BEIJING: Fighting erupted in northeast Myanmar on Saturday after days of clashes in which the leader of ethnic forces said more than 30 government troops had been killed.

The fighting in Kokang in Myanmar’s Shan state, following the deployment of government troops, has sent tens of thousands of people fleeing over the border to the town of Nansan in southwest China’s Yunnan province.

The leader of the Kokang Group which is fighting Myanmar’s army said his forces had captured at least 50 soldiers as well as killing more than 30 on Thursday and Friday, the Chinese Global Times newspaper reported on its website (www.huanqiu.com).

In the telephone interview, Peng Jiasheng, also known as Phone Kyar Shin, gave no details on casualties among his forces, whom he said he was commanding from a safe location in Myanmar.

Reports from Chinese media and Myanmar groups in exile said the fighting began after the Myanmar military, allied with a local splinter group, took control of facilities run by the Kogang Group, also know as Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, in Laogai, in the capital of Shan state.

Myanmar wants ethnic groups to take part in its elections next year, the first in two decades.

Activists and observers say the junta deployed troops because it is trying to forcibly recruit rebel fighters for an army-run border patrol force.

One person was killed and several people were wounded by a bomb thrown across the Chinese border on Friday, He Yongchun, deputy president of Yunnan branch of the Chinese Red Cross, told the China Daily.—Reuters