Kokang Self-Administered Zone
Self-administered zone
Flag of Kokang Self-Administered Zone
Flag
Location in Shan State
Location in Shan State
CountryMyanmar
StateShan State
No. of townships2
CapitalLaukkai
Government
 • ChairmanBrig. Gen. Tun Tun Myint
Elevation
5,189 ft (1,582 m)
Population
 (2014)[1]
 • Total154,912
Time zoneUTC+6.30 (MMT)
Kokang Self-Administered Zone
Simplified Chinese果敢自治区
Traditional Chinese果敢自治區
Burmese name
Burmeseကိုးကန့် ကိုယ်ပိုင်အုပ်ချုပ်ခွင့်ရ ဒေသ
IPA[kóka̰ɰ̃ kòbàɪɰ̃ ʔoʊʔtɕʰoʊʔ kʰwɪ̰ɰ̃ja̰ dèθa̰]

The Kokang Self-Administered Zone (Burmese: ကိုးကန့် ကိုယ်ပိုင်အုပ်ချုပ်ခွင့်ရ ဒေသ), as stipulated by the 2008 Constitution of Myanmar, is a self-administered zone in northern Shan State. The zone is intended to be self-administered by the Kokang people. Its official name was announced by decree on 20 August 2010.[2]

Government and politics

The Kokang Self-Administered Zone (Kokang SAZ) is administered by a Leading Body, which consists of at least ten members and includes Shan State Hluttaw (Assembly) members elected from the Zone and members nominated by the Burmese Armed Forces. The Leading Body performs both executive and legislative functions and is led by a Chairperson. The Leading Body has competence in ten areas of policy, including urban and rural development, road construction and maintenance, and public health. [3]

Bai Xuoqian was elected as an MP of the Amyotha Hluttaw representing Laukkai Constituency No. 2.[4] during the 2010 general election, and became the first head of the Kokang SAZ. Under his rule, the region became known for drugs and weapons trafficking.[5] Bai was not very popular and survived an assassination attempt in March 2012.[6]

On 3 February 2021, shortly after the 2021 Myanmar coup d'état, the State Administration Council (SAC) appointed Myint Swe, a former Union Solidarity and Development Party lawmaker as the chariman of the Kokang SAZ.[7]

In 2023, during Operation 1027, the SAC temporarily replaced Myint Swe by Brigadier General Tun Tun Myint and put out a warrant for former Kokang SAZ chairman, Bai Xuoqian. Tun Tun Myint was previously the commander in charge of northern Shan State operations. The move is understood to be in anticipation of Operation 1027 moving towards Laukkai.[8]

A few days earlier, China had issued arrest warrants for junta-aligned cybercrime ringleader Ming Xuechang and three other family members for their involvement in online scamming operations.[9] On 16 November 2023, three Ming family members were arrested and handed over to China. Ming Xuechang died while being arrested by the Myanmar police, and the Myanmar government claimed that he died by suicide.[10][11] According to The Diplomat, this move signals China's "tacit support for the removal of the Kokang SAZ's leadership".[12]

Administrative divisions

Townships of Kokang SAZ:

The Kokang Self-Administered Zone consists of two townships: Konkyan and Laukkaing.[13] Both townships are administratively part of Laukkaing District.

List of Chairmen

  1. Bai Xuoqian 白所成 (2010–2016)
  2. Zhao Dechen 赵德强 (2016[14]–2021[15])
  3. Myint Swe aka Li Zhanfu 李正福 (2021[7][15]–November 2023[8][15])
  4. Tun Tun Myint (acting) (since November 2023[8])

See also

Further reading

References

  1. ↑ Department of Population (2015). The Union Report (Volume-3M: Shan State Report (Report). UNFPA. p. 29. Retrieved 18 November 2023.
  2. ↑ "တိုင်းခုနစ်တိုင်းကို တိုင်းဒေသကြီးများအဖြစ် လည်းကောင်း၊ ကိုယ်ပိုင်အုပ်ချုပ်ခွင့်ရ တိုင်းနှင့် ကိုယ်ပိုင်အုပ်ချုပ်ခွင့်ရ ဒေသများ ရုံးစိုက်ရာ မြို့များကို လည်းကောင်း ပြည်ထောင်စုနယ်မြေတွင် ခရိုင်နှင့်မြို့နယ်များကို လည်းကောင်း သတ်မှတ်ကြေညာ". Weekly Eleven News (in Burmese). 20 August 2010. Retrieved 23 August 2010.
  3. ↑ "Nagaland: A frontier, for now". 9 April 2019.
  4. ↑ Zin Linn. "Does the junta use drugs as a weapon in Burma's politics?". asiancorrespondent.com/. Archived from the original on 23 July 2015. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  5. ↑ "Tens of thousands flee war, airstrikes in Kokang region". reliefweb.int/r. Democratic Voice of Burma. Retrieved 24 February 2015.
  6. ↑ "Bai Xuoqian, head of the Kokang Self-Administered". www.shanland.org. Shan Herald. Archived from the original on 24 February 2015. Retrieved 24 February 2015.
  7. 1 2 "Self-administered Division & Zones: Chairman of Self-administered Division and Zones Appointed". Myanmar International TV. 3 February 2021. Retrieved 18 November 2023.
  8. 1 2 3 "Struggling to maintain order, junta replaces Kokang leader with brigadier general". Myanmar Now. 17 November 2023.
  9. ↑ Zuo, Mandy (12 November 2023). "Chinese police order arrest of alleged Myanmar crime family over telecoms fraud". South China Morning Post. South China Morning Post. Archived from the original on 14 November 2023. Retrieved 14 November 2023.
  10. ↑ "最新消息！缅北电诈头目明学昌，已自杀身亡". National Business Daily (in Chinese (China)). 17 November 2023.
  11. ↑ "Former lawmaker dies in police custody after arrest for Myanmar scams". Radio Free Asia. Retrieved 17 November 2023.
  12. ↑ "Chinese Authorities Issue Arrest Warrants for Criminal Kingpins in Myanmar's Kokang Region". The Diplomat. 13 November 2023. Archived from the original on 13 November 2023. Retrieved 13 November 2023.
  13. ↑ ပြည်ထောင်စုသမ္မတမြန်မာနိုင်ငံတော် ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေ (၂၀၀၈ ခုနှစ်) (in Burmese). 2008. Archived from the original on 19 November 2015.
  14. ↑ "赵德强担任果敢自治区领导委员会主席" (in Chinese). Kokang News. Archived from the original on 19 April 2016. Retrieved 10 April 2016.
  15. 1 2 3 "Myanmar Junta Places Army in Charge of Kokang as Resistance Eyes Laukkai". Irrawaddy. 16 November 2023.

23°44′31″N 98°34′49″E / 23.74194°N 98.58028°E / 23.74194; 98.58028

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