Suu Kyi is the mortal enemy of the junta, the one they loathe and fear the most because she is the daughter of the father of the Burmese military. China knows this and by them mentioning her in such warm terms soon after the elections the junta held to please China is a flex because it certainly is an irritant to the generals. This statement from China likely prompted the hasty movement of Suu Kyi from prison to “house arrest” in unknown location in Naypyidaw. It shows China is quite confident of its position and standing in Burma. It knows Junta is totally reliant on them. Junta’s battle field successes in the last 6 months can be attributed to Chinese help - China has reigned in the leashes on the powerful ethnic armies it controls - the Wa, the MNDAA, and even the Kachin who doesn’t owe an iota of allegiance to the Chinese whereas the former were founded by China. Having China stop two of the 3 most powerful rebel armies from attacking them, Junta now focuses its resources on other fronts. China helped in the battle field by selling its latest drones to the Junta and with Chinese cyber and AI surveillance Junta has tightened its hold on the civilian population. This military junta stands on its wobbly legs because of China and China knows this.

Xi and China knows well that Suu Kyi is extremely popular in Burma, even amongst different ethnicities. Communist party is well aware of China’s own history of peasant uprisings that toppled dynasties and knows that oppression cannot last long without some appeasement of the peasants. Yes Suu Kyi’s pivot towards China during her tenure plays a part in this but Chinese are not sentimentalists. While Burmese nationalists will point to China’s many centuries-old history of expansionist ambition towards Burma guiding its moves, Chinese Communist Party is more concerned with its own legacy and survival than outward expansion: wealth is disproportionate in China. Land-locked provinces including Yunnan suffer highest poverty rates, so much so that some of its populace had been migrating to Myanmar a poor country before Junta’s coup in search of better life. China wants to open up its poor western frontiers to development while trying to find escape velocity out of the middle-income trap its economy finds itself in. In order to achieve that it needs a stable Burma with a singular regime controlling it to execute its economic plans. A fast high volume trade corridor from Yunnan to Indian ocean through Burma will open up Yunnan and western provinces to large markets they otherwise don’t have easy access: India and South Asia, Middle East, Africa and Europe. Appeasing Burmese populace to some degree releases some pressure from the magma chamber and keep Burma from exploding while allowing it to play every side of Burmese domestic politics.