A report by Myanmar advocacy group Blood Money Campaign has revealed how the country's junta is still able to procure jet fuel despite sanctions, letting it continue to carry out airstrikes against civilians. To learn more, TaiwanPlus spoke to Mark Farmaner from Burma Campaign UK.
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00:00How is the Myanmar junta still procuring aviation fuel despite international sanctions against them?
00:05The Myanmar military doesn't have the ability to manufacture its own jet fuel, its own aviation fuel.
00:11We have Chinese and Vietnamese companies, shipping companies and fuel companies are now involved in the supply indirectly.
00:21I think the main problem we have is, although you might see some of the Western countries boast about the sanctions they've imposed on jet fuel
00:29to try to reduce airstrikes, all they've done so far is sanction a small number of Myanmar companies who have been selling jet fuel to the military.
00:41They haven't sanctioned any of the international suppliers yet.
00:44What impact has the circumvention of aviation fuel sanctions had on the country's civilian population?
00:51Since the attempted coup began in 2021, and the military started using these airstrikes now on a daily basis, more than 4,000 airstrikes,
01:02we've seen there's around probably more now than four million people in the country have been forced to flee their homes because of airstrikes or conflict.
01:11It's not just about the bombs and how many people they're killing,
01:15because in the long run, more people are probably killed by airstrikes by the fact that they are then displaced.
01:21They haven't got access to safe shelter, to health care, to nutritious food.
01:26There are concerns that the sanction on all jet fuel to Myanmar could bring much economic harm.
01:31Why is the Blood Money campaign and Myanmar civil society still calling for this blanket ban?
01:37We know from past experience that even when jet fuel is delivered for civilian use, the military can take it.
01:44So the only way to cut off the supply of jet fuel to the military is to cut off supply of jet fuel to Myanmar itself.
01:52And so far, the international community have refused to take that step.
01:56And one of the reasons they give is, oh, we're worried about the economic impact.
02:01But this is a decision for the people of Myanmar to make.
02:05This is the people in the country who are suffering from the airstrikes are saying,
02:09we need you to do this because without the jet fuel, the jets can't fly.
02:14And if the jets can't fly, they can't bomb.