Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Websites/Multiple Documents
Description:
Stopped October 2016. The Archive survives.
Source/publisher:
Various sources via "BurmaNet News"
Date of entry/update:
2015-03-08
Grouping:
Websites/Multiple Documents
Category:
Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Parliament - general articles and reports, Legislation under consideration, adopted, amended or repealed
Language:
English
more
Description:
About 355,000 results (August 2017)
Source/publisher:
Various sources via Youtube
Date of entry/update:
2017-08-22
Grouping:
Websites/Multiple Documents
Language:
English, Burmese (မြန်မာဘာသာ)
more
Source/publisher:
CIA
Date of entry/update:
2003-06-03
Grouping:
Websites/Multiple Documents
Category:
Statistics, profiles, general information etc. on Burma/Myanmar, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
English
more
Description:
''The Fiscal Federalism modules include the following:
1.Fiscal Federalism Introduction
2.Decentralization, Revenue Transfers, and Social Development
3.Fiscal Federalism and Equalization
4.Fiscal Federalism and Natural Resources
5.Public Infrastructure, Public Services, and Human Capital
6.Fiscal Federalism and Myanmar’s Peace Negotiations...''
Source/publisher:
Asia Foundation
Date of publication:
2018-11-14
Date of entry/update:
2019-01-13
Grouping:
Websites/Multiple Documents
Category:
Decentralisation (Decentralization) in Burma/Myanmar, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Educational resources and materials (Burma- and non-Burma-related)
Language:
English, Burmese (မြန်မာဘာသာ), Kachin, Karen, Shan
Format :
pdf pdf pdf pdf pdf
Size:
2.96 MB 4.34 MB 4.59 MB 4.74 MB 4.58 MB
more
Source/publisher:
MYLAFF
Date of entry/update:
2016-07-02
Grouping:
Websites/Multiple Documents
Category:
Plans, strategies, policy, standards and guidelines, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
English
more
Individual Documents
Description:
"Myanmar is in the midst of a momentous political and economic transition, the outcome of
which will have ramifications not only for the country itself but also for the rest of Southeast
Asia and much of continental Asia. This volume has provided an in-depth survey and analysis
of the many cultural, political and economic shifts currently underway and the key challenges
that the country faces. It is now therefore worth considering what a successful transition in
Myanmar might look like.
There can be little doubt that for most people in Myanmar, and for the country’s many
supporters elsewhere in the world, a successful transition will result in a prosperous and peaceful
democracy: many of its people took to the streets demanding democracy in 1988 and electoral
support for the National League for Democracy (NLD) was overwhelming in both 1990 and
2015 (Ardeth Thawnghmung 2016). However, as with all political concepts, the form and function of democratic rule is heavily contested. In Myanmar, the military’s roadmap to ‘disciplineflourishing democracy’, put into practice with the 2008 constitution, reserves a quarter of
legislative seats for serving military personnel, mandates direct military appointments to the
executive and allocates the Tatmadaw a key role in many aspects of national governance. Such
enduring military dominance does not satisfy most definitions of democracy. Nevertheless, with
the gradual loosening of constraints on political debate and the NLD government coming
to power in 2016, Myanmar is becoming more democratic than at any point in the past half
century. Whether the transition can continue in this democratic direction is still unclear.
A fundamental component of any transition to a democratic society is adherence to international norms relating to democracy and a broad portfolio of human rights in the political, civil,
economic, social and cultural realms. The political reform process underway in Myanmar therefore has major implications for the country’s economic and cultural future. Genuine respect for
democratic norms and human rights should lead to a more equitable and ecologically sustainable
model of economic development. It should also support the recognition and respect of social and
cultural diversity, whether based on ethnicity, sexual orientation, ability or gender. Democracy,
human rights, sustainability and equitable economic development are often treated as separate
issues, but this is usually the result of applying unduly narrow definitions. More comprehensive
visions of sustainable and just states provide useful insights on the interdependence of these issues
(Eckersley 2004). In 2015, Myanmar finally signed the International Covenant on Economic,
Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), which sets out a range of state obligations in these areas.
A democratic, just and sustainable future for Myanmar therefore relies on the notion of
inclusion. An inclusive polity, economy and society do not discriminate on the basis of religion,
ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation. With ongoing civil conflict in Myanmar’s north, east
and west, and the religious tensions between Buddhists and Muslims in much of the country,
this may seem like a utopian vision, but it remains a precursor for any truly liberal or social
democratic state.
Political and economic inclusion is generated by adherence to human rights norms but it is
also necessary for any successful strategy of sustainable development. Inequality in Myanmar is
significant and there is a growing global recognition, even in institutions such as the IMF, that
inequality and neoliberal economic models can stifle the full potential of economic development
(Dabla-Norris et al. 2015; Ostry et al. 2016; Wilkinson and Pickett 2009). Myanmar’s natural
resources and agricultural development provide avenues for addressing poverty throughout the
country but only if such development is achieved through ecologically sustainable strategies that
respect the rights of ethnic minority and local communities in decision-making. Policies that
promote free, high-quality education for all, particularly in ethnic languages, not only improve
understanding and tolerance of difference but also provide the human capital for future economic development ( Jolliffe and Mears 2016; Lall and South 2013).
Political inclusion is possibly the most significant issue facing Myanmar, with questions of
ethnicity a key contributor to historical and contemporary conflicts. Ethnicity feeds directly
into Myanmar’s unresolved citizenship crisis (Holliday 2014). As Walton (2013) has shown,
many in the ethnic Bamar (Burman) community are oblivious of the systematic marginalisation
of other ethnic cultures, languages and religions. This unacknowledged privilege is not, however,
unique to the Bamar community, as some ‘accepted’ national ethnic minorities also receive
unacknowledged privilege and reinforce the marginalisation of other minority communities.
The key document in this area is the 1982 Citizenship Law, which set out the country’s 135
officially designated ethnic groups, the ‘national races’. The law was passed during military rule
under Ne Win, which was opposed by the NLD and many ethnic groups for its authoritarian
and chauvinist practices. While arguing that laws made under Ne Win were unjust and illegitimate, in the new political climate many ethnic minority activists have been happy to cite and
promote this law to justify the exclusion of other minorities, notably the Muslim Rohingya in
Rakhine State, although this is part of a broader scapegoating of Muslims throughout Myanmar
(Cheesman 2017; van Klinken and Su Mon Thazin Aung 2017). There is no easy political
solution to the issue of inclusion in Myanmar but a useful first step could be the technical separation of ethnicity from eligibility for citizenship (see Farrelly 2016).
An intermediate point for the transition currently underway in Myanmar might, therefore,
see the law redrafted to remove ethnicity as a primary determinant of citizenship. There are of
course significant political impediments to implementing such a change but, just as the concept
of federalism is, for the first time, being openly debated in Myanmar, the emergence of a new
definition of citizenship, founded on liberal values rather than arbitrary and often ethnologically
dubious categorisations, should not be entirely ruled out. Such a shift would take courage on
the part of Myanmar’s democrats to make the necessary adjustments in what is currently a rigid
set of social expectations about ethnic belonging.
In government, the NLD has made efforts to promote what they consider neutral language
on sensitive ethnic issues, particularly the Rohingya. Their terminological revisions have caused
consternation among ‘nationalist’ Buddhists, and have also been opposed by some Rohingya
themselves. There were reports that Muslims in Rakhine State townships refused to accept new
government-issued national verification cards, or ‘green cards’, as part of a citizenship verification
pilot programme because their race and religion were omitted ( The Myanmar Times, 16 June 2016). These Muslims wanted their ethnicity listed on the card both to emphasise their identity and
because they thought its absence could reduce their chances of eventually gaining citizenship.
There is, in such cases, a lack of trust between ethnic minorities and the government due to
deep-seated historical animosities. While the NLD government generates much more goodwill
than its predecessors, there are obvious challenges when it comes to contentious ethnic and
religious fault lines. The removal of ethnicity and religion from government identification cards
is, however, a worthwhile ambition for a pluralist democracy. The official diminution of ethnic
classification may be possible if supposedly discrete groups accept that they are all, fundamentally, the same.
An attempt to reduce communal tensions came with the government announcement in
mid-2016 that it would use the religiously determined, but ethnically neutral, terminology of
‘Buddhist community in Rakhine State’ and ‘Muslim community in Rakhine State’ in stateowned publications ( The Irrawaddy, 21 June 2016). The previous USDP government commonly
referred to the Rohingya as ‘Bengalis’, a pejorative and ethnologically suspect term. Under the
NLD government these tentative steps towards more ethnically neutral governance were shaped
by the need to balance the competing demands of local nationalists and external critics. In
championing such difficult changes, the NLD were encouraged by their landslide triumph at
the 2015 election in the face of large-scale ‘nationalist’ Buddhist protests, including exhortations
by prominent monks not to vote for the leading democratic politicians. Even with that popular
mandate, the NLD’s efforts have foundered amongst the Buddhist majority of Rakhine State
who continued to insist on identifying their Muslim neighbours as ‘Bengali’.
The NLD attempted to placate international criticism on the treatment of the Rohingya by
the appointment of an international advisory commission in August 2016, led by former UN
Secretary General Kofi Annan (Reuters, 24 August 2016), and by October the situation in
northern Rakhine State was relatively stable, despite the ongoing incarceration of over 100,000
Rohingya in internally displaced peoples (IDP) camps. On 9 October 2016, however, coordinated armed attacks on three border posts near Maungdaw township in northern Rakhine State
killed nine Myanmar police officers and eight assailants ( The Myanmar Times, 10 October 2016).
As a result, the region again became heavily militarised with widespread allegations of Tatmadaw
abuse of the Muslim community and an exodus of 70,000 Rohingya to Bangladesh (OHCHR
2016; 2017).
On 24 August 2017 the commission delivered their final report, which included comprehensive and productive recommendations on pathways to peace in Rakhine State. The NLD
government quickly committed to implement the recommendations ‘to the fullest extent, and within the shortest timeframe possible’. In the early hours of the next morning, militants
attacked 30 police posts and an army barracks in northern Rakhine State, resulting in a brutal
military operation which the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights labelled ‘a textbook
example of ethnic cleansing’. At the time of writing over 400,000 Rohingya had fled across the
border to Bangladesh in the three weeks following the attacks. The outlook for the Rohingya
and peace in Rakhine State is now even more bleak (Simpson 2017a).
Broader concerns by ethnic minorities over the NLD as primarily a Bamar party were reinforced around the one year anniversary of the NLD government over a bridge-naming dispute
in Chaungzon, Mon State. The government insisted on naming the bridge after the Bamar
General Aung San, Aung San Suu Kyi’s father, while the Mon ethnic community were in
favour of a more locally sensitive name. By-elections for parliament were held on 1 April 2017
to replace government appointees, including for the seat surrounding the bridge, and to fill
several seats left vacant due to civil conflict in Shan State during the 2015 elections. The dispute
resulted in a 17 per cent collapse in the NLD vote in Chaungzon and they lost the seat.Similarly, in Shan State the Shan Nationalities League for Democracy (SNLD) won all six previously empty seats with a negligible NLD vote registered in several electorates. The tactical
voting in ethnic areas that delivered the NLD its landslide in 2015 is unlikely to be repeated
(Simpson 2017b).
Ethnic concerns fed into broader dissatisfaction with the performance of the NLD and Aung
San Suu Kyi in their first year in office. Little progress was made on the peace process, despite
Aung San Suu Kyi expending considerable political capital in this area. Furthermore, there
were relatively few detailed plans for development with Aung San Suu Kyi continuing to promote a ‘socially conservative ideology of radical self-sufficiency and laissez-faire relations
between the state and society’ (Mary Callahan, Nikkei Asian Review, 29 March 2017), arguing
citizens should muster ‘courage’ and ‘self-confidence’ rather than rely on government action or
support; an exhortation unlikely to be received with equanimity in ethnic areas facing off
against the state’s military. The NLD was undoubtedly left a shambolic economic legacy by the
previous USDP government and the military operates independently, but the government
came to power with unprecedented goodwill and it is striking how this has metamorphosed
into an aloof sense of entitlement within the NLD.
One sector with which the NLD needs to engage further is civil society. Since the opening
of political space in Myanmar it has been apparent that civil society is not always civil, with
chauvinist ‘nationalist’ movements becoming more prominent. Nonetheless, civil society is an
essential component of any thriving democratic system and it has a pivotal role to play in
engaging community and government stakeholders. Civil society provides an outlet for
pursuing cultural goals, as well as political ones, and provides mechanisms for minorities or
groups unable, or unwilling, to enter the formal political process. There are concerns that the
NLD government does not consider civil society an active partner in the transition, since it
lacks the electoral legitimacy of the NLD. It would be a missed opportunity, and do little for
democratic development, if local activists were merely expected to follow the lead set by
elected politicians (Simpson and Smits 2018).
After decades of military rule, a free media in Myanmar will also be crucial for the development of a vibrant, inclusive and democratic society but here again the NLD’s record is mixed.
The rapid expansion of newspapers and news outlets in the country under the USDP government was welcome and there have been some moves by the NLD to continue relaxing restrictions on the media. For politicians and government officials, however, there is still a need to
embrace the scrutiny offered by journalists, even when it proves uncomfortable. The media, including its rambunctious online elements, should be considered an essential component of
democracy rather than an impediment to smooth national development. Unfortunately, journalists and political activists continued to be arrested and jailed under residual legislation, such
as section 66(d) of the 2013 Telecommunications Act, during the NLD’s first year in office
(Simpson 2017b). The ongoing difficulties and restrictions in reporting on civil conflicts, particularly in Rakhine State, demonstrate that there remain clear limits on press freedom in the
country (Brooten and Verbruggen 2017).
Free and fair elections are a key component of successful democracies and the 2015 election
was, given Myanmar’s recent history, undoubtedly a success by almost any measure. However,
Myanmar’s first-past-the-post electoral system, while delivering the NLD a useful majority, is
actually not the best system for pursuing inclusive democracy. A system of proportional representation, with preferential voting, would result in more representative and inclusive legislatures
(Dryzek and Dunleavy 2009). If Myanmar’s parliaments are seen as accurately reflecting the will
of all communities, ethnic groups are more likely to pursue their interests through democratic
means rather than armed struggle. A related factor in the potential success of Myanmar’s transition is the continuing centrality
of Myanmar’s military in the country’s political and economic life. While the NLD government
gains most of the media attention for its activities, it still only governs with the acquiescence of
the Tatmadaw. The military may have receded from the frontline of government but it remains
a powerful force that, under its own 2008 constitution, is an autonomous institution, free from
civilian control or oversight. The military clearly runs its own operations in the restive ethnic
regions. The assassination in January 2017 of Ko Ni, a key legal adviser to the NLD, at Yangon
International Airport reinforced the views of some that military subterfuge was consciously
undermining the government. That he was the NLD expert on understanding and challenging
the military-authored constitution, as well as being one of the few prominent Muslims in
political life, cast further doubt on hopes that Myanmar had entered a new more liberal and
democratic era.
While the constitution ensures that the military plays a dominant role in Myanmar’s politics,
its role in Myanmar’s economy is much less formalised, but no less significant (Ford et al. 2016;
Jones 2014). To consolidate democratic rule the NLD must also democratise economic
development; if the poor see continuing inequality and little material gain from democratic rule
they may be inclined to accept more authoritarian options in future if they come attached with
promises of economic relief. During the first year in office Aung San Suu Kyi focused almost
exclusively on the peace process at the expense of economic development; in reality, the two
goals are interdependent.
Finally, the transition inside Myanmar will inevitably be shaped by events in the wider world
as the country continues to embrace international society. External actors are increasingly present in Myanmar as major foreign powers, corporations and INGOs look for opportunities in
what is an emerging site for regional competition. Aung San Suu Kyi rightly insists that the
Myanmar government, not international actors, will decide on the country’s policies both big
and small. Nevertheless, no country is immune to the pressures of globalisation, and Myanmar
will certainly need to account for many transborder considerations.
To build a modern democratic state, political leaders in Myanmar will need to effectively
manage a daunting set of interrelated challenges. As well as establishing robust foundations for
democracy inside the country, they will be forced to balance external influences seeking leverage at a time of national vulnerability. It helps that the elected NLD government claimed a
strong popular mandate to improve the economy and increase political participation but inadequate state resourcing is likely to remain a persistent constraint. As Myanmar continues its
transition towards a more inclusive government and society it remains far too early to claim that the nascent process has been a success.
Source/publisher:
Routledge Handbook of Contemporary Myanmar via Academia
Date of publication:
2018-00-00
Date of entry/update:
2026-05-23
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
93.71 KB
Local URL:
more
Description:
"After decades of mismanagement and direct military rule, Myanmar’s contested transition to a
more democratic government has rapidly shifted the outlook in this significant Southeast Asian
nation. Since 2011, the removal of Western sanctions and new foreign investments have resulted
in high rates of economic growth and an expanding middle class, albeit from a very low base. In a
result unthinkable a few years earlier, former political prisoner and Nobel laureate Aung San Suu
Kyi and her party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), formed a national government
in early 2016. However, despite significant political and economic reforms since the liberalisation
process commenced, the transition to civilian rule remains constrained by the military’s 2008
Constitution, which guarantees that it operates unfettered by civilian oversight. As a result,
although some ethnic conflicts have abated, others continue to fester and new conflicts have
erupted. With a daunting task ahead the NLD government has made some progress in removing
the vestiges of repressive military-era laws but many remain untouched and some of the practices
of the new government provide unwelcome reminders of the country’s authoritarian history.
This timely Handbook describes the political, economic, and cultural dimensions of this
crucial period of transition in Myanmar. It presents explanations for contradictory trends,
including those that defy some of the early narratives about the comprehensive transformation
of Myanmar. The Handbook also considers the impact of major environmental, strategic, and
demographic trends which help underscore that Myanmar’s development will be an ongoing
task. In addition to introductory and concluding chapters by the editors, the body of the Handbook is divided into seven core sections:• Fundamentals
• Spaces
• Cultures
• Living
• Governance
• International
• Challenges
Written by an international team of scholars, with a mix of world-leading established academics
and talented emerging researchers, the Handbook provides a rigorous scholarly overview of Myanmar’s politics, economics, and society. As Myanmar opens to Western businesses and
government agencies, this is an invaluable reference book that will provide a foundation for
further research and offer the first port of call for scholars, students, and policy makers working
on Myanmar and Asia.
Adam Simpson is Director of the Centre for Peace and Security at the Hawke Research
Institute and Senior Lecturer in International Studies at the University of South Australia. He
is also Adjunct Research Fellow at the Centre for Governance and Public Policy at Griffith
University, Australia.
Nicholas Farrelly is an Associate Dean of the College of Asia and the Pacific at the Australian
National University and Director of the ANU Myanmar Research Centre.
Ian Holliday is Vice-President and Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Teaching and Learning) at the
University of Hong Kong..."
Source/publisher:
Routledge Handbook via Academia
Date of publication:
2018-00-00
Date of entry/update:
2026-05-19
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
Format :
pdf (477 pages)
Size:
2.19 MB
more
Description:
"၁။ အကြမ်းဖက်စစ်အုပ်စု အနေဖြင့် ၂၀၂၆ ခုနှစ်၊ ဧပြီလ ၂၁ ရက်နေ့မှ ဇူလိုင်လ (၃၁) ရက် အတွင်း ငြိမ်းချမ်းရေးဆွေးနွေးရန် ဖိတ်ခေါ်မှုတရပ် ထုတ်ပြန်ခဲ့သည်ကို တွေ့ရသည်။
၂။ အဆိုပါ ဖိတ်ခေါ်မှုသည် စစ်အာဏာသိမ်းမှုကြောင့် ပျက်ပြယ်ပြီးဖြစ်သော ၂၀၀၈ ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံ အခြေခံဥပဒေ နှင့် NCA လမ်းကြောင်း တို့မှတဆင့် တော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစု များအား သပ်လျှိုသွေးခွဲရန် ရည်ရွယ်သည့် အတုအယောင်ဖိတ်ခေါ်မှုသာ ဖြစ်သည်။ မတရားအာဏာ လုယူထားသော အကြမ်းဖက်စစ်အုပ်စု အနေဖြင့် ထိုသို့ အတုအယောင် ငြိမ်းချမ်းရေး ဆွေးနွေးရန် ဖိတ်ခေါ်ခြင်းသည် ၎င်းတို့အတွက် နိုင်ငံရေးအရ တရားဝင်မှု ရရှိရန်နှင့် ကျူးလွန်ခဲ့သည့် ရာဇဝတ်မှုများမှ ပြစ်ဒဏ်ကင်းလွတ်ခွင့်ကို ရရှိစေရန် ကြိုးပမ်းမှု လည်း ဖြစ်သည်။
၃။ ယင်းဖိတ်ခေါ်ချက်တွင် “ကြိုတင်ကန့်သတ်ချက်များ မထားသည့် ဆွေးနွေးပွဲများ ကျင်းပပြုလုပ်နိုင်ရန်” ဟု ဖော်ပြထားပြီး အမည်ခံ NCA လုပ်ငန်းစဥ်အား အခြေခံ ထားခြင်းဖြင့် ၎င်းတို့စိတ်ကြိုက် ခြယ်လှယ်နိုင်ရန် ကြိုတင်ကန့်သတ်ခြင်းဖြစ်ပြီး ပြည်သူလူထု တရပ်လုံး လိုလားသည့် စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ် ချုပ်ငြိမ်းရေး၊ ဖက်ဒရယ် ဒီမိုကရေစီစနစ် ဖော်ဆောင်ရေးနှင့် စစ်မှန်သည့် ငြိမ်းချမ်းရေးအား လုံးဝဖော်ဆောင်နိုင်မည် လည်း မဟုတ်ပါ။
၄။ စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ် ချုပ်ငြိမ်းရေးနှင့် ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီစနစ် တည်ဆောက်ရေး လုပ်ငန်းများနှင့် စပ်လျဥ်း၍ တော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုများ အနေဖြင့် အောက်ပါ နိုင်ငံရေး ဦးတည်ချက် (၆) ရပ် အတိုင်း ရပ်တည်ဆောင်ရွက်သွားမည် ဟု ထုတ်ပြန်ကြေညာ ထားကြပြီး ဖြစ်သည်။
(က) စစ်အာဏာသိမ်းထားမှုကိုဖယ်ရှားပြီး မြန်မာစစ်တပ်၏ နိုင်ငံရေး၌ ပါဝင်နေခြင်းအား အဆုံးသတ်ရန်
(ခ) လက်နက်ကိုင်တပ်ဖွဲ့များအားလုံးကို ဒီမိုကရေစီနည်းကျ ရွေးကောက်တင်မြှောက် ထားသည့် အရပ်သားအစိုးရ၏ စီမံအုပ်ချုပ်မှုအောက်၌ အပြည့်အဝထားရှိရန်
(ဂ) ၂၀၀၈ ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေကို အပြီးတိုင်ဖျက်သိမ်းရန်နှင့် ယင်းကို ပြန်လည် အသက်သွင်းရန် ကြိုးပမ်းမှုမှန်သမျှ တိုက်ဖျက်ရန်
(ဃ) သက်ဆိုင်သူများအားလုံးလက်ခံနိုင်သော ဖက်ဒရယ်နှင့် ဒီမိုကရေစီစနစ်ကို အခြေခံ သည့် ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေ ရေးဆွဲပြဋ္ဌာန်းရန်
(င) ထွက်ပေါ်လာသော ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီ ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေနှင့်အညီ ဖက်ဒရယ် ဒီမိုကရေစီ ပြည်ထောင်စုအသစ်အား တည်ဆောက်ရန်
(စ) ပဋိပက္ခအတွင်း မတရားကျူးလွန်ခံရသူများအတွက် တရားမျှတမှုရရှိရေးနှင့် အသွင်ကူးပြောင်းရေးကာလ တရားမျှတမှုရရှိရေး လုပ်ငန်းစဉ်ဖော်ဆောင်ရန်
၅။ အကြမ်းဖက်စစ်အုပ်စု အနေဖြင့် ၎င်းတို့၏ အာဏာဆက်လက် ဆုပ်ကိုင်နိုင်ရေး အတွက် အတုအယောင်ဆွေးနွေးပွဲများ၊ ဟန်ပြငြိမ်းချမ်းရေး ဆွေးနွေးပွဲများအား လက်နက် သဖွယ် ကျင့်သုံးခဲ့ပြီး အဆိုပါ ဆွေးနွေးမှုများသည်လည်း စစ်အာဏာသိမ်းမှုများဖြင့်သာ ပြန်လည်၍ နိဂုံးချုပ်ကြရသည်ကို မြန်မာနိုင်ငံ၏ နှစ် (၇၀) သမိုင်းက သက်သေပြခဲ့ပြီး ဖြစ်သည်။ ထို့အတွက် အကြမ်းဖက်စစ်အုပ်စု နိုင်ငံရေးဦးဆောင်မှုတွင် ရှိနေသရွေ့ တွေ့ဆုံဆွေးနွေးရေး နည်းလမ်းဖြင့် ပြည်သူလူထု၏ လိုလားချက်များအား ရရှိနိုင်မည် မဟုတ်ဘဲ စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ် သက်ဆိုးရှည်နေမည်သာ ဖြစ်သည်။
၆။ မြန်မာပြည်သူများ ကြုံတွေ့နေရသော ဆင်းရဲဒုက္ခပေါင်းစုံသည် စစ်အာဏာသိမ်းမှု များနှင့် စစ်တပ်က နိုင်ငံရေးတွင် ပါဝင်နေမှုတို့၏ အကျိုးဆက်သာ ဖြစ်သည်။ မြန်မာနိုင်ငံ၏ ပြဿနာများ ဖြေရှင်းပြေလည်နိုင်ရေးမှာ “နိုင်ငံရေးတွင် စစ်တပ်ပါဝင်မှု မရှိမှသာ” လမ်းစ ပွင့်လာနိုင်မည် ဖြစ်ကြောင်း အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအတိုင်ပင်ခံကောင်စီ က ယုံကြည်သည်။
၇။ သို့ဖြစ်ပါ၍ တော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုများ၏ ဦးတည်ချက် (၆) ရပ်ကို အခြေခံသော ဘုံနိုင်ငံရေး သဘောတူညီချက်များ စုစည်းရယူ၍ ရပ်တည်သွားကြရန် နှင့် ဆက်လက် တိုက်ပွဲဝင်သွားကြရန် အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအတိုင်ပင်ခံကောင်စီ (NUCC) က အလေးအနက် တိုက်တွန်းအပ်သည်။
၈။ အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေး အတိုင်ပင်ခံကောင်စီ အနေဖြင့်လည်း နွေဦးတော်လှန်ရေး၏ ရည်မှန်းချက်၊ ရည်ရွယ်ချက်များဖြစ်သော စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ် အပါအဝင် အာဏာရှင်စနစ် မှန်သမျှ ချုပ်ငြိမ်းရေး နှင့် ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စု တည်ဆောက်ရေး တို့အတွက် ပြည်သူလူထုနှင့်အတူ လက်တွဲ၍ ဆက်လက်တိုက်ပွဲဝင်သွားမည်ဖြစ်ကြောင်း ထုတ်ပြန်ကြေညာအပ်သည်။..."
Source/publisher:
National Unity Consultative Council
Date of publication:
2026-04-25
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-25
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, The Military's political role, Human Rights Defenders
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
778.82 KB
more
Description:
"“Message of Congratulations on President U Win Myint’s Return to His Family”
Date: April 22, 2026
U Win Myint, the President of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar, who was unlawfully arrested and detained by the terrorist military on February 1, 2021, while serving in his capacity as President, has reunited with his family on April 17, 2026, after more than five years.
On this occasion, the Steering Council for the Emergence of a Federal Democratic Union (SCEF) expresses its great joy and congratulations together with his family and with all the people of Myanmar.
We sincerely wish that President U Win Myint will have good health and that he will be able to continue to safely carry out responsibilities for the benefit of the country and its people.
We will continue to make every possible effort, together with all the people of Myanmar, to ensure the swift and unconditional release of all political prisoners, including State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, who remains unjustly detained.
Steering Council for the Emergence of a Federal Democratic Union (SCEF)..."
Source/publisher:
National Unity Government of Myanmar
Date of publication:
2026-04-22
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-23
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
216.52 KB
more
Description:
"“နိုင်ငံတော်သမ္မတဦးဝင်းမြင့် မိသားစုထံပြန်လည်ရောက်ရှိခြင်းအတွက် ဝမ်းမြောက်ကြောင်း သဝဏ်လွှာ”
ရက်စွဲ။ ။ ၂၀၂၆ ခုနှစ် ဧပြီလ ၂၂ ရက်
၂၀၂၁ ခုနှစ် ဖေဖော်ဝါရီလ (၁) ရက်နေ့တွင် ပြည်ထောင်စုသမ္မတမြန်မာနိုင်ငံတော်၏ နိုင်ငံတော်သမ္မတအဖြစ် တာဝန်ထမ်းဆောင်လျက်ရှိနေချိန် အကြမ်းဖက်စစ်တပ်၏ မတရားဖမ်းဆီးအကျဉ်းချခြင်းကို ခံခဲ့ရသည့် နိုင်ငံတော်သမ္မတဦးဝင်းမြင့်သည် (၅) နှစ်ကျော်အကြာ ၂၀၂၆ ခုနှစ် ဧပြီလ ၁၇ ရက်နေ့တွင် မိသားစုထံ ပြန်လည်ရောက်ရှိခဲ့သည့်အတွက် ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စု ပေါ်ထွန်းရေး ဦးဆောင်ကောင်စီ - SCEF အနေဖြင့် မိသားစုနှင့်ထပ်တူ၊ မြန်မာနိုင်ငံသူနိုင်ငံသားများအားလုံးနှင့် ထပ်တူ ဝမ်းမြောက်ဝမ်းသာဖြစ်ရပါသည်။
နိုင်ငံတော်သမ္မတဦးဝင်းမြင့်အနေဖြင့် ကိုယ်၏ ကျန်းမာခြင်း၊ စိတ်၏ ခိုင်မာခြင်းတို့ကို ပိုင်ဆိုင်ကာ နိုင်ငံ့အကျိုး၊ နိုင်ငံသူနိုင်ငံသားတို့၏ အကျိုးကို ဘေးအန္တရာယ်ကင်းစွာဖြင့် ဆက်လက်သယ်ပိုးထမ်းရွက်နိုင်ပါစေကြောင်း ဆန္ဒပြုဆုမွန်ကောင်းတောင်းအပ်ပါသည်။
ကျွန်ုပ်တို့အနေဖြင့် မတရားဖမ်းဆီးခံထားရသည့် နိုင်ငံတော်၏အတိုင်ပင်ခံပုဂ္ဂိုလ်ဒေါ်အောင်ဆန်းစုကြည်နှင့်တကွ နိုင်ငံရေးအကျဉ်းသားများအားလုံး ခြွင်းချက်မရှိ အမြန်ဆုံးလွတ်မြောက်နိုင်ရေးအတွက် တိုင်းရင်းသား ပြည်သူလူထုအားလုံးနှင့် အတူ အစွမ်းကုန် ဆက်လက် ကြိုးပမ်းဆောင်ရွက်သွားမည်ဖြစ်ပါသည်။
ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စုပေါ်ထွန်းရေးဦးဆောင်ကောင်စီ
Steering Council for the Emergence of a Federal Democratic Union (SCEF)..."
Source/publisher:
National Unity Government of Myanmar
Date of publication:
2026-04-22
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-22
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
313.87 KB
more
Description:
"Kim Aris, the youngest son of Myanmar’s jailed civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi, has issued an urgent plea to the regime in Naypyidaw to provide “proof of life” for his 80-year-old mother on Monday. Aris has had no direct communication with Aung San Suu Kyi since the military seized power in a military coup on Feb. 1, 2021 and detained her.
“I just want some proof that she’s alive more than anything else,” Aris told DVB in an interview on April 20. “The world at large often thinks that she’s still under house arrest, whereas all this time she’s spent in jail.”
This appeal from Aris comes three days after Aung San Suu Kyi loyalist, President Win Myint, was transferred from prison to house arrest in Naypyidaw. But rumors regarding Aung San Suu Kyi’s transfer out of prison have failed to materialize.
A Myanmar New Year amnesty announced by Min Aung Hlaing on April 17 granted parole to a reported 4,514 people, including at least 292 political prisoners, according to the Political Prisoners Network Myanmar (PPNM).
Fears about Aung San Suu Kyi’s health
Aris has not spoken to his mother Aung San Suu Kyi since before the 2021 coup. In the last five years, he has received only a single letter, which arrived nearly three years ago in response to a care package he sent to her at Naypidaw Prison.
The last independent verification of her condition in prison came five years ago from Sean Turnell, an Australian economist and former advisor to the National League for Democracy (NLD) party, who was imprisoned alongside her before being released in 2022.
Aung San Suu Kyi’s NLD administration governed Myanmar from 2016 up until it was ousted by Min Aung Hlaing’s military in the 2021 coup. Aris expressed deep concern over his mother’s deteriorating health, specifically her ongoing heart condition.
“Heart conditions need proper machinery to be diagnosed correctly, and I know that she won’t be getting that. I know that prison doctors in Burma will not be providing that,” Aris told DVB.
He directly challenged Min Aung Hlaing, who was inaugurated Myanmar’s president by a pro-military parliament elected in highly controversial polls which ended on Jan. 25, to allow independent verification of her status.
Aris suggested Myanmar grant access to Aung San Suu Kyi to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) or foreign diplomats based in Yangon. “If she is still alive and healthy, then let me talk to her,” Aris told DVB.
A bargaining chip for the regime?
Despite the reduction of her 27-year sentence by one-sixth on April 17, Aris dismissed this as meaningless. “She’ll still be over a hundred if she sees this sentence through,” he noted.
If the military does eventually move her to house arrest, Aris suspects she will not be permitted to return to their family home on University Avenue in Yangon.
Instead, he believes the regime will keep her close to their seat of power in Naypyidaw—not only to prevent her from speaking publicly but potentially to use her as a bargaining chip in the ongoing civil war started by resistance forces against the military.
“They’re quite vulnerable in Naypyidaw,” Aris observed. “It’s quite close to the frontline, so it might be good for them to have her nearby. I think [Min Aung Hlaing] has his own agenda where she’s concerned.”
A call to the international community
Aris also criticized the international community for its waning focus on his mother’s plight. Unlike Aung San Suu Kyi’s previous 15 years of house arrest under former military regimes, where global leaders consistently advocated for her release, international pressure has largely stalled in recent years.
He warned that some foreign governments may attempt to use Myanmar’s recent “sham” 2025-26 elections as an excuse to normalize relations with the regime.
“They need to understand that they’re doing business with a bunch of crooks, and they can’t expect good results,” Aris told DVB.
Despite the dire situation facing his mother and over 22,000 other political prisoners held since the 2021 coup, Aris expressed a faint hope that Min Aung Hlaing’s elevation to the presidency might make him feel secure enough to ease restrictions.
“I think there’s very little reason for him to fear anything by moving her to house arrest,” Aris told DVB, urging a return to negotiations. “The bloodshed that’s still going on in Burma can’t continue forever.”..."
Source/publisher:
Democratic Voice of Burma
Date of publication:
2026-04-20
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-20
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
About Aung San Suu Kyi, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory
Language:
more
Description:
"Myanmar’s New Year amnesty on 17 April is dominating social media but not with celebration. On the day, Min Aung Hlaing ordered the release of more than 4,300 prisoners to mark the traditional new year The Messenger, yet the number of political detainees among them remains strikingly low. PPNM says only around 160 political prisoners have been confirmed released so far.
Users on Facebook, users are calling the move absurd and politically calculated. “An illegitimate president who stole power is now granting a pardon to the rightful president — Min Aung Hlaing has completely lost it,” one user wrote. Another commented, “Power-mad Min Aung Hlaing released the hostage national leaders as a political chess move, but whether it grants him legitimacy remains uncertain. We, the Spring Revolution comrades, will not be misled — we know the difference between what matters and what doesn’t. We push forward, we fight on.”
Others dismissed any gratitude toward the military: “U Win Myint was only imprisoned inside Myanmar — if he were abroad, he’d still be president. All political prisoners were innocent from the start. The military releasing them deserves no thanks.”
Meanwhile, award-winning filmmaker Shin Daewe was seen walking free from Insein Prison on Friday morning, while Min Aung Hlaing also commuted all death sentences to life imprisonment in a blanket order.
Yet Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar’s most prominent political prisoner, remains detained. The Institute for Strategy and Policy Myanmar has noted that fewer than 14 percent of those released in successive amnesty rounds since the coup have been political prisoners..."
Source/publisher:
"Mizzima"
Date of publication:
2026-04-20
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-20
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Political prisoners and other violations in Burma - reports, Human Rights Defenders, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
more
Description:
"၁။ ပြည်ထောင်စုသမ္မတမြန်မာနိုင်ငံတော်၊ နိုင်ငံတော်သမ္မတ ဦးဝင်းမြင့်သည် ၂၀၂၁ ခုနှစ်၊ ဖေဖော်ဝါရီလ ၁ ရက်နေ့တွင် အကြမ်းဖက်စစ်တပ်၏ မတရားဖမ်းဆီးခြင်းကို ခံခဲ့ရပြီး ၂၀၂၆ ခုနှစ်၊ ဧပြီလ ၁၇ ရက်နေ့တွင် မိသားစုနှင့် ပြန်လည်ဆုံစည်းခွင့်ရရှိသည့်အတွက် ပြည်ထောင်စုလွှတ်တော်ကိုယ်စားပြုကော်မတီ (CRPH) အနေဖြင့် ပြည်သူလူထုနှင့်အတူ ဝမ်းမြောက်ဝမ်းသာဖြစ်မိပါကြောင်း ဖော်ပြအပ်ပါသည်။
၂။ ၂၀၂၁ ခုနှစ်၊ မတ်လ ၅ ရက်နေ့တွင် ပြည်ထောင်စုလွှတ်တော်ကိုယ်စားပြုကော်မတီ (CRPH) သည် အောက်ပါ နိုင်ငံရေးရည်မှန်းချက်များကို ထုတ်ပြန်ခဲ့ပြီး လက်ရှိအချိန်အထိတိုင် ပြည်သူလူထုနှင့် အတူတကွ ခိုင်မာစွာ ရပ်တည်လျက် ယင်းရည်မှန်းချက်များအား ထပ်မံအတည်ပြုဖော်ပြအပ်ပါသည် -
(က) စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ်ချုပ်ငြိမ်းရေး၊
(ခ) သမ္မတကြီး ဦးဝင်းမြင့်နှင့် နိုင်ငံတော်အတိုင်ပင်ခံပုဂ္ဂိုလ် ဒေါ်အောင်ဆန်းစုကြည်အပါအဝင် ဖမ်းဆီးထိန်းသိမ်းခံရသည့် အကျဉ်းသားများအားလုံးလွတ်မြောက်ရေး၊
(ဂ) ဒီမိုကရေစီရရှိရေး၊
(ဃ) ၂၀၀၈ ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေ ဖျက်သိမ်းရေးနှင့် ဖက်ဒရယ်စနစ်ကို အခြေခံသည့် ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံ အခြေခံဥပဒေ ပေါ်ပေါက်ရေး။
၃။ နွေဦးတော်လှန်ရေးသည် နိုင်ငံသားတစ်ဦးချင်းစီ၏ အခွင့်အရေးများနှင့် ဖက်ဒရယ် ဒီမိုကရေစီ နိုင်ငံတော်သစ် တည်ဆောက်ရေးအတွက် အခွင့်အလမ်းတစ်ရပ်ဖြစ်သည်ဟု မိမိတို့ အနေဖြင့် အပြည့်အဝ ယုံကြည်ပါသည်။ ယင်းအခွင့်အလမ်း အောင်မြင်စေရေးအတွက် တော်လှန်ရေး အင်အားစုများအကြား စည်းလုံးညီညွတ်စွာဖြင့် လက်တွဲဆောင်ရွက်နိုင်မှုသည် အထူးအရေးကြီးသောအချက် ဖြစ်ပါသည်။
၄။ ပြည်ထောင်စုလွှတ်တော်ကိုယ်စားပြုကော်မတီ (CRPH) အနေဖြင့် စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ် ချုပ်ငြိမ်းရေးနှင့် ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စု ပေါ်ထွန်းရေးအတွက် ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီ ပြည်ထောင်စုပေါ်ထွန်းရေး ဦးဆောင်ကောင်စီ (SCEF) တွင် ပူးပေါင်းပါဝင်ဆောင်ရွက်လျက် ရှိသကဲ့သို့ အခြားသော နိုင်ငံရေးအင်အားစုများ၊ တော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုများ၊ တိုင်းရင်းသားအင်အားစုများအားလုံးနှင့် အတူတကွ ကြိုးပမ်းဆောင်ရွက်သွားမည်ဖြစ်ပါကြောင်း အလေးအနက်ထား ကတိပြုလျက် ထပ်လောင်းအတည်ပြုထုတ်ပြန်အပ်ပါသည်။..."
Source/publisher:
Committee Representing Pyidaungsu Hluttaw
Date of publication:
2026-04-20
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-20
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Committee Representing Pyidaungsu Hluttaw (CRPH), Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
423.36 KB
more
Description:
"ဖက်ဒရယ်ပညာပေးစာစဉ် အမှတ် (၇) သည် အနာဂတ်ဖက်ဒရယ်ပြည်ထောင်စုအတွက် လိုအပ်သည့်…
ပြည်ထောင်စုအဖွဲ့ဝင် ဖက်ဒရယ်ယူနစ်များ၏ ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေ ရှိ/မရှိအခြေအနေကို နှိုင်းယှဉ်လေ့လာပြီး၊
ပြည်နယ်ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေရှိသည့် ဖက်ဒရယ်ယူနစ်များတွင် တွေ့ရှိရသော ဘုံဖွဲ့စည်းပုံဆိုင်ရာလက္ခဏာများကို
စနစ်တကျ သုံးသပ် တင်ပြထားပါသည်။ …
“ဖက်ဒရယ်စနစ်အတွင်း ပြည်ထောင်စုအဖွဲ့ဝင်ပြည်နယ်များနှင့် ဖက်ဒရယ်ယူနစ်များ၏ ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေ ဒီဇိုင်းအား လေ့လာခြင်း- မိုးသန်”
ပြည်ထောင်စုအဖွဲ့ဝင် ပြည်နယ်များသည် မိမိတို့၏ ကိုယ်ပိုင်ပြဋ္ဌာန်းခွင့်ကို ကျင့်သုံး၍ မိမိတို့ ၏ ပြည်နယ် ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေ ရေးဆွဲပြဋ္ဌာန်းခွင့် ရှိကြပါသည်။ကိုယ်ပိုင်ပြဋ္ဌာန်းခွင့်ရှိသော ပြည်နယ်များက မိမိတို့ကိုယ်တိုင်ကျင့်သုံးမည့် ပြည်နယ်ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေ ရေးဆွဲပြဋ္ဌာန်းခွင့်ရှိခြင်းသည် စစ်မှန်သော ဖက်ဒရယ်ပြည်ထောင်စု၏ အရေးအကြီးဆုံး အင်္ဂါရပ်တခုပင် ဖြစ်ပါသည်။ ကိုယ်ပိုင်ပြဋ္ဌာန်းခွင့်ရှိ၍ ပြည်နယ်ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေ ရေးဆွဲပြဋ္ဌာန်းခွင့် အခွင့်အရေးရှိမှသာ တိုင်းရင်းသားလူမျိုး ပေါင်းစုံ နှစ်ပေါင်း (၇၅) နှစ်ကျော် တိုက်ပွဲဝင်တောင်းဆိုလျက်ရှိသော “ဒီမိုကရေစီရေး၊ အမျိုးသားတန်းတူရေး နှင့် ကိုယ်ပိုင်ပြဋ္ဌာန်းခွင့် အခွင့်အရေး အပြည့်အဝရှိသည့် စစ်မှန်သောဖက်ဒရယ်ပြည်ထောင်စုစနစ်” ကို ထူထောင်နိုင်မည်။…
“ပြည်ထောင်စုအဖွဲ့ဝင်ပြည်နယ်ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေ ရေးဆွဲပြဋ္ဌာန်းခြင်း- ဆလိုင်းလျန်မှုန်း”
ဖက်ဒရယ်စနစ်သည် အာဏာခွဲဝေမှုအပေါ် အခြေခံထားသော အုပ်ချုပ်ရေးစနစ်တခုဖြစ်ပြီး လူမျိုးစု၊ ဘာသာရေးနှင့် ယဉ်ကျေးမှုကွဲပြားမှုများရှိသည့် လူ့အဖွဲ့အစည်းများတွင် လူနည်းစုအခွင့်အရေးများကို ကာကွယ်ရန်အတွက် အရေးပါ သော မူဝါဒဆိုင်ရာစနစ်တစ်ခုအဖြစ် ယူဆရသည်။ ဤဆောင်းပါးတွင် ဖက်ဒရယ်စနစ်အတွင်း လူနည်းစု အခွင့်အရေး များ၏ သဘောတရား၊ အကာအကွယ်ပေးရေးယန္တရားများ၊ အဖွဲ့အစည်းဆိုင်ရာ စီမံခန့်ခွဲမှုများနှင့် နိုင်ငံတကာအတွေ့ အကြုံများကို ဆန်းစစ်လေ့လာထားသည်။ ထို့အပြင် စိန်ခေါ်မှုများနှင့် မူဝါဒဆိုင်ရာအကြံပြုချက်များကိုလည်း ဖော်ပြထားပါသည်။....
“ဖက်ဒရယ်စနစ်အတွင်း လူနည်းစုအခွင့်အရေးများအား ကာကွယ်ရေးနှင့် မြှင့်တင်ရေး - မိုးသန်”..."
Source/publisher:
Ministry of Federal Union Affairs - Myanmar - NUG
Date of publication:
2026-04-00
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-19
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Federalism, ethnic conflict and the politics of national reconciliation - general studies and sources, Federal and State constitutions (texts), Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf (47 pages)
Size:
496.55 KB
more
Description:
"The National Unity Government of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar expresses its sincere satisfaction at the reunion of certain political prisoners—including our President, U Win Myint—who were unjustly arrested and detained by the military dictatorship, with their families, and hereby reaffirms the following position:
The reunion of the President with his family, who was freely and fairly elected by the people, as a result of sustained domestic and international pressure, is firmly regarded as an integral part of the people’s revolutionary victory.
The National Unity Government, together with ethnic revolutionary organizations, revolutionary forces, and the people, continues to uphold and recognize the results of the 2020 general election. In this regard, President U Win Myint and State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi continue to be recognized as the duly elected President and State Counsellor, respectively, in accordance with those election results.
The ultimate objective of the Spring Revolution is not only the unconditional release of all those arbitrarily detained—including State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi—but also the complete liberation from the entrenched cycle of oppression whereby successive military dictatorships have prioritized their own interests while systematically repressing and exploiting the country and its people.
The objectives of the Spring Revolution shall continue to be firmly upheld, guided, and implemented in accordance with the common positions jointly issued on 31 January 2024 with allied ethnic groups (Kachin, Karenni, Karen, and Chin), as well as the statement issued on 30 March 2026 by the Steering Council for the Emergence of a Federal Democratic Union. These common positions comprise the following six principles:
(a) To overturn the usurpation of state power by the military, and to terminate the involvement of the armed forces in politics
(b) To ensure that all armed forces operate solely under the command of a civilian government elected through democratic processes
(c) To abrogate the constitution of 2008 in its entirety, and to quash all attempts to reinstate its provisions
(d) To draft and promulgate a new constitution that embodies federalism and democratic values, garnering the consensus of all relevant parties
(e) To establish a new federal democratic union in accordance with the proposed federal democratic constitution
(f) To institute a system of transitional justice to achieve justice and accountability for victims of injustices, including gender-based violence, during the conflict period.
In particular, we affirm that the successful establishment of a Federal Democratic Union must be grounded in conditions that can deliver transitional justice, including accountability for the war crimes and violations of International Humanitarian Law that have been continuously and brutally perpetrated by the terrorist military group against the entire population. Only under such conditions shall our efforts toward building a Federal Democratic Union be deemed successful, and we shall continue to advance this struggle with unwavering determination.
Accordingly, the National Unity Government—established in accordance with the will of the people through democratic elections—solemnly reaffirms its steadfast commitment to carrying forward the Spring Revolution, aimed at systemic and political transformation, until its objectives are fully fulfilled..."
Source/publisher:
National Unity Government of Myanmar
Date of publication:
2026-04-18
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-18
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
National Unity Government (NUG), Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
1.12 MB
Local URL:
more
Description:
"ပြည်ထောင်စုသမ္မတမြန်မာနိုင်ငံတော်၊ အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရအနေဖြင့် စစ်အာဏာရှင် များက မတရားဖမ်းဆီးထိန်းသိမ်းခြင်းကို ခံခဲ့ရသော ကျွန်ုပ်တို့၏ နိုင်ငံတော်သမ္မတကြီးဦးဝင်းမြင့် အပါအဝင် နိုင်ငံရေး အကျဉ်းသားအချို့ မိသားစုနှင့် ပြန်လည်ဆုံဆည်းရသည်ကို ဝမ်းမြောက်စွာဖြင့် အောက်ပါသဘောထား များကို ထပ်လောင်းအတည်ပြုထုတ်ပြန်အပ်ပါသည်။
၁။ ပြည်သူလူထုက လွတ်လပ်၍ တရားမျှတစွာ ရွေးချယ်တင်မြှောက်ထားသည့် နိုင်ငံတော် သမ္မတကြီးအနေဖြင့် ပြည်တွင်းပြည်ပတော်လှန်ရေးဖိအားများကြောင့် ယခုကဲ့သို့ မိသားစုနှင့် ပြန်လည်ဆုံဆည်းနိုင်ခဲ့ခြင်းသည် ပြည်သူလူထု၏ တော်လှန်ရေးအောင်ပွဲ အစိတ်အပိုင်းတစ်ရပ် အဖြစ် အခိုင်အမာ ယုံကြည်ရှုမြင်သည်။
၂။ အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရ၊ တိုင်းရင်းသားတော်လှန်ရေးအဖွဲ့အစည်းများ၊ တော်လှန်ရေး အင်အားစုများနှင့် ပြည်သူများအနေဖြင့် ၂၀၂၀ ရွေးကောက်ပွဲရလဒ်အား ဆက်လက်အသိအမှတ်ပြု ကိုင်စွဲထားသကဲ့သို့၊ နိုင်ငံတော်သမ္မတဦးဝင်းမြင့်နှင့် နိုင်ငံတော်၏ အတိုင်ပင်ခံပုဂ္ဂိုလ် ဒေါ်အောင်ဆန်းစုကြည်တို့အားလည်း ၂၀၂၀ ရွေးကောက်ပွဲ ရလဒ်အရ ပြည်သူ့ရွေးကောက်ခံ နိုင်ငံတော်သမ္မတနှင့် နိုင်ငံတော်၏ အတိုင်ပင်ခံပုဂ္ဂိုလ်အဖြစ် ဆက်လက်အသိအမှတ်ပြုထားကြပါသည်။
၃။ နွေဦးတော်လှန်ရေး၏ အန္တိမပန်းတိုင်သည် နိုင်ငံတော်၏ အတိုင်ပင်ခံပုဂ္ဂိုလ် ဒေါ်အောင်ဆန်းစုကြည် အပါအဝင် မတရား ဖမ်းဆီးထိန်းသိမ်းခံထားရသူများအားလုံး ခြွင်းချက်မရှိ လွတ်မြောက်ရေးဖြစ်သည့်အပြင် ခေတ်အဆက်ဆက် စစ်အာဏာရှင်လူတစ်စုက ၎င်းတို့၏ ကိုယ်ကျိုးစီးပွားကိုသာ အဦးမူ၍ တိုင်းပြည်နှင့်ပြည်သူလူထုအား နည်းမျိုးစုံ ဖိနှိပ်ချုပ်ချယ် အနိုင်ကျင့်လေ့ရှိသည့် အဆိုးကျော့သံသရာက အပြီးတိုင်လွတ်မြောက်ရေးဖြစ်သည်။
၄။ ကျွန်ုပ်တို့ နွေဦးတော်လှန်ရေး၏ ရည်မှန်းချက်များကို ၂၀၂၄ ခုနှစ်၊ ဇန်နဝါရီလ ၃၁ ရက်နေ့တွင် ကချင်၊ ကရင်နီ၊ ကရင်၊ ချင်း မဟာမိတ်တိုင်းရင်းသားများနှင့် ပူးတွဲထုတ်ပြန်ခဲ့သည့် ဘုံသဘောထား ရပ်တည်ချက်များအရလည်းကောင်း၊ ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စုပေါ်ထွန်းရေးဦးဆောင် ကောင်စီ၏ ၂၀၂၆ ခုနှစ်၊ မတ်လ ၃၀ ရက်နေ့ ထုတ်ပြန်ချက်အရလည်းကောင်း ခိုင်ခိုင်မာမာ ဆက်လက် စွဲကိုင်၍ တိုင်းတာ၊ ဆုံးဖြတ်ဆောင်ရွက်သွားမည်ဖြစ်ပါသည်။ ဘုံသဘောထား ရပ်တည်ချက်များ အဖြစ် အောက်ပါ သဘောထား ၆ ရပ်ကို ချမှတ်ထားပါသည်။
(က) စစ်အာဏာသိမ်းမှုကို ဖယ်ရှားပြီး မြန်မာစစ်တပ်၏ နိုင်ငံရေး၌ ပါဝင်နေခြင်းအား အဆုံးသတ်ရန်။
(ခ) လက်နက်ကိုင်တပ်ဖွဲ့အားလုံးကို ဒီမိုကရေစီနည်းကျ ရွေးကောက်တင်မြှောက်ထားသည့် အရပ်သားအစိုးရ၏ စီမံအုပ်ချုပ်မှုအောက်၌ အပြည့်အဝ ထားရှိရန်။
(ဂ) ၂၀၀၈ ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေကို အပြီးတိုင်ဖျက်သိမ်းရန်နှင့် ယင်းကို ပြန်လည်အသက်သွင်းရန် ကြိုးပမ်းမှု မှန်သမျှ တိုက်ဖျက်ရန်။
(ဃ) သက်ဆိုင်သူအားလုံး လက်ခံနိုင်သော ဖက်ဒရယ်နှင့် ဒီမိုကရေစီစနစ်ကို အခြေခံသည့် ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေ ရေးဆွဲပြဋ္ဌာန်းရန်။
(င) ထွက်ပေါ်လာသော ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီ ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေနှင့်အညီ ဖက်ဒရယ် ဒီမိုကရေစီ ပြည်ထောင်စုအသစ်အား တည်ဆောက်ရန်။
(စ) ပဋိပက္ခအတွင်း မတရားကျူးလွန်ခံရသူများအတွက် တရားမျှတမှုရရှိရေးနှင့် အသွင်ကူးပြောင်းရေး ကာလ တရားမျှတမှု ရရှိရေး လုပ်ငန်းစဉ် ဖော်ဆောင်ရန်။
၅။ အထူးသဖြင့် အကြမ်းဖက်စစ်အုပ်စု၏ ပြည်သူလူထုတရပ်လုံးအပေါ် ရက်စက်ကြမ်းကြုတ်စွာ စဉ်ဆက်မပြတ် ကျူးလွန်ခဲ့၊ ကျူးလွန်ဆဲ စစ်ရာဇဝတ်မှုများနှင့် နိုင်ငံတကာ လူသားချင်း စာနာမှု ဆိုင်ရာဥပဒေ (International Humanitarian Law) ကို ကျူးလွန်ဖောက်ဖျက်မှုများအား အသွင် ကူးပြောင်းရေး ကာလတရားမျှတမှုရရှိရေး ဆောင်ကြဉ်းပေးနိုင်သည့်အခြေအနေရှိမှသာ ကျွန်ုပ်တို့၏ ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စု တည်ဆောက်ရေး အောင်မြင်သည်ဟု မှတ်ယူ၍ မမှိတ်မသုန် ဆက်လက်ချီတက် တိုက်ပွဲဝင်သွားမည်ဖြစ်သည်။
၆။ သို့ဖြစ်ပါ၍ ပြည်သူလူထု၏ မဲဆန္ဒနှင့်အညီ ရွေးကောက်တင်မြှောက် ဖွဲ့စည်းတည်ထောင်ခဲ့ သော အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရအနေဖြင့် ခေတ်ပြောင်းစနစ်ပြောင်းစေရန် ဦးတည်ဆောင်ရွက် နေသည့် နွေဦးတော်လှန်ရေးကို ရည်မှန်းချက်ပန်းတိုင် ရောက်သည်အထိ ဆုံးခန်းတိုင်အောင် ဆောင်ရွက်သွားမည် ဖြစ်ကြောင်း လေးနက်တည်ကြည်စွာ အဓိဋ္ဌာန်ပြုအပ်ပါသည်။..."
Source/publisher:
National Unity Government of Myanmar
Date of publication:
2026-04-18
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-18
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
National Unity Government (NUG), Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
1.67 MB
Local URL:
more
Description:
"AAPP welcomes the reunion of the elected and legitimate President U Win Myint with his loved ones on Myanmar New Year, as well as the reuniting of other political prisoners with their families, including NLD MP Dr. Tin Min Htut and filmmaker Shin Daewe.
However, do not forget that the military are still committing war crimes and crimes against humanity. During the water festival they continued in their airstrike campaign, as well as burning down villages and killing innocent people. This amnesty is an attempt to cover up those crimes.
The first step to peace and stability is the unconditional release of all political prisoners including State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. Those elected in 2020 must be placed in their elected positions. Without such, this release is unlikely to contribute meaningfully to a democratic transition.
These releases may be conditional which will ensure that the broader impact remains limited. Political prisoners are likely to face considerable challenges following their release.
In practical terms, immediate obstacles such as the cost and logistics of traveling long distances to return home complicates the release of some released individuals. Many may encounter difficulties returning to their homes, particularly those from conflict-affected areas.
The conscription law also adds an additional layer of uncertainty and fear for young people who have been released.
“To overcome these challenges, all revolutionary forces must unite and continue moving toward our goal.”..."
