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BANGKOK: Myanmar junta troops have torched hundreds of buildings during a three-day raid in the country’s north, local media and residents said, as the Southeast Asian country’s military struggles to crush resistance to its rule.

Myanmar’s Sagaing region has seen fierce fighting and bloody reprisals since the military ousted the government of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi in February 2021, with local “People’s Defense Force” (PDF) members clashing regularly with junta troops.

Analysts say the informal militia has surprised junta forces with its effectiveness, and the military has launched air strikes on numerous occasions to support its troops on the ground.

Troops torched hundreds of buildings in the villages of Kinn, Upper Kinn and Ke Taung over three days last week, locals and media reports said.

On May 26, Kinn villagers fled as soldiers approached and began shooting into the air, according to one resident who requested anonymity.

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“The next morning we saw smoke rising from our village before they left,” the resident said. “Over 200 houses were burned down…. [M]y house was totally burned down; only the concrete foundation is left.”

Drone footage purporting to show the aftermath obtained by Agence France-Presse (AFP) showed columns of smoke rising to the sky from the villages, set along a roughly 8-kilometer stretch of the Chindwin river.

A health clinic seen in the video matched the geolocation of one in Ke Taung village.

AFP digital verification reporters confirmed the footage had not appeared online before last week, but could not independently verify reports from the region.

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Soldiers “raided and destroyed our houses,” said Ke Taung villager Aye Tin, who requested to use a pseudonym. “And they also burned motor boats that we use for transport and for carrying food for our village, including my boat.”

“My life is ruined, as I have lost my home…and I have nothing left to do for a living,” the villager added.

Satellite images from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration showed fires in locations that matched Ke Taung and Kinn villages last week.

The junta has rebuffed claims its troops have torched houses, accusing “terrorist” PDF fighters of starting the fires.

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Legislator, activist to be executedNews of the raid comes as a junta official announced on Friday that a former lawmaker from Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party and a prominent democracy activist would be executed after they had been convicted on terrorism charges.

Former member of parliament Phyo Zeya Thaw and activist Kyaw Min Yu “will be hanged according to prison procedures,” junta spokesman Zaw Min Tun told AFP.

The junta has sentenced dozens of anti-coup activists to death as part of its crackdown on dissent after seizing power, but Myanmar has not carried out a judicial execution since 1990.

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Phyo Zeya Thaw, who was arrested last November, was sentenced to death in January for offenses under anti-terrorism laws. Kyaw Min Yu, better known as Ko Jimmy, received the same sentence from the military tribunal.

“They continued the legal process of appealing and sending a request letter for the amendment of the sentence,” the spokesman said. “But the court rejected their appeal and request. There is no other step after that.”

No date has been set for the executions.

United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres condemned the junta’s decision, calling it “a blatant violation to the right to life, liberty and security of person,” his spokesman Stephane Dujarric said.

Guterres called for the two to be released and all charges against them dropped.

“The secretary general considers that the death penalty cannot be reconciled with full respect for the right to life,” Dujarric told reporters.