A raid on a jail run by anti-junta groups in Khin-U Township resulted in the release of more than 20 members of the military-backed Pyu Saw Htee militia on Wednesday, according to resistance sources.
The jail, located in Ywar Than, a village about 5km east of the town of Khin-U, was attacked by some 100 regime soldiers and Pyu Saw Htee members at around 4am, the sources said.
“They conducted the raid mainly to rescue their troops. They came in behind some displaced locals, arriving in Ywar Than before dawn. They raided and ransacked the jail house and then left immediately,” said local defence team leader Nat Soe.
The jail and several resistance outposts around the village were also torched during the assault, he added.
Most of the Pyu Saw Htee members in the jail were from Hpoke Kone, a village some 12km south of Ywar Than in Shwebo Township. They were captured days earlier and were being held for questioning, according to Nat Soe.
A member of another local defence group said the junta forces appeared to know exactly where to go.
“They came directly to this village. We actually thought they might stop by some other villages on the way, but they didn’t,” he said, adding that resistance forces were too exposed at the time of the attack to fight back.
After leaving Ywar Than, the attackers and the freed Pyu Saw Htee members reportedly went to Hpoke Kone, which is regarded as a stronghold of the militia.
Some 5,000 people fled their homes as the junta column passed through the area, according to locals.
Meanwhile, regime attacks also took place in the western part of Khin-U Township on Wednesday. In one village, four people, including a 10-year-old boy, were injured by an artillery shell fired by junta troops in neighbouring Ye-U Township.
The victims were identified as Zin Lin Phyo, 10, Zin Myo Tun, 33, Win Sein, 67, and Marlar Oo, 49. All four are residents of Ma Yan Inn, a village on the eastern bank of the Mu River some 20km west of the town of Khin-U.
That incident occurred at around 6 am as a junta column came under attack as it prepared to raid the nearby village of Inpat, according to Lin Yaung, spokesperson for the Khin-U Special Force Organisation (KSO), a local resistance group.
“The column heading for Inpat was hit by explosives right around the time that junta forces stationed at the Ye-U Traditional Medicine Hospital fired 120mm artillery shells at Ma Yan Inn,” he said.
The injured victims are currently receiving medical care from revolutionary forces in the area, he added.
According to the KSO and other resistance groups in the area, two junta soldiers were killed by the explosive attack.
Around 3,000 civilians, including residents of Inpat and other villages in the area, have fled their homes since Wednesday morning, sources said.
