YANGON, Myanmar – Voters in some parts of Myanmar headed to polling stations on Sunday for elections, nearly five years after the government of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi was overthrown. The election is seen by critics as an attempt by the country’s generals to legitimize military rule.
The multi-stage election is unfolding amid an escalating civil war, with ethnic armed groups and rebel militias battling the military for control of vast tracts of territory from the Bangladesh-India border in the west, across the central plains, and to the borders with China and Thailand in the north and east.
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In central Sagaing, voting will take place on Sunday in only one-third of the region’s townships. The remaining third will be targeted in the second and third phases in January, while voting has been canceled completely in the rest.
Fighting, including air raids and arson, has intensified in several areas.
“The military is sending in troops and burning down villages under the guise of ‘territorial control,'” said Esther J., a locally-based journalist. “People here say this is being done for elections.”
In most parts of the region, she said, “we didn’t see any election-related activity.” “Nobody is campaigning, organizing or telling people to vote.”
Across Myanmar, voting has been canceled in 56 of the country’s 330 townships, with more cancellations expected. The conflict sparked by the 2021 coup has left an estimated 90,000 people dead and more than 3.5 million displaced, according to monitoring groups and the United Nations. Almost half of the country’s 55 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance.
“people [in Sagaing] “They say they don’t care about elections,” Esther J. said. “They don’t want an army. They want a revolutionary victory.”
A changing battlefield
For much of last year, Myanmar’s military appeared to be outnumbered.
A coordinated offensive launched in late 2023 by the Alliance of Three Brothers, a coalition of ethnic armed groups and rebel militias, overran vast areas, largely driving troops out of western Rakhine state and seizing a major regional military headquarters in the northeastern city of Lashio, about 120 kilometers from the Chinese border. Armed with commercial drones modified to carry bombs, the rebels soon began terrorizing the country’s second city, Mandalay.
The operation, known as 1027, posed the most serious threat to the military since the 2021 coup.
But this year, that momentum has stalled, mainly due to Chinese intervention.
In April, the Chinese government brokered a deal in which Myanmar’s National League for Democracy forces agreed to surrender the city of Lashio without firing a shot. The military has since recaptured major towns in northern and central Myanmar, including Naung Kio, Turbeikin, Kyaukme and Hsipaw. In late October, China brokered a new agreement for the Ta’an National Liberation Army to withdraw from the gold-mining towns of Mogok and Momake.
“Myanmar’s military is definitely coming back,” said Morgan Michaels, a research fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). “If this current trend continues, the Myanmar military could return to a relatively dominant position within a year or so, perhaps two.”
The military turned the tide by instituting conscription, expanding its drone fleet, and putting trusted soldiers in command in more battles. Researchers say between 70,000 and 80,000 people have been drafted since the announcement of compulsory military service in February 2024.
“Conscription has had unexpected effects,” said Myint Zaw Oo, executive director of the Myanmar Institute for Peace and Security. “Economic hardship and political polarization forced many young people to join the military,” he said, adding that many of the recruits were highly skilled and served as snipers and drone operators. “Military drone forces now outnumber rebel forces,” he added.
Military air and drone attacks have increased by about 30% this year, according to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a monitoring group. The group said it recorded 2,602 air attacks, killing 1,971 people, the highest toll since the coup. The report said Myanmar currently ranks third in the world in drone operations, behind Ukraine and Russia.
Meanwhile, China is applying pressure beyond brokering a ceasefire.
Analysts say the Chinese government has pressured the United Wa State Army, one of the most powerful ethnic groups, to stop supplying weapons to other rebel groups, resulting in ammunition shortages across the country. Rebel groups also suffer from discord. “They remain fragmented,” says IISS’s Michaels. “Relations between these groups are deteriorating and ethnic armed groups are abandoning the People’s Defense Forces,” he said, referring to anti-government militias that rallied after the coup.
china calculation
Observers say China acted out of fear of Myanmar’s collapse.
Einar Tangen, an analyst at the Beijing-based International Governance Innovation Center, said: “The situation in Myanmar is a ‘chaos’ and it is on the Chinese border.” He said he wants peace in Myanmar to protect important trade routes, including the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor, which, once completed, will link landlocked Yunnan province to the Indian Ocean and its deep-sea ports.
Tangen said the Chinese government has no love for the military, but believes there are few alternatives.
Indeed, after the coup, the Chinese government refrained from normalizing relations with Myanmar or recognizing coup leader Min Aung Hlaing. But in a sign of a shift in policy, Chinese President Xi Jinping met with Min Aung Hlaing twice this year. During talks in Tianjin, China, in August, President Xi told Min Aung Hlaing that China supports not only protecting Myanmar’s sovereignty, but also “unifying all domestic political forces” and “restoring stability and development.”
Tangen said China sees elections as a path to more predictable governance. Russia and India also support the process, but the United Nations and some Western countries have called it a “sham.” But Tangen pointed out that while Western countries have condemned the military, they have done little to engage with the rebels. The United States dealt a further blow by cutting off foreign aid and ending visa protections for Myanmar nationals.
“Western countries are paying lip service to the humanitarian crisis. China is trying to do something, but they don’t know how to solve it,” Tangen said.
Limited profits, perpetual war
Meanwhile, the military’s territorial gains remain modest.
The military has regained only 11.3 percent of the territory it lost in northern Shan state, Myanmar’s largest state, according to the Myanmar Strategic Policy Research Institute, a think tank. But Yangon-based analyst Khin Zaw Win said western Rakhine state remained “the theater of a larger and more intense war”.
There, the Arakan Army is advancing eastward in a move that has taken control of multiple bases across state lines and threatens the military’s defense industry. In northern Kachin state, fighting over Bhamo, the gateway to the north, is marking the first anniversary, while in the southeast, armed groups have captured “many important positions along the border with Thailand,” he said.
Therefore, the military’s recent advances in other regions are “less significant,” he added.
War watchdog ACLED also said the military’s successes were “limited in the context of the overall conflict.” Sue Mong, a senior analyst at ACLED, said in a briefing this month that the military remains in a “weaker position than before the 2021 coup and Operation 1027, and is unable to assert effective control over recently recaptured areas.”
Still, the victory gave the military “more confidence to proceed with the elections,” Khin Zaw Win said.
The Union Solidarity and Development Party, backed by the military, is expected to field the most candidates and form the next government. Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party has been dissolved, she remains in isolation, and other smaller opposition parties are barred from participating.
Khin Zaw Win said he did not expect the election to have a “substantial impact on the war” and that the military “could even fall into the deception of aiming for a complete military victory.”
But on the other hand, China could contribute to easing tensions, he said.
“China’s mediation efforts aim at a negotiated solution,” he said. “China expects ‘quid pro quo’ and does not want a long-term war that would harm its larger interests.”
Zahina Rasheed wrote and reported from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and Cape Diamond reported from Yangon, Myanmar.
