The Shan State Army (SSA) ‘South’ has told a Thai firm to seek its cooperation with regard to a cross-border road project, to be constructed between Thailand’s Chiangrai and Burma’s Shan State.
“We have nothing to say about the road construction plan inside Thailand,” Col Yawd Serk, Chairman of the Restoration Council of Shan State (RCSS), the political arm of the SSA, said. “But, nothing should be carried out inside Shan State, without our prior consent,” he added.
Saraburi Coal Mining, a subsidiary of Ital-Thai had been granted concessions by Burmese junta authorities to extract coal from Shan State East’s Mongkok sub-township, Monghsat Township, about 70 kms north of the Chiangrai border, towards the end of 2008.
However, the Burmese Army insisted that the company construct the Mongkok-Maejok route, in exchange for the coal concessions. The road is proposed to be built across Maejok on the Burmese side of the border to Thailand’s Hmong Kaolang, and is to be roughly 60 kms inside Burma and at least 90 kms inside Thailand.
Last month, the firm conducted an opinion survey in Ban Hintaek village (Ban Therd Thai) in Chiangrai’s Mae Fa Luang district, through which the proposed road would pass through. The survey revealed that all villagers opposed the project, because they feared it would destroy the environment and affect the livelihood of the people.
“There will be mass protests, if the company insists on building the road,” a villager quoted a village headman as saying in a public meeting, held on July 13.
On July 10, the villagers staged a protest against this project, and argued that the road project could affect local village life, endanger the environment, promote drug trafficking and place local people’s lives at risk as the proposed area is controlled by the anti-Naypyitaw Shan State Army (SSA) ‘South’ and the United Wa State Army (UWSA).
Critics said that the Burmese Army’s insistence on building a new road near rebel bases, when a road to Tachilek already exists, which joins the Asian highway in Maesai to Tachilek, shows the proposed road would be used for military purposes.
