An army raid on a village in western Myanmar has reportedly killed at least 40 people

This leaflet photo provided by the Arakan Army shows people looking at flames rising from a raid by the ruling military in the village of Kyauk Ni Maw in Ramree commune, also pronounced as Yanbye, in Rakhine State, Myanmar, Wednesday, January 8, 2025. ( Arakan Army’s via AP)

BANGKOK – A Myanmar army raid on a village controlled by an armed ethnic minority killed about 40 people and wounded at least 20 others, group officials and a local charity said Thursday. They said hundreds of houses burned in the fire caused by the bombing.

The attack took place on Wednesday in the village of Kyauk Ni Maw on Ramree Island, an area controlled by the ethnic Arakan army in western Rakhine state. The military did not announce any attack in the area.

The situation in the village could not be independently confirmed as internet and mobile phone access was largely cut off in the area.

Myanmar has been plagued by violence that began with the army’s overthrow of the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February 2021. After the army used lethal force to suppress peaceful demonstrations, many opponents of military rule took up arms, and much of the country was currently embroiled in conflict.

Arakan army spokesman Khaing Thukha told The Associated Press that a fighter jet bombed the village on Wednesday afternoon, killing 40 civilians and wounding more than 20 others.

“All the dead were civilians. Among the dead and injured are women and children,” Khaing Thukha said. The fire caused by the airstrike spread through the village, destroying over 500 houses, Khaing Thukha added.

It was unclear why the village was targeted. The leader of a local charity group and independent media also reported the raid and casualties.

Over the past three years, the military government has stepped up air attacks on armed pro-democracy groups, collectively known as the People’s Defense Forces, and on armed ethnic minority groups that have been fighting for greater autonomy for decades. The two groups sometimes conduct joint operations against the army.

Ramree, located 330 km northwest of Yangon, the country’s largest city, was captured by the Arakan Army in March last year.

The Arakan Army is the well-trained and well-armed military wing of the Arakan ethnic minority movement, which wants independence from Myanmar’s central government. It is also a member of an alliance of armed ethnic groups that recently captured strategic territory in the north-east of the country, near the border with China.

It launched its Rakhine offensive in November 2023 and has now taken control of the strategically important regional army command and 14 of 17 Rakhine municipalities, leaving only the state capital, Sittwe, and two important municipalities near Ramree, still in the hands of the military government.

The leader of a charity group that helps the village told the AP on Thursday that at least 41 people were killed and 50 injured in the raid that targeted the village market.

The leader, who was out of town at the time of the raid, spoke on condition of anonymity for security reasons. He said he received information from members of his group who were in the village and were facing shortages of medicines needed to treat injured people.

Rakhine-based news outlets, including Arakan Princess Media, also reported the attack and posted photos online showing people putting out fires in their homes.

Rakhine, formerly known as Arakan, was the site of a brutal counterinsurgency military operation in 2017 that sent an estimated 740,000 Rohingya Muslims seeking refuge across the border in Bangladesh.