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Several Burmese people protest peacefully against the military coup and dictatorship a few months after the military coup. Photo by Pyae Sone Htun, retrieved by Unsplash, 28 October 2021
Following eye-witnesses and journalists’ reports, the UN realises human rights abuses are still perpetrated in Myanmar and calls for immediate action by the State Parties while uncertainty for the Burmese civilian population and journalists rises.
After four years of harrowing human rights violations in Myanmar, on the occasion of the fourth anniversary of the military coup, on January 30th, 2025, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar, Tom Andrews, made a list of the most heinous crimes committed by the military junta in the country. These included massacres of thousands of civilians, bombing and arson of villages, schools, and religious sites, forced displacement of millions of inhabitants, imprisonment of more than 20,000 political opponents, widespread starvation among the population, arbitrary detentions, and widespread discrimination.
Andrews also commented on certain reports from the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP), highlighting that more than six thousand civilians have been killed by the military since the beginning of the conflict.
Furthermore, he noted that in 2024, the International Community took targeted measures to reduce the junta’s power, such as imposing specific sanctions and restrictions on arms trade. However, he advocated for stronger actions, urging UN Member States to restore the respect for human rights in Myanmar by overthrowing the military junta.
Additionally, he encouraged the International Community to hold the military junta’s leaders accountable, envisioning prosecution by the International Criminal Court (United Nations Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights, 2025).
Despite the gravity of these crimes, the military junta has been able to justify its power by setting up fraudulent elections and by arresting, detaining, torturing, and killing leaders of the opposition and anyone criticising the regime.
The UN Human Rights Office noted that the military junta intensified the violence of the attacks on the civilian population, carrying out shelling on civilians, arbitrary arrests, mass displacement, and denying access to humanitarian aid in response to last year’s sanctioning measures from the International Community.
UN Human Rights Chief Volker Türk gathered updates on the situation from witnesses who highlighted how the situation is worsening for the civilian population still living in the country. Accordingly, civilians in any part of Myanmar endure daily indiscriminate attacks, denial of humanitarian aid, and systematic violations of human rights, including acts of brutality, such as beheadings, burnings, mutilations, executions, torture, and the use of human shields.
In complete disregard for humanitarian law, witnesses also reported that some attacks were directed at villages that offered shelter to the civilian population and had no military presence. Such attacks were executed in retaliation for anti-military group protests, and they targeted civilian infrastructures, such as schools, places of worship, and hospitals.
The latest UN reports show that more than 20 million civilians in Myanmar require humanitarian assistance (United Nations Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights, 2025).
A significant testimony of the situation in Myanmar comes from a group of Burmese journalists who were exiled from their country after the coup and sought refuge in Mae Sot, a Thai city on the border with Myanmar. According to one of these reporters, Su Myat, she and her colleagues cross the border once a month to secretly report on the war situation in their home country.
With their work, they disclose to the world the atrocities committed by the junta that would otherwise be concealed by the regime.
Su Myat further highlights how dangerous and precarious her and her colleague’s work has become: on the one hand, they constantly risk being killed or imprisoned as they lack the necessary documents to live in Thailand. On the other hand, they stress the importance of receiving humanitarian aid for both the civilian population and themselves. In fact, after the suspension of USAID funding last January, many journalists living in Mae Sot, whose existence depended on international funding, have financial insecurities and receive no salaries for their work (The Guardian, 2025).
Four years since the coup in Myanmar, the International Community understands its efforts to stop the conflict were not enough. As a group of brave journalists describes to the world the horrendous acts committed by the military junta, it looks like the UN is ready to intervene by taking more concrete actions and is determined to investigate the terrible human rights violations committed and hold those responsible accountable.
Sources and Further Readings:
Lamb, K. and Ratcliffe, R. (2025, February 23). ‘We have nothing now’: Myanmar’s exiled media face existential crisis after Trump severs aid. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/feb/24/donald-trump-usaid-funding-cuts-myanmar-impact-journalists
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner. (2025, January 31). Myanmar: Four years on, coup leaders ramp up violations to unprecedented levels, UN finds [Press release]. https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2025/01/myanmar-four-years-coup-leaders-ramp-violations-unprecedented-levels-un
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner. (2025, January 30). UN expert urges support for people of Myanmar as they heroically oppose military oppression [Press release]. https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2025/01/un-expert-urges-support-people-myanmar-they-heroically-oppose-military
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