World
Burmese government denies claims it killed 76 villagers
A spokesperson for Burma’s military government denied accusations that army troops and their local allies killed 76 people when they entered a village last week in the western state of Rakhine, state-controlled media reported Wednesday.
Rakhine has become a focal point for Burma’s nationwide civil war, in which pro-democracy guerrillas and ethnic minority armed forces battle the country’s military rulers, who took power in 2021 after the army ousted the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi.
The fighting there has also raised fears of a revival of organized violence against members of the Muslim Rohingya minority, similar to that which drove at least 740,000 members of their community in 2017 to flee to neighboring Bangladesh for safety.
REPORTS OF ARMY KILLING OF VILLAGERS IN BURMA SUPPORTED BY PHOTOS AND HARROWING TALE OF A SURVIVOR
The accusations of a massacre in Byine Phyu village in northern Rakhine were made by the Arakan Army, an ethnic armed organization that has been on the offensive against army outposts in Rakhine since November last year. They have gained control of nine of 17 townships in Rakhine and one in the adjacent Chin state.
Byine Phyu village is on the outskirts of Sittwe, the capital of Rakhine, in a strategic location with easy access to the Bay of Bengal.
The Arakan Army is the well-trained and well-armed military wing of the political movement of the Buddhist Rakhine minority, which seeks autonomy from Burma’s central government.
However, it has also been accused of major human rights violations, most notably in connection with its capture of the town of Buthidaung on May 18. It was accused of forcing the town’s estimated 200,000 residents, mostly from the Rohinyga ethnic minority, to leave and then setting fire to most of the buildings there.
It denies the charges, blaming the army for burning the town, but residents interviewed by phone since the incident told The Associated Press that the Arakan Army was responsible.
In this photo provided by a displaced Rohingya, the scarlet flames that came out from the burning of the houses in the town of Buthidaung in Rakhine state, Burma, are seen from a distance on May 17, 2024. (AP Photo)
The competing claims could not be verified independently, as tight restrictions on travel in that region make it virtually impossible to verify details of such incidents firsthand.
Details of the incident in Byine Phyu village were similarly disputed.
Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun, the spokesperson for the ruling military council, was quoted Wednesday in the state-run Myanma Alinn newspaper as saying the army’s troops went to the village on May 29 to look for members of the Arakan Army and detained about 20 people for interrogation.
He said the security forces were forced to shoot three male suspects who were not village residents as they tried to seize a gun from an army officer, but there had not been any mass killing.
An Arakan Army statement released Tuesday said about 170 soldiers from the military regional command headquarters based in Sittwe, accompanied by armed members of a pro-army Rakhine group and local Muslims recruited by the army, arrested everyone in Byine Phyu village and killed 76 people.
It claimed the army raiders treated their captives brutally and raped three women.
Only one of 20 residents from the area contacted by AP was willing to speak about the incident. Several said they would not talk because they were concerned about friends of family members who had been taken into custody.
One woman said her younger brother was among those arrested, but she did not know how many people had been killed or even if her brother was still alive. She spoke on condition on anonymity to safeguard her personal security.
The U.N. human rights office on May 24 warned of “frightening and disturbing reports” about the impact of new violence in Burma’s western state of Rakhine, pointing to new attacks on Rohingya civilians by the military and an ethnic armed group fighting against it.
The fighting in Rakhine has evoked particular concern because it suggests that the Rohingya minority may face new violent persecution.
The Rohingya were the targets of a brutal counterinsurgency campaign incorporating rape and murder that saw an estimated 740,000 flee to neighboring Bangladesh as their villages were burned down by government troops in 2017.
They have lived in Burma for generations, but they are widely regarded by many in the country’s Buddhist majority, including especially members of the Rakhine minority, as having illegally migrated from Bangladesh. The Rohingya face a great amount of prejudice and are generally denied citizenship and other basic rights.
After the Arakan Army captured Buthidaung on May 18, Rohingya activists accused it of burning down the houses in the town and forcing its residents to flee. The Arakan Army rejected the allegations as baseless and blamed the destruction on the military government’s troops and local Muslims it said were fighting alongside them.
DEVELOPING STORYDEVELOPING STORY,
Secessionist leader took a boat to Berbera and then boarded a plane that flew to Abu Dhabi via Mogadishu, coalition says.
Published On 8 Jan 2026
The Saudi Arabia-led coalition in Yemen has announced that the leader of the secessionist Southern Transitional Council (STC) has fled to the United Arab Emirates via Somaliland after skipping planned peace talks in Riyadh.
In a statement on Thursday, the coalition said Aidarous al-Zubaidi “escaped in the dead of night” on Wednesday on board a vessel that departed Aden in Yemen for the port of Berbera in Somaliland.
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Al-Zubaidi then boarded a plane along with UAE officers and flew to Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu. “The plane turned off its identification systems over the Gulf of Oman, then turned it back on 10 minutes prior to arrival at Al Reef military airport in Abu Dhabi,” the statement said.
There was no immediate comment from the STC or the UAE.
