After the Burmese military staged a military coup on Monday (Feb. 1) and detained the democratically elected government leader, democratic countries such as the United States, Britain and the European Union strongly condemned it and demanded that the Burmese military immediately release the detainees. However, China’s attitude is different: it is taking a painless tone and is waiting to see how things develop. Analysts point out that China has huge interests in Burma and it wants to maintain good relations with any Burmese government of any kind.
International Condemnation, Only China Is Watching
The Burmese military on Monday detained people including Burmese President Win Myint and State Senior Minister Aung San Suu Kyi and announced a takeover of power, handing over state authority to Myanmar Defense Force chief Min Aung Hlaing. The United States, Britain, the European Union, Japan, Australia, India and the United Nations have all strongly condemned the move and demanded the military’s immediate release.
President Joe Biden said Monday that it was a direct attack on “Burma’s shift to democracy and the rule of law. Biden called on the international community to “speak with one voice” to force the Burmese military to return to democracy and release the men immediately. Earlier, the White House also said the U.S. would take action against the individuals involved if the Burmese military did not reverse course.
British Prime Minister Johnson said: “I condemn the coup in Burma and the unlawful imprisonment of civilians, including Aung San Suu Kyi. People’s right to vote must be respected and democratically elected leaders must be released.”
European Council President Michel tweeted, “I strongly condemn the Burmese ‘coup’ and call on the (Burmese) military to release all those illegally detained in operations across the country.” He also wrote: “The election results must be respected and the democratic process needs to be restored.”
UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric also said in a statement, “The Secretary-General strongly condemns the detention of Aung San Suu Kyi and President Win Myint.” And it said, “This chain of developments is a heavy blow to democratic reform in Myanmar.”
China did not condemn the coup; instead, it struck a more moderate tone than any other country. Asked what China had to say about Myanmar’s military detaining Aung San Suu Kyi and others and declaring a one-year state of emergency, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said, “We have noticed what is happening in Myanmar and are learning more about the situation. China is a friendly neighbor of Myanmar and we hope that all parties in Myanmar will properly handle their differences under the constitutional and legal framework and maintain political and social stability.”
China has consistently shown itself to be a “friendly neighbor” when Myanmar is isolated
Analysts point out that China’s attitude on Myanmar is determined by its huge interests in the country. Murray Hiebert, a senior fellow in the Southeast Asia program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a Washington think tank, told the Voice of America, “They realize that the international community is going to condemn what’s going on. I think they thought this was a good opportunity to show that China is supportive of Myanmar and is a good friend of Myanmar.”
Hebert said that China’s adoption of such an attitude does not surprise him, as its current attitude is in line with the one it displayed in 2017 when Myanmar was isolated on the international stage due to the Rohingya crisis.
Back then, more than 740,000 Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar’s Rakhine State were forced to leave Rakhine State and move to neighboring Bangladesh to escape mass killings, rape and village burning by the Myanmar military. U.N. Secretary-General Guterres dismissed the military’s practice as “textbook ethnic cleansing. The international community condemned Aung San Suu Kyi’s government and imposed sanctions on Myanmar’s top military officials, including Min Aung Hlaing. China has expressed support for Myanmar’s approach and said it “welcomes” the government’s actions against the so-called “extremist terrorists”. In addition, China is the only country that has not stopped investing in Myanmar.
Hebert said China is also doing this to thwart U.S. efforts to promote democracy in Myanmar. Naturally, China does not want to see a pro-U.S. democratic government emerge on its own border. Burma is estranged from Europe and the United States because of the Rohingya crisis. Coupled with the coup, Hebert predicts that Burma’s generals should be more willing to deal with China.
The Burmese coup is also a challenge for the new Biden Administration‘s strategic competition with China, he said. In the future, the Biden administration may also have to consider not pushing the Burmese military further into China’s arms when it takes action against them.
A 2018 report by the U.S. Institute of Peace titled “China’s Role in the Burmese Conflict” says the Rohingya crisis actually provides China with an opportunity not only to reassert its dominance in Burma’s diplomatic relations, but also to gain support from the Burmese government for China’s political and economic interests in the country.
For strategic interests, China wants to maintain good relations with the Burmese military
Hibbert wrote a book on China-Southeast Asia relations in 2020 – In the Shadow of Beijing: The Chinese Challenge in Southeast Asia. He has made a number of studies on China’s relations with Myanmar. He says China wants to maintain good relations because of its strategic interests in Burma, both with the democratically elected and military governments.
Hebert notes that in a sense, Aung San Suu Kyi’s democratically elected government appears to be more helpful in advancing China’s interests in Burma than the Burmese military.
In 2011, the military-backed Thein Sein government unilaterally called a halt to China’s efforts in Burma. In 2011, the military-backed Thein Sein government unilaterally halted Chinese investment in the Myitsone hydropower project in Myanmar.
In September 2018, China and Aung San Suu Kyi’s government signed a memorandum of understanding to build the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor. In December of the same year, Myanmar established the Belt and Road Implementation Steering Committee, chaired by Senior Minister of State Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and vice-chaired by First Vice President Myint Swe, with a number of federal ministers and provincial and state chief ministers as members. The two countries also signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation on the feasibility study of the Mandalay-Kyaukpyu railroad during Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s visit to Myanmar on Jan. 10 this year.
Hibbert believes that China’s failure to condemn the Burmese military is still motivated by a desire to safeguard Chinese interests in Myanmar.
I think it is still because of the recognition that Burma is a very important neighbor of China and that China has many strategic and economic interests and therefore wants to continue to have good relations with the government,” he said. If the government changes, I think they believe that this government (the military) will be in power for quite some Time. They think it’s useful to remain friendly with the military even if they have differences with them.”
Myanmar’s China-Myanmar Economic Corridor is an important part of China’s “One Belt, One Road” project in Southeast Asia. The aforementioned Kyaukpyu port is of strategic importance to China. Kyaukpyu is located in Rakhine State in western Myanmar and is the starting point of the China-Myanmar oil and gas pipeline. Now, China is planning to build a deep-water port in Kyaukpyu. Once the 1,470-kilometer route from Kunming, the capital of China’s Yunnan Province, to Kyaukpyu is opened, China will be able to access the Indian Ocean by land without fear of enemy intervention in the Malacca Strait.
China is friendly with both the Burmese military and the democratically elected government
In fact, China maintains friendly relations with both the military and the democratically elected government in Burma. Whether engaging with the elected or military governments, China emphasizes the traditional friendship and “brotherhood” between the two countries.
In January 2021, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi visited Myanmar, where he met not only with Aung San Suu Kyi, the de facto leader of Myanmar’s democratically elected government, but also with Min Aung Hlaing, the commander-in-chief of Myanmar’s defense forces. According to Xinhua, Wang said China appreciates that the Tatmadaw takes national revitalization as its mission, thinks about the future development of the country from a long-term perspective, adheres to the traditional friendship between China and Myanmar, and promotes the “brotherhood” between the two countries.
Chinese President Xi Jinping also met with both Aung San Suu Kyi and Min Aung Hlaing during his visit to Myanmar in January 2020, and sent a letter to Aung San Suu Kyi on Nov. 16, 2020, congratulating her National League for Democracy on its re-election to power in the recent elections.
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