The United Wa State Party: Narco-Army or Ethnic Nationalist Party? 9789812304926

Table of contents :
Contents
List of Acronyms
A Note on Terminology
Executive Summary
The United Wa State Party: Narco-Army or Ethnic Nationalist Party?
History of the Wa Region and the Origin of the United Wa State Party
Narco-Army or Ethnic Nationalist Party?
United Wa State Party Governance: A State within a State
Relations with the Government and the Opposition
International Implications
Conclusion
Endnotes
Bibliography
Project Information: Internal Conflicts and State-Building Challenges in Asia
Project Rationale, Purpose, and Outline
Project Participants
Background on Burma/Myanmar’s Ethnic Conflicts
Pre- and Post-1989 Names
Map of Burma/Myanmar
List of Reviewers 2006–07
Policy Studies: Previous Publications

Citation preview

The United Wa State Party: Narco-Army or Ethnic Nationalist Party?

00 EWC PS38 Prelims

1

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

100

07 EWC PS38 Reviewers

100

9/6/07, 3:27 PM

Policy Studies 38

The United Wa State Party: Narco-Army or Ethnic Nationalist Party? Tom Kramer

00 EWC PS38 Prelims

3

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

Copyright © 2007 by the East-West Center Washington The United Wa State Party: Narco-Army or Ethnic Nationalist Party? by Tom Kramer East-West Center Washington 1819 L Street, NW, Suite 200 Washington, D.C. 20036 Tel: (202) 293-3995 Fax: (202) 293-1402 E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.eastwestcenterwashington.org Online at: www.eastwestcenterwashington.org/publications The Policy Studies series contributes to the East-West Center’s role as a forum for discussion of key contemporary domestic and international political, economic, and strategic issues affecting Asia. The views expressed are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of the Center. This publication is a product of the East-West Center Washington project on Internal Conflicts and State-Building Challenges in Asia. For details, see pages 75–94. The project and this publication are supported by a generous grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York. First co-published in Singapore in 2007 by ISEAS Publishing Institute of Southeast Asian Studies 30 Heng Mui Keng Terrace Pasir Panjang Road Singapore 119614 E-mail: [email protected] Website: ISEAS Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data Kramer, Tom. The United Wa State Party: narco-army or ethnic nationalist party? (East-West Center Washington policy studies series, 1547-1349 ; PS38) 1. United Wa State Party (Burma)—History. 2. Wa (Burmese people)—Burma—Shan State—Politics and government. 3. Wa (Burmese people)—Burma—Shan State—History. I. Title II. Series: Policy studies (East-West Center Washington) ; 38. DS1 E13P no. 38 2007 ISBN 978-981-230-491-9 (soft cover) ISBN 978-981-230-492-6 (PDF) ISSN 1547-1349 (soft cover) ISSN 1547-1330 (PDF) Typeset in Singapore by Superskill Graphics Pte Ltd Printed in Singapore by Seng Lee Press Pte Ltd

00 EWC PS38 Prelims

4

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

Contents List of Acronyms

ix

A Note on Terminology

xi

Executive Summary

xv

Introduction

1

History of the Wa Region and the Origin of the United Wa State Party

5

00 EWC PS38 Prelims

The Wa Region

5

The Period of Warring Wa Chieftains

6

Independence and Civil War

10

The Communist Party of Burma

11

The Wa Revolt and the Fall of the Communist Party of Burma

16

5

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

vi

Tom Kramer The Formation of the United Wa State Party

19

The Southern Command

21

Narco-Army or Ethnic Nationalist Party?

23

The Narcotics Question

23

The Political Agenda of the United Wa State Party

28

United Wa State Party Governance: A State within a State

37

Organizational Structure

37

Elimination of Opium

40

Resettlement Program

41

Business Activities

43

The United Wa State Army

45

Relations with the Government and the Opposition

46

The Ceasefire Agreement

46

Relations with the Military Government

48

Relations with Opposition Groups

51

International Implications

54

The United States

54

China and Thailand

56

UN Agencies and International NGOs

59

00 EWC PS38 Prelims

6

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

vii

The United Wa State Party Conclusion

62

Endnotes

67

Bibliography

71

Project Information: Internal Conflicts and State-Building Challenges in Asia

75

• Project Purpose and Outline

77

• Project Participants List

81

• Background on Burma/Myanmar’s Ethnic Conflicts

87

• Pre-1989 and Post-1989 Names

91

• Map of Burma/Myanmar: Ethnic Groups with Ceasefire Arrangements

93

Policy Studies: List of Reviewers 2006–07

95

Policy Studies: Previous Publications

97

00 EWC PS38 Prelims

7

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

100

07 EWC PS38 Reviewers

100

9/6/07, 3:27 PM

List of Acronyms ATS BSPP CCDAC CCP CPB DEA KIO KKY KMT KOWI MTA NDF NGO NLD NMSP SLORC SPDC SSA SSA North SSA South SUA

00 EWC PS38 Prelims

amphetamine-type stimulants Burma Socialist Programme Party Central Committee for Drug Abuse Control Chinese Communist Party Communist Party of Burma Drug Enforcement Agency Kachin Independence Organization Ka Kwe Ye Kuomintang Kokang and Wa Initiative Mong Tai Army National Democratic Front nongovernmental organization National League for Democracy New Mon State Party State Law and Order Restoration Council State Peace and Development Council Shan State Army Shan State Army North Shan State Army South Shan United Army

9

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

x

Tom Kramer SURA UNDCP UNODC U.S. UWSA UWSP WADP WFP WNA WNC

00 EWC PS38 Prelims

Shan United Revolutionary Army United Nations Drug Control Programme United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime United States United Wa State Army United Wa State Party Wa Alternative Development Project World Food Programme Wa National Army Wa National Council

10

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

A Note on Terminology In 1989 the military government changed the official international name of the country from “Burma” to “Myanmar.” It also changed the international (English) names of some ethnic groups and geographical entities, including cities and rivers, to remove any legacy from the colonial past or because it felt the new names better reflected the Burmese pronunciation. “Karen” thus became “Kayin,” “Rangoon” became “Yangon,” and “Irrawaddy” became “Ayeyarwady.” Opposition groups have rejected these changes, and the new usage has become the subject of a heated political debate. Although the UN uses “Myanmar,” it is not commonly used elsewhere in English language material on the country. Therefore “Burma” will be used throughout this paper. For the same reasons I will use the pre-1989 names of ethnic groups, places, and rivers. This is not intended to make any kind of political statement. Furthermore, I will use “Burmese” to refer to inhabitants of the country and “Burmans” to refer to members of the largest ethnic group. Burma is administratively divided into seven “divisions” (taing in Burmese), which are predominantly inhabited by the majority Burman population, and seven ethnic minority “states” (pyi-neh in Burmese): Mon, Karen, Kayah, Shan, Kachin, Chin, and Rakhine. In English, “state” unfortunately also refers to the national entity based in the capital city that attempts to regulate and reorder populations and resources throughout an

00 EWC PS38 Prelims

11

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

xii

Tom Kramer internationally-recognized territory. In Burmese, there is no equivalent for the latter; one might use asoya (government) or naing-ngan (country), depending on the context. The main political aim of the United Wa State Party (UWSP) is to achieve the formation of a Wa State, or a Wa pyi-neh, falling directly under responsibility of the central government in Rangoon. However, the military government has been reluctant to give minority groups anything that could be explained as going in the direction of independence or federalism. Following truces with minority independence armies, it has given the territory under control of the ceasefire groups such as the UWSP a new (possibly temporary) status called atu deitha, or “Special Region.” These are grouped together within different ethnic minority states (the pyi-neh) and subsequently numbered. UWSP-controlled territories are thus referred to by the government as “Shan State Special Region No. 2,” indicating that the UWSP was the second group in Shan State to sign a ceasefire agreement with the government. UWSP leaders say in correspondence with the government they have always used the term Wa pyi-neh (Wa State), while the government always has used Wa atu deitha (Wa Special Region). According to the UWSP, government officials have told them they could only get a future status as an administrative region that would be less than a “state” (pyi-neh) but more than a “district” (khayaing in Burmese). Neither the pyi-neh nor the atu deitha are mono-ethnic, nor can they be seen as representing the whole ethnic group. The Wa Special Region contains other ethnic groups, including Lahu, Lisu, and Chinese, and Wa people also live outside UWSP areas. In Shan State, apart from the majority Shan population, who are mainly valley dwellers cultivating wet rice, a large number of smaller ethnic groups, including the Palaung, Lahu, and Akha, live in the surrounding mountains, where they practice upland rice cultivation. At the same time, a significant Shan population lives in Kachin State, and many Burmans live in the cities and larger towns of Shan and Kachin States. Furthermore, some of the “divisions” have a substantial nonBurman population, such as the Karen in Irrawaddy Division. The use of the term “ethnic minority” to describe the non-Burman population can also be problematic, and has been resented by some writers because “it gives the impression to outsiders that they are talking about only 1–2% of the population.” These non-Burmans therefore prefer the

00 EWC PS38 Prelims

12

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party term “ethnic nationality” (Yawnghwe 2002). Yet the use of this term also has raised objections for almost similar reasons. The government use of the term “national races” has been rejected by most others. Given this lack of consensus, I will use the term “ethnic minority,” which is most commonly used. Furthermore, where possible I have chosen to use the term “ethnic groups,” which also includes the Burman population. Throughout text I will use “United Wa State Party” (UWSP) when referring to the political entity itself as well as its attempts to function as a local government. Only when I specifically refer to the Wa army will I use “United Wa State Army” (UWSA).

00 EWC PS38 Prelims

13

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

xiii

100

07 EWC PS38 Reviewers

100

9/6/07, 3:27 PM

Executive Summary The Wa are among the most marginalized ethnic groups in Burma, living in an impoverished and isolated mountainous area in northeastern Shan State. However, since the formation of the United Wa State Party (UWSP) in 1989, the strategic position of the Wa region has changed dramatically. The UWSP is currently the largest ethnic minority army in the country, controlling significant territory in northeastern Shan State along the China border. These include most Wa-inhabited areas as well as territory inhabited by several other ethnic groups, including Lahu, Akha, Palaung, Shan, and Chinese. Since the mid-1990s the UWSP also has controlled a strategically located area along the Thai border. Until recently the Wa region constituted one of the primary opium producing areas in Burma. The UWSP has also been accused of flooding the Thai market with amphetamine-type stimulants (ATS). Although the United States and the international community see the UWSP primarily as a “narco-trafficking army,” the organization has an ethnic nationalist agenda whose main aim is to build a Wa State within Burma. The UWSP shares most of the basic grievances and aspirations of other ethnic minority organizations. Driven by poverty and war weariness, its first decision in 1989 was to enter into a ceasefire agreement with the military government. The UWSP has further prioritized the development of the Wa region and, as part of its commitment to the international

00 EWC PS38 Prelims

15

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

xvi

Tom Kramer community to make the region drug free, has imposed a ban on opium cultivation. Following the ban, the UWSP has not been able to provide sufficient alternative sources of income for the population. The ban is generally opposed by the population, which is dependent on opium as a cash crop, but it is strictly implemented. As part of its opium eradication strategy, the UWSP has ordered the relocation of thousands of Wa villagers from the north to the fertile valleys of the UWSP Southern Command along the Thai border. This has resulted in displacing part of the original Lahu, Akha, and Shan populations, aggravating existing ethnic tensions in the area. The UWSP is not innocent, and a number of individuals in the organization still have some involvement in narcotics trafficking. Few conflict parties can claim to have clean hands. In the complexities of decades of ethnic conflict and civil war, it has been convenient to put all the blame for the drug trade on “kings of opium” and “narco armies.” The lack of education opportunities and the isolation of the Wa region have greatly contributed to the weak capacity of the UWSP leadership. Beyond the basic demand of a Wa State, the UWSP has not developed a clear vision for the future of such a state and how it should interact with the rest of the country. Nor has the party developed a comprehensive strategy on how to achieve such a state. The UWSP is a very hierarchical organization with a top-down leadership style and little room for participation in decisionmaking for local communities. Relations with the military government remain tense, and there is no peace yet. The UWSP has put forward its main political demands at the State Peace and Development Council’s National Convention, which is to produce a new constitution. The UWSP is unlikely to agree to disarm until some of its basic demands have been met. The organization has not built strong political alliances with other opposition groups in the country. Instead it has preferred to focus on its own affairs and deal directly with the government. The position of the UWSP has strengthened partly at the expense of the weakening Shan movement. Following the ceasefire agreement, the government gave the UWSP permission to move troops down to the Thai border to join in the attack against Khun Sa’s Mong Tai Army (MTA). The agreement apparently stipulated that in return for an end to fighting, the United Wa State Army (UWSA) could hold on to all areas it managed to occupy. After the MTA’s surrender to the government in 1995, the UWSA

00 EWC PS38 Prelims

16

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party took advantage of the situation and quickly took over most of the MTA’s remaining territory. The UWSP has established good relations with other ceasefire groups, especially with other groups formerly fighting alongside the Communist Party of Burma (CPB), and the Shan State Army North (SSA North), a former CPB ally. In contrast, relations with the Shan State Army South (SSA South), which emerged after the surrender of Khun Sa’s MTA in southern Shan State, remain tense and sporadic fighting has broken out. The policy of the international community toward the UWSP largely has been determined by the perception of the organization as a “narcotrafficking army.” The United States has indicted eight UWSP leaders on drug trafficking charges, including UWSP chairman Bao You Chang and his brothers. Also among the eight are Wei Hsueh Kang and his brothers, ethnic Chinese who came to Burma through Kuomintang (KMT) connections and who were previously with Khun Sa’s MTA. In return for implementing the opium ban, the UWSP has called for political recognition and international assistance to offset the impact of the ban. So far, little support has been forthcoming. This poses questions about the sustainability of the ban. Thailand prefers to have the non-ceasefire SSA South along its border instead of the UWSP, which it not only accuses of exporting millions of amphetamines into Thailand but also sees as pro-China and a formerly communist force. The UWSP is still often referred to in the Thai press as the Red Wa (Wa Daeng). UWSP relations with China are better. Due to historical links from the CPB era, influence from China on the neighboring Wa region is great. China’s primary objective is to have stability along its border, and as long as the UWSP is a powerful organization with de facto control over territory along the border, China will continue to support it. Unlike Thailand, China would rather have the UWSP on its border than the SSA South, which it sees as Western backed and pro-United States. Powerful organizations, mostly run by ethnic Chinese in networks dating back to the KMT presence in northern Burma, play a central role in the drug trade. These elements profit from the continuation of the conflict and instability in the country and have no interest in efforts at reconciliation and state building. Demonizing and isolating the UWSP will make the organization more dependent on them, and will further obstruct reconciliation efforts in Burma.

00 EWC PS38 Prelims

17

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

xvii

100

07 EWC PS38 Reviewers

100

9/6/07, 3:27 PM

The United Wa State Party

The United Wa State Party: Narco-Army or Ethnic Nationalist Party? The Wa are among the most marginalized ethnic groups in Burma, living in an impoverished and isolated mountainous area in northeastern Shan State. The Wa region was in almost constant warfare in the first decades following Burma’s independence in 1948, but Wa soldiers rarely were fighting for a “Wa” cause. However, since the formation of the UWSP in 1989, after ethnic Wa troops mutinied against the Communist Party of Burma, the strategic position of the Wa region has changed dramatically. Although the UWSP is a relative new organization in Burma, its military wing, the United Wa State Army (UWSA), is currently the largest ethnic minority army in the country, with an estimated 20,000 soldiers. The UWSP also controls significant territory in northeastern Shan State along the UWSA is currently the China border. These include most Wa inhabited areas, as well as territory the largest ethnic minority inhabited by several other ethnic groups, army in the country including Lahu, Akha, Palaung, Shan, and Chinese. Since the mid-1990s the UWSP also has controlled a strategically located area along the Thai border.

01 EWC PS38 Text

1

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

1

2

Tom Kramer Furthermore, the Wa region, together with the Kokang region to the north, until recently constituted one of the primary opium producing areas in Burma. The UWSP also has been accused of flooding the Thai market with amphetamine-type stimulants, and has been labeled as the largest “narco-trafficking army” in Southeast Asia by the U.S. government and the international media. This monograph argues that although the United States and the international community see the UWSP primarily as a “narco-trafficking army,” the organization has an ethnic-nationalist agenda whose main aim is to build a Wa State within Burma. The UWSP shares most of the basic grievances and aspirations of other ethnic minority organizations. Driven by poverty and war weariness, its first decision was to enter into a ceasefire agreement with the military government. The UWSP has further prioritized the development of the Wa region and, as part of its commitment to the international community to make the region drug free, has imposed a ban on opium cultivation. Following the ban, the party has not been able to provide sufficient alternative sources of income for the population. The ban is generally opposed by the population, which is dependent on opium as a cash crop, but it is strictly implemented. As part of its opium eradication strategy, the UWSP has ordered the relocation of thousands of Wa villagers from the north to the fertile valleys of the UWSP Southern Command along the Thai border. Part of the original Lahu, Akha, and Shan populations have been displaced, which has aggravated existing ethnic tensions in the area. Although the UWSP is not innocent, and a number of individuals in the organization still have some involvement in narcotics trafficking, in reality few conflict parties can claim to have clean hands. In the complexities of decades of ethnic conflict and civil war, it has been convenient to put all the blame for the drug trade on “kings of opium” and “narco armies.” Instead, powerful organizations, mostly run by ethnic Chinese in networks dating back to the Kuomintang presence in northern Burma, play a central role in the drug trade. These elements profit from the continuation of conflict and instability in the country and have no interest in efforts at reconciliation and state building. Demonizing and isolating the UWSP will make the organization more dependent on them and will further obstruct reconciliation efforts in Burma. In trying to achieve its goals, the UWSP has several weaknesses. The lack of educational opportunities and the geographical isolation of the Wa

01 EWC PS38 Text

2

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party region have greatly contributed to the weak capacity of the UWSP leadership. Beyond the basic demand of a Wa State, the UWSP has not developed a clear vision for the future of such a state or how it should interact with the rest of the country. Nor has the organization developed a comprehensive strategy to achieve such a state. Furthermore, the UWSP is a very hierarchical organization, with a top-down leadership style and little room for participation in decisionmaking for local communities. Although the ceasefire agreement with the government still holds, relations remain tense, and there is no peace yet. The UWSP attends the State Peace and Development Council’s National Convention, the goal of which is to produce a new constitution, where the UWSP has put forward its main political demands. It is unlikely the UWSP will agree to disarm until some basic guarantees about its political demands have been met. Generally speaking, the UWSP has not built strong political alliances with other opposition groups in the country. Instead it has preferred to focus on its own affairs, and deal mainly with the government. The position of the UWSP has strengthened, but partly at the expense of the weakening Shan movement. Following the ceasefire agreement in 1989, the government gave the UWSA permission to move troops down to the Thai border to join in the attack against Khun Sa’s Mong Tai Army (MTA). The agreement apparently stipulated that in return the UWSA could control all areas it managed to occupy as part of this offensive. After the MTA’s surrender to the government in 1995, the UWSA took advantage of the situation and quickly took over most of the remaining territory of the former MTA. The UWSP has established better relations with other ceasefire groups, especially with other former CPB groups and the Shan State Army North (SSA North), a former CPB ally. In contrast, relations with the Shan State Army South (SSA South), which emerged after the surrender of Khun Sa’s MTA in the southern Shan State, remain tense, and the two armies have fought sporadically. Furthermore, the policy of the international community toward the UWSP has been largely determined by international perceptions of the organization as a “narco-trafficking army.” The United States has indicted eight UWSP leaders on drug trafficking charges, including UWSP chairman Bao You Chang and his brothers. Also among the eight are Wei Hsueh Kang and his brothers, ethnic Chinese who came to Burma through KMT connections, and who were previously with Khun Sa’s MTA. In

01 EWC PS38 Text

3

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

3

4

Tom Kramer return for implementing the opium ban, the UWSP has called for political recognition and international assistance to the UWSP has called for… offset the impact of the ban. So far, little support international assistance to offset has been forthcoming. This the impact of the [opium] ban poses questions about the sustainability of the ban. Thailand initially allowed Thai companies to freely trade and build infrastructure in UWSPcontrolled territory across the border. However, in the late 1990s curbing the drug trade became the national security priority, and Thailand closed the border following a number of clashes with UWSP patrols. Overnight, the UWSP became public enemy number one in Thailand, which prefers to have the non-ceasefire SSA South along its border instead of the UWSP. It not only accuses the UWSP of exporting millions of amphetamines into Thailand, but also sees the organization as a pro-China and former communist force. The UWSP is still often referred to in the Thai press as the Red Wa (Wa Daeng). UWSP relations with China are better due to historical links from the era of the CPB regime, which was supported by China. Influence from China on the neighboring Wa region is great, and there are close cultural and economic links with Wa communities across the border. China’s primary objective is to have stability along its border, and as long as the UWSP is a powerful organization with de facto control over territory along its border, it will continue to support the UWSP. China prefers to have UWSP on its border to SSA South, which it sees as Western backed and pro-United States. This monograph begins with a historical overview of the Wa region, from the period of Wa chiefs who were in constant battle with each other to the arrival of the CPB, which first put the Wa region under a form of central administration. It then discusses the origin of the UWSP and the rise of Wa nationalism. The second section, “Narco-Army or Ethnic Nationalist Party?” assesses the main political goals of the UWSP and how the organization has tried to accomplish them. The next section, “United Wa State Party Governance: A State within a State,” analyzes the role of the UWSP as a local government by looking at the way the organization has been set up and functions. It will show the strengths and weaknesses of the

01 EWC PS38 Text

4

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party UWSP as a state through a discussion of the governing structures of the UWSP and the approach to governance in their areas. The study then addresses UWSP relations with the military government. It explains why the UWSP and the government entered into a ceasefire agreement and the impact of the agreement. The next section, “International Implications,” examines areas of contention and consequences for the future. Following that, the monograph shows how the UWSP relates to other ethnic groups in the country as well as to the main opposition party, the National League for Democracy (NLD). The study concludes with an explanation of the implications for the international relations of the UWSP, including the roles of China, Thailand, the United States, the United Nations, and international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). Research on the Wa region is inhibited by limited access due to government restrictions and the inaccessibility of the area. There are few existing publications on the Wa region and the UWSP. Those reports that have come out rarely rely on primary sources, and are often sensationalistic accounts focused on the narcotics trade. This study is the result of more than ten years of field research on Burma, including several trips to the Wa region in 2003–04. Most of the information presented in this monograph is based on first-hand interviews with: (1) Wa farmers; (2) UWSP leaders at various levels; and (3) representatives of international NGOs and UN agencies working in the area, the government, and several opposition groups.

History of the Wa Region and the Origin of the United Wa State Party The Wa Region The Wa region is located in northeastern Shan State bordering the Salween River in the west, the Kokang region to the north, and China to the east. It consists of steep mountain ranges running north to south, with few valleys or flat areas. The majority of the population consists of subsistence farmers practicing upland rice cultivation; most of them cannot grow enough rice to feed their families and rely on opium production as a cash crop to buy food, clothes, and medicines. Compared to the rest of Shan State, the population density in the Wa region is relatively high. The Wa language is identified, along with Palaung, as part of the MonKhmer linguistic family. Various Wa subgroups speak different dialects.

