Myanmar’s military representatives and lawmakers take oath during a Parliament session at Lower House in Naypyitaw, Myanmar, on March 16, 2026.
| Photo Credit: AP

Damage to vehicles at the site of a military strike on a protest in central Myanmar’s Chaung U township. Facebook/UGC via AFP

Peace prospects look bleak in Myanmar as a civil war rages despite international pressure on the military four years after it seized power from an elected civilian government.

The political situation remains tense with no negotiation space in sight between the military government and the major opposition groups fighting against it.

The four years after the army’s takeover on Feb. 1, 2021, have created a profound situation of multiple, overlapping crises with nearly half the population in poverty and the economy in disarray, the UN Development Programme said.

The UN Human Rights Office said the military ramped up violence against civilians last year to unprecedented levels, inflicting the heaviest civilian death toll since the army takeover as its grip on power eroded.

The army launched wave after wave of retaliatory airstrikes and artillery shelling on civilians and civilian populated areas, forced thousands of young people into military service, conducted arbitrary arrests and prosecutions, caused mass displacement, and denied access to humanitarians, even in the face of natural disasters, the rights office said in a statement Friday.

“After four years, it is deeply distressing to find that the situation on the ground for civilians is only getting worse by the day,” UN human rights chief Volker Turk said. “Even as the military’s power wanes, their atrocities and violence have expanded in scope and intensity,” he said, adding that the retaliatory nature of the attacks were designed to control, intimidate, and punish the population.

The United States, United Kingdom, European Union and others criticized the military takeover in a statement that also called for the release of ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi and other political prisoners.

They said nearly 20 million people need humanitarian assistance and up to 3.5 million people are displaced internally, an increase of nearly 1 million in the last year. They also expressed concern about increased cross-border crime in Myanmar such as drug and human trafficking and online scam operations, which affect neighbouring countries and risk broader instability.

“The current trajectory is not sustainable for Myanmar or the region,” the countries said in the joint statement that also included Australia, Canada, South Korea, New Zealand, Norway and Switzerland.

The military’s 2021 takeover prompted widespread public protests, whose violent suppression by security forces triggered an armed resistance that has now led to a state of civil war. Ethnic minority militias and people’s defense forces that support Myanmar’s main opposition control large parts of the country, while the military holds much of central Myanmar and big cities including the capital, Naypyidaw.

The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, which keeps detailed tallies of arrests and casualties linked to the repression of the military government, said that at least 6,239 were killed and 28,444 were arrested since the takeover. The actual death toll is likely to be much higher since the group does not generally include deaths on the side of the military government and cannot easily verify cases in remote areas.

Aung Thu Nyein, director of communications for the Institute for Strategy and Policy-Myanmar think tank, told The Associated Press that Myanmar’s current situation is at its worst with peace and development being pushed back.

“What’s worse is that the sovereignty which ever-proclaimed by the military is losing, and the country’s borders could even shift,” Aung Thu Nyein said in a text message.

Myanmar’s army suffered unprecedented battlefield defeats over the past year, when a coalition of ethnic armed groups won victories in the northeast near the Chinese border and in the western state of Rakhine.

The ethnic rebels were able to quickly capture several towns, military bases and two important regional commands, and their offensive weakened the army’s grip in other parts of the country.

The ethnic minorities have been fighting for decades for greater autonomy from Myanmar’s central government and are loosely allied with the People’s Defense Force, the pro-democracy armed resistance formed after the army’s 2021 takeover.

The UN Human Rights Office and rights groups including Amnesty International also made rare allegations in recent statements that armed groups opposing the military have also committed human rights violations in areas under their control.

In pursuit of a political solution, the military government is pushing for an election, which it has promised to hold this year. Critics say the election would not be free or fair as civil rights have been curtailed and many political opponents imprisoned and the election would be an attempt to normalize military control.

On Friday, the military government extended a state of emergency another six months because it said more time was needed to restore stability before the election, state-run MRTV television reported. No exact date for the polls was given.

Tom Andrews, a special rapporteur working with the UN human rights office, said it wasn’t possible to hold a legitimate election while arresting, detaining, torturing and executing leaders of the opposition and when it is illegal for journalists or citizens to criticize the military government.

“Governments should dismiss these plans for what they are – a fraud,” Tom Andrews said.

The presence of Rohingya community within India is progressively becoming an issue of political blame-game and some political actors are busy pedalling mass anxiety without factoring in the complex multiplicity of vectors related to the issue, including the growing importance of the issue globally. Thus it is creating a situation where the presence of Rohingyas is becoming a manifestation of classic tale of poor and illegal immigrants in global north or global south as they are vilified and blamed for the rise in crime. They are dehumanised and subjected to dog-whistle tactics of mainstream politicians to induce mass anxiety.

