Union Minister for Foreign Affairs, Wunna Maung Lwin held a diplomatic briefing on the recent development in Myanmar at MOFA in Yangon on February 8, 2022. Khin Maung Oo, Member of the Union Election Commission, Dr Yin Yin Nwe, Yin Yin Oo and Dr Salai Ngun Cung Lian, all members of Advisory Board of the Chairman of the State Administration Council, and senior officials from respective ministries of Myanmar, Ambassadors of foreign embassies, diplomats and representatives from the United Nations Resident Coordinator Office attended the briefing.
The Union Minister first briefed the attendees on the matters related to the emergence of the State Administration Council and scrutinising of 2020 electoral process in addressing the issues of electoral fraud. The Union Minister highlighted that the State Administration Council from central level to state/region levels are comprised of members of ethnic nationalities, political parties and members of the Tatmadaw that clearly shows SAC is not a military administration.
Next, the Union Minister explained in detail regarding the establishment of friendly relations with foreign nations in accordance with the foreign policy enshrined in the State Constitution, which is an independent, active and non-aligned policy; outgoing visits and incoming visits of foreign delegations; Myanmar’s cooperation under the ASEAN frameworks as a member of ASEAN; the significant development with regard to the implementation of the five-point consensus of ASEAN; and Myanmar’s cooperation with the United Nations.
The Union Minister then outlined the Government’s effective measures to control and contain the COVID pandemic and endeavours to acquire the COVID vaccines from friendly countries including China, India and Russia as well as arrangements being made for the return of 97,000 Myanmar nationals stranded abroad during the COVID pandemic period.
The Union Minister also highlighted the incidents of killings of innocent civilians, government employees and monks, damages of public buildings and infrastructure such as schools, hospitals, roads and bridges by NNCP terrorist groups and their affiliates; investigation and legal actions taken against those have links to these terrorist organisations; seizures of arms and ammunition and notifying of those terrorist groups and their terrorist acts to UNCTED, ACCT, ASEANAPOL and INTERPOL to denounce them and calls for their positive cooperation in the fight against terrorism.
Khin Maung Oo, Member of the Union Election Commission (UEC) briefed the attendees about the measures taken by the UEC including findings of the investigations on 2020 Multiparty General Election and preparation for upcoming elections in accord with the Five-point Roadmap of the State Administration Council.
Dr Yin Yin Nwe, Member of Advisory Board of the Chairman of the State Administration Council, briefed and explained election fraud and irregularities in the 2020 General Election, and the root cause of the violence and the real situation in Myanmar.
Dr Salai Ngun Cung Lian joined the briefing by explaining the SAC’s assumption of the State responsibilities is in accord with the provisions of the State Constitution 2008. Police Brig-Gen. Aung Htay Myint of Myanmar Police Force, Ministry of Home Affairs informed the attendees about the acts of terrors committed by those terrorist groups to destabilise the country. He also emphasised that accepting and supporting terrorist groups or a terrorist of a country is a crime as described in the United Nations Security Council Resolutions such as 2176, 2368 and 2050.
Dr Tun Tin, Deputy Director-General from the Ministry of Health also updated the preventive measures to contain and control the Covid pandemic in light of the risks posed by the new variant — Omicron. It was followed by the questions and answers session. After the briefing, the attendees observed the documents, photographs, and charts displayed at the lobby of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs as evidences.