01 EWC PS38 Text

5

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

5

6

Tom Kramer UWSP leaders put the total Wa population in Burma at some 600,000, of whom 320,000 live in the Wa region of northeastern Shan State. More than 300,000 Wa live in China, in two autonomous Wa counties in Yunnan Province (Fiskesjö 2000: 53). According to the UWSP, sixteen different ethnic groups live in the areas under its control, including Wa (72 percent), Lahu (13 percent), Shan (7 percent), Han Chinese (4 percent), Akha (2 percent), and Lisu and others (2 percent) (Milsom 2005: 65). Although most of the population in the northern Wa region is Wa, the majority of the population in Mong Pawk District in the southern part of the Wa region is Lahu (57 percent), followed by Akha (14 percent), Shan (9 percent), Lisu (9 percent), Wa (7 percent), and Chinese (2 percent) (UNIDCP n.d.). Wa leaders say the original population in the UWSP-controlled Southern Command along the Thai border consisted of 160,000 villagers, mainly Lahu and Akha. Since the arrival of some 80,000 Wa villagers from the northern Wa region from 1999 to 2002, they put the total number there at over 200,000 people.1 The Period of Warring Wa Chieftains Like other ethnic minority groups in the country, the Wa claim that until the arrival of the British, their region was relatively independent, with little interference from the kingdoms based in the plains and valleys of present day central Burma. According to British colonial records: “The Burmese never exercised even nominal suzerainty over our present un-administered Wa, but knew of them because their dominions extended beyond the Wa, who remained, an unpenetrated enclave of savage hills, far inside the Burmese frontier” (Harvey 1933: 1–2). Wa communities were ruled by independent Wa chiefs and were in constant conflict with each other. According to one Western scholar: “The communities of the central Wa lands were fiercely independent, including of each other. The only situation in which they would join hands was in the face of outside threats. . . . More often than not each community was locked into long-standing feuds with neighboring villages, and maintained but fleeting alliances with the enemies of its own enemies” (Fiskesjö 2000: 328–29). The growing Chinese presence in what is now Yunnan Province really started during the Ming and Qing dynasties and brought them into contact

01 EWC PS38 Text

6

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party with the original population living on the edge of the Chinese empire, including the Wa. Chinese sources differentiate between “Raw” (sheng) and “Cooked” (shu) Wa, the former referring to independent Wa-ruled areas in the center of the Wa region and the latter to Wa under either Shan or Chinese rule in the periphery (Ibid.: 93). The first British expedition into the Wa region was that of Superintendent of Northern Shan States Hugh Haly in 1891, who described the Wa as “naked, dark-skinned, dirty, poor and savage” (Harvey 1933: 6). Following the Chinese example, the British made a distinction between the “Tame” Wa, who were under Shan (or later British) rule, and the unadministered “Wild” Wa (Fiskesjö 2000: 97). The Wild Wa areas were ruled by independent groups of villagers, or so-called Wa circles, which were tied to each other by family relations (Ibid.: 232–33). Headhunting was reported to be common in the Wild Wa area, and British colonial officers reported seeing several “fresh heads” placed on posts at a village entrance. Headhunting took place mostly in the central Wa-inhabited areas, especially around Nawnghkio Lake, which according to the British was the home of the “Wildest” Wa (Harvey 1933: 6, 14, 31). The lake is located in present-day UWSP-administered Long Tan Special Township. According to Wa legend, it is from here that the Wa race originates.2 Wa headhunting was part of their sacrificial culture and was triggered by the continuous feuds between the villages (Fiskesjö 2000: 329). The first British mission to venture deep into the Wild Wa country was the 1893 expedition of James George Scott. The group found a region plagued by internal warfare, often over boundary disputes. The villages were built on hilltops and heavily fortified to protect them against constant attacks. Much of this fighting, British colonial records show, was related to poverty caused by overpopulation and shortage of arable land. The population pressure in the Wa region was much higher than in the Britishcontrolled Shan States and also contributed to deforestation, as whole hillsides had been cleared for cultivation and trees were only visible on hilltops and around villages (Harvey 1933: 14, 92). The British were not very interested in the Wa region itself but were mainly concerned about its relations with China, especially in demarcating the border with British Burma. “The really Wild Wa . . . should be left

01 EWC PS38 Text

7

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

7

8

Tom Kramer alone till the frontier is demarcated, as they do no harm (headhunting only in their own territory) and would not repay administration The British…were mainly (having nothing to export save opium and buffalo horns, and concerned about [Wa] relations nothing to import but salt)” with China (Harvey 1933: 32). The British expeditions into the Wa region sought to explore which groups made up the eastern frontiers of Northern Shan State and which of them owed any allegiance to China. British missions reported that “the Wa were notoriously subject to nobody” and they could not “discover the slightest trace of Chinese suzerainty, however indirect, in the Wa country.” The British had additional interest in exploring the potential for extracting mineral wealth the region might have contained. “For, though the Wa are hardly worth having, there may be mineral wealth (an economic geologist should accompany our next expedition), and in any case we cannot permit China to absorb them, not that she particularly wants to” (Ibid.: 9). After the British defeated the Burmese Konbaung Dynasty in 1885, they removed the traditional political power structures and exiled the royal family to India. Central Burma—“Burma Proper” or “Ministerial Burma,” as the British now called it—was put under direct rule of British officials. In contrast, the surrounding hills and mountains, which were inhabited by a wide range of ethnic minorities, now called “Frontier Areas” or “Excluded Areas,” were indirectly governed through traditional rulers. The Wa-inhabited areas, although officially part of British Burma, were largely left ungoverned because “the costs of introducing administration of this nature would be enormous and unremunerative, and problems would arise entailing armed interference on a large scale” (Government of Burma to Government of India 1913, quoted in Renard 1996: 34). In 1922 the British established the Federated Shan States, which was “not intended to enhance the powers or the status of the chieftans (saohpas), but to bring the areas under British control” (Taylor 1988: 30). These Federated Shan States included the peripheral Tame Wa areas, but the central Wild Wa region remained independent. In 1932 a British administrator stated that “these Wa States are entirely un-administrated

01 EWC PS38 Text

8

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party and no British subject is permitted to enter” (Fiskesjö 2000: 199). British attempts to gain more control over the area and to demarcate the border with China, an effort also inspired by a renewed interest in mining in the Wa hills, were cut short by the outbreak of World War II (Ibid.: 138–39, 156–58). During the negotiations for independence from the British, Burman nationalists advocated independence as soon as possible. For ethnic minority leaders, the key issues were self-determination and autonomy to safeguard their position in a future Union of Burma. In the 1947 Frontier Areas Committee of Enquiry, whose aim was to assess how “to achieve the early unification of the Frontier Areas and Ministerial Burma with free consent of the inhabitants of those areas” (Frontier Areas Committee of Enquiry 1947: 1), four representatives from the Wa states were heard, mainly from Wa-inhabited areas in the periphery. Although they voiced few objections to joining a future Union of Burma, there was less enthusiasm among some Wa representatives to be part of the Federated Shan States. Hkun Sai, representative from the chieftain of Mongkong, who was unaware of the objectives of the Fontier Areas Committee of Enquiry, stated that “as for the future, we would like to remain as in the past, that is to be independent of other people.” When asked whether they wanted to join with the Shans or any sort of association with other people, he replied: “We do not want to join with anybody because in the past we have been very independent.” Thakin Nu, a member of the committee who later became prime minister, asked: “Don’t you want education, clothing, good food, good houses, hospitals, etc.?” Hkun Sai replied: “We are very wild people and we do not appreciate these things . . . . We live entirely by ourselves.” Sao Maha, a Wa representative from Mongmon, who was also unaware of the purpose of the hearing, was asked for his vision of the future position of the Wa states: “We have not thought about that because we are wild people. We never thought of the administrative future. We only think about ourselves” (Ibid.: 35–39). Following the report of the committee, in 1947 the Panglong Agreement was signed between Burmese politicians and ethnic minority representatives from some of the hill areas. The new constitution based on the agreement was inconsistent about the rights of different ethnic minority groups, not all of which were represented at the Panglong meeting. Although several delegates from Shan State attended, no Wa representative was included

01 EWC PS38 Text

9

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

9

10

Tom Kramer (Milsom 2005: 90). The Federated Shan States were now transformed into one new administrative entity, the Shan State, which also included all Wa-inhabited areas The new constitution [of on what the British claimed as 1947]…was inconsistent about Burmese territory. Shan State was granted the right of the rights of…minority groups secession from the union after ten years. Independence and Civil War Following independence in 1948 the Wa hills continued to be plagued with warfare, now mainly because of outside forces entering the region and trying to rally local Wa leaders to join their causes. The first to enter were remnants of the Kuomintang, the Chinese nationalist army led by Chiang Kai-shek. Defeated by Mao Zedong’s communist forces in 1949, the KMT withdrew to northern Burma, from where it launched a number of CIAsupported invasions into China’s Yunnan Province. When these failed, the KMT changed its strategy and occupied areas in Shan State. After facing a joint Chinese-Burmese military offensive, the KMT was forced to withdraw from its bases near the Chinese border and settled in the Thai-Burma border region. From there it set up a successful trading network to the opium fields in northern Shan State. Although the KMT as an armed force disappeared in the mid-1980s, the local and international trade routes and networks established during that time still exist, and many of the players in the drug trade originate from or had close links with the KMT. The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) also entered the Wa region and tried to find local allies to fight the KMT. A further complication was the unsettled border demarcation between the Burmese Wa region and China. With the start of the Shan rebellion in the early 1960s, the Wa region was also drawn into the insurgency politics of Shan State. In 1963 in response to the rebellion in Shan State, General Ne Win, who had come to power in a coup the previous year, introduced the Ka Kwe Ye (KKY) program. This initiative allowed for the creation of local militias to fight the insurgents, including the Shan State Army (SSA). In return, the KKYs were allowed to rule their areas relatively undisturbed. Instead of “counterinsurgency,” most of these militias became heavily

01 EWC PS38 Text

10

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party involved in the opium trade, and in effect the general lawlessness and chaos in Shan State only further increased. The most well known of these KKY were led by Lo Hsing-han in the Kokang region and by Khun Sa at Loi Maw in northern Shan State. Maha San, son of a traditional Wa ruler, led a KKY in the Wa region. After Ne Win abandoned the KKY scheme in 1973, Lo Hsing-han’s Kokang KKY and the smaller Wa KKY led by Maha San went underground and teamed up with their former enemies, the SSA. Together with Khun Sa’s KKY, which had gone underground earlier to become the Shan United Army (SUA), they later emerged at the Thai border with what they claimed was the bulk of the annual opium harvest, which they offered for sale at farm-gate value to the international community—to be destroyed—in return for international assistance. The United States refused the offer, and Lo Hsing-han—branded “King of Opium” in the Thai media—was later arrested near the border by Thai authorities and extradited to Rangoon. He was released a few years later and became an important go-between in talks between the government and break-away groups from the Communist Party of Burma in 1989. Following Lo Hsing-han’s arrest, Khun Sa became the new “King of Opium.” By the mid-1980s, Khun Sa’s SUA had emerged as one of the strongest armies in southern Shan State by forging, and sometimes forcing, alliances with other Shan armed groups and KMT forces. Later renamed Mong Tai Army, it controlled significant territory between the Thai border and the Salween River. The Communist Party of Burma The Wa-inhabited areas on the Chinese side of the border were first pacified by the Chinese government in the 1950s and 1960s. In Burma, the CPB was the first to impose some form of central administration in the Wa region, which until that time had little or no government presence. Its main strategic importance lay in its proximity to China and the presence of KMT remnants. At the time of the Wa mutiny in 1989, the CPB was the largest military opponent of the military government and controlled significant territory in Shan State along the Chinese border. The CPB was the first organization to launch an armed struggle against the central government in Rangoon, two months after independence in 1948. Initially the CPB’s campaign was quite successful, and it was able to overrun several towns in the Irrawaddy Delta and the Sittaung River valley.

01 EWC PS38 Text

11

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

11

12

Tom Kramer In 1949 the Karen National Union also took up arms. Other ethnic minority groups followed suit, including Mon, Karenni, and Pao. With the insurgency spreading throughout the country, the central government in Rangoon barely survived the first years of independence. In 1962 General Ne Win took power from the U Nu government in a military coup and created a one-party state led by the Burma Socialist Program Party (BSPP). Although the purpose of the coup according to Ne Win was to prevent the disintegration of the Union, it led to further political polarization in the country and added fuel to the existing armed [The Ne Win coup of 1962] resistance to the government. Soon after the military takeover, student added fuel to the existing protests broke out in Rangoon armed resistance calling for a restoration of democracy. The army was called in and the movement was bloodily suppressed. A number of political activists fled from the cities to jungles, and many of them joined the CPB—at that time the only Burman organization that was in armed opposition against the central government. Ethnic rebellion also flared up after the Ne Win coup. Prior to the coup, civil war had already spread to Kachin and Shan States, where the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) and the Shan State Army had started armed uprisings. Both groups were able to expand quickly, fuelled by the growing dissatisfaction among the Kachin and Shan populations over the unequal position of ethnic minorities in the Union of Burma. Furthermore, the economic policies of the BSPP proved to be disastrous. The local production of consumer goods collapsed, and official imports were restricted in accordance with the isolationistic policies of the “Burmese Way to Socialism.” As a result, these products were only available through black market channels. Consumer goods were brought illegally into the country, mostly from Thailand, by large numbers of individual traders. Armed groups such as the Karen National Union set up tollgates along the Thai border, where they taxed the trade, earning huge profits. But perhaps the most significant impact of the military takeover on insurgency politics was the deteriorating relations with China. These came to an absolute nadir after anti-Chinese riots of 1967, which China suspected were instigated, or at least stimulated, by the BSPP. The CPB had from the

01 EWC PS38 Text

12

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party

13

beginning looked to China for political guidance and military support. Already in the early 1950s, a group of CPB cadres embarked on what was to become a long march to China. When they finally arrived, they were given political training but not military support, as the Chinese government maintained good relations with the U Nu government, which was following a neutralist foreign policy during these early years of the Cold War. However, after the 1967 riots, China changed its initial careful policy toward the CPB into all-out support. On January 1, 1968, thousands of CPB troops, most of them ethnic minorities newly recruited in the border region, launched a successful invasion into northeastern Shan State from neighboring China. The CPB established a new base area, which became known as the Northeastern Command. “China gave us everything, from the cap down to the shoe,” says a former CPB member. “They also gave us Chinese made ammunition and weapons.”3 The CPB military campaign in northeastern Shan State coincided with the Cultural Revolution in China, and large numbers of Chinese Red Guard large numbers of Chinese volunteers joined the CPB invasion. Among them was Li Ziru, a volunteer Red Guard volunteers joined from Baoshan in Yunnan Province who the CPB invasion later joined the Wa mutineers and became a Central Committee member of the UWSP. The political leadership of the CPB’s Northeastern Command mainly consisted of the so-called “Sechzuan Group”; ethnic Burman CPB members who had traveled in the early 1950s to China, where they received political training. After the collapse of the CPB’s base area in the Pegu Yoma Mountains in central Burma, this group took over party leadership. In contrast to the political leadership, the army leadership of the CPB’s Northeastern Command was formed by the “Guizhou Group,” consisting of some 200–300 Kachin soldiers led by Naw Seng, who led a short-lived Kachin rebellion in northern Shan State before retiring into China in 1950. These two groups had different backgrounds and political opinions.4 The ranks of the party were further swelled by members from the Pegu Yomas and political activists and CPB supporters from the cities. Among the latter group was Brigadier-General Kyaw Zaw, one of the famous Thirty Comrades, a group of Burman nationalists who had gone to Japan

01 EWC PS38 Text

13

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

14

Tom Kramer for military training in 1941 to start an armed uprising for independence against the British.5 The CPB made alliances with a number of local ethnic Kokang, Wa, and Shan leaders and was able to overrun Burma Army outposts to take control of vast areas along the China border. Several Wa leaders decided to join the CPB, including Chao Ngi Lai and Bao You Chang. They were recruited and trained by the Chinese in 1968. Both became CPB Central Committee members at the Party Congress in 1985 and later were the main leaders of the Wa mutiny against the CBP. Maha San, son of the traditional Wa ruler in the town of Vingngun, was also approached by the communists. “In 1966 the Chinese sent a delegation asking us whether we would join the communist side. If we would not, they said, we will have to fight you. Later the CPB also came to negotiate.”6 The Vingngun Wa group decided to resist the CPB, and Maha San and his group joined the government’s KKY program. Fighting with the CPB lasted from 1969 until 1973. When the CPB controlled most of the Wa region, Maha San retreated to the Thai border, where he formed the Wa National Army (WNA) in 1976, and made an alliance with the KMT (Smith 1991: 351). The WNA also became a member of the National Democratic Front (NDF), the first successful alliance of armed ethnic opposition groups. While China gave the CPB its full backing, Thailand had given tacit support to various armed groups from Burma. Until the 1980s almost the whole Thai-Burma border area was under control of a wide range of proWestern and anticommunist insurgent armies, including Mon, Karen, Karenni, and Shan NDF forces, Khun Sa’s SUA, and the KMT. Karen National Union President Bo Mya once compared his organization to a kind of “Foreign Legion” for Thailand, guarding its borders and protecting it against communism during the height of the Cold War, effectively preventing links between the CPB and the Communist Party of Thailand (Ibid.: 297). With full support from China, the CPB soon became the most powerful military opponent of the Burmese army. The CPB also tried to make alliances with other ethnic minority insurgents, offering Chinese arms and ammunition in return for its political leadership. This policy caused a number of heated debates and splits among almost all insurgent groups in Shan State. The NDF and CPB alliances rivaled each other in strength, but

01 EWC PS38 Text

14

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party attempts to form a united front between the CPB and the anticommunist and pro-Western NDF alliance failed. China’s decision to give all out support to the CPB was not motivated by ideological considerations alone. KMT remnants were still active in northern Shan State, among other reasons to gather intelligence for the CIA and Taiwan (McCoy 1991: 355). The CPB invasion put an end to the KMT presence along the Chinese border. This was a major blow to the KMT, which fell back to bases along the Thai border, where they mainly engaged in the opium trade. After initial military successes, The CPB invasion put an end the most significant battle between the CPB and the to the KMT presence along Burmese army took place in the Chinese border 1971 at the bridge at Kunlong in northeastern Shan State. Victory would have enabled the CPB to cross the Salween River and try to connect to the party’s base areas in central Burma, which had come under strong military pressure. After several weeks of heavy fighting claiming huge casualties on both sides, the CPB failed to conquer the strategic bridge and the offensive was halted, despite the fact that the CPB’s campaign was supported by Chinese aid and hundreds of Chinese volunteers.7 The CPB had always been looking to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for political guidance. The ideology of the Cultural Revolution in China was brought to the CPB by returning cadres from China. The purge and executions of “revisionist” party members that followed in 1967–68 did much damage to popular support for the CPB in the cities, where news of the bloodshed was followed closely. These events also coincided with Chinese Red Guard activities in Rangoon and the subsequent anti-Chinese riots. Meanwhile, the situation for the CPB in base areas in central Burma was deteriorating. The Burmese army, led by General Ne Win, designed a new counterinsurgency strategy known as the “Four Cuts” (Pya Lay Pya) (Smith 1991: 258–59). This policy was aimed at cutting four links between the insurgents and the civilian population (of food, finance, recruits, and intelligence). These military campaigns directly targeted the civilian population and have resulted in the forced relocation of hundreds of

01 EWC PS38 Text

15

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

15

16

Tom Kramer thousands of people. The campaigns to this day have been accompanied by gross human rights abuses, including extra-judicial and summary executions, torture, rape, and the confiscation of land and property (see, e.g., Amnesty International 2002). By the mid-1970s the Burmese army had managed to push the CPB out of its base areas in central Burma. In the midst of all the confusion within the party, the Burmese army managed to capture the CPB’s jungle headquarter in the Pegu Yomas. One month later CPB chairman Thakin Than Tun, who had managed to escape, was shot dead by his bodyguard, who subsequently surrendered to the Burmese army. The CPB forces in central Burma never recovered from this blow, and the party’s headquarters shifted to the newly formed Northeastern Command, where Thakin Ba Thein Tin became the new chairman. The CPB did, for the first time, create some kind of political stability within the Wa region and put an end to the conflict between Wa communities. However, the region remained a war zone, as fighting was now directed against the central government. The CPB also had longstanding armed conflict with some National Democratic Front members, including an eight-year-long war with the KIO in northern Shan State. Reliable data are not available, but the fighting led to huge loss of life among the ethnic minority soldiers in the CPB’s People’s Army, which was practicing humanwave style attacks on fixed enemy positions. Although almost all political posts in the party leadership were filled by ethnic Burmans, Wa troops were recruited en masse for the CPB’s People’s Army and formed the bulk of the fighting force. The CPB set up a centrally led civil administration in the Wa hills, but little was done to develop the region. The organization made modest attempts to bring basic health and education services to the area, but for the CPB the Wa region itself was never a priority and was always a stepping stone to reach the central plains. The Wa Revolt and the Fall of the Communist Party of Burma The turning point for the CPB, party veterans now say, was the decision of China to decrease support to its sister party.8 In the power struggle in the Chinese Communist Party, the CPB supported Hua Go Fong and criticized Deng Xiao Ping. When Deng came to power in 1980–81, the Chinese told the CPB they would reduce aid gradually and the Burmese party would have to stand on its own feet after five years.9 However, the CPB had

01 EWC PS38 Text

16

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party become completely dependent on Chinese aid and was unable to become self-reliant. The CPB still had stockpiles of weapons and ammunition, but was the CPB had become especially in need of food supplies. At about the same time, the Chinese completely dependent government started to ask Chinese on Chinese aid volunteers, who had joined the CPB in 1968, to return to China, which many of them did.10 In early 1981 the Chinese started to offer pensions and retirement in China to the CPB leadership (Lintner 1990: 45). In the mid-1980s formal relations between Ne Win’s government and China also improved. Ethnic tensions within the CPB were also growing. Wa leaders, who were mainly on the battlefield, felt that the old Burman leadership in the headquarters was unrealistic and stubborn. From their perspective, the Wa were being used as cannon fodder for a conflict between ethnic Burmans, which had brought only misery and destruction to the Wa people and the Wa region. “The main reason for our mutiny was that the leaders of the CPB refused to change. Everywhere in the world the communists changed, but the CPB leadership had a very conservative theory. After we fought and stayed with them for over twenty years, we lost a lot of people.”11 Some CPB cadres from central Burma had noticed this problem several years before the mutiny. They heard soldiers talking among themselves, saying the leaders were “useless.” “The leaders had no contact and no influence in the army. The soldiers were mainly from ethnic minorities. But they could not control the national races problem, because they were narrow-minded and because of their big-Burma thinking, their chauvinism.”12 The Kachin group led by Naw Seng, who were mainly in the military arm of the party, also did not get along well with the Burman political leaders. Dissatisfaction with the leadership was also present among Burman middle-ranking CPB cadres. The old leaders were seen as inflexible, unrealistic, dependent on China, and without their own philosophy or strategy. “They were very distant from the people and they could not hear their voice. After 1988 nothing changed, we could not organize the people.” Some Burman CPB members therefore joined what they described as “the revolt against the CPB leaders” in 1989. They say that they already discussed

