Myanmar’s junta has announced it will implement a law requiring men aged 18 to 35 and women aged 18 to 27 to serve in the army for at least two years, as it struggles to quell armed resistance to its coup of 2021.
She decided “the entry into force of the law on popular military service from February 10, 2024”announced its information service by communicated. The law, dating from 2010 and the previous military power, had never been implemented.
The statement, published on Saturday February 10, did not provide further details, but said the defense ministry would “publish necessary regulations, procedures, orders, notifications and instructions”.
In conflict since the 2021 military putsch
The 2010 law, adopted in the midst of a state of emergency, provides that the duration of military service can be extended to five years and that people who ignore their summons can be imprisoned for an identical period.
Burma has been torn by violent conflict since the military putsch which overthrew leader Aung San Suu Kyi and ended a ten-year democratic parenthesis in 2021.
No peaceful outcome seems to be in sight while the fighting has caused, according to the UN, the displacement of more than 2 million civilians. The crackdown has left more than 4,400 dead, according to a local monitoring group.
The ruling generals decreed at the end of January the extension of the state of emergency for six months, de facto once again postponing the elections promised since the coup d’état of 1er February 2021.