Southeast Asia is going to be vulnerable permanently if Myanmar continues to pursue its long cherished nuclear ambitions. The military junta could use the weapons against various ethnic rivals or insurgents. Not only that, the whole Southeast Asian region would be volatile, unstable because of this stupidity of the Myanmar junta. Myanmar’s aggressive behaviour would be growing day by day. Recent border tensions beween Myanmar and Bangladesh are the best example to understand and realize that. The Myanmar military is so brutal that it has been carrying out airstrikes upon its own people. Thus, nuclear weapons on the hand of the Myanmar military are more dangerous than those of North Korea even.
An agreement signed by Myanmar’s military regime and Russia’s state-owned nuclear energy corporation to jointly assess building a small reactor in the Southeast Asian country underscores the junta’s long-term pursuit of nuclear weapons, analysts said.
Myo Thein Kyaw, the regime’s minister of science and technology; Thuang Han, minister of electric power; and Alexey Likhachev, chief executive officer at Russia’s State Atomic Energy Corporation, signed the “roadmap for cooperation upon its own citizens” while they attended the Eastern Economic Forum on Sept. 5-8 in Vladivostok. Junta leader Senr Gen Min Aung Hlaing oversaw the signing of the agreement.
The deal would further Russian-Myanmar cooperation in the field of nuclear energy, and assess the feasibility of a small-scale nuclear reactor project in Myanmar, Rosatom said in a statement issued on September 6.
The same day, the junta announced that it would use nuclear energy for electricity generation, scientific research, medicine production and industry.
There is no doubt Myanmar has a nuclear programme. It sent scientists, technicians and army officers to Russia for training in recent years. And Moscow has agreed to supply Myanmar with a small nuclear reactor for civilian use. The question is, why the world is silent in this regard? Why not ASEAN raising its concern this time?
Myanmar has been carrying out rudimentary steps toward developing nuclear weapons, a documentary released in June by an opposition group alleges. The documentary by the Democratic Voice of Myanmar featured information provided by Sai Thein Win, a former officer in the Myanmar army. Win claimed to have been deputy manager of special machine tool factories involved in Myanmar’s secret nuclear weapons efforts and ballistic missile development programme.
Myanamr’s attitude is contradictory to the Protocol to the SEANWFZ Treaty. Whatever may be the truth, the fact remains that nuclear Myanmar is not in the interest of India, China, or any of the neighbouring countries. They cannot afford to have another nuclear power along the border. Other regional countries would definitely feel insecure. The direct nuclear threat from Myanmar would destabilize the whole region in the long run. If nuclear deterrence works, then arms race is a must in the region. This dangerous ambition of Myanmar’s would \snatch the calm from all stakeholders in the region.
The opposition group also issued a corresponding report n June 3 featuring an analysis of Win’s information by former International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspector Robert Kelley. Kelley claimed in the report that, taken collectively, the technology featured in Win’s information “is only for nuclear weapons and not civilian use or nuclear power.”
Myanmar’s nuclear ambitions, spotlighted by last month’s announcement that Russia has agreed to help the regime build a nuclear research facility, date back at least seven years. In December 1995, the junta signed the Bangkok Treaty, banning the development, manufacture, possession, control, stationing, transport, testing or use of nuclear weapons under the terms of the international Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
Five years later, after a visit to Moscow by Myanmar’s minister for science and technology, U Thaung, the junta’s nuclear plans became clearer…”The junta’s recent confirmation that it will build a small-scale nuclear power plant in the next few years caps Myanmar’s long pursuit of nuclear technology dating back to early 2000.
The Southeast Asian country’s two-decade-long journey to nuclear capability was made possible by Russia after a series of engagements that accelerated under the current junta and its military predecessor.
Though the current regime insists nuclear energy would be used for peaceful purposes in Myanmar, which has been hit by chronic electricity shortages, many believe this is the first step in a plan to utilize nuclear energy for military purposes, including production of nuclear weapons.
