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Aung San Suu Kyi, leader of the ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party in Myanmar, was arrested by the army along with other party officials. The coup takes place in a country that has been under a military dictatorship for many years.
UPDATE at 5:00. Myanmar’s military has confirmed that it has taken control of the country after Aung San Suu Kyi and other political leaders were arrested overnight. A few hours after these arrests, Army television confirmed that the military had been declaring a state of emergency for a year.
The coup comes after tensions between the civilian government and the army over the legislative elections held in November 2020.
Initial novelty:
The BBC correspondent says that military deployments took place on the streets of the capital Naypyitaw, but also in the country’s main city, Yangon.
Myanmar’s state television MRTV, as well as public radio, are experiencing technical problems and unable to broadcast, media announced on Facebook on Monday, just hours after the arrest of Aung San Suu Kyi and other high-ranking figures was announced.
Internet access has also been severely disrupted, according to a specialized NGO. The telecommunications outages began around 3:00 am on Monday, according to the source.
Soldiers also went to key ministers’ homes in various regions and picked up officials, their families said.
Who is Aung San Suu Kyi?
Aung San Suu Kyi, 75, has been a dissident for many years. She was detained for 15 years at her home by a ruling military junta and became one of the most famous militants in the world. In fact, in 1991 he received the Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of his fight for democratic rights.
After Myanmar’s military regime, which was subject to international sanctions, showed some signs of flexibility in 2011, elections held in this country in 2015 were won by Aung San Suu Kyi’s party. However, the constitution did not allow the former dissident to assume the presidency, because her husband and children are foreigners, which is why the position of State Councilor was created for her, a role equivalent to that of Prime Minister.
Aung San Suu Kyi is the daughter of the hero of the independence of Myanmar (formerly Burma), General Aung San. He was assassinated when she was just 2 years old, just before Myanmar, a British colony, declared its independence in 1948.
However, after Aung San Suu Kyi became Myanmar’s leader (in 2015), she was criticized internationally for how she handled the Rohingya Muslim crisis.
In 2017, hundreds of thousands of Rohingya people took refuge in neighboring Bangladesh due to a particularly harsh armed crackdown that began after several deadly attacks on police stations in Rakhine State. Former international supporters of Aung Suu Kyi accused her of doing nothing to stop the rape, murder and possible genocide and accused her of refusing to condemn the army, still strong and influential in the country, or at least admitting the atrocities. Some have said that Aung San Suu Kyi is a pragmatic politician who is trying to lead a multi-ethnic country with a complex history. However, at a 2019 hearing at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, he defended the military, which shocked and erased much of his good international reputation.
But at home, the NLD leader, “Lady,” as she is called, continues to enjoy the broad support of the majority of the Buddhist population, who do not look favorably on the Rohingya ethnic group.
The army claims that due to the pandemic, the elections were rigged.
The arrest of Aung San Suu Kyi and other government leaders comes after the legislative elections in November, again won by an overwhelming majority (with 83 percent of the votes) by their party. The new parliament was due to begin its first session on Monday, in a few hours.
However, the army has been accusing for several weeks that there were irregularities in the conduct of the elections. Under the pretext of the COVID-19 pandemic, the elections “were not free or fair,” accused the army spokesman, Zaw Min Tun, at a press conference last week, reports Agerpres.
The military says it has identified millions of cases of fraud, including the votes of thousands of voters or those under 100.
These statements have already alarmed Western foreign ministries, who feared a new military coup. More than 12 embassies, including delegations from the United States and the EU, have called on Myanmar to “adhere to democratic standards” since Friday. They joined the UN in a chorus of international concern over a possible coup.
The November elections were the second general elections since 2011, when the military junta that ruled the country for half a century was dissolved. However, the army still has significant power, as it controls three key ministries (Interior, Defense, and Borders).
Editor: Luana Pavaluca
