Myanmar fighting intensifies near India border, curfew imposed in Sittwe | Conflict News

Offensive launched by anti-coup forces two weeks in the past places navy below stress and is now spreading throughout the nation.

Ethnic armed teams combating to revive civilian rule in Myanmar have claimed new territory within the nation’s northwest close to the border with India, amid an escalating offensive in opposition to the navy regime.

Fighters in Chin state reportedly took management of two navy outposts on the border of India’s Mizoram state after hours-long battles on Monday, based on native media shops.

The advance follows successes in neighbouring Rakhine state and northern Shan state in a coordinated offensive launched two weeks in the past by anti-coup forces.

Myanmar was plunged into disaster when Senior Common Min Aung Hlaing seized energy in a coup in 2021, resulting in mass protests that advanced into armed resistance when the navy used power to crack down on its civilian opponents.

About 80 fighters mounted assaults on Rihkhawdar and Khawmawi navy camps in Chin state within the early hours of Monday, finally taking management of each outposts after a number of hours of combating, Chin Nationwide Entrance (CNF) Vice Chairman Sui Khar informed the Reuters information company.

The CNF will now look to consolidate its management alongside the India-Myanmar border, the place the Myanmar navy has two extra camps, he stated.

“We’ll transfer ahead,” Sui Khar stated. “Our tactic is from the village to the city to the capital.”

Martial legislation

The generals, who’ve acknowledged the dimensions of the problem posed to their regime, have expanded martial legislation to extra components of the nation amid the intensified battle.

Social media posts stated a nighttime curfew had been imposed in Sittwe, Rakhine’s capital, with some reviews of tanks on the streets.

“We noticed tanks going across the city. Many retailers are closed in the present day,” a resident informed Reuters, declining to be named for safety causes.

Combating was going down throughout Rakhine, based on two residents and a spokesperson for the Arakan Military (AA), a bunch combating for higher autonomy that has seized navy posts in Rathedaung and Minbya cities.

A Rathedaung resident informed Reuters on Tuesday the realm got here below artillery fireplace in a single day and that the navy had entered the city.

“Artillery fell on a avenue in Rathedaung city final night time. No fast report of injured or casualties but,” stated the resident, who requested to not be recognized.

“Folks have began fleeing the city. Troopers are within the city now.”

Regardless of its brutal historical past of communal violence and the 2017 military crackdown on the mostly Muslim Rohingya, Rakhine emerged as one of many extra peaceable components of the nation after the coup, due to an off-the-cuff ceasefire between the AA and the navy agreed just some months earlier than.

The association started to break down by November 2021, because the AA entrenched its political management over the state.

The AA was established in 2009 to push for self-determination inside Myanmar and principally represents ethnic Rakhine Buddhists, who make up nearly all of the state’s inhabitants.

Lots of the nation’s different ethnic armed teams have been combating the navy for many years.