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Myanmar refugees begin warily returning from China
Mon Aug 31, 2009 3:39am EDT
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By Chris Buckley
NANSAN, China (Reuters) - Refugees who fled to China from armed clashes in northeast Myanmar began going back on Monday, overcoming worries about safety to return to shops and homes they feared would be looted.
By Monday, Myanmar troops appeared to have won control of Kokang, a heavily ethnic Chinese enclave controlled by local rulers and their militia, after weeks of fighting that forced tens of thousands of residents to flee to neighboring China.
The Myanmar government said on Sunday the situation had returned to normal, adding that 26 government troops or police had been killed and 47 wounded. Eight members of the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, which has been fighting government troops, were killed, it said.
The conflict was triggered after Myanmar deployed troops in the area to disarm insurgents.
Myanmar wants ethnic groups to take part in an election next year, the first in two decades. Activists and observers say the junta sent in its soldiers because it is trying to forcibly recruit rebel fighters for an army-run border patrol force.
The Chinese government has fed and sheltered 13,000 of the 37,000 refugees in Nansan and other towns near the border, according to provincial figures, but it has shown no eagerness to host them for long.
By early afternoon, growing numbers of Kokang residents felt safe enough to begin returning to their homes, with hundreds pressing to get past border checks. Trucks and buses crowded with returning residents unloaded them at the border crossing in Nansan, while others came on foot, carrying blankets.
"Of course I'm scared (to go back), but there's no choice," said Liu Shurong, one of the refugees about to return to Kokang.
"If you don't go back to guard your shop, it will be looted. Many of my neighbors have lost all their belongings."
WAITING IT OUT
But most of the Kokang refugees appeared determined to wait for a few more days before deciding whether to return there.
"People's will want to go back some time, but we can't count out more trouble," said Huang Yuliang, a businessman from Kokang who said he would wait before deciding whether to go back.
"We invested so much, but now it's all gone," he said.
China is one of Myanmar's few diplomatic backers and has deflected pressure from Western governments over the military government's tough steps against pro-democracy campaigners. Keeping large numbers of the refugees, who include fleeing members of the defeated Kokang militia, could rile Myanmar.
Many of the refugees, hunkered down in blue tents, said they felt torn between a desire to return to family, businesses and homes and fear of ill-treatment by Myanmar government troops. Continued...
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