YANGON: A Myanmar junta air strike killed at least 40 people in a village in western Rakhine state, a rescue worker and ethnic minority armed group said on Thursday.

The attack occurred Wednesday in Kyauk Ni Maw village on Ramree island, an area controlled by the ethnic Arakan Army in western Rakhine state, they said. The military has not announced any attack in the area.

Households in Yangon and Mandalay are left without power for most of the day under a new rotating schedule for allocating scarce electricity.

A total of 88 people were killed and 360 injured in 203 traffic accidents on Myanmar Yangon-Mandalay highway in 2024 according to the highway traffic

Myanmar’s military government has released more than 6,000 prisoners and has reduced other inmates’ sentences as part of a mass amnesty to mark the 77th anniversary of independence from Britain.

Michael Martin is an adjunct fellow at Washington's Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). He served as a specialist policy adviser on Myanmar, China, Hong Kong, and Vietnam for two decades. His work included a 15-year tenure as a political and economic analyst with the Congressional Research Service of the Library of Congress.

YANGON: A bus with 45 passengers aboard rolled over on Myanmar's Yangon-Mandalay highway, causing one fatality and 32 injuries, according to the highway traffic police force on Thursday (Jan 2).

Two Myanmar nationals and a Malaysian national were arrested for drug trafficking in Yangon, along with a large haul of drugs and drug-making devices, the official daily The Global New Light of Myanmar reported on Sunday.

Belarusian Minister of Foreign Affairs Maksim Ryzhenkov held talks with Deputy Prime Minister, Union Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar Than Swe during the official visit of Belarus’ delegation to Myanmar on 9 January.

China has much at stake. Its 771-kilometer oil and gas pipeline dissects Rakhine from its capital Sittwe through to Myanmar’s northern states and its security is behind speculation Beijing was prepared to put boots on the ground through a “joint security company” to be established with the military.

People visit the bank of Inya Lake in Yangon Myanmar Dec 31 2024 The provisional results of Myanmar 2024 popula

Released prisoners are welcomed by family members and colleagues after they left Insein Prison on Saturday (4 January) in Yangon, Myanmar. Myanmar’s military government has released more than 6,000 prisoners and has reduced other inmates’ sentences as part of a mass amnesty marking the 77th anniversary of independence from Britain.