(Reuters) – Myanmar’s ruling junta has lost control of large swathes of territory, including access to many of its international borders, allowing ethnic armed groups to expand and consolidate the regions under their control, according to two reports assess the conflict Thursday.
The country of 55 million has been in turmoil since February 2021, when the military ousted an elected government led by Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, sparking widespread protests.
The street demonstrations, which were met with brutal crackdowns, turned into an armed resistance movement that, along with many of Myanmar’s ethnic rebel armies, posed the military’s biggest challenge in decades.
According to the Special Advisory Council on Myanmar (SAC-M), the junta does not have effective control over Myanmar. She has lost full authority over the townships that cover 86% of the country’s territory and where 67% of the population lives.
A junta spokesman did not respond to a Reuters call for comment.
“The military junta does not have enough control over Myanmar’s territory to uphold the state’s core missions,” said the SAC-M, an independent group of international experts formed after the coup to support the return of democracy. in a briefing. paper.
“The junta has abandoned a significant area and has been forced into a defensive posture in most parts of the country where it still has a presence.”
Operation 1027, a coordinated offensive last October led by three ethnic armies, marked a key moment that exposed a weakened army that had ceded parts of border areas in northern Myanmar.
Since then, a series of offensives by ethnic armies have driven the junta out of peripheral areas, from the country’s border with Thailand to the coastal areas along the Bay of Bengal.
“The ethnic armed groups that have won many of these military victories are consolidating control over their extensive homelands, and many are well on their way to establishing autonomous statelets,” the nonprofit Crisis Group said in a report.
Mounting army losses and growing dismay among elites in the capital Naypyidaw have put the future of junta chief Min Aung Hlaing in serious doubt, although he has filled senior ranks with officers loyal to him, according to Crisis Group.
“He could therefore keep his job, but given the level of dissatisfaction he could nevertheless face a plot to remove him,” the report said.
With the junta losing control of almost all of the country’s borders and non-state governments likely to expand, neighboring states, regional blocs and the international community should increase their engagement with resistance groups, both reports said.
Internal displacement in Myanmar has reached a record high, with more than three million people driven from their homes due to the escalating conflict, according to UN agencies.
“The international community must understand this reality and work directly with resistance authorities and civil society to provide urgent aid and assistance to the people of Myanmar,” said Yanghee Lee, a founding member of SAC-M.
(Reporting by Reuters staff, writing by Devjyot Ghoshal; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
