Coconuts Yangon (2024)

14/04/2023

Teenagers are among the many who have fallen victim to these violent human trafficking scam operations. Several dozen teens, including one as young as 14, remain trapped in one casino on Myanmar’s eastern border with Thailand.

It was a clear day when Kham set out from his home in northwestern Laos for what he thought was a chance to make money in the gilded gambling towns of the Golden Triangle, the border region his country shares with Thailand and Myanmar. On that day – a Friday,…

28/02/2023

Insurgents bomb town near Thai-Myanmar border, 5 injured: reports

At least five people were injured when a series of bombs went off near a border crossing between Myanmar and Thailand last night, according to local media reports. At least five bombs exploded in the middle of the night at multiple locations on the Myanmar side of the border in…

16/02/2023

The sale of Burmese blood gems is helping support the brutal junta government and Justice for Myanmar is calling on Rihanna to support a boycott of the jewelers that use them

Pop megastar Rihanna received a good deal of criticism for her performance during Sunday’s NFL Superbowl Halftime Show, but it was what she was wearing during the performance that has led to outcry from those opposed to Myanmar’s brutal military junta. The activist group “Justice for Myanmar...

07/02/2023

Police bribes and harassment are part of everyday life for those who flee the war-torn country.

Burmese political activists Cherry and Min Thura were walking to a cafe in the Thai border city of Mae Sot when they were stopped by the police. What happened next was the beginning of a nightmare that has haunted thousands of migrants fleeing Myanmar since the February 2021 coup that…

01/02/2023

In Bangkok, fury, pain echo in on coup anniversary as hundreds gathered outside Myanmar's Embassy. Coconuts Bangkok's photos and videos from the rally.

Aiming prop assault rifles as they “beat” and “s*xually assaulted” civilians, Myanmar nationals brought to a Bangkok street this morning the brutality being visited by the military upon their friends and families back home. Guerilla theater performers acted out scenes of violence in front th...

31/01/2023

Civilian drones. refitted to drop explosives on junta troops, are helping turn the tide against the country’s better-equipped military, rebel groups say.

Two years into Myanmar’s civil conflict, civilian drones refitted to drop explosives on junta troops are helping turn the tide against the country’s better-equipped military, rebel groups say. Drones were once used exclusively by the army to detect and crack down on pro-democracy protests on the...

25/01/2023

Myanmar now the world’s third-worst jailer of journalists. Here are all 42 behind bars.

Myanmar has become one of the most dangerous countries for journalists, with 42 reporters behind bars, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, or CPJ. That puts Myanmar in third place behind only Iran (62) and China (43), according to CPJ’s annual report on attacks against the press i...

24/01/2023

Complaint charges senior junta officials and subordinates with genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity under a legal concept that allows prosecution of mass atrocities anywhere in the world.

Five years ago, soldiers with Myanmar’s Tatmadaw streamed into a Rakhine state village, burning homes and preventing anyone from escaping. They beat a woman in a room while others r***d her son’s wife in an adjacent room. Ultimately, the soldiers murdered seven people in her family and scarred h...

13/01/2023

Thai authorities arresting a Myanmar arms broker last year confiscated assets owned by the children of junta chief Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, prompting calls for a probe into their ties and to block their access to Thailand’s financial system.

Thai authorities arresting a Myanmar arms broker last year confiscated assets owned by the children of junta chief Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, a legal watchdog has learned, prompting calls for a probe into their ties and to block their access to Thailand’s financial system.

29/11/2022

Australian economist Sean Turnell, who was recently released by Myanmar's junta after spending more than 650 days behind bars, recounts the difficult conditions he endured in prison and offers his views on the country's political crisis since the military takeover.

Sean Turnell, an Australian citizen who served as an economic advisor during the National League for Democracy-led government in Myanmar prior to last year’s military coup, was released from prison by the junta in a general amnesty on Nov. 17 after more than 650 days behind bars. Sentenced to a…

23/11/2022

It had been reported that Thuzar would be set free last Thursday as part of the junta’s National Day amnesty of 5,774 prisoners, prompting her husband, a retired journalist, to wait in front of the prison all day. But she never came out.

Burmese journalist Thuzar, who goes by a single name, was sentenced to two years in prison by Yangon’s Insein prison court on Tuesday, according to a lawyer close to the case, who declined to be named for security reasons. She was charged with “incitement to make unrest” under Section 505…

17/11/2022

Those being freed include Australian economist Sean Turnell, former U.K. ambassador to Myanmar Vicky Bowman and Japanese journalist Toru Kubota.

