War-torn Burma Votes in Broadly Condemned 'Sham' Election.

Myanmar is going to the polls in a vote widely dismissed as a sham, with key opposition groups banned, many of their leaders jailed and as much as half of the country unable to participate because of an continuing civil war.

A Phased Ballot Amid Conflict

The ruling junta is holding a phased ballot nearly five years after it seized power in a coup, which ignited massive protests and spiralled into a civil war.

Observers say the junta, with backing from Beijing, is seeking to legitimise and entrench its power as it looks for a way out of the costly stalemate.

"The environment does not allow for the practice of the rights of free speech, association or peaceful protest," the United Nations' top human rights official Volker Türk stated.

More than 200 people have been charged for disrupting or opposing the election under a new law which imposes harsh penalties, including the possibility of execution.

Film director Mike Tee, performer Kyaw Win Htut and comedian Ohn Daing were among the prominent figures convicted under the law, which was passed in July. They were each given a seven-year jail term after speaking out against a promotional video promoting the elections.

Immense Challenges and Coercion

Civilians are "being coerced from all sides," Mr Türk noted in a comment, pointing out that resistance forces have issued their own threats urging people to shun the polls.

The army has been fighting on multiple battlefields, against both pro-democracy fighters who reject the coup, as well as ethnic armies which have their own militias. It ceded territory of vast areas of the country in a series of major setbacks, but clawed back territory this year following sustained aerial bombardment made possible through support from China and Russia.

All of this and the fact that large parts of the country are still under opposition control presents a huge logistical challenge for conducting an election.

A Restricted Poll

Voting is set to take place in three phases over the next month in two hundred and seventy-four of the country's three hundred and thirty townships, with the remainder deemed too unstable. Outcomes are expected by late January.

There is unlikely to be any voting in as much as one half of the country. Even in the townships that are voting, some districts will go to the polls, making it difficult to forecast a likely turnout.

A handful of parties, including the junta-supported Union Solidarity and Development Party, are running nominees nationwide, while dozens more parties and non-aligned contenders will contest only at the state or regional levels.

Some 40 parties, including Aung San Suu Kyi's National League of Democracy, which scored landslide victories in 2015 and 2020, have been dissolved. Suu Kyi and many of the party's key leaders have been jailed under charges broadly viewed as politically motivated, while the rest are in exile.

Criticism and Rejection

"By splitting the vote into stages, the junta can change their approach if the results in the initial round do not go their way," commented Htin Kyaw Aye, a spokesman of the election-monitoring group Spring Sprouts.

Nations in the West, including the UK and the EU legislature, have rejected the vote as a sham, while neighbouring group Asean has urged political dialogue to come before any election.

The Burmese junta has rejected criticism of the polls, insisting that it aims to "return [the country] to a democracy with multiple parties".

"The election is being held for our nation. It is being held for the people of this country. It is not being held for the outside world," a junta spokesman stated at a briefing last week.

Military leader Min Aung Hlaing warned earlier this week that those who refuse to vote are turning their back on "progress toward democracy".