Thomas Daniel was quoted in Nikkei Asia 18 September 2025
Malaysia’s Hasan gives no reason why trip has been delayed to October
by AMY CHEW
KUALA LUMPUR — Four ASEAN foreign ministers have postponed a visit to Myanmar to discuss the military regime’s plan to hold a general election in the civil war-ravaged country in December, a trip opposition politicians and analysts have criticized as legitimizing a process widely condemned as a sham.
Mohamad Hasan, foreign minister of current ASEAN chair Malaysia, was due to go to Myanmar on Friday with his counterparts from Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines for meetings, including with regime leader Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, to ensure that the election, the first stage of which is scheduled to be held on Dec. 28, benefits all people in the country.
However, he told Nikkei Asia on Thursday that the delegation’s trip had been rescheduled to “early October,” without giving further details. Malaysia’s Foreign Ministry also did not give reasons for the delay.
More than 40 parties, including the National League for Democracy (NLD) — which ruled Myanmar before the military takeover in February 2021, have been banned. The NLD won more than 82% of the vote in the last election, held in 2020.
Meanwhile, the military controls less than half the country, which has been blighted by a civil war that has left more than 7,000 dead since February 2021.
Zachary Abuza, adjunct professor of the security studies program at Washington-based Georgetown University, said the foreign ministers of ASEAN “should not go to Myanmar” because the vote will be neither free not fair.
“The military … continues to imprison many of the NLD leaders, including Aung San Suu Kyi. The military‘s hope is that she dies in captivity so that she can no longer play any role in the politics of Myanmar,” said Abuza, referring to the country’s de facto leader before the military seized power.
Dewi Fortuna Anwar, research professor at the Jakarta-based National Research and Innovation Agency, said the visit should focus on “how to end the violence,” the first point in ASEAN’s so-called five-point consensus on ending the conflict.
“Put the elections further down the road; [talk about] how to bring all the parties that are now opposing the junta [to] participate in the elections; and that the military will accept whoever wins the election even if they are not handpicked by the military,” she said.
Sasa, minister for international cooperation in Myanmar’s shadow National Unity Government, said: “If ASEAN truly seeks peace, it must support a people-led process, not the junta’s manufactured charade. To do otherwise is to legitimize tyranny.”
The ASEAN ministers “have a moral and political obligation to … demand access to Aung San Suu Kyi, who is still the elected leader of Myanmar,” he added. “Meeting the junta on the subject of ‘elections’ grants undeserved credibility to an illegitimate process.”
Kim Aris, Suu Kyi’s son, told Nikkei it was “very difficult to verify any information as nobody from outside the prison has actually seen her.” The Nobel Peace Prize winner is 80 and known to suffer from a heart condition.
The military has passed a draconian law which penalizes any criticism of the election. Earlier this month, a man was sentenced to seven years hard labor, the maximum penalty, under the new legislation for criticizing the regime’s election plan in a social media post.
Thomas Daniel, director of foreign policy and security studies at the Institute of Strategic and International Studies Malaysia, does not foresee the situation “changing anytime soon,” as many parties in the conflict are still not ready for a negotiated settlement.
“ASEAN is simply not equipped, united or has the necessary political will to meaningfully address the many challenges,” he said, adding that there is little consensus by its members on how the bloc should respond.
Abuza agreed, saying that ASEAN’s efforts to bring peace have been extremely lackluster,” given the organization’s consensus-based decision-making and studious noninterference in the internal affairs of others.
“They could have done so much more in supporting the opposition or imposing sanctions on the junta,” said Abuza.
In a report published last month, the U.N.’s human rights commissioner said that since it came to power in 2021, the military has arrested “29,209 individuals on political grounds, of whom 22,074 remained in detention.”
“Military-controlled courts had sentenced 172 detainees to death without respect for due process, fair trial rights or judicial guarantees of independence,” it added.
This article first published in Nikkei Asia 18 September 2025
