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Myanmar crisis: Waiting for ASEAN to take a new course of action
ASEAN still has the time to to take a new course of action to pressure the junta in Naypyidaw. All it takes it resolve: The same resolve the bloc showed in deciding to exclude Min Aung Hlaing from the ASEAN Summit at the end of October.
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A protester makes the three-finger salute during a vigil on March 13, 2021 in Yangon, Myanmar, held to honor those killed during demonstrations against the Feb. 1, 2021 military coup. (AFP/Stringer)
T
he decision to not invite Min Aung Hlaing, the head of the Myanmar junta, to the upcoming ASEAN Summit has been heralded as a real breakthrough, a possible “game changer” in a crisis that, day by day, is seeing more and more bloodshed.
Perhaps Southeast Asian leaders have realized that the “ASEAN way” can work for trade and economic issues, even for matters of maritime security in the region, but cannot be leveraged when certain red lines are crossed.
Which red lines am I talking about? The disregard of lives and a member state’s dereliction of duty in protecting its own people.
The ASEAN way does not work in cases like these and it is counterproductive. Instead, it turns into a lethal enabling tool that perpetuates a regime’s grip on power, inflicting pain and suffering on a civilian population that feels it has no other option than to react to brutal force with an equally brutal force, though with less lethal tools.
Myanmar is now in a bind, and it is tragic. We should never have reached this point, which is basically the closest thing to a civil war.
In addition, according to the United Nations, the humanitarian situation is catastrophic, with emergency food relief saving lives every single day and with more and more people, already exhausted by the pandemic, now even more vulnerable and worn out by the internal strife.
To analysts who thought that the decision to exclude Hlaing from the upcoming summit was akin to ASEAN crossing the Rubicon, the answer is: Not yet. But the decision was relevant and sent a strong signal to the regime in Naypyidaw. And as all major news outlets reported, the generals reacted by freeing over 5.000 activists and political prisoners, although most of them were immediately jailed again, according to Myanmar news media The Irrawaddy.
