He said: “We have already met with officers from the KIA Technical Advisory Team (TAT) from Myitkyinar Township and when we proposed that they release them [the forcibly recruited Shans]. They said they would look into it but that it may be difficult as they are all in different battalions.”

Of the 280 Shan people who were conscripted by the KIO, since the start of armed clashes with the army in June 2011 till September 2014, only 98 have escaped according to U Sai Tun Yin.

He said: “There have been no legal releases [of conscripts] but they get opportunities to run away, especially when they are searching for tree branches to make cooking fires. Some run away to China then return to the country gradually.”

U Dong Khar the KIO’s TAT spokesperson told Photphaw news that TAT are now dealing with complaints about conscriptions and he admitted that previously the KIO had conscripted child soldiers and collected tax from villagers.

He said: “We cannot yet confirm whether there are any  [Shan conscripts]. When their people came and discussed this with us we made investigations.

“When there are frequent armed clashes all forces conscript people, even the government army conscript people.”

Shan people in Kachin State live mainly in an area bounded by Sin-Bo Village on the Irrawaddy River in Myitkyinar Township to the East and the townships of Mogaung and Moehnyin to the west. KIO and government forces are active in the area.

U Wizaya a monk and leader of the Shan Volunteer and Social Association said: “It’s undeniable, the Shan people are jammed between the KIO and government forces in an area where the two sides clash.”

Shan people are caught up in the military and racial affairs of Kachin State and both sides’ leaders should stop the fighting, he added.

Lt. Col. James Lumdau head of the foreign affairs department of the KIO, who is based in Bangkok, denied that they were forcibly recruiting Shan people and conscripting them into the KIA.

The KIO has no policy to forcibly recruit soldiers and if anyone sees KIO forces on the ground conscripting people they can complain and effective action will be taken said a top KIO leader who withheld his name.

The Northern Burma Committee of the Shan Nationalities Affairs estimates that about 500,000 Shan people live in Kachin State. They claim that about 200,000 of the Shans in Kachin State were excluded from the national census as the population list drawn up by the government prior to the census only showed a Shan population of 300,000 people in the State.