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Myanmar Garrison Town Sees Exodus as Junta Faces Humiliating Loss of Its ‘West Point’

August 9, 2024/in News

Hundreds of residents of Pyin Oo Lwin – a garrison town in Mandalay Region – have been fleeing since Thursday due to fears of an imminent attack by an ethnic army and allied resistance forces, residents say. Family members of military personnel stationed in the town, which is home to the Defense Service Academies – […]

Myanmar junta bombs sleeping village killing seven, rebels say

August 9, 2024/in News

Many people were wounded in the latest air attack in the strife-torn Mandalay region, residents said. The Myanmar junta’s air force bombed a village in a strife-torn central region killing seven people as they slept, an insurgent group said on Thursday, the latest deaths in what opponents of the junta say is a deliberate campaign […]

Myanmar Garrison Town Sees Exodus as Junta Faces Humiliating Loss of Its ‘West Point’

August 9, 2024/in News

Myanmar junta bombs sleeping village killing seven, rebels say

August 9, 2024/in News

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Myanmar Garrison Town Sees Exodus as Junta Faces Humiliating Loss of Its ‘West Point’

August 9, 2024/in News

Family members of military personnel stationed in the town, which is home to the Defense Service Academies – Myanmar’s West Point – and other military training schools, were among the first to start fleeing the town about 70 kilometers east of the country’s second-largest city, Mandalay, residents say.

Hundreds of vehicles were seen jamming the eastern entrance to Mandalay on Thursday as the exodus from Pyin Oo Lwin accelerated, witnesses said.

The garrison town has been under threat since the fall of the headquarters of the junta’s North Eastern Military Command in Lashio, the capital of northern Shan State, to the Brotherhood Alliance and allied resistance groups coordinating Operation 1027.

Operation 1027 resumed in northern Shan State on June 25.

Operation 1027, a coordinated offensive by the Brotherhood Alliance of three ethnic armies and allied People’s Defense Force (PDFs) units under the command of the National Unity Government, began in October last year. It succeeded in capturing most of northern Shan State before a Chinese-brokered ceasefire brought it to a halt.

The operation resumed in June and expanded to northern townships of Mandalay Region, where alliance member the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) and PDFs captured Nawnghkio, which borders Pyin Oo Lwin, and two other towns in northern Mandalay.

Ongoing fighting in Mandalay Region and Shan State’s Nawnghkio Township, which borders Pyin Oo Lwin. / The Irrawaddy. /Google Maps

The TNLA and its resistance allies are clashing with regime forces near the border of Pyin Oo Lwin and Nawnghkio townships, resistance groups say.

The junta’s garrison town is their next target if the TNLA and its allies continue their coordinated offensive in Mandalay.

Zin Yaw, a former soldier who joined the Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM), described Pyin Oo Lwin as the last target for resistance groups from northern Shan State seeking to enter Mandalay City.

Linn Htet Aung, a former captain in the junta’s military who joined the CDM, predicted that the garrison town would fall to resistance forces quickly. “Pyin Oo Lwin will fall in a short period of time after it is attacked because the town is designated only for military training schools, not for combat,” he said.

He also said that several regime officers, including lieutenant colonels, from junta bases in Pyin Oo Lwin have recently contacted People’s Embrace – a group formed by former soldiers who joined the civil disobedience movement – for help defecting.

A businessman helping residents of the town escape said most of those fleeing are going to Mandalay, Naypyitaw and Yangon. “Most are rich people and family members of the regime’s military personnel. But I am only providing relocation services to civilians, not people related to the military regime,” he added.

The junta has sent combat troops from other regions of Myanmar to defend the town, an analyst closely monitoring Operation 1027 said, explaining that its military personnel in the town are not combat troops. Many are instructors and students at military training schools and defense academies, he said.

Towns captured by resistance groups during Operation 1027. / The Irrawaddy

One resident of the town said she and her family are staying to safeguard their property. “We have decided not to leave because we are worried that our property will be stolen by thieves. Many of my neighbors also decided to do the same. So, I am digging a bomb shelter at my house,” she said.

