Beijing controls the Myanmar coup? Two major signals raise doubts

Reporter : Luo Tingting  / Editor: Wen Hui / https://www.ntdtv.com/gb/2021/02/08/a103049572.html / Direct translation

Image : On February 7, people in Yangon staged a large-scale protest and the police blocked the streets. (Getty Images)

The military coup in Myanmar triggered a wave of large-scale protests and the domestic situation was turbulent. Myanmar is called the back garden and the frontier of the Belt and Road Initiative by the CCP. Some analysts believe that there are two major signals before and after the coup in Myanmar, showing that there is the shadow of the CCP behind the coup.

The Myanmar military launched a coup on February 1, arresting and prosecuting the Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi and other senior government officials. At the same time, the military announced that it would take over power and implement military control for one year.

The coup triggered a wave of large-scale protests. Since February 6, a large number of people in Yangon and other major cities have taken to the streets to protest the military coup and oppose the military dictatorship.

The situation in Myanmar has aroused the attention of the international community, and the outside world has turned its attention to the Chinese Communist authorities, which have close ties with the Myanmar military. "Apple Daily" reported on the 7th that it is difficult to verify what Beijing did behind the Myanmar coup. However, it is a well-known fact that Beijing and the Burmese military secretly communicate.

There were two major signals before and after the Burmese military launched the coup d’etat, showing that the CCP’s shadow was behind the coup. First, on the eve of the coup, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi visited Myanmar and met with the commander-in-chief of the Myanmar Armed Forces Min Aung Lai.

According to CCP official media reports, Wang Yi expressed his favor to Min Aung Lai, calling the CCP and Myanmar "brothers." Min Aung Lai directly stated to Wang Yi that there was fraud in the Myanmar general election in November 2020 and claimed that he would take action. The official media did not disclose how Wang Yi responded.

Second, after the coup, the UN Security Council discussed the political situation in Myanmar, and the CCP opposed the adoption of a statement condemning the military coup in Myanmar, publicly showing Beijing’s attitude.

Li Liangxi, a former UN special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar and a current professor at Seoul University in South Korea, believes that the Myanmar coup should have been supported by the CCP, and Beijing acquiesced or encouraged the Myanmar military to initiate the coup.

Azeem Ibrahim, director of the Center for Global Policy of the United States, recently published a paper in Foreign Policy that the Myanmar coup may have been acquiesced and supported by the CCP, turning Myanmar into a pariah state and included in the camp of an authoritarian state. .

He believes that Wang Yi's meeting with the military leader Min Aung Lai may be a crucial moment in deciding on the coup in Myanmar, and Beijing may tacitly expressed its support in advance.

The publisher of the American "Political Risk" magazine, "Corr Analytics" (Corr Analytics) director Anders. Anders Corr said that if the coup can happen in Myanmar, it can happen anywhere. This may be part of Beijing's strategic layout in Southeast Asia and a blow to global democracies.

Cole called on the United States to sanction the CCP, so as to help solve the root cause of the problem.

Outsiders believe that Myanmar is not only called its back garden and the forefront of the Belt and Road Initiative by the CCP, but also a crucial strategic fortress.

Myanmar has always been China's channel to the Indian Ocean. When the Japanese army invaded China during World War II, the government of the Republic of China at that time relied on the national army expedition to Burma to open up the lifeline and receive military supplies from the allies.

The CCP vigorously supported the military seizure of power by the Communist Party of Myanmar in the 1960s and 1970s, and even trained its members and their generals in Yunchuan and other places. The Burmese military government was isolated globally but Beijing supported Burma and established oil pipelines and transportation lines connecting Yunnan and Myanmar’s deepest port, Kyaukphyu.

Wu Qiang, a former lecturer in the Department of Political Science at Tsinghua University, told Radio Free Asia recently that the Burmese military's power is more beneficial to the Chinese Communist Party. Under the leadership of Aung San Suu Kyi, the CCP’s dams and oil pipeline construction projects in Myanmar will be subject to some restraints, and the military government’s coming to power means that these restraints can be lifted.