Karen

The Karen are an ethnic group of Southeast Asia native chiefly to the hill and delta regions of eastern and southeastern Myanmar and neighboring parts of Thailand, encompassing several related subgroups, most prominently the Sgaw and Pwo Karen, who speak related but not always mutually intelligible Karenic languages. Unlike Myanmar's Bamar majority, a significant share of Karen are Christian, the legacy of nineteenth-century Baptist and Catholic missionary activity, alongside Karen Buddhists and animists. Since Myanmar's independence in 1948, the Karen National Union has waged one of the world's longest-running armed insurgencies against the central government, and large Karen refugee populations have lived for decades in camps along the Thai border, with many resettled since the 2000s to the United States, Australia and elsewhere.