{{short description|Town in Kachin State, Myanmar}} {{Use dmy dates|date=June 2024}} {{Infobox settlement |settlement_type = Town |native_name = {{lang|my|ဖားကန့်}} |official_name = Hpakant |pushpin_label_position = bottom |pushpin_map = Myanmar |pushpin_map_caption = Location in Myanmar (Burma) |image_skyline =Hpakant City in January 2018.jpg |imagesize = 270px |image_map = |map_caption = Hpakant |subdivision_type = Country |subdivision_name = {{flag|Myanmar}} |subdivision_type1 = Division |subdivision_name1 = {{flag|Kachin State}} |subdivision_type2 = District |subdivision_name2 = Mohnyin District |subdivision_type3 = Township |subdivision_name3 = Hpakant Township |unit_pref = Imperial |area_total_km2 = |population_footnotes = <ref name="census-2014">{{cite book |title=Census Report |publisher=Ministry of Immigration and Population |location=Naypyitaw |date=May 2015 |series=The 2014 Myanmar Population and Housing Census |volume=2 |pages=17 |url=https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B067GBtstE5TeUlIVjRjSjVzWlk/view |access-date=29 November 2015 |archive-date=7 May 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190507224807/https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B067GBtstE5TeUlIVjRjSjVzWlk/view |url-status=live }}</ref> |population_total = 312,278 |population_urban = 60,123 |population_rural = 252,155 |population_as_of = 2014 |population_blank1_title = Ethnicities |population_blank2 = Buddhism, Christianity |population_blank2_title = Religions |population_density_km2 = auto |coordinates = {{coord|25|36|46|N|96|18|41|E|region:MM|display=inline,title}} |leader_title = Mayor |elevation_m = |timezone = MMT |utc_offset = +6.30 |website = }}
'''Hpakant''' ({{langx|my|ဖားကန့်}}, {{IPA|my|pʰá ga̰ɰ̃}}; {{langx|shn|ၽႃၵၢၼ်ႉ}}, also '''Hpakan''' and '''Phakant''') is a town in Hpakant Township, Kachin State in the northernmost part of Myanmar (Burma).<ref>{{Cite web |title=Place codes (Pcodes) |url=https://themimu.info/sites/themimu.info/files/documents/Myanmar_PCodes_Release_9.7_Jan2026_Kachin.xlsm |access-date=2026-05-24 |website=MIMU - Myanmar Information Management Unit}}</ref> It is located on the Uyu River {{convert|350|km}} north of Mandalay. It is famous for its jade mines which produce gem-quality jadeite.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.aditnow.co.uk/mines/Hpakan-Other-Rock-Mine/ |title=Hpakan Other Rock Mine (Myanmar) |website=aditnow.co.uk |access-date=2008-12-26 |archive-date=19 July 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110719062952/http://www.aditnow.co.uk/mines/Hpakan-Other-Rock-Mine/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name=rs>{{Cite web |url=http://www.ruby-sapphire.com/heaven-hell-jade-burma.htm |author1=Richard W. Hughes |author2=Fred Ward |title=Heaven and Hell: The Quest for Jade in Upper Burma |publisher=Ruby-Sapphire.com|access-date=2008-12-26|archive-date=5 February 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090205222243/http://www.ruby-sapphire.com/heaven-hell-jade-burma.htm |url-status=dead}}</ref>
==History== The word Hpakant comes from the Shan language words for "rock fall" or "building up a wall."<ref>{{Cite journal |last=KURABE |first=Keita |date=2021-09-27 |title=Oronyms in northern Burma: Asymmetry between highland and lowland place names |url=https://zenodo.org/record/5529169 |journal=Studies in Geolinguistics |language=en |volume=1 |doi=10.5281/ZENODO.5529169}}</ref> Hpakant was first established in 1832 as a village but shortly afterwards the village was destroyed in a landslide. Thereafter, Hpakant was established for the second time in 1836.
