President Joe Biden talks about the situation in Myanmar in the South Court Auditorium of the Eisenhower Executive Office building in Washington, DC, February 10, 2021.
Saul Loeb | AFP | Getty Images
President Joe Biden announced on Wednesday that he will impose immediate sanctions on Myanmar’s military leaders, who led a coup that led to the arrest of national elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi, among others.
Biden also called on the Myanmar army to relinquish power and release prisoners captured in the coup.
“We will identify a first round of targets this week and also impose strong export controls,” Biden said in announcing two new executive orders authorizing sanctions.
“We are freezing US assets that benefit the Burmese government, while maintaining our support for health care, civil society groups and other areas that directly benefit the Burmese population,” the president said.
Biden last week condemned the military takeover of the civilian-led government, calling it “a direct attack on the country’s transition to democracy and the rule of law.”
Nobel laureate Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD) won the landslide election in Myanmar in November last year.
But the generals behind the coup claimed the election was fraudulent.
Citizens of Myanmar, including monks and nurses, took to the streets in protest of the NLD’s red-covered coup.
In response, the military banned rallies and rallies of more than five people, along with motorized processions, and imposed a left from 8 pm to 4 am for Yangon and Mandalay, the country’s first and second largest cities.
The military also banned citizens from using social networking platforms Facebook, Twitter and Instagram “until further notice.”
The US formally eased previous sanctions against Myanmar in 2012 to allow US dollars to enter the country, withholding certain investments in Myanmar’s armed forces and the Ministry of Defense.
But a clause in the measure included the ability to strengthen sanctions “against those who undermine the reform process and engage in human rights abuses.”
On Tuesday, US State Department spokesman Ned Price said: “We reiterate our calls for the military to relinquish power, restore democratically elected government, release detainees and lift all telecommunications restrictions, and to refrain from violence “.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said last week: “I certainly saw with great alarm what happened in Burma, but I do not see an American military role at the moment.
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