CNF base on the India-Myanmar border targeted, allegedly impacting Indian sovereign territory

Report Published:14 Jan 2023

Myanmar Military airstrikes occurred on 10 and 11 January 2023 against Camp Victoria – the headquarters of the CNF and a strategically important area on the India-Myanmar border. At least one of the strikes conducted by the Myanmar Military allegedly impacted Indian sovereign territory and aircraft reportedly passed through Indian airspace. The strikes against Camp Victoria have resulted in the deaths of at least five individuals, believed to be CNF members. Analysis by Myanmar Witness indicates these attacks were premeditated.

Key Event Details

• Location of Incident: Camp Victoria (ဗစ်တိုးရီးယားစခန်း), in Thantlang Township (ထန်တလန်) Chin State (ချင်း) [23.069562, 93.347362]

• Date/Time of Incident: 

  • 10-11 January 2023 (Verified)

• Alleged Perpetrator(s) and/or Involvement: 

  • Myanmar Air Force

• Investigation:

  • Myanmar Witness has geolocated user-generated content (UGC) of the strike destruction at Camp Victoria and compared it with pre-existing satellite imagery, allowing for independent verification of the strike impact locations.

  • Although the capture date of the various pieces of UGC which were relied upon in this investigation cannot be fully verified, Myanmar Witness determined that the UGC had not appeared online prior to 10 January 2023, the same day that reports and allegations of the air strikes began to emerge.

Summary

A series of airstrikes on a strategically important CNF base has reportedly left at least five dead, including women. This represents an escalation in the use of air power and the conduct of the SAC’s airwar across the conflict in Myanmar. Although a military base, Camp Victoria is known to host and provide services to civilians – containing homes and essential services, such as medical facilities.

On 10 January 2023 at around 1600 local time, an airstrike event was allegedly carried out by the Myanmar Military on Camp Victoria (ဗစ်တိုးရီးယားစခန်း), in Thantlang (ထန်တလန်) Township, Chin (ချင်း) State. On 11 January 2023, another airstrike event on Camp Victoria was reported by outlets such as Khit Thit Media at a similar time in the evening as the previous day. Myanmar Witness defines an ‘airstrike event’ as ‘one or more airstrikes within a 24 hour period in the same village/specific geographic area’.

Myanmar Witness has geolocated footage of the aftermath of the attack and matched it to satellite imagery, showing extensive damage to structures and roads in the area. Myanmar Witness has also assessed allegations of at least one strike impacting Indian sovereign territory and believes this likely did occur. Further investigation is being conducted to provide greater certainty on this claim.

Social media posts, such as those uploaded by Chin Human Rights Organisation, of supposedly ‘leaked’ documents, have also been analysed by Myanmar Witness. The conducted analysis suggests the attacks against Camp Victoria were premeditated.

Further analysis by Myanmar Witness indicates the strikes impacted a medical facility within Camp Victoria which is known to provide medical services to local community members. Myanmar Witness has continually highlighted the brutality of the conflict in Myanmar, particularly in relation to its impact on sites such as schools, clinics and religious buildings. 

Myanmar Witness has geolocated footage to verify: 

• the airstrike-caused destruction of parts of Camp Victoria and its surrounds; and

• the potential targeting of civilian infrastructure such as medical facilities and housing.

Myanmar Witness is actively monitoring:

• claims that Myanmar Military aircrafts entered Indian airspace – as no UGC has been identified which would provide insight into this;

• the allegation that a Myanmar Military airstrike impacted Indian sovereign territory; and

• claims around what kind of aircraft was used in the Camp Victoria (ဗစ်တိုးရီးယားစခန်း) attack.

The five individuals allegedly killed are referred to as members of the CNF. The members were later identified online by Chinland News as:

• Salai Van Ro Sang

• Salai Duh Tin

• Mai Ngun Hlei Par

• Mai Sui Len Par

• Salai Kil Mang.

Figure 1: The location of Camp Victoria [23.069562, 93.347362].