By Devjyot Ghoshal and Panu Wongcha-um
BANGKOK (Reuters) – Myanmar’s junta leader attended a regional summit in Bangkok on Friday, a week after a massive earthquake devastated parts of the impoverished war-torn country, killing more than 3,100, and spurring an appeal for help by the United Nations chief.
Shunned by most world leaders since leading a 2021 coup that overthrew an elected government, Min Aung Hlaing’s rare trip exploits a window opened by the earthquake to ramp up diplomacy at events such as the BIMSTEC summit in the Thai capital.
On the sidelines, Min Aung Hlaing had two-way meetings with Thai premier Paetongtarn Shinawatra and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Amid the quake recovery effort, the junta chief will talk about “the potential for cooperation … to carry out rescue, relief and rehabilitation,” the state-run Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper said.
The death toll from Friday’s earthquake of magnitude 7.7, one of the strongest to hit the Southeast Asian nation in a century, climbed to 3,145, with more than 4,500 injured and more than 200 missing, the ruling junta said.
“The earthquake has supercharged the suffering, with the monsoon season just around the corner,” U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told reporters on Thursday, referring to civil strife unleashed by the coup.
“I appeal for every effort to transform this tragic moment into an opportunity for the people of Myanmar.”
United Nations aid chief Tom Fletcher is set to arrive in Myanmar on Friday, followed by a visit by Julie Bishop, the United Nations’ special envoy for the country.
RARE INTERNATIONAL TRIP
Min Aung Hlaing, who led an entourage of Myanmar officials, also met Nepal’s prime minister on Thursday, state media said, ahead of the summit focused on technical and economic matters.
He sat between the prime ministers of Bhutan and Sri Lanka at the head table during Thursday’s dinner with heads of BIMSTEC nations, Thai government photographs show.
In a post on X after meeting Min Aung Hlaing, India’s Modi said cooperation on connectivity, capacity building and infrastructure development featured in their discussions.
With the Thai prime minister, the junta leader discussed disaster prevention, transnational crime and repatriatiion of those pulled out of scam centres, Thai officials said.
The summit is part of BIMSTEC or the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation, which groups Thailand, Myanmar, India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Bhutan.
Even before the quake, millions had suffered in Myanmar’s widening civil war, triggered by the coup that ousted the government of Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.
It has decimated the mainly agrarian economy, driven more than 3.5 million people from their homes and crippled essential services such as healthcare.
Myanmar’s neighbours, such as China, India and Southeast Asian nations are among the countries that dispatched relief supplies and rescuers to aid the recovery effort in quake-hit areas home to about 28 million people.
Extreme heat and forecast heavy rain could cause disease outbreaks among earthquake survivors camping in the open, as the risk of cholera grows in such areas, namely Mandalay, Sagaing and the capital of Naypyitaw.
“Response efforts still face significant logistical challenges … hampering the relief response,” the World Food Programme said on Thursday. Hurdles range from debris and damaged roads and facilities to telecoms disruption, it said.
This week the junta called a temporary ceasefire from Wednesday to April 22 in operations against armed opponents, reflecting moves by a major rebel alliance and Myanmar’s shadow government that groups parts of the previous administration.
(Reporting by Bangkok Bureau; Additional reporting by Shoon Naing; Writing by Devjyot Ghoshal; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)
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