Dilip Simeon's blog

There are already signs that the coup has prompted an increase in illegal mining and logging, and regime economic policies are set to compound the environmental destruction at a time when activists and communities are unable to push back. Within months of the February 2021 coup, there were already signs that military rule could have disastrous consequences for Myanmar’s natural environment.  From far northern Kachin State,  reports  began to emerge that illegal rare earth mining in remote territory controlled by a military-affiliated Border Guard Force had begun to ramp up. The region is one of the world’s  major sources  of several types of heavy rare earths, which are exported over the border to China for use in everything from electric vehicles to smartphones. But the mining process is environmentally damaging; it involves toxic chemicals that are pumped through the mountains and often seep into waterways. As one miner  told   Frontier  last ...

A bold new exhibition by a young Myanmar artist challenges people not to turn away from dead babies and brutalised women in conflict zones overlooked by the world’s media. The  London show , ‘Please Enjoy Our Tragedies’, is by Sai, a multimedia artist who blocks out his last name for security reasons. Some of Sai’s work will be shown at the Venice Biennale  from 23 April , as part of the European Cultural Centre’s  Personal Structures exhibition . While Russia’s invasion of Ukraine currently dominates global attention, Sai draws links between that conflict and domestic repression in Myanmar. “The same stakeholders are involved in Myanmar as in Ukraine,” he told openDemocracy. “Russia arms Myanmar’s generals and China supports them. It’s not a Ukraine problem; it’s a global problem.”… https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/myanmar-sai-artist-junta/ Silent strike empties streets in Myanmar on anniversary of coup More  posts on Myanmar

The  Myanmar  military kidnapped civilians and forced them to work as human shields, attacked homes, churches and carried out massacres, according to a report that warns recent atrocities in eastern Myanmar may amount to war crimes. The report, by the Myanmar-founded human rights group  Fortify Rights , documents abuses by the country’s military in Karenni state, also known as Kayah state,  an area that has seen intense fighting  between the army and groups opposed to last year’s military coup. The military has faced strong resistance in Karenni state, and has responded with brutal violence in an attempt to crush opposition… https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/15/myanmar-military-atrocities-may-amount-to-war-crimes-says-rights-group Silent strike empties streets in Myanmar on anniversary of coup More  posts on Myanmar

The noise of the exploding artillery shell startled me awake in the middle of a July night. Dazed, I stumbled out of bed and tried to check on the other journalists with whom I share a dormitory. As we ran outside, another shell flew overhead.  It was five months after the military takeover in  Myanmar  and three months since we had been forced to relocate from the Kachin state capital, Myitkyina, to territory held by a group known in Myanmar as an ethnic armed organisation (EAO), fighting for self-determination for an ethnic minority state near Myanmar’s border with China. Now this territory was being bombed. We were all terrified; some of my staff were crying as they looked to me for guidance and comfort. This was neither our first nor last brush with danger. Since the military seized power on 1 February 2021, small local media outlets such as mine have faced immense risks and hardships just to survive…. https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2022/feb/02/well-...

Streets were deserted and shops abandoned across many of Myanmar’s towns and cities on Monday, as the public defied threats by the military junta and stayed at home in a “silent strike” on the first anniversary of the country’s coup. Images posted on social media showed usually congested roads with no traffic and stores shuttered. In a photograph shared by Khit Thit Media, the usually busy Sule Pagoda road in downtown Yangon was completely empty. In Mandalay, the second largest city, a normally bustling market had virtually no customers. Images posted online showed similar scenes across the country: from Myitkyina and Namati in Kachin, Myanmar’s northernmost state, to Dawei and Myeik in Tanintharyi region in the south of the country. The military, which has struggled to control widespread opposition to its rule,  had threatened  charges of sedition or terrorism against anyone who participated in the stay-at-home protest. Business owners had also been told their properties wo...

Myanmar’s ambassador to the United Nations, who has refused to leave his post despite being fired by the junta after the February coup, has alerted the world body to a “reported massacre” by the military. Kyaw Moe Tun sent a letter to the UN secretary general, António Guterres, on Tuesday saying 40 bodies had been found in July in the Sagaing area of north-western Myanmar. The junta has denied the massacre in the township of Kani, while news agencies have not been able to independently verify the reports due to mobile networks being cut in the remote region. Myanmar junta accused of crimes against humanity six months on from coup The representative wrote that soldiers tortured and killed 16 men in a village in the township around 9-10 July, after which 10,000 residents fled the area. He said a further 13 bodies were discovered in the days after clashes between local fighters and security forces on 26 July. Kyaw Moe Tun added that another 11 men, including a 14-year-old boy, were ki...

Since the coup was launched on February 1, the country has been witnessing attacks on civilians by the military on an unprecedented scale. Tatmadaw soldiers are resorting to burning whole villages to terrorize the population, raping and torturing wherever they go. In response to that, People’s Defense Forces (PDF) were formed in many areas to counter the junta forces. According to some estimates, hundreds of thousands of mostly young people have been receiving underground training in secret locations in the borderlands. It cannot be verified how many are really being trained. Also, some report that joining the PDF is very hard as the groups are fearful of spies. The PDF has its successes but pays a high price for it. In a clash against raiding military forces, a couple of military officers were recently gunned down in Mandalay before soldiers captured around 10 PDF members…. https://thediplomat.com/2021/07/david-and-goliath-myanmars-armed-resistance-at-the-crossroads/ More posts on...

