Myanmar’s Youth at Risk
“Most of the young people [on the street] have ended up in the military. Police and administrative junta personnel have detained them to make money. They use these individuals to replace others selected for mandatory military service…”
Kicking off 2025, the Myanmar military junta once again intensified its forced conscription campaign, issuing new measures on 23 January. This alarming development heightens the risks for Myanmar’s youth, including women and children, forcing them to become pawns for the junta or risk everything to escape with constant fear of capture, punishment, and death.
The junta’s attempts to impose a vise-like grip on young people include barring them from leaving the country, putting them at greater risk of abduction and forced recruitment by the junta and its affiliated militias. Since its forced conscription started last February, the junta has been violently recruiting young people, including by summoning them, conducting lotteries, and snatching them off the streets, buses, and planes, as well as from their homes. Intending to recruit 5,000 conscripts per batch, the junta is now on its ninth batch; however, the total number of forced conscripts remains unclear.
This brutal forced conscription campaign has created a cruel twist of fate: Twin brothers placed on opposite sides—one fighting for the democratic resistance movement, the other forcibly conscripted into the junta’s ranks. Neither ever expected they would be forced to fight each other. Many conscripts are almost immediately forced to the frontlines—where the junta is suffering heavy losses to resistance forces—or otherwise forced to serve as porters or human shields. Families are left in the dark regarding their whereabouts, with some having been killed in battle.
Amidst the junta’s escalating violence, vulnerable children in street situations are suffering increased exploitation. In Mandalay City, junta personnel have abducted these children as part of its forced conscription campaign. One activist stated, “Most of the young people [on the street] have ended up in the military. Police and administrative junta personnel have detained them to make money. They use these individuals to replace others selected for mandatory military service. We heard they even create citizenship ID cards for some detainees being sent to the military. This amounts to human trafficking.”
Meanwhile, the Yangon Region General Administration Department instructed its offices at the township, village tract, and ward levels to conscript any person aged 18-35, anywhere, any time. Young people in cities like Yangon and Mandalay are facing a grim reality, with frequent reports of junta squads abducting individuals off the streets. Around 11 p.m. on 10 December 2024, junta soldiers and police forcibly snatched eight men, aged 25-27, in Thingangyun Township, Yangon Region. In Mawlamyine City, Mon State, junta personnel have been collecting family registration documents to identify targets for forced recruitment and threatening consequences for non-compliance.
Furthermore, the junta has been recruiting women since its third batch of forced conscription. Rangoon Scout Network reported that the number of women residents aged 18-27 was collected on 23 January from Kyauktan, Thaketa, Thanlyin, and Tamwe Townships in Yangon Region. Meanwhile, some women in those townships had already received letters summoning them for forced recruitment.
Notorious for corruption, the junta has created a marketplace of bribery for its own profit, weaponizing its forced conscription campaign. Junta personnel have forced families to pay bribes ranging from 2 million to 5 million Myanmar Kyats (USD 953 to 2,380) to avoid conscription, leaving many in severe debt.
Defying the junta’s desperate draft and the duress it imposes, young people have been fleeing the country or seeking refuge in liberated areas. In response, the junta has barred individuals selected for forced conscription from leaving the country. Myanmar citizens living abroad who are eligible for conscription must also register through their family household lists. If families fail to sufficiently explain their absence, the junta will consider the person as attempting to evade forced conscription and take action against them. Moreover, as part of its propaganda strategy, the junta intends to brainwash students about forced conscription by incorporating it into the school curriculum to promote the lie that the junta’s coercive actions are necessary and acceptable.
Such violence tactics by the junta intensify the crisis, not only within Myanmar but also for its neighbors, as people flee for their lives. Neighboring countries and the wider international community must, therefore, prioritize and provide legal protection for Myanmar people and end all forced returns to Myanmar. Deporting Myanmar people to the junta—which forces deportees to fight against their own kin and participate in its atrocities against civilians—not only breaches their international obligation of non-refoulement, but also makes them complicit in the junta’s widespread and systematic human rights violations against the people of Myanmar.
ASEAN in particular must implement its 2017 Declaration on Culture of Prevention for a Peaceful, Inclusive, Resilient, Healthy and Harmonious Society, and take immediate action to ensure the safety and security of Myanmar people by providing temporary protection. The UN Security Council must also fulfill its mandate and implement Resolution 2669 to protect the people of Myanmar. Greater protection must be provided to those seeking refuge, along with increased funding for Myanmar civil society organizations providing assistance to those evading the junta’s forced conscription. Urgent actions must be taken at all costs to stop the junta’s escalating violence, including this brutal forced conscription campaign.
The people of Myanmar, driven by a vision for federal democracy, are making unprecedented sacrifices for a country free from military tyranny. Myanmar’s youth must be supported in their efforts to build a free federal democratic Myanmar. ASEAN and the wider international community must act promptly and in solidarity, rather than pushing Myanmar people into the hands of the illegal junta.
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[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.
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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.”
