For three days, regime jet fighters shelled Kachin Independence Army (KIA) positions on Lung Ja Bum Mountain near Momauk after a Burma Army (BA) commander and five soldiers perished after stepping on a concealed landmine buried there.
A Momauk local has told KNG that three BA columns of 150 soldiers from Bhamo were scaling the mountain when they detonated the hidden explosive device at 8am on 22 October. By 11am the jet fighters were bombing the KIA and People’s Defence Force (PDF) camp on the mountain in Kachin State.
Eyewitnesses saw the regime truck their fallen soldiers back to Bhamo the same day at noon time.
“Both jet fighters and combat helicopters sporadically attacked the mountain. And they also shelled it with artillery,” another local from Momauk told KNG, who also requested confidentiality for fear of reprisals.
More than 800 people from Wawang, Lung Ja, Khun Ja and another village took shelter from the airstrikes in Momauk. KNG is still trying to find out if any KIA and the PDF soldiers were killed in the attacks.
