Read UPDATE: Prominent lawyer, driver shot and killed outside Yangon airport





U Ko Ni, a National League for Democracy legal adviser, was shot and killed at the Yangon airport this afternoon, according to senior party member U Win Htein. Police believe the shooting was a targeted assassination.

A taxi driver was also reportedly shot and killed, according to AFP.

U Ko Ni was returning from Indonesia where he was part of a delegation attending a senior leadership meeting in Jakarta. He was waiting at the taxi station at the airport at around 4:30pm when he was shot in the head and killed.

“It is a very sorrowful thing for Myanmar, and a very big loss for the country, I have to say," U Win Htein told The Myanmar Times.

According to a police report obtained by The Myanmar Times and signed by Police Officer Myo Naing, the suspected shooter is a 53-year-old man from Mandalay. The suspect has been arrested and is being questioned by police. No motive is yet known for the killing.

U Ko Ni was a prominent lawyer and a patron of the recently formed Myanmar Muslim Lawyers Association.

Read an updated version of this story here.





Additional reporting by Toe Wai Aung