What you should know about the Myanmar coup

On February 1st, Myanmar’s military launched a coup and seized control of the government, less than a decade after the nation began its transition to democracy.

Myanmar’s elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi was arrested, and other top figures from the ruling party were detained. Now, an outpouring of citizens has taken to the streets to protest the coup and demand that the civilian government be restored.

How did it get to this point?

Laura Edwards of the University of Pennsylvania Carey School of Law has previously worked as an independent legal consultant in Myanmar, where she consulted with organizations including the United Kingdom’s Department for International Development, the United Nations, the Asia Foundation, and local rule-of-law NGOs. She was also the first foreign legal consultant to be embedded within the civilian government’s National Reconciliation and Peace Center (NRPC) from 2017 to 2019.

The NPRC was the civilian-government entity responsible for administering the peace negotiations with Myanmar’s various ethnic armed organizations. Following the coup, the NRPC has been disbanded.

Here, Edwards explains the current situation in Myanmar, the escalating protests, and what the international community should do:

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