Junta chief confirms plan for year-end elections

Myanmar’s junta chief said the country plans to hold elections in December and January, state media reported yesterday, pressing ahead with polls denounced as a sham by international monitors.

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The military deposed Myanmar’s civilian government in a 2021 coup which sparked a many-sided civil war, but has promoted its election plans as a pathway to peace. With members of the former government locked away, opposition groups set to boycott the vote and huge tracts of the country controlled by anti-junta rebels, observers say a fair poll is impossible.

State newspaper The Global New Light of Myanmar said junta chief Min Aung Hlaing, speaking at a conference in the capital Nay Pyi Taw on Wednesday, “pledged that the election will be held in December this year and January next year.”