2024: Resistance Groups Gain Larger Ground, Much of Rakhine State Gone to Arakan Army

As 2024 approaches its end, the revolutionary forces in Myanmar (Burma/Brahmadesh) continue to weaken an increasingly desperate, demoralized, and brutal military junta. At the same time, the Myanmarese are building a new nation from the ground up, expanding liberated areas and setting the foundations for a federal democracy with local administrations and public services, despite the junta’s campaign of terror. Therefore, international actors should not follow China and ASEAN’s current approach of supporting the junta’s election plans, which would only keep Myanmar trapped in the cycles of military violence and prolong the suffering of ordinary Myanmarese.

Instead, international agencies should support the democratic resistance movements, which will hasten the downfall of the murderous junta and expedite the formation of a federal democracy that paves the way for sustainable peace in the Southeast Asian nation. This was stated in the weekly column of Progressive Voice, a participatory rights-based policy research and advocacy organization rooted in civil society, with strong networks and relationships with grassroots organizations and community-based groups across Myanmar.

The junta continues to lose territory throughout the country in 2024. For the first time ever, a regional military command (Northeastern Regional Military Command, RMC) in Lashio, northern Shan State, fell to the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (a member outfit of the Three Brotherhood Alliance, 3BHA). In other parts of Shan State, another 3BHA member, the Ta’ang National Liberation Army, has taken control of key towns and territories, including the ruby-mining hub of Mogok. The Kachin Independence Army has also made dramatic gains, taking control of the lucrative rare earth element mining areas of Kachin State from the junta’s ally. Much of Rakhine (Arakan) State is now in the hands of the Arakan Army, including the border area with Bangladesh, India, and a second RMC in the Ann locality. The year also witnessed a brief but symbolic liberation of Myawaddy, a large border town in Karen State, by the Karen National Union. Resistance forces in Chin, Karen, and Karenni States, along with Magwe, Sagaing, and Tanintharyi regions, continue to make gains, reclaiming more territories and establishing their administrations.

In 2024, the Myanmar military faced unprecedented battlefield losses, which compelled the junta to forcibly conscript young men and women to send to the frontlines in a bid to block the resistance forces. This led to more people fleeing their localities and even the country, with many joining the resistance movement. Meanwhile, the cash-strapped junta is attempting to squeeze every last Kyat from migrant workers, implementing exploitative policies on remittances to replenish their rapidly depleting reserves of foreign exchange.

"Yet, despite these clear signs of significant deterioration, the junta stubbornly clings to what remains of its diminishing power. This is, in no small part, due to its backers in the international community, particularly Russia and China. China has been pressuring the resistance forces to stop their offensives, giving technical and diplomatic support to the junta, and selling it weapons. Russia and India have also been major sources of weaponry, particularly the aircraft that the junta is increasingly using to bomb liberated towns and cities, while Vietnam has been a key supply node for the junta’s aviation fuel, enabling its continued airstrikes on civilian areas," stated the media column, asserting that China, Russia, and some members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) are not only complicit but are actively aiding and abetting the junta’s atrocity crimes.

A global embargo on arms, aviation fuel, and dual-use goods to the Myanmar military, complete with coordinated and well-enforced targeted sanctions, is imperative to, at the very least, limit or ideally stop the junta’s ability to commit war crimes and crimes against humanity. Additionally, the international aid community must take responsibility for stopping the junta’s weaponization of humanitarian aid, which violates international humanitarian law. The pitiful, self-serving response of the junta to the devastation caused by Typhoon Yagi and subsequent flooding this year, following its blocking of aid to respond to the devastation of Cyclone Mocha in 2023, should again demonstrate that narratives around needing to partner with the junta to ensure the delivery of aid have proven to be not only deeply flawed but extremely unethical.

"Rather, aid provision must be directed through trusted, frontline responders and community-based groups via locally-led cross-border channels, which are the most effective and legitimate way of providing aid to those in most need and saving lives," opined the forum. The Myanmarese have already made it crystal clear that the military’s involvement in politics cannot continue, and this murderous institution must be dismantled. The people of Myanmar have been fighting determinedly and with great sacrifice to achieve this, and any solution centering the Min Aung Hlaing-led junta will not work. The international community must make concerted efforts to hold the perpetrators accountable under international law for their crimes against the Myanmar people and should not support a sham election or any externally imposed peace deal that may bring the junta back to power.