Myanmar junta troops have beheaded a teenager, shot dead a man, and arrested 15 civilians in raids on 10 villages in Sagaing Region’s Wetlet township over the past few days, according to local sources.
Regime soldiers beheaded Hla Soe Aung, 18, and burnt his body during their raid on Na Be Pin Hla village on Saturday, locals reported.
“He was just an ordinary villager and not a member of the People Defense Force [PDF],” a local resistance member said.
He was also tortured before junta troops cut off his head, according to a witness.
Sagaing, a resistance stronghold, has been the focus of numerous arson attacks and atrocities perpetrated against civilians by junta forces in the past two years.
Elsewhere, U Kyaw Win, 60 was injured when troops opened fire on villagers as they fled a junta arson attack that burned over 70 houses and a monastery in Na Be Pin Hla village on Saturday.
“The monastery was set on fire because it was used by members of the People Defense Force,” a source said.
There were no reports of local resistance forces suffering casualties during the raids.
On Sunday, junta soldiers killed a man in Ta Mar Kan village, according to local sources.
Two junta columns that had been raiding villages in eastern Wetlet township since Thursday reportedly merged into one column on Saturday.
One source said the junta troops pretended to be local resistance members by deploying weapons used by the local PDF.
“Two residents of Taung Kone village were arrested after mistaking junta soldiers for PDF members,” a source said.
Another source said junta troops also arrested more than dozen mostly female residents during a raid on Tha Yine Min Kone village in Wetlet on Thursday.
“Fifteen civilians were arrested on Thursday, but the 12 female detainees were released later that day. One male detainee had escaped while junta troops were burning down houses, a member of people’s administrative team said.
The fate of the other two detainees is still unknown.
Local resistance forces said they ambushed junta soldiers with a mine attack near Tha Yine Min Kone village, killing one soldier.
The Irrawaddy could not independently confirm the claim.
On Monday, residents of five local villages were displaced while junta troops continued to raid Sint Kaing village in Wetlet, according to sources.
