Two Ethnic Rebel Groups Announce Merger to Fight the Junta

Two ethnic Shan guerrilla groups announced that they have merged to fight Burma’s military regime, which has recently stepped up attacks against the minority amid fears that its political and military leaders are planning to secede.

The Shan State National Army, which reached a cease-fire with the ruling junta in 1995, will join with the Shan State Army or SSA, their leaders said late Saturday at a joint press conference at SSA headquarters, just across the border from northern Thailand’s Mae Hong Son province. The groups are two of the biggest among numerous Shan organizations.

The move comes amid a government crackdown on Shan organizations, including the heavy shelling of the SSA headquarters in April and the arrests of at least a dozen Shan politicians since February.

Some of those detained have been charged with sedition following reports that Shan politicians and guerrilla groups have held meetings, which the government has said included plans for secession.

Shan State National Army leader Col Jai Yi was reported last month to have fled northern Shan state with almost 2,000 of his guerrillas after relations with the junta deteriorated. However, Burma’s state media have reported that several hundred rebels have surrendered their weapons to the government, reaffirming the cease-fire.

The total number of Shan guerrillas is impossible to verify, but is believed to be in the low thousands.

The junta was already irritated due to some Shan delegates’ boycott of the government's constitutional convention.

The regime's fears about separatism were reinforced last month when a prominent Shan politician, exiled in Canada, issued a unilateral “declaration of independence.”

Jai Yi and Col Yawd Serk, the SSA leader, said they would decide later on a name for the merged group.

Saturday’s announcement coincided with Resistance Day, which marks almost 50 years of Shan struggle for autonomy from Burma’s central government. The Shan are the country's largest ethnic minority, and live in a vast area of northeastern Burma.

To mark the announcement of the merger, about 100 children playing traditional drums marched to the center of the camp where about 300 people gathered to hear a speech by Yawd Serk.

The activities ended with a wreath-laying and religious ceremony at the tomb of guerrillas who died protecting Shan guerrilla camps.