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By The Irrawaddy 25 Could 2023
The Karen Nationwide Union (KNU), essentially the most highly effective ethnic armed group (EAO) in Myanmar, held its seventeenth congress in secrecy early this month, electing new management after a two-year delay as a result of COVID-19 pandemic and the navy coup.
With 91-year-old Mutu Say Poe having stepped down on well being grounds, former vice chairman Padoh Noticed Kwe Htoo Win was elected to succeed him as KNU chairman.
Elections had been additionally held to fill different key positions, together with vice chairman, three secretaries, chief justice, and the heads of the KNU’s 12 departments, within the first week of Could.
In a Could 5 assertion issued after the congress, the armed group vowed to proceed to struggle for equality and a federal, democratic Union.
Rising tensions with junta
In its assertion, the KNU Congress vowed to “struggle racial chauvinism and navy dictatorship, set up federal democracy, and work along with the individuals of all the Karen nation for equality and self-determination.”
It additionally vowed to collaborate with ethnic armed revolutionary organizations, pro-democracy forces, and folks from totally different walks of life which might be combating chauvinism and navy dictatorship and for the reason for democracy, equality and self-determination, and the institution of a federal, democratic Union.
The navy regime denounced the KNU assertion. On Could 10, the junta’s Nationwide Solidarity and Peace Negotiation Committee stated the KNU’s assertion was counter to the Nationwide Ceasefire Settlement (NCA) and would end in confrontation. It insisted the NCA is the one path to peace and stability.
The KNU signed the NCA below U Thein Sein’s quasi-civilian authorities, and actively engaged within the peace course of till the 2021 navy coup, however since then it has offered shelter and coaching for individuals who have determined to take up arms in opposition to the Myanmar navy.
Together with different EAOs together with the Kachin Independence Military, Karenni Military, Chin Nationwide Entrance and All Burma College students Democratic Entrance, the KNU has rejected the junta’s peace overtures and has been combating alongside resistance forces collectively referred to as the Folks’s Protection Pressure (PDF), which operates as the military of the parallel Nationwide Unity Authorities (KNU).
A high-ranking KNU official stated the stance offered within the assertion following the seventeenth congress was nothing new, and continued the armed group’s long-standing coverage, including that the brand new management was unlikely to have interaction in talks with the Myanmar navy regime.
“Nearly all of the [new] management are middle-aged individuals. They’re energetic and enthusiastic. The regime has invited the KNU to a lot of its ceremonies. The KNU has a coverage of not holding talks with navy dictators. [KNU spokesman] Padoh Noticed Taw Nee has additionally stated now we have nothing to speak with the navy about, and can solely speak with an elected civilian authorities,” he stated.
Exterior, inside pressures
The seventeenth congress was repeatedly postponed for concern of junta air assaults for the reason that coup. Attendees had been stored in suspense all through the congress as junta plane had been noticed continuously over KNU territory, in line with KNU sources.
Junta troops and KNU-led allied forces clashed in territories managed by the KNU’s brigades 1, 3, 5 and 6 throughout the congress.
As of December 2022, a complete of 365,178 individuals had been affected by junta air and artillery assaults and by clashes on the bottom, in line with a report by the KNU’s human rights committee and analysis part. Mixed with individuals already displaced by earlier combating, the displaced inhabitants totaled some 500,000 in KNU territories.
The seventeenth congress drew widespread consideration because the KNU’s Central Govt Committee was below stress as a result of alleged involvement of KNU commanders in KK Park, a criminal offense hub on the Thai border.
Karen civil society organizations around the globe even demanded the resignation of all the Central Govt Committee for failing to punish sure KNU leaders concerned in KK Park. Infamous as a hub of human trafficking and on-line scams, the China-backed so-called new metropolis venture is situated close to the village of Maw Hto Talay in an space managed by KNU Brigade 6 within the north of Myawaddy Township.
KNU Brigade 2 and Brigade 5 didn’t take part within the voting to decide on the brand new management and didn’t put up any candidates.
Brigade 5 has referred to as on the brand new management to punish senior KNU members who violated the group’s guidelines and laws, and to crush all unlawful companies in Kawthoolei, because the KNU’s territory is thought within the Karen language.
The committee stated it will probe allegations of KNU leaders’ involvement in KK Park.
It seems that how leaders of the KNU central physique deal with the interior issues will have an effect on the connection between KNU headquarters and brigades 2 and 5.
New chairman
Former vice chairman Padoh Kwe Htoo Win was elected the tenth chair of the KNU. An alumnus of Yangon’s College of Economics, he served because the KNU Brigade 4 chairman from 1990 to 2012 and was elected normal secretary of the KNU on the fifteenth congress.
Because the KNU normal secretary, he attended the signing of the NCA between U Thein Sein’s quasi-civilian authorities and the KNU in October 2015. He was elected vice chairman on the group’s sixteenth congress in 2017.
Following his election, the Myanmar navy regime has carried out numerous operations in all probability supposed to check how he’ll conduct himself as the brand new KNU chief.
On Could 14, round 50 junta troops arrested the youthful brother and nephew of KNU vice chair Padoh Hser Homosexual in Bago Area’s Kyaukkyi Township. The 2 had been launched the next day.
Kyaukkyi in Nyaunglebin District, the place the KNU Brigade 3 is predicated, is a battle zone the place junta troops and KNU-led allied forces are at present combating.
Junta troops additionally killed 20 residents, together with 11 girls and 4 kids, from Nyaungbinthar Village in Nyaunglebin’s Mone Township by setting fireplace to them.
Intensified clashes forward?
Over the previous 4 months, throughout the nation’s scorching season, there have been 1,642 clashes between the 2 sides in areas managed by the KNU. PDF teams fought alongside the KNU in these clashes.
Round 1,700 junta troopers had been killed within the interval, in line with the KNU, however The Irrawaddy couldn’t independently confirm the junta casualties. The KNU stated it suffered 59 fatalities with round 200 others injured.
A supply near the KNU stated it’s tough to foretell whether or not clashes will intensify within the wet season, which begins in June, as a result of the regime tends to conduct extra air and artillery assaults throughout the wet season.
“What is nice concerning the KNU is it has a coverage of collective management,” stated an observer of Karen politics primarily based on the border. “Half of the brand new management are middle-aged individuals. We are going to wait and see their political acumen, and if they’ll present checks and balances on the chairman,” added the observer.
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