By Olivia Enos
(a policy analyst in
the Heritage Foundation’s Asian Studies Center. Hunter Marston is a
Washington-based Burma analyst who writes on U.S. foreign policy and Southeast
Asia.)
At the end of June,
authorities in Burma — including the country’s leader, Nobel laureate Aung San
Suu Kyi — denied United Nations investigators access to Rakhine state, where
the Burmese military is allegedly abusing the Muslim minority Rohingya. The
action placed Burma on a short list of nations that have denied U.N. access in
their countries. The list includes the unsavory regimes of North Korea,
Venezuela, Congo and Syria.
Aung San Suu Kyi’s
decision is a huge disappointment to U.S. policymakers who hoped that the
Obama-era velvet-glove approach to Burma (also known as Myanmar) would improve
conditions for the nation’s long-suffering people.
Under President
Barack Obama, policy regarding Burma changed dramatically. Long-standing
sanctions were loosened, and Washington offered technical assistance ahead of
national elections. Burma’s “opening” was hailed as proof that the new approach
had worked.
The rose-colored
view of Burma has continued in the Trump administration. The State Department
recently upgraded Burma’s rank in its Trafficking in Persons report and removed
the nation from its Child Soldier Prevention Act list. These diplomatic rewards
are, at present, unmerited.
Now comes the denial
of U.N. access, suggesting that the democratic transition in Burma has stalled,
at the very least. At worst, it has seriously deteriorated.
After multiparty
elections in 2015 brought Aung San Suu Kyi and the National League for
Democracy (NLD) to power, the international community hoped that Burma had
finally taken a turn for the better — one that put it on solid footing for
democratization. But elections alone do not a democracy make.
Burma’s
democratization did not begin with a solid foundation. While the Obama
administration described the 2015 elections as “credible, transparent, and
inclusive,” many observers disagreed. And certainly the elections were far from
being free and fair. All 1.3 million Rohingya – and hundreds of thousands of
others — were not allowed to vote.
The military retains
control over key government organs, the powerful Ministry of Home Affairs, the
Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of Border Affairs, as well as the
oft-overlooked General Administrative Department, which is responsible for
matters of sub-national governance. Active-duty military hold a quarter of all
parliamentary seats, effectively granting the army a veto over constitutional
amendments, which require a 75 percent vote of approval. If that weren’t
enough, the 2008 Constitution grants the commander in chief of the armed forces
the right to declare a state of national emergency and retake political power
whenever he deems it necessary to preserve national unity.
There are other
indications that Burma has strayed from a path toward democratization. Since
the election of the NLD, Aung San Suu Kyi has displayed strong authoritarian
tendencies and a willingness to acquiesce to the military’s demands that far
exceeds the call of duty in the Burmese political system. She has failed to
institute meaningful economic reform or substantive reform to political
institutions.
Nor has she been
able to muster the political clout necessary to arrange a cease-fire among the
nation’s disparate separatist and ethnic movements. Richard Weir from Human
Rights Watch believes that violence has actually risen since Aung San Suu Kyi’s
election.
While the
international community focuses largely (and rightly) on the plight of
Rohingya, Weir fears that other groups experiencing violence and oppression —
such as the Kachin and Shan in the north — are slipping off the radar. Weir’s
on-the-ground observations were recently corroborated by reports from the U.S.
Commission on International Religious Freedom that note rising violence against
the Christian minority Kachin.
Now Aung San Suu
Kyi’s denial of U.N. entry should be the straw that breaks the camel’s back.
Human rights groups and local media have reported a slew of abuses by security
forces across Rakhine state: the systemic use of rape as a weapon of war,
beatings and killings of civilians, and the widespread looting and destruction
of Rohingya homes.
Aung San Suu Kyi
faces a difficult political situation. A deep bias against ethnic Rohingya
(extending to Muslim believers in general) is rampant among the Burmese
majority. If she lets racial divisions foment social discord, she risks
provoking a military reaction — perhaps even an attempt by the generals to
return to power.
It is clear the NLD
would rather ignore the problem until tensions dissipate. On Monday, an NLD
spokesperson acknowledged that the ruling party had used the recent
international Rakhine state commission, chaired by former U.N. Secretary
General Kofi Annan, as a “shield” from political criticism.
While Aung San Suu
Kyi remains, for many, a powerful symbol of the struggle for democracy, the
time has come for stronger international pressure to condemn her moral
abstention regarding the abuse of her country’s ethnic minorities.
Burma’s democratic
transition is faltering. The Trump administration should respond by shoring up
and maintaining democracy programming in Burma. Moreover, it should press the
NLD government to begin to implement a path to recognize Rohingya as citizens.
Such actions would affirm the U.S. commitment to promote human rights and
freedom, not just in Burma but also throughout Southeast Asia.