Mingalardon Township Court has fined a Buddhist monk and six persons charged under the peaceful assembly and procession law for staging a protest against Myanmar’s K Pop group, Project K, at Yangon International Airport, Ks20,000 each.

“Seven of us were charged under Section 19 of the law. Then, the Mingalardon Township judge ruled that we were to pay a fine of Ks20,000 each. So the total amount is Ks140,000,” said Monk U Panna Vamsa.

Project K, met with a protest from some public members when they arrived back at Yangon International Airport on October 13 after participating in Asia Song Festival 2020.

Their performance at the festival has drawn widespread condemnation for stepping on images of the Shwedagon Pagoda.  

On October 10, Project K group uploaded the video of their performance at the Asia Song Festival 2020 on their Facebook page, in which it showed that the image of the Shwedagon Pagoda was projected on the floor of the stage.

Since then the group has been criticized by social media users for their performance by stepping on the pagoda images. When they arrived back, they also met with a protest at the airport.

Regarding the incident, Project K issued an apology on their Facebook Page by claiming that they only found out they were performing on the image of the Shwedagon Pagoda at the Asia Song Festival 2020.

"There was no LED light during the first rehearsal. It was there for the second rehearsal. We knew that there was an LED being shown below us but while we were dancing, we did not know what image it even was," said the apology.

It further goes on to say that all of them are Buddhists and they would have surely stopped it if they had known earlier. They only found out after the event and that they were very sorry for their mistake even though they tried their best.

They expressed their sincere apologies, on their Facebook Page.