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Agencies

A prominent Muslim lawyer and member of Myanmar’s ruling party was shot dead along with a taxi driver outside Yangon’s international airport on Sunday, officials said.
Ko Ni, a member of Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party, was gunned down as he got into a taxi outside arrivals around 5pm by an assassin who also killed the driver.
“According to our initial information, Ko Ni and the taxi driver were killed,” a security source at the airport said, asking not to be named.
“An unknown man shot him in the head while he was hiring a taxi. He was later arrested,” the source added.
Zaw Htay, a spokesman at the president’s office, said Ko Ni had just returned from a government delegation trip to Indonesia.

“He (Ko Ni) was shot while he was waiting for a car outside the airport. Ko Ni died on the spot,” he said.
A friend of Ko Ni who witnessed the shooting said the suspected assassin also shot the taxi driver who tried to stop him from fleeing.
“As I stopped my car by the airport, that’s where I saw Ko Ni’s body lying on the walkway outside of the airport and I couldn’t believe that just happened,” said Thet Paing Soe, a friend and an NLD supporter. “Then as the shooter tried to run away, the police arrested him.”
The Ministry of Information identified the suspect as Kyi Linn from Mandalay. The motive was not known.

#Myanmar #Yangon airport the site where #NLD lawyer Ko Ni was gunned down. Place filled with police, media & curious by-standers pic.twitter.com/3xfo6BVEOb
— May Wong (@MayWongCNA) January 29, 2017

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A very dark day for Myanmar. Just hearing the incredibly tragic and upsetting news that U Ko Ni was just assasinated at Yangon airport.
— Thant Myint-U (@thantmyintu) January 29, 2017

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Extremely angry, heartbroken & beyond words over news of assassination of U Ko Ni, NLD's highest ranking Muslim lawyer. #burma #myanmar
— Thin (@thinink) January 29, 2017

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U Ko Ni was a brilliant, kind, brave man. His death demonstrates just how dangerous it is to speak out on #humanrights issues in #Myanmar.
— Amy A. Smith (@AmyAlexSmith) January 29, 2017

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Ko Ni was a Burmese Muslim and as a practicing lawyer had handled more than 900 criminal cases and more than 1,400 civil cases.
In 1995, he established Laurel Law Firm with two other advocates.
“It is a big loss for us that Ko Ni, our beloved friend, has been killed. He is the face of the democracy in our country and this is a big loss for us,” said Kyee Myint, a former chairman of the Myanmar Lawyer Network who has a close relationship with Ko Ni.
Myanmar’s border regions have simmered for decades with ethnic minority insurgencies.
Yet it is rare for prominent political figures to be murdered in Yangon, the country’s booming and largely safe commercial hub.

But in recent years Myanmar has witnessed a surge of anti-Muslim sentiment, fanned by hardline Buddhist nationalists.
Ko Ni, a long time member of the NLD and legal advisor to the party, often spoke out in favour of religious tolerance and pluralism.
In late 2015 Suu Kyi’s NLD party won a landslide election victory, ending decades of military led rule.
But in what analysts widely saw as a sop to Buddhist hardliners the party fielded no Muslim candidates, despite boasting many prominent Muslim figures in its ranks.
Suu Kyi has also faced international censure for her failure to criticise an ongoing army crackdown against the Muslim Rohingya minority in western Rakhine state.
Since the launch of the crackdown in October at least 66,000 Rohingya have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh alleging security forces are carrying out a campaign of rape, torture and mass killings.
The treatment of the Rohingya, a stateless group denied citizenship in Myanmar, has galvanised anger across the Muslim world.
Many among Myanmar’s Buddhist majority call them Bengalis - shorthand for illegal immigrants from neighbouring Bangladesh - even though many have lived in Myanmar for generations.
Agence France-Presse, Associated Press

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Myanmar's democratic transition

Prominent Muslim lawyer gunned down at Yangon’s international airport as he hailed taxi

Ko Ni was the Supreme Court advocate for the NLD and a longstanding adviser to the country’s leader Aung San Suu Kyi. Photo: Handout