Source/publisher:
Assistance Association for Political Prisoners
Date of publication:
2026-04-17
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-17
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Political prisoners and other violations in Burma - reports, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
114.15 KB
more
Description:
"၁။ နိုင်ငံတော်သမ္မတ ဦးဝင်းမြင့်သည် ပြည်သူလူထုမှ ဒီမိုကရေစီ နည်းလမ်းကျ အပ်နှင်းထားသော နိုင်ငံတော် သမ္မတ တာဝန် ထမ်းဆောင်နေစဉ် အကြမ်းဖက် စစ်အုပ်စုမှ ၎င်းတို့ကိုယ်တိုင် ရေးဆွဲ ထားသည့် ၂၀၀၈ ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံ အခြေခံဥပဒေကို ချိုးဖောက်ကာ နိုင်ငံတော်ပုန်ကန်မှု ကျူးလွန် ပြီး မတရား ဖမ်းဆီး ချုပ်နှောင်မှုကို ခံခဲ့ရခြင်းဖြစ်သည်။
၂။ ယနေ့ ၂၀၂၆ ခုနှစ်၊ ဧပြီလ ၁၇ ရက်၊ မြန်မာနှစ်ဆန်း တစ်ရက်နေ့တွင် နိုင်ငံတော် သမ္မတ ဦးဝင်းမြင့် အနေဖြင့် ကျန်းမာစွာဖြင့် မိသားစုနှင့် ပြန်လည်ဆုံဆည်းရသည်ကို အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအတိုင်ပင်ခံကောင်စီ (NUCC) က ပြည်သူလူထုနှင့် ထပ်တူများစွာ ဝမ်းမြောက်ရပါသည်။
၃။ နိုင်ငံတော် သမ္မတ ဦးဝင်းမြင့်အား မြန်မာနိုင်ငံ၏ သမ္မတဖြစ်သည်ဟု အမျိုးသား ညီညွတ်ရေး အတိုင်ပင်ခံ ကောင်စီက တရားဝင် ဆက်လက်အသိအမှတ်ပြု ထားဆဲ ဖြစ်သည်။။
၄။ အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေး အတိုင်ပင်ခံကောင်စီ အနေဖြင့် လူထုခေါင်းဆောင် ဒေါ်အောင်ဆန်းစုကြည် နှင့်တကွ ကျန်ရှိနေသော နိုင်ငံရေး အကျဉ်းသားများ အားလုံး လွတ်မြောက်ရေး အတွက် ဆက်လက် ကြိုးပမ်းသွားမည်ဖြစ်သည်။
၅။ ထို့အပြင် အမျိုးသား ညီညွတ်ရေး အတိုင်ပင်ခံ ကောင်စီသည် စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ် အပါအဝင် အာဏာရှင် စနစ်မှန်သမျှ ပပျောက်ရေးနှင့် ဖက်ဒရယ် ဒီမိုကရေစီ ပြည်ထောင်စု တည်ဆောက်ရေး တို့အတွက် ပြည်သူတရပ်လုံး၊ တော်လှန်ရေး အင်အားစု အားလုံးနှင့် အတူလက်တွဲ၍ နွေဦးတော်လှန်ရေး အောင်ပွဲရသည်အထိ ဆက်လက်တိုက်ပွဲဝင်သွားမည် ဖြစ်သည်။..."
Source/publisher:
National Unity Consultative Council
Date of publication:
2026-04-17
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-17
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
233.29 KB
more
Description:
"၁။ ယနေ့ကျရောက်သည့် မြန်မာသက္ကရာဇ် ၁၃၈၈ ခုနှစ် မြန်မာ့နှစ်သစ်ကူး နှစ်ဆန်းတစ်ရက်နေ့ အချိန်အခါသမယတွင် ပြည်တွင်းပြည်ပရှိ ရဟန်းရှင်လူ ပြည်သူအပေါင်း၊ တိုင်းရင်းသား ညီအစ်ကို မောင်နှမများနှင့် မဟာမိတ် တော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုများအားလုံး ကိုယ်စိတ်နှစ်ဖြာ ဘေးရန်ကင်းကွာ၍ နှစ်သစ်တွင် မင်္ဂလာအပေါင်းနှင့် ပြည့်စုံကြပါစေကြောင်း ဆုတောင်းမေတ္တာ ပို့သအပ်ပါသည်။
၂။ ကုန်လွန်ခဲ့သော နှစ်ဟောင်းသည် မြန်မာပြည်သူများအတွက် သမိုင်းတစ်လျှောက် အခက်ခဲဆုံးနှင့် အနက်ရှိုင်းဆုံးသော ဒုက္ခများကို ကြံ့ကြံ့ခံကျော်ဖြတ်ခဲ့ရသည့် နှစ်တစ်နှစ် ဖြစ်ပါသည်။ စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ်ဆိုးကြောင့် ပြည်သူတို့ ပေးဆပ်ခဲ့ရသည့် အဖိုးတန်အသက်ပေါင်းများစွာ၊ စီးကျခဲ့ရသည့် သွေးနှင့် မျက်ရည်များ၊ ပြာပုံအတိဖြစ်ခဲ့ရသည့် အိုးအိမ် စည်းစိမ်များနှင့် ကွဲကွာခဲ့ရသည့် မိသားစုများ၏ နာကျင်မှုများသည် အလွန်ကြီးမားသည့် အရင်းအနှီးများပင် ဖြစ်ပါသည်။
၃။ သို့သော် ထိုဆိုးရွားလှသည့် စိန်ခေါ်မှု အခက်အခဲများကြားမှပင် ပြည်သူတို့ ပြသခဲ့သည့် မယိုင်လဲသော အားမာန်နှင့် တစ်ဦးအပေါ်တစ်ဦး ကူညီဖေးမကြသည့် ခိုင်မာသော စည်းလုံးမှုတို့ သည် စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ်ကို အလဲထိုးနိုင်သည့် အကြီးမားဆုံးလက်နက်ဖြစ်ခဲ့ပါသည်။ နှစ်ဟောင်းမှ အညစ်အကြေး ကပ်ဆိုးများနှင့် ဒုက္ခများအားလုံးကို အတာရေစင်ဖြင့် ဆေးကြောသန့်စင်ပြီး ယခုနှစ်သစ်သည် ပြည်သူတို့ မျှော်လင့်တောင့်တသည့် တရားမျှတမှုနှင့် ကောင်းမွန်သော ပြောင်းလဲ ခြင်းများကို လက်ဝယ်ပိုင်ဆိုင် ဆုပ်ကိုင်နိုင်မည့် အောင်ပွဲနှစ် ဖြစ်ပါစေကြောင်း အလေးအနက် ဆန္ဒပြုအပ်ပါသည်။
၄။ အကြမ်းဖက်စစ်အာဏာရှင်များ၏ မတရားသော ဖိနှိပ်မှုများအောက်တွင် ကြံ့ကြံ့ခံ ရပ်တည်နေကြသည့် မိမိတို့၏ ခေါင်းဆောင်များဖြစ်ကြသော နိုင်ငံတော်၏ အတိုင်ပင်ခံပုဂ္ဂိုလ် ဒေါ်အောင်ဆန်းစုကြည်၊ နိုင်ငံတော်သမ္မတ ဦးဝင်းမြင့်တို့အပါအဝင် မတရားသဖြင့် ဖမ်းဆီး ထိန်းသိမ်းခြင်းခံထားရသော နိုင်ငံရေးအကျဉ်းသားအားလုံး အမြန်ဆုံးလွတ်မြောက်လာရေးသည် မိမိတို့၏ အဓိက ဦးစားပေး လုပ်ငန်းစဉ်တစ်ခုဖြစ်ပါသည်။ စစ်မှန်သော ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီ ပြည်ထောင်စု ပန်းတိုင်သို့ ရောက်ရှိရန်အတွက် မတရားဖမ်းဆီးခံထားရသူအားလုံး လွတ်မြောက်ပြီး ပြည်သူ့ခေါင်းဆောင်များ ပြည်သူ့ထံသို့ ပြန်လည်ရောက်ရှိရေးအတွက် မိမိတို့ ပြည်ထောင်စု လွှတ်တော်ကိုယ်စားပြုကော်မတီအနေဖြင့် အစွမ်းကုန် ဆက်လက်ကြိုးပမ်းသွားမည်ဟု ယနေ့ကဲ့သို့ နှစ်သစ်အခါသမယတွင် ခိုင်မာစွာ ကတိပြုအပ်ပါသည်။
၅။ ပြည်ထောင်စုလွှတ်တော်ကိုယ်စားပြုကော်မတီသည် ပြည်သူတို့ အပ်နှင်းထားသော လုပ်ပိုင်ခွင့်နှင့် အာဏာကိုစွဲကိုင်၍ တော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုအားလုံးနှင့်အတူ ညီညွတ်စွာ လက်တွဲကာ စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ် အပြီးတိုင်ချုပ်ငြိမ်း၍ ပြည်သူ့အာဏာ ပြည်သူ့ထံ ပြန်လည်ရောက်ရှိသည်အထိ မယိုင်မလဲ ဆက်လက်ချီတက်သွားမည်ဖြစ်ပါသည်။ မိမိတို့ဆင်နွှဲနေသော ဤတော်လှန်ရေးသည် စနစ်ဟောင်းကို ဖျက်သိမ်းရုံသာမက လူမျိုးတိုင်း၊ နိုင်ငံသားတိုင်း တန်းတူညီမျှစွာဖြင့် ကိုယ့်ကံကြမ္မာ ကိုယ်ဖန်တီးနိုင်ခွင့်ရှိသည့် အနာဂတ်သစ်ကို တည်ဆောက်နေခြင်းဖြစ်ပါသည်။ ထို့ကြောင့် နှစ်သစ်မှသည် အောင်ပွဲရသည်အထိ ပြည်သူတစ်ရပ်လုံးက မိမိတို့နဲ့အတူ ဆက်လက်ကြိုးပမ်း ဆောင်ရွက်ပေးကြပါရန် တိုက်တွန်းနှိုးဆော်အပ်ပါသည်။ ပြည်သူသာလျှင် အဓိကဖြစ်သည့်အတွက် ပြည်သူတို့၏ စည်းလုံးမှုအင်အားဖြင့် အာဏာရှင်စနစ် အမှန်တစ်ကယ် နိဂုံးချုပ်ရမည်ဟု ယုံကြည် သောကြောင့် အမှန်တရားနှင့် တရားမျှတမှုတို့ အောင်ပွဲခံသည့် နှစ်သစ်ဖြစ်ပါစေကြောင်းနှင့် နိုင်ငံတော်၏ အတိုင်ပင်ခံပုဂ္ဂိုလ် ဒေါ်အောင်ဆန်းစုကြည်၊ နိုင်ငံတော်သမ္မတ ဦးဝင်းမြင့်တို့ အပါအဝင် မတရားသဖြင့် ဖမ်းဆီးထိန်းသိမ်းခြင်းခံထားရသော နိုင်ငံရေးအကျဉ်းသားအားလုံး အမြန်ဆုံး ပြန်လည်လွတ်မြောက်လာပါစေကြောင်း ဆန္ဒပြုလျက် ဤသဝဏ်လွှာအား ထုတ်ပြန်အပ်ပါသည်။..."
Source/publisher:
Committee Representing Pyidaungsu Hluttaw
Date of publication:
2026-04-17
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-17
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Committee Representing Pyidaungsu Hluttaw (CRPH), Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
1.59 MB
more
Description:
"ပြည်သူ့တော်လှန်ရေးရဲဘော်များနဲ့ ပြည်သူများအားလုံးအတွက် နှစ်သစ်မင်္ဂလာဖြစ်ပါစေလို့ ဆုမွန်ကောင်း တောင်းပါတယ်။
တော်လှန်ရေးခရီး (၅)နှစ်လုံးလုံး ကျရာတာဝန်ကို ဦးလည်မသုန် ထမ်းရွက်ခဲ့ကြတဲ့ ရဲဘော် ရဲဘက်များ လုပ်ဖော်ကိုင်ဖက်များနဲ့ တော်လှန်ပြည်သူများအားလုံး နှစ်သစ်မှာ စိတ်သစ်၊ လူသစ်၊ ခွန်အားသစ်နဲ့ တော်လှန်ရေးရှေ့ခရီးအတွက် အသင့်ဖြစ်နေကြလိမ့်မယ်လို့ ယုံကြည်ပါတယ်။
(၅)နှစ်သား ပြည်သူ့ကာကွယ်ရေးတပ်မတော်ဟာ အခုဆိုရင် ရင့်ကျက်မှု၊ တည်ငြိမ်မှုအဆင့် တခုကို ရောက်ရှိလာပြီလို့ ပြောနိုင်ပါတယ်။ ၂၀၂၅ ခုနှစ်အတွင်း ပြည်သူ့ကာကွယ်ရေး တပ်မတော် တပ်ရင်းတပ်ဖွဲ့အားလုံးကို စစ်ရုံးချုပ်၊ တိုင်းစစ်ဌာန၊ ခရိုင်စစ်ဌာန အဆင့်ဆင့်ဖြင့် တစ်ခုတည်းသော ကွပ်ကဲမှုစနစ်ကို တည်ဆောက်နိုင်ခဲ့သည်။ PDF တပ်မတော်ရဲ့ တည်ငြိမ်ရင့်ကျက်မှုဟာ တော်လှန်ရေးရဲ့ အဓိကခွန်အား ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။
အခုလို နှစ်သစ်အခါသမယမှာ ရဲဘော်များ၊ မိတ်ဆွေများကို အထူးအသိပေးလိုတာက တော်လှန်ရေးဟာ သူ့ မဟာဗျူဟာ၊ သူ့အစီအစဉ်အတိုင်း ခြေလှမ်းမှန်မှန်နဲ့ ရှေ့ဆက်နေတယ်ဆိုတဲ့ အချက် ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။
တော်လှန်ရေး (၅)နှစ်ကာလမှာ ကျနော်တို့အနေနဲ့ တော်လှန်ရေးတစုံလုံးအပေါ် ပြန်သုံးသပ်၊ ပြုပြင်၊ တည့်မတ်ရတာတွေ ရှိပါတယ်။ အထူးသဖြင့် မဟာဗျူဟာပိုင်း ဦးစားပေးအစီအစဉ်များ ပြန်လည်သတ်မှတ်ခြင်း၊ နည်းဗျူဟာပိုင်းမှာ စစ်ပွဲနဲ့ဆီလျော်အောင် ပြုပြင်ပြောင်းလဲခြင်း လုပ်ရတယ်။
ဦးစားပေးအစီအစဉ်တွေအနေနဲ့ တပ်ကို ပိုမာအောင် PDF တပ်ရင်းအလိုက် မွမ်းမံလေ့ကျင့် စုဖွဲ့ရတာ၊ ပကဖကို PDF နှင့်အတူ တိုက်ပွဲဝင်နိုင်တဲ့ အမာခံ တိုက်ခိုက်ရေး အင်အားဖြစ်အောင် တည်ဆောက်ရတာ၊ အရင်းအမြစ် ရှာဖွေစုစည်းရေးကို ပိုအားစိုက်ရတာ ဒီအလုပ်တွေ ရှိပါမယ်။
တော်လှန်ရေး အစပြုချိန်ကတည်းက ဒါဟာ အချိုးမညီစစ်ပွဲတခု ဖြစ်မယ်လို့ အားလုံး မျှော်လင့်ထားပြီး ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ရန်သူမှာ နှစ်ပေါင်းများစွာ တည်ဆောက်ထားတဲ့ တပ်တခု ရှိတယ်။ စစ်လက်နက်ပစ္စည်းနဲ့ ဘဏ္ဍာငွေကြေးအရာမှာ တော်လှန်ရေးဘက်တော်သားတွေထက် အဆများစွာ သာလွန်တယ်။ သို့သော် ရန်သူမှာ အားနည်းချက်တွေလည်း ရှိတယ်။ ပြည်သူအပေါ် စစ်ကျွန်ပြုရေး အတွေးအခေါ် တပ်ဆင်ထားတဲ့စစ်တပ်၊ ပြည်သူအော့နှလုံးနာတဲ့ စစ်တပ်၊ စိတ်ဓာတ်ကော၊ ကျင့်ဝတ် စည်းကမ်းပါ ပျက်ပြားနေတဲ့ စစ်တပ် ဖြစ်နေတာပါပဲ။
တော်လှန်ရေးတရပ် ဆင်နွှဲတဲ့အခါ ရန်သူ့အားနည်းချက်ကို ကျနော်တို့ မြင်အောင်ကြည့်ဖို့ လိုသလို ကိုယ့်အားသာချက်ကိုလည်း ကိုယ်တိုင် သိဖို့ လိုပါတယ်။ ရန်သူ့အားနည်းချက်ဟာ တော်လှန်ရေးရဲ့ အားသာချက် ဖြစ်စေရပါမယ်။ ရန်သူ့အားသာချက်အပေါ်မှာ ကိုယ့်ရဲ့ ဉာဏ်ပညာနဲ့ ဇွဲသတ္တိသုံးပြီး ကျော်လွှားရမှာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။
ဒီကနေ့ ပြည်သူ့တော်လှန်ရေးရဲ့ အားသာချက်က ပြည်သူရဲ့ တခဲနက် ထောက်ခံပါဝင်မှု ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ဒီအချက်အပေါ်မှာ တော်လှန်ရေးရဲဘော်တွေရဲ့ ပြည်သူအပေါ် တန်ဖိုးထားမှု၊ ခေတ်စနစ်ပြောင်း တော်လှန်ရေးအပေါ် သက်ဝင်ယုံကြည်မှု ထပ်ဆောင်းအားဖြည့်ကြရရင် ဒီတော်လှန်ရေး မအောင်စရာ အကြောင်းမရှိပါဘူး။
ဒီအချိန်မှာ တော်လှန်ရေးဟာ ရပ်တန့်နေတာ မရှိသလို နောက်ဆုတ်နေတာလည်း မရှိဘူး။ လတ်တလောမှာ မြို့တချို့ကို ကျနော်တို့ လက်လွှတ်ခဲ့ရပေမယ့် နယ်တွေမှာ တော်လှန်ရေး ရဲဘော်တွေ ဆက်ရှိနေတယ်။ ပြောက်ကျားနည်းဗျူဟာသုံးပြီး ရန်သူကို ပြန်လည်ဝိုင်းပတ်ရေးနဲ့ နယ်မြေစိုးမိုးရေး လုပ်ဆောင်နေကြတာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။
တော်လှန်ရေးမှာ လက်နက်ခဲယမ်းမီးကျောက်နဲ့ ဘဏ္ဍာရန်ပုံငွေဟာ အမြဲတမ်း အကန့် အသတ် ရှိတဲ့အတွက် မြို့သိမ်း စခန်းသိမ်း တိုက်ပွဲကြီးတွေဆိုရင် အကန့်အသတ်နဲ့သာ ဆောင်ရွက် နိုင်တာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ တော်လှန်စစ်တလျှောက် ပုံမှန်အားဖြင့် ပြောက်ကျား လှုပ်ရှား ခြွေစစ်ကို အားပြု ကြရတယ်။
ပြည်သူ့ကာကွယ်ရေးရဲဘော်များအနေနဲ့ဆိုရင် အခြေအနေ အချိန်အခါအလျောက် စစ်နည်း ဗျူဟာအမျိုးမျိုးကို ကျွမ်းကျင်စွာ အသုံးပြုနိုင်ဖို့ လေ့ကျင့်ပျိုးထောင်ထားတာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။
၂၀၂၃-၂၄ အတွင်းမှာ တနိုင်ငံလုံးအတိုင်းအတာနဲ့ ဆင်နွှဲကြတဲ့ အရှေ့၊ အနောက်၊ တောင်၊ မြောက် ဟန်ချက်ညီစစ်ဆင်မှုများကြောင့် ရန်သူဟာ စစ်ရှုံးလုနီးအခြေအနေ ရောက်ရှိခဲ့ပြီး ဖြစ်ပါ တယ်။ ရန်သူ့ရဲ့ အမာခံတိုက်ခိုက်ရေးအင်အား အများစုကို တော်လှန်စစ်အတွင်း ချေမှုန်းနိုင်ခဲ့ ကြတယ်။ သို့သော် စစ်အာဏာ သက်ဆိုးရှည်ရေး လူငယ်တွေရဲ့အသက်ကို စတေးတဲ့ အဓမ္မ စစ်သားစုဆောင်းမှုအစီအစဉ်က သူ့အတွက် အသက်ရှုပေါက် ရခဲ့တာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။
ရန်သူမှာလည်း လူ၊ စစ်လက်ပစ္စည်းနဲ့ ဘဏ္ဍာငွေဆိုတာ အကန့်အသတ်မဲ့ ရှိနေတာတော့ မဟုတ်ပါဘူး။ စစ်ပွဲ ရှည်ကြာတာနဲ့အမျှ ရန်သူမှာလည်း လူ၊ လက်နက်ခဲယမ်း၊ ငွေကြေး စသဖြင့် အားနည်းချက် ရှိလာတယ်ဆိုတာ ကျနော်တို့ သတိပြုရမှာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။
၂၀၂၅-၂၆ ရန်သူ့ထိုးစစ်တွေကိုကြည့်ရင် သူလည်း အကန့်အသတ်နဲ့သာ လုပ်ဆောင် နိုင်တယ်။ တနိုင်ငံလုံး ထိုးစစ်ဆင်ဖို့ သူ့မှာ လုံလောက်တဲ့အား မရှိဘူး၊ အခု ဒေသအချို့မှာ အားထည့်လုပ်နေတဲ့ သူ့ထိုးစစ်တွေဟာ ထင်တိုင်းမပေါက် ခရီးမရောက်ဘူးဆိုတာ တွေ့ရမှာ ဖြစ်တယ်။ သူ့ရဲ့ ထိုးစစ်များတာနဲ့အမျှ သူ့တပ် ပြုန်းတီးမှုလည်း ကြီးမားနေတာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။
တကယ်တော့ တော်လှန်ရေးဘက်တော်သားတွေရဲ့ ကြံ့ကြံ့ခံနိုင်စွမ်းကပဲ တော်လှန်ရေးကို အဆုံးအဖြတ်ပေးမှာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ကျနော်တို့ တောင့်ခံကြဖို့ လိုပါတယ်။
နိုင်ငံရေးမျက်နှာစာမှာဆိုရင် ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စု ပေါ်ထွန်းရေး ဦးဆောင် ကောင်စီ SCEF ဖွဲ့စည်းနိုင်တာဟာ တော်လှန်ရေး တဆင့်တက်မှုလို့ ပြောရပါမယ်။ နိုင်ငံရေး အခြေခံပေါ်မှာ တော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုတွေရဲ့ စုစည်းညီညွတ်မှုကို တည်ဆောက်ပြီး ပီပြင်တဲ့ တော်လှန်ရေးဦးဆောင်မှုကို ဖော်ထုတ်နိုင်ခဲ့တာလည်း ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ SCEF ဟာ One Policy One Strategy တခုတည်းသော မူဝါဒ၊ တခုတည်းသော မဟာဗျူဟာအောက်မှာ အလုပ်လုပ်ကြမှာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ဦးဆောင်မှု ခိုင်မာဖို့နဲ့ မဟာဗျူဟာ မှန်ကန်ဖို့ဟာ တော်လှန်ရေးအောင်မြင်ဖို့ အသက်တမျှ အရေးကြီးပါတယ်။
SCEF မှာ နိုင်ငံရေးစုဖွဲ့မှုနဲ့ စစ်ရေးစုဖွဲ့မှု ပါဝင်မယ်။ စစ်ရေးအပိုင်းမှာ ဗဟိုကွပ်ကဲမှုစနစ် တည်ဆောက်ပြီး တနိုင်ငံလုံး လွှမ်းခြုံတဲ့ စစ်မဟာဗျူဟာတရပ် ရေးဆွဲ အကောင်အထည်ဖော်သွားမှာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။
SCEF ဟာ အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်မှုအား ပိုကောင်းလာတဲ့ အမှတ်လက္ခဏာလည်း ဖြစ်တယ်။ ဒီအားကို အရင်းတည်ပြီး ခိုင်မာတဲ့ ဦးဆောင်မှု၊မှန်ကန်တဲ့ မဟာဗျူဟာအောက်မှာ စိတ်ဇွဲသန်သန်နဲ့ ပန်းတိုင်အရောက် ဆက်လက်ချီတက်ကြပါစို့လို့ တိုက်တွန်းရင်း နှစ်ဦးသဝဏ်လွှာ ပါးလိုက်ပါမယ်။
ရဲဘော်များ၊ ပြည်သူများအားလုံး ဘေးကင်းလုံခြုံကြပါစေ။
ပြည်သူ့တော်လှန်ရေး မုချအောင်ရမည်။..."
Source/publisher:
Ministry of Defence - National Unity Government of Myanmar
Date of publication:
2026-04-17
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-17
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
National Unity Government (NUG), Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
789.6 KB
more
Description:
"၁။ ၂၀၂၁ ခုနှစ်၊ ဧပြီလ (၁၆) ရက်နေ့တွင် ၂၀၂၀ ပြည့်နှစ် အထွေထွေရွေးကောက်ပွဲရလဒ်နှင့် ပြည်သူ့ဆန္ဒကိုအခြေခံ၍ စတင်ဖွဲ့စည်းခဲ့သော အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရ (NUG) သည် ယနေ့အချိန်တွင် (၅) နှစ် ပြည့်မြောက်ခဲ့ပြီ ဖြစ်ပါသည်။ ဤ (၅) နှစ်တာ တော်လှန်ရေးခရီးအတွင်း အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရအနေဖြင့် ပြည်တွင်း၊ ပြည်ပ နိုင်ငံရေးစိန်ခေါ်မှုများကြားမှ တော်လှန်ရေး၏ ဦးဆောင်မှုအခန်းကဏ္ဍတွင် ပါဝင်နိုင်ခဲ့ခြင်းအပေါ် ပြည်ထောင်စုလွှတ်တော်ကိုယ်စားပြုကော်မတီအနေဖြင့် လေးစားဂုဏ်ယူကြောင်း ဖော်ပြအပ်ပါသည်။
၂။ အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရ (NUG) အနေဖြင့် တော်လှန်ရေးခရီးလမ်းတစ်လျှောက် စိန်ခေါ်မှုအခက်အခဲပေါင်းများစွာကို ရင်ဆိုင်ကျော်ဖြတ်ကာ ပြည်သူ့အာဏာကို ပြည်သူ့ထံ ပြန်လည်အပ်နှံနိုင်ရေးအတွက် တိုင်းရင်းသားတော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုများ၊ ပြည်သူ့ကာကွယ်ရေးတပ်ဖွဲ့များနှင့် အခြားတော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုအသီးသီးတို့နှင့်အတူ စစ်ရေးနှင့် နိုင်ငံရေးဟန်ချက်ညီညီဖြင့် ပူးပေါင်းဆောင်ရွက်နိုင်ခဲ့ခြင်းသည် (၅) နှစ်တာကာလအတွင်း ရရှိခဲ့သော အကြီးမားဆုံးအောင်မြင်မှုများပင်ဖြစ်ပါသည်။ အထူးသဖြင့် အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရအနေဖြင့် စိုးမိုးနယ်မြေများ၌ ပြည်သူ့အုပ်ချုပ်ရေး၊ တရားစီရင်ရေး၊ ပညာရေးနှင့် ကျန်းမာရေးကဏ္ဍများကို လက်တွေ့ကျကျ ဖော်ဆောင်နိုင်ခြင်းသည် နိုင်ငံတကာမျက်နှာစာ၌ အစိုးရတစ်ရပ်၏ တာဝန်ယူမှု၊ တာဝန်ခံမှုကို အခိုင်အမာ သက်သေပြနိုင်ခဲ့ခြင်းဖြစ်ပါသည်။ ထိုကဲ့သို့သော ကြိုးပမ်းအားထုတ်မှုများသည် စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ် အမြစ်ပြတ်ရေးအတွက်သာမက အနာဂတ်ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီ ပြည်ထောင်စုတည်ဆောက်ရေးအတွက် ခိုင်မာသော အုတ်မြစ်များ ချနိုင်ခဲ့ခြင်းဖြစ်သည့်အတွက် ဂုဏ်ပြုမှတ်တမ်းတင်အပ်ပါသည်။
၃။ ထို့အပြင် အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရအနေဖြင့် ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စု ပေါ်ထွန်းရေး ဦးဆောင်ကောင်စီ (SCEF) ပေါ်ပေါက်လာရေးအတွက် အင်အားစုအသီးသီးမှ ဘုံရည်မှန်းချက်တူညီသော အဖွဲ့အစည်းများကို ပေါင်းစည်းကာ အစပြုနိုင်ခဲ့သည့်အတွက် အထူးပင် လေးစားဂုဏ်ယူမိပါသည်။ ဤကောင်စီ ပေါ်ပေါက်လာခြင်းသည် တော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုများအကြား နိုင်ငံရေးအရ အပြန်အလှန် ယုံကြည်မှုကို လက်တွေ့ကျကျ သက်သေပြလိုက်ခြင်းဖြစ်သကဲ့သို့ အနာဂတ် ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စု တည်ဆောက်ရေးအတွက် လိုအပ်သော စုပေါင်းခေါင်းဆောင်မှု မဏ္ဍိုင်ကို ခိုင်မာစွာ တည်ဆောက်နိုင်ခဲ့ခြင်းလည်း ဖြစ်ပါသည်။
၄။ စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ်ဆိုးကို တိုက်ဖျက်ရာတွင် စစ်ရေးအရ ညီညွတ်ရုံသာမက နိုင်ငံရေးအရပါ တစ်သံတည်းထွက်ကာ ဟန်ချက်ညီညီ ဦးဆောင်နိုင်မည့် နိုင်ငံရေးဦးဆောင်မှုယန္တရားကို ဖော်ဆောင်နိုင်ခြင်းသည် တော်လှန်ရေး၏ အလှည့်အပြောင်းမှတ်တိုင်တစ်ခုဖြစ်ပြီး ပြည်သူလူထု မျှော်လင့်တောင့်တသည့် ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စုဆီသို့ အရောက်လှမ်းနိုင်မည့် မဟာဗျူဟာမြောက် အောင်မြင်မှုပင်ဖြစ်ပါသည်။ ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စုပေါ်ထွန်းရေး ဦးဆောင်ကောင်စီ (SCEF) အနေဖြင့် ကျန်ရှိနေသော အခြားသော တိုင်းရင်းသားတော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုများ အားလုံးနှင့်လည်း ပိုမိုစုစည်းညီညွတ်သော နိုင်ငံရေးပေါင်းစည်းမှုများကို ဆက်လက်ဖော်ဆောင်သွားနိုင်မည်ဟု ယုံကြည်မျှော်လင့်ပါသည်။
၅။ မိမိတို့ တော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုအားလုံးသည် မတူကွဲပြားသော အင်အားစုများ ဖြစ်ကြသော်လည်း ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စုဟူသော ဘုံရည်မှန်းချက်ပန်းတိုင်ကို မျက်နှာမူကာ ချီတက်နေကြခြင်းဖြစ်ပါသည်။ မိမိတို့၏ ညီညွတ်မှုအားမာန်သည်သာလျှင် အနာဂတ်ဖက်ဒရယ် ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စုဆီသို့ အမြန်ဆုံး ပို့ဆောင်ပေးမည်ဖြစ်ပါသည်။
၆။ ပြည်ထောင်စုလွှတ်တော်ကိုယ်စားပြုကော်မတီသည် ပြည်သူ့ဆန္ဒကို ကိုယ်စားပြုသည့်အတွက် နိုင်ငံရေးအရ တရားဝင်မှုကိုပေးစွမ်းပြီး အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရသည် ထိုတရားဝင်မှုကို အခြေခံ၍ အုပ်ချုပ်ရေးစွမ်းဆောင်ရည်ကို ဖော်ဆောင်ကာ ထိုမဏ္ဍိုင်နှစ်ရပ်အကြား အပြန်အလှန်ထိန်းကျောင်းခြင်းနှင့် ပူးပေါင်းဆောင်ရွက်ခြင်းများကို လုပ်ဆောင်ရပါသည်။ လွှတ်တော်၏ နိုင်ငံရေးအရ ထိန်းကျောင်းမှုနှင့် အစိုးရ၏ လက်တွေ့အကောင်အထည်ဖော်မှုတို့ ဟန်ချက်ညီညီ ယှဉ်တွဲနေမှသာလျှင် တော်လှန်ရေးခရီးလမ်းသည် တည့်မတ်မှန်ကန်ပြီး လိုရာပန်းတိုင်သို့ ရောက်ရှိမည်ဖြစ်ပါသည်။
၇။ ထို့ကြောင့် စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ် အပြီးတိုင်ချုပ်ငြိမ်း၍ ပြည်သူ့အာဏာ ပြည်သူ့ထံ ပြန်လည်ရောက်ရှိသည်အထိ ပြည်ထောင်စုလွှတ်တော်ကိုယ်စားပြုကော်မတီသည် အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရနှင့်အတူ မယိုင်မလဲ ဆက်လက်ရပ်တည်သွားမည်ဖြစ်ပါသည်။ အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရ (NUG) အနေဖြင့် မတူကွဲပြားသော အင်အားစုများအကြား အပြန်အလှန် ယုံကြည်လေးစားမှုကို အခြေခံ၍ အနာဂတ် ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စုကြီး၏ ခိုင်မာသော မဏ္ဍိုင်တစ်ခုအဖြစ် ဆက်လက်ဝင့်ထည်နိုင်ပါစေကြောင်း ဆန္ဒပြုလျက် ဤသဝဏ်လွှာအား ပေးပို့အပ်ပါသည်။..."
Source/publisher:
Committee Representing Pyidaungsu Hluttaw
Date of publication:
2026-04-16
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-16
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Committee Representing Pyidaungsu Hluttaw (CRPH), Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
2.01 MB
more
Description:
"လေးစားချစ်ခင်ရပါသော ပြည်သူလူထုကြီးခင်ဗျား
ယနေ့ဟာ မြန်မာ့နှစ်သစ်ကူးနေ့ အခါသမယလည်းဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ နှစ်ဟောင်းကနေ နှစ်သစ်ကို ကူးပြောင်းတဲ့ အချိန်ကာလအတွင်းမှာ ကျွန်တော်တို့ ပြည်သူအားလုံး ဘေးကင်းစွာ ဖြတ်သန်းနိုင်ခဲ့ ကြလိမ့်မယ်လို့ မျှော်လင့်ပါတယ်။ တိုင်းရင်းသားပြည်သူအားလုံးအနေနဲ့ ယခုလာမယ့် နှစ်သစ်မှာ စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ်ဆိုးရဲ့ အနှောက်အယှက်ပေးမှုက ကင်းဝေးပြီး၊ အကြောက်တရားက လွတ်မြောက်တဲ့ လွတ်လပ်ပြီး တရားမျှတသော နိုင်ငံတော်နဲ့ လူ့အဖွဲ့အစည်းဆီကို အားပြည့် အင်ပြည့် ချီတက်လျှောက်လှမ်းနိုင်ပါစေကြောင်း ဆုမွန်ကောင်း တောင်းအပ်ပါတယ်…။
လေးစားချစ်ခင်ရပါသော ပြည်သူလူထုကြီး ခင်ဗျား…
အခုဆိုရင် နွေဦးတော်လှန်ရေးကို ဖြတ်သန်းလာခဲ့တာဟာ (၅) နှစ်ကျော်လာပြီဖြစ်သလို၊ ကျွန်တော်တို့ အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရအဖွဲ့ကို ဖွဲ့စည်းခဲ့တာကလည်း (၅) နှစ်ပြည့်မြောက်ပြီး ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ကျွန်တော်တို့ဟာ စစ်အာဏာသိမ်းမှုကို အပြင်းအထန် ဆန့်ကျင်ကန့်ကွက်ပြီး၊ လွတ်လပ်၍ တရားမျှတသော ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီနိုင်ငံတော်သစ်ကို ခိုင်ခိုင်မာမာ တည်ဆောက်ဖို့ ကြိုးစားနေပါတယ်။ ကျွန်တော်တို့ ဖြတ်သန်းချီတက်လာခဲ့ကြတဲ့ (၅) နှစ်တာ၊ အချိန်ကာလမှာ - အောင်မြင်သော တော်လှန်ရေးဖြစ်ရပ်တွေကို ဖန်တီးနိုင်ခဲ့သလို၊ အောင်မြင်ဖို့ ကြိုးစားနေဆဲ အခြေအနေတွေကိုလည်း ဖြတ်သန်းနေရပါတယ်။ တစ်ဖက်မှာလည်း ခရီးဆုံးပန်းတိုင်အထိ ရောက်အောင် လျှောက်လှမ်းရင်း၊ စိန်ခေါ်ချက် အမျိုးမျိုးနဲ့လည်း ကြုံတွေ့နေရကြောင်း၊ ပြည်သူလူထုတစ်ရပ်လုံးကို ပွင့်ပွင့်လင်းလင်း ဝန်ခံလိုပါတယ်။ အထူးသဖြင့် ကျွန်တော်တို့ နိုင်ငံရဲ့ ပထဝီနိုင်ငံရေးအကျပ်အတည်းနဲ့ သမိုင်းဆိုင်ရာ နာကျည်းချက်တွေကို ခက်ခက်ခဲခဲ ကျော်ဖြတ်ဖို့ ကြိုးစားခဲ့ရပါတယ်။ လက်ရှိအချိန်မှာလည်း ကမ္ဘာ့နိုင်ငံရေး အခြေအနေတွေရဲ့ သက်ရောက်မှု ကြောင့်၊ ကျွန်တော်တို့ နိုင်ငံရဲ့ ပြည်တွင်းရေး အခြေအနေကိုလည်း ရိုက်ခတ်နေတာတွေ အမြောက်အမြား ရှိနေပါတယ်။
တော်လှန်ရေးရည်မှန်းချက်များ အမြန်ဆုံး အောင်မြင်နိုင်ဖို့ ကျွန်ုတော်တို့ အစွမ်းကုန် ကြိုးစားနေ ကြပေမဲ့ ခက်ခဲတဲ့စိန်ခေါ်မှုတွေ အကန့်အသတ်တွေ များစွာ ရှိနေဆဲဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ဒါဟာ စစ်အုပ်စုက ဆယ်စုနှစ်ပေါင်းများစွာ တည်ဆောက်ခဲ့တဲ့ သွေးခွဲအုပ်ချုပ်မှုယန္တရား၊ တိုင်းပြည်ရဲ့ အရင်းအမြစ်နှင့် ငွေကြေးနဲ့ အာဏာကိုသုံးပြီး အမှားကို အမှန်လုပ်ခဲ့တဲ့ အမြစ်တွယ်နေတဲ့ စနစ်ဆိုးတွေကြောင့်လည်း ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ဒါပေမဲ့ ဒီတော်လှန်ရေးဟာ ကျွန်ုတော်တို့ကို သမိုင်းဝင်ညီညွတ်မှုတစ်ခု ပေးခဲ့ပါတယ်။ စစ်တပ်ရဲ့ သွေးခွဲမှုကြောင့် ကျွန်တော်တို့လူ့အဖွဲ့အစည်းဟာ အစိပ်စိပ်အမွှာမွှာ ဖြစ်ခဲ့ရပေမဲ့၊ ဒီနေ့ "နွေဦးတော်လှန်ရေး" မှာတော့ တိုင်းရင်းသားပြည်သူအားလုံးဟာ တစ်စိတ်တစ်ဝမ်းတည်း စုစည်းမိသွားကြပါပြီ။ ဒါဟာ မြန်မာ့သမိုင်းမှာ မကြုံစဖူးတဲ့ အောင်မြင်မှုဖြစ်ပြီး ဒီညီညွတ်မှုဟာ ကျွန်ုတော်တို့ရဲ့ အကြီးမားဆုံးသော ခွန်အားပဲ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။
လေးစားချစ်ခင်ရပါသော ပြည်သူလူထုကြီးခင်ဗျား- ကျွန်တော်တို့ အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရ ဟာ ၅ နှစ်တာကာလအတွင်း တော်လှန်ရေးကို ဦးဆောင်လာခဲ့ရာမှာ ကျွန်တော်တို့ရဲ့ ခေါင်းဆောင် များဖြစ်ကြတဲ့ နိုင်ငံတော်၏အတိုင်ပင်ခံပုဂ္ဂိုလ် ဒေါ်အောင်ဆန်းစုကြည်၊ နိုင်ငံတော်သမ္မတကြီး ဦးဝင်းမြင့် နဲ့တကွ မတရားဖမ်းဆီး ထိန်းသိမ်းခံထားရတဲ့ နိုင်ငံရေးအကျဉ်းသားအားလုံးရဲ့ အခြေအနေကို တစ်မိနစ်တစ်စက္ကန့်မျှ မေ့လျော့ခြင်းမရှိကြောင်း အလေးအနက်ပြောကြားလိုပါ တယ်။ စစ်အုပ်စုဟာ ကျွန်တော်တို့ရဲ့ ခေါင်းဆောင်တွေကို မတရားပုဒ်မတွေတပ်ပြီး ချုပ်နှောင် ထားနိုင်ပေမဲ့ သူတို့ရဲ့ စိတ်ဓာတ်နဲ့ ပြည်သူ့အပေါ်ထားတဲ့ မေတ္တာတွေကိုတော့ ဘယ်တော့မှ ပိတ်လှောင်ထားနိုင်မှာမဟုတ်ပါဘူး။ ကျွန်တော်တို့ရဲ့ ခေါင်းဆောင်ကြီးများနဲ့တကွ နွေဦးတော်လှန် ရေးအတွင်း မတရားဖမ်းဆီးခံထားရသူအားလုံးကို 'ချွင်းချက်မရှိ အမြန်ဆုံးလွှတ်ပေးဖို့' ပြတ်ပြတ်သားသား တောင်းဆိုပါတယ်။ သူတို့အားလုံး အမြန်ဆုံး ပြန်လည်လွတ်မြောက်လာရေး ဟာ ကျွန်တော်တို့ တော်လှန်ရေးရဲ့ အဓိကတာဝန်တစ်ခုဖြစ်သလို၊ သူတို့ရဲ့ အနစ်နာခံမှုတွေ ဟာလည်း ကျွန်တော်တို့အတွက် အားမလျော့တမ်း ရှေ့ဆက်ဖို့ ခွန်အားတွေပဲဖြစ်ပါတယ်။
ချစ်ခင်လေးစားရသော ပြည်သူလူထုခင်ကြီးခင်ဗျား - နွေဦးတော်လှန်ရေးဟာ ပြည်သူထဲက ပေါက်ဖွားလာတဲ့ ပြည်သူ့တော်လှန်ရေးဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ဒါ့အပြင် အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရဟာ၊ ပြည်သူ့ဆန္ဒ သဘောထားနဲ့အညီ ဖွဲ့စည်းဖြစ်တည်လာတဲ့ ပြည်သူ့အစိုးရဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ နွေဦး တော်လှန်ရေးအတွင်းမှာ၊ အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရဟာ တော်လှန်ရေးတပ်ဦးကနေ မားမားမတ် မတ် ရပ်ခံပြီး၊ စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ် အမြစ်ပြတ် ချုပ်ငြိမ်းရေးအတွက် ဖြောင့်ဖြောင့်မတ်မတ် ချီတက်နေပါတယ်။ ဒီလို တော်လှန်ရေးခရီးတစ်လျှောက်လုံးမှာ၊ ပြည်သူလူထုရဲ့ အားပေးထောက်ခံ မှု၊ ပြည်သူ့ကာကွယ်ရေး ရဲဘော်တွေရဲ့ စွန့်လွှတ်အနစ်နာခံမှုတွေ အပါအဝင် စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ်ကို ပုံစံအမျိုးမျိုးနဲ့ ဆန့်ကျင်တော်လှန်ခဲ့ကြတဲ့ နယ်ပယ်အသီးသီး/ ကဏ္ဍအသီးသီးက လူထု၊ လူတန်းစားတွေရဲ့ လုံ့လဝီရိယတွေ မြောက်မြားစွာ ထည့်ဝင် မြှုပ်နှံခဲ့ကြ ပါတယ်။ ဒီလိုမျိုး လူထုရဲ့ ရင်းနှီးပေးဆပ်မှုတွေ မရှိဘူးဆိုရင်၊ ကျွန်တော်တို့ဟာ ယနေ့ အချိန်မှာ မြင်တွေ့နေရတဲ့ တော်လှန်ရေး ခရီးပန်းတိုင်တွေကို ရောက်လာနိုင်စရာအကြောင်း မရှိဘူးဆိုတာ သတိချပ်စေချင်ပါတယ်။ ဒါ့ကြောင့် တော်လှန်ရေးဘက်တော်သားအားလုံးကို ဒီနေရာကနေ အလေးအမြတ်ပြု ကျေးဇူးတင် ကြောင်း ပြောကြားလိုပါတယ်။
လေးစားချစ်ခင်ရပါသော ပြည်သူလူထုကြီး ခင်ဗျား- စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ်အမြစ်ပြတ် ချုပ်ငြိမ်းရေး ကို လုပ်ဆောင်တဲ့နေရာမှာ ပြည်တွင်းက တော်လှန်ရေးတွေ အပါအဝင် ပြည်ပက တော်လှန်ရေး လှုပ်ရှားမှုတွေကလည်း အကျိုးသက်ရောက်မှု ကြီးမားခဲ့ပါတယ်။ အဝေးရောက် ပြည်သူလူထု အားလုံးရဲ့ ကာယကံမြောက် ပံ့ပိုးကူညီမှုတွေဟာ နွေဦးတော်လှန်ရေးရဲ့ အရွေ့တစ်ခုလုံးအတွက် အင်မတန် အကျိုးကျေးဇူး ကြီးမားခဲ့တာတွေ့ရပါတယ်။ တစ်ဖက်မှာလည်း လူထုသံတမန်ရေး နည်းလမ်းတွေနဲ့ နိုင်ငံတကာအစိုးရအသီးသီးကို ချိတ်ဆက်လုပ်ဆောင်နိုင်ခဲ့တာဟာ စစ်အာဏာရှင် တွေကို ပြင်းပြင်းထန်ထန် ဒဏ်ခတ်နိုင်တဲ့ အခြေအနေအထိ ရောက်ရှိခဲ့တာတွေ့ရပါတယ်။ ပြည်တွင်းမှာ လှုပ်ရှားဆောင်ရွက်ဖို့ ခက်ခဲတာတွေကို၊ ပြည်ပကနေ ကူညီဆောင်ရွက်ပေးနိုင်တာ တွေ အများအပြား ရှိခဲ့တာတွေ့ရပါတယ်။ ဒါ့ကြောင့် နွေဦးတော်လှန်ရေးဟာ ပြည်တွင်းလှုပ်ရှားမှုနဲ့ ပြည်ပလှုပ်ရှားမှုကို ပူးပေါင်းနိုင်ပြီး၊ အချိန်တိုတို အတွင်းမှာ သက်ရောက်မှု ကျယ်ပြန့်အောင် လုပ်ဆောင်နိုင်ခဲ့တာဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ဒါ့ကြောင့် ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီနိုင်ငံတော်သစ် တည်ဆောက်ရေး မှာ ပြည်ပရောက် ပြည်သူလူထုအားလုံးရဲ့ အားထုတ်မှု စေတနာတွေကို လေးနက်စွာ ဂုဏ်ပြု ကျေးဇူးတင်ကြောင်း ပြောကြားလိုပါတယ်။
လေးစားချစ်ခင်ရပါသော ပြည်သူလူထုကြီး ခင်ဗျား- နွေဦးတော်လှန်ရေးဟာ အကြမ်းမဖက် တော်လှန်ရေးနည်းလမ်းတွေ အပါအဝင် လူထုလက်နက်ကိုင် လမ်းစဉ်နဲ့ ပေါင်းစပ်ပြီး စစ်အာဏာရှင် တော်လှန်ရေးကို ချီတက်ခဲ့ကြတာဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ဒီနေရာမှာ နိုင်ငံရေးနည်းအရ အကူအညီအပံ့အပိုး တွေအပြင်၊ စစ်ရေးနည်းအရ အကူအညီတွေ အများအပြား လိုအပ်ခဲ့ပါတယ်။ အထူးသဖြင့် စစ်ရေးအရ လက်တွဲကူညီမှုတွေမှာ၊ တိုင်းရင်းသားလက်နက်ကိုင် တော်လှန်ရေးအဖွဲ့အစည်းကြီး တွေရဲ့ အားပေးကူညီမှုတွေကို လက်တွေ့ကျကျ ရယူခဲ့ရပါတယ်။ လက်ရှိ အချိန်အထိ ပြည်သူ့ ကာကွယ်ရေးတပ်မတော်သားအားလုံးရဲ့ စစ်ရေးစွမ်းရည်တွေဟာ တိုင်းရင်းသားလက်နက်ကိုင် တော်လှန်ရေးအဖွဲ့အစည်းတွေရဲ့ အားပေးကူညီမှုတွေကြောင့် အချိန်တိုအတွင်းမှာ တိုးတက်မှုတွေ အများအပြား ဖြစ်ပေါ်ခဲ့ပါတယ်။ အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရနဲ့အတူ၊ တိုင်းရင်းသားမဟာမိတ် တွေရဲ့ ပူးပေါင်းပေါင်းဝင်မှုတွေဟာ အနာဂတ် ဖက်ဒရယ်တပ်မတော် တည်ဆောက်ရေးအတွက် အခြေခံအုတ်မြစ်ကောင်းတွေဖြစ်ကြောင်း လေးလေးနက်နက် မှတ်တမ်းတင် ပြောကြားလိုပါတယ်။
လေးစားချစ်ခင်ရပါသော ပြည်သူလူထုကြီး ခင်ဗျား…
ပြည်သူ့တော်လှန်ရေးရဲ့ အရှိန်အဟုန် ကြီးမားမှုကြောင့်၊ အာဏာသိမ်းစစ်တပ်ထဲမှာ၊ အမြင်မှန် ရလာ ကြတဲ့ ပြည်သူ့တပ်မတော်သားတွေ အများအပြား ရှိပါတယ်။ တစ်ဖက်မှာလည်း စစ်အာဏာရှင် စနစ်ရဲ့ အမြစ်တွယ်မှုကို မဖယ်ရှားနိုင်သေးတာကြောင့်၊ ပြည်သူ့ဘက်ကို ရုန်းမထွက်နိုင်သေးတဲ့ စစ်ဗိုလ် စစ်သားတွေ အများအပြား ရှိနေတာတွေ့ရပါတယ်။ ပြည်သူလူထုကနေ တစ်ဆင့်၊ အကြမ်းဖက် စစ်တပ်အတွင်းက စစ်သည် စစ်သားတွေကို သတင်းစကား တချို့ ပါးလိုပါတယ်။ အဲဒါကတော့ ပြည်သူကို အလုပ်အကျွေးပြုရမယ့် တပ်မတော်ဟာ ပြည်သူ့ဆန္ဒကို လျစ်လျှူမရှုသင့်ဘူးဆိုတာ သတိချပ်စေချင်ပါတယ်။ လက်ရှိ မြန်မာ့တပ်မတော်ဟာ ကျွန်တော်တို့ နိုင်ငံရဲ့ တည်ငြိမ်အေးချမ်းမှုကို ဖျက်လို ဖျက်ဆီးလုပ်နေတဲ့ အဓိက တရားခံဘဝကို ရောက်နေ ပါတယ်။ ဒါ့ကြောင့် အကြမ်းဖက် စစ်တပ်ဆိုတဲ့ ဂုဏ်ပုဒ်ကို ရရှိနေတာဖြစ်ကြောင်း သတိချပ်စေလို ပါတယ်။ အကြမ်းဖက်စစ်တပ်ဆိုတဲ့ နိမ့်ကျ ဆိုးဝါးသော အခြေအနေကနေ အမြန်ဆုံး ရုန်းထွက်ပြီး၊ ပြည်သူချစ်သော မြန်မာ့တပ်မတော် အဖြစ် ပြန်လည် အဖက်ဆယ်ကြဖို့ အလေးအနက်ထား တိုက်တွန်းလိုပါတယ်။ စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ် ချုပ်ငြိမ်းရေးမှာ၊ ပြည်သူ့လူထုရဲ့ အခန်းကဏ္ဍက အင်မတန် အရေးကြီးသလို၊ လက်နက်ကိုင်စစ်တပ်အတွင်းက ပြည်သူ့တပ်မတော် သားစိတ်ဓာတ် ပြည့်ဝသူတွေရဲ့ အခန်းကဏ္ဍကလည်း အလွန်အရေးကြီးကြောင်း ပြောကြားလိုပါတယ်။
လေးစားချစ်ခင်ရပါသော ပြည်သူလူထုကြီး ခင်ဗျား- ကျွန်တော်တို့ အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရ အနေနဲ့၊ တော်လှန်ရေးအောင်မြင်မှုတွေကို ရရှိခဲ့သလို၊ ပြန်လည် လက်လွှတ်ခဲ့ရတဲ့ ဆုံးရှုံးမှုတွေ လည်း ရှိခဲ့တာကို ပွင့်လင်းစွာ ဝန်ခံလိုပါတယ်။ ကျွန်တော်တို့အနေနဲ့ ခက်ခဲကြမ်းတမ်းတဲ့ ခရီးလမ်းကို လျှောက်ခဲ့တာကြောင့်၊ မပေါက်သေးတဲ့ လမ်းတွေကိုလည်း ချဲ့ထွင် လျှောက်လှမ်းခဲ့ကြ ရပါတယ်။ အဲသည့်ထဲမှာ၊ တော်လှန်ရေးသမိုင်း အဆက်ဆက် မကြုံခဲ့ဖူးတဲ့ အောင်မြင်မှု ခြေလှမ်း တွေကို တက်လှမ်းနိုင်ခဲ့သလို၊ ကျွန်တော်တို့ရဲ့ အားနည်းချက်ကြောင့်၊ လက်လွှတ်ခဲ့ရတဲ့ မအောင်မြင်မှုတွေလည်း ရှိခဲ့တာကို ဝန်ခံချင်ပါတယ်။ အထူးသဖြင့် အတွေ့အကြုံရင့်ကျက်မှု အားနည်းသေးတဲ့ လက်နက်ကိုင်တော်လှန်ရေးမှာ၊ ကျွန်တော်တို့အတွက် သင်ခန်းစာ အများအပြား ကို သင်ယူခွင့်ရခဲ့တာတွေ ရှိပါတယ်။ ကျွန်တော်တို့မှာ အရင်းအမြစ် အကန့်အသတ်ရှိသလို၊ လှုပ်ရှားနိုင်မှု (ဂွင်) အကန့်အသတ်တွေလည်း ရှိပါတယ်။ ဒါ့ကြောင့် ကျွန်တော်တို့ရဲ့ တော်လှန်ရေး ခရီးမှာ၊ ပြန်လည်လက်လွှတ် လိုက်ရတဲ့ ဆုံးရှုံးမှုတွေ ရှိသလို၊ လက်ရှိ အချိန်အထိ ကျော်လွှားဖို့ ခက်ခဲနေသေးတဲ့ အရာတွေလည်း အများအပြား ရှိနေကြောင်း ပြည်သူလူထုကို ရိုးသားစွာ တင်ပြလိုပါတယ်။ ကျွန်တော်တို့အနေနဲ့ အမှားတွေကို သင်ခန်းစာယူပြီး၊ တစ်နေ့ထက် တစ်နေ့ ပိုမိုထိရောက်တဲ့ တော်လှန်ရေးလျှောက်လမ်းဖြစ်အောင် ကြိုးစားနေမှာဖြစ်ကြောင်း ပြည်သူလူထု အားလုံးကို အသိပေးပြောကြားလိုပါတယ်။
လေးစားချစ်ခင်ရပါသော ပြည်သူလူထုကြီးခင်ဗျား- တော်လှန်ရေးအောင်မြင်ဖို့အတွက် အဓိက သော့ချက်ဟာ တော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုများအကြား "ညီညွတ်မှု" ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ညီညွတ်မှုဟာ တော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုတွေကြားမှာရော၊ ပြည်သူလူထု ကြားမှာပါ အဓိကအရေးကြီးပါတယ်။ ကျွန်တော်တို့အကြား အချင်းချင်း အပြစ်တင် ကဲ့ရဲ့တာ တွေကို ရှောင်ကြဉ်ပြီး လက်တွေ့ကျတဲ့ ပူးပေါင်းဆောင်ရွက်မှုတွေကို အာရုံစိုက်ကြရမှာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ကျွန်တော်တို့ ပတ်ဝန်းကျင်မှာ တော်လှန်ရေးအရှိန်ကို ပျက်ပြားအောင် လှုံ့ဆော်နေသူ တွေကို သတိပြုပြီး တော်လှန်ရေးကို အထောက်အကူပြုမယ့် ဝေဖန်အကြံပြုချက်တွေကိုသာ ဝန်းရံကြဖို့ မေတ္တာရပ်ခံပါတယ်။
ကျွန်တော်တို့ ရင်ဆိုင်နေရတဲ့ ရန်သူဟာ ဆယ်စုနှစ်များစွာ တိုင်းပြည်ရဲ့ အရင်းအမြစ်များနှင့် ၄င်းတို့ လူတစ်စုစာအတွက် အာဏာနှင့် ငွေကြေးအပေါ် အခြေခံပြီး စစ်တပ် ယန္တရား တစ်ခုလုံးကို တည်ဆောက်ထားတဲ့ မိစ္ဆာကြီးတွေဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ဒီမိစ္ဆာကြီးများကို ရင်ဆိုင်ဖို့ ကျွန်တော် အယောက်ဆီတိုင်း ညီညွတ်ရမှာဖြစ်သလို တော်လှန်ရေးအတွက် ဆိုးကျိုးဖြစ်စေမည့်အရာများကို အထူးရှောင်ကြည်ကြဖို့ တိုက်တွန်းလိုပါတယ်။ ကျွန်တော်တို့ပြည်သူတွေဟာ အာဏာရှင်စနစ်ရဲ့ ဆိုးရွားတဲ့ ဒဏ်ကို ရင်ဆိုင်ဖြတ်ကျော်ခဲ့ပြီးဖြစ်သလို နေ့စဥ်နှင့်အမျှ ဒီစနစ်ရဲ့ ဆိုးရွားမှုကို ဖြတ်ကျော် နေကြရပါတယ်။ ဒီအရာတွေကို ဖြတ်ကျော်ပြီး အေးချမ်းပြီး လွတ်လပ်တဲ့ နိုင်ငံနှင့် လူ့အဖွဲ့အစည်း ကို ထူထောင်ဖို့ ကျွန်တော်တို့အကြား ညီညွတ်ရမှာဖြစ်ပါတယ်။
ချစ်ခင်လေးစားရပါသော ပြည်သူလူထုကြီးခင်ဗျား- အမျိုးသားညီညွတ်ရေးအစိုးရအနေဖြင့် တော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုများအကြား ညီညွတ်မှုနှင့် လက်တွဲ ပူးပေါင်းရေးကို မြင့်တင်နိုင်ဖို့ အစိုးရ ဖွဲ့စည်းသည့်နေ့မှစတင်ပြီး အားမလျော့ဘဲ ညီညွတ်ရေးအတွက် အစွမ်းကုန်ကြိုးပမ်း တည်ဆောက် ခဲ့တာ ယနေ့အထိ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ၂၀၂၆ ခုနှစ်၊ မတ်လ (၃၀) ရက်နေ့မှာ ကျွန်ုတော်တို့ဟာ “ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စုပေါ်ထွန်းရေးဦးဆောင်ကောင်စီ (SCEF)” ကို ဖွဲ့စည်းနိုင်ခဲ့ ပါတယ်။ ဒါဟာ နွေဦးတော်လှန်ရေးအတွင်းမှာ ထွက်ပေါ်လာတဲ့ တော်လှန်သောညီညွတ်ရေး အင်အားစုဆိုတဲ့ ပြယုဂ်တစ်ခုဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ တော်လှန်ရေးမှာ ညီညွတ်ရေးဟာ အဓိက ကျပါတယ်။ SCEF ဖွဲ့စည်းမှုဟာ တော်လှန်ရေးကို အရင်လို တစုတဖွဲ့တည်း တိုက်နေတာထက်၊ ညီညွတ်တဲ့ မဟာဗျူဟာတစ်ခုအောက်မှာ အရှိန်မြှင့်ဖို့ ရည်ရွယ်တာဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ဒီကောင်စီမှာ KIO, KNU, KNPP (IEC), CNF, CRPH နဲ့ ကျွန်ုတော်တို့ NUG အစိုးရတို့ ကနဦးအနေဖြင့် ပါဝင်ဖွဲ့စည်းထားခြင်းဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ဒါဟာ အစ စုဖွဲ့မှုသာဖြစ်ပြီး SCEF ထဲ မပါဝင်သေးတဲ့ တော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုတွေ ထပ်မံပြီး ပါဝင်လာအောင် ဆက်လက်ကြိုးပမ်းသွားမှာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။
ကျွန်တော်တို့ တော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုများအကြား သမိုင်းကြောင်းဆိုင်ရာ မယုံကြည်မှုတွေ၊ အိမ်နီးချင်းနိုင်ငံတွေရဲ့ လွှမ်းမိုးမှုတွေကြောင့် ညီညွတ်ရေးမှာ အတားအဆီးတွေ ရှိနေဆဲဖြစ်ပေမဲ့ ကျွန်ုတော်တို့အားလုံးရဲ့ တူညီတဲ့ ရည်မှန်းချက်ဟာ "စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ် ဖျက်သိမ်းရေး" ပဲ ဖြစ်ပါ တယ်။ အတားအဆီးအခက်အခဲတွေ ဘယ်လောက်ဘဲ များပါစေ တူညီတဲ့ ရည်မှန်းချက်ပန်းတိုင် ကဘဲ ကျွန်ုတော်တို့ကို တစ်နေ့မှာ ပိုမိုခိုင်မာတဲ့ ညီညွတ်မှုဆီ ခေါ်ဆောင်သွားမှာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ဒီတော်လှန်ရေးခရီးမှာ "ကျွန်ုပ်တို့မှာ ကျွန်ုပ်တို့ပဲ ရှိပါတယ်"။ ပြည်သူလူထုရဲ့ အားကိုးရာဟာ ပြည်သူလူထုပါပဲ။ စစ်တပ်က လက်နက်နဲ့ ငွေကြေး သာလွန်ကောင်း သာလွန်နိုင်ပေမဲ့၊ ကျွန်ုပ်တို့မှာ သူတို့မရှိတဲ့ "မှန်ကန်တဲ့ စိတ်ဓာတ်နဲ့ တရားမျှတမှု" ရှိပါတယ်။ ကျွန်ုတော်တို့အားလုံး အတူလက်တွဲပြီး စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ် ကင်းစင်တဲ့၊ လွတ်လပ်ငြိမ်းချမ်းတဲ့ လူ့အဖွဲ့အစည်းသစ်ဆီသို့ မရမနား ဆက်လက်ချီတက်သွားကြပါစို့လို့ တိုက်တွန်းရင်း နိဂုံးချုပ်အပ်ပါတယ်။
အရေးတော်ပုံမုချအောင်ရမည်..."
