His name is not on the ballot, and his photographs don’t appear on campaign posters. But one man looms large over the general election under way in Myanmar: junta chief Min Aung Hlaing.
The 69-year-old general has ruled the impoverished Southeast Asian nation since ousting Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government in a 2021 coup. That sparked a civil war of unprecedented violence, which has displaced millions and left much of Myanmar’s borderlands in rebel hands.
The general said in a New Year address, as votes for the first phase of the three-stage election were being counted, that he intends to hand over “state responsibilities” to the next government.
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