Myanmar's military government extends its mandate to rule another 6 months

Myanmar's military government on Friday announced another six-month extension of its mandate to rule in preparation for elections it has said will be held this year, as the country enters its fifth year of crisis.

However, it did not announce an exact date for the polls.

The military declared a state of emergency on Feb. 1, 2021, when it arrested the country's leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, and top officials from her government in an army takeover which reversed years of progress toward democracy after five decades of earlier military rule.

The takeover sparked an armed resistance movement, with powerful ethnic minority militias and people's defense forces that support Myanmar's main opposition now controlling large parts of the country.

The military government is currently facing its greatest challenge since taking power and is on the defensive in much of the country. However, it is still able to hold onto much of central Myanmar and big cities including the capital, Naypyidaw.

State-run MRTV television reported on Friday that the National Defense and Security Council decided unanimously to grant an extension of emergency rule after Senior Gen. Ming Aung Hlaing, the head of the military government, argued that more time was needed to restore stability to the country to hold national elections.

The council is nominally a constitutional administrative government body, but in practice is controlled by the military.

Under the army-drafted 2008 constitution, the military was able to rule the country under a state of emergency for one year, followed by two possible six-month extensions before holding elections. However, the extension on Friday was the seventh.

Tom Andrews, a special rapporteur with the UN Human Rights Office, said in a statement on Thursday that four years of military oppression, violence and incompetence have cast Myanmar into an abyss. The United Nations has estimated that more than 3.5 million people have been displaced by the conflict.

"Junta forces have slaughtered thousands of civilians, bombed and burned villages, and displaced millions of people. More than 20,000 political prisoners remain behind bars. The economy and public services have collapsed. Famine and starvation loom over large parts of the population," he said.

The United States, United Kingdom, European Union and others jointly condemned the military government's violence against civilians and the deprivation of their rights.

They said more than one-third of the population, 19.9 million people, need humanitarian assistance to meet their basic needs, including food aid, and that up to 3.5 million people are displaced internally, an increase of nearly 1 million in the last year.

The joint statement marking the anniversary of the 2021 army takeover also expressed concern over increased cross-border crime in Myanmar such as drug and human trafficking and online scam operations, which affect neighboring countries and risk broader instability.

"The current trajectory is not sustainable for Myanmar or the region," said the countries, which also included Australia, Canada, South Korea, New Zealand, Norway and Switzerland.

Myanmar's extended state of emergency consolidates all legislative, judicial and executive powers of government under Min Aung Hlaing.

Under the constitution, the military must transfer government functions to the president at least six months before elections are held.

The military originally said elections would be held in August 2023, but has regularly pushed back the date and has recently said they would take place sometime in 2025.

Critics say the elections will neither be free nor fair because there is no free media and most of the leaders of Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party have been arrested. The plan is widely seen as an attempt to legitimize the military's rule by delivering a result that ensures the generals retain control.

Moe Zaw Oo, a member of the opposition's shadow National Unity Government, said Wednesday that opposition groups are preparing to prevent the military-held election through nonviolent means. The NUG, which calls itself the country's legitimate government, serves as an opposition umbrella group.

"No one from any organization on our revolutionary forces side will accept the illegal election that the military is planning to hold. We may have differences of opinion on other issues, but the position among the revolutionary forces regarding this election issue is unified and clear. We do not accept this at all," Moe Zaw Oo said in an online news conference.