China on Sunday denied a Reuters' report accusing the country of derailing a nationwide cease-fire deal in Myanmar's peace talks with ethnic rebels last week.
According to Thursday's report, Min Zaw Oo, a senior official at the government-linked Myanmar Peace Center, which coordinates talks to quell the patchwork of insurgencies that have lingered in Myanmar since independence in 1948, told Reuters that China's special envoy pressed two key rebel groups not to sign the peace accord.
The report said that after China intervened, only eight of the 15 groups that were invited by the government committed to the agreement. Some of the other groups are headed by ethnic Chinese commanders, and had received funding and other forms of support from China in the past.
However, the Chinese embassy in Myanmar told the Global Times Sunday that Min denies having made the statement, saying that China has been playing a positive role in Myanmar's peace talks.
As a prestigious news agency, it is hard to understand that its news report could not be approved by its interviewee, said an official from the embassy.
The official said that China supports the Myanmar government's to enter into a cease-fire with ethnic rebels as soon as possible.
He stressed that China has been practicing what it preaches in Myanmar's peace progress. Myanmar thanked China for its active role in boosting the peace process in the country, said the news release during President U Thein Sein's visit to China in September.
