 Good morning. My name is Lise Grande and I'm the head of the United States Institute of Peace which was established by the US Congress in 1984 as a national nonpartisan public institution dedicated to helping prevent, mitigate and resolve violent conflict abroad. USIP is very pleased to welcome everyone to today's important discussion on peace and democracy in Myanmar. It is an honor to host this side event during this year's Summit for Democracy in partnership with the Global Democracy Coalition. We are particularly pleased to welcome Erin Barkley, who serves as the acting assistant secretary in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor and as the coordinator for global democratic renewal at the US Department of State. It is an honor to welcome Mo Zhao Wu, the Deputy Foreign Minister of the National Unity Government of Myanmar, Ambassador Scott Marcial, Joanne Kwao of IRI and Christina Fink from George Washington University. The cause of global democracy was dramatically set back in 2021 when Myanmar's military overthrew the country's democratically elected government. Overnight, the gains achieved by Burmese citizens and communities during the unprecedented decade-long expansion of democratic freedom were brutally torn away. Burmese have fought back, staging widespread nonviolent protests in the days following the coup and supporting the resistance movements that have reemerged across the country. The military has responded with extraordinary repression, and yet Burmese are uniting around the singular goal of overthrowing the coup to establish a federal democracy. Today's discussion is an opportunity for us to learn from the leaders of the pro-democracy movement and discuss the role of the international community in bringing an end to the violent conflict and our role in supporting the building of a democratic and peaceful Myanmar. Erin, allow me to hand the floor over to you. Thank you so much, Liz, and thank you for welcoming me here today. I want to thank USIP for hosting this panel and bringing together such a distinguished group of participants to discuss the urgent crisis in Burma and the critical role of democracy in shaping a peaceful and just future for the country. As next week's Summit for Democracy makes clear, democracy is and remains the best vehicle for fully realizing our human potential and improving people's lives in tangible ways. We will continue to champion it around the world. Nowhere is this cause more important than in Burma. It is my distinct honor to speak with you about the US government's policy to addressing the worsening crisis in Burma and the concrete actions we have taken to support the people of Burma in this time of crisis. First, let me emphasize that despite international condemnation and calls to end the violence, the regime has only escalated its brutality against those who aspire for an inclusive federal democracy. The regime has carried out executions of pro-democracy activists, political leaders, it has conducted airstrikes against schools, concerts and places of worship, and killed scores of women, men and children using an array of weapons. Tragically, the March 11th massacre of at least 28 people sheltering in a monastery in Sean State is only the most recent example of the regime's brutality. The regime has thrown thousands of peaceful protesters in jail and torched entire villages, leaving 50,000 homes in ruin and nearly 1.4 million people internally displaced since the coup. There are reports that the regime has also engaged in torture and horrific sexual violence against people across Burma. The regime's scorched earth tactics have provoked a catastrophic armed conflict and thrown the economy further into disarray. We now face the specter of a multi-sided civil war in the heart of Southeast Asia. The people of Burma have made clear they do not want to spend another day under a military dictatorship. The United States will continue to support them and all of those working for peace and a future inclusive democratic Burma. I want to take a moment to highlight the impressive and unprecedented collaboration among Burma's many pro-democracy elements. The National Unity Government, the National Unity Consultative Council, the Committee representing the Union Parliament, ethnic organizations, religious organizations, and civil society. And I greatly appreciate the attendance of representatives from some of those groups with us today. A genuine democratic Burma cannot exist without the involvement and contributions of all of Burma's various ethnic groups, including Rohingya. This leads me to the various lines of effort the U.S. government is pursuing to support inclusive democracy in Burma and a peaceful resolution to this crisis. First, we are stepping up economic and political pressure on the regime to promote accountability for its atrocities and to push the military to the negotiating table. To mark two years since the coup, we rolled out a new round of targeted sanctions on January 31 in lockstep with our partners from Australia, the United Kingdom, and Canada to impose greater costs on the regime. The sanctions targeted six individuals and three entities linked to the regime's revenue streams, including the senior leadership of Miana Oil and Gas Enterprise, arms dealers, regime leader family members, and their business associates. We also sanctioned the Union Election Commission, which the regime has manipulated in advance of its flawed election goals. To date, we have sanctioned a total of 80 individuals and 32 entities to deprive the regime of the means to perpetuate its violence. Diplomacy is also key to isolating the regime and denying it international credibility. Last December, the United States joined our partners, the United Nations Security Council, to pass a resolution calling on the regime to cease the violence and uphold human rights. In the coming months, we will continue to urge Burma's neighbors to use their channels with the regime to persuade the regime to change course. And we are using all diplomatic tools available to engage with our partners in ASEAN, including to support their efforts to urge the regime to implement the five-point consensus. We applaud ASEAN's downgrading of Burma's participation in its most senior meetings, and we welcome ASEAN Chair Indonesia's leadership in establishing the ASEAN Special Envoy Office on Myanmar. The United States looks forward to working closely with Indonesia this year to make progress in resolving the crisis. Second, we remain intensely focused on facilitating unhindered humanitarian access. We are redoubling our efforts to ease the suffering of those afflicted by the worsening humanitarian crisis, which is spilling across borders into the entire region. Immediately after the February 2021 military coup, we redirected over $40 million away from programs benefiting the government to support programs benefiting civil society and the people themselves. Since then, the United States has become the largest single country donor addressing the crisis in Burma, providing nearly $1 billion in life-saving humanitarian assistance for vulnerable communities in Burma, and those who have sought refuge in neighboring countries. We also remain focused on addressing the acute hardship of displaced Rohingya refugees who remain unable to safely return to their homeland, as well as those in Rakhine State who continue to suffer from the military's repression. Since 2017, the United States has provided nearly $2.1 billion U.S. dollars to assist those affected by the crisis in Burma, Bangladesh, and elsewhere in the region. This includes the March 8th announcement of nearly $26 million U.S. dollars in additional funding for Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh and other communities hosting refugees from Burma. We continue to work with the Bangladesh government and other Rohingya hosting governments to improve the conditions in camps for the displaced. We are also working to significantly increase resettlement of Rohingya refugees from the region, including from Bangladesh, so that they can rebuild their lives in the United States. Finally, we are also engaged in clear, meaningful dialogue with Burma's pro-democracy movement. This engagement acknowledges the will of the people of Burma, and not the will of a handful of military leaders and those who benefit from them. This line of effort is particularly important considering the regime's plan to hold sham elections. Any election without the participation of Burma's people, including