An increasingly violent situation has worsened in the past week in the borderlands of China and Burma. In the Kokang region of Burma (Myanmar), tensions have been rising over the past months as the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, an ethnically Chinese guerilla separatist group, began to attack Burmese army units in the border town, Laukkai. An estimated 60,000 ethnic Chinese citizens of Kokang have fled the border into China's Yunnan province.
About a week ago, a bomb was dropped inside Chinese territory, just over the border. The Chinese government has blamed the Burmese military as the ones who dropped the bomb, which killed 5 field workers in the small Chinese town. Burmese officials denied responsibility over the bombing, but expressed "deep sorrow" for the incident and agreed to cooperate in a joint investigation.
Although violence has steadily been creasing in Kokang, this is the first time the fighting has led to Chinese civilian casualties on their side of the border. As the MNDAA continues to fight the Burmese army, it is likely that more of the violence will spill onto the Chinese side of the border, as Burmese forces tried to repel them. The only place the MNDAA could safely go, if not successful, is over the border into China.
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2015/03/17/burm-m17.html
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