UNFC would welcome KNU return to ethnic armed alliance

UNFC chairman and KIO vicd-president Gen. N'ban La speaking to reporters at the 2014 UNFC conference

The recently re-elected chairman of the United Nationalities Federal Council (UNFC), a coalition of Burma's ethnic armed groups, says that the Karen National Union (KNU) is welcome to return to the alliance, this after the KNU's chairman and several of his subordinates walked out of a UNFC conference in dramatic fashion last weekend.

Gen. N’Ban La who in addition to being the UNFC chairman also serves as the Kachin Independence Organization's (KIO) Vice-President made the comments while speaking to a scrum of reporters on Tuesday night following the conclusion of a lengthy UNFC conference which took place on the outskirts of Chiang Mai in northern Thailand.

According to N’Ban La a seat on the UNFC's central committee remained unfilled and was reserved for the KNU should they want to return to the UNFC.

The KNU has claimed that it was necessary for the group to withdraw from the UNFC because the structure of the UNFC threatens the KNU's “sovereignty”. This claim has been challenged by several leading figures in the KNU who are critical of the KNU chairman Mutu Say Poe's leadership.

After Mutu Say Poe walked out of the conference, the KNU's former General Secretary, Zipporah Sein issued a statement apologizing for KNU's delegations action's “On behalf of the Karen National Union, I would like to apologise to the UNFC for delaying the conference,” she wrote.