the national unity government, religious groups, would represent a naked attempt by the regime to cling to power. We are also urging all partners, including in the region, to refrain from endorsing regime-led elections. With so many figures, political figures still imprisoned, we also fear that regime-led elections would only further inflame instability in Burma in the region. Authoritarianism under the guise of, quote, democracy only leads to more instability. This means engaging in dialogue with and elevating the profile of key pro-democracy actors in Burma as they work for a future democratic Burma. Under Secretary Zeya and Assistant Secretary Clinton visited the national unity government offices in Washington this month, and these are recent examples of this effort. They were able to speak with pro-democracy leaders as well as representatives from ethnic communities and religious actors about their efforts to build bridges across Burma's historically deep-seated ethnic, religious, and social divisions. My colleagues and I learned about their efforts to engender cohesion, unity, and a shared vision for an inclusive federal democracy in Burma, and a roadmap for achieving it. We also stress the importance of protecting the rights of Rohingya and other ethnic and religious minority groups in Burma. We recognize much work remains to be done. We welcome the U.S. Congress's Landmark Burma Act, which has given the U.S. government new authorities and tools to expand our support to those striving for democracy in Burma. We will continue to explore a range of options to provide assistance to the pro-democracy movement. We regularly press our partners to follow our lead as we seek to deepen our support. And we're looking forward to working with many of you gathered here, as well as with Congress, in implementing some of these new authorities in the coming year. But let me be clear, these efforts are still not enough. Over 17 million people in Burma are currently in need of humanitarian assistance. The military's bloodshed continues to destroy the lives of families around the country and put a peaceful resolution to this crisis further out of reach. This is a human rights tragedy for the people of Burma as well as the international community. The regime's atrocities are destabilizing the entire Indo-Pacific region. Refugee boats are stranded and in distress at sea. Illegal drug production is surging, and arms and human trafficking and people smuggling are fueling criminal networks in the region. As our Indo-Pacific strategy makes clear, we must work to achieve a free and open Indo-Pacific that is more connected, prosperous, secure and resilient. We are under no illusions that democracy will be established in Burma overnight, or that there is any silver bullet to end the regime's reign of terror. Nevertheless, the people of Burma and those who support them, like those gathered here today, give us tremendous hope that the establishment of a future democratic and inclusive Burma where the human rights of all are protected is possible. Thank you again to the organizers of this panel for the invitation, and I wish you a good and productive discussion over the course of today. And I'd like to now turn to Christina Fink, our moderator for the panel. Christina, over to you. Thank you. Thank you again, Assistant, sorry, Acting Assistant Secretary Barkley for your important comments. Before we turn to our panel, we're going to have video presentations by representatives of four ethnic groups in Myanmar. Chin, Kereni, Keren and Kachin. And each of them will be speaking about the situation in their area of the country as well as what their organizations are doing to promote peace and democracy. Their names are as follows. The first is Chin, Dr. Kenton Lin, the second, Kereni, Aung San Nguyen, the third, Keren, Nimrod, Andrew, and the fourth is Kachin, Nangra, Zakong. And each of them will speak for about five minutes, after which we will turn to our panel discussion. So if we could start the presentations, please. Hello, my name is Dr. Kenton. I'm a Presidium Member of the ICNCC, which is known as Interim Chin Consultative Council. Our council is a political platform of Chin ethnic people in this spring revolution that consists of four groups, which are elected Chin MPs, CSO CDM team, political parties in Chin state and the CNF as an ethnic resistance organization. As you may be aware, since the military coup in February 2021, there have been several military crackdowns against the pro-democracy movement, resulting in the deaths of 3,154 people as of today. Additionally, around 16,000 people are currently under detention and 17.6 million people are in dire need of humanitarian support, with 1.6 million people internally displaced. Due to the military's offensive attacks and continuous a strike in Chin state, around 100,000 Chin IDPs have been forced to flee to India and other parts of the country. 1,900 houses have been burned and destroyed. On February 2nd, 2023, one day after the second anniversary of the military coup, the SAC declared martial law in 37 townships across the country. As a result, 8 out of 9 townships in Chin state are now under the direct control of military. However, despite all of these difficulties, the Chin defend forces, the people defend forces and all the revolution forces are working hand in hand to fight for freedom and justice. As a result of their efforts, the people's administration boards have successfully controlled and administered 70% of the Chin state territory. One of the main objectives of the spring revolution is to achieve political system change and adopt civilian control over the military. This is different from merely a regime change. It is believed that the only political system change will solve the country's rural long war. As the solutions and strategies that have been initiated, implemented, installed and activated in the country by different means and policies for many decades have failed. To achieve this political system change, there are two solutions. First, transform the military into professional armed forces under civilian control. Second, implementation of federal democracy in Myanmar. The spring revolution and its objectives need to be supported by international community to achieve authentic peace and security. Therefore, I respectfully request that all available channels, tools and ways be utilized to take the strongest possible actions to help build federal democracy in our country. This is a once and for all effort revolution that is imperative and necessary. We will never forget any contributions and assistance provided for the democracy movement in Myanmar. Thank you. What I can say is that democracies and human rights have been eroded in the Green State. Since the military seeks country power on 1st February 2021, since the military coup, the Green people protect nonviolently against the military coup. But the terrorist bombings army unjustly arrested the people, soldiers and because of the killings, all the state generation of young people who are future leaders, they have no choice in holding their arms and fighting back to SAC. Anyway, in Green State, SAC legislative, administrative and judiciary sector and power are become out of action. Their revolutionary forces have been able to control more than 75% of territories of Greenland. That is why the military council is trying to regain control of the place with a large number of military forces. The Green State consolidated council was established on April 9, 2021 and we practically implement administration and judiciary for more than two years already. In the KCC is imposed on five core groups in Green State, including members from ethnic armed groups in Green State, representatives from political parties, elected members in general election in 2020, youth civil society organization and strike committee, members from women groups, they are working together to reach our political goal for future Green State. In addition, in order to implement KCC implement activities and more effectively, KCC was reorganized in his conference from January 17 to 2020, 2023. The interim arrangement for our Green State also drafted and approved at the conference. The interim is a duty council of Green State has also started to establish. As for the judiciary process, we have been doing cooperation from V4s and now, but we just need to review and develop. We are currently working based on an interim arrangement and we also draft a constitution for the transition appearance