Intensive clashes in Myanmar near Tak ease leaving locals near the border rattled and on guard

[webfact]

Last Thursday, two Royal Thai Air Force F16 fighter jets were scrambled as a Mig 19 jet from the Myanmar Air Force made a 4 km to 5 km incursion into Thai air space. This drew a calm response from Prime Minister Prayut Chan ocha (left) after representations were made to the under-fire Myanmar junta. Over the weekend, early on Saturday morning, the fighting across the border from Thailand, near Tak province, flared up again but this was followed by the retreat of rebel forces from a Myanmar military stronghold which had been seized in the last week. This was the reason for the intense and ferocious aerial bombardment which saw over one thousand refugees flee into Thailand and damage to homes and property on the Thai side of the border.

 

by Joseph O' Connor

 

Myanmar is now effectively in a state of all-out civil conflict with a deadly war of attrition between swelling rebel groups and a military fighting for its life and holding on through air power. The disruption and damage caused in Tak province this week as well as the incursion into Thailand’s air space by a Mig 19 fighter of Myanmar’s Air Force highlight the growing crisis in Thailand’s neighbouring country to the West and the challenge it may pose to authorities here if it spirals out of control.

 

Local Thai military units in Tak were placed on high alert, last week, in response to the situation by the National Security Council. Earlier this year, in March, the US-based organisation Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED) estimated that some 12,000 people in Myanmar had, at that point, died in the uprising.

 

Over the weekend, intensive fighting between Myanmar’s increasingly beleaguered and isolated military junta and rebel forces across Thailand’s border with Myanmar in Karen province abated somewhat after it flared up again early on Saturday morning when a bomb killed at least 3 civilians, dropped approximately 400 metres from Thailand’s border and sparking a renewed influx of refugees into the kingdom.

 

The heavy fighting over 7 days saw an incursion by Myanmar’s air force into Thailand on Thursday morning which saw Thailand dispatch two F16 fighter jets to the Phop Phra district of Tak province and the Prime Minister General Prayut Chan ocha, on Friday, play down the incident saying an apology had been offered by the junta leadership in Nay Pyi Taw.

 

Full story: https://www.thaiexaminer.com/thai-news-foreigners/2022/07/04/intense-warfare-in-myanmar-near-tak-eases/

 

-- © Copyright Thai Examiner 2022-07-05

 

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[RichardColeman]

I'd chuck all those in the picture in prison and let civilians just get on with life

[hotchilli]

8 hours ago, webfact said:

Myanmar is now effectively in a state of all-out civil conflict with a deadly war of attrition between swelling rebel groups and a military fighting for its life and holding on through air power.

Disgusting military regime.

[nutosf]

1 hour ago, hotchilli said:

Disgusting military regime.

Which one, Thai or Myanmar?

[ozz1]

In the photo is cha cha tickling him on the bum

[NoshowJones]

3 hours ago, nutosf said:

Which one, Thai or Myanmar?

Both.