Source/publisher:
National Unity Government of Myanmar
Date of publication:
2026-04-16
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-16
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
National Unity Government (NUG), Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
4.79 MB
more
Source/publisher:
National Unity Consultative Council
Date of publication:
2026-04-16
Date of entry/update:
2026-04-16
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
331.4 KB
more
Description:
"In order to advance our ongoing revolution and achieve victory at the earliest possible time; to advance the current revolutionary phase by adopting the Federal Transitional Arrangements and successfully establish a transitional government; and to effectively implement the processes of building a Federal Democratic Union— we have formally established the Steering Council for the Emergence of a Federal Democratic Union (SCEF) on the following three pillars:
1. The pillar representing States/Federal Units/EROs
2. The pillar representing the people
3. The pillar representing women — to coordinate, lead, guide, and implement military, political, federal, and institutional matters.
We hereby solemnly announce this formation to all the people.
Our vision and strategic objectives are to completely dismantle all forms of dictatorship, including the military dictatorship, and to collectively initiate a new political landscape that can effectively and practically realize our political aspirations and positions.
Furthermore, we are committed to protecting and promoting the diverse identities of all ethnic nationalities residing within members states and units of the Union, and to firmly building a new Federal Democratic Union composed of states that fully guarantee equality among nationalities and the right to self-determination.
To ensure the swift achievement of these objectives, we will lead and coordinate the military and political activities of all revolutionary forces with legitimacy, unity, and accountable leadership.
To realize these goals, we have firmly adopted the following six political objectives:
(1) To overturn the usurpation of state power by the military, and to terminate the involvement of the armed forces in politics
(2) To ensure that all armed forces operate solely under the command of a civilian government elected through democratic processes
(3) To abrogate the constitution of 2008 in its entirety, and to quash all attempts to reinstate its provisions
(4) To draft and promulgate a new constitution that embodies federalism and democratic values, garnering the consensus of all relevant parties
(5) To establish a new federal democratic union in accordance with the proposed federal democratic constitution
(6) To institute a system of transitional justice to achieve justice and accountability for victims of injustices, including gender-based violence, during the conflict period.
In carrying out its functions, the SCEF upholds the principle that sovereignty belongs to the people residing within the States/Federal Units, and adopts the principle of shared sovereignty between the Union and the States/Federal Units.
In political decision-making, we will practice collective leadership, ensuring that the voices of Ethnic Revolutionary Organizations (EROs), democratic resistance forces, women’s groups, and representatives of the people are meaningfully included.
Member organizations of the Council will act based on mutual respect and recognition of diversity, and will adopt and implement the principle of “one policy, one strategy.” Through coordinated efforts across military, political, and administrative sectors, we will work in unity with the people and allied forces to achieve our shared goals while promoting broader representation.
We hereby make this announcement..."
Source/publisher:
National Unity Government of Myanmar
Date of publication:
2026-03-30
Date of entry/update:
2026-03-30
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
National Unity Government (NUG), Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
597.19 KB
Local URL:
more
Description:
"ကျွန်ုပ်တို့ဆင်နွှဲလျက်ရှိသော တော်လှန်ရေးကို အရှိန်အဟုန်မြှင့်တင်၍ အမြန်ဆုံးအောင်ပွဲ ရယူ နိုင်ရန်၊ လက်ရှိတော်လှန်ရေးကို တဆင့်တက်၍ အသွင်ကူးပြောင်းမှုကာလ အစီအမံများ ကို အတည်ပြုပြီး အသွင်ကူးပြောင်းရေး အစိုးရတရပ်အောင်မြင်စွာဖွဲ့စည်းနိုင်ရန်၊ ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီ ပြည်ထောင်စု တည်ဆောက်ရေးလုပ်ငန်းစဉ်များကို လက်တွေ့အကောင်အထည်ဖော်နိုင်စေရန် တို့အတွက် စစ်ရေး၊ နိုင်ငံရေး၊ ဖက်ဒရယ်ရေးနှင့် အင်စတီကျူးရှင်းဆိုင်ရာ ကိစ္စရပ်များကို ညှိနှိုင်းဦးဆောင်လမ်းညွှန်အကောင်အထည်ဖော်ဆောင်နိုင်ရန် "ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စုပေါ်ထွန်းရေး ဦးဆောင် ကောင်စီ (Steering Council for the Emergence of a Federal Democratic Union - SCEF)" ကို အောက်ပါ
၁။ ပြည်နယ်/ဖက်ဒရယ်ယူနစ်/EROs ကိုယ်စားပြုမဏ္ဍိုင်
၂။ ပြည်သူ့ကိုယ်စားပြုမဏ္ဍိုင် နှင့်
၃။ အမျိုးသမီးကိုယ်စားပြု/ ကိုယ်စားလှယ်များ မဏ္ဍိုင်တို့ကို အခြေခံပြီး တရားဝင်ဖွဲ့စည်း လိုက်ပြီဖြစ်ကြောင်း ပြည်သူလူထုတရပ်လုံးကို လေးနက်တည်ကြည်စွာ အသိပေးကြေညာအပ် ပါသည်။
ကျွန်ုပ်တို့၏မျှော်မှန်းချက်နှင့် မဟာဗျူဟာရည်မှန်းချက်မှာ စစ်အာဏာရှင်စနစ် အပါအဝင် မည်သည့် အာဏာရှင်စနစ်ကိုမဆို မဖြစ်မနေ အမြစ်ပြတ်ဖယ်ရှားပစ်ရန်ဖြစ်ပြီး ကျွန်ုပ်တို့၏ နိုင်ငံရေး ရည်မှန်းချက်များ၊ ရပ်တည်ချက်များကို လက်တွေ့ကျကျ၊ ထိရောက်အောင်မြင်စွာ အကောင် အထည်ဖော်ဆောင်နိုင်မည့် နိုင်ငံရေးအခင်းအကျင်းအသစ်တခုကို စုစည်းညီညွတ်စွာ စတင် လိုက်ခြင်းဖြစ်ပါသည်။ ထို့အပြင် ပြည်ထောင်စုအတွင်း မှီတင်းနေထိုင်ကြသော စုံလင် ကွဲပြားသည့် လူမျိုးများ၏ ကိုယ်ပိုင်လက္ခဏာများကို ကာကွယ်မြှင့်တင်ပေးပြီး၊ အမျိုးသားတန်းတူရေးနှင့် ကိုယ်ပိုင်ပြဋ္ဌာန်းခွင့် အပြည့်အဝရှိသည့် ပြည်နယ်များဖြင့် စုဖွဲ့ထားသော ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီ ပြည်ထောင်စုသစ်ကို ခိုင်မာကောင်းမွန်စွာ တည်ဆောက်သွားရန် ဖြစ်ပါသည်။
ဤရည်မှန်းချက်များ အမြန်ဆုံး အောင်မြင်နိုင်စေရန် တော်လှန်ရေးအဖွဲ့အစည်းအသီးသီး၏ စစ်ရေးနှင့် နိုင်ငံရေးလှုပ်ရှားမှုများကို တရားဝင်မှု၊ ညီညွတ်မှုနှင့် တာဝန်ယူ၊တာဝန်ခံမှုရှိသော ခေါင်းဆောင်မှုတို့ဖြင့် ဦးဆောင်ညှိနှိုင်း အကောင်အထည်ဖော်ဆောင်ရွက်သွားမည် ဖြစ်ပါသည်။
ကျွန်ုပ်တို့သည် အဆိုပါ ရည်မှန်းချက်များ အောင်မြင်စွာ အကောင်အထည် ဖော်နိုင်ရန်အတွက် အောက်ပါ နိုင်ငံရေးဦးတည်ချက် (၆) ရပ်ကို ခိုင်မာစွာ ချမှတ်ထားပါသည်။
(၁) စစ်အာဏာသိမ်းထားမှုကို ဖယ်ရှားပြီး မြန်မာစစ်တပ်၏ နိုင်ငံရေး၌ ပါဝင်နေခြင်းအား အပြီးတိုင် အဆုံးသတ်ရန်
(၂) လက်နက်ကိုင်တပ်ဖွဲ့များအားလုံးကို ဒီမိုကရေစီနည်းကျ ရွေးကောက်တင်မြှောက်ထား သည့် အရပ်သားအစိုးရ၏ စီမံအုပ်ချုပ်မှုအောက်၌ အပြည့်အဝထားရှိရန်
(၃) ၂၀၀၈ ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေကို အပြီးတိုင် ဖျက်သိမ်းရန်နှင့် ယင်းကို ပြန်လည်အသက်သွင်းရန် ကြိုးပမ်းမှုမှန်သမျှကို တိုက်ဖျက်ရန်
(၄) သက်ဆိုင်သူများအားလုံး လက်ခံနိုင်သော ဖက်ဒရယ်နှင့် ဒီမိုကရေစီစနစ်ကို အခြေခံသည့် ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေသစ် ရေးဆွဲပြဋ္ဌာန်းရန်
(၅) ထွက်ပေါ်လာမည့် ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီ ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေနှင့်အညီ ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီ ပြည်ထောင်စုအသစ်အား တည်ဆောက်ရန်
(၆) ပဋိပက္ခအတွင်း မတရားကျူးလွန်ခံရသူများအတွက် တရားမျှတမှုရရှိရေးနှင့် အသွင်ကူးပြောင်း ရေးကာလ တရားမျှတမှု ရရှိရေး လုပ်ငန်းစဉ်များကို ဖော်ဆောင်ရန်
"ဖက်ဒရယ်ဒီမိုကရေစီပြည်ထောင်စုပေါ်ထွန်းရေး ဦးဆောင်ကောင်စီ” အနေဖြင့် လုပ်ငန်းစဉ်များ ဆောင်ရွက်ရာတွင် အချုပ်အခြာအာဏာကို ပြည်နယ်/ဖက်ဒရယ်ယူနစ်များအတွင်း နေထိုင်ကြသော ပြည်သူလူထုက ပိုင်ဆိုင်ကြပြီး ဖက်ဒရယ်နှင့် ပြည်နယ်/ဖက်ဒရယ်ယူနစ် များအကြား "မျှဝေသုံးစွဲသော အချုပ်အခြာအာဏာ (Shared Sovereignty)" မူကို ကိုင်စွဲမည် ဖြစ်ပါသည် ။ နိုင်ငံရေး ဆုံးဖြတ်ချက်များ ချမှတ်ရာတွင် တိုင်းရင်းသားလက်နက်ကိုင်တော်လှန်ရေး အဖွဲ့အစည်းများ (EROs)၊ ဒီမိုကရေစီတော်လှန်ရေးအင်အားစုများ၊ အမျိုးသမီးအစုအဖွဲ့များနှင့် ပြည်သူ့ကိုယ်စားလှယ် များ၏ သဘောထားအမြင်များထင်ဟပ်ပါဝင်သည့် "စုပေါင်းခေါင်းဆောင်မှု (Collective Leadership)" ဖြင့် ဖော်ဆောင်သွားမည် ဖြစ်ပါသည် ။
ကောင်စီဝင်အဖွဲ့အစည်းများအနေဖြင့် မတူကွဲပြားမှုများအပေါ် အပြန်အလှန် လေးစားမှု၊ အပြန်အလှန် အသိအမှတ်ပြုမှုတို့ကိုအခြေခံ၍ “မူဝါဒတရပ်တည်း၊ မဟာဗျူဟာတရပ်တည်း - one policy, one strategy” မူဝါဒကို ချမှတ်ကျင့်သုံး၍ စစ်ရေး၊ နိုင်ငံရေး နှင့် အုပ်ချုပ်ရေး ကဏ္ဍများကို ဟန်ချက်ညီပူးတွဲဖော်ဆောင်ပြီး ပိုမိုကျယ်ပြန်သည့် နိုင်ငံရေးကိုယ်စားပြုမှုဖြစ်အောင် မဟာမိတ် အင်အားစုများ နှင့်ဆက်လက်ပူးပေါင်းညှိနှိုင်း၍ ကျွန်ုပ်တို့၏ ရည်မှန်ချက်ပန်းတိုင်ရောက်အောင် လက်တွဲဆောင်ရွက်သွားမည်ဖြစ်ကြောင်း ကြေညာအပ်ပါသည်။..."
Source/publisher:
National Unity Government of Myanmar
Date of publication:
2026-03-30
Date of entry/update:
2026-03-30
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
National Unity Government (NUG), Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
833.91 KB
Local URL:
more
Description:
"U Aung Lin Dwe, a former general and longtime loyalist of coup leader Min Aung Hlaing, will oversee the selection of the next president and cabinet over the next two weeks after taking office as speaker of the post‑coup Upper House.
The presidential election is due to take place later this month amid widespread rumors within the regime that Min Aung Hlaing intends to secure the role after stepping down as commander‑in‑chief. If he stands, the vote elevating him to the post will be chaired by one of his closest confidants—a clear indication of the trust he places in U Aung Lin Dwe.
That trust has been on display throughout the junta’s five years in power. As secretary of the State Administration Council (SAC), U Aung Lin Dwe signed more than 350 decrees on Min Aung Hlaing’s behalf to ensure the regime’s administrative machinery functioned smoothly.
While the junta chief personally signed key political orders—including the formation of the SAC and its successor, the State Security and Peace Commission—U Aung Lin Dwe handled most other executive directives. These ranged from appointing and dismissing ministers and deputy ministers to installing Central Bank chiefs, declaring martial law, reassigning military officers, and token reduction of jail sentences for democracy leaders U Win Myint and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi .
His central role in the regime’s day‑to‑day governance reflects the depth of Min Aung Hlaing’s reliance on him. U Aung Lin Dwe—then a lieutenant general—was appointed SAC secretary as soon as the junta was formed in 2021. He remained in that post even as other top brass were purged, before being promoted to full general and serving in the restructured State Security and Peace Commission and the Office of the National Defense and Security Council.
Under the 2008 Constitution, the Upper House speaker presides over the presidential election as chair of the Union Parliament. Political observers say this constitutional point is a key reason U Aung Lin Dwe was elevated to speaker, as Min Aung Hlaing is widely expected to assume presidency in the incoming government. Analyst Ko Htin Kyaw Aye noted that U Aung Lin Dwe’s immediate priority is the presidential election.
“He will serve to ensure the process goes smoothly,” he said.
Speculation regarding the junta chief’s intentions intensified after U Khin Yi—previously viewed as a potential presidential contender due to his role as chairman of the military’s proxy Union Solidarity and Development Party—was instead appointed speaker of the Lower House. Meanwhile, Min Aung Hlaing held what observers described as a farewell party among his generals, further reinforcing expectations that he will assume the presidency after stepping down as commander-in-chief—a position he has held for 15 years.
U Aung Lin Dwe, 64, won an Upper House seat on the USDP ticket in Mandalay Region in the junta’s December-January election. During campaigning, he highlighted his experience as commandant of the Defense Services Technological Academy and the Defense Services Academy, as well as his six years as Judge Advocate General. His administrative and legal background is exactly what Min Aung Hlaing needs to ensure his bid for presidency proceeds smoothly in parliament.
U Aung Lin Dwe will serve as speaker of the bicameral parliament for the first half of its five-year term, before the Lower House speaker takes over for the remainder.
His close ties with Min Aung Hlaing predate the coup by decades. The two men have been linked since their days at the Defense Services Academy, where U Aung Lin Dwe served under Min Aung Hlaing when the latter was still a commandant. When Min Aung Hlaing became military chief in 2011, he oversaw his confidant’s steady rise through the ranks — from Western Command chief in 2014 to Judge Advocate General in 2016, and later to SAC secretary after the coup. Military sources say his promotions resulted less from professional merit than unwavering loyalty to Min Aung Hlaing.
His family reaped benefits from his rise. Following his promotion to SAC secretary, three businesses owned by his wife and children—Mingalar Aung Myay Co, Aung Myint Moh Lin Co, and Shwe Yi Phyo Pyae Co.—expanded rapidly, becoming key players in construction and manufacturing. At the same time, his younger sister, Dr. Su Su Dwe, was promoted from medical superintendent of Mandalay General Hospital to director‑general of the Traditional Medicine Department.
Analysts note that as leader of the rubberstamp parliament, U Aung Lin Dwe is unlikely to prioritize the public interest. Instead, they expect him to continue advancing the interests of Min Aung Hlaing and his own family, just as he did throughout the junta’s five years in power..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2026-03-20
Date of entry/update:
2026-03-20
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
more
Description:
"Abstract:
Myanmar’s rallying cry do ayei (‘our cause’) encodes a structural duality that this article
takes as its organising problem: ayei means both ‘cause’ and ‘inscription.’ Since 1988, the
cause has been claimed repeatedly; the inscription has not followed. No binding compact
co-signed across ethnic lines has emerged from three decades of resistance. The military
understood this gap before the resistance did, capturing do ayei as constitutional obligation
within two years of the 1988 uprising.
This article asks why Burmese resists horizontal political inscription and what building it
would require. Drawing on linguistic analysis of pronouns, verbs, and documentary genres;
a border workshop in which resistance participants attempted to compose horizontal
compact sentences in Burmese; bilingual scoring of twelve constitutional texts spanning
1878 to 2026; and comparative analysis of mid-conflict declarations from the Atlantic
Charter to the Federal Democracy Charter, it identifies six reinforcing impediments, each
expressing a single structural condition in which Burmese political culture defaults to the
individual as the unit of revolutionary agency: sacral confinement of the political domain, a
grammatical default to hierarchy, soteriological orientation inward, the absence of any
sacralizing mechanism for horizontal obligation, systematic co-option of resistance
vocabulary, and a documentary asymmetry that confines compact-making expertise to the
ethnic periphery. Every document in the corpus scores higher in horizontal commitment in
English than in Burmese; the gap measures a structural condition, not a translation
problem.
The article concludes that the drafter’s task is assembly, not recovery: no single Burmese
political term survives stress-testing as genuinely horizontal, but compromised
components can be combined so that the cracks do not align. The ethnic nationality
organizations who have maintained continuous compact-making traditions since 1947
hold the engineering knowledge the Bamar centre lacks. The Burmese case exposes a
precondition Derrida’s (1986) paradox of self-constitution left unexamined: that the
language of a founding declaration can carry a horizontal collective pronoun. When it
cannot, the declaration constitutes not citizens but subjects, and the founding paradox
shifts from political (who authorized the signer?) to material (what did the declaration actually bring into being?). The compact must accomplish what grammar, soteriology, and
revolutionary tradition have not: the constitution of a collective political subject..."
Source/publisher:
Royal Anthropological Institute
Date of publication:
2026-03-04
Date of entry/update:
2026-03-10
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, The Military's political role
Language:
Format :
pdf (84 pages)
Size:
828.84 KB
more
Description:
"Myanmar’s military rulers on Monday released several prominent figures from the elected National League for Democracy (NLD) government they overthrew in 2021, as part of an amnesty for more than 9,000 prisoners.
However, democracy icon Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, President U Win Myint and other NLD leaders remained behind bars as the regime prepares to rebrand in civilian clothing following a widely rejected election.
Monday’s amnesty covered 7,337 political prisoners jailed under the Counter-Terrorism Law, used by the regime to criminalize opposition to its takeover. However, only around 4,000 had been released as of Wednesday evening, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP), which cited tallies from 23 prisons. The junta said it had also dropped cases against 12,487 individuals charged under the same law.
The amnesty for political prisoners came just two weeks before the new military-dominated parliament is due to convene on March 16.
Elected NLD lawmaker U Bo Bo Oo said those freed Monday included senior NLD figures U Min Thu, a former Union Minister, and Dr. Myo Aung, the former Naypyitaw Mayor and an NLD Central Committee member.
The regime had sentenced Dr. Myo Aung to 22 years in prison on multiple charges, including inciting offenses against the state or “public tranquility” and corruption. U Min Thu was also charged under the anti-corruption law.
Two former NLD Yangon Region Ministers also walked free on Monday.
Daw Moe Moe Su Kyi and U Han Tun—Yangon’s former ministers for Immigration and Human Resources and for Agriculture, respectively—were released from Yangon’s Insein Prison, according to local news outlets.
Former Magwe parliament speaker U Tar was also set free, U Bo Bo Oo said.
However, the mass amnesty was no act of goodwill, said Ko Thaik Tun Oo of the Political Prisoners Network Myanmar (PPNM).
“It’s a move by the regime to win acceptance from ASEAN and the wider international community and secure recognition as a legitimate government ahead of the upcoming military-led parliament and administration,” Ko Thaik Tun Oo said.
Several prominent student activists were also released Monday.
They included Ma Su Yee Lin, ex-president of the East Yangon University Students’ Union, who was sentenced to 15 years under the Counter-Terrorism Law. She was freed along with her sister, Ma Su Myat Htet, and their aunt, Daw Ni Moe Hlaing, both jailed under the same law.
Among other student leaders released were Ko Htet Paing Soe, Vice President of the Yangon Economic University Students’ Union, and Ma Nway Yati Soe.
Journalists granted amnesty included Ma Hmu Yadanar Khet Moh Moh Tun, a Myanmar Pressphoto Agency (MPA) videographer who was injured and arrested after a military vehicle rammed an anti-coup rally she was covering in Yangon’s Kyimyintai Township in 2021.
However, the junta attached parole conditions to the mass release, warning that anyone who reoffends will have to serve out their original sentence on top of any new penalties.
It also announced the release and deportation of 10 foreigners on Monday.
Of the 30,538 people arrested by the military regime, 22,818 remain in jail, according to the AAPP. They include the 80-year-old Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, who was sentenced to 27 years in prison..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2026-03-03
Date of entry/update:
2026-03-03
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Political prisoners and other violations in Burma - reports, Human Rights Defenders, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
more
Description:
"Myanmar junta chief Min Aung Hlaing is fond of bestowing titles on loyalists and receiving honors from allies—but he also has a habit of awarding prestigious titles on himself.
As well as the six decorations he received before the coup—including honors from Thailand and Malaysia—the senior general has amassed at least 12 titles. That makes him the most heavily decorated military dictator in Myanmar’s modern history.
The most recent vanity honor came on February 5, when Yangon University handed him an Honorary Doctorate in Public Administration. Education Minister Chaw Chaw Sein said the degree was awarded in recognition of his “successful” management of challenges during the country’s transitional period, including the recent election.
“Awarding him a title for ‘managing’ the country is absurd. People in Myanmar and around the world know Min Aung Hlaing as the man who led the country to ruin—economically, socially, politically, and in every other way,” said Daw Hnin Hnin Mway, general secretary of the Democratic Party for a New Society (DPNS), which boycotted the election.
Chaw Chaw Sein presented the award to her boss in person, months after being promoted as education minister by Min Aung Hlaing last July. The “successful election” she mentioned was in reality a staggered vote held in three phases, as large parts of the country remained beyond junta control. Staged five years after the military ousted the elected National League for Democracy and jailed its leaders including Aung San Suu Kyi, the poll recorded the lowest turnout of the four elections held since 2010.
A year after leading the coup, Min Aung Hlaing awarded himself two high-ranking national titles: the Thadoe Thiri Thudhamma, for “exceptional service to the nation,” and the Thadoe Maha Thray Sithu, awarded for “outstanding efforts to realize the Union.”
His “service to the nation” was to deprive Myanmar of years of democratic and economic progress after decades of isolation under military rule. His supposed “efforts to realize the Union,” meanwhile, take the form of military attacks on ethnic civilians—non-military targets—that continue to this day.
The junta chief has also bestowed honorary titles upon his wife, close cronies, loyal ethnic leaders, and even deceased artists. In doing so, he ignored Article 205 of the Constitution, the which stipulates that authority to confer national titles belongs solely to the country’s president. Myint Swe held the position of acting president at the time, but Min Aung Hlaing signed off on these awards—including his own—in his capacity as the chairman of the State Administration Council (junta chief).....
Awards from Russia.....Russia’s military academy awarded Min Aung Hlaing an Honorary Professorship in 2021 as reward for strengthening ties with Moscow following the coup.
In 2023, he was bestowed an honorary doctorate for his “humanitarian work”, along with other titles. His major humanitarian legacy is the 3.6 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) currently fleeing conflict across the country.....Honors from Thailand and Malaysia.....Min Aung Hlaing received three titles from Thailand and Malaysia before staging the coup in 2021. However, international human rights groups urged Malaysia to revoke his honors in 2018 following the Rohingya genocide. Min Aung Hlaing now faces international arrest warrants for overseeing the ethnic cleansing in Rakhine State.
At home, the nationalist Young Men’s Buddhist Association (YMBA) also awarded him three titles in 2019 and 2020.
As his collection of medals and honors continues to grow—a reflection of self-aggrandizement and quest for legitimacy—Min Aung Hlaing has overseen five years of economic collapse, with record price surges for basic commodities, gold and the US dollar. Meanwhile, the rule of law has deteriorated so severely that many are questioning whether it exists at all..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2026-02-19
Date of entry/update:
2026-02-19
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
more
Description:
"Today marks the fourth anniversary of the military coup in Myanmar, The Border Consortium (TBC) stands in solidarity with civil society, humanitarian workers, and activists who continue to work tirelessly for a peaceful, just, and inclusive future for the people of Myanmar.
Since the coup in February 2021, the illegitimate military regime has inflicted immense suffering on the people of Myanmar and widespread crimes against humanity. Over 6,100 civilians have been killed and more than 28,000 individuals have been arbitrarily arrested. Indiscriminate aerial attacks have destroyed schools, hospitals, and places of worship, tearing apart communities and depriving civilians of basic safety and dignity.
TBC reaffirms our commitment to supporting displaced communities on both sides of the Thai-Myanmar border. We embody resistance humanitarianism, not only addressing the immediate needs of those displaced but also by challenging the root causes of this crisis, the illegitimate military regime.
For refugees in Thailand, many of whom have spent more than four decades in displacement, we continue to advocate for durable solutions that uphold their rights to security, protection, and development. In Myanmar, together with our partners, we will continue to provide emergency humanitarian aid and focus on the pursuit of human security and long-term stability for these communities.
Today, we call upon the international community to renew its commitment to Myanmar. Funding for Myanmar is at an all-time low, and there exists real risks that due to funding pressures displaced communities may not receive the assistance they need. The needs of Myanmar’s displaced communities cannot be forgotten.
TBC stands united with the people of Myanmar in their struggle for freedom, justice, and peace. Together, we will build a better future for all..."
Source/publisher:
The Border Consortium (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2025-02-01
Date of entry/update:
2025-02-01
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Human Rights and international relations, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Articles on the TB[B]C
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
567.02 KB
more
Sub-title:
The junta still holds a third of Myanmar, and two-thirds of the population, but misrule has left the regime broke.
Description:
"Myanmar’s military approaches the fourth anniversary of the coup d’etat that put them in power in terminal decline.
The economy continues to atrophy, with even more pronounced energy shortages, less foreign exchange, and an even larger share of the budget allocated to the military.
The battlefield losses are staggering, as the opposition has withstood Chinese pressure to stop their offensives, and continues to hand the over-stretched military defeat after defeat. Opposition forces now control two of the 14 military regional commands.
According to the National Unity Government (NUG) Ministry of Defense, the opposition is in full control of 95 of 330 townships, while the State Administrative Council (SAC), as the junta calls itself, had full control over 107 townships.
By the junta’s own admission, they are only able to conduct a census and safely organize elections in 161 of Myanmar’s 330 townships.
Losses on all battlefronts
Having taken 15 of 17 townships in Rakhine state, the Arakan Army is now in almost total control of the key western state. They’ve surrounded the Rakhine capital of Sittwe and come up to the border of Kyaukphyu where China’s special economic zone and port are located.
Although the capture of Buthidaung and Ann were neither quick nor easy, the AA was able to sustain sieges of over a month at each, and in the case of the former, tunneled beneath the last military outpost in a stunning display of grit.
Having captured the southern city of Gwa, the Arakan Army has now crossed into Ayeyarwaddy, taking the fight into the Bamar ethnic majority heartland.
In the north, the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) has shrugged off extensive Chinese pressure, and taken the strategic junction town of Mansi, which will make the overland resupply of the besieged city of Bhamo from Mandalay very hard for the junta.
Fighting is ongoing in Bhamo, Kachin’s second largest city. The KIA is now in control of well over half of Kachin, including most of the resource rich regions.
Although they are known for fractiousness, Chin opposition forces are now in almost full control of that state that borders India and Bangladesh, holding five of nine townships, roughly 85% of the territory.
In Shan state, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) and the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) temporarily succumbed to Chinese pressure to stop their offensive in November, but they’ve neither surrendered Lashio nor ceded territory, despite airstrikes.
Citing a new military offensive in Naungcho township, the TNLA, which controls nine townships, announced an end to the ceasefire on Jan. 9.
In eastern Myanmar, Karenni resistance have continued to battle, despite concerted military regime efforts and airstrikes, and their acknowledged ammunition shortages. The Karenni National Defense Force and allied People’s Defense Forces (PDFs) militias claim to control 80% of Kayah state.
Further south, the Karen National Liberation Army and allied people’s defense forces (PDFs) are slowly taking pro-junta border guard posts along the frontier with Thailand.
In Tanintharyi, local PDFs have increased their coordination and are pushing west from the Thai border towards the Andaman Sea coast, diminishing the scope of the military-controlled patchwork of terrain in Myanmar’s southernmost state.
Some of the most intense fighting of late has been in the Bamar heartland, including Sagaing, Magway, and Mandalay.
The military has stepped up their bombings, artillery strikes, and arson, intentionally targeting civilians for their support of the opposition forces. A number of PDFs have expanded their operations into the dry zone.
Mounting troubles
The Myanmar military regime faces severe headwinds as the fourth anniversary of the Feb. 1, 2021 coup approaches.
Prisoners of war from multiple fronts have recounted that the military’s ability to resupply and reinforce troops in the field has all but broken down.
They have a limited number of heavy lift helicopters, including three new Mi-17s that entered service in December. But even those are vulnerable: Some six Mi-17s and two other helicopters have been lost since the coup.
In some cases, the military has tried to parachute in supplies, but those often fall into the hands of the opposition forces.
Nothing demoralizes troops more than the feeling that the headquarters has abandoned them.
The military has always treated Myanmar as a country under occupation, with thousands of remote outposts scattered throughout the country. The NUG claims that opposition forces have captured 741 of these through 2024, and they continue to fall.
The military is increasingly short of manpower. Over a thousand POWs have been taken in recent months, more have surrendered and others have deserted.
The military has now taken in nine tranches of conscripts, amounting to roughly 45,000 troops, and is increasingly dragooning men. But they are deployed almost immediately and are untrained and poorly motivated, in sharp contrast with ethnic resistance organizations (EROs) and PDFs.
That loss of manpower includes senior officers. The NUG claims that in 2024, 53 senior officers, ranked colonel to major general, were killed, captured or injured.
The military is so broke that they recently announced that they would no longer pay death benefits to conscripts. At the same time, the military is often labeling their dead as “MIA”, rather than “KIA”, to avoid paying benefits.
While the junta fumbles, the degree of tactical battlefield coordination between the legacy ethnic armies and the new PDFs is unprecedented.
Every major offensive outside of Rakhine, entails cooperation between them, and even there, the AA was assisted by Chin PDFs who blocked the military’s resupply from Magway.
The increased PDF operations have been made possible by increased assistance from EROs. The AA and Chin PDFs are pushing in from the west and assisting local PDFs in the Bamar heartland.
The AA’s foray into Ayeyarwaddy was done in concert with local PDFs. The United Wa State Army appears to be defying China by arming and equipping the Mandalay PDF and others that are operating in Mandalay, Magway, and Sagaing.
In its favor, the military has finally caught up to the opposition and effectively employed unmanned aerial systems down to the tactical level.
These include drones that can drop munitions, kamikaze drones, and those for intelligence gathering or for more accurate targeting of artillery.
This has proven costly for the opposition and impeded some of their offensives. Nonetheless, their deployment of drones has been too little too late, and will not fundamentally alter the battlefield dynamics.
The military continues to use air power. Indeed, they put their fifth and sixth SU-30 imported from Russia and three more FTC-2000Gs imported from China into service in December.
It’s the economy
But air power is primarily used as a punitive weapon against unarmed civilian targets, not in support of ground forces.
For example, the Jan. 9 bombing in Rakhine’s Yanbye township that killed 52, wounded over 40 and destroyed 500 homes, had no military utility.
Finally, the state of the economy is even more precarious given the loss of almost all border crossings..."
Source/publisher:
"Radio Free Asia" (USA)
Date of publication:
2025-01-18
Date of entry/update:
2025-01-18
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
more
Description:
"Myanmar’s junta has invited anti-regime organizations to peace talks since December to discuss a possible general election. Meanwhile, revolutionary groups hope to make military gains during 2025.
The Karenni Nationalities Defence Force (KNDF) is a coalition of armed groups in Karenni State formed after the 2021 coup as part of the broader resistance movement against the regime.
What changes do you expect in 2025?
The regime has been talking about holding elections and calling for ceasefires with revolutionary groups. However, behind this, the generals aim to maintain power and reestablish centralized authority. This is unacceptable to Myanmar’s people, including us. Clashes will continue in 2025 as a solid political foundation is laid down with public support.
What political and administrative systems could guarantee freedom?
It’s difficult to speak for the entire country at the moment. Our primary struggle is to overthrow the dictatorship. Everyone believes it will eventually fall. However, I don’t know what the future will look like for the whole country.
But in Karenni State, I guarantee freedom for everyone. We can choose the path we want and the system our people want by electing a government democratically, separating the three branches of power [the executive, legislative branch and judiciary] and ensuring everyone can move, trade and speak freely. We aim to establish a political platform that allows people to do business freely without government interference.
We have been building this system [in Karenni State], despite the regime’s oppression. We have assumed the responsibilities of a government by providing education and healthcare and protecting the people. This is how we fight for our freedom.
I invite other parts of the country to do the same. Let’s see which area can best deliver freedom and equality. I believe that competing in this way will lead to freedom for the entire country. All leaders, especially those who are pro-democratic, share this view.
How close are you to achieving freedom from the military dictatorship?
We are getting close to achieving nationwide freedom. This largely depends on the unity of our people and leaders. We have exercised different military strategies and approaches. Some areas may achieve liberation faster but it’s not true freedom until the whole country is liberated. Nationwide freedom is crucial.
As long as the regime remains in Naypyitaw, it can regroup its forces to fight in Rakhine, bomb Kokang or attack Karenni anytime.
To achieve true freedom, the country must stand united. The public must continue to assist by providing information and participating in anti-junta campaigns. It is difficult to set a specific timeline for completely dismantling the junta.
As long as our people remain united and our efforts unwavering, we will see progress. In 2025 we are close to achieving our goals.
If we are united militarily and politically, the regime will not be able to hold elections or fight back. The country will be free and liberated if we can continue to pressure the regime by consolidating our gains.
What are your military preparations for 2025?
There have been junta offensives but they have failed to regain 20 percent of the lost territory. They are desperately trying to control the main roads.
We have defeated the junta’s counteroffensives. Depending on our weapons, ammunition and troop numbers, this year we will make strategic decisions about where to attack. We will aim to achieve the best military outcomes in 2025. We also need to install an administrative mechanism and promote socio-economic stability in a balanced way.
Recently, the military has ramped up attacks on civilians, including displacement camps. It has also cut off internet access to disrupt our socio-economic life. We need to respond with resilience.
There are ongoing battles in Kachin, Mandalay and Karen. We have to keep pressuring the regime by working collaboratively. This is how we will achieve victory in 2025.
What is your view on regime calls for elections and peace talks?
I am very skeptical about the possibility of the regime holding elections. Political parties participating said they fear that armed groups will disrupt voting and they will carry weapons in response.
If politicians are holding weapons, the election cannot be free or fair. The parties standing for election will be aligned with the regime, fitting into the general’s political mold. It would be an ugly election.
The regime is calling for peace talks with armed groups but their actions contradict their words. They continue to bomb civilians each day. We are not naive revolutionaries who will lay down our arms and trust the regime’s “sincere” invitations. We have clear reasons and evidence not to trust their invitations.
We also face international pressure. This will not lead to peace talks or negotiations. The best course of action for the generals is to relinquish power and seek asylum in another country..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2025-01-17
Date of entry/update:
2025-01-17
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
more
Description:
"UN Member States should support a resolution to promptly begin formal negotiations of a Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Crimes against Humanity, with the aim of strengthening the international justice framework and vastly reducing safe havens from investigation and prosecution for perpetrators, said Amnesty International today.
The organization’s call comes as the UN General Assembly (UNGA) Sixth Committee meets to debate the agenda item “Crimes against humanity”. The Sixth Committee session is scheduled to last until 22 November.
“The next six weeks present a unique opportunity for the international community to finally make progress on the negotiation and adoption of a convention on crimes against humanity. Such a treaty would open new pathways – desperately needed in today’s world – for ensuring justice, truth and reparation for victims and survivors of some of the most heinous of crimes,” said Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General.
Unlike other crimes under international law, such as genocide and war crimes, there is presently no specific, standalone convention for crimes against humanity. While the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) does outlaw crimes against humanity under international law, a Convention on Crimes Against Humanity, which would be applied by states, would reinforce and strengthen the overall international justice framework, including that of the ICC.
“The Crimes Against Humanity Convention could be a milestone treaty in more ways than one. It would impose obligations on states not only to criminalize and punish crimes against humanity, but also to prevent them, and to cooperate with other states, including through mutual legal assistance,” said Agnès Callamard.
The next six weeks present a unique opportunity for the international community to finally make progress on the negotiation and adoption of a convention on crimes against humanity.
Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General
“The new convention would bring much-needed improvement of international standards on gender justice, including by recognizing gender-based crimes that have received far too little international attention, such as gender apartheid, forced marriage and forced abortion. It is well past time for an international law that’s fit to address the age-old war being waged on women, girls and LGBTI people in many corners of our planet.”
“A convention on crimes against humanity would make it much harder for perpetrators to escape justice. For instance, the present draft includes provisions for universal jurisdiction for all crimes covered. It would obligate states to either prosecute or extradite any suspects within their reach – regardless of where the crime was committed or the nationality of the suspect or the victim – and enable domestic courts to take up cases, including those that the International Criminal Court is unable or unwilling to pursue.”
Crimes against humanity are a worldwide phenomenon. In the past 10 years alone, Amnesty International has found evidence of such crimes in at least 18 countries all over the planet.
“No region on earth is free from these atrocities that deeply shock the conscience of humanity. Recent and ongoing situations in countries such as Afghanistan, China, Ethiopia, Iran, Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Myanmar, Nicaragua, the Philippines, Syria, Ukraine and Venezuela serve as constant reminders of the urgent need to reinforce the international justice system,” said Agnès Callamard..."
Source/publisher:
Amnesty International (UK)
Date of publication:
2024-10-09
Date of entry/update:
2024-10-09
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Crimes Against Humanity
Language:
more
Description:
"1. Introduction
The current human rights and security situation in Southeast Burma (Myanmar) has been in crisis since the 2021 military coup due to an escalation of armed conflict and increasing human rights violations committed by the State Administration Council (SAC). The SAC has targeted and attacked anyone who opposes the regime, including peaceful protestors, pro-democracy activists, members of the Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM), local rights organisations, and civil society. Since the 2021 coup, Human Rights Defenders (HRDs) and their family members have been arbitrarily arrested and detained, tortured, forcibly disappeared, and killed, with total impunity. Whilst the gravity of threats and lack of protection has forced HRDs in Southeast Burma to adapt their activism and protection strategies, their work remains active and essential, and in increased need of protection and recognition.
This briefing paper analyses the threats and challenges that HRDs have faced in locally-defined Karen State since the 2021 coup (until June 2024). The first section gives an overview of the history of violence and oppression against HRDs. The second section provides evidence of attacks and violence faced by HRDs and their families, including anyone perceived to be defending human rights: namely torture and killings; arbitrary arrest and detention; restrictions on freedom of movement; surveillance and digital threats; risks related to the armed conflict; and threats faced by women human rights defenders. It also shows how those threats have changed since the 2021 coup; the impacts of such threats; and how HRDs have adapted. The third section presents a security and legal analysis of the situation. The paper concludes with a set of policy recommendations provided for regional and international stakeholders..."
Source/publisher:
Karen Human Rights Group
Date of publication:
2024-09-30
Date of entry/update:
2024-09-30
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
2.97 MB
more
Description:
"In Myanmar, the Shelter/NFI/CCCM Cluster was activated in January 2013. By March 2013, the Shelter/NFI/CCCM Cluster became operational in Kachin and Shan (North) States. Currently 3 Camp Management Agencies undertake substantial work for the Shelter/NFI/CCCM Cluster: data collection, coordination, monitoring of services, community mobilization and capacity building across camps that house over 107,600 IDPs. The objective of the Shelter/NFI/CCCM Cluster remains to ensure all of the priority camps, camps that contain the majority of IDPs, have a dedicated Camp Management Agency, delivering coordinated assistance in line with the rights and needs of the displaced and where possible preparing them for life after displacement..."
Source/publisher:
CCCM Cluster, Shelter Cluster, UN High Commissioner for Refugees via Reliefweb (New York)
Date of publication:
2024-09-24
Date of entry/update:
2024-09-25
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
442.97 KB
more
Description:
"Since early 2024, fighting in northern Rakhine state has led to the worst attacks on the Rohingya population since 2017, when Myanmar’s military drove more than 750,000 across the border into Bangladesh. The new attacks are a stark reminder of the Rohingyas’ vulnerability. The world has known about their plight for decades, and in 2024, only 636,000 Rohingya — or 23 percent of the 2.8 million Rohingya around the world — still live in their homeland, Myanmar.
Since early 2024, fighting in northern Rakhine state has led to the worst attacks on the Rohingya population since 2017, when Myanmar’s military drove more than 750,000 across the border into Bangladesh. The new attacks are a stark reminder of the Rohingyas’ vulnerability. The world has known about their plight for decades, and in 2024, only 636,000 Rohingya — or 23 percent of the 2.8 million Rohingya around the world — still live in their homeland, Myanmar.
These figures are from a new report by Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières, or MSF) on the global Rohingya community. Behind the Wire offers an alarming illustration of the devastating impact of prolonged discrimination and persecution on the entire group. This persecution intensified in the 1980s when Myanmar’s military regime deliberately rendered the Rohingya stateless. Since then, their statelessness has been passed down from one generation to the next. The majority of Rohingya children are now born outside Myanmar and have never known their homeland. By the end of this decade, only one in five will be born in Myanmar.
The four countries where most exiled Rohingya now live are Bangladesh, with 1.1 million; Pakistan, with 400,000; Saudi Arabia, with 340,000; and Malaysia, with 210,000.
MSF estimates that only one percent of the total Rohingya population has managed to obtain a passport, citizenship or resettlement in a country where they have no fear of arrest and abuse. Most others are contained or marginalized by harmful policies that deny them basic human rights and self-determination, both in Myanmar and elsewhere. Fifty-seven percent live in barbed-wire-fenced camps in Bangladesh and Myanmar, or in closed villages in Myanmar where apartheid-like conditions are the norm.
While most international attention focuses on the Rohingya in Myanmar and Bangladesh, the overall situation of the 2.8 million Rohingya has been deteriorating, says MSF, negatively impacting the community’s ability to cope with the consequences of exclusion from citizenship and a place in the world. There is no credible international dialogue underway that addresses the Rohingya as a people scattered around the world. International attention tends to focus on immediate humanitarian and conflict-related crises and, as MSF points out, broader perspectives are largely ignored.
Of course, the current crises in Arakan and Bangladesh do deserve full attention, but they should be considered part of the search for comprehensive solutions for the entire group.
The Current Crisis in Arakan
Military forces of the State Administration Council (SAC) — Myanmar’s illegitimate regime — are gradually retreating from Rakhine (or Arakan as it is increasingly called). With most of Arakan under control of the Arakan Army (AA), the key question is how to achieve the kind of stability needed to ensure that all Arakan’speoplecan live in peace and harmony and lead safe and productive lives. Shifting from military control to civilian governance is always a tall order, but in the case of Arakan, trust between its two main communities, the Rakhine and the Rohingya, has suffered serious setbacks since the start of the AA’s current campaign in November 2023, making this transition even more difficult.
Although the SAC is losing the war in Arakan, it has won an important battle. It has successfully employed its tried-and-tested divide-and-rule strategy, not only deepening the divide between the Arakan and Rohingya communities, but also creating a split that has brought some Rohingya armed groups to the SAC’s side. Both the AA and SAC have increased their recruitment of Rohingya fighters. In both cases, reports indicate that many have been forcibly recruited, particularly by Rohingya militias aligned with the SAC.
Although the SAC is losing the war in Arakan, it has won an important battle.
These militias — Arakan Rohingya Army (ARA), Rohingya Solidarity Organization (RSO) and Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) — have long been unpopular with most Rohingya. Earlier this year, as the war in northern Arakan escalated, it became abundantly clear that the militias worked closely with the SAC to forcibly recruit young Rohingya from the camps in Bangladesh and traffic them into the hands of the military regime. Some sources say that as many as 2,000 crossed the border into Myanmar. It is highly unlikely that this could have been done without the knowledge of senior officials in Bangladesh.
Tragically, Rohingya have been forced to fight on both sides of the conflict. This complicated and brutal warfare has contributed significantly to the thick fog of war in northern Arakan. Many individuals have provided information and evidence to help piece together a complex conflict puzzle, sometimes at great personal risk. Their efforts must be acknowledged. However, as of mid-September, none of the conflict parties (SAC, AA, RSO, ARA and ARSA) has released information about the number of fatalities or wounded.
At the same time, civilian casualties are said to be high, which would be consistent with reports from other parts of Myanmar, showing shocking disregard for the laws of war and humanitarian law. The willful destruction of entire villages and towns, critical infrastructure and the targeting of schools, clinics and houses of worship demonstrate a total lack of respect for human life.
Serious allegations have been lodged against all parties, but verification has been problematic mostly due to the lack of independent access to conflict areas. A truth deficit remains, and an independent assessment mission will be necessary to obtain a more complete picture of what happened since early 2024, particularly in Maungdaw and Buthidaung townships.
To establish a credible record, the cooperation of all conflict parties will be needed. Moreover, an independent mission should examine the impact of violent conflict on all ethnic communities in Arakan. While the Rohingya are the largest population group in northern Arakan, there are many others, such as the Rakhine, Hindus, Maramagyi, Mro, Thet and Kaman. Amid the flood of information coming out of northern Arakan, details about the impact of conflict on some of these groups have been scant.
With most of Arakan now under AA’s military control, its civilian branch, the United League of Arakan (ULA), may soon have an opportunity to share proposals to operationalize what the group calls “The Way of Rakhita,” its, until now, fairly vague vision for a future Arakan. In an interview with The Diplomat in early September, AA commander Twan Mrat Naing said, “We are always in favor of repatriation [of Rohingya Muslims] in principle, and there should be voluntary, dignified and safe repatriation under conducive conditions.” That is a welcome statement, but it remains to be seen what specific proposals the ULA will present. Will they envisage an inclusive Arakan, one where all ethnic communities can find a place they can call home, based on equality and respect? One thing is clear: without dismantling the apartheid system — put in place by successive regimes — genuine progress will remain out of reach.
It is important to acknowledge that for decades, the Rohingya have borne the brunt of violence and oppression in Arakan. However, the justifiable fears and grievances of all other communities must also be recognized and addressed. Without dialogue and understanding among all groups, progress will be limited.
Equally, it must be clear that there are no quick fixes. Arakan has multiple crises: a security crisis, an economic and development crisis, and a human rights crisis. Much of the state’s critical infrastructure has been destroyed, while outward flight has depleted essential human resources in critical sectors, including agriculture. Food security is no longer guaranteed, the toll on all ethnic communities is significant and the destruction of entire villages and livelihoods has led to incalculable economic damage. The United Nations reports that 533,000 people in Arakan are now displaced, while many others have fled.
Given the enormous destruction of human and economic capital, a long-term recovery plan will be needed—one that addresses not only the economy but also the restoration of inter-communal relations, including a transitional justice plan. Discussions about transitional justice are always difficult, particularly when suffering continues. Reconciliation cannot succeed unless all are prepared to listen to others’ fears and grievances. Postponing dialogue risks making matters worse.
In the case of the Rohingya, the all-important issue of citizenship will be high on the agenda, and in addition, freedom of movement will also be critically important. The lack of freedom of movement infringes on many other rights, including access to livelihoods, education, health care and religious worship. In other words, addressing lack of freedom of movement paves the way for the enjoyment of many other rights.
The Current Crisis in Bangladesh
For Rohingya in refugee camps in Bangladesh, 2024 has been an exceedingly difficult year. With the violence and insecurity in camps increasing and enforced abductions leaving behind terrified families of hundreds of young men, trauma is widespread, and hope has dimmed.
Given the major destruction and displacement in Arakan, the immediate returns of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh will not be possible. However, Bangladesh, Arakan’s leadership and the Rohingya should start discussions about how returns might ultimately take place. Fostering hope is critical, as is ensuring that Rohingya repatriation becomes part of Arakan’s longer-term recovery plan. In this context, the recent statement by Bangladesh’s head of government, Mohammed Yunus, is encouraging. He pledged continued support for the Rohingya and their “eventual repatriation to their homeland, Myanmar, with safety, dignity and full rights.”
To improve the situation in the camps near Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh and its international partners should consider enabling greater freedom of movement, improving access to livelihoods, allowing the use of sturdier building materials and providing education to all Rohingya children and young people in the camps. There could hardly be a greater gift from Bangladesh to Arakan than the education of young Rohingya.
Additionally, there is one immediate recommendation for Bangladesh. It would be an act of great humanity and neighborliness to facilitate the establishment of a humanitarian corridor into Maungdaw district. Reducing the severe shortages of humanitarian supplies in Arakan would not only directly aid all communities but also significantly contribute to stabilizing the current situation.
Looking Ahead
Even though bilateral relations are important for addressing issues between immediate neighbors like Bangladesh and Myanmar, the insistence on a state-centric approach — one that dictates that faraway Naypyidaw should be the entry point for all contacts between states — has increasingly lost relevance.
The AA’s de facto territorial control demands greater pragmatism in the conduct of interstate relations. Myanmar’s western neighbors should begin to accept this reality and reach out to Arakan’s leadership, particularly to the United League of Arakan (ULA), the civilian arm of the Arakan Army. The SAC regime in Myanmar’s capital, Naypyidaw, is not only far from Arakan but has also lost control over much of Myanmar. Pragmatism is particularly urgent to ensure immediate humanitarian access and assistance.
At the same time, important questions about atrocities committed in Arakan remain, particularly in Buthidaung and Maungdaw. ULA/AA’s willingness to cooperate with an independent investigation might help to overcome the understandable reluctance of key players.
Another major issue is the future of the Rohingya as a people. As the new MSF report shows, the situation of most Rohingya around the world is deeply troubling. Limiting responses to mostly short-term humanitarian issues while ignoring the longer-term plight of a community of 2.8 million has been a failure of the international community. A new initiative is needed — one that addresses the Rohingya community as a whole, focusing on improving their immediate needs as well as their future. Obviously, highly sensitive issues will have to be addressed. One of these, mentioned by MSF, could be the acceptance that not all Rohingya will return to Arakan, particularly descendants of older generations who left 20 to 40 years ago and have never seen their homeland. But such questions can only be addressed as part of a comprehensive effort to do justice to the Rohingya people and their plight.
A new comprehensive effort could be based on the Global Compact on Refugees, which represents the political will and ambition of the international community for strengthened cooperation and solidarity with refugees and affected home countries. It is based on four principles: (i) enhancing refugee self-reliance, (ii) easing pressure on host countries, (iii) supporting conditions in countries of origin and (iv) expanding access to refugees’ countries of origin..."
Source/publisher:
United States Institute of Peace
Date of publication:
2024-09-25
Date of entry/update:
2024-09-25
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Arakan (Rakhine) State - reports etc. by date (latest first), Discrimination against the Rohingya, Burmese refugees in Bangladesh
Language:
more
Description:
"Jakarta, 23 September 2024—The ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights (APHR) strongly condemns the executions of two Myanmar pro-democracy activists by the State Administration Council (SAC) today and expresses its deepest condolences to the families and friends for the loss of their beloved ones.
Kaung Htet and his wife Chan Myae Thu were executed at 04:00 AM Myanmar time on 23 September 2024 for alleged involvement in Yangon’s Insein Prison bombing on October 19, 2022.
“Break the silence now,“ said Mercy Chriesty Barends, APHR Chairperson and member of Indonesia’s House of Representatives. “ASEAN foreign ministers must speak up against the SAC execution policy.”
The junta military arrested the couple and sentenced them to death for their alleged involvement without due process and fair trial. Chan Myae Thu is the first woman who was executed since the military coup in February 2021, according to the Women’s Peace Network.
“We are gravely concerned that the death penalty is being used to silence persons with dissenting views in Myanmar,” said Arlene D. Brosas, APHR Board Member and the Philippines Member of Parliament.
APHR has received a report from a reliable source that the SAC will execute five other pro-democracy activists on 24 September 2024. They are Zaryaw Phyo (32), San Min Aung (24), Kyaw Win Soe (33), Kaung Pyae Sone Oo (27) and Myat Phyo Pwint (unknown).
The five activists were sentenced to death on 18 May 2023 in a closed-door civilian hearing at Yangon’s Insein Prison for their alleged participation in a shooting on a train in 2021. APHR was informed that they were brutally tortured and experienced sexual violence without any access to reliable legal support.
“This must stop,” said Charles Santiago, APHR co-chairperson and former Malaysian parliament member. He further said, “ASEAN foreign ministers must denounce such an unjust act. They must be united to push the SAC to terminate their execution and release them from prison.”
The Myanmar junta military will execute over 120 detainees in the coming weeks, who are mostly activists and human rights defenders. Fifteen of them are women human rights defenders.
APHR urges the international community to hold the SAC accountable for the arbitrary arrest and detention of over 27,000 people, as well as its commission of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide, as a fundamental step toward ending impunity in Myanmar..."
Source/publisher:
ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights
Date of publication:
2024-09-23
Date of entry/update:
2024-09-23
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"Geneva, 23 September 2024 – The Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar is closely monitoring reports of planned executions of persons sentenced to death in non-public trials.
According to information received by the Mechanism, executions may be imminent for several individuals who were sentenced to death during closed-door hearings in Yangon’s Insein Prison in 2023.
Imposing a death sentence, or even a period of detention, on the basis of proceedings that do not satisfy the basic requirements of a fair trial may constitute one or more crimes against humanity or war crimes.
One of the most fundamental attributes of a fair trial is that it be held in public unless there are compelling national security reasons. When proceedings are not public, this casts doubt on whether other fair trial guarantees have been respected, such as the requirement that the tribunal was impartial and independent. Imposing a prison or death sentence in such circumstances could constitute crimes against humanity or war crimes.
The Mechanism is monitoring and collecting information on the cases against these individuals and others that involve the imposition of the death penalty in circumstances that might violate fundamental fair trial guarantees.
The Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar (IIMM or Mechanism) was created by the United Nations Human Rights Council in 2018 to collect and analyse evidence of the most serious international crimes and other violations of international law committed in Myanmar since 2011. It aims to facilitate justice and accountability by preserving and organizing this evidence and preparing case files that can be used by authorities to prosecute individuals in national, regional and international courts..."
Source/publisher:
UN Human Rights Council (Geneva) via "Reliefweb" (New York)
Date of publication:
2024-09-23
Date of entry/update:
2024-09-23
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Human Rights and international relations, Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
84.57 KB
more
Description:
"Human Rights Violations took place in States and Regions from Sep 8 to 14, 2024
Military Junta Troop launched airstrikes and dropped bombs in the Magway Region, Shan State, Kachin State, and Rakhine State from September 8th to 14th. Military Junta arrested the civilians as human shields from Mindon Township, Magway Region, and Salingyi Township, Sagaing Region. Military Junta also committed a massacre by killing over 30 civilians in Hpakant Township, Kachin State. The Military Junta arrested the civilians from Ayeyarwady Region and Bago Region for the Military Service.
Over 30 civilians died, and over 10 were injured by the Military’s heavy and light artillery attacks within a week. Over 50 civilians were arrested by the Military Junta within a week..."
Source/publisher:
Network for Human Rights Documentation-Burma
Date of publication:
2024-09-20
Date of entry/update:
2024-09-20
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Human Rights and international relations, Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf pdf pdf
Size:
1.33 MB 1.58 MB 102.79 KB
more
Description:
"An American currently fighting for the revolution in Myanmar discusses the avoidance of ethnic and political schisms, the decentralisation of guerilla combat, the confusions generated by counter-insurrection, and the complex geopolitical dynamics at play
~ Azad, intrerviewed by Ill Will ~
Ill Will: How did a civil protest movement using the tactics and strategies of the black bloc and rock throwing evolve to become a domestic insurgency? How does this process compare to the 1988 civil war which, at first glance, seemed to proceed along similar lines?