and future fair state structure. However, due to political change, there are things that need to be updated. These are also our KCC activities and current situation in Green State. We have found the Green State consolidated council together with the stakeholder in the Green State to carry out state administration and judiciary works. Moreover, we make political cooperation with the National Unity Government, National Unity Consolidated Council. We also send Green State representatives to the NUTA and UCC to working together for the future fair democracy union in Myanmar. We also cooperation with other ethnic and resistant organizations, state representative council, political parties and civil society organizations. We regularly share our activities and implementation process with other state councils, ethnic organizations for better fair democracy unions in Myanmar. We conduct virtual meetings and sometimes in person. This is our cooperation with stakeholder in and out of the Green State. So what I would like to dimension and encourage one thing to international community that international cooperation is important in order to take action against the SEC, arbitrary treatments, abuse of powers and the crimes against humanity committed against the people of Myanmar as well as in Green State. Thank you very much. Thank you so much for giving the opportunity for me to speak today. My name is Son Nimrod. I'm from the Korean National Union Forest Department. And I'm very honored to share with you our perspective on the current situation in Burma. Especially when we look at the situation in Myanmar, we could see that all peace and democracy is important in Korea, only in the Korean state, only in the whole Myanmar. And I think this is a very good question because when you look at the current military coup, because of the upset of the democracy, the violence have been spread all over the country. And in our experience, current people have been suffering under the military rule for so many years. And we lost all the basis right and freedom. And because of the military authorization, who went against our own people, this suffering, this violence have been going on for decades after decades. And this military coup also really reinforced why democracy is important to the people and to the community. Because of the military rule, because of the military attack and authoritarian rules. In turn of ending the military rule or military violence in Myanmar, KNU and the Korean people are working closely and fostering the alliance relationship with our ethnic people, as well as with the pro-democracy movement. Because we know that it is important to work together and to be united. To fight against our common enemy military dictatorship. To remove the military dictatorship and prevent a federal democratic system to Myanmar. And in that, we are working closely with our alliance, as you might have heard, the K-3C, for example, the Korean, Korean chain and chain. And on the political issue, as well as military matter, coordination. And also we are working with, we have an alliance relationship with the national unity government. And we work on many issues. And especially we see that we also coordinate military coordination. For example, you might have heard about the K-3C, sorry, J-2C joint command and control. And this is not only to fight against the military dictatorship, but it's also in a way of building a future system, a future better professional armed system that would be a model for our future federal democratic system. So it is important to have the kind of coordination. This is important to work together. And by working together, having a united front, we believe that we will be able to remove the military rule and prevent a democracy and rebuild a federal system in Myanmar in the near future. The inspiration of building a future federal democratic system is not only from the top down, but also from the border up. And Korean, especially the Korean people have been practicing some kind of democracy or some kind of better system in our own territory. Because in Kian New Area, we have several districts. And those several districts have their own local governments and all of their work coordinated together. And now it is important that to strengthen this local government mechanism system. And we know that we need a lot of support. We need a lot of resources. But at the same time, we already have this system in place. For example, we have a health system, education system and the rule of law and legal system. This local government and administration is important because this is how the federal system works. And this is how it is inspired to build this local government to strengthen it. And if we can build it and strengthen it, then when we have a chance to implement or practice a federal democratic system, this system can integrate into the broader federal democratic system that we are inspired of. So this is an important message that we want to share with you that in Korean, in Kian New Administrative Control Area, we already have a business system that we are practicing for decades. Thank you. Good morning distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen. I am honored for getting this opportunity to share my perspectives in this panel with the theme democracy as a pathway to peace in Burma. This theme is extremely valid and timely for Burma today. Let me begin by recalling the early days of 2021. Burma was just about to experience the third term of the democratically elected government. People in civil society organizations were excited to continue supporting the ongoing peace building and state building works. Young people in all over the country have been excited, planning to implement the national youth policy approved by the NLD government. There was so much hope and excitement for better peace, good governance and development through the Myanmar Sustainable Development Plan, which was started in 2018 to 2030. However, the coup on February 1, 2021 attempted to wash away almost everything. International community has witnessed what we have been going through within the past 25 months. People of Burma don't deserve at all. Here I would like to highlight some points on where we are. Firstly, amidst all odds and challenges, we don't give up and we won't give up for at least three reasons. Number one, because the people of Burma has tasted the essence of democracy for about 10 years, they want to get back what was robbed by the military. Myanmar people of all walks of life have been in the movement in whatever possible ways wherever they are. Number two, because this is the best time ever to restore peace as all the people including Burma majority have seen the dark side of the military that common enemy of peace and democracy became crystal clear. Number three, because the youth dare to dream for the new nation with new set of values as promulgated in the federal democracy charter on 31st March of 2021. Secondly, it has been two years this month that the National Unity Consultative Council was formed with broad spectrum of pro-democracy forces such as CRPH, political parties, ethnic resistant organizations, strike committees, unions, civil society organizations including youth and women. This broad coalition or alliance if you like holds deliberative dialogues on the current policy issues and future nation building agenda. Yes, we have challenges given the diverse backgrounds and distinctive organization cultures of which we came from. However, we all value this platform in which we build understanding and trust for the aspiration of future new union. Thirdly, to build peace in multi-ethnic country like Burma with intractable conflict for decades, it is needed to maintain and strengthen such valuable venue in order for holding father healthy dialogues among the pro-democracy. Finally, I would like to conclude that building peace in Burma as we see it in the world map right now means rebuilding a new nation federal democratic union because only peace values can be the connectors of the diverse people into a well-woven pluralistic society or nation. There is no other way as I see it. We need multi-sectoral support from world democracies such as United States and others for current face and new future in rebuilding the new nation. Thank you very much. I want to thank all of our speakers who were so generous in giving their time coming from resistance areas in Myanmar to make those presentations to us today. And their speeches really highlight some things