The Kachin people, marginalised by the Burmese government, are willing to fight for survival. Is China the only hope for preventing all-out war?
High in Burma’s rolling Kachin hills at a training camp in May this year, officers of the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) were conducting artillery training. It was the first time in nearly six years, and the young cadets were eager to learn. ‘I joined the KIA for the revolutionary principles of our leaders and to fight for Kachin ethnic rights,’ says one cadet. According to the officer in charge, for the last six years Kachin, Burma’s northernmost state, has enjoyed relative peace, and there was no need for military preparation. Now, however, the situation is different. ‘Things are tense, we need to be ready,’ he says, before entering the training hall.
The KIA was right to prepare. On the afternoon of June 9, fighting broke out near Chinese-backed hydropower projects between the KIA and the Burmese government, signalling the end of a 17-year ceasefire. Both sides dispute who started it. In state media, the Burmese government blame the KIA. The KIA, on the other hand, claim it was the Burmese that opened fire on a Kachin camp after KIA soldiers refused to leave their territory near the hydropower projects. Later, tensions only worsened when Burmese soldiers allegedly returned the dead body of a KIA officer. The Burmese claimed he was killed in the fighting, however the KIA asserts that he was stabbed and tortured.
Formed in 1961, the KIA's raison d'être was to defend their region from Burmese troops and create an independent Kachin state. Previously, in 1949, the Kachin and other ethnic groups in the region had signed an agreement with Aung San to form a federal union, the leader of the Burmese army, under the watchful eye of the departing British colonials. After Aung San – the father of Aung San Suu Kyi – was assassinated, the ethnic leaders felt the Burmese government wasn’t respecting the agreement and many took up arms, engaging in gruelling guerrilla wars with the Burmese army in the dense jungle.
Tired of endless fighting, in the 1990s many of the ethnic armies signed ceasefires with the Burmese government, and up until very recently enjoyed the perks that came with peace. Benefiting from a border with China, the Kachin were able to build up their territory and main city Laiza, which boasts hotels, casinos and even a nightclub. At one point, citizens were renting cheaper accommodation on the Chinese side and making the daily journey back to Laiza for work. But the peace wasn’t to last.
In the run up to the 2010 elections, Burma's generals proposed that all the ethnic armies that had observed the ceasefire become ‘Border Guard Forces.’ By agreeing, the Kachin would have been required to allow Burmese commanders into their ranks, lay down their weapons and become part of the state army. For the Kachin, and nearly all the other major ethnic armies, this was completely out of the question. ‘We will never agree to their proposal,’ Lama Gum Hpan, the secretary of the Kachin Independence Council (KIC), which governs the region, said in his headquarters last month. ‘If we accept (the Burmese government's offer), the whole struggle by the people for our Kachin land will be in vain.’
Photo Credit: KC Ortiz
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ozivan
In Australia, I have attended a number of fund raising campaigns for the Kachin’s cause organised by Kachins who are permanent residents in Australia, but never really got to know what it’s all about as they are quite reticent. So this is an interesting article for me.
They are exemplary PR or citizens in Australia,… as I see them.
Pavithra
China brought peace to the northern borders of Burma in late-seventies and early eighties when it commenced its economic development plans to uplift several of its poor and backward provinces. Yunnan was one of them. China was keen to access the Bay of Bengal for trade and commerce through Burma. It leaned on several Burmese insurgent groups, including its protege the Burma Communist Party, to exchange arms for peace with the Rangoon authorities. Burma has seen profit by this policy of its northen neighbor and will continue to earn more making a mockery of the western sanctions. China will do every thing possible to keep peace in this sensitive area including making a deal with the Kachins. Beijing does not want ethnic problems when it has had enough of the Tibetan and Xinjiang variety. The article and its analysis by several commentators is indeed note-worthy.
Th
Michael Turton
Excellent and informative. Thank you very much for this.
Burmawatcher
Perfect Analysis.
mareo2
I think that put too much hope on the CCP foreign policy is not very wise, but typical from people who still hope that the CCP “be a responsible stakeholder and use their leverage for keep peace”. After all the PRC’s investments are all about profit, not about encourage or pressure a regime. Their official selling point is promoted as “we do business not politics”. If a civil war start, it is not impossible that the CCP end selling weapons to both sides.
Also the very existence of semi-autonomous regions in the neighbor Burma with their own militias can be perceived in Beijing as a bad example for ethnic minorities in China like in the Tibet and Xijiang regions. To say that the CCP can feel somewhat uncomfortable with them is not exaggerated.
Bismo
Interesting analysis. Some businessmen who are close to the regime have told me that the recent changes in Burma are a direct result of the central government’s realization that the Chinese had actually been supporting the local militias against the military. As trade with Burma thus far has been heavily geared towards China, the regime wanted to end their dependence and is now targeting a lifting of sanctions by Q2 of next year. Another theory to throw out there but who knows…