At least 40 civilians are feared dead after a devastating blast ripped through a rebel-held village in central Myanmar on Wednesday, as the military junta escalates its aerial campaign against opposition strongholds. The strike, which hit the village of Kyauk Kyi in Sagaing Region at dawn, left charred homes and bodies scattered across muddy lanes. Witnesses described fighter jets roaring overhead before two explosions levelled a market and a school.
The junta claimed it was targeting a People's Defence Force training camp, but local medics say the dead include women, children and elderly monks. This is the deadliest single incident in weeks, a grim milestone in a conflict that has already displaced over 2 million people. The attack comes hours after junta leader Min Aung Hlaing vowed to crush all resistance.
Our correspondent on the ground says the scene is one of utter devastation: families searching for loved ones under heaps of tin roofing, and the stench of cordite mixing with the monsoon rain. Amid the chaos, digital networks are being jammed, and aid convoys are turned back at military checkpoints. This is not just a bombing.
It is a methodical erasure of digital and physical resistance. The junta uses Russian-supplied drones to pinpoint hideouts, while blocking every signal that might summon help. For the villagers of Kyauk Kyi, the algorithm of war has offered no mercy.
Only silence. Only ash.
