Myanmar Generals’ Path to ‘Eternal Peace’
The peace process was already at a crossroads before the coup. With the Tatmadaw now in charge, what comes next?
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February 08, 2021
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When the National League for Democracy closed its first term in government last year, peacebuilding in Myanmar was already at a crossroads.
Now, following the military coup, observers are asking what approach the generals might take to secure the “eternal peace” prescribed in the declaration justifying the emergency state.
Armed conflicts in the ethnic areas are Myanmar’s seemingly never ending drama. They were even cited as the cause of the major political crises of the 20th century, followed by power grabs by other men in uniform. This time, however, the military is citing election irregularities and the smuggled walkie-talkie of NLD leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
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Myanmar s fragile, flawed democracy has collapsed. In the early hours Monday, the country s military initiated a coup, arresting civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi and other politicians, including ministers from her National League for Democracy (NLD) party. A state of emergency was declared for a year. Soldiers blocked roads and fanned out across the capital Naypyidaw and Yangon, the country s largest city.
The military carried out the predawn raid just hours before Myanmar s new parliament, dominated by Suu Kyi s NLD, was scheduled to sit. The generals and their proxy political party, which suffered badly in November elections, claimed voter irregularities, though Myanmar s electoral commission last week rejected allegations that fraud played a significant role in the NLD s landslide win. (My
AFP
Myanmar’s ruling party will begin meetings with various ethnic political parties on this week, making good on its stated plan to include ethnic minorities in its efforts to build a democratic federal union after winning national elections in November, party officials said Tuesday.
Two days after the Nov. 8 election victory with a new five-year mandate, Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) issued statements calling on 48 ethnic political parties to join renewed talks about a federal union, held up as a way to end 70 years of ethnic wars.
Myanmar, a country of 54 million people the size of Texas or France, recognizes 135 official ethic groups, with majority Bamars (Burmese) accounting for about 68 percent of the population, far exceeding the next largest group, the Shan, which account for nine percent of the population.