In 2011, fighting broke out between the Kachin Independence Army and the Myanmar Army in the area around the Hpakant jade mines, displacing an estimated 90,000 people by September 2012 and killing hundreds of others.<ref>Democratic Voice of Burma, Displaced by fighting, villagers take shelter in Hpakant, 22 October 2012, http://www.dvb.no/news/displaced-by-fighting-villagers-take-shelter-in-hpakant/23955 {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121127023044/http://www.dvb.no/news/displaced-by-fighting-villagers-take-shelter-in-hpakant/23955 |date=27 November 2012 }}</ref>
==Political economy== [[File:Txu-pclmaps-oclc-22834566_h-10c.jpg|left|thumb|Map including the Hpakant area (DMA, 1990)]] Since after the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) came into the area before negotiating a ceasefire agreement with Burma's military government in the early 1990s, heroin is no longer openly on sale on the streets of Hpakant. Both addicts and drug dealers were rounded up, taken to the nearby Uru River, shot and their bodies dumped in the river.<ref name=rs/>
Concerns have been expressed regarding the encroachment on and destruction of the environment from deforestation and landslides resulting from mining activities and consequent flooding. The Uru River has also been affected by the dumping of soil. There have been instances of locals being forced to leave their homes when upland areas were bulldozed by the big mining companies.<ref>{{Cite news |url=http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=12966 |author=Violet Cho |title=Gem Mining Destroying Environment, Activists Say |publisher=The Irrawaddy 25 June 2008 |access-date=2008-12-26 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080627184605/http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=12966 |archive-date=27 June 2008}}</ref>
The KIA however lost control of the jade mines once the ceasefire had been arranged, and firms from China, Hong Kong and Singapore started to operate in the area after winning concessions from the government.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2390&page=2 |author1=John S. Moncreif |author2=Htun Myat |title=The War on Kachin Forests |publisher=The Irrawaddy October 2001, vol 9, no 8 |access-date=2008-12-26 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100920055535/http://irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=2390&page=2 |archive-date=20 September 2010}}</ref> More recently however the mining contracts went to the well known Burmese tycoon Tay Za's Htoo Group and also to Myanmar Dagaung Co Ltd, a subsidiary of the Hong Pang Group headed by Wei Hsueh-kang, a former drug trafficker and leader of the Wa insurgent group UWSA turned entrepreneur after the cease-fire deal.<ref>{{Cite news |url=http://www.kachinnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=507:te-za-mines-jade-with-sophisticated-equipment-in-phakant&catid=1:latest-news&Itemid=50 |title=Te Za mines jade with sophisticated equipment in Phakant |publisher=KachinNews.com, 5 July 2007 |access-date=2009-01-06 |archive-date=12 February 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120212192353/http://www.kachinnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=507:te-za-mines-jade-with-sophisticated-equipment-in-phakant&catid=1:latest-news&Itemid=50 |url-status=live }}</ref>
Maran Brang Seng, former chairman of the Kachin Independence Organisation (KIO) from 1976 until he died in 1994, was born in Hpakant in 1930.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.kachinstate.com/history.html |title=Kachin's Anti-Government Forces |publisher=Kachinstate.com |access-date=2009-01-06 |archive-date=12 June 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110612030029/http://www.kachinstate.com/history.html |url-status=live }}</ref>
==Mining hazards== One thousand miners apparently drowned in 2000 when flood waters of the Uru River rushed into the underground mines, but the news was hushed up by the authorities, according to the locals.{{Dubious |Event in 2000|date=July 2020}} An explosion at Hpakant Gyi mine on New Year's Eve 2008 killed two miners and injured seven. It is owned by another one of the ethnic ceasefire groups, the Pa-O National Army (PNA), headed by Aung Kham Hti.<ref>{{Cite news |url=http://www.kachinnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=691:two-miners-killed-seven-injured-on-new-year-eve-explosion-in-hpakant-mine&catid=1:latest-news&Itemid=50 |title=Two miners killed, seven injured on New Year eve explosion in Hpakant mine |publisher=KachinNews.com, 7 January 2009 |access-date=2009-01-11 |archive-date=21 December 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171221123513/http://www.kachinnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=691:two-miners-killed-seven-injured-on-new-year-eve-explosion-in-hpakant-mine&catid=1:latest-news&Itemid=50 |url-status=live }}</ref> thumb|A large jade mine in Hpakant