that I think we don't always see from the outside. From the outside we see what the military is doing. We see there's this vast array of resistance forces operating in the country, but it doesn't seem to necessarily come together. We just see this picture of violence. But what our speakers highlighted is the degree to which people from all walks of life have come together, whether they're civilians, whether they're members of political parties, whether they're members of armed resistance forces. Across ethnicities they are working together to try to restore democracy. And why is that? Because they've realized that only through democracy can peace, stability, and development be brought to the country. And I think two phrases that came up in those presentations were democracy from below and federalism from below. That's what we're really seeing, although it can be invisible from the outside. But we got a taste of it from our speakers that these experiments, these dialogues, these consultative bodies are working together to implement this here and now as well as to design frameworks for a better future in Myanmar. So with that I'd like to turn to our panel discussion and I'm going to introduce each of our panelists in turn and then we'll begin our discussion. So first I'd like to introduce Mozaou. He is the Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister from the National Unity Government and he's also the former Chief of Staff to Aung San Suu Kyi. And then on the screen we have retired Ambassador Scott Marciel who served as both the ambassador to Burma or Myanmar as well as the ambassador to Indonesia. And then we have Johanna Cao for this to the left who is from the International Republican Institute and serves as the Asia Regional Director. So Mozaou, let's start with you. I'd like to ask you to talk a little bit about your perspective on the resistance movement, its purpose, its challenges, and its achievements to date. Thank you Christina for the introduction and thank you the USIP for giving me this very good chance to talk about our resistance. So like Siaman Naira recently said, our country is a multi-ethnic society. So ethnic nationalities which used to have been independent entities in our country for a long time in the history. After the war we decided to seek independence together with the Burma majority, Burma majority people. And then they decided to build a federal union with the Burma majority. So, but after the independence the subsequent constitutions such as the 1947, 1974 or 2008 constitutions failed to fulfill the promises described, specified in the Penelope Agreement. Penelope Agreement which is our founding accord of the union among different ethnic nationalities that became a reason and cause for our very long, prolonged, more than 60, 70 year long Sibawa. So after 1962, after the military coup in 1962 and subsequent military coups, the democracy just disappeared in our country together with the multi-party system and the federalism. So in that place the military dictatorship came in and that's the reason why there are a lot of problems in our country as a consequence of the lack of both democracy as well as federal system. So I would like to say that this is a very good time for our country, for us to redeem the promises like the democracy, equality or self-determinations, the rights specified in the Penelope Agreement. So the spring revolution, what we call the current revolution has been a very good opportunity for us to address these problems like the eradication of the military dictatorship and establishment of the federal union. So yes, of course we need a collaboration among different elements that are similar assisting the military counter and that is being trying to establish a federal union. But I would like to say that very good news is that we have a unity in purpose because we could establish after the attempted coup, we could establish a platform, what we call the National Unity Consultative Council in which we could discuss a lot of things including the fundamental principles for our future union. So we stipulated these fundamental principles in our federal democracy charter. So I would like to say very proudly that the most important achievement of this current spring revolution is the product, the federal democracy charter. Because all the elements that have been resisting the military dictatorship agreed and endorsed the federal democracy charter. But of course there are a lot of other groups that have yet to ratify the federal democracy charter because when people talk about the unity, people always complain about the differences like in terms of different political effects. There are differences in political affiliations or differences in our ethnicities or our civil entities or things like that. But we already have the unity in our purpose. And for example, very recently the seven groups in northern part of the countries, what they call them says as FPNCC, federal, political negotiating and consultation committee FPNCC release a statement on March 16. In that statement they said that they agreed an idea of establishment of the federal democratic union in cooperation with the Pema Pima, Pema Pima, Parma Prabha, the Punjabi or the Bami people. So they have yet to ratify the federal democracy charter but they agreed on the very essence of the federal democracy charter which is to establish a federal democratic union. So I would like to say that the only group, the only entity that has been resisting the idea of establishment of the federal democracy union is the military regime itself. Because in the constitution that we have drafted, I would say that the two of them in constitution fall far short of two aspects that we need to address which is the one is democracy and the other one is the federal system. So I would say that the majority are more concerned with the principles for the democracy and then the ethnic minorities and ethnic groups are more concerned with the federal system. Anyway, we all need both systems at the same time in our country, in our country. So we have a purpose, we have a united purpose and then we all agree to establish a federal democratic union. It's only in that way that we were able to solve the problems of crisis in our country. So of course we need peace, stability and security to bring about some developments and prosperity to our country. But without democracy, without federal system, I think it would not happen. We would not be able to achieve that goal as well. So this is our baseline, this is our red line as well. So we cannot compromise on it. We cannot compromise on it. So this is our people are determined to continue our revolution, no matter what, despite their hardships and brutalities of the military and atrocities of the military being committed by the military right now. So of course we need assistance from the international community. So first of all, the international community should effectively support the pro-democracy and pro-federal system groups in our country, effectively and substantively in a coordinated manner. So that I would say that, for example, the international community should not land any legitimacy or the recognition to the military counter at all. That includes some sort of the legitimacy of the military counter like their attempt to hold so-called sham elections. Another thing is that the international community should put more pressures, effective pressures on the military counter. Because as long as the military has, they are also by a lifeline, they will continue their dominance in the politics of our country. So we need to cut the income flowing into the coffer of the military counter, which is very important. The most important income that we need to cut is the revenues from the MOGE, Myanmar, Ireland, this enterprise. So the last thing is that we understand that the international community has been trying to help solve the crisis and problem in our country. So we understand that when they do that, we would like the international community to focus on the root causes of the country, which is eradication of the military dictatorship, the dominance of the military in our politics and the establishment of the federal union. So sometimes, for example, a call for a dialogue without any substantive political agenda to address these root causes and without any conducive environment for that dialogue and would say that it would not help at all. It would even make the situation more confusing and more deteriorating. So anyway, the people of our country are pretty much determined to continue our revolution, to continue our struggle. So we need the assistance of the international community. So the message I would like to give is that please don't allow the military to win in our country. Please allow us to win. Thank you very much. Thank you for that, Mozo. So Ambassador Marciel, Mozo has just said to the international community, please don't allow the military to win. Allow us to win. What is the position of Southeast Asian nations on the situation in Myanmar? And if you could also talk a little bit about international actions more broadly. