The Kachin Independence Army (KIA), backed by the People’s Defence Force (PDF), engaged in several days of fierce fighting with the regime in Htigyaing Township, Sagaing Region, with casualties on both sides.
According to a PDF fighter, the regime took huge losses during the recent clashes from 8 to 9 December, after junta soldiers razed people’s homes in the villages while patrolling the township a few days earlier.
“Soldiers carried injured soldiers on 7 stretchers as the column returned to Htigyaing town,” he said. A KIA soldier and a PDF soldier were also killed in the fighting, he said, which began between Alae Taw and Ingyin Kon and continued between Alae Taw and Htang Kon.
According to the PDF source, the column has since returned to Htigyaing town, but on the way the soldiers burnt down roadside bamboo huts belonging to displaced civilians who had fled their villages.
In the last week of November, the KIA and the PDF killed at least 10 regime soldiers, including a lieutenant, in an attack in Alae Taw. The fighting displaced tens of thousands of people.
According to the Institute of Strategy and Policy Myanmar, 800,000 people have been displaced and 900 clashes have taken place in the Sagaing Region since the coup almost two years ago until 15 November.