01 EWC PS38 Text

17

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

17

18

Tom Kramer deposing the CPB leadership in 1983–84. “The Chinese felt the same. The leaders were old and inflexible. The idea was to change the leaders.”13 Another cause for the fall of the CPB was its military failures. Until 1975 the Northeastern Command was on the offensive and was dictating the war. The Burmese army launched its first large counteroffensive against the CPB in 1979. It managed to conquer some areas, including a strategic hill south of Panghsang. From then on the Burmese army was on the offensive, on several fronts at the same time, which posed a big problem for the CPB. Attempts to regain the initiative failed, and the CPB was never able to march down to the plains and river valleys of central Burma. It was only able to cross the Salween River after teaming up with the SSA (currently the ceasefire SSA North) and the Pao-based Shan State Nationalities Liberation Organization. However, the CPB leadership was opposed by NDF members such as the Pao National Organization and the Shan United Revolutionary Army-KMT group, and as a result unable to move further. Furthermore, most of the CPB’s People’s Army consisted of highlanders who had little interest in going to Lower Burma.14 The CPB’s tougher policy on the opium trade adopted at the Third Congress in 1985 also greatly contributed to the mutinies. Following the decreasing support from China, in 1982 the CPB allowed its local leaders to tax opium, and a number of CPB leaders became heavily involved. They taxed opium farmers, but especially the traders, and some went down to the Thai border to sell opium—ironically, to KMT remnants. They then went to China to buy ammunition, and especially food. These groups resented the tougher policy adopted in 1985. Former CPB members allege that by this time several CPB brigades had started to act on their own. “Our army more and more became a drugs army. It was a big problem for the CPB, they could not control it.”15 The first to revolt against the CPB were Kokang units led by Pheung Kya-shin, who on March 12, 1989, took control of the Kokang region. Wa troops refused to put down the Kokang revolt. Instead, about a month later on April 16, Wa troops took control of the local CPB headquarters in Mong Mao in the northern Wa region. The next day they also took over the CPB headquarters in Panghsang, arrested the CPB leadership, who were released in the following days and forced across the border to China.16 The Wa leaders burned all the papers, documents, and photos of the CPB, “because they hated the Burmese leaders.”17 A few days after the revolt, the

01 EWC PS38 Text

18

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party Wa group broadcast a strong critique of the CPB leadership from the old party’s radio station in Panghsang: Conditions were good before 1979. But what has the situation come to now? No progress whatsoever is being made. Why? In our opinion, it is because some leaders are clinging to power and are obstinately pursuing an erroneous line. They are divorced from reality, practicing individualism and sectarianism, failing to study and analyze local and foreign conditions, and ignoring actual material conditions. . . . They have cheated the people of the Wa region, and through lies and propaganda have dragged us into their sham revolution.18

The Wa leaders were wary of China’s reaction to the revolt. “We did not inform the Chinese. If we had told them they would have stopped our revolution. When we did it they were very angry, and stopped all aid to us.”19 The Wa group initially kept in contact with the CPB leaders through intermediaries. They feared that people like CPB Chairman Ba Thein Tin were important leaders with many international friends. According to one source, the Wa mutineers assured Ba Thein Tin that they were not against communism or the CCP, but were fighting against the mistakes of some of the leaders.20 The Wa revolt effectively put an end to the CPB. As Wa soldiers had made up the bulk of the fighting force, the CPB’s People’s Army virtually ceased to exist. The Wa group controlled the The Wa revolt effectively CPB’s headquarters in Panghsang, put an end to the CPB including its warehouses with weapons and ammunition. Furthermore, it had forced almost all of the Burman leadership into exile in China. Soon after the Wa mutiny, other CPB base areas in northern Burma also revolted. The Formation of the United Wa State Party Factionalism in the CPB had existed since 1968, and it was one of the reasons for its downfall.21 By the end of 1989 four new groups had emerged. The Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (initially called the Kokang Democratic Party) was formed in the Kokang region. In

01 EWC PS38 Text

19

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

19

20

Tom Kramer the Wa region the United Wa State Party (until November 1989 known as the Myanmar Nationalities Solidarity Party)22 was formed. Further east in Shan State, the National Democratic Alliance Army was set up in the area north of Kengtung along the border with China and Laos. The last group to split from the CPB was the New Democratic Army–Kachin in eastern Kachin State along the Chinese border. The Wa group that revolted against the CPB in 1989 was led by two ethnic Wa leaders, Chao Ngi Lai and Bao You Chang, who had both joined the CPB in 1968 as local militia leaders. Bao You Chang and his brothers had been organized by the Chinese to fight the KMT before they joined the CPB.23 They came to play a key role in the UWSP. Other leaders included Li Ziru, an ethnic Chinese from Baoshan in Yunnan Province who had joined the CPB in 1968 as a Red Guard Volunteer and had worked closely with Bao You Chang. Zau Mai, a Kachin who was part of Naw Seng’s group and who had been commander of the CPB’s Northeastern Command People’s Army, also joined the Wa group. Other UWSP leaders include Bao Lai Kham, an ethnic Wa from Loimaw. At the time of the mutinies, none of these leaders had been a member of the CPB politburo, which consisted solely of CPB veterans from old base areas in central Burma and members of the group that had traveled to China in the early 1950s. Among the mutineers, only Zau Mai had been a full Central Committee member. Chao Ngi Lai, Bao You Chang, and Li Ziru had been appointed as alternate Central Committee members at the CPB’s 1985 Congress (Lintner 1990: 71–73). Initially some Burman CPB middle ranking cadres who had entered the party in the 1970s joined the revolt. They had spent years together in the field with the Wa leaders and shared many of the frustrations about the CPB leadership. However, most of them left after the Wa leaders signed the ceasefire agreement with the military government in 1989. The significance of the CPB mutinies was not lost on other political actors. The CPB’s People’s Army was the largest insurgent army in the country, consisting of some 15,000–20,000 mainly Wa but also Kokang, Shan, and Lahu troops. Both the military government and the NDF sent representatives to the Wa group in Panghsang. The first to meet the Wa leaders was Lo Hsing-han, the Kokang KKY leader who had been released from jail in 1980. He met them at least three times, and suggested to the Wa that they make a ceasefire with the military government. He told the

01 EWC PS38 Text

20

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party

21

Wa leaders that if they agreed to make peace, the government would give them assistance to develop their region. Lo Hsing-han came together with Khun Htun Lu, a Wa headman who was on good terms with the government.24 The Wa, like the Kokang group, had plenty of arms and ammunition, but were in short supply of food after the Chinese had cut off aid following the mutiny. The NDF also sent a delegation to hold talks with the Wa group and try to persuade the Wa…did not want it to join the alliance. According to an exCPB member present at the meeting, the Wa to fight anymore told the delegation they could send a representative to their area, but the Wa would not join the NDF because they did not want to fight anymore. Their priority, the Wa leaders said, was peace.25 The CPB leaders also sent a message to the Wa asking them to join the NDF and continue to fight.26 Maha San, the leader of the Wa National Army, was part of a second NDF delegation that arrived in Panghsang later in 1989. He was invited for a meeting with the Wa leaders, but was accused of being a spy for Khun Sa and of trying to break the peace with Rangoon. He was arrested by UWSP authorities, but with the help of some friends later escaped to China in December 1989.27 The Wa made a peace agreement with the government on May 18, 1989, on the bridge of Hopang.28 The agreement provided for an end to the fighting, for the Wa group to administer the territory under its control, and for government assistance in health, education, and other facilities.29 The decision to make a truce with the military government may also have been in consideration of China, which would not have welcomed a Wa alliance with the pro-Western NDF. The Southern Command Since the start of the civil war in Shan State, almost all armed groups have tried to establish strategic bases along the Thai border, which gives access to goods from Thailand, opportunities to levy taxes on goods passing the border (including drugs), and possibilities to link up with alliance forces or possible outside supporters. The Thai border area has therefore seen continuous violent conflict between various actors, and there have been many surprising and shifting alliances.

01 EWC PS38 Text

21

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

22

Tom Kramer Wa forces first arrived at the Thai border in 1973 after they had been pushed out of the Wa region by the CPB. The WNA was based in Mae Aw, on an important trade route opposite Thailand’s Mae Hong Son Province. Another Wa group, the Wa National Council (WNC) led by Ai Xiao-Sue, Maha San’s brother-in-law, was based near the strategic mountain Doi Angkang opposite Thailand’s Chiangmai Province. Both the WNA and WNC were relatively small, but fought long battles with Khun Sa’s army with support from different KMT factions and NDF members. After the NDF-CPB military agreement of 1986, some Wa CPB troops came down to the Thai border in 1987 to join the WNC. The WNC in return sent some troops to CPB areas in the north and was able to recruit some soldiers (Smith 1991: 352). Neither the WNC nor the WNA played a significant role in the Wa mutiny against the CPB. But what followed had tremendous consequences for insurgency politics in Shan State and the Thai-Burma border dynamics. After the mutiny, the Wa group in Panghsang made a strategic alliance with the WNC, thereby gaining access to the Thai border area. The WNC was already closely involved with the three Wei brothers, Wei Hsueh Long, Wei Hsueh Kang, and Wei Hsueh Ying, who had been part of the KMT intelligence network. After the CPB invasion in northeastern Shan State, the Wei brothers joined Khun Sa’s SUA, where Wei Hsueh Kang was in charge of finance. After Wei Hsueh Kang came into conflict with Khun Sa’s aides in 1985, he joined the WNC. Wei Hsueh Kang came to play an important role in the UWSP, while the nominal WNC leader Ai Xiao-Sue disappeared to the background. Following the UWSP merge with the WNC, the military government allowed the UWSA to send troops down to the Thai border to join the attack against Khun Sa’s MTA. In return the UWSA could take control over any territory it managed to conquer. The position of the MTA was further weakened by an unusual offensive of the Burmese army, a stricter Thai border policy, and subsequent mutinies by some MTA troops. In January 1996, Khun Sa took everybody by surprise when he invited the Burmese army to his headquarters in Homong near the Thai border and surrendered his army. As the MTA fell apart into different groups, UWSA units used the opportunity to conquer much of the former MTA’s strategic territory along the Thai border. Some MTA units simply became a government sanctioned

01 EWC PS38 Text

22

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party militia, such as the Maha Ja (Maha San’s brother) group based at the exMTA headquarters in Homong. The main group to emerge from the MTA was a Shan nationalist army led by Colonel Yawd Serk, currently known as the Shan State Army South (SSA South). The SSA South is now fighting a guerrilla war in central Shan State, in the area between Taunggyi and Kengtung. It also has bases along the Thai border that are surrounded by UWSA and Burmese army positions. The UWSA’s 171st Brigade in the Southern Command has operated with some independence from the headquarters in Panghsang. The nominal commander is Wei Hsueh Kang, but presently the unit is led, at least in name, by his younger brother, Wei Hsueh Ying. It is believed Wei Hsueh Kang still exercises control over the unit from the background.

Narco-Army or Ethnic Nationalist Party? The Narcotics Question Opium Production in Burma Burma is, after Afghanistan, the world’s second largest producer of opium. However, opium cultivation in Burma has steadily declined in the last decade. According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime opium cultivation in Burma (UNODC), opium production fell from 1,676 metric tons in 1997 to 315 has steadily declined tons in 2006. The area under poppy in the last decade cultivation in 2006 was estimated at some 21,500 hectares, a decrease of 26 percent compared to 2005. Nevertheless, UNODC estimated that opium production in Burma rose slightly from 312 metric tons in 2005 to 315 metric tons in 2006 due to higher yields (UNODC 2006). Until 2003, about 90 percent of the opium poppy in Burma was grown in Shan State, with the Wa and Kokang Special Regions alone accounting for about 40–50 percent. However, while opium production has stopped in Wa areas, it has recently gone up in southern Shan State, west of the Salween River. According to UNODC the area now represents 72 percent of total cultivation in Burma (UNODC 2006: 61). Figures

01 EWC PS38 Text

23

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

23

24

Tom Kramer from the U.S. Department of State (2006) are slightly different, but nevertheless confirm that “annual production of opium has declined over the past ten years and is now at less than 20 percent of mid-1990 peak levels.” At the same time, opium production in Afghanistan has reached a new record of an estimated 6,100 metric tons, or 92 percent of world production.30 The decline in opium production in Burma can be attributed partly to policy interventions, especially to opium bans implemented in the Mong La region in 1997, in the Kokang region in 2003, and in the Wa region in 2005. Government eradication efforts and anti-drug campaigns by other armed groups in Kachin and Shan States have also contributed to it. Another factor, which has received less attention, is the trend in the global market. Heroin of Burmese origin has been almost completely pushed off the American and European markets by heroin from Colombia and Afghanistan, respectively. Virtually all Burmese opium and derived heroin is nowadays consumed in Southeast Asia, China, India, Australia, and Japan (Jelsma, Kramer, and Vervest 2003). Amphetamine-Type Stimulants While opium production in Burma has declined in the last decade, the production of amphetamine-type stimulants (ATS) has risen sharply. Although reliable figures are not available, estimates of the production of amphetaminethe annual production of methamphetamine tablets in type stimulants has risen sharply Burma’s border areas with China and Thailand are put at several hundred million (Phongpaichit 2003). Most of the opium, heroin, and ATS produced in Burma is exported from Shan State to China, Thailand, and Laos. Precursor chemicals, such as acetic anhydride (heroin) and ephedrine (methamphetamine) are not produced in Burma. These are all illegally imported from Thailand, China and, more recently, India. ATS production is among the fastest growing illicit markets worldwide. Huge profits are earned in the process, corrupting many local authorities, police, and customs and military officers in the region. Synthetic drugs can be produced anywhere. Until 1996, large-scale manufacturing sites existed in central Thailand, and the move to Burma seems to be partly in response to enhanced Thai law enforcement. In the late 1980s, Wei

01 EWC PS38 Text

24

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party Hsueh Kang was among the first to produce methamphetamines, or yaba (crazy medicine) as it is called in Thailand, after being approached by ethnic Chinese and Thai businessmen. Khun Sa’s MTA involvement in yaba production dates back to 1995, one year before he surrendered. After the surrender of the MTA, the group disintegrated and some yaba producers moved to the Wa region, some to the Kokang area, and others remained on their own. The War Economy Until the end of the 1980s, most insurgent groups along the Thai border depended on taxing consumer goods passing through tollgates they set up. The Karen National Union, which was earning huge amounts of money from this trade, had an anti-narcotics policy that officially prohibited the use and trade in narcotics. Shan and Kachin State insurgent groups could not afford this policy. Most of the population in their areas, upon whom they depended for intelligence, food, taxes, and recruits, depend on opium as a cash crop. A strong anti-opium policy would also bring them into conflict with potential allies against the government. Most armed groups in Shan State relied on income from the opium trade, either by taxing farmers (mostly in kind), providing armed escorts to opium caravans, providing sanctuary to heroin laboratories, or setting up tollgates at important trade routes to Thailand. Over the years, some of the armed groups became more committed to the opium trade than to their original political objectives. For armed groups with a strong political agenda, the situation in Shan State was thus always more complicated, as the narcotics trade and insurgency politics became increasingly intertwined. It remains difficult for any armed group based in Shan State to survive without some kind of involvement in the drug trade. The KMT was the first group to organize the drug trade in the border regions of Burma, Thailand, and Laos. Following the failure of the KMT to regain a foothold in China, it became an occupation force in Shan State, with its main income coming from the drug trade. As KMT General Tuan Shi-wen stated back in 1967: “Necessity knows no law. That is why we deal with opium. We have to continue to fight the evil of communism, and to fight you must have an army, and an army must have guns, and to buy guns you must have money. In these mountains the only money is opium” (Tuan Shi-wen quoted in McCoy 1991: 352).

01 EWC PS38 Text

25

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

25

26

Tom Kramer After the KMT was pushed out of northeastern Shan State by a joint Chinese-Burmese military operation in 1961, it set up bases in Thailand near the Burmese border. From there it organized caravan convoys to northern Shan State, bringing consumer goods from Thailand on their way up and raw opium on their way down.31 Some KMT forces later took part in military campaigns against the Communist Party of Thailand in return for Thai citizenship. The KMT forces in Thailand were officially disbanded in the mid-1980s. By that time the KMT’s central position in the drug trade inside Burma had been replaced by Khun Sa’s SUA, which had established a strong position along the Thai border. However, Chinese networks established by the KMT still dominate the regional drug trade. Furthermore, the SUA included several people with former KMT connections. Other KMT remnants who refused to disband teamed up with the Shan United Revolutionary Army (SURA) based at Piengluang and with Maha San’s WNA at Mae Aw. For the SURA and the WNA, the KMT brought in much needed financial resources, while the KMT profited from the military bases of the SURA and WNA to protect its narcotics trade. The SURA later merged with Khun Sa’s SUA to become the MTA. By the early 1990s, the MTA had grown into a 10,000-strong army and had taken control of most of the Thai-Burma border region. Kings of Opium and Narco-Armies? As noted, Lo Hsing-han and Khun Sa in the past have been labeled Kings of Opium. At present the UWSP has been branded as a “narco-trafficking army” and has been singled out as the main cause of Burma’s drug problem. The Wa have acknowledged their involvement in the drug trade: “Frankly speaking, we admit that up to 1998 we had some heroin refineries and amphetamine factories in our Wa region, and we levied tax on them. But after that we banned all heroin and ATS refineries in our area. Now we feel unfairly treated by the international media that we are still involved. We have a large border area, and other groups can also make it and bring it to neighboring countries.”32 The arrest of a UWSA Brigade Commander and forty-nine of his soldiers by the Burmese authorities in September 2005 while carrying 500 kilograms of heroin are a reminder that some UWSP leaders are still involved (U.S. Department of State 2006). However, it is not these conflict actors who control the drug trade. As Shan academic and former SSA member Chao Tzang Yawnghwe argued some twenty years ago:

01 EWC PS38 Text

26

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

27

The United Wa State Party In fact, the opium business in Shan State, and the international trade in heroin, are essentially non-political. That is, those in this business and making money are a class of apolitical people whose sole interest in life is trade and profit. The majority are Chinese whose relatives, partners, friends, organizations, finance, loyalties, interests and obligations straddle national frontiers. . . . Even the “narcotics kingpin” Lo Hsing-han who commanded the Kokang KKY (1965–73), did not own all the opium that was traded, or the refineries or have access to international markets, much less control over heroin beyond the Shan border (Yawnghwe 1987: 54–55).

The drug trade is controlled by powerful organizations, mostly run by Chinese syndicates in networks dating back to the KMT presence in northern Burma. According to The drug trade is…mostly Colonel Hkam Awng of Central by Chinese syndicates Committee for Drug Abuse Control of the military government: In the Thai media the UWSP are accused of being the main drug producing group. But along the Thai border there are lots of other groups. Some of them [have reached peace agreements with the government], some are still fighting. Others are not even armed groups, just Chinese [organizations]…. The majority of the ATS producers are ethnic Chinese, and most syndicates are Chinese. Many of them are involved in drug producing and trafficking. They have good connections and financing from abroad. It is difficult for us to penetrate their circles. They sent their representatives to Myanmar to do their business, and they are very strong.33

These elements, which have played a role not only in the UWSP but also in various other organizations, notably the MTA, profit from the continuation of conflict and instability in the country and have no interest in efforts at reconciliation and state building. Demonizing and isolating the UWSP will make the organization more dependent on them and will further obstruct reconciliation efforts in Burma. Furthermore, corruption is widespread in Burma, and the sums of money changing hands in the drug trade are huge. A 2003 report of the U.S. Department of State found no evidence of direct involvement of senior Burmese officials in the drug trade, but notes that lower-ranking

01 EWC PS38 Text

27

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

run

28

Tom Kramer Burmese officials, especially corrupt army personnel in peripheral areas, have been prosecuted for drug abuse or narcotics-related corruption. The report also argues that there is reason to believe that some senior military leaders protect or are otherwise involved with narcotics traffickers. It is also clear that the drug trade and corruption are not limited to Burma. According to UNODC: “Since ATS is not destined for the domestic market and precursor chemicals need to be imported, it implies a high level of crossborder complicity within Myanmar and Thailand, and to an extend, also China, Laos, and India” (United Nations Office of Drug Control and Crime Prevention [UNODCCP] 2001: 11). In April 2005 WNA leader Maha San was arrested by the Thai police on drug-trafficking charges. The Thai police issued an arrest warrant for his half-brother Maha Ja, a militia leader based at Khun Sa’s former headquarters in Homong. Maha Ja is accused of drug trafficking and is linked to the network of Wei Hsueh Kang. Earlier, an aide to SSA South leader Yawd Serk was arrested in Thailand, allegedly in possession of over 160 bars of heroin. Maha San and the SSA South have denied involvement in trafficking. Both are believed to be cooperating with Thai anti-narcotics agencies. With Maha San in a Thai jail and the UWSP leadership indicted by the United States, the blame for the drug trade in Burma has been put heavily on the Wa. Similarly, in the “war on drugs” launched by the government of former Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra in early 2003, most of those arrested or killed were small users or dealers who were at the bottom of the sales pyramid. Few of the big players were touched (Phongpaichit 2003). Although a number of individuals in the UWSP still have some involvement in the narcotics trade, in reality few conflict parties can claim to have clean hands. In the complexities of decades of ethnic conflict and civil war, it has been convenient for the international community, especially the governments of Thailand and the U.S., to indict and try to arrest “opium kings” and “narco-armies” instead of seriously investigating the drug trade, which has links to individuals in high offices in the region (Smith 1991: 315). The Political Agenda of the United Wa State Party Formation of a Wa State The main political aim of the UWSP is to achieve the formation of a Wa State directly under control of the central government in Rangoon and not

01 EWC PS38 Text

28

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party administered through Shan State. The UWSP shares most of the basic grievances and aspirations of other ethnic minority organizations in Burma. Driven by poverty and war weariness, its first decision upon formation in 1989 was to enter into a ceasefire agreement with the military government. Although the agreement is informal and verbal only, it has put an end to decades of open armed conflict in the Wa region. The UWSP has prioritized the development of the Wa region and, as part of its commitment to the international community to make the region drug free, has imposed a ban on opium cultivation. UWSP leaders feel that the Wa have been politically, economically, and socially marginalized. “We are the minority of the minority,” says a Wa leader. “We are among the least developed people in the world.”34 As far as UWSP leaders are concerned, the Wa are now doing better then ever before. The Wa region is at peace and under control of a strong organization led by local leaders who are following an ethnic nationalist policy. Since the ceasefire agreement of 1989, the UWSP has officially accepted that the area under its control is part of Burma. Additionally, it has stated that the UWSP will not seek independence. According to UWSP Chairman Bao You Chang: “Wa State is an indivisible part of the Union of Myanmar. As a minority autonomous region, we only ask the government to grant us more power in selfadministration” (Bao 2002). At the time of the mutinies, the the UWSP has officially accepted CPB still had an underground that the area under its control is network in parts of the country outside of its territory. For the part of Burma UWSP this has never been an issue; its political interests are limited to areas under its control. “Mainly our demands will be concerned for the Wa region, to have certain autonomy.”35 According to a UWSP representative who attended the National Convention: “Only the other groups that attended the National Convention had demands for the country as a whole, but not the Wa. We do not have any demands or conditions to attend the National Convention. We were invited, we will attend, go into the room, and listen to other people. At that time we will decide what to ask.”36

