Military intelligence of Myanmar

Office of the Chief of Military Affairs Security (MAS) စစ်ဘက်ရေးရာ လုံခြုံရေးအရာရှိချုပ်ရုံး (စရခ), commonly referred to by its Burmese acronym Sa Ya Pa (Sa Aa Pa in S'gaw Karen), is the office of the Myanmar armed forces tasked with intelligence gathering. It was created to replace the Military Intelligence Service, which was disbanded as its chief Khin Nyunt fell from favour in 2004. The office is charged with handling political issues, and had played a central role in monitoring the 2007 popular protests in Myanmar; coordinating widespread arrests of protesters and their interrogation. Human Rights Watch reported that as part of its interrogation process, MAS uses sleep deprivation and condones the beating and kicking of detainees until they are unconscious. Notable former commanders of MAS include current Chief of General Staff (Army, Navy and Airforce) General Mya Tun Oo and Union Minister for Home Affairs Lieutenant General Kyaw Swe. As of September 2016, MAS is headed by Lieutenant General Soe Htut.