Equation
Lieutenant General
No need to be afraid. If the church acts, dictates, and behaves like a state, than it should be open for questioning.
China's Westward One Belt One Road Strategy
- Thread starter tidalwave
- Start date
Hendrik_2000
Lieutenant General
Blackstone said that Myanmar turn to US for security reason. I guess China is in driver seat when it come to Myanmar security or for that matter her national integrity
By keeping the peace process in low boil,China effectively keep Myanmar in tight leash. In case she wander into western orbit again like Than Sein
I do agree China primary interest is access to sea and port Kyakpau
The second in a planned series of meetings between the Myanmar military, the government and various ethnic armed groups aimed at establishing peace in the country’s decades-long civil war was concluded last week in the capital Naypyitaw. The clear winner of the event’s deliberations: China.
Myanmar authorities insisted before the meeting that talks would not he held with three of the seven ethnic armed groups active in the country’s conflict-ridden north because they had taken up arms after the peace process began.
THE DAILYBrief
Must-reads from across Asia - directly to your inbox
The groups that were invited to the conference were told they must sign a detailed accord, known as the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement (NCA), before any major political talks are held.
Yet China flew representatives from all seven northern armed groups, none of which have signed the NCA, in a chartered plane that departed from the nearby Chinese city of Kunming and landed in Naypyitaw. The move effectively presented Myanmar’s civil and military authorities with a fait accompli to include the ethnic armies that Beijing tacitly backs in the peace process.
United Wa State Army soldiers during a media display in Panghsang, Wa territory in northeast Myanmar October 4, 2016. Photo: Reuters/Soe Zeya Tun
Some Western observers had somewhat naively believed that Beijing would put pressure on the northern groups to sign the NCA, not realizing that China’s pressure was applied instead on the Myanmar government to include its allies in the talks without pre-conditions.
The seven groups, led by the United Wa State Army (UWSA), a close Chinese ally, had already made clear that they were interested in holding dialogue before signing any NCA.
Not surprisingly, the meeting — dubbed 21st Century Panglong after an agreement signed by Myanmar nationalist leader Aung San and Shan, Kachin and Chin representatives on February 12, 1947, which paved the way for Myanmar’s independence — ended inconclusively.
China is playing a complex political game, part of which includes the rehabilitation of the UWSA, traditionally the region’s largest drug-trafficking militia. In recent years, the heavily armed group has been more media friendly than ever, even allowing foreign journalists to visit its secretive headquarters at Panghsang.
Over the past year, the UWSA has played host to several meetings with many ethnic armies, mainly those situated in the north, but also others that have long operated along the Thai border. China has shown directly and through its UWSA ally that it is now the most important foreign actor in Myanmar’s peace process.
While the West, including the European Union, Norway, Switzerland and the United States, have spent millions of dollars on seminars for issues such as women’s participation in the peace process, conflict sensitivity and capacity building, and sponsored study trips to post-conflict Northern Ireland, Colombia and South Africa, China has played its cards more subtly.
European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini and Myanmar State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi in Brussels, Belgium May 2, 2017. Photo: Reuters/Eric Vidal
The longer talks in Naypyitaw and Panghsang continue, the stronger China’s role will become. An immediate end to Myanmar’s long-running civil war is in many ways not in China’s strategic interest.
Rather, a prolonged peace process would give China a chance to assert its mediating role and pressure Myanmar authorities to reciprocate through concessions and privileges, including Beijing’s desired strategic access to the Indian Ocean in western Rakhine state.
While maintaining close relations with Myanmar’s government and military, China has also supplied the UWSA with sophisticated weaponry, some of which has been shared with the group’s six armed allies, among them the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army in Kokang, the Ta’ang National Liberation Army, the Shan State Army-North and, to a lesser extent, the Kachin Independence Army.
A smaller group, the Arakan Army, is also a member of the Northern Alliance, as is the National Democratic Alliance Army in easternmost Shan State. China’s relations with those seven groups, which by some estimates account for more than 80% of all rebels under arms, puts it in a position which no other foreign power can match.
The Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA), a Palaung ethnic armed group, parading as they mark the 51st anniversary of its resistance in Myanmar’s northern Shan state. Photo: AFP/Ye Aung Thu
Sources familiar with the peace process emphasize that China’s interests in Myanmar go far beyond peace between the government and ethnic armed groups.
“Peace-making is a tool, not a goal for the Chinese,” said one well-connected observer. By playing the role of interlocutor, China can regain some of the influence it lost when the previous quasi-civilian government reopened to the West, including the US, beginning in 2011.
