New fighting has broken out in northeastern Myanmar, bringing an end to a Chinese-brokered ceasefire and putting pressure on the military regime as it faces attacks from resistance forces on multiple fronts in the country’s civil war.

The Ta’ang National Liberation Army, one of three powerful militias that launched a surprise joint offensive last October, renewed its attacks on regime positions last week in the northeastern Shan State, which borders China, Laos, and Thailand, and the neighbouring Mandalay region with the support of local forces there.

Since then, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army has joined in, and by Friday, combined forces from the two allied militias had reportedly encircled the strategically important city of Lashio, the headquarters of the regime’s northeastern military command.

‘Safety of people’

This is the next phase of October’s “1027” offensive, said Lway Yay Oo, spokesperson for the TNLA, which last week said the military provoked retaliation with artillery and airstrikes despite the cease-fire. “In phase two, our number one aim is the eradication of the military dictatorship, and number two is the protection and safety of local people,” she said.

Thet Swe, a spokesperson for the military regime, which seized power from the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February 2021, accused the militias of putting civilians in jeopardy by restarting the fighting. “As the TNLA are starting to violate the ceasefire, the Tatmadaw is protecting the lives and the property of the ethnic people,” he said in an email, referring to the military by its Burmese name.

There was no indication that the third ethnic armed organisation that makes up the Three Brotherhood Alliance, the powerful Arakan Army, has joined in the renewed fighting in Shan state.

The TNLA claims to have already captured more than 30 army outposts, and to now control the western part of Mogok, whose ruby mines make it a lucrative target. There is also fighting for the town of Kyaukme, which sits at a highway crossroads, and Nawnghkio to the southwest, which leads toward the major military garrison town of Pyin Oo Lwin along the same highway.

“That’s where you need to cut it off to prevent the military from sending reinforcements,” said Morgan Michaels, a Singapore-based analyst with the International Institute of Strategic Studies who runs its Myanmar Conflict Map project.

In Mandalay, the region west of Shan, a local People’s Defence Force — one of many armed resistance groups that have sprung up in support of the underground National Unity Government, which views itself as Myanmar’s legitimate administration — joined the TNLA’s offensive.

Osmond, a spokesperson for the Mandalay People’s Defence Force who would only give his nom de guerre because of safety concerns, said his and other local resistance groups have seized nearly 20 military outposts.

The October offensive by the Three Brotherhood Alliance made rapid advances as the militias took large expanses of territory in the north and northeast, including multiple important border crossings with China and several major military bases.

Chinese ties

The alliance militias have close ties to China, and it’s widely believed that the offensive had Beijing’s tacit approval because of its growing dissatisfaction with the military regime’s seeming indifference to the burgeoning drug trade along its border and the proliferation of centres in Myanmar at which cyberscams are run, with workers trafficked from China.

China then helped broker the ceasefire in January, bringing the major fighting in the northeast to an end.

With the renewed violence in the northeast, China’s Foreign Ministry said it stood ready to again provide support for peace talks, but would not say whether it had been in direct contact with the Three Brotherhood Alliance or the military State Administration Council.

“China urges all parties in Myanmar to earnestly abide by the ceasefire agreement, exercise maximum restraint, disengage on the ground as soon as possible, and take practical and effective measures to ensure the tranquillity of the China-Myanmar border and the safety of Chinese personnel and projects,” the Ministry said in a faxed reply to questions.

The Myanmar army doesn’t appear to have been surprised by the TNLA attacks, with evidence that it mobilised forces and prepared defences as well as security checkpoints and patrols ahead of the renewed offensive, Mr. Michaels said.

“They didn’t get caught completely off guard, although they’ve not been able to respond yet, there’s been no counter-offensive,” he said.

Objectives unclear

It is not yet clear what the TNLA’s objectives are, and it could be that the group is just looking to expand gains and consolidate positions now while the military is stretched thin by fighting on several fronts, and before new batches of conscripts are trained for service.

