Myanmar is on the verge of collapse

Deep in south-east Asia sits a country where 54 million people are living a total nightmare. A nation that, benighted for decades, now faces a humanitarian catastrophe.

Myanmar – otherwise known as Burma – has been hit by a quadruple whammy: a military coup, a half-century long civil war reignited with a vengeance, economic collapse and coronavirus. It faces a dire humanitarian emergency fuelled by coup, collapse, civil war and Covid.

Since the coup on 1 February, over 900 people have been killed by the army and over 5,000 jailed. Hundreds of thousands have been displaced after the military unleashed an aerial bombardment on ethnic minorities on a scale not seen for years.

Activists are facing what the United Nations calls a ‘brute force terror campaign’, while children endure an onslaught that the UN Child Rights Committee (CRC) says risks leaving an entire generation damaged.

At least 75 children have been killed, 1,000 detained and countless more denied medical care.