Calls for a civil disobedience campaign in Myanmar gathered pace on Wednesday as the United States formally declared the military’s takeover a coup and vowed further penalties for the Generals behind the putsch.
Doctors and medical staff at multiple hospitals across the country announced that they were donning red ribbons and walking away from all non-emergency work to protest against the coup.
“Our main goal is to accept only the government we elected,” Aung San Min, head of a 100-bed hospital in Gangaw district, said.
Some medical teams posted pictures on social media wearing red ribbons — the colours of Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy — and raising a three-finger salute, a protest gesture used by democracy activists in Thailand.
“My protest starts today by not going to the hospital... I have no desire to work under the military dictatorship,” said Nor Nor Wint Wah, a doctor in Mandalay.
Activists were announcing their campaigns on a Facebook group called “Civil Disobedience Movement” which by Wednesday afternoon had more than 1,50,000 followers within 24 hours of its launch.
The clatter of pots and pans — and the honking of car horns — also rang out across Yangon on Tuesday evening after calls for protest went out on social media.
