03/02/2019 Myanmar (International Christian Concern) – On February 25, the four ethnic armed groups of the Northern Alliance met with the government’s National Reconciliation and Peace Center (NRPC) in Yunnan Province, China and offered the Myanmar military a ceasefire during their meeting.
The Kachin Independence Army (KIA), Arakan Army (AA), Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA), and Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA), who formed the Northern Alliance, proposed a bilateral ceasefire with the military, an offer the NRPC said it would relay to senior officials, said TNLA spokesman Major Tar Aike Kyaw.
“It was an informal talk. Each side proposed its ideas for the peace process, so there was no agreement. We told them that we will have a bilateral ceasefire first, then we will sign the NCA,” he said, referring to the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement that was already signed by other ten armed groups, but not them.
“We asked them to sign a bilateral deal with our four armed groups at the same time and at the same place,” he said. Another round of negotiations is scheduled to take place in Yunnan next month.
For more than 70 years, Myanmar has been troubled with in-country fighting between different ethnic groups and the Burmese army across the country. As a result, tens of thousands of people from the mostly Christian Kachin ethnic group have been internally displaced, living in IDP camps with poor conditions.
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Author: Anna Grebeniuk
