Myanmar military marks rebel ceasefire despite rebel clashes

Myanmar's junta blocked roads and deployed heavy security in the military-built capital Naypyidaw on Sunday to mark the anniversary of a 2015 rebel ceasefire that its critics say is now defunct.

Over a dozen rebel groups have fought Myanmar's military for decades over autonomy and control of lucrative resources, but ten had signed a Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement (NCA).

Critics of the NCA say it is in tatters since the junta's 2021 coup, which unleashed a bloody crackdown on dissent and sparked renewed fighting with some of its signatories.

Officials from seven of the ten signatories attended the event in Naypyidaw, where barricades and plainclothes security were deployed.

Diplomats from Russia and China -- allies and arms suppliers of the internationally isolated junta -- also attended, as did a representative from India, which has been accused by rights groups of supplying the military.

Timor-Leste sent a representative, weeks after the junta ordered the expulsion of its top diplomat over a meeting his government held with a shadow "National Unity Government" working to overturn the coup.

Several rebel groups have trained and armed anti-coup fighters battling to overturn the military regime.

Two groups -- the Chin National Front (CNF) and the Karen National Union (KNU) -- said last week that the coup had made implementing the agreement "impossible."

The KNU and the CNF have regularly fought with the military since its takeover, in the far east and west of the country respectively.

The Kachin Independence Army -- which did not sign the 2015 accord -- also accused the military last week of bombing a camp for displaced people on its territory in northern Myanmar, killing 29 and wounding dozens.

The military was "making necessary preparations for the holding of free and fair multi-party general elections," junta chief Min Aung Hlaing said on Sunday.

But the junta has pushed back a timetable to hold fresh polls several times since ousting civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi's government over unsubstantiated allegations of election fraud.