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| Leaders of Armed Ethnic Groups Support Suu Kyi |
| Tuesday, 16 November 2010 |
Leaders of several of Burma's armed ethnic groups voiced support for freed pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, saying she is the appropriate person to lead an attempt at national reconciliation.
“We are very happy to hear that she is going to work for national reconciliation and a second Panglong conference. We believe that she is the right person for the task because there are many people in Burma and the international community who support her,” said Nai Hang Thar, the secretary of the New Mon State Party, an armed ethnic ceasefire group.
Maj Sai Lao Hseng, spokesperson for the Shan State Army-South (SSA-S), said, “We believe that she can work towards unity among the Burmese people and ethnic minorities.”
Suu Kyi is the one person suitable to organize the process of reconciliation in Burma and a second Panglong conference that includes ethnic minorities, said Sai Lao Hseng.
Upon her release on Nov. 13 after more than seven years under house arrest, Suu Kyi told thousands of cheering supporters that she first wanted to listen to the people before resuming new political activity and wished to form a strong “people's network.”
An official of the United Wa State Army (UWSA) in Panghsang, southern Shan State, said, “I personally support her efforts for democracy. We also want Burma to be a peaceful country.”
He also said that armed conflict between the Burmese government and ethnic groups will not end unless the government solves the conflict peacefully by political means.
Similarly, Suu Kyi said in response to a question at her press conference on Sunday that the ethnic conflicts should be solved peacefully, not by military means.
Zipporah Sein, the general secretary of the Karen National Union (KNU), said that even though the KNU and other armed ethnic groups engage in armed struggle, they wish to move in the same direction as Suu Kyi, who promotes nonviolent means.
“Suu Kyi is attempting to achieve democracy and change in Burma. Her goal is the same with ours,” she said.
Zipporah Sein also said that she believes the Burmese people will join Suu Kyi and the opposition political movement will be stronger.
“People will not sit and watch. They will join her as they have been waiting for her for so long,” she said.
Armed ethnic groups have been fighting for autonomy, self-determination and equality against the Burmese government since the country gained independence from Britain in 1948.
Tension between the government and the armed ethnic ceasefire groups that rejected the junta’s border guard force (BGF) has been mounting since April 2009, when the junta ordered the militias to join the BGF.
These tensions recently spiked when fighting between government troops and a splinter Karen rebel group, the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army's Brigade 5, erupted last week in several towns on the Thai-Burmese border, forcing more than 20,000 civilians to seek refuge on Thai soil for one night.
DKBA Brigade 5, led by Col Saw Lah Pwe, has rejected the BGF. Saw Lah Pwe said in a recent statement that he will join hands with Aung San Suu Kyi and fight for democracy, albeit by different means.
James Lum Dau, the deputy chief of foreign affairs in the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO), a cease-fire group that also rejected the BGF, said, “Ethnic conflict can be only solved by political means.”
irrawaddy |
posted by moderator
Copyright, respective author or news agency
 22:55   |
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