<p> A prominent Muslim lawyer and member of Myanmar's ruling party was shot dead along with a taxi driver outside Yangon's international airport today, officials said.<br /><br /></p>.<p>Ko Ni, a member of Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party, was gunned down as he got into a taxi outside arrivals around 5pm (local time) by an assassin who also killed the driver.<br /><br />"According to our initial information, Ko Ni and the taxi driver were killed," a security source at the airport told AFP, asking not to be named.<br /><br />"An unknown man shot him in the head while he was hiring a taxi. He was later arrested," the source added.<br /><br />Zaw Htay, a spokesman at the president's office, said Ko Ni had just returned from a government delegation trip to Indonesia.<br /><br />"He (Ko Ni) was shot while he was waiting for a car outside the airport. Ko Ni died on the spot," he said.<br /><br />There were no reports on possible motives behind the murder.<br />Myanmar's border regions have simmered for decades with ethnic minority insurgencies.<br /><br />Yet it is rare for prominent political figures to be murdered in Yangon, the country's booming and largely safe commercial hub.<br /><br />But in recent years Myanmar has witnessed a surge of anti-Muslim sentiment, fanned by hardline Buddhist nationalists.<br /><br />Ko Ni, a long time member of the NLD and legal advisor to the party, often spoke out in favour of religious tolerance and pluralism.<br /><br />In late 2015 Suu Kyi's NLD party won a landslide election victory, ending decades of military led rule.<br /><br />But in what analysts widely saw as a sop to Buddhist hardliners the party fielded no Muslim candidates, despite boasting many prominent Muslim figures in its ranks.<br /><br />Suu Kyi has also faced international censure for her failure to criticise an ongoing army crackdown against the Muslim Rohingya minority in western Rakhine state.<br /><br />Since the launch of the crackdown in October at least 66,000 Rohingya have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh alleging security forces are carrying out a campaign of rape, torture and mass killings.<br /><br />The treatment of the Rohingya, a stateless group denied citizenship in Myanmar, has galvanised anger across the Muslim world.<br /><br />Many among Myanmar's Buddhist majority call them Bengalis -- shorthand for illegal immigrants from neighbouring Bangladesh -- even though many have lived in Myanmar for generations.</p>
<p> A prominent Muslim lawyer and member of Myanmar's ruling party was shot dead along with a taxi driver outside Yangon's international airport today, officials said.<br /><br /></p>.<p>Ko Ni, a member of Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party, was gunned down as he got into a taxi outside arrivals around 5pm (local time) by an assassin who also killed the driver.<br /><br />"According to our initial information, Ko Ni and the taxi driver were killed," a security source at the airport told AFP, asking not to be named.<br /><br />"An unknown man shot him in the head while he was hiring a taxi. He was later arrested," the source added.<br /><br />Zaw Htay, a spokesman at the president's office, said Ko Ni had just returned from a government delegation trip to Indonesia.<br /><br />"He (Ko Ni) was shot while he was waiting for a car outside the airport. Ko Ni died on the spot," he said.<br /><br />There were no reports on possible motives behind the murder.<br />Myanmar's border regions have simmered for decades with ethnic minority insurgencies.<br /><br />Yet it is rare for prominent political figures to be murdered in Yangon, the country's booming and largely safe commercial hub.<br /><br />But in recent years Myanmar has witnessed a surge of anti-Muslim sentiment, fanned by hardline Buddhist nationalists.<br /><br />Ko Ni, a long time member of the NLD and legal advisor to the party, often spoke out in favour of religious tolerance and pluralism.<br /><br />In late 2015 Suu Kyi's NLD party won a landslide election victory, ending decades of military led rule.<br /><br />But in what analysts widely saw as a sop to Buddhist hardliners the party fielded no Muslim candidates, despite boasting many prominent Muslim figures in its ranks.<br /><br />Suu Kyi has also faced international censure for her failure to criticise an ongoing army crackdown against the Muslim Rohingya minority in western Rakhine state.<br /><br />Since the launch of the crackdown in October at least 66,000 Rohingya have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh alleging security forces are carrying out a campaign of rape, torture and mass killings.<br /><br />The treatment of the Rohingya, a stateless group denied citizenship in Myanmar, has galvanised anger across the Muslim world.<br /><br />Many among Myanmar's Buddhist majority call them Bengalis -- shorthand for illegal immigrants from neighbouring Bangladesh -- even though many have lived in Myanmar for generations.</p>