Armed soldiers loyal to a turncoat warlord patrol the streets of southeastern Myanmar's frontier town of Myawaddy, as troops of the ruling junta and rebels jostle for control of the outpost that handles more than $1 billion in border trade every year.

(Reuters) - A Myanmar rebel group has withdrawn its troops from a town along the Thai border following a counteroffensive by soldiers of the ruling junta from whom the rebels had this month wrested the key trading post, an official said on Wednesday.

Resistance soldiers were forced to leave Myawaddy, a key trading center on the border with Thailand, weeks after capturing it.

Thailand has warned Myanmar’s junta and rebel groups against using its territory for “their own sake,” the country’s defense minister said, amid fears that fighting in eastern Myanmar could spill over the Thai-Myanmar border.

A Myanmar rebel group has withdrawn its troops from a town along the Thai border following a counteroffensive by soldiers of the ruling junta from whom the rebels had this month wrested the key trading post,

Myawaddy, the most important trading town with Thailand in Myanmar, has recently fallen to rebel forces.

YANGON: Myanmar junta troops have moved back into a vital border town they were ousted from by an alliance of ethnic rebels and anti-junta fighters this month, military sources told AFP on Tuesday (April 23).