CAMBODIA began its chair of Asean with a bang. But it is not the kind of "bang" most members of the regional bloc wanted to hear.
On Friday, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen flew into Myanmar and "was met by an honour guard and red carpet" (as Reuters put it), a welcome fit for kings. Not unexpected.
After all, Hun Sen is the only head of state to have cared to visit the much-troubled Southeast Asian country since the Feb 1 military coup. Besides, not many leaders in the world want to be seen associating with Min Aung Hlaing, a general with genocidal tendencies.
But this move of Hun Sen is bound to cause division within the already-divided bloc. Many Asean member countries had condemned the military coup and blocked Min Aung Hlaing from attending its two meetings in October and November. A very brave move by the habitually timid bloc.
Already questions are being asked: is Hun Sen there on behalf of Asean? Or is he there as the prime minister of Cambodia? As chair of Asean, Cambodia should stick to the regional body's five-point plan, of which it was a part.
And let the Asean-appointed envoy to Myanmar do the job. There cannot be two Asean approaches, one by Cambodia and another by the rest of the bloc.
Cambodia must surely know that the errant general is leading the country into a civil war. Back-door diplomacy isn't the way to go, especially with one who refuses to engage with the bloc. He has been given enough notice. Time to think of Asean-minus one.
If Hun Sen's recent statement to the media is anything to go by, he is all for bringing Min Aung Hlaing back to the fold. This is a mistake, and a grave one, too. It is support like this that makes impunity so hard to put an end to.
The junta's war crimes aren't just as old as Feb 1. They are older. They are more aged than the crimes against the Rohingya. The Tatmadaw, Myanmar's military, is unrepentant. To welcome Min Aung Hlaing, who stands accused of countless war crimes, to Asean's meetings is akin to saying that the regional bloc has no respect for human rights or democracy.
The Tatmadaw's coup was based on a fictitious argument: electoral fraud in the Nov 8, 2020 election in which Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy won a landslide victory.
Min Aung Hlaing is sticking to his "millions of irregularities" fiction, though he has provided no evidence to prove his claim. All he is willing to say is that the Tatmadaw has evidence that people voted multiple times.
Myanmar's election commission dismisses this as an impossibility given the checks in place. Independent observers did, however, agree that there might have been "significant errors in the voter rolls", but no evidence that people actually committed electoral fraud was presented, according to a Feb 5 BBC report.
It also quoted the Carter Centre, which had 40 staff visiting polling stations on polling day, as saying the election had taken place "without major irregularities being reported by mission observers".
Even if the Tatmadaw is proven right, the answer to a fraudulent election isn't a military coup. Another national election is. And that, too, without the Tatmadaw as a political party.
Bullets and ballots are a very unhappy mix.