Myanmar coup: Military receives new shipments of aviation fuel despite air strikes on civilians

The Myanmar military has reportedly been receiving new shipments of aviation fuel from companies despite the military’s use of the fuel to conduct air strikes on its own civilians. This follows last year’s investigation into the aviation fuel supply chain.

A report by rights groups Amnesty International, Global Witness, and Burma Campaign UK published on Wednesday found that the Myanmar military has been securing new shipments of aviation fuel from companies in Asia and Europe. The shipments of fuel come despite the Myanmar military’s repeated air strikes on its own civilians since the generals seized power in a coup in February 2021.

The rights groups said they had identified more companies that are involved in aviation fuel transactions. This follows the probe into the aviation fuel supply chain last year that found supplies for civilian aviation were being diverted to the military.

“We have traced new shipments of aviation fuel that have likely ended up in the hands of Myanmar’s military which has consistently conducted unlawful air strikes,” said Amnesty International’s researcher and adviser on business and human rights Montse Ferrer in a statement.

“Since the military’s coup in 2021, it has brutally suppressed its critics and attacked civilians on the ground and the air. Supplies of aviation fuel reaching the military enable these war crimes. These shipments must stop now.”

The United Nations said the Myanmar military carried out at least 670 air strikes in 2022, 12 times more than the 54 strikes conducted in 2021 in the early months of the coup. The UN said some of the strikes, including the raid on a school in the Sagaing region in September that killed around 11 children, amount to war crimes.

“We urge anyone involved in this trade to put people before profits and to cease supplying the fuel that facilitates these attacks,” Global Witness senior investigator Hanna Hindstrom said in a statement.

In February, the United States condemned the military’s arrest and detention of a Christian religious leader in the Kachin region. The former leader of the Kachin Baptist Convention, Reverend Hkalam Samson, was detained by junta authorities in December. Human Rights Watch said in February that Samson had a hearing on February 21 for counterterrorism charges pressed on him by the junta in a court inside the Myitkyina prison.