Kutkai men arrested on suspicion of links to rebels
Two men in northern Shan State’s Kutkai Township have
reportedly been arrested by the Burmese military on suspicion of association
with a rebel armed group.
“The Burmese troops arrested them because they
suspected they were linked to the SSPP [Shan State Progress Party/Shan State
Army], he said. “The Tatmadaw [Burmese army] said that if they could prove
they were not associated with the SSPP they would release them.”
These two men are residents of That Fah village in
Kengmon tract in Kutkai Township, Shan State Assembly lawmaker Sai Jing Lu
explained. “On the day of their arrest, they were returning home from selling
their buffalos in Kutkai,” he said. “Their car broke down in Karleng, so they
went into the town to borrow a friend’s motorbike to buy the equipment to fix
their car. After buying the equipment they were driving back to the car on the
motorbike when they were stopped by Burmese soldiers from Division 99. They
were questioned but they don’t speak any Burmese. The soldiers then arrested
them.”
The SNLD MP said he received a report of their
arrest on February 15. He then contacted the Kutkai Township’s governor, Kyaw
Winn.
On February 17, the parents of both men requested a
meeting with their sons, he said, and were able to see them that afternoon.
Meanwhile, Sai Jing Lu said, he contacted local authorities in Kutkai and asked
them to process the case.
He said the men were told they would be released if
they had nothing to do with the Shan rebels. However, at the time of press the
pair was still in detention.
Clashes have been reported regularly between the Tatmadaw
and SSPP/SSA, which is a member of the ethnic
bloc United Nationalities Federal Council (UNFC). The SSPPSSA declined to sign
the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement (NCA) with the government in October 2015.
However, it did sign state-level and union-level ceasefire accords with the
then Thein Sein government. On January 25, Shan Herald reported
that clashes broke out between two
groups in southern Shan State’s Mong Hsu Township.
Tags: News, War
