Myanmar ethnic groups are uniting against a common enemy: the military

Determined to fight these abuses and ensure that their distinct voices and demands are heard, ethnic peoples have joined protests across the country, uniting in solidarity against a common enemy. Although many fear more violence and intensified conflict from an uncontrolled military junta operating with impunity and now firmly in control of the country.

“This struggle has been going on since the beginning of the formation of the country itself. We hope that the current fight against the military coup in the 21st century can be a new hope for our people,” said activist Jin Sang Hnin Lian.

Ethnic demands go deeper

But minorities, of which there are 135 official groups, say that these demands are made largely by the country’s majority ethnic group, the Buddhist Bamar, who traditionally live in the heart of the country – which includes large cities like Yangon and Mandalay – and say the fight goes deeper than just the military verses of the NLD.

“This is a very important transition period,” said activist Karen Naw Esther Chit. Using another name for Myanmar, she added: “In Burma, ethnic people have been marginalized and their voices excluded … ethnic people need to come together and raise a voice for our rights.”

A group called the Nationality Strike Committee (GSCN) was established to support the protests and to be a central place for the many ethnic minorities who protested. Comprised of 29 ethnic groups, the GSCN wants to end the military regime, abolish the 2008 constitution drafted by the military, build a federal democratic union and release all those who have been unjustly detained.

“Ethnic people do not want the dictatorship, we do not want to bring the military government back to rule the country because we already know the consequences of the military regime in ethnic areas,” said Chit, a member of the GSCN.

When Suu Kyi’s NLD won the elections in 2015, there was hope that its promise of national reconciliation would stop the abuses, reinforce the peace process and give a voice to ethnic people in the new Myanmar. But many minorities felt that Suu Kyi ruled by the majority and were excluded from consultations on issues that affected them.

Meanwhile, the peace process has failed.

The NLD has made progress in building infrastructure, such as roads, construction, Internet access and education, “but when we talk about political issues, nothing has changed in the past 10 years,” said Sang Hnin Lian, of the Human Rights Chin Organization.

Perched high in the mountains bordering India and Bangladesh, on the western edge of Myanmar, is the state of Chin. The remote and rugged state of 500,000 people is one of the poorest in the country and, over the past 20 years, a strong military presence has settled there, according to Sang Hnin Lian. Its people have recently been involved in fighting in the south between ethnic Rakhine rebels and the military.

Sang Hnin Lian said the Chin were used as human shields in wars in the past and were forced to carry or guide the military.

“Carrying was one of the worst human rights violations, forcing villagers to carry (rice and equipment) and asking civilians to guide them when they left. And that is still happening for the past two years, ”said Lian.

And because of decades of conflict, landmines still contaminate many ethnic areas across the country. The Chin Human Rights Organization has documented more than 12 landmine deaths in the state in the past two years.

CNN contacted the governing military regime by email, but has yet to receive a response.and.

If Myanmar’s military manages to establish a full administration, Lian’s biggest fear is that fighting in ethnic areas will increase.

“There will be more human rights violations, loss of life,” he said. “This will certainly cause a massive exodus to neighboring countries.”

Anti-coup protests are taking place in the state capital of Chin, Hakha, and elsewhere. Lian said that among the biggest demands are for federal democracy and the abolition of the 2008 constitution.

In the months leading up to Myanmar’s independence from the British, an agreement was signed in 1947 between some of the country’s ethnic groups to unify the country in exchange for federal autonomy. Suu Kyi’s father, General Aung San, led the interim government that negotiated the Panglong Agreement, but was assassinated shortly afterwards and the promise of a federal union was never fulfilled.

Instead, successive military rulers subjected ethnic minorities to a policy of forced assimilation called “Burmanization”, which restricted non-Bamar religious and cultural practices, made the Burmese language mandatory in schools and favored the dominant Buddhist religion.

Non-Bamar people were oppressed, Lian said. “You could be slapped if you don’t speak Burmese,” he added.

