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Aid needed for villagers displaced by clashes in northern Shan State

September 1, 2023/in News

Around 2,000 civilians are in need of food and accommodation after fleeing recent clashes between the military and the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) in northern Shan State, sources assisting the displaced communities said. The displaced civilians inhabited eight villages located in Muse and Kutkai townships, where fierce fighting between the Myanmar Army and TNLA–an […]

CIVIL SOCIETY STATEMENT ON THE VISIT OF HEAD OF OCHA TO MYANMAR

August 22, 2023/in Member statements, Press Releases and Statements

Civil society statement on the visit of Head of OCHA to Myanmar While noting efforts by UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Martin Griffiths, to negotiate humanitarian access across Myanmar, including to Rakhine State following deadly Cyclone Mocha, we, the undersigned 513 civil society organizations, are concerned that Mr. Griffiths’ visit lacked […]

Aid needed for villagers displaced by clashes in northern Shan State

September 1, 2023/in News

CIVIL SOCIETY STATEMENT ON THE VISIT OF HEAD OF OCHA TO MYANMAR

August 22, 2023/in Member statements, Press Releases and Statements

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Aid needed for villagers displaced by clashes in northern Shan State

September 1, 2023/in News

The displaced civilians inhabited eight villages located in Muse and Kutkai townships, where fierce fighting between the Myanmar Army and TNLA–an ethnic armed organisation–has been reported since Tuesday.

According to a statement issued by the TNLA, battles broke out in three places in the two townships on Tuesday alone, followed by junta airstrikes in retaliation for the assaults by the ethnic armed group.

The TNLA claimed that on that day, a column of around 100 junta soldiers belonging to Light Infantry Battalions (LIB) 420 and 417—part of the notorious Light Infantry Division (LID) 99—and members of the pro-junta Namhkam Myoma militia group approached Loi Tan Mein hill, where the TNLA has a base.

The junta’s advance set off fighting near the villages of Nar Htan and Seilant in Muse Township, the statement said.

As a diversion, TNLA members attacked other military units occupying the town of Muse in the morning and a base established inside Seilant in the evening, according to the group’s statement. Around 5:40pm on Tuesday, a junta jet carried out an airstrike, dropping eight bombs near the site of battle in Seilant, the TNLA said.

“We were fighting all night, till 1am this morning. I haven’t slept till now. We haven’t been able to seize their base yet,” a TNLA member involved in the battle told Myanmar Now on Wednesday.

At least ten houses were destroyed, and a man was injured by artillery shelling, the TNLA member said.

The military has been stationed in Seilant for about a month, during which TNLA forces have made repeated attempts to take over. Due to the fighting, all of Seilant’s civilian residents have fled the village and have been staying at temporary shelters in Muse as well as in nearby villages in Namkhan Township.

Community-based social welfare groups are assisting the displaced villagers at the temporary shelters. Volunteers told Myanmar Now they are in need of food supplies and other necessities.

“The number of displaced people is increasing, so there’s not enough rice, bedsheets, or blankets. They still need a lot of help,” said a volunteer who asked not to be named due to security concerns.

He added that the displaced villagers would not be able to return home as both army and anti-junta forces continued to carry out combat operations near Seilant.

There were additional reports of fighting between the TNLA and junta forces near the village of Hko Mone, Kutkai Township around 11am on Tuesday, which started when another junta column advanced into an area where the TNLA forces were active.

In response, TNLA forces attacked junta outposts in Nam Hpat Kar village north of Hko Mone around 6pm.

The junta forces continued their advance into Hko Mone the next day, fighting the TNLA at the same time. Shrapnel from an exploding shell killed a woman in Nam Hpat Kar on Wednesday, with the TNLA and the Myanmar army each assigning responsibility to the other for her death in public statements the next day.

According to TNLA spokespersons, a total of 21 battles with junta forces have been reported in the month of August.