The Myanmar government’s suspension of the US$3.6 billion Myitsone dam project in northern Kachin state in September of that year is known to have surprised and angered Beijing. It subsequently watched with apprehension as Western leaders, among them US President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, paid high-profile visits to the country.
Now, while Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government recoils from Western criticism of its abusive treatment of the Rohingyas, Muslims living in the country’s west, China has blocked attempts to raise the issue at the United Nations Security Council. As was the case when the US and Europe imposed harsh sanctions on the previous military regime, China is seemingly now again Myanmar’s top diplomatic ally.
Myanmar State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi and Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, May 16, 2017. Photo: Reuters/Damir Sagolj
Beijing’s bid to regain lost influence through the peace process should also be viewed from the perspective of its broader geopolitical interests, analysts say. Multi-billion dollar hydroelectric dams, mining ventures and other commercial interests are not at the top of China’s strategic priorities in Myanmar.
“Access to the Indian Ocean is,” says one well-placed Myanmar observer, noting China’s CITIC Group Corporation’s won a contract last year to build a deep-sea port at Kyaukpyu in western Rakhine state that faces the Bay of Bengal.
A prolonged peace process would give China a chance to assert its mediating role and pressure Myanmar authorities to reciprocate through concessions and privileges, including Beijing’s desired strategic access to the Indian Ocean in western Rakhine state.
China is already involved in similar port projects in Gwadar in Pakistan, Chittagong in Bangladesh and Hambantota and Colombo in Sri Lanka. Of all these, however, analysts say Kyaukpyu is the most important as it provides China’s southwestern industrial areas with a direct corridor to the Indian Ocean.
It is uncertain when the next 21st Century Panglong meeting will be held in Myanmar. While Western nations and nongovernmental organizations have been largely sidelined and marginalized, China has taken a clear leading role in the peace process.
Myanmar’s fiercely nationalistic military, which has made clear its desire to diversify the country’s diplomacy and strategic relations away from over-reliance on China, is now no doubt on a back foot.
But given China’s relative strength — and the West’s haphazard, ad hoc approach to Myanmar’s ethnic conflicts — Naypyitaw may have no choice but to accommodate Beijing’s requests for economic and strategic concessions in exchange for peace in its ethnic hinterlands.
By keeping the peace process in low boil,China effectively keep Myanmar in tight leash. In case she wander into western orbit again like Than Sein
I do agree China primary interest is access to sea and port Kyakpau
The second in a planned series of meetings between the Myanmar military, the government and various ethnic armed groups aimed at establishing peace in the country’s decades-long civil war was concluded last week in the capital Naypyitaw. The clear winner of the event’s deliberations: China.
Myanmar authorities insisted before the meeting that talks would not he held with three of the seven ethnic armed groups active in the country’s conflict-ridden north because they had taken up arms after the peace process began.
THE DAILYBrief
Must-reads from across Asia - directly to your inbox
The groups that were invited to the conference were told they must sign a detailed accord, known as the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement (NCA), before any major political talks are held.
Yet China flew representatives from all seven northern armed groups, none of which have signed the NCA, in a chartered plane that departed from the nearby Chinese city of Kunming and landed in Naypyitaw. The move effectively presented Myanmar’s civil and military authorities with a fait accompli to include the ethnic armies that Beijing tacitly backs in the peace process.
United Wa State Army soldiers during a media display in Panghsang, Wa territory in northeast Myanmar October 4, 2016. Photo: Reuters/Soe Zeya Tun
Some Western observers had somewhat naively believed that Beijing would put pressure on the northern groups to sign the NCA, not realizing that China’s pressure was applied instead on the Myanmar government to include its allies in the talks without pre-conditions.
The seven groups, led by the United Wa State Army (UWSA), a close Chinese ally, had already made clear that they were interested in holding dialogue before signing any NCA.
Not surprisingly, the meeting — dubbed 21st Century Panglong after an agreement signed by Myanmar nationalist leader Aung San and Shan, Kachin and Chin representatives on February 12, 1947, which paved the way for Myanmar’s independence — ended inconclusively.
China is playing a complex political game, part of which includes the rehabilitation of the UWSA, traditionally the region’s largest drug-trafficking militia. In recent years, the heavily armed group has been more media friendly than ever, even allowing foreign journalists to visit its secretive headquarters at Panghsang.
Over the past year, the UWSA has played host to several meetings with many ethnic armies, mainly those situated in the north, but also others that have long operated along the Thai border. China has shown directly and through its UWSA ally that it is now the most important foreign actor in Myanmar’s peace process.