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you, Christina. Thanks, USIP, for organizing this event. Overall, the international community's response to this attempted coup by the military and the attempt to turn back the clock in Myanmar has been pretty disappointing. You've got on the one hand the countries that like China, India, along with Russia, and I'll focus on countries in the region, just very clearly supporting the junta. And obviously I can't speak for those governments, but I'll give you my thoughts on why. China, my guess is, is probably not thrilled with the coup, but they will work with whoever holds power in the capital of NPTOP. So they're providing arms, diplomatic support, and also pushing the ethnic resistance organizations near China to strike a deal with the military, which would be a disaster. They're also, by the way, pushing Rohingya repatriation when their conditions for Rohingya repatriation are absolutely not there. This reflects a very cynical Beijing approach. They don't really care, but Chinese government doesn't care about Myanmar people's views. They don't really want in my view a strong and successful Myanmar. They prefer a weak, fractious one with just enough stability. One last point is that I'm concerned that Beijing increasingly seems to be looking at Myanmar as a U.S.-China issue and worrying more about whether they might lose influence to the U.S. And this is really unfortunate because it's not a U.S.-China issue. There's no reason for it to be. This is a Myanmar issue. And I would just point out that any government that emerges in Myanmar in the future will need to have good relations with China, and that should not be a concern for the United States. I want to talk to you about India, which isn't talked about enough. Also, being supportive of the junta, probably for two reasons. One, concern about losing influence to China. And two, feeling it needs to cooperate with the junta on border issues, including small insurgency groups that operate near the border. I'm guessing they also just assume that the military will win, which is a very questionable assumption. In my view, again, this is a cynical approach that's also short-sighted. If and when the resistance wins, the new government will have to have good ties with China. But I'm not sure it's so important for them to have such good ties with India because India, frankly, is less important. I'm not saying any new government would be hostile to India, but I think there will be some price that India will pay for its support for the junta. And if India is worried about Chinese influence, the best thing would be to work for a strong and unified and successful Myanmar. And you're not going to get that with the junta. ASEAN has tried and has done some positive things, such as not inviting the junta leadership to come to summits and those sorts of things and issuing some good statements. And they also came up with this five-point consensus almost two years ago. But that consensus was still born. The generals in de facto rejected it and it didn't really fit the realities of Myanmar. It was based, in my view, on the false assumption that the generals could be reasoned with and that they cared about the country. Neither of those assumptions is true, in my view. And my sense is that many in ASEAN understand that this five-point consensus isn't going in anywhere, but they continue to hold it out because since ASEAN is divided, they can't gain consensus on a new or bolder approach. Excuse me. I have to say our friends, the Thai government, has been pretty unhelpful. They're clearly supporting the junta, although they are quietly doing a few positive things, but basically supporting the junta. Others in ASEAN are hiding behind the ASEAN don't interfere in domestic affairs concept. My view is any engagement with the junta is interfering in Myanmar's internal affairs, since it has no legitimacy. Others in ASEAN would like to do more, but they can't get the broad support. Indonesia's chairmanship is certainly an opportunity. Indonesia has been, A, as a democracy, and B, has been more outspoken and critical of the coup and more supportive of the people of Myanmar. But we have to see what Indonesia is going to do. Ideally, there will be more engagement by Indonesia and others in ASEAN with NUG and ethnic resistance groups, so-called mini-lateralism, perhaps if not all of ASEAN can get behind. I hope Indonesia will also push particularly Thailand to be more open to allowing humanitarian assistance to come in. But again, we have to see. My sense is that Parazion and all the neighbors kind of underlined these positions. It has been a belief that, as I said earlier, that A, the generals can be reasoned with, and that there is some possibility of a negotiated compromise deal between the military and the resistance under which the military would maintain lots of power. And I think, again, there's this underlying sense that the military is an essential institution and that there's no possibility of dramatically restructuring it. Some see the military as inevitable or even essential. I don't think that's true. And for those who know the history of Myanmar, you know that the military over the last 60 years has really driven the country down consistently in every respect and created conflict. The SAC, the junta regime, is the worst regime in the region since the Khmer Rouge. It has no support. It's incapable of running the country. And it's absolutely despised by the Myanmar people. You've got massive conflict, displacement, refugee flows, increased criminal activity, which should concern the region. With a wink and a nod from the military, this has been going on, including narcotics spreading, growing, huge problem. And you have a prospect of instability continuing and further decline of Myanmar. So there is no positive way forward with this military junta. And again, countries in the region need to understand the SAC can't restore stability. It can't govern the country, nor will the population accept its continued power. And there is no, in my view, at this point, there is no compromise deal to be had that allows the military to maintain power. First, the military is not interested at all at this point in compromise. And as the Deputy Foreign Minister just said, Deputy Foreign Minister of the NUG just said, people's resistance is not going to compromise if it means allowing the military to stay. They don't have the power or not achieving the goals of a democratic federal union. So it's not helpful at this time to support unrealistic compromise deal. There is also, I think, a concern and doubt about the broad resistance's ability to A, win, and B, to succeed in unifying the country. And I understand those concerns. But what I think people need to understand is, A, how much work is being done, as we've just heard, by the various elements of the resistance to overcome the decades of mistrust and build collaboration and cooperation. But also that the resistance is really the only hope for a successful Myanmar. With the junta, there is zero hope. With the resistance, there's no guarantees, but there's a lot of hope and there's an opportunity and the world should get behind it. The goal should be to weaken the junta to the point that it seeks a way out and at the same time support the democratic forces build their governance capacity and build cohesion. I'll stop there. Thank you so much. Thank you. Johanna, I'd like to turn to you. So the International Republican Institute has long been involved in supporting democracy and human rights in Myanmar. Could you talk a little bit about what you think the United States could do, what needs to be done to strengthen the movement from outside? Thank you, Christina, and thank you for having us here today. You know, I think just briefly, you know, IRI, we are a nonprofit, non-governmental organization. Our work is supporting democratic