01 EWC PS38 Text

29

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

29

30

Tom Kramer The UWSP has put these demands forward to the ruling State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) and also attends the National Convention with five representatives. The UWSP says it has pushed hard for the formation of a Wa State within Burma, but government officials have told them they would only be able to attain a status that is something less than a state and something more than a district. UWSP leaders say they are not satisfied by this.37 According to UWSP Central Committee member Xiao Min Liang: “We will not claim independence from this country. Starting from 1989 our objective is to achieve a Wa State. [Former prime minister] General Khin Nyunt told us we could get a status for our region which is lower than the level of a state but a little bit higher than district level. In the British time, they already gave us state level; we are not claiming a new thing.”38 Furthermore, the Wa expect this new Wa State to have some autonomy to enable them to administer their region on their own.39 The UWSP also wants this Wa State to include all territory it currently controls, including the Southern Command area along the Thai border. It is unlikely that the government will agree to this. It has ordered the UWSP on several occasions to move its troops back to the northern Wa region, which the UWSP has so far refused to accept (Pathan 2005: 105). Recent reports indicate that the military government may also be reluctant to include in a new Wa administrative unit the UWSP-controlled district Mong Pawk, an area in the northern Wa region mainly inhabited by non-Wa minorities. However, while the UWSP has promoted Wa nationalism by referring to itself as an ethnic Wa organization and by calling for the formation of a Wa State in Burma, the organization is not mono-ethnic. The UWSP leadership has included members of other ethnic groups in the region, The UWSP leadership has including Lahu, Kachin, Akha, and Chinese. The extent of the UWSP’s included members of demand for the formation of a Wa other ethnic groups State seems more based on current territorial control than on ethnicity. The UWSP has not asked for other Wa-inhabited areas not under its control to be included in a future Wa State. Furthermore, the UWSP wants areas with a significant non-Wa population to be part of a future Wa State, including Mong Pawk District

01 EWC PS38 Text

30

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party in the northern part of the Wa region and the Southern Command along the Thai border. The UWSP has not developed a clear political vision for the future, and has not put forward a more detailed proposal for what a Wa State should look like; how exactly it should interact with the central government and other states and divisions, including Shan State; and what its legislative and executive powers should be. This relates to weak capacity of the leadership of UWSP, which is a general problem among all political organizations in the country. The UWSP also has not clarified the rights of non-Wa minorities in a future Wa state. The UWSP has had to be careful not to upset the significant Lahu population in its area. The relocation of ethnic Wa to the UWSP Southern Command displaced part of the original Lahu, Akha, and Shan populations and has aggravated ethnic tensions in the area. The UWSP also has come into conflict in southern Shan State not only with the SSA South but also with some Lahu militias. Development of the Wa Region Ethnic minority communities have born the brunt of the violence and destruction of decades of civil war. At the same time, the central government has been keen to extract the abundant natural resources from the ethnic minority states. However, ethnic minority community leaders claim, the central government has not made any effort to use its funds to develop these areas. Infrastructure, transportation and communication facilities, and health and education services are hardly developed, and all compare unfavorably to the predominantly Burman areas of the country. At the time of the collapse of the CPB, the Wa region was one of the least developed areas among the ethnic minority regions. “Before 1989 road access was very difficult, and there were very few cars in the whole Wa region. We had no electricity or communication with the outside world. We were a very closed society, we did not know what happened in the outside world, and the outside world did not know what happened here.”40 The focus of these UWSP development efforts, especially in the first years after the ceasefire, has been heavily on large infrastructure projects. The UWSP prioritized road construction; in early 2004 it reported that 1,800 km of roads in the northern Wa region had been constructed and another 600 km in the Southern Command. The UWSP has also built

01 EWC PS38 Text

31

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

31

32

Tom Kramer seven power stations and started urban development projects (Bao 2004). Some of these projects have been supported by UNODC. The development approach of the UWSP is top-down and lacks community participation. “The Wa are very much influenced by China, they want to make big projects. It is very difficult to make them understand community development.”41 The UWSP hopes that the Southern Command will produce enough rice, vegetables, and fruit to offset the food shortage in the northern Wa region following the 2005 opium ban. Wei Hsueh Kang’s 171st Brigade, based at the town of Mong Yawn, has set up large plantations in the area, growing oranges, corn, beans, coffee, and other crops. There has been some support from China, including agricultural training as well as provision of seeds.42 Health and Education The health and education system in Burma has all but collapsed, and government spending is very limited. Access to clean water and proper sanitation is low, and Burma has one of the highest rates in Asia of infant mortality, maternal mortality, and malnutrition among children. Most people in Burma still die of preventable or curable illnesses, including malaria, tuberculosis, pneumonia, and diarrhea. Burma is in the midst of an HIV/AIDS epidemic, which is another major cause of death. Ethnic minority areas are worst off. Decades of civil war and isolation have left the Wa region with some of the poorest health and social indicators in Southeast Asia. “In the past the Wa people relied on the forest for plants and herbs, it is their hospital,” says Wa leader Ya Khoo. “Up until now old people have never taken Western medicine or received an injection. This has greatly affected the health situation in our region. . . . Most of the people die when they are still very young.”43 Reliable health statistics for the Wa region are not available. According to one report, “In outlying areas, few health statistics have been recorded, but infant mortality is anecdotally reported to be so high that the population has not increased for many years, despite a high birth rate. In fact, the available figures suggest that many causes of illness could be prevented or treated.”44 According to UWSP figures, the main fatal diseases in the region are malaria (45–50 percent), diarrhea (30–35 percent), typhoid (6 percent), tuberculosis (4–5 percent), hepatitis (3–4 percent), and malnutrition (2–3

01 EWC PS38 Text

32

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party percent).45 Lack of access to safe drinking water and sanitation facilities further exacerbate the situation. Access to health and education is also hampered by poverty. In one Wa village, sick people without funds were reported to “simply wait at home for death or recovery.”46 Only a few villages have a school, and there are high illiteracy rates of up to 90 percent. Public health outreach and services in the Wa region are very limited. The UWSP health care system initially existed in name only. It was managed by the UWSA Supply Bureau, with only four health facilities with eleven staff mainly treating wounded soldiers. However, since 2002 a Wa civilian physician with a degree from Yangon University is in charge of a newly formed Health Department and has received some support from international NGOs. The UWSP reported in early 2004 that 20 public hospitals and 106 clinics were operating (Bao 2004). It is unclear how many of them are actually functioning well, as there is a lack of trained staff, medicines, and funds to sustain them. Since the end of the 1990s UNODC, followed in 2003 by a number of international NGOs, has started health projects related to malaria, HIV/ AIDS, and mother and child care. For many villagers this is their first experience with primary health care, and they often are treated by private Chinese health practitioners. The UWSP also has built a number of schools, but not enough to provide basic education to all children in the region. According to UWSP figures, by the year 2000 five middle schools and 240 primary schools had been established.47 The schools have both a Chinese and Burmese curriculum. Some classes teach Wa and Lahu languages, including adult literacy classes. Not all new school buildings have teachers, and schools often have to be maintained by the villagers themselves. UNODC has helped with construction of schools and supported teachers and teacher training. Education beyond middle school is nonexistent in the Wa region, and Education beyond middle very few ethnic Wa have gone on for further studies. This is clearly a school is nonexistent frustration among the Wa leaders and in the Wa region is a direct cause of the weak leadership capacity. Some UWSP leaders

01 EWC PS38 Text

33

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

33

34

Tom Kramer therefore rely on outsiders for advice. After decades of isolation, UWSP leaders say they have little knowledge about events outside of their region. The UWSP top-down and hierarchical leadership style and its vision for social and economic development are based on the models they know: the CPB and China. Although as part of the ceasefire agreement the government promised support to develop the Wa region, so far little has come forth. The government has built some schools, but most of them remain empty. As Wa leader Xiao Min Liang commented: “We also have some assistance from the Myanmar government, but the Myanmar government itself is poor, so they cannot give a lot of support.”48 The UWSP in the northern Wa region has created “a state within a state,” and the presence of the Burmese government in this region is minimal. State-building activities by the UWSP in the health and education sector have taken place mainly in the northern Wa region, and to a lesser extent in the Southern Command. Anti-Narcotics Policy The UWSP decided in November 1989 to eliminate poppy cultivation within 15–20 years. According to Xiao Min Liang: “Only after we had a peace agreement with the government could we start the development and reconstruction of our region. The peace agreement was the first decision of the Wa authority; opium elimination was the second decision.”49 The opium ban officially went into effect on June 24, 2005, at a low-key ceremony in Panghsang. On behalf of UWSP Chairman Bao You Chang, his brother Bao You Yi declared the Wa region opium free and announced a new UWSP drug control law: It has been more than 120 years since poppy cultivation became the main source of income for the local population. . . . After the establishment of Wa authority in 1989, the people decided to cooperate with the international community in order to eradicate drugs. . . . How are the farmers going to survive after the poppy ban? This is a big question that every level of local authorities encounters.50

UNODC estimated in December 2005 that “350,000 households, or about two million people in the Shan State alone, will lose their primary income as a result of bans on cultivation opium.”51 An assessment of the

01 EWC PS38 Text

34

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party Kokang region one year after the opium ban found that some 60,000 people out of the original population of 200,000 people had left the area. Among them were many Chinese traders and Chinese who ran private clinics and pharmacies. Furthermore, 30 percent of the schools had closed down, forcing some 6,000 children to quit school and reducing the enrollment by half. As a result of the opium ban, over half the population in Kokang only had food security for six months. In some cases people resorted to eating tree bark.52 The impact of the opium ban on rural livelihoods is likely to be grave. Most farmers can only grow enough rice to feed their families for six to The impact of the opium eight months. The rest of the food, as well as medicines, clothing, and access on rural livelihoods is to education, are bought with the likely to be grave opium they grow. The ban will cause serious food security problems and will further limit access to healthcare and education, especially for children. According to one NGO report: Apart from affecting family economy as their income decreases by 600 percent (including decreases in spending on food, health care, education and so on), the ban will result in a migration of merchants and doctors, denuding the region of manufactured goods and medical care. Soon the population will start to sell off their productive assets and land at reduced prices (there will be few left to pay market rates). From here, the region will enter a downward spiral of poverty, malnutrition, and disease.53

The first reports coming out of the Wa region are worrying. Opium reduction has resulted in a serious lack of cash, lack of food, and increased debts for many households. Farmers in Naung Khit Township for example, consistently report that families are now unable to purchase not only rice, but also basic household necessities such as cooking oil, salt and clothing. In the Naung Khit town market, about half of the shops have recently closed because of lack of customers, which is a clear indication of a lack of cash that is evident throughout the northern Wa region (UNODC 2006: 25).

01 EWC PS38 Text

35

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

35

ban

36

Tom Kramer The impact of the opium ban differs from one area to another. The more isolated areas in the mountains suffer more than others. However, UNODC reported that 90 percent of all villages in the Wa region experienced food insecurity in 2005. (UNODC 2006: 26). According to World Food Programme (WFP), malnutrition rates among children in the Kokang and Wa regions are among the highest in the country (WFP 2005). Sustaining the Opium Ban The main reason for implementing opium bans is to accommodate drugcontrol pressure from the international community, especially from China, Thailand, and the United States. UWSP leaders hope that in return for their anti-drug policy they will receive political recognition, humanitarian aid, and international support to develop their region. There are serious questions about the sustainability of the ban. Examples in other parts of the world have shown that quick fixes for such complicated problems do not exist. The main problem is the wrong sequencing: instead of first ensuring alternative livelihoods are in place and gradually reducing opium production, projects in effect give humanitarian assistance to victims of repressive drug policies. The present levels of assistance will by no means be sufficient to cover basic needs of local communities and offset the impact of the opium ban. In fact the majority of communities already were struggling to find enough income for their families while still growing opium. By 2004, one year before the opium ban, no more than 10 percent of the population of the Northern Wa region had food and economic security without being dependent on opium.54 Current levels of assistance are still insufficient. According to UNODC, development assistance to the Wa region since 1999 is less than US$20 million, or less than US$3 per person per year (UNODC 2006: 33). Earlier attempts by the CPB in the Wa region to ban opium cultivation in the 1970s and 1980s all failed miserably. A needs assessment of the problems in the Wa and Kokang regions that took place in the end of 2003 warned: “The significant gains that Myanmar has made in reducing poppy growing (over 50 percent reduction in area over the past five years) might be compromised if alternative development assistance and access to food is not ensured for these populations” (WFP/JICA 2003). It also remains to be seen what will happen if the international aid and political recognition that the UWSP is expecting in return for its antinarcotics policy does not materialize. The population in the Wa region

01 EWC PS38 Text

36

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party opposes the ban, and has been resentful of the Wa leadership. Furthermore, while opium production in the Wa region has stopped, cultivation levels have gone up in southern Shan State.

United Wa State Party Governance: A State within a State Organizational Structure UWSP has set up its own governance structure in the Wa region and has created a state within a state. The UWSP organizational structure still mirrors that of the CPB (and the CCP). The Politburo is the most important decisionmaking body of the UWSP and consisted of five members when the organization was founded in 1989: Chao Ngi Lai (paralyzed after a stroke since 1994), Bao You Chang, Li Ziru (passed away in January 2005), Xiao Min Liang, and Bao Lai Kham.55 Chao Ngi Lai and Li Ziru have been replaced by Zhao Wen Guang (chief of the Agriculture, Forestry, and Irrigation Bureau) and Bao You Yi (brother of Bao You Chang). The Central Committee is the second most important body and, until the deaths of Li Ziru and Zau Mai, consisted of nineteen members. Apart from all Politburo members, the Central Committee includes the heads of all UWSP bureaus. Under the Central Committee are seven bureaus: Finance; Agriculture, Forestry, and Irrigation; Infrastructure; External Relations; Political Affairs; Health; and Central Law Enforcement. Administratively, the Wa region is divided into three districts: Mong Mao, Wein Kao, and Mong Pawk. The civil administration of the UWSP is divided from district level down to township, village tract, and village level. There are twenty-four townships, including four special townships: Nam Tit, Long Tan, Mong Phen, and Panghsang. These special townships are considered strategic areas and are under direct control of the headquarters. Mong Mao is the largest district in the Wa region, with ten townships. Wein Kao and Mong Pawk both have five townships. An additional six townships are in the Southern Command along the Thai border. Leadership Style As noted, the UWSP is a hierarchical, top-down organization, and its leadership style is, like most organizations in Burma, highly personalized. When first UWSP chairman Chao Ngi Lai was paralyzed in 1994, Bao You Chang took over as de facto leader. But it took ten years, at the fifteenth

01 EWC PS38 Text

37

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

37

38

Tom Kramer

the

01 EWC PS38 Text

anniversary of the Wa ceasefire agreement on April 17, 2004, for Bao You Chang officially to succeed Chao Ngi Lai as chairman (Milsom 2005: 90). Bao You Chang heads the Politburo as well as the Central UWSP…leadership style Committee and is in charge of the military, and therefore seems to be is…highly personalized in firm control of the UWSP. Bao You Chang and his three brothers (Bao You Yi, Bao You Liang, and Bao You Hua) have played an important role in the organization. Bao You Yi is currently in control of Mong Mao District. Bao You Hua, the youngest brother, led the Mong Phen Security Brigade. Following pressure from China, which accused him of involvement in drug trafficking, he was relieved of his duties and the Security Brigade was moved to Mong Mao. Chairman Bao You Chang is now in ill health and has hardly been seen in public since last year. This has left a power vacuum in the organization, and it is not clear who exactly is in control. Daily affairs are run by Xiao Min Liang, Zhao Wen Guang, and Bao You Yi. Some sources say Wei Hsueh Kang is managing the financial affairs of the UWSP in the background and further allege he is back on the UWSP Central Committee. He is reported to be building a big house near Panghsang, and his troops from the 171st UWSA Brigade now also have a presence in the northern Wa region, where they are constructing a road from Naung Khit to Mong Mao, giving rise to speculation about Wei Hsueh Kang’s whereabouts.56 Relations between Mong Mao District (led by Bao You Yi) and Panghsang have recently deteriorated, and its district leaders have operated with some independence from headquarters. International agencies have had some difficulty operating in Mong Mao District, while their activities in other UWSP areas continue as before. “They do not listen to anyone, it is a special region within a special region,” noted one observer.57 Nam Tit Special Township, located at the northern tip of the Wa region bordering Kokang, is also said to act relatively independently from the UWSP headquarters. The dominant position of the Bao brothers in the UWSP, and the influential role of the Wei brothers in the organization, has caused resentment among other UWSP leaders. Fragmentation of the UWSP could result.

38

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party Governing Capacity The capacity of most bureaus is weak, and few of the staff are able to read and write Chinese, the language most commonly used within the top UWSP administration (Gebert 1999: 4). The top-down decisionmaking process prevents bureaus from making any important decision; most initiatives come from Panghsang. “The UWSP civilian administration is weak and decisionmaking depends on strong leadership of a handful of senior, powerful military leaders combined with delicate ‘wheeling and dealing’ between all different factions” (UNODC 2002: 10). Opposition to the leadership is not appreciated and has in some cases led to dismissal and imprisonment. Most UWSP leaders were military commanders in the CPB People’s Army. Few have any experience in civil administration, and the UWSP, like most ceasefire groups, is mainly ruled by military people in a military style. Local UWSP administrative Local UWSP administrative units have little power, and often just wait for orders from Panghsang. Few units have little power dare to take their own initiative. “Over and over again I asked Wa officials as to their roles and responsibilities, the answer was always the same: follow orders, report on accomplishment of orders, and collect taxes” (Gebert 1999: 6). Furthermore, most leaders from district level downward work on a part-time basis, and responsibilities are unclear and not well defined. Salaries of administrative staff and army soldiers are low or nonexistent, and many cultivate their own land to supplement their income. Every civil administration and military unit of the UWSP is expected to raise its own financial resources. This reduces the effectiveness of the administration. “If the Wa civilian authorities would get a salary,” says Wei Ai Jung, UWSP chairman of Nam Kham Oo Township, “I would not need to do other things to feed my family, and I could spend all my time with the people.”58 This system stimulates corruption and informal taxation. The weak capacity of the leadership is related to the lack of educational opportunities in the Wa region. Although the situation has improved since the ceasefire, access to education and education standards remain low. One international observer estimates that half of the UWSP Central Committee members are illiterate.59 The isolation of the region and decades of conflict

01 EWC PS38 Text

39

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

39

40

Tom Kramer have further prevented the Wa leadership from learning about developments in the rest of the world. UWSP leaders therefore often feel dependent on the advice and management skills of outsiders, especially from China. The population has little opportunity to organize outside of the UWSP structure. Generally speaking, people are too afraid to challenge or resist UWSP policies. There is little communication and consultation with the communities the UWSP aims to represent, and these communities are not allowed to take part in decisionmaking processes. Farmers have not been able to organize themselves to represent their common interests. After decades of conflict and military rule, many of these problems are nationwide and affect all conflict actors. Although the UWSP is very hierarchical and does not allow dissent, it is not a monolithic organization, and the headquarters in Panghsang has had trouble exercising full control over some army units. Theoretically the UWSP leads the UWSA, but in practice army units are more powerful and have some level of independence from the political district leaders in their area. Elimination of Opium Stressing the seriousness of the 2005 opium ban deadline, Wa leader Bao You Chang vowed: “I’m ready to chop off my head if we don’t make it.” The UWSP Narcotic Drug Control Law bans opium poppy cultivation and the processing and trading of drugs, including heroin and ATS. The law stipulates forced detoxification of addicts; only for addicts above 65years-old is treatment voluntarily (but local authorities will have to encourage them to seek treatment). Addicts who relapse are to be punished with reeducation, prison terms of three to five years, or even life imprisonment. The law aims to make “the whole Wa State” an addict free society within ten years, starting from June 2005 (Central Committee of the United Wa State Party 2005). Local Wa leaders seemed to be at a loss to replace the income for expoppy farmers and are waiting for directions from Panghsang and assistance from the international community. The determination of the UWSP leadership to make their region free of opium cultivation by 2005 is clearly linked to their expectations of international support. “The Wa people are only at the bottom of the drug trade, and we are exploited by the drug businessmen. People think that the poppy farmers are very rich, but actually

01 EWC PS38 Text

40

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party it takes a lot of labor, and they get very low daily wages. They work for their basic survival. . . . We have the expectation that the international community will help us to get rid of this exploitation.”60 The ban was strictly implemented, and in a number of cases attempted cultivation was suppressed and the perpetrators incarcerated and heavily fined.61 According to Central Committee member Xiao Min Liang: “Only convincing and educating farmers is not enough. We have to take strong action against those who continue to grow opium. Frankly speaking, if you say to the farmers, “Raise your hands if you agree with the poppy ban,” none of them will. But for the benefit of our whole community, and of the international community, we have to do it.”62 Those who resist face a fine of 500 Yuan per every mu of poppy field (6 mu = 1 acre) and can be sentenced to six months in prison (Ibid.). According to Township Chairman Wei Ai Jung: “The instruction is coming from the central authority, and we pass on the message to the villagers. Some individuals stood up and were against it. But I said if you continue after 2005 I cannot protect you anymore. Whether the villagers are happy or not, they have to follow the order. It is the same like the buffalo with the rope in its nose, it has to follow.”63 The ban is generally opposed by the population and has already caused resentment against the Wa leadership. “The first two years after we came to Son Khie Village, we could still grow opium, but after that the Wa authorities told us to stop it. We do not know why, but when the Wa authorities send the order, we have to listen, otherwise we will be punished. Now we cannot grow opium, so we have a food problem. If we do not get any assistance, how can we survive?”64 Resettlement Program With the agreement of the military government, the UWSP has ordered the relocation of tens of thousands of Wa villagers from their mountainous homelands in the northern Wa region to the fertile valleys of southern Shan State under control of the UWSP Southern Command. UWSP leaders say the objective is to move poppy growers and impoverished villages to areas where they can grow other crops.65 It also strengthens the UWSP’s control over this strategic border area. The exact number of Wa farmers relocated to the Thai border region between 1999 and 2002 is unknown. Estimates by Wa leaders vary from 50,000 to 100,000 people.

