Push coming to shove for Kachins

No.07 - 1/2007
18 January 2007
Drugs
 
Push coming to shove for Kachins
 
A year after the cross-border timber trade has been closed off by Burma's ruling military junta, the cash-strapped Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) is increasingly becoming dependent on drug production and trade for survival, Hawkeye reports from the Sino-Burma border:
 
Before 2006, the group's income could be roughly broken down into 4 categories, according to sources close to the KIO: timber (40%), jade (30%), casinos (20%) and others (10%).
 
However, since the arrival in 2005 of the new regional commander Maj-Gen Ohn Myint in Kachin State, the logging business have been seeing better days. Chinese loggers working in the Kachin forests were cracked down and some shot down in cold blood, forcing several Chinese companies to close shop.
 
"The HQ in Laiza and most of its brigades are low on income but that does not include the 4th Brigade in northern Shan State," said a source working with the Kachin group since it had concluded a ceasefire agreement with the Burma Army in 1994.
 
The townships of Namkham, Kutkhai, Hsenwi and Lashio, where the KIO, together with another Kachin ceasefire group, Kachin Democratic Army (KDA) of Mahtu Naw, holds sway, poppy fields have returned in force during the 2006-2007 season, many reportedly with full knowledge of the local Burma Army units. "You can find 5-6 refineries working full time," one insider source told S.H.A.N. "This area boasts the largest number of refineries in Shan State today."
 
The markets for their products are also either close at hand or convenient: China (60%), border areas (15%), gem mines and jade mines of Phakant, Hsaitawng and Monghsu (15%) and India and Rangoon (10%).
 
The result: although the KIO has declared itself drug free, drugs are "selling like hot cakes," according to a source, across the border in places like Longchuan (Mongwan) and Yinjiang (Mongna).
 
Further south, the Wa who had also declared its territory drug free in 2005 are facing the same situation "It looks as if the SPDC (the ruling State Peace and Development Council) do not want us to be free from drugs," remarks a ceasefire officer. "They tell us to do away with drugs, but offer us no alternatives in return."
 
Burma's generals have declared the country would be free of drugs by 2014.