ND Burma
ND-Burma formed in 2004 in order to provide a way for Burma human rights organizations to collaborate on the human rights documentation process. The 13 ND-Burma member organizations seek to collectively use the truth of what communities in Burma have endured to advocate for justice for victims. ND-Burma trains local organizations in human rights documentation; coordinates members’ input into a common database using Martus, a secure open-source software; and engages in joint-advocacy campaigns.
Recent Posts
- Myanmar Mechanism investigations reveal deliberate attacks on civilians by the Myanmar military – Annual Report
- Protecting Humanity: Enforcing the ICRC Mandate in Myanmar – An Open Letter to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)
- Joint Statement: SEANF Must Deny the Junta-controlled Myanmar Commission the 2027 Chairship to Protect Regional Credibility
- Myanmar military escalates civilian killings, monitor warns, amid diplomatic push
- KWAT 2025 yearly activity report
Myanmar Mechanism investigations reveal deliberate attacks on civilians by the Myanmar military – Annual Report
/in Other Human Rights ReportsGeneva, 11 August 2026 – Investigations by the Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar (Mechanism), as detailed in its Annual Report released today, show a pattern of deliberate aerial attacks on civilians, arbitrary detentions, torture and sexual violence committed by the Myanmar military.
The Myanmar military escalated its aerial attacks and other crimes against civilians in the lead-up to the elections completed in January this year and these have continued unabated.
“Behind every piece of evidence we collect are people whose lives have been devastated by these crimes,” said Nicholas Koumjian, Head of the Mechanism. “Communities across Myanmar are not only living under the constant threat of violence but are also coping with the profound and lasting impact of what they have endured. This underscores the urgent need to hold those responsible to account.”
Covering the period from 1 July 2025 to 30 June 2026, the Report outlines the Mechanism’s investigations into aerial attacks targeting homes, schools, medical facilities, religious buildings and camps for internally displaced persons, causing deaths, injuries and destruction. The military’s increasing reliance on paramotors and drones has made attacks harder for civilians to detect, limiting their ability to flee or seek shelter. The Mechanism has identified some of the military units responsible for these attacks.
The Mechanism has also collected and analysed extensive evidence of arbitrary detention, torture and sexual violence in military-run detention facilities, including cases linked to the 2025 law criminalizing criticism of the elections. Numerous individuals have been arrested under the law and face up to 20 years’ imprisonment and the death penalty for activities such as posting critical comments on social media.
While most of the evidence collected by the Mechanism concerns crimes committed by the Myanmar security forces and affiliated militias, it is also investigating alleged atrocities involving armed groups opposed to the military.
The Mechanism’s investigations draw on evidence from more than 1,600 sources, including over 750 accounts from witnesses, as well as photographs, videos, audio material, documents, maps, geospatial imagery, social media posts and forensic evidence.
The Mechanism continues to share evidence and analysis with authorities pursuing accountability for crimes committed against the Rohingya, including at the International Criminal Court (ICC) and in Argentina, and has also responded to requests from other authorities investigating crimes committed since the 2021 military takeover.
It has also provided extensive evidence and analysis to the parties in The Gambia v. Myanmar proceedings before the International Court of Justice (ICJ), where the judges are deliberating whether Myanmar violated its obligations under the Genocide Convention during the 2016 and 2017 clearance operations against the Rohingya.
The Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar (IIMM or Mechanism) was created by the United Nations Human Rights Council in 2018 to collect and analyse evidence of the most serious international crimes and other violations of international law committed in Myanmar since 2011. It aims to facilitate justice and accountability by preserving and organizing this evidence and preparing analysis that can be used by authorities to prosecute individuals in national, regional and international courts.
For more information, visit iimm.un.org or contact iimm@un.org.
Protecting Humanity: Enforcing the ICRC Mandate in Myanmar – An Open Letter to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)
/in ND-Burma Members' Reports, Press Releases and StatementsDate: 11 August 2026
To the Leadership and Representatives of the ICRC,
We, the undersigned 155 Myanmar, regional and international civil society organizations, write to you today with a profound sense of urgency and deep frustration regarding the 3 August 2026 meeting between your resident representative, Arnaud de Baecque, and Myanmar’s State Counsellor, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.