01 EWC PS38 Text

41

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

41

42

Tom Kramer The UWSP also has resettled Wa villagers from the mountains into lower lying areas within the northern Wa Region. Many of them have been told to move near the road, according to the UWSP, so that the organization can better reach them with services. The resettlement is not voluntary and has caused resentment among the Wa population. According to a township leader in the northern Wa region: “We force people from the highlands to move to the lowlands here. We try to convince them, but they have to go. Frankly speaking they do not want to go, and some of them may have bad feelings against us. . . . There are four thousand people left in the highlands here, and we are going to move all of them.”66 A large number of Wa have been resettled in the Mong Kar Valley in Mong Pawk District. Most mountain people had always avoided this place because of high incidences of malaria. In response to requests by the Wa authorities, UNODC created a large irrigation scheme in Mong Kar to respond to the problems faced by the settlers. For example, Song Khie Village in Mong Pawk District was established in 1999. The population of Song Khie originates from a village tract in the northern Wa region with about four hundred households. The Wa authorities informed the population three years in advance that half of them had to move, and six months before the move pointed out which households had to go. “We had no choice in who had to go, and some people were crying. About seventy households came here, and the rest moved to the Thai border area.”67 Like many other relocated Wa villages, Song Khie Village had a high mortality rate in the period following the relocation. Within the first three years after the relocation, 108 people out of an original population of 370 died of malaria and other diseases. One report estimates that some 4,000 Lahu, Akha, and Shan inhabitants of Southern Shan State have fled to Thailand as a result of the Wa relocation, and another 4,500 are estimated to have moved to other areas in Shan State (Lahu National Development Organization 2002: 3). This is likely to have political implications for the future. According to WNA leader Maha San: “First of all, for the Wa people, those that were genuinely looking for better agricultural land, this was a good idea. But, on the other side of the coin, politically it was a bad idea, because it has created a problem that will take a lot to solve. That is the preferential treatment given by [former prime minister] Khin Nyunt to [the UWSP], who have displaced people who lived there for many generations, mainly Lahu and Shan. . . . I see this as

01 EWC PS38 Text

42

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party part of a plan of the Burmese to create problems between ethnic groups, which [the Burmese] profit from.”68 Business Activities Following the ceasefire agreements, most opposition groups were given business opportunities by the military government. The UWSP obtained concessions in the Mong Shue ruby mines in Shan State and the Hpa-kant jade mines in Kachin State. According to the UWSP, in the beginning they were given special privileges, but now have to compete with other private companies at market prices.69 The UWSP has invested in various enterprises, including a cigarette factory and a paper mill in Panghsang, a lighter factory, a water bottling plant, and a beer brewery. It has also tried to revive traditional industries in the region, including a tea plantation in Mong Maw and a tin mine in Long Tan. The UWSP also has invested in several big businesses, including Yangon Air and hotels in Rangoon. Individual Wa leaders also run guest houses and karaokes in Mandalay and elsewhere.70 Some casinos have been established in the Wa region, in Panghsang, Mong Pawk, and Nam Tit, but not in Mong Mao, where it has been forbidden. Recent UWSP commercial activities have focused heavily on rubber. Like most other business ventures, these are set up with Chinese capital and know-how, with the UWSP providing the land and manpower. Rubber plantations were already present on the Chinese side of the border for several years and have spread across the border not only to the Wa region but also to northern Laos. In the Wa region this “rubber belt” started in the area near Panghsang and has spread north to Mong Mao and Nam Tit. Farmers are hired as daily laborers to work on the plantations, which are mostly run by Chinese, although some are also owned by individual UWSP Central Committee members. A number of these commercial ventures have failed due to lack of technical capacity of the UWSP and lack of good assessment of potential markets, among other reasons. Import taxes by the Chinese government and trade restrictions by the Burmese authorities have also contributed to business failures (Joint Kokang-Wa Humanitarian Needs Assessment Team 2003). Wa leaders complain that it takes very long to get registration permits for their companies from the Burmese military government. The procedures are complex, they say, but without registration they are not allowed to send their

01 EWC PS38 Text

43

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

43

44

Tom Kramer products to central Burma.71 The profits from projects that have been successful have often gone to the Chinese investors from outside the Wa region rather than benefiting the UWSP or local communities. The UWSP also has given logging concessions to Chinese companies. Officially the UWSP banned logging in 1997, and all concessions need permission from the headquarters in Panghsang. Numerous saw mills operate in the Wa region. As there is little forest cover left in the Wa region, timber passing the Panghsang checkpoint to China is also believed to originate from other areas in Burma. Local communities have no say in decisionmaking over the forest and do not profit from logging. On the contrary, they have felt the negative impact of the deforestation. “There is intense pressure from Chinese business concerns for logging and other natural resource exploitation. . . In response to this pressure, in the Wa region foreign investors are given priority over local population for access to and profit from forest resource. . . . Local communities have no ownership of the forest” (Eberhardt 2001: 6). Deforestation is also caused by fires (both intentional and unintentional) and shifting cultivation. The degradation of forest and land has had a tremendous negative impact on the environment, and subsequently on the livelihoods of local communities. Investment of drug money into the formal Burmese economy has increased since the 1990s. In a 1998 report, the U.S. Department of State warned that “money laundering in Burma and the return of narcotics profits laundered elsewhere are significant factors in the overall Burmese economy” (International Narcotics Control Strategy Report 1998). The Hong Pang Group, whose start-up capital is believed to have come from the drug trade, is investing in a wide range of legal businesses, including road-building, construction, and large agricultural projects, and is one of the largest companies in the country. Wei Hsueh Kang, the architect of economic development in the UWSP-controlled territories along the Thai border around the town of Mong Yawn, is believed to be the major shareholder of the Hong Pang Group and a member of the Board of Directors. Some individual UWSP leaders are also believed to be shareholders. According to UWSP leader Bao Lai Kham: “Hong Pang does not belong to the Central Treasury of the Wa Authority, it has nothing to do with it. Its shareholders are individual businessmen, people from Taiwan and Thailand. Maybe some of the leaders here also hold some share in Hong Pang. I do not have shares in it.”72

01 EWC PS38 Text

44

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party Following accusations of involvement in the drug trade, Hong Pang Group changed its name to Xinhong Company. The company in fact consists of numerous subsidiaries, reflecting the different sectors it is involved in. These reportedly include Shwe Pauk Kan Orange, Wai Family Agriculture, Kwanlong Transportation, Mekong River Hotel, and Ne Wun Gas Station (S.H.A.N. 2005c). Chinese individuals like Wei Hsueh Kang are admired by some Wa leaders, mainly for the economic development of the Southern Command area near the Thai border and the business success of the Hong Pang Group. According to Colonel Hkam Awng of the Central Committee for Drug Abuse Control: “There are Chinese, ex-MTA people and ex-KMT people who are giving the UWSP economic and business advice. They are using the name of the UWSP, getting a rank to do business, and they give a commission to the organization. They are not real ethnic Wa but Chinese. Like Wei Hsueh Kang, who is jumping ship all the time. He is an individual who is just doing business.”73 Some in the UWSP resent the influence of Chinese like the Wei brothers in the organization. Furthermore, Wei Hsueh Kang has made investments in the area controlled by the 171st USWA Brigade but not in the northern Wa region, despite requests to do so by UWSP leaders in Panghsang. These issues could potentially lead to instability and fragmentation of the UWSP. The United Wa State Army With an estimated 15,000–20,000 soldiers, the UWSA is currently the strongest ethnic minority army in the country. At its formation in 1989, the UWSA had inherited a large stockpile of arms and ammunition. Most of its weaponry was donated by the Chinese authorities to the now defunct Communist Party of Burma. The UWSA consists of five divisions and three brigades geographically spread over all the districts. Some reports say the UWSA has increased in size since the ceasefire agreement to some 22,000 soldiers (Joint KokangWa Needs Assessment Team 2003). Apart from the army, many more ablebodied men have had basic militia training. UWSA commander Bao You Chang is also the political leader of the UWSP. In practice, local army units are more powerful than Wa party leaders, especially local officials. Salaries for soldiers, who are conscripted, are low, and units get little support from the center. Therefore they rely

01 EWC PS38 Text

45

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

45

46

Tom Kramer

on income derived from taxing the local population, working on army owned land, and engaging in various business opportunities. local army units are more Decades of fighting have taken a huge toll on the Wa population. powerful than Wa party leaders The Chinese-style human wave attacks by the CPB, which were copied by the UWSA, have resulted in a high casualty rate among Wa troops. However, the ceasefire agreement did not mean an end of active armed conflict for the Wa. Soon after the agreement was reached in 1989, fighting broke out first with Khun Sa’s MTA and then, following his surrender, with the SSA South.

Relations with the Government and the Opposition The Ceasefire Agreement For the UWSP, the main reason to enter into a truce was to end decades of fighting, which they say caused only misery and destruction for the Wa people. There was a strong feeling among the Wa leaders that they were caught up in a conflict between ethnic Burmans—the central government in Rangoon and the CPB—and that they were used by the CPB leadership to fight for the communists’ political agenda: The Wa people have been pawns in the violent, destructive games of others. We have been used as fighters for both the Ne Win government and in the Burma Communist Party’s military arm. Neither army “The Wa people have been was under Wa officers. The Wa fought other people’s wars in return pawns in the violent, for food and clothes. Finally, we destructive games of others…” have come to realize that we were being used to kill each other off (Lu n.d. [1993–94?].

In essence the ceasefire agreements are military truces that allow armed groups to control certain designated territory and maintain their arms. The agreements have put an end to the bloodshed, as well as to the most serious human rights abuses. The truces have facilitated easier travel and

01 EWC PS38 Text

46

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party communication for local communities and resulted in some improvements in the health and education sector. A number of local and international NGOs have started community-based projects in these war-torn areas. None of the contents of the truces have been made public, and only the Kachin Independence Organization is believed to have a written agreement. According to UWSP leaders, their ceasefire agreement with the government provides for an end to hostilities and the right to maintain their armed troops and to administer their own territory. Furthermore, the government promised development assistance in the region, and particular support for health, education, and agriculture. In return, the Wa leadership “agreed to be under the leadership of the Myanmar government, and not ask for independence.”74 The government refers to the Wa region as “Shan State Special Region 2,” indicating the UWSP was the second group in Shan State to sign a ceasefire. The conclusion of ceasefire agreements is seen by the SPDC as one of its major accomplishments. According to Colonel Hkam Awng: “The peace agreement is important for the government, peace and stability is top priority for us.”75 The SPDC officially lists seventeen ceasefire groups (Yan Nyein Aye 2000: 108–09), but differences exist in goals, objectives, and status of various agreements. While the objectives of the KIO and the New Mon State Party (NMSP), for instance, are essentially political, other groups, such as the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (Kokang) and the National Democratic Alliance Army (eastern Shan State), have come forward with few political demands and seem more focused on business interests. A number of ceasefire groups, such as the New Democratic Army–Kachin in Kachin State, have a status more or less similar to a border police force. They seem mainly interested in maintaining the status quo, which allows them to control their territory relatively undisturbed, maintain their arms, and pursue their economic interests. For some actors (including in the government), therefore, ceasefires have become a “way of life.”76 The UWSP ceasefire with the military government is a verbal and informal agreement. Since the truce, Wa leaders have established contacts with the government in Rangoon, the first time since decades of conflict. The UWSP would like to formalize the agreement and enshrine the status of the Wa region in a new constitution. The UWSP administers a relatively large, officially demarcated geographical area, and all entry points into the region by road are manned

01 EWC PS38 Text

47

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

47

48

Tom Kramer by separate UWSA and government checkpoints. Government representatives can only enter after obtaining permission from the UWSP. Furthermore, the UWSP currently has effective control over the areas its want a future Wa State to encompass and has not made any political claims on areas outside its current territory. The UWSP has first and foremost tried to promote political change for the Wa region—which is entirely under its control—at the national level through the National Convention and in meetings with government representatives. Relations with the Military Government Relations with the military government remain tense. The build-up of Burmese army outposts in areas adjacent the Wa region and the restrictions on the import of food (mainly rice, but also onions and garlic) to UWSP areas are viewed with great suspicion by the UWSP. Restrictions on the export of goods produced in the Wa Relations with the military region to government controlled areas government remain tense are also resented. The government has been reluctant to register Wa companies to do business in government controlled areas. The UWSP has complained about these restrictions, but so far to no avail.77 These restrictions are also in contradiction to official government policy to develop the Wa region in support of opium elimination efforts. Until the removal of Prime Minister Khin Nyunt in October 2004, all direct contact with ceasefire groups was controlled by the Military Intelligence. UWSP leaders had established a personal relationship with Khin Nyunt, and after his arrest and the dismantling of the Military Intelligence, speculation spread about possible policy changes, especially regarding the ceasefire agreements. The SPDC was quick to stress that the leadership change would not affect the truces; the “seven step roadmap to democracy,” including the National Convention; or its foreign policy.78 However, government pressure on ceasefire groups, including the UWSP, has increased after the SPDC leadership change at the end of 2004. SSA North leader Hso Ten and Shan Nationalities League for Democracy leaders Hkun Htun Oo and Sai Nyunt Lwin were arrested in February

01 EWC PS38 Text

48

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party 2005 after attending a meeting in Taunggyi. In April 2005 units of the Shan State National Army (an ally of the SSA North) were told to disarm, but its leader, Sai Yi, traveled to the Thai border with some of his troops and merged with the SSA South in May 2005. Ethnic minority representatives, especially from the ceasefire groups, hoped that the National Convention would be a platform for them to formally put forward their political demands. Privately they say that if they could at least get some of their demands included in the new constitution, it would be acceptable. Many ethnic minority leaders now fear there may not be anything that they will gain from the National Convention. At the same time, pressure from the government on ceasefire groups to disarm has increased. The UWSP has expressed some disappointment about the National Convention. “I think it is quite a difficult process for the present government to draw up a constitution, because the ethnic diversity of the country is quite great,” says UWSP delegate Ya Khoo. “Officially the government claims there are 135 different groups, which is quite a lot. The most difficult thing for the government is that every delegation wants to ask for its own territory. . . . The main issue that made the delegates unhappy at the last National Convention was that the military government claimed that the military should be head of the nation.”79 Postponement of the Opium Ban Ceremony The SPDC asked the UWSP to postpone a big ceremony planned for June 24, 2005, in the Wa capital Panghsang to formally announce the opium ban. The UWSP was asked to cancel the ceremony at the last moment, although the government had initially agreed to it.80 The government objected to the wording used in the UWSP invitation cards for the ceremony. The UWSP seal on the invitation, which it has been using since 1989, read “Myanmar Special Region No. 2” in the Burmese language and what translates as “Wa State Government” in Chinese. The government demanded that the Wa use the term “Northern Shan State Special Region 2.” This is clearly a sensitive issue for both sides. The main political aim of the UWSP is to achieve the formation of a Wa State falling directly under responsibility of the central government in Rangoon. The government has been reluctant to give minority groups anything that could be explained as

01 EWC PS38 Text

49

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

49

50

Tom Kramer going in the direction of independence or federalism. UWSP leaders say in correspondence with the government they have always used the term Wa Pyin Ne (Wa State), while the government has always used Wa Atu Deitha, which translates as Wa Special Region. The government was unhappy with the distinction the UWSP made for one other opium ban ceremony it had planned for June 20, 2005, in Wan Hong in the UWSP Southern Command area. The government told the Wa these ceremonies were not a good idea, as they reminded Rangoon of the division between the SSA South and the ceasefire Shan State Army North. The government further told the UWSP that its officials were very busy and asked the organization to postpone the ceremony until October or November 2005. The UWSP decided to go ahead with a small ceremony in Panghsang in June 2005, which was attended by government officials and UNODC local staff as observers, and postpone the big ceremony. Prospects for the Future The truce still holds, even though there have been problems and differences between the two sides. According to Xiao Min Liang: “Sometimes we have different views on the political situation. But until we have a new elected government, we will be under the present government. We will be under the Myanmar government whoever the leader is.”81 The main areas of contention between the government and the UWSP are related to the political future of UWSP controlled areas. The main shortcoming of the ceasefire agreements is the lack of political development and the absence of a peace process as a follow-up to the agreements. As one mediator stated: “The problem is that we have a ceasefire agreement, but not peace.”82 The SPDC maintains that it is a transitional government, and therefore not in a position to negotiate political settlements. Instead it has told ceasefire groups to wait until the National Convention has finalized the new constitution and a new government is formed. The uncertainty of the situation also provides space for many illegal activities, including drug trafficking, logging, other black market trading, gambling, and human trafficking. Opium production rose significantly in the early years after 1989, as the end of hostilities provided farmers with an opportunity to tend to their fields without fear of being shot at. In such areas, some of the ceasefire groups were, at least initially, allowed to grow and transport opium largely unhindered by the military government.

01 EWC PS38 Text

50

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party After decades of fighting, ethnic minority organizations still deeply mistrust the Burman military government. It is unlikely that the UWSP, like other ceasefire groups, will agree to disarm unless it has some basic guarantees about the political future. In early 2004 Bao Lai Kham stated that there had not been any discussion about this with the SPDC: “I think it will not be easy for them if they just ask us to lay down our arms without any negotiation first. If that happens, the civil war will come back, and the whole country will be fighting again.”83 This is the key issue now related to conflict, and it may also lead to further fragmentation among these armed groups. Even if there were a political agreement with the UWSP about a future Wa State, the UWSP may still be reluctant to give up its arms. As Xiao Min Liang said: “We know that we have to lay down our arms, but we demand that we keep our arms as local police, as a border police, under control of the central government.”84 Relations with Opposition Groups National League for Democracy From the start of the first National Convention in 1993, the Wa have made clear they are willing to accept any interim government, whether led by the military, the NLD, or both. “When a new constitution has emerged, and the election has successfully been held and we have an elected government, we are ready to listen to the leadership.” This policy is perhaps not so much related to political preferences but to a feeling among the Wa leaders that their region is far away from the capital Rangoon, most people in the Wa region do not speak Burmese, and that they do not understand the political objectives of the military and the NLD very well.85 The UWSP has no contact with political parties such as the NLD. According to one Wa leader: “We do not have any relations with political parties because we have no chance to talk with them, so we do not The UWSP has no contact understand their ideas, and their 86 policies for our Wa region.” Upon with political parties asked whether the UWSP sees Aung such as the NLD San Suu Kyi as a possible leader, he replied: “Your question is quite difficult to answer, because I do not know her policy, and have never met her in person.”87

01 EWC PS38 Text

51

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

51

52

Tom Kramer

Ceasefire groups The UWSP has the closest relations with ceasefire groups from the neighboring regions that are also ex-CPB groups, including the Myanmar National Democratic Army in the Kokang region and the National Democratic Alliance Army from eastern Shan State, as well as with former CPB allies, mainly the Shan State Army North. UWSP representatives at the National Convention have also had a chance to meet with the other ceasefire groups. Furthermore, on several other occasions they have met representatives from groups such as the KIO and NMSP, for instance at the funeral of Li Ziru, which took place in the Wa region. Generally speaking, the grievances and aspirations of these groups are similar. However, since the UWSP has been heavily criticized for involvement in narcotics trafficking by the international community, some ceasefire groups seem to be keeping a distance from them. At the same time, the UWSP seems to prefer not to deal with too many different actors, fearing that they may get involved in issues they do not want to be part of and be used for political games of others, and that they lack the information, knowledge, or capacity to deal with these issues. They prefer to just deal with the central government in Rangoon directly about issues that affect the Wa region. There have been some occasions where a number of ceasefire groups have released joint-statements, but the UWSP has rarely joined these. There is some resentment on the part of Kachin ceasefire groups and Kachin residents about UWSP logging and mining activities in Kachin State. Also, at least in the past, groups like the Kachin Independence Organization have felt that the SPDC favored the UWSP, especially in access for international NGOs and meetings with diplomats, because the Wa organization does not have any nation-wide political demands. Ceasefire groups in general, and the UWSP in particular, are not popular among the urban Ceasefire groups…are not popular population in central Burma. among the urban population The Wa have an especially bad name in Mandalay, Burma’s in central Burma second largest city and the religious center of the country. A huge influx of Chinese from Yunnan Province into Mandalay is strongly

01 EWC PS38 Text

52

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party resented by the Burman population, and many of the Chinese have entered the country via the Wa and Kokang regions. Some violent incidents in Mandalay, allegedly involving members of the UWSP, also have caused resentment against the Wa. Shan State Army South The dramatic rise of the UWSP as a Wa nationalist force has partly been at the expense of the weakening Shan movement. The current Wa-Shan conflict is likely to remain a serious obstacle for peace in Shan State. The UWSP has also increasingly come into conflict with various Lahu militias in southern Shan State that have grown in strength in recent years. After the surrender of Khun Sa and the break-up of the MTA, conflict between Wa and Shan armed groups continued along the Thai border. The SSA South launched its own war on drugs, attacking various amphetamine factories and transport routes near the Thai border, and asked for international support. Fighting between the SSA South and the Burmese army, and sometimes with the UWSA, led to a number of border clashes between the Burmese and Thai armies in 2001 and 2002. The SPDC accuses the Thai authorities of supporting the SSA South. The Thai, from their side, claim the SPDC is condoning the UWSP smuggling of narcotics into Thailand. In March 2005 renewed fighting broke out near the Thai border when units of the UWSA’s 171st Brigade launched an attack on the SSA South headquarters at Loi Tai Leng. Different versions have been offered as to why the fighting broke out. The Wa leadership accused the SSA South of kidnapping eight people from the Wa Southern Command area and cutting off water sources that were shared by both the UWSA and the SSA South. The UWSP also complained that SSA South spokespersons who are “based abroad often use the topic of drugs to spread false rumors in websites and the media, and attack and damage the image of Wa leaders and Wa people” (Headquarters Office of Wa Central Authority 2005). The SSA South denies the charges. According to SSA South commander Colonel Yawd Serk, the offensive was an initiative of Wei Hsueh Kang only and was not backed by the UWSP leadership based in Panghsang (S.H.A.N. 2005a). Wei Hsueh Kang may indeed have acted on his own to some degree by cooperating with the SPDC to fight against the SSA South. In return, he may hope to find an arrangement similar to that of Khun Sa or Lo Hsing-

01 EWC PS38 Text

53

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

53

54

Tom Kramer han. The recent U.S. pressure on the Wa leaders may have also convinced him to do so. However, at the same time it is clear that the conflict between the UWSP and SSA South has deeper roots. The UWSP strongly resents what it sees as attempts by the SSA South to blame the Wa for all the drug problems, thereby harming Wa relations with the international community, especially Thailand. According to a UWSP leader in Panghsang: “We are really fed up with fighting. One of the main reasons we ousted the CPB was that we wanted an end to it all. Yawd Serk’s actions are not bearable to us. We have no intention to destroy them or get their territory.”88 Nevertheless, the potential of a resumption of hostilities between the UWSA and SSA South remains.

