Type of Incident

Air strike by fighter jet [causing civilian casualties]

Date of Incident(s)

March 20th 2024

Incident Location

(Village, Township and District)

G--- village, Noh Poe village tract, Kaw T’Ree Township, Dooplaya District

Victim(s) Information

Name

Saw[2] A---

Naw[3] E---

Unknown

Age

41 years old

42 years old

Unknown

Gender

Man

Woman

Woman

Ethnicity

Karen

Karen

Unknown

Marital Status  

Married

Married

Unknown

Occupation

Farmer

Seller

Unknown

Religion

Buddhist

Buddhist

Unknown

Position

Villager

Villager

Villager

Village

G--- village, Noh Poe village tract[4], Kaw T’Ree Township, Dooplaya District

G--- village, Noh Poe village tract

G--- village, Noh Poe village tract

Perpetrator Information (Armed Actors)

Name(s)           

Rank

Unit

Base

Commander’s Name

N/A

N/A

Burma [State Administration Council (SAC)[5]] Air Force

N/A

[Htun Aung serves as the Commander-in-Chief of the Burma (SAC) Air Force]

1. Explain in detail how this information was collected.

A Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA)[6] soldier informed [a KHRG researcher] about the incident. The KHRG researcher went to the incident place and interviewed G--- villagers. After that, he met with the village head. The village head showed him the areas destroyed by the air strike, [including] five houses, one middle school and one elementary school. The KHRG researcher conducted interviews with the village head, [a family member of the deceased victim,] a victim of [injury due to] the incident, and [other] local villagers.

2. Explain how the source verified this information.

[KHRG field researcher] conducted interviews [separately] with (i) Saw C---, the brother of Saw A---; (ii) Saw D---, the village head of G--- village; and (iii) Naw E---, who was injured by the shrapnel [from air strike]. 

Describe the Incident(s) in complete detail.

On March 20th 2024, in the evening, an air strike was conducted on G--- village, Noh Poe village tract, Kaw T’Ree Township. When Saw A--- had finished showering, it was around 5 pm. Saw A---’s four-month-old son was unwell, so Saw A--- rode his bike to take his child to a [local] medical nurse who lived in the same village [around 200 meters away from his home]. His wife, Naw F---, had given birth four months prior so she did not accompany her husband. When Saw A--- reached half-way [to the nurse’s house], he heard the sound of an aircraft flying across the sky, so he stopped his bike, hid in a covered place and watched the aircraft pass over him [, as witnessed by a local villager named Naw E---].

After, he met with the medic nurse and did the checkup for his son, Saw A--- visited Naw E--- [a villager from G--- village,] at her house [around 40 meters from the local nurse’s house]. As Saw A--- was eating betel nut [at Naw E---’s house], he heard the sound of an aircraft once again, around 15 minutes after the first aircraft. This time, the aircraft sounded like it was dipping down. In fear, he rushed to bring his son to safety with his wife.

As soon as he reached his wife, Naw F---, she went inside the [underground] bunker. While they [mother and three children] were in the bunker, Saw A--- was [outside] searching to see where the aircraft was. He saw the SAC fighter jet drop a bomb, so he tried to flee to a covered place, but he could not reach safety. The bomb landed beside him and his body was propelled by the force of the explosion. He was found lying next to a house, injured all over. Saw A--- was taken to a KNLA-run clinic in B--- village [also known as B--- clinic], P’Lu village tract, Kaw T’Ree Township, by the Cobra Column[7] security in Dooplaya District, but he died on the way. His wife became a widow with three children. [At the time of the incident,] his eldest child was 9 years old, middle child was 5 years old, and the youngest was 4 months old.

The bomb also injured three women, including Naw E--- [who Saw A--- had visited], as reported by Saw A---’s brother named Saw C---. Naw E--- was minorly injured on her face. For the other two elderly women, Naw H--- was injured severely on her stomach and Naw J--- was injured on her ear. The injured villagers were sent to B--- clinic with Saw A---.

The air strike also destroyed five villagers’ houses, an elementary school located inside a church compound, an animist temple, one middle school located near a football ground, a rice barn, and one toilet in G--- village. 

Did the victim(s) provide permission to use this information? Explain how that permission was provided.

The interviewees gave permission for this information to be used by KHRG.