Bomb blasts shake Myanmar, one American injured
Yangon - Two bomb blasts rocked a town near the central Myanmar city of Mandalay early Tuesday, hours after an explosion in an upmarket Yangon hotel injured an American woman, officials said.
The low-level explosives were detonated early Tuesday in the Shwe Prasone Hotel and on the stairways to the Soon U Ponya Shin pagoda in the town of Sagaing, situated on the Irrawaddy River about 25 kilometres south-west of Mandalay.
"No one was injured in the two blasts, which were caused by hand-made, low-explosive bombs," said Colonel Kyi Naing, security affairs minister of the Sagaing Division. "Police are questioning eye-witnesses." The two explosions in central Myanmar come on the heels of a bomb blast Monday night at Yangon's upmarket Traders Hotel, which injured a 43-year-old American woman.
"She is not seriously injured and is now in hospital," Traders Hotel general manager Phillip Couvaras said.
The woman's husband and two children, aged 8 and 5 years old, were not injured, a police officer said.
Traders Hotel, located in Yangon's central business district, is popular among visiting businessmen, diplomats and upmarket tourists.
The blast occurred on Monday night in room 921 on the ninth floor of the 22-storey hotel.
Authorities have detained a Myanmar national who had used the room earlier as a suspect in the hotel bombing, the police said.//DPA
