Lack of accountability allows junta to escalate its atrocities
The lack of robust actions from the international community, particularly by the UN and ASEAN, has proven to embolden the Myanmar military junta to further its atrocities. In order to stop the violence, it is essential for the UNHRC to take concrete actions to advance accountability through all possible avenues.
As the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) kicked off its 52nd Regular Session in Geneva on 27 February where the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar will be reporting on Myanmar, the junta’s atrocities and inhumane tactics against civilians in Myanmar continue, particularly in strong hold areas of the resistance. The lack of robust actions from the international community, particularly by the UN and ASEAN, has proven to embolden the Myanmar military junta to further its atrocities. In order to stop the violence, it is essential for the UNHRC to take concrete actions to advance accountability through all possible avenues.
On 1 March, just days before the High Commissioner’s reporting at the Human Rights Council, the Myanmar military raided Tar Taing Village located between Sagaing and Myinmu Townships, detaining 16 villagers and one resistance force leader. They dismembered a resistance force leader, and took the rest as human shields on their way to rampaging through another village. All hostages were later found to have been tortured and then killed by shots to the chest and head. A few days before the Tar Taing massacre, the same troops killed and dismembered five members of local resistance forces, including two teenagers. A man who lost four family members including his mother and younger brother in the Tar Taing Massacre said, “I would like to ask the international community to help us so that things like our family will not happen again” in the press conference organized by the Ministry of Human Rights under the National Unity Government.
In the same week, in Sagaing Region, junta soldiers also killed four civilians – three of whom were people with disabilities – during a raid on Kone Village in Yinmarbin Township. They also destroyed almost the entire village by torching more than 500 houses. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, in his recent reporting to the Council on Myanmar described how the Myanmar military has put the country into a horrendous humanitarian crisis through “a scorched earth policy” in an attempt to stop the resistance against the military junta. The same policy was applied by the Myanmar military when they committed genocide against the Rohingya in 2017.
The Tar Taing massacre is one of the numerous inhumane mass killings and deliberate targeting of civilians committed by the Myanmar military junta since its failed coup on 1 February 2021. The military incinerated 27 villagers in Mon Taing Pin Village in Ye-U Township, Sagaing Region, last May. The news agency, RFA reportedly retrieved data from a junta soldier’s cell phone which contained multiple evidence of the Mon Taing Pin massacre, including a conversation where a soldier told the others, “I killed those whom I caught. And the sergeant told us to cut them in three pieces and bury them.” The High Commissioner’s recent report outlined “at least 24 incidents where 5 or more people were detained and then killed in a single incident” in the past year.
The lives of Myanmar people are lost on a daily basis not only through the junta’s mass killings, but also by its artillery shelling and airstrikes targeting civilians. On 27 February, the junta’s shelling killed two people and injured four at an IDP camp in Demoso Township, Karenni State, despite there being no armed clashes. Three family members including a child were killed by the junta’s shelling in Mindat, Chin State on 25 February, 2023. Analysis from Burmese Women’s Union shows that 15 women were killed due to the junta’s attack in February alone – among them eight were killed by artillery shelling while six were burned alive.
Despite the escalation of atrocities in Myanmar, the international community continues to fail to take robust actions to stop the junta’s violence, bring about justice, and support frontline humanitarian aid providers. Resolutions of the UNHRC and UN Security Council (UNSC) last year failed to seek a solution to the rapidly escalating human rights, political and humanitarian crises in Myanmar, and in the case of the latter, failed to impose a global arms embargo and sanctions on aviation fuel, thus allowing the military junta to commit further horrific crimes against civilians. The failure of the United Nations to act decisively on Myanmar permeates into decisions by its close partner, the Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions (GANHRI), to invite the junta-controlled Myanmar National Human Rights Commission (MNHRC) to participate in its Annual Meeting at the UN Human Rights Council. The MNHRC is not just a proxy of the junta, but is also complicit in gross human rights violations and atrocity crimes committed by the junta against the people of Myanmar.
