Archdiocese of Mandalay
A military tribunal in rebel-controlled central Myanmar has sentenced eight men to 20 years of hard labor for murdering a Catholic priest in February.
The court, operated by the country’s National Unity Government (NUG), issued its final verdict July 17 following a five-month investigation, UCANews reported. U Maung Maung Swe, deputy secretary of the NUG’s Defense Ministry, said the men were sentenced under Section 302(2) of the country’s Penal Code.
“All eight of those who committed the murder are [now] being held in respective prisons in our controlled areas,” he said.
The perpetrators attacked and killed Father Donald Martin Ye Naing Win, 44, Feb. 14 in Kangyitaw Village, where he was serving at Our Lady of Lourdes Church in Shwebo Township. According to local sources, a group of gunmen from a nearby village initially targeted two women who taught at the local school. When Fr. Ye Naing Win intervened to defend them, the attackers turned on him, killing him with machetes.
According to reports, the priest’s final words were, “I kneel only before God.”
>> Mandalay Archdiocese mourns Catholic priest killed amid Myanmar conflict <<
The region falls within the Archdiocese of Mandalay and is under the control of the NUG, a shadow government formed in opposition to Myanmar’s military regime. The convicted attackers were identified as members of a militia from Ta Ohn village, a group not officially affiliated with the NUG’s armed wing, the People’s Defense Force (PDF).
Two additional attackers, who were minors at the time, were released into parental custody at the tribunal’s recommendation.
>> ‘A forgotten conflict’: Global day of prayer held for Myanmar’s civil war <<
