Myanmar

[tiggerblue10]

What is going on here? I'm not going to pretend I understand because I don't. All I know is that the leader was arrested and hasn't been seen for days or weeks and that the country now appears to be under a military dictatorship.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-55967959

[Prudie]

Yes it's quite complicated, a military coup and their leader missing but she has been in the news for years and is not quite the angel the West always thought she was. There is some major persecution of minorities in that country too. I'm only really commenting as when I was growing up it was called Burma (not Myanmar) and the major city called Rangoon (not Yangon).

[tiggerblue10]

The Rohingyan Muslims?

I remember Myanmar as Burma too.

[Prudie]

That's what I was thinking Tigger, we never really know what the truth is in some of these far flung places. From wiki about the Rohingya and the current missing leader
"The 2016 military crackdown on the Rohingya people drew criticism from the UN (which cited possible "crimes against humanity"), the human rights group Amnesty International, the U.S. Department of State, the government of neighbouring Bangladesh, and the government of Malaysia. The Burmese leader and State Counsellor (de facto head of government) and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi was criticised for her inaction and silence over the issue and did little to prevent military abuses. Myanmar also drew criticism for the prosecutions of journalists under her leadership."

They all seem corrupt to me.

[tiggerblue10]

Yes it does sound like all sides are corrupt and dangerous.

[emmie]

The Rohingya people ( / roʊˈhɪndʒə, - ɪn -, - ɪŋjə /) are a stateless Indo-Aryan ethnic group who predominantly follow Islam and reside in Rakhine State, Myanmar (previously known as Burma). Before the displacement crisis in 2017, when over 740,000 fled to Bangladesh, an estimated 1.4 million Rohingya lived in Myanmar.

[emmie]

corrupt mostly certainly, and she as pointed out is no saint, as oft portrayed.

[ichkeria]

...but a better bet than the army who have never really relinquished control.
Sadly persecution of minorities is a common theme in Asia. Even happy, peaceful, isolated and mysterious Bhutan has a similar stain on its history.

[Sunk]

Myanmar was British and gained Independence in 1948.
In 1962 there was a military coup which lasted until 2015.
In the 2015 elections Aung San Suu Kyi’s Party won. She had held by the military for years. They remained heavily involve in politics in the country and were still a threat in the background.
Last year they had their second elections. The military supported the far right opposition Party. They were well beaten, so the milirary have taken over again.

[jno]

Aung San Suu Kyi was only tolerated by the military as long as she kept her mouth shut; if she'd spoken out as people in free countries have been blithely demanding, she'd have been back under house arrest long ago.

[ichkeria]

There have been unexpectedly wide protests against the takeover although it’s debatable to what extent the military ever relinquished control in the first place. Probably just enough to make it remarkable that they seize it again

[tiggerblue10]

People from minority groups have a habit of disappearing in the Far East.

[fender62]

military supported by china..nothing new there.

[Sunk]

// military supported by china..nothing new there. //

Not so.
China tolerates them not supports them. In fact the Myanmar military are a bit of an irritation. China has not condemned the coup and block a UN resolution, but that is more about looking to gain from the chaos.

// China has invested billions of dollars in Myanmar mines, oil and gas pipelines and other infrastructure and is its biggest trading partner. But while China’s ruling Communist Party tends to favor fellow authoritarian regimes, it has had a fractious history with Myanmar’s military, sometimes related to its campaigns against ethnic Chinese minority groups and the drug trade along their long, mountainous border. //

[Peter Pedant]

despite her many faults
she was elected recently on 80% of the vote

and the Burmese are revolting on the straightforward grounds of
" we dont want another election: we have spoken clearly"

her more obvious faults are
that despite being a fave of the media,
she created two million refugees
which is kinda a lot - and then behaved as tho she kinda meant to all along

[douglas9401]

And she wears a flower in her hair.

What's not to love?

[Peter Pedant]

oh I love the bit about the rohingya being stateless
well they are now !

uprooting people and chucking them out was such a problem in 1945 that it is now specifially against international law

suu chi upped and defended the army's actions in an international court which caused the fluffy marxist tree hugging commentators to have convulsions

[Jackdaw33]

I suppose the one thing that can be said in favour of the military regime in Burma is that it does not routinely torture or execute its opponents.

[Peter Pedant]

yeah it does if your name is not au sang soo chi

[Sunk]

Congratulations PP on being 100% factually inaccurate.
Even for you, that is very impressive.
Go out and make a snowman to celebrate !

[jno]

I wouldn't say that, Jackdaw

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/18/tied-to-trees-and-raped-un-report-details-rohingya-horrors