Nearly a dozen Myanmar military soldiers, including two officers, were reportedly killed and six others captured on Tuesday during fierce urban fighting in Pinlebu Township, Sagaing Region, according to the township’s resistance force and the parallel National Unity Government (NUG).
At 3:45am on Tuesday morning, the resistance fighters of Pinlebu People’s Defense Force (PDF) raided the township police station and a military camp located in the center of Pinlebu, the Pinlebu-PDF spokesperson told The Irrawaddy on Friday.
During the shootout, there were many military casualties and six junta soldiers were captured along with weapons and ammunition.
One resistance fighter was killed and eight others suffered minor injuries, said the NUG’s Defense Ministry.
Pinlebu-PDF said that its forces were forced to retreat from the fighting at around 8am on Tuesday morning when a junta helicopter gunship arrived in the area.
Citing witnesses, Pinlebu-PDF said that many corpses of soldiers were taken away by truck and buried at the township’s cemetery.
Regime forces were planning to airlift the bodies of the two dead officers in coffins, added the Pinlebu-PDF spokesperson.
However, The Irrawaddy was unable to confirm independently the number of military casualties. After the clash, regime forces were patrolling and checking people in the town. Military regime troops also looted and destroyed some houses in Pinlebu.
Internet access and all mobile phone connections have been cut off in Pinlebu since late September, when over 40 regime soldiers were killed in two firefights with the combined local resistance forces on September 11 and 24.
Since then, the junta has deployed reinforcements in Pinlebu and used two helicopter gunships to attack local PDFs.
The military regime is currently facing intense attacks from PDFs and ethnic armed groups nationwide, with the exception of Rakhine State.
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