While any contact with the State Counsellor, who is being unlawfully imprisoned by the illegal military junta in Myanmar, is a matter of intense public interest, the sequence of events surrounding this visit illustrates our greatest fear: the ICRC’s mandate is being actively exploited by the military junta. The meeting demonstrated how humanitarian engagement in Myanmar is increasingly vulnerable to political instrumentalization by the military junta, thereby aiding them to advance their political aims, and in turn prolonging the suffering of the Myanmar people and undermining their expressed democratic will and aspirations.
The junta first publicized the meeting, releasing carefully curated photographs of handshakes and a birthday cake to project an illusion of normalcy and cooperation to the international community as it desperately seeks legitimacy for its violently imposed rule. Only after this propaganda was disseminated did the ICRC issue a brief, reactionary confirmation.
In your statement, you noted that the visit followed “established guidelines” and permitted a “private conversation,” and you added that, per your standard procedures, all observations regarding her condition are kept strictly confidential and shared only with detaining authorities. You disclosed nothing regarding her health, her whereabouts, or the reality of her captivity.
A short, sanitized announcement is NOT enough. When the ICRC allows the military junta to exploit its presence as a credible international humanitarian organization for propaganda to advance its political agenda while remaining silent about the realities of the situation, the ICRC is no longer practicing neutrality. The ICRC is instead complicit in the military junta’s theater and blatant violations of international humanitarian law.
We anticipate the ICRC’s defence. We know it will rest upon the Fundamental Principles of the ICRC Movement, particularly neutrality, independence and confidentiality. We recognize that confidential dialogue is intended to secure humanitarian access and protect those deprived of their liberty. However, humanitarian engagement also carries a responsibility to safeguard its integrity from political exploitation.
The political instrumentalization of this visit was entirely foreseeable. The military junta has, for more than five years, consistently exploited humanitarian and diplomatic engagement to extract legitimacy and project an image of normalcy. Given this well-established pattern, the ICRC had a responsibility to anticipate and actively prevent such exploitation. The public dissemination of carefully staged photographs and messaging by the junta was not an unforeseeable consequence—it was an entirely predictable outcome.
Against this backdrop, we must ask: was the ICRC protecting its humanitarian mandate, or merely accommodating the military junta’s need in turn to protect the ICRC? An honest examination of your own doctrine reveals that your current approach is failing the very principles you claim to uphold:
The Call for Enforcement
If the ICRC can allow the military junta to exploit the ICRC’s presence to parade Daw Aung San Suu Kyi in front of cameras in a deliberate staged show to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the world while over twenty thousand unnamed, un-profiled political prisoners endure unimaginable torture in the junta’s prisons, the ICRC can no longer claim its silence is serving the victims.
The people of Myanmar are not asking the ICRC to step outside its humanitarian mandate, nor are we asking the ICRC to abandon its core mission. However, we are demanding the strict enforcement of ICRC’s own operational guidelines and of international human rights standards. The ICRC should not allow itself to be used as a prop by those who slaughter civilians.
In addition, we urgently call upon the ICRC to enforce a principled position and prioritize the lives of Myanmar’s people. The ICRC must immediately trigger its internal guidelines to publicly denounce the military junta’s repeated violations of IHL, openly recognizing that confidential dialogue has completely failed.
Furthermore, the ICRC must insist on regular, independent and unimpeded access to all political prisoners and places of detention, free from the presence or interference of junta personnel. Any engagement with detainees, including State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, must be conducted solely for humanitarian purposes and must not be exploited for political theatre or public relations. The ICRC should prioritize facilitating meaningful family contact, including with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s son, Kim Aris, in accordance with its humanitarian mandate, while refusing participation in any military junta-staged photo opportunities or engagements that manufacture legitimacy for the junta.
History will not judge the ICRC by how strictly it adhered to its bylaws in a vacuum, but by whether it had the courage to recognize when those bylaws were being exploited and manipulated by the military junta. We urge the ICRC to reassess its purpose and strategy, to demand true, unmanipulated access to all political prisoners, and to stop allowing its confidentiality to be extracted for the junta’s legitimacy.
State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is the legitimate leader of Myanmar and continues to be recognized as such by the United Nations (UN). For the ICRC to allow itself to be used by the military junta for its political gain in response to ASEAN and world leaders demanding direct access to Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the ICRC is participating in the exploitation of the democratically elected leader of the Myanmar people. This is entirely unacceptable. Human suffering in Myanmar is not a confidential matter. ICRC’s response to it should not be either.
