A Myanmar military contingent entered the villages of Sabarhtar and Aungzeya in Ponnagyun Township, Arakan State, on Tuesday afternoon, according to uneasy local residents.

The Consumer Affairs Department of the military regime’s Commerce Ministry has threatened legal action against palm oil distributors who unfairly increase prices or keep large stockpiles for the purpose of speculating on the edible oil market.

Junta security forces have stepped up inspections on passenger and cargo trucks at Kyauktan checkpoint, located on the Yangon-Sittwe highway in Sittwe Township.

Chin civil society organisations held a two-day meeting on April 23 and 24 to build a common national identity agreement between the Chin ethnic group and subgroups living in Arakan State.

Locals want Kyaukmyaung Station Hospital in Arakan State’s Ann Township to be opened as soon as possible, as about 10,000 people from 11 villages in the area are expecting to rely on the facility for healthcare services once it is operational. 

The Arakan League for Democracy (ALD) says it will face dissolution rather than submit to an order from the junta-controlled Union Election Commission (UEC) to have the party’s finances audited at the UEC headquarters.

The Ann Township police force has ordered houses and shops occupying the former site of the township central police station to move by May 21.

Brigade 4 of the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), the armed wing of the Karen National Union (KNU), has warned that fighting may continue as the Myanmar military has sent reinforcements to five townships in southeastern Myanmar’s Tanintharyi Region, according to a KNU source.

The Arakan State Administration Council has distributed fertiliser to township agriculture offices so that farmers in Thandwe, Taungup, Gwa, Mrauk-U and Kyauktaw townships can buy at subsidised prices as the cost of fertiliser has skyrocketed over the past year.

Residents of Ponnagyun Township have called for the earliest possible implementation of a long-delayed industrial zone in the township, hoping that the project will create job opportunities for locals.

A first-of-its-kind modern poetry award has been bestowed in Arakan State by the Arakanese Literature Development Foundation.

Political observers have said the Myanmar junta leader’s recent proposal for face-to-face peace talks with the country’s established ethnic armed groups rings hollow.

Cashew trees planted in Arakan State’s Manaung Township have seen declining yields this year, according to cashew nut farmers.

Some 400 ethnic Mro people who have relocated near the village of Kyauk Pandu in northern Maungdaw Township are struggling to access drinking water.

Building materials worth more than K6 million were reportedly stolen from the Yan Pyay Man Pyay Pagoda under construction at the BXT port in the Arakan State capital Sittwe.

The Arakan State military council said it has tasked the concerned district administrators with repairing houses damaged by destructive windstorms that hit the state earlier this week.

The department aims for 100 percent coverage of both doses of the Covid-19 vaccine in Arakan State, said the assistant director of Arakan State Public Health Department, Dr. Soe Win Paing, who acknowledged that they likely would not reach that goal.

Junta chief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing on Friday invited Myanmar’s ethnic armed groups to engage in dialogue as the military regime endeavours to restart the country’s moribund peace process in the wake of its February 2021 coup.

Military tensions are running high between Myanmar’s military and the Karen National Union (KNU) after KNU Brigade 1 based in Mon State’s Thaton District told the regime to withdraw its troop deployments from Bilin Township in Mon State.