Villagers have been assaulted and displaced in a series of recent junta raids in southern Myaung, according to local sources in the Sagaing Region township.
Some 150 soldiers from two junta columns attacked more than 10 villages on September 3 and 4, capturing and interrogating at least 15 residents, a spokesperson from the Civil Defence and Security Organisation of Myaung (CDSOM), the resistance coalition, told Myanmar Now.
“They usually only come after midnight. I think they are trying to regain control over the region,” the group’s information officer, Nway Oo, told Myanmar Now.
The targeted communities included Bu Kaing, Thayet Thar, Thayet Taw, Si Ywar, Gaung Khwel, Sin Min, Pan Nyo, Nyaung Kar Kar, Ywar Pale, Ngar Yant Oh and Min Hla.
More than 5,000 people from the villages had fled their homes at the time of reporting.
One local man was hospitalised on September 5 after being tortured by the occupying Myanmar army troops, the CDSOM spokesperson said.
“They beat one of the men so badly that he was sent to the hospital in a social welfare vehicle. We still don’t know which village he was from or if he survived,” Nway Oo explained.
The series of assaults followed a clash between resistance forces and the military in Myaung on September 2 in which three junta personnel and one guerrilla fighter were reportedly killed.
Anti-junta defence forces in the area have been assisting with providing shelter and food to the internally displaced persons (IDP) in Myaung, but are facing difficulties in meeting the growing humanitarian needs, the coalition reported.
On August 31, CDSOM’s information officer said that two civilians were killed and three injured after a military artillery shell hit an IDP camp in Zee Kyun, also in Myaung Township, where some 200 people from the villages of Bu Khaing, Thayet Thar and Kyauk Yit had been sheltering.