ASEAN Beat | Diplomacy | Southeast Asia

With Laos Trip, Min Aung Hlaing Drives a Wedge Into ASEAN

Myanmar’s “president” is embarking on his first official visit to an ASEAN country since his appointment in April.

Min Aung Hlaing, the leader of Myanmar’s military-backed government, is greeted on his arrival to Beijing, China, Jun. 15, 2026.

Shortly after the military-backed government in Myanmar thumbed its nose at the ASEAN chair and denied its request to meet with ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi, the regime in Naypyidaw went one step further and announced that Laos was next on the agenda.

No date was given for the first official visit to an ASEAN country by self-anointed President Min Aung Hlaing in the Global New Light of Myanmar, which said on July 1 that the visit would take place over the “next few days.”

But official scribes across the border had a bit more to say.

The state-run Vientiane Times announced that Min Aung Hlaing would make the trip during July 3-5 “to mark the 70th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Laos and Myanmar,” after an invitation was extended by Lao President Thongloun Sisoulith.

In denying access to Suu Kyi – and rejecting the proof of life campaign that has been launched by her son Kim Aris – and then traveling to Laos in an official capacity, Min Aung Hlaing has neatly driven a wedge into ASEAN, not unlike a lumberjack felling a tree.

The fault lines within ASEAN have only widened ever since mainland countries Cambodia, Laos, and Myanmar, known as the “CLM Club,” were granted entry into the regional bloc in the late 1990s.

Rifts with maritime ASEAN, including Vietnam, were often centered on the Code of Conduct in the South China Sea, where the CLM Club acted as a proxy and spoiler on China’s behalf.

ASEAN’s relations with Naypyidaw then all but collapsed with Min Aung Hlaing’s coup in early 2021, which ousted Suu Kyi and tipped the country into a civil war that to date has claimed almost 100,000 lives.

His stage-managed election that made him president has not been endorsed by ASEAN and a ban on his regime attending ASEAN summits remains in place.

But Laos and Cambodia have stuck by Myanmar as all three countries emerged as havens for organized crime, with their ruling elites profiting off the back of ubiquitous human trafficking networks and industrial-scale scam compounds.

Meanwhile, Thailand, by virtue of its geography, is stranded and squeezed by its mainland........

© The Diplomat