Written evidence from Dr David Brenner, University of Sussex (MYA0008)

Questions addressed in this evidence:

Primary:

Secondary:

 

 

 

Summary:

Author:

Dr David Brenner is a lecturer in the Department of International Relations at the University of Sussex. He is a Myanmar expert who has researched the country’s difficult transition from the outset, including for his PhD at the London School of Economics (2012-2016). Throughout the past nine years, David’s research has focused on the violent nature of transition that went hand in hand with escalating ethnic conflict and civil war. Specifically, David has researched the politics of Myanmar’s ethnic armed organisations (EAOs), on the basis of extensive fieldwork. His research on Myanmar has been published widely. David is author of Rebel Politics: A Political Sociology of Armed Struggle in Myanmar’s Borderlands (Cornell University Press, 2019). David is a regular media commentator on the situation in Myanmar and has advised a variety of political stakeholders on the situation in Myanmar, such as domestic peace negotiators, international development agencies, and foreign policymaking, including for the German Parliamentary Committee on Foreign Affairs and the U.S. Department of State.

 

 

 

Evidence:

 

The Crisis

  1. More than three months after Myanmar’s military ousted the democratically elected government in a military coup, popular resistance to military dictatorship is not abating. This is despite unrelenting state violence against civilians, including the use of large-scale lethal violence against peaceful protesters, targeted killings, mass arrests, wide-scale torture, and aerial bombardment of civilian targets. While state terror prevents people from gathering in mass protests at present, people evidence their defiance of military rule on a daily basis with spontaneous protests as well as an ongoing civil disobedience campaign. Importantly, revolutionary forces span across ethnic divides, demanding for the remaking of Myanmar as a federal union with equal rights and citizenship at its core. This has the potential to uproot the very foundations upon which the general’s power rests upon: the perpetuation of decades-long ethnic conflict and civil war.
  2. Myanmar’s military clearly miscalculated the degree and resolution of popular backlash against its coup on 1 February 2021. Nevertheless, the military has evidenced that it will not give in to popular demand but instead continue to use violence and terror against any form of resistance, including non-violent protests and activism. This is despite diplomatic moves, such as an ASEAN initiative on 24 April, where leader of the new junta, Min Aung Hlaing, committed to an end of violence against peaceful protesters. It is also despite new targeted economic sanctions, including the UK’s February sanctions against regime officials. In order to influence a peaceful solution to the crisis, the UK and its international allies will thus need to pursue a different, more resolute strategy that aims at supporting a change in the calculus of the junta in the short term and transforming the Myanmar’s military as an institution, ending its stranglehold over state, society and economy in Myanmar in the long term.

The Junta’s Calculus

  1. The current strategy with which the junta aims to weather the crisis appears to rely on two main calculi, both of which are informed from past experience. Domestically, the junta attempts to rely on its long-standing strategy to divide and rule its opponents with political and economic incentives. Most importantly, the military fears a unification of the pro-democracy movement with ethnic armed organisations (EAOs), who have long fought against the country’s military in demand of ethnic minority rights and autonomy from the central state. After the 1988 uprising, the military has made extensive use of ceasefires that granted lucrative spoils and de-facto autonomy to some EAOs, in order to focus its fire power on others who were siding with the prodemocracy movement. Similar constellations can be witnessed in the present crisis. The military heavily attacks EAOs that have positioned themselves clearly on side of the pro-democracy revolution, most importantly the Karen National Union (KNU) and the Kachin Independence Organisations (KIO). At the same time, it invests significant energy in retaining peaceful relations with the ones who have not, such as the United Wa State Army (UWSA).
  2. Internationally, the junta relies on a handful of strategic allies (most importantly China, Russia and Thailand) to avoid complete international isolation in the short term. In the long term, the junta is calculating on an eventual international recognition of the new power realities in Myanmar and a normalisation of its foreign relations after making limited concessions, such as the eventual transition towards a hybrid military–civilian regime and potentially the release of political prisoners and other limited reforms. Here also, the junta’s calculus is informed by past experience, including its ascension to ASEAN in 1997 and the rapid normalisation of international relations after the military implemented surprising, though limited, reforms in 2011. Importantly, this top-down transition was never meant as a process of genuine democratisation, as evidenced by the fact that the military retained direct control over crucial ministries and 25 percent of parliamentary seats, which also granted the military veto power over constitutional reform. However, Myanmar rehabilitated itself almost instantaneously from its previous reputation as an international pariah, despite the military’s persistent and even increased violence, including ethnic cleansing, crimes against humanity, and acts of genocide.

