Conflict-ravaged Myanmar Votes in Widely Criticised 'Sham' Election.

Myanmar is going to the polls in a vote broadly rejected as a farce, with major political parties dissolved, many of their leaders jailed and a significant portion of the country unlikely to vote because of an ongoing internal conflict.

A Staggered Vote Amid Conflict

The military government is conducting a phased ballot nearly five years after it took control in a coup, which sparked widespread opposition and escalated into a civil war.

Analysts note the military regime, with backing from Beijing, is attempting to validate and entrench its power as it looks for a way out of the costly stalemate.

"There are no conditions for the practice of the rights of freedom of expression, association or peaceful assembly," UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk stated.

More than 200 people have been prosecuted for interfering with or criticising 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 prison sentence of seven years after criticising a promotional video endorsing the elections.

Immense Challenges and Coercion

Civilians are "facing pressure from all sides," Mr Türk said in a statement, adding that resistance forces have issued their own threats urging people to boycott the polls.

The army has been fighting on multiple battlefields, against both armed resistance groups who reject the coup, as well as ethnic armed organisations which have their own militias. It ceded territory of large parts of the country in a series of major setbacks, but clawed back territory this year after 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 rebel administration presents a huge operational hurdle for conducting an election.

A Restricted Poll

Voting is set to take place in three rounds over the next month in two hundred and seventy-four of the country's 330 townships, with the rest deemed not secure enough. Results are expected around the end of January.

There is not expected to be any voting in up to fifty percent of the country. Even in the townships that are voting, not all constituencies will hold elections, making it difficult to forecast a likely turnout.

Six parties, including the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party, are running nominees nationwide, while dozens more parties and non-aligned contenders will contest only at the local levels.

Approximately forty groups, including Aung San Suu Kyi's National League of Democracy, which achieved decisive wins in 2015 and 2020, have been banned. Suu Kyi and many of the party's senior figures have been imprisoned under charges widely condemned as fabricated, while others are in exile.

Criticism and Rejection

"Through dividing the vote into stages, the authorities can change their approach if the outcomes in the initial round do not go their way," noted Htin Kyaw Aye, a representative of the election-monitoring group Spring Sprouts.

Western governments, including the UK and the EU legislature, have dismissed the vote as a pretence, while neighbouring group Asean has called for negotiations to precede any election.

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

"This vote is being held for our nation. It is being held for the people of this country. It is not being held for the international community," 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 rejecting "the path to democracy".