Read RFA coverage of this story in Burmese.
Myanmar’s military has launched air and artillery strikes as it tries to clear pro-democracy fighters from the vicinity of a major north-south road and nearly 20,000 villagers have fled from their homes to escape the violence, an insurgent fighter told Radio Free Asia on Wednesday.
The army has been targeting more than 20 villages along the road in the Kanbalu township of the central Sagaing region since late February, they said. The road links Myanmar’s second largest city of Mandalay with Myitkyina city in the north.
“The battles are intensifying. The junta is conducting so many offensives,” said a member of a rebel militia, or People’s Defense Force, in the area.
The fighter, who declined to be identified for safety reasons, said recent fighting had been particularly heavy near Hnget Pyaw Taing village.
“The people from evacuated villages need to run … they are now attacking with drones,” he said.
RFA tried to contact Sagaing region’s junta spokesperson, Nyunt Win Aung, for information but he did not respond by the time of publication.
The junta that seized power in an early 2021 coup faced major setbacks last year, losing ground in different parts of the country to PDFs and their ethnic minority insurgent allies.
The army now controls about half the country, security analysts say, but it has been trying to regain lost ground during the current dry season.
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Clashes have been particularly heavy in central areas, like Sagaing, where members of the majority Burman community have for the first time taken up arms in a bid to end military rule.
The United Nations says about 3.5 million people have been displaced by both fighting and a natural disaster and the country is facing a humanitarian crisis, with widespread hunger looming.
People displaced in the fighting in Kanbalu had to deal with a lack of water, the PDF member said.
“Because now it’s the dry season and water is scarce, it’s difficult for people to flee,” he said.
Junta forces also torched 250 houses at a major intersection near Hnget Pyaw Taing village late last week and into this week, he said.
The anti-junta fighter said 21 members of the military’s Battalion 361 had been killed and 57 wounded while only five members of the PDF were wounded.
RFA could not independently verify the casualties.
Translated by Kiana Duncan. Edited by RFA Staff.