As the US looks to build a coalition to further punish Myanmar’s generals, it is not having much success convincing governments in Asia to follow suit.
The standing of Burmese Army Senior General Min Aung Hlaing’s regime has slipped even further in the West after his envoy to the UN denounced the military takeover and Burmese authorities killed 18 protesters on Sunday, the deadliest day since the Feb. 1 coup.
While the junta has since told security forces to avoid using live bullets, reports emerged yesterday that protesters were still being shot with them.
Photo: EPA-EFE
Washington has led the global pushback, with US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan saying the US was “coordinating closely with allies and partners in the Indo-Pacific region” and would take additional actions after imposing targeted sanctions on the coup makers.
The UK also sanctioned the generals and the EU has said it is working on punitive measures.
Asian nations, by contrast, have not taken any concrete action.
Photo: EPA-EFE
While Indonesia has conducted shuttle diplomacy and Singapore has said its “appalled by the violence,” no countries in the region have so far indicated they would support sanctions or any other measures that would hit the military’s finances.
Foreign ministers of the 10-member ASEAN, which includes Myanmar, sought to balance calls for the release of Aung San Suu Kyi, while also avoiding any interference in its internal affairs.
Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) said sanctions would only hurt the population at large and push Myanmar closer to those willing to talk to them like China.
“You can ostracize them, condemn them, and pass resolutions or not, but it really has very little influence,” Lee told the BBC, according to comments distributed by his office. “We have to express disapproval for what is done, which is against the values of many other countries, and in fact a large part of humanity. But to say that I will take action against them, where does this lead?”
For Myanmar’s generals, Asia’s reluctance to join US-led sanctions or even cut them out of meetings effectively offers a diplomatic lifeline as they struggle to gain control of the country.
Prior to Myanmar’s opening about a decade ago, business ties with Asia allowed the junta to survive for years, despite much broader Western sanctions than are currently in place.
“ASEAN has an unmatched track record of indifference to authoritarian rule in Myanmar,” said Lee Morgenbesser, a lecturer at Australia’s Griffith University who researches Southeast Asian politics.
Countries in Asia also avoided sanctioning Burmese generals over allegations of genocide against the Muslim Rohingya minority that forced more than 700,000 people to flee to Bangladesh.
An independent UN fact-finding mission found in 2019 that at least 59 foreign firms — most from Asia — had either joint ventures or commercial ties with the military, producing revenue that “substantially enhances its ability to carry out gross violations of human rights with impunity.”
“In some ways, ASEAN allowed the military to get away with what happened with the Rohingya crisis and I think that they are faced with something more dangerous,” said Bridget Welsh, honorary research associate at the Asia Research Institute, University of Nottingham Malaysia. “This is going to be much more difficult for them to wrestle with.”
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