The brutality and repression there highlight the failings of a dysfunctional world order. Unless we do better, this is the future<\/p>\n
The children were sleeping when death came from the air<\/a>. A military warplane dropped two 500lb (230kg) bombs on their boarding school, witnesses said. Imagine, if you can, the carnage and the horror. At least 18 died<\/a>. Others suffered life-changing injuries. The ruling regime claims to be fighting terrorists. Yet more often than not, it is defenceless, blameless civilians who are killed, maimed and displaced. No, this isn\u2019t Gaza. It isn\u2019t Ukraine. It\u2019s Myanmar, where appalling atrocities, including crimes against humanity, often go unreported and unpunished. That doesn\u2019t render them any less heinous or less deserving of universal condemnation.<\/p>\n Myanmar, formerly British-run colonial Burma, where civil war has raged since an army coup overthrew the elected government in 2021, is a microcosm of today\u2019s fractured world. National leaders gathering at the UN general assembly this week<\/a> face numerous daunting problems: among them, the authoritarian assault on democracy; record levels of conflict; pervasive flouting of human rights; impunity in the committing of genocide and war crimes; humanitarian emergencies exacerbated by foreign aid cuts<\/a>; rising poverty; and environmentally damaging exploitation of less-developed countries\u2019 natural resources.<\/p>\n Simon Tisdall is a Guardian foreign affairs commentator<\/p>\n