While the West, including the European Union, Norway, Switzerland and the United States, have spent millions of dollars on seminars for issues such as women’s participation in the peace process, conflict sensitivity and capacity building, and sponsored study trips to post-conflict Northern Ireland, Colombia and South Africa, China has played its cards more subtly.
European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini and Myanmar State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi in Brussels, Belgium May 2, 2017. Photo: Reuters/Eric Vidal
The longer talks in Naypyitaw and Panghsang continue, the stronger China’s role will become. An immediate end to Myanmar’s long-running civil war is in many ways not in China’s strategic interest.
Rather, a prolonged peace process would give China a chance to assert its mediating role and pressure Myanmar authorities to reciprocate through concessions and privileges, including Beijing’s desired strategic access to the Indian Ocean in western Rakhine state.
While maintaining close relations with Myanmar’s government and military, China has also supplied the UWSA with sophisticated weaponry, some of which has been shared with the group’s six armed allies, among them the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army in Kokang, the Ta’ang National Liberation Army, the Shan State Army-North and, to a lesser extent, the Kachin Independence Army.
A smaller group, the Arakan Army, is also a member of the Northern Alliance, as is the National Democratic Alliance Army in easternmost Shan State. China’s relations with those seven groups, which by some estimates account for more than 80% of all rebels under arms, puts it in a position which no other foreign power can match.
The Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA), a Palaung ethnic armed group, parading as they mark the 51st anniversary of its resistance in Myanmar’s northern Shan state. Photo: AFP/Ye Aung Thu
Sources familiar with the peace process emphasize that China’s interests in Myanmar go far beyond peace between the government and ethnic armed groups.
“Peace-making is a tool, not a goal for the Chinese,” said one well-connected observer. By playing the role of interlocutor, China can regain some of the influence it lost when the previous quasi-civilian government reopened to the West, including the US, beginning in 2011.
The Myanmar government’s suspension of the US$3.6 billion Myitsone dam project in northern Kachin state in September of that year is known to have surprised and angered Beijing. It subsequently watched with apprehension as Western leaders, among them US President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, paid high-profile visits to the country.
Now, while Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government recoils from Western criticism of its abusive treatment of the Rohingyas, Muslims living in the country’s west, China has blocked attempts to raise the issue at the United Nations Security Council. As was the case when the US and Europe imposed harsh sanctions on the previous military regime, China is seemingly now again Myanmar’s top diplomatic ally.
Myanmar State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi and Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, May 16, 2017. Photo: Reuters/Damir Sagolj
Beijing’s bid to regain lost influence through the peace process should also be viewed from the perspective of its broader geopolitical interests, analysts say. Multi-billion dollar hydroelectric dams, mining ventures and other commercial interests are not at the top of China’s strategic priorities in Myanmar.
“Access to the Indian Ocean is,” says one well-placed Myanmar observer, noting China’s CITIC Group Corporation’s won a contract last year to build a deep-sea port at Kyaukpyu in western Rakhine state that faces the Bay of Bengal.
A prolonged peace process would give China a chance to assert its mediating role and pressure Myanmar authorities to reciprocate through concessions and privileges, including Beijing’s desired strategic access to the Indian Ocean in western Rakhine state.
China is already involved in similar port projects in Gwadar in Pakistan, Chittagong in Bangladesh and Hambantota and Colombo in Sri Lanka. Of all these, however, analysts say Kyaukpyu is the most important as it provides China’s southwestern industrial areas with a direct corridor to the Indian Ocean.
It is uncertain when the next 21st Century Panglong meeting will be held in Myanmar. While Western nations and nongovernmental organizations have been largely sidelined and marginalized, China has taken a clear leading role in the peace process.
Myanmar’s fiercely nationalistic military, which has made clear its desire to diversify the country’s diplomacy and strategic relations away from over-reliance on China, is now no doubt on a back foot.
But given China’s relative strength — and the West’s haphazard, ad hoc approach to Myanmar’s ethnic conflicts — Naypyitaw may have no choice but to accommodate Beijing’s requests for economic and strategic concessions in exchange for peace in its ethnic hinterlands.
Blackstone
Brigadier
@Hendrik_2000 - if we look at nations in the Asia-Pacific region, geopolitics can be viewed as most countries need China for development, but want US for security. There's no realistic substitute for China on economics, and those who fantasize Japan or India could be alternatives need to get real. It's 'need' versus 'want,' and when push comes to shove, 'must have' trumps 'like to have.'