In 2009, it was reported that Myanmar was suspected to have initiated a nuclear weapons programme. If such a programme does exist, Myanmar’s technical and financial limitations may make it difficult for the programme to succeed. The USA expressed concern in 2011 about potential violations of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), though by 2012 these concerns had been “partially allayed.” Myanmar has faced persistent accusations of using chemical weapons.
In 2007, Russia and Myanmar made a controversial nuclear research centre deal. According to them, “The centre will comprise a 10MW light-water reactor working on 20%-enriched uranium-235, an activation analysis laboratory, a medical isotope production laboratory, silicon doping system, nuclear waste treatment and burial facilities”.
According to an August 2009 report published in the Sydney Morning Herald, Myanmar had been working to develop a nuclear weapon by 2014. The reported effort, purportedly being undertaken with assistance from North Korea, involves the construction of a nuclear reactor and plutonium extraction facilities in caves tunnelled into a mountain at Naung Laing, a village in the Mandalay division. The information cited in the newspaper story reportedly originated from two high-ranking defectors who had settled in Australia.
On 3 June 2010, a five-year investigation by an anti-government Myanmar broadcaster, the Democratic Voice of Myanmar (DVB), found evidence that allegedly showed the country’s military regime had begun a programme to develop nuclear weapons. The DVB said evidence of Myanmar’s nuclear programme came from top-secret documents smuggled out of the country over several years, including hundreds of files and other evidence provided by Sai Thein Win, a former major in the military of Myanmar. A UN report said there was evidence that North Korea had been exporting nuclear technology to Myanmar, Iran and Syria. Now, Russia supports Myanamr’s nuclear programme openly.
Based on Win’s evidence, Robert Kelley, a former weapons inspector, said he believed Myanmar “has the intent to go nuclear and it is… expending huge resources along the way.” But as of 2010, experts said that Myanmar was a long way from succeeding, given the poor quality of their current materials. Despite Kelley’s analysis, some experts are uncertain that a nuclear weapons programme exists; for example, the Institute for Science and International Security notes ambiguity as to whether certain equipment is used for uranium production, or for innocently producing “rare earth metals or metals such as titanium or vanadium.” The USA expressed concern in 2011 about possible NPT violations, but by 2012 stated that its concerns had been “partially allayed.”
Myanmar signed the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons on 26 September 2018, but has not ratified it.
On 15 December 1995, ASEAN Member States signed the Treaty of Southeast Asia Nuclear Weapon-Free Zone (SEANWFZ Treaty) as a commitment to preserve the Southeast Asian region as a region free of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction. The Treaty is also known as the Bangkok Treaty. Through thisTreaty, ASEAN reaffirms the importance of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) in preventing the proliferation of nuclear weapons and in contributing towards international peace and security.
It also marks the establishment of a Nuclear Weapon-Free Zone (NWFZ) in Southeast Asia– one among five NWFZs in the world. The other four NWFZs are in Latin America and the Caribbean, the South Pacific, Africa, and Central Asia.
The Protocol to the SEANWFZ Treaty welcomes the signing and early ratification of the Nuclear Weapon States (NWS), which will contribute to the promotion of the realisation of a Southeast Asia Nuclear Weapon-Free Zone. Efforts are underway towards the accession of the NWS to the Protocol.
Myanamr’s attitude is contradictory to the Protocol to the SEANWFZ Treaty. Whatever may be the truth, the fact remains that nuclear Myanmar is not in the interest of India, China, or any of the neighbouring countries. They cannot afford to have another nuclear power along the border. Other regional countries would definitely feel insecure. The direct nuclear threat from Myanmar would destabilize the whole region in the long run. If nuclear deterrence works, then arms race is a must in the region. This dangerous ambition of Myanmar’s would \snatch the calm from all stakeholders in the region.
The West should join with all regional countries and ASEAN to pressure Myanmar to give up its nuclear weapons ambitions. They must take actions like thr Iran case. Otherwise, the world is going to see another nuclear threat in Southeast Asia. Instead of developing nuclear weapons, the world must compel Myanmar to focus on bringing back democracy and resolving problems like HIV AIDS, human trafficking, rape, drug abuse, child soldiers, forced labour, ethnic crisis, refugee issues and corruption.
