The Arakan Army (AA) has seized another Myanmar junta outpost as it pushes deeper into Magwe Region from its Rakhine State stronghold along the Ann-Padan highway, according to resistance sources.
AA-led forces captured the Gokkyi outpost on Sunday after a three-day battle. Defended by around 100 troops, the position was a critical supply hub for the major junta base 3 kilometers north at Nat Yay Kan.
Resistance fighters seized large quantities of rations and weapons while taking regime soldiers prisoner as they fled toward Nat Yay Kan.
“We found multiple bodies of junta soldiers,” a resistance fighter told The Irrawaddy.
The Gokkyi outpost supplied food and ammunition to the junta base on Nat Yay Kan Mountain, located just 16 km from Padan town and within 12 km of Ordnance Factory (KaPaSa) No. 14, one of the regime’s key arms‑production facilities.
Nat Yay Kan Mountain rises to 1,587 meters over Padan Town in Magwe’s Ngape Township, making it a strategically crucial military position. The base serves as a critical artillery and air defense hub for the regime.
The fall of Gokkyi has left Nat Yay Kan base increasingly vulnerable, with AA units now surrounding the position and engaged in heavy clashes with its defenders.
“Fighting around Nat Yay Kan is intense. Junta troops are retreating to the camp and launching counterattacks with air support, including daily Y‑12 flights,” a frontline source told The Irrawaddy.
AA-led forces began advancing down the Ann-Padan road in January after capturing Rakhine State’s Ann town and its Western Command headquarters in December. They have since seized several outposts guarding Nat Yay Kan, threatening the junta’s control over Padan.
Padan is home to Artillery Battalion Headquarters 905 and three artillery battalions, as well as the KaPaSa 14 munitions plant.
In response to Gokkyi’s fall, the regime dispatched over 100 reinforcements from Padan to Nat Yay Kan, but the convoys are facing repeated ambushes by AA units and struggling to reach their destination.
“Even when reinforcements are sent, only about half make it through,” said another frontline source.
The AA says the junta has flooded its frontline with new conscripts, many of whom are fleeing. Dozens have abandoned the Nat Yay Kan base despite the threat of execution for desertion, it added.
The AA controls 14 of Rakhine’s 17 townships and is pressing deeper into central Myanmar in coordination with local resistance groups. The fighting has spread to Magwe’s Padan Township, Bago (Padaung Township), and Ayeyarwady (Ngathaingchaung and Lemyethna). The junta’s munitions factories are concentrated along the west bank of the Irrawaddy River in Magwe and Bago regions.
