The ceasefire comes into effect on Wednesday and will last until April 22, according to the junta in a statement.
The purpose of the ceasefire is, according to the junta, to accelerate relief and reconstruction efforts and maintain peace and stability after the earthquake.
Since a military coup in 2021, Myanmar has been plagued by a violent civil war, with battles raging between the regime and several resistance groups. After the earthquake, the UN, human rights organizations, and several countries have called on the military junta to lay down their arms and focus on rescue efforts, but junta leader Min Aung Hlaing rejected the demands until Wednesday.
One rescued
Late on Tuesday – nearly 108 hours after the earthquake – a 26-year-old was rescued from the rubble of a collapsed hotel in the capital Naypyidaw by rescue workers from Myanmar and Turkey. In a video, the man, dusty and disheveled but alive, is seen being pulled out through a drilled hole in the rubble and placed on a stretcher.
However, hope of finding more survivors is dwindling by the minute. Most rescue workers are only finding dead bodies, writes news agency AP.
Friday's shallow earthquake with a magnitude of 7.7 occurred near Myanmar's second-largest city Mandalay with 1.7 million inhabitants. Roads were cracked, bridges collapsed, and hundreds of buildings collapsed.
Thousands homeless
The death toll has been rising steadily since the earthquake – and is expected to rise further when rescue workers manage to reach areas where communication is not functioning.
On Wednesday, the military-controlled TV company MRTV reports that the number of dead is up to 3,002, with over 4,600 injured, many missing, and thousands homeless.
On Tuesday, rescue workers from the Chinese Red Cross were reportedly shot at by the military junta, reports Reuters. No one was injured in the shooting, which the junta describes as "warning shots".
In Myanmar's neighboring country Thailand, over 20 people have been confirmed dead in the earthquake, most of them in the rubble of a 30-story skyscraper that collapsed in northern Bangkok.
Corrected: In an earlier version, the wrong date was given for the ceasefire.
