As the 2025 chair of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim described the current situation in Burma as “better than before” when his nation took over from Laos. Malaysia handed over ASEAN chairmanship to the Philippines, bypassing Myanmar in its alphabetical order, on Tuesday. President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. will take over ASEAN as chair on Jan. 1, 2026.

“There are still one or two incidents, but not like what we heard two or three years ago, when villages were destroyed, killing occurred, and hundreds of thousands fled. Such things no longer happen on that scale. Yes. incidents still occur, and we do regret them, but the situation is much calmer now,” Anwar Ibrahim told a media conference at the close of the ASEAN 47th Summit on Oct. 28.

Malaysia maintained its pledge throughout the year to uphold the ASEAN Five Point Consensus, a regional peace plan agreed to by Min Aung Hlaing in April 2021–following the military coup on Feb. 1, 2021–but not implemented upon his return to Burma. Anwar Ibrahim said this proved Malaysia’s persistent efforts for ASEAN to bring peace to Burma and to maintain “constructive relations” to the regime in Naypyidaw.