By Madan Lal Sharma
A change of stance seems discernible in Myanmar’s military-dominated leadership in the aftermath of US Secretary of State, Mrs Hillary Clinton’s recent three-day official visit to that country which had remained in isolation for decades.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived in Myanmar on 30 November this year to measure the depth of the political and economic opening that the country’s autocratic, military-dominated government has unexpectedly begun. After years of abysmal relations, the Obama administration has promised to respond to progress — Mrs. Clinton’s trip being the most significant reward so far — even as it presses for more significant steps to end the country’s repressive rule and international isolation.
Those steps include freeing hundreds more political prisoners, ending the often violent repression of democracy advocates and ethnic groups, and clarifying the country’s illicit cooperation with North Korea on developing ballistic missiles and, possibly, nuclear technologies.
But the highest priority of a meeting with Myanmar’s foreign minister, according to a senior State Department official traveling with Clinton, as reported in media, will be to seek assurances that the Southeast Asian nation will halt purchases of missile technology from renegade North Korea.
The Myanmar visit by Clinton, the first visit by a sitting secretary of State since 1955, signals that the United States is ready to engage with a leadership whose “flickers of progress,” in President Obama’s words, are promising, even as it remains unclear whether they are deeply rooted or sustainable.
American analysts have examined closely whether Myanmar and North Korea have been secretly collaborating on a nuclear weapons program, but “we do not see signs of substantial effort at this time,” the senior official said.
Another key U.S. objective in Myanmar, and in Washington’s other recent Southeast Asian initiatives, has been to check China’s growing economic, political and military clout in the region. Closer links between Myanmar and the U.S. could also reduce border issues between Myanmar and both Thailand and India, affording greater security to these two strong U.S. allies.
The challenge for Washington, analysts said, will be to effectively employ the West’s available carrots and sticks — among them, economic sanctions, foreign aid and diplomatic recognition — in ways that keep Myanmar moving forward but don’t embolden hard-liners intent on reversing course.
In recent years, Myanmar, which is also known as Burma, has taken steps that might seem relatively modest by Western standards — including holding elections, writing a new constitution, releasing pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi and easing restrictions on the media — but that are significant in a nation with a long history of strong-arm rule.
U.S. companies, which have watched their Indian, Chinese and Southeast Asian counterparts cut deals and extract resources in Myanmar, are eager to enter the market themselves, though Congress is unlikely to drop long-standing economic sanctions quickly.
China, Hong Kong and Thailand have invested about $25 billion in ports, pipelines, dams and other projects, according to government statistics, accounting for more than 70% of Myanmar’s total foreign investment. One of the few U.S. companies with a presence in Myanmar is San Ramon, Calif.-based Chevron, which got a 28% stake in a Myanmar natural gas field when it acquired Unocal in 2005.
Clinton’s trip involved more complicated logistics than usual, because Myanmar lacks the facilities common in most countries she visits. The airport at the new capital, Naypyidaw, doesn’t have night landing strip lights or U.S.-style security, so Clinton’s plane had to drop off the American party during the day, and was then flown to Thailand for the night to guarantee its proper protection.
A highlight of Clinton’s trip has been her scheduled meeting with Suu Kyi, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate who spent 15 years in detention. Suu Kyi, who gave the Clinton trip her blessing, recently announced plans to run for a parliament seat after Myanmar’s president ruled that her previously banned political party could return to politics.
The West has listened carefully to Suu Kyi’s views in making its decision to reengage with the leadership in Naypyidaw. But some analysts said it’s important that Washington start moving away from a policy based on a single person, no matter how charismatic and high-profile.
“The world has seen Aung San Suu Kyi as the be-all,” said Udai Bhanu Singh, senior research associate with New Delhi’s Institute for Defense Studies and Analyses. “She’s a great lady, and hats off to her, but the policy should be more party-focused rather than individual-focused.”
Myanmar has a long list of problems, including fighting and endemic human rights abuses in many of its ethnic border states. About 1,600 political prisoners remain incarcerated. Much of the economy is in the hands of relatively few cronies of the military junta, which first took power nearly 50 years ago. The country’s political system is riven with factions, and protracted instability has led to widespread human trafficking and drug cultivation.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton embraces Myanmar pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi after their meeting at Suu Kyi’s residence in Yangon. (Associated Press, Saul Loeb / December 2, 2011)
Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi praised Washington’s newly declared support for her country’s recent political reforms, but she emphasized the importance of remaining on good terms with the nation’s powerful longtime patron, China.
Clinton, however, downplayed suggestions by analysts that the U.S. diplomatic overture in Myanmar was part of an intensified effort to counter Chinese influence across the region. “We are not about opposing any other country; we’re about supporting” Myanmar, she said.
If Myanmar’s regime was looking for approval from the superpower as it goes down the road of political reform, it has got one now, even if this is somewhat cautious and with conditions attached. The visit of Hillary Clinton was the first by a United States Secretary of State since John Foster Dulles’ in 1955, and for this reason, it carried symbolic value. In 1988, the U.S. downgraded diplomatic relations with Myanmar after a military crackdown on pro-democracy activists; it still does not have an Ambassador there.
After the junta rejected the 1990 election victory of Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy and placed her under arrest, Washington imposed economic sanctions. But the perestroika President Thein Sein set in motion earlier this year has clearly changed the way the world looks at Myanmar now. The Thein Sein regime’s decision to introduce political reforms was born out of the realisation that it needed to end its isolation and make connections with the world outside China, the ASEAN countries, and India, which have remained engaged with it over most of the last two decades.
That Ms Suu Kyi is participating in these reforms, in a measured way, has given the process much credibility. Ms Clinton was careful to describe her visit to Myanmar as “a first date, not a marriage.” She stressed that further steps, including the lifting of sanctions, would depend on “real” progress towards democratic reforms, including an unconditional release of all prisoners. Washington also wants the regime to cut military ties with North Korea. Still the announcement of projects worth $1.2 million in education and health sectors is a major step forward. American restrictions on international financial assistance to Myanmar have also been eased.
Aside from encouraging Myanmar’s political reforms, Ms Clinton’s mission was driven by the desire to patch up with a country that has long been a missing link in its broader engagement in East and Southeast Asia, where the U.S. has actively sought to counter China’s rise. Much like New Delhi, Washington has been concerned about increasing Chinese influence in Myanmar. But unlike New Delhi, which adopted the path of engagement with the junta early on, Washington could not as easily backtrack on its pro-democracy commitment in Myanmar as it has done elsewhere. Hopefully, its renewed involvement there will not set off a ‘great game’ in the region. Myanmar knows the pitfalls: Ms Clinton’s tight embrace did not deter Ms Suu Kyi from saying that her country wanted “good, friendly relations with China, our very close neighbour, and not just with China but the rest of the world.” Well said.
When India started improving its relations with Myanmar, Washington was opposed to such a move. However, India’s approach was dictated by its geopolitical, strategic and energy stakes. A decade later, Washington has perhaps realized the rationale of India’s approach and followed suit. One can hope that new opportunities that have been unveiled by the ground realities for the leadership of Myanmar should not be allowed to fizzle out and it should make best use of it to bring Myanmar into the international mainstream.
