Hundreds of villagers in Bago Region’s Mone Twsp need aid after junta eviction

By DMG 17 Sep 2022

DMG Newsroom
17 September 2022, Mone, Bago Region

Hundreds of local people from Tamarkhaw Village in Mone Township, Bago Region, who were forcibly evicted from their village by Myanmar’s military regime, are in urgent need of food, shelter and clothes, according to local civil society organisations.

A large number of junta soldiers entered Tamarkhaw Village and forced the villagers to relocate on September 12, said a member of a Mone area Karen youth organisation.

“The regime soldiers entered the village without informing the local administrative bodies and forced the residents to relocate. There was no fighting near the village. Almost all residents have fled to safer locations,” he explained.

A total of 334 people from Tamarkhaw Village have fled to the neighbouring villages of Taungsu Village and Nobokhee on the west bank of the Sittaung River due to the military’s forced eviction.

“We need food and clothes for them urgently. The displaced people are currently accommodated in Taungsu and Nobokhee villages. Both are located in a Karen National Union-controlled area,” said an official from a Karen civil society organisation.

The military has conducted aerial surveillance and sent reinforcements to some villages in Shwegyin, Kyaukkyi and Mone townships, which are controlled by Brigade 3 of the Karen National Union (KNU), according to locals.

More than 6,200 people in Mone Township have been displaced by fighting between the military and anti-regime forces led by Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), the armed wing of the KNU, since the coup, according to KNU Central.