The Karen National Army, ( my, ကရင်အမျိုးသားတပ်မတော် ;

abbreviated An abbreviation (from Latin ''brevis'', meaning ''short'') is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method. It may consist of a group of letters or words taken from the full version of the word or phrase; for example, the word ''abbrevia ...

KNA) formerly the Karen Border Guard Force (Karen BGF), is a primarily

Karen Karen may refer to: * Karen (name), a given name and surname * Karen (slang), a term and meme for a demanding woman displaying certain behaviors People * Karen people, an ethnic group in Myanmar and Thailand ** Karen languages or Karenic l ...

Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...

ethnic army active in

Kayin State Kayin State ( my, ကရင်ပြည်နယ်, ; kjp, ဖၠုံခါန်ႋကၞင့်, italics=no; ksw, ကညီကီၢ်စဲၣ်, ), also known by the endonyms Kawthoolei and Karen State, is a state of Myanmar. The ...

Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John C. Wells, Joh ...

, which split off from the

Myanmar Army The Myanmar Army ( my, တပ်မတော်(ကြည်း), ) is the largest branch of the Tatmadaw, Armed Forces (''Tatmadaw'') of Myanmar (Burma) and has the primary responsibility of conducting land-based military operations. The My ...

in January 2024. The KNA was formed as the

Democratic Karen Buddhist Army The Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA; my, တိုးတက်သော ဗုဒ္ဓဘာသာ ကရင်အမျိုးသား တပ်ဖွဲ့) was originally an insurgent group of Buddhist soldiers and officers in Mya ...

(DKBA) in December 1994 after the

insurgent An insurgency is a violent, armed rebellion against authority waged by small, lightly armed bands who practice guerrilla warfare from primarily rural base areas. The key descriptive feature of insurgency is its asymmetric warfare, asymmetric na ...

group split off of the

Karen National Liberation Army The Karen National Liberation Army ( ksw, ကညီဒီကလုာ် တၢ်ထူၣ်ဖျဲး သုးမုၢ်ဒိၣ်, my, ကရင်အမျိုးသား လွတ်မြောက်ရေး တပ်မတ� ...

. Shortly after, the DKBA signed a ceasefire agreement with the

, officially joining the army as the Karen Border Guard Force (Karen BGF) alongside the Karen Peace Force in 2009. In January 2024, after intensified rebel operations throughout Myanmar, the Karen BGF began distancing itself from the ruling

military junta A military junta () is a government led by a committee of military leaders. The term ''junta'' means "meeting" or "committee" and originated in the national and local junta organized by the Spanish resistance to Napoleon's invasion of Spain in ...

, eventually splitting off from the Army and rebranding themselves the "Karen National Army" by April.

Background

DKBA

Karen BGF

Tensions with junta and rebranding

After splitting away from the Tatmadaw, the KNA acquires revenue via taxation of gambling and scam businesses in Shwe Kokko.

Assistance to the military regime during the Siege of Myawaddy

Multiple sources and analysts showed the KNA took control of Myawaddy after the junta's remaining troops from the 275th LIB retreated, and later facilitated the transfer of junta troops from their base to the 2nd Friendship Bridge. Jason Tower, the Myanmar director of the

United States Institute of Peace The United States Institute of Peace (USIP) is an American Federal government of the United States, federal institution tasked with promoting conflict resolution and prevention worldwide. It provides research, analysis, and training to individual ...

, said KNA had been playing both sides and that it ultimately pivoted to assist the military regime, "leading to the photo op of the Myanmar flag once again being raised over the base".

References

{{Insurgent groups in Myanmar Ethnic armed organisations in Myanmar Karen history Political schisms