Over at the Lowy Institute’s Interpreter they have published my short analysis of the new war in northern Burma. It picks up some of the broader regional dynamics that are relevant to the re-ignition of the Kachin Independence Army battle against Burmese government forces. After a 17-year ceasefire there is plenty for us to consider closely. This analysis builds on previous New Mandala coverage available here, here and here, among other places.
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I enjoy gleaning what little I can from irrawady, karennationalunion.net, shanland.org, burmadigest.info, burmanet.org.
There is so little of this that summarizes or documents on maps the progression of resistance in terms of battles, skirmishes, sabotage, military executions/population reduction. It’s just so difficult to get the big picture here.
Your article here begins to do more of that. Thank you.
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I almost mis-read Mr Farrelly’s article as India and China fighting over Kachin…corrected myself!
Bottomline there is only one who can help the Kachin prosper as an ethnic group – the Kachins themselves. All the other parties have their own agenda – India wants to shut off the support to its rebels; China wants the cheap goodies; the West wants to preach human rights and the Burmese just wants to own Kachin.
Ideally the Burmese will have to respect the Kachin as masters of their own destinies hopefully in the near future, the West has to understand that their belief systems are not universal and really localized, China has to work on a sustainable model of economic trade and commerce in resource rich lands and India has to see the larger picture of political stability in a regional perspective than just myopically settling for shortcuts.
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