Myanmar–Thailand border

Burma, Siam and Britain

Burma and Thailand fought repeatedly from the 16th century: Burmese armies sacked the Thai capital in 1568 and destroyed Ayutthaya in 1767. Britain then conquered Burma in stages, taking Tenasserim in the south after the war of 1824–26 and completing the conquest with the Shan States by 1890, which fixed the modern limits with Siam. A convention of 1868 defined the line from the Salween south along the Moei River, the mountains of the peninsula and the Pakchan River to the sea.^[1]

Most of the line follows mountain crests and water divides; for 81 miles it follows the Salween and for 240 miles its tributary the Moei. Burma became independent on 4 January 1948 with its British-era boundaries, and in 1966 the US Geographer knew of no disputes over the line.^[1]

“on the north the channel of the River Maymuey (Siamese) or Thuongyong (Burmese) up to its source in the Pa-wan range of mountains”^[1]

Scam towns

By the 2020s, according to the UN, hundreds of thousands of people had been tricked into working for scam operations run by Chinese crime syndicates in loosely governed parts of Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos. After a Chinese actor, Wang Xing, was rescued in January 2025 from a compound at Shwe Kokko near Myawaddy, Thailand declared the scams a national security threat. On 5 February 2025 it cut electricity, internet and fuel to three areas across the border: Myawaddy opposite Mae Sot, Payathonzu opposite Three Pagodas Pass, and Tachileik opposite Mae Sai.^[2]