The Myanmar junta’s military is fortifying Karen State’s Myawaddy town, a major trading hub on the border with Thailand, deploying more troops there ahead of expected resistance attacks.
The town has been surrounded by the ethnic Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), the armed wing of the Karen National Union (KNU), and allied People’s Defense Forces (PDFs), the armed wing of the civilian National Unity Government (NUG), for months.
Junta airplanes parachuted crates believed to contain ammunition and food to the junta’s Infantry Battalion 275 located at the entrance of Myawaddy town on Sunday, according to residents.
Videos captured by residents show airplanes dropping objects on parachutes.
A Myawaddy resident close to Karen anti-regime resistance groups told The Irrawaddy that the junta has stealthily deployed a total of up to 1,000 troops to the border town. Junta forces are stationed across Myawaddy along with troops of the Border Guard Force (BGF).
The BGF announced it had separated itself from the junta’s chain of command and reformed as the Karen National Army (KNA) in March, but its leadership remains close to the regime.
“The resistance forces have already surrounded the town, but the junta is determined not to let it fall into resistance hands. So, the junta is planning to mount a defense,” said the resident.
The junta supply drop came three days after the KNLA and allied PDF groups seized a strategic junta base on Swal Taw Mountain in Lay Kay Kaw town to the south of Myawaddy.
The seized base, which housed junta artillery units, was deemed crucial to the security of Myawaddy. In the following days, the resistance groups seized three more junta bases in southernmost Myawaddy Township as regime forces abandoned their positions there.
On April 11, KNLA and PDF forces seized the headquarters of the junta’s Infantry Battalion 275, the regime’s last line of defense outside Myawaddy town.
Some days later, however, the KNLA and PDF groups left the seized base and Myawaddy town under the control of the KNA led by Colonel Saw Chit Thu, in order to avoid regime airstrikes.
Since then, the resistance groups have occupied Thin Gan Nyi Naung town near the entrance to Myawaddy, and KNLA and PDF groups have blocked road access to Myawaddy from Kawkareik Township, effectively controlling the Asian Highway that links Myawaddy with Sagaing Region’s Tamu Township on the Indian border.
In April, the junta launched a counteroffensive named Operation Aung Zeya aiming to retake Myawaddy, but its troops were pinned down in the Dawna Mountain Range for months by the KNLA and PDF groups.
Junta forces attempted to advance along the Asian Highway in the Dawna Mountains with the help of airstrikes last week, but retreated after being defeated by resistance forces, a Karen media outlet reported.
The Irrawaddy reporter Saw Lwin contributed to the report.