Azad: Before responding to the questions of the comrades, I would like to first address certain realities about the revolution in Myanmar that I believe are important for the full understanding of the situation. The current revolution, spurred from a nationwide rebuke of the sudden assumption of power by the military, has proceeded along many separate and contradictory lines. I think it is important to frame these developments in the language of diversity and flowering, rather than of fracturing or inconsistency.
Myanmar is a state formed within colonial boundaries. As a result, it is the common nation of a dozen-plus ethnicities in addition to the Burmese people. The progression from independence to ‘Burmese Socialism’ has long been complicated, and democratic rule here has always stood on shaky ground.
As I write this, the state is now confronted by over a hundred different armed groups. Some of them are as small as a township, while others rival the junta’s army in capability. I have spent 7 months in Chin State with two militias; the PDF Zoland and the Chin National Defense Force (CNDF). These two groups are members of the Chin Brotherhood alliance, itself one of two military blocs within Chin state. In this short 7 months, I have only just begun to understand the local dynamics and conditions of the revolution, to say nothing of regional and national differences. As such, I hope any inaccuracies can be forgiven, and that any insight I can give will be considered a fragment of a more complete analysis of the situation in Myanmar.
Following the Juntas usurpation of power, protests from all sections of society began immediately: not only in the Burmese heartland, but in the urban centers of the ethnic regions as well. In Instagram and Facebook story collections of those who resisted, you can find a progression of the protests reminiscent of a slideshow: at first, reactions of disbelief and outrage at the coup; then, of horror at the use of violence and massacres to repress dissent, followed finally by calls for armed resistance. While initially peaceful, favoring mass marches and general strikes, the dissident movement underwent rapid evolution when faced with bullets and massacres in the streets. Realizing they were confronting an enemy that recognized only violence, armed resistance began in the first month with homemade air-cannons, slingshots, and traditional muzzle-loading hunting rifles. It soon became clear that there were only two choices: between revolution, or surrender to dictatorship. At this point, thousands flocked to the countryside, either joining existing “Ethnic Armed Organizations” (EAOs) that had already been resisting the central Burmese government for decades, or forming their own new resistance organizations.
As resistance swelled in the streets, the now-deposed elected government worked to retain its legitimacy. Only days after the coup, legislators from the National League for Democracy (NLD) — the political party that secured majority control of both houses of the legislature, with help from politicians from other ousted parties, — formed the CRPH, or “Committee representing [the legislature].” The CRPH refused to recognize the authority of the military coup. One month later, the National Unity Consultative Council (NUCC) was formed, a coalition that gathered elements from the nationwide protest movement, the opposition government, and — significantly — eight ethnic armed organizations. The NUCC went on to form the National Unity Government (NUG), widely recognized as the legitimate de jure government of Myanmar.
To return to your question, I think it is a mistake to see this as “1988 but different.” The current moment is the result of a historical current that cannot be explained without the 1988 uprising. The NLD, for example, had its roots in this uprising. Since its inception as a state, there has always been a “pro-democracy” element of Burmese politics and ethnic armed organizations vying for independence or autonomy. However, never have these two elements joined forces like we are seeing today. The 1988 uprising was catalyzed in urban centers and failed to evolve into a national resistance, while today almost all liberated territory is held by the EAOs. Symbolized in the inclusion of EAO representatives in the NUCC and later NUG, the alliance between ethnic fighters seeking autonomy and pro-democracy Burmese society marks a major point of departure from previous cycles of struggle.
It seems like the tables have turned in favor of the revolution? To what do you attribute this? What would winning look like militarily and politically?
For the first time in the revolutionary history of Myanmar, the military is indeed on the backfoot. The Tatmadaw (the armed forces of Myanmar) was historically organized exclusively for the purposes of counter-insurgency, modeled after the brutal colonial repression strategy of the British empire. Through the clever use of ceasefires and autonomy agreements, it has pursued a divide and conquer strategy, isolating EAOs one at a time and destroying them with concentrated force. Before the outbreak of the “Spring revolution” against the dictatorship, the government of Myanmar was party to the NCA or “National Ceasefire Agreement” alongside signatories from ten EAOs.
Now, the situation has changed. Following the overwhelming popular opposition to the Junta and the collaboration of the NUG with the EAOs, almost every organization either withdrew from the ceasefire agreement or was otherwise attacked by the Tatmadaw (in violation of the ceasefire). Instead of having the freedom to amass forces in one section of the country, with no complaints from a largely apathetic Burmese public, the Tatmadaw was now forced to fight everywhere at once against an enemy with virtually unlimited popular support. While clashes began almost immediately following the coup, the junta suffered its first major defeat as a result of Operation 1027, which took its name from the coordinated strike on October 27 2023 by the Three Brotherhood Alliance, an alliance of three major EAOs. In just the first month of the offensive, over 220 junta positions were overrun, triggering a shockwave across the country. This was the first signal that the military regime was too overstretched to defend itself, and gave many around the country the confidence needed to begin their own offensives. As operation 1027 continues, so too do the many regional campaigns that it inspired. Since then, as you have seen, the junta has suffered defeat after defeat.
It seems that the trend will continue. Militarily, each EAO is nearing the liberation of their home states, and as PDF militias under the ostensible command of the NUG fight alongside them, slowly the Tatmadaw is losing its footing in the ethnic regions, all the while facing a guerrilla campaign around the outskirts of cities in the Bamar regions. Plain and simple, the military is losing. The ethnic areas will soon be liberated, the only remaining question being how much of that momentum will carry over into Bamar-majority regions. Many EAOs have stated plainly that in addition to their demands for autonomy, they will continue fighting until the unconditional defeat of the military dictatorship.
At a political level the goal is a bit less defined. Whoever you ask will tell you that we are all fighting for a “Federal Democracy.” What that means in practice has yet to be clearly defined and universally agreed upon, but this is understandable given the nature of the conflict and doesn’t necessarily detract from its validity as a goal.
Have you had support from other countries or international forces? Have the fighters drawn upon connections with insurgents elsewhere?
So far, support from foreign governments has been mostly marginal: recognition of the NUG as the legitimate representative of Myanmar, as well as economic sanctions against those affiliated with the junta. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has been largely non-committal, and the efforts of neighboring nations to mediate the conflict have been mostly ignored. India and China have been incredibly calculating in their relationship to the regime and rebels, overtly continuing their support of the regime while turning a blind eye to the activities of resistance groups conducting business in their own countries. This is especially true when we consider the rate at which the junta has been suffering defeats — it seems many are waiting to see how the conflict will develop before fully committing to a position.
In December 2022, the United States Congress passed the “BURMA Act,” which recognizes the NUG as the legitimate representative of Myanmar and authorizes the use of funds to support “democratic elements.” So far, this is all going through humanitarian avenues. While it isn’t guns and ammo, armed groups who are now ousting the junta from their towns are having to foot the bill for the services provided. NGOs such as USAID are able to cover a portion of that cost, which understandably reduces administrative burden significantly.
I have yet to see serious indications of meaningful connections or examples drawn from other insurgent groups. In the span of a few years, entire armies have been made out of students, teachers, workers, and the former professional class, so the focus has been on the rapid emergency armament of a people and less on the strategic analysis of methods. Many ethnicities in Myanmar have a significant diaspora in the West, and especially in the United States, where participation in the military is more common. As a result, I have seen multiple ethnic Chin from the US with a military background give trainings, and anecdotally I’m told this has happened in other regions as well.
I am aware of various communist and Maoist groups such as the Burmese Communist Party, but am not knowledgeable enough about them to comment as to their inspirations.
What lessons can be taken from the sequence of insurgency, then civil war with guerilla features? How portable is the model that has been adopted? What limits are there to translating the situation to elsewhere?
I don’t think there actually is a model that has been adopted, but rather a progression of developments that are still very much unfolding. The lessons from these are nevertheless tangible. One of the most striking is that unorganized popular resistance can only be so effective in the face of bullets. As we saw in Syria in 2011, unrest can provide the inertia necessary to begin revolution, but it cannot become the revolution in and of itself. In the case of Rojava, it was the People’s Democratic Union (PYD), dormant but organized since 2003, which was able to put the spear into the heart of the Syrian occupation, and subsequently to defend the revolution from attacks by Al-Nusra and ISIS, as well as the fascist Turkish state. Here in Burma, it was the ethnic organizations that have been resisting in the mountains for decades which were able to fight with renewed spirit and support of the people, alongside a shadow government which still holds serious claims to legitimacy.
Still, there is something to be said for the newer groups formed after the coup. These organizations and armies — hewn from nothing but the moral fiber of refusal to live under dictatorship — catalyzed around pre-existing organizational structures that later solidified during the post-coup civil disobedience movement, mostly along regional or ethnic lines.
This is not to say that the role of “the people” isn’t critical, or to imply that the revolution is made by armed vanguards alone. Rather, as revolutionaries of all nations, we should understand the critical role that organization plays. When the moment of intensity and inertia arrives, a prepared revolutionary organization must seize it. If there is no such organization at the time, one must be formed. If one is not formed, the revolution will die.
What is the culture of the fighters? What ties like with locals or other above ground elements of the struggle? Are the guerillas in the jungle isolated, or is there a lot of exchange with civilian elements?
Every ethnic organization has a political and an armed wing. Perhaps in previous times these were of a much more traditional clandestine and “guerilla” nature, but given the current inability of the central government to maintain its grasp on remote areas, these have increasingly become above-ground organizations in and of themselves. The legitimacy gained from affiliation or official relationship with the NUG helps in this regard. While the NUG has a ministry of defense that is doing its best to rally support and raise funds to support the PDFs and various EAOs with whom it has partnered, the fact that it is an exiled government means that local militias are largely responsible for funding their own operations.
This is done through a very organic relationship with the civil population, combined with a well-organized support element in the diaspora. Although the specific numbers vary group by group, roughly 50% of operational funds come from local donations and taxes, and the other 50% from the diaspora. While taxes are levied primarily on commerce vehicles passing through resistance checkpoints, the overwhelming majority of income of these groups is generated via donations from supporters. This is in part due to the nature from which these groups arose. As mentioned earlier, the civil disobedience movement following the coup commanded huge amounts of social power and organizational capital. Professionals and government workers from villages and entire cities walked off the job to join the resistance. It would be imprecise to say that the relationship with the people is “good”; more accurate would be to say that the various defense forces are themselves the people, and likewise that the people see themselves represented in the guerilla.
As to the culture of the fighters, truth be told there is still much to be desired. Imagine you have given a liberal a gun and now they are fighting fascism. They are ready to fight, but there is still a lack of a deep revolutionary perspective in many of the rank and file, and much adherence to the trappings of civil life. In a way, this is to be expected — after all, this is the story of a people in arms, who had their hopes for a peaceful transition to democratic rule snatched from them after the military coup. They had never dreamed of holding a rifle and yet, forced by circumstance and the dignity of the human spirit, they have become revolutionaries. This lack of depth should be understood but criticized; above all, it must be taken into account as a necessary feature of any successful mobilization of a people towards radical ends.
It cannot be said that every group is revolutionary. Indeed, many opportunists, especially in the border regions, have taken advantage of the chaos and formed “militias” which are little more than crime organizations in order to participate in lucrative smuggling, drug trade, or scamming markets. Groups of this nature are, as a rule, either functionally neutral to the conflict, or are tacitly supporting the junta in exchange for taking up space that the rebels cannot operate in. It should be said that these groups make up a very tiny minority, instead representing the unsavory element on the edges of any revolution.
What is the relationship between the various armed groups? Is there a coordinated command? Does this relation reflect any political distinctions, and if so, of what sort?
In Burma there are over a hundred armed groups. If we were to consider only the most significant, this number can be reduced to about a dozen, falling into one of two blocs — EAO or PDF/Bamar militia. Between these there is a complicated web of relationships, some much more collaborative than others. At scale, most groups fundamentally agree on a set of basic principles: first, that the military regime is the common enemy; second, that the fight should continue until the total defeat of the regime; third, among EAOs, that their shared goals of autonomy are working towards more or less the same end; and finally, among all groups, that the establishment of a federal system which removes the historic power of the military from government, and grants autonomous regions an equal footing in a new union, is the ultimate goal.
With this in mind, there is no “national alliance” with a coordinated strategy and logistical pipeline. This is not to say that higher-level cooperation doesn’t exist. Between EAOs especially, there is a high degree of material cooperation in the form of soldiers, training, weapons, and ammo. Sometimes entire units pack up and move across the country to take part in a strategic flashpoint which would help another group, and ultimately the progression of the revolution as a whole. In its own way, this collaboration between groups across religious and ethnic lines is itself a shining example of internationalist solidarity.
The NUG, while officially being the vehicle through which the resistance is coordinated and facilitated, is in practice a power among powers. While the NUG does not officially control as much liberated land as the EAOs by volume, the fact that they retain international legitimacy and the support of the Burmese public is enough to make them a serious unifying element. This balance of power is likely to make itself felt in any federal formation that may occur after the defeat of the dictatorship.
Not to give the skeptics ammunition for their arguments, but of course the sheer number of different groups has given rise to conflict inside and between ethnic groups. This has yet to truly explode into something tragic, but it already has made the fight against the junta more difficult in areas plagued by factionalism. However, these tensions exist mostly along regional or tribal lines, and on the national scale do not pose a threat to the unity of the largest groups who are cooperating to bring down the dictatorship. In general, the political language of every group emphasizes and reinforces the solidarity and friendship between peoples.
We’d like to understand the struggle more historically: what kind of theory or thinkers, past and present, have contributed to the present strategy? Are people reading books or websites?
Among the new wave of groups formed after the 2021 coup — those with which I have the most experience — I cannot say that I have identified any particular tendency. While I have seen individuals in leadership positions reading and studying, this is not in pursuit of a particular line of study rather than a general search for information and solutions, including options that we might not consider to be revolutionary. Social democracy has a particularly strong pull, as the country’s problematic history with “socialism” — in practice, the most absurd dictatorships — has left many sour to the concept. At the same time, the glaring contradictions of dictatorship also causes unease when “capitalism” is mentioned. While there are groups that include a socialist union in their platform, this is not the common tendency of the resistance as a whole. “Federalism” is the only word we can go off of, which includes as varied sources of study as the US and European federal systems and the revolution in Rojava.
The level of political development among the rank and file is low. Especially in the EAOs, many are motivated first of all by feelings of national pride, and only secondarily by an ideological opposition to fascism and dictatorship (though this is not uncommon in even more developed revolutionary movements). Anecdotally, my experience with Bamar comrades has been slightly different: since many come from a student background, it is not uncommon for them to engage in an individual search for more radical methods. Still, I have not noticed any preference towards any particular revolutionary tendency.
Does the current struggle employ the Maoist concepts of a protracted people’s war and urban encirclement?
Many legacy EAOs subscribed in whole or in part to a Maoist theory of guerilla war. However, although the present revolution developed along lines that Mao had identified, it did not emerge through any actual study and application of this theory. The strongholds of the EAOs in remote and mountainous regions provided the perfect springboard that the newly insurgent population needed to rapidly train, organize, and develop. While some groups may still subscribe to Maoist political and military theory, I do not have enough experience with these groups to comment about them.
What is the relationship of the revolution to the Rohingya and other disenfranchised ethnic groups from before the coup?
While there is no monolithic “revolution,” in general all parties have condemned the genocide committed by the military against the Rohingya and called for greater co-operation between ethnic groups. Given the ongoing nature of a tragedy like this one, it is a touchy subject with many elements. Exacerbating existing religious and ethnic tensions, various Islamist Rohingya organizations have allied with the military which just committed genocide against them, and are fighting against the Arakha Army, one of the largest rebel organizations. Now, Junta disinformation mills are capitalizing on the international recognition of the Rohingya genocide, trying to paint the AA as continuing this persecution. Despite evidence being shaky at best, this narrative has even been picked up by mainstream media outlets, causing confusion as to the reality of the situation.
Each region is fighting its own micro-war, with limited strategic coordination between them. Sometimes it can seem like a battle in a neighboring state might as well be happening in another country. The news that you see is the same news everyone else here is reading, so you will learn about complicated events such as hotly contested battles or tragic massacres of civilians at the same time I do. Nobody in the country wants to see the mistreatment of the Rohingya continue, and as a group they are caught in the crossfire without adequate representation. The fact that several Rohingya groups, with foreign support from private individuals in countries like Turkey, are fighting for the Junta only further complicates the situation and adds salt to an already tense relationship.
As for the relationship of the revolution with “other ethnic groups,” I think its safe to say that the revolution is itself comprised of these ethnic groups and that relations are in general friendly.
What are the politics of the insurgency? Western media describe the rebels as “pro-democracy.” From our vantage point, capitalist democracy is not revolutionary. What do the people there want, and how do they speak of it?
I have encountered this sentiment in the majority of comrades with whom I have spoken at any depth about Myanmar. It is true, there exists no mainstream element of the revolution in Myanmar upon which we can project our hopes and aspirations for revolution against the liberal systems we are faced with in the West. Perhaps even out of the mainstream, you would be hard pressed to zoom in on any particular group and highlight them as the example of a revolutionary alternative. That doesn’t change the validity of the struggle the people here are waging against the dictatorship.
I think the question of what a transition to a democratic system would look like was up in the air even before the coup. In any case, the party spearheading the push for democracy, the NLD (itself born in the aftermath of the 1988 uprisings) commands the absolute popular support of the people of Myanmar, across all ethnic and religious lines. The intent was to bloodlessly remove the stranglehold of the military from the government. When the military seized power to stop these proposed changes, the only option left on the table was revolution. It can then be understood why there is not necessarily a universally accepted revolutionary platform, especially when many EAOs had already been resisting the government for decades under a variety of motives.
I cannot speak for the people of Burma, but with their near-unanimous support of the NLD (78% of seats in the lower house, 82% in the upper house), there was a clear base for the uprising against the dictatorship. In such a case, while the future may not be as clear as we’d like it to be, I cannot envision the struggle of an entire people against dictatorship and towards a democratic system described in any way except as revolution. Whether observers will support such a perspective depends largely on their moral facilities. The people certainly perceive themselves as revolutionaries.
Take the example of Palestine. In the current struggle against Israeli occupation, the actual politics of most of the organizations waging the resistance are unquestionably bad. Yet this doesn’t change the fact that their struggle against settler colonialism grants them a certain moral authority and legitimacy. This is what explains the tension many experience in supporting Islamic fascists against occupation, or receiving US support while defending oneself against Turkish imperialism in Rojava. A similar contradiction is at issue here, just as it was in Hong Kong five years ago, where we find would-be neoliberals fighting tooth and nail against dictatorship. In my view — and perhaps this is controversial, who knows — those doing so are deserving of our revolutionary solidarity.
We’re reminded of a text that comrades in France wrote in 2016, where their message to the liberals in the Nuit debout movement was something like, “okay so, how about instead of drafting constitutions now, what if we focus on achieving the insurrection first, then sort this out later?”
Exactly.1
What is at stake geopolitically? How could we map the struggle in Myanmar to what is happening to places like Palestine, Ukraine, Haiti, Rojava, or Sudan? Has there been a circulation of ideas or practices between these places? How might a victory there resonate elsewhere?
China, Russia, and the US are all certainly keeping a very close eye on the developments in Burma. Most tangibly, Russia and the military regime have a two-way transfer of arms and munitions, and Russia forms a very serious component of Tatmadaw military capability in the form of training and equipment repair services. As China tries to improve its naval power, having Myanmar as a close ally allows it an important access point to the sea, avoiding strategic chokepoints. Conversely, the US is looking for any opportunity to create a friendly power on China’s doorstep.
Russia is the only power that will suffer from the defeat of the Junta. Ammunition manufactured in Myanmar is used on the frontlines in Ukraine. China is much more calculating, refusing to take steps necessary to cement the control of the Junta but without yet throwing its weight behind any resistance groups. It keeps its ties to the SAC warm, but turns a blind eye to cross-border resistance activity and mediates ceasefires to protect Chinese interests in areas under insurgent control.
The resistance, the diaspora, and the exiled government have strong roots in the West and especially in the US. However, the official position of the NUG has not been anti-China, and a controversial January 2024 statement pledged to safeguard Chinese interests, including recognizing Chinese sovereignty over Taiwan. While the NUG doesn’t represent every revolutionary group, this balancing act nevertheless gives context to the situation the rebels find themselves in.
Messages of support and solidarity are common both from armed resistance groups as well as civil protestors, especially in politically organized sections of the diaspora. The common throughlines run through Palestine, Rojava, Ukraine, Hong Kong, Taiwan, recently Bangladesh, and elsewhere in the similar vein. As is common in revolutionary movements with a strong diaspora component, there is lots of collaboration and intermingling in the diaspora, but I don’t have the impression that in-country there has been any serious exchange of lessons or practices yet.
A victory in Myanmar would be a victory for resisting peoples everywhere. It sends a simple yet powerful message: a rebellious people with a unified will can overthrow the systems that oppress them. In the first days of the uprising, the common analysis was that the Tatmadaw was so strong as to be militarily undefeatable; yet the people took up arms regardless, if for nothing else than a life lived with dignity. When they did rise up, they found that the giant was not as invulnerable as everyone assumed, and the façade began to crumble rapidly. Victory in Myanmar would be a victory for hope itself, for the idea that victory is possible but not inevitable, depending only on our commitment to struggle and the degree to which we are willing to organize and sacrifice for freedom..."
Source/publisher:
Freedom News (London)
Date of publication:
2024-09-18
Date of entry/update:
2024-09-18
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"GENEVA, Switzerland—The UN on Tuesday provided accounts of horrifying torture and an overall worsening rights situation in Myanmar, amid intensifying hostilities and the absence of rule of law.
“Myanmar is plumbing the depths of the human rights abyss,” said James Rodehaver, head of the United Nations rights office’s Myanmar team.
Speaking to reporters in Geneva, he said the office’s latest report on the situation in the war-torn country had found “massive regressions in human rights that have been provoked by a vacuum of rule of law”.
“Myanmar military has created the crisis by instrumentalizing the legal system, criminalizing nearly all forms of dissent against its attempts to rule the country,” he said.
Myanmar has been in turmoil since the military ousted Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s government and seized power in 2021.
The junta is struggling to crush resistance to its rule by long-established ethnic rebel groups and newer pro-democracy forces.
Since the coup, at least 5,350 civilians have been killed and more than 3.3 million displaced, while nearly 27,4000 people have been arrested, Tuesday’s report said.
“Credible sources indicate that at least 1,853 people have died in custody, including 88 children and 125 women,” rights office spokeswoman Liz Throssell told reporters.
Rodehaver said that since the rights office’s last report on Myanmar was published 15 months ago, the mass arrests had continued and the rights situation had continued to deteriorate.
He voiced particular concern over the “horrific conditions” in detention facilities, where torture and ill-treatment were “pervasive”.
“Detainees interviewed by our office describe methods such as being suspended from the ceiling without food or water, being forced to kneel or crawl on hard or sharp objects, the introduction of animals such as snakes or insects or other wild animals in order to provoke fear and terror in individuals,” he said.
Others, he said, described beatings with iron poles, bamboo sticks, batons, rifle butts, leather strips, electric wires and motorcycle chains.
There were also accounts of “asphyxiation, mock executions, electrocution and burning with tasers, lighters, cigarettes and boiling water”.
“There are truly some of the most depraved behavior utilized as methods of torture in these detention centers,” Rodehaver said, also decrying “extremely disturbing reports … of sexual violence both against male and female detainees”.
The UN rights office stressed the urgent need for those behind the vast array of abuses to be brought to justice.
“The lack of any form of accountability for perpetrators is an enabler for the repetition of violations, abuses and crimes,” Throssell warned.
UN rights chief Volker Turk was once again calling on the UN Security Council to refer the situation in Myanmar to the International Criminal Court, she said..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-09-18
Date of entry/update:
2024-09-18
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Armed conflict in Burma - attacks on civilians
Language:
more
Description:
"An investigation by Justice For Myanmar and Info Birmanie has uncovered damning evidence of Aviation Industry Corporation of China's (AVIC) continued supply of aircraft and weapons to Myanmar's military junta.
The Myanmar military is using AVIC-supplied aircraft to commit war crimes and crimes against humanity against the people of Myanmar with total impunity.
The report “#Airbusted: How Airbus' close partner AVIC is supplying arms to the Myanmar military and what Airbus should do about it” details how AVIC is supplying fighter jets, combat aircraft, and military transport aircraft to the Myanmar military, which are being used in indiscriminate bombings of civilians.
The report includes new details about the recent purchase of FTC 2000G combat aircraft and various missiles.
AVIC also supports the Myanmar Air Force by continuing to provide maintenance, repair, and overhaul services for Chinese fixed-wing aircraft in use by the junta.
French aerospace giant Airbus is a major investor in AVIC's Hong Kong-listed holding company, AviChina Industry and Technology Co. Ltd., and a strategic partner of AVIC in China.
Despite AVIC's clear role in arming Myanmar's brutal junta, Airbus has not only maintained but increased its investment in and collaboration with AVIC-controlled companies. This continues even as other investors have withdrawn due to AviChina’s links to transfers of military aircraft and weapons to the Myanmar junta.
The investigation highlights a stark contradiction between the public statements and private actions of Airbus's key shareholders – the governments of Spain, Germany, and France.
While these governments have publicly condemned the Myanmar military's crimes and committed to stopping arms flows, they appear to be, at least, silent regarding Airbus's continued collaboration with AVIC behind the scenes.
Justice For Myanmar and Info Birmanie demand that Airbus immediately use its leverage to pressure AVIC to cease all collaboration with the Myanmar junta. If AVIC fails to comply, Airbus must responsibly divest from all AVIC-controlled entities.
The governments of Spain, Germany, and France must align their actions with their public commitments by ensuring Airbus acts to cut its links to war crimes in Myanmar.
The people of Myanmar deserve more than empty words. It's time for concrete action to stop the flow of arms and support to the illegal military junta.
Yadanar Maung, spokesperson for Justice For Myanmar, says:
"Airbus has been turning a blind eye to AVIC's dirty deals with the brutal Myanmar military for too long.
"With ongoing credible documentation and reporting at the UN of the human rights crisis in Myanmar, Airbus must have known that its key business partner AVIC is supplying aircraft, weapons and ongoing technical maintenance services to the junta in Myanmar.
"Airbus and its states shareholders must end the flow of arms from AVIC to the genocidal Myanmar military, or ensure Airbus ends it business with AVIC for good.
"How can we take the condemnations of Spain, Germany, and France seriously, if they have investments that sustain the junta in Myanmar?"
Johanna Chardonnieras, coordinator for Info Birmanie, says:
"Multiple tools have been put in place in France, at European and international levels to guarantee corporate responsibility. Our investigation has established serious doubts about Airbus' ability to comply with these tools in the case of the Myanmar conflict.
"Airbus is not an ordinary company, both because operates in the defence sector and because of the identity of its fixed shareholders: governments. The French, Spanish and German governments have a responsibility and a duty to act when Airbus’ partner and investee is linked in war crimes.
"The French, Spanish and German governments, alongside the European Union, have condemned the atrocities committed in Myanmar. Today they have the opportunity to show their capacity for action, in line with their statements, values and sanctions."..."
Source/publisher:
Justice For Myanmar
Date of publication:
2024-09-16
Date of entry/update:
2024-09-16
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Sanctions, Business and the Military
Language:
Format :
pdf pdf pdf
Size:
169.27 KB 142.62 KB 204.2 KB
Local URL:
2024-09-16-J4M_Airbus'-Chinese-partner-AVIC-complicit-in-Myanmar-military’s-international-crimes-en.pdf- 2024-09-16-J4M_Airbus'-Chinese-partner-AVIC-complicit-in-Myanmar-military’s-international-crimes-bu.pdf
- 2024-09-16-J4M_Airbus'-Chinese-partner-AVIC-complicit-in-Myanmar-military’s-international-crimes-french.pdf
more
Description:
"BANGKOK, Thailand (4 September 2024) – The Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development (FORUM-ASIA) condemns the Myanmar military junta’s plan to expand the age limit of its forced conscription policy.
We are calling on the international community to express solidarity with the people of Myanmar.
The junta’s plan to extend the age limit of forced conscription represents its desperate attempt to tighten its grip on power amid its losing streak against the growing pro-democracy resistance movement.
On 25 August 2024, junta leader Senior General Min Aung Hlaing announced plans to introduce a new “security system with public participation,” which required men aged 35 to 60 to serve as guards, with the possibility of being sent to the frontlines of fighting forces.
On 16 August 2024, the junta established the Central Supervisory Committee for People’s Security and Anti-Terrorism to organise a military training. The committee is also tasked to form branch offices at regional, district, and township levels to oversee “people’s security and anti-terrorism” groups.
The junta’s plan follows its forced conscription policy implemented on 10 February 2024. The policy activates the 2010 People’s Military Service Law, mandating men aged 18 to 35 and women aged 18 to 27 to serve two years in the military, with professionals such as doctors and engineers potentially serving up to five years. Those evading service or assisting others to do so face up to five years in prison. The junta planned to conscript 5,000 individuals monthly starting in April 2024.
Civilians used for forced labor and human shields
FORUM-ASIA has condemned the junta’s forced conscription policy. The military has a documented history of using civilians as human shields as well as forcing them into hard labor.
Since the attempted coup in 2021, the military junta continues to impose forced labor and recruitment amidst armed conflict, the International Labour Organization’s Commission of Inquiry found in October 2023.
The military junta is also forcibly abducting and arresting citizens, using them as human shields, according to local news and human rights groups.
Rather than be forced to fight for a war they did not choose, the forced conscription has pushed Myanmar’s youth to flee their homes to join the resistance movement..
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres expressed concern over the reported forced detention and recruitment of Myanmar youth. UN Special Rapporteur on the situation in Myanmar, Tom Andrews, also noted how the junta has been intensifying its assault on civilians–utilizing powerful weapons–following its troop losses and recruitment challenges.
Call to action
FORUM-ASIA calls on the Myanmar military junta to immediately halt its forced conscription policy, abductions, forced labor, and use of civilians as human shields.
“FORUM-ASIA urges the international community, including the UN and ASEAN to thoroughly investigate the Myanmar military junta’s long list of human rights violations. The junta should be held accountable for all its crimes through sanctions and other punitive measures,” said Mary Aileen Diez-Bacalso, Executive Director of FORUM-ASIA.
“The international community must urgently isolate the junta and support the people of Myanmar in their struggle for justice and freedom,” Bacalso added...'
Source/publisher:
FORUM-ASIA
Date of publication:
2024-09-04
Date of entry/update:
2024-09-04
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Title: Evolution of the Myanmar Revolution (Part 3): The Factors That Sparked the Current Revolution
Description:
"One spring morning in 2021, the sky fell: The military was staging another coup. That’s what every citizen felt, as they knew nothing would be the same in their lives or for their nation.
Twenty years earlier, on Sept. 11, 2001, when Islamic terrorists launched their deadly attacks on New York’s World Trade Center in what would become known as the 9/11 attacks, we all witnessed shocking live video of a jetliner flying into the North Tower, followed soon after by another flying into the South Tower. As the towers exploded in fireballs, with smoke pouring from within, followed by their horrifying collapse, it definitely seemed to all as if the sky was falling—especially for the onlookers in lower Manhattan.
On Feb. 1, 2021, when the military seized power in Myanmar, the sky—the whole sky—fell for the Myanmar people. The coup staged by military leader Min Aung Hlaing has inflicted huge damage on the country and devastated the entire population of 55 million.
Since Day One, nothing has been the same for Myanmar’s society, politics and economy. It changed everything—crushing the existing social order, shattering the economy, destroying the livelihoods of the people and forcing the country into a revolution. For the Myanmar people, the coup was “The Attack”, worse than any terrorist attack and different from the coups the country experienced in 1962 and 1988.
A day of hope turns into doomsday
Feb. 1, 2021 began as a day of promise for the country and its people; on that day their newly elected or reelected lawmakers were due to assemble in Parliament and a second five-year term was due to begin for the civilian government first formed in 2016—54 years after the first coup in 1962. Though the civilian government had in its first term faced both expected and unexpected political turbulence as it struggled to negotiate a system designed and manipulation by the military—the military-drafted constitution, the military’s quota of 25 percent of seats in Parliament, military-appointed ministerial positions in the government, the obstructions of a military-backed party, and the conservative military leaders themselves—the coming term, many believed, would further the country’s political transition toward democracy, autonomy for ethnic states and economic growth.
By the time the sun rose, however, the coup had crushed the expectations, held by the entire population, that their country was heading in the right direction thanks to the result of the votes they cast less than three months earlier. The coup leader, Min Aung Hlaing, tried to justify his takeover by claiming that the election was fraudulent—a claim rejected by the majority of Myanmar people as well as independent international electoral observers. The putsch was not the first; multiple generations have been affected by the military’s repeated deceptions—first in 1962, a second time in 1988 and again this time in 2021. Their anger at the military was tripled.
The latest takeover sparked an uprising, stirring what had been a stable Myanmar to get angry again. According to dictionary definitions, “angry” means: “having the feeling people get when something unfair, painful or bad happens,” or: “having a strong feeling against someone who has behaved badly, making you want to shout at them or hurt them.” Both definitions literally capture the feeling of the Myanmar people when the military staged the coup. That’s one of the elements that has brought Myanmar to revolution this time.
But the Spring Revolution ignited by the coup did not begin as a real revolution. At first, it was a nationwide uprising like the one in 1988. One definition of “revolution” is: “a change in the way a country is governed, usually to a different political system and often using violence or war.” That’s what happened a few months after the coup. Like every revolution throughout world history, Myanmar’s revolution had multiple causes.
Immediate elements for a revolution
A coup is a way to kill democracy, but Min Aung Hlaing’s coup killed much more than that.
It also killed every potential political process and all platforms that might lead to democracy and federalism.
What his coup killed:
the 2020 election results (a landslide victory for the NLD).
the elected civilian government and Parliament.
the democratic transition started in 2011 by the coup maker’s ex-boss, General-turned-President Thein Sein.
the national reconciliation process involving an elected government, other key stakeholders (including ethnic organizations) and the military, as well as public support for the process as an alternative to
the ceasefire or peace process, which prompted many EAOs to join the new armed resistance after the coup.
the opinion held by the public, including politicians, ethnic leaders and civil society groups (except military sympathizers), that the military leadership at that time was a key stakeholder in the democratization process.
With those political platforms destroyed, the people were deeply aware that this coup would end the “best and freest” period they had known, that it was different from the two dictatorships, both of which lasted for decades, that preceded it; that this coup would destroy everything: their lives, businesses, education, opportunities, hopes and dreams, now and in the future—in other words, forever.
All generations, from grandparents to their grandchildren, felt sad, hopeless and angry. These emotions feed into political discontent as an essential element for revolution.
A new level of butchery
In the beginning, the uprising was peaceful, organized, and even colorful and creative as demonstrators, mostly members of Generation Z, staged protests in various ways, including street performances. Their demands were simple—truth and democratic values, as expressed in their slogans: “Down with the military dictatorship!”, “Respect our votes!” “Free our leaders.” In addition to these demands, huge graffiti appeared on city walls, expressing their anger: “Fuck the coup!”
But the Myanmar military has never changed when it comes to its oppressive attitude and conservative mentality, which have been institutionalized over many decades since the first coup. If anything, it has only gotten worse. The way the regime troops responded to the peaceful demonstrations was much worse than any other crackdown, even in their brutal history.
They indulged in a new level of butchery this time. Soon after the coup in 2021, the junta troops started killing young peaceful protesters execution-style, aiming for their heads and hearts. Victims of the junta this time were from all generations. One of the youngest victims was 5-year-old Khin Myo Chit, who was killed in her home in Mandalay. Another was 19-year-old Kyal Sin, who was shot in the head while protesting on a street in Mandalay. My former fellow political prisoner Ko Soe Moe Hlaing (aka Mae Gyi)—by this time in his early 50s, he had taken part in the ’88 uprising, joined the ABSDF student army, and was jailed in the 1990s for 13 years—was tortured to death within two days of his arrest at home in Yangon in May 2021.
Within a few months, Min Aung Hlaing had turned Myanmar into a “killing field”. The streets were bloody; funerals were being held in every city; houses were deserted; prisons were packed; the nation was crying.
The mood of the people was as if murderers were at their door; all their dreams had been torn apart; nothing good was left and evil prevailed; the dark age had returned as they saw their country fall again into the abyss of military dictatorship, realizing their worst fears. This left the majority of Myanmar people feeling so desperate they’d rather fight back than submit to military rule. The hard lessons from their bitter experiences in the past strengthened their feelings.
Bitter lessons of the past fuel revolution
The hard lessons the Myanmar people learned under the previous coups and from earlier resistance movements also served as foundations for a revolutionary period. These feelings, determination and lessons were accumulated over 60 years of consecutive military dictatorships.
As discussed in Part 2 of this series, the Myanmar people learned from the ’88 Uprising and the following years under the then junta:
Popular uprisings don’t work because the generals will simply oppress them. (Yes, once again.)
Elections and even landslide victories don’t work because the generals will reject them. (They did it again!)
Nonviolent methods don’t work because the generals respond with violence. (They are ferociously violent this time.)
Pressure from the international community doesn’t work because the generals don’t play by its standards. (Exactly the same.)
Having learned those hard lessons, they are more politically aware that this military, with the same mentality of the generals, will repeat what it did in the past and will even choose a worse path, as they are doing now.
Given all these hard lessons from the past and present, combined with the specific elements of the present, the new level of butchery and their feelings of sadness, anger and fear, they had only one option left—a revolution.
The final battle—do or die!
Driven by this impetus, they started to fight the junta with their bare hands. Their revolution was a reaction against the junta’s injustice and cruelty. They started to wage their “war” with makeshift “weapons” like slingshots, catapults, air guns made from blue plastic pipes, slings and bamboo arrows. Many of them were killed, but they refused to cower. In short, the whole terrible situation drove young people in different regions and states to take up arms for “the final battle”, as they put it, which means “do or die”— a different level of fighting from the 1988 Uprising.
Not only young Bamar people from Yangon, Mandalay, Sagaing, Magwe, Tanintharyi and other regions but also ethnic youths from Chin, Karenni, Kachin, Karen and other states decided to fight back with whatever they had—even with rudimentary hunting rifles. They flocked to ethnic armed group-controlled areas to undergo military training. While some of them returned to their towns to join underground movements, most remained in the jungle to form their own anti-regime armed resistance forces across the country.
Meanwhile, the formation of the National Unity Government (NUG) by elected NLD lawmakers and their ethnic allies—not only as an umbrella organization for the anti-regime movement but also as a parallel government to challenge the junta’s legitimacy at home and abroad—has given people more faith in the revolution as they see the NUG as their legitimate government. The NUG has worked with some anti-regime EAOs and their collaboration has seen a mushrooming of People’s Defense Force groups (PDFs) across the country.
This was a different level of resistance, and marked the beginning of a revolution against the military dictatorship, after the young resistance fighters (some of them were first-time voters) saw their votes and democratic rights discarded. This revolution initiated by a diverse new generation of young Bamar and ethnic fighters was also different from the autonomy-based struggle started by some EAOs many decades ago. That’s why we’ve been seeing members of PDFs fighting alongside experienced EAOs like the Kachin Independence Army, the Ta’ang National Liberation Army, the Karen National Union, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army and others in various military offensives. They’ll do whatever it takes to end the military dictatorship, as rooting out the system is their common goal.
This is the first revolution in Myanmar’s modern history.
Unprecedented coordination
Unlike the 1988 coup, many established ethnic armed organizations have taken a political stand in solidarity with the anti-coup movement. They have supported, trained and equipped newly arrived young fighters and have fought the junta troops with them. Such coordination had never before been seen in the history of armed struggle in Myanmar, bringing together young and old generations, old and new fighters and newly-formed PDFs and established EAOs, though of course there have been disagreements and arguments.
An important factor this time is that many EAOs have the same feeling as young fighters and the people about this latest coup. The military has always bullied and betrayed the people but this time they went too far. For many of the EAOs who sympathize with the anti-military regime movement, the latest takeover was a testament to the fact that the military couldn’t be trusted, especially in the peace process they participated in with the military for many years. The result was that following the coup they openly stated that they would no longer participate in the regime’s peace process.
The collaboration between PDFs and EAOs put the Myanmar people’s hopes of toppling the regime in high gear and saw them join hands to support the revolution by establishing crowdfunding among their compatriots at home and abroad, generating millions of dollars. It’s the Myanmar people’s support that has kept the revolution moving forward for more than three years now while the world merely offers lip service, and not a dime in material assistance.
While the people’s financial support for the revolution plays an important role, new technology like mobile phones and the internet have become another powerful force in the Spring Revolution. Unlike in 1988, information technology in 2021 enabled the people to record the regime’s atrocities on their phones, allowing the world to see how brutal the junta is. Furthermore, the internet also makes crowdfunding easier as well-wishers can contribute to the revolution with a few taps on their phones. On the front lines, the PDFs have successfully turned commercial drones into objects of fear for the regime troops, capable of carrying bombs.
The junta’s terror tactics intensify the revolutionary spirit
The junta and its military have resorted to the worst forms of brutality. They have attacked not only resistance fighters but the civilian population for supporting them. They have used all methods and weapons—from Su-30 fighter jets to MI-17 and MI-35 military helicopters, to helicopter gunships and all forms of artillery. Junta fighter jets have bombed village schools while students are learning; its troops have torched houses, churches and monasteries in villages and towns; they have kidnapped, tortured and beheaded innocent villagers. They use these tactics to terrify the public.
Over the past three years, according to the UN and observer groups, junta fighter jets have carried out 5,800 airstrikes. Its troops have killed around 5,600 people, including more than 1,000 women and 705 children, mostly in artillery barrages, airstrikes and shootings. And more than 27,200 people have been arrested. An estimated 3 million people have been forced from their homes since the coup.
But the junta’s terror tactics haven’t been able to weaken the revolution. Instead, they have only intensified the revolutionary spirit. Since last October, the resistance fighters, both PDFs and EAOs, have launched unprecedented military offensives like Operation 1027, seizing many military bases, outposts and towns in different states and regions. And because of their operations, thousands of soldiers have already surrendered.
In the beginning, scholars and observers believed that this resistance initiated by young resistance fighters would be crushed by the brutal tactics of the military. This view reflects their failure to grasp the revolutionary spirit of the Myanmar people this time, or to understand how and why this revolution has evolved step by step based on previous coups and resistance movements and the bitter lessons learned over the past 60 years, or to understand the key elements in this revolution.
No more deals with the criminal generals
After this latest coup, the military has become the enemy of the people again. This time, it is seen as a genuine enemy, one with whom there can be no compromise, under any conditions. In the past, most political forces from political parties to the prominent ’88 generation student group to ethnic armed organizations agreed to compromise and open negotiations with the military. It was a kind of national political tendency before the 2021 coup. They all tried to achieve national reconciliation with the military. Because not only different political leaders and ethnic leaders but also the general public thought reconciliation would be the best way to avoid confrontation and more bloodshed, despite the military’s long-term human rights violations and its greed for power. It was probably based on a traditional view that the Myanmar military was too powerful to collapse. Another thought was the military leaders might change positively, like military generals in other countries. That was the policy adopted by the National League for Democracy when it tried to work with a semi-civilian government led by ex-General Thein Sein in the 2010s.
But that didn’t work either. During that “democratic transition” period (2011-2020), the Myanmar people learned other lessons from the ex-generals’ quasi-civilian government:
“Democratic transition” doesn’t work.
National reconciliation doesn’t work.
Ceasefire or peace processes don’t work.
So, the “national reconciliation” era is over and the “peace process” has failed. Likewise, the junta’s election proposal has been rejected by the public. It will not turn back as long as this military exists. This is because the military leaders have repeatedly destroyed the public’s trust and hopes, and have rebuffed every opportunity they have been offered to join other stakeholders and the public in sincerely rebuilding a democratic nation based on federalism. All tolerance for them is gone.
In the place of national reconciliation, only justice will be available for the criminal generals and their collaborators. Only justice will heal the wounded Myanmar people; only justice will bring about a future from which war has been banished. That’s all the Myanmar people want this time. No more Ne Win. No more Than Shwe. No more Min Aung Hlaing. No more junta. No more quasi-civilian governments, either.
For many Myanmar people, they are fighting this revolution with all that they have left—their flesh, blood and their remaining belongings. So, this is the final battle, one they can’t lose, one on which they have bet their lives—it is do or die.
Understanding this evolution of the Myanmar revolution, everyone, including our neighboring countries and the rest of the international community, should understand that old, military-centered solutions that led nowhere over the past many decades—like elections planned by the junta and negotiations with the criminal generals—are nothing but empty and insincere diplomatic gestures.
Those who support the generals—China, Russia, India and others—only insult the Myanmar people who have been fighting this revolution with their own blood, flesh and funding.
This is the Myanmar revolution (စစ်အာဏာရှင်တော်လှန်ရေး), whose goal is to uproot the military dictatorship, including the military institution’s political culture—its unethical, brutal, lie-ridden, corrupt culture—forever, in a final battle. Once it is won, the vicious circle of Myanmar’s modern history will end, and a new chapter can begin. This time, having suffered this decades-long cycle created by the military, all Myanmar people deserve a successful revolution that will allow them to live in the free world..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-09-03
Date of entry/update:
2024-09-03
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"The Chinese government has found itself on the receiving end of a torrent of condemnation from Myanmar people over a threat it reportedly made against the ethnic Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) for fighting the regime.
The warning issued by the Ruili Town Security Committee on Thursday told the TNLA to “immediately stop fighting and cooperate with China in maintaining peace and stability in northern Shan State and along the China-Myanmar border or face more deterrent and disciplinary actions.”
Despite arguments over the authenticity of the warning, the TNLA confirmed that it had received the warning in the form of a letter.
When asked by AFP about the letter during a press conference in Beijing, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson replied, “China is closely following the situation in Myanmar and the developments of the conflict in northern Myanmar, and has been working to promote peace talks and ceasefire.
“China will continue to play a constructive role for Myanmar’s peace and reconciliation process and promote the de-escalation in northern Myanmar.”
Since the Chinese Embassy in Myanmar shared the ministry’s reply on its Facebook on Saturday, thousands of netizens in Myanmar have responded to the post, slamming Beijing for interfering in Myanmar’s domestic affairs while expressing their support for the TNLA.
Netizens said they understand China’s concerns over border stability and its interests in Myanmar, but added that China should not put pressure on Myanmar’s popular revolt against the regime.
The post had attracted 6.3k comments as of noon Monday, most of them criticizing China for its threat against the TNLA.
Octopus, an anti-regime group waging guerrilla warfare in Yangon, commented under the post: “We are revolutionaries. We listen to the voices of our people. The comments you see are the testimony to the voices of our people. If you listen to the voices of the people, people’s government, and ethnic forces, and stand by the side of the truth, you will gain huge benefits as a good neighbor.”
Other netizens called on China to support revolutionary forces including the civilian National Unity Government instead of the “fascist” military if it really wants to see peace and stability in Myanmar.
Some said the warning was evidence of Beijing’s meddling in Myanmar’s internal affairs despite its repeated claims that it does not do so. Many warned that in the future China would be collectively punished by the Myanmar people—such as through increased anti-China sentiment—if it turns a blind eye to their will.
The National Unity Consultative Council, the NUG’s advisory body, issued a statement on Saturday condemning China’s “impertinent threat and insult against the army of the ethnic Ta’ang people and the popular revolt”.
Prominent former 88-Generation student leader U Min Ko Naing told anti-regime media PVTV: “Those who made threats must recognize the reality. The revolutionary people are prepared to face anything. They will not surrender to the bullying of any big power. They will not allow any threat to destroy a revolution that has cost many lives and limbs, while the destination is not far.”
China issued the warning as the TNLA, one of the three members of the Brotherhood Alliance of ethnic armies, is in the midst of installing its own administrations in townships it has seized from the regime in northern Shan State during the alliance’s anti-regime offensive, known as Operation 1027.
The warning was issued after China ended a three-day live-fire drill on the Chinese border on Thursday, and followed Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s visit to Naypyitaw in mid-August.
When he held informal talks with counterparts from Myanmar, Thailand and Laos in Chiang Mai following his Naypyitaw visit, Wang insisted that three basic principles must be adhered to regarding the Myanmar “issue.” The principles he cited are: that Myanmar should not be subject to civil strife, should not be detached from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, and should not be infiltrated or interfered with by external forces..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-09-02
Date of entry/update:
2024-09-02
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"A provincial agency of China’s Yunnan province bordering Shan State has warned the ethnic Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) to immediately stop fighting the Myanmar regime in northern Shan or face “more deterrent and disciplinary measures”. The Ruili City Security Commission made the warning in a statement issued Thursday. Ruili is a major trading hub on the border with Myanmar, across from Muse in Shan State.
It urged the TNLA to cooperate with China in “maintaining peace and stability” in northern Shan State and along the China-Myanmar border, and to ensure the safety of the border and the people who live in the area, as well as of Chinese projects and Chinese nationals in Myanmar.
“End all military activities harmful to Chinese border stability and to the lives and properties of Chinese citizens. Otherwise, China will take more deterrent and disciplinary measures. And you [the TNLA] will be entirely responsible for the consequences,” the Chinese-language statement reads.
The commission urged the TNLA to swiftly return to dialogue with the regime, saying it was the right path to settle differences.
It said China is willing to continue to play a “constructive” role and help to restore peace in northern Myanmar, and will help the TNLA assert its rightful claims.
“We are watching where you [the TNLA] are heading,” the commissioned warned.
TNLA spokeswoman Lway Yay Oo told The Irrawaddy on Friday that the group had read the statement and that its Central Committee was still discussing how to respond.
“The Chinese government has been putting pressure on us in various ways since before we resumed Operation 1027 [in June]. It is pressuring us by blocking trade routes and trade flows to us,” the spokeswoman said.
Another TNLA source said the Chinese government is also urging other ethnic armed groups in northern and eastern Shan to block trade routes to prevent the flow of foods, medicine and fuel to the TNLA.
At a press conference on Friday, when asked about the Chinese warning to the TNLA to stop fighting, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said China “will continue to play a constructive role for Myanmar’s peace and reconciliation process and promote the deescalation in northern Myanmar”, the ministry said.
The Chinese embassy in Yangon was not available for comment on Friday.
The TNLA is a member of the Brotherhood Alliance, which launched Operation 1027 in northern Shan State last year, seizing hundreds of junta bases and command centers, and 24 junta military battalion headquarters as well as around 20 towns and vital trade routes with China.
The operation was halted in northern Shan State on Jan. 10 after Beijing brokered a ceasefire between the ethnic alliance and the regime. However, the TNLA and another member of the ethnic alliance, the Myanmar Nationalities Democratic Alliance Army, resumed their operation in northern Shan State on June 25 after the regime’s military repeatedly bombed the TNLA’s territory, breaching the China-brokered ceasefire.
Since the resumption of the operation, the ethnic armies and allied resistance groups have seized the capital of northern Shan State, Lashio, along with the Myanmar military’s Northeastern Command, which was based in the city, as well as Kyaukme, Nawnghkio and Mongmit towns.
As part of the operation, along with the TNLA, several resistance groups including People’s Defense Forces under the civilian National Unity Government have seized Mogoke, Singu, Tagaung and Thabeikkyin townships in neighboring Mandalay Region..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-31
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-31
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Sub-title:
Security officials told the insurgent group they would 'teach them a lesson' if they didn’t comply.
Description:
"Chinese authorities warned an ethnic minority insurgent group on Myanmar’s northeastern border to stop fighting the Myanmar military or be “responsible for the consequences,” according to a spokesperson for the group.
China has extensive economic interests in neighboring Myanmar, including oil and gas pipelines and mines, and it has been increasingly concerned about the impact of a surge of fighting this year between various insurgent forces and the military
A spokesman for the insurgent group, the Ta’ang National Liberation Army, or TNLA, told Radio Free Asia that the security committee in the Chinese border town of Ruili told the TNLA in a letter to stop fighting.
“Fighting must stop immediately in order to maintain stability and peace on the China-Myanmar border and protect the lives of Chinese citizens,” the Chinese security committee said in the letter, copies of which were posted online.
If the TNLA did not comply, China would “teach them a lesson,” and the group would be “responsible for the consequences,” the security committee said.
Radio Free Asia was not able to contact the security committee in Ruili and the Chinese Embassy in Yangon did not respond to a request for comment by the time of publication. However, during a regular press briefing in Beijing on Friday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian told reporters that China is "highly concerned about ... the conflict in northern Myanmar" and "will continue to ... promote the easing and cooling of the situation" in the region.
A spokesperson for the TNLA, Lway Yay Oo, confirmed that the letter was from Chinese authorities but declined further comment except to say the group’s top leaders were meeting to discuss it.
China is known to maintain contacts with Myanmar rebel groups operating along its border, some of which have promised to protect Chinese business interests.
China-brokered two short-lived ceasefires between a three-party insurgent alliance, which includes the TNLA, and the junta this year but the truces collapsed and the insurgents stepped up pressure on the military, capturing numerous outposts, several major towns and a regional military headquarters. RFA was unable to independently confirm whether the warning was also sent to the other armies that make up the alliance -- the Arakan Army and the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army.
China also maintains close ties with the junta that seized power in a 2021 coup, and is keen to limit the influence in Myanmar of Western countries and Myanmar’s other big neighbor, India.
RELATED STORIES:
Myanmar’s old army leader calls on China to help restore stability
China’s frustration with the Myanmar junta’s incompetence mounts
As Myanmar junta falters, rival ethnic armies jostle in Shan state
Exercises
China is hoping an election the junta has promised to hold next year can help restore peace and stability, analysts say, while at the same time it is pressing anti-junta forces to agree to peace.
Media reported this week that China had closed the border between Ruili and the Myanmar town of Muse, cutting off trade including fuel supplies apparently to pressure the TNLA to silence its guns.
In a show of force, China’s People’s Liberation Army began military exercises, including live-fire drills, in the Ruili area on Tuesday. China’s defense ministry said the drills would strengthen border security and stability.
In mid-August, China fired warning shots into Kachin state to the north apparently in a bid to warn off junta aircraft bombing an insurgent base on the border.
Myanmar political and military analyst Than Soe Naing said there was little China could do to stop the war apart from making threats and imposing border restrictions on the insurgent groups and their leaders.
“These restrictions can’t actually limit the battles that are being fought from Nawnghkio township in Shan state to Pyinoolwin township in Mandalay,” Than Soe Naing said, referring to a broad swathe of central-northeast Myanmar where rebel forces have been making advances..."
Source/publisher:
"Radio Free Asia" (USA)
Date of publication:
2024-08-30
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-30
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Various groups
Language:
more
Sub-title:
The government-in-exile says the vote would be a sham and has vowed to accelerate its offensive.
Description:
"Myanmar’s military junta, which seized power in a 2021 coup d’etat from a civilian government, has declared it intends to hold a general election in November 2025.
But armed rebel groups and members of the shadow National Unity Government, or NUG – made up of former civilian leaders – are opposed to the vote, which they say would be a sham, allowing the military to legitimize its control over the country.
Ever since the coup, the country has been wracked by a civil war, with ethnic armies and rebel groups gaining the upper hand over the past year, pushing the military back on its heels.
On Tuesday, the NUG said it would try to speed up its offensive against the military to gain even more territory – where they would boycott elections – and double international outreach efforts.
Why does the junta want to hold elections?
Facing a series of battlefield defeats and troop surrenders, military leaders are searching for an exit strategy to a civil war that will drag on and that increasingly appears they will not win. Holding elections may be a bid by the junta to create a sense of normalcy and political stability in the country – in part to placate its northern neighbor China, one of its few international backers.
The military leaders probably are hoping to legitimize their control of Myanmar’s government by manipulating the electoral process to ensure that their preferred candidates win, experts say. Doing so would allow them to retain power under the guise of a democratic system.
The junta is also hoping that plans to hold an election will ease international pressure and sanctions, and even give the regime international recognition by showing a commitment to the democratic process – regardless of whether the polls are manipulated.
Meanwhile, on the ground, the junta’s recent enactment of a military draft to shore up troop shortages and formation of a committee to arm communities at the village level appear to be aimed in part at providing security for the would-be polls.
Why are Myanmar’s armed opposition groups so opposed to such an election?
Junta opponents say a history of election fraud under military rule – and the junta’s crackdown on any form of dissent – means it is highly unlikely any such election will be free and fair. It would be illegitimate and aimed at securing power for the junta, rather than ushering in a democratic transition, they say.
These doubts are bolstered by the junta’s exclusionary electoral process that would deny many groups a stake in the country’s future.
Instead, the rebel groups say they will ratchet up their attacks on junta positions to increase their territory and block elections in areas under their control.
Furthermore, the armed opposition says the junta is using the election as a distraction from the ongoing civil war and its human rights abuses. Many groups say they will focus on resisting the junta militarily while advocating for democratic reforms without a ballot.
"The military council has planned to hold a fake election as their last resort next year,” NUG Prime Minister Mahn Win Khaing Than said Tuesday. “Some countries will support the elections, encouraging the junta to continue the plan by all possible means. With thorough consideration, we need to speed up our offensives and political measures.”
Is the junta even able to stage elections?
Junta chief Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing has made promises to hold the ballot ever since the coup in early 2021, with little progress made.
Junta forces have lost significant territory this year to various rebel groups, and its Union Election Commission said this week that a vote would need to be conducted “first in places where the situation is fine and stable,” followed by “areas that are moderately stable.”
The junta extended a state of emergency for another six months on July 31, the sixth extension since the 2021 coup. The constitution mandates that elections must be held within six months after a state of emergency is lifted. The junta is also planning to organize a census this October to prepare for the polls, but observers say that may be difficult..."
Source/publisher:
"Radio Free Asia" (USA)
Date of publication:
2024-08-28
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-30
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"Editor’s Note: If you or someone you know is struggling with suicidal thoughts or mental health matters, please call the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by dialing 988 to connect with a trained counselor, or visit the 988 Lifeline website.
Hong Kong/New Delhi
CNN
—
Delivery driver Maung Maung’s wife and young daughter hadn’t eaten in three days, he recalled, when he walked into an internet cafe in his hometown of Mandalay, Myanmar, in late 2022.
He had recently been detained and tortured by the country’s military junta for weeks, he said, on suspicion of transporting goods for opposition forces, during which time his wife had been forced to take out loans to support the family.
When he was finally released, he had lost his job and the family found themselves penniless and ridden with debt. Desperate, Maung Maung went on Facebook and offered to sell his kidney.
“In that moment, I felt life was so harsh. There is no other way I could survive other than to rob or kill people for money,” he said. “My wife was the same, she didn’t want to stay in this world anymore. But only for the sake of our daughter we stayed.”
Months later in July 2023, Maung Maung, who asked to use a pseudonym for safety reasons, traveled to India for the transplant surgery. A wealthy Chinese-Burmese businessman had bought his kidney for 10 million Burmese kyat ($3,079), nearly twice the annual average urban household income in Myanmar, according to 2019 data from UN affiliated Myanmar Information Management Unit.
Maung Maung is not the only one.
A year-long CNN investigation has revealed desperate people in Myanmar, also known as Burma, hawking their organs to wealthy people on Facebook. With the help of agents, they travel to India, for instance, for transplants — defying laws in both countries, where selling organs is illegal.
CNN found posts offering to sell organs on at least three Burmese-language Facebook groups and spoke to two dozen people involved in the organ trade — including sellers, buyers and agents — to piece together the inner workings of an illicit industry fueled by desperation in a country ravaged by civil war.
When asked for comment, Meta, Facebook’s owner, said one online group had been removed, but the company declined to give further details or comment further. Facebook’s own rules do not allow content that lets users buy, sell or trade human body parts and breaches can be reported for review.
