A rare meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping and Myanmar’s junta leader has signalled Beijing’s growing support for a military regime widely viewed as faltering and its strategic alignment with Russia in backing the embattled government, according to analysts.
Xi and junta chief Min Aung Hlaing met in Moscow on May 9 on the sidelines of Russia’s Victory Day celebrations. According to Xinhua, this meeting marked the highest-level contact between Beijing and the isolated junta since the 2021 coup in Myanmar, which sparked the country’s civil war, characterised by the military’s struggles against widespread rebellion from ethnic armed groups and newly formed resistance militias.
Chinese state media reported that Xi expressed support for Myanmar in progressing its political agenda and urged the junta “to ensure the safety of Chinese personnel, institutions and projects in Myanmar, and intensify efforts to combat cross-border crimes”.
Jason Tower, an expert on regional security issues, said that after more than four years of avoiding high-level interaction with the senior general, Xi’s decision to meet Min Aung Hlaing showed “China’s growing support for an otherwise failing regime”.
“That the meeting took place in Russia shows growing coordination between Moscow and Beijing around the Myanmar issue,” Tower said.
Russia’s willingness to provide space for the meeting indicated that both China and Russia were “aligned” in their support for the Myanmar military, Tower added.