The people of Myanmar do not question the importance of humanitarian engagement. We question whether humanitarian engagement can continue to fulfil its purpose when it is exploited and manipulated to legitimize those responsible for widespread violations of international humanitarian law. The credibility of the ICRC depends not only on preserving access, but also on ensuring that such access does not come at the expense of the very people it pledges to protect.
The people of Myanmar deserve an answer: How will the ICRC hold itself accountable to Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and the people of Myanmar? What safeguards will the ICRC put in place to ensure that future humanitarian engagement cannot again be exploited as political propaganda by the illegal criminal junta?
For more information, please contact:
Signed by 155 civil society organizations, including 2 organizations that have chosen not to disclose their names:
Joint Statement: SEANF Must Deny the Junta-controlled Myanmar Commission the 2027 Chairship to Protect Regional Credibility
/in ND-Burma Members' Reports, Press Releases and Statements[BANGKOK, 7 August 2026] We, the undersigned 146 Myanmar, regional, and international civil society organizations, express deep alarm and concern regarding reports that the junta-controlled Myanmar National Human Rights Commission (MNHRC) has announced its intention to assume the Chairship of the Southeast Asia National Human Rights Institutions Forum (SEANF) in 2027, following discussions during the second Technical Working Group Meeting of SEANF held in Malaysia from 21 to 23 July 2026.
We urge SEANF members to take a principled stand and prevent the MNHRC from assuming any leadership position within SEANF and to urgently review its continued membership in the Forum. Allowing the MNHRC to chair SEANF would not only seriously undermine the credibility, legitimacy, and integrity of a regional human rights mechanism established to advance human rights protection in Southeast Asia, but would embolden the MNHRC to further provide the criminal military junta with a shield from international accountability.
SEANF’s credibility must be grounded in international human rights standards
SEANF’s credibility as a regional network of National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs) depends on its commitment to the standards it seeks to promote. As a mechanism established to strengthen human rights protection in Southeast Asia, SEANF must ensure that its membership and leadership are consistent with the principles of independence, pluralism, and effectiveness enshrined in the UN Paris Principles.
Providing leadership roles to institutions that no longer meet these standards risks undermining confidence in SEANF among civil society organizations, human rights defenders, and communities affected by human rights violations.
MNHRC’s failure to comply with the Paris Principles
MNHRC’s continued membership and its boldness of seeking to assume the SEANF Chairship raise serious concerns regarding the Forum’s commitment to international minimum NHRI standards.
Following a review by the GANHRI Sub-Committee on Accreditation (SCA), MNHRC’s “B” status accreditation was removed in December 2024 due to its failure to comply with the UN Paris Principles. The SCA raised serious concerns regarding MNHRC’s independence, its failure to effectively fulfil its mandate following the military’s 2021 illegal coup attempt, inadequate engagement with civil society and the international human rights system, and concerns regarding its appointment process and being complicit in the military junta’s human rights violations and atrocity crimes.
Following the removal of its accreditation, MNHRC’s membership in GANHRI was formally removed in March 2025, and the Asia Pacific Forum of National Human Rights Institutions (APF) subsequently removed MNHRC from its membership in May 2025.
These decisions clearly demonstrate that MNHRC no longer meets the standards expected of an independent and effective NHRI. Civil society organizations have consistently called upon SEANF to take similar action and remove MNHRC from its network in order to uphold the integrity of regional NHRI mechanisms and to avoid the risk of being complicit in the MNHRC’s protection of the perpetrators.
MNHRC has failed to protect human rights in Myanmar
Since the 2021 illegal military coup attempt, MNHRC has failed to act as an independent institution capable of protecting victims and holding perpetrators accountable for widespread and systematic human rights violations committed by the Myanmar military.
Rather than independently investigating and addressing violations, MNHRC has failed to challenge the actions of the military junta or provide effective protection or access to justice to victims of serious violations, including arbitrary detention, torture, sexual violence, deaths in custody, enforced disappearances, massacres and airstrikes and ground attacks against civilians, including children.
Through its actions and omissions, MNHRC has contributed to efforts by the military junta to project an appearance of human rights oversight while failing to provide any accountability and protection for victims and survivors.
