Foreign ministers from the 11-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) were told on Sunday by their Myanmar regime “counterpart” that jailed State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi is in good health and would be looked after, ASEAN’s special envoy to Myanmar told a press conference in Thailand.
Ma. Theresa P. Lazaro, the Philippine foreign minister, has been seeking access to Suu Kyi, 81, who has been detained since her elected government was ousted in a 2021 military coup.
“My recollection of the statement of the Myanmar foreign minister on Aung San Suu Kyi is that she’s in good health and that the premise of how he said this is that she is a relative, she’s a sister and therefore we will take care of her,” Lazaro said in Bangkok on July 12.
Suu Kyi is serving a 27-year sentence, recently commuted by one-third, on a series of charges that her allies said were fabricated to keep her out of politics, including incitement, corruption, election fraud and violations of the state secrets law. She has denied wrongdoing.
Failed peace effort
The top diplomats of ASEAN met in person with Myanmar regime Foreign Minister Tin Maung Swe on July 12 for the first time since the coup, in an effort to kick-start a five-year-old peace initiative that has failed to end a civil war gripping the country.
The conflict has killed an estimated 100,000 people and displaced several million more.
Myanmar’s senior regime officials have been banned from top-level ASEAN meetings since the military seized power because of their failure to implement a “five-point consensus” peace plan agreed with the bloc.
Regime leader Min Aung Hlaing, who led the 2021 military coup as commander-in-chief and jailed State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi, was appointed Myanmar’s president on April 10 following the regime’s 2025-26 elections that ended on Jan. 25.
Now a pro-military parliament, formed after what the U.N. and several western countries called “sham” elections, have sought to normalize relations with ASEAN.
Aung San Suu Kyi’s whereabouts are unknown, but Lazaro earlier said she had been transferred to a “designated location” in Naypyidaw, without elaborating further.
Thai Foreign Minister Sihasak Phuangketkeow said Tin Maung Swe had faced questions during the informal meeting in Bangkok on July 12 about the status of the Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
“We also made our comment that if the ASEAN special envoy could be given the opportunity to meet with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, that would be even better so that we can be able to verify the claims that the foreign minister made,” he said, referring to her using a Myanmar honorific.
REUTERS