This screen grab taken on January 4, 2017 from a YouTube video originally taken by Myanmar Constable Zaw Myo Htike (pictured at far L - looking at camera) shows a policeman (back C) kicking out at a Rohingya minority villager seated on the ground with others, in the village of Kotankauk during a police area clearance operation on November 5, 2016. A commission probing violence in Myanmar's Rakhine State on January 4 denied security forces had abused Rohingya, days after a video emerged showing police beating civilians from the Muslim minority. / AFP PHOTO / YOUTUBE / Zaw Myo Htike / -----EDITORS NOTE --- RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE - MANDATORY CREDIT "AFP PHOTO / YOUTUBE / Zaw Myo Htike" - NO MARKETING - NO ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS - DISTRIBUTED AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS - NO ARCHIVES

Myanmar State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi speaks during the "Peace Talk" at the Myanmar International Convention Centre in Naypyitaw, Myanmar, Sunday, Jan. 1, 2017. Nearly a dozen fellow Nobel peace laureates on Thursday, Dec. 29, 2016, criticized Myanmar leader Suu Kyi, saying she has failed to ensure equal rights for the minority Rohingya people in Rakhine state, where the group says more than 30,000 people have been displaced amid an unfolding humanitarian crisis. (AP Photo/Aung Shine Oo)

The ‘delicate’ problem in Myanmar that Suu Kyi is under pressure to fix

The smouldering remains of burned houses in Warpait, a Muslim village in Rakhine State. Photo: AFP

In this photograph taken on October 21, 2016, armed Myanmar soldiers patrol a village in Maungdaw located in Rakhine State as security operation continue following the October 9, 2016 attacks by armed militant Muslim. The United Nations called for an investigation into claims Myanmar troops have been killing civilians and torching villages in northern Rakhine, as reports emerged thousands of Rohingya had been forced from their homes. / AFP PHOTO / STR

In this photograph taken on October 28, 2016, displaced Rakhine Buddhist residents of Maungdaw are housed in tents at an evacuation center in a sports stadium in Sittwe, capital of Rakhine State, following attacks that killed nine border police near the Myanmar-Bangladesh border. Allegations that Myanmar soldiers are killing, raping and torturing villagers in Rakhine, a restive region that is home to the persecuted Muslim Rohingya, must be independently investigated, rights groups said. Northern Rakhine has been under a military lockdown since the attack on border guards three weeks ago left nine policeman dead. / AFP PHOTO / KHINE HTOO MRAT

Children recycle goods from the ruins of a market which was set on fire at a Rohingya village outside Maugndaw in Rakhine state, Myanmar, October 27, 2016. Picture taken October 27, 2016. REUTERS/Soe Zeya Tun

The ruins of a market which was set on fire are seen at a Rohingya village outside Maugndaw in Rakhine state, Myanmar October 27, 2016. Picture taken October 27, 2016. REUTERS/Soe Zeya Tun TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY

In this Friday, Oct. 14, 2016 photo, Myanmar police officers patrol along the border fence between Myanmar and Bangladesh in Maungdaw, Rakhine State, Myanmar. Just five months after her party took power, Myanmar's Nobel Peace Prize-winning leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, is facing international pressure over recent reports that soldiers have been killing, raping and burning homes of the country's long-persecuted Rohingya Muslims. The U.S. State Department joined activist and aid groups in raising concerns about new reports of rape and murder, while satellite imagery released Monday, Oct. 31, by Human Rights Watch shows that at least three villages in the western state of Rakhine have been burned. Myanmar government officials deny the reports of attacks, and presidential spokesman Zaw Htay said Monday that United Nations representatives should visit "and see the actual situation in that region." (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

Men walk at a Rohingya village outside Maugndaw in Rakhine state, Myanmar October 27, 2016. Picture taken October 27, 2016. REUTERS/Soe Zeya Tun

Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida (L) and Myanmar's de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi hold talks at a hotel in Tokyo on Nov. 3, 2016. They agreed to cooperate in efforts to end ethnic conflict in Myanmar. (Pool photo)(Kyodo) ==Kyodo

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