As Thingyan ushers in the Burmese New Year this week, our thoughts turn to Aung San Suu Kyi — once a global icon of democracy, now a prisoner of the regime she once defied. Her dramatic fall from grace remains one of the most striking reversals in modern political history.

Daw Suu Kyi revered for her decades-long struggle against military rule now faces charges in an Argentine court filed under the principle of “universal jurisdiction” over alleged "genocide and crimes against humanity" targeting the Rohingya minority group. This stunning development places her in the same prosecutorial frame as the Myanmar junta’s commander-in-chief, Min Aung Hlaing who is charged with war crimes at the International Criminal Court.

Whether or not Suu Kyi deserves prosecution is a question that forces us to confront uncomfortable truths: about leadership, silence, complicity, and the enduring weight of nationalism. But we must also ask—what now for Myanmar, a country ravaged by dictatorship, war, and natural disaster, where hope clings on as a thin straw?

‘Cancelled: The Rise and Fall of Aung San Suu Kyi’, a new documentary by The Independent, traces her public life journey from 1988 — after she returned home to Myanmar from Oxford — with measured honesty. The film has extensive footage of events from when Suu Kyi was a political prisoner to an elected state counsellor, highlighting her Nobel Peace Prize and the widespread adoration that once cast her as a symbol of democratic hope.

Suu Kyi’s story is steeped in extraordinary sacrifice and personal courage. Her years under house arrest by the military junta made her a martyr to the cause of civilian rule and the decisive victory of her National League for Democracy in the 2015 general election, allowing her party to form the government, was celebrated as a long-overdue triumph of the people’s will.

But the documentary does not shy away from the moment when her moral authority collapsed. Her refusal to condemn the military’s 2017 campaign of ethnic cleansing against the Rohingya—and her defense of the genocidal acts of the junta at the International Court of Justice in The Hague—shattered her image abroad. Suu Kyi’s rhetoric on the international stage became chillingly familiar to autocrats: denying atrocities, discrediting victims, and cloaking state violence in the language of law and sovereignty.

Silence Seen as Complicity?

Inside Myanmar, many still saw her as a nationalist defending the country’s dignity. But to the rest of the world, her silence and deflection were seen as complicity. Suu Kyi's sustained silence, for whatever reason, occurred despite credible evidence of the Myanmar military junta's systematic annihilation of the Rohingya population. And this silence may well form the legal and moral basis for the case against her.

The documentary includes intimate reflections from those close to Suu Kyi, including her son Kim Aris and her former economic adviser Sean Turnell, as well as political figures like former U.K. Conservative leader and Foreign Secretary William Hague and human rights advocate Benedict Rogers. Their perspectives reveal the tension at the heart of Suu Kyi’s story: she was both a prisoner of circumstance and a woman of formidable agency. She could have spoken out, but she chose not to. This choice resulted in Amnesty International withdrawing its highest honor, the Ambassador of Conscience Award, from Suu Kyi in 2018.

Subsequently, at a London screening of ‘Cancelled’, author Jung Chang and human rights campaigner Bianca Jagger—while not featured in the documentary—voiced their concern over Suu Kyi’s harsh detention in solitary confinement and called for her release. Jagger emphasized the need for compassion even toward fallen heroes, and Chang reminded the audience of Suu Kyi’s quiet strength and the cruelty of her current imprisonment.  Ultimately, their views reflect a broader discomfort: can we still care about Suu Kyi’s freedom while holding her accountable for what she failed to stop?

The decision to charge Suu Kyi alongside the generals sends a message that silence can be as damning as command. To be clear, she did not control the army, nor did she order attacks. But she legitimized them by refusing to speak, by standing at the UN’s highest court and treating war crimes as misperceptions. Her defenders argue that she had no choice—that speaking out would have cost the fragile National League for Democracy and junta coalition to unravel and tear to tatters her life’s work in honoring her father General Aung San, the founder of modern Burma. But isn’t that the moral test of leadership? To speak when it matters most?

Meanwhile, the country Suu Kyi once led has descended into chaos. Since the military coup of February 2021, Myanmar has been plunged into a full-scale civil war. Armed resistance movements have formed across the country. The military continues to carry out airstrikes on villages and torture detainees. Tens of thousands have been killed; hundreds of thousands displaced. Just last month, a devastating 7.7 magnitude earthquake jolted Myanmar, killing more than 3,600 people and injuring thousands more. In its wake, the junta blocked humanitarian aid, seized control of local relief efforts, and used the crisis to tighten its grip on desperate populations.

International aid missions, such as India’s Operation Brahma and China’s disaster relief packages, have faced obstructions, delays, and politically motivated denials of access. Even well-established humanitarian actors cannot operate freely. By manipulating a natural disaster response, the military inflicts starvation and neglect as instruments of control, devastating vulnerable populations.

NUG Needs to Win Moral Authority

Following the 2021 military takeover, the National Unity Government (NUG)—formed in exile by elected lawmakers and civil society leaders ousted by the coup—has taken on the enormous burden of representing the democratic aspirations of the people. It has helped coordinate resistance, diplomatic engagement, and some elements of local governance in liberated zones. But the NUG’s role cannot be symbolic alone. It must be bold in vision and clear in principle.

While the NUG has articulated a reconciliation framework concerning the Rohingya, it remains in development rather than fully implemented. If the NUG wishes to be seen as a legitimate, moral alternative to the junta, it must acknowledge the past and offer a new political future based on justice and equality. It must lead not only through resistance but through accountability.

This means reckoning with the failures of the National League for Democracy, in which many NUG leaders once served. The NLD’s refusal to acknowledge the Rohingya as citizens, its complicity in their persecution, and Suu Kyi’s defense of the military at the International Court of Justice in 2019 remain deep wounds that undermine the moral authority of any future democratic government.

Nonetheless, even in the shadow of repression hope still endures. And this time, it comes not from one person, but from the people. Across Myanmar, resistance fighters, students, artists, doctors, and monks continue to defy the regime at great personal cost. Diaspora communities are organizing, documenting abuses, and building solidarity. Civil society networks are still delivering aid—quietly, dangerously, defiantly.

The international community must support these efforts—not with platitudes, but with resources, pressure, and protection. There must be consequences for junta violence, and there must be avenues for humanitarian assistance that bypass regime control. Myanmar’s survival depends on it.

The story of Aung San Suu Kyi reminds us that simplistic narratives cannot survive the weight of history. She is not merely a martyr or a villain. She is both a product and a shaper of Myanmar’s turbulent political past. Her silence on the Rohingya cannot be forgiven, but her current imprisonment should not be ignored. She is a cautionary tale—but also a human being.

Myanmar’s future will not be built on the shoulders of a single leader again. It will be shaped by the people—if we help them reclaim it. And the NUG, if it is to play a meaningful role in that future, must rise to the moment. There is no room left for hesitation. Myanmar has been silenced long enough. Its leaders—past and present—must find their voice or make way for those who already have.