International Implications The United States The United States has described the UWSP as “a criminal group controlling the UWSA, which is primarily responsible for criminal activities such as heroin/ATS production in Wa territories” (U.S. Department of State 2006). In January 2005 the U.S. Department of Justice announced the indictment of eight UWSP leaders on heroin- and methamphetaminetrafficking charges. They include the U.S. Department of Justice UWSP chairman Bao You Xiang [has indicted]…eight UWSP and Wei Hsueh Kang. The UWSP is described “as one of leaders on…trafficking charges the largest heroin-producing and trafficking groups in the world” (U.S. Department of Justice 2005). The UWSP issued a lengthy statement denying the accusations, claiming the “evidence supplied by some Thai politicians and institutes are groundless and fake.” The UWSP also questions the motive behind the indictment, which it feels is political (People’s Government of Special Region II 2005). Wei Hsueh Kang had been indicted in 1993 by a U.S. court on drugtrafficking charges. He was also designated a drug kingpin in 2000 under the 1999 Foreign Narcotics Designation Kingpin Act, and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) is offering a reward of two million dollars for information leading to his capture. The UWSP as an organization was designated a drug kingpin in 2003 under the same act (U.S. Department

01 EWC PS38 Text

54

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party of Justice 2005). The indictment also links the eight Wa leaders with the Hong Pang Group, “which represents the proceeds of the defendants’ narcotics trafficking activities.” According to the statement these companies “are managed, operated, financed and controlled by the defendants” (Ibid.). U.S. policy is somewhat contradictory. For many years, it has been an important donor to UNODC’s project in the Wa region, but after the indictment Washington stopped all direct funding for the project. The future possibilities of working in the Wa region became uncertain following the indictment, and all international staff was temporarily withdrawn. Furthermore, the indictment describes the UWSP as “Southeast Asia’s largest narcotics trafficking organization. . . . Since 1985 [four years before UWSP was formed], the defendants have imported over a ton of heroin with a retail value of $1 billion into the U.S. alone.” However, a 2006 report by the U.S. State Department makes a different assessment: “Drug gangs, many of which are ethnic Chinese, based in the Burma/China and Burma/Thailand border areas annually produce several hundred million methamphetamine tablets for markets in Thailand, China, and India, with the precursors imported from China and India. . . . [The] UWSP leadership facilitates the manufacture and trafficking of ATS pills in Wa territory, predominantly by ethnic Chinese criminal gangs” (U.S. Department of State 2006). The timing of the indictment gave rise to speculation, as it came just a few months before the June 2005 UWSP opium ban. “We were very surprised that the U.S. issued this statement,” says Police Colonel Hkam Awng. “It was bad timing. It is not a secret that the Wa are involved in drugs, they have already admitted this. Why not wait until June 2005: if after that they are still involved, then yes, go ahead. But now they are stopping, and we have to take their word for it.”89 The U.S. Department of Justice maintains that the indictment is not politically motivated but only related to law enforcement and is the result of a long investigation by the DEA. The Justice Department acknowledged that “it could take years—if ever—for the eight to be arrested and brought to trial in the U.S.” (Aita 2005). The Burmese government most probably will not try to arrest the eight Wa leaders, which could cause a breakdown in the ceasefire with the Wa. “Our government’s priority is peace and stability, and it took a long time to get the status quo. I am sure that the Wa do not want to go back to fighting. The DEA also knows this. They would like to see our government

01 EWC PS38 Text

55

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

55

56

Tom Kramer to do something, even as a token thing, because this is law enforcement, and not politics. However, they also know that we will not be overturning and spilling the apple cart.”90 Because powerful Chinese syndicates, not the armed groups in Shan State such as the UWSP, control the narcotics trade, decisions over who to blame and indict for the drug trade seem, as has been the case in other countries, arbitrary and politicized. Demonizing one specific actor in the conflict usually has stronger roots in politics than in evidence. It is also highly questionable whether trying to arrest conflict actors in Shan State, such as UWSP leaders, will have a measurable and long-term impact on the drug trade. The much heralded arrest of Lo Hsing-han in 1973 and surrender of Khun Sa in 2005 had at most only a temporary effect on the flow of drugs out of the Golden Triangle, after which trafficking networks adjusted themselves, and the trade continued as before. After thirty years of the failed U.S.-led war on drugs, Lo Hsing-han and Khun Sa are important reminders that trying to arrest drug kingpins does not help cut the flow of narcotics. China and Thailand The UWSP has made serious efforts to maintain good relations with both China and Thailand, among other reasons to stimulate trade and to attract foreign investment. Individual UWSP leaders are believed to own property in both countries. During the Cold War, Burma’s neighboring countries supported insurgent groups based on their borders. While China assisted the CPB and its allies, Thailand supported ethnic armed groups from the NDF. At the end of the Cold War, security priorities for both Thailand and China changed radically. Both countries prioritized formal relations with Burma and decreased support for insurgent groups. By 1994, all armed opposition groups along the Chinese border had entered into ceasefire agreements with the SPDC. In contrast, the New Mon State Party, which signed a ceasefire in 1995, is the only group along the Thai border with a truce. All other armed opposition groups, including the Karen National Union, the Karenni National Progressive Party, and the SSA South are all still waging a guerrilla war. This is no coincidence, as China and Thailand have different policies and approaches to Rangoon.

01 EWC PS38 Text

56

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party

57

Drug production in Burma has increasingly become a security concern for both Thailand and China. Both countries have increasingly transformed from drug transporting routes into drug consuming markets. Related to this is the growing HIV/AIDS crisis, which is fuelled by the high prevalence of injecting drugs and HIV among drug users. China China is Burma’s most important strategic regional ally and its main supplier of arms. Chinese influence in central Burma is significant, and Chinese have invested large sums of money in the formal Burmese economy. Chinese companies in Yunnan Province have also greatly profited from the instability in northern Burma. They are involved in logging and mining operations in Kachin and Shan States. The Chinese have established close relations with the UWSP leaders. They have historical links with the CPB, which was supported by China. Influence from China on the neighboring Wa region is great, and Chinese maintain close cultural and The Chinese have established economic links with Wa communities close relations with the across the border. Wa is the main language spoken in the Wa region, and UWSP leaders most UWSP leaders do not speak Burmese. However, there are several Wa dialects, and UWSP leaders therefore use Chinese as the main language for communication. The Chinese Yuan is, apart from old silver coins from British India, the main currency used in the Wa region. China’s primary objective is to have stability along its border. As long as the UWSP is a powerful organization with de facto control over territory across the border, China is likely to support the UWSP. It prefers to have UWSP on its border to SSA South, which it sees as Western backed and pro-U.S. In 2006 China donated 10,000 tons of rice to border regions in Burma, including to the Wa region, to offset food shortages that resulted partly from opium bans and eradication of poppy fields in Shan and Kachin States. The main reason behind this is to prevent instability in areas across its border. China has assisted the UWSP with development efforts in the Southern

01 EWC PS38 Text

57

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

58

Tom Kramer Command area along the Thai border. It also has trained the Wa police force for anti-narcotics purposes and border control. Because Wa relations with the Burmese government remain tense, and have further deteriorated since the removal of Khin Nyunt, the UWSP feels more vulnerable to Chinese economic influence, on which they have become more dependent. The U.S. indictment of the UWSP leaders has restricted their freedom of movement, and Wa leaders are now more reluctant to travel to China, which previously they were able to do unhindered.91 Thailand Thailand has had a problematic relationship with Burma. A number of small skirmishes have broken out along the border between the two countries. This fighting is related to armed conflict in Burma, disagreements over border demarcation, and the drug trade. Although there are several formal border crossings, Thailand does not have the same amount of economic involvement in Burma as does China. Thailand has generally seen the ceasefire groups as a threat to its security and has relied more on relations with armed groups that are still in opposition to Rangoon (Pathan 2005: 115). Thai national security interests clearly prefer the SSA South to the UWSP along its border, especially the UWSA 171st Brigade, which it is has accused of flooding the Thai market with large quantities of ATS. It is also suspicious of influence from China in the UWSP, still sometimes referred to as Red Wa (Wa Daeng) in the Thai press. UWSP relations with Thailand are tense. Following the surrender of Khun Sa, the UWSP took control of large areas along the Thai border. The arrival of thousands of Wa settlers was also seen with suspicion in Bangkok. Led by Wei Hsueh Kang, the UWSP Southern Command started several development and UWSP relations with construction projects near the town of Mong Yawn, all built by Thai Thailand are tense companies. Initially Thai workers were allowed to cross the border into Wa territory undisturbed. However, this situation came to an end in 1999, after nine Thai villagers were found dead near the border. The exact circumstances remain unclear, but in the Thai press all fingers were pointed to the UWSP. According to a Thai journalist: “Overnight the Wa became

01 EWC PS38 Text

58

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party Thailand’s public enemy number one, demonized by both the authorities and the public” (Pathan 2005: 106). Relations came to an absolute nadir when in May 2002 Thai army units launched an attack on Wa positions across the border, apparently in retaliation for an earlier shoot-out between the two sides on Thai territory that left one Thai soldier dead. The SSA South used the opportunity to attack Burmese army positions. UWSP Central Committee member Xiao Min Liang says it is inaccurate to blame the Wa for all ATS going into Thailand. Moreover, “any Wa people found on the other side of Thai border were shot dead or arrested. We are really upset about that. Also the Thai media is making the thing bigger than it is. When we moved 50,000 people down to the Thai border there was a rumor that we would attack Thailand. But we have no wish to do that. Another rumor is that Bao You Chang would give a million baht to assassinate [former Thai Prime Minister] Thaksin. But if we had that kind of money we better use it for our own people.”92 Following an improvement in relations between Thailand and Burma in 2003, the Thai government adopted a less confrontational approach toward the UWSP and even initiated a small alternative development project in the UWSP Southern Command area, the Yawngkha project. The agreement for the development project was made with then-prime minister General Khin Nyunt and was part of an effort by Thailand to support what it felt were more pragmatic forces within the SPDC. At the same time, tacit Thai support for SSA South operations against drug production facilities and drug transport decreased. However, since the leadership change in Burma, the Yawngkha development project seems to have effectively come to an end (S.H.A.N. 2005b). Tension between Thailand and Burma may increase again, with the Thai side blaming the SPDC for condoning the drug trade of the UWSP, and the Burmese accusing the Thais of supporting the SSA South. The situation remains tense, and renewal of hostilities is likely (see Pathan 2005). UN Agencies and International NGOs The first contact between the UWSP and the United Nations Drug Control Programme (UNDCP; renamed UNODC in 2002) was made in the end of 1994. A feasibility study was carried out in Ho Tao Township in Mong Pawk District to assess possibilities to initiate an alternative livelihood

01 EWC PS38 Text

59

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

59

60

Tom Kramer project for poppy farmers. After that a meeting was held in Rangoon in mid-1995 between UWSP leaders, government officials, and UNDCP. In the presence of observers of the U.S. and Japanese governments, the UWSP officially declared its policy to make the region opium free by 2005. After long discussions with the military government and the Wa authorities, in 1998 UNDCP started the Wa Alternative Development Project (WADP).93 The five-year pilot project started in Mong Pawk District, in the lower part of the northern Wa region. Most of the inhabitants in the area are Lahu, Palaung, and Akha. The official Burmese government counterparts of UNDCP are the Ministry of Progress for the Border Areas and National Races (better know by its Burmese acronym “Natala”) and the Central Committee for Drug Abuse Control under the Ministry of Home Affairs.94 Initially the presence of UN agencies and later also of international NGOs in the Wa region was met with suspicion by UWSP leaders. In the first phase of the project UNDCP therefore focused on establishing trust and good relations with the Wa authorities. There were several incidents and misunderstandings. First of all, the Wa were unsure where to place UNDCP, as the organization had no previous experience with the UN and NGOs. UNDCP had entered the Wa region through their government counterparts, whose intentions the UWSP, like other ceasefire groups, distrust. Furthermore, the UWSP leadership, at least initially, did not fully comprehend the overall aims and objectives of the WADP. The communitybased approach of the project was also seen by some Wa leaders as undermining their leadership. According to UNODC: “When efforts were made to involve the villagers in decision-making, organizing micro-credit schemes such as rice banks, and cooperatives, some in the authority felt threatened” (Joint KokangWa Humanitarian Needs Assessment Team 2003). The understanding and vision of the UWSP leadership on community development is limited and reflects weak leadership capacity and the nondemocratic nature of the organization. In many ways these ideas mirror those of the military government. It is also unclear whether the Wa authorities are able to operate and maintain the projects (due to lack of technical capacity and financial resources). The UWSP has different priorities for developing the Wa region and providing poppy farmers with alternative livelihoods than UNDCP. The

01 EWC PS38 Text

60

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party Wa authorities want large infrastructure projects, such as roads, irrigation schemes, and electricity, rather then agricultural development projects. “UNDCP attempted to respond to some of these requests, in the process building confidence with local authorities by providing some of the infrastructure requested while at the same time continuing some participatory community work” (Ibid.). The mid-term evaluation of the Wa Alternative Development Project noted that project leaders had given in to pressure from both the Wa authorities and the military government to construct infrastructure in order to “prove” that it is making accomplishments. The military government also had complained that the WADP had not constructed enough infrastructure and was not making enough progress.95 In 1998 the powerful UWSA Security Brigade held project staff hostage at gunpoint during a community drug detoxification program at Nam Lwi in Mong Phen Township. As a result, “work in remote highland villages, mostly with non-Wa groups was prohibited because the Brigade head thought such work threatened security and might lead to an insurgency” (Ibid.). Although the actions of the UWSA Security Brigade in Mong Phen were not sanctioned by the leadership in Panghsang, the incident led to a temporarily halt of all project activities and withdrawal of staff from the project villages. The WADP was later renamed UNODC/Wa Project. After the first phase of the project ended in 2000, UNODC felt that although misunderstandings with the UWSP continued, relations had improved. They felt that by engaging with the Wa authorities, they created trust and a better understanding among them of development work and more space for participatory and community-based approaches (Ibid.). International NGOs confirm this picture. The third phase of the UNODC/Wa Project runs from January 2004 to December 2007. UNODC has facilitated the entry of eighteen UN agencies and international NGOs in the Wa and Kokang regions, in a new partnership called the Kokang and Wa Initiative (KOWI). KOWI aims to help poppy farmers and their families meet their basic human needs without the income derived from opium.96 UNODC has handed over its health component to international NGOs and plans to phase out its involvement in 2007, after which the United Nations Development Programme is to oversee activities. In order to address the humanitarian crisis caused by the opium bans, the World Food Programme was called in

01 EWC PS38 Text

61

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

61

62

Tom Kramer to provide emergency food assistance to ex-poppy farmers in the Kokang region, where an opium ban already was put into place in 2003 and later extended into the northern Wa Region (WFP/JICA 2003). The international community has made significant funds available to other countries with a drug-based economy, notably Afghanistan. However, heated debate continues about whether and how international organizations should channel humanitarian aid to Burma. This has also affected programs in the Wa region, and UNODC continues to face a huge shortfall of funds for planned projects. Wa leaders have made clear they want KOWI to continue. They are afraid that after the opium ban, when poppy has disappeared from the region, donors will loose interest and reduce or stop funding development projects in the Wa region.97 According to UNODC: “There is an imminent danger that without a timely effort on the part of governments, donors and aid agencies, the gains achieved over the last decade in terms of poverty alleviation and opium poppy reduction will be lost” (UNODC 2006: 33).

Conclusion

The

The UWSP poses a number of important challenges and opportunities for reconciliation and state-building efforts in Burma. Although it is a relatively new organization, it is currently the strongest nonstate actor in the country. It maintains the largest ethnic minority army and controls strategic territory along both the Chinese and Thai UWSP…is currently the borders. When the UWSP was set up, strongest nonstate actor the organization inherited control over most of the Wa-inhabited areas in in [Burma] Burma, plenty of weapons and ammunition, an isolated and impoverished region plagued by warfare, and a population dependent on opium cultivation. There are strong economic, cultural, and political Chinese influences in the Wa region. Although the UWSP has been demonized by the international community as a “narco-trafficking army,” the organization has an ethnic nationalist agenda. Its main political demand is to achieve the formation of a Wa State. It shares most of the basic grievances and aspirations of other ethnic minority organizations. However, the UWSP has mainly

01 EWC PS38 Text

62

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party focused on promoting political change for the Wa region and not for the country as a whole. The organization says it is ready to accept any government in Rangoon. The UWSP has taken a number of important steps toward peace and reconciliation in Burma. Driven by poverty and war weariness, its first decision was to enter into a ceasefire agreement with the military government. Although the agreement is informal and verbal only, it has put an end to decades of open armed conflict. The UWSP has made clear it does not want to fight anymore, and is committed to finding a political solution at the negotiating table. The organization has further prioritized the development of the Wa region and, as part of its commitment to the international community to make the region drug free, has imposed a ban on opium cultivation. Although the UWSP has promoted Wa nationalism and is demanding a Wa State, the population under its control is not mono-ethnic; apart from the Wa population, various other ethnic groups inhabit the territory under UWSP control, including a significant Lahu population. The UWSP is a very hierarchical organization, and local communities have no room to participate in decisionmaking processes of the organization. Beyond the basic demand of a Wa State, the UWSP has not developed a clear vision for a future state, a comprehensive strategy to achieve it, how it would treat non-Wa minorities, or how it would interact with the rest of the country. The isolation of the Wa region and the lack of educational opportunities have contributed to weak capacity of the leadership. Meanwhile, relations with the military government remain tense. The buildup of Burmese army outposts near the Wa region, the restrictions on imports of food, and difficulties for the UWSP to register its companies have all caused resentment by the UWSP. Organization representatives attend the National Convention, the military regime’s platform to draft a new constitution. A big dilemma for ceasefire groups such as the UWSP is what to do if some of their most important demands are not incorporated in the new constitution. If they accept a constitution that does not meet their demands, dissatisfaction within the organization is likely and could potentially lead to fragmentation and break-away by dissatisfied factions. If they do not approve the new constitution, conflict with the military government and a renewal of hostilities could result. The main challenge for state building in Burma remains the lack of a political process to follow up on the ceasefire agreements. After the removal

01 EWC PS38 Text

63

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

63

64

Tom Kramer of Khin Nyunt, the military government has increased pressure on the ceasefire groups to disarm. The UWSP is very unlikely to disarm, unless it has some basic guarantees about the future position of the Wa region in the The UWSP is very new constitution. Even if guarantees are written into the constitution, the unlikely to disarm UWSP might not give up its arms. Decades of conflict have fomented considerable mistrust, and the UWSP already has indicated that it may want to serve as a local police force or a border patrol unit. The UWSP does not maintain regular contact with many of the other conflict actors in the country, and UWSP leaders admit they lack understanding of the policies of other groups. The organization has preferred to deal mainly with the military government, partly in fear of being used in “the political games of others.” However, this is also related to lack of exposure and political experience and weak capacity in the leadership. After years of isolation, the UWSP has made great efforts to establish good relations with the international community. Relations with China are relatively strong. China has given some practical and technical assistance to the UWSP, and Chinese have invested in the Wa region. Most other countries, especially Thailand and the United States, have accused the UWSP of being a major drug trafficking organization. The U.S. Department of Justice has indicted party leaders on drug trafficking charges, which will effectively confine them to their region and keep them isolated. The UWSP has declared its region drug free as of June 2005. This is mainly to comply with international pressure. The ban will cause misery for the population in the Wa region, which depends on opium as a cash crop. UNODC and eighteen other international agencies have implemented development programs to offset the impact of the opium ban. After some initial mistrust and misunderstanding by the UWSP, relations with these international agencies have improved. The organization has slowly become more open to participatory community-based development programs, which it initially saw as undermining its authority. Serious concerns remain about the sustainability of the ban. It is unclear what the UWSP will do if the political recognition and international assistance it hopes to gain from the ban are not forthcoming.

01 EWC PS38 Text

64

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party The relocation of tens of thousands of Wa villagers from the northern Wa hills into southern Shan State, which is under control of the UWSP Southern Command, is perhaps the most controversial policy of the UWSP and may lead to future conflict. The UWSP says relocation will allow the possibility of alternative livelihoods for opium farmers. The UWSP wants a future Wa State to include the Southern Command, which the SPDC is unlikely to accept. The resettlement program also in some cases has forced out the original Shan, Akha, and Lahu inhabitants, which has caused ethnic tensions between the Wa and these communities and could have political implications. Furthermore, Thailand is unhappy with the presence of the UWSP along its border. It accuses the organization of smuggling large amounts of amphetamine-type stimulants into the country. Thai security forces also see ceasefire groups as too close to the SPDC and perceive the UWSP to be pro-China. Several clashes have occurred between troops of the UWSP Southern Command and the SSA South. The absence of a political process and the growing space for the illegal economy may also lead to further fragmentation in the country. The uncertainty of the situation provides increasingly larger opportunity for many illegal activities, including drug trafficking, unsustainable logging, other black market trading, gambling, and human trafficking. Apolitical armed groups and other powerful actors are benefiting (mostly economically) from the current political instability in the country and from the uncertainty of the status of armed groups and the future of the ceasefire agreements. These groups include foreign actors such as Chinese and Thai logging companies and drug syndicates. The drug problem existed before the military takeover in 1962 and is an issue that will continue to pose serious problems for any future government of the country. Chinese syndicates, not conflict parties such as the UWSP, control the trade. These are powerful international organizations that most likely pose a greater challenge to state building in Burma than ceasefire groups such as the UWSP. Demonizing and isolating the UWSP will make them more dependent on these groups. Some elements within the UWSP, notably Wei Hsueh Kang, profit from this situation, and may try to frustrate efforts for national reconciliation and peace building, from which they are not likely to gain. Syndicate leaders do not necessarily share the political objectives of the UWSP and mainly have a business agenda.

01 EWC PS38 Text

65

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

65

66

01 EWC PS38 Text

Tom Kramer

66

9/6/07, 3:10 PM

The United Wa State Party

Endnotes 1. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, September 12, 2003. 2. This story was relayed to me by UWSP representatives and UNODC staff during a visit to Lake Nawnghkio in February 2004. 3. Interview with a former CPB member, August 18, 2005. 4. Interview with former CPB member U Mya Maung, August 19, 2005. See also Lintner 1990: 32–35. 5. Interview with a former CPB member, August 18, 2005. 6. Interview with Maha San, January 22, 1999. 7. According to one former CPB member, the plan was actually to hold up the Burma army at the Kunlong Bridge while a smaller guerrilla force was to go down to the Pegu Yomas to assist party members there. “On paper the main purpose was to bring the CPB leaders from the Pegu Yomas. But the relationship between the two groups was not very good. I think they maybe did not really try.” Interview with U Mya Maung, August 19, 2005. 8. Interview with a former CPB member, August 18, 2005. 9. Interview with former CPB member U Nyo Hein, October 1, 2001. 10. Interview with U Mya Maung, August 19, 2005. 11. Interview with UWSP Mong Pawk Central Committee member and District Secretary Ya Khoo, September 9, 2003. 12. Interview with U Nyo Hein, October 1, 2001. 13. Ibid. 14. Communication with Khuensai Jaiyen, January 2, 2007. 15. Interview with U Mya Maung, August 19, 2005. 16. Ibid. 17. Interview with U Nyo Hein, October 1, 2001. 18. Broadcast by Wa mutineers on the former CPB’s People’s Voice, FBIS-EAS-89-081, April 28, 1989, quoted in Lintner 1990: 46.