development. We have been working on Burma for about 30 years and we are part of a family of organizations that do this work in support, supported by USAID, by the Department of State and by the National Endowment for Democracy. You know, I think just to reiterate a couple of the points that other speakers have made, you know, we are in this unprecedented time in Burma right now. You know, we've heard about this collective reaction, the scale of the reaction to the military. One of the big changes I think we have seen is that across the country, across ethnic groups, there is this real clear-eyedness that the obstacle to peace and stability in Burma is the military, and that's what it is. One of the other big changes that we are seeing is this transformation, these transformations in society. So particularly among Burma groups, you know, especially in relation to ethnic groups, attitudes about the Rohingya that have changed, all of these have been incredibly positive changes that have come about. You know, when IRI, the work we had done working certainly inside Burma during that, that's almost decade, when there was more democracy on the ground, you know, some of the challenges that we saw to building democratic institutions were on things like inclusion, on issues such as, you know, challenges of centralized decision making, for example. And one of the things when we look at the situation now in this post-Ku environment, or since the Ku has taken place, are very big shifts, you know, by necessity decision making has had to become less centralized. The ability of the national unity government, of civil society groups that are working in the resistance to be able to innovate, to be very creative, to be very adaptive, all of those strengths within the society have really come to the fore. And I think what we've heard from some of the earlier speakers about this really focused effort for more inclusion in decision making, the grassroots, the sort of bottom-up effort to bring in people into decision making about their own country. All of these things, you know, as Scott just said, there are reasons for hope because these are the foundations of democracy, right? As we all know, democracy is an act, it is not a destination. And so all of these changes that are taking place lay some strong foundations. Now, so this is a crucial time, right? It is a crucial time where two years on from the Ku, people clearly remained very determined and very resilient. And so from the perspective of the US, you know, I think leaders and opposition, the opposition groups also now need to remain resilient. And I think, I believe, this is really where our role is. You know, our role is to support this resilience and support these efforts at resilience and to push back and to ensure that the junta is indeed isolated and seeks its exit ramp. So I think one of the ways, the main way that the US can do this is through keeping an eye on the big picture. You know, that the goal is peace and a free society and a democracy in Burma. There are lessons that the US has learned from experiences all over the world of what transitions out of conflict look like, of what transitions to democracy look like. And so drawing on some of those lessons in order to build unity, to focus on coalition building, those are the areas in which, you know, in addition to the things that Erin was talking about earlier, those are areas of direct support that the US can offer. And I think in this, this perspective of looking at the very big picture, working with all of the actors who are working towards the restoration of democracy for Burma is going to be very important. And then thinking through what are some of those hard and soft skills that can be provided to support those efforts. And so that is in areas to continue this instinct of inclusion, working on coalition building, supporting those efforts, supporting clear communications so that the institutions are working towards democracy are able to clearly communicate their intentions both to their own people and continue to communicate clearly to the international community the efforts as you have done of what is needed. Thanks so much for that Joanna. So I'm going to ask our panelists one last question, but before that I wanted to just remind the audience you're free to put questions into the chat box online and then we will be taking those questions. So my last question to all of you, I hope you'll all just say something is just thinking in the short term next three months for instance what are one or two things that you think would be helpful for the U.S. government or other international entities to do to further the democracy movement the movement for federalism in Myanmar? So what would you like to start? We need anti-immunition, we need manpower, we need traveling, I'm just kidding. We need these, but we understand that it is not possible for the international community to provide such leader assistance to our country now the time is running out. So we need some effective assistance to our movement like the non-leaders, there are a lot of non-leaders that can be provided to us I don't want to specify, I don't want to defy what non-leaders assistance are, but for example we need some sort of assistance for our communication system we need some assistance for the local administration and local governance because we have some sort of controlled area inside the country that we have to provide some services to these areas like education for the children and healthcare for the people in these areas and there are a lot of increasing numbers of the internally displaced people because of the brutal attack on the civilians of the military so we need some urgent assistance for these people who are in need of assistance immediately. I don't want to say that within three months what assistance we need, but in terms of assistance we need assistance for many areas at the same time so the international community or any countries or any organizations they have their own preference in terms of assistance so they could provide any assistance in our country. The most important thing is that some of the international NGOs or some of the UN organizations are trying to reach out to the people in our country through the UN systems inside the country, but the country team and UN they have been doing a great job, I accept that but they have to cooperate with the military counter, have some access to the area that they would like to provide the systems in that case they cannot reach to us so the most important thing is that they also need to reach to the people in the area where we could control so they could consult with us, they could consult with the ethnic resistance groups they could consult with the local organization in these areas to provide and to deliver the assistance to these areas this is also very important I think. Thank you for that. So humanitarian assistance, having UN agencies work together with local organizations that are already providing this assistance on the ground and areas that are not controlled by the military and non-lethal assistance to the resistance movement are some of the things that are very important. Ambassador Murciel. A couple of things. One, I think the United States should increase assistance to the broad pro-democracy movement. I'm out of government now so I don't know all the details of what's already happening but I do believe that there is more that can be done and I think that should be made a priority too and this will be very hard given the state of U.S.-China relations. Ideally there's some quiet conversations between U.S. and Chinese officials where the U.S. can I think make it very clear that it's important this not become a U.S.