Five years after the Burma military coup: What is happening now?

This month marks five years since the military coup in Burma (also called Myanmar*). It’s a heavy milestone.

Today, the country faces intensifying conflict, mass displacement and widespread humanitarian need. As the military junta continues airstrikes on civilian areas, millions of people across Burma remain at risk.

Five years after the coup put an end to the country’s democratic transition, what is the situation in Burma?

Escalating humanitarian crisis in Burma

Though today the military junta controls only an estimated 21 per cent of the country’s territory, its atrocities and the knock-on effects of its brutality are vast. 

More than 5 million people have been displaced by the Burma civil war. Forced to flee their homes, some leave the country while others seek refuge where they can within its borders. About a quarter of the population faces acute food insecurity. Day to day, people are contending with forced conscription, mass arrests and persistent air and drone attacks on civilian areas—including hospitals, homes and schools.

“Within these five years, many civilians have lost their lives because of the military junta’s airstrikes,” says Zue Padonmar, a member of the interim government set up in Karenni State in the wake of the coup.

The interim state government brings together political parties, civil society organizations and others to address the state’s immediate needs, organize collective responses to the junta’s violence and plan for a democratic future. Inter Pares supports the Karenni State interim government through our long-term partnerships with local social justice organizations.

The military junta’s sham elections of 2025–2026

From December 2025 to January 2026, the junta held so-called elections, ostensibly to ease tensions in the country. But they were only held in military‑controlled areas and excluded major opposition parties.

These sham elections unfolded amid widespread violence. The military increased attacks on civilians as it tried to regain areas of the country in which to hold the elections. There were 408 documented military airstrikes during the voting period alone.

“Those holding the elections [commit] violence against civilians every day. They are holding elections and on the other side, many states they are bombing,” Zue told us in a recent conversation.

“The election is not legal and cannot solve the problems in Myanmar.”

Many countries, including Canada, condemned the elections.

Rohingya communities seek justice at the ICJ

The recent sham elections explicitly excluded Rohingya communities—along with displaced populations and minorities—from participation.

While this continues the long standing pattern of denying the Rohingya citizenship, voting rights and recognition, there has recently been a glimmer of hope for justice.

In January 2026, public hearings began in the genocide case brought by Gambia against Myanmar at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) over the military’s treatment of the Rohingya minority.

Members of the Rohingya community, themselves survivors of the military’s well-documented violence and oppression, testified before the court.

The Rohingya genocide case before the ICJ may set a historic precedent. The hope is that a favourable ruling will bind the country—once it is controlled by a civilian government—to uphold Rohingya rights and enable the full democratic participation of all Burma’s peoples.

Feminism and systemic change in Burma’s revolution

For many people in Burma, the revolution is about building a better future in the country: a federal democracy inclusive of Indigenous people**, women and more.

Women in Burma have been engaged in civil society for decades. Women’s leadership has become central to the democracy movement in Burma.

But after the coup, women’s participation increased, expanding into new revolutionary political and administrative spaces. Even as civil war rages and patriarchal values are still entrenched, people like Zue who are building new governance systems are working to ensure they’re more inclusive than the ones that came before.

“In this revolution, women’s responsibility is not only to destroy the military dictatorship and build a federal democracy… we have to abolish the patriarchal system,” Zue says.

For her, feminism is a core pillar of the revolution, not an add‑on.

“This revolution is not just regime change—it’s system change.”

* Why do some people say Burma instead of Myanmar?

In 1989, the military regime changed the country’s name from Burma to Myanmar. For decades, the democracy movement chose to use Burma as an act of resistance.

During the democratic period, many countries, including Canada, began using Myanmar. At Inter Pares, we continue to follow the lead of our partners who mostly refer to their country as Burma, while acknowledging the common use of Myanmar.

** Burma is an ethnically diverse nation. The dominant ethnicity is Burman, while most of the rest of the population identifies as being from an ethnic nationality—in short, they identify as ethnic. Many ethnic people and organizations identify as Indigenous, but the term has not yet gained widespread adoption across Burma.

At Inter Pares we use the term Indigenous when communicating with people in Canada about ethnic people from Burma, given its applicability and its ease in facilitating understanding of issues such as assimilation, oppression and self-determination.