02 EWC PS38 Endnotes

67

9/6/07, 3:11 PM

67

68

Tom Kramer 19. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, UWSP Central Committee member, September 12, 2003. 20. Interview with U Nyo Hein, October 1, 2001. U Nyo Hein served under Bao You Chang and Li Ziru in CPB times and knew them well. He was appointed by the Wa leaders to liaise with the KNLP, SNPLO, and KNPLF delegation that was visiting Panghsang, and to control a group of 40 armed left-wing students who after 1988 had formed the Democratic Patriotic Army (DPA) that was still in Wa territory. 21. Interview with former CPB member Saw Jacob Creedman, January 1, 1998. 22. The name translates variously as Myanmar Nationalities Solidarity Party (MNSP), Myanmar Nationalities Unity Party (MNUP), or Burma Nationalities Unity Party (BNUP). Correspondence with Khuensai Jaiyen, May 29, 2006. 23. Interview with U Mya Maung, August 19, 2005. 24. Interview with U Nyo Hein, October 1, 2001. 25. Ibid. 26. According to Saw Jacob Creedman, the CPB sent three delegates, including him, to persuade the Wa to join the NDF and not agree to a ceasefire. Interview with Saw Jacob Creedman, January 1, 1998. 27. Interview with Maha San, March 10, 1997. 28. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, September 12, 2003. 29. Interview with Ya Khoo, September 9, 2003. 30. UNODC, Afghanistan Opium Survey 2006, Executive Summary, September 2006. 31. Interview with Yang Xue-kin, a Chinese trader who used to take part in KMT caravans, December 28, 2006. 32. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, September 12, 2003. 33. Interview with Col. Hkam Awng, Central Committee for Drug Abuse Control (CCDAC), September 15, 2003. 34. Interview with Ngo Shui, UWSP Chairman, Long Tan Special Township, February 27, 2004. 35. Interview with Bao Lai Kham, February 26, 2004. 36. Interview with Ya Khoo, February 25, 2004. 37. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, September 12, 2003. 38. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, February 25, 2004. 39. Interview with Ya Khoo, February 25, 2004. 40. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, September 12, 2003. 41. Interview with international aid worker, September 2003. 42. Opium Replacement Projects (O.R.P.), Special Region (2) of Myanmar, 171st Army of Southern Wa, September 13, 2003. 43. Interview with Ya Khoo, February 25, 2004. 44. Confidential NGO report, 2003. 45. Ibid. 46. Ibid. 47. The Third Five Year Plan of the Wa Region (2000–2004), United Wa State Party Central Committee, Wa Regional Authority, 26 July 2000 (unofficial translation of original Chinese version). 48. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, September 12, 2003. 49. Ibid. 50. The speech of Bao You Xiang, Chairman of Special Region 2 (Wa State) in the Ceremony of “Drug Source Free Zone” announcement, Panghsang, June 24, 2005.

02 EWC PS38 Endnotes

68

9/6/07, 3:11 PM

The United Wa State Party 51. UNODC, Working Paper on KOWI, December 2005. 52. Powerpoint presentation by JICA, “Findings presented at the ‘Project Formulation Study for Eradication of Opium Poppy Cultivation and Poverty Alleviation Programme,’ ” Yangon, March 18, 2004, quoted in UNODC, “What others say related to humanitarian implications of opium reduction,” Yangon, 2004. 53. Confidential NGO report, 2004. 54. UNODC, “KOWI Fact Sheets–Frequently Asked Questions,” March 31, 2004. 55. Interview with Chao Ai Ngap, UWSP Chief of Foreign Relations, September 12, 2003. 56. Confidential interview, February 2007. 57. Ibid. 58. Interview with Wei Ai Jung, UWSP Chairman, Nam Kham Oo Township, February 26, 2004. 59. Confidential personal communication, January 2007. 60. Interview with Ngo Shui, UWSP Chairman, Long Tan Special Township, February 27, 2004. 61. Confidential personal communication, January 2007. 62. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, February 25, 2004. 63. Interview with Wei Ai Jung, UWSP Chairman, Nam Kham Oo Township, February 26, 2004. 64. Interview with villagers in Song Khie Village, Mong Phen District, Mong Pawk Township, September 11, 2003. 65. We cordially welcome all the Diplomatic Corps to visit and inspect our Opium Replacement Projects (O.R.P.), The Administration Committee of Southern Wa at Special Region (2) of Myanmar, January 1, 2003; and Interview with Xiao Min Liang, September 12, 2003. 66. Interview with Soe Myint, UWSP head of Foreign Relations, Nam Thit Special Township, February 29, 2004. 67. Interview with villagers in Song Khie Village, Mong Phen District, Mong Pawk Township, September 11, 2003. 68. Interview with Maha San, December 7, 2004. 69. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, February 25, 2004. 70. Confidential communication, January 2007. 71. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, February 25, 2004. 72. Interview with Bao Lai Kham, February 26, 2004. 73. Interview with Police Colonel Hkam Awng, February 3, 2006. 74. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, September 12, 2003, and with Ya Khoo, September 9, 2003. 75. Interview with Police Colonel Hkam Awng, September 15, 2003. 76. In a similar way, Martin Smith once wrote that “insurgency has developed a life of its own.” Smith 1991: 88. 77. Interview with Ai Rong, UWSP Chairman of Nam Tit Special Township, February 28, 2004, and with Bao Lai Kham, February 26, 2004. 78. Complete explanation on the developments in the country given by General Thura Shwe Mann (member of the State Peace and Development Council) and Lt. General Soe Win (prime minister) at Zeyar Thiri Hall, October 24, 2004; and explanation by Secretary-1, Lt. General Thein Sein, Chairman of the National Convention Convening Commission, October 22, 2004. 79. Interview with Ya Khoo, February 25, 2004.

02 EWC PS38 Endnotes

69

9/6/07, 3:11 PM

69

70

Tom Kramer 80. “Postpone the day of festival of determination to make Wa State an Opium Cultivation Free Zone,” Headquarters of the United Wa State Army, June 7, 2005. 81. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, September 12, 2003. 82. Confidential interview, January 2002. 83. Interview with Bao Lai Kham, February 26, 2004. 84. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, February 25, 2004. 85. Ibid. 86. Interview with Ya Khoo, February 25, 2004. 87. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, February 25, 2004. 88. Interview with Xiao Ming Liang by Jeremy Milsom, May 15, 2005. Personal correspondence with Jeremy Milsom, April 2006. 89. Interview with Police Colonel Hkam Awng, CCDAC, February 4, 2005. 90. Ibid. 91. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, February 25, 2004, and with Bao Lai Kham, February 26, 2004. 92. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, February 25, 2004. 93. Interview with Ya Khoo, September 9, 2003. 94. Interview with Xiao Min Liang, September 12, 2003. 95. Confidential report, 2003. 96. Personal communication with UNODC, Yangon, June 6, 2005; and UNODC, “Drug Control through Integrated Livelihood Development in the Wa Special Region of Myanmar” (UNODC/WA Project), KOWI Partner Project, No. 001, Yangon, n.d. 97. Interview with Ya Khoo, September 9, 2003.

02 EWC PS38 Endnotes

70

9/6/07, 3:11 PM

The United Wa State Party

Bibliography Aita, Judy. 2005.“Indicted Burma Drug Syndicate Posed Grave Threat, U.S. Says. U.S. Department of State. January 25. http://usinfo.state.gov. Amnesty International. 2002. “Myanmar: Lack of Security in Counter-Insurgency Areas.” London: Amnesty International. July. Barton, G. E. 1933. Barton’s 1929 Wa Diary. Rangoon: G.B.P.C.O. Bao You Chang. 2002. “Key Words in Mutuals Answers for UN Delegation in Visiting Wa State.” [Translated from original Chinese by UNODC staff.] Bao You Chang, Chairman of Wa State Government. March 6. ———. 2004. “A Survey Report on the Investment in Construction of Substitute, Project in Special Region II (Wa State), Myanmar.” [Translated from original Chinese by UNODC staff.] January 24. Central Committee of the United Wa State Party. 2005. “The Narcotics Drug Control Law.” Legislated by the Central Committee of the United Wa State Party, Central Authority of Special Region 2 (Wa State), Headquarters of United Wa State Party. Chouvy, Pierre-Arnoud, and Joel Meissonnier. 2004. Yaa Baa: Production, Traffic and Consumption of Methamphetamine in Mainland Southeast Asia. Singapore: Singapore University Press; and Bangkok: Institut de Recherche sur l’Asia du Sud-Est Contemporaine. Eberhardt, Karin. 2001. UNDCP Wa Alternative Development Project, Forest Management Situation Assessment. July. Fiskesjö, Nils Magnus Geir. 2000. The Fate of Sacrifice and the Making of Wa History. Ph.D. diss., University of Chicago, 2000. Frontier Areas Committee of Enquiry. 1947. Report Presented to his Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom and the Government of Burma, Part II: Appendices. Rangoon: Superintendent Government Printing and Stationary. April 24.

03 EWC PS38 Biblio

71

9/6/07, 3:11 PM

71

72

Tom Kramer Gebert, Rita. 1999. UNDCP/UNOPS Drug Control and Development Project in the Wa Region of Shan State (“Wa Alternative Development Project”). Yangon: Consultant’s Report on Major Stakeholders in Wa Special Region No. 2. Government of Burma to Government of India. 1913 (December 27). Quoted in Renard, Ronald D. 1996. The Burmese Connection: Illegal Drugs & The Making of the Golden Triangle. Boulder and Washington, DC: Lynne Rienner. Harvey, G. E. 1933. 1932 Wa Précis, A Précis Made in the Burma Secretariat of all Traceable Records Relating to the Wa States. Rangoon: Office of the Superintendent, Government Printing and Stationary. Headquarters Office of Wa Central Authority. 2005. “The Main Causes of Conflict between SURA and UWSA.” Headquarters Office of Wa Central Authority, Special Region (2), Myanmar. May 13. Hla Min. 2001. Political Situation of Myanmar and its Role in the Region. Office of Strategic Studies, Ministry of Defense, Union of Myanmar. Jelsma, Martin, and Tom Kramer. 2005. Downward Spiral: Banning Opium in Afghanistan and Burma. Drugs & Conflict Debate Papers, No.12. Amsterdam: Transnational Institute. Jelsma, Martin, Tom Kramer, and Pietje Vervest. 2003. Drugs and Conflict in Burma (Myanmar): Dilemmas for Policy Responses. Drugs & Conflict Debate Papers, No. 9. Amsterdam: Transnational Institute. Jelsma, Martin, Tom Kramer, and Pietje Vervest, eds. 2005. Trouble in the Triangle: Opium and Conflict in Burma. Transnational Institute and Burma Centrum Nederland. Chiangmai: Silkworm Books. Joint Kokang-Wa Humanitarian Needs Assessment Team. 2003. Replacing Opium in Kokang and Wa Special Regions, Shan State Myanmar. March/April. Khaing Soe Naing Aung. 2000. A Brief History of the National Democratic Movement of Ethnic Nationalities. General Secretary of the National Democratic Front. KOWI. 2005. The Kokang and Wa Initiative: A Partnership for Development. Yangon. October. Kramer, Tom. 2004. “Burma/Myanmar: Ethnic Conflict and Military Rule.” In Searching for Peace in Northeast Asia, Southeast Asia and the Pacific. Utrecht: European Centre for Conflict Prevention. ———. 2005. “Ethnic Conflict and Dilemmas for International Engagement.” In Jelsma Kramer, and Vervest, eds. 2005. Trouble in the Triangle. Lahu National Development Organization. 2002. Unsettling Moves: The Wa Forced Resettlement Program in Eastern Shan State. Chiangmai. Lintner, Bertil. 1990. The Rise and Fall of the Communist Party of Burma (CPB). Ithaca, NY: Southeast Asia Program, Cornell University. ———. 1999. Burma in Revolt: Opium and Insurgency since 1948. Chiangmai: Silkworm Books. Lu, Saw. n.d. [1993–94?]. The Bondage of Opium: The Agony of the Wa People, A Proposal and a Plea. n.p. McCoy, Alfred W. 1991. The Politics of Heroin: CIA Complicity in the Global Drug Trade. New York: Lawrence Hill Books. Milsom, Jeremy. 2005. The Long Hard Road out of Drugs: The Case of the Wa. In Jelsma, Kramer, and Vervest, eds. 2005. Trouble in the Triangle. Pathan, Don. 2005. Thailand’s War on Drugs. In Jelsma, Kramer, and Vervest, eds. 2005. Trouble in the Triangle.

03 EWC PS38 Biblio

72

9/6/07, 3:11 PM

The United Wa State Party People’s Government of Special Region II. 2005. A Solemn and Just Statement in Responding for some State Court in US Accusing Wa Leaders. [Translated from original Chinese by UNODC staff.] People’s Government of Special Region II (Wa State), Myanmar [UWSA]. February 8. Phongpaichit, Pasuk. 2003. Drug Policy in Thailand. Senlis Council International Symposium on Global Drugs Policy, Lisbon, October 23–25. Renard, Ronald D. 1996. The Burmese Connection: Illegal Drugs & The Making of the Golden Triangle. Boulder and Washington, DC: Lynne Rienner. Reports on Wa State by British Officers During the Colonial Period I & II, n.d., n.p. S.H.A.N. (Shan Herald Agency for News). 2005a. Yawd Serk: The quarrel is with Wei, not Wa. No. 19–04/2005. April 20. ———. 2005b. Finding Neverland: The Story of Yawngkha. ———. 2005c. From Hongpang to Xinhong. No. 14–12/2005. December 19. ———. 2005d. Show Business: Rangoon’s “War on Drugs” in Shan State. Second Edition. Chiangmai. ———. 2006. Hands in Glove: The Burma Army and the Drug Trade in Shan State. Chiangmai. Smith, Martin. 1991. Burma: Insurgency and the Politics of Ethnicity. London and New Jersey: Zed Books. ———. 2002. Burma (Myanmar): The Time for Change. London: Minority Rights Groups International. Taylor, Robert. 1988. British Policy and the Shan States, 1886–1942. In Nontawasee, Prakai, ed. Changes in Northern Thailand and the Shan States 1886–1940. Singapore. Southeast Asian Studies Program, Institute of Southeast Asia Studies (ISEAS). UNDCP. 1999. Wa Development Project. 1999 Project Survey Report. ———. 2002. Strategic Program Framework UN Drug Control Activities in Myanmar. ———. n.d. Wa Alternative Development Project, Leaflet. UNODC. 2004. Myanmar Opium Survey 2004. October. ———. 2005a. Myanmar Opium Survey 2005. ———. 2005b. Farmers’ Intentions Survey 2005. ———. 2005c. Achievement in Mong Pawk District (1999–2005). Impact Assessment Survey Report. Wa Project. Wa Special Region 2, Eastern Shan State, Myanmar. ———. 2006. Opium Poppy Cultivation in the Golden Triangle, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Thailand. October. UNODCCP. 2001. Country Profile on Myanmar. U.S. Department of Justice. 2005. Press Release: Eight Leaders of Southeast Asia’s Largest Narcotics Trafficking Organization Indicted by a Federal Grand Jury in Brooklyn, New York. United States Attorney, Eastern District of New York. January 24. U.S. Department of State. 1999. International Narcotics Control Strategy Report 1998. Washington, DC. February. ———. 2006. International Narcotics Control Strategy Report 2006. Washington, DC. WFP/JICA. 2003. Rapid Needs Assessment Mission to Poppy Growing Areas of Kokang and Wa (Myanmar). November 20 to December 1. WFP. 2005. Nutrition Survey in WFP Project Areas in Magway, Lashio, Kokang and Wa. April–June. Yan Nyein Aye. 2000. Endeavors of the Myanmar Armed Forces Government for National Reconsolidation.

03 EWC PS38 Biblio

73

9/6/07, 3:11 PM

73

74

Tom Kramer Yawnghwe, Chao Tzang. 1987. The Shan of Burma: Memoirs of a Shan Exile. Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS). Yawnghwe, Harn. 2002. “The Non-Burman Ethnic Peoples of Burma.” In Sakhong, Lian H., ed. 2002. The New Panglong Initiative: Re-Building the Union of Burma. Chiangmai: UNLD Press, 29–30.

03 EWC PS38 Biblio

74

9/6/07, 3:11 PM

75

Internal Conflicts and State-Building Challenges in Asia Project Information

04 EWC PS38 Project

75

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

76

04 EWC PS38 Project

76

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

77

Project Rationale, Purpose, and Outline Project Director: Muthiah Alagappa Principal Researchers: Morten Pedersen (Burma/Myanmar) Saroja Dorairajoo (southern Thailand) Mahendra Lawoti (Nepal) Samir Kumar Das (northeast India) Neil DeVotta (Sri Lanka) Rationale Internal Conflicts and State-Building Challenges in Asia is part of a larger East-West Center project on state building and governance in Asia that investigates political legitimacy of governments, the relationship of the military to the state, the development of political and civil societies and their roles in democratic development, the role of military force in state formation, and the dynamics and management of internal conflicts arising from nation- and state-building processes. An earlier project investigating internal conflicts arising from nation- and state-building processes focused on conflicts arising from the political consciousness of minority communities in China (Tibet and Xinjiang), Indonesia (Aceh and Papua), and southern Philippines (the Moro Muslims). Funded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York, that highly successful project was completed in March 2005. The present project, which began in July 2005, investigates the causes and consequences of internal conflicts arising from state- and nation-building processes in Burma/Myanmar, southern Thailand, Nepal, northeast India, and Sri Lanka, and explores strategies and solutions for their peaceful management and eventual settlement. Internal conflicts have been a prominent feature of the Asian political landscape since 1945. Asia has witnessed numerous civil wars, armed insurgencies, coups d’état, regional rebellions, and revolutions. Many have been protracted; several have far-reaching domestic and international consequences. The civil war in Pakistan led to the break up of that country in 1971; separatist struggles challenge the political and territorial integrity of China, India, Indonesia, Burma, the Philippines, Thailand, and Sri Lanka; political uprisings in Thailand (1973 and 1991), the Philippines (1986), South Korea (1986), Taiwan (1991) Bangladesh (1991), and Indonesia (1998) resulted in dramatic political change in those countries.

04 EWC PS38 Project

77

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

78 Although the political uprisings in Burma (1988) and China (1989) were suppressed, the political systems in those countries, as well as in Vietnam, continue to confront problems of legitimacy that could become acute; and radical Islam poses serious challenges to stability in Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Indonesia. The Thai military ousted the democratically-elected government of Thaksin Shinawatra in 2006. In all, millions of people have been killed in the internal conflicts, and tens of millions have been displaced. Moreover, the involvement of external powers in a competitive manner (especially during the Cold War) in several of these conflicts had negative consequences for domestic and regional security. Internal conflicts in Asia can be traced to contestations over political legitimacy (the title to rule), national identity, state building, and distributive justice––that are often interconnected. With the bankruptcy of the socialist model and transitions to democracy in several countries, the number of internal conflicts over political legitimacy has declined in Asia. However, the legitimacy of certain governments continues to be contested from time to time, and the remaining communist and authoritarian systems are likely to confront challenges to their legitimacy in due course. Internal conflicts also arise from the process of constructing modern nation-states, and the unequal distribution of material and status benefits. Although many Asian states have made considerable progress in constructing national communities and viable states, several countries, including some major ones, still confront serious problems that have degenerated into violent conflict. By affecting the political and territorial integrity of the state as well as the physical, cultural, economic, and political security of individuals and groups, these conflicts have great potential to affect domestic and international stability. Purpose Internal Conflicts and State-Building Challenges in Asia examines internal conflicts arising from the political consciousness of minority communities in Burma/Myanmar, southern Thailand, northeast India, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. Except for Nepal, these states are not in danger of collapse. However, they do face serious challenges at the regional and local levels which, if not addressed, can negatively affect the vitality of the national state in these countries. Specifically, the project has a threefold purpose: (1) to develop an in-depth understanding of the domestic, transnational, and international dynamics of internal conflicts in these countries in the context of nationand state-building strategies; (2) to examine how such conflicts have affected

04 EWC PS38 Project

78

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

79 the vitality of the state; and (3) to explore strategies and solutions for the peaceful management and eventual settlement of these conflicts. Design A study group has been organized for each of the five conflicts investigated in the study. With a principal researcher for each, the study groups comprise practitioners and scholars from the respective Asian countries, including the region or province that is the focus of the conflict, as well as from Australia, Britain, Belgium, Sweden, and the United States. The participants list that follows shows the composition of the study groups. All five study groups met jointly for the first time in Washington, D.C., on October 30–November 3, 2005. Over a period of five days, participants engaged in intensive discussion of a wide range of issues pertaining to the conflicts investigated in the project. In addition to identifying key issues for research and publication, the meeting facilitated the development of cross-country perspectives and interaction among scholars who had not previously worked together. Based on discussion at the meeting, twenty-five policy papers were commissioned. The study groups met separately in the summer of 2006 for the second set of meetings, which were organized in collaboration with respected policy-oriented think tanks in each host country. The Burma and southern Thailand study group meetings were held in Bangkok July 10–11 and July 12–13, respectively. These meetings were cosponsored by The Institute of Security and International Studies, Chulalongkorn University. The Nepal study group was held in Kathmandu, Nepal, July 17–19, and was cosponsored by the Social Science Baha. The northeast India study group met in New Delhi, India, August 9–10. This meeting was cosponsored by the Centre for Policy Research. The Sri Lanka meeting was held in Colombo, Sri Lanka, August 14–16, and cosponsored by the Centre for Policy Alternatives. In each of these meetings, scholars and practitioners reviewed and critiqued papers produced for the meetings and made suggestions for revision. Publications This project will result in twenty to twenty-five policy papers providing a detailed examination of particular aspects of each conflict. Subject to satisfactory peer review, these 18,000- to 24,000-word essays will be published in the East-West Center Washington Policy Studies series, and

04 EWC PS38 Project

79

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

80 will be circulated widely to key personnel and institutions in the policy and intellectual communities and the media in the respective Asian countries, the United States, and other relevant countries. Some studies will be published in the East-West Center Washington Working Papers series. Public Forums To engage the informed public and to disseminate the findings of the project to a wide audience, public forums have been organized in conjunction with study group meetings. Five public forums were organized in Washington, D.C., in conjunction with the first study group meeting. The first forum, cosponsored by The Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies, discussed the conflict in southern Thailand. The second, cosponsored by The Sigur Center for Asian Studies of The George Washington University, discussed the conflict in Burma. The conflicts in Nepal were the focus of the third forum, which was cosponsored by the Asia Program at The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. The fourth public meeting, cosponsored by the Foreign Policy Studies program at The Brookings Institution, discussed the conflicts in northeast India. The fifth forum, cosponsored by the South Asia Program of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, focused on the conflict in Sri Lanka. Funding Support The Carnegie Corporation of New York is once again providing generous funding support for the project.

04 EWC PS38 Project

80

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

81

Project Participants Project Director Muthiah Alagappa, Ph.D. Director, East-West Center Washington (from February 2001 to January 2007) Distinguished Senior Fellow, East-West Center (from February 1, 2007)

Burma/Myanmar Study Group Morten Pedersen United Nations University Principal Researcher Mary Callahan University of Washington

Martin Smith Independent Analyst, London David I. Steinberg Georgetown University

Christina Fink Chiang Mai University

David Tegenfeldt Hope International Development Agency, Yangon

Saboi Jum Shalom Foundation, Yangon

Mya Than Chulalongkorn University

Kyi May Kaung Freelance Writer/Analyst, Washington, D.C.