Likewise, with the MNDAA, it is not clear whether it is planning to join the broader offensive or whether it intends to take encircled Lashio by force, lay siege to it, or simply tie up the troops now trapped there. The group did not respond to requests for comment.

This photo taken on May 21, 2024 shows people rebuilding temporary homes near a destroyed building following fighting between Myanmar’s military and the Arakan Army (AA) ethnic minority armed group in a village in Minbya Township in Rakhine State.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Myanmar’s Rakhine State is facing a terrifying situation similar to the run-up to “genocidal violence” eight years ago against the persecuted Rohingya minority, a UN expert warned on July 4.

Speaking at the United Nations Human Rights Council, Thomas Andrews, the special rapporteur on the situation in Myanmar, voiced deep alarm at recent events in the western region.

“The situation in Rakhine State, where the junta is rapidly losing territory to the Arakan Army, is terrifying,” Mr. Andrews said.

“For Rohingya people — oppressed, scapegoated, exploited, and stuck between warring parties — the situation carries echoes of the lead-up to genocidal violence in 2016 and 2017.”

Clashes have rocked Rakhine State since the Arakan Army (AA) attacked security forces in November.

That ended a ceasefire that had largely held since a military coup in 2021 after a short-lived experiment with democracy.

AA fighters have seized swathes of territory, piling pressure on the junta as it battles opponents elsewhere.

Mr. Andrews, an independent expert appointed by the rights council who does not speak on behalf of the UN, said the military had been conscripting “thousands of Rohingya youth and mobilising them against the Arakan Army”.

“Even though many Rohingya young men have been taken to the front lines of the conflict against their will, the potential for retaliation by members of the Arakan community, and a downward spiral of violence, is enormous,” he cautioned.

Mr. Andrews said there were reports linking AA soldiers to rights violations against Rohingya civilians, at a time when the humanitarian situation for both Rohingya and Rakhine people was “extremely dire”.

He said “tens, if not hundreds of thousands, have been displaced in Rakhine State”.

In May, the AA said it had seized the town of Buthidaung in northern Rakhine, home to many Rohingya Muslims.

Several Rohingya diaspora groups later accused the AA of forcing Rohingya to flee and then looting and burning their homes — claims the AA called “propaganda”.

The AA, which says it is fighting for autonomy for the state’s ethnic Rakhine population, has vowed to capture the whole of the state.

In this photo released by the Myanmar Army, a fire burns in the predominantly ethnic Rakhine village of Let Kar in Rakhine State’s Mrauk-U township, western Myanmar.
| Photo Credit: AP

“Myanmar ethnic armed groups seized a popular beach resort town in the west of the country and launched dawn attacks on junta positions in the north,” a military source and residents told AFP on June 25.

Fighting is raging across swathes of the Southeast Asian nation as ethnic armed groups and pro-democracy “People’s Defence Forces” battle the military, which seized power in a 2021 coup.

In western Rakhine state Arakan Army (AA) fighters have battled security forces for days around Ngapali beach, home to upmarket hotels and resorts owned by military-backed businesses.

“Junta troops and police had retreated to an airport in the town of Thandwe, around two kilometres (more than a mile) away,” a military source, speaking on condition of anonymity told AFP.

“Hundreds of kilometres away in northern Shan state, the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) launched dawn attacks on the military in the town of Kyaukme,” residents said.

One resident of the town, which sits on a vital highway to China, said they had heard artillery and gunfire around the town since the morning. “Most people from the town are hiding inside their houses,” another Kyaukme resident who works for a volunteer rescue team told AFP.

“The TNLA had restricted travel around Kyaukme,” they said, requesting anonymity for security reasons. The AA and TNLA are members of the so-called “Three Brotherhood Alliance” that launched a surprise offensive against the junta last October across northern Shan state.

Their fighters seized swathes of territory and several lucrative trade crossings with China, dealing the junta its biggest blow since it seized power.

In January, China brokered a ceasefire that allowed the alliance to hold on to territory it had captured, but both sides have recently accused each other of breaking the truce.

