The Search for Arakan's Security amidst Myanmar's Uncertain Future

The future of Myanmar remains largely uncertain. Having forcibly taken power from the elected government leaders in February 2021, the generals in Naypyidaw are now trying to have a so-called ‘general election’ in order, it seems, to manufacture ‘legitimacy’ under their rules. To back this up, the National League for Democracy (NLD) and key ethnic parties like the Shan Nationalities League for Democracy and Arakan National Party have been dissolved or excluded from standing. But even if elections are neither free and fair nor sensible and inclusive, there are observers who believe that actors in neighbouring countries could be ready to ‘recognize’ the validity of the polls. The whole world would like to see stability and political change in Myanmar.

This, however, is not the whole picture. Administering many parts of the country, there are key opposition and ethnic nationality organisations which have publicly stated that they will not support the December elections as, they argue, it is merely an attempt by the Myanmar military to continue in power by illegal and illegitimate means. Leading ethnic resistance movements include the Karen National Union, Kachin Independence Organisation, Palaung State Liberation Front, (Kokang) Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, Chin National Front, (external link)Karenni National Progressive Party, Shan State Progress Party and the United League of Arakan (ULA).

A similar stand is taken by the National Unity Government (NUG) which claims to be the legitimate government of the country – not the military State Administration Council (SAC: renamed in July as the State Security and Peace Commission [SSPC]). This anti-election view is supported by People’s Defence Forces (PDFs) that have been set up in many parts of the country in opposition to the 2021 coup. Meanwhile there are pro-junta proxies, notably in Karen State or the Pa-O National Organisation in Shan State, as well as groups standing by the 2015 Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement (NCA), such as the Arakan Liberation Party (ALP) and Democratic Karen Benevolent Army. These latter parties say that they will cooperate with the SAC-SSPC during the holding of the election.

Clearly, the political and security landscape is extremely complicated on the ground. This leads to the question whether – beyond the inter-party issues of opposition, cooperation and recognition – there is a more realistic likelihood that the elections will only bring more violence, especially against the civilian population. Unfortunately, the current situation warns of worrying trends in that direction. Such actions, it needs to be considered, can happen from more than one side. 

First, in the forefront of repression, the junta is using a combination of ‘legal’ warfare and military punishment to instigate violence against civilians. To support this tactic, the junta released a so-called ‘Law on the Protection of Multiparty Democratic Elections from Obstruction, Disruption and Destruction’ on 29 July this year. As of early October, the BBC Burmese Service reported that at least 64 civilians have been arrested under this law, facing imprisonment terms of between five and ten years.

Second, without any respect for human life and international humanitarian law, the junta has stepped up military assaults and air strikes, deliberately targeting urban, populated and civilian areas where opposition movements administer territory, especially in Chin, Kachin, Karen, Kayah (Karenni), northern Shan and Arakan (Rakhine) States and Sagaing Region. As a result, local peoples have become more vulnerable, with data confirming that the numbers of civilians killed by air strikes has increased proportionally across the country in recent months. These attacks appear to be systemic.

On 8 October, the UN Human Rights Office (OHCHR) detailed over 108 airstrikes in Sagaing Region alone during escalating attacks between March and May this year, killing 89 civilians. On a broader time and territorial scale, it was also reported that nearly half of verified civilian deaths in Shan State, Sagaing and Mandalay Regions between April 2024 and May 2025 occurred during aerial attacks that targeted civilian infrastructure and locations such as schools and markets. The OHCHR report said that these are potential war crimes. Other international human rights groups documented 1,134 airstrikes between January and May this year, as compared with totals of 197 in 2023 and 640 in 2024, with attacks currently increasing. Paramotors are also being deployed by the junta to avoid resistance defences, and the killing of more than 20 civilians at a Buddhist festival in the Sagaing Region on 7 October made headlines around the world.

Disturbingly, high numbers of civilian deaths are also being reported in similar attacks in other parts of the country. In Kayah (Karenni) State, which is majority Christian, near-daily airstrikes were reported in Hpasawng township during July and August, killing 33 civilians and injuring 94 in the first part of July with a further 32 civilians killed in the deadliest single strike on 17 August in Mawchi. These appeared to be deliberate terror attacks on mining towns and villages.

The same patterns have been reported in Arakan where Narinjara News recorded six major airstrikes between January and September, killing more than 100 civilians. Bombing was especially intense in Sittwe and Kyaukphyu townships during August and September, confirming the junta’s strategy of launching indiscriminate air strikes against civilian populations as the general election approaches. 

Finally, in understanding the context of violence before the polls, the opposition NUG as well as several other opposition movements have warned that politicians, administrators and officials who collaborate with junta bureaucracies face potential targeting in resistance actions against the polls. Already local incidents have been reported, including abductions and the threat of killings, in which anti-regime groups are involved. It is thus critical that the human rights of all people in Myanmar are protected and respected equally. As the election looms, civilians – wherever they live in the country – face ever more insecurity and violence during the junta’s attempt to rescue its failed ‘power grab’.

This then leads to the theme of this commentary. Myanmar is undoubtedly in the midst of one the most turbulent periods of conflict and state failure since independence in 1948. Generalisations, though, can be very difficult in a land of ethnic and cultural diversity. Since the coup, ethnic resistance and self-governance have deepened in many parts of the country in opposition to the junta. But this also raises challenges about political goals and the trajectory of these movements. 

As so often in the past, this is especially the case in Arakan (Rakhine State) where a fundamental question is frequently asked: will Arakan, a gateway land on Myanmar’s western frontier, have a different story to tell from the countrywide direction? Certainly, the past four years have seen dramatic and, in many respects, unprecedented change in reshaping the ethno-political landscape.