Military-run Myanmar plays host to goodwill visit by Belarusian leader

BANGKOK (AP) — Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko arrived in Myanmar on a goodwill visit, state media reported Friday, becoming only the second foreign leader to visit the Southeast Asian country since it came under military rule in 2021.

The visit comes just a month before an election in Myanmar that has been criticized as neither free nor fair. Lukashenko’s visit is seen by critics as giving the appearance of support to the polls.

Since Myanmar’s military takeover, Belarus has been a major supporter and supplier of its government, along with China and Russia. It is one of only a few countries that have been visited by Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, the head of Myanmar’s military government, who traveled there in March and June. Like Myanmar, the government of Belarus is widely seen as authoritarian.

Myanmar’s military leaders have been shunned and sanctioned by many Western nations for ousting the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February 2021, and for committing major human rights violations in trying to crush the resistance to army rule.

The only other foreign leader to visit Myanmar since 2021 was Cambodia’s then-Prime Minister Hun Sen, in his capacity as chair of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in 2022.

A report in the state-run Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper said Lukashenko’s Thursday night arrival at the military airport in the capital Naypyitaw saw him welcomed by Myanmar’s Prime Minister Nyo Saw and other Cabinet members with full state honors and cultural performers.

Myanmar state television MRTV reported that Lukashenko held talks Friday with Min Aung Hlaing and other top officials, exchanging views on bilateral relations, electoral processes and the dispatch of Belarusian election observers, as well as enhancing cooperation in all sectors, including military.

The report said they signed memorandums of understanding and contracts for cooperation in sectors including science, technology and economics.

During Min Aung Hlaing’s visit in March to Belarus, Lukashenko pledged to support the military-organized election and promised to send observers.

Critics say the planned election is a sham to normalize the military’s grip, and several opposition groups, including armed resistance forces, have said they will try to derail the polls.

Justice For Myanmar, a rights advocacy group that seeks to expose the financial underpinning of the military, said in a statement released Thursday that Belarus has provided Myanmar’s military with arms, equipment and training that builds the army’s technical capacity and domestic arms industry.

Transfers from Belarus include a Myanmar air defense operational command system, radar technology and ground-based missile systems, the group’s statement said.