Coup Leader Woos Tourists; TV Censorship Revived; and More

Few regular folks would need to spend their trip in a risky nation routinely rocked by armed clashes and explosions. So when somebody begins touting the potential of the tourism business in such a spot, it might be smart to take their claims with a grain of salt.

Talking at an occasion to mark World Tourism Day on Tuesday, junta chief Min Aung Hlaing claimed that the home journey and inbound tour industries are creating in Myanmar. The Russian and Japanese ambassadors and the heads of the diplomatic missions of various different nations together with India attended the occasion.

Whereas the US authorities has hit Myanmar with its highest Stage 4 journey advisory—“Do Not Journey”—Russia, China, India and Thailand are growing their tourism cooperation with the regime.

After years of progress below the now ousted Nationwide League for Democracy authorities, Myanmar’s tourism business was battered by the COVID-19 pandemic. Within the wake of the navy coup and ensuing worldwide sanctions, it has collapsed virtually solely.

The navy regime, which is ravenous for arduous international foreign money, is determined to reopen the sector. Realizing that vacationers from Western nations is not going to come, it’s planning to launch direct flights to and from Moscow within the hope of attracting holidaymakers from its main arms provider, Russia. Additionally it is arranging Russian-language programs for resort and tourism workers, and vacationer police. On the similar time, regime-backed documentaries on Myanmar have been aired by a Thai military-owned broadcaster in a bid to draw vacationers from the neighboring nation.

Min Aung Hlaing could also be optimistic that tourism will develop additional within the upcoming dry season, nevertheless it is not going to be simple for the business, as the top of the wet season can also be anticipated to deliver an escalation in preventing between his junta and resistance forces.

Noose tightens on free speech

After revoking the licenses of a number of media shops and placing scores of journalists and dissidents behind bars over the previous yr, the navy regime apparently thinks its restrictions on freedom of speech nonetheless haven’t gone far sufficient.

At a gathering on Tuesday, the junta-controlled Data Ministry determined to impose pre-broadcast censorship on native and international tv serials. In keeping with the choice, the ministry will ban any content material it deems politically or religiously harmful, or that it believes undermines the tradition and nationwide solidarity or arouses sexual need.

That is indisputably a return to the draconian censorship exercised below earlier navy regimes, and in addition means the approaching demise of creative freedom in Myanmar.

On Tuesday, a regime-controlled courtroom sentenced outstanding “attractive mannequin” Nang Mwe San to 6 years in jail for “harming the tradition and dignity” of Myanmar. One other high mannequin, Thinzar Wint Kyaw, faces the identical cost.

Within the aftermath of the coup, the regime banned folks from utilizing satellite tv for pc dishes in an try to limit entry to protest-related information. It additionally ordered pay TV operators to take away information channels just like the BBC and CNN.

In the meantime, in a sign of the type of content material the regime deems acceptable, Min Aung Hlaing has resurrected the Myanmar Conventional Cultural Performing Arts competitors, which was first organized in the course of the period of former navy spy chief Khin Nyunt.

Resistance shrugs off Min Aung Hlaing’s threats

A day after junta chief Min Aung Hlaing warned of tit-for-tat reprisals for resistance assaults on the Myanmar navy and police drive, city guerilla fighters ambushed a car carrying political prisoners in Mandalay on Wednesday, as Min Aung Hlaing was visiting the town.

Regardless of the heavy safety presence as a result of junta boss being on the town, some prisoners managed to flee over the useless our bodies of two junta policemen.

And in Yangon, the place the regime has tightened safety following the assassination of former Brigadier-Common Ohn Thwin, who was a mentor of deputy junta chief Soe Win, resistance fighters attacked police stations in Pabedan and Mingalar Taung Nyunt townships on Thursday night time, inflicting casualties.

The junta chief’s barking doesn’t appear to be scaring anybody. If it did, he in all probability wouldn’t have discovered it obligatory lately to impose a nighttime curfew within the administrative capital, Naypyitaw, the place he lives. Many retired generals should have had sleepless nights this week after Brig-Gen Ohn Thwin was shot useless in his Yangon dwelling on Sept. 24.

India serving to junta with financial objectives

Within the newest signal of warming ties between India and the Myanmar junta, the world’s largest democracy helps regime chief Min Aung Hlaing’s ambitions come true.

The regime stated this week a delegation led by its Agriculture, Livestock and Irrigation Minister Tin Htut Oo visited the Indian Agricultural Analysis Institute, an affiliated group of the state-owned Nationwide Seed Company, to amass seeds of quite a lot of beans and pulses, together with inexperienced gram (mung beans), which regime chief Min Aung Hlaing seeks to export as a way of pulling Myanmar’s financial system out of its nosedive.

The delegation additionally met with representatives of the India Pulses and Grains Affiliation (IPGA) and the Abroad Agro Merchants Affiliation (OATA) to debate the addition of inexperienced gram to Myanmar’s bean and pulse export checklist, and to ask extra Indian funding in Myanmar. Additionally they met with different personal corporations to purchase seeds for cotton and sunflower, one other crop Min Aung Hlaing is pinning his hopes on to function an alternative to the nation’s edible oil imports.

Moreover, India continues to foster navy, diplomatic and electoral ties with the regime. Whereas Britain and Australia have downgraded their diplomatic missions in military-ruled Myanmar, Indian Ambassador Vinay Kumar offered his credentials to Min Aung Hlaing in April this yr. The envoy additionally mentioned additional cooperation with the junta’s electoral physique on the election the regime plans to carry subsequent yr. Each the UN and the US have warned that the ballot is not going to be free and truthful.