(AFP) – Myanmar campaigners denounced on Tuesday US lobbyist Roger Stone, a close confidante of President Donald Trump, for accepting $50,000 a month to “rebuild” the Southeast Asian government’s relations with Washington. Myanmar’s leaders have been considered political pariahs in many Western nations since 2021, when the military staged a putsch deposing the democratic government of Aung San Suu Kyi and triggering civil war.
The United States has imposed economic sanctions targeting Myanmar’s top brass and their associates, as the nation suffered a half-decade human rights backslide that has crushed political dissent. Filings under the Foreign Agents Registration Act last week revealed conservative political consultant Stone has been commissioned through consulting firm the DCI Group to provide “public affairs services” to Myanmar’s information ministry. Campaign group Justice For Myanmar said in a statement that Stone and DCI “are profiting from a heavily sanctioned junta that is committing war crimes and crimes against humanity with total impunity”.
US government documents said Stone will work on “rebuilding relations between the Republic of the Union of Myanmar and the United States, with a focus on trade, natural resources, and humanitarian relief”. The revelation comes as Myanmar’s post-coup authorities are touting a new chapter for the country, a campaign which rights monitors are treating with deep scepticism.
After five years of direct military rule, the junta oversaw tightly restricted elections returning a walkover win in January for its allies in civilian politics. The polls excluded detained Suu Kyi’s party. A new parliament voted for coup leader Min Aung Hlaing to serve as the country’s president, buttressing critics who describe the administration as a civilian fig leaf for military rule. The new military-backed government is using the appearance of political reform to rehabilitate its image and reboot diplomatic ties, analysts say.
Justice For Myanmar said the lobbying work was registered “after the junta’s last rebrand”. “Roger Stone has joined this contract with international criminals, which benefits US-sanctioned natural resource state-owned enterprises that the junta has illegally seized and is using to fund its widening attacks against schools, churches, monasteries, and hospitals,” their statement added.
Stone is a long-time firebrand conservative activist who served as a Trump campaign consultant. In 2020 he was sentenced to 40 months in prison for hindering a congressional probe into whether Trump’s first electoral bid conspired with Russia. The sentence was commuted by Trump, sparing Stone jail time.
© 2024 AFP
