The Myanmar junta continued its atrocities including bombing and arson attacks against civilian targets across the country over the past eight days, killing at least 16 civilians and injuring dozens.
Many houses and a number of school buildings were destroyed in the attacks.
The junta conducted attacks on civilian targets in Shan, Rakhine and Mon states and Bago, Magwe and Sagaing regions.
The Irrawaddy has collected the following reports of junta attacks targeting civilians.
Some civilian casualties could not be independently verified.
Junta aircraft bombs village in Shan despite absence of ground clashes
Although there were no clashes with local ethnic armed groups going on, a junta fighter jet bombed Nawnghtaw Village in Hsi Hseng Township, southern Shan State on Monday evening, killing a displaced civilian and injuring two villagers, local media reported.
The village currently houses many displaced people from neighboring Karenni (Kayah) State, where intense fighting between regime forces and ethnic resistance groups is occurring.
Many houses and some buildings in the village monastery compound were also destroyed in the airstrikes.
Junta continues attacks on civilian targets in Rakhine State
At least four civilians were killed and 17 injured from Jan. 20 to 24 in Rakhine State as junta bases and gunboats continued to attack civilian targets in villages in Minbya, Maungdaw and Buthidaung townships, according to local media and the Arakan Army (AA), which is fighting the regime across the state.
Junta continues to shell civilian targets in villages in Bago, Mon
The country’s oldest ethnic revolutionary group the Karen National Union (KNU) said the Myanmar junta continued its artillery bombardment of villages in Kyaukkyi and Phyu townships in Bago Regio, killing at least three civilians and injuring many others.
Military battalions in the area used artillery rounds measuring up to 120-mm to shell around a dozen villages in the townships from Jan. 17 to 23. During the bombardments, houses were destroyed and cows belonging to residents were killed.
On Jan. 19, the junta’s Artillery Battalion 314 shelled Tat Tu Kone Village in Thaton Township, Mon State, killing four civilians and injuring six.
At least six houses and two school buildings were destroyed, the KNU said.
10-month-old child, mother killed in indiscriminate junta shelling of villages in Magwe
The Myanmar junta’s artillery base outside Gangaw town in Magwe Region used 120-mm artillery rounds to bombard nearby villages in the absence of any clashes with resistance groups on Saturday, according to local news site Yawalinntam, which monitors junta atrocities in the region.
One of the artillery shells struck Gangaw Anouk Village, killing a mother and her 10-month-old child and injuring two other villagers aged 60 and 80.
Other shells hit houses in Pyar Village, destroying several of them. Around 50 shells struck nearby areas and villages.
Civilians killed by junta shelling in Magwe
A father and his son were killed and a mother and daughter suffered serious injuries in Tilin Township, Magwe Region on Sunday night when regime forces and pro-regime Pyu Saw Htee militia members stationed at a public hall in Tilin town arbitrarily shelled nearby villages, according to local media and resistance groups.
One of the explosives hit the home of the family of four in Taw Young Village.
Junta torches houses in village in Sagaing
At least 12 buildings, including some used to store harvested crops, and two motorbikes were destroyed by fire in Yay Lal Maw Village in Wetlet Township early Wednesday when regime forces and pro-junta Pyu Saw Htee militia members raided and torched the village’s civilian structures, said Wetlet Information Network, a local revolutionary news site monitoring junta atrocities.
During the raid, the regime forces attacked the village with both firearms and heavy explosives.
The junta troops involved are based in the pro-military village of Ywar Thayar on the opposite bank of the Irrawaddy River in Mandalay Region’s Singu Township.
