By The Diplomat | Created at 2026-06-15 15:13:59 | Updated at 2026-06-18 14:51:07
3 days ago
On Friday, authorities in China announced the arrest of a U.S. citizen who heads a prominent think-tank in Myanmar, for allegedly endangering China’s national security.
The New York Times reported that Min Zin, the executive director of the Institute for Strategy and Policy-Myanmar (ISP-Myanmar), disappeared on June 3 while visiting the city of Kunming in Yunnan province, citing sources with knowledge of the arrest. Another source told Reuters that Min Zin was “arrested at Kunming airport about two weeks ago.”
A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson subsequently confirmed the arrest, stating that Min Zin, a former student activist who participated in pro-democracy protests in 1988, had “been placed under criminal detention by the relevant authorities in accordance with the law on suspicion of engaging in espionage and endangering China’s national security.”
The U.S. government has not commented in detail on Min Zin’s arrest, citing the sensitivity of the issue. “We are aware of reports regarding a U.S. citizen detained in China,” the Times quoted the U.S. State Department as saying. “Whenever a U.S. citizen is detained, we work to provide the appropriate consular assistance.”
As the Washington Post noted in its report on Min Zin’s arrest, it is rare for China to arrest U.S. citizens on national security grounds. In late 2024, Beijing released three detained American citizens as part of a prisoner swap; one was being held on drug charges, while the two others were charged with espionage.
A graduate in political science from the University of California, Berkeley, Min Zin helped establish ISP-Myanmar in 2016, which describes itself as “an independent, non-partisan, and non-governmental think tank” that “supports the advancement of democracy, good governance, federal principles and practices, and fundamental human rights.” ISP-Myanmar was initially based in Yangon but moved outside the country following the military coup of February 2021, which abruptly closed off the space available for independent media outlets and civil society groups. It is currently based in the northern Thai city of Chiang Mai, a long-time hub for Myanmar exiles.
Strangely, Min Zin’s arrest came a day after authorities in Myanmar detained an American businessman who ran a security consultancy in the country.
Adam Castillo, a former head of the American Chamber of Commerce in Myanmar, was stopped at an airport on Thursday after travelling to the country, Reuters reported, citing two people briefed on the matter. Castillo had been abroad promoting a book that he recently published about living through the 2021 coup.
While there is no evidence that the arrests are related, the timing is curious to say the least. The fact that both arrests took place just before Myanmar regime head Min Aung Hlaing began a five-day state visit to China, during which he is set to meet with Chinese leader Xi Jinping, will only further fuel speculation.
As was pointed out by the Washington Post, both Min Zin and Castillo “have been vocal commentators on China’s growing influence in Myanmar’s civil war” and have “traveled periodically to Washington to share their views with policymakers and legislators.”
It is true that Myanmar-China relations is one of the ISP-Myanmar’s three main areas of research focus, and it runs a China Desk that publishes detailed analysis of Chinese infrastructure projects in Myanmar, including the clutch of projects grouped under the umbrella of the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor. It has also published reports analyzing China’s response to the 2021 coup, the impact of Myanmar’s conflicts on Chinese infrastructure investments, and China’s influence in areas of Kachin State with large deposits of rare earth minerals.
Its analysis on China’s investments in Myanmar is relatively measured, and certainly does not indulge in overtly anti-China fearmongering that one sometimes sees among opponents of the Myanmar military (and indeed within the security establishment itself).
Nonetheless, one could imagine how ISP-Myanmar’s detailed analysis of China’s investment footprint in Myanmar, in addition to Min Zin’s good connections in Washington, could pose a serious enough threat to the Chinese authorities that they might seek his arrest. It is also possible that the arrest, like past instances of Chinese “hostage diplomacy,” is motivated foremost by developments in China’s relations with the U.S. and other Western countries.
Whatever the reason for his arrest, it will make people in Myanmar and elsewhere think twice about looking too closely at China’s core strategic interests in Myanmar, as Saw Zin Maung Soe, the founder of the nonprofit CAN-Myanmar, told the Post.
“While we already know they don’t tolerate issues regarding Tibet, Uyghurs, or Tiananmen Square,” he told the paper. “We now have to question whether ‘Myanmar’ has also become part of that list.”
Castillo’s case is more confounding. While the former U.S. Marine has been at times critical of Chinese influence in Myanmar, he has for this reason also been a strong advocate of U.S. engagement with the military junta and a persistent critic of U.S. sanctions policy. Last year, during a trip to the White House, Reuters reported that he suggested to U.S. officials to normalize relations with the military junta with a view to gaining access to sources of rare earth minerals in Kachin State.
In other words, Castillo’s views are not too far removed from currents of opinion within Myanmar’s security establishment, which have long been privately suspicious of China’s growing influence in the country and probably would like few things more than a normalization of relations with Washington and the lifting of U.S. sanctions.
For their own part, the Myanmar military’s propaganda accounts on social media have advanced their own explanation for Castillo’s arrest. The Views of Myanmar account on X stated that he had been detained for embezzlement, and that he had “misused” the name of the American Chamber of Commerce to “illegally collect over billions [sic] from some member companies for his personal gain.”
Like the Chinese government’s vague statement about Min Zin, this obviously cannot be taken at face value. But it does seem likely that there is more to Castillo’s arrest than his occasional criticisms of China, whether in terms of his activities in Myanmar or the broader trajectory of U.S.-Myanmar relations.