Myanmar Now News

CIVIL SOCIETY STATEMENT ON THE VISIT OF HEAD OF OCHA TO MYANMAR

August 22, 2023/in Member statements, Press Releases and Statements

Civil society statement on the visit of Head of OCHA to Myanmar

While noting efforts by UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Martin Griffiths, to negotiate humanitarian access across Myanmar, including to Rakhine State following deadly Cyclone Mocha, we, the undersigned 513 civil society organizations, are concerned that Mr. Griffiths’ visit lacked substantive achievements and was used as propaganda by the military junta. We urge the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), to officially engage and partner with legitimate stakeholders of Myanmar and civil society service providers to deliver humanitarian assistance.

As Mr. Griffiths’ end-of-visit statement affirmed, “it is critical for us to have the humanitarian space we need for safe, sustained aid deliveries around the country.” Principled humanitarian engagement must see OCHA and other UN humanitarian agencies cut ties with the illegal criminal junta which is weaponizing aid and is the root cause of human suffering in Myanmar. Rather, OCHA must immediately partner with legitimate governance actors that control large parts of the country and deliver aid through local service providers. This includes Ethnic Revolutionary Organizations (EROs), the National Unity Government (NUG), and civil society organizations who have been effectively providing essential services on the ground, including through cross-border channels. Such stakeholders have the access, legitimacy, capacity and, most importantly, trust from the people that the junta simply lacks.

Given that the visit happened three months since Cyclone Mocha devastated communities in Chin and Rakhine States, Sagaing Region and beyond, the junta has proven to have no intention to address the acute needs of affected communities. Rather, OCHA visit has become the military junta’s latest propaganda exercise to attempt to gain international recognition and legitimacy. We are alarmed that OCHA’s statement omits the fact that the cause of the escalating humanitarian crisis is the junta’s violence and atrocities, or that it is the junta’s weaponization of humanitarian assistance that is blocking access to Cyclone Mocha’s victims.

While the junta has restricted humanitarian access and prevented aid from reaching vulnerable communities affected by the natural disaster, it is also the perpetrators of a nationwide man-made humanitarian catastrophe. Its widespread and systematic campaign of arson, military offensives, extrajudicial killings, and aerial attacks on civilians are, according to the Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar, strong evidence of “increasingly frequent and brazen war crimes.” In addition to these heinous crimes, severe restrictions of humanitarian aid delivery, including targeting aid workers, are the junta’s collective punishment of a population that is rejecting its ongoing brutal attempt to grab power. In his recent report to the 53rd Session of the Human Rights Council, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, outlines how “As part of its attempts to assert control, the military has imposed a range of legal, financial, and bureaucratic requirements on civil society and humanitarian activity that have severely reduced civic space and delivery of life-saving assistance.”

We further note OCHA’s recognition of the Myanmar military’s unconstitutional body of the “State Administration Council” in its statementwhich is inconsistent with the language used by the UN Security Council and UN General Assembly in their resolutions. It also legitimizes Min Aung Hlaing’s claim to be head of government by referring to him as the Chairman of the State Administration Council. We express serious concerns that OCHA’s current approach will embolden the junta to further its war of terror across the nation. Such actions risk exacerbating the humanitarian crisis, the very crisis OCHA is mandated to address and alleviate.

Despite the junta attempting to gain diplomatic legitimacy over this type of visit, OCHA must ensure substantial benefits are provided for the millions of people in dire need of humanitarian assistance as a result of the junta’s violence and atrocities. Access for OCHA staff to parts of Rakhine State and nearby areas is one issue at stake, but so is the hundreds of thousands of internally displaced persons in central, southeast and northwest Myanmar, where the junta is launching non-stop deliberate attacks on civilians. In these areas, the junta does not have effective control and cannot grant access to affected communities. On the contrary, local governance and civil society actors have been effectively delivering assistance to affected communities, but must be supported by more resources.

