U.S. calls arrests in Burma a coup
New sanctions weighed for generals already under penalties
The United States said Tuesday that it considered the military roundup of civilian leaders in Burma a coup, setting the stage for sanctions and other measures targeting what State Department officials said was “the very small circle of military generals” responsible.
The military power grab poses a challenge for the 2-week-old administration of President Joe Biden, which wants both to support wobbly democracy movements globally but to avoid driving countries like Burma toward China.
And with Burma’s military leaders already under U.S. sanctions over the brutal campaign against the country’s Muslim Rohingya minority, it was unclear how much additional impact any new penalties would have.
Burma is often called Myanmar, a name that military authorities adopted in 1989. Some nations, such as the United States and Britain, have refused to adopt the name change.
Biden administration officials previously had held off on officially classifying the military’s weekend roundup as an outright takeover, and the country’s leaders said in a televised address that they were taking power for a oneyear state of emergency. State Department officials said Tuesday that they were satisfied the move met the legal definition of a coup.
Humanitarian assistance to Burma’s people would not be affected by whatever penalties the U.S. decides on, a State Department official said. The officials briefed reporters on condition they not be identified.
Meanwhile, the country’s civilian leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, finds herself right back where she was just over a decade ago — under house arrest.
But this time, her standoff with the military comes after she has sorely disappointed many once-staunch supporters in the international community by cozying up to the country’s generals while in power. Leaders in the West are still denouncing her detention, of course — but they no longer view her as a paragon of democratic leadership.
Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party won November elections by a landslide, catching the generals by surprise. They immediately cried voter fraud — an allegation the country’s election commission has dismissed.
With flights grounded and communications largely cut, Burma plunged back into isolation and darkness, ending 10 years of new freedoms and quasi-civilian rule that the President Barack Obama’s administration held up as a beacon of nascent democracy. The military-owned Myawaddy TV said the country would be under a one-year state of emergency.
Now, it’s not clear who can lead the country out of the wilderness, with Suu Kyi’s reputation abroad badly tarnished.
“I believe that Aung San Suu Kyi has been an accomplice with the military,” said veteran U.S. diplomat, Bill Richardson. “I hope she realizes that her compact with the devil has boomeranged against her, and that she will now take the right stand on behalf of democracy” and become a true advocate for human rights.
“But if she doesn’t step aside,” he said, “I think the [National League for Democracy] needs to find new leaders.”
Separately, Rohingya refugees from Burma living in camps in Bangladesh condemned the military coup in their homeland and said it makes them more fearful to return.
A counterinsurgency operation by Burma’s military in 2017 involving mass rape, killings and the torching of villages drove more than 700,000 Rohingya Muslims into neighboring Bangladesh.
Bangladesh has hosted them in crowded refugee camps and is eager to begin sending them back to Buddhist-majority Burma. Several attempts at repatriation under a joint agreement failed because the Rohingya refused to go, fearing more violence in a country that denies them basic rights including citizenship.
Refugees said Tuesday that they are more afraid now that the military is in complete control.
“The military killed us, raped our sisters and mothers, torched our villages. How is it possible for us to stay safe under their control?” said Khin Maung, head of the Rohingya Youth Association in the camps in the Cox’s Bazar district.
“Any peaceful repatriation will hugely be impacted,” he said. “It will take a long time because the political situation in Myanmar is worse now.”