United Nations says about half of Myanmar's people could sink into poverty in 2022

In this file photo taken on May 25, 2021 children and elders displaced from recent fighting between govt troops and ethnic rebels, wait for food distribution from a volunteer group while taking refuge at a monastery in Namlan town, in Myanmar's eastern Shan state. - AFP

YANGON, Dec 1 (Reuters): Urban poverty is on course to triple in Myanmar, pushing nearly half the population below the poverty line next year, the United Nations said on Wednesday, as the twin impact of the pandemic and a military coup threaten progress made in the past decade.

The army seized power from the elected civilian government of Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi on Feb. 1, unleashing political and economic turmoil as it sought to crush opposition and hurting efforts to fight the coronavirus.