Junta forces travelling north to Tamu in Sagaing Region detained the three victims after being hit by a series of explosions

Three men who were abducted after an attack on a military convoy in Sagaing Region’s Tamu Township last Thursday were found dead the following day, according to resistance sources.

The men, who were all in their late 20s, were travelling between the villages of Khum Mun Nun and Yan Lin Hpai, about 20km south of the town of Tamu, when several explosions hit the convoy in the same area, the sources said.

“They were taken hostage soon after the attack and were interrogated all night until they were shot dead in the morning,” an officer of the Tamu People’s Defence Force (PDF) told Myanmar Now.

The victims were identified as Pao Tin Thang and Hao Len Mang, both from Yan Lin Hpai, and Sei Kho Thang, a resident of Khum Mun Nun.

Their bodies were discovered near Nan Mun Tar, a village about 2km from Khum Mun Nun, on Friday morning, local sources reported.

According to the Tamu PDF officer, the 13-vehicle convoy was heading north from Kalay Township when it was hit by a series of explosions on Thursday.

“We managed to land direct hits on two of the military vehicles, which were thrown into the air,” he said, adding that around 15 of the roughly 100 troops travelling with the convoy were killed.

Myanmar Now has been unable to independently confirm these figures.

The Tamu PDF officer said that regime forces fired a number of random shots after the incident, but no other casualties were reported.

The next day, the convoy continued on to Pan Thar, a village about 15km from Tamu, after leaving Khum Mun Nun in the morning, according to the Tamu PDF officer.

Troops stationed in Tamu also later arrived in Pan Thar following attacks on members of the military-backed Pyu Saw Htee militia based in the village, he added.

Tamu Township, which borders India, has seen frequent attacks on regime forces sent into the area to suppress local resistance groups.

Local residents said that the three men killed last week were among many civilians displaced by the conflict and forced to flee across the border into India. 

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The men, believed to have been captured by junta troops, are found dismembered following a Myanmar military raid on a nearby village in Sagaing’s Salingyi Township

Locals found the mutilated bodies of two men near the Letpadaung copper mining project in Sagaing Region’s Salingyi Township on Wednesday morning following a military raid on a nearby village. 

The deceased were identified as Tin Soe, 50, and Pwa Gyi, 40, of Moe Gyo Pyin village, which was attacked by a column of some 70 junta soldiers on Tuesday. 

“Tin Soe was decapitated and both of Pwa Gyi’s hands were cut off from the wrist,” said a villager who saw the bodies. “There were also so many knife wounds on Tin Soe’s body… Intestines were also falling out of Pwa Gyi’s stomach.”

Locals said that it was likely that Tin Soe and Pwa Gyi were killed by the same military unit that raided and shelled Moe Gyo Pyin.

“It seems that they were captured inside the village, taken outside, and then tortured and killed. I think they were killed in the same place where they were found,” said the local man, referring to a field located near Moe Gyo Pyin.

Villagers cremated the bodies on Wednesday morning. 
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Smoke is seen rising from Moe Gyo Pyin village on June 21 following  (Supplied)

An officer in the Young People’s Force, a Salingyi-based resistance group, said that in retaliation for the military’s assault on Moe Gyo Pyin, they had ambushed three junta police outposts guarding the Letpadaung mining project, the fenced boundary of which is located just across the road from the village. It is jointly operated by China’s Wanbao Mining and the military conglomerate Union of Myanmar Economic Holdings Ltd (UMEHL).

“We attacked them because they torched Moe Gyo Pyin, unprovoked,” he said, adding that an estimated two-thirds of the village’s 280 households were destroyed in the raid.

A local in the Letpadaung area said he saw the village burning at around 4pm on Tuesday, and that the attacks by resistance fighters began soon after. 

“The defence forces attacked them from Se Te Zee Taw, located south of the copper mining project, as soon as smoke started coming out of the village. We also heard gunshots and heavy artillery shells coming from there,” he told Myanmar Now. 

The soldiers reportedly took hostages in Moe Gyo Pyin but later released them. They also raided Se Te Zee Taw—eight miles away—where they occupied a monastery and held some 20 villagers as of Wednesday morning. 

Since military assaults in the Letpadaung area intensified last month, thousands of locals from at least 15 villages have been displaced. 

In late May, two men from Salingyi’s Ywar Thar village who had fled the junta offensives were found murdered after being detained by Myanmar army soldiers. Severe injuries indicated that they had been tortured. 

They were identified as employees of the Myanmar branch of Wanbao subsidiary Yangtse Copper Co Ltd, which jointly operates two other copper mines with UMEHL: Sabetaung and Kyisintaung, known as the S&K mines.

A coalition of local resistance forces active in Salingyi and neighbouring Yinmabin Township released a joint statement in April calling on the Wanbao and Yangtse companies to halt their operations at the Letpadaung and S&K mining sites by early May, accusing them of propping up the coup regime. 

A column of around 100 junta troops has since been stationed near the Yangtse Copper Co office and linked to assaults on multiple villages in the area, as well as ongoing clashes with guerrilla forces. 

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