Increased public engagements cannot restore lost legitimacy
The undersigned organizations are further concerned that MNHRC has recently increased its public engagements and international outreach despite losing recognition within the international NHRI system.
Its reported engagements–including a meeting with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) on 17 July 2026 and with the Commissioner for Human Rights of the Russian Federation on 10 July–appear designed to increase its international visibility in the military junta’s post-sham-election rebrand in civilian disguise. However, public engagements cannot substitute for genuine independence, accountability, and compliance with the Paris Principles.
The Russian Commissioner for Human Rights has also faced serious scrutiny within the international NHRI community, including the removal of its accreditation following GANHRI-SCA findings concerning its compliance with the Paris Principles and its response to serious human rights violations in the context of Russia’s aggression against Ukraine.
SEANF members must ensure none of their engagements are used to normalize MNHRC’s role within regional and international human rights spaces without addressing the fundamental concerns that led to the removal of its accreditation and memberships.
SEANF must act to protect its integrity
Allowing MNHRC to assume the SEANF Chairship would cause a public outcry and severely damage the credibility and public trust required for the Forum to function effectively. Civil society organizations and human rights defenders cannot meaningfully engage with a regional mechanism that provides leadership to an institution acting as a smokescreen for a criminal military junta. This junta has been found by the international NHRI community to be non-compliant with the Paris Principles and has failed to protect the human rights of Myanmar’s peoples.
We therefore call upon SEANF members to prevent MNHRC from assuming the Chairship of SEANF in 2027 and to take immediate steps towards its formal removal from the Forum. SEANF must ensure that its membership and leadership positions are held only by institutions that demonstrate independence, credibility, and genuine commitment to human rights protection, while taking concrete measures to safeguard its integrity as a credible and effective regional platform for human rights cooperation and advancement.
For more information, please contact:
Signed by 146 civil society organizations, including one organization that has chosen not to disclose its name:
Myanmar military escalates civilian killings, monitor warns, amid diplomatic push
/in NewsBy Reuters
July 27 (Reuters) – Myanmar’s military has sharply escalated attacks on civilians since a new administration took office in the war-torn country, a conflict monitor said on Monday, even as regional governments ramp up diplomatic engagement.
The Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED) said the onslaught was a result of the tactics deployed by Myanmar’s new military chief who took over in late March as his predecessor prepared to become the country’s president.
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“Since the ruling junta in Myanmar reconfigured its military command structure in March, civilians have been subject to the military’s worsening repression and intensified aerial bombing campaign,” ACLED said.
“These adjustments included the regular deployment of specialised groups of two to five jet fighters executing sustained airstrikes against single targets.”
A Myanmar government spokesperson did not immediately respond to questions from Reuters.
ACLED gathers data on Myanmar’s ongoing conflict from media reports and local partners, as well as reports by the UN, international monitoring groups and local human rights organisations.
Myanmar was plunged into turmoil after the military ousted Aung San Suu Kyi‘s elected government in February 2021, sparking a civil war that has killed some 100,000 people and displaced millions.
Days before becoming president after an election that banned most opposition, Min Aung Hlaing appointed long-time loyalist and former spymaster Ye Win Oo as the military’s new commander-in-chief.
Under his command, the military has launched renewed offensives into several border regions, including a frontier area with critical rare earth deposits and other vital trade routes.
“Reprieve for civilians is unlikely as the junta focuses its efforts on consolidating control following coup leader Min Aung Hlaing’s transition from commander of the military to civilian president in April,” ACLED said.
https://www.reuters.com/graphics/MYANMAR-CONFLICT/klvyobgorvg/media-embed.html
MASS KILLINGS
During the first half of 2026, ACLED said it recorded more than a dozen mass killings, resulting in over 450 civilian fatalities, around 40% of them in Myanmar’s central dry zone known as the Anyar region.
In May, hundreds of junta troops swept through parts of Myit Chay township, across the river from the ancient temples of Bagan, killing at least 40 people, three residents of the area told Reuters.
“About 700 soldiers came into the town, grabbed the belongings of the people here and then beat them and killed them,” said Ye Naung, 35.
Reuters could not independently verify accounts of the incident at Myit Chay, which is part of ACLED’s event database with at least five fatalities and was reported by local media.
