2LT International News

BANGKOK, Thailand – According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Thailand’s foreign minister has visited a border town near Myanmar following days of hostilities in which ethnic minority armed groups forced the military regime’s troops to retreat, and hundreds of civilians fled.

Foreign Minister Parnpree Bahiddha-Nukara visited the Thai town of Mae Sot, located over the border from Myanmar’s Myawaddy and freed from military control.

“Thailand wants to see peace and dialogue,” Parnpree told reporters, adding that it was looking into alternative trade routes in the event of road closures caused by the fighting.

Thailand’s Foreign Ministry said it would review plans for another surge of Myanmar migrants.

Thailand announced earlier this week that it will take 100,000 migrants fleeing Myanmar.

However, Thai Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin warned on Thursday that conflict should not spread into his country’s airspace.

Fighting between Myanmar’s military and ethnic minority armed groups shook Myawaddy last week, sending many fleeing into Thailand, where the sound of artillery shells and gunfire could be heard.

The fighting in Myanmar, sparked by the military’s 2021 coup, routinely sends people fleeing across the two nations’ shared 2,400-kilometer (1,490-mile) border.

As fighting intensified, the number of people crossing to Mae Sot from Myawaddy surged to almost 4,000 per day, according to Reuters.