In Uttar Pradesh, in July 2023, the police had reportedly detained 74 Rohingya Muslims — 55 men, 14 women, and five minors — in 2023. Now, in Muslim majority former State of J&K , the BJP recently gave a new turn to the issue by appealing to J&K Lt. Governor Manoj Sinha to initiate a CBI probe into the rising number of Rohingyas and Bangladeshi settlers in J&K. It termed their settlement as a major “political conspiracy”. They have accused the ruling National Conference government of protecting the settlers by providing them with power and water connections because they were members of a “particular community.” The J&K Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, who assumed office only in October, 2024, urged the central government to formulate a clear policy to determine the fate of the Rohingyas in the Union Territory, terming the condition to be a ‘humanitarian dispute’. He reportedly said, “The central government should decide what to do about them. If they can be sent back, they should be sent back. But if we cannot send them back, we cannot let them starve or freeze to death.” Stating that the Rohingyas must be treated with “dignity”, the Chief Minister said, “They are human beings and must not be treated like animals.”

In the national capital, within the same time-frame as the Delhi Assembly elections approach, the AAP accused the BJP of orchestrating a conspiracy to bring and settle Rohingya refugees in Delhi. AAP leader Manish Sisodia had reportedly referred to Minister Hardeep Puri’s social media post on August 17, 2022, where he reportedly announced the relocation of Rohingya refugees to EWS flats in Delhi’s Bakkarwala area. In the social media post, Minister Puri had said, “India has always welcomed those who have sought refuge in the country. In a landmark decision, all Rohingya refugees will be shifted to EWS flats in Bakkarwala, Delhi. They will be provided basic amenities, UNHCR IDs, and round-the-clock Delhi Police protection.”

In this season of points scoring over Rohingya presence in India, multi-dimensional nuances related with the community both at the national, regional and global levels, including the historical context which has deep connections with India, are being ignored. A key argument in support of their deportation is that their stay in India may endanger national security. However, there is no evidence to this effect, a fact underlined by security officials, including in the sensitive region of J&K. The number of Rohingyas living outside, particularly in Bangladesh, as stateless population, is more than two million which is four times that of those who are in that country. As per the Arakan Project, in 2019-20, the approximate number of Rohingyas living in Bangladesh, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, India, the UAE and Malaysia was 9,47,000, 5,00,000, 3,50,000, 40,000, 50,000 and 1,50,000, respectively. Bangladesh hosts the maximum of number of refugees and they have come to the country in several phases. The most recent was in August 2017 as 720000 Rohingyas were expelled from Rakhine in Myanmar on account of the army’s allegedly disproportionate use of force after attacks by the Arakan Rakhine Salvation Army on military’s posts. The magnitude of the displacement in 2017 can be gauged from the fact that Maungdaw district, comprising the townships of Maungdaw and Buthidaung, with a population of over 7,50,000 Rohingyas, witnessed a near-total exodus.

The issue requires unpacking within its regional as well as broader context. Within the subcontinent, in actual terms, the presence of Rohingya is nothing new. They had been migrating from Myanmar in the last three-decades and the trigger for the migration of the Rohingyas is persecution. To understand the problems of statelessness of the Rohingyas, one has to factor in the contestations of history, identity, colonialism and conceptualisation of modern-day nationhood. Myanmar’s version is that the Rohingyas came from Bangladesh to Rakhine and their language is Chittagonian, which has similarities with Bengali. Myanmar calls Rohingyas ‘Bengalis’, which goes against the universally agreed right of the community to ‘self-identify’. It is said that the British, when they gained control of Rakhine, facilitated the flight of the Rohingyas as sharecroppers. The community contests this version. Its members affirm that they are native to Rakhine and have a distinct language.

In this battle of versions, little attention is paid to the fact that till the British empire imploded in 1947-48 in Myanmar and India and new nation-states were created, including Myanmar and East Pakistan (which became Bangladesh in 1971), the border between the coastal Rakhine and neighbouring Bangladesh’s Chittagong district was porous. The seeds of the exclusionary citizenship project in Myanmar, which directly impacted Rohingyas, were sowed by General Ne Win, a military dictator who ruled the country from 1962 to 1981. General Ne Win’s administration identified 135 national races of Myanmar, excluding the Rohingya. Building on that, his successor President San Yu passed a citizenship law in 1982. The law recognised three categories of citizens, namely, citizen, associate citizen and naturalised citizen. Full citizenship is granted to the descendants of residents who lived in Myanmar prior to 1823 or were born to parents who were citizens at the time of birth. 1824 is the year when the first Anglo-Burmese war took place. Associate citizens are those who acquired citizenship through the 1948 Union Citizenship Law. Naturalised citizens are those who lived in Myanmar before January 4, 1948, the date of the country’s independence, and applied for citizenship after 1982. Thus Rohingyas were stripped of citizenship rights in 1982 and thus started more than four decades of institutionalized discrimination and oppression.

