YANGON: Foreign minister of China Wang Yi will hold talks with Myanmar’s junta chief during an upcoming visit to the country but will not meet detained leader Aung San Suu Kyi, a senior military official on Tuesday said.
The senior official said Wang Yi will meet with junta chief Min Aung Hlaing, on a visit starting on Wednesday. The tour comes at a time when the junta is battling with ethnic minority armed groups along their shared border.
According to the official, he will not meet Suu Kyi, who has been in military custody since it seized power in February 2021.
The last top Chinese official to visit Myanmar was former Chinese foreign minister Qin Gang, who held talks with Min Aung Hlaing in May last year. During that trip, he said Beijing “stands with Myanmar on the international stage.”
Ties later cooled over the junta’s failure to crackdown on online scams in Myanmar’s borderlands targeting the citizens of China. The military is facing heavy resistance from the ethnic minority armed groups in Shan state near the border with China.
Analysts say Beijing maintains relations with ethnic armed groups in the area.