OCHA must reflect on its current failed approach and take critical, concrete actions which truly serve Myanmar communities that are in dire need. To fulfill its mandate and principles to do no harm, OCHA must immediately pivot to delivering aid in collaboration or partnership with local humanitarian and civil society groups, ethnic service providers, diaspora communities, local administration forces of the Spring Revolution, members of the Civil Disobedience Movement, EROs, and the NUG who have been effectively providing life-saving services on the ground, including through cross-border channels.

The Myanmar military has a long history of weaponizing humanitarian aid and UN agencies have a long history of being criticized for complicity in military atrocities, all done in the name of access. OCHA can no longer afford to rehash failed models of humanitarianism, and thus tacitly giving credence and status to the illegal military junta. Rather, OCHA must be innovative and supportive of local service providers, as well as engage and collaborate with the legitimate stakeholders of Myanmar. This will ensure the most effective and widespread delivery of humanitarian assistance to affected communities suffering from international crimes committed by a brutal military junta.

or more information, please contact:

Khin Ohmar, Progressive Voice, info@progressive-voice.org
Maw Pray Myar, Karenni National Women’s Organization, praymyarmaw@gmail.com
Nai Aue Mon, Human Rights Foundation of Monland, auemon@rehmonnya.org
Naw Wahku Shee, Karen Peace Support Network, wahku80@gmail.com
Salai Za Uk Ling, Chin Human Rights Organization, zauk@chinhumanrights.org

Signed by 513 Myanmar, regional and international organizations including 260 organizations who have chosen to not disclose their name:

5/ of Zaya State Strike
8888 Generation (New Zealand)
Action Against Myanmar Military Coup (AAMMC)
Action Committee for Democracy Development (Coalition of 14 grassroots networks)
Action Committee of Basic Education Students
Active Youths Kalaymyo
Ah Nah Podcast – Conversation with Myanmar
All Aung Myay Thar San Schools Strike Force
All Burma Democratic Front in New Zealand
All Burma Indigenous People Alliance (ABIPA)
All Burma Student Democratic Front (ABSDF) – Australia Branch
All Young Burmese League (AYBL)
Alliance of Students’ Union – Yangon (ASU-Yangon)
ALTSEAN-Burma
Anti Dictatorship in Burma – DC Metropolitan Area
Anti-coup Forces Coordination Committee (ACFCC -Mandalay)
Anti – Junta Alliance Yangon – AJAY
Anti – Myanmar Military Dictatorship Network (Australia)
ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights (APHR)
Asia Pacific Solidarity Coalition (APSOC)
Asian Cultural Forum on Development (ACFOD)
Association of Human Rights Defenders and Promoters
Association Suisse-Birmanie
Associazione per l’Amicizia Italia Birmania “Giuseppe Malpeli”
Athan – Freedom of Expression Activist Organization
Auckland Kachin Community NZ
Auckland Zomi Community
Aung San Suu Kyi Park Norway
Australian Karen Organisation (AKO)
A-Yar -Taw People Strike
Ayeyarwaddy West Development Organisation AWDO (Magway)
Ayeyarwaddy West Development Organisation AWDO (Nagphe)
Back Pack Health Worker Team
Better Burma
Blood Money Campaign
Blooming Padauk
Boat People SOS
Burma Action Ireland
Burma Advocacy Group
Burma Campaign UK
Burma Civil War Museum (BCM)
Burma Lawyer Council (BLC)
Burma Medical Association
Burma Support
Burmese Canadian Network
Burmese Community Development Collaboration (BCDC)
Burmese Community Group (Manawatu, NZ)
Burmese Community Support Group (BCSG)
Burmese Medical Association Australia (BMAA)
Burmese Rohingya Welfare Organisation New Zealand
Burmese Women’s Union
CAN – Myanmar
CDM Medical Network (CDMMN)
CDM Support Organisation Mae Sot
Center For Action Point (CAP)
Chaung Oo Township Youth Strike Committee
Chin Community in Norway
Chin Community of Auckland
Chin Human Rights Organization
Civil Information Network (CIN)
Coalition for Democracy
Coalition Strike Committee – Dawei
Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (KontraS)
Community Association Development
Creative Home
CRPH & NUG Supporters Ireland
CRPH Funding Ireland
CRPH Support Group
CRPH, NUG Support Team Germany – Deutschland
Dahnu Youth Organization
Dawei Youths Revolutionary Movement Strike Committee
Democracy for Ethnic Minorities Organization
Democracy, Peace and Women’s Organization
Democratic Party for a New Society, Norway
Democratic Youth Council
Depayin Township Revolution Steering Committee
Doh Atu – Ensemble pour le Myanmar (France)
Earthrights International
Educational Initiatives Prague
Equality Myanmar
Ethnic Youth General Strike Committee (Mandalay)
Federal Corner
Federal Myanmar Benevolence Group (NZ)
Feminist Equality Justice and Peace (Myanmar)
Finland Myanmar Society Ry
Food Not Bombs
Free Burma Campaign (South Africa) (FBC(SA)
Free Rohingya Coalition
Freedom and Labor Action Group (FLAG)
Future Light Center
Future Thanlwin
Gender Equality Network
General Strike Collaboration Committee (GSCC)
General Strike Committee of Basic and Higher Education

