Myanmar or Burma

China reopened all its border crossings to areas of Myanmar controlled by the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) after the junta and MNDAA signed a peace deal.

The Arakan Army (AA) and its allies have extended operations from Rakhine State into Ayeyarwady Region and are reportedly 62km northwest of the regional capital, Pathein.

Junta troops have been rapidly retreating since the AA attacked Magyizin on January 5 following the seizure of Gwa Township in southern Rakhine on December 29, according to residents.

The military regime is targeting homeless people in its conscription drive in Mandalay, Myanmar’s second-largest city, according to residents.

China’s foreign affairs ministry announced on Monday that the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) had agreed to return control of the northern Shan State capital to the Myanmar military regime in a new ceasefire deal.

Representatives of the Myanmar junta and the MNDAA—also commonly called the Kokang army—concluded the ceasefire agreement on Saturday following negotiations mediated by Chinese officials.

The MNDAA is an ethnic armed organisation whose members are mostly Kokang people, a Mandarin-speaking ethnic community native to an area of northern Shan State that borders China’s Yunnan Province.

Although the Chinese ministry’s statement provided few details about the terms of the agreement, sources in Myanmar and China confirmed that the Kokang army’s forces will be required to withdraw from the city of Lashio, northern Shan State, the location of the Myanmar military’s northeastern regional headquarters, by June.

Chinese authorities have been pressuring the MNDAA to withdraw from Lashio and cease hostilities against the Myanmar junta for months, threatening action against the Kokang group’s commanders and throttling the traffic of fuel, medicine, food and other vital supplies to MNDAA-held territories via the Chinese border.

With the ceasefire already in force on Sunday, Chinese authorities opened the border crossing in Chin Shwe Haw, northern Shan State, a town in the MNDAA-controlled territory of Shan State Special Region 1 or the Kokang region of Myanmar, previously designated as the Kokang Self-Administered Zone in Myanmar’s 2008 constitution.

Spokespersons for the United Wa State Party and its armed wing the United Wa State Army—a larger ethnic armed organisation in control of other territories in northern and eastern Shan State—announced on Monday that the Namtit Bridge border checkpoint in Namtit Subtownship had also reopened with permission from Chinese authorities.

In an alleged bid to pressure the Kokang army, Chinese authorities detained MNDAA head Peng Daxun in China, claiming he was undergoing medical treatment when pressed for an explanation. Peng Daxun’s status and whereabouts are still unknown.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/37353879

Over 360 media workers were behind bars in the final month of 2024, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) reported Thursday, highlighting China and Israel as jailing the highest number.

In its annual census the New York-based organization counted 361 people as being in prison on December 1, 2024, its highest total since 2022, when 370 were counted.

China, Israel, and Myanmar — with 50, 43 and 35 journalists detained, respectively — “emerged as the world’s three worst offenders in another record-setting year for journalists jailed because of their work,” CPJ said.

The Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and allies say they are attacking Myanmar junta troops retreating from Mansi Township, Kachin State, inflicting heavy casualties.

The Karen Border Guard Force (BGF) has announced a crackdown following the abduction of Chinese celebrities as forced labor for scam compounds in areas under its control on the Myanmar-Thai border.

The announcement came during an emergency meeting in Karen State’s Myawaddy on Wednesday between the BGF, the Democratic Karen Benevolent Army (DKBA), and local Chinese businessmen.

China will make every effort to rescue Chinese nationals who fell foul of scam operations luring them to countries including Myanmar, the public security ministry said late on Wednesday. Overseas fraud syndicates have duped Chinese citizens with promises of high-paying jobs, food, accommodation and airfares, and trapped them in telecoms fraud dens in towns such as Myawaddy, on Myanmar's border with Thailand, the ministry said in a report by state media CCTV.

Kyu Kyu Hla, wife of Myanmar coup leader Min Aung Hlaing, is known for her lavish tastes, particularly when it comes to luxury handbags. The exact number in her collection remains unknown, but she has been spotted with 15 totes from several ultraluxury brands, valued at a staggering US$ 275,000 – or over 1 billion kyats.

In a statement released on Monday, the US government agency said that Telecom International Myanmar Co, Ltd—better known as Mytel—had been sanctioned for “actions and activities” contrary to US national security and foreign policy interests.

Specifically, the company has provided “surveillance services and financial support to Burma’s military regime, enabling the regime to carry out human rights abuses through the tracking and identification of target individuals and groups,” the statement said.

Thai condo transfers to Myanmar buyers ranked second after Chinese purchasers for the first nine months of 2024, overtaking Russian buyers as the Myanmar junta’s crackdown on Thai condo purchases subsided.

The purported leader of a Japan-based crime syndicate pleaded guilty Wednesday to charges alleging that he conspired to traffic uranium and plutonium from Myanmar in the belief that Iran would use it for nuclear weapons.