Myanmar ambassador, who opposed coup, is target of assassination plot

NEW YORK: Two Myanmar citizens living in New York plotted over the past month to attack and potentially kill the country’s ambassador to the United Nations who resides in Westchester County, federal prosecutors in Manhattan said Friday.

After being contacted by an arms dealer in Thailand, one of the men, Phyo Hein Htut, agreed to “hire attackers” to injure ambassador Kyaw Moe Tun in an effort to force him to step down, according to court documents. If the ambassador, whom Myanmar’s military has repeatedly tried to replace, refused to resign, the dealer proposed the attackers kill him, prosecutors said.

Htut, 28, and Ye Hein Zaw, 20, who prosecutors say served as intermediaries and made payments to fund the attack, each face a charge of conspiracy to assault and make a violent attack upon a foreign official. Neither entered pleas Friday as they made initial court appearances in White Plains, New York, on their criminal complaints.

“Time was of the essence when we received information about a threat to Myanmar’s ambassador to the United Nations,” Jacqueline Maguire, an acting assistant director at the Federal Bureau of Investigation, said in a statement. “Our laws apply to everyone in our country, and these men will now face the consequences of allegedly breaking those laws.”

If convicted, Htut and Zaw could each serve up to five years in prison. Lawyers for the two men did not immediately respond to requests for comment Friday.

The charges come at a time of upheaval in Myanmar. After the country’s elected government was overthrown in a military coup in February, millions of protesters took to the streets.

At the time, Tun stood in open opposition to the ousting of the country’s civilian leader, Aung San Suu Kyi. In February, he delivered a defiant speech at a UN General Assembly meeting in New York, calling for “the strongest possible action from the international community” to restore democracy.

The audience applauded, and during the meeting, Tun raised his hand in the three-finger salute of resistance from the Hunger Games films, which came to represent the country’s protest movement.

Agencies