Myanmar’s ruling military declares ceasefire to facilitate quake relief efforts

Myanmar’s ruling military has declared a temporary ceasefire in the country’s civil war to facilitate relief efforts following a 7.7 magnitude earthquake that has killed more than 3,000 people.

The announcement by the military’s high command was reported late on Wednesday on state television MRTV, which said the truce would run until April 22 and was aimed at showing compassion for people affected by Friday’s quake.

The announcement followed unilateral temporary ceasefires announced by armed resistance groups opposed to military rule.

Those groups must refrain from attacking the state, or regrouping, or else the military will take “necessary” measures, the army’s statement said.

Earlier on Wednesday, rescuers pulled two men alive from the ruins of a hotel in Myanmar’s capital, a third from a guesthouse in another city, and another in the country’s second city, Mandalay, five days after the quake.

But most teams were finding only bodies.

The quake hit at midday on Friday, toppling thousands of buildings, collapsing bridges and buckling roads.

The death toll rose to 3,003 on Wednesday, with more than 4,500 people injured, MRTV reported.

Local reports suggest much higher figures.

The earthquake came amid civil war in Myanmar, making a dire humanitarian crisis even worse.

More than three million people had been displaced from their homes and nearly 20 million were in need even before it hit, according to the United Nations.

Two of the major armed resistance forces fighting the military, which seized power in 2021 from the democratically elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi, had announced ceasefires to facilitate the humanitarian response to the earthquake, though the military initially did not relent in its attacks.

In the capital Naypyitaw, a team of Turkish and local rescue workers used an endoscopic camera to locate Naing Lin Tun on a lower floor of the damaged hotel where he worked.

They pulled him gingerly through a hole jackhammered through a floor and loaded him on to a gurney nearly 108 hours after he was first trapped.

Shirtless and covered in dust, he appeared weak but conscious in a video released by the local fire department, as he was fitted with an IV drip and taken away.

State-run MRTV reported later in the day that another man was saved from the same building, more than 121 hours after the quake struck.

Both were aged 26.

Another man was rescued by a team of Malaysian and local crews from a collapsed guesthouse in the Sagaing township, near the epicentre of the earthquake close to Myanmar’s second-largest city, Mandalay.

The earthquake also rocked neighbouring Thailand, causing the collapse of a high-rise building under construction in Bangkok.

One body was removed from the rubble early on Wednesday, raising the death toll in Bangkok to 22 with 35 injured, primarily at the construction site.

The Three Brotherhood Alliance, one of a powerful group of militias that has taken a large swathe of the country from the military, announced a unilateral one-month ceasefire on Tuesday to facilitate the humanitarian response.

The shadow opposition National Unity Government founded by legislators ousted in 2021 had already called a ceasefire for its forces.

The announcements had put pressure on the military government to follow suit.

Before Wednesday’s ceasefire announcement, an opposition militia belonging to the Brotherhood Alliance reported that the military fired on a relief convoy of nine Chinese Red Cross vehicles late on Tuesday in the northern part of Shan state near Ohn Ma Tee village.

The Ta’ang National Liberation Army said that the Chinese Red Cross was bringing supplies to Mandalay and had reported its route to the military.

But Major General Zaw Min Tun, spokesman for the military government, said that the convoy had not notified authorities of its route ahead of time, MRTV reported.

While not mentioning the Red Cross, he said that security forces had fired into the air to deter a convoy that refused to stop near Ohn Ma Tee village, the site of recent fighting with the TNLA.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun did not comment on the attack.

Neighbouring China is economically important to Myanmar, and also one of the military’s largest suppliers of weapons, along with Russia.

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said it was looking into the matter.

Countries have pledged millions in assistance to help Myanmar and humanitarian aid organisations with the monumental task ahead.

Australia on Wednesday said it was providing another 4.5 million US dollars, in addition to 1.25 million dollars it had already committed, and had a rapid response team on the ground.

India has flown in aid and sent two navy ships with supplies as well as providing around 200 rescue workers.

Multiple other countries have sent teams, including 270 people from China, 212 from Russia and 122 from the United Arab Emirates.

A three-person team from the US Agency for International Development arrived on Tuesday to determine how best to respond given limited US resources due to the slashing of the foreign aid budget and dismantling of the agency as an independent operation.

Washington has said it would provide two million dollars in emergency assistance.

Most of the details so far have come from Mandalay, which was near the epicentre of the earthquake, and Naypyitaw, about 270 kilometres (165 miles) north of Mandalay.

Many areas are without power, telephone or mobile phone connections and difficult to reach by road, but more reports are beginning to trickle in.

In Singu township, about 65 kilometres (40 miles) north of Mandalay, 27 gold miners were killed in a cave-in, the independent Democratic Voice of Burma reported.

In the area of Inle Lake, north east of the capital, many people died when homes built on wooden stilts in the water collapsed in the earthquake, the Global New Light of Myanmar reported without providing specific figures.