BANGKOK (AP) — Myanmar’s military government on Thursday formally applied the designation of terrorist organization to the Karen National Union, a major ethnic rebel group, making virtually any activities connected with it illegal, including contact by third parties.
The group, better known by the initials KNU and located in the country’s southeast, has been fighting on and off for greater autonomy from the central government since Myanmar became independent from Britain in 1948 under the name of Burma.
The KNU has been engaged in especially fierce combat with the army since the military seized power from the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February 2021.
The announcement came just four months before the military’s planned elections begin on Dec. 28, which the KNU has vowed to disrupt. The terrorist designation would make it more difficult to carry out any activities hindering the polls, even nonviolent information campaigns, which already have been declared illegal.
State-run MRTV television reported Thursday night that the military government’s Anti-Terrorism Central Committee named the KNU as terrorist because they “have caused serious losses of public security, lives and property, important infrastructures of the public and private sector, state-owned buildings, vehicles, equipment and materials.”
A separate notice on MRTV said Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, the military’s leader who is serving as Myanmar’s acting president, declared the KNU and its affiliated organizations to be unlawful organizations, which criminalizes contact with them.
After reporting the announcements, the MRTV repeatedly broadcast a 1947 quote from Aung San, Myanmar’s independence hero, to serve as a warning to the KNU about its plans to disrupt the election.
“Our government will not look on with indifference at those who try to disrupt the election,” were the words attributed to Aung San, who was the father of Aung San Suu Kyi, who was imprisoned after the 2021 military takeover.
“They will be severely punished. Our government will not interfere with anyone who is competing freely in the election. However, let me clearly warn you that we will use all the power to suppress anyone who tries to disrupt it.”
The KNU did not immediately respond to requests from The Associated Press for comment.
The polls have been denounced by critics as a sham to normalize the army’s 2021 seizure of power. They also say that the dissolution of Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party, which won a landslide victory in the 2020 elections, means the polls cannot be considered fair.
Several opposition organizations, including the KNU, have said they will try to derail the election. The military government enacted an election law last month that carries the death penalty under certain conditions for anyone who opposes or disrupts the polls.
The Karen, like other minority groups living in border regions, have struggled for decades for greater autonomy from Myanmar’s central government.
The KNU, along with seven other ethnic rebel armies, signed a cease-fire agreement in October 2015 with the former quasi-civilian government led by former general Thein Sein to end more than six decades of fighting.
However, the group became allies with pro-democracy militias formed after the military seized power in 2021 and offered refuge to the opponents of the military government. After nonviolent protests against the military takeover were put down with lethal force, armed resistance arose that has now embroiled much of the country in civil war.
In addition to directly engaging the military government’s troops on the battlefield in Kayin state, the armed wing of the KNU, the Karen National Liberation Army, has been training hundreds of young activists from the cities in the rudiments of warfare. Kayin state is also known as Karen state.
The KNU, together with the other ethnic minority groups fighting with the army, also boycotted the military government’s proposed peace talks after the army takeover, saying they did not meet their demands.
The group’s demands include the military’s withdrawal from politics, implementation of federal democracy and acceptance of international involvement in solving the country’s crisis.
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