The Ta’ang National Liberation Army has released a video of a junta brigadier general it arrested in which he urges regime boss Min Aung Hlaing, his deputy and other junta officials to stop committing war crimes.
Brigadier General Min Min Tun – who has been a prisoner of war since Dec. 16 – says in the video that the Myanmar military’s war crimes include brutally arresting, imprisoning and killing civilians as well as airstrikes and shelling of civilian targets.
“I would like to say to the leaders of the Myanmar military, which commits various war crimes, including Commander-in-Chief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing and [his] deputy commander, the chief of defense services, to stop what is being done now,” Min Min Tun, 48, says in the video released yesterday.
The prisoner of war also urges soldiers from the junta’s military to defect. They should cooperate with the people of Myanmar instead of waging war against them, he says in the video.
Min Min Tun and other officers were arrested in northern Shan State’s Namhsan Township while fleeing a camp where the 101 Infantry Division – which was under his command – was based.
The TNLA stormed the camp on Dec. 16 as part of Operation 1027, which it launched in northern Shan State with two other ethnic armies – the Arakan Army and the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army on Oct. 27. Together, they are known as the Brotherhood Alliance.
Min Min Tun became the highest-ranking military officer to be arrested by the alliance since the onset of the operation.
In the video, he also apologizes to ethnic Ta’ang people hit by junta airstrikes and shelling, saying he bore some responsibility for this.
“I had no intention of harming local people and their homes. I honestly say that the heavy shelling and the aerial bombardment caused such damage due to the lack of accuracy on the weapons,” Min Min Tun says in the video, adding, however, that he is the person most responsible for what happened in the area.
“We don’t want any apology. The lives of those who die cannot be replaced,” a resident of Shan State’s Namhsan Township told The Irrawaddy.
The junta’s military has been conducting airstrikes on the township since the TNLA took control of it. Nine civilians were killed and eight more were wounded by junta airstrikes on Namhsan and Lashio townships on Sunday alone.
Another resident of the township said the junta’s military had bombed civilian areas in northern Shan State even when no fighting was occurring in them.
The Ta’ang Women’s Organization said that 123 civilians were killed and another 239 were injured by airstrikes, shelling and landmines in 16 townships of northern Shan State in the first two months of Operation 1027.
