Ethnic Karen guerrillas yesterday said they had captured a Burmese army base near the border with Thailand, representing a morale-boosting action for those opposing the military’s takeover of the nation’s civilian government in February.
Myanmar’s military staged airstrikes several hours later on villages in territory controlled by the Karen forces, said a guerrilla spokesman, a senior Thai official and a relief worker.
A spokesman for the Karen National Union (KNU), the minority’s main political group seeking greater autonomy from Myanmar’s central government, said that its armed wing attacked the base at 5am and burned it down just after dawn.
Photo: AFP / Kawthoolei Today
Casualty figures were not yet known, KNU head of foreign affairs Padoh Saw Taw Nee said in a text message.
There was no immediate comment from Myanmar’s military government.
The KNU, which controls territory in eastern Myanmar near the Thai border, is a close ally of the resistance movement against the military takeover that ousted the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi. Its armed wing is called the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA).
Video shot from the Thai side of the border showed flames rising from the government position on the banks of the Salween River, amid the sound of heavy gunfire. The river marks the border with Thailand.
A report by online news site Karen Information Center quoted an unnamed villager on the Thai side of the river as saying he saw seven government soldiers trying to flee the camp, which is opposite Thailand’s Mae Sam Laep Village.
Padoh Man Man of the KNLA’s 5th Brigade, which launched the morning attack, said that the Burmese military carried out airstrikes in the early afternoon, but he did not know how many casualties there were.
He described the air raids as a “heinous war crime” and called for the international community to pressure the junta to stop them.
Sithichai Jindaluang, the governor of Thailand’s Mae Hong Son Province, confirmed at a news conference that Karen guerrillas had overrun the Burmese base and said a woman on Thai soil was wounded by a stray bullet during the morning’s fighting.
About 450 villagers have been evacuated from Mae Sam Lap for their own safety, he said.
Sithichai also said a Burmese military aircraft later bombed a Karen village.
Dave Eubank of the Free Burma Rangers, a humanitarian aid group with extensive experience in the area, said that he could confirm that there had been airstrikes on Karen villages in two townships in Papun District.
He said the Burmese army was also staging ground attacks in the area. Neither he nor the governor had casualty figures available.
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