Myanmar military intensified air attacks and abuses before election, UN investigators say
GENEVA: Myanmar’s military stepped up aerial attacks on civilians before an election held last December and January, and all sides in the country’s civil war committed war crimes and serious abuses including torture and sexual violence in the past year, UN investigators said on Tuesday.
GENEVA: Myanmar's military intensified aerial attacks on civilians in the months leading up to the December-January election, according to UN investigators. The Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar (IIMM) reported that war crimes and crimes against humanity by both the military and armed groups escalated over the past year.
The election, which Western governments and rights groups deemed neither free nor fair, resulted in a victory for a military-backed party, allowing the then junta leader Min Aung Hlaing to become president. The military government has not yet commented on the allegations. Investigators documented attacks on homes, schools, medical facilities, religious buildings, and internally displaced person camps, noting a significant rise in low-cost paramotor, gyrocopter, and drone strikes with unguided explosives in the lead-up to the election.
The IIMM head, Nicholas Koumjian, emphasized that communities in Myanmar live under constant threat of violence and are suffering from the long-term impacts of the atrocities they endured. The civil war since the 2021 coup has reportedly killed 100,000 people and displaced millions, with the United Nations estimating tens of thousands detained since then.
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