A blast killed four young children and gravely injured a fifth on Tuesday in Bago Region’s Phyu Township beside the Yangon-Naypyitaw highway, according to a social welfare group that assisted the victims.
Shrapnel and debris hit four young boys and a girl, all between 5 and 10 years old, as well as a man in his 40s, when an explosive detonated at around 4pm near a public rest stop in the village of In Pin Thar in southern Phyu Township, Bago Region.
The man, who was inside a house near the public rest stop, sustained only minor injuries. However, four of the five children at the scene of the explosion died, and the boy who survived remains in critical condition after being transferred from Phyu’s general hospital to Naypyitaw.
Two of the deceased children, Aye Chan Maung and a second boy, died immediately. The girl, Wathann Moe, and another boy died later at the general hospital in Phyu, according to a member of the In Pin Thar village’s social welfare group, which helped transport the children there.
“The children set off the landmine while they were playing. Two died on the spot and we drove the other three to the hospital but two of them died that night, so we had to bring them back to the village,” said the social welfare group member.
Another In Pin Thar local said he heard the blast from his farm outside the village.
“The explosion was very loud. We were near the village and could hear it from the field, but we didn’t dare go look at the bodies,” the local man said.
Another man who saw the deceased children said there were extensive injuries on their bodies.
“One of the bodies was completely mangled. The other had broken limbs and teeth. We don’t know whose explosives those were. I felt very bad to see young children suffer that fate,’ he said.
Only Aye Chan Maung’s and Wathan Moe’s names were disclosed. Sources did not provide the names of the other victims or other identifying information, and Myanmar Now is still trying to contact the victims’ families.
A junta force also reportedly came to investigate the incident on Wednesday, according to the same sources.
No organisation has claimed responsibility for setting the explosive.
Anti-junta resistance forces remain active in some parts of Bago Region, including Kyaukkyi Township, located 10 miles southeast of In Pin Thar village, and Nyaunglebin Township, around 40 miles to the south.
The local source who witnessed the victims’ bodies said a junta column had passed through In Pin Thar 10 days before the explosion, but that fighting in or near the village was rare. Myanmar Now has yet to independently confirm the claim that a junta column was present in the village before the explosion.
Bago Region is largely under the control of various anti-junta resistance groups, including the Karen National Liberation Army–the armed wing of the Karen National Union, an ethnic political organisation–and the People’s Defence Forces (PDF), which operate under the command of the publicly mandated National Unity Government.
The military has been escalating operations to regain control of resistance strongholds like those in Bago Region since the beginning of this year, and has tightened security along the roads between Yangon and Mandalay as part of these efforts.
