A report submitted by Justice for Myanmar, a movement which aims to expose systemic oppression and human rights violations in the country, on December 20, 2020, released details regarding the involvement of Viettel and other international businesses in the Myanmar telecommunications sector. This piece of investigative journalism states that “the commercial partnerships established between these businesses and Mytel (Myanmar’s newest mobile network operator) show that they are complicit in the abuses committed by the Myanmar military.”

An even more concerning factor would be the connivance of the Vietnamese government itself. Viettel is a state-owned enterprise operated by Vietnam’s Ministry of Defense and it is also the fourth largest stakeholder in Mytel. Hence, the Vietnamese government appears to have a direct hand in the affairs of another sovereign nation. In the same vein, Mytel itself has its own fair share of controversies and scandals hounding it since its inception.