The Karen National Union (KNU), the political wing of the ethnic armed group Karen National Liberation Army [KNLA], announced on 5 July that armed clashes between the junta and Karen armed groups break out almost daily in the KNU’s Kawthoolei administrative area in Kayin [Karen] State.

There were 365 armed clashes in June this year, according to KNU’s statement dated 5 July.

During the fighting in June, a total of 410 soldiers of the junta army and the junta’s ally Border Guard Force (BGF) were killed and another other 335 soldiers were injured, according to the statement.

Mizzima could not independently verify the number of casualties, according to the statement.

A total of 17 fighters of the KNLA and the Karen National Defence Organisation [KNDO] were killed and 30 others from the Karen side were injured in the fighting in the Kawthoolei administrative area in June, according to the statement.

The junta does not usually report casualties in this kind of fighting.

Pado Saw Taw Nee, a spokesman for the KNU, recently told Mizzima that the fighting could intensify as the military junta invaded the Kayin (Karen) State and strengthened its military positions in the region.

In the area, there have been many airstrikes by the junta, according to residents.

KNU-affiliated armed forces from the KNLA and the KNDO have been trying to seize the junta-controlled Ukrithta army camp in the south of Kawkareik Township near the Thai-Burmese border since late June and fighting on both sides is intensifying.

The KNU said in the statement that the junta had used a large number of airstrikes during the Battle of Ukrithta with 94 airstrikes in the four days from 27 June to 30 June. The fighting has forced thousands of local people to flee their homes and from their refuges that they have fled to.