Tin Maung Maung Than Institute for Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore

Tom Kramer Transnational Institute, Amsterdam

Ardeth Thawnghmung University of Massachusetts, Lowell

Curtis Lambrecht Yale University

Meredith Weiss East-West Center Washington

David Scott Mathieson Australian National University

Khin Zaw Win Independent Researcher, Yangon

Win Min Chiang Mai University

Harn Yawnghwe Euro-Burma Office, Brussels

Zaw Oo American University

05 EWC PS38 PList

81

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

82

Southern Thailand Study Group Saroja Dorairajoo National University of Singapore Principal Researcher

Chandra-nuj Mahakanjana National Institute of Development Administration, Bangkok

Thanet Aphornsuvan Thammasat University

Duncan McCargo University of Leeds

Marc Askew Victoria University, Melbourne

Celakhan (Don) Pathan The Nation Newspaper, Bangkok

Suchit Bunbongkarn Chulalongkorn University

Surin Pitsuwan MP, Thai House of Representatives

Kavi Chongkittavorn Nation Multimedia Group, Bangkok

Thitinan Pongsudhirak Chulalongkorn University

Neil John Funston Australian National University

Chaiwat Satha-Anand Thammasat University

Surat Horachaikul Chulalongkorn University

Vaipot Srinual Supreme Command Headquarters, Thailand

Srisompob Jitpiromsri Prince of Songkla University, Pattani Campus Joseph Chinyong Liow Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

Wattana Sugunnasil Prince of Songkla University, Pattani Campus Panitan Wattanayagorn Chulalongkorn University Imtiyaz Yusuf Assumption University, Bangkok

Nepal Study Group

05 EWC PS38 PList

Mahendra Lawoti Western Michigan University Principal Researcher

Lok Raj Baral Nepal Center for Contemporary Studies, Kathmandu

Itty Abraham East-West Center Washington

Surendra Raj Bhandari Law Associates Nepal, Kathmandu

Meena Acharya Tanka Prasad Acharya Memorial Foundation, Kathmandu

Chandra Dev Bhatta London School of Economics

82

Krishna Bhattachan Tribhuvan University

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

83 Sumitra Manandhar-Gurung Lumanthi and National Coalition Against Racial Discrimination, Kathmandu Harka Gurung (deceased) Transparency International, Nepal Dipak Gyawali Royal Nepal Academy of Science and Technology, Kathmandu Krishna Hacchethu Tribhuvan University Susan Hangen Ramapo College, New Jersey Lauren Leve University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill Prakash Chandra Lohani Former Finance Minister, Nepal

Anup Pahari Foreign Service Institute, Arlington Rajendra Pradhan Social Science Baha, Kathmandu Shree Govind Shah Environmental Resources Planning and Monitoring/Academy of Social Justice & Human Rights, Kathmandu Saubhagya Shah Tribhuvan University Hari Sharma Social Science Baha, Kathmandu Sudhindra Sharma Interdisciplinary Analyst (IDA), Kathmandu Dhruba Kumar Shrestha Tribhuvan University

Pancha Narayan Maharjan Tribhuvan University, Kirtipur

Seira Tamang Centre for Social Research and Development, Kathmandu

Sukh Deo Muni Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi

Bishnu Raj Upreti National Centre of Competence in Research, Kathmandu

Northeast India Study Group Samir Kumar Das University of Calcutta Principal Researcher

Dipankar Banerjee Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, New Delhi

Sanjay Barbara North Eastern Social Research Centre, Assam

Kalyan Barooah Assam Tribune

Sanjib Baruah Center for Policy Research, New Delhi Bard College, New York

05 EWC PS38 PList

83

M.P. Bezbaruah UN – WTO (World Tourism Organization), New Delhi Pinaki Bhattacharya The Mathrubhumi, Kerala

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

84 Subir Bhaumik British Broadcasting Corporation, Kolkata

Sukh Deo Muni Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi

Bejoy Das Gupta Institute of International Finance, Inc., Washington, D.C.

Bhagat Oinam Jawaharlal Nehru University

Partha S. Ghosh Jawaharlal Nehru University Uddipana Goswami Center for Studies in Social Science, Kolkata Sanjoy Hazarika Centre for North East Studies and Policy Research, New Delhi Anil Kamboj Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, New Delhi Bengt Karlsson Uppsala University, Sweden Dolly Kikon Stanford University Ved Marwah Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi Pratap Bhanu Mehta Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi

Pradip Phanjoubam Imphal Free Press, Manipur V.R. Raghavan Delhi Policy Group Rajesh Rajagopalan Jawaharlal Nehru University Swarna Rajagopalan Chaitanya––The Policy Consultancy, Chennai E.N. Rammohan National Security Council, New Delhi Bibhu Prasad Routray Institute for Conflict Management, New Delhi Ronojoy Sen The Times of India, New Delhi Prakash Singh Border Security Force (Ret’d.) George Verghese Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi

Sri Lanka Study Group

05 EWC PS38 PList

Neil DeVotta Hartwick College Principal Researcher

Sunanda Deshapriya Centre for Policy Alternatives, Colombo

Ravinatha P. Aryasinha American University

Rohan Edrisinha Centre for Policy Alternatives, Colombo

84

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

85 Nimalka Fernando International Movement Against All Forms of Discrimination & Racism, Colombo Bhavani Fonseka Centre for Policy Alternatives, Colombo Mario Gomez Berghof Foundation for Conflict Studies, Colombo Air Vice Marshall Harry Goonetileke Colombo Anberiya Hanifa Muslim Women’s Research and Action Forum, Colombo Dayan Jayatilleka University of Colombo N. Kandasamy Center for Human Rights and Development in Colombo S.I. Keethaponcalan University of Colombo

Darini Rajasingham Centre for Poverty Analysis, Colombo John Richardson, Jr. American University Norbert Ropers Berghof Foundation for Conflict Studies, Colombo Kanchana N. Ruwanpura Hobart and William Smith Colleges, New York P. Sahadevan Jawaharlal Nehru University Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu Centre for Policy Alternatives, Colombo Muttukrishna Sarvananthan Point Pedro Institute of Development, Sri Lanka Peter Schalk Uppsala University, Sweden Asanga Tilakaratne University of Kelaniya

N. Manoharan Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, New Delhi

Jayadeva Uyangoda University of Colombo

Dennis McGilvray University of Colorado at Boulder

Asanga Welikala Centre for Policy Alternatives, Colombo

Jehan Perera National Peace Council of Sri Lanka, Colombo Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam MP, Sri Lanka

Jayampathy Wickramaratne Ministry of Constitutional Affairs, Sri Lanka Javid Yusuf Attorney-at-Law, Colombo

Mirak Raheem Centre for Policy Alternatives, Colombo

05 EWC PS38 PList

85

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

86

05 EWC PS38 PList

86

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

87

Background on Burma/Myanmar’s Ethnic Conflicts One of the ethnically most diverse countries in the world, Burma (Myanmar) has suffered continuous armed ethnic conflict since independence in 1948. A series of ceasefires since the late 1980s has significantly reduced the levels of fighting across the country, but the legacies of hostility run deep, and the achievement of sustainable peace remains a major challenge in the twentyfirst century. The lands constituting the modern union-state of Burma have a turbulent history. From the foundation of Anawrahta’s empire at Pagan in the eleventh century, political authority often fluctuated in wars between different Burman, Mon, Rakhine, and Shan rulers in Buddhist city-states on the plains. Meanwhile Chin, Kachin, Karen, and other ethnic groups in the hills were only nominally brought under control of the various dynasties and kingdoms. On a major crossroads in Asia, a diversity of cultures proliferated and survived. Colonization by the British in the nineteenth century temporarily imposed external authority over this complex ethnic mosaic, but at the same time exacerbated existing ethnic cleavages. While Central Burma was subjected to British administrative and legal institutions, the non-Burman Frontier Areas were mostly left under the traditional rulers. This division compounded political and economic differences during a time of rapid social change. The British policy of recruiting hill peoples into the colonial army and the conversion of many to Christianity only fuelled interethnic suspicions. During the Second World War, Burman nationalist forces in the Burma Independence Army initially fought on the side of Imperial Japan, but eventually turned against the Japanese and cooperated with the returning British Army. However, atrocities committed during the early months of the war by Burmans against Karen and other minority groups loyal to the British had dangerously increased ethnic tensions. At the 1947 Panglong Conference, Chin, Kachin, and Shan representatives agreed to join a new Union of Burma in return for the promise of full autonomy. However the leaders of other ethnic groups were not included in these discussions, and the Karen national union boycotted the 1947 elections. Burma’s first constitution deepened these emerging fault lines by granting unequal rights to different ethnic groups and

06 EWC PS38 BkgdIn

87

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

88 territories. During the hurried British departure, conditions were being created for conflicts that would endure for decades to come. The first major group to take up arms against the government after independence was the Communist Party of Burma in March 1948. As violence escalated, armed struggle rapidly spread to the Karen, Mon, Karenni, Pao, Rakhine, and other nationality groups. The invasion by Chinese Nationalist Kuomintang remnants into the Shan State in late 1949 aggravated the breakdown of the embattled central government. By the late 1950s, the mood of rebellion had spread to the Shan, Kachin, and other ethnic groups, frustrated by what they perceived as governmental neglect. In 1960, Shan and other nationality leaders organized a Federal Movement that sought, by constitutional reform, to replace the centralized system of government with a genuinely federal structure. Their efforts were aborted though, when the national armed forces under General Ne Win seized power in March 1962. Parliamentary democracy was brought to a complete end. For a quarter of a century, Ne Win attempted to impose his isolationist “Burmese Way to Socialism” on the country. Confronting intensive counterinsurgency operations, armed opposition groups were gradually pushed out of the central plains into the surrounding borderlands. Here, however, insurgent forces were able to maintain control of their own “liberated zones,” financing their struggles out of taxes on Burma’s flourishing black markets that included illicit opium. Against this unending backdrop of war, Burma became one of the world’s poorest countries. The post-Cold War period has brought major changes to Burma, but no definitive solutions. The new military government, which took power after quelling pro-democracy protests in 1988, refused to hand over power to the newly-formed National League for Democracy (NLD) that won the 1990 general election by a landslide. Instead, following the collapse of the insurgent CPB, the regime forged ceasefires with a relatively large number of armed ethnic opposition groups, while massively expanding the national armed forces. In these endeavors, the military government was helped by neighboring countries that change their policies of de facto support for opposition groups to close economic relations with the post-Ne Win regime. This decisively shifted the military balance in favor of the central government, which continued to be largely boycotted by Western nations. New

06 EWC PS38 BkgdIn

88

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

89 infrastructure and economic projects were started in many areas previously contested by insurgent groups, with central government authority extending further than ever before. In contrast, opposition groups became steadily weakened, divided over tactics between militant forces, ceasefire groups, pro-electoral organizations, and those that sought broader alliances. In the twenty-first century, Burma’s future remains delicately poised. A few insurgent groups have continued largely defensive guerilla warfare, but with little apparent hope of reasserting their authority by military means. However, the ceasefire groups similarly fear that the country’s new constitution will provide few concessions to ethnic aspirations. Additionally, ethnic parties that stood in the 1990 election have been excluded—like the NLD—from constitutional discussions. Against this backdrop, conflict and human rights abuses have continued in several border regions, sustaining ethnic anger and resentment. The desire is widespread for peace through dialogue. But the sentiment that future generations will take up arms again to continue the cycles of political violence cannot be discounted.

06 EWC PS38 BkgdIn

89

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

90

06 EWC PS38 BkgdIn

90

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

91

Pre- and Post-1989 Names

06 EWC PS38 BkgdIn

State/Division Names Pre-1989

State/Division Names Post-1989

Chin State Irrawady Division Kachin State Karen State Karenni State (pre-1951) Magwe Division Mandalay Division Mon State Pegu Division Arakan Division Rangoon Division Sagaing Division Shan State Tenasserim Division

Same Ayeyarwady Division Same Kayin State Kayah State Magway Division Same Same Bago Division Rakhine Division Yangon Division Same Same Tanintharyi Division

City/Town Names Pre-1989

City/Town Names Post-1989

Bassein Myitkyina Bhamo Paan Pagan Moulmein Taungoo Prome Pegu Akyab Rangoon Lashio Taunggyi Pangsang Tavoy Mergui

Pathein Same Same Hpa-an Bagan Mawlamyine Toungoo Pyay Bago Sittwe Yangon Same Same Panghsang Dawei Myeik

91

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

92

06 EWC PS38 BkgdIn

92

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

93

Map of Burma/Myanmar

06 EWC PS38 BkgdIn

93

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

94

Ethnic Groups with Ceasefire Arrangements (2006)* 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20.

Communist Party of Burma (Arakan) New Democratic Army––Kachin Kachin Independence Organization Palaung State Liberation Party Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (Kokang) Kachin Defense Army United Wa State Army National Democratic Alliance Army (eastern Shan state) Shan State Army Shan State National Army Pao National Organization Shan State Nationalities People’s Liberation Organization Mong Tai Army Kayan National Guard Karenni National Democratic Party (Dragon Group) Kayan New Land Party Karenni Nationalities People’s Liberation Front Democratic Karen Buddhist Army New Mon State Party Mon Peace Group Chaungchi Region

*The locations marked are the headquarter bases of the main ceasefire groups recognized by the government. However there are great differences in the sizes and territories of the various organizations. Some forces are organized in extensive rural areas (e.g. the Kachin Independence Organization, Pao National Organization, and United Wa State Army), whereas a number of smaller breakaway factions exist in only a few villages (e.g. Kayan National Guard).

06 EWC PS38 BkgdIn

94

9/6/07, 3:12 PM

95

List of Reviewers 2006–07 The East-West Center Washington would like to acknowledge the following, who have offered reviews of manuscripts for Policy Studies. Itty Abraham East-West Center Washington

Sunil Dasgupta Georgetown University

Jaya Raj Acharya United States Institute of Peace

Neil DeVotta Hartwick College

Vinod K. Aggarwal University of California, Berkeley

Dieter Ernst East-West Center

Muthiah Alagappa East-West Center Washington

Greg Fealy Australian National University

Walter Andersen The Johns Hopkins University

David Finkelstein The CNA Corporation

Edward Aspinall Australian National University

Michael Foley The Catholic University of America

Marc Askew Victoria University, Melbourne

Sumit Ganguly Indiana University, Bloomington

Dipankar Banerjee Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, New Delhi

Brigham Golden Columbia University

Sanjay Barbora Panos South Asia, Guwahati

Michael J. Green Center for Strategic and International Studies Georgetown University

Upendra Baxi University of Warwick

Stephan Haggard University of California, San Diego

Apurba K. Baruah North Eastern Hill University, Shillong

Natasha Hamilton National University of Singapore

Sanjib Baruah Bard College

Farzana Haniffa University of Colombo

Thomas Berger Boston University

Rana Hasan Asian Development Bank

Ikrar Nusa Bhakti Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI), Jakarta

M. Sajjad Hassan London School of Economics

C. Raja Mohan Nanyang Technological University

Eric Heginbotham RAND Corporation

Mary P. Callahan University of Washington

Donald Horowitz Duke University

Richard Chauvel Victoria University, Melbourne

Chinnaiah Jangam Wagner College

T.J. Cheng The College of William and Mary

Brian Joseph National Endowment for Democracy

Chu Yun-han Academia Sinica

S. Kalyanaraman Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, New Delhi

Ralph A. Cossa Pacific Forum CSIS, Honolulu

07 EWC PS38 Reviewers

95

9/6/07, 3:27 PM

96 Bengt Karlsson Uppsala University

Danilyn Rutherford University of Chicago

Damien Kingsbury Deakin University

Kanchana N. Ruwanpura University of Southampton

Mahendra Lawoti Western Michigan University

James Scott Yale University

R. William Liddle The Ohio State University

Amita Shastri San Francisco State University

Satu P. Limaye Institute for Defense Analyses

Emile C.J. Sheng Soochow University

Joseph Chinyong Liow Nanyang Technological University

John Sidel London School of Economics

Owen M. Lynch New York University

Martin Smith Independent Analyst, London

Gurpreet Mahajan Jawaharlal Nehru University

Selma Sonntag Humboldt State University

Onkar S. Marwah Independent Consultant, Geneva

Ashley South Independent Consultant

Bruce Matthews Acadia University

David I. Steinberg Georgetown University

Duncan McCargo University of Leeds

Robert H. Taylor University of London

Donald McFetridge Former U.S. Defense Attaché, Jakarta

Tin Maung Maung Than Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore

Udayon Misra Dibrugarh University

Willem van Schendel Amsterdam School for Social science Research

Pratyoush Onta Martin Chautari

Jayadeva Uyangoda University of Colombo

Andrew Oros Washington College

Meredith Weiss East-West Center Washington

Morten Pedersen United Nations University, Tokyo

Thongchai Winichakul University of Wisconsin, Madison

Steven Rood The Asia Foundation, Philippines

Wu Xinbo Fudan University Harn Yawnghe Euro-Burma Office, Brussels

07 EWC PS38 Reviewers

96

9/6/07, 3:27 PM

97

Policy Studies Previous Publications Policy Studies 37 The Islamist Threat in Southeast Asia: A Reassessment John T. Sidel, London School of Economics and Political Science

Policy Studies 36 State of Strife: The Dynamics of Ethnic Conflict in Burma Martin Smith, Independent Analyst, London

Policy Studies 35 Rebellion in Southern Thailand: Contending Histories Thanet Aphornsuvan, Thammasat University

2006 Policy Studies 28 Counterterrorism Legislation in Sri Lanka: Evaluating Efficacy N. Manoharan, Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, New Delhi

Policy Studies 27 Japanese Public Opinion and the War on Terrorism: Implications for Japan’s Security Strategy Paul Midford, Norwegian University for Science and Technology, Trondheim

Policy Studies 26 Taiwan’s Rising Rationalism: Generations, Politics, and “Taiwanese Nationalism”

Policy Studies 34 Creating a “New Nepal”: The Ethnic Dimension

Shelley Rigger, Davidson College

Susan Hangen, Ramapo College of New Jersey

Policy Studies 33 Postfrontier Blues: Toward a New Policy Framework for Northeast India

Policy Studies 25 Initiating a Peace Process in Papua: Actors, Issues, Process, and the Role of the International Community Timo Kivimäki, Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, Copenhagen

Sanjib Baruah, Bard College

Policy Studies 32 Ethnic Conflict in Sri Lanka: Changing Dynamics Jayadeva Uyangoda, University of Colombo

Policy Studies 31 Political Authority in Burma’s Ethnic Minority States: Devolution, Occupation, and Coexistence Mary P. Callahan, University of Washington

Policy Studies 30 Legalizing Religion: The Indian Supreme Court and Secularism Ronojoy Sen, The Times of India, New Delhi

Policy Studies 29 Conspiracy, Politics, and a Disorderly Border: The Struggle to Comprehend Insurgency in Thailand’s Deep South

Policy Studies 24 Muslim Resistance in Southern Thailand and Southern Philippines: Religion, Ideology, and Politics Joseph Chinyong Liow, Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies, Singapore

Policy Studies 23 The Politics of Military Reform in Post-Suharto Indonesia: Elite Conflict, Nationalism, and Institutional Resistance Marcus Mietzner, Political Analyst

Policy Studies 22 India’s Globalization: Evaluating the Economic Consequences Baldev Raj Nayar, McGill University

Marc Askew, Victoria University, Melbourne

(continued next page)

These issues of Policy Studies are presently available in print and PDF. Hardcopies are available through Amazon.com. In Asia, hardcopies of all titles, and electronic copies of Southeast Asia titles are available through the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore at 30 Heng Mui Keng Terrace, Pasir Panjang Road, Singapore 119614. Website: http://bookshop.iseas.edu.sg/ Online at: www.eastwestcenterwashington.org/publications

07 EWC PS38 Reviewers

97

9/6/07, 3:27 PM

98

Policy Studies Previous Publications continued Policy Studies 21 China’s Rise: Implications for U.S. Leadership in Asia Robert G. Sutter, Georgetown University

2004 Policy Studies 13 Plural Society in Peril: Migration, Economic Change, and the Papua Conflict Rodd McGibbon, USAID, Jakarta

2005

Policy Studies 12

Policy Studies 20 The Helsinki Agreement: A More Promising Basis for Peace in Aceh? Edward Aspinall, Australian National University

Policy Studies 19 Nine Lives?: The Politics of Constitutional Reform in Japan J. Patrick Boyd, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Richard J. Samuels, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Policy Studies 18 Islamic Radicalism and Anti-Americanism in Indonesia: The Role of the Internet Merlyna Lim, Bandung Institute of Technology, Indonesia

Policy Studies 17 Forging Sustainable Peace in Mindanao: The Role of Civil Society Steven Rood, The Asia Foundation, Philippines

Policy Studies 16 Meeting the China Challenge: The U.S. in Southeast Asian Regional Security Strategies Evelyn Goh, Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies, Singapore

Sino-Tibetan Dialogue in the Post-Mao Era: Lessons and Prospects Tashi Rabgey, Harvard University Tseten Wangchuk Sharlho, Independent Journalist

Policy Studies 11 Autonomy in Xinjiang: Han Nationalist Imperatives and Uyghur Discontent Gardner Bovingdon, Indiana University, Bloomington

Policy Studies 10 Secessionist Challenges in Aceh and Papua: Is Special Autonomy the Solution? Rodd McGibbon, USAID, Jakarta

Policy Studies 9 The HDC in Aceh: Promises and Pitfalls of NGO Mediation and Implementation Konrad Huber, Council on Foreign Relations

Policy Studies 8 The Moro Conflict: Landlessness and Misdirected State Policies Eric Gutierrez, WaterAid, U.K. Saturnino Borras, Jr., Institute of Social Studies, The Hague

Policy Studies 7

Policy Studies 15

The Tibet-China Conflict: History and Polemics

The Xinjiang Conflict: Uyghur Identity, Language Policy, and Political Discourse

Elliot Sperling, Indiana University, Bloomington

Arienne M. Dwyer, The University of Kansas

Policy Studies 14 Constructing Papuan Nationalism: History, Ethnicity, and Adaptation

Policy Studies 6 Violent Separatism in Xinjiang: A Critical Assessment James Millward, Georgetown University

Richard Chauvel, Victoria University, Melbourne

(continued next page) These issues of Policy Studies are presently available in print and PDF. Hardcopies are available through Amazon.com. In Asia, hardcopies of all titles, and electronic copies of Southeast Asia titles are available through the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore at 30 Heng Mui Keng Terrace, Pasir Panjang Road, Singapore 119614. Website: http://bookshop.iseas.edu.sg/ Online at: www.eastwestcenterwashington.org/publications

07 EWC PS38 Reviewers

98

9/6/07, 3:27 PM

99

Policy Studies Previous Publications continued Policy Studies 5 The Papua Conflict: Jakarta’s Perceptions and Policies Richard Chauvel, Victoria University, Melbourne Ikrar Nusa Bhakti, Indonesian Institute of Sciences, Jakarta

Policy Studies 4 Beijing’s Tibet Policy: Securing Sovereignty and Legitimacy Allen Carlson, Cornell University

Policy Studies 3 Security Operations in Aceh: Goals, Consequences, and Lessons Rizal Sukma, Centre for Strategic and International Studies, Jakarta

Policy Studies 2 The Free Aceh Movement (GAM): Anatomy of a Separatist Organization Kirsten E. Schulze, London School of Economics

2003 Policy Studies 1 The Aceh Peace Process: Why it Failed Edward Aspinall, University of Sydney Harold Crouch, Australian National University

These issues of Policy Studies are presently available in print and PDF. Hardcopies are available through Amazon.com. In Asia, hardcopies of all titles, and electronic copies of Southeast Asia titles are available through the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore at 30 Heng Mui Keng Terrace, Pasir Panjang Road, Singapore 119614. Website: http://bookshop.iseas.edu.sg/ Online at: www.eastwestcenterwashington.org/publications

07 EWC PS38 Reviewers

99

9/6/07, 3:27 PM

100

07 EWC PS38 Reviewers

100

9/6/07, 3:27 PM