ASEAN chair Philippines hopes to widen talks with anti-junta forces in Myanmar

MANILA, Philippines – Current ASEAN chair the Philippines said it looked forward to further talks with opponents of Myanmar’s ruling junta, and expected to engage more groups while staying open to the outcome of its general elections, but has not endorsed the vote.

Official results of the two completed rounds of voting in Myanmar’s three-phase ballot show the majority of seats going to a party allied with the military, ahead of the third round on Sunday, January 25.

Despite low turnout, the junta has called the election “a victory for the people,” saying it will bring political stability.

“I’m not endorsing the elections,” said ASEAN’s special envoy on the Myanmar crisis, Ma. Theresa Lazaro.

“Even as the Philippines, we are not endorsing the elections, but we’re open to what should come up from these events unraveling before us,” she told Reuters in an interview.

Myanmar has been ravaged by conflict since a 2021 coup that triggered a protest movement, which was brutally suppressed by the military, unleashing a civil war with a loose alliance of rebel groups.

While critics and some Western governments have called the election a one-sided sham to perpetuate army rule through civilian proxies, ASEAN has not sent observers to monitor it.

Stakeholders meet in PH this week

Lazaro, who took on her post this year, said de-escalation, facilitating aid delivery, and fostering political dialogue featured in a Manila-led “stakeholders’ meeting” on the crisis held in the Philippine town of Tagaytay this week.

The Chin National Front, an ethnic minority rebel group that holds territory near Myanmar’s northern border with India, confirmed to Reuters it had attended the two-day meeting and praised Lazaro for early headway in talking to all sides.

“This was a positive meeting,” its spokesperson Salai Van said. “Within one month, ASEAN’s new chair met with Myanmar stakeholders, and we are optimistic about the situation.”

A junta spokesperson did not answer telephone calls to seek comment on Thursday, January 22.

Myanmar’s shadow National Unity Government did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the meeting, but Lazaro confirmed it had participated.

The meeting followed Lazaro’s visit to Myanmar this month, when she met ruling general Min Aung Hlaing in a “warm and constructive exchange of views,” as Manila described the talks.

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Lazaro said she hoped more engagement drawing in other groups “that have to be heard” would follow the first meeting of stakeholders during the Philippines’ term as chair of the ASEAN bloc.

In a message on X, Lazaro said she was encouraged by the groups’ “active, constructive and meaningful sharing of perspectives” on adopting a peace plan agreed in 2021 by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and Myanmar.

Lazaro said she supported a longer term for envoys instead of the current yearly rotation, but said such changes would need to be discussed by the 11-member bloc.

Peace plan has made little progress amid fighting

With fighting roiling swathes of the country, the peace plan, known as the ASEAN five-point consensus, has made little progress, however, aside from improvements in humanitarian access.

Last year’s ASEAN chair, Malaysia, had voiced optimism that its efforts to engage various sides in the conflict could bear fruit.

A resource-rich former British colony governed by the military for most of the past six decades, Myanmar is grappling with one of Asia’s worst humanitarian crises.

Thousands have been killed in the post-coup conflict, in which the United Nations says 3.6 million people were displaced. – Rappler.com