US and Asean will keep up pressure on Myanmar, Blinken says in Malaysia
- Malaysia has been calling for Asean to take a harder stance on junta chief Min Aung Hlaing to ensure he complies with a ‘five-point consensus’ peace plan
- The top US diplomat, who cut short his Southeast Asia trip due to a virus case among his entourage, said nothing was off the table, including sanctions on oil and gas revenues
Blinken, asked about the possibility of further punitive measures including sanctions on oil and gas revenues, indicated nothing was off the table. The US last week announced a raft of fresh sanctions on Myanmar but left out fossil fuel revenues.
“I think it’s going to be very important in the weeks and months ahead to look at what additional steps and measures we can take individually and collectively to pressure the regime to put the country back on a democratic trajectory,” Blinken said.
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Saifuddin meanwhile reiterated his previously-stated position for Asean to engage in internal “soul-searching” on the way forward with Myanmar given that its current strategy had not led to Myanmar’s crisis being defused.
“The decision was made then that we do not invite the leader of the military junta. But we cannot go on like this, we have to make sure that there are certain ways of doing things,” Saifuddin said.
He said while Asean had to abide by its principle of non-interference in member states’ internal affairs, it also had a responsibility to “look at the principle of non-indifference”.
The strongman leader has in recent weeks suggested he prefers engagement rather than isolation with Myanmar. Amid criticism of his softer stance, Hun Sen on Wednesday said he hoped he would be given a chance to mediate the crisis.
“Asean can’t be called Asean if there are only nine members. Asean must save itself from the Asean-9 situation,” he was quoted as saying by the Cambodianess portal. “Please do not bother me, give me time [to meet the leader of Myanmar]. I am not your teacher and you are not my teacher.”
Since the coup, the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP), an independent monitoring group, says more than 10,900 civilians have been detained and over 1,300 killed by security forces.
The junta claims these figures are exaggerated and that anti-coup forces including the shadow National Unity Government – classified by the military as a “terrorist group” – had killed hundreds of soldiers.
Suu Kyi jail term halved ‘on grounds of humanity’, Myanmar junta says
Along with Suu Kyi, other senior members of the National League for Democracy that had governed Myanmar since elections in 2015 remain in military custody and face criminal charges that rights groups say are trumped up.
Earlier in December, Suu Kyi and President Win Myint were sentenced to four years in jail in the first of several trials. Min Aung Hlaing later commuted the sentence to a two-year detention term on “grounds of humanity”.