While the military ruler in Myanmar promises the population and the outside world a speedy recovery, the country is sliding into a humanitarian disaster.
The health system has collapsed, the government is not doing much, and the coronavirus is making more victims than ever, an NGO employee tells this news site. “If money is not pumped into agriculture soon, we will also have a famine here.”
The NGO employee does not want to be called by name for fear of reprisals. “Two friends of mine are already in jail for talking to foreign media,” he says over the phone from Yangon, the country’s largest city.
Myanmar has been in a political crisis since February. The army seized absolute power, pushed aside the civilian government and arrested government leader Aung San Suu Kyi and other prominent members of her NLD party for alleged electoral fraud.
Last Monday, the junta cancelled the results of the parliamentary elections because the polls were not “free and fair”.