Malaysia’s Anwar urges ASEAN to speak up on Myanmar violence

Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim urged the Association of Southeast Asian Nations to speak up and hold Myanmar’s military leaders accountable for blatant human rights violations, but said the country should remain in the regional bloc. Anwar, who took office in November, has become one of the most vocal critics in ASEAN of Myanmar’s military, which seized power from the democratically elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in 2021. In a visit to the Philippines, he discussed the Myanmar crisis with President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. on Wednesday and called on ASEAN to explore new ways to persuade Myanmar’s ruling generals to halt the violence, saying it is affecting the region. “They need to do more because it is causing us a major problem, we have 200,000 (Myanmar) refugees in Malaysia alone,” Anwar told The Associated Press after delivering a lecture Thursday at the University of the Philippines, at which he received an honorary degree for advocating democracy and fighting corruption. In his lecture, Anwar urged ASEAN to speak up on atrocities in Myanmar and not be restrained by the group’s bedrock principles of deciding by consensus and non-intervention in each other’s domestic affairs. Deciding by consensus “does not mean that ASEAN should remain silent over developments in member states that affect the wider region or particularly egregious violations of the ASEAN charter by its own members,” Anwar said.