The domestic situation in Myanmar has changed drastically since November 2020. That was the time of the country’s last federal election, which the National League for Democracy, led by Aung San Suu Kyi, dominated as expected. For a number of reasons — some clear, others less so — the leadership of the Tatmadaw, the military of Myanmar, decided to illegitimately contest the election result in a manner very similar to the protests of Donald Trump in the US. And then, on Feb. 1, 2021, the military asserted itself by force: It arrested the entire leadership of the NLD and others in the hierarchy of the civilian government, installing its own leader, Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, as head of a new military government. The Tatmadaw has the experience, capacity and inclination to impose its will on Myanmar by force and rule the country with an iron fist, just as it has done for decades. But it has never had to contend with such fierce opposition across the board. So, how does the domestic chaos in Myanmar help the Rohingya? At first glance, it does not. Quite the opposite. The civilian government that was removed was at least nominally entertaining discussions with Bangladesh about allowing the Rohingya to return to Myanmar. Those discussions were dishonest and mostly empty political theater, but at least they were happening. That committed the state of Myanmar to accepting the principle that the Rohingya had a right to return. Since the coup, the new military leadership has withdrawn from all such talks and has explicitly rejected that the Rohingya have any place in Myanmar. But then, as the anti-coup protests started ramping up in Myanmar during March and April last year, the Tatmadaw deployed the “anti-insurgency” tactics it had used to eject the Rohingya from the country against Burmese pro-democracy protesters in the heartlands. Everything that the Rohingya had reported of the abuses they had to endure at the hands of the Tatmadaw in their remote borderlands was now witnessed first-hand by Burmese civilians in Yangon, Mandalay and Naypyidaw. An unexpected outpouring of regret and support for the Rohingya among the protesters and Myanmar’s civil society swiftly followed. While the Rohingya had been dehumanized and attacked by decades of military regimes as an “enemy within” that had to be “dealt with,” a sudden realization now dawned on the breadth of Myanmarese society that the real enemy was the Tatmadaw — those who kept brutalizing people in the country for decades in the name of “security.” A few months later, after demands from the international community, the national unity government, which is organizing the resistance against the ongoing military domination of the country, also invited the Rohingya to send representatives on the same basis as every other minority group in the country, despite them having been mostly physically removed from the territory of Myanmar. Furthermore, the national unity government promised full repatriation. There is now a future on the table where they are recognized as a people and can take their rightful place in the country of their birth. Dr. Azeem Ibrahim This was a huge step forward for the Rohingya. It did not improve their immediate physical situation, but it was the first time they had been recognized as a full and proper part of Myanmar by a significant authority in the country since their formal status had been degraded by the Citizenship Law of 1982, which formally excluded them from citizenship in the country of their forefathers. Material change to the fate of the Rohingya remains contingent on whether the national unity government is successful in reversing the coup. That is still a remote prospect for the time being. Not only is it remote, it is also dangerous, as the looming civil war would be an absolute disaster in terms of human suffering. However, at least there is now a future on the table where the Rohingya are recognized as a people and can take their rightful place in the country of their birth as normal and full citizens. This is no small thing. It bodes well not just for the Rohingya, but also for the future of their native Myanmar as a country. Hope can be a very powerful thing, and it can now drive the Rohingya through the dark days just ahead. Dr. Azeem Ibrahim is a director at the Newlines Institute for Strategy and Policy in Washington, DC. Twitter: @AzeemIbrahim