Displaced residents returning to Loikaw despite safety concerns

Maw Saw Mya*, a mother of two in her 30s, has been unable to reopen the traditional Kayah weaving workshop she once ran as a family business in Loikaw, Karenni (Kayah) State for more than a year. As fighting intensified in late 2023 in Loikaw—Maw Saw Mya’s hometown and the junta’s administrative capital in Karenni State—Maw Saw Mya and her family were forced to flee, leaving everything they had built. Their workshop, home, and lives were all abandoned amid the chaos of war. Nine months later, after the military regime recaptured the town from anti-junta forces that had partially taken it over, she returned to Loikaw to see how her house had fared through the fighting. “I don’t even have words to describe it,” Maw Saw Mya said as she remembered the effects of the clashes. Only a few houses in her ward were left standing, and even they sustained devastating damage, she said, recalling how the few remaining houses looked like islands in a sea of charred ground. Her house was among those still standing, but had its windows shattered, walls riddled with bullets, and roof partially torn off. “I couldn’t even recognise my old neighbourhood. Half of it lay in ashes and the only remaining houses were all damaged and overgrown with grass,” she said, before adding, “Some areas are still strewn with landmines.” Due to the danger from landmines and the possibility that fighting would resume, she returned to Taunggyi, the capital of southern Shan State, where she had been staying as an internally displaced person (IDP). “It’s pretty horrifying because there’s no one living there. We couldn’t reopen our business and there is no hope for my children’s education,” she explained. According to Maw Saw Mya, only two of the ten weaving workshops she knew about had managed to relocate or reopen their businesses. Her own workshop remains closed. “When the situation becomes peaceful and stable, I will try to reopen my business in my hometown,” she said. Other returning residents also said most parts of the town were off limits to former residents, who found they could not even enter their old neighbourhoods, let alone stay in them. Only four wards including a small section of Min Su Ward were open for residents to return home, they said. At least five out of 19 wards in Loikaw are allowed to enter for displaced people while the rest of the urban areas remain largely deserted. While the military regime has called for displaced residents to return to Loikaw, there are scant signs of life in the worst-hit wards. “Generally speaking, the situation is still dangerous for people to return,” said Banya Khung Aung, a secretary of the Interim Executive Council of Karenni State, a governing body opposed to the junta. “Fighting intermittently breaks out on the outskirts of Loikaw where there are junta troops stationed at battalion bases.” However, a few displaced Loikaw residents have made the daring decision to go back to their hometown, especially when they find it difficult to make ends meet elsewhere due to spreading, unpredictable outbreaks of fighting or the rising cost of living in neighbouring southern Shan State. One such returning resident, Nyein Nyien, went back to Loikaw with her family a month after the military regime granted access to the displaced inhabitants in July of last year. She rented a house near the city centre and opened a restaurant to restart her family’s life. “Prices here are much cheaper compared with cities in southern Shan State,” said Nyein Nyein. Prices had jumped in the southern Shan State capital of Taunggyi, where her family had fled, due in part to the massive influx of displaced people from northern Shan State as well as Karenni State. As civil servants return to Loikaw along with other displaced civilians, the military regime is beginning to restore some of the town’s infrastructure, reopening healthcare facilities and educational institutions, with schools running on an adjusted schedule. A damaged marketplace is also being rebuilt. Loikaw is also one of the few cities in Myanmar where electricity is available around the clock, since the nearby Lawpita hydropower station does not have the capacity to transmit to other cities after its connecting power lines were damaged. However, residents said that Loikaw University and surrounding neighbourhoods, which were heavily impacted by fighting and temporarily taken over by anti-junta forces, remain cordoned off. The town is also not yet free of the threat of violence. Artillery fire can be heard every day from junta bases in and near the town, and soldiers continue to patrol the town regularly. “It’s currently safe inside the town but it’s not possible to predict when fighting could flare up again,” Nyein Nyein said. Nevertheless, she has resolved not to flee from Loikaw again, insisting that she will find ways to stay safe inside the town if fighting resumes. It is too challenging to try living in other towns, she said. Clashes have continued near Loikaw due to the military regime’s attempts to recapture Moebye, a large village close to the Shan-Karenni state border. Despite the ongoing safety concerns, some families plan to return to Loikaw during their children’s upcoming school break. “Many people will return once their children’s exams are over,” a displaced man from Loikaw said. “People are becoming unwilling to stay in other towns a long time because of various difficulties.” *The names of sources have been changed in this article to protect their security.

Displaced residents returning to Loikaw despite safety concerns

The military regime has retaken the Karenni State capital, returned civil servants to the city, reopened schools and clinics, and urged people who fled fighting in the town to return

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