Myanmar regime forces raped a mother before killing her and her two daughters last Saturday in Magwe Region’s Pauk Township. Junta troops also detained 29 villagers as potential human shields.
Some 70 Myanmar military soldiers, police and pro-junta Pyu Saw Htee militia raided Inn Nge Htauk Village in Pauk Township on Saturday, forcing villagers to flee their homes. Daw Aye Aye Win, 42, was caught trying to escape and was then raped and killed. Her four-year-old daughter was also stabbed to death, according to local residents.
Daw Aye Aye Win was raped in a wayside public rest house near her home. A volunteer doctor from a local resistance group carried out a post-mortem on her body and confirmed that she had been raped, a resident told The Irrawaddy.
“Junta troops raided Inn Nge Htauk on March 5, firing heavy guns. All the villagers fled and so did Daw Aye Aye Win’s family. The husband and wife fled separately and the wife and the daughter were caught. She was raped at a public rest house not far from her home,” said the resident.
Junta troops also detained 29 villagers, including nine children, as potential human shields. Among the young detainees was another of Daw Aye Aye Win’s daughters, an 11-year-old, whose dead body was found three days later by a creek near the village, according to locals.
Some detainees were reportedly killed in junta custody. The Irrawaddy, however, was unable to verify those reports independently.
Fighting took place in Inn Nge Htauk from last Saturday to Tuesday. Five resistance fighters were killed by junta soldiers in the clashes and their bodies were subsequently set on fire, local sources said.
Military regime forces and Pyu Saw Htee militia are deployed in Wun Chone Village, Pauk Township. The village is reported to be a Pyu Saw Htee stronghold and junta soldiers have used it as a base to raid the surrounding villages of Lelyar, Letpan Hla and Inn Nge Htauk.
Lelyar Village, which has 252 households, was raided on March 3. Regime troops torched 210 houses. Letpan Hla Village was raided the following day, and half of the village’s 120 households were burned down, said locals.
One resident said: “With their [junta forces] megalomaniac streak, they view anyone unlike them as their enemy, kill and intimidate them, torch their houses and loot their possessions. The higher-ups turn a blind eye to these acts to demoralize the people so that they never dare to hold up their heads, speak the truth and demand a different system.”
Since early March, people from at least 12 villages in Pauk have been forced to flee junta raids.
Over 6,100 civilian houses have been destroyed in the 13 months since the military’s coup, according to a report by Data for Myanmar, an independent research organization.
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