Junta invites Shans to

Junta invites Shans to "exchange arms for peace" 

A junta general recently issued leaflets inviting Yawdserk's Shan State Army to surrender, according to sources coming from across the Salween. 

Brig Gen Htay Oo, Commander, LID (Light Infantry Division) 99, during a mass meeting on 6 October at Kawngmu Temple, Kholam Village, Kunhing Township, southern Shan State, delivered thousands of leaflets containing an invitation to officers and men of the Shan State Army "South" to "join hands with the Army and people" and "exchange arms for peace". The leaflets, written both in Burmese and Shan, and signed by Htay Oo himself, also directed the units concerned "to take good care of the bearer of the leaflet," forbade them "to torture, confiscate personal belongings and mistreat the leaflet bearer in general" promising to punish those who disobeyed with "severe action." 

Gen Htay Oo also urged the meeting "to persuade the SURA (Junta's term for Shan State Army 'South') either to surrender or make truce like other groups, so there shall be no more abandoned fields and villages and people caught in the crossfire," according to the source who brought copies of the leaflets to S.H.A.N. 

Although the text was worded in such a way to mean that the Shan fighters could only surrender, the general went on to explain that they could "keep their arms and stay anywhere. The main thing is that we don't fight each other." 
Another source later added that Gen Htay Oo was summoned to Rangoon after reports of last month's conflict in Loihtwe (Doi Thuay in Thai), Mongton Township, opposite Chiangmai Province of Thailand, came out. He left for Rangoon on 1 October to Kholam where he had his advance headquarters. (LID 99 is based in Meikthila)
Kholam, situated between Namzarng and Kunhing, used to have only 200-300 households. It swelled 10-fold following forced relocations in Hailai, Tonhoong, Napoi and Kungmong, village tracts in the surrounding areas. 

A few days before the meeting in Kholam, the Army clashed with Shan fighters in a sesame field near the abandoned village of Wanlook, Napoi Tract. The soldiers captured 2 dead and also shot to death the 3 farmers in the field.