In June 2024 the former MCC Cambodia & Myanmar Peace Coordinator, Audrey Thill, published an article in Foreign Policy on How Myanmar’s Wood Funds Its Brutal Military. It’s a fantastic article pulling back the curtain on the illicit economy driving conflict and deforestation. The article is on Myanmar but also looks at similar issues in…
Tag: Myanmar
Podcast: Distributing aid in Myanmar at great risk
The MCC Relief, development and podcast recently hosted an interview with one of our partner staff in Myanmar. I’m sharing the podcast and transcript below. For security reasons our partner is not identified in the interview and the partner staff is going by Mr. Khong. It’s a wonderful opportunity to hear about the situation directly…
Myanmar: Saying No To War
In October, the Three Brotherhood Alliance – a partnership of three armed ethnic groups in the north – launched an offensive campaign against the military junta that lead the coup in February 2021 (and which, to varying degrees, has been the dominant force in the country since taking power through a coup in 1962). The…
Association of Southeast Asian Nations Summit
Last week Cambodia hosted the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) annual summit. Foreign ministries and leaders from around the world gathered to meet with Southeast Asian leaders in Phnom Penh. The heavy influx of motorcades brought traffic in the city to a standstill. Schools were already closed for the national holidays of Water Festival…
Update from Myanmar: April 2022
I wanted to share an update from a check-in earlier this week with one of our partners in Myanmar. I am not including our partner’s names for safety reasons and have removed any specific details that might identify them. I’m also not including the details of their current MCC project. I might share this in…
Myanmar: Give the LORD no rest
The situation in Myanmar is getting worse. Now the power cuts are extreme and people are surviving without electricity most of the time, setting alarms for when the electricity comes on so they can quickly cook their food and charge their phones. Food and basic commodities are more expensive. And Omicron is blazing through the…
Action Alert: Stand up against violence in Myanmar (Burma)
I wanted to share this action alert from the MCC advocacy office in Washington, DC. This line of advocacy is the one supported by our partners in Myanmar and, while the results are uncertain given Russian/Chinese support for the military coup, the fruit of witnessing for peace and justice often appears in unexpected ways. Please…
Winnie the Pooh and Milk Tea too
There’s a new Milk Tea shop near our house and I couldn’t help but notice that Winnie the Pooh is out promoting it. This might seem like the kind of innocuous copyright infringement that often occurs here but in Asia the combination of Winnie the Pooh and Milk Tea are actually a meaningful political statement….
Myanmar: Light in the Darkness
“I hate the military. They kill. They rape. They torture. But if they come to my house I will offer them something to eat. Not because I like them. But because we must have forgiveness in my country. There is no peace possible if we do not choose what is best for all of us,…
COVID-19: Myanmar Update
The situation in Myanmar is very sad and desperate. We had calls with our partners there last week and wanted to share their updates (with all identifying information removed). • People are dying everyday from COVID and numbers of cases and deaths are increasing at a rapid pace. (One partner Director) said that it is…