How do you mediate a war when neither side has agreed to talk? Thailand’s answer, given at the Mae Sot border crossing on Tuesday, April 23, was to declare itself ready anyway and start asking around.
Foreign Minister Parnpree Bahiddha-Nukara said Bangkok had already held early conversations with several parties, among them the Myanmar junta and the Myawaddy faction. “They haven’t had the time to discuss with us yet, but they are aware that we are ready to act as a mediator and to comprehensively resolve Myanmar’s issues to restore peace quickly,” he said, according to BenarNews. The prime minister had put him in charge of a new committee on the Myanmar crisis only the day before. Deputy Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul and Defence Minister Sutin Klungsang travelled with him.
The fighting next door
The trip followed a bad fortnight across the river. On April 10 rebels from the armed wing of the Karen National Union took a junta battalion, Infantry Battalion 275, in Myawaddy, the town facing Mae Sot. They then intercepted a convoy sent to retake it, wounding over 100 soldiers, and two days later the junta answered with a helicopter attack. Thai border officials reported aerial bombing 1.5 to 12 km from the line, though nothing hit Thai soil.
People crossed to safety. Tak’s provincial health office counted 735 refugees, 255 of them children, and 114 had needed hospital treatment by Monday. By Tuesday the border had calmed. The last 658 people sheltering in Mae Sot went back over the Moei River, and residents reported no gunfire.
How the mediation would work
Thailand did not plan to do it alone. Nikorndej Balankura, the foreign ministry’s spokesman, said Bangkok had worked through Laos, this year’s ASEAN chair, to set up meetings of an “ASEAN Troika” and a wider “Troika plus”. The troika is formed by the foreign ministers of the bloc’s previous, current and future chairs: Indonesia, Laos and Malaysia. The “plus” leaves room for other members that want to help or feel the fallout. Nikorndej said the meetings would probably be held in Thailand and that Bangkok was prepared to broker talks between the junta and its opponents.
“The conflict affects every country, not just Thailand, which shares a border with Myanmar,” he said. “Thailand is an advocate for peace, so we need to emphasise our position as an active promoter of peace.”
The idea is not new. UCA News noted that a troika was first floated two years earlier, under Cambodia’s chairmanship, and was dismissed even then as “too little too late”. What has changed is the battlefield. Five months of gains by ethnic armed groups and the People’s Defence Force had caught the bloc off guard.
Doubts at home
Not everyone in Thailand thought the plan went far enough. Chalida Tajaroensuk of the People’s Empowerment Foundation told BenarNews that the Myanmar military was “faltering significantly” and that the Thai government lacked a long-term plan. She wanted a special ASEAN meeting hosted in Bangkok that would also hear from civil society, the media and Myanmar organisations, and she urged Bangkok to speak to the National Unity Government as well. “Thailand should do more than just one humanitarian corridor,” she said.
Sources
- Thailand offers to mediate in Myanmar conflict, urges ASEAN involvement amid violence (BenarNews)
- Thailand proposes ASEAN 'Troika' to mediate Myanmar crisis (Thaiger)
- Thailand eyes ASEAN troika to negotiate with Myanmar junta (UCA News)
