KEY TAKEAWAYS
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Three years into Myanmar’s Spring Revolution, the country’s humanitarian crisis is only worsening. The Myanmar military continues to compensate for territorial defeats by punishing the civilian population with air strikes and large-scale arson attacks.
The devastation is particularly dire in northwest Myanmar. According to the United Nations, half of Myanmar’s 3,136,000 internally displaced persons are in Chin State, Sagaing and Magway. Physical access is a consistent challenge, as the region is far removed from existing humanitarian operations which are primarily operating from the country’s southeast.
Recent victories by resistance forces, however, have left them in control of much of the border between India and Chin State, presenting new options for humanitarian operations on the India-Myanmar border. While this will require coordination among donors and a nuanced approach to internal politics within the resistance, the chance to address northwest Myanmar’s humanitarian crisis should not be missed.
[T] he chance to address northwest Myanmar’s humanitarian crisis should not be missed.
Since early in the post-coup conflict, Sagaing and Chin State have been the sites of mass atrocities. The Myanmar military has burned tens of thousands of homes and churches in Sagaing and torched the large town of Thantlang and many other areas of Chin State. Indiscriminate air strikes and shelling are de rigueur, displacing thousands of people into the jungles or across the border to India.
In November 2023, resistance forces in Chin State began an offensive that wrested control of the India-Myanmar border away from the Myanmar military. On November 13, the Chin National Front (CNF) and its allies captured Rikhawdar, a main border crossing connecting Chin State to Mizoram state in India. In the months since, they have also captured the northern town of Tonzang, while the Chin Brotherhood Alliance has taken the southern hub of Matupi.
In the same period, the Arakan Army (AA), one of the country’s most powerful ethnic armies, seized most of neighboring Rakhine state’s north and has made rapid gains in central and southern Rakhine as well. The AA went on to cement its control of Chin State’s southern Paletwa township, expelling the junta from the Kaladan river corridor and key roads from Lawngtlai district in Mizoram.
Taken together, Chin and Arakan forces have ended the Tatmadaw’s physical presence along much of Myanmar’s border with India, creating potential pathways for cross-border aid to reach isolated people in the war-torn northwest. U.N. agencies, international aid organizations or a consortium replicating that of the Thai-Myanmar border, could use this opening to reach the mass of displaced people in northwestern areas.
Thus far, the Indian government has not allowed any such presence, suspending the Free Movement Regime with Myanmar and proposing new fencing on its 1,000-mile border. New Delhi maintains ties with the junta while keeping resistance groups at an arm's length for reasons that encompass border security, domestic politics and geopolitical interests, though this may be shifting.
India has long relied on the Myanmar military to keep the border clear of anti-India insurgents and the drug trade, which is particularly important given the outbreak of ethnic violence in Manipur. India also relies on the junta to safeguard the Kaladan Multi-Modal Transit Project, a grand infrastructure link from Mizoram to the Indian Ocean via Myanmar. Finally, India may worry that breaking with the Myanmar military will cede control of Myanmar to China.
However, India’s reluctance to take an active role in Myanmar and build ties with the resistance has hampered its ability to shape events. The Myanmar military’s scorched earth warfare is creating chaos on the India border, forcing roughly 64,600 refugees into India; the vast majority have gone to Mizoram, which shares ethnic and cultural ties with the Chin people. While the state has welcomed the refugees, their limited resources are increasingly strained without access to outside assistance.
Elsewhere, the Myanmar military is no longer the border’s governing authority; by controlling Paletwa, the AA has become a key actor in completion of the Kaladan link. To preserve border stability and its geopolitical position, New Delhi should consider cultivating partners among anti-junta groups, much as China does on its own border.
There are some signs that New Delhi is reconsidering its stance. In January 2024, India’s Assam Rifles border guards were seen meeting with Chin resistance counterparts at Rikhawdar. On February 29, Mizoram’s sole member of Parliament in the Indian Upper House (Rajya Sabha), K. Vanlalvena, traveled 10 km into Paletwa to meet with the AA, who pledged cooperation on the Kaladan project.
India’s 2024 general election saw the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its allies lose all four of their Lok Sabha (Lower House) seats in the border states of Mizoram, Manipur and Nagaland, signaling dissatisfaction with how the government has handled ethnic and border issues. While observers expect foreign policy continuity from the BJP, regional parties such as Mizoram’s Zoram People’s Movement may now have even more leverage with the center.
