Myanmar Signs ‘Debt Trap’ Agreement
with China in Response to Rohingya Genocide Censure: This month, Myanmar
(Burma) signed a series of memos of understanding (MOUs) for joint construction
with China to build the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor (CMEC), part of China’s
Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). The CMEC will focus on 12 areas including basic
infrastructure, construction, manufacturing, agriculture, transport, finance,
human resource development, and telecommunications.
According to the CMEC proposal, construction will begin with 24 projects
costing $2 billion at the beginning, increasing later. The corridor will start
from Kunming, the capital of China’s Yunnan Province. It will continue for
1,700-kilometers, through Myanmar’s major economic hubs, ending at Myanmar’s
deep sea port in Kyaukphyu in Rakhine State on the Bay of Bengal, leading to
the Indian Ocean.
The project will create thousands of
jobs for Burmese workers, but it will provide far larger benefits for Chinese
companies and workers. The proposal claims that the CMEC would allow a direct
flow of Chinese goods into the southern and western regions of Myanmar and that
Chinese industries could transfer into Myanmar in order to abate the rising
labor cost and overcapacity of China’s industries. It said that Myanmar would
become a major trade hub for Chinese goods between China, Southeast Asia, and
South Asia.