The 2008 Constitution drafted and promulgated by the military is still in operation and it has 135 national races enshrined. The authorities in Myanmar argue that the Rohingya are not a distinct ethnic group and that they are ‘Bengalis’. However, facts demonstrate that the Rohingya were once part and parcel of the country’s political and electoral landscape. A Rohingya leader, who had been a Member of Parliament, had even served as a federal minister in the early 1960s. Till 2010, the Rohingya even participated in national elections, though they were declared non-citizens in 1982. It was only in 2015 that the authorities took away their voter cards. Facing criticism, including at the Security Council and General Assembly, President Thein Sein and his successor Aung Sung Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy’s governments often cited the national verification card (NVC) process as their commitment to grant citizenship to anyone who fulfilled any of the three criterion. However, there was a catch as the Rohingya could only declare themselves as ‘Bengalis’ as Myanmar does not accept the Rohingya as an ethnic group. The 2014 census failed to officially enumerate the Rohingya as they boycotted the exercise. The fact is that the anti-Rohingya narrative of several decades created a situation where even a seemingly democratic and liberal party like the ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) exacerbated the situation of Rohingyas. The NLD oversaw two phases of violent expulsions of Rohingyas in 2016 and 2017.

In the present context, keeping in mind the complicated and turbulent past, there is little doubt that the problem of Rohingyas has also coincided with a surge in territorial nationalism and Islamophobia that has swept across the globe. In Myanmar, the new official narrative promoted a binary history, which was internalised, including the idea of natives and foreigners, by the Burman Buddhist majority. In a country of multiplicities in terms of ethnicity and religion, internal strife became a way of life, including among adherents of Buddhist majority of different ethnicities such as Rakhine Buddhists as a result of the enforcement of the singular national vision of the majority. The Rohingyas, who are cent per cent Muslim and with their own ethnicity, stood little chance of being included in such a polity. The Myanmar military has often invoked the threat of Rohingyas to gain political legitimacy and the ruling political elite is always insecure about adopting a liberal, accommodating approach towards the Rohingyas as this would potentially invite the wrath of the majority.

The Myanmar leadership, be it the military or political, consistently deny the claim that they are anti-Muslim. They cite the recognition of the Kaman Muslims as one of the indigenous ethnic groups listed in the Constitution. In the post-2010 elections — catalysed by many variables, including the availability of greater right to free expression in the backdrop of the ongoing democratic transition that also unleashed old stereotypes against the Rohingya in the public domain — the citizenship project played out differently on the ground. In 2012, a case of sexual violence and murder of a Rakhine Buddhist woman sparked off inter-communal violence in Sitwe, central Rakhine, that led to internal displacement of both communities, including 1,20,000 Rohingya. Belying the claims of the authorities, the animosity against the Rohingya had morphed into Islamophobia across the country and not just Rakhine. Extremist Buddhist monk Wirathu became a symbol of hate as he peddled vitriol against the Muslims. Islamophobia became the trend among the vast swathes of the Buddhist community. A number of inter-communal riots took place across the country in 2013. In Meiktila, situated in central Myanmar, more than 40 people were killed. There was inter-communal violence in Yangon and Lashio of Shan state, situated in the north. The ruling political elite become even more rigid and shunned any accommodation. In fact, when the then United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) António Guterres, who is now the UN Secretary-General, met President Thein Sein in July 2012, the President stated that his government was prepared to hand over the Rohingya to the UNHCR and then they can resettle the ethnic group in any third country “that are willing to take them.”

Coming to the subcontinent, more than twenty-three-years ago, the author remembers, while reporting for this paper, it was common for the Border Security Force (BSF) to send press releases about the arrest of “Myanmarese” citizens. Many times, political reporters were taken to meet “Myanmarese” along the India-Pak international border in J&K and there was no mention of their Rohingya identity. In the press release, there was explicit mention of the fact that they were caught by the BSF for crossing over to adjoining Sialkot district of Pakistan which adjoins the plains of J&K. The issue got little notice nationally as there was an acceptance to the fact that they were attempting to crossover to Pakistan as desperate economic migrants with the purpose to migrate to the Middle East. In fact, one of the terrorist attacks on slum dwellers by Lashkar on 13th July 2002 in the plains of J&K took place in the same area where Rohingyas are presently living. On the ground zero, various interviews of Rohingyas by the author in the last four-years suggest many of the Rohingyas have refugee cards issued by UNHCR. They are even routinely hired and preferred by local contractors to work as masons and labourers for municipality work as they charge less than the market rates.

Within India, there is an ongoing litigation between Mohammad Salimullah vs Union of India, where the apex court has to decide whether the deportation of Rohingyas will violate the right to equality under Article 14 and also Article 21 of the Constitution, which upholds the right to life. In March 2024, the Central Government had told the Supreme Court that illegal Rohingyas did not have the fundamental right to reside and settle in India and that New Delhi did not recognise refugee cards issued by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. The Rohingya case cannot be divorced from the community’s institutionalised victimisation. This aspect is critical to the ongoing litigation and will clarify India’s refugee policy, which will have international consequences as well. In an interim order, the SC said in April 2021 that Articles 14 and 21 were guaranteed to all, irrespective of citizenship. However, the court added: “The right not to be deported is ancillary or concomitant to the right to reside or settle in any part of the territory of India guaranteed under Article 19(1)(e).” This meant that Article 19(1)(e) only applied to Indian citizens. The court further ordered that unless the procedure prescribed for such deportation is followed, it cannot be undertaken.

