The UNFC 8 point proposal spelled out in this report is the key to make the NCA a more fair negotiation process and correct the lop-sided present form of agreement. In other words, until now which is the only game in town, would become a level playing field, where contenders could participate in an equal manner.

But when General Mya Tun Oo, joint chief of staff of the army, navy and air force, said by signing the NCA in its present form would do away with the recent Tatmadaw offensives in Kachin and Shan States, he was in effect saying that “if you people don’t sign, we will go on with the offensive and swing you to do it”. Precisely, he rejected the most important condition proposal of Tatmadaw’s unilateral ceasefire declaration, followed by ethnic armies ceasefire declaration, which will then would become a bilateral one, thereby torpedoing the UNFC proposal altogether.

This means, there is no political will and for that matter no good will from the part of the Tatmadaw to end the war for mutual benefit, but to force the ethnic resistance armies to give in to its “negotiated surrender” mode of political settlement, which will not happen given the time tested approach employed earlier for decades by the Tatmadaw and the will of the ethnic people to wage and continue with the resistance war.

On top of this, Mya Tun Oo rejection of all-inclusiveness by refusing even to consider talking about taking the Kokang, Palaung and Arakan Army into the NCA; and Commander-in-Chief Min Aung Hlaing recently telling Special Envoy for Asian Affairs Sun Guoxiang that the ethnic armies refused to “sign the NCA because they do not want to carry out peace processes similar to that of international community. Despite wishing to demand all political rights through the meeting in political trend, they want to hold up the armed struggle line. No country accepts the demand of political rights all over the world by holding firearms,” according to the publication in his Facebook.

To sum up, despite the Chinese pressure for all-inclusiveness peace negotiation, the Tatmadaw seems to be determined to go on for a continued military offensive on the ethnic armies, presuming that the country’s sovereignty is solely owned by it and justify its war on the ethnic nationalities as preserving national unity through sheer military might.

But the fact is that this political notion is contested by the ethnic armies and as well ethnic political parties based on “shared-sovereignty” notion, which in effect means the monopoly of sovereignty by the Tatmadaw and as well, Bamar political class, would not be accepted and this main bone of contention should be ironed out through peaceful negotiation process, rather than just war. That is in fact the roots of the whole conflict problematic.

Link to the story: http://frontiermyanmar.net/en/unfc-commits-to-nca-negotiations-panglong-process