COMMENTARY CITIZENSHIP STRIPPING IN MYANMAR AS LAWFARE NYI NYI KYAW* TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction........................................................................................................... 280 The 1982 Law and the Provision for Denationalisation ........................................ 281 ‘Anti-Terrorism’ Lawfare against Resistance in Myanmar .................................. 282 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 285 INTRODUCTION In March and April 2022, 1 the military junta of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar (‘Myanmar’), known as the State Administration Council (‘SAC’) issued three orders to strip 33 people (‘the 33 people’) of Myanmar citizenship. Among them were opposition politicians, (ex)-diplomats, dissidents, social media influencers-cum-fundraisers, writers, singers, actors and beauticians who had been leading, involved in or supportive of the (armed) resistance against the military rule known as the Spring Revolution. These orders referred to these people as those ‘who violated the existing laws of the State and left the country illegally [who] were found to be committing acts that could harm the interests of Myanmar’. 2 The SAC justified its orders with s 16 of the 1982 Myanmar Citizenship Law (‘1982 Law’). 3 Many of the newly stateless immediately responded that it was an illegitimate use of law by the SAC4 and that they would continue to revolt against the SAC despite their denationalisation. 5 Opposition politicians who sat in the parallel National Unity Government of the Republic of * 1 2 3 4 5 Nyi Nyi Kyaw is the Research Chair on Forced Displacement in Southeast Asia at Chiang Mai University in Thailand and Honorary Fellow at the Melbourne Law School. His work on citizenship, nationalism and constitutional change, among other topics, has appeared in Social Identities, Journal of Immigrant and Refugee Studies, and Review of Faith & International Affairs. ‘Termination of Citizenship’, Global New Light of Myanmar (Yangon, Myanmar, 5 March 2022) 4; ‘Termination of Citizenship’, Global New Light of Myanmar (Yangon, Myanmar, 8 March 2022) 2; ‘Termination of Citizenship’, Global New Light of Myanmar (Yangon, 2 April 2022) 10. ibid. ibid. ‘နင ို င ် သ ံ ားအဖြစ်မှ ရပ်စက ဲ င်ား က ည ခံရသည်အကပေါ် တံိုဖပန်ချ ်မျ ား [Responses to the Stripping of Citizenship]’, Democratic Voice of Burma (online, 5 March 2022) <http://burmese.dvb.no/archives/520372>, archived at <https://perma.cc/YY6D-DBQS>; Dr Sasa (Facebook, 10 March 2022) <https://www.facebook.com/DrSasa22222/posts/ 502207124703483>, archived at <https://perma.cc/XMY4-7HFH>. ‘နင ို င ် သ ံ ားအဖြစ်မှ ရပ်စဖဲ ခင်ားဖြင် ကတ ်လှနစ ် တ် ို ရပ်၍မရ [The Revolutionary Spirit Cannot Be Stopped by Denationalisation]’, Irrawaddy (online, <https://burma.irrawaddy.com/article/2022/04/14/251279.html>, <https://perma.cc/4Q2K-BHLX>. 14 April archived 2022) at