Tribune. Four months have passed since the military coup in Burma [Myanmar]. Four months of protests against the junta which overthrew a newly elected government. Four months of shooting at peaceful demonstrators. Four months of arbitrary arrests of civil servants, protest leaders and journalists.
In just four months, security forces have killed more than 800 people and detained thousands, some of whom have been enforced disappearances, increasing the risk of torture and summary executions.
At the same time, escalating fighting and heightened vulnerability in ethnic minority areas have forced at least 175,000 people to flee their homes. Across the country, media are closed and internet access is almost non-existent. Humanitarian conditions and food insecurity are worsening everywhere. The UN has warned that half of Burma’s population, or around 25 million people, could live below the national poverty line by early 2022.
Sanctions on the oil sector
President Emmanuel Macron’s response to this disaster has not yet matched the gravity of the situation. On June 11, the President of the Republic will travel to the United Kingdom to meet the other leaders of the G7. This must be an opportunity for him to be bold and to work more closely with the main governments for a more firm and robust international response to the serious crimes of the junta in Burma.
The United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada have already imposed a series of increasingly severe sanctions on the leaders of the junta and the companies they control, the main sources of revenue for the military. The European Union (EU) is also preparing a new set of sanctions which should be adopted on June 21 at the next European Union Foreign Affairs Council.
It is imperative that these sanctions target the revenues of the oil and gas sector in Burma and that France adopt a voluntarist and proactive approach to lead its European and international partners towards this urgent objective. Today, the United States and other key G7 partners are exploring possibilities to block the junta’s access to natural gas revenues, which are the military’s main source of foreign exchange (around $ 1 billion). dollars a year), money the military uses to buy weapons, pay for patronage networks, and maintain its grip on power.
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