Several missing as villages, displaced people’s camps flood near KIA headquarters in Laiza

Several village homes and camp areas were submerged on Monday when a creek overflowed its banks near Laiza in Kachin State’s Waingmaw Township, where the headquarters of the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) is located. Nine people were reported missing after the start of the flood, which impacted the Je Yang and Hpun Lum Yang internally displaced persons’ (IDP) camps, Jar Htu Kwang village, and surrounding areas as rising waters and stronger currents in the Munglai Hkyet Creek destroyed a bridge and many homes near Kachin State’s border with China. A woman sheltering at the Je Yang camp, located roughly six miles south of Laiza, reported that the flooding began around 5am on Monday. Six houses in Laiza’s Ward 1 and a makeshift boarding school for Chinese language students in the camp were carried off by the floodwaters. “The boarding school behind the KBC office was carried away along with several vehicles. However, the rest of Je Yang camp remained untouched, as floodwaters did not rise high enough to reach anything else. Only the structures along the bank were lost,” the displaced woman said. Houses near the creek’s bank in the other camp and the village were also destroyed. Three villagers in the same family as well as three drivers and two automotive repair workers in the village were also reportedly lost in the floods and had not been seen since. A displaced woman living in a village several miles north of Je Yang camp, where the flooding destroyed 13 houses, is also missing after being carried off. “I heard that the flooding affected the area from that village all the way to the Laiza bridge,” the displaced woman told Myanmar Now. “Around there, 13 houses were swept away, and more than 10 others were damaged. People from there also said all the roads have been destroyed.” Myanmar Now has not been able to verify the reported damage to homes independently, nor confirm the accounts or numbers of dead and missing people following the flood. Several homes were damaged and carried away by the rising creek waters. (Photo: Still image from video by Naw Tu Awng) The KIA confirmed that the bridge over the Munglai Hkyet Creek, near the south exit from Laiza, was damaged in the unusually strong current. The creek’s water level started to drop and the current slowed around noon on the same day the flooding began, according to locals. KIA spokesperson Col. Naw Bu said the group had started inspecting the damage at the Je Yang IDP camp. “Bridges on the route from Laiza to the IDP camp are underwater, making travel very challenging. We don’t have a clear picture of the situation yet,” the KIA spokesperson said. “Although we received word about the flooding, we didn’t anticipate it would be this severe.” He added that the group anticipated having a more complete assessment of the damage after a day, when the floodwaters would have receded from the roads and bridge to which they were obstructing access. The Je Yang, Hpun Lum Yang, and Mung Sai Yang displaced people’s camps provide shelter to people who fled their homes in Waingmaw Township starting in 2011, when fighting resumed between the KIA and Myanmar military after a 14-year ceasefire. These clashes had not fully settled by the time the military took control of Myanmar’s government ministries in a coup in February 2021, and the KIA again took up arms against the military across most of Kachin State. Fighting is ongoing between the junta and KIA-led coalition of forces in some parts of the state such as the town of Bhamo and the jade-mining hub of Hpakant in the north.

Several missing as villages, displaced people’s camps flood near KIA headquarters in Laiza

Rising waters and strong currents in the Munglai Hkyet Creek on Monday reportedly resulted in destruction or severe damage to a bridge and dozens of homes, as well as carrying off at least nine local people

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