On August 20^th, 2025 a HDFF team attended a seminar titled “Myanmar in the Era of Geopolitical Rivalry in the Indo-Pacific” hosted by Chulalongkorn’s Faculty of Political Science, the Nelson Mandela Center and the Hann Seidel Foundation at Chulalongkorn University.

Mr. Achim Munz (TBC) ASEAN Project Manager, Hanns Seidel Foundation, offered opening remarks on the foundation’s involvement in fostering discussion and cooperation between Thailand and Myanmar.

In a dialogue moderated by Assistant Professor Dr. Bhanubhatra Jittiang, Mr. Min Zin, Executive Director, Institute for Strategy and Policy – Myanmar offered his insights on the situation in Myanmar, with the army recently announcing elections at the end of the year.

The conference began with a reminder. While conflict trends have seen a 50% decline between 2024 and 2025, this drop in frequency does not equal a drop in intensity. Quite the opposite, as brutality escalates and massacres are still being committed. Frequency has nonetheless dropped as the military is overtime straining the resistance. Yet, if the latter is weak, it is unlikely to collapse. It has accumulated victories and while it currently fails to institutionalize them, they remain unwilling to give up to the army.

However, the psychological impact of such a lasting conflict on the resistance movement has in the meantime created a breach which allowed the People’s Republic of China to intervene and become an external manager in handling the conflict. Its strategy, also known as the 3 in 1 package, includes de-escalation through trade, commerce and business rather than humanitarian settlements, elections as instruments to exit the crisis, and eventually post-elections mediation.  

The discussion then shifted to the importance of Myanmar’s location in regional risk management and international dynamics. The country holds a key strategic position for international relations as it offers a link between the Pacific and Indian Oceans as well as between South Asia and Southeast Asia in terms of naval assets and energy routes.

For China, it represents a means to avoid a chokepoint to its economic corridor and a chance to reduce its dependence on the Straits of Malacca. For India, it holds value as an anchor between themselves and the region. For the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), the conflict in Myanmar heightens the risk of exposing internal incoherence and failures to find consensus, undermining their role as the central regional actor by forcing external actors to intervene.

Internally, this conflict testifies to an unprecedented existential crisis characterized by decline in human security, economy and security provisions, education as well as a de facto balkanization (a fragmentation which parallels the times before British colonization). Moreover, the country is rarely ever seen as a modern Asian state, which reveals fundamental issues with nation building and will either encourage Myanmar to proactively realign by bargaining with China or sleepwalk to avoid the internal breakup of the country. According to the expert, it appears that while even at the lower end of hierarchy, Burmese groups maintain agency and power to negotiate, their preference will go towards converging with Chinese interests.

This allowed panelists to delve deeper into the role of external actors since 2021. While China initially expressed discontentment with the military coup and first collaborated with the UNSC and the international community, it increasingly focused on more specific issues fostering its own interests. After realizing Myanmar was on the verge of collapsing, China decided to back up the army to foster what they consider regional stability by imposing targeted objectives.

According to the speaker, other countries have been involved but failed to lead significant changes. The US could for instance not persuade resistance groups to translate military victories into political settlements and hence shifted away from the conflict while Russia perceives an interest in increased arms sales and merely engages in transactional relations. Likewise, the European Union’s focus on long-terms goals conflicting with short term priorities, as well as its sensitivity to ASEAN initiatives, have led to a certain distance with the conflict and for a general hope of post-elections improving the status quo.

When it comes to ASEAN, frustration is mounting as its handling of the conflict in Myanmar is no less than a test case for the organization, raising concerns on the potential erosion of multilaterals. In fact, as China has established itself as the key negotiator and the organization struggles to agree on common measures, sanctions have so far not led to much progress. The exclusion of the Myanmar military from the summit, while unusual, only held a limited impact. According to the panelist, the most likely future scenario is hence that of an ASEAN continued paralysis. Yet, other scenarios are imaginable such as a coalition of willing actors taking measures, or the crisis leading to a resignation and externalization of the Myanmar conflict to bigger powers, hence losing power and credibility.

The expert argued more time should be spent to find common grounds with China and Thailand (as the key neighbors of Myanmar) than on providing safe spaces to resistance groups in summits. He advocated for pragmatic tradeoffs and realistic objectives such as de-escalation rather than immediately focusing on nation building. Since the country does not have the domestic capacity to do so now, it was suggested that a coalition of willing countries should profit from Chinese diplomatic expertise (as a neighbor with heightened sensibility to the issue) in moving forward.

The last part of the session focused on the potential restructuring of the country and strategic landscape. The expert immediately asserted there would not be a single peace process, rather multiple competing ones in the next 10 to 15 years, notably with the Arakan Army. He then suggested that two trajectories could likely prevail: the military weaponizes neighbor weaknesses to disrupt the current situation and gain power or the state shrinks and conflict economies (both legal and illicit) thrive, at the cost of humanitarian shock.

In a case where armed forces would not collapse, he underscored any transition will inevitably be linked with internal military reforms not to be met with neighbors’ opposition. However, with a current refusal to step down from the third-generation leadership, questions arise on what a new generation identity could look like and its regional impact. Nonetheless, he concluded by reminding how any outburst (refugee crisis, genocidal risks) could lead to increased implication from external actors, bypassing ASEAN unless coordinated efforts and redistributing the cards.

The Q&A session then allowed the panelists to dive deeper into the role of different actors in the current conflict. The UN’s role was for instance envisioned as mainly acting on humanitarian priorities rather than political settlements. Similarly, the speaker raised concern on ethnic minorities and ethnic resistance organizations’ ability to politically organize (although easily mobilized in the current multiparty civil war) due to diverging mentalities and interests.

The role of the US, EU, Japan and Australia as key external actors also raised questions. The expert highlighted the necessity to go beyond human rights and regional stability considerations by using leverage to foster positive rather than negative peace, without alienating Myanmar’s neighbors. He also insisted on the urgency to do so before China or India could impose their own silos and interests, underscoring how multilaterals frameworks help maintain expectations and pressure.

Questions also regarded the means to ensure supply chains benefits go to communities instead of armed conflict, notably citing jade and rare earths tied to Chinese interests. Recommendations insisted on the crucial need to institutionalize confederal arrangements to reduce communities’ vulnerability and climate risks.

HDFF would like to thank the Chulalongkorn’s Faculty of Science, the Hanns Seidel Foundation and the Nelson Mandela Center for Conflict Resolution, Atrocity Prevention and Human Security for the invitation and opportunity to participate. HDFF is looking forward to future opportunities and exchanges.