My Lords, the instrument before us was laid on 29 April under the powers provided by the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018. It revokes and replaces the Burma (Sanctions) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019, which had previously established the UK’s sanctions regime in respect of Myanmar.
The 2019 regulations brought the policy effect of the EU’s Myanmar regime into UK law at the end of the transition period. This regime was designed as a response to the serious human rights violations committed by the Myanmar security forces, including widespread and systematic attacks on ethnic minorities and the ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya in 2017.
As noble Lords will be aware, on 1 February this year the Myanmar military launched a coup which disregarded the democratically expressed will of the Myanmar people, arresting Aung San Suu Kyi among many others. Peaceful protest has been met with brutal force, with over 700 civilians killed and more than 4,000 people detained. There are credible reports of torture. Humanitarian relief organisations have been refused access. Internet shutdowns, and the intimidation and persecution of civil society, have restricted access to information and journalistic freedoms.
Her Majesty’s Government are pressing the military to return power to the democratically elected Government of Myanmar, to protect the rights and freedoms of the Myanmar people, including their right to political protest,
to release all those arbitrarily detained and to ensure the unobstructed humanitarian access that is so desperately needed.
Targeted sanctions are very much part of our collaborative response. However, the 2019 regulations did not contain purposes or designation criteria that would allow us to make designations in relation to the coup. The Government therefore took the decision to revoke and replace the 2019 regime.
The new regulations we are considering today expand the purposes and designation criteria from those set out in the previous 2019 regulations. Our new regime aims to: promote peace, security and stability in Myanmar; promote respect for democracy, the rule of law and good governance; discourage the repression of the civilian population; and promote compliance with international human rights law and respect for human rights.
As for designations, the regulations enable us to designate not only members of the Myanmar security forces but any other individuals or entities that meet the designation criteria, including those supporting the military junta. We are now able to designate people not only for committing serious human rights violations but for undermining democracy, the rule of law or good governance, repressing the civilian population, violating international humanitarian law, obstructing humanitarian assistance activity or any other action, policy or activity which threatens the peace, stability or security of Myanmar.
Significantly, the regulations now give us the power to list entities under our geographic regime, allowing us to target the military’s economic interests and demonstrating that we stand in solidarity with the domestic movement to boycott businesses linked to the military. In this respect, on 17 May we used these regulations to designate the Myanmar Gems Enterprise. Gems are a multibillion-dollar trade in Myanmar, and a key source of revenue for the military junta.
In addition to expanding the purposes and designation criteria, the new regulations create another licensing purpose for financial sanctions, enabling the Treasury to grant a licence to conduct otherwise prohibited activities if they are in connection with humanitarian assistance activity. This helps ensure that the effects of the sanctions are targeted and that there is no unintentional impact on humanitarian operations. The substance of the regulations before us is otherwise the same as set out in the previous legislation, and the types of sanctions measures permitted—financial, trade and immigration—have not changed.
It is important to note that the new regulations retain the comprehensive arms embargo which the UK worked to secure while we were a member of the European Union. They also retain trade prohibitions on dual-use items for military use, as well as items that could be used to intercept or monitor telecommunications and repress the civilian population. Finally, the regulations prohibit the provision of military-related services, including the provision of technical assistance to or for the benefit of the Myanmar security forces, which are defined to include the Tatmadaw, police force and border force.
Of course, sanctions are only one element of our response to the coup. We have been at the forefront of the international response, drawing on our presidencies of both the G7 and the UN Security Council, as well as our positive relationships with ASEAN member states and others in the region. At the G7 Foreign and Development Ministers’ meeting on 4 and 5 May this year, we ensured that G7 countries were aligned in calling for the military to restore democracy to Myanmar. We also succeeded in committing all G7 countries—for the first time—to preventing the supply, sale or transfer of weapons, munitions or other military-related equipment to Myanmar.
Similarly, our leadership at the UN Security Council has kept the issue at the forefront of the council’s agenda. We have secured a succession of strong council statements which condemn the violence, call for the release of political detainees and support Myanmar’s democratic transition. Crucially, we are working closely with civil society to build community resilience and help create the foundations for a more open, inclusive and democratic Myanmar.
However, sanctions provide an important tool to take concrete and meaningful steps that demonstrate to the junta that its actions have a cost and it cannot repress the population of Myanmar with impunity. Our designations have already undermined the credibility of the military junta and its governing body, the State Administration Council. They have reduced their access to key revenue streams. We are also considering further possible designations that would meet our objective of targeting the military’s revenue streams—which I know interests several noble Lords and has been raised before—while mitigating risk to the wider population.
In conclusion, the UK considers the recent actions of the military junta and the Myanmar security forces to be, frankly, abhorrent. They have undermined democracy, brutally repressed protests, arbitrarily detained thousands and, tragically, killed hundreds of innocent people. The regulations expand our powers to impose sanctions in response. They demonstrate that we will not accept such egregious violations of human rights. They enable us to stand with our international partners and, most importantly, with the people of Myanmar in working towards what we hope will be a peaceful and prosperous return to a democratic future for the country. I beg to move.
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