Three civilians killed in Myanmar junta airstrike on Karenni IDP camp

A junta airstrike on a camp for internally displaced persons (IDPs) killed at least three civilians in a resistance-held area of Karenni (Kayah) State’s Demoso Township on Wednesday, according to a local rights group. The victims—two women and a man—lost their lives when the camp, located in the Daw Hpu village tract in eastern Demoso, was struck by an aerial assault at around 12:50pm, the Karenni Human Rights Group reported. “A man and a woman died on the spot, while another woman succumbed to her injuries later,” the group’s director, Banya Khung Aung, told Myanmar Now on Thursday. He also stated that the village tract hit by the junta airstrike is located far from any area where recent clashes have occurred. There have also been reports of shelling by regime forces in western Loikaw Township and neighbouring Pekhon Township in southern Shan State over the past two days. Local sources said Hpa Yar Ni, a village located less than four miles west of the state capital Loikaw, was hit by heavy shelling on Wednesday. It could not be confirmed at the time of reporting if there were any civilian casualties. On Tuesday evening, resistance forces reportedly launched a series of missile attacks on targets in junta-controlled Loikaw, including its town hall and the military’s Loikaw Regional Operations Command centre. The covered body of a civilian killed by a junta airstrike on an IDP camp in Karenni State’s Demoso Township on January 15 (KnHRG) Those attacks came ahead of a visit to the Karenni capital by Adm. Tin Aung San, the regime’s deputy prime minister and former defence minister, on Wednesday. He was there to attend a ceremony marking Kayah State Day, state media reported. Pro-junta social media accounts claimed that the shelling on Wednesday was carried out in response to the previous day’s resistance missile attacks. An anti-regime group called Brave Warriors for Myanmar claimed responsibility for the attacks on Tuesday, and said it also launched missiles on a junta air base in Bago Region’s Taungoo Township on January 4, Myanmar's Independence Day. The group has previously targeted the regime’s Central Regional Military Command in Mandalay. On January 9, heavy artillery fire by junta forces resulted in the death of two children in Aing Sant, a village in Loikaw Township near the border with Shan State. Two others, including a five-month-old infant, were injured. Indiscriminate air and artillery assaults by regime forces have killed at least seven civilians—including four children—near the Shan-Karenni border since late November. Meanwhile, Karenni resistance forces also ambushed a junta column near Want Ma Lan, a village in Karenni State’s Bawlakhe Township, on Sunday, sources there reported.

Three civilians killed in Myanmar junta airstrike on Karenni IDP camp

The attack came on the same day that the regime’s deputy prime minister was visiting the Karenni State capital Loikaw

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