Gangaw Township IDPs struggle to survive in forests after fleeing junta terror

More than 3,000 people from villages in Magway Region’s Gangaw Township have been displaced to the surrounding forests by recent Myanmar military raids and are in need of food, shelter, and medical attention. 

Since late May, the military has been attacking some 13 villages in Gangaw in an attempt to crush support for the anti-coup resistance movement in the region. The internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Gangaw are largely from Hnan Khar, Myin Thar and Htei Hlaw villages, which have been recently terrorised by the junta’s armed forces. 

The 1,000-household Hnan Khar, the target of at least four raids since June, was most recently ransacked by the military on September 13, with troops burning down some 14 homes, bringing the total destroyed by the junta to 50. An elderly man was also killed in the village in an earlier raid.

One day earlier, Htei Hlaw was targeted, with 27 homes torched, and a 55-year-old man and a People’s Defence Force member killed. Nearly the entire population of 1,000 people has fled. 

Myin Thar was the site of a deadly clash between the military and resistance forces on September 9; some 18 people were killed by Myanmar army troops and 20 houses burned. 

“We have just decided to stay in the forest after our village got burned as we don’t dare to stay there anymore,” a villager displaced from Htei Hlaw said.

“There are a lot of difficulties, especially regarding food. Several of us cannot afford to buy food as we were previously working as day labourers for minimum wage,” he continued. “We’re especially in need of rice and oil. We don’t have much to eat aside from mushrooms.”

Among the IDPs are 30 pregnant women and 60 children, as well as elderly and sick persons in need of medical attention, another villager from Htei Hlaw said. There is reportedly only one medic among them. 

“The pregnant women need a doctor and some children are getting sick in the forest as well. We still haven’t been able to send them to a clinic,” he said. 

According to a spokesperson for the Yaw Defence Force, which is active in Gangaw, the group has temporarily halted resistance activities in order to help the IDPs. 

Those displaced are in need of shelter, cooking oil, rice, salt, clothing, and basic medicines, according to multiple sources. 

An NLD parliamentarian elected in Magway Region in 2020 but who was unable to take office following the February 1 military coup, said that the small amount of aid that had come through was insufficient.

“People are donating as much as they can, but it’s a requirement too big to fulfil,” the MP said.