As the junta continues to lose control of more territory, it has illegally imposed martial law in more areas that are strongly held by resistance forces. Only concrete actions from the international community can prevent the loss of innocent lives and end the atrocities of the junta – not just statements on a piece of paper. In an open letter to the UNHRC, 160 civil society organizations are calling on the Council to adopt a meaningful and robust resolution which reflects their desire for federal democracy, including to call on the UN member states for coordinated sanctions on aviation fuel and a global arms embargo on the junta. These actions will save millions of lives. It is also critical that the UNHRC makes concrete efforts to seek justice and accountability, by pursuing all available mechanisms and avenues such as calling for the UNSC to refer the situation in Myanmar to the International Criminal Court (ICC) and encourage UN member states, agencies, and mechanisms to support ongoing universal jurisdiction efforts in Argentina, Germany, Indonesia, and Turkey. After all, it is the Human Rights Council that established the Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar in 2019 with the purpose of holding the perpetrators of international crimes in Myanmar to account in response to the Rohingya genocide in 2017. Thus, with the nationwide magnitude of the international crimes that the same military has committed since its illegal coup attempt over the past two years, now is the time for the Council, as the only mandated international human rights body under the UN General Assembly, to explore and exercise its mandate in full to end the military impunity in Myanmar.
_______________________
[1] One year following the 1988 pro-democracy uprising, the former military junta changed the country’s name from Burma to Myanmar overnight. Progressive Voice uses the term ‘Myanmar’ in acknowledgement that most people of the country use this term. However, the deception of inclusiveness and the historical process of coercion by the former State Peace and Development Council military regime into usage of ‘Myanmar’ rather than ‘Burma’ without the consent of the people is recognized and not forgotten. Thus, under certain circumstances, ‘Burma’ is used.
Resources from the past week
Statements and Press Releases
By 161 Organizations
By 161 Organizations
Myanmar: New shipments of aviation fuel revealed despite the military’s war crimes
By Amnesty International, Global Witness
By Anti-Junta Forces Coordination Committee – Mandalay
By ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights
New report denounces the worsening situation of Parliamentarians at risk in Southeast Asia
By ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights
By Assistance Association for Political Prisoners
End Myanmar National Human Rights Commission’s complicity in junta’s atrocity crimes
By CSO Working Group on Independent National Human Rights Institution (Burma/Myanmar), Asian NGOs Network on National Human Rights Institutions
Joint statement by Myanmar resistance forces on situation of Myanmar refugees in Manipur, India
By India For Myanmar
India complicit in Myanmar junta atrocity crimes through export of gun barrels
By Justice For Myanmar
Humanitarian assistance to the people of Myanmar affected by the coup d’état
By Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan
By Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
Military’s ‘four cuts’ doctrine drives perpetual human rights crisis in Myanmar, says UN report
By Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
Myanmar: High Commissioner details severe violations amid shocking violence
By Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
By Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
Reports
Parliamentarians At Risk: Reprisals against opposition MPs in Southeast Asia in 2022
By ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights
Accessory to the Junta’s Crimes
By CSO Working Group on Independent National Human Rights Institution (Burma/Myanmar), Asian NGOs Network on National Human Rights Institutions
စစ်အုပ်စု၏ ရာဇဝတ်မှုများတွင် အလိုတူအလိုပါခြင်း
By CSO Working Group on Independent National Human Rights Institution (Burma/Myanmar), Asian NGOs Network on National Human Rights Institutions
When Will “No-Fly Zones” Be Established? Issue 94
By Myanmar Peace Monitor
By Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
By Shan Human Rights Foundation
Myanmar: Tanintharyi Region Monthly Situation Update (28 February 2023)
By Southern Monitor
Progressive Voice is a participatory, rights-based policy research and advocacy organization that was born out of Burma Partnership. Burma Partnership officially ended its work on October 10, 2016 transitioning to a rights-based policy research and advocacy organization called Progressive Voice. For further information, please see our press release “Burma Partnership Celebrates Continuing Regional Solidarity for Burma and Embraces the Work Ahead for Progressive Voice.”