Coup sends poverty soaring
Three years since Myanmar’s military took power in a coup, nearly half of the country’s 54 million people live below the poverty line. That figure has doubled since 2017, researchers with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has found.
As various armed groups fought against junta control, violence spread across the country. Foreign investment dropped, unemployment skyrocketed and the cost of basic goods increased at a rate most people couldn’t keep up with. While sellers are poor and buyers relatively rich, both sides are in the illegal organ market because they find themselves in dire straits.
“To sell a part of your body is a difficult decision for everyone. Nobody wants to do it,” April, 26, who asked to go by a pseudonym, said shortly after advertising her kidney on Facebook in February. “The only reason I am doing this is because I have no choice.”
April said she abandoned her dreams of becoming a nurse and moved to Myanmar’s commercial capital Yangon when she was 18 to work in a garment factory and help support her family. But her monthly salary of $100 was not enough to keep up with rising costs exacerbated by the political crisis and medical bills that kept piling up as her aunt suffered from cancer.
“I am trying my best to survive amid such a challenging situation. There were days I cried. There were days I didn’t have anything to eat when my friends could not help me,” she told CNN.
One night, unable to sleep, she was up late scrolling Facebook when she came upon a group where people were offering to sell their kidneys. Most of these groups were made for patients suffering from kidney disease to share home remedies and recommend doctors. But in recent years, posts offering to sell organs have become increasingly common, a CNN analysis has found.
A person can still live a healthy life with one kidney, which makes this trade possible, but it’s a major surgery that can have lasting consequences. The biggest risk is not having a backup in case anything happens to the remaining kidney, according to the National Kidney Foundation.
April quickly wrote up her own post: “I want to donate my kidney. My blood type is O. I need money for my aunt who has cancer and needs an operation. I’m 26 years old and I don’t drink. DM me.”
An illegal but accessible industry
In the online organ trade, buyers and sellers often work with agents, middlemen who match donors with recipients, to forge the necessary documents and arrange surgery.
Because the sale of organs is illegal in India and donations are permitted only among relatives, with a few rare exceptions, agents often forge household records, family trees and other documents with the help of lawyers and notaries. Myanmar’s embassy in New Delhi has to review the paperwork in order to pass the case to the state or hospital authorization committee.
The authorization committee is the final line of defense. It’s designed to catch anyone trying to cheat the system. Documents, family photos and bank statements are checked, and interviews conducted to expose strangers posing as family members or anyone trafficking organs.
CNN has reached out to Myanmar’s embassy in New Delhi and the Indian Ministry of Health and Family Welfare for comment, but did not get a response.
Thiri Khine, who asked to use a pseudonym so she could speak safely, became a widow when her husband died eight years ago. Six years later, ravaged by kidney disease, she posed for new wedding photos. This time, the groom smiling next to her was the man whose kidney she was buying for 12 million kyat ($3,695).
Thiri Khine tried to get a transplant by getting on the official transplant waitlist, but said the process would’ve taken years, at which point she may have already died from her illness.
Between 1995 and 2022, there were only 308 successful kidney transplants in Myanmar, according to ruling junta chief Min Aung Hlaing’s office.
Since the coronavirus pandemic and the coup, transplants can only be performed at military hospitals, with a few exceptions, according to one current and one former doctor in Yangon who asked to remain anonymous out of fear for their safety.
The war has also created a shortage of doctors.
In the early days of the military takeover, doctors were often at the forefront of the resistance movement, treating injured protesters and staging strikes. For this, they paid a high price, with many medical professionals arrested or forced to flee the country, leaving Myanmar’s already fragile healthcare system on the brink of collapse.
‘Family photos’, a trip to India
In the weeks leading up to the surgery, Thiri Khine and her pretend husband practiced for the authorization committee interview, finding answers to questions such as how they met, each other’s favorite foods and their license plate number.
“It’s an interrogation to confirm whether we are a real couple or not. But the thing is they know that we are lying,” Thiri Khine says. “The law by definition is strict, and so are the hospital’s rules. However they make it possible for us to get the treatment by ignoring the red flags and forged documents.”
All of the ten donors and recipients CNN spoke to, except for one, confirmed that in each of their cases, documents were falsified to prove a family relationship. They pretended to be spouses, in-laws, nieces and nephews. Maung Maung was supposed to be his recipient’s son-in-law.
Scared and far from home, Maung Maung went through a number of medical tests and interviews in the days before his transplant surgery. He had never left Myanmar before, but now he found himself posing for photos in front of New Delhi’s famous Lotus Temple next to the family of the man who would soon have his kidney.
“I am suffering deep down when I look at my family. They have nothing. Meanwhile, I am also stressed about what lies ahead,” he told CNN before his surgery.
“If I die, I hope this money could help my wife and daughter for their food and survival, even if it would not last their whole lifetime.”
Myanmar’s military has a long and well-documented track record of rights abuses, and the civil war has unleashed new levels of violence on both civilians and rebel forces alike.
In response to Maung Maung’s arrest and torture allegations, which set off the chain of events that led him to sell his kidney, Myanmar’s military told CNN: “Members of Myanmar’s military are well organized, meaning they cannot unlawfully arrest or torture anyone.”
‘Saving a life’
In 2022, just under 10,000 kidney transplants involving live donors were carried out across India, according to the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organization. CNN could not confirm the number of transplant surgeries involving Burmese patients or the number of surgeries in which an organ may have been sold.
One Yangon-based agent, who asked to remain anonymous due to the illicit nature of his work, said both the Burmese embassy in India as well as the authorization committees are aware that the document presented are forged.
“It is an act of saving a life. It is not a bad thing,” he says, having received a kidney transplant himself in a similar way last year.
Dr Sunil Shroff, a transplant surgeon and founder of the Multi Organ Harvesting Aid Network, a non-profit which promotes organ donation in India, said the issue of organ donation is complex.
“It is not an easy job for the (authorization) committee either. Then again, they’re not policing it. They’re looking at each case individually with some sympathy because there is a recipient suffering who needs an organ,” he said.
This is complicated by the fact that documents produced in another country are extremely difficult to authenticate.
“Once the embassy signs, what happens is that the local authorization committee thinks the responsibility was on the embassy. They might be coming with an unrelated donor we don’t know,” Dr Shroff said.
A ward filled with Burmese patients
A few days after the transplant surgery in August 2023, Maung Maung sat on the edge of his hospital bed and lifted his shirt to reveal a fresh scar on his left side.
“It seems it is healing from inside, but it still hurts on the outside,” he said, touching the purple mark.
As he walked through the hospital, he pointed out other Burmese patients in the recovery ward, each with the same four-inch scar on their abdomen.
“When you go to the toilet, you see Myanmar people and when you go somewhere nearby you see Myanmar people again,” he said.
For those trapped in a never-ending cycle of poverty, selling a body part often appears as a quick way to escape. It’s been a last resort taken by people in many other countries from Afghanistan to Nepal, but it’s one that comes with serious and sometimes fatal health consequences.
“The quality of life after selling the kidney is not good because once the money runs out, they’re back to square one. And then there’s a scar to see. They look at it, so they’re depressed,” Dr Shroff says.
Maung Maung predicts that with only one kidney left “the most I can live is 15 to 20 years and then I will be gone.”
Yet, he doesn’t regret his decision.
“If I had not done this at this moment, my life would be in chaos. No job, no food. My wife, my kid didn’t have anything to eat. All three of us could have been dead or gone crazy.” he says.
He has since returned home to Mandalay but hasn’t recovered enough to work. He spends most of his days at home, in pain, as the money he got for selling his kidney slowly runs out.
As for April, the last time CNN was able to reachher was a few months ago. She had found a 49-year-old man from Yangon who was willing to buy her kidney for 12 million kyat ($3,700).
Documents were forged, family photos showing April as the man’s eldest daughter taken — the only thing left was the surgery.
As the transplant neared, April worried she might die on the operating table, but felt it was too late to back out.
April’s family still did not know about her plan to sell her kidney.
For mental health support outside of the US, a worldwide directory of resources and international hotlines is provided by the International Association for Suicide Prevention. You can also turn to Befrienders Worldwide..."
Source/publisher:
"CNN" (USA)
Date of publication:
2024-08-30
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-30
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"
Justice For Myanmar welcomes the launch of Malaysian police and anti-corruption commission investigations into the involvement of former deputy minister Datuk Dr Mashitah Ibrahim and her husband, Datuk Abdul Shakor bin Abu Bakar, in a cyber scam hub in Karen State.
At a press conference today, Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Razarudin Husain confirmed that investigations into the involvement of a former deputy minister and her husband in organised crime activities in Myanmar was ongoing and that statements were taken from the couple in July. He also announced that the police are looking for witnesses.
Mashitah Ibrahim has publicly confirmed that she gave a statement to police on the matter.
A Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) investigation has also been launched against Mashitah Ibrahim following a civil society complaint filed this week.
The investigations come after a Justice For Myanmar report in May that revealed the role of prominent Malaysians in Dongmei Park with the Karen Border Guard Force (BGF)/Karen National Army, a militia allied with the Myanmar military. The report named Mashitah Ibrahim, Abdul Shakor and others.
We urge the police to conduct a swift investigation into Mashitah Ibrahim and Abdul Shakor, as well as all other Malaysian nationals involved in cyber scam parks in Myanmar, and to hold them accountable under the law.
We urge MACC to conduct a full and transparent investigation and inform the public about its outcomes.
The Dongmei transnational crime hub, formerly named Saixigang Industrial Park, is run with trafficked labour who have been subjected to forced criminality, torture and extortion. Tight security prevents captives from escaping, with watchtowers and guards in military uniform and rifles stationed at the main gate.
Mashitah Ibrahim responded to reports in a Facebook post today that includes an image of her and Abdul Shakor at the anti-trafficking and migrant smuggling division of the Malaysian police: “It was purely coincidental that my friend invited me to take a photo at his project there … I will not hesitate to take legal action against anyone trying to associate me with this slander aimed at damaging my reputation.” However, much of the evidence linking the couple to Dongmei Park is detailed in past posts on Mashitah Ibrahim’s own Facebook page. In one post she referred to herself as an “iron lady” for the project.
Dongmei Park’s investors
One of the main investors in Dongmei Park is Wan Kuok-koi (also known as Broken Tooth, Yin Gouju), a former leader of the 14K Triad, a major Chinese transnational criminal organisation. Wan Kuok-koi was sanctioned by the USA in 2020.
Dongmei Group has a registered company in Hong Kong, Dongmei Investment Group Company Limited, which is also sanctioned by the USA. The company has two Malaysian directors and shareholders: Abdul Shakor bin Abu Bakar and Yong Mun Hong.
Numerous posts on Mashibah Ibrahim’s Facebook page provide evidence of her and Abdul Shakor’s involvement in Dongmei Park.
As Justice For Myanmar detailed in May, Mashitah Ibrahim and Abdul Shakor travelled to Thailand and Myanmar on January 29, 2020 with some of their associates. One photo shows Mashitah Ibrahim in what appears to be Dongmei Park’s construction site, accompanied by Karen BGF troops.
They returned to Thailand and Myanmar the following month, with Mashitah Ibrahim posting on February 23 from Bangkok Airport that she was traveling with a group of 20 “taikos”, a Cantonese term for big brother or boss. One of the bosses was Wan Kuok-koi.
The next day, Mashitah Ibrahim posted from the foundation-laying ceremony at the project site in Myawaddy township where Abdul Shakor gave a speech.
Photos and video of the foundation-laying ceremony show well-armed Karen BGF soldiers standing across the stage during the proceedings and in the background providing security, further evidence of the militia group’s involvement in the park.
On March 15, 2020, a launch event and “investor appreciation night” for the park was held at the Marriott Hotel in Kuala Lumpur. A charitable donation was made to “youth club activities”, with photos showing a giant CIMB Bank cheque issued by Dongmei Group and Grand Commerce Network, a company owned by Mashitah Ibrahim and Abdul Shakor.
Malaysian citizens are also involved in Yatai New City in Shwe Kokko, a development that profits from cyber scam and illegal online gambling operations in partnership with the Karen BGF/KNA. Two Malaysians serve as directors and shareholders of Myanmar Yatai International Holding Group Company Limited, the developer of Yatai New City.
Justice For Myanmar spokesperson Yadanar Maung says: “We welcome the Malaysian police and MACC investigations into the role of prominent Malaysians in the notorious Dongmei cyber scam park.
“Malaysian authorities should swiftly investigate all Malaysian citizens engaged in transnational crime in Myanmar and ensure full accountability.
“Dongmei Park’s business model is human suffering and the destruction of lives. The project profits from human trafficking and cyber slavery with the involvement of the Karen BGF/KNA, a criminal militia responsible for the commission of war crimes.
“As the next ASEAN chair, Malaysia should show the people of Myanmar and the region that it will not tolerate the involvement of its citizens in human trafficking and cyber slavery.
“Malaysia needs to take a clear stand against business with the military junta and its militias, refuse to lend legitimacy to the junta, and reject its sham election.”..."
Source/publisher:
Justice For Myanmar
Date of publication:
2024-08-29
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-29
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Business and the Military
Language:
Format :
pdf pdf
Size:
83.12 KB 157.06 KB
more
Sub-title:
With the Arakan Army making gains in Rakhine state, junta officials arm civilians.
Description:
"Insurgents in Myanmar’s Rakhine state are closing in on an important junta naval base, a spokesman for the group said on Thursday, as military authorities in neighboring regions rounded up people into civil defense teams in preparation for rebel advances.
The Arkan Army ethnic minority force has made stunning gains in Myanmar's westernmost state, capturing townships, military bases and an airport at Thandwe town, since going on the offensive late last year.
Now AA fighters are attacking the last remaining junta positions protecting its Maung Shwe Lay naval base in Thandwe, AA spokesman Khaing Thu Kha told Radio Free Asia.
He said eight naval vessels were supporting junta ground troops and the fighting was fierce.
Junta spokesmen have not commented on the latest fighting.
Myanmar’s military has been battling insurgencies since soon after independence from Britain in 1948 but the pressure its forces are under this year is unprecedented.
Pro-democracy activists, outraged by the ouster of an elected government in 2021 and a bloody crackdown on protests that followed, have taken up arms, linking up in many parts of the country with ethnic minority rebels fighting long wars for self-determination.
Junta forces have lost ground in Rakhine and Chin states in the west, Kachin state in the north, Shan state in the northeast and eastern areas along the border with Thailand.
In addition, central heartland areas that have been peaceful for decades have been rocked by clashes as anti-junta People’s Defense Forces go on the attack.
Junta officials told administrators on Aug. 16 it would begin setting up militias, or public security committees, to arm people to defend their communities, according to information leaked on social media.
Residents in the Ayeyarwady region, near a conflict zone in southern Rakhine state, said on Thursday that authorities there had begun recruiting people into the militias, drawing names through a lottery system in five townships.
“They’re recruiting us for their militia,” said one resident of a township that borders Rakhine state.
“Local administrators are recruiting people between the ages of 35 and 65 under the pretext of serving public security in the neighborhoods and villages,” said the resident, who declined to be identified.
“They even tried to recruit some disabled people and when they refused, they had to pay a fine.”
RFA tried to telephone Ayeyarwady region’s junta spokesperson, Khin Maung Kyi, for information but he did not answer.
Political parties in the area have also been told to help fill the ranks, said one party member.
“Political parties have been called up for recruitment in some towns,” said the party worker who declined to be identified. “The junta asked us to contribute 50 people.”
Recruits would be asked to carry weapons and do some short military training, he said..."
Source/publisher:
"Radio Free Asia" (USA)
Date of publication:
2024-08-29
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-29
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"The Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) and allied resistance forces reportedly seized two artillery battalion headquarters in Taung Hkam Village, Nawnghkio Township, northern Shan State on Wednesday and Thursday after weeks of fighting, according to sources close to the frontline forces.
Citing both frontline resistance fighters and informants in the junta’s military, former Captain Zin Yaw, a participant in the Civil Disobedience Movement, confirmed that the headquarters of Artillery Battalions 206 and 406 are now in the hands of the TNLA.
“This time, the TNLA is fighting in Taung Hkam with [the help of] many allied forces, so they were able to break through the junta’s defenses and seize these two bases,” Zin Yaw said.
However, he added that the TNLA and its allies are still fighting in Taung Hkam as they try to seize two remaining regime units there—Artillery Operations Command 902 and Artillery Battalion 354.
A source close to TNLA fighters and officers on the front line also confirmed the TNLA has seized Artillery Battalions 206 and 406.
Additionally, a local media outlet founded by Ta’ang youths reported the capture of Artillery Battalion 206’s headquarters by the TNLA on Wednesday evening.
However, the TNLA has yet to make any official announcement on the seizure of the bases, and its spokesperson Lway Yay Oo did not answer The Irrawaddy’s phone calls.
On Wednesday evening, the TNLA announced in a statement that it and its allies had launched attacks on Artillery Operations Command 902 and Artillery Battalions 406 and 206.
The TNLA said junta fighter jets and a Y-12 transport plane dropped at least 100 bombs on Taung Hkam and nearby areas.
Taung Hkam is currently crowded with forces from both sides. Junta military units that retreated from Lashio in recent months are stranded in the village, while reinforcements sent from the Myanmar military’s Eastern Command in Taunggyi city, the capital of Shan State, are also there.
Taung Hkam is a large village on the road between Nawnghkio and Lawksawk (Yatsauk) townships in southern Shan State. Lawksawk is located about 160 km south of Nawnghkio. Taung Hkam is home to the four artillery bases, including a command, but has no infantry or light infantry bases.
The junta’s military goal in in Taung Hkam is a defensive one: to prevent the TNLA and its allies from entering southern Shan State, Capt. Zin Yaw said..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-29
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-29
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Various groups
Language:
more
Description:
"Chinese special envoy to Myanmar Deng Xijun held talks with the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) in China’s Tengchong, Yunnan Province, on Wednesday. The meeting with KIA vice-chairman General Gam Shawng followed China’s closure of northern Shan State border crossings in areas controlled by the United Wa State Army (UWSA) and the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA).
Sources told The Irrawaddy that Beijing has warned the UWSA about the flow of weapons through its territory to the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA).
China reportedly plans to hold separate talks with the TNLA and its Northern Alliance partners – the KIA, MNDAA, and Arakan Army.
The KIA, which is battling the regime in Kachin State and Sagaing Region, has seized Lwelgel on the Chinese border and Sadone town on the trade route between Kachin’s capital Myitkyina and the border trade town of Kanpiketi, which remains under junta control.
The MNDAA, TNLA and AA also belong to the Brotherhood Alliance, a separate military coalition that launched Operation 1027 in northern Shan State last October, seizing hundreds of junta bases and command centers, 24 battalion headquarters and around 20 towns and vital trade routes with China.
The operation was halted in northern Shan State on Jan. 10 after Beijing brokered a ceasefire between the ethnic alliance and the regime. The AA however continues to fight in Rakhine State where China has major interests including the Kyaukphyu Special Economic Zone and deep-sea port that will give it direct access to the Indian Ocean.
Since Operation 1027 resumed in late June, the regime has lost the capital of northern Shan State, Lashio, along with the Northeastern Command it hosted, as well as Kyaukme, Nawnghkio and Mongmit towns. It has also lost Mogoke, Singu, Thabeikkyin and Tagung towns in neighboring Mandalay Region. Fighting has now spilled into southern Shan State.
Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi met with junta chief Min Aung Hlaing in Naypyitaw on Aug. 14. Following Wang’s visit, China closed border crossings with territory controlled by the MNDAA and the Namtit crossing in UWSA-controlled territory. It also restricted the flow of goods at other border crossings.
Responding to an inquiry by The Irrawaddy, KIA spokesman Colonel Naw Bu said he had no knowledge of the meeting between Gen. Gam Shawng and the Chinese special envoy.
China has expressed concern over its investments in Myanmar, including oil and gas pipelines running from coastal Rakhine State through central Myanmar and Shan State to Yunnan Province, the Tagaung nickel mine in Mandalay Region, the Letpadaung copper mine in Sagaing Region, and other projects within the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor.
China specialist Dr. Hla Kyaw Zaw stated, “I heard China had warned it would close border crossings if the fighting didn’t stop. China will continue to negotiate with all sides, using various approaches to pressure the Northern Alliance and the regime into peace talks. The Brotherhood Alliance may already recognize the potential consequences and have contingency plans in place.”
China is pushing to resume Myanmar border trade worth billions of dollars annually which has ground to a halt since Operation 1027.
KIA spokesman Naw Bu said trade through Kachin State’s Lwelgel border hub is now limited to goods bartering.
“We don’t have a checkpoint in Kanpiketi and the road is open. I don’t know the exact amount of trade, but I’ve heard it’s limited to only a few cargo trucks,” he said.
An analyst who asked for anonymity said China is pressuring ethnic armies to join peace talks by restricting the flow of food, medicines and fuel to territory they control, but might find it more difficult to persuade the regime.
“China recognizes the regime’s military is collapsing and wants to pressure both sides into peace talks. But the regime may not be willing to acknowledge its loss of the entire northern Shan State. The regime is reluctant to grant control of Lashio, Nawnghkio and Kyaukme to the MNDAA and the TNLA and it will try to reclaim those towns.”
During their meeting in Naypyitaw, Wang told Min Aung Hlaing that China opposes chaos and armed conflict in Myanmar and called on the junta boss to secure the China-Myanmar oil and gas pipelines and ensure peace and stability along the border.
On Tuesday, the Chinese military launched live-fire drills with ground and air force units along the border with Myanmar..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-28
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-28
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Armed conflict and peace-building in Burma - theoretical, strategic and general
Language:
more
Description:
"Myanmar junta artillery and airstrikes have killed at least 21 civilians in Hsipaw Township, northern Shan State, this month, according to the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA).
On Tuesday morning, a Y-12 transport plane reportedly dropped at least 50 bombs on Hsipaw town and a fighter jet bombed the town later that day.
A Shan civil society group member said: “The junta cannot reinforce Hsipaw and bombs the town instead. It is inhumane. Civilians are the victims.”
Two men were killed in Tuesday’s airstrikes, two other residents were injured and two schools were damaged, according to the TNLA.
The TNLA, a member of Brotherhood Alliance along with the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) and Arakan Army, said junta artillery and airstrikes had killed at least 21 civilians and injured 59 others, including 10 children, this month.
The Shan Human Rights Foundation (SHRF) on Tuesday reported that junta bombardment of Hsipaw had killed at least 19 civilians from July 19 to August 25, damaging over 100 buildings, including near Chinese oil and gas pipelines.
On August 10, junta shelling killed five civilians and injured four. A man was killed in Na Loi village and a woman was killed in Kyaung Suu village. Both villages are beside the key pipelines.
Since June 25, the TNLA and its allies have seized Nawnghkio, Mongmit and Kyaukse towns in northern Shan State and Mogoke Township in Mandalay Region. The MNDAA and its allies have captured Lashio, the capital of northern Shan.
TNLA-led forces are attempting to seize full control of Hsipaw Township, where Infantry Battalion 23 and Light Infantry battalions 503 and 504 are based.
Hsipaw is a junta hub on the Dokthawaddy River and on the main road from Mandalay to the Chinese border. Junta troops are trapped in their bases in the town surrounded by the TNLA, according to sources..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-28
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-28
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Sub-title:
Shadow government expects junta to try to re-capture lost ground before 2025 election
Description:
"Myanmar junta officials have begun collecting the personal information of workers in industrial zones in preparation for a census and a general election next year, an industry management official said on Wednesday.
The military has promised to hold elections since shortly after it ousted an elected government in early 2021, triggering a civil war in which its troops are under growing pressure from pro-democracy fighters and ethnic minority guerrillas.
The collection of data at industrial zones in the city of Yangon has raised fears the information could also be used by officials enforcing a hugely unpopular conscription law.
“It’s so worrying to give out our information at a time like this,” said one worker in Yangon’s Hlaingtharya township who declined to be identified for safety reasons.
“They don’t care if you’re a woman or man, or your age, to recruit you for the military,” said the worker.
He said he had given information in 2023 for a smart identification card and workers were now being told they risked losing their jobs if they didn’t give personal data.
“If we don’t want to, they said we can quit,” he said.
Radio Free Asia tried to call Kyaw Kyaw Lwin, director general of the junta’s Workshop and Labor Law Inspection Department, to ask about the data collection but he did not respond.
The generals who ousted a government led by Aung San Suu Kyi in 2021 aims to hold a staggered elections by November 2025, with voting likely to be impossible in large areas controlled by insurgents. A census is planned for this October.
Those fighting to end military rule including a shadow National Unity Government, or NUG, say an election will be a sham with Suu Kyi, by far Myanmar’s most popular politician, locked up along with hundreds of politicians and activists.
‘Increase attacks’
The NUG prime minister, Mahn Win Khaing Than, told a meeting on Tuesday, the junta was likely to launch new offensives before the election and pro-democracy forces had to go on the attack.
“The junta will do whatever they can,” he told a meeting of his cabinet.“We need to also increase our own attacks as much as possible while preparing politically.”
The data collection follows a recent junta announcement it was forming neighborhood and village-level supervision groups for “public security” and “anti-terrorist operations” to crack down on insurgent forces.
China, India and Thailand have offered to help with the election, hoping it can help end the war in their resource-rich neighbor.
An official with a junta industrial zone management committee said workers’ personal information must be submitted by Friday.
“It’s necessary to count the workers and send the lists to our committee, the council told us it was necessary for the census,” said the official at the management committee in Hlaingtharya, Yangon’s biggest industrial zone.
Some 80,000 workers from more than 700 factories in six industrial zones of Hlaingtharya have given their information, a labor activist estimated..."
Source/publisher:
"Radio Free Asia" (USA)
Date of publication:
2024-08-28
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-28
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"Buddhists and Hindus believe in the power of the White Elephant to subdue enemies.
Myanmar’s military junta, facing powerful armed insurgencies in the North Eastern part of the country, has decided to use Buddhist symbolism to defeat the enemy.
According the Myanmar daily Irrawaddy, the junta is preparing to launch a major offensive code-named “Operation Sin Phyu Shin” or “Operation Lord of the White Elephant” – to retake the areas of northern Shan State captured by the “Brotherhood Alliance” and its allies late last year.
The Irrawaddy reported that the junta had set up a committee to lead the operation and placed Vice-Senior General Soe Win in control of it. Three recently promoted Generals have been assigned to command the troops.
The operation’s name refers to Burmese King Hsinbyushin (1763-76) of the Konbaung dynasty who is revered among the generals for waging wars against Qing China and Siam. Hsinbyushin was the third king of the Alaungpaya, or Konbaung dynasty in Myanmar. He had pursued a policy of expansion at the expense of practically all his neighbors, especially Siam (Thailand).
The Myanmar military’s fresh move to step up attacks follows a second string of humiliating defeats in the northern Shan State in July. The first series of defeats began in late October 2023 and ended when China intervened to broker a ceasefire in January 2024.
The Brotherhood Alliance comprises three ethnic armies – the Arakan Army, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army and the Ta’ang Nationalities Liberation Army (TNLA). These armies overran dozens of towns in northern Shan State during its first phase. The alliance also punctured the government military’s reputation as a competent fighting force when many of its troops and senior officers raised the white flag in the face of determined and coordinated attacks by the Brotherhood Alliance, the Irrawaddy said.
The operation resumed in late June this year after the China-brokered ceasefire collapsed. Since then, the Brotherhood Alliance has seized northern Shan’s Kyaukme, Nawnghkio and Lashio towns, and the Northeastern Military Command, as well as Madaya and Mogoke towns in the Mandalay Region..
India, the White Elephant does not have the pejorative connotation that it has in the English language where it means an expensive and non-productive project or property. But it is a good omen, a sign of wisdom, good governance and power.
In Hindu mythology, Indra, the king of the gods, is depicted as seated on a White Elephant. Buddhists believe that the mother of Gautama Siddhartha, the Buddha, dreamt that a White Elephant had entered her womb, signifying that she was to give birth to a person of great wisdom and power.
The kings of Myanmar took the title “Master of the White Elephant” and had a large number of White Elephants which they captured by waging wars against the Thais. When the British took over Myanmar (then known as Burma), they discouraged the use of White Elephants as these represented the Burmese monarchy which they had abolished in 1885.
A later military dictator of Myanmar,Than Shwe, (1992- 2011) revived the use of the White Elephant as a symbol of power. Than Shwe, it was said, desperately wanted one of the power symbols to signify his own “kingly rule.” He needed divine help especially to build Naypyidaw, Myanmar’s new capital.
In 2008, Than Shwe’s created a White Elephant Capture and Training Group charged with directing a nationwide effort to increase the stock of White Elephants.
The question as to whether White Elephants are really white arises. In fact, they appear to have little in common with the silk-draped White Elephants in paintings of royal processions in the mythical past. At best, they could be gray.
It is said that a White Elephant’s skin “has to turn red, not black, when sprayed with water, the tail and trunk should be straight and long, and the eyes must have yellow irises enclosed by red rings.”
According to literature on the subject, some of the more mystical authorities even insist that a White Elephant must not snore but should emit the gentle sounds of Burmese and Thai classical musical instruments!
However, in Thailand, the most important traits of the White Elephant are the shape of the tail hair, the mottling on the inside of the mouth, the blotches on the head of the penis and even the sound of snoring, according to one source. Notice that the one trait that seems not to matter at all is the color of the elephant.
To set the record straight, the Thai term for the “White Elephant” is actually “Auspicious Elephant.” There is no allusion to color!
From 1549 to 1769, the kings of Thailand, Cambodia and Burma fought a series of wars over White Elephants. In fact, White Elephant-related plunder of rival partly helped build Myanmar’s national symbol, the golden stupa of the Shwedagon pagoda in Yangon (Rangoon).
White Elephants are believed to appear during the reign of the righteous leaders and their presence in a country or kingdom as signifying “a new renaissance”.
It is believed that in Myanmar’s history, White Elephants emerged during the time of kings who ruled discharging ten kingly duties. The White Elephant is a good omen when the state is endeavoring to build a peaceful, modern and developed nation.
Is Myanmar ruled justly?
The obvious answer to the question whether Myanmar is ruled justly is a resounding “no”. The military launched a coup against an elected government in February 2021 and cracked down on protests. War against rebellious Christian tribes in the North made that part of the country unlivable.
Vowing to resist the military junta, former lawmakers and activists formed a shadow government and mobilized fighting forces across the country. The military has responded with a brutal crackdown on opposition forces and protesters.
“The coup has also brought economic turmoil, wiping out modest gains in poverty reduction made over the past decade. The economy shrank by nearly 20 percent in 2021. Additionally, the health-care system has collapsed amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Millions of people are facing hunger, and tens of thousands have fled to other parts of Myanmar or across the borders. Because of the coup, Myanmar has become a failing state,” says Joshua Kurlantzick of America’s Council on Foreign Relations (CFR).
The junta detained and charged de facto civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi with corruption and other crimes. It placed members of her party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), and other parties, as well as many activists, under house arrest.
Massive protests erupted nationwide in the weeks after the coup. Eventually, ousted NLD lawmakers, protest leaders, and activists from several minority groups established a parallel government known as the National Unity Government (NUG). The NUG declared war on the junta and formed an armed division known as the People’s Defense Force.
The military’s brutal crackdown on dissent and widespread abuses in the conflict have drawn condemnation from the United Nations, foreign governments, and rights organizations. The military shot live ammunition at civilian protesters and into people’s homes. By late 2021, the military was destroying entire villages believed to support the opposition, massacring both civilians and opposition fighters.
At least 1,500 people have been killed by the military, which is likely an undercount, according to Thailand-based nonprofit Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (Burma). The junta has arrested more than eight thousand people, including journalists, medical workers, and NLD politicians.
More than one million people fled abroad as refugees before the 2021 coup. Hundreds of thousands more remain displaced internally. Many of these refugees in recent years have been Muslim Rohingya.
In 2019, The Gambia filed the first international lawsuit against Myanmar at the International Court of Justice, accusing the country of violating the UN Genocide Convention. But both Suu Kyi’s government and the military have denied that ethnic cleansing is taking place, and Suu Kyi defended the military at a tribunal in The Hague..."
Source/publisher:
"Eurasia Review"
Date of publication:
2024-08-28
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-28
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"Myanmar was ready to explode—just like the historic student union building that General Ne Win dynamited after his coup in 1962. Asia’s former “rice bowl” was now empty and classified by the UN as a least developed country, the parliamentary democracy long gone, no pride left. By 1988, these were the terrible legacies of his coup and his iron-fisted rule over the previous 26 years.
When it exploded, it shook Ne Win’s entire system. It was the 1988 people’s uprising. He could do nothing but step down in shame. History was having its revenge. But even before he stepped down, he threatened the protestors in a state-run broadcast: “The military never fires into the air. It just shoots straight to hit.” We would expect nothing less from the mouth of a dictator—and he was regarded as exactly that: the first dictator of Myanmar.
Though his coup, or the “Mother Coup”, in 1962, faced little resistance, history didn’t repeat for the coups to follow.
The ’88 Uprising and the 2021 Spring Revolution drew similar levels of nationwide popular participation, but they differed in other ways. Here’s one overlooked but crucial point of difference between the two coups: In 1988, the military staged its takeover one month and 10 days after the pro-democracy uprising erupted across the country in an attempt to topple the Socialist authoritarian regime led by Ne Win. In 2021, the military staged a coup when the country was stable and the people were in a good mood, full of positive expectations to welcome a newly elected civilian government.
To make it very clear: in 1988, a nationwide uprising sparked a coup; but in 2021, a coup sparked a nationwide uprising. The sequence of events was reversed.
In March 1988, a riot in which university student Phone Maw was shot to death by security forces led to a student demonstration. Later it escalated into a democracy movement as the public’s discontent with political repression and economic hardships was already at boiling point after 26 years of the regime’s oppressive rule and mismanagement. When student-led demonstrations evolved into a nationwide uprising on Aug. 8, known as the Four Eights Uprising or the ’88 Uprising, Ne Win and his immediate successors tried to convince the public that they would change their one-party system to a multi-party system.
But the people continued their uprising to get rid of what was just a military dictatorship in disguise. The daily protests continued in full swing across the country for more than one month until Sept. 18, when the generals staged a bloody coup. (Here, it is important to understand that the junta actually assumed power from Ne Win’s Socialist regime rather than grabbing it by force. The coup took place with Ne Win’s consent but its goal was to stop the people power movement by force and prevent outcomes which might be even worse from the regime’s perspective.)
The coup was led by Ne Win loyalists and younger generals—General Saw Maung and his deputy officers Than Shwe and Khin Nyunt. Of course, the coup halted the uprising, with regime troops killing several thousand protesters and arresting thousands more across the country. Such a brutal and massive crackdown outraged the people. Public sentiment against the regime and in support of radical change was still strong; it maintained its momentum and there were all kinds of intentions and ideas on how to continue the anti-regime movement in different ways to achieve the main goal—democracy. But the junta’s new political course led to a new political landscape.
New landscape
Right after the coup, the junta announced that it would hold a free and fair election under a multi-party system—a U-turn from the one-party system of its predecessor Socialist regime.
Immediately, many political figures and forces rushed to form parties. Both old politicians and new faces became leaders of those parties. U Nu—the first prime minister of the country—Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, old communists, ex-generals, ethnic figures and even young student activists who were part of the ’88 uprising formed political parties. After 26 years under just one party—the Burma Socialist Programme Party led by dictator Ne Win—about 200 parties were registered. Contesting elections became the main political priority. Let’s call those engaged in this task “the urban politics” camp, which was close to what we called it back then.
Globally, it should be noted that when Myanmar reintroduced a multi-party system in September 1988, right after the coup, the Soviet Union had yet to collapse and its reformist leader Mikhail Gorbachev had yet to introduce his policies of glasnost (openness) and perestroika (restructuring) to reform the USSR’s one-party system. Even before the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe and the end of the Cold War on the world stage, the ’88 uprising in Myanmar managed to bring down the Socialist regime and force the new military junta to transform the country’s political system from a one-party to a multi-party system. It also appeared set to switch to a market economy after 26 years of isolation. Under the circumstances, that was a significant change brought to the country by the ’88 uprising.
As new political parties mushroomed, two other spheres of anti-junta activity emerged—one was the armed struggle (or “AS”, a term student activists then used widely). Another was an underground movement launched by student unions. Both of these were led by students. After the coup and nationwide crackdown, students who wanted to take the AS route left for border areas where ethnic armed organizations have been based for decades fighting for autonomy. There, thousands of students formed the All Burma Students’ Democratic Front (ABSDF) as a student army.
Those in the student unions continued their anti-regime activities (broadly speaking, this was a pro-democracy movement) in urban areas, organizing underground activities such as guerilla-style street protests, publishing and distributing political journals and statements to keep the public informed and politically aware. The latter—to which I belonged—was part of the “urban politics” camp. So, the whole “urban politics” camp was based on non-violent methods employed by political parties and underground student unions. But we regarded all three ways—political parties, underground student unions and AS—as supporting one another to keep pressuring the junta. (Note: That’s not what happened in 2021. The “fresh election” option was rejected by the public, and the political parties that chose to reregister after the 2021 coup were regarded as collaborators of the junta who rejected the recent election result.)
A dominant trend emerges
Among the three alternatives, however, the most popular was to contest the junta’s elections. Newly formed political parties were actively preparing to take on the junta-backed party, the National Unity Party, which was transformed from Ne Win’s Socialist party, and hoping to form a civilian government after the elections. The country’s many ethnic parties were also a main force in this “urban politics”, planning to contest the elections both in main cities and their ethnic states. They were not related to the ethnic armed organizations based along the borders.
The new political landscape had advantages: the political parties could open offices across the country, they could officially organize party activities, and they could conduct campaigns in which thousands of people could take part. Mainly, they could publicly challenge the ruling junta. And people could support the parties they liked. The political space was significantly widened, though the junta continued to arrest and intimidate party members as well as student activists and dissidents, sentencing them to lengthy terms of imprisonment. This anti-regime movement through non-violent methods within the framework of the political parties became quite active and dynamic. It became the main political trend after the coup and the majority of the people supported it.
On May 27, 1990, the junta held the election as promised. Millions of citizens cast votes, almost three decades after the people’s democratic rights were denied. The result shocked the ruling generals—a landslide victory for the National League for Democracy (NLD), the party they had endlessly denounced and oppressed the most. The junta refused to hand over power to the victorious NLD. Later, the junta arrested many elected members of parliament and jailed them. Some elected members were forced to flee the country.
This led to the formation of the National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma (NCGUB) in late 1990, in Manerplaw, Karen State (home to the headquarters of the KNU). Comprising elected MPs from the NLD and other parties, the NCGUB was formed with the aim of implementing the results of the 1990 election. But it never gained sufficient traction to threaten the junta’s de facto rule.
However, the election result became a legitimate political tool with which the international community could pressure the junta.
Why the ‘AS’ didn’t work
The armed struggle along the borders started by the newly formed student army (made up mostly of Bamar students from cities like Yangon and Mandalay, the central regions and other cities and towns) was fought for two years at that time but never achieved anything significant either. (In stark contrast to what we have seen in the current post-2021 armed revolt.)
There were several reasons for that. One was that established ethnic armed organizations were not ready to fully support the student army. (A totally different scenario from the cooperation we’ve seen between some EAOs and newly formed resistance forces since the 2021 coup.) Among the reasons was that the young students from the cities couldn’t really adapt to the tough jungle life. Soon after arriving, several thousand students went back to their homes when the junta offered them an amnesty.
Another big factor undermining the students’ armed struggle was a ceasefire agreement initiated by the junta. After the coup, the junta’s powerful Secretary-1 and spy chief General Khin Nyunt convinced many ethnic armed organizations to sign ceasefire agreements in the late 1980s and 1990s. More than a dozen ethnic armed groups, including major groups like the Kachin Independence Army, the United Wa State Army, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, the New Mon State Party and others signed the junta’s ceasefire agreements, though the process was obviously a sham. Many people, including ethnic communities, regarded the EAOs as the junta’s “allies” or “ceasefire partners” at the time, deviating from the pro-democracy political course embarked upon after the ’88 uprising.
Looking at it through a political prism, it’s easy to understand that the “ceasefire” was the junta’s card to divide the resistance forces. For the junta, at that time, there were two main political enemy camps: the political parties “inside” the system and the dozens of ethnic armed organizations along the borders. Of these two, the political party camp was the top priority for the generals as it was supported by the majority of people. The generals knew that if they could neutralize ethnic armed organizations with “ceasefire agreements” and offers of business concessions, they wouldn’t need to fight them, so they could use their energy and capacity to annihilate the “urban politics” camp—both the political parties and the underground student unions.
Many leaders of the NLD and ethnic parties were arrested. But as the elections approached in May 1990, the crackdown became more targeted: Many key leaders of political parties, including Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and ethnic figures, were arrested even before the vote.
Most of the student activists were also thrown behind bars with lengthy imprisonment terms. To take my own case as an example, I was arrested at a protest in 1991 along with over 100 other students. We were each sentenced to a minimum of 10 years’ imprisonment. A series of student protests occurred in the 1990s and the junta responded with a blanket crackdown on them. I would say there were almost no dissidents who were not arrested at least once after the 1988 coup. All of us who were active dissidents under a political party flag or a student union flag were arrested and tortured because the junta aimed to “kill” our political awareness and fighting spirit, so that it could not be passed to a new generation. That was the junta’s political strategy at the time—to annihilate “urban politics” rather than the neutralized ethnic armed organizations along the borders. Their strategy worked.
To analyze the whole situation after the 1988 coup, the nonviolent “urban politics” camp, the armed struggle launched by the new student army and the established ethnic armed organizations were not on the same page or synchronized at all. That’s how the AS lost its way at that time.
Hard lessons
The “urban politics” camp was crippled by the junta’s systematic, yearslong crackdown. But by securing political legitimacy for the anti-regime movement, the election result was the most significant and long-lasting achievement of the 1988 uprising. It was used for political leverage and a tool by the international community led by the UN and the West to pressure the junta to hand over power or enter negotiations with the election winner and ethnic organizations. And it took exactly 20 years for the ruling generals to formally “override” the people’s 1990 choice with its rigged election held in 2010.
If I had to give a name to the popular resistance against the coup in 1988 and the following decades, I would call it “the nonviolent resistance period” as it overwhelmed other political trends and methods. So, the resistance against the regime throughout the whole period before and after the 1988 coup didn’t reach the level of a revolution (တော်လှန်ရေး), in which all necessary methods are applied, especially armed struggle.
But all of the military’s brutality and cheating—the coup in 1988, the killing of innocent protesters and political persecutions, and the blatant refusal to hand over power to the party for which the people voted—were engraved in the hearts of the Myanmar people once more. It was the second time the entire population had been deceived.
The generals have displayed this political treachery again and again since 1962. It has become institutionalized as “the military institution’s political culture.” This unethical and brutal military culture sufficiently angered and outraged the Myanmar people that their motivation changed from anti-regime sentiment to anti-military sentiment. This has never waned—it has only grown and grown.
Here, we should understand what the Myanmar people learned—through their own experience and suffering—from the ’88 Uprising and the couple of decades that followed it under another round of military dictatorship:
Popular uprisings don’t work because the generals will simply oppress them.
Elections and even landslide victories don’t work because the generals will reject them.
Nonviolent methods don’t work because the generals respond with violence.
Pressure from the international community doesn’t work because the generals don’t play by its standards.
The biggest lesson of all, based on the above lessons: The generals individually and the military institutionally use their power and cunning ways to destroy the people’s aspirations to, at a minimum, simply live and die in a free and democratic society.
But these seemingly discouraging lessons couldn’t kill the people’s hopes or stop them struggling to achieve them. That’s the nature of the Myanmar people. In the next installment in this series, we’ll see how these lessons have been applied to their unfinished struggle.
Read the first part of this series: Evolution of the Myanmar Revolution (Part 1): Why the ‘Mother Coup’ Faced Little Resistance..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-27
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-27
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
The Military's political role, Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"Human Rights Violations took place in States and Regions from Aug 15 to 21, 2024
Military Junta Troop launched airstrikes and dropped bombs in Sagaing Region, Magway Region, Mandalay Region, Tanintharyi Region, Rakhine State, and Shan State from August 15th to 21st. The Military Junta arrested the civilians for military service in the Bago Region, Magway Region, and Mandalay Region. The political prisoners from Daik-U Prison and Thayawaddy Prison from Bago Region were tortured.
Over 20 civilians died, and about 40 were injured by the Military’s heavy and light artillery attacks. Over 200 civilians were arrested by the Military Junta within a week..."
Source/publisher:
Network for Human Rights Documentation-Burma
Date of publication:
2024-08-26
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-26
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
Format :
pdf pdf pdf pdf
Size:
276.83 KB 269.96 KB 80.23 KB 144.45 KB
more
Sub-title:
The junta’s opponents say an election organized during military rule would be a sham and solve no problems.
Description:
"Myanmar’s junta has committed to holding a general election late next year, with voting to be staggered because of security concerns, said politicians who met the military’s election committee on the weekend.
Junta chief Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing has made promises to hold an election ever since early 2021 when he overthrew a government led by then State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi.
Suu Kyi’s party won a late 2020 election in a landslide but the military complained of election fraud, staged a coup, locked up Suu Kyi and many others and declared a state of emergency.
The junta’s Union Election Commission, or UEC, met political party representatives in the capital, Naypyidaw, on Saturday and urged them to prepare for the polls, said Tin Swe, vice chairman of the Democratic Party, one the parties at the meeting.
“They said they are prepared and that the election is a goal of the State Administration Council,” he told Radio Free Asia, referring to the junta by its official name.
“It must hold the election and has committed to holding it,” he said.
While the UEC had not officially announced the date of the election Tin Swe said he believed, given the discussions the parties held with the election organizer, that it would be held in November.
Military-run media also reported on the meeting and the preparations for the election, without reporting a date.
Radio Free Asia attempted to contact UEC member Khin Maung Oo for details about the plan for the election but he did not return calls by the time of publication.
The junta’s opponents have dismissed the junta’s plans for an election as meaningless.
Suu Kyi, Myanmar’s most popular politician, remains in detention along with many of her party members and supporters. Her National League for Democracy (NLD) party, which swept elections in 2016 and again in 2020, has been disbanded along with many other parties.
“I believe that the international community and the public will strongly oppose the sham election,” said Sithu Maung, spokesperson for a group of NLD politicians elected in the 2020 vote.
“This election is a way of trying to bring about military rule with supposed civilian approval,” Sithu Maung, who lives outside Myanmar, told RFA.
Elections organized by the military would resolve nothing, he said.
“We’ve said all along it’s not practical to solve Myanmar’s problems through elections. What Myanmar needs is not an election, it’s to change the system,” he said.
'Voting in stages'
Parties seen as representing the military and led by retired officers fared poorly in the 2016 and 2020 elections, even in constituencies where many military personnel and their families live.
The junta remains very unpopular, most Myanmar people say, and its forces have lost significant territory this year to various rebel groups fighting to end what they condemn as illegitimate army rule.
The election organizer told the parties on the weekend that voting would have to be staggered because of the security situation, said Myo Set Thway, general secretary of the People’s Pioneer Party.
“The UEC chairman said that it’s impossible to complete the election in one day in terms of security and other conditions. He said that the election will be held in stages,” he said.
“For security, we will do it first in places where the situation is fine and stable,” Myo Set Thway said, citing the UEC. “After that, elections will be held in areas that are moderately stable.”
The junta extended a state of emergency for another six months on July 31, the sixth extension since the 2021 coup. The constitution mandates that elections must be held within six months after a state of emergency is lifted.
The junta is also planning to organize a census this October to prepare for the polls.
Neighbors, including China and India, will be hoping that an election can help to bring stability to resource-rich Myanmar. Thailand, China and India have discussed providing support for the census and the vote.
In January 2023, the UEC introduced an election law stipulating that parties wanting to participate in a general election must have at least 100,000 members and funds of at least 100 million kyats (US$50,000). Parties were required to re-register within 60 days, which many of them, in disarray with members in detention or exile, failed to do so and were disqualified.
Of the 49 parties that have been approved, only nine plan to campaign nationally. The other 40 will compete on a regional or state level.
Scores of parties with suspected ties to rebel groups, including any political or ideological links, have been barred from any election..."
Source/publisher:
"Radio Free Asia" (USA)
Date of publication:
2024-08-26
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-26
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"Khin Mar Cho worries for her 4-year-old son as she struggles to scrape together enough food to feed him in a makeshift displacement camp at a crowded monastery in western Myanmar.
Soldiers had stormed their village of Byine Phyu, Rakhine state, and forced her and other family members out of their homes. They detained all the men and shot her brother and other neighbors, she said.
Survivors like Khin Mar Cho fled to the monastery just outside the regional capital Sittwe. There, a lone monk is struggling to feed about 300 people who have sought refuge inside the camp as a three-year civil war intensifies around them, waged by Myanmar’s military junta against an armed resistance.
“There are days that we have no food, even though we are hungry,” Khin Mar Cho said. “I cannot feed my kid anything more than meals donated by people because I don’t have a job or income, and all the male family members have been taken away.”
Disturbing accounts from multiple aid workers suggest hunger is being used as a weapon of war in Rakhine state.
The junta is preventing aid from reaching desperate people by imposing checkpoints, blocking roads and waterways, and refusing to issue access permits to humanitarian groups, multiple senior United Nations officials, and local and international aid workers in Rakhine told CNN on condition of anonymity because most weren’t authorized to speak.
Rakhine has become a focal point of the conflict, where a powerful ethnic minority armed rebel group, the Arakan Army (AA) — which is accused of human rights abuses — has seized control of at least 10 of the state’s townships since a year-long ceasefire with the military collapsed in November.
The aid officials said the junta is trying to “starve” civilians in AA-held territory, using tactics that have repeatedly been described as war crimes and crimes against humanity by UN officials and rights groups.
“They are using food as a weapon,” a senior aid official told CNN. “That much is clear.”
Related
Hundreds of fleeing Rohingya reportedly killed in Rakhine as fears mount of ethnic cleansing mount
In a statement to CNN, Myint Kyaw, Deputy Permanent Secretary for Myanmar’s Ministry of Information, alleged rebel groups — not the junta — are restricting “people’s access” to territories they control.
“The Myanmar government is committed to the equality of all citizens,” the statement said. “Every citizen has the right to travel freely without any restrictions.”
Risk of starvation
Aid workers say they don’t know the full extent of the suffering due to telecoms and internet blocks coupled with restrictions on access to affected areas.
But they say the crisis is acute.
The situation unfolding across the country is desperate, but in Rakhine — which is almost entirely dependent on food aid — the UN says that fewer than a quarter of the 873,000 people who need food assistance have received it.
“There is a very real possibility that the most vulnerable… may die if they do not receive support,” a UN report warned in June. It is now August, and the situation has deteriorated.
Displaced residents in Rakhine told CNN they are growing increasingly desperate as they and their families struggle to cope with escalating violence and dwindling supplies of food and medicine.
Prices for basic staples, like rice, fuel and cooking oil, have skyrocketed partly due to shortages created by the junta’s control of supply routes north from Myanmar’s largest city, Yangon, aid officials said. Requests to transport goods, including food, into the region are being refused, they added.
Meanwhile, food production in the state has plummeted, with farmers predicting a 50% drop in this year’s rice harvest, independent Myanmar news outlet The Irrawaddy reported.
Mohammed, a 43-year-old father of three, has lived in a displacement camp with his family in Sittwe since 2012, when anti-Muslim violence forced tens of thousands of people from their homes.
The latest fighting has not yet reached Sittwe, which the junta still controls. But since the collapse of the ceasefire deal between the AA and the military in November opened a major new front in Myanmar’s civil war, the camp has been all but cut off and conditions have drastically deteriorated, he said.
Mohammed’s children attend a small, makeshift school within the camp, but he says it’s difficult to nurture their dreams when he can only feed them half a bowl of rice.
“My children would cry and ask, ‘Are we not eating tonight?’ In those moments, feeling desperate, I would go to a neighbor and ask for some food to feed our children,” Mohammed told Partners Relief and Development, an aid NGO.
Yet his neighbors are hungry too, and they have little to spare.
Access denied
Shayna Bauchner, a researcher at Human Rights Watch, told CNN the junta is obstructing aid deliveries in Rakhine by blocking roads and waterways, seizing relief cargoes and confiscating medical supplies.
“As the conflict has spread around Rakhine, we’ve also seen the destruction of roadways and bridges,” she said. “The result is, basically, no one has access to these places.”
Aid groups, including UN agencies, must get “travel authorizations” from the state government, which reports to the ruling military council, before they can access territory that the junta considers “travel-restricted areas,” according to aid officials.
In February, the junta stopped issuing nearly all travel authorizations to contested or rebel-controlled territory in the state, most of which are in northern Rakhine, according to seven aid officials with direct knowledge of the matter, all of whom requested anonymity.
Without the travel authorizations, it’s impossible to pass through the junta’s road and waterway blockades, they said.
“All we need at the moment is aid and support to survive this.”
North Rakhine State villager
One senior aid official said, “it is difficult to negotiate because the SAC does not want assistance to go to non-SAC controlled areas,” referring to the State Administration Council, the official name of the junta government.
In May, some aid agencies received travel authorizations for Sittwe when the junta allowed them to begin transporting supplies from Yangon. Two cargo vessels carrying rice and basic medicine arrived in Sittwe two months later, but some items such as solar lights, hygiene and newborn kits remained held up, OCHA reported in August.
Teams still can’t access the surrounding townships or areas further afield.
“No official travel authorization has been granted to humanitarian partners to implement activities outside of Sittwe township since November 2023,” a senior aid official told CNN.
Seeking to broker an end to the blockade, senior UN officials held informal talks with SAC officials last month in the country’s capital, two sources told CNN.
The UN aid officials made clear in their meetings, which have not been previously reported, that the status quo is unacceptable, the sources said. Separately, the two officials said the issue was raised with the UN Security Council, the European Union and China, among others.
The junta told humanitarian groups that it cut their access to AA territory because aid workers cannot safely travel through areas the military does not control, sources told CNN.
But “that’s a lame excuse,” said a senior aid official. “We don’t need the junta to cover for our security.”
Local aid workers caught trying to deliver food and supplies in junta-controlled territory without a permit have also been arrested, those on the ground told CNN.
Aid workers and officials say the junta’s blockade is part of a wider war strategy long used by the military, designed to chip away at the rebel group’s popular support by cutting off food, water and medical care to the civilian population.
“They are using food as a weapon. That much is clear.”
Senior aid official
Bauchner, the Human Rights Watch researcher, said the blockades are “deliberate, and they are intended to harm the population in what is an apparent war crime.”
Myint Kyaw of the junta’s information ministry, said humanitarian groups are “being allowed to go to safe areas” after completing a verification process and alleged — without evidence — that rebel groups are blocking aid deliveries.
In the statement, the junta linked instability in the region to armed groups allegedly engaging in online gambling, planting and selling illegal drugs, human trafficking, online scams and illegal weapons deliveries to “terrorist groups” in rebel-controlled areas.
But one local aid official who works in northern Rakhine said the junta is “punishing civilians collectively” by blocking most food and medicine imports. Even the limited food that is available in the state is prohibitively expensive to most, largely thanks to blockade-induced inflation, he said.
“People are surviving on the bare minimum … like rice and salt,” said Ejaz, who asked to be identified by a pseudonym for his safety.
“I’ve seen it with my own eyes.”
War and hunger
Many of the displaced in Rakhine are members of the stateless Rohingya minority, who have been persecuted for decades in a country that denies them citizenship.
Jamila, 26, a former resident of the predominantly Rohingya town of Buthidaung, close to the Bangladesh border, said the community recently suffered food shortages for at least six months due to the fighting.
“No one came to give us food. The junta blocks all roads. They block all aid trucks,” said Jamila, who goes by one name and spoke to CNN from a refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, where her family recently fled.
Many shops were looted by fighters and soldiers, she said, and those still open could only get supplies by smuggling them at high prices across the border from Bangladesh.
Food supplies were also strained as droves of displaced people from surrounding villages fled to Buthidaung to escape fighting and landmines.
“Everyone was helping everyone,” she said. “I lived life with risk and hunger.”
With little food and no medicine, Jamila said her children suffered from diarrhea and vomiting. “I am suffering from allergies. My whole body is full of itching. But there is no medicine, no treatment,” she said.
In late May, the Arakan Army said it seized Buthidaung. Activists and relatives of residents accused AA soldiers of extrajudicial killings, torching and looting Rohingya neighborhoods, and forcing thousands of people to flee.
Jamila said fighters stormed her village, drenching her home in petrol and setting it on fire while she and her family were still inside.
As the flames consumed their home, they scrambled to grab what belongings they could salvage — but only those on the ground floor had time to flee. Her parents-in-law, asleep in their beds upstairs, did not make it out.
They had no time to mourn. As they ran to escape their village, the howl of gunfire rang out, and a bullet pierced her younger brother. He did not survive.
“We didn’t try to save him,” Jamila said. “We were hearing the screams of people, the cries of children.”
She walked for six days to reach Bangladesh, saying “we lived by eating banana leaves and drinking pond water.”
CNN could not verify Jamila’s account but it matches other reports from the incident.
In a statement, the AA denied it torched Buthidaung, saying it “adheres to its principle of fighting under the military code of conduct and never targets non-military objects.”
Earlier this month, the AA was accused of killing Rohingya people in drone strikes and artillery fire as villagers fled the nearby town of Maungdaw. It denied involvement and blamed the deaths on the Myanmar military and allied Rohingya armed groups.
CNN reached out for comment to the AA and the Humanitarian and Development Coordination Office (HDCO) of the United League of Arakan (ULA), the AA’s political wing.
In a statement to CNN, the HDCO said there are about 590,000 people displaced in Rakhine state, according to their data, but civil society organizations are only reaching 20-30% of conflict-affected people.
“Emergency responses are extremely slow. The ULA government, including HDCO, is making every effort to provide food, shelter, water, and healthcare with the limited resources available,” it said.
‘We are invisible’
When the junta blocks official aid deliveries, regional and local humanitarian groups use covert tactics to operate without approval from the military, risking their lives to deliver aid to those in need, according to officials at four local aid groups, all of whom declined to publicize their tactics because it could jeopardize their operations.
But it’s far from enough.
At least 18.6 million people — about one third of Myanmar’s population — need humanitarian assistance this year, but aid workers have only been able to reach 2.1 million, according to an OCHA report published last week. Even in territories that the junta does not blockade, intensifying war, record-low funding and international apathy are also limiting aid workers’ access.
Aid workers have also become targets in the junta’s war.
A World Food Programme (WFP) warehouse in Maungdaw was looted and burned in June, depriving that community of urgently needed food aid. But WFP’s local partners were already struggling to reach their warehouses in Rakhine because “artillery shells are falling everywhere,” according to a source with direct knowledge of the matter.
Junta-imposed restrictions on communications are also limiting aid workers’ ability to operate, they say. Signal, a popular encrypted messaging app, has become inaccessible to users in Myanmar unless they use a VPN (virtual private network), four Yangon residents told CNN. Junta police are also conducting random phone checks throughout the city, one resident added.
Meanwhile, the UN’s humanitarian response program in Myanmar is among the most underfunded in the world. UN agencies and their local partners estimate that about $1 billion is needed to fund aid efforts in the country through 2024, but they have only raised about 20% of that amount.
“In the best-case scenario, based on my discussions with the donors, we may raise 30-35%, though not beyond that, by the end of the year,” Sajjad Mohammad Sajid, the OCHA Head of Office in Myanmar, told CNN. “This is the second year in a row that Myanmar is facing a significant decrease in funds despite rising food insecurity.”
