Campaign group Progressive Voice has called on international aid organisations to stop dealing with and legitimising the Myanmar junta and instead hold them publicly and unequivocally responsible for the atrocities they have committed.
Progressive Voice says that the targeting of civilians, including children, throughout the past 20 months since the attempted coup of 1 February 2021 is ingrained in the military junta’s tactics, as they continue their attempted subjugation of the people of Myanmar.
The Myanmar military’s heinous attacks on children continue to mount. Families are stricken with grief and the Myanmar people are reeling after junta forces targeted and killed children in many instances of violence against children in recent weeks. Junta forces shelled a temple housing 300 internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Moebye, southern Shan State and killed eleven in airstrikes on a monastic school in Let Yet Kone, Depayin Township, Sagaing Region. These killings are yet another tragic reminder that the international community’s approach to the Myanmar crisis and the military’s atrocities has completely and utterly failed.
At least 191, and as many as 350, children and youth 17 years and under have been killed since the attempted coup on 1 February 2021. Last week the number of children and youth killed rose sharply, as the Myanmar military escalated attacks on civilians.
On 16 September, four people, including two girls aged 6 and 10, were callously killed by junta troops shelling of Mwe Taw Buddhist temple in Moebye, southern Shan State, where 300 IDPs were sheltered. The attack also triggered 3,000 people to flee the area. The spokesperson for the Karenni National Defence Force, Khu Re Du told the Irrawaddy that “They [Myanmar military] know civilians are hiding in churches, monasteries and pagodas but they continue to attack. It is shameful and they will pay for it.”
On the same day as the attack on Mwe Taw Temple, junta troops in two Mi-35 helicopters attacked a monastic school in Let Yet Kone, Depayin Township, Sagaing Region, brutally killing at least 11 children and three teachers, with 15 children missing and 14 students injured.
The attack came without warning while the children attended classes. One 7 year old boy, Phone Tay Za, who lost a limb and died as a result of the airstrikes, asked his mother “Just kill me, as it hurts too much.”
Ground troops raided the village and took the dead bodies and severed body parts from the school, cremating them to hide their crimes. Reports of the troops taking people hostage have been posted online and in the news but much remains unknown, as sources are in hiding.
In a statement in response to this attack, 71 schools in Myanmar called on the international community to bring about swift justice and accountability for this tragedy and all attacks on schools.
Yet, as Progressive Voice points out, while these barbaric acts by the junta occur far too frequently, international non-government organizations and UN agencies continue to lend legitimacy to the military junta by signing memorandums of understanding, presenting their credentials, or showing deference to the junta by engaging in meetings.
All these actions breach humanitarian principles of impartiality, neutrality and ‘do no harm’, but also the UN’s Human Rights Upfront initiative.
In response to the attack on the Let Yet Kone school, the UN Secretary-General issued a statement through his spokesperson, condemning the attack by the Myanmar military but stopping short of concrete steps to bring about a global response to the crisis in Myanmar.
While these barbaric acts by the junta occur far too frequently, international non-government organizations and UN agencies continue to lend legitimacy to the military junta by signing memorandums of understanding, presenting their credentials, or showing deference to the junta by engaging in meetings. All these actions breach humanitarian principles of impartiality, neutrality and ‘do no harm’, but also the UN’s Human Rights Upfront initiative.
In response to the attack on the Let Yet Kone school, the UN Secretary-General issued a statement through his spokesperson, condemning the attack by the Myanmar military but stopping short of concrete steps to bring about a global response to the crisis in Myanmar.
Both Save the Children and United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) have issued statements on the airstrikes in Let Yet Kone, but failed to name the Myanmar military as perpetrators and adequately stress how dire the situation is for all children in Myanmar.
Progressive Voice believes the inaction of these groups, and the UN as a body, strengthens the junta’s resolve in continuing to commit atrocity crimes.
Save the Children and the Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack were called out by the National Unity Government’s (NUG) Ministry of Women, Youths and Children earlier this month in a statement, after the two children’s rights groups conflated the human rights violations of the Myanmar military with actions of ethnic revolutionary organizations and resistance groups.
The NUG statement said: “It is extremely dangerous to put two starkly different degrees of violation in the same tone as though both parties committed the crime equally, and that could result in the international misinterpretation of the Myanmar people’s rejection of the junta and demand for federal democracy.”[sic] the NUG ministry stated.
The reality is that the Myanmar military has for decades and decades been the main perpetrator of violence against children in Myanmar – committing genocide against the Rohingya children; targeting children with airstrikes; perpetrating sexual and gender-based violence and torture against children; using children as human shields, forced labor and porters; using schools as military bases; and, point-blank shooting of children and planting landmines and unexploded ordnances, all with complete impunity.
The targeting of civilians, including children, throughout the past 20 months since the attempted coup of 1 February 2021 is ingrained in the military junta’s tactics, as it continues its attempted subjugation of the Myanmar people.
UNICEF has recently presented credentials to the military junta in June, which Progressive Voice says is not the legitimate government of Myanmar but a band of thugs that is violently attempting a coup.
For UN agencies to profess to uphold human rights, the protection of children and the principle of ‘do no harm’, and to work with the junta is irreconcilable in the eyes of the people of Myanmar, however they massage the narrative.
For the UN agencies to claim to be non-political or neutral is impossible, when the military junta is waging war against the very people UN agencies purport to protect. Progressive Voice says if UNICEF fully believed in the principles of neutrality and ‘do no harm’, it would present credentials to the legitimate government of the country, the NUG, and work with the Ministry of Women, Youth and Children to assist children on the ground.
Additionally, it would seek alternative means to provide assistance to children through local civil society groups, local education providers working in tandem with the NUG and Ethnic Revolutionary Organizations (EROs), while excluding the military junta.
To partner with the military junta, does harm to civilians on the ground, lends legitimacy to the junta and emboldens them to commit further atrocities – the last 601 days are a testament to this fact.
Progressive Voice believes that the principled step UNICEF, Save the Children, UN entities and the international community must take, is to call out perpetrators by name and press for justice and accountability.
They must stand for Myanmar children’s right to life and right to education. Most importantly, they must stop legitimizing the murderous junta, but instead work with the NUG and EROs and support the people of Myanmar in their struggle for a genuine federal democracy.
For the UN and its member states, they must impose concrete measures to stop the illegal military junta’s atrocities and end their decades-long impunity by cutting legitimacy, funds, arms and jet fuel.
A coordinated UN response, one that is led by the UN Secretary General, must be undertaken immediately to prevent more children from being harmed by this murderous junta.
