Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – The Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) on Sunday sent a letter to Thein Zaw, the general secretary of the ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), asking for proof to show that Burmese government troops have stopped their military offensive against the KIO.
‘If the government really wants permanent peace, they need to give us proof to show that they have stopped the offensive. We need official documents that ordered the relevant government military units to stop fighting’, La Nang, a KIO central committee member, told Mizzima.
Thein Zaw is an MP from Myitkyina, the capital of Kachin State.
The Kachin Consultative Assembly on Friday forwarded a government message that offered the KIO a cease-fire, but the KIO doubted the authenticity of the offer.
The KIO letter said that if the government could provide proof, the KIO would withdraw its troops from the front and try to reach an agreement.
Meanwhile, KIO troops carried out an attack on the government’s Military Affairs Security office in Namsangyang village on the Myitkyina-Bhamo Road about 2 a.m. on Sunday, La Nang said.
Because of recent fighting, about 10,000 people have fled to the Sino-Burmese border town of Laiza, where KIO headquarters are located, the KIO said.
On Sunday, a ceremony to mark Burma’s pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s 66th birthday was held in Laiza. In the ceremony, former members of the All Burma Students’ Democratic Front and pro-democracy activists donated 5 million kyat (about US$ 700) to war victims.
The KIO, which is fighting for racial equality and self-determination, signed a cease-fire agreement with the former junta in 1994, but after it rejected the junta’s Border Guard Force plan, the cease-fire agreement was broken and fresh fighting began in early June.
