What happened in Mon Taing Bin village

Myanmar Now, a local news media outlet, has gained the photographs of 16 victims and contacted and interviewed five villagers whom were captured and escaped at last. According to these interviews, it is true and can be confirmed that 28 victims, who all are innocent civilian villagers, from Mon Taing Bin village were murdered. The translation of the following incident was prepared by our local team so that foreign readers could understand what transpired.

Local villagers from Mon Taing Bin village in Ye U township in Sagaing Region, where 28 innocent civilian villagers were murdered by the demon Myanmar military, called for armed assistance for their survival.

As a man who does not usually believe in the extraordinary events, Ko Lin [redacted name] is getting confused about the events happening in his surroundings and what he and his villagers are encountering.

It is that Mon Taing Bin villagers are now believing and talking about the ghosts who suffered from being murdered in the village in the north of Ye U about two months ago. Villagers are hearing the dogs’ cries, getting the bad smells and seeing the indistinct appearances in the east of the village and there is no one who dares to live in that part there.

Although the dead (burned) bodies of the victims were buried, the Buddhist traditional rituals were not able to be carried out until two months later. According to Burmese Buddhist tradition, family members of a dead person invite the monks, offer the alms-food and offerings to them and share the merits with the dead one. Villagers are believing that the souls of the victims whom were murdered in groups are now inhabiting these regions as these rites were not performed.

“The villagers and the family members of the victims tried to perform these rituals within a week after they found the corpses but they could not do it yet, as the demon troops came back in the village again to operate the military campaigns,” said Ko Lin.

He continued, “For the interests of all the victims, we planned to do alms donations and good merits, the villagers will listen to the Parittas (Buddhist chantings) and then will scatter the Parittas all around the village.”

The villagers of Mon Taing Bin village are willing to do good merits and share the benefits with the victims, send the loving kindness to them. For those family members who fled from Mon Taing Bin village and are staying at other towns and villages, they could only perform the funeral rituals in brief and rush for the victims.

Now, the village’s leaders are planning to share the intended good merits, clean the village and cover the earth on the land of the houses which were being burned, since there can be the remaining bones and ashes of the corpses.

“Deeply hurt-heated! If they (Myanmar military soldiers) came, just run to escape. Otherwise, you’ll be in trouble. Just as my husband encountered and suffered, anyone might be brutally murdered and be burned to ashes,” recalled by Daw Thin Kyi whose husband was killed. She herself escaped from being captured and killed though she can’t escape from this nightmare for the rest of her life.

At the time of the military’s raid to Mon Taing Bin village, over 100 locals were captured and 28 villagers among them were murdered in groups. Three other locals were also murdered with a suspicion to be local defense force members or to be supporting local pdf with no evidence. The total number of the victims is 31 in fact.