Myanmar junta troops have withdrawn from their positions in a major trade hub near the Thai border following days of clashes, an ethnic armed group said Thursday, in a further blow to the embattled military.
On the border near the bustling trading town of Myawaddy, AFP reporters in Thailand heard shelling early Thursday after witnessing hundreds of people queueing the night before to seek safety in the kingdom.
By Thursday afternoon, while the flow into Thailand’s Mae Sot town had lessened, people like 26-year-old Sadi were anxiously waiting for relatives.
“I’m just about holding it together,” he told AFP, checking his phone as he explained that his fiancee was still in Myanmar.
The country has been roiled with conflict since the army overthrew a democratically elected government in 2021, but the junta is facing its gravest threat yet after heavy losses in recent months.
Karen National Union (KNU) fighters and other anti-junta groups launched an assault on Myawaddy town this week.
Myawaddy is important to the cash-strapped junta, with more than $1.1 billion worth of trade passing through it in the 12 months to April, according to the junta’s commerce ministry.
The remaining 200 or so junta troops in the town had withdrawn late Wednesday, Padoh Saw Taw Nee, a KNU spokesman, told AFP.
The troops were now sheltering on a bridge that connects Myawaddy to the Thai border town of Mae Sot, he said, claiming the KNU now controlled the whole town.
AFP could not independently verify the claims but a Thai border official said the town had “fallen” late Wednesday.
The KNU and allied anti-junta groups would “surely intercept and block” any attempt by the military to send troops to Myawaddy, Padoh Saw Taw Nee said.
Thai soldiers stood on alert alongside armoured cars at the border in heat of 37 degrees Celsius (99 degrees Fahrenheit) on Thursday.
AFP reporters there heard a plane flying in the direction of Myawaddy, followed by a thudding sound around 10:30 am local time (0330 GMT).
Myawaddy residents told AFP that the military was carrying out air strikes on the town but they had not seen KNU fighters in the streets.
The complete capture of the town would be a humiliating defeat for the junta, which has suffered a string of battlefield losses in recent months that have prompted rare criticism of its top brass by its supporters.
– ‘Dust settles’ –
Independent Myanmar analyst David Mathieson told AFP it was “still too early to assess who actually controls Myawaddy and actually what constitutes control, as opposed to presence”.
At the “Friendship Bridge No.2” on the Thai side, the trucks that normally carry medicine, consumer goods and construction materials into Myanmar were standing idle, AFP reporters saw.
A Thai border official said checkpoints were open on both sides but that no goods traffic was moving.
From a hill overlooking Myawaddy on Thursday evening the town appeared calm, with residents riding motorcycles out into farmland and the sounds of a construction site mingling with bells at a Buddhist monastery.
The Thai government needs to prepare for a potential influx of people fleeing conflict in Myanmar, member of parliament Kannavee Suebsang told AFP during a visit to Mae Sot.
“We need to prepare. We need to plan. We cannot just ignore the situation inside Myanmar,” he said.
Reinforcements
The Myanmar junta was sending reinforcements towards Myawaddy, military sources told AFP on Thursday, although it was unclear when or how they would arrive because some routes to the town are in the hands of its opponents.
Locals near the town of Kyonedoe along the main highway to Myawaddy told AFP they had seen dozens of trucks and tanks carrying equipment and hundreds of soldiers.
The junta has not commented on the recent action around Myawaddy.
The military is anxious to avoid losing another major town, analysts say, after the humiliating surrender of around 2,000 troops at the town of Laukkai on the northern border with China in January.
Analyst Mathieson said Myawaddy’s economic importance could prevent a major escalation of fighting inside the town.
“All sides must be wondering, if Myawaddy is so important, is it a good idea to invite destruction of the town and its infrastructure?” he said.
‘I feel more free’
More than 2.5 million people have been displaced by the conflict sparked by the military’s ouster of Aung San Suu Kyi in 2021, according to the United Nations.
“Being in Myanmar is difficult now,” said one young man just arrived in Mae Sot.
“I feelmore free after getting to this side.”
“I feelmore free after getting to this side.”
Authorities in Thailand have said they are preparing to accept up to 100,000 people displaced by the clashes.
Thailand’s foreign minister will travel to the border Friday, the ministry said, without providing specific details.
rma-tp-hla-rbu/dhw
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