On a chilly December evening, with a shivering breeze that sent chills through my heart, I drove my motorcycle wearing a warm jacket and found families gathered around a fire at a displacement camp.

As the evening set in, the wind blew gently, and chickens and birds were settling in for the night. While feeling the December atmosphere, I overheard a conversation among the displaced families sitting around the fire.

“When will we be able to go home?”

I have visited many displacement camps before. And almost every time, the elderly ask me the same question: “Son, when will we ever return home?”

Each time I hear this question, I feel very sad.

Yet, all I can do is offer words of comfort. I have no real way to help them. Why do they keep asking this? How much hardship and suffering have they endured in the forests and mountains?

December is unbearably cold. Every day, they sit around fires for warmth, sharing their struggles and wondering when they will return home. I also listened intently whenever I had a chance.

But even around a simple fire, they cannot sit with ease. When I asked why, a displaced woman responded anxiously, “If there’s firelight, the airstrikes or artillery might come.”

In addition to the unjust artillery strikes by the military, they are also suffering the trauma of daily unexpected airstrikes, leaving them filled with psychological wounds.

And it’s not just people who suffer. Even pets, such as dogs, react very quickly to the sound of artillery fire. In Demoso Township, near Ngwe Taung, the moment artillery is fired from Light Infantry Battalion 102, I have seen dogs run faster than humans as they scramble to hide in bomb shelters.

Given how often the junta targets displacement camps, it is no surprise that these displaced people constantly fear for their safety.

From my witness, the displaced people who frequently hear, experience, and witness the airstrikes by the military junta can sometimes mistakenly be perceived as the sound of a window closing by the sound of artillery.

In eastern Demoso, where junta shelling is frequent, local village authorities have urged every household to dig bomb shelters by the end of 2024.

U Nyar Reh, a village leader from HteePoKaLo, said he personally witnessed deaths caused by the lack of bomb shelters.

“If we hadn’t dug the shelters, I would have seen even more deaths with my own eyes. In our village, if you don’t hide in a shelter in time, you either die or get wounded. It happens all the time,” he said.

For unarmed displaced civilians, the only defense against junta airstrikes and artillery shelling is to build proper bomb shelters and hide.

On January 15, a junta airstrike on an eastern Demoso displacement camp killed three people and injured four others.

Later that evening, Light Infantry Battalion 102 continued shelling the area. As a result, many elderly displaced people are forced to sleep in their bomb shelters throughout the night.

Some wealthier families have built their shelters with concrete, making them more secure. But the majority cannot afford such protection. Many families, including children and the elderly, are forced to sleep in cramped, makeshift bomb shelters. This is life in Karenni State.

Before the military coup in early 2021, people lived peacefully in their own homes, enjoying life with their families. On cold evenings, they would visit each other’s houses by sitting around the fire and sharing stories.

This was a common tradition in ethnic villages.

But since the 2021 coup, such simple joys have become rare. People have been forced to abandon their homes and flee into the mountains and forests, where they continue to endure the junta’s inhumane acts of violence.

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