More than a year after Myanmar’s military took power in a coup, the civil conflict in the country shows no signs of easing.
In fact, with opposition forces — ethnic armed militias with experience fighting the regime and more recently formed people’s militias composed of newly trained recruits — enjoying some success in encouraging military defections, targeting military units and utilizing urban guerilla tactics, the hostilities look likely to continue for a long time.
The Myanmar junta has been accused of a wide range of atrocities since the coup, and the death toll and prison count since Feb. 1, 2021, is mounting. According to Reuters, “at least 1,500 people are known to have been killed in yearlong protests against the coup in Myanmar, with thousands more possibly killed in the armed conflict, the United Nations human rights office said ... (and) at least 11,787 people were unlawfully detained in Myanmar in that period.”