Myanmar junta strikes Kachin armed group’s stronghold as clashes in Bhamo continue

Regime forces deployed drones to attack the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) stronghold of Laiza, Kachin State on Saturday amid ongoing attacks on junta camps in the state, a source close to the KIA said. After KIA-led fighters intensified assaults on the junta’s Military Operations Command 21 (MOC-21) headquarters and battalion bases in Bhamo Township starting around 6am on Saturday, junta aircraft were spotted over Laiza the same day. Bhamo Township is some 40 miles southwest of Laiza, which is on Kachin State’s border with China’s Yunnan Province and served as the location for the headquarters of the KIA and the Kachin Independence Organisation (KIO), for which it operates as an armed wing. According to KIA spokesperson Colonel Naw Bu, junta aircraft that were seen hovering over Laiza at around 3pm carried out an attack near the armed group’s headquarters in the town. “I heard explosions coming from Ah Law Bum in Laiza,” he said on Saturday. “I’m not certain if it was a drone strike, but I heard it twice.” He added that it is still unclear whether the bombing resulted in civilian casualties or injuries. A local man connected to the KIA confirmed initial reports indicating that the explosions had injured some civilians, although he knew none were injured in a drone strike on the Myitkyina Hotel in Laiza’s centre. “A bomb landed there in downtown Laiza. Although no one was hurt, the hotel sustained damage,” he said. “They used a kamikaze drone.” Laiza and its surroundings have become a common destination for people displaced by violence in Myanmar, as well as a repeated target of military airstrikes. An attack on Laiza in May of 2024 did not cause any known casualties but provoked Chinese authorities across the border to fire warning flares in response. An airstrike on the town less than two months later reportedly injured a pregnant woman. In October of the previous year, an attack on a displaced people’s camp in a village three miles from the town massacred dozens of people, including at least 11 children, eliciting broad condemnation from human rights advocacy groups in Myanmar and the international community. Anti-junta forces led by the KIA reportedly captured an armoured corps base during the clashes in Bhamo Township on Saturday. The anti-junta fighters have been in control of the township’s urban areas since January 8, when they captured the junta’s Light Infantry Battalion (LIB) 319 and LIB 601 bases, as well as an artillery base in Mansi some ten miles to the southeast. The military council has not issued any statements regarding clashes in Bhamo or Mansi. Chinese authorities have been exerting increasing pressure on anti-junta armed groups to negotiate ceasefires with the Myanmar military, especially the members of the Brotherhood Alliance that carried out a sweeping “Operation 1027” offensive campaign against the military from 2023 to 2024. An urban area of Bhamo Township on January 22 (Video still: Zaw Min Oo) Leaders of the KIA reportedly met with Chinese officials in December, but did not disclose the details of what they discussed publicly. While not a member of the Brotherhood Alliance, the KIA has fought against the military to take over territory in northern Shan State, where Operation 1027 was concentrated. Beginning in March of 2024, the KIA and allied groups have also conducted offensive operations across a range of townships, capturing 14 towns in Kachin and northern Shan states as well as taking effective control over most of Hpakant Township, Myanmar’s jade mining hub.

Myanmar junta strikes Kachin armed group’s stronghold as clashes in Bhamo continue

Anti-junta sources said the military used drones in the attack on Laiza, Kachin State, which is thought to have been a retaliation for attacks on military bases led by the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) elsewhere in the state

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