Kokang army still seeking recruits from Hseni Township, northern Shan State

Despite reports of its impending withdrawal from the town of Hseni (Hsenwi), northern Shan State, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) are still recruiting new members from the town’s wards, locals said. Hseni residents said that officials from the ethnic armed group—which is under pressure from the Chinese government to relinquish control of the town to the Myanmar military—met with them recently and made demands for young civilian men from the town to enlist in their ranks. “They demanded seven people per ward,” one resident said. “They had also made this demand before, but now there aren’t enough people left. So now they have to go to the town’s residents again to negotiate. The news is that now at least two people must be provided [per ward].” The MNDAA is enforcing similar demands in all villages under its control in the area it has designated as “Hseni District”, which is at variance with the junta’s inclusion of Hseni and Hseni Township in northern Shan State’s Lashio District. “They're demanding new people from villages between Lashio and Hseni too, and we’ll have to put them forward,” the Hseni resident said. “They’ve made the same demands in all the villages.” He also said that the MNDAA had told locals that any wards or villages unable to offer new recruits would have to pay for the hire of substitutes. Hseni Township consists of four urban wards and 36 village tracts and has a population of over 60,000, most of which is ethnically Shan. The MNDAA, commonly called the “Kokang Army”, is an ethnic armed group whose membership is mostly from the Kokang ethnic community—a Mandarin-speaking, Han Chinese people that has lived in northern Shan State near the border with China’s Yunnan Province for centuries. Adhering to a ceasefire with the Myanmar military regime brokered by the Chinese government, the MNDAA handed back control of northern Shan State’s capital, Lashio, to the Myanmar military in April after holding the city for more than eight months. However, the Kokang armed group maintained control of rural villages in Lashio Township—incorporating them into Hseni District—even after withdrawing from Lashio’s 12 urban wards and the military’s Northeastern Regional Military Command headquarters. While some media outlets have reported that the MNDAA is slated to withdraw from Hseni in September, the armed group has continued to operate its own administrative apparatus in the town and shows no signs of preparing to surrender it to the Myanmar junta, according to another Hseni resident. “In the town, their administrative side is operating as normal. They’re demanding people [to enlist] and they're also expanding hospitals and schools,” the resident said. “We don’t see them following a scenario of withdrawing from the town. Even if they have to move out, it may only be from the central wards, like in Lashio.” Myanmar Now attempted to reach MNDAA spokespersons for comment, but did not receive a response. Jest as the weakened Myanmar military has resorted to mandatory conscription to address its shortage of manpower, anti-junta armed groups holding control over extensive, populous territories have also escalated their recruitment efforts. Lashio was the largest of seven towns captured by the Kokang army in northern Shan State during “Operation 1027”, a sweeping campaign against junta forces carried out by the MNDAA and its allies in northern Shan State in 2023 and 2024. The other towns included Chin Shwe Haw, Laukkai, Hseni, and Pang Hseng (Kyu Koke) in Muse Township, all of which are important for the control of trade on the China-Myanmar border. When the MNDAA withdrew from Lashio, they removed medical equipment such as dialysis machines and installed them in the Hseni General Hospital. The Kokang group has controlled Hseni since January 2024, when its Battalion 501 was joined by members of the Karenni Nationalities Defence Force and People’s Liberation Army (PLA)—the revived armed wing of the Communist Party of Burma—in its operations to capture the town. News of the MNDAA’s escalated recruitment efforts in Hseni emerged after reports that the Ta’ang National Liberation Army—the MNDAA’s sometime ally—rejected the military junta’s demand to withdraw its forces from several other northern Shan State towns under its control.

Kokang army still seeking recruits from Hseni Township, northern Shan State

Continuing administrative operations and search for local enlistees by the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) in Hseni Township appear inconsistent with reports that the armed group plans to hand back control Myanmar military in three months

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