"The Karen National Union (KNU), alongside the Restoration Council of Shan State (RCSS), were instrumental in encouraging a number of Ethnic Armed Organisations (EAOs) to sign Myanmar’s Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement on 15 October 2015. It was the actions of these two groups and the positions they have held within the armed ethnic resistance movement that allowed for the peace process, no matter how flawed it may be, to move forward. That said, however, despite their support for the process and the current government’s efforts, through the Union Peace Conference, to secure a more permanent peace, both groups have found themselves attacked by the Myanmar military, the Tatmadaw. While such skirmishes were expected initially due to little official demarcation of territory and a lack of conflict solving mechanisms,1 one and a half years later it would appear the Myanmar military is selectively applying the NCA in areas where it operates. Most recently the Tatmadaw has attempted to exert its influence further into the KNU controlled 5th Brigade area of Mutraw (Papun) resulting in human rights abuses, displacement and the unlawful killing of a local environmental activist. The main reason given for the incursion was the reconstruction of an all-weather road, the Bu Hsa Kee Road, connecting the Myanmar military camps at Ler Mu Plaw and Kay Pu. The original road had been built during the Tatmadaw's offensives in 2006 and 2007, Tatmadaw soldiers had the north-south road built to connect their camps, and many small security outposts were built at intervals along the side of the road. According to Free Burma Rangers, roads built by the Myanmar Army served three purposes in the projection and expansion of Myanmar army power and control in Karen State, namely, 1. To resupply and connect camps 2. To more rapidly launch offensives and patrols and 3. To compartmentalise and isolate ethnic communities to better be able to control them within a network of roads and camps..."