BANGKOK: Myanmar’s coup has pressed forward with its campaign of air strikes despite the country’s catastrophic disaster, with a rebel party telling AFP Sunday seven of its fighters were killed in an underwater attack shortly after the tremors hit.
The Myanmar government has increasingly turned to air strikes as it struggles to gain the upper hand against a complex array of anti-coup soldiers and ethnic minority armed parties in the civil war.
Friday’s large 7.7-magnitude disaster, which has killed at least 1, 700 people and destroyed thousands of homes and buildings, prompted some armed groups to halt conflicts while the country deals with the issue.
But soldiers from the Danu People’s Liberation Army, an racial minority armed group engaged in northern Shan state, said they were hit by an air strike shortly after the collapse struck.
Five defense aircraft attacked their foundation in Naungcho town, killing seven soldiers, one of their soldiers told AFP.
” Our men tried to get into pits when they heard the sound of aircraft”, he said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
” But one major weapon hit one vault where five adult soldiers were killed on the spot”.
There have been reports of different air attacks since the collapse, but AFP has not been able to verify them.
Increasing usage of air energy
The army has suffered big battle loses over the past year and a half, losing command of swathes of territory.
But while its surface forces have struggled, it retains air supremacy thanks to fighter jets provided by Russia, its longtime supporter and big arms provider.
The number of military air strikes on civilians has risen throughout the four-year civil war, according to non-profit organisation Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED), with nearly 800 in 2024.
That figure was more than triple the previous year and ACLED predicted the junta would continue to rely on air strikes because it is” under increasing military pressure on the ground”.
News of the junta’s continued use of air attacks drew criticism from rights groups and the UN special rapporteur for Myanmar.
” Reports that Myanmar’s military has continued with airstrikes after the earthquake tells you everything you need to know about the junta– obsessed with its brutal repression of civilians and desperately trying to win the war whatever the human cost”, Elaine Pearson, Asia director at Human Rights Watch, wrote on social media platform X.
The UN’s special rapporteur for Myanmar, Tom Andrews, urged the junta to halt military operations and declare an immediate ceasefire.
He told the BBC it was “nothing short of incredible” that the military was dropping bombs on people after a devastating earthquake.
An air strike earlier this month hit a village held by anti-coup fighters around 60 kilometres ( 40 miles ) north of the second-biggest city Mandalay, which has been badly affected by the quake.
The strike killed at least 12 people, according to a local official who said it targeted civilian areas.
