The chairman of Nippon Foundation and Japan’s special envoy for national reconciliation in Myanmar, Yohei Sasakawa, said he told the Arakan Army to maintain a situation of no armed conflict in Arakan State during an online meeting with the ethnic armed group.

“To maintain the current peace situation, both sides need to avoid fighting. I have told them to order, down to the lowest ranking troops, not to open fire upon each other. We will seek not to have a clash between them,” he told journalists on Monday, less than a week after a brief clash between the two sides broke an informal ceasefire of more than a year.

Sasakawa, who aided in negotiating peace between the Myanmar military and Arakan Army last year, arrived in Sittwe for the second time on November 15.

U Pe Than, a former Pyithu Hluttaw MP, said both sides needed to keep lines of communication open to sustain peace over the long term.

“To maintain the situation of no war, the AA and Tatmadaw need to continue to meet and talk. They need to negotiate for the deployment of troops. The negotiation should include commitments,” he said.

On his latest trip, Sasakawa visited IDP camps in the Arakan State capital Sittwe, and met with Arakan National Party representatives.  

During his first visit in late November 2020, he visited Buthidaung and Kyauktaw townships in northern Arakan State, and urged the government to hold make-up elections as soon as possible in the Arakan State townships where general elections were cancelled on November 8 of last year.