More than 30 (and up to 70) people are believed to have been killed in a massive landslide near Hpakant in early July 2009; official figures are not available.{{citation needed|date=July 2020}} The flood waters swept away homes, blocked roads and cut communications.{{citation needed|date=July 2020}} The disaster is being blamed on jade mining, which creates large deposits of debris that block heavy rain from reaching natural rivers and drainage, including the Uru river.{{citation needed|date=July 2020}}
About 100 jade mining companies operate in the Hpakant area. The Kachin Environmental Organization, based on the Sino-Burmese border, says that people living in the Hpakant area had appealed to the companies not to dump waste near the Uru River and to avoid environmental damage. The companies enjoy government backing, however, and local complaints are regularly ignored.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=16295 |title=Many Die as Landslide Sweeps through Jade-mining Area |date=11 August 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100811204834/http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=16295|archive-date=11 August 2010}}</ref>
Over 100 people were killed in a landslide in the 22 November 2015 Hpakant jade mine disaster. Most of those killed were people living near the waste heap, who made their living scavenging through waste soil looking for jade remnants. At least 15 jade seekers in a closed mine were killed and 45 injured by a landslide in July 2018.<ref>[http://orf.at/#/stories/2447065/ Viele Tote bei Erdrutsch in stillgelegter Mine in Myanmar] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130420074603/http://orf.at/#/stories/2447065/ |date=20 April 2013 }} orf.at, 16 July 2018, retrieved 16 July 2018 – German.</ref> Six people were killed in the April 2019 Hpakant jade mine collapse. More than 162 people were killed in a landslide in the 2 July 2020 Hpakant jade mine disaster.<ref>{{cite news |title=Myanmar jade mine landslide kills more than 100 |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-53260834 |publisher=BBC |date=2 July 2020 |access-date=2 July 2020 |archive-date=3 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200703025311/https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-53260834 |url-status=live }}</ref> In 2021, a landslide at a jade mine killed 20 and swept up to 100 people into a lake.<ref>{{cite news |title=Myanmar: dozens feared missing after landslide at jade mine |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/dec/22/myanmar-dozens-feared-missing-after-landslide-at-jade-mine |access-date=15 October 2022 |work=The Guardian|location=London |date=22 December 2021}}</ref> On 13 August 2023 a landslide killed 32 people in the 2023 Hpakant jade mine disaster.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Magramo |first=Su Chay, Sophie Jeong, Kathleen |date=2023-08-16 |title=At least 32 dead after landslide at Myanmar jade mine |url=https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/16/asia/myanmar-jade-mine-landslide-deaths-intl-hnk/index.html |access-date=2024-02-28 |publisher=CNN}}</ref> Another 32 people were killed during a similar landslide in Hpakant in the early hours of 13 January 2025.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Zan |first=Hein Htoo |date=2025-01-17 |title=32 Bodies Found, Scores More Missing in Myanmar Jade Mine Collapse |url=https://www.irrawaddy.com/news/burma/32-bodies-found-scores-more-missing-in-myanmar-jade-mine-collapse.html |access-date=2025-01-17 |website=The Irrawaddy |language=en-US}}</ref>
==See also == {{Hpakant jade mining disasters|state=expanded}}
==Notes== {{Reflist}}
==External links== *[http://www.maplandia.com/burma/kachin/kamaing/hpakan/ Satellite map] ''Maplandia.com'' *[https://web.archive.org/web/20100911000528/http://www.geohavens.com/articles.php?article_id=98 Sources of Jadeite Jade] ''Geohavens'' *[http://www.palagems.com/burma_jade.htm Burmese Jade: The Inscrutable Gem] ''Palagems.com'' *[http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3721/is_200409/ai_n9412465/pg_13 Journal of the Geological Society, Sep 2004] Morley, C K *[http://www.seat61.com/Burma.htm#Mandalay%20-%20Myityina Mandalay-Myitkyina train times]
{{Kachin State}}
Category:Populated places in Kachin State Category:Township capitals of Myanmar Category:Populated places established in 1832 Category:Hpakant