Air strikes near India border as Myanmar junta bombs rebels
- The bombing by five jets on Tuesday evening killed five fighters at the headquarters of the Chin National Front
- Reports say one bomb landed in Champhai district, in India’s Mizoram state, but police say it landed in a riverbed on the international boundary
Myanmar’s junta has carried out air strikes on an ethnic armed group’s base near the border with India, the rebels and media said on Wednesday, with one bomb landing close to the international boundary.
The military coup almost two years ago has sparked renewed fighting with long-established ethnic rebel groups, as well as with dozens of People’s Defence Force groups that have sprang up to oppose the junta.
The bombing by five jets on Tuesday evening killed five fighters at the headquarters of the Chin National Front (CNF), which claims to represent the mainly Christian Chin minority in Western Myanmar, spokesman Salai Htet Ni said.
“They dropped seven bombs … Some of our houses were destroyed from their air strike … One bomb landed on the Indian side,” he said.
Local media also reported five fighters had been killed and that one bomb landed in Champhai district, in India’s Mizoram state.
But Indian police said the bomb had actually landed directly in the dry riverbed that marks the international boundary.