Myanmar - August 2025

Myanmar’s military junta announced it would hold a national election on 28 December 2025, the first since it seized power in a coup in February 2021. The move is part of the junta’s effort to legitimize its claim on power through what the United Nations, the National Unity Government, and other domestic and international observers agree is a sham election. Given the lack of international legitimacy and the limited control the junta exercises over the country, the impact on the country’s politics and security are highly unpredictable and potentially volatile. While the junta announced an end to the national state of emergency, which it had used to rule by emergency decree since the coup, it also announced 63 local states of emergency, and there are no public indications of a meaningful return to constitutional rule. An additional law passed on 30 July punishes any ‘disruption’ of the electoral process, broadly defined to include speech or distributing critical texts, with three to ten years imprisonment.

Sources: France24, The Diplomat (1), The Irrawaddy, British Broadcasting Corporation, The Diplomat (2), Associated Press