Three anti-junta fighters killed as clashes intensify near Shan-Karenni border

Karenni resistance forces fighting back against a regime offensive in southern Shan State lost three fighters on Monday, according to local resistance sources. The three fighters were killed by heavy artillery fire, reported the Southern Shan Local Revolution Union, a coalition of six armed groups operating in southern Shan State’s Pekhon Township. Funerals for the fallen anti-junta troops were held at an undisclosed location in a resistance-held area of Karenni State, the group told Myanmar Now. Last week, a Karenni fighter was killed by junta shelling near Moebye, a large village located in southern Pekhon Township, near the border with Karenni State. The regime has launched a series of major attacks in the area since December as part of an offensive to retake Moebye, which resistance forces have held since last year. Strategically located about halfway between the town of Pekhon and the Karenni State capital Loikaw, which are both under junta control, Moebye is also just 120 miles east of the regime’s capital, Naypyitaw. “Fighting is still intense and ongoing. The military is bombing and shelling the area all the time,” a member of a Moebye-based defence team said on Wednesday. The most severe clashes have taken place along the road from Pekhon to Loikaw, which are less than 22 miles apart, another resistance fighter told Myanmar Now. “There are clashes every day. We still control some parts of the Loikaw-Pekhon route near Moebye,” he said. The Karenni fighters also claimed that troops of the Pa-O National Organisation, a junta-aligned ethnic armed group, have been fighting alongside regime forces during the clashes in Pekhon Township. There have also been reports of civilian casualties in rural areas of Pekhon Township since the current offensive began late last year. “One man was killed and eight others were injured by junta shelling in eastern Pekhon Township earlier this month,” a spokesperson for the Karenni Human Rights Group said. The allied anti-junta forces in Pekhon include eight battalions of the People’s Defence Force under the command of National Unity Government, two battalions of the Karenni Nationalities Defence Force, the Karenni Army, and the Urban Revolutionary Front.

Three anti-junta fighters killed as clashes intensify near Shan-Karenni border

Karenni forces continue to push back against a regime offensive to retake the strategically important village of Moebye

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