Basic Education Worker Unions – Steering Committee
Representative Committee of University Teacher Associations
Basic Education General Strike Committee

General Strikes Committee of Nationalities – GSCN
Generation Wave
Global Movement for Myanmar Democracy (GM4MD)
Global Myanmar Spring Revolution
Global Myanmar Spring Revolution (Japan)
Global Myanmar Spring Revolution (Korea)
Grass-root People
Human Rights Educators Network
Human Rights Foundation of Monland
Industrial Training Centre (ITC) Family Sydney
Info Birmanie
Initiatives for International Dialogue
Insight Myanmar Podcast
Institute for Asian Democracy
Integria, z.u.
International Association, Myanmar – Switzerland (IAMS)
JMC Inn Lay
Justice For Myanmar
Kachin Association Australia (KAA)
Kachin Association Norway
Kachin Student Union
Kachin Women’s Association Thailand (KWAT)
Kalay Township Strike Force
Kanpetlat Land Development Association
Karen Environment and Social Action Network
Karen Human Rights Group
Karen Office Relief Development (KORD)
Karen Peace Support Network (KPSN)
Karen Swedish Community (KSC)
Karen Women’s Organization (KWO)
Karenni Association – Norway
Karenni Civil Society Network
Karenni National Women’s Organization (KNWO)
Karenni Society New Zealand
Kayan Women’s Organization (KyWO)
K’cho Ethnic Association
Keng Tung Youth
Kyain Seikgyi Spring Revolution Leading Committee
La Communauté Birmane de France
Latpadaung Region Strike Committee
Legal Aid for Human Rights
Let’s Help Each Other
LGBT Alliance
LGBT Community Yangon
LGBT Alliance Myanmar (Kalay Region)
LGBT Alliance Myanmar (Kyaukse Region)
LGBT Union – Mandalay
Monywa LGBT Strike
MAGGA Initiative
Magway People’s Revolution Committee
Mandalay-Based University Students’ Unions
Mandalay Medical Family (MFM)
Mandalay Regional Youth Association Revolution Core Group
Mandalay Strike Force (MSF)
Chanmyatharzi Township People’s Strike
Co-operative University Mandalay Students’ Strike
Daung Sitthe Strike
Industries Strike
Maharaungmyay Township People’s Strike
Mandalay-based People’s Strike
Mandalay Alliance Coalition Strike
Mandalar University Students’ Strike
Mandalay Youth Strike
Multi-Religions Strike
Mya Taung Strike
Myanmar Institute of Information Technology Students’ Strike
No.12 Basic Education Branch High School (Maharaungmyay) Students’ Union
Samgha Sammaga – Mandalay
Seinpann Strike
Matu Chin Community – NSW/UPU Chin Association
MayMyo Strike Force
Metta Campaign Mandalay
Min Hla farmers Group
Minbu farmers Group
Mindat Chin Community NSW
Mon National Council (MNC)
Monywa-Amyint Road Strike Leading Committee
Monywa People’s Strike Steering Committee
All Burma Federation of Student Unions (Monywa District)
Civil Society Organizations Coordination Committee (Monywa)
Former Political Prisoners and New Generation Group – Monywa
National League for Democracy (Monywa Township)
Network of University Student Unions – Monywa
Thakhin Kodaw Mhine Peace Network (Monywa)
The 88 Generation Peace and Open Society (Monywa)
Myanmar Accountability Project