Without an immediate injection of cash and a lifting of the blockade, aid officials say they will be forced to choose who does — and does not — receive humanitarian aid, leaving millions of desperate civilians without urgently needed assistance.
“Underfunding will result in livelihoods falling beyond the point of repair,” the OCHA report warned.
A senior UN aid official in Myanmar blamed the funding shortfall in part on international apathy. There are relatively few global advocacy groups and international news outlets consistently reporting on the country, and unlike Gaza and Ukraine, human rights abuses in Myanmar have gained little international attention, he said.
“We have become invisible,” the official said. “Donors will find it difficult to fund missions that are invisible.”
The monastery in Sittwe, where Khin Mar Cho and her family now reside, relies on food donated from the local community.
Another villager from Byine Phyu, who declined to be named for safety reasons, told CNN that on good days they are given two basic meals of rice and vegetables, but her two children, aged 11 and 7, often go to bed hungry.
“The soldiers took all the money we had,” she said. “All we need at the moment is aid and support to survive this.”
Though his small monastery is overwhelmed with displaced people, the monk said he tries to collect more donations from the community, hoping to feed those in the compound more than small helpings of rice.
But they receive meager food donations. Adding to the dire situation, his makeshift camp is overfilled, many families are forced to sleep outside without a covering in the height of the rainy season, so sickness and diarrhea is rife, the monk said.
“There are no NGOs or medics helping them,” he said.
“The only help we get is from the fire service for their funerals.”
This story has been updated with additional information..."
Source/publisher:
"CNN" (USA)
Date of publication:
2024-08-25
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-25
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations, The discussion on humanitarian assistance to Burma
Language:
more
Description:
"Pioneering Myanmar documentary filmmaker Pe Maung Same died on Monday, three days after being transferring from Yangon’s notorious Insein Prison to a hospital, according to close friends.
He was 51 years old.
Pe Maung Same was arrested at a Myanmar military regime checkpoint in Karenni State’s capital, Loikaw, in late May 2022. Junta officials prosecuted him for allegedly contacting local People’s Defense Force groups and sending his video records to the National Unity Government and local media outlets.
He was convicted and sentenced to three years in prison.
He contracted tuberculosis in Loikaw Prison. His condition worsened in April this year, and he had not been able to walk since then.
“He said his lower body was like a stone and sensed nothing,” one of his friends said.
Later, it was found that he had developed spinal tuberculosis. Due to the severity of his condition, he was transferred to Insein Prison in Yangon on July 13 to receive medical treatment in the prison hospital, but he never recovered.
“While he was in Loikaw Prison, four of his ribs were broken during interrogation. He also said he was denied proper food and medical treatment in both prisons,” the friend said.
After over two years in prison, Pe Maung Same was released from Insein Prison on Aug. 16 due to his health condition and transferred to Yangon’s Sakura Hospital.
He died in the hospital on Monday, three days after his release.
“After he underwent a screening test of his stomach on Sunday, his heart stopped. He was [revived and] sent to the ICU but the next day he died of cardiac arrest. He died because of being sent into prison and not receiving proper food or treatment. He would not have died had he not been arrested,” the friend added.
He was cremated at the Yayway Cemetery in Yangon on Wednesday.
Pe Maung Same was a son of prominent Burmese satirical cartoonist Pe Thein, who was widely respected for both his artistic gifts and his political convictions.
Pe Maung Same was among a group of young Myanmar documentary filmmakers who emerged in the early 2000s. He made many documentaries while at Yangon Film School and won many international awards.
His prominent documentaries include “Don’t Think It’s Funny”, about his father; and “Nargis—When Time Stopped Breathing”, the first-ever feature-length documentary made by a Myanmar filmmaker, which captured the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis, which killed nearly 140,000 people in the Irrawaddy Delta in 2008. The film was internationally screened and won four awards.
Another of his documentaries, “The River Our Ayeyarwady”, won plaudits among both local and international audiences.
He was widely admired by his peers in the new generation of Myanmar documentary filmmakers for his willingness to share his documentary filmmaking experiences and teach about filmmaking.
“Pe Maung Same is a pioneer filmmaker in the modern film industry of Myanmar. Everybody loves him,” his friend said..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-21
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-21
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Freedom of opinion and expression: - the situation in Burma/Myanmar - reports, analyses, recommendations, Freedom of Opinion and Expression - tools for change in Burma/Myanmar
Language:
more
Sub-title:
Investors also cite rising inflation, banking difficulties, a lack of raw materials and worker shortages.
Description:
"Foreign investment in Myanmar has dropped precipitously in the three and a half years since the military seized power from a democratically elected government, according to officials and observers, as companies weigh the risks of operating in a nation engulfed in civil war.
Myanmar’s economy has been in freefall since the Feb. 1, 2021, coup, contracting by nearly 20%, according to the World Bank. Its 2024 gross domestic product growth estimates have been halved to 1%, in large part due to widespread conflict and junta mismanagement.
Investors have fled, citing political instability, rising inflation, difficulties with bank transactions, challenges in obtaining raw materials, and insufficient manpower as reasons for scaling back their presence or leaving Myanmar altogether.
According to official statements from Myanmar’s Directorate of Investments and Company Administration, foreign investment reached a mere US$150 million in the first seven months of 2024. Comparatively, some US$2.9 billion in investment flowed into Myanmar during the three years between 2021 and 2024.
These numbers represent a drop in the bucket when measured against US$3.8 billion in foreign investment in 2020 alone, when the country was governed by former State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi’s civilian National League for Democracy party.
Singapore’s Sembcorp became one of the latest firms to reduce its footprint in Myanmar on Aug. 12, when it announced the temporary closure of its gas-fired power plant in the Mandalay region city of Myingyan, citing safety concerns.
Similarly, on May 28, South Korea’s CJ Feed Myanmar announced the suspension of its production and sales of animal feed at its plant in the largest city Yangon due to the economic crisis.
Dueling exchange rates
One Myanmar businessman told RFA Burmese that the junta’s control of the exchange rate for the kyat has made it difficult for foreign companies to operate.
"The exchange rate of the dollar is unstable due to inflation,” said the businessman who, like others interviewed for this report, requested anonymity for security reasons. “The Central Bank’s control of the dollar, with a fixed rate of 2,100 kyats, poses significant challenges for foreign companies."
The junta is increasingly cracking down on black market money changers as they keep desperately needed foreign exchange out of the formal banking system, where people and companies are forced to convert it to kyats at artificially low exchange rates.
In Myanmar’s informal banking sector, known as hundi, one U.S. dollar is worth more than 6,000 kyats.
Worsening conflict
However, the main obstacle to foreign investment is the worsening conflict, according to Aung Thu Nyein, a member of the Institute for Strategy and Policy – Myanmar think tank.
"The current environment in Myanmar is not conducive to smooth business operations,” he said. “The primary concern is that investing in Myanmar under the present circumstances entails significant political risk.”
Meanwhile, the junta’s investment policies are unclear, “making it uncertain with whom one should engage."
Just last month, Thailand-based newspaper The Thaiger reported that Thai companies with investments worth US$7 billion had withdrawn from Myanmar due to the persistent tensions between the junta and the armed opposition.
And Japan’s Nikkei Asia reported last week that numerous businesses in Myanmar have relocated to Thailand due to the conflict.
Junta lacks ‘business mindset’
A senior official from the junta’s Ministry of Investment and Foreign Economic Relations, who also declined to be identified, told RFA that “new investment is unlikely.”
“Foreign investment is almost non-existent under the present circumstances,” he said. “Existing businesses may be transferred, with the likelihood of such transfers depending on the evolving situation.”
The official noted that it was increasingly difficult for companies to justify investing in Myanmar when they could do so elsewhere in the region, where the political situation was more stable.
An economic analyst told RFA that the junta lacks a “business-oriented mindset.”
"If the economy were managed by a government with a strong understanding of business practices, the country’s economic situation would likely improve,” he said.
Following the coup in 2021, a majority of Western companies withdrew from Myanmar.
According to a report released by ISP-Myanmar at the end of 2022, out of 52 countries with companies that had regularly done business in Myanmar, 39 had ceased their investments.
The primary foreign investors in Myanmar now are companies based in Singapore, China, and Thailand. Among the 12 foreign investment sectors, energy, natural gas, and oil manufacturing attract the most investment..."
Source/publisher:
"Radio Free Asia" (USA)
Date of publication:
2024-08-21
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-21
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"From their base in ungoverned stretches of Southeast Asia, international criminal networks are prowling the Internet, seeking to defraud victims around the world with sophisticated and psychologically devastating scams. Gangsters operating out of Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos, relying on forced labor, have spread their tentacles through Asia, Africa and Latin America and increasingly within the United States, stripping gullible prey of at least $64 billion annually. Clearly, to eradicate such a global menace will require a coordinated international response. Even so, the United States is not internally powerless to confront this striking example of how conflict and corrupt governance in distant parts of the world can directly threaten Americans’ security and well-being.
The scale and scope of this mass scamming has essentially snuck up on law enforcement and policy makers given its pathbreaking geographic and organizational parameters. Effective action to counter the scammers will require a whole-of-government effort by the U.S. coordinating the work of government agencies, civil society and concerned international counterparts, beginning with Southeast Asia.
One such effort to address scamming in the U.S. is already underway, organized by civil society and government on an ad hoc basis to begin charting a comprehensive plan of attack. Known as Operation Shamrock, it is a first-of-its-kind public-private partnership whose goal is sharing information across diverse and multi-disciplinary stakeholders affected by the organized crime crisis emanating from Southeast Asia. Within the Shamrock alliance, working groups focus on specific strategies and tactics that include raising public awareness of the scams; educating bankers to look for red flags that indicate criminal activity; and boosting law enforcement capacity to assist victims and trace lost funds, thereby gaining better intelligence on precisely how the criminal groups operate. Acting as a non-governmental arm and laboratory for innovative responses to the problem, Operation Shamrock could be a valuable partner for a larger government program.
How the Scam Operations in Southeast Asia Developed
The epicenter of this scamming activity is located in the borderlands of Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos, where weak governance, vast swathes of largely unregulated territory, widespread corruption and armed conflict have provided virtually free license for the criminal networks to gain a solid foothold over the past decade.
A USIP study published this year found that what began as enclaves hosting illegal gambling has expanded in recent years into sophisticated scamming operations. The tightly guarded enclaves operated by the criminal networks house hundreds of thousands of forced-labor victims from around the world, enticed by false ads for well paid, high-tech jobs and trafficked into the armed enclaves by another set of criminal networks adept at moving people across borders under false pretenses.
While the transnational criminal networks originate predominantly from China, until recently Beijing did very little to disrupt these criminal groups overseas.
While the transnational criminal networks originate predominantly from China, until recently Beijing did very little to disrupt these criminal groups overseas. In many cases Chinese enterprises, government and party institutions played a role in deepening the gangs’ influence across Southeast Asia to further their own goals.
When the scam centers along the Chinese border began to proliferate during the pandemic, with the Chinese public as their major target, however, Chinese police cracked down on the syndicates targeting mainland China. The crime groups responded by globalizing their illicit activities, seeking victims on other continents including North America. While Africa, Central Asia, South Asia and Latin America have all been hit hard by the human trafficking employed to staff the scam centers, the United States is proving to be a particularly rich target for this malign activity.
The Toll on American Victims
The scams are unprecedented in their use of psychological manipulation, technology, social media and advanced financial technologies. Dubbed “pig-butchering” for the technique of figuratively fattening and ultimately slaughtering the victim, the scams aim to strip targets of all their assets — a process that of course inflicts deep emotional harm. New victims emerge every day in the U.S. reporting losses of hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars.
Pig butchering works by luring potential marks into online investment or romantic relationships — or both —through common social media and internet sites. Scam actors will target victims by text message or social media and then engage in a psychological campaign to isolate the victim and develop a trust between victim and scammer. The process is similar to brainwashing.
Preying on the bond that develops, they induce Americans to deposit money into “cryptocurrency investment accounts” after showing them false data purportedly reflecting their return on investment. Then, believing that they have it all — a new love and an amazing way to make money — the victims are pushed into liquidating retirement accounts, college savings or other forms of assets. Some have even been manipulated into taking high interest loans to allegedly pay “taxes” on their fictitious reported gains. One such victim, an employee of a local U.S. bank, was even convinced to criminally divert bank funds into a scam investment scheme, causing millions of dollars in losses. Ultimately, victims are hit with a double punch: Their entire nest egg is gone and they have been betrayed by someone they may have loved and definitely trusted.
Some reported case studies illustrate particular manipulative techniques. An adult son received a call from his elderly mother in Florida asking him to help her pay the mortgage on her condo. “You don’t have a mortgage,” he told her. “I do now,” she said, explaining how her new love had helped her get a high-interest equity line against the home so that she could put it into a crypto investment. The son told the authors he then used his retirement funds to pay off that mortgage for his mother, two generations were struck by this crime.
Other manipulative techniques have even resulted in violent crimes in the United States — illustrating how these networks could undermine much broader forms of instability. In Ohio, AP recently reported a case involving a scam victim who shot and killed an Uber driver after a manipulative criminal convinced him that the driver was somehow involved in the scam. Meanwhile, a newer plague of custom scams in the United States and Europe also illustrate how the pig-butchering scamsters may impersonate law enforcement by acquiring knowledge of the family situations and legal and or political vulnerabilities of victims.
Reports to the FBI’s victim hotline (known as IC3) from 2023 alone show losses of $4.5 billion to online investment schemes and $650 million to romance scams, though we know this is only the tip of the iceberg, because victim shame leads to vast underreporting of the crime. Victims are embarrassed, isolated and frequently too humiliated to seek help. In the most extreme cases, people have been known to end their lives. Such losses are commonly thought to affect the elder population, but IC3 reports show people of all ages — indeed anyone with a cell phone — is vulnerable to these scams.
Countering the Threat
As the USIP study concludes, only a comprehensive, well-coordinated international effort, beginning with Southeast Asia, has any chance of containing this global menace. It cannot be effectively addressed on a county-by-country basis, because the criminal networks behind it are infinitely adept at outpacing law enforcement efforts and advancing new technological applications that reach beyond current capabilities.
Only a comprehensive, well-coordinated international effort, beginning with Southeast Asia, has any chance of containing this global menace.
However, with the United States increasingly rising to the top as a prime victim of this type of scamming, it also behooves U.S. institutions — law enforcement, cybersecurity agencies, civil society organizations and media — to organize a coordinated program to prevent and disrupt its impact on innocent U.S. citizens.
This is the goal of Operation Shamrock, which could serve as a model platform for a much wider U.S.-government led effort.
Operation Shamrock has assembled many of the stakeholders necessary for alerting the public to the threat of this criminal activity and mobilizing grassroots responses toward crafting remedial measures to disrupt the scams. Stakeholders engaged in the operation include social media, financial sector and banking industry representatives, cryptocurrency exchanges, law enforcement at all levels including international, NGOs and victim services providers. Operating mainly in the United States, but with international ties, Shamrock is a good example of the kind of multidisciplinary approach that must be replicated and expanded to check criminal scamming.
Building public awareness must be at the center of any strategy to combat scams. This crime won’t stop until we reach full American awareness of the threat. It warrants a massive campaign to educate the public about the dangers of engaging by text with people we don’t know. And it requires new efforts by the private sector to ensure that Americans using various social media platforms can do so safely. It also requires much greater partnership between banks, law enforcement and social media companies to prevent psychological manipulation from emptying bank accounts. Finally, it requires strong government leadership in building a whole-of-government approach that can advance robust international collaboration to disrupt these networks overseas. It’s time to cultivate a new normal of caution as a primary response to online communication..."
Source/publisher:
United States Institute of Peace
Date of publication:
2024-08-21
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-21
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"BEIJING, Aug. 20 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met with Julie Bishop, special envoy of the secretary-general of the United Nations (UN) for Myanmar, in Beijing on Tuesday.
Wang, also a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, said that on the Myanmar issue, China is committed to respecting its sovereignty, independence, national unity and territorial integrity, is committed to non-interference in its internal affairs, and is committed to the "Myanmar-owned, Myanmar-led" peace process. China supports ASEAN's role as the main channel, he added.
Noting the special envoy of the UN secretary-general on Myanmar plays a unique role, Wang said China stands ready to provide support and assistance to Bishop in performing her duties and play a constructive role in achieving political reconciliation and lasting peace and stability in Myanmar.
Bishop said she is willing to maintain close communication and strengthen cooperation with China and ASEAN to reach a consensus on the proper handling of the Myanmar issue. ■
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, also a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, meets with Julie Bishop, special envoy of the secretary-general of the United Nations (UN) for Myanmar, in Beijing, capital of China, Aug. 20, 2024. (Xinhua/Yan Yan)..."
Source/publisher:
"Xinhua News Agency" (Beijing)
Date of publication:
2024-08-20
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-20
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Sub-title:
Battlefield failures and scapegoating have prompted a growing dissatisfaction with Min Aung Hlaing’s leadership.
Description:
"Rumors of a putsch swirled around Myanmar last week ahead of Chinese Prime Minister Wang Yi’s visit to Naypyidaw where he obliquely rebuked junta chief Senior Gen.l Min Aung Hlaing. Given the scale of recent military losses there were reasons for both.
The opposition’s military gains have fundamentally transformed the battlescape and it is hard to see how the military can recover.
Since the ethnic army offensive known as Operation 1027 began in late 2023, opposition forces have captured over 2,000 military positions. The Arakan Army controls almost the entire northern half of Rakhine, and is rapidly pushing south, meeting little resistance.
The Kachin Independence Army controls every border crossing to China, and it is now on the outskirts of Myitkyina and Bhamo. The Ta’ang National Liberation Army and the Myanmar National Defense Alliance Army control much of northern Shan state.
One conflict monitoring group estimates that there have been 6,000 army casualties since Operation 1027 began. Hastily recruited and poorly trained conscripts are now at the front lines.
The military mustered 5,000 troops for the defense of Lashio and, even with air support, were outmanned and overpowered. When Lashio fell, nearly 5,000 troops and their families surrendered.
The shadow National Unity Government, or NUG, Defense Minister Ye Mon, recently asserted that 75 of 252, or 30%, of the country’s towns and cities are completely liberated, while 74 are being contested. Only one-third of the cities and towns are under full military control, though they are the largest population centers.
Since Operation 1027 began, the military has been unable to recapture almost any territory, and where it has, it’s been through sheer scorched earth tactics, intended to depopulate communities.
Unappreciated role of PDFs
While so much attention has been focused on the gains of the ethnic resistance organizations, or EROs, not enough attention has been paid to the NUG’s People’s Defense Forces, also known as PDFs.
When the PDFs were first established in 2021, they were largely written off as nothing more than canon fodder. Filled with urban youths who fled the junta, they had few arms.
Take a moment to read more
Myanmar’s old army leader calls on China to help restore stability
China top diplomat meets Myanmar leader, junta denies coup rumors
Top Myanmar army officers seized by insurgents in Shan state, junta says
China’s frustration with the Myanmar junta’s incompetence is mounting
Groups like the Karen National Liberation Army and the Ta’ang National Liberation Army provided training and a limited supply of arms and ammunition. By 2022 and 2023, the NUG was able to supply the PDFs with a steady stream of funding, which allowed them to begin to purchase weapons on the black market.
But most of the weapons they obtained were captured on the battlefield. Each successive victory gave them the arms and munitions that laid the foundation for future victories.
The PDFs have been disciplined and highly motivated, committed to the political goals of a federal democracy.
Taking advantage of their tech savvy youth, they have also been technically proficient and innovative, quickly utilizing commercial drones, long before any ERO or the military did.
PDFs have played an under-appreciated role in all of the Operation 1027 battles. They fought alongside the Karen Nationalities Defence Force in Kayah state, the Ta’ang National Liberation Army, and Kachin Independence Army.
The NUG was smart enough to put many of their units under the operational command of the various EROs, which had more battlefield experience.
But the PDFs have demonstrated exceptional battlefield experience in the past two years. In some regions, they are doing the lion’s share of the fighting.
Operation Shan-Man
The Mandalay PDF has built on the success of the Ta’ang National Liberation Army in northern Shan state.
It moved out of the hills to the east of the Irrawaddy River, capturing the town of Singu, a mere 50 km (30 miles) north of Mandalay.
This allowed them to block the movement of troops and supplies up Route 311 to the southern Kachin city of Bhamo, evidence of close tactical coordination between the NUG and the EROs.
The Mandalay PDF continues to stage attacks along that road. Last week they captured Takaung, which is the symbolic center of the Burmese empire, and Thabeikkyin township, situated between Singu and Takaung. In addition, they have taken nine army camps.Control of these towns not only gives them control of the highway, but also, should they be able to acquire heavier weaponry, control of the movement of troops and supplies along the Irrawaddy River.
PDFs have increased sporadic, though not sustained, attacks on the outskirts of Mandalay, the country’s second largest city.
Roughly 100 km (60 miles) to the city’s southwest, PDFs have been engaged in fighting across Myingyan township. Four separate PDFs converged on Taungtha township.
Other PDFs moved on the town of Natogyi. The government quickly responded, deploying 200 reinforcements to retake the town, where there is a pumping and off-take station for China’s parallel oil and gas pipeline from Kyaukphyu in Rakhine state to Kunming, across the border in Yunnan province. PDFs had briefly held the guard stations at the facility.
The escalation of fighting in the region prompted the Singapore-listed Sembcorp to indefinitely suspend operations at its US$300 million, 225-megawatt gas-fired power plant, which was opened in 2019. For a country already suffering acute power shortages, this is another blow for the faltering junta.
From four cuts to depopulation
While the NUG and their PDFs are quick to capitalize on their victories, releasing videos of townspeople warmly welcoming opposition forces, there are costs entailed with liberation.
When Operation 1027 began, the Kachin Independence Army and PDFs took over Kawlin township, in the heart of Sagaing region’s dry zone. This prompted a brutal counterattack. For nearly two weeks the town was shelled and bombed.
PDF-initiated attacks have also intensified in recent weeks in southern Sagaing, prompting fierce reprisals, mass arson attacks, and artillery strikes. Likewise, the military has lashed out in Shan state, indiscriminately bombing civilians in towns captured by the armed opposition.
A desperate regime seems to be adapting its already brutal counter-insurgency doctrine known as the “Four Cuts,” which is designed to terrorize the population into submission, to a Russian style campaign of depopulating territories.
Signs of strain
Min Aung Hlaing met with China’s Wang Yi, on Aug. 15, dispelling claims that he had been ousted by his peers.
But given the battlefield failures and his penchant for scapegoating, one certainly understands why there is growing dissatisfaction and unease.Min Aung Hlaing has been rotating generals at breakneck speed. Of the 14 regional military commands, seven have been assigned new commanders in 2024 alone. The Northeast Command has had three commanders in the past two months alone.
Only one of the 14 regional military commanders has been in place since January 2022. The remainder were replaced between April and August 2023. Of the six Bureau of Special Operation commanders that oversee the regional military commands, four have been replaced since April 2023. This month Lt. General Ni Lin Aung was assigned to oversee the four regional military commands in Shan state.
There are reports that the State Administrative Council, as the junta is formally known, has assigned its second ranking official, General Soe Win, to personally lead counter-offensive operations.
The junta has detained several commanders and their deputies from the Triangle Region, Northeast, and Central Region commands.
The costs of failure are high as the regime searches for people to blame. But more failure is likely, as the flailing junta is confronted by a surging opposition, and the financial and logistical realities that make any counter-offensive impossible..."
Source/publisher:
"Radio Free Asia" (USA)
Date of publication:
2024-08-20
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-20
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Sub-title:
The captured base is a key to the defense of a military headquarters.
Description:
"One of Myanmar’s most powerful insurgent armies has taken full control of a strategically important township in Kachin state on the border with China, its information officer told Radio Free Asia.
The Kachin Independence Army, or KIA, together with People’s Defense Forces loyal to the shadow National Unity Government, defeated junta forces to capture their last remaining battalion base in Momauk township in northern Myanmar on Monday, Col. Naw Bu said.
“We were able to completely seize Infantry Battalion 437,” he said. “The military council launched airstrikes but now we can say we have taken control of the whole of Momauk township.”
There were casualties on both sides, Naw Bu said, but he declined to give details.
RFA telephoned the junta’s Kachin state spokesman and social affairs minister Moe Min Thei to ask about Momauk but he did not answer.
The KIA, fighting for self-determination against the forces of the junta that toppled a democratically elected government in 2021, launched an initial attack on Momauk on May 7, then began their final push, along with their allies, on July 24.
Momauk is about 130 kilometers (81 miles) south of the Kachin state capital of Myitkyina, and only about 14 kilometers (9 miles) east of the town of Bhamo where the junta’s Operations and Command Headquarters 21 is based, Naw Bu said.
Junta forces had withdrawn towards Bhamo, which is on the east bank of the Irrawaddy River, he said.
The KIA and its allies have captured more than 20 junta camps in the township since late July and about 200 junta camps in the whole of Kachin state since the beginning of the year, he said.
RELATED STORIES
China fires into Myanmar after junta airstrike on border, group says
Fighting flares near state capital in north Myanmar
Northern Myanmar residents caught up in fighting, dozens hurt
Residents flee fighting
Junta airstrikes, artillery attacks and arson led to the destruction of more than 100 homes in Momauk and more than 3,000 people had fled, many to the safety of areas under KIA control, residents said.
One displaced resident sheltering near the Chinese border said he was afraid of more fighting.
“The town is being cleared up but I haven’t gone back,” said the man, who wished to remain anonymous for safety reasons.
“I would like to check my home if I could but I’m still worried that there will be more fighting,” he said, referring to Bhamo and Mansi towns where junta forces are based.
“There are so many difficulties when we flee and shelter with relatives”.
The KIA is one of several insurgent forces to make significant gains against junta forces since late last year.
An alliance of three rebel factions has pushed junta forces out of major towns in Shan state, to the southeast of Kachin state, while the military has lost ground to ethnic minority insurgents in Rakhine state in the west, and in Kayah and Kayin states in the east, as well as in parts of the deep south.
The junta has responded with airstrikes including on the KIA headquarters at Lai Zar on Aug. 15. That attack unsettled neighboring China, which fired warning shots at junta jets, according to the KIA.
The United Nations says about 3 million people have been forced from their homes by the fighting in Myanmar, many since clashes surged at the beginning of the year..."
Source/publisher:
"Radio Free Asia" (USA)
Date of publication:
2024-08-20
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-20
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"Friedgard Lottermoser passed away at the age of 82 on Aug. 8th, 2024 in Germany, from an aggressive cancer of unknown origin. Dedicating herself to a life that fused Western and Eastern spiritual traditions, Friedgard’s journey was marked by profound personal transformation and significant contributions to the global dissemination of Vipassana meditation. Under the guidance of Sayagyi U Ba Khin, one of Burma’s most revered meditation masters, she became a testament to the power of mindfulness.
Friedgard was born in Germany on April 13, 1942, and grew up during a time of immense upheaval and reconstruction. Her early life was shaped by the challenges of living in a society just emerging from years of brutal dictatorship and the ravages of World War II. Despite the hardships, those formative years instilled in Friedgard a resilience and adaptability that characterized her life.
At some point after the war, her mother remarried. Her stepfather secured a position with Fritz Werner, a German company involved in establishing armament factories in Burma, and in 1959, when Friedgard was just 17, her family relocated there. It was a move that would forever alter the trajectory of her life. It was the beginning of Friedgard’s deep connection with the culture and its people, and a country that became her spiritual home.
The family’s initial years in Burma were spent in Rangoon (now Yangon), where they lived in an exotic but somewhat isolated Chinese-style palace situated on a peninsula in Inya Lake. Surrounded by the lush, colorful, overgrown wilderness, her new home sparked in Friedgard a deep sense of curiosity and wonder about the country, and pointed her in the direction of its rich cultural and spiritual traditions.
Fascinated by the Burmese way of life, Friedgard began learning the language and gradually immersed herself in Burmese society, quite a rare thing for a foreigner in those days, and eventually taking the Burmese name Daw Onmar Khin. Her budding interest in Buddhism led her to the International Meditation Center (IMC) in Rangoon, where she met Sayagyi U Ba Khin, a pioneering teacher of Vipassana meditation and a good friend of her stepfather, who had organized his previous visit to Germany. This turned out to be a pivotal moment in Friedgard’s life. Under the guidance of this great meditation master, Friedgard immersed herself in the practice, becoming a committed disciple at U Ba Khin’s IMC for over a decade. She was strongly attracted to the simple yet profound way that Sayagyi presented the teachings.
Friedgard also spent considerable time with both Webu Sayadaw and Maha Gandayone Sayadaw during her time in Burma. Webu Sayadaw, a reputed Arahat, was known for his emphasis on the continuous practice of mindfulness, a teaching that profoundly influenced Friedgard’s own meditation journey. And she was granted rare permission to attend the Maha Gandayone Monastery in Amarapura to study Buddhist philosophy under the guidance of Maha Gandayone Sayadaw, who was renowned for his strict adherence to monastic discipline and deep commitment to monastic education.
While continuing her committed engagement with her spiritual practice, Friedgard also pursued academic studies as one of the few foreign students at the University of Rangoon, and then the University of Mandalay, where she got a Master’s degree in Pali; her 1969 thesis was titled, The Doctrine of Relationship. Yet her academic pursuits were not just about getting a degree; they also provided her with a deeper understanding of the cultural and historical context in which she was living. This knowledge enriched her spiritual practice, allowing her to connect more deeply with the teachings of the Buddha and the Vipassana tradition. Her ability to integrate into Burmese culture, combined with her commitment to Vipassana meditation, set her apart, and the intersection of her academic and spiritual pursuits laid the groundwork for her future contributions to the global mindfulness movement.
But her time at the university coincided with significant upheaval in Burma. The military coup of 1962 led by General Ne Win marked the beginning of decades of military rule in Burma. In this period of great political instability, many foreigners were forced to leave the country … but even as her family packed up to return to Germany, she adamantly insisted that she would stay behind to continue her meditation practice and studies. Fortunately, she had a rare kind of scholarship that allowed her to do so.
Nearly a decade later, in 1971, Friedgard left Burma on her own terms to return to Germany to complete a PhD, also in Pali. During the early 1970s, Friedgard supported the emerging globalization of the meditation lineage of Sayagyi U Ba Khin, helping it gain a foothold in Europe. She facilitated meditation courses for Robert Hover, Ruth Denison, and John Coleman, while also corresponding with S.N. Goenka and others.
In her later years, Friedgard’s commitment to Buddhism deepened, leading her to ordain as a Sāmaṇerī, taking the Pāḷi name of Akiñcanā. This ordination marked a significant step in her spiritual journey, reflecting her lifelong dedication to the Dhamma. In her view, the disappearance of the bhikkhuni order in Burma and elsewhere was not only a loss for women, but a significant historical oversight as well. She believed that there is a strong potential for the revival of the bhikkhuni order, and she actively advocated for this, understanding it as a necessary step for gender equality within the Buddhist community. Friedgard’s perspective on this was based not in contemporary thinking or recent social movements, but rather, was grounded in her historical understanding of the practical and egalitarian spirit of early Buddhism. She contrasted this with later developments that became increasingly patriarchal and restrictive. Friedgard argued that early Buddhism, as practiced by the Buddha, did not impose gender-based limitations on spiritual practice and leadership, suggesting that a return to those principles could lead to greater gender equality within contemporary Buddhist communities.
Friedgard expressed deep sorrow and frustration over the 2021 coup in Myanmar. She felt a profound sense of loss and disillusionment about the violence and suffering caused by the military’s actions, and lamented the senseless brutality inflicted on civilians and the deep scars they have left. Yet her reflections on the coup were grounded in her Buddhist outlook. She saw the military’s acts as not just political tragedies, but as deep spiritual failings, which, in her view, would lead to severe karmic consequences for those responsible.
Despite her deep resonance with the sufferings of the Burmese people, she was at the same time hopeful that the fall of the military would pave the way for the restoration of peace, justice, and dignity. She hoped for a future where the Burmese people are able to overcome the divisions and traumas inflicted by the military regime, working together to create a compassionate and harmonious society. She was also a fervent advocate of the current revolution, insisting that now was the time for Burmese to do everything in their power to finally achieve their freedom from decades of oppression and tyranny.
An accomplished scholar and author, Friedgard contributed to the books “Code of Conduct for Buddhist Nuns” and “A Critical Pali Dictionary”, and her unpublished thesis was titled “Quoted Verse Passages in the Works of Buddhaghosa”.
If a Hollywood screenwriter were to fashion a script based on the real life biography of Friedgard Lottermoser, it would likely be rejected as too fanciful. Her life was truly unique, intersecting so many diverse elements: the modern origins and early global spread of Vipassana meditation; the ongoing battle for freedom to win over tyranny and oppression; and the recognition of women’s rights in all sectors. Her story is a testament to the extraordinary impact one determined individual can have on the world, defying the boundaries of history, culture, gender and spirituality..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-19
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-19
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations, Buddhism in Burma - general
Language:
more
Description:
"The protracted conflict in Myanmar, known for its ongoing repression of opposition groups and ethnic minorities by the military junta, has resulted in significant regional instability. The recent meeting between former Myanmar military leader Than Shwe and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi underscores China’s increasing influence in the region. While China presents itself as a mediator, there are concerns about its true intentions and whether its actions are genuinely aimed at restoring peace or driven by self-interest.
Given these circumstances, it is crucial to critically examine Indonesia’s role and potential under President-Elect Prabowo to assume a bridging role in the diplomatic landscape of Southeast Asia. The political turmoil in Myanmar has persisted since the military coup in February 2021, which deposed the democratically elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi. The junta’s rule has been characterised by severe crackdowns on dissent, widespread human rights abuses, and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of individuals. Ethnic minority groups, particularly the Rohingya population, have faced considerable persecution, while the country’s economy has suffered due to mismanagement by the military.
The ongoing violence and instability in Myanmar have not only exacerbated the domestic crisis but also had far-reaching implications for regional security and international relations. In response to this situation, Myanmar has increasingly relied on China for support. The recent meeting between Than Shwe and Wang Yi highlights Myanmar’s dependence on Chinese assistance in sustaining the junta’s hold on power. Than Shwe’s request for help from China in restoring stability provides insight into the deepening relationship between the two nations. However, China’s involvement in Myanmar is primarily driven by strategic interests rather than altruistic motives.
China’s involvement in Myanmar is multifaceted. On the one hand, Beijing has offered diplomatic and military assistance to the junta, shielding it from international condemnation and sanctions. This support has been crucial in enabling the regime to survive despite widespread international isolation. On the other hand, China has also engaged with ethnic insurgent groups in Myanmar, helping to broker ceasefires and serving as a mediator in conflicts.
Through this dual approach, China seeks to maintain its influence in Myanmar while safeguarding its strategic interests, which include access to Myanmar’s natural resources and the preservation of its geopolitical position. China’s role as a mediator in Myanmar has been met with scepticism regarding its true intentions. Rather than genuinely addressing the conflict, China’s actions seem to prioritize the protection of its interests. This is evident through its involvement in brokering ceasefires with ethnic insurgent groups, which can be seen as a strategy to ensure stability in border areas crucial for Chinese infrastructure projects. Additionally, China’s support for the junta serves to maintain a government that aligns closely with Beijing’s interests, particularly in countering Western influence in the region.
The response of global and regional powers to the Myanmar situation has varied. The United States has taken a firm stance against the junta, implementing sanctions on military leaders and entities involved in the coup. The Biden administration consistently denounces the military’s actions and calls for the reinstatement of democratic governance. Similarly, the European Union has imposed sanctions on the junta and assists in humanitarian efforts in Myanmar. The EU also advocates for international pressure on the military regime to cease its violence against civilians and engage in dialogue with opposition forces.
ASEAN’s response to the crisis is multifaceted. The regional organization remains divided in its approach, with some member states advocating for engagement with the junta while others push for its isolation. Although the Five-Point Consensus of ASEAN, which calls for an end to violence and the initiation of dialogue, has yet to be fully implemented, the bloc’s inability to effectively address the crisis underscores the limitations of its consensus-based decision-making process.
Nevertheless, ASEAN continues to play a vital role in regional diplomacy, and its efforts to mediate the conflict remain ongoing. Indonesia, a prominent member of ASEAN, consistently calls for a peaceful resolution to the conflict in Myanmar. The country has consistently called for dialogue and the restoration of democratic governance in Myanmar. Indonesia’s diplomatic efforts are guided by its historical commitment to non-alignment and its influential role as a leader in Southeast Asia.
The election of President-Elect Prabowo has the potential to further enhance Indonesia’s involvement in regional diplomacy. Prabowo’s administration could leverage Indonesia’s influence within ASEAN to promote a more coordinated and effective response to the crisis in Myanmar.
The role of China in resolving the conflict in Myanmar is a topic of great significance that warrants academic analysis. The assessment of whether China acts as a facilitator for peace or is primarily motivated by self-interest is crucial. While China’s involvement is integral to any potential resolution, it is imperative to evaluate its actions in light of broader regional and international efforts aimed at restoring peace and stability. The efficacy of China as a mediator may be compromised if its primary objective is to safeguard and expand its influence and strategic interests.
In contrast, Indonesia holds considerable potential as a bridge builder, which assumes particular significance with the advent of President Prabowo. Unlike China, Indonesia lacks comparable strategic interests in Myanmar, thus positioning itself as a more neutral and credible mediator. Indonesia’s non-aligned stance, combined with its adeptness in regional diplomacy, makes it well-suited to play a constructive role in mediating the conflict. Prabowo’s administration should prioritize Myanmar in its foreign policy agenda and work in close collaboration with ASEAN and other international partners to advocate for a peaceful resolution.
In conclusion, the situation in Myanmar remains highly unstable, with no immediate prospects for conflict resolution. While China’s involvement is indispensable, concerns arise due to its self-interest-driven motives, which cast doubt on its effectiveness as a mediator. The international community, including the United States, European Union, and ASEAN, must persist in exerting pressure on the junta to engage in dialogue and restore democratic governance.
Simultaneously, Indonesia possesses the potential to assume a pivotal role in resolving the crisis. Under the leadership of President-Elect Prabowo, Indonesia should utilize its diplomatic influence to advocate for a peaceful resolution, establishing itself as a prominent mediator in Southeast Asia. By doing so, Indonesia can make a significant contribution to regional stability and facilitate the path towards a more peaceful and prosperous Myanmar.
opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own.
References
Albert, Eleanor. “Myanmar’s Troubled History: Coups, Military Rule, and the Struggle for Democracy.” Council on Foreign Relations, 28 February 2022.
ASEAN Secretariat. “ASEAN’s Five-Point Consensus on Myanmar: Progress and Challenges.” ASEAN.org, 10 August 2024.
Li, Nan. “China’s Strategic Interests in Myanmar: Diplomacy, Security, and Economic Ties.” Journal of Contemporary China, vol. 31, no. 134, 2022, pp. 345-362.
Maizland, Lindsay. “The Myanmar Coup and its Regional Implications.” Council on Foreign Relations, 5 March 2023.
Myanmar Institute for Peace and Security. “Myanmar’s Political Crisis: An Overview of the Current Situation.” MIPS Reports, July 2024.
O’Toole, Megan. “Myanmar’s Future under Military Rule.” Al Jazeera, 23 July 2023.
Zaw, Htet Htet. “Ethnic Conflicts and Ceasefires in Myanmar: China’s Influence.” The Diplomat, 30 June 2023.
FacebookTwitterEmailFlipboardMastodonLinkedInShare..."
Source/publisher:
"Eurasia Review"
Date of publication:
2024-08-17
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-17
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"The recent four-day visit of Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi to Southeast Asia has underscored the implementation of China’s good neighbour’s diplomacy.
Wang Yi firstly visited Myanmar and remarked that China supports its government’s plan to hold fresh elections and return the country to a “democratic transition” – a gesture showing China’s respect to Myanmar’s peaceful political transition and objection to any foreign intervention. After the removal of Aung San Suu Kyi government, the Myanmar military regime has encountered a legitimacy problem, especially in light of the fierce fighting with ethnic minority armed forces in the northern regions. Some of the ethnic armed forces are composed of Hans Chinese who are also supportive of China. Although China mediated in the conflicts between the Myanmar military regime and some ethnic armed forces, the ceasefire has recently been broken in June as some rebels captured a military command post in Lashio in the Shan state, where the violent conflicts between the military and the Hans-dominated Kokang forces (who according to some rumours received weapons from mysteriously unknown external forces) have undermined the border security as some Chinese in mainland China were wounded innocently by shells fired from Myanmar.
The military junta in Myanmar has failed to control the whole country as online gambling, telecom fraud syndicates and human smuggling persisted. Recently the military has smashed the telecommunication fraud syndicates amid unsubstantiated rumours that a minority of rotten elements in the military supported a few kingpins of telecom fraud syndicates, which deceived a lot of mainland Chinese in China.
After the diplomatic lobbying and efforts from China, the Myanmar government dismantled the telecom syndicates and extradited thousands of the Chinese organizers, participants and victims of these criminal syndicates back to China – a triumph of the joint Sino-Myanmar combat against cross-border crime.
On August 16, Wang Yi met the former chair of Myanmar’s State Peace and Development Council, U Than Swe, who said China is Myanmar’s brother and friendly neighbour, and who hoped that China would continue to help Myanmar prevent external interference and maintain domestic stability.
Wang Yi said that the Sino-Myanmar brotherly friendship is important to China’s neighbourhood diplomacy, and that China upholds the five principles of peaceful coexistence with Myanmar on a shared future. He added that China is keen to deepen the Belt and Road cooperation with Myanmar, develop the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor, ensure the smooth operation of the Sino-Myanmar oil and gas pipeline project, combat cross-border crime, and to collaborate in agricultural development and people-to-people exchange.
U Than Swe emphasized Myanmar’s support of the one-China principle, backed up China’s Belt and Road Initiative and welcomed the idea of having a shared future for mankind, and he pledged to work with China to safeguard border security through the joint combat against cross-border crime.
After the diplomatic lobbying and efforts from China, the Myanmar government dismantled the telecom syndicates and extradited thousands of the Chinese organizers, participants and victims of these criminal syndicates back to China – a triumph of the joint Sino-Myanmar combat against cross-border crime.
Wang Yi’s visit to Myanmar followed not only the trip of Chinese special envoy Deng Xijun’s trip to meet Myanmar’s junta chief Min Aung Hlaing last year, but also the arrival of new Chinese ambassador Ma Jia in Myanmar. China has reportedly supplied weapons to the military junta which encounters Western sanctions, but it is in Beijing’s interest to maintain border security for the sake of enhancing and deepening all kinds of cooperation. As such, Wang Yi’s visit was timely and necessary.
Wang Yi also went to Thailand where he met Laos deputy prime minister and foreign minister Saleumxay Kommasith in Chiang Mai. The Sino-Laos trade has risen with the full capacity of the Sino-Laotian railway. Wang Yi remarked that China supports Laos to be a rotating chair of ASEAN, that Beijing is keen to see Laos enhancing its regional and international influence, and that China is eager to accelerate infrastructure development along the Sino-Laos railway, to deepen high-level and people-to-people exchange and to fight cross-border crime.
Saleumxay expressed his appreciation to China for promoting peace talks in Myanmar’s northern regions as border peace and regional stability are the common interests of Laos and China.
During the 9th Lancang-Mekong Cooperation (LMC) Foreign Ministers Meeting, Wang Yi conducted informal discussion with not only Saleumxay but also Myanmar foreign minister U Than Swe and Thailand foreign affairs permanent secretary Eksiri Pintaruchi. They came to a consensus that all sides would combat cross-border crimes, including online gambling, telecom fraud and human smuggling, which have affected the personal safety and properties of ordinary people. China’s Global Security Initiative, according to Wang Yi, secured the warm responses from Myanmar, Laos and Thailand. Since 2023, about 50,000 people who were involved in cross-border crimes have been arrested by the joint efforts of these countries.
The LMC was formed in 2016 with the participation of China, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam to strengthen connectivity, production capacity, socio-economic development, poverty alleviation, and water resources and agricultural management in the region.
Wang Yi also said that the borders of China, Myanmar, Thailand and Laos have to be guarded while criminal intelligence will have to be shared together through a ministerial-level law enforcement and security meeting in the Lancang-Mekong region. Technology, equipment and judicial cooperation will have to be utilized and strengthened to combat cross-border crime.
Wang Yi’s visit was politically significant.
First and foremost, China’s good neighbourhood diplomacy can be seen so as to counter the misperception of the so-called “China threat” as propagated by those foreigners hawkish and hostile to China without a deeper understanding of the turbulence of Chinese history.
Wang Yi’s visit to Southeast Asia has revealed the implementation of China’s good neighbourhood diplomacy under which the joint combat against cross-border crime has become a precondition for closer socio-economic and sustainable development, infrastructure expansion, mutual investment, expanded tourism, and more intensive people-to-people as well as cultural and educational exchange
Second, the Lancang-Mekong region is geopolitically and economically strategic for the implementation of China’s Belt and Road Initiative, Global Security Initiative, Global Civilization Initiative and the common destiny for mankind. Combining regional security issues with infrastructure development, socio-economic and sustainable development, China is keen to create a peaceful and mutually economically prosperous environment in Southeast Asia through the realization of its good neighbourhood diplomacy.
Take the example of Sino-Thailand relations. China is Thailand’s biggest trading partner while Thailand provides a huge market for China’s Electric Vehicles. Chinese tourists amount to 3.5 million in 2023 and the number is expected to increase with the introduction of a mutual visa waiver scheme. Although Thailand has traditionally been an ally of the US, China has been adopting a good neighbourhood diplomacy to woo the support of Thailand for the sake of balancing the US influence.
Third, China accurately targets at the joint combat against cross-border crime so that other issues will be tackled more smoothly and systematically, including detailed visit and visa arrangements, mutual investment, the personal and property safety of Chinese investors, and the minimization of mainland Chinese victims of cross-border online gambling, cross-border casinos, human smuggling, drugs trafficking and telecom fraud.
Fourth, Wang Yi’ visit came at a time when China criticized the Philippines for continuous provocation in the South China Sea, like a military NC-212 aircraft entering the airspace over China’s Huangyan Island. Objectively speaking, the Philippines leadership has shifted to a more militarily hawkish position toward the territorial disputes with China since 2022. It remains to be seen how the Ferdinand Marcos Jr leadership can rein in its own hawkish elements so that economic pragmatism and peace can and will continue to prevail over ultranationalist fervour in a new Cold War era during which ideological politics are threatening world peace. Wang Yi’s peaceful moves and good neighbourhood diplomacy to Southeast Asian states perhaps made a gesture, indirectly or unintentionally, to the Philippines leadership that China remains a peace-loving country.
In conclusion, Wang Yi’s visit to Southeast Asia has revealed the implementation of China’s good neighbourhood diplomacy under which the joint combat against cross-border crime has become a precondition for closer socio-economic and sustainable development, infrastructure expansion, mutual investment, expanded tourism, and more intensive people-to-people as well as cultural and educational exchange. From a broader perspective, China’s Belt and Road Initiative, Global Security Initiative and the common shared future for mankind can and will hopefully make a breakthrough in Southeast Asia. The deeper meaning and significance of Wang Yi’s visit to Southeast Asia and the related good neighbourhood diplomacy have to be properly and objectively understood..."
Source/publisher:
Macau Business
Date of publication:
2024-08-17
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-17
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"WASHINGTON—The United States on Friday promised to keep supporting Myanmar’s democratic opposition, after China endorsed the junta’s transition plans.
Two senior US officials met virtually with the shadow National Unity Government, which consists mostly of lawmakers ousted in the 2021 coup, as well as key ethnic rebel groups, including the Karen National Union.
The US officials “commended the groups on their collaborative efforts to work on establishing a path toward an inclusive federal, democratic Burma,” the State Department said, using Myanmar’s former name.
The US officials “reiterated that the United States will continue to expand direct support and assistance to pro-democracy actors” including to “develop concrete steps towards a full transition to civilian governance that respects the will of the people of Burma,” it said.
The US officials in the meeting were Tom Sullivan, who is a senior advisor to Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and Michael Schiffer, the top official for Asia at the US Agency for International Development.
Myanmar’s coup upended a 10-year democratic transition process that had been backed by the United States.
Beijing is a major ally and arms supplier to the junta, whose chief, Min Aung Hlaing, met earlier this week with China’s visiting foreign minister, Wang Yi.
Wang voiced support for promises by the junta for a transition that includes an election.
The junta has repeatedly delayed its timetable for a general election..."
Source/publisher:
"Agence France-Presse" (Paris) via "The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-17
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-17
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"BEIJING —
China urged neighboring countries to help war-torn Myanmar advance its peace and reconciliation process as its foreign minister met counterparts from Laos, Myanmar and Thailand on Friday.
Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi called the situation in Myanmar "worrying," and he suggested neighboring countries should promote cooperation with Myanmar to help it create economic and social conditions that prevent conflict.
Earlier, Wang told a news conference in Thailand that China supports a democratic transition in Myanmar and backs a regional plan to find a way out of the ongoing crisis in the Southeast Asian country.
Wang said neighboring countries "sitting in the same boat, and drinking water from the same river" have a better understanding of Myanmar's situation than others.
Myanmar has been in turmoil since February 2021 when the military ousted an elected civilian government in a coup, abruptly ending the impoverished country's tentative steps toward becoming a full-fledged democracy.
"No one wants Myanmar to restore stability and development more than its neighbors," Wang said..."
Source/publisher:
"Reuters" (UK) via "Voice of America" (Washington, D.C)
Date of publication:
2024-08-16
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-16
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"BANGKOK, Aug. 15 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met with Lao Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Saleumxay Kommasith in Chiang Mai, Thailand on Thursday on strengthening bilateral relations and cooperation on regional issues, and the situation in Myanmar.
Wang, also a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, said China and Laos treat each other with sincerity and have always been supporting and helping each other.
Under the strategic guidance of the top leaders of the two parties and countries, the building of the China-Laos community with a shared future has accelerated, bilateral trade has been increasing, the China-Laos railway capacity has been constantly achieving new heights, personnel exchanges have significantly intensified, and the two sides have seen closer coordination in international and regional affairs, said Wang.
China firmly supports Laos in exploring a development path suited to its national conditions, staunchly supports Laos to hold the 12th Congress of the Lao People's Revolutionary Party to consolidate the party's leadership and the direction of socialism, and firmly supports Laos' ASEAN chairmanship to further enhance its international and regional influence, he said.
China is willing to further deepen mutually beneficial cooperation with Laos across various fields, leverage the comprehensive benefits of the China-Laos railway, jointly resolve bottlenecks and accelerate integrated development along the route so as to serve the respective development and revitalization of the two countries.
Saleumxay, for his part, said the rapid development of cooperation between Laos and China has played a crucial role in the socio-economic development of Laos. Laos is willing to jointly implement the important consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries, enhance high-level exchanges, deepen cooperation in areas such as connectivity and mineral resources, jointly fight transnational crime, and promote further achievements in the building of the Laos-China community with a shared future for the benefit of the people of both nations.
The two foreign ministers also exchanged views on the situation in Myanmar. Wang pointed out that Myanmar is an important member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). China supports ASEAN to enhance communication and contact with Myanmar, explore the docking of ASEAN's five-point consensus and Myanmar's new five-point roadmap, and help Myanmar maintain domestic stability, achieve political reconciliation, and resume its process of democratic transition, which is beneficial for ASEAN's unity and the peace and stability of the region.
Saleumxay spoke highly of China's constructive role in promoting peace talks in northern Myanmar and its political reconciliation, adding that Laos is willing to strengthen coordination and cooperation with China to support Myanmar's stability and development.
The two ministers agreed to ensure the success of the ninth Lancang-Mekong Cooperation Foreign Ministers' Meeting in Chiang Mai, strengthen the awareness of a community with a shared future, enhance practical cooperation in all fields, and advance the building of a community with a shared future for the Lancang-Mekong countries in an effort to make greater contribution to regional prosperity and stability..."
Source/publisher:
"Xinhua News Agency" (Beijing)
Date of publication:
2024-08-16
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-16
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"London —
China has increased high-level diplomatic engagement with Myanmar’s military government over the past week as rebel groups continue to make gains in the northern part of the country, where Beijing has huge economic and geostrategic interests.
Some analysts say recent trips by top Chinese officials, including Foreign Minister Wang Yi and China’s special envoy to Myanmar, Deng Xijun, reflect Beijing’s attempt to stabilize the situation in Myanmar.
“The Chinese are trying to use these high-level visits to entice the Myanmar military to come back to the negotiation table,” said Jason Tower, the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP) country director for Myanmar.
However, he thinks the Chinese government is struggling to facilitate new rounds of cease-fire talks between the military government and rebel groups, which have been gaining control over key facilities along the China-Myanmar border in recent months.
“It’s not clear how the Chinese would be able to facilitate a sustainable agreement between the rebel groups and the military government [since] both sides seem to be fundamentally at odds with each other,” Tower told VOA in a phone interview.
Following his meeting with the Myanmar junta chief Min Aung Hlaing on Wednesday, Wang said Beijing “opposes chaos and conflicts in Myanmar” and hopes the country will increase efforts to stabilize the situation along the China-Myanmar border.
“Wang Yi expressed his hope that Myanmar will earnestly safeguard the safety of Chinese personnel and projects in Myanmar, maintain peace and stability along the China-Myanmar border, step up joint efforts to crack down on cross-border crimes, and create a safe environment for bilateral exchanges and cooperation,” the Chinese government said in its official readout.
For its part, Myanmar’s military government said China supports its “endeavors in implementing the five-point roadmap for ensuring peace and stability of the state and development and making preparations to hold a free and fair multiparty democratic general election.”
While Myanmar’s state-run Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper claimed that Beijing vowed to support a promised election, which the military government has said will be held in 2025, the Chinese readout didn’t include such details.
Some analysts say this difference reflects how Myanmar’s military government and the Chinese government view the supposed “election plan.”
“For the Myanmar military and its leader Min Aung Hlaing in particular, the elections are existential, but China probably remains very skeptical about the likelihood of an election being held since the military government controls less than half of Myanmar’s territory at the moment,” Hunter Marston, an adjunct research fellow at La Trobe University in Australia, told VOA by phone.
An alliance formed by several armed resistance groups called the Three Brotherhood Alliance gained control in recent months over key facilities and infrastructure in the northern part of the country, including a regional military base in the northern Shan State and the strategic city of Lashio, which sits on a highway between China and the major city of Mandalay.
USIP’s Tower said as the Myanmar military loses more of its monopoly over the ability to provide security to Chinese state-run enterprises’ projects in northern Myanmar, Beijing may increase cooperation with rebel groups to safeguard its economic interests in the region.
“As more and more of these projects fall under the control of different resistance actors, we may see China work with these groups to try to facilitate its business operation in Myanmar,” he told VOA.
While Beijing may increase cooperation with rebel groups, Marston said, China will continue to manage its relationship with Myanmar by engaging all political players in the country.
“China is continuing its long-term strategy of hedging its bets, which means that it will engage with a number of stakeholders and try to retain influence over as many factions in Myanmar as possible,” he told VOA.
In addition to meeting leaders of Myanmar’s military government, Wang also met with the former chairman of Myanmar’s State Peace and Development Council, Than Shwe, who urged Beijing to help Myanmar “prevent external interference and maintain domestic stability.”
While some analysts say Myanmar’s military government has been stalling the cease-fire negotiations as many competing political forces refuse to negotiate with them, they think China will not support the complete ousting of the military from Burmese politics.
“Since Myanmar became independent in 1948, there has not been a single day when the Burmese military was not a part of the center of the Burmese politics,” Yun Sun, China Program director at the Stimson Center in Washington, told VOA by phone.
She said Beijing will likely support a peace process based on negotiation and reconciliation.
“The peace process has to be based on some sort of concessions made by both sides,” said Sun.
But since there is no sign that the fighting between rebel groups and Myanmar’s military will stop any time soon, Marston said Beijing can only try to urge different resistance groups to respect its interests while gradually cultivating an environment for potential cease-fire negotiations.
“Beijing will continue to incrementally work around the margins by pushing cease-fire negotiations in northern Myanmar while trying to ensure that all players are on China’s side,” he told VOA..."
Source/publisher:
"Voice of America" (Washington, D.C)
Date of publication:
2024-08-16
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-16
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"Executive Summary
Myanmar is experiencing a deepening economic crisis with devastating consequences for its population. Accurate assessments of poverty and vulnerability indices are increasingly needed to evaluate the current crisis. Given the data challenges, it has become essential to investigate proxy indicators that provide a greater understanding of the unfolding situation on the ground in Myanmar. One such proxy indicator that has been applied in other countries, including fragile states like Afghanistan and Yemen, is the analysis of Nighttime Light (NTL). NTL satellite imagery measures the intensity of artificial light emissions, primarily from human settlements and economic activities. With traditional data sources potentially compromised or unavailable, nighttime light analysis offers an alternative means to monitor changes in the country's development landscape.
This report leverages NTL satellite imagery to shed light on Myanmar’s development challenges. Key findings of the report include:
Localized analysis and perspectives: NTL data offers a strong evidence-base for conducting localized analysis and provides insights into the dynamics and disparities across different administrative levels in Myanmar.
Economic Activity: There is a strong relation between NTL intensity and economic activity.
From 2013 to 2021, Myanmar experienced a steady increase in NTL, indicative of economic growth and development. The post-2021 decline in NTL intensity (with over 70% of the townships facing a decline) corroborates the severe economic downturn.
Urban & Rural Development: NTL data revealed significant urban & rural development trends prior to 2021, with notable growth especially in rural areas. Post-2021, the decline in both urban & rural NTL suggests a regression in overall development.
Electricity Access and Consumption: There is a stark discrepancy between the latest 2021 electricity access rate of 72.5% and the projected rate based on UNDP’s NTL data of 48%, showing a difference of 24.5 percentage points. It is argued that Myanmar’s access to affordable and reliable electricity has decreased drastically, as illustrated by the country’s frequent power outages, reduced usage to save costs, and disconnections from the grid due to an inability to pay.
Socio-economic Inequality and Human Well-being: NTL intensity variations between regions underscore existing socio-economic inequalities. Regions with higher NTL growth pre-2021 saw improved economic conditions and development, while post-2021, the decline in NTL exacerbated existing inequalities, particularly in conflict-affected and vulnerable areas. A positive correlation was also found between NTL changes and changes of the
Household Human Development Index (H-HDI) — a multidimensional indicator combining education, health, and assets — proving NTL can serve as a proxy indicator for H-HDI, and consequently, for human well-being.
Conflict and Social Distress: Nearly 90% of the townships with a high vulnerability to conflict experience a drop in NTL, compared to a national average of 70%. This observation underscores that townships with a high vulnerability to conflict are disproportionally affected by electricity outages and declined economic activity.
The report highlights the value of NTL as a proxy indicator for assessing the impact of political turmoil, economic decline, and social distress in Myanmar. The human cost to the already vulnerable communities is high. Though a response requires a holistic approach, specific actions regarding electricity access and use can be taken into consideration: enhancing household level coping and adaptation strategies, application of alternative energy sources, and strengthening of local energy governance.
It is imperative to continue leveraging innovative data sources for accurate monitoring and targeted interventions. Comprehensive recovery and resilience strategies, informed by high-frequency data, will be essential in fostering localized sustainable development and resilience amidst Myanmar's ongoing adversity..."
