Who put the lights out?

Former military dictator Than Shwe has become the latest target in Min Aung Hlaing’s blame game as the junta boss seeks scapegoats for the worsening electricity crisis in Myanmar.
On Saturday, during a meeting with small-business owners in Mandalay’s Pyin Oo Lwin, Min Aung Hlaing declared there would be no outages today if electricity generation projects initiated in 2005 had materialized. In power at the time was his predecessor Than Shwe, who handpicked him as military chief.
Min Aung Hlaing did not specify which projects had failed.
The junta chief often blames previous governments for power outages, but he usually points the finger at Thein Sein’s quasi-civilian government, which shelved the Myitsone Dam Project.
Myanmar enjoyed a regular electricity supply covering almost the entire nation under the civilian government, before it was ousted by the military in 2021. The coup was followed by power outages that have worsened over time and now last up to 16 hours a day. The severe disruption to daily life has prompted Min Aung Hlaing to add Than Shwe, barely seen in public since the power transfer in 2011, to his list of individuals responsible for the worsening crisis.
Naypyitaw, the junta’s nerve center, was until recently the only place in Myanmar free of power outages. However, the administrative capital founded by Than Shwe is now suffering regular blackouts.
Min Aung Hlaing’s legacy secured

Myanmar’s military has suffered a series of humiliating and unprecedented defeats under Min Aung Hlaing’s leadership. Despite this, the junta boss declared during a meeting with Central Command officers last Friday that his Tatmadaw “is making history and that its actions will go down in history.”
He delivered this brazen statement following the loss of two regional commands and hundreds of battalion headquarters and bases across Myanmar, including ethnic states and the Bamar heartland, not to mention the hundreds of towns where his troops have been kicked out.
To the shame of the once proud Myanmar military, whole battalions of junta soldiers have hightailed it to neighboring countries like China, India, Bangladesh, and Thailand in the face of resistance attacks.
Meanwhile, military academies have been left almost deserted, with thousands of soldiers and police defecting to the Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM) or losing their lives in daily clashes with anti-regime groups. The scale of troop depletion was laid bare when the regime was forced to dust off the long-forgotten Conscription Law to shore up the ranks last year.
Min Aung Hlaing has also failed dismally on the international front, where only Russia and China, his key arms suppliers, have invited him on visits. Even then, China made sure that Beijing was off the itinerary.
In stark contrast, former dictator Ne Win was hosted by regional and Western nations while Min Aung Hlaing’s predecessor, Than Shwe, took trips to China, India and fellow ASEAN countries.
Though the junta boss boasts about making history, he’s in hot water with former generals. Military supporters have also been calling for him to step down.
Min Aung Hlaing’s leadership has left an indelible stain on Myanmar’s armed forces, marked by heinous acts like air and artillery strikes on civilian populations, arbitrary arrests and killings, the torching of whole towns and villages, and massacres. He has indeed made history – as a ruthless dictator whose countless atrocities have caused immense suffering and left the country in ruins.
Air massacre mission intensifies

Junta airstrikes are the leading cause of civilian deaths in Myanmar’s civil war. But Air Force chief Htun Aung has decided that the ongoing aerial campaign is not lethal enough. Addressing graduates of the Air Force Pilot Course at a ceremony in Meiktila, Mandalay on Thursday, he demanded a high level of combat readiness and an unwavering desire for victory.
The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP) reports that junta airstrikes killed 45 civilians in December. So far in January, air raids have killed at least 60 civilians, including children and women, in 15 towns across seven regions and states, according to The Irrawaddy’s tally. The junta and its allies have killed at least 6,131 civilians since the 2021 coup, according to the AAPP.
Htun Aung, appointed Air Force chief in 2022, has been sanctioned by the US and Britain for leading the brutal campaign.
December’s delivery of the last two of six Su-30 fighter jets ordered from Russia has sparked fears of an even higher civilian death toll from air attacks in the coming months.
A tough sell

A junta delegation joined the 18th Financial Forum in Hong Kong on Monday and Tuesday, touting Myanmar as an investment hub to businesses from Hong Kong and Macau. The delegation reportedly received a warm welcome from Hong Kong’s business community, which offered congratulations on the occasion of Myanmar’s Independence Day.
The junta’s Foreign Ministry reported that policymakers from over 50 countries joined 3,600 business leaders at the forum to discuss regional financial markets and explore investment opportunities.
Faced with crippling economic sanctions from Western countries, the regime is desperately seeking investment from fellow pariah nations Iran, Russia, and Belarus, as well as still-sympathetic neighboring countries.
Championing Myanmar as a potential investment destination in Hong Kong was the director-general of the junta’s Investment and Foreign Economic Relations Ministry.
While it’s unclear whether the mission was a success, what’s certain is that it was a tough one.
Attendees at the forum would have been well aware that VPower, a Hong Kong-listed power generation company, pulled out of Myanmar following the 2021 coup.
Pushing China projects despite AA’s advance

The Myanmar military regime continues to work with China to develop the Kyaukphyu Special Economic Zone (SEZ) and a deep-sea port in Rakhine State’s Kyaukphyu despite the fact that the town has been encircled by troops of the ethnic Arakan Army (AA).
On Tuesday, junta Minister of Investment and Foreign Economic Relations Kan Zaw addressed a meeting of Myanmar’s Central Working Group for Special Economic Zones, which he chairs, in Naypyitaw. He called for effective collaboration between Kyauk Phyu SEZ Consortium Company Ltd. – formed as a Myanmar Government Designated Entity – and China’s CITIC Consortium, as well as…
Trunk call to Russia

Myanmar’s junta has once again employed “elephant diplomacy”, gifting five female and one male pachyderm to the Great Moscow State Circus.
Russian media reported that the gift celebrates the 75th anniversary of diplomatic relations between the two nations.
Edgard Zapashny, general director of the circus, was quoted in the Russian news agency Tass saying that the six elephants…
Arms supplier turns business partner

The military regime has expanded its cooperation with Belarus beyond arms dealing, hosting a first-ever visit by its top diplomat at the Myanmar-Belarus Business Forum on Friday.
The forum was attended by Lieutenant-General Nyo Saw, an advisor to Min Aung Hlaing who chairs the military-owned Myanmar Economic Corporation and sits on the junta’s governing body, the State Administration Council.
Also at the forum was Belarus Foreign Minister Maxim Ryzhenkov, who led a delegation of deputy ministers and businesspeople on a visit to…