At least 170 people were killed in military air strikes during Myanmar's weeks' long election period, the United Nations has reported.
Credible sources had counted the civilian deaths, the UN's rights office said, alongside 408 military aerial attacks conducted from December 2025 to late last week, coinciding with the third and final voting round.
This election has been widely denounced as a sham, with numerous countries and human rights groups expressing similar sentiments.
The military-backed Union and Solidarity Party (USDP) secured a decisive victory, as reported by state media, an outcome anticipated due to the tightly-controlled voting process.
Consequently, voting was not feasible in large portions of the country, where a civil war triggered by a military coup has unraveled since the ousting and imprisonment of democratically elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi in 2021.
Suu Kyi's party, the National League for Democracy, which had dominated the two elections prior to the coup, was barred from participating in the voting.
Many observers suspect that the military junta intends to maintain its power through proxy political parties. UN rights chief Volker Turk labeled the election staged by the military in a statement released on Friday.
He noted that opposition candidates and some ethnic groups were excluded from the electoral process which commenced on December 28.
Turk emphasized that citizens made their voting decisions out of fear, starkly contrasting with their civil and political rights. Continuing unrest and insecurity remain prevalent throughout much of the country.
James Rodehaver, head of the UN Human Rights' Myanmar team, indicated that civilian death toll figures featured open sources and are likely incomplete due to widespread communication restrictions and fear within various regions. These figures span the election campaigning period, from December to the final voting day in late January.
