REUTERS

Min Aung Hlaing, Myanmar’s military chief who led a coup in 2021, stepped down yesterday to stand as president in a parliamentary vote following the first polls in the Southeast Asian nation since the takeover that triggered a civil war.

The 69-year-old general, who had commanded Myanmar’s armed forces since 2011, was one of two people named as vice-presidential candidates by lawmakers from the country’s newly convened lower house of parliament.

The country’s upper house will also nominate a vice-presidential candidate, with both houses to select a president from the three in a later vote. A date for that vote has not been announced.

“Senior General Min Aung Hlaing is proposed as a vice-presidential candidate,” Kyaw Kyaw Htay, a lawmaker from a military-aligned party, said on the floor of the lower house of parliament, according to a live broadcast of proceedings on state media.