While there is no universal definition of migrants, as per the UN, refugees are people who have fled their countries to escape conflict, violence or persecution and have sought safety in another country. In line with the universally acknowledged ‘refugee protection regime’, the authorities as well as civil society should ensure that xenophobia is avoided with respect to the Rohingyas. International norms dictate that no one can be deported without informed consent. The Centre has stated that the deportation process will follow the procedure of notifying the government of the country of origin of the foreigners and the deportation will be ordered only when confirmed by that government that the persons concerned are citizens/nationals of that country and that they are entitled to come back. Practically, the same procedure is being followed for non-Rohingya Myanmar refugees living in Manipur, who escaped after the 2021 coup. The first batch was deported from India in the first quarter of 2024. For all practical purposes, even if this procedure is adhered to, the Rohingya deportation is subject to the Myanmar Government’s consent, which is an unlikely scenario.

Obviously, the main impediment stalling repatriation is the demand by Rohingyas for the full recognition of their political, social and economic rights that no one in Myanmar is willing to concede. As per the international humanitarian norms, the return should be a fully informed and voluntary decision with enabling conditions. The ongoing case also cannot be delinked from the litigation on the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA). Except the clause on religion, the Rohingyas fulfil the criterion of persecution mentioned in the CAA. The apex court will also have to reconcile Article 21 and Article 19(1)(e) in its final order. This will determine whether refugees coming to India will have legal recourse like they do in some Western democracies or their stay/deportation will solely depend on the executive’s discretionary powers. Meanwhile, within camps in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, the situation is becoming more and more challenging for the authorities. Many have expressed the risk that because of depressing status quo ante there is a potential of radicalisation in the midst of poverty and a situation of hopelessness, particularly among the youth, as incidents of violence and fatalities increase as a result of intra-camp feuds.

Burdened by previous experiences of forced expulsion, particularly in 1978 and in 1991-92, a feeling of despondency lurks among the Rohingya community about the various international initiatives being taken in the context of accountability, justice and repatriation efforts being pursued after the 2017 crisis. A fatigue also prevails in the international community as efforts towards repatriation have achieved little success. It is obvious that a sustainable resolution of the Rohingya crisis is predicated upon support for current efforts to create a democratic and federal polity in Myanmar along with the simultaneous pursuit of accountability for human rights violations. Rohingyas will only be accepted in a democratic, inclusive, federal Myanmar.

Within the multilateral arena, Myanmar is facing trial at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for an alleged genocide, apart from being the subject of several human rights reports and mechanisms at the United Nations. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) is hearing the Rohingya genocide case (The Gambia vs Myanmar) whereas in November 2024  an arrest warrant had been filled by the International Criminal Court (ICC) Prosecutor Karim Khan against Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, Commander-in-Chief of Myanmar’s armed forces and Acting President, alleging his involvement in crimes against humanity targeting the Rohingya population. Considering their large presence in South Asia, South East Asia and West Asia as refugees, the situation of Rohingyas is a humanitarian problem and it has often been stressed that they require a concerted engagement among the relevant host countries to evolve a common strategy in their engagement with Myanmar about their long-term status.

Keeping in mind the wider global interest in the community, the intent and shrill narrative by the political actors to deport the Rohingyas is an empty rhetoric and will worsen the state of affairs. As half of the 10 elected members of UNSC will be from the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in 2025, Rohingya issue will be one of the critical agenda items. With the forcible deportation of a community universally recognised as one of the most persecuted an unlikely prospect, political stakeholders should desist from perpetuating a state of mass-scale anxiety against the community as it harms the country’s image. In fact, as one of the leaders of the global south, India should take a lead in constituting a consortium of host countries to address the multifold challenges facing the Rohingyas, including formulating innovative solutions for the community members. This would enable them to work legally and also address the concerns of law enforcement authorities in the host countries. This includes the proposal of Saudi Arabia of the issuance of permanent residency. Some of the Gulf countries, which now have good relations with India, may be willing to join India to fund this consortium, and this can provide a template for similarly persecuted refugees and their host countries elsewhere. There is also the proposal of settlement of a few refugees in western countries willing to accept them as part of their overall asylum policy. This is obviously not a panacea to the basic lingering conceptual problem of their statelessness and the rights of the vast majority of Rohingyas living both within Myanmar and outside.

