TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search results
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search resultsMyanmar leaders’ ‘house arrest’ masks so little
The Myanmar junta believes it has weathered an acute threat to its survival; however, this perception rests on a miscalculation.
Change text size
Gift Premium Articles
to Anyone
Share the best of The Jakarta Post with friends, family, or colleagues. As a subscriber, you can gift 3 to 5 articles each month that anyone can read—no subscription needed!
Aung San Suu Kyi (center) talks to Myanmar security forces personnel from the military (left) and the police in an undisclosed location, in this undated handout photo from the Myanmar Military Information Team released on April 30, 2026. (AFP/Myanmar Military Information Team)
A
ung San Suu Kyi’s recent transfer from a Naypyidaw interrogation center to a “designated residence" by the Myanmar military sent a reminder of how long the toppled leader, beloved by many, has been detained incommunicado.
Her transfer followed the release of president U Win Myint on April 17, the day the country observed Myanmar New Year. The two moves came in the wake of the military’s choreographed general elections, widely derided as a sham.
It should also be seen as a signal that this regime believes it has weathered an acute threat to its survival. This perception, however, rests on a miscalculation, a gamble that resistance has ended when the underlying drivers remain.
In July 2022, amid assassination campaigns against military allies and the spread of unprecedented armed resistance in the central Bamar heartlands, the junta executed four political prisoners: Phyo Zeya Thaw, Ko Jimmy, Hla Myo Aung and Aung Thura Zaw.
In April 2024, still feeling the heat as resistance groups prepared for an attack against the encircled northern city of Mandalay, the regime moved Suu Kyi, then 79, to a secret detention center.
When it is under pressure, the Myanmar military hunkers down and cracks down. In this sense, Suu Kyi and Win Myint are detained in their “residences”, because coup leader Min Aung Hlaing has convinced himself that his regime is more secure.
In 2023 and 2024, armed groups in northern Shan state led a nationwide charge that almost dealt a deadly blow to the military. By late 2025, those same armed groups had signed Beijing-induced ceasefire deals with Naypyidaw and then recognized its elections, simultaneously damaging their ties to other anti-military coalitions.