Human Rights Watch  – The use of the word ‘apartheid’ in its legal meaning can sometimes, but not always, generate considerable power and attention. The related crime against humanity of persecution never seems to attract the same interest.  Our finding  in 2020 that the Myanmar authorities were committing the crime against humanity of apartheid against ethnic Rohingya received considerable coverage of the facts of their mistreatment, though less about the crime itself. Our new findings that Israeli authorities were committing the crime against humanity of persecution against Palestinians received limited attention. But our finding that they were also committing  the crime of apartheid  has received an extraordinary amount of attention — both support and criticism…. https://www.juancole.com/2021/05/apartheid-humanity-prosecuted.html More posts on Human Rights

In this episode of  Himal  interviews, we speak to Geoffrey Aung, an anthropologist of Myanmar whose area of research focuses on the politics of infrastructure and the economic history of postcolonial Myanmar. He is currently a PhD candidate at Columbia University. In the context of the military coup and ongoing violence against civilians, Aung talks to us about the changing composition and strategies of the resistance movement, the limits of international intervention, and why a nuanced history of postcolonial Myanmar might help us better understand the current crisis.. hear the podcast

NB : The Indian government, along with Russia, China, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Laos and Thailand, sent representatives to a military parade to mark Myanmar Armed Forces Day on March 27. This is especially shameful in the midst of a massacre of civilians - including children by the Army. Bangladeshis may recall the massacre of 1971, and the Blood Telegram by the US Consul in Dhaka. Of the Russian and Chinese  governments we may expect no respect for human rights. And the Indian government has joined this parade of contempt for humanity. This is India's conscience in the midst of a human calamity. There will be no peace in Myanmar until the criminal military regime is dismantled. And maybe Aung San Su Kyi will regret her silent complicity with the same regimes' treatment of the Rohinyas.  DS The defense chiefs from Australia, Canada, Germany, Greece, Italy, Japan, Denmark, the Netherlands, New Zealand, the South Korea, the United Kingdom, and the US issued a joint statem...

Zaw Myat Lynn had been at the forefront of local anti-coup protests. He shared graphic videos of soldiers beating and shooting peaceful demonstrators. On Facebook he spoke out in fearless terms against Myanmar’s ruling junta. Its armed enforcers were “terrorists” and “dogs”, he wrote, adding “people should fight the army even if it costs our lives”. In his haunting final post, Zaw Myat Lynn live-streamed a pro-democracy rally close to the school. Locals sought to defend themselves from night-time arrest by putting up barricades and making defences out of sandbags. “We must prepare to protect our people,” he said, adding that an unknown number of troops had taken up positions nearby….. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/mar/15/the-death-of-zaw-myat-lynn-allegations-torture-used-on-opposition-activist-in-myanmar Aung San Suu Kyi  

The Myanmar coup is a sad and onerous turn of events for a country with a long and unhappy experience of military rule. It is important to note that this is not an institutional crisis. What we are witnessing is a squabble among court factions for the throne. In such power struggles, the wellbeing of the country and the people generally aren’t of concern. The military’s attitude in this regard is well known, but there would have been higher expectations of the country’s ousted party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), and its leader, Aung San Suu Kyi. There has been an uncanny consistency between the NLD’s term in office since it was elected in 2015 and the preceding term under the country’s military-backed party, the Union Solidarity and Development Party. The NLD has claimed that the military continued to exert a strong influence and its hands were tied. This is only true to a certain extent, and there is a lot that the NLD could have done but did not…. https://www.opendemo...

Aung San Suu Kyi  has been told her silence over allegations of sexual violence and rape carried out against Rohingya people in Myanmar “says far more than your words”, on the third day of the international court of justice’s hearing into accusations of genocide. Prof Philippe Sands QC told the court in The Hague: “Not a word [has been said by Aung San Suu Kyi] about the women and girls of  Myanmar  who have been subjected to these awful serial violations. Madame Agent [her status in court], your silence says far more than your words.” Myanmar has not disputed at the ICJ hearing reports that 392 villages were destroyed in military clearance operations, or commented on widespread allegations of organised sexual violence and rape, the court was told. Sands was speaking for the Gambia,  which has brought the charge  that Myanmar’s military carried out mass murder, rape and destruction of Rohingya Muslim communities. It alleges there have been “extrajud...

A court in  Myanmar  has sentenced five members of a traditional theatrical troupe to a year in prison for their gibes about the military. The members of the Peacock Generation thangyat troupe were arrested in April for performances during celebrations of Myanmar’s traditional new year in which they poked fun at military representatives in parliament and military involvement in business. The military is a powerful political force in Myanmar even though the country has an elected government. Thangyat combines dance and music with verse that often has a satirical edge. The five were convicted on Wednesday under a law prohibiting the circulation of information that could endanger or demoralise members of the military. “This is an appalling verdict. Punishing people for performing a piece of satire speaks volumes about the dire state of freedom of expression in Myanmar,” said Joanne Mariner, research director for southeast Asia for the human rights organisation Amnesty Inte...