Rather than attracting international attention by uncalled statements and acts that may be seen as victimizing the victims, Indian political elite as well as political stakeholders should contribute to a more compassionate understanding of Rohingya’s flight from Myanmar globally. Because of the history and geography, ideally, India should be more aware of the nuances of the challenges facing the Rohingya community. As mentioned above, it could also further facilitate global and regional efforts aimed at evolution of an innovative solution-oriented approaches to the challenges facing the community. This would cement India’s image as an effective global south leader that has an ability to craft viable sustainable and humane solutions to global challenges.

The author was an a member of the UN Secretary-General’s Good Offices on Myanmar.

Myanmar’s junta chief Min Aung Hlaing held talks with Premier Li Qiang of key ally China on the civil war roiling his country. File photo
| Photo Credit: AP

Myanmar’s junta chief has held talks with Premier Li Qiang of key ally China on the civil war roiling his country, state media said Thursday, during his first visit to the country since seizing power in a 2021 coup.

Min Aung Hlaing told Li at a meeting in the southwestern city of Kunming that the military was ready for peace if armed groups would engage, according to an account of the meeting in the Global New Light of Myanmar (GNLM).

Myanmar has been racked by conflict between the military and various armed groups opposed to its rule since the army ousted Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government in February 2021.

The junta is reeling from a major rebel offensive last year that seized a large area of territory, much of it near the border with China.

“The door of peace is always open if they genuinely want peace,” Min Aung Hlaing told Li, according to the GNLM report.

“The armed insurgents should do what needs to be done instead of giving priority to their needs and wishes.”

China has been a major arms supplier to the junta and provided Myanmar with political backing even as other countries shun the generals over their brutal crackdown on dissent.

But Beijing is concerned about the chaos unfolding on its doorstep, in particular the growth of online scam compounds in Myanmar, run by and targeting Chinese citizens.

In its report of the Kunming meeting, on the sidelines of a regional summit, China’s state news agency Xinhua said Li had stressed the need to ensure the safety of Chinese citizens and projects in Myanmar.

Last month, a blast targeted the Chinese consulate in Mandalay. There were no casualties but Beijing issued a furious rebuke.

Li did not explicitly back the junta’s approach to the civil war, according to the Xinhua report.

Instead, he told Min Aung Hlaing that China supported Myanmar in “advancing the political reconciliation and transformation”.

Beijing is concerned about the possibility the junta could fall, analysts say, and is suspicious about Western influence among some of the pro-democracy armed groups battling the military.

Myanmar is a vital part of Beijing’s trillion-dollar Belt and Road initiative, with railways and pipelines to link China’s landlocked southwest to the Indian Ocean.

South East Asian country leaders hold hands during the opening ceremony of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) Summit in Vientiane, Laos, Wednesday (October 9, 2024)
| Photo Credit: AP

Southeast Asian leaders pressed Myanmar’s junta and its opponents on Wednesday (October 9, 2024) to take “concrete action” to stop the bloodshed in the country’s civil war and sought to kickstart faltering diplomatic efforts to solve the crisis.

The 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has tried to no avail to find a negotiated solution to the Myanmar crisis, which has killed thousands of people and forced millions to flee their homes since the military seized power in February 2021.

The crisis dominated the first day of the ASEAN summit in Vientiane, where the disputed South China Sea will also be high on the agenda.

ASEAN leaders held their first face-to-face talks with a senior Myanmar junta representative in more than three years on the first day.

The junta has suffered serious battlefield defeats over the past year during a renewed offensive by ethnic minority armed groups and pro-democracy “People’s Defence Forces” that rose up to oppose its coup.

ASEAN leaders condemned attacks on civilians and “urged all parties involved to take concrete action to immediately halt indiscriminate violence”, according to a draft summit chairman’s statement.

The junta agreed to a “five point consensus” plan with ASEAN to restore peace weeks after it ousted Aung San Suu Kyi’s government, but instead pushed ahead with a bloody crackdown on opposition to its rule.

After condemning Myanmar for ignoring the five-point plan at summits in 2022 and 2023, the leaders insisted again on Wednesday (October 9, 2024) it was still their “main reference” to deal with the crisis, the chairman’s draft statement said.

How to enforce it remains unclear.

“We are trying to find ways to move forward, because we have to admit that although the five points have been there… we have not been very successful in actually changing the situation,” Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos told reporters.

“We are trying to formulate new strategies,” he said, adding that those new strategies had not yet been decided.

Thai foreign ministry spokesman Nikorndej Balankura confirmed there was no discussion at the summit on how to implement the peace plan.

Myanmar sent a senior foreign ministry official to the meeting after three years of shunning summits because the bloc barred junta chief Min Aung Hlaing in the wake of the coup.

Bloc’s clout in doubt

ASEAN’s failure to make any tangible progress in resolving a civil war inside one of its own members has fuelled longstanding questions about its effectiveness.

“The longer the Myanmar crisis remains unresolved, the greater the risk of ASEAN outliving its usefulness in resolving conflicts within the Southeast Asian region,” Mustafa Izzuddin, international affairs analyst at Solaris Strategies Singapore, told AFP.