The junta on Thursday dismissed news reports that relatives of regime personnel and other residents were fleeing the garrison town as fake news. It accused independent media of fanning instability in Pyin Oo Lwin.

Leaked documents, however, tell a different story. Letters from the junta’s Mandalay Region Settlement and Land Record Department leaked on Thursday instructed township offices in Pyin Oo Lwin and Patehigyi, which is adjacent Mandalay city, to develop plans to relocate their staff and remove important documents due to security concerns.

Regime troops have been deployed in residential wards of Pyin Oo Lwin and some have taken position at the University of Technology – also known as Yatanarpon Cyber City – on a main road linking Pyin Oo Lwin and Mandalay city, where the headquarters of the junta’s Central Command is based.

In early April, Mandalay PDF attacked the junta’s Defense Service Academy at Pyin Oo Lwin with 107mm rockets. The junta admitted that the resistance attack killed four people and wounded 12 more, including cadets at the academy.

Mandalay PDF and allied resistance groups recently launched attacks on regime targets in Patheingyi township in Mandalay city. The PDF groups and its allies have seized over 35 regime bases and outposts, including the headquarters of the junta’s Air Defense Battalion at Madaya township next to Mandalay city.

In July, the TNLA, Mandalay PDF and other allies took control of Singu town and the ruby town of Mogoke in northern Mandalay Region.

Irrawaddy News

Myanmar junta bombs sleeping village killing seven, rebels say

August 9, 2024/in News

Many people were wounded in the latest air attack in the strife-torn Mandalay region, residents said.

The Myanmar junta’s air force bombed a village in a strife-torn central region killing seven people as they slept, an insurgent group said on Thursday, the latest deaths in what opponents of the junta say is a deliberate campaign to target civilians in areas under rebel control.

Forces of the junta that seized power in a 2021 coup are increasingly relying on air power to strike back at insurgent forces who have made significant gains on the ground in several parts of the country since late last year.

In the central Mandalay region, pro-democracy fighters in the Mandalay People’s Defense Force and allied Ta’ang National Liberation Army, or TNLA, ethnic minority insurgents have captured dozens of junta positions, including the gem-mining town of Mogoke, over recent months.

But the junta has responded with deadly retaliation from the air, in a campaign the junta’s enemies say is aimed at killing civilians in a bid to warn the population off support for the rebels.

In the dead of night on Tuesday, the junta’s air force launched an attack on Mandalay region’s Payaung Taung village in a strike that appeared to be timed to catch villagers asleep in their beds to maximize casualties, the Mandalay force said in a statement.

“Seven people were killed when a bomb was dropped at night, four women and three men,” said a resident of the area who declined to be identified for safety reasons.

“There were also many injured people but we don’t know the details yet.”

Radio Free Asia could not reach the junta main spokesperson, Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun, by telephone to ask about the incident.

The Mandalay People’s Defense Force released photographs of the victims but it said it could not identify them.

The junta’s air force launched strikes on two villages in the Mandalay region’s Singu township on Aug. 4, killing 13 people and wounding 19, the group said.

Junta spokesmen have denied targeting civilians.

A three-party alliance of insurgent forces, including the TNLA, this week called on neighboring China to intervene with the junta to press it to stop attacking civilians.

The insurgents have little in the way of anti-aircraft weapons to defend against junta jets.

According to data compiled by the RFA, airstrikes and heavy weapon attacks by junta troops have killed about 2,000 civilians and wounded nearly 4,000 since the 2021 coup, up to May.

RFA News

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ND Burma

ND-Burma formed in 2004 in order to provide a way for Burma human rights organizations to collaborate on the human rights documentation process. The 13 ND-Burma member organizations seek to collectively use the truth of what communities in Burma have endured to advocate for justice for victims. ND-Burma trains local organizations in human rights documentation; coordinates members’ input into a common database using Martus, a secure open-source software; and engages in joint-advocacy campaigns.

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