Thailand is now the preferred banking location of the Myanmar junta, according to UN experts, while military attacks increase

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International banks are playing a key role in enabling Myanmar’s military junta to carry out its systematic and deadly attack on its own population, according to a new United Nations-backed report.

Thai banks have become the Myanmar military’s main source of arms and military equipment, including parts for attack helicopters, which are used to finance the three-year civil war that has devastated the country and claimed the lives of more than 5,000 civilians, said UN Special Rapporteur for Human Rights Tom Andrews in a new report on Wednesday.

Since the coup in February 2021, the military has been waging an increasingly fierce war against ethnic armed groups and popular resistance forces across Myanmar, suffering significant territorial and troop losses in recent months.

As the junta grapples with widespread public opposition and an economic crisis that has led to a rapid rise in poverty, it has stepped up airstrikes and attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure, displacing more than three million people.

The military’s brutal campaign of violence has prompted Western nations to impose sweeping sanctions against the military leadership, their families and cronies, state-owned companies, banks and jet fuel suppliers.

“The junta, or State Administration Council (SAC), relies primarily on two resources from abroad: weapons and money,” Andrews said in the report.

The report, “Banking on the Death Trade: How Banks and Governments Support Myanmar’s Military Junta,” found that 16 banks in seven countries processed transactions related to military procurement last year.

The value of weapons, dual-use technologies, manufacturing equipment and raw materials secured by the junta from abroad amounted to $253 million between April 2023 and March 2024, the report said.

“By relying on financial institutions willing to do business with Myanmar’s state-owned banks, which it controls, the junta has easy access to the financial services it needs to commit systematic human rights abuses, including airstrikes against civilians,” Andrews said.

However, the volume of weapons and military equipment purchased by the junta through foreign banks has fallen by a third since 2023, and exports from Singapore have also fallen dramatically, the report said.

“The good news is that the junta is increasingly isolated,” Andrews said. “The bad news is that the junta is evading sanctions and other measures by exploiting loopholes in sanctions regimes, shifting financial institutions and taking advantage of member states’ failure to fully coordinate and enforce measures.”

Singapore-based companies were Myanmar’s third-largest source of weapons and military equipment. But according to a government investigation, the flow of arms shipments to Myanmar from Singapore-registered companies has fallen by almost 90 percent compared to last year.

In 2022, Singapore-based banks handled more than 70 percent of the junta’s purchases through the banking system. By 2023, that share fell to less than 20 percent, the report said.

In its search for other financial institutions, the junta found neighboring Thailand.

Between 2022 and 2023, exports of weapons and related materials from Thai companies more than doubled, from $60 million to nearly $130 million last year.

“Many of SAC’s (junta’s) purchases previously made from Singapore-based companies, including parts for Mi-17 and Mi-35 helicopters used for air strikes on civilian targets, are now sourced from Thailand,” the report said.

Siam Commercial Bank is among the Thai banks that have played a “critical role” in this change, the report said. In 2022, the bank handled just over $5 million worth of military-related transactions, and by 2023 that number rose to over $100 million, according to the report.

CNN has reached out to Siam Commercial Bank for comment on the report but has not received a response.

A spokesman for the Thai Foreign Ministry told CNN: “We have seen the report and are investigating it.”

“Many countries have been mentioned and these are certainly countries through which the majority of financial transactions in the region are conducted,” the spokesman said in a statement.

“Our banks and financial institutions follow banking protocols like any major financial center. Therefore, we must first clarify the facts before considering any further steps.”

Andrews said it was “critical” that “financial institutions take their human rights obligations seriously and do not support the junta’s deadly transactions.”

In addition, sanctions against the networks that supply the junta with jet fuel and against the Myanma Economic Bank, the military’s “main bank,” “could play a critical role in turning the tide in Myanmar and saving countless lives,” he said.