Myanmar’s regime has invited the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to send observers for planned year-end elections, and the regional bloc will discuss the request during a regional summit later this month, Malaysia’s foreign ministry has said.
The invitation to send election observers was extended to all ASEAN member states, the ministry said in a statement on Friday night.
“The foreign minister noted the invitation extended to ASEAN member states to send election observers. For Malaysia, the invitation was addressed to Malaysia’s Election Commission,” the ministry stated.
The statement did not refer to reports in Myanmar regime media on Friday that Malaysia will send observer teams for the contentious general election, set to be held in phases starting on Dec. 28.
The announcement came after talks were held between Myanmar’s regime leader Min Aung Hlaing and Malaysia’s Foreign Minister Mohamad Hasan in Naypyidaw on Thursday.
Critics and many Western nations view the election as a sham exercise designed to legitimize the military’s rule via a proxy political party called the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP).
Myanmar has been in turmoil since a 2021 military coup that overthrew the elected National League for Democracy (NLD) government of Aung San Suu Kyi and triggered an armed uprising which has led to large parts of the country no longer under regime control.
Malaysia and Myanmar are both members of ASEAN, which has barred the latter’s military leaders from its meetings since 2022, citing Min Aung Hlaing’s failure to implement the block’s peace plan, known as the ASEAN Five Point Consensus, upon his return to Myanmar in April 2021 after agreeing to it.
The ASEAN Five Point Consensus calls for dialogue among all parties to the conflict, as well as the release of all political prisoners, which includes NLD State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi and President Win Myint, who’ve been held incommunicado by the regime since the military coup on Feb. 1, 2021.
Malaysia is the current chair of ASEAN, which also includes Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
Myanmar’s ballot will be held amid a bitter civil war, with key opposition groups, including the NLD, banned and new electoral laws that favour parties backed by the military.
In the fray will be 57 political parties that have registered for the polls, six of which plan to compete nationwide, according to the regime’s Union Election Commission (UEC).
In remarks after a January ASEAN meeting on Malaysia’s island of Langkawi, Mohamad Hasan had said the grouping told Myanmar’s regime that an election should not be its priority, and urged instead for dialogue and an end to fighting.
REUTERS
