Myanmar's military government, led by President Min Aung Hlaing — the general who seized power in a 2021 coup and was elected president this month by a parliament critics dismissed as a rubber-stamp body — has called on opposition armed groups to join peace talks before a July 31 deadline. Two major rebel factions, the Karen National Union and the Chin National Front, swiftly rejected the offer, with the Chin group declaring it had "nothing to discuss" with a military administration that had merely changed its appearance. The National Unity Government, the main body coordinating resistance to military rule, dismissed the invitation as a tactic to prolong junta control, underscoring the depth of a civil war that has engulfed most of the country since the coup ousted elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi.