Myanmar junta airstrike kills four civilians in Sagaing village, including infant

A Myanmar military airstrike struck a village in Sagaing Region on Tuesday, killing four civilians—including a two-month-old infant and a schoolteacher—in Wetlet Township, according to local resistance forces and a monitoring group. The attack hit Paukkan Butar village, about 10 miles south of Wetlet town, around 9:45am, when a junta jet dropped three high-explosive bombs, residents and the Wetlet Informational Network told Myanmar Now. Those killed included a two-month-old baby, a 70-year-old woman, a 60-year-old woman named Tin Tin Htay, and a 40-year-old woman who later died from head injuries after being taken for treatment, local resistance fighters said. Residents added that there was no ground fighting in the area at the time of the strike, yet the bombs landed near a football field and hit civilian homes. “There were no ground clashes or fighting of any kind,” a resistance fighter told Myanmar Now.“The bombs fell directly inside the village, hitting civilian houses. Daw Tin Tin Htay was a CDM schoolteacher.”The Wetlet Township People’s Defence Organization (PDO) confirmed that another nearby village, Thaukkan, was also bombed on the same morning. The airstrike comes as the junta intensifies operations against resistance-held towns east of the Ayeyarwady River in Mandalay Region, while simultaneously stepping up aerial pressure on Wetlet Township on the opposite bank.Sagaing Region has been one of the epicentres of resistance to military rule since the 2021 coup, with Wetlet Township under near-constant pressure from airstrikes as the junta seeks to regain control of areas held by resistance forces. Civilian villages across the region have increasingly borne the brunt of aerial attacks, despite the absence of active fighting nearby, residents and monitoring groups say. In December alone, Wetlet Township was hit by at least 14 airstrikes, killing 26 people—including monks, children and elderly residents—and injuring more than 40 others, according to local monitoring groups. Across Sagaing Region, at least 16 townships have been targeted by junta’s air attacks, with nearly 90 civilian deaths reported over the past month. Residents said the airstrikes have increasingly targeted transport routes, river crossings, jetties and sites sheltering displaced people, following the junta’s recent recapture of Madaya and Singu townships in Mandalay Region. Tens of thousands of civilians have fled across the Ayeyarwady River into Sagaing Region to escape intensified fighting, local sources said. They warned that the military has since expanded its air campaign to include displacement routes and shelter sites in Wetlet and neighboring townships, raising fears for civilians seeking refuge.“Although there are military movements elsewhere in the township, there was nothing happening in the areas that were bombed,” the PDO information officer told Myanmar Now.“These were places where there was no fighting at all.”

Myanmar junta airstrike kills four civilians in Sagaing village, including infant

Residents said a village in Wetlet Township was bombed despite the absence of fighting, as air attacks intensify

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