Blasts in Myanmar's biggest city kill 2, destroy army truck

Two people were killed and a military truck was destroyed in an explosion that rocked a Yangon neighbourhood on Friday.

At least two explosions on Friday rocked a neighbourhood in Myanmar’s biggest city, killing two people, destroying a military truck and damaging a taxi in what appeared to be a serious escalation of violence between the country’s military rulers and their pro-democracy opponents. Myanmar media reported that the blasts in Yangon’s working-class Tarmwe neighbourhood were caused by bombs, though there was no official confirmation. The neighbourhood has been a stronghold of resistance to the military government that ousted the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February. A nonviolent civil disobedience movement arose to challenge the military rule, but the junta’s attempt to repress it with deadly force fuelled rather than quelled resistance, and there is now an incipient nationwide insurrection.