A hawker on a street in Yangon, the largest city of Myanmar on Feb 2. (ZHANG DONGQIANG / XINHUA)
As Myanmar’s new governing council headed by the military gets down to work, China has urged the international community to create a sound external environment for the poor country to properly resolve its internal differences.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said on Feb 3, the day after a closed-door discussion by the United Nations Security Council on the Myanmar issue, that all actions taken by the Security Council should be conducive to peaceful settlement and not to complicating the situation.
“We hope that all parties in Myanmar will put aspiration and interest of the people first, properly handle differences through dialogues within the constitutional and legal framework, and safeguard political and social stability,” Wang said in a news briefing.
After weeks of rising tension in Myanmar between the government and the military over the results of the November 2020 general election, former elected leaders including Aung San Suu Kyi and U Win Myint, as well as other senior officials, were detained by the military, known as the Tatmadaw, on Feb 1.
A one-year state of emergency was declared and the state power was handed to the military, which said that a new election will be held after the period of emergency and that it will hand the reins back to a civilian administration after the election.
A majority of regional and state chief ministers have been released so far. But a National League for Democracy official said Suu Kyi and U Win Myint will be held in detention until Feb 15.
Suu Kyi was charged under the Export and Import Law as handheld radios that were illegally imported and used without permission were found in a search of her residence in the capital city of Naypyitaw.
The military and the police have yet to make any statements in response to request for information from NLD, Suu Kyi’s policitical party, as of Feb 3, Xinhua News Agency reported.
Min Zaw Oo, executive director of Myanmar Institute for Peace and Security, an independent think tank, said the situation could have been resolved through proper dialogues and discussion but the matter reached a point of escalation.
He said that the current military takeover is significantly different from those in the past. For example, most of the new cabinet members are civil servants, while in the past, top decision-makers and cabinet members were all from the military.
“The extent of the impact depends on the reaction from the international community,” said Adam McCarty, chief economist with research and consulting firm Mekong Economics, which operates in Myanmar and Vietnam.
Brunei, speaking as the current chair of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, said in a statement that the 10-nation bloc encourages “the pursuance of dialogue, reconciliation and the return to normalcy in accordance with the will and interests of the people of Myanmar”.
Some ASEAN member states, including Cambodia and Thailand, said it is Myanmar’s “internal affair” while others have indicated their “concern”.
However, the United States used just one day to determine that the military takeover in the Southeast Asian country constituted a coup d’etat, as per a US Department of State news briefing in Washington on Feb 2. A day earlier, US President Joe Biden threatened to reimpose sanctions on Myanmar’s military leaders. The Group of Seven nations issued a statement on Feb 3 condemning the “coup” in Myanmar.
Russia’s foreign ministry in a statement on Feb 1 said it hopes for “peaceful settlement of the (Myanmar) situation in accordance with the current legislation through the resumption of political dialogue and the preservation of sustainable socioeconomic development of the country.”
Mekong Economics’ McCarty said earlier he is worried this will “trigger certain sanctions” from the international community. Even without the sanctions, McCarty said he expects Myanmar’s foreign direct investment inflows to be negatively affected by the political situation.
On Feb 2, Myanmar’s Office of the Commander-in-Chief of Defence Services announced formation of a new 11-member State Administration Council late in the evening.
Chaired by Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, commander-in-chief of defence services, the council includes Vice-Senior General Soe Win, who will serve as deputy chairman, Xinhua reported.
The council also formed a six-member Union Election Committee in accordance with the Constitution.
The day before, the military announced a major cabinet reshuffle.
Myanmar’s military also reconstituted the Peace Talks Committee on Feb 1 to continue discussions with armed ethnic organizations in order to achieve a lasting peace, especially in the country’s northern regions.
During the first meeting among newly appointed ministers on Feb 2, Min Aung Hlaing unveiled further plans to be implemented during the state of emergency. These include reopening religious buildings and pagodas, resuming the domestic travel and hotel businesses as well as some other industries, in line with COVID-19 rules and regulations.
Among the key tasks are revitalizing the country’s economy, providing job opportunities for the unemployed and repatriating promptly Myanmar citizens who are stuck overseas during the pandemic, Xinhua reported, citing a release from Myanmar’s Military True News Information Team.
During the cabinet meeting, Min Aung Hlaing said it was inevitable that the army had to take power given the protests over alleged election fraud last year, which the electoral commission had dismissed, according to Myanmar Times.
Oxford Economics said in a research briefing on Feb 1 that it expects the increase in political risk and business uncertainty to lead to a slower recovery in investment and foreign direct investment inflows to Myanmar, with the possibility of US sanctions also a risk.
The British think tank has lowered its GDP forecast for Myanmar for this year to around 2 percent, from a 4.1 percent projection made before the military takeover. The country’s FDI inflow is also estimated to drop by 2 percentage points.
Supporters of the military-backed parties were seen demonstrating on the streets in the capital city of Naypyitaw, while in Yangon, the country’s largest city, hundreds of people blared car horns and lit handles on Feb 2 evening in a show of support for Suu Kyi’s party.
The Confederation of Trade Unions of Myanmar said in a statement on Feb 3 that workers’ representatives from all its member companies recognize the 2020 election results and hope a new government can be formed based on those results, according to China Central Television. It said that all the staff in confederation will stop working in protest against the military takeover.
Dereck Aw, lead analyst for Myanmar at the global consultancy firm Control Risks, said large-scale protests could have “the potential to set in motion a prolonged crisis”.
Aw said the best-case scenario involves the parties agreeing to deescalate the situation and reaching a compromise in the coming weeks.
How Suu Kyi and her party will react to the military’s plan will determine the nature and length of the crisis, he said.
The executive committee of National League for Democracy, Suu Kyi’s political party, issued a statement on Feb 2 calling for the release of people who have been detained by the military. It also called for an acknowledgement of the election results and the resumption of the parliament session.
Min Zaw Oo from MIPS said “the most important issue” facing the country will be the transition from military supervision to an elected government.
Xinhua and agencies contributed to this report.