-China issue and make it I'd say be very explicit that we support any future government that emerges, Democratic government while obviously it would make its own choices but we would support it having a good relationship with China. Three, I hope that Indonesia and maybe some other sympathetic ASEAN governments will meet publicly with the NUG and resistance forces. I think that would send a very strong signal. And last but not least the Secretary General of the UN who has been really disappointing on this crisis. I should travel to the region particularly to Thailand and push harder for a humanitarian assistance opening. Stop there, thanks. Thank you. And Johanna? Yeah, I think it's sort of in two things in the near term. I think sort of echoing what Scott just said for the U.S. to continue its very broad consultations across all of the resistance groups that are currently engaged in the struggle and to continue support to all of those groups in their efforts would be a key thing. I think in addition to that sort of unwavering communication by the U.S. of its support for the resistance, for the right of the Burmese people to have their choice, have their voices heard in this movement towards democracy will also be critical I think not only to convey to the international community to the junta itself of where the U.S. stands, but also just to convey clearly to the people of Burma where the U.S. stands in their struggle, in their struggle. And I think the upcoming Summit for Democracy is a fantastic opportunity to use that platform to talk about why democratic values, why the dangers that are posed by this junta in the heart of Southeast Asia, the dangers that that poses not just to the people inside Burma, but to the region and more broadly as well. Great. Thanks so much. So I know the questions have been coming in from online and Nicole Kakron from USIP will be reading out the questions and then some of them may be directed to specific panelists. In other cases, everyone feel free to answer. Thank you. So we've heard from representatives of ethnic armed organizations and of course the NUG about the work that they're doing to fight for federal democracy and the coordination that is involved in that. What is the role of civil society and faith-based groups in this resistance? Great question. Mozo, do you want to say something about that? Yeah, I think there is a very big role that the civil society in our country can play because like I said in my remarks, that in our consultation process in the National Unity Consultative Council, there are a lot of civil society groups participating in the process to discuss about different things, not only about the federal fundamental principles or things like that. So especially when we talk about the local governance or local administration, like the previous speaker said, there is a process of bottom-up approach of the building of the federal union. So in that area as well, there are a lot of things that the civil society can do and they are doing a lot of things as well. For example, delivering the assistance or capacity building or trying to reach to the different ethnic groups and women, the children groups, they are playing a lot of roles to do such things. So not only that, but also for our future federal union. I mean in the post-conflict period, there are a lot of things that the civil society can do as well, because we have a lot of problems remained to be solved in the aftermath of our conflict. So I would say that a big role is still there for the civil society to play. If I could add to that, I think as I was mentioning earlier, the adaptation and the creativity and the innovation that we are seeing among groups that are engaged in the full breadth of resistance activities, it has all been driven from civil society. I think in IRA's experience working with Burmese opposition groups, civil society has always been the beating heart of ensuring that the movement just keeps renewing itself. I think whether it's in the health or education sectors or certainly when it comes to looking at the democracy and human rights space, civil society has been active both outside of the borders of Burma and inside in trying to maintain morale, in trying to support the civilian defiance movements that are smaller now than they were two years ago, but still exist and they still pop up, which I think are important internal symbolic reminders to everyone that the resistance is alive and that the military hasn't been able to snuff that out. But I think as transition continues, another very important role of civil society will be on the accountability piece and ensuring that as the political leadership is coalescing, as there's a move towards institutions of federal democracy, civil society can play a role in ensuring that the promises that leaders are making are being upheld for their own people. And so in those ways the foundations are very strong and would expect civil society to continue to play a very robust role. Ambassador Marciel, did you want to add anything? No, I think my colleagues have covered it well. Great, okay. Great. Thank you. Our next question. Ambassador Marciel spoke about the possibility of negotiations, about the possibility of an off-ramp for the junta. What conditions need to be met before negotiations between the Democratic opposition forces and the military is even possible? Great question, yeah. Mozo, do you want to start on that? What would be the conditions that would need to be met before negotiations could happen? Any one negotiations that might go somewhere? First of all, I wanted to say that we cannot compromise on the eradication of the military dictatorship, which is the dominance of the military in our politics. So we don't need that at all. And then we need to abolish the 200th constitution and then we need to establish a new federal union and we need to draft a new constitution, new federal democratic constitution for our country, which is the deadline that we cannot cross. And then there is the baseline that we cannot compromise on. So I think it is not a good time for us to talk about the negotiations of the insulate. Because we knew very well about the mentality of the military. They are always trying to take advantage of the so-called negotiation or the dialogue or whatever it is for their political benefit. They have used that kind of tactic in the history so many times. So they are always trying to manipulate that kind of process for their benefit. So when it comes to the negotiation or the dialogue or something like that, we very carefully need to address the root causes of the country first. And then we need to note the fact that the military will not give up even part of their power to back to the people unless they are precious enough to do so. That is a very fact that we need to take care of. Thank you. Thanks. Ambassador Marcial, do you like to say anything here? Yeah, I don't want to offer any ideas on what the condition should be because I think that is up to the resistance and people of Myanmar, not foreigners. But I think my main point is that there has been an effort by some of the international community, maybe well intentioned. I am sure it is well intentioned to encourage this dialogue as if the problem in Myanmar is that we just need to get the people in the room together to talk. That is not the problem. The problem as the Deputy Foreign Minister just said is that this military has been a cancer in the society for 60 years and they want to hold on to power and they don't care how many people they have to kill to do it. So they have to be, the military as it currently exists has to go and be replaced with something that works for the Myanmar people. My point on off-ramp is that I don't see any possibility of useful dialogue or negotiations until and unless the junta is weakened to the point that it is rather desperately looking for a way out. And then perhaps there is an opportunity. Thank you for that. Let's go on to the next question. Thank you. So the junta has attempted to feign legitimacy with these sham elections. How might ASEAN or other actors in the international space respond if those elections were to occur? Yeah. Ambassador Marcial, that might be a question for you. Well, inevitably some countries will accept the elections if they happen. And I hesitate to even call them elections because they are so far from that. But they would be so far from that. But if they happen, I would imagine there will be some countries that will say, hey, this is a step forward. And they would do so knowing full well that it's not a step forward. But governments sometimes act pretty cynically. I would hope that ASEAN as a whole would see that such sham elections actually will make the situation worse, enhance or increase violence and instability, and do nothing positive. So I think it's really important that ASEAN, at least Indonesia as the chair, make it clear ahead of time that they would not accept elections organized by the military. But it's a concern because there are always some governments that are willing to go along with these things. I think this is a question for Minister Mozaou. Could you please explain the NUG's position on the Rohingya crisis and the current NUG's position on the Huntas stance on repatriation? First of all, we already released a