AFP, TheDhaka Tribune, June 14, 2024

Myanmar's junta has ordered thousands of people livingoutside a state capital threatened by ethnic rebels to leave their homes andhead into the city, residents said on Friday.

Sittwe city is one of the few holdouts for junta troops inwestern Rakhine state, where the military has lost swathes of territory to theArakan Army (AA) in recent weeks.

The AA, which says it is fighting for autonomy for thestate's ethnic Rakhine population, has vowed to capture Sittwe, home to anIndia-backed deep sea port and around 200,000 people.

Residents of 15 villages around Sittwe were given five daysto leave their homes and move to the state capital, a resident of one of thevillages told AFP.

"The army threatened to shoot and kill if they foundsomeone after the deadline" which expires on Saturday, she said,requesting anonymity due to fear of arrest.

A resident of Sittwe put the number of villages ordered toevacuate at around 10, saying that residents had been told "to move outfor security reasons" by Saturday.

The villages were home to around 3,500 people, the Sittweresident said, requesting anonymity. They added the military had not arrangedfor temporary shelters in Sittwe. "People have to move to their relatives'homes from other villages," they said.

Local media also reported the order to evacuate villages inthe area. AFP was unable to reach a junta spokesman for comment.

In November, the AA launched a wave of attacks on themilitary across Rakhine, shattering a ceasefire that had largely held since themilitary's 2021 coup.

It has since seized territory along the border with Indiaand Bangladesh, piling further pressure on the junta as it battles opponentselsewhere across the Southeast Asian country.

It has also held the town of Pauktaw, around 25km fromSittwe, since January. AFP images from the town last month showed guttedbuildings, vacant windows and blocks bombed to rubble by the fighting, whichhas emptied the fishing port of its residents.

This month, the AA said junta troops had killed more than 70civilians in a raid on Byain Phyu village, north of Sittwe.

The junta said the claim was "propaganda" andaccused AA fighters of launching attacks on Sittwe from surrounding villages.

Phone and internet services have been all but cut off acrossRakhine state, making it difficult to verify reports of violence.