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View all search resultsLet's face it, Myanmar is not ASEAN's problem anymore
Five years of catastrophic failure make it undeniably clear: ASEAN must finally abandon its toothless "Five-Point Consensus" and expel Myanmar’s junta to save its own collapsing institutional credibility.
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This undated handout photo from the Myanmar Military Information Team released on April 30 shows Aung San Suu Kyi (center) talking in an undisclosed location. Myanmar's deposed leader is under house arrest in the capital Naypyidaw, according to her captors, but experts say the city is purpose built to guard secrets of the country's closed-ranks rulers. (AFP/Myanmar Military Information Team/handout)
F
ive years after generals in Naypyidaw tore up an election result and jailed the government the Myanmar people had chosen, ASEAN foreign ministers sat down again this month with the junta's representative in Bangkok and did what they have done at every juncture since 2021: reaffirmed the Five-Point Consensus.
No benchmarks. No timeline. No consequence for the fact that almost none of it has been implemented. It is time to say plainly what many diplomats already believe in private: The Consensus was dead on arrival, and ASEAN's Myanmar policy has become a liability the bloc can no longer afford.
The Consensus was agreed in Jakarta in April 2021 with Min Aung Hlaing himself in the room. It called for an end to violence, inclusive dialogue, a special envoy, humanitarian access and an envoy's visit to all parties.
Reasonable asks. But the junta had no incentive to honor any of them, because ASEAN built in no cost for ignoring them.
Five years on, the pattern is monotonous: a summit, a statement of "deep concern", a renewed commitment to the same five points and a junta that keeps bombing villages, jailing dissidents and stage-managing elections it has already rigged.
The Consensus was never a peace plan. It was a face-saving device that let ASEAN look engaged while nothing changed on the ground.
This isn't just a failed policy - it's an active drag on ASEAN's credibility.
