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Hello and welcome to NewsHour from the BBC World Service.

We're coming to you live from London.

I'm Paul Henley.

First up on the programme today, in the run-up to elections in Myanmar,

which begin in less than two and a half

hours time, it's been difficult to inspire enthusiasm in many voters. A civil war, a humanitarian

crisis, and the fact that a military dictatorship is organising the vote are serious obstacles

to democracy in the Asian country, formerly known as Burma, between Bangladesh and

Thailand. Human rights groups, the United Nations and many Western governments have criticized

Sunday's elections as an attempt by the generals to entrench their rule via political proxies.

There'll be 57 parties on the ballot, the majority, have links to the military.

It was in 2021 that the army deposed an elected government, led by the Nobel laureate,

Aung San Suu Kyi. Her party has not been allowed to run this time, and she remains locked up

in prison. Her son, Kim Aris, lives here in the UK and has had no contact with his mother for the

past two years. He told the World Service he did not believe these elections were legitimate.

The democratically elected leadership has been all locked up, including my mother, and without

there being allowed to participate in these elections, they are essentially

meaningless. If the international community stepped up and helped the resistance in a meaningful

way, then we could end all of this. Bilateral support would go a long way, and the humanitarian

situation in Burma is untenable now, but also in terms of military aid,

meaning supplying the resistance with weaponry and bullets.

...