Amnesty International has announced it is stripping Aung San Suu Kyi of a prestigious human rights award over her “shameful betrayal of the values she once stood for”. The Ambassador of Conscience Award is the latest in a series of accolades to be withdrawn from Myanmar’s de facto leader, who has been criticised for failing to intervene to stop a campaign of violence against the country’s Rohingya Muslims. Amnesty said it was withdrawing the award “with great sadness” because of Ms Suu Kyi’s “apparent indifference to atrocities committed by the Myanmar military and increasing intolerance of freedom of expression”. While living under house arrest in 2009, Ms Suu Kyi was named as Amnesty’s Ambassador of Conscience ”in recognition of her peaceful and non-violent struggle for democracy and human rights”. But now, half way through her term in office and eight years after being released from custody, Amnesty said it was disappointed she had not safeguarded human rights, justice or equality...

Two  Reuters  journalists have each been sentenced to seven years in prison after they were found guilty breaching the official secrets act in Myanmar, prompting outcry from the international community.. Wa Lone, 32, and Kyaw Soe Oo, 28, were arrested in December while investigating the killings of Rohingya Muslims  in Rakhine State. They have been held in prison in Yangon ever since. As he was led to a police van in handcuffs, Wa Lone said: “I have no fear. I have not done anything wrong … I believe in justice, democracy and freedom.” Reuters said the verdict was “a major step backward” for  Myanmar . “Today is a sad day for Myanmar, Reuters journalists Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, and the press everywhere,” Reuters editor in chief Stephen Adler said in a statement. Adler called for Myanmar to review the decision urgently. Defence lawyer Khin Maung Zaw said the verdict was “bad for our country”. Press freedom advocates, the United Nations, the European ...

An armed  Rohingya  group carried out at least one massacre of Hindu villagers in Myanmar’s conflict-wracked Rakhine state, an  Amnesty International  report has concluded. Ethnic conflict has convulsed the southeast Asian country in recent years, with the military accused of slaughtering members of the Muslim Rohingya minority in the majority-Buddhist country. But the new  report   from the human rights organisation suggests that a Rohingya group known as the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) killed up to 99 Hindu women, men and children while also abducting Hindu villagers.  “It’s hard to ignore the sheer brutality of ARSA’s actions, which have left an indelible impression on the survivors we’ve spoken to,” Amnesty International’s Tirana Hassan said in a statement. Myanmar’s government has justified a crackdown on Rohingya residents by saying they were suppressing an armed insurrection after attacks on police posts. The Ro...

Dear President Erdoğan, We wish to draw your attention to the damage being done to the Republic of  Turkey , to its reputation and the dignity and well-being of its citizens, through what leading authorities on freedom of expression deem to be the unlawful detention and wrongful conviction of writers and thinkers. In a  Memorandum on the Freedom of Expression in Turkey  (2017), Nils Muižnieks, then Council of Europe commissioner for Human Rights, warned: “The space for democratic debate in Turkey has shrunk alarmingly following increased judicial harassment of large strata of society, including journalists, members of parliament, academics and ordinary citizens, and government action which has reduced pluralism and led to self-censorship. This deterioration came about in a very difficult context, but neither the attempted coup, nor other terrorist threats faced by Turkey, can justify measures that infringe media freedom and disavow the rule of law to such an exten...

Bound together, the 10 Rohingya captives watched their Buddhist neighbours dig a grave. Soon afterwards, on the morning of 2 September, all 10 lay dead. At least two were hacked to death by Buddhist villagers. The rest were shot by soldiers, two of the gravediggers said. The killings marked another episode in the violence sweeping Myanmar’s northern Rakhine State. The Rohingya accuse the army of arson, rapes and killings. The United Nations has said the army may have committed genocide. Myanmar says its “clearance operation” is a legitimate response to attacks by insurgents. Rohingya people trace their presence in Rakhine back centuries. But most people in majority-Buddhist Myanmar consider them to be unwanted Muslim immigrants from Bangladesh. The army refers to the Rohingya as “Bengalis”, and most lack citizenship. In recent years, the government has confined more than 100,000 Rohingya in camps where they have limited access to food, medicine and education. Nearly 690,00...

Bill Richardson, the veteran US diplomat, has resigned from an international panel on the Rohingya crisis, calling it a “whitewash” and accusing the country’s leader Aung San Suu Kyi of lacking “moral leadership”. Richardson, a former Clinton administration cabinet member, quit as the 10-member advisory board was making its first visit to Rakhine state, from where nearly 700,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled in recent months. Aung San Suu Kyi once called for a free press. Now, the dead are used for fake news “The main reason I am resigning is that this advisory board is a whitewash,” Richardson told Reuters in an interview, adding he did not want to be part of “a cheerleading squad for the government”. Richardson said he got into an argument with Suu Kyi during a meeting on Monday with other members of the board, when he brought up the case of two Reuters reporters who are on trial accused of breaching the country’s secrets act. He said Suu Kyi’s response was “furious”, saying the c...