New Year as Resistance.
No #Myanmar New Year!
Terrorist-in-Chief Min Aung Hlaing and his wife Kyu Kyu Hla celebrating the Water Festival in their alternative world while the entire society of 54 million organized Non-Celebration throughout the country - in memory and honour of 700+ innocent, unarmed, peaceful Myanmar activists, citizens and children, as well as countless victims of Myanmar national minorities.
Just the 59th Old Year of Military Killings & Repression:
This is completely and utterly unprecedented, extraordinary, disciplined and united in our country's recorded history.
Yangon. City Hall, Downtown Avenues. Sule Pagoda. Today.
Instead the people have ushered in Nwe Oo Tawhlan Yay (Early Summer Revolution).
တရက်ဆိုတာ
မြန်မာပြည်သူတွေရဲ့အသက်ပါ
A Typical Day in the Life of People in Myanmar under Terrorist Siege
A thoughtful but painful comment on the situation in Myanmar written by an anonymous Burmese Facebook user.
English Translation by Maung Zarni
To read the original Burmese comment click here.
A Typical Day in the Life of People in Myanmar (under Terrorist Siege)
This evening we had this “guest list” check (by the regime)
They typically take away the overnight guest (s), whether you report to the regime or not,
(as it is required of all households).
You are punished either way.
The regime kills everyday.
Everyone lives with greatest of anxieties and fear.
Money is not THE issue: those who have more share with those in need.
We all share communally.
Daily kills by the regime take a huge toll on us.
We all stare at the calendar anticipating the day we may all be delivered from this fear-stricken existence.
We pray for everyone who dares to join the protest movement.
But the news of their murder hits home hard, leaving no appetite for meals.
One’s mind can’t help but wonder “when is my turn?”
Everyday being alive is full of meaning and everyday feels like a life time now.
Our lives are like in a living hell.
Even death is not peaceful as the regime harvest organs of our deads.
Those in diaspora tell us “to hang in there.”
Well, we typically grit our teeth
but it is as though we were readying for our turns (to be murdered).
One Day in Myanmar now feels like a whole lifetime.
Myanmar Moves Toward Civil War,
Failed State
by Joshua Kurlantzick
Council on Foreign Relations
April 12, 2021
12:48 pm (EST)
In the initial days after the Myanmar armed forces launched a coup on February 1, deposing an elected government, the military may have hoped it would be able to pull off the putsch with minimal bloodshed. It would create a faux transition to democracy, and retain its power by eventually creating an election in which military parties and their allies would win—and then neighboring states and possibly even leading democracies would recognize that government. Indeed, in the first few days after the coup, as protest movements began to break out in the streets of many Myanmar cities and towns, the military responded with crowd control efforts, but did not immediately turn to widespread deadly force. The junta also tried to woo armed ethnic groups, many of whom had signed ceasefire agreements.
But over the past two months, the resiliency and growing anger of the protest movement has made clear that the demonstrations are not going to stop. In response, the Myanmar military has stepped up its patterns of violence, shooting protestors and bystanders with live ammunition, arresting scores of people, killing children, and committing a wide range of other atrocities. In response, demonstrators, who had started by primarily yelling slogans, trying to pressure the military, and using civil disobedience to cripple the functioning of the state, have begun in some places to fight back, albeit mostly with makeshift weapons that are no match the for the military’s arms. Meanwhile, rather than aligning with the military, nearly all the armed ethnic organizations, some of which possess considerable numbers of men under arms, have united against the coup, and are beginning themselves to launch attacks against the armed forces. Two of the most powerful armed organizations, the Kachin Independence Army and the Karen National Union, have attacked military posts.
The violence, and the continuing disintegration of state functioning, seems to have no clear endpoint, raising the possibility that all of Myanmar will become a failed state. For more on Myanmar’s potential disintegration into widespread civil strife, and a possible failed state, see my new World Politics Review article.
Read the full blog
here.
- ミャンマー市民が頼るのは、迫害してきたはずの少数民…
ミャンマー市民が頼るのは、迫害してきたはずの少数民族 「内戦勃発」が最後の希望
Bloody but Unavoidable
2021年4月13日（火）18時01分
前川祐補（本誌記者）
NEWSWEEK (Japan)
ミャンマー市民が頼るのは、迫害してきたはずの少数民族 「内戦勃発」が最後の希望 | ワールド | 最新記事 | ニューズウィーク日本版 オフィシャルサイト (newsweekjapan.jp)
Read the full text of the Japanese language interview with a Rohingya leader, a Kachin activist and myself (through Google Translation which will pop up on the right hand corner of the item when you click on the link
here.
Geostrategic Outlook for the Indo-Pacific 2019-2024
Chatham House, UK
The project aims to broaden and deepen understanding of the geostrategic realities in, and outlook for, the Indo-Pacific region.
Click the link here.