Source/publisher:
UN Development Programme (New York) via Reliefweb (New York)
Date of publication:
2024-08-04
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-16
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
UNDP - Burma/Myanmar, Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
11.74 MB
more
Description:
"Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi warned Myanmar junta boss Min Aung Hlaing on Wednesday that Beijing would not accept comments intended to harm bilateral ties or “smear” China, according to a statement released by the Chinese Embassy in Myanmar after the two met in Naypyitaw.
“China opposes any remarks that attempt to sow discord in China-Myanmar relations or smear and vilify China,” Wang said at the meeting, according to the embassy. The meeting followed a recent televised address by Min Aung Hlaing in which he lamented foreign intervention in the fighting in northern Shan State near the Chinese border, without naming a particular country.
Wang visited Myanmar on Wednesday before traveling to Thailand to co-chair the ninth Lancang-Mekong Cooperation Foreign Ministers’ Meeting.
China’s top diplomat did not bother to meet the junta boss when he attended the 7th edition of the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation Foreign Ministers’ Meeting in Bagan, Mandalay Region in 2022.
Beijing apparently thought it should deliver an in-person warning to the junta boss after Min Aung Hlaing repeatedly implied that China is behind the anti-regime military operations in northern Shan State.
In November last year, after the Brotherhood Alliance of three ethnic armies launched a major offensive against the regime in northern Shan State, Min Aung Hlaing alleged anti-regime groups were using China-made drones to bomb junta positions there, and said foreign technicians were assisting the groups.
Following that outburst, junta-backed nationalists staged anti-Beijing protests in downtown Yangon and outside the Chinese Embassy in the city.
After the Myanmar military’s Northeastern Command fell to ethnic and resistance forces earlier this month during the second phase of the offensive, the junta boss claimed in the televised speech that certain foreign countries were funding the anti-regime armed groups, though he did not name China specifically.
He claimed ordnance factories built in territory controlled by ethnic armed organizations on the China-Myanmar border were selling weapons to anti-regime groups, and alleged that weapons seized from People’s Defense Force resistance groups had been traced to those factories.
Certain foreign countries were supplying anti-regime groups with food, pharmaceuticals, arms, technology and administrative aid to prolong conflicts in Myanmar, Min Aung Hlaing said in the speech.
Military sympathizers then organized rallies against the Brotherhood Alliance. The protesters saluted Myanmar’s flag, raised banners reading “Victory in the just war”, and sang the national anthem and patriotic songs as they attempted to portray the war in northern Myanmar as a foreign invasion.
Pro-junta Telegram channels have also alleged that Chinese mercenaries are involved in the fighting.
Chinese special envoy to Myanmar Deng Xijun met with Min Aung Hlaing in Naypyitaw on the heels of those protests.
During the meeting with Min Aung Hlaing on Wednesday, Wang said “China firmly supports Myanmar in maintaining its independence, sovereignty, national unity, and territorial integrity,” according to the Chinese Embassy.
It said Wang also expressed China’s support for what he characterized as the junta’s efforts to restore peace and stability in Myanmar and restore the democratic transition process.
In their coverage of the meeting, junta-controlled media claimed Wang stressed China’s opposition to attacks by ethnic armed organizations in northern Shan State. However, both Xinhua and the Chinese Embassy quoted Wang as saying simply that “China opposes chaos or conflict in Myanmar.”
The junta-controlled media also failed to report Wang’s statement that “China opposes external forces interfering in Myanmar’s internal affairs, and opposes any remarks that attempt to sow discord in China-Myanmar relations or smear and vilify China.”
They also ignored a warning delivered by Wang to the regime to ensure the effective operation of the China-Myanmar oil and gas pipeline project, as well as the safety of the project and its employees.
A photo of the meeting published by junta media drew mockery online, with critics pointing out that the regime boss essentially treated the Chinese foreign minister as his equal—despite recently assuming the title of acting president of Myanmar—by sitting side-by-side with Wang before the Palin (throne), the symbol of Myanmar’s sovereignty..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-15
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-15
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"Introduction:
Myanmar, a nation rich in natural resources and biodiversity, continues to confront unprecedented challenges due to ongoing political turmoil since 1962, intensified by the recent chaos beginning in 2021, which has thrown the country and its citizens into deep uncertainty. On the other hand, Myanmar is one of the world’s most disaster-prone countries, susceptible to multiple hazards such as floods, droughts, strong winds, cyclones, tsunamis, earthquakes, landslides, fires, and industrial/technological incidents. Additional localised disasters have occurred in recent years, including lightning strikes and riverbank erosion. The country’s geographical location makes it particularly vulnerable to these multiple hazards, with existing poverty and inadequate infrastructure further amplifying its susceptibility to natural calamities.
Amidst the political crisis, promoting sustainability literacy has become essential for safeguarding the environment and empowering citizens. Myanmar’s numerous natural disasters will likely persist regardless of the political situation. This is further evidenced by the recent, June 2024 flood in Myanmar, which began in areas controlled by ethnic armed groups and has since spread to regions under Myanmar military control.
The Current Landscape
Since the political instability in February 2021, the State Administration Council (SAC) seized power, implementing numerous new laws and governance guidelines. Consequently, the SAC imposed censorship on major social media platforms such as Facebook, X (formerly Twitter), Instagram, and WhatsApp, citing political turbulence as the reason. This was a significant setback for Myanmar netizens, as Facebook had been the most popular and versatile platform, widely used for personal communication, online marketing, SMEs, and major business advertising. Despite the censorship, many tech-savvy youths and adults continue to access these social media platforms using virtual private networks (VPNs). However, the number of users has significantly decreased, particularly among those who are not as comfortable with technology. In addition, the instability in the banking sector, fuelled by widespread rumours, led to a banking crisis where most users withdrew their savings in cash in concern of bankruptcy.
Due to the overall political unrest, many international funding agencies and nongovernmental organizations have withdrawn most of their development projects in Myanmar, while some, including the UN agencies, have scaled down their activities to focus solely on humanitarian aid. The political turmoil also triggered a mass exodus of youths from major cities to areas controlled by ethnic armed groups, where they began armed resistance against the SAC government. Concurrently, many Burmese academics and professionals fled to neighbouring countries and various locations worldwide for their survival. This dramatic shift created a significant knowledge gap between the youths remaining in Myanmar and the Burmese professionals who have established themselves at intermediate and senior levels in their respective fields. Furthermore, the ongoing civil war between ethnic armed groups and the SAC has fragmented the country into multiple zones with different administrations, severely restricting freedom of movement across regions.
Edu4SD Project
In response, the Shwetaungthagathu Reform Initiative Centre (SRIc) is dedicated to enhancing the sustainability literacy of the youth, targeting this demographic as a primary group for fostering long-term change. SRIc leverages the power of information technology, social media, and various other platforms to effectively disseminate knowledge and promote sustainable practices, despite some youths facing challenges in accessing the internet. By organising initiatives and creating a platform that connects Burmese young professionals worldwide with the underprivileged youth in Myanmar under the Edu4SD project. As part of its initiative to target the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), especially under the scope of Sustainability Literacy, SRIc is offering invaluable knowledge and guidance to individuals dealing with daily uncertainties. By doing so, SRIc empowers them to navigate and tackle the complex challenges they encounter, fostering their sustainability literacy, resilience and sustainable development in their communities.
Edu4SD Approach
With the voluntary support and collaboration of Burmese and non-Burmese professionals worldwide, SRIc is organising monthly webinars with the “Sabai Webinar Series”, covering a diverse range of sustainability topics. These topics include such as waste management, youth and women-led sustainable development, sustainability finance, and sustainability diplomacy. Additionally, SRIc manages the weekly publication of the Guest Opinion Corner at SRIc – The Sabai Times by accepting articles from both professional and young sustainability enthusiasts. This platform invites contributors to write opinion pieces related to sustainable development themes, addressing any of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). These initiatives enable Burmese professionals across the globe to share their visions, experiences, and expertise with underprivileged Burmese youth in both their native language and English.
Due to internet censorship concerns, these webinars are initially hosted on the Microsoft Teams platform and recorded. The recordings are then uploaded to the SRIc YouTube channel and Zenodo, a general-purpose open repository developed under the European OpenAIRE Consortium, a Horizon 2020 project, and operated by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), for reference. To further expand accessibility and reach, audio recordings are also made available as podcasts on the SRIc website, Apple Podcasts for iOS users, and Spotify for Android users. Meanwhile, opinion articles are published on the SRIc website and the Medium platform. This multi-platform approach ensures that our content is widely accessible and impactful.
In addition, to maximise awareness and engagement, we extensively share announcements about these webinars and published articles, along with infographics and videos highlighting key points from the sessions, across a variety of social media channels. These include Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram, Telegram, and TikTok, ensuring that the information reaches a broad and diverse audience. By leveraging these platforms, we aim to engage users who prefer different types of media and social networks, thereby enhancing the overall visibility and impact of our sustainability initiatives. Notably, YouTube, Telegram, and TikTok are not subject to censorship, providing us with uncensored channels to disseminate our content effectively.
Edu4SD Progress
Since the launch of the Edu4SD project in January 2023, SRIc has successfully organised 14 monthly webinars and published 8 infographics and 5 educational videos. These achievements were made possible through the collaboration of 26 professionals from various fields of sustainability. Among the speakers, 50% were based outside of Myanmar, with 23% hailing from Asian countries, 23% from European countries, 4% from the United States, and the remaining 50% from Myanmar. In terms of gender diversity, 58% of the speakers were female, and 42% were male.
In the Guest Opinion Corner at SRIc – The Sabai Times, we have broadened our scope to include voices traditionally marginalised in Burmese-led initiatives, such as Rohingya refugees. These contributions have provided unique perspectives and enriched our discourse on sustainability. By actively seeking and accepting articles from ethnic writers, we aim to create an inclusive platform that amplifies diverse voices and fosters dialogue on critical issues. This initiative not only empowers the ethnic communities to share their insights and experiences but also challenges existing narratives and encourages broader engagement with the complexities of sustainable development in the region. Through this effort, we are committed to promoting inclusivity and diversity in our discussions and ensuring that the voices of those often overlooked are heard and valued.
Over 10 months (Nov 2023 to July 2023), the Sabai Webinar Series successfully drew nearly 450 attendees (direct beneficiaries) from across Myanmar’s 14 states and regions and from Burmese communities living abroad. Each webinar averaged an impressive 31 registrations, reflecting strong and consistent interest. Among the regions, Yangon, Myanmar’s largest city, led with the highest number of participants, with attendance numbers tripling those of Mandalay, the country’s second capital, ranked as having the second highest participation. Interestingly, attendees from outside Myanmar ranked third in participation, underscoring the webinar series’ broad reach and impact across borders. Given Myanmar’s current challenges, such as limited electricity and internet access, the recorded sessions available on the SRIc YouTube channel have been particularly valuable, amassing more than 3000 views (indirect beneficiaries). Despite the difficult circumstances, this highlights the significant interest and engagement in the sustainability-focused discussions facilitated by the webinar series.
The demographic breakdown of the attendees is noteworthy highlighting strong female participation at 58, while 41% were male, reflecting a diverse audience. The age distribution of the attendees further underscores the inclusive nature of the series, with 44% of participants falling within the 26-35 age group, 35% within the 18-25 range, 17% in the 36-45 bracket, and 5% being 46 years or older. This diverse mix of participants from various age groups and gender identities demonstrates the broad appeal and relevance of the Sabai Webinar Series in addressing critical sustainability issues.
Conclusion
In Myanmar, virtual engagement is the only solution capable of reaching all parts of the country during these challenging times. However, there are significant limitations regarding internet access and electricity availability, particularly during summer. This is evidenced by data from the Sabai webinar series, which showed a slight decline in registrations in February, March, and April when electricity was severely limited in Myanmar. Additionally, attendance numbers were significantly low in Kayah and Chin states, where intense conflict persists between the Myanmar military and ethnic armed groups. Interestingly, the number of female attendees was considerably higher than that of males, surpassing the gender ratio typical in Myanmar. This discrepancy may be due to the ongoing conflict, with men either being forcibly recruited or voluntarily participating on both sides. Despite the challenges posed by political instability, SRIc remains committed to fostering sustainability literacy and empowering Myanmar’s citizens to create positive change. Notably, more than 75% of attendees were younger than 35, indicating the impact of the Edu4SD project, which primarily aims to enhance sustainability literacy among the younger generation aligned with the SRIc’s motto “Advocating Sustainability, Shaping Our Future”..."
Source/publisher:
"Eurasia Review"
Date of publication:
2024-08-15
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-15
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"Source: Myanmar Peace Monitor.....Format: Infographic.....Theme: Protection and Human Rights..."
Source/publisher:
Myanmar Peace Monitor via Reliefweb (New York)
Date of publication:
2024-08-14
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-14
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Human Rights and international relations, Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf pdf
Size:
718.71 KB 842.42 KB
more
Description:
"Yangon, Myanmar —
Myanmar's military on Wednesday said rumors top generals had detained the embattled junta chief in a new coup were "propaganda" spread by "traitors" ahead of a visit by China's foreign minister.
Junta chief Min Aung Hlaing has faced public criticism from military supporters in recent weeks as government troops lose territory to ethnic minority armed groups and other opponents battling to overturn its 2021 coup.
On Tuesday several social media posts claimed that top generals had detained Min Aung Hlaing in the capital Naypyidaw in a bid to change the junta's top leadership.
The claims were "propaganda... with the aim of disrupting the country's peace and stability," the junta said in a statement, accusing those sharing the news of being "traitors."
"The head of state and authorities are fulfilling their national responsibility together," it said.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi is due to arrive in Myanmar on Wednesday for talks with Min Aung Hlaing.
The visit is "aimed at deepening bilateral mutually beneficial cooperation in various fields," an unnamed Chinese foreign ministry spokesman said on Tuesday.
China is a major ally and arms supplier to the junta but analysts say it also maintains ties with ethnic armed groups that hold territory near its border.
In recent weeks an alliance of ethnic armed groups has seized territory from the junta in northern Shan state, which borders China's Yunnan province.
Territory captured includes the military's northeastern command in the Shan state town of Lashio, home to about 150,000 people.
The capture of the regional command, the first by opponents of the junta since the military's 2021 coup, sparked rare public criticism of the top generals by its supporters.
Min Aung Hlaing later said the alliance was receiving weapons, including drones and short-range missiles, from "foreign" sources that he did not identify.
The last top Chinese official to visit the isolated junta was former foreign minister Qin Gang, who held talks with Min Aung Hlaing in May last year.
According to a senior Myanmar military official Wang Yi will not meet Myanmar democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been detained by the military since it seized power..."
Source/publisher:
"Voice of America" (Washington, D.C)
Date of publication:
2024-08-14
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-14
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"The resistance’s capture of the northern city of Lashio on August 3 marks a watershed moment in Myanmar’s conflict. After a month of fierce fighting, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army and allied resistance forces captured this crucial stronghold in northern Shan State, dealing a severe blow to the beleaguered junta. This represents more than just the loss of a major city. It is the first time that a military regional command has been captured by resistance forces.
Even more, the prestigious Northeastern Regional Military Command (NERMC) is widely regarded as the strongest among the military’s 14 regional commands. The loss is another major setback that has provoked frustration within the military’s inner circles and among its key internal supporters.
Although the fall of Lashio and capture of the NERMC is historic, it is also the continuation of a sustained trend of resistance gains.
Despite possessing superior aerial power and weaponry, Myanmar’s military, known as the Sit-Tat, has deteriorated into just another of the many armed groups operating in the country, rather than a dominant national army. As the resistance continues its assault on junta forces across the country, it has only deepened its steadfast resolve to remove the Myanmar military from power and achieve a new political paradigm no longer dominated by the military.
Failed Cease-fire
In late 2023, resistance forces launched a coordinated assault on the junta, dubbed Operation 1027, which was centered on northern Shan State but replicated in conflict theaters across the country. When fighting in northern Shan State was interrupted in January 2024 by a China-brokered cease-fire, many analysts and diplomats concluded that the conflict in Myanmar had reached a stalemate. Some expected that the regime would concede its losses in ethnic areas and consolidate control in central Myanmar. They predicted that this would motivate ethnic-armed organizations (EAOs) to withdraw from the broader fight and focus on consolidating their gains in newly won areas.
Myanmar’s military has deteriorated into just another of the many armed groups operating in the country, rather than a dominant national army.
This view assumes that the warring parties would be content with a power-sharing arrangement – EAOs maintaining their respective territories while the Myanmar military controls the center. Some analysts even suggested that the regime could “win” by holding urban areas and outlasting the fractious resistance. These assumptions tend to misunderstand the objectives of the conflict’s key actors and the dominant trend of the war.
Despite repeated claims that the junta would soon realize its losses and withdraw to the center, it has not. And it will not. The Myanmar military is committed to its self-appointed role as the nation's guardian, driven by a deep-seated delusion of its own indispensability. This ideological commitment is reinforced by the practical need to hold territory for resource extraction (particularly as foreign exchange dwindles), to tax border trade and to manage the complex logistics of a multi-front war.
Furthermore, the Sit-Tat overestimates its own fighting capability, underestimates the capacity of its adversary and expects the international community to shift power in its direction through cease-fires and political dialogue. For these reasons, among others, it will not concede territorial losses and is unlikely to accept a position as anything other than the dominant player in Myanmar.
As illustrated by statements from the leaders of resistance forces — such as the Karenni, Kokang, Three Brotherhood Alliance (3BHA), Kachin and Ta’ang — many ethnic minority stakeholders understand that the Myanmar military is a threat to their communities as long as it is in a position of power. Even where it is incapable of capturing and occupying resistance-held territory, the military deploys heavy artillery and air power to terrorize the public. This is playing out in Laukkai today, but can also be seen in other parts of the country like Minbya in Rakhine State, Camp Victoria in Chin State, and Laiza in Kachin State. These leaders also recognize this as an historic opportunity to eliminate or greatly weaken this threat. Some EAOs only recently joined the fight as this opportunity became clear to them.
Primarily for these two reasons, resistance groups continue to pursue their goal of removing the Myanmar military from power. There is little that internationals can do, at this point, to derail resistance groups who see this as an historic chance to eliminate Myanmar’s primary agent of instability and suffering.
Shan-Man(dalay) Operation
Whereas phase 1 of Operation 1027 focused primarily on northern Shan State, during phase 2, the anti-junta resistance forces have set their sights on Mandalay — marking a new phase of the war and challenging the junta head on in Myanmar’s second largest city. Before launching the second wave of Operation 1027, leaders from the 3BHA and the National Unity Government (NUG) convened in a secret location in northern Shan State to coordinate the attack. Contrary to some reports claiming the NUG was not involved in 1027, the coordination around phase 2 mirrors the dynamics of phase 1, in which the NUG and 3BHA worked closely together to prepare for a new wave of conflict.
The anti-junta resistance forces have set their sights on Mandalay, marking a new phase of the war and challenging the junta head on in Myanmar’s second largest city.
On June 24, the T’ang National Liberation Army, joined by the Mandalay People’s Defense Forces and other people’s defense groups, launched offensives in Kyaukme. This was followed by a Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) attack on Lashio on July 5. Within days, resistance groups launched offensives on Nawnghkio and Mongmit in northern Shan State and Madaya, Singu, Mogoke, and Tabeikkyin in the Mandalay region. This new wave of operations was dubbed “Operation 1027 Phase 2” and “Shan-Man Operation,” referencing its targets in northern Shan State and Mandalay.
The resumption of hostilities in northern Shan State and new fighting in Mandalay further stretched the beleaguered military, which was losing ground in Rakhine and Kachin states, and facing sustained pressure in Karenni, Karen, Chin, Tanintharyi, Sagaing, Bago and Magway. Resistance forces fought with greater intensity than phase 1 and made more rapid advances. This is partly a result of the resistance’s greater military coordination and weaponry, but also because of the low morale of Sit-Tat forces, many of whom surrendered without contest. Over the course of a month, the resistance forces have succeeded in controlling six townships, including Lashio, home to the military’s NERMC.
The Most Intense Urban Fighting
The battle of Lashio featured the most intense urban fighting in Myanmar's civil war, with both sides engaging in conventional warfare on a scale not previously seen. The military, recognizing the strategic and symbolic importance of this regional command, fortified Lashio with extensive defenses and deployed heavy weaponry to prevent its fall.
Approximately 5,000 Sit-Tat soldiers were mobilized to defend Lashio, including troops from the NERMC, LID 99 and Military Operations Command 1, 14 and 16, along with artillery, tank, and armored vehicle battalions, and numerous support units. Additionally, the military reinforced its position with newly acquired advanced Chinese-built drones, which some believed could tilt the battle in favor of the Sit-Tat.
While the Sit-Tat utilized the cease-fire to prepare for an escalation of conflict, the MNDAA-led resistance forces also mobilized. They assembled about 6,000 troops for the battle for Lashio, drawn from its own forces, NUG-aligned people’s defense forces and other local defense forces. Beginning July 5, the resistance forces launched attacks on Lashio from five positions around the city. They gradually broke through the military's defensive lines and advanced toward the NERMC headquarters.
As the battle intensified, the involvement of other armed actors, such as the United Wa State Army (UWSA) and its ally, the Shan State Army-North (SSA-N), complicated the situation. While the regime struggled to contain the resistance’s advance, it sent delegates to the UWSA headquarters in Pang Seng, hoping the UWSA would intervene to halt the MNDAA’s offensive.
On July 12, the UWSA deployed 2,000 troops to Tangyan Township, east of Lashio, while the SSA-N sent forces to Mongyai, approximately 40 miles from Lashio. Both groups announced that the troops movements were to prevent the conflict from spilling over into their areas. The regime did not impede these movements, possibly hoping intra-EAO competition over territorial control might undermine the assault on Lashio.
To head off attempts by other EAOs to involve themselves in the late stages of capturing Lashio, the MNDAA announced on July 25 that the city had been liberated from military control. They claimed to have established administration of the city even though fierce fighting continued.
Facing the impending loss of a crucial regional command, the regime made several attempts to persuade the UWSA leadership to intervene and disrupt the MNDAA-led offensives. On July 27, some UWSA troops entered Lashio, fueling speculation that the UWSA would support the junta’s aims. However, the UWSA announced that they entered Lashio to protect their liaison office and assist the relocation of some residents — not to engage in combat.
Twice during the battle, the MNDAA announced unilateral cease-fires, aiming to alleviate pressure from China. Despite these cease-fire declarations, intense fighting continued on the ground as MNDAA forces pressed forward to gain full control of Lashio. This highlights a broader trend in which resistance groups superficially respond to Chinese pressure without allowing it to divert them from their strategic goals.
Contrary to predictions of an inter-EAO conflict that would undermine the offensive, MNDAA-led forces advanced and successfully captured both Lashio and the NERMC on August 3.
Around 2,000 junta troops and approximately 500 resistance fighters were killed in the battle for Lashio. Additionally, 4,783 individuals, including 2,000 soldiers and their family members, surrendered (author’s estimates). Numerous high-ranking military officials, including one major general and two brigadier generals, were captured by the resistance. The regime’s miscalculation with the UWSA also cost it dearly. Instead of fragmenting the resistance, the UWSA deployed 2,000 troops across the Salween River into Tangyan and took control of the town without firing a shot.
Moving Beyond the Old Paradigm
The battle of Lashio has had far-reaching effects on the trajectory of Myanmar's conflict. It has further demoralized the military and bolstered the morale and confidence of the resistance forces, which are now preparing to advance into central Myanmar.
Resistance control of northern Shan State and the surrounding areas also provides a valuable base of operations for resistance forces planning to escalate their offensives into Mandalay and Sagaing. Stabilized by this base, the resistance is preparing attacks on Madaya and Pyinoolwin, which will open direct paths to Mandalay.
Establishing a base in weapons-rich northern Shan State also helped achieve the objective of opening a weapons supply route to forces in Sagaing, Magwe, Chin and Rakhine. Since taking control of northern Shan State, resistance forces have initiated attacks on Thabeikkyin, a strategic junction linking northern Shan State, Sagaing and Mandalay, and are seeking to establish a corridor between resistance-controlled areas on the east bank of the Ayeyarwady River and Shwebo valley in Sagaing on the west bank. Linking northern Shan State and central Myanmar would be a boon to the over 50,000 resistance troops there who have struggled to expel junta forces from the open plains of Sagaing and Magwe partly because of their rudimentary weaponry.
Currently, the resistance forces appear to be planning a multi-pronged advance on Mandalay from Pyinoolwin, Madaya and Sagaing. To encircle Mandalay, operations in Myingyan and Ngatogyi to the west have intensified significantly. The resistance's push toward Mandalay is likely to be its most challenging and costly undertaking to date. The regime is expected to mount its strongest defenses, viewing the battle for Mandalay as existential. If the resistance manages to secure control over Mandalay, it would signify a dramatic new conflict landscape.
Looking Forward
Although some argued before the fall of Lashio that the military is beginning to “regroup”, the Sit-Tat is, in fact, at its weakest point in modern history and showing no signs of regrouping. In addition to its historic losses in northern Shan State, the Myanmar military faces resistance offensives in Mandalay, Rakhine, Chin, Karen, Bago, Sagaing, Magway, Tanintharyi, Karenni and Kachin.
Within four months of offensives in Kachin State, the Kachin Independence Army has captured over 200 military positions, including several strategically significant bases and nine towns. In Karen State, the junta deployed its largest operation to date, named Aung Zeya, with 3,000 troops aimed to retake Myawaddy in Karen State. The offensive faced stiff resistance defenses in the Dawna hills and has been forced to retreat — never coming close to retaking Myawaddy. Meanwhile, the Arakan Army has achieved near-total control of northern Rakhine State and is steadily advancing toward full control of the entire region.
Plagued by low morale, poor fighting capabilities, inept leadership, public hatred and internal discontent, there are few scenarios in which the military could recover. Over the past three years, the military has deteriorated from a national army, capable of controlling the country through fear and force, into just one of many armed groups in Myanmar.
The resistance movement recognizes this as an historic opportunity to remove the military from power and achieve a new political order.
Although the conflict landscape in Myanmar is complex, two things are clear: (1) the conflict has consistently moved in a single direction that favors the resistance, and the Myanmar military lacks the capacity to alter its course; and (2) the resistance movement recognizes this as an historic opportunity to remove the military from power and achieve a new political order that is not dominated by the military, and it is unlikely to be diverted from that objective.
Ultimately, it may not matter much if the international community understands these facts — the war will be decided by those inside Myanmar — but international efforts that prolong the life of the military, by providing direct assistance, encouraging power-sharing negotiation, or otherwise, only increase civilian suffering. It would help if the international community would support the people’s will to remove the genocidal dictatorship from power..."
Source/publisher:
United States Institute of Peace
Date of publication:
2024-08-14
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-14
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"Source: Myanmar Peace Monitor.....Format: Infographic..."
Source/publisher:
Myanmar Peace Monitor via Reliefweb (New York)
Date of publication:
2024-08-14
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-14
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Armed conflict and peace-building in Burma - theoretical, strategic and general, Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf pdf
Size:
808.32 KB 825.51 KB
more
Description:
"Unlike the Chinese, who have close dealings with the State Administration Council (SAC) while maintaining a certain distance from the generals so as not to further antagonize public opinion in Myanmar, the Russians have without hesitation thrown in their entire lot with the coupmakers in Naypyitaw. China has yet to invite the SAC leader, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, but he has visited Moscow on several occasions and met Russian dictator Vladimir Putin in Vladivostok in September 2022. Russia has sold helicopter gunships, jet fighters, armored vehicles, artillery and other military equipment to Myanmar, and thousands of Myanmar cadets have undergone training in Russia, while Russian military dignitaries in full uniform have attended March 27 Armed Forces celebrations in Naypyitaw.
More controversially, Russian military technicians are helping the Myanmar Air Force maintain its Russian-supplied aircraft, and, according to on-the-ground eyewitnesses, some are even assisting the Myanmar army in its drone warfare in Rakhine State, which may be the case in other warzones as well.
On the day before the Feb. 1, 2021 coup, a group of Russians and Myanmar colleagues were having a party in Yangon, where the vodka flowed freely. They were reportedly celebrating the opening of a military high-tech multimedia complex in which some of Min Aung Hlaing’s children had financial interests. It goes without saying that they also toasted the coup that was going to be launched the following day.
There is every reason for Beijing to play its cards carefully; it has vital, long-term geostrategic interests in Myanmar, the only neighboring country that provides China with direct access to the Indian Ocean. The Russians, on the other hand, have other concerns. Their friendship with Myanmar’s military should be understood first and foremost in the context of Putin’s vision of “making Russia great again.” Having lost its superpower status after the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union and the chaotic Boris Yeltsin years that ensued—and seen its once strong influence in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia and close relationship with India diminish—the Kremlin leadership has found a new friend in Myanmar, whose generals have become its most trusted and faithful allies in Asia. As The Irrawaddy reported on June 26, 2021: “Min Aung Hlaing lauded Russia as Myanmar’s ‘friend forever’…[while] our neighboring China and India are our close friends.”
Key arms supplier
Wary of becoming too dependent on Myanmar’s powerful northern neighbor for military supplies, Naypyitaw has turned increasingly to Russia, which since the 2021 coup has displaced China as the country’s largest provider of defense-related material. According to a Nov. 21, 2023 research paper titled “Myanmar-Russia Relations Since the Coup: An Even Tighter Embrace” and written by Ian Storey for the Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore, Russia provided Myanmar’s military with US$276 million worth of supplies between 2021 and 2022, compared to armaments valued at $156 million from China. A UN report states that Russian entities during the same period transferred US$406 million in defense supplies to Myanmar, with China at second place at US$267 million.
Significantly, the Myanmar military remains one of very few outside entities which has all along supported the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and is the only member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations to do so. On Feb. 27, 2022, Myanmar Alin, the Burmese-language version of the Global New Light of Myanmar, published a two-page commentary titled “Lessons from Ukraine for those who haven’t learned from history” by a writer using the pseudonym “Myint Myat”. The article referred to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as a “puppet of the West”, while Putin was praised as a “visionary leader” who had had the “foresight to quietly build up his country’s military and economic strength.”
But there is an economic dimension to the partnership as well. Apart from Myanmar’s becoming a lucrative market for the Russian war industry, Russia has also shown interest in oil and gas exploration as well as mining in Myanmar. Playing “religious diplomacy,” one of the first Russian companies that became involved in Myanmar was one from Kalmykia, a Buddhist, autonomous republic in the European part of the Russian Federation. Russian website Kommersant carried an article on March 20, 2007 reporting that Kalmykia’s Kalmneftegaz “wins Myanmar’s Crude, Gas Tender on Religious Fellowship.” In another development, The New Light of Myanmar (before it became “The Global New Light”) reported on Feb. 16, 2008 that Myanmar’s Geological Survey and Mineral Exploration Department and a Russian company, Victorious Glory International, had signed a deal for exploration for “gold and associated minerals” in an area along the Uru River between Hpakant in Kachin State and Homalin in Sagaing Region. The newspaper gave no further details, but the Homalin area in the upper Chindwin River basin is known for its deposits of gold, while Hpakant is world-famous for its jade.
It is uncertain what became of those ventures and, given the fierce fighting that has broken out in precisely those regions since Min Aung Hlaing’s ill-fated 2021 coup, it is likely that they have been put on hold. Instead, it is Russia that has provided Myanmar with energy supplies. According to Storey: “Between March and June 2023, Russian oil exports to Myanmar jumped from almost nothing to 836 million barrels of oil.” A portion of that oil, the report states, “is likely to have been jet fuel for use by MAF (Myanmar Air Force) aircraft to conduct air strikes.” However, the research paper states, “not all Russian oil shipped to Myanmar is for domestic consumption. According to Energy Intelligence, from February 2023 Russia began delivering an estimated 70,000 barrels of oil per day to China using a Chinese-funded oil pipeline from the port of Kyaukphyu in Myanmar to Kunming in Yunnan Province.”
In August this year, Khin Yi, the chairman of the military’s own political outfit, the Union Solidarity and Development Party, said in an interview with the Russian news agency Sputnik: “The main support we would like is for Russia to work together with us in the fight against terrorism. To do this, we must first realize that what is happening [in Myanmar] must be perceived not as internal political squabbles, but as terrorism. If you recognize this as terrorism, then your departments and agencies that are engaged in the fight against terrorism can join us and together achieve our goals.” In effect, he asked for Russian intervention in Myanmar’s civil wars, which would violate even the Myanmar army-drafted 2008 constitution. Its Section 42 (b) stipulates that no foreign troops can be deployed in Myanmar. But, in a sense, that is already happening with Russian technicians working together with the Myanmar military in the maintenance of Russian-supplied jet fighters and helicopter gunships as well as in drone warfare. And in November 2023, the first Myanmar-Russia Maritime Security Exercise (MARUMEX) was held in the seas west of Myeik, Tanintharyi Region, involving ships and aircraft from both countries and focusing on the “prevention of air, water surface and underwater dangers and maritime security measures”, according to Myanmar’s military-controlled state media.
In the less lethal field, Russian Ambassador to Myanmar Iskander Azizov met the number two in the SAC, Vice Senior General Soe Win, in July to discuss the progress of Myanmar’s special economic zones and power projects. Russia is, reportedly, interested in investing in the deep-sea port at Tanintharyi’s Dawei in the southeast and, somewhat ironically given the volatile domestic situation in Myanmar, tourism in, among other areas, the beaches in Rakhine State.
Nuclear partnership
Russia and Myanmar have also agreed to cooperate in the field of nuclear power. In October 2023, Rosatom Director General Alexei Likhachev and the junta’s Science and Technology Minister Myo Thein Kyaw signed a memorandum of understanding which, according to Russian sources, “determines that the development of nuclear infrastructure will be carried out in accordance with the IAEA approaches and recommendations as well as Rosatom’s best practices.” (Rosatom is a Russian state corporation specializing in nuclear energy, while the IAEA, the International Atomic Energy Agency, is a global intergovernmental nuclear energy watchdog.) The memorandum also provides for training of Myanmar scientists and “human resources development and enhancement of safety culture in the organizations participating in the nuclear energy development program.” And then, in June this year, Moscow approved what Nuclear Engineering International, a monthly magazine published in the United Kingdom, called “a draft agreement on the basic principles of cooperation in the construction of a low-power nuclear power plant in Myanmar.” That seems to be the latest development in the long saga of nuclear cooperation between Russia and Myanmar, and it remains to be seen if it will ever materialize.
The Kremlin seems to believe that absolute military rule is there to stay in Naypyitaw and that Myanmar is not, as many independent analysts fear, on the verge of becoming a failed state. Russians have been spotted at several military bases and institutions in Myanmar, including Pyin Oo Lwin, the home of the Defense Services Academy and the Defense Services Technological Academy. But they may have been evacuated recently along with Myanmar personnel because of the fighting that is raging to the north and east of Pyin Oo Lwin. According to unconfirmed reports, however, seemingly optimistic Russian entities are still interested in mineral exploration in Myanmar’s more remote regions. Exactly what they are doing is not clear, but what can be said with certainty is that the SAC’s minister for natural resources and environmental conservation, Khin Maung Yi, received a Russian delegation headed by Anatoly Bulochnikov, senior vice-president of the Russia-Myanmar Association of Friendship and Cooperation, in Naypyitaw on June 28 last year. According to local media reports, they discussed development of the mineral sector and Russian technological assistance to Myanmar in mineral exploration. Furthermore, on Oct. 8 last year, a delegation from Fund RC Investments of Russia’s Roscongress Foundation also visited Naypyitaw, where they met SAC Energy Minister Ko Ko Lwin. The Russian guests reportedly pledged to provide technical assistance and investment for extracting natural gas trapped in coal deposits in Myanmar.
Even if military rule survives in one form or another, it seems shortsighted of the Russians to engage in such a close relationship with the junta—and for Myanmar generals to depend on Russia for business deals and military purchases. It is impossible under present circumstances to engage in any large-scale mineral exploration in Myanmar, and, even if Myanmar’s generals want to buy more military hardware from Russia, Moscow’s domestic needs for the war effort in Ukraine have made it harder for it to export weapons to any country, let alone a cash-strapped entity like the junta in Naypyitaw. But as long as the vodka flows, the friendship between the warmongers in Moscow and Naypyitaw seems solid. And there is precious little the outside world can do about it..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-14
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-14
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"BEIJING —
China's top diplomat Wang Yi will visit Myanmar and Thailand from Aug. 14 to 17, Beijing's foreign ministry said Tuesday.
"Wang Yi will visit Myanmar and travel to Thailand to co-chair the ninth Lancang-Mekong Cooperation Foreign Ministers' Meeting," foreign ministry spokesman Lin Jian said.
Wang will also attend an "informal discussion" between counterparts from Laos, Myanmar and Thailand, Lin said.
Last week, China's special envoy for Asian affairs met Myanmar's junta chief in the capital Naypyidaw for talks on "peace and stability" along their shared border, Myanmar state media said, days after ethnic rebels seized a regional military command.
Myanmar's northern Shan state has seen repeated clashes since late June after ethnic rebel groups renewed an offensive against the military along a vital trade highway to China.
Junta chief Min Aung Hlaing discussed "internal peace processes in Myanmar, peace and stability measures in the border region" with China's Deng Xijun, according to the Global New Light of Myanmar.
The senior general "explained the implementation of objectives and a five-point roadmap in order to ensure peace, stability," the state-run newspaper said.
China is a major ally and arms supplier to the junta, but analysts say it also maintains ties with armed ethnic groups in Myanmar that hold territory near its border.
An unnamed spokesman from China's foreign ministry on Tuesday said Wang's visit to Myanmar was "aimed at deepening bilateral mutually beneficial cooperation in various fields."
China supports "Myanmar's effort to uphold stability, grow the economy and improve people's livelihood," the spokesman added..."
Source/publisher:
"Agence France-Presse" (Paris) via "Voice of America" (Washington, D.C)
Date of publication:
2024-08-13
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-13
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"Human Rights Violations took place in States and Regions from Aug 1 to 7, 2024
Military Junta Troop launched airstrikes and dropped bombs in Mandalay Region, Shan State, Chin State, and Rakhine State from August 1st to 7th. The Military Junta is making lists and arresting youths for batch 4th of Military Service in the Yangon and Ayeyarwady regions. The Military Junta arrested over 100 local civilians in Sagaing Region and Rakhine State.
Over 30 civilians died, and over 40 were injured by the Military’s heavy and light artillery attacks. 3 underaged children were injured when the Military Junta committed abuses..."
Source/publisher:
Network for Human Rights Documentation-Burma
Date of publication:
2024-08-11
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-11
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Human Rights and international relations, Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
Format :
pdf pdf pdf
Size:
1.31 MB 1.46 MB 272.62 KB
more
Description:
"washington —
Myanmar's ruling generals are facing unprecedented challenges as armed resistance groups gain more control in the north and the economy stalls. Experts say the rapidly shifting situation is giving China more leverage over the nation’s ruling military junta.
Earlier this week, Myanmar's junta confirmed its loss of control of a regional military base in the northern Shan State – a key area for China's Belt and Road Initiative and border trade.
That setback was the latest in the northern part of the country where the United States Institute of Peace (USIP) says the Three Brotherhood Alliance, an ethnic group coalition, has been making steady advances since late last year.
Between October and December 2023, USIP says, rebels gained control of more than 7,700 square miles, an area including crucial border crossings and trade routes between China and Myanmar.
By June, the Three Brotherhood Alliance expanded its control to central Myanmar, including Lashio, Kyauk Mae and areas near Mandalay, the country's second-largest city.
Professor Zachary Abuza of the National War College in Washington told VOA Burmese that the opposition forces' capture of the strategic city of Lashio has "symbolic meaning."
"It is on the highway between Mandalay and the Chinese border of Ruili. It's a critically important town. It's also the headquarters of the Northeastern Command," Abuza said.
On Thursday, China dispatched its special envoy to Myanmar, Deng Xijun, and he met with Myanmar's military leader, senior general Min Aung Hlaing.
According to the junta's official statement, their discussions focused on election preparations and maintaining stability at the border and the rest of the country. It did not, however, mention China's sponsored peace talks with the Three Brotherhood Alliance, initially scheduled for the end of July but reportedly boycotted by the regime. China has been pushing for the next round of talks to occur soon.
The junta's struggles have led to an increasing reliance on China for support, experts say.
In April 2024, Min Aung Hlaing offered to restart the long-delayed Myitsone Dam project in Kachin State to appeal to Chinese interests.
The China-backed Myitsone Dam was put on hold in 2011 following protests over its possible environmental and social impact. The loss of the project was a big setback for Beijing; 90% of the electricity the project was expected to generate was supposed to go to China.
"Min Aung Hlaing's recent messaging around the Myitsone Dam is quite instructive. He's trying to use economic concessions to compel the Chinese side to give additional support to the Myanmar military strategically," said Jason Tower of USIP, who has closely watched China-Myanmar relations.
China has also shown growing interest in engaging with former military elites including Thein Sein and Than Shwe, signaling Beijing's possible concerns about Min Aung Hlaing's leadership.
Former President Thein Sein visited Beijing in July, and the Chinese ambassador to Myanmar visited former military chief Than Shwe in April.
In a recent USIP analysis, Tower argued that "by inviting Thein Sein, Beijing sent a strong message that it hopes Myanmar will return to a pathway of reform like the military started on in 2008."
Abuza agreed, and said he believes China is looking for elections in Myanmar as an "off-ramp."
"I think the Chinese are looking for a way that Min Aung Hlaing and [Deputy Commander-in-Chief of Defense] Soe Win are retired. A group of more pragmatic generals looks for elections with the opposition as a transitional process to end this civil war," Abuza said. "I think the Chinese believe that the devil you know is better than the one you don't."..."
Source/publisher:
"Voice of America" (Washington, D.C)
Date of publication:
2024-08-08
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-08
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"The regime has toughened checks on young people attempting to leave Myanmar by flight to prevent them from evading mandatory conscription, blocking scores of job seekers and tourists from boarding their flights.
Since August 1, scores of young travelers with either passports for jobs or for visits have been turned back by immigration officials at Yangon International Airport, with officials citing a lack of documents for their refusal to let them fly to another country. (Myanmar issues two types of passports: one for citizens leaving for jobs, PJ, and the other for visits, PV).
Many of those who were refused to board their pre-booked flights were between 23 and 32 years of age who had returned to Myanmar on their PJ passports but wanted to go back to their jobs in foreign countries.
Immigration officials are denying exit to those who cannot present overseas worker identity cards, tax receipts and proof that they had remitted 25 percent of their foreign currency income back to Myanmar through the country’s banking system.
A member of an overseas employment agency said: “The regime apparently thinks that young people planning to leave the country after returning from abroad want to dodge conscription.”
Workers looking for overseas jobs through licensed employment agencies are also affected by the tighter restrictions, he added.
More than 40 documented employees leaving for jobs in Japan, Singapore and the Middle East were turned back at Yangon Airport on August 1. They lost the money they spent on their flight tickets.
Five overseas employment agencies serving them said they would have to negotiate with the junta’s Labor Ministry for permission to let the workers leave.
One worker turned back on August 1 said, “I was turned back. Transit flights to Japan are expensive.”
The owner of one overseas job agency said the workers were prevented from boarding their flights because the junta suspected they were trying to evade conscription.
Stringent checks are also being imposed on men aged between 23 and 32 of age leaving on PVs. They are required to show proof of funds, return tickets and a hotel booking. Some were prevented from leaving, but others were allowed to board their flights after paying “fines.”
A Myanmar national who recently arrived in Thailand for a visit told The Irrawaddy that immigration officials at Yangon Airport ask for money from people leaving the country even if they have all the newly required documents.. I saw some travelers asked to pay from 50,000 to 100,000 kyats (about US$ 10 to 20).”
The junta announced on Feb. 10 that it was enacting the Conscription Law, requiring men aged 18 to 35 and women aged 18 to 27 to join the military. It began its first intake of forced recruits in March, prompting an exodus of young people from Myanmar..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-08
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-08
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, 2021 Burma/Myanmar coup d'état
Language:
more
Description:
"Clashes erupted in Nawnghkio Township, northern Shan State, on Tuesday as Myanmar’s junta deployed reinforcements near Nawnghkio town, which was captured by the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) last month.
The ethnic Brotherhood Alliance member resumed Operation 1027 in June and seized control of Nawnghkio town, which lies on the vital Myanmar-China trade route, on July 10.
At around 11.40 am on Tuesday, the TNLA and allies attacked a unit of junta reinforcements sent to Shwe Mote Htaw village, 19 kilometers north of Nawnghkio town.
Nawnghkio is situated on the main road from Mandalay to the Chinese border, making it a strategic hub in northern Myanmar. The town is connected to Mandalay, Pyin Oo Lwin, Kyaukme, Hsipaw and Lashio by road and rail, and linked to Shan State’s capital Taunggyi by National Road 43.
Also on Tuesday, the TNLA and its allied Mandalay People’s Defense Force (MDY-PDF) attacked fleeing regime forces in Mogoke township.
Mogoke, Mandalay Region’s famed ruby-mining town, was seized by the TNLA and MDY-PDF on July 24 after a month of fighting.
“We chased the enemy and a clash broke out around Sein Kone village in Mogoke,” said the TNLA in a statement.
Tuesday also saw the TNLA and allies seize Kyaukme town, 50 kilometers northeast of Nawnghkio, after defeating its last remaining junta defenses.
“The clashes halted in both Mogoke and Nawnghkio on Wednesday. After we took complete control of Kyaukme, the junta is now dropping bombs on Kutkai,” said a TNLA official, describing the airstrikes as junta retaliation.
Kutkai town lies 185 km northeast of Kyaukme on the Myanmar-China trade route.
Regime airstrikes in Kutkai Township on Tuesday killed at least six residents, wounded 10, and destroyed around 400 shops in a market, the TNLA said.
Kutkai was taken by the TNLA last year during the first phase of Operation 1027.
The TNLA, Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) and allied groups resumed Operation 1027 on June 25 after a China-brokered ceasefire collapsed.
Over a month into phase two of the operation, the ethnic armies and People’s Defense Force groups (PDFs) under the civilian National Unity Government have seized six towns and over 100 junta bases — including the regime military’s North Eastern Command headquarters — in northern Shan State and northern Mandalay Region..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-07
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-07
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
The Military's political role, Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies
Language:
more
Description:
"Local aid workers and organisations must not only be accountable to the communities they serve but also meet the compliance requirements of international funding agencies.
Compliance frameworks are of course important to ensure the accountability and effectiveness of internationally funded programs. However, local humanitarian actors often find these frameworks to be top-down, overly rigid, and unsuited to volatile and politically complex crises. This persists despite the commitments made in the Grand Bargain to localise aid systems and simplify requirements such as those related to reporting.
Our evidence from Myanmar demonstrates that, while perhaps established with good intentions, international agencies’ compliance frameworks and related requirements can have unintended negative consequences for local actors and communities.
Since the military junta’s coup in early 2021, civilian populations in Myanmar have faced an escalating humanitarian emergency. In a country of approximately 56 million people, more than three million have been forced to flee their homes. This crisis is a direct result of the Myanmar military’s targeting of civilian populations and aid workers. In this context, local aid workers and systems are essential to ensuring vital aid for civilian populations, serving as a “lifeline for the population,” as one aid worker said.
Yet our interviews with leading members of Myanmar’s local humanitarian networks revealed a pattern of negative repercussions from the compliance requirements imposed on internationally funded aid programs, including increased security risks and the obstruction of vital aid flows.
In Myanmar, the junta’s widespread use of extreme violence has led local organisations to develop very low-profile approaches which enable them to navigate military restrictions and reach communities in need of humanitarian aid. However, the compliance frameworks of international aid agencies commonly require local organisations to collect detailed information from “beneficiaries”, including sensitive information, revealing a dangerous lack of situational awareness. These systems can lead to critical delays in the delivery of humanitarian aid, undermining rapid and adaptive approaches.
International compliance requirements can also increase the already grave risks faced by actors on the ground. For example, the common requirement to obtain multiple quotes before procuring aid supplies can draw increased attention to aid workers and suppliers. A local Civil Society Organisation (CSO) member pointedly said:
[The Myanmar military] asked the local sellers to report to them when there is buying of temporary shelters … as they do not want [them] to reach [internally displaced people] and defence forces … But if we ask for three quotations using organisational formats in our small town, they will know us right away, putting us at risk.
Other requirements like the need to supply copies of drivers’ licences to show how supplies are transported, or the location of displacement camps, similarly jeopardise the low-profile approaches that local aid workers have developed.
During our interviews, aid workers described having to hide sensitive documents, often storing them at staff houses or concealing them on their bodies to cross through checkpoints.
There were exceptions, with some international agencies having increased the flexibility of their systems since the coup — for example, allowing for soft copies of documentation or reducing the need for multiple quotes for procurement. But these changes often took the form of short-term “emergency exceptions”, leaving local actors concerned about a return to “business as usual”.
For local humanitarian actors, there is a perception that this business-as-usual approach is linked to self-interest. As one local organisation leader said:
The most important thing that many INGOs and UN agencies should consider right now is the community, what they need and how they can support … Instead, they are just considering themselves, their survival, staff salaries, organisational survival, and self-preservation.
Amid Myanmar’s complex emergency, leaders of local organisations were not advocating for the abandonment of compliance systems; they acknowledged the crucial role they play. Instead, they argued for “a balance between what local partners can do in this context and how to ensure … minimum accountability requirements,” as said by one CSO member. They felt that this balance was currently lacking.
Not only can inappropriate compliance systems cause harm for local aid workers and organisations, they can also perpetuate unequal aid partnerships and create the perception of a lack of trust by international actors in their local “partners”. The knowledge and expertise of local aid organisations are often sidelined when compliance systems impose externally determined ways of working that are ill-suited to Myanmar’s volatile situation. This speaks to a disconnect between international approaches and the commitments made in frameworks like the Grand Bargain and the Charter for Change.
Many local organisations have developed contextually appropriate internal policies and systems to ensure accountability and compliance. However, international agencies too often deem these policies and approaches inadequate. This can force local agencies into prioritising what one CSO leader called the “capacity to comply” with internationally determined standards and criteria, rather than focusing on the “capacity to grow” their organisation and human resources based on local context and needs.
As highlighted by analysts like Hugo Slim, genuine localisation should enhance the agency of local populations in crisis situations to develop and lead their own humanitarian systems and approaches. Yet a “compliance-first” culture impedes the agency of local actors, reinforcing power inequalities in aid relationships.
It is vital that international agencies adopt a “do no harm” approach in relation to all compliance systems, ensuring that local partner and beneficiary security is always prioritised above other concerns, including financial risk management. They should also work with local organisations to develop systems that achieve a fair balance between their requirements and what is realistic in a context like Myanmar.
In developing and implementing compliance systems, they should “walk the walk” and not just “talk the talk” of shifting power to the local actors who are leading humanitarian responses on the ground.
The authors would like to acknowledge the contribution of Tamas Wells to this blog.
Disclosure
This research was conducted by the authors for the Myanmar Research Network at the University of Melbourne. The research was part-funded by a European NGO that prefers not to be identified..."
Source/publisher:
Australian National University
Date of publication:
2024-08-06
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-06
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"The fall of the Myanmar military’s North Eastern Command in the northern Shan State capital Lashio is a major blow to the military—not to mention a deep humiliation. Analysts are already predicting it is the beginning of the end for the military regime.
Established in 1972, the regional command achieved numerous battlefield victories against the Communist Party of Burma and ethnic armies. During the Myanmar military’s decades-long presence in Lashio it built formidable defensive structures. The base commanded all military activities from neighboring Mandalay Region in the west to the Chinese border in the north and east. It was one of 14 regional military commands in the country.
Now it is gone. The regional headquarters in Rakhine and Kachin states may face a similar fate. We shall see. The question now is: Is the Myanmar military at a tipping point?
The fall of the North Eastern Command will have huge consequences. Coup leader Senior General Min Aung Hlaing’s leadership is in serious question. Of course, he blamed everyone but himself in his speech addressing the nation on Monday. He even accused external forces of interfering in the civil war. While he stopped short of naming the country, it was an obvious reference to China. In fact, he is the one to blame and should be held accountable by his forces.
The defeat is all the more striking given that the Myanmar military is still far superior in terms of hardware and manpower to the ethnic armies and resistance forces it has been fighting for more than three years. It possesses warplanes, helicopters, heavy artillery, naval ships, armored vehicles and mounted missiles. To its shame, none of this could prevent the loss of the military command headquarters in northeastern Shan. The loss has come as a jarring wakeup call for those analysts who cling stubbornly to the daydream that the military will ultimately prevail against the anti-regime armed resistance movement.
The Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA), the Ta’ang National Liberation Army and the Arakan Army—who comprise the Brotherhood Alliance, which has inflicted a series of defeats on the junta since October last year—and their allied resistance forces possess only minimal heavy weapons and drones. In an attempt to defend Lashio, the regime prepared extensively to deter any offensive, using the time it gained during a Chinese-mediated ceasefire from January to June to put up a defensive perimeter. At the time, analysts wrote approvingly that the Myanmar military’s defensive capabilities appeared to have improved.
To capture Lashio, the MNDAA encircled it and the approximately 10,000 Myanmar junta forces—about 6,000 regular troops plus militia members—defending the city.
The MNDAA mobilized its three brigades and steadily dismantled the outer defensive positions of the Myanmar military forces, progressively shrinking the defense line and penetrating the interior of the city.
Local analysts said the ethnic Kokang army and its allies showed a high level of military competence, local support, intelligence, and strategic clarity, all of which positioned them favorably in the conflict and allowed them to win the Battle of Lashio.
More importantly, unlike in the past, the Burman population is not behind the Myanmar military. The majority of Burmans opposed the coup in 2021 and, having experienced and witnessed the brutality and atrocities of the regime, are satisfied to see it pay dearly on the battlefield. Most heartily celebrated the news of the fall of the North Eastern Command. Several senior junta military commanders responsible for the defense of Lashio were captured by the MNDAA and are now being interrogated.
However, some analysts and diplomats are now wondering whether a China-installed regime is imminent.
It is interesting to note that China reportedly put pressure on the MNDAA and its allies to stop attacking Lashio. Analysts speculated that China wanted to wait and see whether the regime would proceed with another extension of its emergency rule at the end of July. As expected, the regime did exactly that and Min Aung Hlaing is now acting president. It is important to note that the fall of Lashio and the regional command came three days after the extension of emergency rule.
The debacle in Lashio will no doubt have shaken the military. Among military supporters, the feeling of defeat, fear, anger, frustration and humiliation is palpable.
Min Aung Hlaing is no commander-in-chief of the armed forces, nor a leader of the country. He is the murderer-in-chief, a war criminal and a coward. There have been calls for him to step down and even go into exile. He will do neither.
This means we will see more offensives in the coming months. On the heels of Lashio’s fall, Kyaukme, located on the Mandalay-Lashio Road, was taken by the TNLA on Tuesday morning.
Will Pyin Oo Lwin be next?
Garrison town emptying
War veterans and holiday home buyers in Pyin Oo Lwin—a former British hill station in Mandalay Region not far from Kyaukme—have deserted the town and the real estate market there has collapsed in anticipation that war will soon arrive. The town has already come under drone and rocket attack this year.
Unconfirmed reports suggest the regime has ordered military cadets and military hospital staff in Pyin Oo Lwin—home to the military’s Defense Services Academy—to relocate to Hmawbi, Yangon.
After Pyin Oo Lwin, Mandalay—Myanmar’ second-largest city—is the next target of the resistance, analysts said.
Clashes have already occurred on the periphery of Mandalay city, as Mandalay People’s Defense Force, operating jointly with the TNLA, is active in that part of Mandalay Region. The regime recently sent jet fighters to bomb villages in the area, killing many civilians and children.
Residents of Mandalay—Burma’s royal capital until the British seized it in 1885—have been rattled by the news from Lashio, which is only five hours away by road.
But they are no stranger to war. Warplanes pounded the city and Royal Palace during World War II as allied forces battled the Japanese there.
If indeed war does come to the once royal city in the cold season this year, it will not be for the first time..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-06
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-06
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, The Military's political role, Various groups, Several Groups
Language:
more
Description:
"The concept of localisation, which gained prominence with the Grand Bargain agreement from the World Humanitarian Summit in 2016, has been evolving over the past decade. This approach emphasises the importance of local actors in humanitarian aid, striving for practical frameworks and realistic methodologies. In countries like Myanmar, where international aid plays a crucial role, localisation is familiar to some of the local communities. Drawing from practical experience with local aid groups, this discussion aims to reinforce better practices and explore the nuances of capacity-building and strengthening for local support organisations and community members.
The practical implementation of localisation often varies widely depending on who is involved, leading to significant differences on the ground. One key area of discussion is the role of capacity-building or strengthening for local support organisations, including individual community members. Many efforts are being made in this regard, prompting the question: why is there a need to improve the capacity of local support organisations and individuals? Suggesting the need to improve and strengthen capacity may be perceived as implying a lack of capacity among the locals, which has sparked considerable debate. While this is a complex issue, it is crucial to address it without straying from the primary intention. Focusing on capacity-building or strengthening, there is a significant emphasis on demand-driven approaches. International humanitarian aid organisations are seemingly tailoring their capacity-building initiatives based on the needs expressed by local groups.
Aligning efforts with genuine needs and demands
A critical question arises from this: ‘On whose demand are we building or strengthening capacity?’ Or put another way, who exactly is asking for this capacity-building? This question is at the heart of ensuring that capacity-building efforts are genuinely aligned with the needs and demands of local communities. Based on experiences on the ground, it is evident that many are developing demand-driven capacity-building strategies based on their own agenda. However, it is crucial to scrutinise whether these initiatives are truly driven by local demands or if they are influenced by outside agendas.
First, capacity-building/-strengthening programmes are often shaped by the requirements of donors, United Nations (UN) agencies and international intermediary organisations. These programmes prioritise compliance with financial, auditing and project management standards. More recently, additional requirements such as child protection and protection against sexual exploitation and abuse have also become mandatory. While these requirements are important, they are often externally imposed, leaving local groups with no choice but to comply, regardless of their own priorities.
Instead, capacity-building/-strengthening should be based on the actual needs of local groups, which can be multi-faceted. Local organisations frequently seek guidance from their more experienced peers to meet donor requirements. However, smaller organisations often request support based on their perception of donor expectations, which may not always align with their practical needs. Conversely, some organisations with more experience are better able to identify and articulate their own needs. To enhance the effectiveness of capacity-building, donors, UN agencies and international intermediary organisations should support local aid groups in developing skills to reflect on their own needs and those of their communities. This approach would ensure that capacity-building is more relevant and tailored to the actual requirements of local organisations.
This speaks to the concept of community demand, as defined within the framework of the Grand Bargain. This approach emphasises the community’s ability to self-reflect and identify their own needs for improving their resilience and response capacity. Appeals based on community demand are often directed to local support groups that are close to the community, and occasionally to donors, UN agencies and international organisations. In such situations, it is crucial to systematically encourage local support groups to strengthen the necessary capacity to meet these community-driven demands. Building this capacity not only enhances the ability of local groups to respond effectively but also fosters greater community trust and cooperation. To ensure the community’s voice is heard, and their needs are addressed, local support groups should receive robust support in developing the necessary skills and resources. For example, enhancing networking capacities can enable local support groups to better coordinate and cover community needs.