If confirmed, the move could deepen the feud between Saudi Arabia and the UAE that came to light after the Abu Dhabi-backed STC launched an offensive against the Riyadh-backed Yemeni government troops in December.
The STC – which initially supported Yemen’s internationally recognised government against the Houthi rebels in northern Yemen – is seeking an independent state in southern Yemen. It seized the provinces of Hadramout and Mahra, which border Saudi Arabia, in a campaign that Riyadh described as a red line for its national security.
The Saudi-led coalition responded with air strikes on the Yemeni port of Mukalla on December 30, targeting what it called a UAE-linked weapons shipment, and backed a call by Yemen’s internationally recognised government for Emirati forces to withdraw from the country.
For its part, Abu Dhabi denied that the shipment contained weapons and expressed a commitment to ensure Riyadh’s security. On the same day, it announced an end to what it called its “counterterrorism mission” in Yemen.
Yemeni government troops, backed by Saudi Arabian air attacks, went on to reclaim Hadramout and Mahra, and the STC said on Saturday that it would attend peace talks hosted by Saudi Arabia.
But the coalition said al-Zubaidi was not on board the Yemeni Air flight that took the STC delegation to Riyadh on Wednesday.
It launched strikes on al-Zubaidi’s forces in Yemen’s Dhale governorate, while Yemeni government’s ground forces moved on the STC controlled Aden and seized the presidential palace in the city.
The head of the internationally recognised government’s Presidential Leadership Council, Rashad al-Alimi, has meanwhile announced that al-Zubaidi has been removed from the council for “committing high treason”.
Al-Alimi said he has asked the country’s attorney general to launch an investigation against al-Zubaidi and take legal action.
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
World
Iranian protesters rename Tehran street after Trump, plead ‘don’t let them kill us’ amid crackdown
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Iranian protesters intensified nationwide demonstrations over the past 24 hours, directly appealing to President Donald Trump while chanting anti-regime slogans. Footage published Wednesday showed a protester in Tehran symbolically renaming a street after Trump, while other videos captured handwritten appeals reading, “Don’t let them kill us,” Iran International reported.
Holly Dagres, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute, posted the video on X stating, “Since Trump’s comments about the Iran protests, I’ve seen numbers videos of Iranian protesters either thanking him or, in this case, renaming streets after the US president.”
The appeals came as demonstrators faced a widening security crackdown, including the deployment of armed units and tear gas near major civilian sites in Tehran.
TRUMP SIGNS ‘MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN’ HAT ALONGSIDE LINDSEY GRAHAM
Exiled Iranian opposition leader Reza Pahlavi said the current unrest represents a historic opportunity to end Iran’s Islamic Republic.
“In all these years, I’ve never seen an opportunity as we see today in Iran,” Pahlavi said in an interview aired Tuesday on “Hannity.”
“Iranian people are more than ever committed to bringing an end to this regime, as the world has witnessed in the last few days, the level of demonstrations is unprecedented in Iran,” he said.
Pahlavi said protests have spread to more than 100 cities and emphasized the role of Iran’s traditional merchant class, describing developments inside the country’s bazaars as a turning point. “We are beginning to see more and more defections,” Pahlavi said, adding that “Either way, the regime is crumbling and is very close to collapsing.”
IRAN ON THE BRINK AS PROTESTERS MOVE TO TAKE TWO CITIES, APPEAL TO TRUMP
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., posted a photo of himself posing with President Donald Trump, who is holding a signed “Make Iran Great Again” hat. (Lindsey Graham / X)
Over the past 24 hours, Iran International reported continued protests and strikes across the country, including in Tehran, Tabriz, Qazvin, Kermanshah, Kerman, Shiraz, Falavarjan and Bandar Abbas. Tehran’s Grand Bazaar remained a focal point of unrest, with large crowds chanting against Iran’s leadership as authorities responded with tear gas and armed deployments.
Security operations expanded into sensitive civilian locations. Videos published by Iran International showed tear gas used near or inside Tehran’s Sina Hospital and the Plasco Shopping Center.
Protesters hold signs during a demonstration in Iran amid ongoing unrest, according to images released by the Iranian opposition group National Council of Resistance of Iran. (NCRI )
Casualty and arrest figures continued to rise. The Human Rights Activists News Agency, cited by Iran International on Wednesday, reported at least 36 people killed since protests began, including 34 protesters and two members of Iran’s security forces, with more than 2,000 arrests nationwide. Iranian authorities have not released updated official figures.
New footage from the past day showed demonstrators lighting fires in the streets of Shiraz and chanting “Death to Khamenei,” referring to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. In Qazvin, protesters were heard chanting, “Law enforcement, return to the side of the nation.”
Iranian protesters try to take control of two cities in western Iran as nationwide unrest continues, with demonstrators chanting ‘Death to Khamenei’ in the streets. (Getty)
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Workers also joined the unrest, with strikes reported at the South Pars gas refinery and widespread shop closures at major markets in Tehran and Tabriz.
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