Myanmar army soldiers burnt down a free clinic and dozens of homes in a village in Sagaing Region’s Budalin Township over the weekend as military reprisals continue to follow a recent resistance raid on a local fire station.
Some 70 junta troops set fire to the clinic, which operated from a Buddhist monastery in Thakhuttanei village, as well as some 40 residences, on August 12 after arriving in the community the day before.
Nearly one week earlier, anti-junta resistance forces attacked the fire department in downtown Budalin, detaining 11 staff, eight of their family members, and two civil servants. Within days, the military responded by launching offensives throughout the township.
On Monday, the troops occupying Thakhuttanei returned to Budalin town, 10 miles east of the village, but not before reportedly shooting at displaced residents returning to the besieged community.
“The villagers initially thought the soldiers had left after burning the village, so they ventured back to attempt to extinguish the flames, but the junta troops opened fire on these villagers, forcing them to flee once again,” a man from Thakhuttanei said.
The local told Myanmar Now that another man who lived in the forest outside of the village was shot multiple times by the soldiers.
“As he was bringing his goats back to the farm, the soldiers shot him. His ears and hands were hit by bullets: five shots. But he didn’t die.”
Since August 10, two columns—one with 100 soldiers from Saing Pyin village in Depayin Township, and one with 70 soldiers, from Ku Taw in Budalin—had been advancing through the area. It was not clear which unit had targeted Thakuttanei, sources within the resistance said.
The estimate of homes destroyed in the arson attack was based on aerial photographs made public by local resistance forces. However, Myanmar Now was unable to independently verify details regarding casualties, arrests, and the extent of the injuries endured by the civilian allegedly shot five times.
An officer in a Budalin-based guerrilla group that attacked the raiding column said that the unit had been searching for firefighters and staff detained in the August 6 assault on the regime fire station.
Residents of Thakuttanei, as well as the villages of Phogon, Gway Pin Kyin, Nyaung Kan, Saing Pyin and Ywa Tha have fled their homes due to the recent military operations in Budalin Township.
Budalin is less than 40km north of Monywa, Sagaing Region’s largest city and host to the junta’s Northwestern Regional Military Command.
According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, around 1.6 million people have been displaced from their homes in Myanmar since the military seized power in February 2021, with Sagaing Region alone accounting for more than half of this figure.
