By 
Nabil Ruhaizat
Peggy_Marco, November 17, 2015
As Malaysian PM Anwar Ibrahim prepares to meet Myanmar’s Junta leader, rights groups warn that diplomacy cloaked as humanitarianism risks validating a regime still waging war on its own people.
Malaysia’s leadership in ASEAN, long tied to its moral capital and public opposition to military brutality, is now facing a defining test. On April 17th, 2025, Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim will meet with Myanmar’s junta chief, Min Aung Hlaing, in Bangkok – a move that, though framed as “purely humanitarian”, places the Prime Minister in the uncomfortable position of being the first sitting ASEAN chair to engage with the sanctioned general since his 2021 coup.
The coup and the civil war it subsequently unleashed have devastated Myanmar’s civilian population. Thousands have been killed, and millions displaced. Yet, as the military reels from its losses on the battlefield, the recent earthquake in Sagaing offers the junta an opportunity to pivot its narrative. Using the disaster as an opportunity to reposition itself as a legitimate disaster response government internationally.
Prime Minister Ibrahim’s camp insists that any aid channelled would be contingent on a ceasefire. But with airstrikes reportedly continuing and humanitarian assistance withheld from anti-junta zones, critics question whether such conditions will hold. Political analyst Tunku Mohar Mokhtar warns that this meeting, regardless of intent, may lend decisive validation to a junta preparing sham elections. As he bluntly put it, “There’s no doubt … that the meeting will give the junta leader the validation to improve his standing in the upcoming election”.
Rights groups are not mincing words. ASEAN parliamentarians for Human Rights (APHR) have called on PM Ibrahim to avoid reinforcing authoritarian propaganda and instead pressure China to capitalise on its position over the junta. Their open letter urges Malaysia to lead ASEAN in supporting inclusive dialogue, not just between statesmen, but with Myanmar’s civil society and ethnic groups that have been left out of the junta’s farcical “election” plans.
Additionally, Thaksin Shinawatra’s own bilateral dealings with the junta earlier this month, despite being an unofficial advisor to PM Ibrahim, only further muddied the waters. The meeting comes despite Myanmar’s continued defiance of ASEAN’s Five-Point Consensus, a framework that calls for an end to violence and humanitarian access, agreed upon by all members of ASEAN in 2021 but largely ignored by the junta ever since.
As it stands, the optics of this diplomatic re-entry may carry more weight than its stated intentions. Whether Malaysia’s posture is interpreted as leadership or concession depends on what is said in Bangkok and, ultimately, on its results.
Sources and Further Readings:
How Malaysia’s Anwar risks legitimising Myanmar junta through diplomacy
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