NORTHERN THAILAND COMMENTS ON KARENNI NATIONAL PROGRESSIVE

C O N F I D E N T I A L CHIANG MAI 000139 SIPDIS SIPDIS STATE FOR EAP/MLS, PRM/A: TRUSCH AND S/CT: TKUSCHNER E.O. 12958: DECL: 8/22/2016 TAGS: PGOV PHUM PREF PTER TH BM SUBJECT: NORTHERN THAILAND COMMENTS ON KARENNI NATIONAL PROGRESSIVE PARTY REF: A. RANGOON 1184 B. STATE 130770 CLASSIFIED BY: John Spykerman, Political Officer, Consulate Chiang Mai, State. REASON: 1.4 (c) ¶1. (U) This cable provides supplemental information to Embassy Rangoon's more comprehensive response (ref. A) to Department's request for information on the Karenni National Progressive Party (KNPP) in ref B. ¶2. (C) SUMMARY. Local RTG intelligence officials strongly dismissed links between the KNPP and any terrorist activities. Instead, these officials suspect that Burma's State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) engages in active misinformation campaigns against those ethnic organizations that have not agreed to cease-fire agreements with the Burmese regime. According to one source, these SPDC propaganda attacks are designed to link ethnic organizations to terrorism and erode international support for their cause. Northern Thailand-based refugee assistance organization sources also doubt the KNPP's ability to execute terrorist attacks, although they allege the organization has used intimidation and violence both within the camps and outside. End Summary. ¶3. (C) Wiroon Iampraphat, chief of the RTG's National Intelligence Agency (NIA) Mae Hong Son office, flatly dismissed alleged links between the KNPP and terrorist activities. Wiroon (PROTECT) told post he has worked in northwestern Thailand's Mae Hong Son province with his Burmese ethnic minority counterparts (including Karenni, Shan, Pa-O, and Palaung) for more than 10 years and has a deep familiarity with the KNPP's military and political strategies and those of the SPDC. According to his analysis, the SPDC has tried to capitalize on international sentiment against terrorist movements to discredit non-ceasefire rebel groups, thus weakening international support and pressuring these rebels to seek "a return to legal fold" within the Burmese regime. Wiroon also speculated that such propaganda could be meant to save face for SPDC leaders' failure to charge suspects in a spate of bombings in Rangoon earlier this year. ¶4. (C) Wiroon said the NIA believes the KNPP and other ethnic rebel groups have usually attacked only SPDC military targets and have eschewed civilian locations. Moreover, Wiroon said KNPP military action is defensive in nature, limited to small areas of Kayah State, and designed to protect bases, villages, and cross-border trade routes. Wiroon said the KNPP, like other ethnic rebel groups, relies to some degree on assistance from the RTG and Thailand-based organizations and it was in their best interests to "keep themselves clean" from suspicions of drug trafficking or terrorist activities. ¶5. (C) Officials with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) office in Mae Hong Son who are familiar with the KNPP also doubt that the group has any capacity to engage in the activities listed in ref B. Gradual loss of territory and defections to the SPDC over the years have weakened the KNPP's reach, and the group is especially sensitive to bad press and eager to maintain its dialogue with the UNHCR and other NGOs, those officials said. However, UHNCR Mae Hong Son field office chief Hanne Mathisen said that the KNPP has used intimidation and violence both within the camps and outside. She added that although the KNPP now says it does not employ child soldiers, it continues to compel porters and medics to cross into Burma to treat injured soldiers during its operations in Kayah State. ¶6. (U) This cable was coordinated with Embassies Bangkok and Rangoon. CAMP