Myanmar Action Group Denmark
Myanmar anti-military coup movement in New Zealand
Myanmar Campaign Network
Myanmar Catholic Community In Norway
Myanmar Community Coffs Harbour (MCC)
Myanmar Community Group Christchurch New Zealand
Myanmar Community Group Dunedin New Zealand
Myanmar Community in Norway
Myanmar Cultural Research Society (MCRS)
Myanmar Democratic Force in Denmark
Myanmar Diaspora Group Finland
Myanmar Engineers – New Zealand
Myanmar Gonye (New Zealand)
Myanmar Hindu Community – Norway
Myanmar Labor Alliance (MLA)
Myanmar People Alliance (Shan State)
Myanmar Students’ Union in New Zealand
Myanmar Teachers’ Federation
Myaung Education Network
Myaung Medical Team
Myaung Youth Network
Myingyan Civilian Movement Committee
Nelson Myanmar Community Group New Zealand
Network for Human Rights Documentation Burma (ND-Burma)
New Zealand Doctors for NUG
New Zealand Karen Association
New Zealand Zo Community Inc.
NLD Organization Committee (International) Norway
NLD Solidarity Association (NSW Chapter)
Norway Falam Community
Norway Matu Community
Norway Rvwang Community
NSW Karenni (Kayah) Communities
Nyan Lynn Thit Analytica
Olive Organization
Open Development Foundation
Overseas Mon Association. New Zealand
Padauk Finland – Myanmar Association
Pale Township People’s Strike Steering Committee
ParChan River Conservation and Development
PFLAG – Myanmar
Pwintphyu Development Organisation
Pyi Gyi Tagon Strike Force
Pyithu Gonye (New Zealand)
Rohingya Community in Norway
Rural Community Development Society
Rvwang Community Association New Zealand
Save and Care Organization for Women at Border Areas
Save Myanmar – USA
Save Myanmar Fundraising Group (New Zealand)
Shan Community (New Zealand)
Shan MATA
Shwe Pan Kone People`s Strike Steering Committee
Social Garden
Southern Dragon Myanmar
Southern Youth Development Organization
Spring Friends
Spring Traveller
Student Voice
Sydney Friends For Myanmar Unity
Synergy – Social Harmony Organization
Ta Mar Institute of Development
Ta’ang Women’s Organization (TWO)
Tanintharyi MATA
Taze Strike Committee
Thai Action Committee for Democracy in Burma (TACDB)
The Ladies
The Mindanao Peacebuilding Institute Foundation, Inc. (MPI)
TRF – Myanmar
TRIPNET
Twel Let Myar
Twitter Team for Revolution
S. Campaign for Burma (USCB)
Unitarian Universalist Service Committee (UUSC)
University Students’ Unions Alumni Force
We Pledge CDM (Australia)
Wetlet Revolution Leading Committee
White Coat Society Yangon (WCSY)
Women Activists Myanmar
Women Advocacy Coalition
Women Alliance Burma (WAB)
Chindwin (West) Villages Women Strike
Dawei ( Ashaetaw) Women Strike
Depayin Women Strike
Gangaw Women Strike
Kalay Women Strike
Mandalay Women Strike
Monywa-Amyint Road Women Strike
Monywa Women Strike
Taze Women Strike
Thayat Chaung Women Strike
Wetlet Township Women Strike
Yangon Women Strike
Download PDF.

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Civil society statement on the visit of Head of OCHA to Myanmar

ND Burma

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