| Published Sat, May 12th 2018 at 10:02, Updated May 12th 2018 at 10:04 GMT +3

At least 19 people have been killed in clashes between Myanmar's military and an ethnic armed group on Saturday in northern Shan State, Myanmar army and local sources told AFP, the most deadly flare-up in recent years as fighting in the borderlands intensifies. Rights defenders say clashes in the north near the main border gate with China have ramped up since January as the international community focuses on the Rohingya crisis in the west of the country. The encounters between the Myanmar military and the Ta’ang National Liberation Army, or TNLA, have reportedly increased in recent months while the global focus has remained on the Rohingya refugee crisis in the western part of the country. “Nineteen [people] were killed in fighting” on Saturday, a military source said, adding that two dozen had been injured. Thaung Tun, a local NGO leader who helped carry the injured to the hospital, said the dead included one police officer, one rebel fighter, four members of a state-backed militia, and two women civilians. Government spokesman Zaw Htay said all but four of those killed were civilians, adding that one police officer and three state-backed militia members were killed by “terrorists” who had attacked joint military and militia posts and a casino earlier in the day. "We fight because of heavy fighting in our region and the serious offensive in Kachin state," he said, referring to fresh confrontations in Myanmar's northernmost state between the military and the TNLA-aligned Kachin Independence Army (KIA). More than 100,000 displaced people now reside in camps in Kachin and Shan states since a ceasefire between the KIA and the military broke down in 2011, according to the latest United Nations statistics.
19 people are killed in clashes between the Myanmar Army and the Ta'ang National Liberation Army in Shan State.