Junta-appointed ministers visited the displacement camp twice last month to ask the IDPs to return home, according to the IDPs.

Despite the fact that Kandawgyi Lake is dredged every year, the lake still dries up in the hot season.

A 150-strong military contingent from the military’s Light Infantry Battalion (LIB) No. 351 and LIB No. 599 opened fire into the village, said a resident of Nyaungpintha Village.

While the military regime is trying to deceive the public and the world by organising a sham election, these four people are not respecting the will of the people, the statement alleges.

Farmers say the declining agricultural industry in Arakan State is due to a lack of effective support measures by those who have ruled for generations.

The IDP children suffering from diarrhoea are under the age of 5, and a 7-month-old infant reportedly died due to the severity of the illness.

Myanmar’s military regime has barred local fishermen from Thitpoketaung Village in Arakan State’s Kyaukphyu Township from fishing in the Chizhang River near their village.

Three projects are slated to be fully operational by 2025, and the first phase of the Gwa project will be implemented in December 2023.

Locals, however, say they still need many more bridges and roads, and local authorities have not yet responded to their demands.

Since November 26 — when the Arakan Army and Myanmar military reached an informal ceasefire — six people have been killed and 14 others were injured in landmine explosions in Arakan State, according to a DMG tally.

Myanmar’s military regime has imposed a ban, as of Sunday, on deliveries of fuel from Pulaw Township in Tanintharyi Region to Pala and Palauk towns, according to locals.

Around 10 vessels extract sand from the island every day, and the shore is eroding away, said the chairman of the Rakhine Biodiversity and Nature Conservation Association, U Yan Naung Soe, who called on authorities to put a stop to the illegal sand extraction.

The regime has been forcing internally displaced people (IDPs) to return to their homes while junta troops are still deployed near their villages and the regime has not yet cleared landmines, said AA spokesman U Khaing Thukha.

The Arakan Front Party (AFP) has registered with the junta-appointed Union Election Commission (UEC) for the national election slated for later this year, the state-run Myanmar Alinn daily reported on Tuesday.

Coup leader Min Aung Hlaing made the remarks during a meeting with local businesspeople at U Ottama Hall in the Arakan State capital Sittwe on February 27, the junta-controlled Myanmar Alinn daily reported.

When the Myanmar military and the AA observed an informal ceasefire in late November, the military promised to release the detained Arakan civilians within two months, said U Khaing Thukha.

Fierce clashes took place along the Myawaddy-Waw Lay road between junta troops and KNLA-led resistance forces from February 22-24, and Pa Law Ta displacement camp was hit by stray bullets and artillery strikes, forcing displaced people there to flee the camp.

Myanmar’s military regime has signalled that it plans to move forward with the repatriation of hundreds of thousands of Muslim refugees who fled Arakan State amid brutal military crackdowns in 2016 and 2017.

 AA spokesperson U Khaing Thukha said junta soldiers have threatened local residents in Taungup, Thandwe and Maungdaw townships not to associate with, communicate with, or provide support to the ULA/AA, which the regime has called an illegal organisation.