Myanmar military steps up airstrikes in Rakhine State, killing at least seven

Airstrikes carried out by Myanmar’s military in four townships across Rakhine State killed at least seven people since late last week, according to local sources. The deadliest attack took place late Friday, when five people were killed and 10 injured in an aerial assault on the town of Minbya, a man living in the area told Myanmar Now. “Three men and two women died in the attack. Ten people, including two teenagers, suffered injuries,” the man said, adding that at least seven houses were also damaged. The next day, the regime carried out multiple airstrikes in three other townships: Ponnagyun, Pauktaw, and Rathedaung. In Ponnagyun Township, an attack on Kyauk Than Chay, a village about 13 miles northwest of the town of Ponnagyun, left two women, aged 83 and 37, dead, sources there said. Both women were staying in the village after fleeing fighting elsewhere, the sources added. The attack, which took place at around 2pm, injured two others. Another airstrike targeting the village of Yoetayoke in Ponnagyun Township killed five people—four women and a man—and wounded seven others last Thursday. In Pauktaw Township—which like Ponnagyun is near the junta-controlled state capital Sittwe—four people were injured on Saturday when two bombs dropped from a junta aircraft landed near a high school in an urban area, a local man said. “Many Pauktaw residents have fled the town as they fear junta shelling fired from Sittwe,” he added. The military also carried out another airstrike on Saturday targeting Kyauk Than Chay, a village located just west of the town of Rathedaung. However, no civilian casualties were reported. Since reaching a Chinese-brokered ceasefire agreement with the Ta’ang National Liberation Army in northern Shan State late last month, the military has stepped up its offensive in Rakhine State, where the Arakan Army (AA) currently controls 14 out of 17 townships. “There are almost always fighter jets in the sky, so our lives are constantly at risk. We never know where or when the next bomb will fall. We can’t sleep at night and just keep listening for the sound of aircraft,” said a man sheltering in an AA-controlled area. A spokesperson for the group denounced the regime’s indiscriminate airstrikes on civilian targets, saying they flagrantly violate the rules of war. “The fascist military council must be held accountable for the violence and killings it has committed against civilians,” AA spokesperson Khaing Thu Kha said. Fighting also persists in Kyaukphyu, the site of major Chinese-backed economic projects, as the AA continues to push for full control of the state. Kyaukphyu, Sittwe, and Manaung Island are the only townships in Rakhine State still under junta control. At least 10 people were killed and 28 injured by airstrikes in Kyaukphyu and Ponnagyun townships on October 30. Shelling by regime forces in Sittwe also killed a five-year-old girl and injured two others in Pauktaw Township last month.

Myanmar military steps up airstrikes in Rakhine State, killing at least seven

The civilian victims were killed in aerial assaults carried out in four townships since last Friday

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