A combined force of resistance groups in Kayah State has rescued 134 junta regime employees and 64 of their family members who were trapped inside Loikaw University amid clashes between the groups and the junta’s military, according to Karenni resistance groups and the Karenni State Interim Executive Council (KSIEC).
According to a KSIEC statement released on Tuesday, the regime employees, who worked for the university, were abandoned by the junta’s military council and left to fend for themselves following the launch of Operation 11.11 in Kayah State. Karenni revolutionary troops evacuated them from the university compound and transported them to a safe place, the KSIEC said.
“The regime employees from Loikaw University, who didn’t join in the Civil Disobedience Movement [CDM], are now being well cared for, in accordance with human rights principles, and provided humanitarian assistance,” the statement reads.
The humanitarian evacuation of the regime employees, most of whom are lecturers, and their families from the university compound followed a junta public disinformation campaign in which the regime portrayed the resistance groups as attempting to abduct the university staff.
At a press conference on Monday, junta spokesman Zaw Min Tun alleged that the “KNPP and PDF” were firing on Loikaw University while trying to abduct regime employees present there. He said regime forces had saved some of the lecturers and were attempting to rescue the remaining ones. The KNPP, or Karenni National Progressive Party, is the political wing of the Karenni Army (KA), while PDF, or People’s Defense Force, groups operate under the civilian National Unity Government.
However, the Karenni revolutionary forces denied the claim, explaining that in fact the junta troops made no effort to evacuate the employees from the university compound, despite being based there.
When the resistance groups launched their attack on regime troops in the area on Saturday as part of Operation 1111, hundreds of regime forces took up a position at the university compound, so resistance forces were forced to open fire on the compound, said Khu Ree Du, a spokesperson for the Karenni Nationalities Defense Force (KNDF).
“But we realized that there were many non-CDM employees inside the university and they were in danger of being injured or killed at any time. Therefore, we decided to take them out,” he said.
The junta’s propaganda channels also falsely reported that the rector of Loikaw University had been killed. The KNDF denied the report and said the rector and all the other lecturers had been safely evacuated and were being well cared for.
Though the lecturers and other regime employees at Loikaw University didn’t join in the CDM movement, CDM participants are now helping them, providing them with food and drinking water.
After the combined resistance groups entered the university compound on Tuesday afternoon, they started evacuating the employees and their families. Resistance groups said intense clashes continue at Loikaw University and in other parts of the city.
Loikaw is the center of the junta’s administration in Kayah State and has around 50,000 residents, including those displaced by fighting since the 2021 military coup. Volunteer groups said at least 35,000 people now need to evacuate the town.
Allied resistance forces comprising the KA, KNDF, Karenni National People’s Liberation Front (KNPLF) and PDF groups launched the Operation 11.11 offensive in Kayah on Saturday in harmony with Operation 1027 in northern Shan State.
The offensive has so far seized seven junta outposts in Kayah’s Loikaw and Demoso and neighboring southern Shan State’s Pekon Township.
