Regime forces, including members of the pro-junta Pyu Saw Htee militia, killed three civilians during a raid on a village in Myingyan Township, Mandalay Region, on Wednesday, according to local resistance sources.
The victims were shot after being captured by a column of around 100 regime troops conducting the operation in Phon, a village near the town of Myingyan, according to Wan Tu, leader of Battalion 1 of the Myingyan People’s Defence Force.
“As they arrived in four trucks, the junta forces apprehended the three men. They claimed the men were informants and executed them by shooting them in the head,” he said, adding that the identities of the men, who were all in their 30s, remain unknown.
According to local sources, the Pyu Saw Htee forces involved in the attack were led by a woman named Thida Yu Mon, a former chair of the local chapter of the Union Solidarity and Development Party, the military’s political proxy.
Thida Yu Mon previously led a group known as the Blood Drinkers, notorious for assasinating regime opponents, which was later incorporated into the Pyu Saw Htee.
According to Wan Tu, resistance forces have recently taken control of Lay Sone, the village where Thida Yu Mon’s forces were based.
On August 10, anti-regime forces launched the Myingyan District Special Operation, targeting junta forces across three townships southwest of Mandalay.
These townships—Myingyan, Taungtha, and Natogyi—form a triangle east of the Ayeyarwady River, adjacent to Sagaing Region, where resistance forces are also active.
The regime has reportedly suffered heavy losses in the area, which is home to about 750,000 residents, since the offensive began. In response, it has carried out numerous airstrikes on resistance-held territory, as well as occasional raids on villages that anti-junta forces are unable to defend.
On September 16, regime troops captured and killed six local resistance fighters in Thar Yar Gyi, a village in Taungtha Township. A week later, airstrikes on three villages in the same township injured two civilians and destroyed several homes.
Another airstrike on September 22 killed one woman and seriously injured three others in Myingyan Township.
