Two years after the coup, women are defying the generals’ misogyny by overturning gender stereotypes and mounting political and armed resistance, writes Zoya Phan, Burma Campaign UK’s Campaigns Manager, for Chatham House.
Despite having killed at least 2,300 pro-democracy activists and arbitrarily detaining 16,000 more, the country’s military rulers, the Tatmadaw, are facing unprecedented resistance. Women are bearing the brunt of the military response in the country’s civil war – more than a million people have been displaced since February 2021, most of whom are women and children. Yet in the horrors of the past two years, on the political front and, to a certain extent, on the battlefield women have been playing a key role.
Donors must increase aid for the female civil society organizations that support Myanmar’s women – the people who have the most to gain from creating the just and equitable society that it is hoped will emerge from the conflict.