With formal diplomacy making no progress, Thailand will host informal talks on the crisis in December involving ASEAN members and possibly neighbouring countries such as China and India.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will join the leaders in Vientiane for talks on Friday (October 11, 2024), when he is expected to press for the junta to take steps such as reducing violence, releasing political prisoners and engaging with the opposition.

Daniel Kritenbrink, the top U.S. diplomat for East Asia, said there had been “virtually zero progress” on these issues from the junta.

Premier Li Qiang of China — long Myanmar’s most important ally — will hold talks with ASEAN leaders on Thursday (October 10, 2024) before joining an “ASEAN Plus Three” summit with new Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba and President Yoon Suk Yeol of South Korea.

The South China Sea will also be discussed when the leaders sit down with Mr. Li, after months of violent clashes between Chinese vessels and Philippine and Vietnamese fishermen.

Beijing claims almost all of the South China Sea, a waterway of immense strategic importance through which trillions of dollars in trade transits every year.

Four ASEAN members — the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia and Brunei — have competing claims to various small islands and reefs.

The draft summit statement reiterated ASEAN’s longstanding calls for restraint and respect for international law.

Top officials pose for a group photo at the 25th ASEAN Plus Three Foreign Ministers session of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Foreign Ministers’ Meeting in Vientiane, Laos, Saturday, July 27, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AP

Top diplomats from Southeast Asia convened on July 27 in the Laotian capital with their powerful dialogue partners in the last of the three-day regional talks that have grappled with tensions over territorial claims in the South China Sea, escalating fighting in Myanmar, and regional rivalry.

Meetings on July 27 will bring together in the same room allies of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations — including the United States, China, Russia, Japan, India and Australia — to bolster their relationships and discuss key security issues and other regional affairs.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived July 27 in Vientiane to meet with the ASEAN foreign ministers. He is also expected to meet on the sidelines with his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, as both countries are looking to expand their influence in the region. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov is also in Vientiane, and already held direct talks with Mr. Wang on July 25.

Participants in these meetings represent either critical U.S. allies and partners, and Washington’s two largest rivals, Moscow and Beijing, who have grown closer over the past two years, prompting deep concerns about their combined global influence.

Indonesia said it emphasized in their opening meetings on Thursday that it’s important the bloc doesn’t get drawn in as both China and the U.S. look to expand their influence in the region.

Focus on the South China Sea

Among other issues, Mr. Blinken will discuss economic cooperation, the humanitarian crisis in Myanmar and territorial disputes in the South China Sea during his trip to Vientiane, according to a statement from the U.S. Department of State.

ASEAN members Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei have conflicts with China over its claim of sovereignty over virtually all of the South China Sea, one of the world’s most crucial waterways for shipping. Many worry that direct confrontations there could lead to broader conflict. Indonesia has also expressed concern about what it sees as Beijing’s encroachment on its exclusive economic zone.

The United States and its allies, meanwhile, have regularly conducted military exercises and patrols in the area to assert their “free and open Indo-Pacific” policy, including the right to navigate in international waters, drawing criticism from China.

There are divisions within ASEAN on how to deal with China’s maritime claims. The Philippines has been critical over a perceived lack of support from the bloc, but in a rare deal, China and the Philippines said they had reached an agreement that they hope will end their confrontations, aiming to establish a mutually acceptable arrangement for the disputed area without conceding each other’s territorial claims.

Philippines Secretary of Foreign Affairs Enrique Manalo said after the gala dinner on Friday that he had a bilateral meeting with Mr. Wang, where they agreed that they would “honour the provisional agreement in a clear and sincere effort to defuse tensions and try and prevent any incidents of course from leading to further tension in our relationship.”

Addressing the crisis in Myanmar

The increasingly violent civil war in ASEAN member state Myanmar is one of the other issues dominating talks. Thailand has said the group gave their support for it to take a broader role as one of Myanmar’s immediate neighbors.

Nikorndej Balankura, spokesperson of Thailand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told reporters on July 26 that more dialogue mechanisms have been proposed to include more stakeholders, especially countries that share borders with Myanmar.

He, however, noted that those proposals have just been submitted to Laos, which currently chairs ASEAN and is in charge of recommending them directly to Myanmar to seek its approval.

The army in Myanmar ousted the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February 2021 and suppressed widespread nonviolent protests that sought a return to democratic rule, leading to increasing violence and a humanitarian crisis.

ASEAN has been pushing a “five-point consensus” for peace, but the military leadership in Myanmar has so far ignored the plan, raising questions about the bloc’s efficiency and credibility. The peace plan calls for the immediate cessation of violence in Myanmar, a dialogue among all concerned parties, mediation by an ASEAN special envoy, provision of humanitarian aid through ASEAN channels, and a visit to Myanmar by the special envoy to meet all concerned parties.

