The Myanmar military has called the Reuters news agency’s coverage of two civilian deaths in Rakhine state ‘biased’ in a complaint filed with the Myanmar Press Council (MPC).
The military was responding to a 25 January story by the agency about the death of two Rohingya women in northern Rakhine state.
It took objection to the article’s title, ‘Two Rohingya women killed as Myanmar army shells village – MP,’ calling it “biased” and “one-sided.”
MPC joint secretary Myint Kyaw told Myanmar Now the council received the complaint, which said the Reuters report contained “factual inaccuracies”, on 30 January, and that the MPC will mediate the dispute.
He said the council plans to discuss the complaint at its regular meeting Thursday.
“We have no comments on who is right or wrong,” he told Myanmar Now. “We will try to mediate and resolve the issue.”
“This story is accusatory, with a one-sided view even in its title,” military spokesperson brigadier general Zaw Min Tun said at the press conference in Naypyidaw. “It was done on purpose.”
In an updated version of the story, a Reuters spokesperson said the agency stands by its reporting but has “updated the story to fully reflect the Myanmar military’s position.”
A new title reads ‘Two Rohingya women killed in Myanmar shelling’ without mentioning the military.
Buthidaung township MP Maung Kyaw Zan told Myanmar Now there is a military battalion near Kin Taung village, where the deaths occurred, but was careful not to blame the deaths on military fire.
Shelling killed two Rohingya women, one of whom was pregnant, in northern Rakhine’s Buthidaung township on Saturday, 25 January.
The deaths came just two days after the International Court of Justice ordered Myanmar to prevent genocidal acts against Rohingya and preserve evidence of such crimes.
The case, filed by Gambia, is based largely on military operations in 2017 that forced more than 730,000 Rohingya to flee northern Rakhine state for refugee camps in neighbouring Bangladesh. The UN has said the operations were carried out with “genocidal intent”.
More recently, northern Rakhine state has become the epicentre of armed conflict between the military and the Arakan Army (AA), an armed rebel group based there. The fighting has raged for more than a year.
In statements released after the 25 January deaths, the AA and the military blamed each other.
