A New Year’s Eve drone attack killed seven civilians and injured four at a Hindu temple in Bago Region’s Phyu Township, according to local and resistance sources.
The deadly drone strikes hit the 50-year-old Shri Maa Mansa Mandir temple in Ran Na Gar village, located some six miles northeast of Phyu, Bago Region, in the early afternoon.
“I got a call from my friend at around 1pm,” a displaced villager from Ran Na Gar said. “He said seven villagers had been killed.”
Ran Na Gar, which is home to a predominantly Hindu community, is also four miles east of the small, junta-controlled town of Zeyawaddy, Phyu Township on the Yangon-Mandalay road,
While Myanmar Now was unable to confirm at the time of reporting which armed forces or units were responsible for the attack, resistance sources and a Hindu group accused the military of deploying the drones.
The religious organisation Myanmar Hindu Union issued a statement on Thursday condemning what it called a deliberate attack on vulnerable minorities by the military regime.
The organisation’s statement gave the names and ages of the seven slain civilians, who were all between 30 and 55 years old.
Citing a first-hand witness, the Myanmar Hindu Union’s statement also described how the attacks had come in two rounds, with the drones first firing on civilians including people attempting to rescue the injured, then returning with another, more powerful strike that caused all seven reported deaths.
On the same day as the attack on the temple, anti-junta forces launched their own drone strikes on military targets in the area between Zeyawaddy and Ran Na Gar, attempting to block the army’s ground troops from advancing into the villages of Har Sa Nar Pu and Kyu Inn north of Ran Na Gar.
Since the last full week of December, two columns of junta troops have been advancing from bases in Nyaung Chay Htauk village south of Phyu and Kyu Inn village northeast of Zeyawaddy into resistance-held territories on the west side of the Sittaung River, gradually coming closer to Ran Na Gar and its environs.
The troops have already clashed with anti-regime forces in and around villages close to Ran Na Gar such as Kyu Inn, Myet Ni Kwin, Hnaw Khin and Har Sa Nar Pu, forcing many of the residents to flee their homes.
“Fighting has subsided today but they’re not allowing us to enter our village,” said a displaced man from Htan Kone village on Thursday, referring to the junta troops.
“They are taking up positions in the areas surrounding our village,” he said, referring to a location less than three miles north of Ran Na Gar.
Despite hearing distant gunfire and artillery strikes, some villagers said they were choosing to stay in their homes until the fighting spread closer.
“Both sides are using drones now,” said a woman from Pat Tar village. “We’re staying indoors, keeping our doors locked. But if the situation gets worse, we’ll have no choice but to leave.”
The rural communities caught between the Yangon-Mandalay road—a major thoroughfare—and the west bank of the Sittaung are vulnerable to clashes arising from the ongoing struggle for territorial control between the junta and resistance forces in eastern Bago Region.
Phyu Township’s three towns—Phyu, Kanyutkwin and Zeyawaddy—all remain under the control of the military.
If the military was responsible for the drone strike on the temple, it may have been part of a broader campaign of aerial bombing that has escalated across Myanmar during the New Year’s holidays.
On Wednesday night, locals said the junta air force attacked the town of Hseni (Hsenwi), northern Shan State, which is under the control of Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA).
The MNDAA, an ethnic armed group that fought against the army for months in 2023 and 2024, is currently observing a ceasefire under pressure from China.
Although bombs hit some houses near a hotel in Ward 3, there were no casualties among the locals because they had previously fled their homes for safety, a Hseni resident said.
“We were asleep when we heard the sounds of bombs, twice, but we didn’t dare go see,” the man told Myanmar Now. “In the morning, we woke up to news that a house was badly damaged, but there were no casualties.”
Although there has not been any fighting for nearly a year in Hseni and the MNDAA has suspended operations against the junta, residents are wary of returning home due to the threat of junta airstrikes, which have occurred daily across territories in Myanmar where the junta is struggling to maintain or regain control.
The junta’s air raids on New Year’s Eve alone hit mostly civilian areas in Mandalay Region as well as Karen, Karenni (Kayah), Shan, and Rakhine states, causing numerous casualties and deaths.
“People are scared of the airstrikes, so they have not returned. To live here is to live under constant threat,” the man from Hseni said.
