ICC Note: Last June, fighting between Burmese government soldiers and the Kachin Independent Army (KIA) forced thousands of people to flee the seven wards that comprise the Tanaing gold and amber mining region in Kachin state’s Tanaing township. As a result, the number of IDPs in need of assistance is on the rise. Last Sunday, Burmese troops prevented members of an aid group from entering the area to deliver rice, though the group had received permission from the Kachin state government.
08/21/2017 Myanmar (Radio Free Asia) – The Myanmar military has stopped a prominent domestic activist and aid group from delivering rice to war refugees in a camp in Kachin state, even though there are no hostilities between the government army and ethnic militias in the area.
Soldiers on Sunday stopped cars driven by members of the 88 Generation Peace and Open Society Group, formerly known as the pro-democracy 88 Generation Student Group, from transporting bags of rice to ethnic Lisu people living in an internally displaced persons camp in the northern state’s Sadone area.
They left their villages during a recent flare-up of hostilities between the Myanmar army and the Kachin Independence Army (KIA), one of Myanmar’s ethnic armed militias. The two armies have been engaged in fighting in the state, which is home to many of the country’s estimated 700,000 members of the Lisu ethnic minority.
Mie Mie, an activist and a prominent member of the 88 Generation Peace and Open Society Group — known for its activism against a previous military junta that ruled the country — told RFA’s Myanmar Service that troops prevented members from entering the area to deliver the rice, though the group had received permission from the Kachin state government.
More than 500 internally displaced persons, including 100 children, are staying at the camp.
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