Please don't turn away from Myanmar

As the conflict in Myanmar stretches on, an unfortunate development has taken shape: while the atrocities committed by the military continue to climb, the continued support and attention from the international community has ultimately come to dwindle. This is certainly something we’ve seen in our own donation fund at Better Burma, which has largely gone dry, causing us to inform past recipients we have minimal means left to support them.

And while the attention towards the conflict has diminished, this does not mean the conflict itself has stabilized. Far from it! It actually may be argued that the decreased attention has encouraged the military to win this conflict by whatever means necessary, as they can be more confident they are now acting in darkness.

One certainly understands the difficulty of remaining alert and engaged for so long, and admittedly with still no end in sight. That being said, it is this very disinterest that the Tatmadaw was counting on from the start. Examining the recent history will tell us all we need to know. When the military engaged in one sort of atrocity or human rights violation, they always managed to absorb the burnt of the immediate international condemnation, knowing that after several weeks or months, these same actors would become distracted and the Tatmadaw could continue to act with impunity.

This current crisis brought on a different storyline, however. Thanks largely to the use of internet and social media, and Generation Z’s fervent determination to end the reign of this mafia terrorist organization controlling the country, their story of resistance managed to keep at least part of the world’s attention far longer than has been seen in recent conflicts.

Yet now nearing a year and half since the attempted coup, aid workers and activists everywhere have been reporting a kind of fatigue and disengagement. That this is happening as the military, becoming increasingly desperate and lacking what little restraint they had in earlier days, is exacting a terrible human toll by mercilessly launching airstrikes, burning villages, and targeting IDP camps, all while continuing to rape, torture, abduct, and kill in ever higher numbers.

We are tremendously grateful to all past donors for your extraordinary generosity in allowing us to support so many thousands of people since the coup who had nowhere else to turn. And we ask you to please not turn away now! Please help us to stay the course, standing by the Burmese people in their quest for freedom and democracy. Please consider contributing what you can to keep our mission alive.