Smoke rises from debris and corrugated roofing of a school structure that was burned to the ground in Taung Myint village in the Magway region of Myanmar on October 16, 2022.
| Photo Credit: AP

An intensification of fighting in Myanmar’s civil war has brought a sharp increase in destructive attacks on schools, a group that monitors armed conflict in the Southeast Asian nation said in a report on July 20.

Myanmar Witness said the attacks have further strained Myanmar’s already fractured school system, taking away education for millions of children who have also been forced to flee their homes, miss vaccinations and suffer from inadequate nutrition.

The group, a project of the United Kingdom-based Centre for Information Resilience, identified a total of 174 attacks on Myanmar schools and universities since the military seized power from the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi three years ago. It said the count came from evidence in social media and news reports.

Myanmar’s civil war and India’s interests

Other groups have suggested higher numbers of attacks. The Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack, an advocacy group based in New York, counted over 245 reports of attacks on schools and 190 reports of military use of educational facilities in 2022-23.

The 2021 military takeover was met with widespread nonviolent demonstrations for democracy, but those were crushed with lethal force. Many opponents of military rule then took up arms, and large parts of the country are now embroiled in conflict. The military government is estimated to control less than half the country.

“Education underpinned the democratic movement in Myanmar, but today Myanmar’s youth are witnessing their schools — and life opportunities — reduced to rubble,“ said Matt Lawrence, project director at Myanmar Witness. “If education is not protected throughout Myanmar, the next generation’s view of the world risks being driven by factionalism and war, rather than hope and reason.”

Student enrollment in Myanmar dropped 80% from the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 through 2022, a year after the Army’s takeover, according to the humanitarian group Save the Children. By mid-2022, about half the country’s children, or 7.8 million, were not attending schools, it said.

Myanmar Witness said it documented reports of 64 fatalities and 106 injuries associated with the 176 attacks on schools, though most could not be verified.

Myanmar’s shadow National Unity Government, which leads the pro-democracy struggle against military rule, estimated in January that more than 570 children under age 18 had been killed in various circumstances by security forces. Upwards of 8,000 civilians have been killed in the conflict, according to the multinational Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project.

Myanmar Witness put most of the responsibility for the destruction of schools on airstrikes conducted by the Myanmar military. Air attacks have become more frequent as pro-democracy forces and ethnic minority armed groups allied with them have made gains on the battlefield.

The military “has had to resort to more and more airstrikes, often with less and less appropriate aircraft, as they lose effective access to the ground” as a result of offensives by the resistance, Mr. Lawrence told The Associated Press.

The military government has consistently denied targeting civilians or using disproportionate force.

The report said resistance forces also have attacked schools, but much less frequently and less destructively, often using drones with small explosive loads.

Education is also being disrupted by other factors. Many young people, including older students, have taken a greater role in the resistance. Thousands of teachers left their jobs after the army seized power and joined a civil disobedience movement aimed at disabling military control over government institutions. And the conflict’s shifting front lines make it difficult for teachers to provide lessons on a reliable basis.

Some teachers have established or joined schools outside the reach of the military’s control.

“What we see is almost a dual system that’s developing in Myanmar, where there are state-sponsored schools and then schools sponsored by other parties and retribution for participating in either system,” said Lisa Chung Bender, executive director of the Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack.

“It puts children and educators in an impossible position where they have to go through checkpoints and say where they’re going, and if it’s determined that they’re going to an enemy school, whichever enemy that is, they can be harassed, detained, or physically punished,” she said.

OPINION | The Myanmar conflict is a regional problem

The lack of proper access to education is only part of a deepening humanitarian crisis in Myanmar. More than 3 million people have been displaced from their homes by fighting, most since the military’s seizure of power in 2021, and the country suffers from a deepening economic crisis.

A report in June by the United Nations Children’s Fund on global child food poverty said 35% of Myanmar’s children live in food poverty, defined as having access to half or fewer of the eight food groups children need daily for healthy growth and development.

According to the U.N. Development Program, over half of Myanmar’s children now live in poverty as the country’s nascent middle class has disappeared.

Gutted buildings, vacant windows and blocks bombed to rubble show the price paid by the western Myanmar town of Pauktaw for victory against the junta in the country’s civil war.

Fighters from the Arakan Army (AA) ethnic minority armed group took control of the fishing port of 20,000 people in January, as the conflict sparked by the military’s coup entered its fourth year.

Pauktaw was one of a string of losses suffered by the junta across the country at the time, leading many to hope its decades-long stranglehold over Myanmar’s politics could be broken.

Four months later, the Arakan Army remains in control but Pauktaw is mostly empty of residents, who are living on the outskirts and fearful of a repeat of the junta’s heavy artillery attacks on the town.

“We are frightened of them (the military),” one man told AFP from his temporary home just outside Pauktaw, asking for anonymity for security reasons.

“We don’t know what will happen or what kind of weapon they will drop on us if we go and stay back at home in the town.

“We can’t detect their air strikes or bombs and we will be killed if they attack.”

