Myanmar Junta Forces Torch Nearly 150 Civilian Homes in a Day
By The Irrawaddy 9 November 2022
Around 150 civilian houses were burned down as Myanmar’s junta forces torched villages in Mandalay and Sagaing regions on Tuesday.
On Tuesday evening troops torched at least 50 Pyar village houses in Myingyan Township, Mandalay Region, following a clash with resistance forces, according to media reports.
Thousands of civilians fled their homes.
On Wednesday morning, Pyar villager Ko Zaw Myo Naing was killed when he returned home for his cattle and bullock cart, according to the Myingyan General Strike Committee.
It said other villagers had been injured after being shot by junta troops.
At least 61 houses were burned down in Padaukchone village in Wetlet Township, Sagaing Region, on Tuesday morning after a second arson attack on the village, according to the Generation Z Special Task Force resistance group.
On October 16 five other houses were burned down by regime forces.
Another 30 houses were torched in Mingin Township, Sagaing Region, when around 30 regime troops and Pyu Saw Htee militia allies attacked Kone Maw village on Tuesday morning, said Mingin People’s Defense Force.
During the raid, U Htay Lin, 55, who was suffering from mental illness, was shot dead by junta forces, the group said.
In June the regime forces also burned 40 houses in the village.
On Tuesday regime troops torched 14 houses in nearby Kyauk Maw village in the township.
Troops also looted houses and killed livestock, the resistance group claimed.
Junta arson attacks constitute a crime against humanity.
In October more than 1,550 houses and other civilian buildings were burned down, said the civilian National Unity Government’s Ministry of Home Affairs.
By August 25 an estimated 28,434 civilian buildings and religious buildings had been burned down across the country by the junta, according to Data for Myanmar, an independent research group documenting regime crimes.
More than 1.1 million people had been displaced by October, reported the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
