To Hopeland and Back: 27th trip
Day Five. Thursday, 16 February 2017
You are a reasonable man.
It’s just that you’ve never been approached the right way.
Mareen
O’Hara, The Redhead from Wyoming (1953)
 |
The KNU delegation with the
cadet
school faculty, 16 February 2017. (Photo: PI)
|
The meeting today with the KIO CEC lasts 5 hours,
08:00-13-00, with a 20minute break in-between.
Gen
N’Ban La opens the meeting:
·
We had jointly
drafted the NCA, but were unable to sign it. The reason was the government had
spurned the all inclusive principle
·
When it comes to
political matters, we follow the decisions of the UNFC
·
At
Mai Ja Yang (July 2016), both signatories and non-signatories were able to
adopt the 8 point federal guideline
(For those readers, who are unfamiliar with the
guideline, which was first adopted in 2005 by Thai border-based organizations,
here it is:
1.
Sovereign powers
derive from the people
2.
Equality of all
national races, both political and racial wise
3.
Right of Self
Determination
4.
Federal
principles
5.
Minority rights
6.
Democracy, human
rights and gender equality
7.
Secular State
8.
Multi-party
democratic system)
·
Other obstacles
to negotiations included the resolution by Shan State legislature designating
us as terrorist organizations
·
We are disappointed
the NLD government has nothing to say about it despite overwhelming support for
her during the 2015 polls by the Kachin people
·
Please regard
criticisms between us (signatories and non-signatories) as flowers thrown at
each other
Other
than him, there’s only Gen Gun Maw who takes the floor, despite the presence of
several prominent leaders like Sumlut Gam, Lanan, and Laphai La, to name a few.
Gun
Maw strongly supports the cooperation among SMJH and Karen Unity and Peace
Committee (KUPC) of which KNU is a member and Committee for Shan State Unity
(CSSU), of which RCSS is a member.
Altogether,
the three EAOs will be working together at least in three areas:
·
Cooperation among
SMJH, KUPC and CSSU
·
Panglong Handbook
publication
·
The 8 point
federal guidelines
 |
The KA 25,
produced by
KIA factory. (Photo:PI)
|
Gen N’Ban La concludes the meeting with the remark: Signing
the NCA means submission to the 2008 constitution.
Which
seems to be different what he had said on 20 January. The thought comes to me
that maybe he is reflecting the general view of the KIO CEC. (Col Hkun Okker later
recalled that at the Lawkhilar Conference in 2015, the matter was already
resolved by the decision that signing the NCA would not mean accepting the 2008
constitution.)
In
the afternoon, we visit three places:
·
The Cadet Training School, where its 7th
intake (65 cadets) are due to wind up their training by the end of the
month. Needless to say, we also visit
the spot where 23 cadets were killed by shelling from the Burma Army on 18
November 2014.
·
Forward base
facing the Burma Army bases where we see several KIA fighters from Battalion
#23 armed with the Kachin version of AK47s, renamed KA 25. They are lighter
than AKs and MAs, we are told.
·
School for
administrators, where they are training 80 trainees (5 of them women). The KIO
has divided the Kachin State into several administrative levels:
5 divisions
20 districts
60 townships
194 tracts
 |
The KNU delegation with the
KIA cadets,
16 February 2017. (Photo: PI)
|
The
day ends with a 3 hour discussion on SSR/DDR between the KNU’s JMC expert Ta Do
Moo and top KIA officers led by deputy chief of staff Brig Gen Khawng Lum.
The
next day we are back in Kunming.
The
following day is spent reviewing our trip. All conclude that it has been a
rewarding trip that further cements the relations between the signatories and
non-signatories.
The
problem of being signatories and non-signatories still persists nevertheless.
To this, the review session decides to leave well enough alone. That a policy
other than the respect for each other’s right of self-determination will ruin
any progress we have made.
On
19 February, we are back in Chiangmai.
Tags: Opinion
