Myanmar junta and Russia begin talks to revive Dawei port project

Myanmar’s military junta has begun talks with Russia to revive the long-stalled Dawei deep-sea port project in the country’s south, according to a senior regime official. Aung Soe, chair of the junta-controlled Dawei Special Economic Zone Management Committee, told Myanmar Now the two sides had met for preliminary discussions after the Russian embassy and several private Russian companies expressed an interest in the project. The talks were still “at the initial stage,” he said, declining to discuss what the Russians had proposed or any other details. “We will release the news once we have been able to reach a concrete agreement,” he said. In March, junta chief Min Aung Hlaing told the Russian news agency ITAR-TASS that discussions were underway with Russia to construct a port capable of accommodating ships of 200,000 tons or more in the southern part of the country. In 2008, an agreement was signed between the then-ruling junta and Italian-Thai Development, a Thailand-based construction company, to build an SEZ around Dawei’s deep-sea port. Covering an area of nearly 200 square km, the planned SEZ would have been one of the largest in the region. The entire project included an industrial estate, a cross-border highway to Thailand, and a possible rail link and pipeline. A map supplied by Myanmar authorities shows the location of the proposed Dawei SEZ in southern Myanmar’s Tanintharyi Region However, it was suspended five years later, during the quasi-civilian administration of former general Thein Sein, over a failure to secure funding within the designated time frame. In 2015, the governments of Myanmar, Thailand, and Japan agreed to restart the project, but it has since remained at a standstill. No major development projects involving foreign partnership have been undertaken in Myanmar since the current regime seized power in February 2021. However, Russia has built strong ties with the junta since the coup, supplying it with the fighter jets and attack helicopters that it has used extensively to suppress resistance to its rule.

Myanmar junta and Russia begin talks to revive Dawei port project

The mega-project, long put on hold over financing issues, could become the first built with foreign partners since the 2021 coup

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