Myanmar rebel group withdraws troops from key town on Thai border
An armed ethnic group in Myanmar has withdrawn its troops from a town along the Thai border following a counteroffensive by the ruling junta.
An armed ethnic group in Myanmar has withdrawn its troops from a town along the Thai border following a counteroffensive by the ruling junta from whom rebel fighters wrested the key trading post this month, a spokesperson for the group said on Wednesday.
Myanmar is locked in a civil war between the military on one side and, on the other, a loose alliance of established ethnic minority armies and a resistance movement born out of the ruling junta’s bloody crackdown on dissent after its 2021 coup.
The Karen National Union (KNU) made a “temporary retreat” from Myawaddy, its spokesperson, Saw Taw Nee, said after the return of junta soldiers to the vital strategic area that is a conduit for annual foreign trade of more than $1 billion.
Photographs posted on some pro-junta social media groups showed a handful of its soldiers raising the Myanmar national flag at a military base the KNU had controlled just days before, and where the rebel group had raised its own banner.
“KNLA troops will ... destroy the junta troops and their backup troops who marched to Myawaddy,” added Saw Taw Nee, referring to the group’s armed wing, the Karen National Liberation Army, one of Myanmar’s oldest ethnic fighting forces.
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