President Barack Obama on Friday lifted U.S. economic sanctions on Myanmar, the culmination of years of rapprochement that he has worked to facilitate.
Mr. Obama had announced plans to lift the sanctions last month, when Myanmar’s State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi visited the Oval Office.
The U.S. has already eased broad prohibitions on investment and trade but had retained more targeted restrictions on military-owned companies and officials and associates of the former ruling junta.
Friday’s executive order lifts those restrictions. It removes the national emergency with respect to Myanmar — the executive order authorising sanctions that has been renewed annually by different U.S. Presidents for about two decades till now.