logoalt Hacker News

yorwbatoday at 8:14 PM1 replyview on HN

For Myanmar, having "De facto independent areas (e.g. Wa state)" at admin_level=3 is wildly ambitious, since not only are these boundaries constantly shifting slightly due to the ongoing civil war, the actors involved don't even necessarily have the state capacity to accurately demarcate their own territorial claims.

The Wa State in particular appears to have undergone some "boundary fixing" a few weeks ago https://www.openstreetmap.org/relation/9399863 but whether it now accurately reflects realities on the ground is anyone's guess. I'm inclined to believe the Wikimedia map https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Myanmar_civil_war.sv... showing Tangyan in Wa State territory is more up-to-date, unless they withdrew for some reason without it making the news. (The most recent I could find is this article from March where they were mining quartz in the area: https://english.shannews.org/archives/29385 )


Replies

xg15today at 8:21 PM

Documenting disputed borders or borders in war zones seems tricky in general. Not only can they be constantly shifting, but even at a fixed point in time, the boundary is probably wildly different depending on which of the belligerent parties you may ask - or in extreme cases, a party may deny the demarcation exists at all.

show 1 reply