position on the Rohingya people in 2021. And then in that policy statement, we clearly expressed our policies and our way forward in terms of the repatriation of the refugees back to the places where they belonged and then the accountability to justice issues and the citizenship issues as well and some other issues like the future social cohesion and co-existence between different ethnic groups in Rohingya states or things like that and development factors as well. So in terms of the repatriation of the Rohingya refugees now taking shelters in Bangladesh, I would say that it is very important, it should be voluntary repatriation. The process must be consulted with the Rohingya people, the refugees taking shelter in Bangladesh and then they need to be informed very well what is going on on the other side of the NUG, where they are going back to. So all of this information needs to be provided and then the consultation process with the refugees should be transparent and then I would like to say it should be a safe and voluntary and dignified return to the country but I would like to warn that in our country there are a lot of the atrocities and brutalities and crimes committed by the military to stay going on. So it is not a conducive situation for the refugees, not only the refugees taking shelter in Bangladesh but also for some other refugees taking shelter in some other countries as well. So yeah, that sort of things should be taken note very well. Yeah, there are many Rohingya in Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, etc. as well who need to be taken care of. Thank you. Okay, thank you very much. Next question relates to the role of non-democratic countries like Russia and China. Could you elaborate more about their role in our positions on the conflict in Myanmar particularly in light of the recent visit of Xi Jinping to Russia? Yeah, Ambassador Marcial, you talked about that a little already but maybe you'd like to say a few more words particularly about Russia. Yeah, I mean Russia hasn't had a lot of influence in Myanmar in recent history but they embraced the coup almost immediately, sent delegations down. Again, I'm not a Russia expert and I obviously can't get inside the head of Russian leadership but A, it's an opportunity to sell weapons. B, it's an opportunity to try to enhance their relationship and their standing in Southeast Asia. C, at a time maybe when they don't have a lot of friends it's an opportunity to have a friend even if I'm not sure that having the SAC as a friend is all that helpful. And fourth, I think it's an opportunity to create instability and to sort of be anti-democratic. I'm not sure that has a lot to do with their relationship with China. I think China's interests are very different and much more substantive than Russia's. So would you like to talk about China and what's the stance of the NUG and China's relationship with Myanmar and NUG interaction if you're able to talk about that with China? Thank you. Yeah, China is our neighbor. Not only China, we have some other neighbors as well so it's an opportunity for us to move away from that place to another. So we would like to have a very good relationship with our neighboring countries which is very important. For example, for China, we have a lot of investments and businesses of China in our country so we don't have any intention to have bad impact on these businesses or the investments of not only China but also some other neighboring countries as well but we need stability, we need security and we need peace in our country for our neighboring country to continue their business and their investments in our country. So in order to maintain that stability and security in our country we need a stable government and stable governance in the country so that is the reason why we are trying to establish a federal democratic union and that is the reason why we are trying to eradicate the dominance of the military in our country so that we are able to establish a country that can guarantee very well the investments of other countries including China. Okay, thanks. Next question. Alright, perhaps the last question. Could you elaborate a bit more on the types of assistance that the US could potentially provide to pro-democracy actors in Burma? Alright, so this is something we've talked about a little bit already but there's always more to say on this topic so this is a chance to say whatever else you haven't said. I mean I think the assistance that has been provided is a number of different forms into the pro-democracy movement. I mean the first is consultation, right? It's ensuring that there is outreach to a broad range of actors who are engaged in the resistance movement and ensuring that we in the US government and all of the American stakeholders that we are listening to what they are saying and understanding their priorities and their needs and responding to those. The nature of that assistance is through support, technical assistance, it might be training opportunities, it might be leveraging as I was referring to earlier the experience of implementers like IRI in working on democratic and post-conflict transitions around the world to be able to offer comparative experience and lessons learned to our friends and to our partners who are engaged in this struggle to help them think about the hard and soft skills that need to be built but also to help them keep an eye on the path that they're trying to take and provide support to that. Like I said before, we need assistance for our revolution which is the most important thing for us for the time being and at the same time we need some assistance for the process of building the bottom-up approach of the establishment of a federal system as well because we are not exercising our federal systems right now in the revolution repeated because we have, for example, trying to provide some healthcare services to the people in different areas. In that case, we are cooperating with the ethnic groups because ethnic resistance groups have their own network of the healthcare providing systems and things like that so we are cooperating with ethnic groups and not only for the healthcare but also for the education and some of the things as well so we work together with them trying to exercise a federal system in the very beginning of our revolution so we also need that kind of assistance and then we also need to cooperate with all different groups so like I said for the post-conflict period we also need some other things like for example the demining process it is not only for the post-conflict period but also we need now as well the demining we need to spend a lot of money, a lot of technology, technical assistance or things like that to demine in some areas as well so that the people who have been displaced will be able to return to their place safely or things like that this is just an example. Yeah, there has been tremendous use of land mines to prevent people from being able to come back to their own communities and that is a very serious problem. Thank you for raising that. Ambassador Marcial, we haven't talked about Japan, we haven't talked about the EU, other countries, is there anything the US can do to get them more engaged or to work together collectively in maybe 30 seconds? Yeah, I think there's pretty good discussion with Japan, the EU. Japan is still not quite where I think it should be on this issue but I think going forward on assistance to tie it all together the US, Japan, EU, others should be working to support the local governance initiatives absolutely and also looking ahead as the Deputy Foreign Minister said to a post-crisis situation thinking about with the World Bank and Economic Recovery Program, a massive humanitarian assistance program obviously the demining, these are things that the Europeans, Japanese and others, Australia, Korea can all contribute to and at the same time just taking a continuing to take a very firm line, not getting tempted into engaging with the generals in any way so there's always would be peacemakers out there who for maybe with good intentions might want to engage the generals and it's important to stay firm on that. Right, well I want to thank everyone who participated in this event and I hope that the audience will take away the message that there's tremendous expertise and commitment and collaboration in the movement to bring about a federal democratic union in Myanmar and that there's much that the international community can do to support it. Thank you. Thank you.