 

 

Changing the Junta’s Calculus

  1. The UK and its international allies can influence a peaceful resolution to the present crisis by helping to shift the junta’s domestic and international calculus. In order to do so, it is imperative to support the formation of a strong and united domestic opposition movement. This is because the military’s main source of power is the manufacturing of division and conflict, especially along ethnic lines. In fact, its self-portrayal as the ‘guardian of the nation’ that allegedly keeps Myanmar from disintegrating is the very rationale for the military’s inflated size and stranglehold over the country. Throughout the past decade, many of these divisions deepened because of state-sanctioned hate speech, the perpetuation of racialised hierarchies, including in the education and legal system, and a deeply flawed peace process that promoted ethnocratic state-building. Fostering reconciliation and unity amongst Myanmar’s diverse society and opposition movement would thus not only limit the military’s ability to weather the current crisis by relying on continued divide-and-rule. It would also contribute to remaking the social foundations that underlie militarised authoritarianism in Myanmar.
  2. As horrific as the violence that the military has unleashed across the country since the February coup has been, it also opened a window of opportunity for achieving greater unity amongst the country’s diverse social and opposition forces. In particular it has sparked unprecedented debate on the need for ethnic reconciliation. This is most poignantly reflected in the formation of the National Unity Government (NUG), which does not only consist of the ousted NLD administration but also incorporates wide ethnic minority representation. The NUG has indeed made great efforts to address ethnic minority demands and grievances by committing to transform Myanmar into a federal union, including autonomy and power-sharing provisions for ethnic groups. Significant alliances are forming between the country’s pro-democracy movement and several EAOs, especially the KNU and the KIO. The UK and its allies should seize this historic moment by recognising and engaging the NUG (and its EAO allies), including on outstanding questions, for instance about unconditional citizenship for the Rohingya community.
  3. In addition to supporting the unification of a strong domestic opposition movement, the UK needs to use its position as the UN Security Council Penholder on Myanmar and its new status as an ASEAN Dialogue Partner to push for increased international pressure on Myanmar. This needs to include further sanctions. Importantly and urgently, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) needs to live up to their responsibility to protect civilians in Myanmar from a murderous regime. At the bare minimum, it needs to impose a global arms embargo against the junta that is deliberately targeting civilians with heavy battlefield weaponry, including artillery and fighter jets, most of which is supplied by China and Russia. On top of this, the UK needs to propose the enactment of a ‘no-fly zone’ to protect civilians from at least some of the junta’s most horrific attacks. In order to prevent the vetoing of such resolutions by China and Russia, the UK should seek close coordination with ASEAN in formulating and co-sponsoring these UNSC resolutions. This is because UNSC Resolution 1973, which enacted a no-fly zone in Libya, was made possible through the strong involvement of the League of Arab States and the African Union, which convinced China and Russia to abstain rather than veto the resolution. While ASEAN follows its own non-interference policy, the regional organisation is after all interested in a peaceful resolution to the crisis in Myanmar. Countries such as Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore have already tested the boundaries of non-intervention in recent weeks. It is with these states that the UK needs to coordinate closely to convince other ASEAN members, in particular Thailand, to live up to their regional responsibility.
  4. Lastly, the UK and its allies need to push for more targeted sanctions and continue international isolation of the junta. On top of a global arms embargo, sanctions need to target industries close to the military. Despite new sanctions, a UN expert panel expressed their concern that many foreign companies ‘continue to engage in business with the military as if nothing has happened’. This includes European and US American oil and gas companies Chevron and Total, who are making themselves complicit in crimes against humanity by continuing oil and gas exploitation and paying revenues to the junta. As both, Chevron and Total are US and European companies, these can be sanctioned without UNSC involvement (cf. Dodd-Frank Act Section 1502 on conflict minerals in the DR Congo). Targeted sanctions alone will, however, not change the general’s calculus (and blanket sanctions will only impoverish Myanmar’s people and strengthen the generals rule). At least equally important, is the stringent and continued isolation of the junta, which can currently still rely on international partners, especially China, Russia and Thailand, and speculates on further rehabilitation through limited political concessions in the future. The UK and its allies need to push for a crystal-clear policy of non-recognition of the junta and a recognition of the NUG instead.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

May 2021