Since then, Myanmar’s ethnic groups have fought for the self-determination of their ancestral lands, where states are governed by ethnic people, not by the central government in Naypyidaw.

Karen protects her lands

This long struggle is shared by the Karen, an ethnic minority who live mainly in the Irrawaddy Delta and in the mountainous regions of the Thai border in the east of the country.

Since December, new fighting broke out between the military and the Karen National Union – one of the oldest rebel groups – despite the 2012 ceasefire, forcing residents to flee their homes.

The Free Burma Rangers, a humanitarian group that operates on the front lines of many of Myanmar’s conflicts, including in Karen, said the attacks are the most intense and widespread since 2012 and that 6,000 displaced people are sheltered in the forest.

The group’s founder, Dave Eubanks, believes that the increase in fighting is directly linked to the coup, as the military wants to “exercise full control in Burma”.

“The coup was obviously well planned in advance and we saw the pressure start to increase in the ethnic areas here in December last year and January and then even more after the coup,” said Eubanks. “At the moment, ethnic leaders feel that they are not only trying to protect their people and the displaced, but also feel supportive of democracy and the CDM in Burma’s cities and plains.”

On Tuesday, a statement from more than 2,500 Karen people in 34 villages protested the army “occupying our lands and threatening our lives and peaceful existence.” In solidarity with the anti-coup movement, they demanded that the army “immediately withdraw from our territory” and that the regime be “held responsible for the crimes that were committed against ethnic people”.

“We practice self-determination and declare that we are the legitimate political authority in our territory. We reject all centrally imposed systems, we reject the Burmese military dictatorship and its administrative system imposed on our territory, ”said the group. “As guardians of our ancestral territories, we must protect our environment and keep it free from outside interference that threatens to harm our inhabitants.”

Empathy for ethnic struggle

Although an uncomfortable ceasefire is in place, fighting in Western Rakhine State between the Arakan ethnic army and the military as of November 2018 has become one of the country’s most serious and intense conflicts, leading to civilian casualties, 200,000 displaced people and a prolonged Internet power outage.

And while ethnic people have joined in protests against the military coup, attitudes in western Rakhine state are more complex.

Khine, a Rakhine activist living in Yangon, said that for many in the northern state, torn by the conflict, there is little difference between the military and the deposed NLD government, which supported the state’s recent army campaigns.

“Most (in northern Rakhine) see the two enemies, the NLD and the military, join forces to fight the Arakan Army for two years. Now they are fighting each other,” he said.

In March 2020, the government designated the Arakan Army and its political wing as a terrorist organization, and in the run-up to the November elections, the electoral commission canceled the vote in many districts of Rakhine, citing security concerns.

Last month, the Arakan National Party – the state’s largest political party and fierce critics of the NLD – sent a representative to join the military’s state board of directors, generating widespread criticism from the Rakhine people and civil society.

Khine said the move “totally damaged” the state’s political reputation, so he formed the protest group Arakan Against the Dictatorship in Yangon “to show that we are against the coup and the dictatorship and to show solidarity with the people here”. Although he said that a result in which the NLD would return to power under the 2008 constitution would not be worth risking lives.

The conflict in Rakhine followed the bloody military campaign against the Rohingya. Some Rohingya people who now live in refugee camps in Bangladesh have expressed solidarity with the protesters, posting on social media or holding their own demonstrations.

The coup even led to a deep search among the Burmese population, with some apologizing on social media for not recognizing ethnic struggles.

As the Rohingya crisis unfolded, “the general population in Myanmar shared the same opinion with the military at the time,” said Khine. When Suu Kyi defended the military’s actions at CIJ, it may even have increased in popularity before the elections.

“But after the coup, many shared their sympathy for the fact that the terror happened, but we neglected it,” said Khine.

He added to move on, “feelings and sympathy are not enough, they need to show it with their action.”