Myanmar's junta says it is releasing four foreigners from prison, including a former British ambassador and an Australian economist, as part of a major amnesty to mark a national holiday on Thursday. Among the 5,774 prisoners to be released are Australian Sean Turnell, a former economic advisor to o...

02/11/2022

The move comes amid a shortage of doctors, who are already stretched thin due to fighting and the pandemic.

The move comes amid a shortage of doctors, who are already stretched by fighting and the pandemic.

28/10/2022

Human Rights Watch called the decision “a huge disappointment”

Southeast Asian foreign ministers decided Thursday to persist with a failed peace plan on Myanmar, a move that a top human rights group called “a huge disappointment,” days after the bloodiest single airstrike in the country since last year’s military coup. The ministers emphasized the need to...

25/10/2022

The blow-up over the s*x dolls began when a group tried to bring them into Yangon's sacred Shwedagon pagoda. After being blocked by guards, they performed rituals with the dolls in the parking lot.

According to local reports, a man has been arrested after he led a group that attempted to bring two s*x dolls, dressed up in traditional dresses and tiaras, into Yangon’s Shwedagon Pagoda, the most famous Buddhist pilgrimage site in Myanmar. https://twitter.com/KoPhyo73407557/status/1583768739886...

25/10/2022

It's believed to be the deadliest single airstrike since the military seized power in the Feb 2021 coup.

Military jets bombed a concert in northern Myanmar commemorating the founding of an ethnic political group on Monday, killing at least 50 civilians and wounding 100 more, according to residents. It was believed to be the deadliest single airstrike since the military seized power in a February 2021 c...

20/10/2022

“Recently, a few tourists came back but not as many as before,” said Maung Maung, who has been a horse-and-buggy driver in Bagan for 50 years. “Now there are very few. Some days, I don’t make a single dime. Others, I make only a little money.”

For 50 years, Maung Maung has been a horse-and-buggy driver in the ancient city of Bagan, ferrying tourists around to its soaring spires and iconic Buddhist pagodas and temples. But tourists have dwindled to a trickle, thanks to the combination of the Covid-19 pandemic that reached Myanmar in Marc...

18/10/2022

The junta threatened to take action against BBC Burmese and The Irrawaddy after the outlets reported that military soldiers fired random shots into crowds at one of the most famous Buddhist sites in the country, killing 3 civilians.

Local reporters from two media outlets in Myanmar went into hiding after the country’s ruling military junta threatened to sue the news agencies for reporting that regime troops killed three civilians and wounded 19 others near a Buddhist pagoda in Mon state last week. BBC Burmese and The Irrawadd...

29/09/2022

Junta sentences Australian economist Sean Turnell to 3 years in prison

An Australian academic and former economic adviser to Aung San Suu Kyi was sentenced to three years in prison this morning at the conclusion of a secret military tribunal. Sean Turnell was tried along with Finance Ministry officials including Minister Soe Win, Deputy Minister Set Aung, and former Mi...

28/09/2022

“There is no doubt that what transpired was a trap to try to force Han Lay to return to Myanmar, where she would have faced immediate arrest, likely abuse in detention, and imprisonment” said Human Rights Watch.

Han Lay, the 2020 winner of the Miss Grand International Myanmar content who used her platform to denounce the military junta, has been granted asylum in Canada and flew there yesterday from Thailand, where she had been stuck in legal limbo since last week after she was denied entry into…

13/09/2022

“We have gathered reports of children in Myanmar having been tortured and arbitrarily detained, sometimes to target their parents. There is also increasing evidence of s*xual and gender-based crimes against both women and men.”

“We have gathered reports of children in Myanmar having been tortured and arbitrarily detained, sometimes to target their parents. There is also increasing evidence of s*xual and gender-based crimes against both women and men.” Nicholas Koumjian, the head of the Independent Investigative Mechani...

26/07/2022

Happening right now in Bangkok

Hundreds gathered outside the Myanmar Embassy in Bangkok this afternoon to condemn the ex*****on of four high-profile activists by its ruling junta. A day after the junta said it had executed four pro-democracy activists including a longtime advocate for change and a hip-hop artist-turned-politician...