Adapting to rapidly changing environments
Finally, it is important to highlight contextual demand, which refers to the capacity to adapt to rapidly changing environments. Sudden changes such as war, civil conflicts, or emergency situations often result in unforeseen needs that require swift responses to alleviate human suffering. For instance, in a country like Myanmar, the situation is constantly evolving. While local responders can analyse the overall situation, there is often a lack of capacity and resources to provide the necessary support to affected communities. Additionally, local responders may have a development mindset but lack an understanding of international humanitarian rules and regulations when responding to emergencies. Given these challenges, it is crucial for donors and international intermediary organisations to prioritise discussions and provide encouragement to ensure local communities and responders develop the necessary skill sets. This process should be conducted with mutual respect and flexibility, allowing adjustments based on local systems. This approach will help to build the capacity of local responders and enable them to effectively address the needs of their communities in rapidly changing situations.
The capacity-building and -strengthening of local responders is fundamental. Evidence has shown that this approach is beneficial in many aspects. However, defining the demand must be done with care, to prioritise the needs of the community and local support groups. The situation is often complicated and unstable, especially in conflict-affected settings. Donors, UN agencies and intermediary international organisations should also consider supporting the capacities necessary for the survival of local support groups, rather than always aiming for their development and growth. Local aid organisations operating in areas with heavy fighting or under military control, like in Myanmar, face enormous pressure and have limited functional space. For these groups, the emphasis should be on developing the capabilities and resources necessary for their continued survival.
In summary, demand-driven capacity-building and -strengthening should exist as a process and method that is discussed and deciphered by all concerned stakeholders. At the same time, while using the principle of improving and strengthening capacity based on demand, donors, UN agencies and international organisations should be careful to avoid spending excessive time on compliance demands..."
Source/publisher:
ODI - Humanitarian Practice Network
Date of publication:
2024-08-06
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-06
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, The discussion on humanitarian assistance to Burma
Language:
more
Description:
"Fifty-two years after it was founded to fight the Communist Party of Burma in northeastern Myanmar near the Chinese border, the military’s Northeastern Command in Lashio, northern Shan State, fell on Saturday.
The defeat marks the first time since 1962, when the military staged its first coup, that a military command has been lost to ethnic armed groups and their allies. It was also a major milestone for Myanmar’s resistance movement, which has captured its first command since the 2021 coup.
The Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) and allies seized both Lashio and Northeastern Command one month after launching their offensive on July 3.
The Lashio defeat is the biggest blow so far to a military regime that takes pride in the command’s historic achievements. Junta spokesman Maj-Gen Zaw Min Tun recently declared, “Among the 14 military commands in the Tatmadaw, the Northeastern Command stands out for its tradition.”
“It defeated the Kuomintang invasion from abroad. It repeatedly defeated invasions by the Communist Party of Burma. It is the military command that helped free the local national race from the oppression of warlords and opium kings,” he said.
One week after that declaration, the command headquarters was conquered. The MNDAA said in a statement that its troops “took complete control of the Northeastern Command at 12.20 pm on August 3, and its operation has achieved complete victory.”
Ye Myo Hein, a Visiting Fellow at the United States Institute of Peace, said the fall of Northeastern Command represented more than the loss of a regional command for the Myanmar military. The defeat showed the Myanmar military’s combat power had weakened to the point that it could no longer resist the advance of revolutionary forces, he wrote on Facebook.
“Though the battle itself was crucial, [it showed] the institution of the military has weakened to the extent that it could not recover when it started to lose ground during the fighting.”
He added that the rout of Northeastern Command also dealt a severe blow to morale within the military while bolstering confidence among anti-regime forces.
“The defeat will have domino effects,” he predicted.
Junta spokesman Major General Zaw Min Tun acknowledged the fall of the military hub, saying the regime had “lost contact with officers at the headquarters on Saturday afternoon.”
In June 1970, the Myanmar Socialist Program Party led by dictator Gen. Ne Win formed a strategic command headquarters in Lashio to counter the threat of the Communist Party of Burma (CPB), whose troops entered Kokang in 1967.
In 1971, Northeastern Command-led troops successfully repelled 40 days of “human-wave” attacks on Kunlong by the CPB, halting the offensive’s momentum and marking a historic turning point in the battle against the insurgency.
After the fighting subsided, the regime dissolved the strategic command headquarters and established nine regional commands: Northern Command based in Myitkyina, Northeastern Command in Lashio, Eastern Command in Taunggyi, Southeastern Command in Mawlamyine, Yangon Command in Mingalardon, Southwestern Command in Pathein, Western Command in Sittwe, Northwestern Command in Mandalay and Central Command in Taungoo.
Northeastern Command engaged in fierce fighting with the Shan State Army, ethnic Palaung groups, troops under drug lord Khun Sa, and Kachin Independence Army Brigade 4, active in northern Shan State until the collapse of the CPB in 1989.
The command assumed an even more important role protecting the Muse-Lashio route to China after border trade resumed following the CPB’s collapse. Senior officers at the command also started to get involved in local business.
In 2009, amid tensions over the military-drafted 2008 Constitution’s requirement for ethnic armed organizations to transform into border guard forces, the military attacked Kokang and expelled the MNDAA led by Peng Jiasheng. The MNDAA returned to Kokang in 2015, triggering further clashes.
Northern Shan State saw few clashes in the aftermath of the 2021 coup, until the Brotherhood Alliance including the MNDAA launched Operation 1027 in late October last year. The regime quickly lost Kunlong, Hseni and Namhkam townships near Lashio, before China brokered a ceasefire in mid-January.
The alliance resumed Operation 1027 in late June, making more gains culminating in the MNDAA seizing both Lashio and the Northeastern Command HQ it hosted.
Junta boss Min Aung Hlaing has now assured his place in history as the first military commander-in-chief to have lost a regional command..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-05
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-05
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, The Military's political role
Language:
more
Description:
"Human Rights Violations took place in States and Regions from July 22 to 31, 2024
Military Junta Troop launched airstrikes and dropped bombs in Sagaing Region, Magway Region, Tanintharyi Region, Mandalay Region, Shan State, and Rakhine State from July 22nd to 31st. The Military Junta Ships attacked with heavy artillery to the villages along the Chindwin River in Monywa Township, Sagaing Region. Prisoners from Insein Prison, Yangon Region, and Kyaiksagaw Prison, Bago Region, got Seasonal Diarrhea Disease and needed medical care. The Military the Minister of Labor gave directions to give fines to the agencies that do not provide the personal details of the coworkers and to send the people to Thailand when they show the papers that give the 25% of their tax fees that must be given to Myanmar.
Around 50 civilians died, and nearly 70 were injured by the Military’s heavy and light artillery attacks within a week. A civilian also died by the landmine of the Military Junta Troop..."
Source/publisher:
Network for Human Rights Documentation-Burma
Date of publication:
2024-08-03
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-03
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
Format :
pdf pdf pdf
Size:
1.43 MB 1.61 MB 708.46 KB
more
Sub-title:
Despite the deteriorating security situation, junta chief Min Aung Hlaing remains committed to holding elections at some point next year.
Description:
"Myanmar’s military junta has once again extended its state of emergency for another six months, as resistance groups continue to make battlefield gains across the country.
According to state media reports, the decision was made at a meeting of the military-controlled National Defense and Security Council (NDSC) on Wednesday, at which coup leader Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing held fast to his previously announced plans to hold a multi-party election.
“Holding the election is a government’s vision which never changes. Hence, preparations are ongoing to hold an election,” the Global New Light of Myanmar paraphrased Min Aung Hlaing as saying. The junta leader told the NDSC that the extension was necessary in order to enact “security measures” and “continue the restoration of peace and stability across the nation.” According to other reports, he said that the military administration also needs time to carry out a pre-election census. The new phase of emergency rule is now due to expire at the end of January; Min Aung Hlaing announced in June that polls will be conducted sometime in 2025.
During the meeting, Min Aung Hlaing repeated his prior claims that the February 2021 coup was necessary due to pervasive “voting fraud” at the general election held in November 2020. (No evidence of extensive fraud has ever been adduced.)
Such extensions are supposed to be endorsed by the country’s president, but on July 22, Myanmar state media announced that acting President Myint Swe, who had served in the role since the coup on February 1, 2021 coup, had gone on medical leave, authorizing Min Aung Hlaing to carry out the presidential duties with the NDSC.
The extension of the state of emergency – the sixth since it was imposed following the military takeover – amounted to an admission that the armed forces do not exercise enough control to prepare for the elections that the junta intends as a transition back to a form of civilianized military rule. Indeed, over the past year – and since the most recent extensions of the state of emergency, in August 2023 and February of this year – the junta’s battlefield fortunes have gone from bad to worse.
In late October, the Three Brotherhood Alliance of ethnic armed groups launched Operation 1027, a sweeping offensive in northern Shan State along the country’s border with China.
The first phase of the offensive, which ended with a China-backed ceasefire deal in January, left the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) and Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA), two members of the Alliance, in control of large swathes of territory in Shan State, including numerous towns and several important border crossings with China. The most significant of these was the MNDAA’s reconquest of the ethnic Chinese-majority Kokang region, from which the military had expelled it in 2009. At the same time, the Arakan Army, the third member of the Alliance, scored remarkable successes against the Myanmar military in Rakhine State in Myanmar’s west.
After a five-month pause in fighting, the TNLA and MNDAA, backed by allied People’s Defense Forces (PDFs) and other anti-regime groups, opened the second phase of Operation 1027 in Shan State and Mandalay Region in late June. This saw the MNDAA launch attacks on Lashio, the largest city in northern Shan State where the military’s Northeast Regional Command is located, which is reportedly besieged and on the brink of defeat. Meanwhile, the TNLA this week announced the complete seizure of the town of Mongmit in Shan State, the third town that it claims to have captured since the second phase of the offensive began.
Addressing the NDSC yesterday, Min Aung Hlaing said that the MNDAA and TNLA had “violated the temporary ceasefire agreement” and vowed to continue efforts to “forge peace and stability” in northern Shan State and Mandalay Region.
These gains, and the prospect of a full collapse of the military position in northern Shan State, make any discussion of elections increasingly fantastical and detached from reality. While it is hard to gauge claims about which groups have effective control over which areas, it is clear that the junta probably would only be able to administer elections in a minority of the country, predominantly on the dry central plain and in the major cities like Yangon, Mandalay, and Naypyidaw. Whether such partial and illusory exercise would fulfill even the military’s minimal goal of resetting international expectations or disguising its rule in civilian guise, remains very much open to question..."
Source/publisher:
"The Diplomat" (Japan)
Date of publication:
2024-08-02
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-02
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"ry base in Kokang region, on March 11, 2015. Stringer/Reuters
CNN
—
The pounding of sustained gunfire and artillery had rattled Khin Swe’s home in northeastern Myanmar for days, with shelling getting ever closer until it was impossible for her to remain.
“If I had stayed, I would have been dead by now because of artillery firing and airstrikes that were falling all over the town,” Khin Swe told CNN, using a pseudonym for security reasons.
“There was nothing we could do to be safe, except to run,” said the 28-year-old online sales rep.
Like many of the residents of Lashio, a major town of about 170,000 people nestled in the mountains of northern Shan state, Khin Swe packed what she could and fled.
Images published by local media in the past few weeks show a mass exodus from the town, with a long line of cars, trucks and bikes laden with belongings snaking through muddy, monsoon-lashed roads.
Since late June, a powerful ethnic rebel army and its allied resistance forces have mounted a renewed offensive to capture Lashio. The strategic garrison town, the largest in Shan state, is the seat of the junta’s regional Northeastern Military Command and the center of its power base in Myanmar’s northeast and areas near the Chinese border, with about 40 battalions under its command.
Myanmar has spiraled into a devastating civil conflict since the junta’s 2021 coup was overwhelmingly spurned by the people, as the military wages a ruthless war against a nationwide armed resistance determined to oust it from power.
On July 25, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA), a rebel force of the ethnic Chinese Kokang minority, announced it had “won a decisive victory” against the junta and declared Lashio “fully liberated” following a 23-day operation.
If confirmed, the capture of Lashio would be the biggest victory for the resistance since the coup and mark a turning point in the three-year civil war that has been characterized by increasingly brutal attacks against civilians by junta soldiers and warplanes, and the mass displacement of more than 3 million people.
Junta spokesperson Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun has repeatedly denied that the town and the regional command has been captured, calling the claims “propaganda.” The junta said the rebel group has “devastated civilians’ areas [rather] than military strategic holds.”
Video and images posted to social media and on the MDNAA’s accounts in recent days appeared to show their troops in central Lashio, including at the railway station, prison and a broadcast station, and within hundreds of meters of core military infrastructure.
CNN cannot independently verify the claims from either side.
Analysts say the situation remains fluid and while the rebel group is quickly moving through the town, capturing several battalions especially to the south of the city, fighting is ongoing.
“That sort of position in the very middle of Lashio certainly points toward significant gains within the city,” said Nathan Ruser, an analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, who has been mapping positions of the resistance in Lashio.
For Lashio to fall, “it basically eliminates the junta as an effective organized force from a huge part of the country,” Ruser said. “And for it to appear to be happening after only about a month of clashes shows how much the capabilities of the junta have declined in the last year especially.”
Caught in the crossfire
Khin Swe said Lashio’s residents were used to the sounds of fighting nearby but not within the city itself.
“Artillery shelling was fired constantly at night over the town. With our phones in our hands to keep updated with the news, we all sat anxiously. Some nights, I didn’t dare to sleep as shells roared overhead. At some point I fell asleep and was woken up by the sound of the loud artillery again,” she said. “It was the scariest moment I have ever experienced in my life.”
The main forward part of the rebels’ assault had focused on the south and west of Lashio, with the MNDAA and its allies targeting the LIB 507 military base before entering the town and clearing it street by street, analysts and residents told CNN.
Khin Swe, whose home was close to the base, described how shelling started near her part of town but had grown in intensity in other areas as the military’s soldiers exchanged fire with the rebels.
She escaped to Myanmar’s second-biggest city Mandalay, a six-hour drive away in normal conditions. Bus fares leaving the city had skyrocketed, she said, as droves of people tried to flee.
Some of her family members decided to stay in Lashio to protect their homes and businesses. Before phone lines got cut off, Khin Swe said her relatives “saw Kokang troops move into the town and position themselves in empty buildings, while they urged the people to leave.”
“I am sure my home has been wrecked, but we can’t reach out to people who are left in the town because the phone connection is cut off,” she said. “My friend who had stayed in the town until very recently told me that most of the houses have been damaged.”
Being among many people displaced by war in Mandalay, Khin Swe said she and her family “are barely surviving.”
“The displacement shelters are full up with the entire population of Lashio town, some of us are struggling to find a place to live. Besides, we don’t have food to eat either,” she said. “Our family could not take some valuable items other than some money, and now we are living with more than 30 people in a place we rented.”
Other Lashio residents caught in the crossfire have written desperate messages for help on local community and neighborhood Facebook groups.
“There are children and elderly being caught in a high school amid crossfire in Lashio, they have not eaten the whole day, I don’t know how to help,” one social media user posted.
“We are a group of three girls with a 70-year-old grandma, we want to leave the town either for Taunggyi or Mandalay, but we are struggling with how,” another resident posted, leaving her phone number.
One man who spoke to CNN by phone said he fled Lashio at 4 a.m. last Friday as heavy fire raged overhead. “We left the town with a bunch of people by truck. The road on the way was badly damaged,” he said as he traveled to Taunggyi, the Shan state capital some nine hours south of Lashio.
The fighting, which has extended across Shan state and the neighboring Mandalay region has forced thousands of civilians to flee – many of them multiple times – often to towns and villages also facing a barrage of junta airstrikes and shelling.
The deteriorating humanitarian crisis is being exacerbated by a lack of food and aid, with local community networks risking their lives to reach those in need.
Coordination of anti-coup resistance
Rebels have reportedly seized dozens of junta bases and several northern towns since a renewed offensive in late June by the Three Brotherhood Alliance, a trio of ethnic armed groups fighting alongside the People’s Defence Force (PDF), the armed wing of the national unity government in exile.
The gains for the rebel alliance – made up of the MNDAA, the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) and the Arakan Army – followed the collapse of a Chinese-brokered ceasefire, according to local media and resistance groups.
Last week, the TNLA said it had captured another strategic town in the Mandalay region – Mogok, the center of Myanmar’s lucrative gem mining industry.
Analysts say resistance forces now control many of the roads to Lashio and other key towns in the northeast, preventing the military from resupplying soldiers in its peripheral outposts.
“They’re unable to push forces up because all the roads are controlled by the opposition, so they have a hard time sending reinforcements,” said Miemie Winn Byrd, a retired US Army Lt. Col. and professor at the Daniel K. Inouye Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies.
Since October, the military has been weakened by a series of territorial losses, troop defections, desertions and loss of manpower. Endemic corruption and poor command within its ranks mean the junta leadership may not have a clear idea of the situation on the ground across the country, including in Lashio, analysts say.
“Because of the corruption, Naypyidaw does not know how many forces it has… they have had a lot of desertions and defections that are going unreported,” Byrd said. “I’m not sure (junta chief) Min Aung Hlaing knows that that city has fallen into the hands of the opposition. I’m not sure his people are telling him that.”
Last week, the junta reportedly replaced the head of the northeast command. There were also reports in local media that the junta had ordered its staff to leave Lashio as fighting got closer. CNN cannot independently verify these claims.
In a recent address, junta spokesperson Zaw Min Tun appeared to counter claims of a weakened military, which he referred to by its local name, the Tatmadaw.
“As long as Myanmar exists, the Tatmadaw will exist. As long as we exist, Myanmar will live even stronger because we will safeguard your lives and your properties. Therefore, you all must work hand in hand to defend your country,” he said.
The anti-coup resistance in Myanmar was once considered a loose grouping of ill-equipped fighters, but recent successes, including the MNDAA’s push into Lashio, has shown a new level of coordination and capability, according to analysts.
“This phase of Operation 1027 has really shown a new level of interoperability and coordination between the ethnic resistance organizations and the political PDF resistance,” said Ruser, referring to the Three Brotherhood Alliance’s name for its ongoing offensive.
“Given the sort of snowballing gains by the resistance, and especially the Three Brotherhood Alliance over the last six to eight months, they’re now a really equipped force. They have artillery, they have plenty of drones, they have all sorts of capabilities that now allow them to really strike apart at qualified and static positions.”
For Khin Swe, the fighting in Lashio has left people divided.
“Chinese people in the town and young people who are in support of revolution are largely in favor of the Kokang group while the older generation, who don’t want war, blame the Kokang for their territorial invasion [and] are in support of the military,” she said.
Khin Swe said she is “saddened to see the destruction” in her hometown but she supports the “revolutionary groups defeating the junta.”
“I am happy and sad at the same time because I don’t know how we will rebuild our home. But the news of Lashio being captured gives us hope that one day in the near future we can go back home,” she said..."
Source/publisher:
"CNN" (USA)
Date of publication:
2024-08-02
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-02
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"Former Karen National Union Vice President Naw Zipporah Sein Passes Away.....NUG Prime Minister Mahn Winn
Khaing Thann Emphasizes Administrative Preparedness Amid
Expanding Territorial Control.....NUG Human Rights Minister
U Aung Myo Min Highlights Junta’s Decline at Philippine Conference......NUG Human Rights Minister U Aung Myo Min Urges Philippine Support for Myanmar
Democracy Movement.....NUG Ministry of Health Urges Participation in
Spring Health Heroes Program.....NUG Ministry of Education
Extends University Admission Deadline.....PDF Forces Capture Military
Council Base in Inn Nat Village.....NUG Ministry of Defense Congratulates
P29999/Special Operations Force on 3rd Anniversary.....NUG Ministry of Women, Youth and Children Affairs Issues Condolence Message
for Naw Zipporah Sein...."
Source/publisher:
National Unity Government of Myanmar
Date of publication:
2024-08-02
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-02
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
3.89 MB
Local URL:
more
Description:
"Weekly Update of National unity Government ( 31 / 2024 )..."
Source/publisher:
National Unity Government of Myanmar
Date of publication:
2024-08-02
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-02
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations, National Unity Government (NUG)
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
4.4 MB
Local URL:
more
Description:
"Walking back his vow to hold a nationwide election, junta boss Min Aung Hlaing said during the National Defense and Security Council (NDSC) meeting on Wednesday that elections would be held first in areas where it is safe to do so while his regime tries to bring “stability and security” to conflict zones.
The junta boss added that his troops would bring “peace and stability” to Lashio, Nawnghkio, Kyaukme, Hsipaw and Mogoke—areas where his troops have recently suffered humiliating defeats, including the losses of several major bases and towns, to ethnic armies and their allies.
He insisted that after seizing power on Feb. 1, 2021, his regime had planned to hold a nationwide election when the initial two-year state of emergency expired. Hostilities hindered the regime’s plan to return to democracy while forcing an extension of the state of emergency, he said.
During the civil war in the early 1950s, a general election was held over seven months between June 1951 and April 1952 due to armed conflicts.
Nationwide general elections were held in 1990, 2010, 2015 and 2020. But after losing vast swathes of territory in northern Shan State and Rakhine State and with unrest ongoing in many parts of the country, the regime has been left with no option but to hold the election in stages.
At an NDSC meeting in January 2023, Min Aung Hlaing said his regime had complete control over only 198 of 330 townships in the country, and that it needed to improve security in 132 townships.
That was before the Brotherhood Alliance of three ethnic armed organizations launched its large-scale offensive, Operation 1027, which has seen the regime lose dozens of towns in northern Shan State. One of the three alliance members, the Arakan Army, has seized more than half of Rakhine State in western Myanmar.
The junta’s loss of territory is not limited to Shan and Rakhine, however. It has also ceded territory in other ethnic states including Kachin. Recently, it lost two towns in Mandalay Region, home to the second-largest city in Myanmar.
Even as the regime was holding the NDSC meeting on Wednesday to extend the state of emergency for a sixth time, allied anti-regime groups continued their attacks on junta positions in northern Shan State, seizing almost total control of Lashio, where the regime’s Northeastern Command is based.
Nearly 70 towns have fallen into the hands of anti-regime groups since the beginning of Operation 1027 in October last year, which would reduce the 198 townships under junta control claimed by the junta chief to around 130. Furthermore, the junta’s administrative mechanism is not fully functional in some of the areas it claims to control.
Observers doubt the regime has the capacity even to conduct the population census needed to compile voter lists, let alone a nationwide poll.
Min Aung Hlaing earlier said a poll would be held next year after a census scheduled for October. Observers say polls are highly unlikely except in Naypyitaw, Yangon and Mandalay, and in large towns in other regions and states.
At the NDSC meeting on Wednesday, Min Aung Hlaing said his regime would never give up on its objective of holding an election.
After being extended by six more months on Wednesday, emergency rule is now due to expire at the end of January 2025. If Min Aung Hlaing returns power to the NDSC then, it is constitutionally required to organize polls within six months..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-01
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-01
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"July 31 (Reuters) - Myanmar's embattled military government extended a state of emergency on Wednesday for another six months, state media said, as the junta struggles to maintain its grip on power with fighting flaring on multiple fronts and the economy in crisis.
Army-run Myawaddy media said the military-controlled National Defence and Security Council extended emergency rule to give the junta more time to put together population data for voter lists. The junta has said it will hold an election next year.
The military put the country under emergency rule for a year when it took power in a February 2021 coup, deposing the elected civilian government of Aung San Suu Kyi and triggering nationwide street protests that it violently crushed.
The junta has since extended that every six months, as the protest movement morphed into an armed rebellion that has widened and is now posing an existential threat to the generals.
"It is necessary to restore peace and stability because of ongoing terrorist activities," state-run media said of the latest extension, referring to the armed resistance.
Last week, all responsibilities of Myanmar's figurehead president were handed over to junta chief Min Aung Hlaing, after the nominal head of state was placed on medical leave due to a prolonged illness.
Min Aung Hlaing has repeatedly promised to hold a multi-party election, with the general saying in June that polls will be conducted in 2025.
Previous election timelines have been postponed, citing the ongoing violence as the reason. Min Aung Hlaing has insisted the junta does not plan to hold power long.
The military took power after complaining of fraud in a November 2020 general election won overwhelmingly by Suu Kyi's party, which the party denied. Election monitoring groups found no evidence of mass fraud..."
Source/publisher:
"Reuters" (UK)
Date of publication:
2024-07-31
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-01
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"The Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) says it has seized complete control of a third town, Mongmit, in northern Shan State following the resumption of Operation 1027 in late June.
The junta’s Infantry Battalion 276, Light Infantry Battalion 348, and a tactical command overseen by the Northern Command fell on Wednesday, TNLA spokesman Lwei Yay Oo told The Irrawaddy.
“We seized total control of Mongmit today,” she told The Irrawaddy on Wednesday. Details of casualties are still unknown, she said.
Mongmit is bordered by Mandalay Region’s Mogoke to the south, Namtu to the east, and the Irrawaddy River to the west.
The northern Shan State town of Namtu was captured by the TNLA during the first phase of Operation 1027 in December.
The TNLA together with People’s Defense Force groups under the command of the civilian National Unity Government (NUG) took complete control of ruby hub Mogoke in northern Mandalay Region last week on Wednesday.
Mongmit is located 46 km north of Mogoke.
The ethnic Kachin Independence Army (KIA) briefly occupied Mongmit in November, but the town was retaken by the regime.
The TNLA and allied groups have also captured Nawnghkio town in northern Shan State. They are now focusing their assault on junta positions in Kyaukme and Hsipaw.
Elsewhere, the KIA has also seized Mabein town, 57 km north of Mongmit.
Much of the Shweli River basin has now fallen into the hands of anti-regime groups.
Meanwhile, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, a TNLA ally, has seized almost complete control of Lashio, the capital of northern Shan State.
PDF groups have also seized Singu town in Mandalay Region and are now conducting an onslaught on junta positions in Madaya and Thabeikkyin just north of Mandalay City..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-01
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-01
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"A convoy of reinforcements the junta sent to the northern Shan State capital Lashio retreated after suffering heavy losses in an early morning ambush by the Myanmar Nationalities Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) and its allies on Tuesday, according to resistance sources and Shan media.
The 30-truck convoy carrying an estimated 400 reinforcements was ambushed near Man Bang town, about 95 kilometers southeast of Lashio.
The reinforcements included young men who were forcibly drafted under the conscription law activated earlier this year, a military analyst close to resistance groups said.
Charred remains of junta troops are visible in a video showing MNDAA fighters inspecting the destroyed vehicles, some of which were still burning. The video has gone viral in Myanmar.
Reports said the convoy was led by Brigadier General Than Tun Aung, a commander of the junta’s Middle East Command based in Kholam town in southern Shan State. The convoy was ambushed while traveling to Lashio on the road between Tangyan and Nampawng towns.
“Eight military vehicles were destroyed or burned and up to 80 regime troops, including the brigadier general suffered injuries. The commander was sent back to Kholam and the other injured soldiers were treated in Tangyan town,” the military analyst told The Irrawaddy on Thursday.
It is now impossible for the junta to retake Lashio because it has to rely on a longer land route to supply and reinforce its troops in and around the city, the analyst said, noting that the MNDAA and its allies were fighting to take control of the city’s airport.
About 50 regime forces were killed in the ambush, according to Shan media reports citing troops on the ground.
The Brotherhood Alliance of three ethnic armies launched Operation 1027 in October last year. The coordinated offensive steamrolled through northern Shan State and was closing in on its goal of liberating the region from the regime’s military when a China-brokered ceasefire halted its progress in January.
Since then, all land routes to Lashio have been controlled by resistance groups. The junta only had access to the city by air.
It lost that access after the MNDAA and its allies captured parts of the airport north of Lashio. They are now fighting for control of Lashio Airport.
Intense clashes continued on Thursday as resistance groups attacked the regime’s remaining bases and positions in Lashio. They are poised to assert complete control over the city after seizing the headquarters of the junta’s North Eastern Command last Thursday.
The MNDAA on Saturday announced the formation of a commission to rebuild and administer the city.
The MNDAA resumed Operation 1027 on July 3 along with its allies by attacking the junta’s outposts and battalion headquarters defending Lashio.
Another member of the Brotherhood Alliance, the Ta’ang National Liberation Army is attacking junta troops west of Lashio in both northern Shan State and northern Mandalay Region. It is fighting alongside other resistance groups, including People’s Defense Force units, under the command of the civilian National Unity Government.
Since the resumption of Operation 1027, ethnic armies and allied resistance groups have captured six towns and cities, including Lashio, and about 100 junta bases – including several battalion headquarters – in northern Shan State and northern Mandalay Region.
In the first phase of Operation 1027, the ethnic alliance and its allies seized 17 towns, 24 junta battalion headquarters and hundreds of the junta’s frontline bases, including command centers..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-08-01
Date of entry/update:
2024-08-01
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Human Rights and international relations
Language:
more
Description:
"Anti-regime groups have seized junta outposts at the tourist hotspot of Inle lake since launching an offensive against Myanmar’s regime and the allied Pa’O National Organization (PNO) in Nyaung Shwe Township, southern Shan State, on July 18.
The People’s Defense Forces (PDFs) from Inle and Pekon, the Karenni Nationalities Defence Force from Pekon and other groups joined the offensive targeting junta and PNO positions in rural Nyaung Shwe.
An anti-regime fighter said: “We captured a PNO base and a military checkpoint on July 18. We have also seized smaller positions.”
Inle lake is a major tourist destination with numerous hotels, including hotels owned by junta cronies Tay Za and Aung Myo Min Din.
The clashes are about 32km from Nyaung Shwe town.
Anti-regime forces have also surrounded a junta hilltop base after briefly occupying it.
“We surrounded the Htee Ree tactical command base. Our troops have been deployed in villages, which were previously PNO strongholds near Htee Ree,” said a fighter.
At least 5,000 people from five villages in the township have been reportedly displaced by the fighting, including about 1,700 displaced people from Karenni State (Kayah) who fled previous fighting.
They have reportedly moved to Nyaungshwe, Taunggyi, Pinlaung and Aungban towns.
A Loikaw town resident, who was sheltering at a monastery in Sankar village in Nyaung Shwe, said: “Approximately 1,700 people from Karenni State were taking shelter in the villages. All of them and other villagers have fled since the fighting. I am now in Taunggyi.”
Nyaung Shwe borders Taunggyi, Hsihseng, Kalaw, Pinlaung and Pekon townships. The regime has been sending reinforcements from Pinlaung Township, said anti-regime groups.
Military tensions have been running high in Lwel Lone and Sankar villages as the regime tries to retake them. Fighting has also been reported on the border of Pinlaung and Pekon townships.
The latest clashes took place at the Htee Ree base and four villages on July 27 when anti-regime groups attacked junta and PNO positions.
The regime has retaken parts of Karenni State after launching a large-scale counteroffensive in June. Karenni State borders southern Shan State..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-07-31
Date of entry/update:
2024-07-31
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Armed conflict in Burma - attacks on civilians
Language:
more
Description:
"This Situation Update describes events occurring in Tha Htoo (Thaton) Township, Doo Tha Htoo (Thaton) District during the period between February and November 2023, including State Administration Council (SAC) shelling and looting, as well as villagers’ displacement and landmine contamination. During the reporting period, the SAC military conducted indiscriminate shelling at least 25 times, firing 135 mortar rounds. As a result, five villagers died (including two children) and 26 villagers (including nine children) were injured. Livestock was also affected, including 22 cattle killed. Property was also destroyed: 17 houses, four monastery buildings, critical infrastructure, and a car were also destroyed by the SAC’s shelling. 20 civilian houses and 26 rubber trees were damaged. Villagers fled for their safety and SAC military looted their properties from their houses. A landmine-related incident was also reported, that injured a villager and her 12-year-old daughter while they were foraging in the forest.[1]
February 2023: SAC shelling caused injuries and property destruction
On February 9th 2023, at 6:30 am, State Administration Council (SAC)[2] Artillery Unit #314 [based in Kya T’Raw (Zi Won) army base, in Shwe Yaung Pya village tract] shelled several mortars in Tha Htoo Township, Doo Tha Htoo District. One of the mortar rounds landed on Saw[3] A---’s plantation in B--- village, Ka Ti Pu village tract[4], Tha Htoo Township, and his rubber trees and betel nut leaf plants[5] were destroyed by the explosion. One of the mortar rounds also landed on Saw A---’s rubber tree plantation, so his 11 trees were destroyed [by the explosion].
On February 9th 2023, at 10:06 am, SAC Artillery Unit #314 shelled several 80mm mortars at a rubber plantation nearby C--- village, Shwe Yaung Pya village tract, Tha Htoo Township, in Karen National Union (KNU)[6]-controlled territory. Two of the mortar rounds landed in Naw[7] D---’s rubber plantation, damaging her 13 rubber trees. Shrapnel also hit a 52-year-old villager named Saw E---, injuring [his face, on] his eyebrow.
April 2023: SAC shelling and landmine incident
On April 2nd 2023, SAC troops [unknown battalion] entered KNU-controlled territory in Tha Htoo Township and were attacked by [combined troops from Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA)[8] and People’s Defence Force (PDF)[9]] on the way to enter Tha Htoo Township. During the skirmishes, SAC Artillery Unit #9, based in Ah Lah T’Ya army camp [located in Ah Lah T’Ya village tract, Tha Htoo Township] shelled several mortars around the fighting area to help their troops [as reinforcement]. Three of the mortar rounds landed beside F--- village, Htee Nya Paw village tract. One of the mortar explosions injured two children who were collecting plums. The injured children are Saw G--- (17 years old), who was injured in his knee, and Saw H--- (16 years old), who was injured in his thigh. They were taken to a local clinic for treatment. The villagers [from F--- village] did not flee, but they were fearful and waiting to see the situation [if there will be more SAC attacks].
On April 3rd 2023, Border Guard Force (BGF)[10] forces led by General No Way, entered I--- village, in Hpa-An Township, and shelled multiple mortars toward Tha Htoo Township. One of the mortar rounds landed on a village farm in J--- village, Waw Poo village tract, Tha Htoo Township, and injured a 63-year-old villager named Saw K---.
On April 6th 2023, at about 3:30 pm, Naw L--- (30 years old) and her daughter, Naw M--- (12 years old), were going out from their village [N--- village, Win Raw village tract, Tha Htoo Township] to search for Kaempferia candida Wallich [one type of local edible flower]. They stepped on a [handmade] landmine on their way to N--- forest, and both of them were injured [by the landmine’s shrapnel]. Naw L--- was injured on her hip, back and right leg, and Naw M--- was injured on her abdomen, legs, hand and her whole face, including her right eye. Therefore, they had to seek medical treatment in N--- village clinic, Win Raw village tract, Tha Htoo Township, run by local KNU. Villagers do not know which armed group planted this landmine because both SAC and KNLA operate there, and fighting often occurred in this area.
On April 6th 2023, at 7:40 am, SAC Military Operation Command (MOC)[11] #8, based in P’Nweh Klah army camp, Maw Lay village tract, Tha Htoo Township, shelled several mortar rounds around their army camp. Two of the mortar rounds landed in O---village, Maw Lay village tract, Tha Htoo Township, and damaged a house and plantations owned by a villager named Naw P---.
Another mortar round landed in Q--- village, Maw Lay village tract, Tha Htoo Township, and damaged three villagers’ houses owned by Saw R---, Saw S---, Naw T--- and Saw U---, one shop owned by Naw V---, and some coconut trees. This [second] mortar explosion injured a 55-year-old villager named Naw W--- on the hip, and a 66-year-old villager named Saw X--- on his left thumb. The explosion also injured a goat owned by Saw Y---.
May 2023: SAC shelling caused casualties and property destruction
On May 27th 2023, at 9 am, SAC Artillery Unit #314 based in Kya T’Raw (Zi Won) army camp in Shwe Yaung Pya village tract, Tha Htoo Township, shelled seven mortar rounds in Tha Htoo Township. Two of the mortar rounds landed in the compound of a monastery in Z--- village, Sway Yaw Pya village tract, and shrapnel from the explosion injured five people. The first injured person is a novice monk named U[12] Aa--- (24 years old), injured on his waist, hand, leg and other parts of his whole body. The second injured person is novice Ashin[13] Ab--- (19-year-old), injured on his hand and right leg. The third injured person is novice Ashin Ac--- (13 years old), injured on his neck. The fourth injured person is Saw Ad--- (16 years old), injured on his right thigh. The fifth injured person is Saw Ae--- (27 years old), injured on his hand and leg. The injured people were sent to a local clinic under KNU administration, and received treatment.
Shrapnel also destroyed a Buddha statue, a monastery’s hall, wall, preaching hall, kitchen, light post, water storage, and three pots. Another two mortars landed at Z--- village grave, Shwe Yaw Pya village tract, without causing any casualties. Three of the mortar rounds landed into Af--- village, Daw Ya village tract, and two of the rounds exploded. Shrapnel from the mortar explosions damaged one house and killed one cattle. Two 15-year-old villagers named Saw Ag--- and Saw Ah--- were also killed by the shrapnel. Saw Aq--- was seriously injured on his head and died at the incident place. Saw Ah--- was gravely injured in his stomach, and also died at the incident place.
June 2023: SAC shelling caused displacement
[During the month of June,] SAC Artillery Unit #314, based in Kya T’Raw (Zi Won), Shwe Yaung Pya village tract, Tha Htoo Township, continuously shelled mortars at villages around their army camp, so many villagers had to flee. One of the incidents occurred on June 8th 2023, when the SAC’s mortar rounds landed in Ak--- village, Kaw Ler village tract, so villagers had to flee from their village.
July 2023: SAC shelling caused casualties and property destruction
On July 7th 2023, at 11:05 am, SAC Artillery Unit #314 based in Kya T'Raw army camp, Kya T’Raw village, Shwe Yaw Pya village tract, Tha Htoo Township, shelled mortars at Al--- village, Shwe Yaw Pya village tract. The shrapnel injured six villagers, and one of them died at a local clinic on July 9th 2023. Villagers helped the six injured villagers with emergency first aid and transportation to seek medical treatment at a local clinic in Am--- village, under KNU administration. The six injured villagers were one man, Saw An--- (25 years old, injured on his right hand); one boy, Saw Ao--- (5 years old, injured at his leg and the right side of the neck); one girl, Naw Ap--- (9 years old, injured at the left side of head, near her ear); and three women named Naw As--- (58 years old), Naw Aq--- (18 years old), and Naw Ar--- (57 years old, injured on her hip). Naw Ar--- died at the clinic on July 9th 2023.
The mortar explosions also damaged three houses and some properties owned by Naw At--, Naw Au--- and Naw Av---, including solar panels.
On July 27th 2023, between 4:55 am and 10:30 pm, a skirmish happened [between SAC soldiers and KNLA/PDF soldiers] at SAC’s Way Raw army camp. SAC LIB #9, based in Wa Pa (Win Pa) army camp, Wa Pa village tract, Tha Htoo Township, conducted an artillery barrage consisting of four series of shelling around the area where the skirmish was happening at Way Raw army camp [to assist the SAC soldiers]. During the first shelling, nine of the mortar shells landed and exploded in N--- village, Way Raw village tract, near a school campus, and injured four villagers. [There were no lessons taking place at the time of the shelling, but many villagers live near the school campus and were injured]. The four injured villagers were Saw Aw--- (48 years old, injured at his right leg); Saw Ax--- (17 years old, injured at the right side of his back); Naw Ay--- (13 years old, injured on her left hand); and Naw Az--- (54 years old, injured on her right hand).
During the second shelling, nine mortar shells landed in an area between Ba--- village, T’No village tract, and Bb--- village, Way Raw village tract. Five shells landed in Nya Htee Kyo place, four shells landed in Mee Chaw Koh [place], and five shells landed next to T’Rweh Kloh stream, in Way Raw village tract, without causing any casualties. [A total of 23 shells landed in these villages and nearby areas.]
During the third shelling, 14 mortar shells landed in Bb--- village, Way Raw village tract, and caused a large amount of destruction in the village, including two monastery buildings, cars, and 13 houses. The houses are owned by Naw Bc---, Saw Bd---, Naw Be---, Naw Bf---, Saw Bg---, Saw Bh---, Saw Bi--, Saw Bj---, Saw Bk---, Naw Bl---, Saw Bm---, Saw Bn--- and Saw Bo---. Entry signposts of village clinics and the monastery were also damaged by the mortar explosions. Shrapnel from the explosions also killed two cattle owned by Saw Bp---, three cattle owned by Saw Bq---, and one cattle owned by Naw Br---.
During the fourth shelling, at 1:30 pm, SAC mortar rounds also landed in Bs--- village, Sway Yaw Pya village tract, and the shrapnel injured a 37-year-old villager named Saw Bt--- on his right hip.
July 2023: Houses damaged by SAC shelling and looting of villagers’ properties
In July and early August 2023, SAC troops (under Light Infantry Division (LID)[14] #44) shelled mortars and looted villagers’ belongings in Bs--- village, Shwe Yaw Pyaw village tract. The mortar explosions damaged eight villagers’ houses.
The eight damaged houses are owned by Naw Bu--- (50 years old), Tee[15] Bv--- (50 years old), Naw Bw--- (40 years old), Saw Bx--- (55 years old), Saw By--- (35 years old), Tee Bz--- (70 years old), Saw Ca--- (45 years old) and Naw Cb---(45 years old).
September 2023: Shelling caused casualties, property destruction, and displacement
On September 9th 2023, from 9:20 am to 4:10 pm, SAC soldiers under LID #44, based in P’Nweh Klah camp, Maw Lay village tract, shelled six mortar rounds around their army camp in Tha Htoo Township. Three of the mortar rounds landed on O--- village, Maw Lay village tract, and injured a child [unknown age], Saw Dm---, on his left leg. One of the mortar rounds also landed in Dn--- village, Maw Lay village tract, and shrapnel damaged four villagers’ houses and injured a 38-year-old villager, Naw Do---, on her left leg. The two injured villagers were sent to a local clinic for medical treatment. The four damaged houses are owned by villagers named Tee Dp---, Naw Dq---, Tee Dr--- and Tee Ds---. Another two mortar rounds landed in [other locations at] Maw Lay village tract, so villagers in Maw Lay village tract were afraid and had to be displaced.
On September 9th 2023, at 7:30 pm, SAC Infantry Battalion (IB)[17] #24 shelled five mortar rounds in Ak--- village, Kaw Ler village tract; two of them landed in Ak--- village and damaged Tee Dt---’s house, and another three mortars landed beside Ak--- village without causing any damage.
November 2023: shelling caused casualties and properties destruction
On November 10th 2023, at about 3:10 pm, SAC soldiers under LID #44, based in in P’Nweh Klah army camp, Maw Lay village tract, shelled six 60mm mortar rounds [around their army camp]. Two of the mortar rounds landed on Htee Nya Loo farm, one mortar landed beside Du--- village, one mortar landed on Lah Ko forest and one mortar landed in eastern Dv--- village, Maw Lay village tract. One of the six mortar rounds [landed at an unidentified place and] did not explode. The mortar explosion in eastern Dv--- village injured four villagers, and two of the villagers died from their injuries. Saw Dw--- (73 years old) died immediately after his whole body was injured by shrapnel, and Saw Dx--- (46 years old) died in a hospital in Thaton Town. The two [surviving] injured villagers are Naw Dy--- (72 years old), injured on the left leg, and Saw Dz--- (32 years old), injured on his back. The mortar explosion in the eastern area of Dv--- village also damaged two villager’s houses, owned by Saw Ea--- (52 years old) and Saw Eb--- (26 years old).
On November 13th 2023, between 7:40 and 8:30 pm, [SAC] LIB #9 in Way Pa army camp shelled eight mortar rounds in Way Raw and Shwe Yaw Pya village tracts, Tha Htoo Township. Two mortar rounds landed beside Ec--- village, two mortar rounds landed in Ed--- village, and two mortar rounds landed beside Ee--- village, Way Raw village tract. Two mortar rounds exploded in Ef--- village, Shwe Yaung Pya village tract. A mortar explosion beside Ec--- village damaged four villagers’ houses, owned by Naw Eg--- (78 years old), Naw Eh--- (48 years old), Saw Ei--- (72 years old) and Naw Ej--- (50 years old).
On November 18th 2023, between 6 pm and 8:30 pm, SAC Artillery Unit #314, based in Kya T’Raw (Zi Won) army camp, Shwe Yaung Pya village tract, shelled 16 mortars in Shwe Yaung Pya, K’Dee Poo and Daw Ya village tracts, Tha Htoo Township. Two mortar rounds landed in Ek--- village, and two landed in an area between Al--- and Z--- villages, Shwe Yaung Pya village tract. Two mortar rounds landed in Af--- village, Daw Ya village tract, and one mortar round landed in El--- village, K’Dee Poo village tract. Two mortar rounds landed in an area between Em--- and En--- villages, four mortar rounds landed beside Eo--- village, and two mortar rounds landed in an area between Ep--- and Eo--- villages, K’Dee Poo village tract. There were no major damages or casualties.
On November 28th 2023, at 9:50 am, SAC Artillery Unit #402, based in Noh Ta Shuh village tract, shelled eight mortar rounds in Kaw Ler village tract. Six of the mortars landed in an area between Eq--- and Ak--- villages, and two mortars landed on Er--- villagers’ farms, without causing any damage or injury. On the evening of the same day, from 6 pm to 11 pm, SAC Artillery Unit #402 shelled six more mortar rounds [in Kaw Ler village tract]. Two mortars landed in Ak--- village, two mortars landed beside Er--- village and the other two mortars landed beside Es--- village, without any [major] damages or casualties.
On November 30th 2023, at 4:10 pm, SAC Artillery Unit #314, based in Kya T’Raw (Zi Won) army camp, Shwe Yaung Pya village tract, shelled two mortar rounds beside Ep--- village, K’Dee Poo village tract, without causing any [major] damages or casualties. On the same day, at 7:45 pm, SAC IB #8, based in Myay Taung [army camp] in Bilin Town area [Tha Htoo Township], shelled four mortar rounds. Three of the mortar rounds landed in an area between Eo--- and Et--- villages, K’Dee Poo village tract [Tha Htoo Township]. One mortar round landed in Et--- school compound, damaging three school buildings and two villagers’ houses situated close to the school. The houses are owned by Saw Eu--- (47 years old) and Saw Ev--- (47 years old).
On the same day at 7:30 pm, SAC LIB #118, based in Thaton Town, shelled two mortar rounds in an area between Ak--- and Ew--- villages, Kaw Ler village tract, Tha Htoo Township, without causing any [major] damage or casualties.
On November 30th 2023, at 3 pm, SAC Artillery Unit #402, based in Noh Ta Shuh village tract, shelled three mortar rounds on villagers’ farms near Ex--- village, Noh Ta Shuh village tract, Tha Htoo Township. The explosions killed 15 cows and bulls owned by a villager named Saw Ey--- (58 years old).
Further background reading on shelling in Southeast Burma/Myanmar can be found in the following KHRG reports:
‘Doo Tha Htoo District Situation Update: SAC shelling into villages in Tha Htoo Township, causing injuries and destruction (September 2022 to February 2023)’, March 2024;
‘Doo Tha Htoo District Situation Update: villagers used as human shields, forced labour and navigators; SAC shelling and looting; and forced displacement in Bilin Township (July 2021 to September 2022)’, January 2024;
Striking Fear: Impacts of State Administration Council (SAC) shelling on villagers’ lives in Southeast Burma (January to October 2023), December 2023;
‘Doo Tha Htoo District Situation Update: Two villagers were killed and 17 villagers were injured by SAC’s indiscriminate shelling in Kyeh Htoh Township (December 2022 to February 2023)’, August 2023;
‘Doo Tha Htoo District Short Update: House burning and indiscriminate shelling in Kyeh Htoh Township (January 2023)’, June 2023..."
Source/publisher:
Karen Human Rights Group
Date of publication:
2024-07-31
Date of entry/update:
2024-07-31
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG) reports
Language:
Format :
pdf
Size:
4.01 MB
more
Description:
"Clashes broke out between junta troops and the ethnic Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) and its allies near the North Eastern Command headquarters in northern Shan State’s capital Lashio on Tuesday as the junta tried to regain control of the base.
The MNDAA and allied resistance groups are poised to take complete control of Lashio after seizing the command HQ on July 25. They are currently trying to take the regime’s remaining military bases in the city.
However, the regime has denied that Lashio has fallen, insisting that its battalions in the city are tactically regrouping and redeploying, and that it will have things under control soon.
Fighting continued Tuesday near the North Eastern Command and in Wards 8 and 9 between the junta’s military and the MNDAA, a member of the Brotherhood Alliance of ethnic armies, helped by allied resistance groups. Civilians have been killed by shelling and some who were injured are trapped in their homes, according to residents.
“As the clashes continue, rescue teams are not able to reach these houses. Heavy clashes continue as of Tuesday afternoon,” a Lashio resident said Tuesday.
The Irrawaddy was still trying to reach sources for an update on the situation on Wednesday morning.
Combined forces of the MNDAA and Bamar People’s Liberation Army (BPLA) seized the headquarters of a Lashio-based signal battalion, the headquarters of the 7005th Armored Battalion and the headquarters of the 242nd Ordnance Unit, as well as a golf course belonging to the junta military on July 28 and 29, according to a BPLA statement.
At around 9 a.m. on Tuesday, at least 10 improvised shells were fired at the North Eastern Command, some of whose buildings caught fire, residents said.
“Some junta troops that had spread out around the city reentered the command, and that’s why the MNDAA focused on them again, so they could not base themselves inside the command again,” said a source close to the alliance.
Presently, the MNDAA and allies are taking up positions at various places around the city and the situation in Lashio remains chaotic as the ethnic army attempts to establish an administration there, he said.
In a statement released on July 29, the MNDAA said it had taken control of Lashio Railway Station, Lashio Prison—from which it released hundreds of prisoners including about 200 political prisoners—Infantry Battalions 68 and 41, the Hopeik Toll Gate area, the 912th Engineer Battalion and a junta military broadcasting station.
Heavy clashes also continued in Mongmit, Nawnghkio and Kyaukme townships in northern Shan State and in Mogoke Township in Mandalay Region between the junta military and the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA)—which is also a member of the Brotherhood Alliance—and its allies on Monday and Tuesday.
The TNLA said in a statement released on Monday evening that it seized a patrol outpost from the junta’s 348th Light Infantry Battalion in Mongmit Township on Monday and that the TNLA and its allies, including the People’s Defense Force, are still launching attacks on a strategic hilltop outpost, the 21st Military Operations Command and the 348th Light Infantry Battalion in Mongmit.
Heavy clashes also broke out near Yay Hpyu monastery in Nawnghkio Township, which is under the control of the TNLA, on Monday.
The Brotherhood Alliance comprising the MNDAA, TNLA and Arakan Army launched Operation 1027 in Shan State on Oct. 17 last year, seizing hundreds of junta bases, command centers and 24 battalion headquarters, as well as around 20 towns and trade routes with China.
The operation was halted on Jan. 10 after the alliance agreed to a China-brokered ceasefire with the regime. The TNLA and MNDAA resumed the operation in northern Shan State on June 25 after junta forces violated the ceasefire by repeatedly bombarding TNLA territory in early June..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-07-31
Date of entry/update:
2024-07-31
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Armed conflict in Burma - attacks on civilians
Language:
more
Description:
"The Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) has told its commanders to protect Chinese interests and citizens as it advances in northern Shan State.
Beijing has influence over the MNDAA, an ethnically Chinese armed group from the Kokang Special Region on Myanmar’s side of the Chinese border.
The MNDAA and its allies began attacking junta troops in the northern Shan State capital, Lashio, on July 3.
The MNDAA formed a military governing body last week after claiming control of Lashio and the regime’s Northeastern Command headquarters after three weeks of offensive. The MNDAA is still attacking the remaining junta forces in Lashio, despite having announced a unilateral ceasefire until the end of July in response to pressure from China.
On Tuesday, the MNDAA said its troops must “seriously” protect foreign investments and “make their utmost efforts to prevent Chinese businesses from being harmed”.
China’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning last week called for an end to hostilities, the preservation of China’s border security, safety for border communities and Chinese projects, businesses and personnel in Myanmar.
China has major investments in Myanmar, including an oil and gas pipeline from the Indian Ocean in Rakhine State to Yunnan Province, crossing northern Shan State. In Rakhine, the MNDAA’s ally, the Arakan Army, has been fighting against the regime.
The MNDAA instructed its commanders to discourage its allies from harming Chinese investments and staff.
“If an activity that can harm China’s interests is spotted, it must be stopped immediately and reported to the military affairs committee and the Chinese authorities,” the MNDAA told its commanders.
The MNDAA instructed troops to remove Chinese citizens from conflict zones and help any injured Chinese citizens or businesses under threat..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-07-31
Date of entry/update:
2024-07-31
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Armed conflict in Burma - attacks on civilians
Language:
more
Sub-title:
The force said it would speak with allied insurgent groups to ensure protection of Chinese citizens and businesses.
Description:
"A member of a Myanmar rebel alliance fighting military rule has promised to protect Chinese interests in northern Myanmar.
The Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, or MNDAA, pledged to protect Chinese nationals and investments as the battle for a major Shan state town intensified, the group announced on Tuesday.
Several ceasefires brokered with China’s help between Myanmar’s Three Brotherhood Alliance and junta forces have failed to maintain a lasting peace since January. Since July 22, when the latest ceasefire collapsed, fighting over Lashio, the main city in northern Shan state, has surged.
The MNDAA has since claimed it captured most of the town, including a regional military headquarters, which junta officials have denied.
The group said it would consult allied organizations and “prevent actions that may harm Chinese investment and Chinese employees.”
Political analyst Than Soe Naing told Radio Free Asia that groups involved in fighting the junta, which include the allied Ta’ang National Liberation Army and Arakan Army, are already obligated to protect Chinese interests under an earlier agreement.
The renewed declaration may be the result of a warning from China to be more cautious during battles, he said.
“China’s interests in northern Shan state are to keep its trade routes convenient and smooth and to maintain stability on the border region. Its interests are also to clean up online scamming,” he said. “Therefore, China has put its trust in the Federal Political Negotiation and Consultative Committee to ensure that its interests are not affected.”
RELATED STORIES:
Insurgents claim seizure of regional headquarters in northeast Myanmar
Myanmar junta airstrike on market kills 15, residents say
Myanmar insurgents free political prisoners in northern Shan state city
The committee is an alliance of seven ethnic minority forces established in 2017. In 2023, it called on China to help solve the crisis triggered by a military coup two years earlier.
China’s investments in Myanmar include oil and natural gas pipelines running through both Shan and Rakhine states. Fighting in the latter has threatened the safety of Chinese employees.
The MNDAA said it would urge its allies to assist injured Chinese citizens trapped by fighting as well as those who have businesses affected by the war. RFA telephoned MNDAA spokesman Li Kyar Win to ask about the details of the statement, but he did not answer calls.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning told a recent briefing China’s borders and the security of people living there, as well as its projects and businesses in Myanmar, should not be compromised.
China has called on Myanmar’s rivals to end their fighting and resolve differences peacefully and said it would push for ceasefires and talks.
Wa army claims neutrality
Conflict in Lashio continued early on Wednesday morning, after another ethnic minority militia group, the United Wa State Army, which controls an autonomous region of Shan state and is known to be closely affiliated with China, evacuated trapped Lashio prison employees and their family members, residents told RFA on Wednesday.
The Wa army led more than 120 junta-affiliated prison staff and their relatives, who had been trapped by clashes, to a nearby town on Tuesday, said one witness, declining to be named for security reasons.
“I saw three military vehicles carrying prison employees. They were sent to Mongyai town,” he said, referencing a town 93 km (58 miles) from Lashio.
The evacuees said they were trapped when MNDAA fighters captured an infantry battalion’s position near the prison.
RFA attempted to contact Nyi Ran, an official of the Wa Liaison Office in Lashio, regarding the evacuation but he did not answer.
One resident close to the Wa army, asking to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals, told RFA that troops arrived in Lashio on Saturday in order to protect properties at the request of “various ethnic groups” in the town. However, the resident declined to reveal which parties had asked the Wa force to come although the resident said the Wa army would not take sides in any battles.
Two Lashio neighborhoods have been damaged by junta airstrikes and heavy weapons fire, residents said, but they could not verify if there were any casualties The Wa Liaison Office and nearby houses were also damaged in air strikes, they added.
RFA called Shan state’s junta spokesperson Khun Thein Maung for more information on the battle in Lashio but he did not answer..."
Source/publisher:
"Radio Free Asia" (USA)
Date of publication:
2024-07-31
Date of entry/update:
2024-07-31
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, Armed conflict in Burma - attacks on civilians
Language:
more
Description:
"After taking over the position of acting president less than two weeks ago, junta boss Min Aung Hlaing extended the state of emergency for another six months on Wednesday, saying he and his regime need more time to bring “stability and security” to the country, junta media said.
The coup-maker told a meeting of his National Defense and Security Council (NDSC) that after he initially seized power – on Feb. 1, 2021 – his regime planned to hold a new nationwide election when the two-year state of emergency expired, junta media said.
The return of democratic elections was hindered by ongoing unrest, junta media quoted Min Aung Hlaing as telling the Wednesday morning meeting in the junta’s nerve center, Naypyitaw.
Min Aung Hlaing also said that a nationwide census was necessary to ensure “accurate” voter lists for the election, possibly in 2025. The need to keep trying to impose stability and security was due to “terror acts” perpetrated by the civilian National Unity Government formed in the wake of the coup, its armed wing, People’s Defense Forces (PDFs), and ethnic armed groups, he said.
The latest extension of the state of emergency is necessary to continue implementing the measures necessary to ensure the nation’s stability and development, junta media quoted Min Aung Hlaing as saying.
The junta said the members of its NDSC “unanimously decided to extend the period of the state of emergency by another six months.”
Min Aung Hlaing, 68, on July 18 replaced acting president U Myint Swe, 73, after he reportedly took medical leave and was unable to perform daily activities.
Myint Swe was the military-appointed vice-president under the elected National League for Democracy government ousted in the coup. He was named acting president after President Win Myint was arrested during the coup.
Myint Swe was widely seen as a puppet of the junta boss, who wields absolute legislative, executive and judicial power.
Min Aung Hlaing was addressed as both acting president and Commander-in-Chief of Defense Services at Wednesday’s NDSC meeting.
Others present at the meeting were Lower House Speaker T Khun Myat, Deputy junta chief Senior General Soe Win, Defense Minister General Tin Aung San, Home Affairs Minister Lieutenant General Yar Pyae, Border Affairs Minister Lt-Gen Tun Tun Naung, State Administration Council Secretary Lt-Gen Aung Lin Dwe and Joint Secretary Lt-Gen Ye Win Oo.
The military declared a state of emergency when it ousted State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s government in February 2021, alleging fraud in the 2020 general elections.
More than three years later, the junta is struggling to contain widespread resistance against its rule nationwide. It has suffered humiliating defeats at the hands of an alliance of ethnic armed groups and PDFs, especially in northern and western Myanmar.
Myanmar’s constitution states that an emergency can be declared for an initial period of one year and can “normally” be extended for a maximum of two half-year terms at the discretion of the military-dominated NDSC.
Junta boss Min Aung Hlaing, however, has extended emergency rule six times. Each time he cites the need to restore peace and stability so that the fresh election he promised after the coup could be held.
The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners reported that it had verified that at least 5,464 civilians have been killed by the junta since the coup and over 27, 000 more have been arrested. These numbers likely under-report deaths and arrests because they only include those it can verify, the association said..."
Source/publisher:
"The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of publication:
2024-07-31
Date of entry/update:
2024-07-31
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory, Politics, Government and Governance - Burma/Myanmar - general studies, The Military's political role
Language:
more