The Myanmar junta’s desperate campaign of terror

It was about 9:15pm on 5 September when the roaring sound of a warplane began to hum across the hills. Tucked away in a valley in Pekon Township in Myanmar, on the border with Karenni and Shan states, a community of some thousand people were about to go to sleep. Illuminated only by small solar-powered lights and campfires, mothers and fathers were putting their children to bed. But the junta jet fighter didn’t need light. It had already been given direct coordinates, and it was about to drop its payload directly on the camp.

The violence which has plagued Myanmar for over three years had once again come to Pekon. The warplane released two large bombs right into the heart of the settlement where hundreds of displaced families were living. Upon impact, the explosives decimated the bamboo and metal shelters, violently splintering bamboo into the air. Pieces of sheet metal took flight, tearing into everything in its path.