The Myanmar junta has stepped up airstrikes on resistance-held towns in northern Shan State while attempting to retake lost territory in Nawnghkio Township near its garrison town, Pyin Oo Lwin.
Clashes between regime forces and the ethnic Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) and its allies have been reported in villages along the Mandalay-Lashio-Muse Road in Nawnghkio Township, northern Shan State for 10 days, according to Mandalay People’s Defense Force (Mandalay PDF), part of the armed wing of the civilian National Unity Government (NUG).
Mandalay PDF is fighting the regime in northern Shan State alongside the TNLA.
The clash sites are just 30 km north of Pyin Oo Lwin, which is in Mandalay Region.
“We [revolutionary groups] have been engaging in intense fighting with the regime around Gant Gaw and Bant Bwe villages for 10 days. Both sides have made advances and retreats [during the period],” Mandalay PDF spokesman Osmond told The Irrawaddy on Tuesday.
Citing frontline resistance forces, local media reported that the TNLA and allied resistance groups had to retreat from Gant Gaw as regime forces advanced into the village using heavy explosives. The resistance groups have since surrounded the village where the regime forces are stationed, according to the reports.
On Monday evening, regime fighter jets bombed a detention center operated by revolutionary groups that was holding dozens of regime forces who had been arrested during recent anti-regime operations in Mandalay Region and northern Shan State, according to Mandalay PDF and local media.
At least 12 people including eight detained junta soldiers were killed and over 60 others suffered injuries in the airstrikes, the PDF group said.
On Tuesday morning, junta aircraft used 500-lb bombs to attack northern Shan State capital Lashio, which was liberated by the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) in August, reportedly destroying a Buddhist monastery and injuring a motorcyclist.
Since August, the junta—unable to send ground troops to retake Lashio—has conducted over 30 airstrikes on civilian targets in the city including hotels, school, hospitals and Chinese temples, according to the Lashio Reconstruction Group, which was formed by the MNDAA to rehabilitate the war-torn city.
A church and civilian houses were destroyed as a junta fighter jet dropped 500-lb bombs on civilian targets in MNDAA-controlled Hseni town in northern Shan State on Sunday night, the ethnic army said.
Earlier that day, civilian houses were destroyed when junta aircraft bombed Namkham, Kutkai, Laukkai and Nawnghkio towns, which have been liberated by the ethnic armies of the Brotherhood Alliance in northern Shan State.
Myanmar junta fighter jets dropped 11 bombs including 300-lb bombs on residential wards of TNLA-controlled Nawnghkio town in northern Shan on Sunday night, killing a 50-year-old resident and injuring another resident, said the ethnic army.
Three civilian houses were destroyed in the airstrikes. Junta aircraft also bombed another TNLA-controlled area in Kutkai Township the next morning, destroying houses.
The TNLA, MNDAA and Rakhine State’s Arakan Army comprise the Brotherhood Alliance, which launched the successful anti-regime Operation 1027 across northern Shan State along with several resistance groups in October last year.
Amid repeated pressure by the Chinese government to stop fighting the regime, the ethnic alliance has seized almost all of northern Shan State, capturing some 25 towns and townships and vital trade routes with China.
Clashes are ongoing in Nawnghkio Township as the junta deploys troops there in a bid to retake the lost territory.