Since falling into a single great power's orbit limits one's strategic space, most regional countries want the US to remain and balance China. Why America? Because no one else can do it, plus it's 7,000 miles away, as opposed to being right next door, and no longer has territorial ambitions in Asia. So, the game for regional countries is to hang onto Washington tightly while sending emissaries to curry favors in Beijing. Which means I agree with your comment that China is in the catbird seat.
Since falling into a single great power's orbit limits one's strategic space, most regional countries want the US to remain and balance China. Why America? Because no one else can do it, plus it's 7,000 miles away, as opposed to being right next door, and no longer has territorial ambitions in Asia. So, the game for regional countries is to hang onto Washington tightly while sending emissaries to curry favors in Beijing. Which means I agree with your comment that China is in the catbird seat.
Equation
Lieutenant General
The world is changing and those regional countries around China will soon find it sending emissaries to curry favors in Beijing will bear little fruit. China is just the next super power whether one likes it or not. Washington is so no longer interested sending their sons and daughters to die by the thousands JUST to make them feel safe from a rising super power they themselves couldn't stop. The only people caring about this are the rich. Meanwhile most people in the region are more concern about their daily lives and work.
Blackstone
Brigadier
Facts disagree with your assertion as Duterte successfully curried favors in Beijing. China will likely hand out candy to other countries' emissaries, not because it's such an enlightened nation, but because it's in China's interests to do so.
You're mostly right, except the part in bold. It is the rich and the elite who care more than everyday people, because they have more to lose. That's why they'll jump ship from Bretton Woods to Zhongnanhai Woods when it's clearly more advantages to align with Beijing than with Washington. It's all power politics.
Equation
Lieutenant General
What works in the Philippine's does not work in Vietnam. Look at Vietnam already $17 Billion deal with Trump last time.
AssassinsMace
Lieutenant General
Plenty of dirt poor countries the US doesn't give any aid to simply because they don't serve US interests to do so. So who's giving economic assistance for altruistic reasons? US aid always comes with strings. Let's not distract from the fact that a country like Myanmar who has a US puppet now leading has to go to China for things the US isn't giving. And what does it say that the puppet now shows her true face when now she faces the reality of problems running a country and doing what the governments before have always done. Is it altruism when the critics are now silent when it's their person in power?
timepass
Brigadier
PUTIN TELLS MODI TO HIS FACE THAT THE SCO WILL COOPERATE WITH OBOR
Modi declined to send an envoy to last month's OBOR Summit in Beijing, and his country's jingoistic media has lambasted China's global vision of New Silk Road connectivity, yet President Putin said in no uncertain terms that the SCO will work with OBOR, which therefore puts India on the spot to choose whether it wants to be an active participant in the bloc or an aggressive obstructionist to its grand strategic aims:
"Putin also said that the SCO members should work on combing economic cooperation efforts and national strategies to bring together the capacities of the existing integration projects in Eurasia, including the Eurasian Economic Community (EURASEC) and the One Belt, One Road initiative.
"As for the economic aspects, I am sure that we must focus on combining efforts, coordination of national strategies and multilateral projects throughout the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. The aim is to combine the potentials of the Eurasian Economic Community, SCO, Association of Southeast Asian Nations [ASEAN] and the Chinese initiative One Belt, One Road.""
The expansion of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) membership will make the organization more powerful and influential in the political,…
SPUTNIKNEWS.COM
Modi declined to send an envoy to last month's OBOR Summit in Beijing, and his country's jingoistic media has lambasted China's global vision of New Silk Road connectivity, yet President Putin said in no uncertain terms that the SCO will work with OBOR, which therefore puts India on the spot to choose whether it wants to be an active participant in the bloc or an aggressive obstructionist to its grand strategic aims:
"Putin also said that the SCO members should work on combing economic cooperation efforts and national strategies to bring together the capacities of the existing integration projects in Eurasia, including the Eurasian Economic Community (EURASEC) and the One Belt, One Road initiative.
"As for the economic aspects, I am sure that we must focus on combining efforts, coordination of national strategies and multilateral projects throughout the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. The aim is to combine the potentials of the Eurasian Economic Community, SCO, Association of Southeast Asian Nations [ASEAN] and the Chinese initiative One Belt, One Road.""
The expansion of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) membership will make the organization more powerful and influential in the political,…
SPUTNIKNEWS.COM
Last edited:
timepass
Brigadier
- PM Nawaz Sharif calls on Russian President H.E Viladmir Putin on the sidelines of SCO.
Blackstone
Brigadier
A big message to Modi; time to stop interfering and get on board the BRI.