Hello and welcome to the Intelligence on Economist Radio. I'm your host, Jason Palmer.

Every weekday we provide a fresh perspective on the events shaping your world.

Mobile phone technology used to be only about the need for speed, but 5G has sparked geopolitical

battles, worries about spies, international arrests. America's attempt to control the

situation seems to be failing. We ask what its options are.

And officials in Sri Lanka thought they were doing a public service by outlawing the

sale of alcohol. The public didn't agree. While the administration flipped clubs on when

in and weather to open liquor stores, an army of homebrewers is bubbling up.

But first, on Tuesday, a driver for the World Health Organization was killed in Rakhine

state in Myanmar after his car was hit by gunfire. The attack took place in a region where

government troops have been locked in fierce fighting with the Arakhan army, which want

greater autonomy for the state and for the Rakhine or the Arakhan people.

Countries including Britain and America have called for an end to fighting amid the COVID-19

pandemic. But clashes have intensified and the government's flailing response seems

to be boosting the Arakhan army.

Any April the Arakhan army declared a month-long ceasefire, but it was rejected by the government

as unrealistic.

Charlie McCann is the economist's Southeast Asia correspondent.

Fighting between the Arakhan army and the Burmese military is escalated over the last two

months as has a war of words that they have been fighting. Each group has blamed the other

for firing at the WHO car, which is carrying swabs from patients to be tested for coronavirus.

So how did this conflict get its start then?

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