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Wired News on Feb. 11 & 12, '95



Attn: Burma Newsreaders
Re: Wired News on February 11 & 12, 1995
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Karen mutineers seize senior guerrilla official   

    By Robert Birsel 

    MAE SOT, Thailand, Feb 12 (Reuter) - A breakaway Karen rebel faction has
kidnapped a senior Karen National Union (KNU) official and spirited him back
from Thailand to a government-controlled zone in Burma, guerrilla and Thai
military sources said on Sunday. 

    They said six members of a group which mutinied against the KNU
leadership in December crossed into Thailand and seized senior official Mun
Yin Sein and two others in a border refugee camp on Thursday night. 

    The mutineers, armed with automatic rifles and grenade launchers, then
ordered the three captives to drive to a remote section of the Thai-Burmese
border. 

    One of the trio, a son of senior KNU commander General Maung Maung,
managed to escape. But the other two were forced across a border river into
an area under the control of Burmese government forces, the sources said. 

    The KNU has been fighting for Karen autonomy for more than 40 years and
Mun Yin Sein was the group's most senior official in southeast Burma's Paan
district. 

    The third person taken back to Burma was a low-ranking KNU member who
happened to be in the house with Mun Yin Sein when the kidnappers burst in,
the sources said. 

    Mun Yin Sein had been staying at a refugee camp on the Thai side of the
border since Burmese government forces, assisted by several hundred of the
Karen mutineers, captured the KNU's headquarters at Manerplaw on January 27. 

    About 500 rank-and-file Karen Buddhist guerrillas rebelled against the
Christian-led KNU in early December. 

    They formed their own Democratic Kayin (Karen) Buddhist Army and guided
and assisted government troops in the offensive against Manerplaw, KNU
guerrillas said. 

    Neither the Thai military nor the KNU sources would speculate on the
motive behind the kidnapping, but one KNU official said Mun Yin Sein was a
Buddhist who had remained loyal to the mostly-Christian KNU leadership. 

    ``I don't know why they took him, they must have their reason,'' the
official said. 

    Many KNU officials and guerrillas, as well as some 6,000 civilians, took
refuge on the Thai side of the border after the fall of Manerplaw. 

    Thai authorities say civilians can remain in Thailand until it is safe
for them to return to Burma. 

    Burmese government forces continued sporadic artillery attacks against
the KNU's last major border stronghold at Kawmoora. The camp was shelled on
Saturday evening and again in the early hours of Sunday. 

    Thai army sources said Burmese forces were keeping the 1,000 defenders of
Kawmoora on edge while they prepared for another assault on the well-defended
rebel base. 

    It lies in a loop of a border river with Thai territory on three sides.
The base is connected to Burma by a neck of land only a few hundred metres
wide and is difficult to attack. 

    More than 50 Burmese soldiers were killed and at least 50 wounded in a
large-scale attack on the camp last Wednesday, Thai officers said. 

 REUTER


Transmitted: 95-02-12 02:32:05 EST
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Burmese rebels determined to hold besieged base   

    By Robert Birsel 

    MAE SOT, Thailand, Feb 11 (Reuter) - Guerrillas from Burma's Karen ethnic
minority said on Saturday they were determined to hold their last major
stronghold on the Thai-Burmese border but would have to endure weeks of
intense bombardment and vicious fighting. 

    ``Kawmoora is the last place. If we lose it we become refugees,'' said
one senior guerrilla who slipped across the border to try to buy rice for his
unit. 

    Guerrillas said Burmese government forces had been ordered to capture the
Karen rebel base of Kawmoora at any cost and had deployed a formidable
battery of weapons to do it. 

    With the capture of the Karens' Manerplaw headquarters on January 27,
Kawmoora, on a horseshoe-shaped loop in the Moei river which forms the border
with Thailand, is the guerrillas' last major frontier stronghold. 

    The camp, with Thai territory of three sides and only a well-defended
neck of land several hundred metres wide linking it to Burma, will be hard to
take. 

    Burmese forces are dug in on two hills several hundred metres to the west
from which they fire down into the base. 

    Guerrillas said Burmese troops were preparing to cross into Thailand,
double back, and attack Kawmoora from its more vulnerable rear. 

    On Friday afternoon Burmese troops unleashed an artillery barrage,
including many phosphorous shells to burn down protective undergrowth in
Kawmoora and on the Thai bank of the Moei. 

    The guerrillas said that was obvious preparation for an attack through
Thailand. 

    Reuters correspondents flying over the Thai side of the border in a Thai
army helicopter could clearly see Burmese shells landing well inside Thai
territory. 

    A thick layer of smoke and dust hung over the besieged camp and circular
flashes of fire studded the gloom as shells slammed in. 

    Kawmoora has been shelled regularly since mid-December when Burmese
forces, taking advantage of a mutiny by several hundred Karen guerrillas,
launched their largest offensive since 1992. 

    They made their most determined effort yet to break through the camp's
defences on Wednesday with hundreds of soldiers rushing guerrilla positions
in what one Thai army commander likened to World War One human wave attacks. 

    Colonel Direk Yeamngarmrieb, commander of a Thai army task force
responsible for the border area opposite Kawmoora, told Reuters 50 Burmese
soldiers were killed in the attack and at least another 50 wounded. 

    Seven guerrillas were killed, other Thai military sources said. 

    Direk said Thailand was determined to keep the fighting off its soil and
his forces this week fired both warning smoke shells and live rounds at
Burmese positions when about 150 Burmese shells landed in Thailand. 

    Karen National Union (KNU) leaders say Kawmoora has little strategic
value but is an important symbol of their 46-year fight for greater autonomy.


    ``It's important for us to hold it, to have a place on the border, we
have lost all of our other places,'' one said. 

    ``If we lose Kawmoora the world will think we are finished,'' said the
official, who declined to be identified.


Transmitted: 95-02-11 02:25:28 EST
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