Earlier in 2024, Mizoram’s Chief Minister Lalduhoma met with high-ranking Indian officials, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, to advocate for changes in border and refugee policy. Post-election, Lalduhoma met with External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar on June 21, invoking India’s “Act East” regional policy and “challenges on the border.” A meeting with Home Minister Amit Shah on the same day produced a promise of humanitarian assistance from the center for refugees in Mizoram. While the Indian government has not announced a reversal on the Free Movement Regime, border fencing in Mizoram is now looking less likely.
If India needs stable and competent partners to manage the India-Myanmar border, then new organizational efforts among the Chin should attract its attention.
If India needs stable and competent partners to manage the India-Myanmar border, then new organizational efforts among the Chin should attract its attention.
After the coup in 2021, the Chin formed dozens of Chinland Defense Forces (CDFs), corresponding roughly to Chin State’s distinct cultural and dialect groups. In December 2023, the CNF and its allied CDFs founded a Chinland Council to establish administrative authority over the entire state. This state-building project has progressed to the point of establishing a government, complete with a defense ministry, interim constitution, legislature and court system. An estimated 80% of Chin armed groups joined the effort.
On the ground, administration varies from one village to the next. The civilian wings of the many CDFs, which include former civil servants from the Civil Disobedience Movement, make up the actual governing presence in most places. One such example is CDF-Zophei, whose administrators recognize the Chinland Government and maintain hospitals and schools in Zophei-speaking areas.
In May 2024, the new Chinland Ministry of Defense launched its first official military action, successfully taking the northern town of Tonzang, a township administrative center. Soon afterwards, the CNF began highlighting anti-drug efforts in the area, possibly to demonstrate its effectiveness as a potential partner on border security.
In southern Chin State, Chin Brotherhood forces allied with the AA have set up their own parallel administrations in territory taken from the Myanmar military.
In all of these newly liberated areas, administrators must now tackle the challenge of rebuilding and providing for thousands of displaced people. Finding a way to work with these local authorities could lead to a more inclusive aid effort free of junta interference.
In March 2024, six months into the fiscal year, the U.S. Congress passed its final budget for FY 2024 with $121 million in funding for Myanmar-related programs.
Whereas appropriations in previous years had only mentioned Thailand, this year’s budget identified India as a potential conduit for a combined allocation of $75 million to “assistance and cross-border programs.” This represents an opportunity to reduce human suffering for refugees and displaced people on both sides of the India-Myanmar border.
As with most U.S. humanitarian aid to Myanmar, the United Nations, its implementing partners and other international humanitarian organizations would be the ideal partners for delivery. This will require the United States to invest time and effort in diplomacy with India to allow them access to the border area.
A first step could be for the Indian central government to heed the suggestion of Mizoram’s State government and populace and lead a refugee relief effort. The promise of government aid by Shah, India’s home minister, is a start, but lifting restrictions on the activities of U.N. agencies and international NGOs in Mizoram would catalyze the influx of even more substantial humanitarian aid.
The next step would be cross-border aid to reach the thousands of displaced people in Chin State and, eventually, those in Sagaing and Magway. Using the precedent of the Thai-Myanmar border, a consortium or similar system allowing NGOs to provide cross-border aid should be established. These middlemen could provide assistance to the region without jeopardizing the U.N.’s arrangements with the Myanmar military elsewhere.
The geography of the India-Myanmar border suggests the possibility of several humanitarian corridors.
The geography of the India-Myanmar border suggests the possibility of several humanitarian corridors: two through the town of Rikhawdar and Thantlang township, which are governed by the Chinland Council, one through AA-controlled Paletwa township and one leading to the Chin Brotherhood’s newly captured town of Matupi. Where territorial control overlaps, agreements to allocate aid on an equal basis could help rebuild trust between the different Chin groups, which are at odds over governing authority.
At a time when fighting is intensifying in Myanmar’s northwest, there is a lot that India and the United States can collaboratively do to alleviate human suffering and stem the damaging effects of the war, and potentially stem the destabilization of India’s northeast. Now that physical barriers to aid are vastly reduced, outside actors should begin building the infrastructure for a more robust major humanitarian operation.
Zo Tum Hmung is the executive director of the Chin Association of Maryland.
John Indergaard is the project and advocacy coordinator of the Chin Association of Maryland.