The CEO of Eleven Media Group has escaped uninjured after five unknown assailants allegedly pelted his car with nuts in Bahan township on Tuesday night.
No, not the kind of nuts you have with your beer, but the kind you use to change a tire, as seen from the photo below posted on the agency’s Facebook page.
Than Htut Aung was driving home from work at about 6pm when men armed with slingshots opened fire from a nearby taxi.
The driver has been arrested but four men believed to be the perpetrators are still at large.
The CEO said he suspected the slingshot attack was politically-motivated.
“Perhaps, someone reported on my return which time I return home and his accomplices waited somewhere and attacked me. The assailants may be around 25 years and over 30,” he was quoted as saying in an Eleven report.
“Such assault cannot prevent us from our ongoing stance and our journalism of Eleven Media Group. I don’t think it can pose a danger to the change of the country the people long for. I am not worried about it. If such attack is a political violence, [however], I am deeply concerned about the safety of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.”
Reporters Without Borders awarded Eleven a ‘Media of the Year’ award in 2011 for its reporting on the former ruling military junta. Than Htut Aung was in 2013 given the annual press freedom prize from the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers.
Photo / Eleven Media Group
