A human rights monitoring group has disclosed in a report that Myanmar’s military is increasingly turning to airstrikes with deadly results to try to crush stiff armed resistance.
The military is heavily dependent on fighter jets and helicopter gunships supplied by its allies; Russia and China, according to the organization, Myanmar Witness and other experts.
The group’s compilation of 135 “airwar incidents” from July to mid-December shows the number of airstrikes has been on an upward trend since September.
“As the Myanmar military struggles to exert control over areas of resistance, airstrikes have become a key part of their offensive,” the report says.
The military is putting the population of Myanmar in a precarious position, destroying homes, schools and places of worship.
According to a January statement by the National Unity Government, an underground group that calls itself the country’s legitimate government and serves as an umbrella organization for opponents of military rule, 460 civilians, mostly children, have lost their lives in airstrikes.
Myanmar’s army has defended its actions, saying they are being used against what it calls terrorist activities and legitimate military targets.
The army ousted the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi on February 1, 2021, and immediately was met with widespread public protests that security forces suppressed with lethal force.
The futility of nonviolent protest drove opponents to armed resistance, which some U.N. experts and others have characterized as civil war.
According to the independent Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, a watchdog group that tracks killings and arrests, 2,940 civilians have been killed by the authorities since the army takeover.
The actual death toll is likely to be much higher since the group cannot easily verify casualties in remote areas and combat zones.
The army has long contended with ethnic minority rebel groups in frontier areas that are fighting for greater autonomy but now it also battles pre-democracy guerrillas in Myanmar’s heartland.
In many cases, ethnic rebels have teamed up with pro-democracy guerrillas in the loosely organized armed wing of the National Unity Government.
They have effectively denied the military government control of large swaths of the country, undermining its claims to legitimacy. However, they lack the resources to deliver a knockout punch on the battlefield.
Major Challenge For The Resistance
Christina Fink, a professor of international affairs at George Washington University, noted at a January 19 online seminar that although the military is demoralized and has been losing control over many parts of the country, its increasing use of air power is a major challenge for the resistance.
The military has an air force capability it didn’t have 20 years ago, Christina said.
“They have been able to purchase planes from both Russia and China. They’ve been able to get the training in Russia, for instance, and are now using those to great effect.”
Christina Fink
Members of the Free Burma Rangers, a humanitarian relief organization that offers hands-on medical assistance to ethnic minority villagers in Myanmar’s border regions, were among the rare outside witnesses who were able to see the effects of an airstrike when a Myanmar jet fighter dropped two bombs on the village of Lay Wah in northern Karen state on January 12, 2023.
They observed the bombing run from a distance and rushed to the village to offer assistance.
The opponents of military rule have virtually no access to sophisticated weapons to combat air attacks. Their supporters are urging an embargo on the sale of aviation fuel to Myanmar to stop the air attacks.
The European Union has imposed an arms embargo on Myanmar as well as a ban on equipment that can be used for internal repression or for monitoring communications.
The United States prohibits any commercial transactions with Myanmar’s military and its major cronies and agents.
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