BEIJING: Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi met Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing on Thursday, state media said, during her closely watched first visit that China hopes will establish a line of communication with the influential opposition leader.

Suu Kyi met Xi at Beijing’s Great Hall of the People, according to the official Xinhua News Agency, which did not immediately provide details on what was discussed.

Beijing was a key backer of Myanmar’s former military junta while it was under Western sanctions — most of which have been lifted since 2011 — and a much-needed international ally for a brutal regime that crushed dissent and kept Suu Kyi under house arrest for more than 15 years.

But China-Myanmar relations have cooled as the country has introduced democratic reforms and opened up economically to the West while in recent months an ethnic insurgency in the Kokang region of Myanmar has spilled over the border into China.

Published in Dawn June 12th, 2015

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