NAYPYITAW: Myanmar's military government held its annual Armed Forces Day parade on Wednesday in a show of force as it struggles to contain a growing armed resistance that has captured broad swathes of territory.

The military has suffered a series of major losses to an alliance of ethnic minority armed groups, and junta chief Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing admitted this week that it might not be possible to hold elections all over the Southeast Asian country because of the instability.

Three years after seizing power in a coup, the junta is now facing an "existential threat," a United Nations expert has said, with casualties and defections taking a toll.

Wednesday saw a show of defiance as the military rolled out troops and hardware for the Armed Forces Day parade, which commemorated the start of resistance to Japanese occupation during World War 2.

Unlike in years past, the parade was held in the evening because of hot weather, a junta spokesman said.

Security in Naypyitaw, the junta's remote, purpose-built capital, was tight, with few cars on the roads in the run-up to the event.

On Tuesday night, Min Aung Hlaing attended in the capital a gala dinner with a number of visiting Russian officers.

Moscow has remained a close ally, providing arms and diplomatic support to the junta.

The Feb. 1, 2021 coup against the elected government of 1991 Nobel Peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi unleashed turmoil that has left thousands dead and shattered Myanmar's economy.

At last year's parade, Min Aung Hlaing vowed "decisive action" against the junta's opponents, but over the past six months, the generals' grip on power has looked shakier than ever.

Dozens of anti-junta "People's Defense Forces" (PDFs) have enlisted tens of thousands of young recruits to battle the army across the country.

And last October, an alliance of ethnic minority fighters launched a surprise offensive in northern Shan state, capturing territory and taking control of lucrative trade routes to China.

State of emergency

Tom Andrews, the UN's special rapporteur on the human rights situation in Myanmar, said last week that battlefield losses and problems with recruitment were posing "an existential threat for the Myanmar military."

The situation has driven the junta to enforce a military service law, allowing it to call up all men ages 18 to 35 and women ages 18 to 27 to render two years of service.

The announcement last month prompted thousands of potential recruits to try to flee the country, with Thailand's embassy in the former capital Yangon deluged with visa applicants.

The military justified its coup with unsubstantiated claims of electoral fraud during the 2020 polls won by Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party.

It has repeatedly pledged to hold new elections while also extending a state of emergency that prevents them from taking place.

More than 4,500 people have been killed in the military's crackdown on dissent since the coup and over 26,000 arrested, a local monitoring group said.

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