Why did the Burmese army blow up this bridge?
It’s not easy getting information out of Burma. The man who snapped this photo hid the camera’s SD card in his sock in order to sneak it across the border. The image shows a 105 meter bridge in eastern Burma reportedly destroyed by the army on June 30 with heavy artillery. It’s in an area ...
It’s not easy getting information out of Burma. The man who snapped this photo hid the camera’s SD card in his sock in order to sneak it across the border.
The image shows a 105 meter bridge in eastern Burma reportedly destroyed by the army on June 30 with heavy artillery.
It’s in an area of the country dominated by the Shan ethnic group, the largest minority in Burma, who have been at war on and off with the government for decades.
Many Shan have fled to neighboring Thailand, claiming human rights abuses by the Burmese.
“This bridge was strategic,” said Jaden McNeely of the NGO Global Refuge. His group distributed cameras to Burmese people to obtain evidence of abuses like this. “It moved everything from animals to tools for local villagers.” He said the army has destroyed a number of bridges in the area.
According to McNeely, the Burmese army suspected the Shan army of using it to move supplies across.
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