‘Continuous shelling’

The town of Thandwe, a few kilometres from Rakhine’s Ngapali beach and home to the local airport, was largely deserted as of Monday, a resident who fled that day told AFP.

“Almost everyone in the town has fled… Very few people are now in Thandwe,” said the resident, who requested anonymity for security reasons. “A rocket shell landed in the town yesterday. We also heard continuous heavy artillery shelling.”

A local hotel owner who was no longer in the town told AFP his staff said the military had carried out air strikes near the airport on June 24. His employees told him there were “some army and police trapped inside the airport building.”

AFP was unable to reach a junta spokesman for comment and has contacted an AA spokesman. Thandwe airport has been closed since early this month as AA fighters launched attacks in the area.

Since launching its own offensive in Rakhine state in November, the AA has seized territory along the border with India and Bangladesh. State capital Sittwe is one of the few holdouts for junta troops in Rakhine.

The AA, which says it is fighting for autonomy for the state’s ethnic Rakhine population, has vowed to capture the city, home to an India-backed deep sea port and around 2,00,000 people.

Myanmar’s borderlands are home to a plethora of ethnic armed groups, many of whom have battled the military since independence from Britain in 1948 over autonomy and control of lucrative resources.

This photo shows a destroyed house and burned trees following fighting between Myanmar’s military and the Arakan Army (AA) ethnic minority armed group in the Rakhine State.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Myanmar’s junta has ordered thousands of people living outside a State capital threatened by ethnic rebels to leave their homes and head into the city, residents said on June 14.

Sittwe city is one of the few holdouts for junta troops in western Rakhine State, where the military has lost swathes of territory to the Arakan Army (AA) in recent weeks.

The AA, which says it is fighting for autonomy for the State’s ethnic Rakhine population, has vowed to capture Sittwe, home to an India-backed deep sea port and around 2,00,000 people.

Residents of 15 villages around Sittwe were given five days to leave their homes and move to the state capital, a resident of one of the villages told AFP.

“The army threatened to shoot and kill if they found someone after the deadline” which expires on June 15, she said, requesting anonymity due to fear of arrest.

A resident of Sittwe put the number of villages ordered to evacuate at around 10, saying that residents had been told “to move out for security reasons” by June 15.

The villages were home to around 3,500 people, the Sittwe resident said, requesting anonymity.

They added the military had not arranged for temporary shelters in Sittwe.

“People have to move to their relatives’ homes from other villages,” they said.

Local media also reported the order to evacuate villages in the area.

AFP was unable to reach a junta spokesman for comment.

In November, the AA launched a wave of attacks on the military across Rakhine, shattering a ceasefire that had largely held since the military’s 2021 coup.

It has since seized territory along the border with India and Bangladesh, piling further pressure on the junta as it battles opponents elsewhere across the Southeast Asian country.

It has also held the town of Pauktaw, around 25 kilometres (15 miles) from Sittwe, since January.

AFP images from the town last month showed gutted buildings, vacant windows and blocks bombed to rubble by the fighting, which has emptied the fishing port of its residents.

This month, the AA said junta troops had killed more than 70 civilians in a raid on Byain Phyu village, north of Sittwe.

The junta said the claim was “propaganda” and accused AA fighters of launching attacks on Sittwe from surrounding villages.

Phone and internet services have been all but cut off across Rakhine State, making it difficult to verify reports of violence.

A powerful armed ethnic group in Myanmar said on Sunday it had won control over a town in the western state of Rakhine after weeks of fighting, denying accusations it had targeted members of the Muslim-minority Rohingya during the offensive.

Khine Thu Kha, a spokesman for the Arakan Army (AA), said its soldiers had taken Buthidaung near Myanmar’s border with Bangladesh, marking another battlefield defeat for the ruling junta that is fighting opposition groups on multiple fronts.

“We have conquered all the bases in Buthidaung and also took over the town yesterday,” Khine Thu Kha told Reuters by telephone.

