A 30-year-old protester on Monday was participating in a gathering against Myanmar’s ruling junta on a festival day in the central region of Sagaing when he heard the distinctive noise of fan blades cutting through the air.
Minutes later, explosives were dropped by a motorized paraglider, also known as a paramotor.
“I was thrown away,” the protester said, asking not to be named for fear of retribution from the junta. “Initially, I thought the whole lower part of my body had been severed. I touched it and I realized the legs are still there.”
Photo: AFP
At least 20 people were killed in the attack by the junta, according to the eyewitness, Amnesty International, the shadow National Unity Government and an armed resistance group in the area.
It was the latest instance of Myanmar’s well-armed military using paramotors as part of its widening range of aerial weaponry, including aircraft and drones, deployed in an expanding civil war.
A spokesperson for Myanmar’s junta did not respond to calls seeking comment. The military has previously rejected accusations that it targets civilians.
A US Department of State spokesperson said it was deeply disturbed by reports of the attack.
“We urge the military regime to cease its violence and bombing civilians, release all unjustly detained prisoners, allow unhindered humanitarian access and begin genuine dialogue with opposition groups,” they said.
Myanmar has been gripped by protests and a nationwide armed rebellion since 2021 following the military’s ouster of an elected civilian government.
The attack at Sagaing’s Chaung-U Township took place just before 8pm on Monday as residents gathered in a field, said the eyewitness and a spokesman for a local anti-junta armed resistance group.
“The military has used paramotors to bomb this area approximately six times before this latest incident,” Chaung-U Township People’s Defense Force information officer Ko Thant said.
The junta’s first recorded use of paramotors, which can seat up to three soldiers to drop bombs or fire at targets, was in December last year, and they have since been deployed more widely, the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED) said.
The military also used paramotors to carry out attacks in parts of Myanmar hit by a deadly earthquake in March, the UN said in April.
“Paramotors are typically deployed in areas of mixed control or where resistance groups have minimal equipment, such as lacking access to the 7.62 cartridges and weapons required to shoot them down,” ACLED senior analyst Su Mon said in a July report.
In some areas rebels have claimed to have shot down a junta paramotor, the Burma Revolution Rangers group said in a statement issued in April.
With front lines stretching from the northern Kachin Hills to the western coastal state of Rakhine, the junta is increasingly relying on aerial power, with 1,134 airstrikes from January to May, far higher than corresponding figures of 197 and 640 in 2023 and last year, ACLED data showed.
In the aftermath of the strike in Chaung-U, the 30-year-old protester said he crawled into a nearby ditch and hid there until his friends pulled him out.
“This is mass murder,” he said, referring to the junta’s attack. “They are committing it openly.”
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