Vegetable vendor loses leg in Taungup landmine blast

By Admin 06 May 2024

DMG Newsroom
6 May 2024, Taungup

A local woman was severely injured after stepping on a landmine near a hill in Arakan State’s Taungup Township on Monday morning.

Daw Khin Than Hlaing, 48, from Kanpaing Ward in Taungup, was foraging for vegetables near Thinchaing Hill in front of the donor’s association office on May 6 when she stepped on the landmine. She lost her left leg in the blast, locals said.

“She makes a living by selling vegetables. She lost her left leg after she stepped on a landmine planted by the military and her condition is considered life-threatening,” said a local woman.

Daw Khin Than Hlaing was sent to Taungup Hospital, but she was transferred to Yangon General Hospital due to her serious injuries and medicine insufficiency.

There is no fighting between the military and Arakkha Army (AA) in Taungup, where the No. 5 Military Operations Command headquarters is located, but the regime has tightened security and restricted the movements of local people, said a local resident.

“Regime soldiers have been deployed at entries and exits of the town and near Taungup University. Local people in Taungup were told not to go to the locations where junta soldiers are stationed,” the resident explained.

The regime has blocked roads since renewed fighting in Arakan State began in November. In the months since, shortages of medicine have arisen and there is no flow of goods. Prices have risen across the board as a result, causing difficulties for the locals.

Civilian casualties caused by landmines and explosive remnants of war (ERWs), meanwhile, have been on the rise in Arakan State. 

A young man from Cheltaung Village in Minbya Township was killed and his father was injured after they stepped on a landmine while collecting vegetables on a hill near the village on May 3.