A 42-year-old woman and her 12-year-old child were killed last week after accidentally setting off an explosive device planted en route to their farmland in Sagaing Region’s Kanbalu Township.
The woman, Kyi Kyi Win, and her daughter, Khit Thit Oo, died at the scene of the blast on September 27. Her eight-year-old son was also injured and sent to Mandalay for treatment.
The incident occurred a half-mile north of Zin village, where the family resided. The community is located 40 miles northeast of Kanbalu town along the highway connecting the city of Shwebo with Myitkyina in Kachin State.
Since the February 2021 coup, the 700-household Zin has been occupied by dozens of troops belonging to the Myanmar army and its Pyu Saw Htee militia. They also provide cover for military columns passing through the area, according to an officer in the anti-junta Kanbalu District People’s Defence Force (PDF).
While both the military and resistance groups have used explosives in battles throughout Sagaing, the Kanbalu PDF officer said that the Myanmar army was likely responsible for planting the device in question near Zin.
“Mines were set up [by the military] within a two-mile radius around the village and the Pyu Saw Htee are stationed here as well, so the PDF hasn’t been able to get close to the village,” the officer, who serves in the PDF’s Battalion 3, told Myanmar Now.
A leader in Zin’s village-level defence force confirmed that members of his group and the PDF had not dared to return to the community due to the ongoing military presence.
However, he said that it was difficult to determine which group had planted the device that killed the civilians.
“We still don’t know for sure if the mines were the ones set up by us or them,” he told Myanmar Now, referring to the resistance and the military. “The Pyu Saw Htee are stationed inside the village, so we still can’t go check. The Pyu Saw Htee has set up their own mines as well.”
A man who had been forcibly recruited to serve in the Pyu Saw Htee in Zin and escaped on September 29 told Myanmar Now that nine soldiers and 47 militiamen were occupying the village at the time of reporting. The Pyu Saw Htee members had 20 rifles between them, he said.
“I had to work as a Pyu Saw Htee member for three months. They came at midnight and forced me to join them,” the man explained, adding that his duties included guarding the homes occupied by officers and joining junta columns on raids.
One day before the fatal explosion near Zin, three civilians fleeing Myanmar army attacks in neighbouring Kawlin Township were killed after they triggered explosive devices set by the resistance to target junta soldiers. A member of the resistance was also seriously injured after triggering one of the junta’s explosives during a de-mining operation in a Kawlin village previously occupied by the military.
