The European Union’s Special Representative for Human Rights Kajsa Ollongren said on Thursday that they would not send observers to an election in military-ruled Myanmar, as it was unlikely to result in a credible outcome, according to the Reuters news agency.
It follows Myanmar junta chief Min Aung Hlaing admitting on Wednesday that the military-backed administration will be unable to conduct an upcoming general election across the entire country, as a civil war triggered by a 2021 coup rages on.
Critics – including many Western nations – have described the election scheduled for late December as a sham exercise aimed at legitimizing the Myanmar junta’s rule after it overthrew a civilian democratic government in 2021.
“I would call them regime-sponsored elections. And if they’re regime-sponsored, they can only lead to one outcome,” Ollogren told reporters in Kuala Lumpur.
The remarks by Min Aung Hlaing were his first public admission that the polls cannot be fully inclusive.
“We can’t hold the election everywhere 100%,” Min Aung Hlaing said in a speech broadcast on state TV from the capital Naypyidaw on Wednesday, adding that by-elections would follow in some areas after a new government is formed.
Myanmar’s last multi-party elections were held on November 8, 2020, with Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD) party winning in a landslide victory. The results were not honored and a military coup took place in February 2021.
The military doesn’t control all of Myanmar. Vast swaths are administered by a range of armed militias, ethnic groups and pro-democracy fighters, some in open, armed conflict with the ruling junta.
The junta has invited ASEAN countries to send observers for the election, due to start on December 28 and to continue in phases into January.
With reporting by Reuters
