Myanmar Air Strikes Kill 15 Including Newborn, Students — SkimNews
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- Myanmar military conducted air strikes on Nov 1 and 2, hitting a maternity clinic in Mrauk-U and a school in Loikaw, killing at least 15 people including a newborn and three students.
- Wai Hun Aung, a Mrauk-U-based aid worker, reported the week-old baby girl was crushed when the maternity clinic collapsed from the blast, one day before she was to be discharged with her surviving twin.
- Karenni Human Rights Group stated that a school in Loikaw was struck during class by a Y-12 transport aircraft and a fighter jet that dropped over 20 bombs, with no military activity in the area at the time.
- Banyar Khun Aung, secretary of the Karenni Interim Executive Council, called the repeated bombing of a school an inhumane act that amounts to a war crime.
- UN investigators accused Myanmar's military in August of deliberately targeting civilian infrastructure, including schools and hospitals, in aerial attacks.
- Thai fighter jets have begun air patrols near the border as the conflict spills into Thailand, damaging homes and injuring at least one person on the Thai side.
Why it matters: The strikes on a maternity clinic and school—killing a newborn and students—demonstrate an escalation in Myanmar’s use of air power against civilians, undermining the military’s claims of restraint and increasing pressure on neighboring Thailand, which now faces direct spillover from the conflict.
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