“The military’s tactics in 2026 so far show merely shifting modalities of civilian repression rather than any reduction in its severity,” ACLED said.
The political transition in Myanmar has triggered a flurry of diplomacy, with Min Aung Hlaing travelling to key neighbours India and China.
There has also been tentative re-engagement with the 11-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations bloc, which barred Myanmar’s ruling generals from its summits after the coup.
Min Aung Hlaing will make an official visit to Thailand on August 6 to 7, as he pushes for further legitimacy.
(This story has been refiled to add Reuters to the dateline)
Reporting by Reuters staff; Editing by Devjyot Ghoshal and Kate Mayberry
KWAT 2025 yearly activity report
/in ND-Burma Members' Reports“We are pleased to share with you KWAT’s 2025 Annual Report, which highlights our efforts to promote the rights, safety, and dignity of women and communities affected by conflict in Kachin and Northern Shan States.”
UN Special Envoy on Myanmar calls for release of Aung San Suu Kyi
/in NewsThe United Nations Special Envoy on Myanmar, Julie Bishop, delivered a scathing indictment of Myanmar over five years after the military coup on Feb. 1, 2021, to the U.N. General Assembly in New York City on June 19.
Bishop’s address at U.N. Headquarters coincided with the 81st birthday of jailed democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi. The former Australian Foreign Minister presented a grim report on the complete breakdown of the rule of law across regime-controlled Myanmar.
A grim list of international records
In her speech to U.N. member states, Bishop painted a picture of a collapsing nation where deep-seated instability has created a sprawling vacuum exploited by transnational criminal organizations.
Instead of a localized civil crisis, Bishop warned that the consequences are actively bleeding past Myanmar’s borders with devastating global implications. According to her findings, Myanmar is now setting global records for human suffering and criminality:
Exposing the 2025-26 ‘sham’ elections
The Special Envoy used her address to firmly dismiss Naypyidaw’s claims that a transition to civilian normalcy is underway. Bishop walked member states through the political maneuvering orchestrated over the last six months.
A three-phase general election concluded on Jan. 25, resulting in a predictable landslide victory for the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP)—the political proxy of the military.
When combined with the 25 per cent of parliamentary seats constitutionally locked for military appointees, Bishop noted the process further entrenched the military’s grip over the population rather than offering a path toward democracy.
Bishop clarified that the U.N. completely refused to support, fund, or observe the electoral process in Myanmar.
“Many on the ground described tight security, a reduced electorate, the exclusion of major political parties, low turnout, and polls conducted in the midst of an ongoing armed conflict,” Bishop reported.
“The overall outcome is viewed by Myanmar’s stakeholders as a consolidation of power for the military, not a transition to civilian government.”
Demanding ‘Proof of Life’ for Aung San Suu Kyi
Bishop addressed her fourth diplomatic mission to Myanmar, where she met with regime leader Min Aung Hlaing. She noted that while he sought goodwill through the recent release of President Win Myint, his continued isolation of other elected officials is unacceptable.
Focusing heavily on the 81st birthday of Aung San Suu Kyi, Bishop demanded that international actors stop engaging with the regime in Naypyidaw based strictly on economic self-interest while the country’s elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi is hidden from view.
“There have been no independent, verifiable reports of her circumstances for years. Today, on her 81st birthday, I urge others to join with me in calling for her release. In the eyes of many, there can be no progress to peace while ever State Counsellor Daw Suu is held prisoner.”
The UN vows to ‘stay and deliver’
Looking forward, Bishop emphasized the critical importance of regional cohesion, highlighting her ongoing collaboration with the 2026 Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) chair the Philippines’ Special Envoy Theresa Lazaro, and looking ahead to Singapore’s 2027 chairmanship.
Despite escalating hate speech against refugees, intense military operations, and the compounding structural trauma of the catastrophic 2025 Myanmar earthquake, Bishop concluded her briefing with a firm message that the international body would not withdraw its aid networks.
“The calls of the General Assembly and Security Council have been ignored,” Bishop stated. “But the United Nations, through its agencies, funds, and programs, will stay and deliver in Myanmar despite immense challenges. The international community must remain steadfast in solidarity with the people of Myanmar and be guided by their appeals for help.”
DVB News