Representatives from armed resistance movements (ARMs) are scheduled to hold a meeting in Myitkyina and 15 May, a day after the planned 2-day talks between the Kachin Independence Organization/Kachin Independence Army (KIO/KIA) and the government’s Union Peacemaking Work Committee (UPWC), according to resistance sources.

Earlier they were planning to hold a third summit in Mongla on the Sino-Burmese border to discuss on the single text document for the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement (NCA). [The first was in Laiza, 30 October-2 November 2013 and the second at Law Khee Lar, 20-25 January 2014]. However, both the United Wa State Army (UWSA) and its ally the National Democratic Alliance Army (NDAA), had refused to host it “at the last minute,” citing “incomprehension of the aim and objectives” of the planned summit, according to NCCT sources.

The representatives meeting in Myitkyina will then travel to Rangoon for the NCCT-UPWC meeting, 19-20 May, over the NCA single text document.

The document, combining proposals made by both sides, has 23 pages. All propositions and words both sides are in agreement are typed in black, while those that have been proposed by the NCCT for the UPWC to consider are in red. Concurrently, those that were proposed by the UPWC for the NCCT to consider are in blue.

Differences in the wordings include, among others, the NCCT’s “Ethnic Armed Movements” (together with the UPWC’s “Armed Ethnic Movements”) and “Federal Democratic Union” (UPWC’s Democratic Nation.)
Differences in principles include, also among others, the UPWC’s proposition that “Any violation of the NCA by either side shall be subject to the decision of the Union Peacemaking Central Committee (UPCC).”

The UPCC, according to the NCCT is to all intents and purposes, “the Ka-long (National Defense and Security Council, considered the most powerful organ in the country) in another name.”

It is made up of 11 people: the President, 2 Vice Presidents, lower house speaker, upper house speaker, Commander-in-Chief, Home Minister, Defense Minister, Border Affairs Minister, Attorney General and President’s Office Secretary. The only difference to the Ka-long is that the latter has the Deputy Commander in Chief and a foreign minister instead of the Attorney General and the President’s Office Secretary.

“One reason it has taken so much time to finalize the NCA is the both sides have been spending so much time wrangling with each other over political issues, which are better discussed after the NCA,” said a prominent NCCT member.

The NCA signing is planned to be followed by negotiations for the Framework for Political Dialogue and, afterward, Political Dialogue.