While China has been touting its earthquake rescue-and-relief efforts in Myanmar, the operation is unlikely to ease widespread resentment over Beijing’s ongoing support for the military regime.
In an article published in junta-run newspapers on Monday, Chinese ambassador to Myanmar Ma Jia claimed Beijing was the first foreign government to send rescue teams and erect temporary shelters, responsible for the greatest number of rescue personnel and aid, and the most survivors rescued.
However, China also prioritized aid for the junta, providing prefabricated offices, computers and furniture so that it could restore administrative operations disrupted by the earthquake.
Nevertheless, the outpouring of gratitude among Myanmar netizens covered China along with India, Russia, Japan, Malaysia, and more than a dozen other countries involved in the international rescue and relief push.
But shortly after the earthquake, news that the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) was preparing to withdraw from the northern Shan capital of Lashio near the Chinese border came as a hammer blow to the popular uprising against junta rule.
The retreat came after China cut off supplies to MNDAA territory last year and detained its leader, pressuring the ethnic army into signing a ceasefire with the regime in January.
Chinese Envoy to Myanmar Deng Xijun personally oversaw Lashio’s handover to the junta on April 21, sparking widespread public anger in Myanmar.
The MNDAA belongs to the three-member Brotherhood Alliance, whose Operation 1027 had captured most of northern Shan State, including the junta’s Northeastern Command in Lashio, and major trade routes with China.
Though leaders of both countries have often boasted of fraternal ties, China-Myanmar relations have largely been shaped by Beijing’s strategic interests.
China has been deeply involved in Myanmar’s long-running civil war, backing the Communist Party of Burma and supplying the United Wa State Army, MNDAA and other ethnic armed groups operating on its border.
However, under the current regime, anti-China sentiment in Myanmar has surged to unprecedented levels over perceived blatant Chinese interference in the country’s internal affairs.
Following China’s intervention, the regime reclaimed Lashio without firing a single shot – an outcome that would have been militarily impossible.
Operation 1027 marked one of the most humiliating defeats in the Myanmar military’s history. For the people of Myanmar, who have endured over 60 years of oppression under military rule, the operation sparked new hope that military dictatorship might finally be dismantled.
As towns and military bases fell in northern Shan State, with junta forces fleeing and abandoning their weapons, the victory over Northeastern Command was celebrated by Myanmar people as a turning point in the uprising.
Resistance forces secured control of key towns along the Union Highway, including Kyaukme, Hsipaw, and Nawnghkio in northern Shan, also seizing towns in neighboring Mandalay Region and threatening the country’s second-largest city, Mandalay, and Pyin Oo Lwin, seat of Myanmar military academies. Hope rose that the resistance could exert military pressure on the junta’s nerve center of Naypyitaw.
However, the revolutionary momentum was halted when Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi visited Naypyitaw last August. Soon after, the MNDAA announced that it would not advance on Mandalay or Taunggyi, the southern Shan State capital, and would not align with the civilian National Unity Government.
Subsequently, the regime escalated its airstrikes on resistance-held territories while China closed its border crossings to pressure ethnic armed groups into halting their offensives.
Beijing capped its decisive intervention in November by hosting junta boss Min Aung Hlaing at a regional summit in Kunming – his first visit to China since staging the 2021 coup.
China’s strategic interests in Myanmar center on annual border trade worth around US$ 6 billion and Belt & Road projects in the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor.
These include the Kyaukphyu Special Economic Zone and deep-sea port, oil and gas pipelines, and the Mandalay-Muse railroad.
From Beijing’s perspective, the junta’s collapse would plunge the country into chaos, jeopardizing Chinese projects in Myanmar. As a result, China continues to prop up the regime, ignoring the will of the majority in Myanmar,
China is a key arms supplier to the regime, selling warplanes and drones used in its air campaign against civilians in resistance-held territory. Beijing has officially pledged support for the junta’s planned election in December or January – a plan condemned by regime opponents and democratic nations as a sham designed to cement military rule.
However, China has remained silent over ongoing regime airstrikes – launched despite the ceasefire following the quake – that have claimed more than 200 lives since March 28.
Late last month, Beijing brokered talks between the regime and the Brotherhood Alliance’s Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) in Kunming. The TNLA reportedly refused to hand back border-trade towns including Kyaukme, Hsipaw and Nawnghkio seized from the regime. But given their economic importance, China is likely to up its pressure on the TNLA. Myanmar’s people are now waiting anxiously to see which towns will meet the same fate as Lashio.
While Myanmar’s citizens are grateful to China for its earthquake recovery assistance, what they want most from Beijing is a halt to its support for a regime that is dragging their country deeper into disaster.
