Many dozens of Rohingya, including children, killed in drone attack while fleeing Myanmar, witnesses say By Reuters

By Shoon Naing, Poppy McPherson and Devjyot Ghoshal

BANGKOK (Reuters) -A drone assault on Rohingya fleeing Myanmar killed many dozens of individuals, together with households with youngsters, a number of witnesses mentioned, describing survivors wandering between piles of our bodies to determine lifeless and injured relations.

4 witnesses, activists and a diplomat described drone assaults on Monday that struck down households ready to cross the border into neighbouring Bangladesh.

A closely pregnant lady and her 2-year-old daughter have been among the many victims within the assault, the only deadliest recognized assault on civilians in Rakhine state throughout latest weeks of combating between junta troops and rebels.

Three of the witnesses instructed Reuters on Friday that the Arakan Military was accountable, allegations the group denied. The militia and Myanmar’s navy blamed every one other. Reuters couldn’t confirm how many individuals had died within the assault or independently decide accountability.

Movies posted to social media confirmed piles of our bodies strewn throughout muddy floor, their suitcases and backpacks scattered round them. Three survivors mentioned greater than 200 had died whereas a witness to the aftermath mentioned he had seen not less than 70 our bodies.

Reuters verified the placement of the movies as simply exterior the coastal Myanmar city of Maungdaw. Reuters was not capable of independently verify the date the movies have been filmed.

One witness, 35-year-old Mohammed Eleyas, mentioned his pregnant spouse and 2-year-old daughter have been wounded within the assault and later died. He was standing with them on the shoreline when drones started attacking the crowds, Eleyas instructed Reuters from a refugee camp in Bangladesh.

“I heard the deafening sound of shelling a number of instances,” he mentioned. Eleyas mentioned he lay on the bottom to guard himself and when he obtained up, he noticed his spouse and daughter critically injured and lots of of his different relations lifeless.

A second witness, Shamsuddin, 28, mentioned he survived together with his spouse and new child son. Additionally talking from a refugee camp in Bangladesh, he mentioned that after the assault many lay lifeless and ”some individuals have been shouting out from the ache of their accidents”.

Boats carrying fleeing Rohingya, members of a principally Muslim minority who face excessive persecution in Myanmar, additionally sank within the Naf River that separates the 2 international locations on Monday, killing dozens extra, in line with two witnesses and Bangladesh media.

Medecins Sans Frontieres mentioned in a press release the help organisation had handled 39 individuals who had crossed from Myanmar into Bangladesh since Saturday for violence-related accidents, together with mortar shell accidents and gunshot wounds. Sufferers described seeing individuals bombed whereas looking for boats to cross the river, the assertion mentioned.

A spokesperson for the United Nations Excessive Fee for Refugees mentioned the company was “conscious of the deaths of refugees from the capsize of two boats within the Bay of Bengal” and it had heard reviews of civilian deaths in Maungdaw however that it couldn’t verify the numbers or circumstances.

FIGHTING IN THE REGION

The Rohingya have been lengthy persecuted in Buddhist-majority Myanmar. Greater than 730,000 of them fled the nation in 2017 after a military-led crackdown that the U.N. mentioned was carried out with genocidal intent.

Myanmar has been in turmoil because the navy seized energy from a democratically elected authorities in 2021, and mass protests developed into widespread armed battle.

Rohingya have been leaving Rakhine for weeks because the Arakan Military, considered one of many armed teams combating, has made sweeping positive factors within the north, house to a big inhabitants of Muslims.

Reuters has beforehand reported that the militia burned down the biggest Rohingya city in Might, leaving Maungdaw, which is underneath siege by the rebels, because the final main Rohingya settlement other than grim displacement camps additional south. The group denied the allegations.

Activist teams condemned this week’s assaults. A senior Western diplomat mentioned he had confirmed the reviews.

“These reviews of tons of of Rohingya killed on the Bangladesh/Myanmar border are, I’m sorry to say, correct,” Bob Rae, Canada’s ambassador to the United Nations and a earlier particular envoy to Myanmar, posted on X on Wednesday.

Myanmar’s junta blamed the Arakan Military in a submit on its Telegram channel.

The militia denied accountability. “In line with our investigation, relations of terrorists tried to go to Bangladesh from Maungdaw and the junta dropped the bomb as a result of they left with out permission,” Arakan Military spokesman Khine Thu Kha instructed Reuters, referring to Muslims who’ve joined Rohingya armed teams combating in opposition to the Arakan Military.

TRYING TO GET TO SAFETY

Reuters was capable of verify the placement of the movies seen on social media from the place and form of the mountain and shoreline, which matched file and satellite tv for pc imagery of the world.

The fencing featured in one of many movies additionally matched file imagery of the placement. The situation of the movies matched the world described by Shamsuddin.

Eleyas described how his spouse and daughter died within the aftermath of the assault, and his determined efforts to discover a boat that may take them to Bangladesh.

Earlier than his spouse died, “We apologised to one another for any wrongs we might have carried out in our lives,” he mentioned.

Round midnight, he mentioned, he lastly discovered a small boat and managed to cross the border with it.