, tens of thousands attended cricket matches against England at Narendra Modi stadium in Gujarat, an event that swelled national pride even amid warnings that infections were climbing.
On March 21, advertisements on the front pages of newspapers read, “Beautiful Clean Safe,” as Modi and a political ally welcomed Hindu devotees to the Kumbh Mela, a pilgrimage to the Ganges River that drew millions throughout April.
By contrast, in March 2020, his government blamed a Muslim gathering of 3,000 for an initial spike in infections in a move that triggered violence and boycotts, even as courts dismissed the accusations.
Critics have blasted the BJP for holding election rallies packed with tens of thousands of unmasked supporters, particularly in West Bengal. Other parties also campaigned to large crowds. Bowing to criticism, Modi began appearing over video instead of live, but the crowds remained.
Though his party was defeated in the state, analysts say he still enjoys popularity nationwide.
Meanwhile, India’s vaccination campaign begun in January has sputtered amid perceptions the virus was defeated. Only 10% of the population has received one shot and fewer than 2% have gotten both since it began in January.
The latest effort to inoculate those between 18 and 44 has been left to states and the private sector — an approach that critics say will make it easier for the government to pass blame when problems arise. Already, several states have said they don’t have enough vaccine to even start.
The surge has sparked assistance from overseas, a reversal of India’s earlier success at “vaccine diplomacy” when it exported 64 million doses. Some say Modi’s flagship self-sufficiency campaign, known as “Make in India,” is being undermined.
“India has long sought to project itself as a strong nation that need not be dependent on any other. Its immediate need for international assistance flies in the face of that image,” said Michael Kugelman of the Asia Program at the Washington-based Wilson Center.
Some Modi supporters are lashing out. When BJP lawmaker Kesar Singh Gangwar died of the virus in Uttar Pradesh state, his son said Modi’s office didn’t help.
“What kind of government is this? What kind of PM is Modi?” said Vishal Gangwar. “If he cannot provide treatment to a lawmaker of his own party, what is happening to a common man is anybody’s guess.”
Also Read: Impact of devastating Indian virus surge spreads to politics
To circumvent such criticism, the government ordered Twitter to remove posts criticizing his pandemic response. In BJP-run Uttar Pradesh, authorities recently charged a man over a tweet pleading for oxygen for his dying grandfather, accusing him of “circulating a rumor,” as top officials deny widespread oxygen shortages.
“To blame social media or users for either critiquing or begging for help is just — I mean, what are their priorities? To help people or silence criticism?” said digital rights activist Nikhil Pahwa.
The level of urban and middle class anger at Modi is unprecedented, political analyst Vaishnav said, although it is blunted by supporters who believe he can do no wrong.
“He shouldn’t be expected to solve all problems by himself. The government machinery which existed before him, full of corruption, is to blame,” said Sunil Saini, a driver in New Delhi. “My vote will go to Modi the next time too.”
India reports over 380,000 new cases, tally at 20,665,148
India's COVID-19 tally reached 20,665,148 on Wednesday with as many as 382,315 new cases registered during the past 24 hours, confirmed the federal health ministry.
Besides, 3,780 deaths were also reported, taking the death toll to 226,188.
Also Read: India's COVID-19 tally crosses 20 million
There are still a total of 3,487,229 active cases in the country, with an increase of 40,096 active cases through Tuesday, as 16,951,731 people have been cured and discharged from hospitals so far across the country.
The COVID-19 figures continue to peak in the country every day. The federal government has ruled out imposing a complete lockdown to contain the worsening situation though some states have imposed night curfews or partial lockdowns.
Delhi has been put under a third successive lockdown till May 10.
While some school examinations are cancelled, others have been postponed in the wake of COVID-19 situation.
The number of daily active cases has been on the rise over the past few weeks. In January the number of daily cases in the country had come down to below 10,000. As many as 9,102 new cases were reported between January 25-26, which was the lowest in the previous 237 days. Prior to that the lowest number of daily new cases were 9,304 registered on June 4, 2020.
January 16 was a crucial day in India's fight against the pandemic as the nationwide vaccination drive was kicked off during the day. So far over 160 million vaccination doses (160,494,188) have been administered to the people across the country.
Also Read: ‘Horrible’ weeks ahead as India’s virus catastrophe worsens
Online registration began last Wednesday for vaccinating people aged above 18. This is the third phase of COVID-19 vaccination, which began on Saturday.
Meanwhile, the federal government has ramped up COVID-19 testing facilities across the country, even as over 294 million tests have been conducted so far.
As many as 294,852,078 tests were conducted till Tuesday, out of which 1,541,299 tests were conducted on Tuesday alone, said the latest data issued by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) on Wednesday.
The national capital Delhi, which has been one of the most COVID-19- affected places in the country, witnessed 19,953 new cases and 338 deaths through Tuesday.
So far as many as 17,752 people have died in the national capital due to COVID-19, confirmed Delhi's health department.
Also Read: Impact of devastating Indian virus surge spreads to politics
Two types of vaccines are being administered in India. While the "Covishield" vaccine, made by the "Serum Institute of India (SII)", was supplied to all states, the "Covaxin" vaccine, made by the "Bharat Biotech International Limited", was supplied to only 12 states.
Meanwhile, India received its first doses of Sputnik-V, the Russian-made vaccine, on Saturday.
Mamata Banerjee sworn in as Bengal CM
Mamata Banerjee, affectionately called Didi, on Wednesday took her oath as the chief minister of the eastern Indian state of West Bengal for the third time.
The 66-year-old firebrand politician was administered the oath of office by West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar at 11am (India time) at Taj Bhavan (governor's house) in state capital Kolkata.
"My first priority is tackling Covid. I will go to Nabanna (state secretariat) now and hold a meeting about the measures we are taking about this crisis," she said immediately after her oath-taking ceremony.
Bucking anti-incumbency, Mamata scripted history on Sunday by single handedly pulling off an astounding victory in the assembly election. She not only staved off a massive challenge from India's ruling BJP but also decimated the Left Front.
Though her party swept back to power with a resounding majority of 213 seats in the 292-member assembly, Mamata lost her own seat in Nandigram to her former protege-turned-rival Suvendu Adhikari by a thin margin of around 2,000 votes.
Also read: Bucking anti-incumbency, Mamata scores a hat-trick in Bengal
"This is Bangla's win... this is Bengal's win... this is your win. This win has saved Bengal, it has saved the culture and tradition of Bengal," she said, addressing a press meet on Sunday evening.
Mamata, however, made it clear in that presser only that she would challenge the result in a court of law. "How come the Election Commission reverse the results in Nandigram after formally announcing it? We will move court."
In Nandigram, the Election Commission initially announced that Mamata had won by 1,200 votes but subsequently declared Adhikari as the winner. The polling officer also rejected a plea for a recount of votes.
The BJP though has made major gains in Bengal, winning some 77 seats. In 2016, the party had just three legislators in the state. However, the Left Front has failed to grab a single seat this time. The Left Front ruled Bengal for 34 years -- from 1977 to 2011.
Also read: Mamata to be sworn in as Bengal CM on May 5
In fact, West Bengal witnessed the most high-profile contest in India's recently held state elections. While Mamata harped on being Bengal’s daughter, the BJP asked people to vote for "change and socio-economic development" after 50 years of Communist and Trinamool Congress rule.