Video taken by locals this month and obtained exclusively by AFP shows streets silent apart from birdsong and the sounds of AA soldiers sifting through piles of debris and sheets of corrugated iron.

Near a deserted market that once bustled with vendors buying and selling crabs and tiger shrimp, a ragged awning advertising a mobile phone carrier flutters above the doorway of a gutted shop.

Phone and internet services have been all but cut off.

No chance

The AA has fought an on-off war for years against the Myanmar military, seeking more autonomy for the state’s ethnic Rakhine population.

As the army has faced growing resistance to its rule, from multiple armed groups — some new, some long-established — the AA has stepped up its campaign.

As the junta has lost territory on the ground, it is increasingly calling on its air power to support its ground troops.

Rights groups accuse the junta of using the strikes to punish communities suspected of opposing its rule.

When a military helicopter hovered over Pauktaw and began shooting into the town last November, many fled in panic.

“There was no chance for us to take a single thing from our house,” one woman now living outside the town told AFP.

“We had cooked a pot of rice and we were not able to eat it,” she said, also asking for anonymity.

“We had no money when we fled. We only had some gold jewellery with us. We tried to pawn that but it wasn’t easy. The interest was too high.”

The fate of Pauktaw’s residents reflects a nationwide tragedy. Across Myanmar, around 2.7 million have been forced to flee by the civil war.

Looting

The AA has not allowed residents to live back in Pauktaw, citing the danger of more air or artillery strikes on the town, although it does allow them to come and go to pick up items.

The man who spoke to AFP said he had returned to check on his house and found it partly in ruins, with the family statue of the Buddha fallen onto the floor.

His savings box — containing money for a Buddhist ritual for his children and for timber to repair a roof damaged by a cyclone last year — was gone, he said.

“I have lost all of that money,” he said.

“Everything in our house got stolen… my father’s fishing nets were stolen,” another woman said, also requesting anonymity.

“I am a tailor, and luckily, I managed to save my sewing machines.”

During the fighting, both sides looted houses and damaged buildings, according to local reports.

In March, the AA said it would “investigate” any reports of looting by its members during the fighting.

‘Decisive battle’

The AA’s offensive has seized swathes of territory in Rakhine state and along the border with India and Bangladesh.

It has said it will capture the state capital Sittwe, 25 kilometres from Pauktaw and the last major town in northern Rakhine in the military’s hands.

In April, the AA warned residents of the town, which is home to an India-backed deep sea port, to leave ahead of a “decisive” battle.

Sittwe residents contacted by AFP said the military was restricting travel out of the town by road and river and the prices of basic foods such as rice and eggs had doubled.

Those already displaced from Pauktaw fear further fighting nearby.

“I am sad that we have fled our own house and we can’t live in it,” one resident told AFP.

“I have pawned my necklace for 18 lakhs ($850) so we have money to live. I still hope I can claim it back.”

Others said they wanted payback.

“I haven’t joined the Arakan Army because I am worried about who will look after my child,” one woman said.

“If I wasn’t… I would join them and fight back. I will be satisfied only if I can take revenge.”

Members of Myanmar Border Guard Police, in civilian clothing, sit under the shade of trees after abandoning their posts following an alleged attack by members of the Arakan Army as Bangladesh border guards stand guard in Ghumdhum, Bandarban, Bangladesh, on Monday, Feb. 5, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AP

A Myanmar ethnic minority armed group on Saturday claimed its fighters had seized control of a town in western Rakhine state, in what would be another blow to the junta.

Clashes have rocked Rakhine since the Arakan Army (AA) attacked security forces in November, ending a ceasefire that had largely held since the 2021 military coup.

AA fighters have seized territory, including along the border with India and Bangladesh, piling further pressure on the junta as it battles opponents elsewhere across the Southeast Asian country.

“We seized all bases of the Myanmar Army in Buthidaung,” in northern Rakhine state, the AA said on its Telegram channel on Saturday.

Those seized included a “military strategic headquarters”, it added, without giving details.

Its fighters were still clashing with junta troops outside the town, it said.

Buthidaung sits around 90 km north of state capital Sittwe, which is still held by the military.

Earlier this month, the AA said it had taken hundreds of junta personnel prisoner following an assault on a command near the Buthidaung.

A junta spokesman has been approached for comment.

Communication with Rakhine is extremely difficult, with most mobile networks down.

The AA is one of several armed ethnic minority groups in Myanmar’s border regions, many of whom have battled the military since independence from Britain in 1948 over autonomy and control of lucrative resources.

The AA claims to be fighting for more autonomy for the state’s ethnic Rakhine population.

Fighting had spread to 15 of Rakhine state’s 17 townships since November, the UN’s human rights chief said last month.

Hundreds of people have been killed or wounded and more than 300,000 displaced, it said.

Clashes between the AA and the military in 2019 roiled the region and displaced around 200,000 people.

The military launched a crackdown on the Rohingya minority there in 2017 which is now the subject of a United Nations genocide court case.