The Arakan Army, an insurgent group whose activities have severely affected the Indian-backed Kaladan multimodal transport project in Myanmar, has benefited from the clandestine transfer and smuggling of Chinese-made weapons, people familiar with the events said on Wednesday.
The group, designated a terrorist organization by Naypyitaw, clashed with Myanmar troops nearly 600 times last year, with most of the skirmishes taking place near the $ 480 million Kaladan project. There have also been at least four instances of Arakan Army cadres targeting shipments of materials for the infrastructure project, or attacking Myanmar troops providing security for the project, the people said on condition of anonymity. In 2019, just as a key phase of the Kaladan project was nearing completion in Rakhine and Chin states, the Arakan Army changed its area of operations there, they added.
“The Arakan Army has always kept its anti-Kaladan activities below a certain threshold so as not to up the ante. But their activities have had the overall impact of seriously hampering the implementation of the project, ”said one of the people cited above.
India and Myanmar are currently working to bring the Port of Sittwe into operation early next year as part of the massive transit and transportation project that will connect with the Port of Kolkata and help move goods to the landlocked northeastern states to across the Kaladan river.
On June 23, the Thai military seized a shipment of Chinese-made weapons, including AK-47 assault rifles, in the Mae Sot district, on the border with Myanmar’s Karen state. The weapons, worth 30 million baht (nearly $ 1 million), were intended to be supplied to the Arakan Army and the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), both active in Rakhine, the people said.
There are also reports that another large shipment of Chinese-made weapons was smuggled into Rakhine State via Monakhali Beach, near the Myanmar-Bangladesh junction, in the third week of February this year. “This illicit flow of Chinese-made weapons into Myanmar represents a threat to regional security and has implications for the Kaladan project. There are strong suspicions that China is orchestrating the actions of armed ethnic groups in Myanmar to further their objectives, ”said a second person from the security establishment.
People said there were growing signs that Myanmar’s military is acting to curb China’s influence and has contributed to canceling or restricting projects under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). The $ 3.6 billion Myitsone dam project remains on hold, while the Kyaukpyu port project was scaled down.
Sameer Patil, a fellow for international security studies at Gateway House, said it appeared that China was trying to undermine the viability of the Kaladan project after failing to convince Myanmar to give up on it.
.
