Chapter (3) (3.1) Unceasing Strikes Despite the military junta’s extremely brutal arrests and murders, people’s struggle for democracy and freedom has always prevailed, still perpetuating strikes and protests since the first day of the coup. The residents have preserved the protests in Kalay, Yinmabin and Salingyi, the oppressed townships in Sagaing Region. The local community continues to show their adamant dissent with the main strike of Kalay township, Shwenewthway strike and the “Our Village Searches No Savior” strike in Yinmabin, and the multi-village strikes in eastern Yinmabin and northern Salingyin. Marking the 425th day of the strike, Shwenwethway strike members protested on 30 July 2022 despite the unstable situation in Yinmabin township, Sagaing Region. A young strike leader said, “The youths want freedom. If the military dictatorship continues, the youth will have no freedom. Therefore, the youth are fighting to overthrow the military dictatorship.”24 The main strike of Kalay township also carried out its 516th day of protest on 9 July 2022, holding a banner reading, “Resist until the end. This is the vigor of 5/”.25 (3.2) The Military’s Oppression of Local Peaceful Protesters Peaceful protestors running away from the crackdown as the security forces fire flash bangs and tear gas in Yangon on 17 March, 2021. “အဆုံးး��ထိိတော်�်�လှန် ှ ် ၅/ တို့့��အားး�မာာန််” စာာတန်းး�ကိုု�င််ဆော�ာင််ဆန္ဒဒပြ�ခဲ့့�တဲ့့� ကလေး�းမြို့�့��ပင််မသပိိတ််. (2022 July 9). 25 ယင်းး�မာာပင််မြို့�့��နယ််တွွင်် ရွှေ�ေနွွယ််သွေး�း�သပိိတ််ချီီ�တက််ဆန္ဒဒပြ�. (2022 June 30). Mizzima Burmese 24 Delta News Agency https://www.facebook.com/662575584120143/posts/1690612784649746 https://www.mizzimaburmese.com/article/110384 17