March 29: A team of policemen at Daik-U, Pegu Division in lower central Burma brutally beat up four innocent civilians of the same family in public on 19 March, causing outrage among the local population.

The incident started on the night of 18 March when a relative of the four victims, Naing Too from Ward-3 was forced to guard a security checkpoint by the local authorities. As the police beat up those who fell asleep during the night, Naing Too kept awake by playing guitar to entertain his fellow guards. On the following day, two policemen Min Aye and Tin Soe Win came to arrest Naing Too at his home for causing noisy dins while on duty. But Naing Too tried to resist arrest by locking himself in the house. The two policemen then smashed the door open with bricks but they were confronted by sword wielding Naing Too who wounded Myint Aye on the head, requiring him seven stitches at the hospital. Fifteen minutes later the whole local police force, numbered around 60, came to arrest Naing Too but he managed to escape. Then, the police beat up Naing Too’s 70-year old father Tun Shwe who was not well, mother Yin Myint, younger brother Zeya San and his wife Ni Ni Mar for letting off the accused.

“The old man was handcuffed and his longyi (sarong) fell off and he was dragged out onto the street stark naked,” a local resident told DVB. “Then, they all beat him up mercilessly with sticks, kicked him with their feet. There is nothing to salvage from his face…they then arrested four of them and like kidnapping they said that they will be exchanged with Maung Naing Too”.

The police are also pressurising and intimidating other relatives of the family. The local resident who witnessed the brutality of the police said it reminded him of the brutality of the fascist Japanese military police Kempetai during WW2.

Recently, a former political prisoner Thet Naing Oo was brutally beaten up by a mob led by the police and fire brigade members of Rangoon Kyimyintaing (Kemmendine) Township. He died on the following day.