Some Rohingya activists accuse the AA of targeting the community during the assault on Buthidaung and surrounding areas, forcing many of them to flee for safety.

“AA troops came into downtown, forced the people to leave their homes and started torching houses,” Nay San Lwin, co-founder of the Free Rohingya Coalition advocacy group told Reuters, based on what he said were eyewitness accounts.

“While the town was burning, I spoke with several people I have known and trusted for years. They all testified that the arson attack was done by the AA.”

Reuters could not independently verify the conflicting accounts. A junta spokesman did not respond to a call seeking comment.

Rohingya have faced persecution in Buddhist-majority Myanmar for decades. After escaping a military-led crackdown in 2017, nearly a million of them live crammed into refugee camps in Bangladesh’s border district of Cox’s Bazar.

Junta’s Biggest Challenge

Myanmar has been in turmoil since a 2021 military coup, which led to the rise of the resistance fighting alongside long-established ethnic minority rebel groups.

The conflict has escalated since October, when an alliance of ethnic armies including the AA launched a major offensive near the Chinese border, taking swathes of territory from the better-armed junta and presenting its biggest challenge since taking power.

The junta has lost control of around half its 5,280 military positions, including outposts, bases and headquarters, according to one estimate.

The AA’s Khine Thu Kha said junta aircraft and Muslim insurgent groups aligned with the military had set fire to parts of Buthidaung, which had a population of around 55,000 people, according to the most recent government census available, from 2014.

“The burning of Buthidaung is due to the air strikes from the junta’s jet fighter before our troops entered the town,” he said.

Aung Kyaw Moe, a Rohingya civil society activist and a deputy minister in Myanmar’s shadow National Unity Government, said Rohingya residents had been asked by the AA to leave Buthidaung but had responded that they had nowhere to go, leaving them trapped when the offensive occurred.

“Since about 10 p.m. last night up to this early morning, Buthidaung town had been burning and now only ashes remain,” he told Reuters.

Rohingya residents fled to the field and there may casualties, he said.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Members of Myanmar Border Guard Police, in civilian clothing, sit under the shade of trees after abandoning their posts following an alleged attack by members of the Arakan Army as Bangladesh border guards stand guard in Ghumdhum, Bandarban, Bangladesh, on Monday, Feb. 5, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AP

A Myanmar ethnic minority armed group on Saturday claimed its fighters had seized control of a town in western Rakhine state, in what would be another blow to the junta.

Clashes have rocked Rakhine since the Arakan Army (AA) attacked security forces in November, ending a ceasefire that had largely held since the 2021 military coup.

AA fighters have seized territory, including along the border with India and Bangladesh, piling further pressure on the junta as it battles opponents elsewhere across the Southeast Asian country.

“We seized all bases of the Myanmar Army in Buthidaung,” in northern Rakhine state, the AA said on its Telegram channel on Saturday.

Those seized included a “military strategic headquarters”, it added, without giving details.

Its fighters were still clashing with junta troops outside the town, it said.

Buthidaung sits around 90 km north of state capital Sittwe, which is still held by the military.

Earlier this month, the AA said it had taken hundreds of junta personnel prisoner following an assault on a command near the Buthidaung.

A junta spokesman has been approached for comment.

Communication with Rakhine is extremely difficult, with most mobile networks down.

The AA is one of several armed ethnic minority groups in Myanmar’s border regions, many of whom have battled the military since independence from Britain in 1948 over autonomy and control of lucrative resources.

The AA claims to be fighting for more autonomy for the state’s ethnic Rakhine population.

Fighting had spread to 15 of Rakhine state’s 17 townships since November, the UN’s human rights chief said last month.

Hundreds of people have been killed or wounded and more than 300,000 displaced, it said.

Clashes between the AA and the military in 2019 roiled the region and displaced around 200,000 people.

The military launched a crackdown on the Rohingya minority there in 2017 which is now the subject of a United Nations genocide court case.