A group of businessmen linked to the Myanmar junta has left for China ahead of the regime leader’s visit to the country this week.
Kyaw Win, the founder of media, bank and real estate conglomerate Shwe Than Lwin Group, and Xiao Sen, a Chinese businessman behind a controversial Yangon city expansion project under the miliary proxy U Thein Sein administration in 2014, are among those making the trip, sources familiar with the matter said.
The business delegation to China is largely made up of new cronies who have been thriving since the military coup in 2021.
Myanmar junta boss Min Aung Hlaing will leave for China’s Kunming on Tuesday to attend the 8th Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) Summit of Leaders. It is the regime leader’s first visit to China since the takeover and comes at Beijing’s invitation. The junta confirmed the trip on Monday, saying Min Aung Hlaing will participate in GMS-related summits, as well as meetings under the Ayeyawady-Chao Phraya Economic Cooperation Strategy and the Cambodia-Lao-Myanmar-Vietnam Summit. It also said he will meet with Chinese officials.
The Irrawaddy has learned that Min Aung Hlaing will meet with Chinese Premier Li Qiang during the week-long trip. He will also tour other parts of China, including Shanghai, to meet with members of the Chinese business community including representatives of companies in the defense industry. The sources said it is believed the business delegation went ahead of Min Aung Hlaing to arrange the meetings.
While Xiao Sen and Shwe Than Lwin’s Kyaw Win were confirmed to be on board, it’s not clear whether Steven Law (aka Tun Myint Naing) of Asia World was in the delegation. The chief of one of Myanmar’s largest conglomerates is not only close to the Chinese government, but has also had deep ties with successive military regimes in Myanmar, including Min Aung Hlaing’s junta. In September, Tun Myint Naing attended an event at which the junta summoned businessmen to give money for fund relief, donating 1 billion kyats (about US$477,000).
Prior to the business delegation’s visit, former Myanmar military intelligence officials Thein Swe and Hla Min, who now work for a junta-sponsored think tank, were also in Beijing last week, meeting with Chinese think tanks to discuss Myanmar’s internal security matters.
An established crony, Kyaw Win has survived successive military regimes, forging ties with those in power to build up his conglomerate since 1996, when Myanmar was under the previous regime. Shwe Than Lwin owns the SkyNet broadcasting service and Shwe Bank among many other business interests. In June 2023, Kyaw Win, along with other cronies, donated 100 million kyats to Min Aung Hlaing for the construction of his colossal Maravijaya Buddha statue in Naypyitaw. In July, the businessman donated another 200 million kyats for the statue.
Xiao Sen was one of two low-profile Chinese businessmen behind the developer Myanmar Say Ta Nar Myothit, which won a contract to develop a city expansion project west of the Yangon River in 2014. Many believed they won the project as they were close to then Yangon Chief Minister Myint Swe, who most recently served as the current junta’s acting president before stepping down this year due to ill health.
The city expansion project was later suspended due to criticism over the lack of transparency in the deal. It was resumed under the National League for Democracy government in 2017 but has been stalled since the coup of 2021.
