Myanmar regime forces torch villages during hunt for new recruits

A junta column carrying out raids in Sagaing Region’s Kanbalu Township has been demanding new recruits and setting fire to villages that fail to provide them, according to local residents. The column of around 150 soldiers, accompanied by members of the military-backed Pyu Saw Htee militia, began the raids on October 30 and has so far detained around 130 people, mostly men of conscription age, sources reported. “If they don’t find anyone in the village, they set it on fire. If they do find people, they capture them and force them to join either the Pyu Saw Htee or the army,” said a local man who spoke to Myanmar Now on Wednesday. “Right now it feels like we’re just sitting and waiting for our turn. We have nowhere to run or hide. Our region lacks forests or mountains,” he added. According to the man, the villages of Kyi Su and Kyauk Taing, which were among the first to be targeted, were completely destroyed by the attacks. “They began burning Kyi Su at around 11am [on October 30] and continued until 1pm, only moving on to Kyauk Taing after everything in Kyi Su was destroyed. There is only one house left standing between the two villages,” he said. Kyi Su was a village of around 700 households, while Kyauk Taing had about 200. Both were previously targeted in 2022, losing a total of 600 houses to arson attacks, according to locals. Smoke rises from a village in Sagaing Region’s Kanbalu Township following a raid by junta forces (Kyunhla-Kanbalu Activists Group) The next day the junta forces raided Aing Paung Chaung, a village about three miles north of Kyauk Taing, where they did not set any fires but captured 34 men and three women who were sheltering there, according to the Kyunhla-Kanbalu Activist Group. The column then proceeded to uses drones to attack the villages of Wet Toe (South) and Wet Toe (North), destroying a total of 83 houses, according to the local man. While most villagers fled upon hearing of the column’s advance, five workers who stayed behind to guard a fish farm were captured and taken to a junta base in the town of Kanbalu along with the 37 captured in Aing Paung Chaung, the man added. On Monday, after stationing itself in the village of Kar Boe, a known Pyu Saw Htee stronghold, the column launched raids on the villages of Bu Gyi (South) and Bu Gyi (North), sources said. Although no houses were set on fire during the raids, 50 villagers were detained after the junta troops threatened to burn down the village if they could not provide recruits. The column then raided Kyi Kone, a village located about a mile to the west, and used the same threat to forcibly recruit 35 villagers. Nyaung Pin Seik, a village located about two miles north of Kyi Kone, was raided late Monday. The village was set on fire the next morning after the junta troops could not find any residents. It was unknown at the time of reporting how many of the village’s roughly 100 homes were destroyed.

Myanmar regime forces torch villages during hunt for new recruits

Junta troops are destroying entire villages in Sagaing’s Kanbalu Township as their residents flee to avoid being forcibly conscripted

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