How many more Myanmar people, including children, must sacrifice their lives before the international community intervenes to halt the barbarity that the country’s military regime is committing against its own people?
Lest the world forget how brutal it is: Myanmar’s murderous military junta on Monday bombed a school in a resistance stronghold in upper Myanmar, killing at least 20 students, some as young as 7 years old, and two teachers.
The deadly bombing of the school—where around 100 youngsters were studying—in O Htein Twin Village in Sagaing Region’s Depayin Township was just one of the most recent of the regime’s frequent indiscriminate air raids against civilians. On Tuesday, a junta airstrike in Rathedaung in Rakhine State killed 13 civilians, including children. The majority of the state is now under the control of the anti-regime Arakan Army.
From the beginning of 2023 to May 12 this year, the junta launched 2,679 airstrikes, killing 3,043 people in response to the nationwide anti-wide anti-regime resistance, Myanmar’s parallel National Unity Government said. If you include attacks in 2022, the total death toll is much higher.
In light of the junta’s latest aerial massacre, and the death toll mentioned above, no one in their right mind, who has a heart, could help but wonder: “How did this happen, and how can the world keep letting it happen all these years after the coup?”
The answer is it happened because Myanmar has been forsaken. Because the world has failed to take concrete and meaningful action against the junta since all hell broke loose in Myanmar in 2021 when the junta staged a coup. Rather than taking action, the international community has been united in simply expressing concern and condemning the junta, and occasionally imposing sanctions with limited effect whenever a regime massacre pops up in the international headlines. For Myanmar people, these superficial international stands haven’t brought any change, while they continue to endure the junta’s barbaric shelling, air raids, arson and other daily atrocities.
Regionally, all major players have failed the people of Myanmar. Paralyzed by its policy of noninterference in member states’ affairs, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has proven itself to be a toothless bloc, with member states divided over Myanmar issues. It’s pathetic to see the current chairman, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, being cheated by junta boss Min Aung Hlaing’s vow to honor a ceasefire in Myanmar, as Anwar requested during their meeting in April. Despite his promise, Min Aung Hlaing ordered his air force to keep bombing. The massacres on Monday and Tuesday are the latest examples.
This raises the question of how the junta has been able to sustain its atrocities for years with impunity. Emboldened by support showered on it by Russia and China, the junta’s ability to terrorize its own people knows no limits, while the world turns a blind eye to Myanmar. Support from Moscow and Beijing—from standing together on the regime’s behalf at the UN to selling it jet fighters and other military hardware, as well as Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping agreeing to accept official visits from Min Aung Hlaing—throw a lifeline to the Myanmar junta, which would otherwise have been long gone due to the unprecedented nationwide popular armed resistance against it. For now, the junta is using every means of lethal support it can get to hold on to power at the cost of people’s lives, including those of children. How does it feel, Mr. Putin and Mr. Xi, to learn that the regime continues to bomb its own civilians with your support?
For now, it’s heartwrenching to see the lives of thousands of people being wasted in Myanmar at the hands of Min Aung Hlaing’s regime while the world remains idle and indecisive, failing to take the necessary action. We can take it for granted that many more will be sacrificed as long as the junta, backed by immoral supporters, is in power.
Such an outcome will only be prevented if the world unites to take serious action to remove the regime.
So, please show meaningful support to the people of Myanmar before it’s too late; show that they are not alone and forsaken, and ensure that justice will prevail for them. Your moral and prompt action could at least save civilian lives—not least those of children.
