Win Lwin is seen during an anti-dictatorship protest (Supplied)

The junta cremated the body of 32-year-old Win Lwin without his family’s permission

By Myanmar Now

A teacher from Sintgaing Township in Mandalay Region died on Tuesday after just 24 hours in a junta interrogation centre.

Win Lwin, 32, had worked at a government high school in Sintgaing, and was arrested on Monday morning, according to another resident of his home village of Ywar Bo.

“He died at the interrogation centre and his family was notified to come and collect his body. However, when they went there to get his body, they were told that he had already been cremated,” the villager told Myanmar Now.

The victim had been staying in Ywar Bo and had left his teaching post to participate in the Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM) aimed at toppling the junta, which took power in a coup in February.

Another Sintgaing local said that Win Lwin was likely questioned about an explosion that took place in the village in late September.

“The soldiers stationed in the community hall in the middle of the village were attacked with a bomb and there were some casualties,” the local said. “[The junta’s forces] started arresting the teachers taking part in the CDM after the attack. He was one of the many that were arrested.”

On Monday, Win Lwin was among five people who were initially detained, but three were later released the same day.

Only Win Lwin and a private tutor, Yan Aung Win, were held overnight in detention.

Win Lwin is survived by his wife and a two-year-old son.

The Sintgaing local who spoke to Myanmar Now about Win Lwin’s death condemned his arrest and murder as “senseless,” and also denounced the junta’s brutal crackdown on resistance in the township.

On October 29, another 27-year-old teacher participating in the CDM and a 40-year-old betel nut vendor named Pho Wa were arrested and accused of involvement in the assassination of a junta-appointed ward administrator three days earlier.

The deceased, Aung Myint, was from Wun Htan Kwat Thut ward in Paleik town in Sintgaing, and an alleged military informant.

“We heard that they were torturing Pho Wa to get him to confess that he was the getaway driver for the assaillants that killed Aung Myint. The CDM teacher who got arrested along with him was also in danger, I heard,” another local from the township said.

Two more Sintgaing locals, Aye Wai, 50, and Chaw Su, 40, were arrested by the military council on October 30 and accused of supporting the anti-junta People’s Defence Force.

No one at the Sintgaing Central Police Station has answered Myanmar Now’s calls regarding the incidents.

According to data published on Tuesday by the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, at least 1,233 civilians have been killed by the military council since the coup.

Burmese version.

Original Post: Myanmar Now