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Myanmar Junta Seen Cozying Up to China if West Gets Tough

Ralph Jennings

   TAIPEI, TAIWAN -- The military government that seized power in Myanmar
   will get along well with its authoritarian neighbor China in the long
   term, despite historical misgivings, and grow closer if international
   sanctions isolate the Southeast Asian state from Western powers,
   observers say.
   Myanmar's military took control of the country Monday and declared a
   year-long state of emergency. Civilian de facto head of state Aung San
   Suu Kyi, a Nobel laureate, was detained in the power shift, prompting
   condemnation from Western governments.
   China might fumble at first to work with the new Myanmar leader, Min
   Aung Hlaing, because the military resents China's involvement in a now
   suspended hydropower dam, cross-border shipments of Myanmar's natural
   gas and other influence over the economy in the past 20 years, said
   Thitinan Pongsudhirak, a political science professor at Bangkok's
   Chulalongkorn University.

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