Showing 1 - 10 of 11
Asean should back a new Myanmar
Oped, Laetitia van den Assum and Kobsak Chutikul, Published on 24/01/2024
» On Jan 28-29, Asean's foreign ministers will meet in historic Luang Prabang, until 1975 the capital of Laos, their host country. It will be their first meeting since Laos took over Asean's rotating chairmanship from Indonesia at the beginning of the year.
Repatriation needs right conditions
Oped, Laetitia van den Assum and Kobsak Chutikul, Published on 27/03/2023
» Early this month, news broke about plans of Myanmar's military regime to start repatriating some 1,000 Rohingya refugees from Bangladesh to Myanmar's Rakhine State. Myanmar's generals are in a hurry. Reportedly, they want to start repatriation by mid-next month, during Ramadan. The choice of that date is no coincidence.
Wishful thinking
Oped, Postbag, Published on 01/10/2022
» Re: "Double-track lines to open this year", (BP, Sept 20).
The long wait for Asean is reaching its limits
Oped, Syed Hamid Albar, Marzuki Darusman, Laetitia van den Assum & Kobsak Chutikul, Published on 06/08/2021
» Even though Asean may now get a mediation effort started in Myanmar, others who can play a role in helping to address immediate humanitarian needs, particularly related to Covid-19, must go ahead and assist where they can.
Rakhine engagement must be based on facts
Oped, Laetitia van den Assum and Kobsak Chutikul, Published on 15/05/2021
» The Asean special summit on Myanmar's crisis in Jakarta on April 24 led to a five-point consensus that has received considerable international attention. But another important paragraph in the summit statement has largely been overlooked.
When to admit a coup has failed
Oped, Laetitia van den Assum and Kobsak Chutikul, Published on 21/04/2021
» It had seemed so easy: Close off the access roads into Myanmar's capital Nay Pyi Taw, surround the buildings housing members of parliament and government, as well all chief ministers of the states of the Union, and presto! Your coup d'état delivers itself. That is what the Tatmadaw, as Myanmar's military is called, must have thought.
Rakhine crisis needs holistic approach
Oped, Laetitia van den Assum & Kobsak Chutikul, Published on 21/10/2020
» When Myanmar joined Asean in 1997, it was considered a strategic move to counter the influence of China and India. Since then, Asean's relationship with the country has had many ups and downs, often due to persistent reports of human rights abuses.
Resignations a reality check for Prayut
Oped, Chairith Yonpiam, Published on 18/07/2020
» The resignation of Uttama Savanayana from the finance portfolio and the team under Deputy Prime Minister Somkid Jatusripitak from the party and the cabinet is a sign of cracks appearing in the ruling Palang Pracharath Party (PPRP).
Vicious cycle strikes again
Oped, Editorial, Published on 17/07/2020
» With the formal resignation from the cabinet of Deputy Prime Minister Somkid Jatusripitak and three ministers working for him, Thai politics looks set to experience yet another bout of turbulence as factions in the core coalition Palang Pracharath Party (PPRP), scramble for the most attractive cabinet portfolios.
Top brass, technocrats, politicos all same
Oped, Thitinan Pongsudhirak, Published on 12/06/2020
» When ostensible technocrats become ambitious politicians, supervised by army generals and beholden to patronage-driven elected politicians, the result is a power struggle, internal party turmoil, and a country being governed to nowhere. This is the current state of Thailand's ruling Palang Pracharath Party (PPRP), the head of a motley and fractious 19-member coalition of minor and micro parties, some represented by one single MP, propping up the government of former coup leader and current Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha. Yet in the face of the opposition bloc that is weak because it has been weakened, after the third-largest winner the Future Forward Party from the last election was dissolved earlier this year, the PPRP is on course to be in office for the foreseeable future, as a new poll is not due for another three years. These dire dynamics suggest Thailand will continue to be rudderless, stuck in a quagmire of its own making, with headwinds that may lead to a reckoning tempest.