China in Myanmar

How do different types of external interests shape the dynamics of civil wars? This study analyzes conflict fatalities in Myanmar between 2011 and 2025 and examines how different types of Chinese interests are associated with both overall conflict fatalities and fatalities in regions bordering China. To operationalize Chinese interests, I analyze news coverage from China Daily and categorize the themes of the articles using BERTopic. The results reveal heterogeneous effects across issue areas and locations. Chinese political interests and development-related interests are associated with higher overall conflict fatalities but lower fatalities in regions bordering China. In contrast, interests related to drug trafficking and fraud show no statistically significant relationship with conflict fatalities. Finally, interests in regional cooperation are associated with increases in both overall fatalities and fatalities near the border. The study contributes to the literature on external intervention in civil wars by demonstrating how issue-specific interests of external actors can produce heterogeneous effects across locations within a conflict.