Junta, allies arrest some 200 villagers in southern Shan State

Myanmar army troops detained around 200 people for unknown reasons in southern Shan State’s Pekhon Township on the border with Karenni (Kayah) State, according to Karenni resistance fighters citing firsthand accounts from locals. Pu Chei is located two miles northwest of Pekhon on the Pekhon-Pinlaung road. Tar Eh Soe, a spokesperson for the Karenni Nationalities Defence Force (KNDF), told Myanmar Now that a junta column of around 500 armed personnel advanced from Pinlaung Township and took some 200 local people into custody as they were returning home from a day of harvesting. They then transported the detainees to Pinlaung Township by car. The KNDF is a well-equipped anti-junta resistance force based in Karenni State which formed in 2021 in response to the military’s seizure of power in a coup. “Our information is from reports made directly by people on the frontlines,” Tar Eh Soe said. “They said the junta took away the detainees in closed vehicles. The reports say they were taken away without being beaten or tortured.” He added that the KNDF had learned that the 200 Pu Chei villagers are being held at a sports stadium in Pinlaung, which remains under junta control. Along with Hopong, Pinlaung is one of the main towns of the Pa-O Self-Administered Zone (SAZ), a territory set aside for autonomous self-government by the Pa-O ethnic community in Myanmar’s military-drafted 2008 constitution. According to the KNDF, the column of 500 personnel that advanced into Pekhon Township and Pu Chei from Pinlaung included not only soldiers, but also members of the armed group Pa-O National Army (PNA), which has come to operate mostly as a pro-junta militia in the area. After detaining the 200 locals from Pu Chei, the column continued advancing to Pekhon and joined the junta garrison stationed there, the KNDF said. Pekhon town has the junta's Military Operations Command 7 and two subordinate battalions, with the junta controlling the town. KNDF Central Information Officer Tar Eh Soe said, "The junta column's strength is between 500 to 1,000 personnel, including PNO troops. Inside Pekhon Town, the junta's base camps also have around 500 to 700 personnel." The reason for the junta’s mass arrest of civilian villagers remains unclear. A source connected to the Pa-O National Organisation (PNO)—the group for which the PNA operates as an armed wing—told Myanmar Now he had not heard reports about any arrests of civilians from Pekhon Township or their detention in Pinlaung. He confirmed, however, that the Myanmar army and PNA are jointly engaged in ongoing offensive operations against resistance groups, including People’s Defence Forces (PDF) and Karenni fighters, in both Pinlaung and Pekhon townships. “Battles are raging both day and night,” the PNO-connected source said. “Currently, the PNA seems intent on recapturing territory claimed by the PNO in Pinlaung Township. In Pekhon Township, the army is also present and fighting.” “If I'm not mistaken, the Nam Hpar Mu cillage area in Pinlaung is PNO territory, and since the other side is also present, there is constant fighting,” he continued, referring to the Karenni resistance groups active in that area. Speculating that conflict may have arisen between the PNA and Karenni fighters due to territorial or interethnic disputes, he said that while PNO leaders try to prevent conflicts between the PNA and other armed groups from taking on ethnic cast, they sometimes encounter difficulties in controlling their lower-ranking fighters. “The PNA forces fighting in Pinlaung are mostly locals,” he said. “They were recruited as soldiers to defend their own villages. So when they see their villages being destroyed, they have strong emotional reactions.” The PNO and its armed wing have drawn criticism, especially from Pa-O ethnic organisations opposed to the junta, for their alleged policy of forcible recruitment from among local civilian populations in the territory they claim. It is unclear whether the reported mass detention of villagers in Pekhon Township had any connection to this policy. The PNO’s stated military objective is to reestablish unchallenged control over the territory in the the Pa-O SAZ, including Pinlaung Township, where Karenni resistance forces maintain an active presence. The PNO source also told Myanmar Now that the military has also been positioning forces to launch assaults on resistance forces in Moebye (Mongpai), southern Shan State—which is currently under Karenni resistance fighters’ control—and in Pekhon, where Karenni fighters are menacing their Military Operations Command 7 (MOC-7) office. According to a KNDF statement, the joint junta and PNA forces have burned houses in villages along their route in Pinlaung and Pekhon Townships, including Nam Hpar Mu, Loi Keng, and Kone Paw. Myanmar Now has yet to confirm whether houses have been torched in these villages. According to the KNDF, six civilians including an eight-year-old were killed by junta airstrikes and drone attacks in Pekhon Township in the first eight days of November.

Junta, allies arrest some 200 villagers in southern Shan State

The regime troops, accompanied by members of the junta-allied Pa-O National Army (PNA), frequently clash with resistance forces in and near Pekhon Township, Southern Shan State, but their motive for the mass arrest of civilians is unclear

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