Defectors accuse regime of killing conscripts for fleeing battlefields

By Admin 17 Jul 2025

DMG Newsroom

17 July 2025, Sittwe

Junta soldiers who defected to the Arakan Army (AA) have said that Myanmar's military regime forced conscripts to fight on the front lines, and shot those who retreated.

Two junta soldiers who defected to the AA during the Nat Yay Kan battle on the Ann-Padan front said in a video clip released by the AA that conscripts were placed at the forefront of junta battalions' marches and shot dead by Myanmar military officers if they retreated.

"I witnessed a conscript friend of mine being shot dead by a military officer right in front of me. Seeing that, we were also afraid, so if they stepped forward, we had to step forward," said Nay Lin Aung, a defector.

Nay Lin Aung, originally from Mandalay, was forcibly recruited for Myanmar military service, attended two months of basic military training, two weeks of refresher training, and served one week in Light Infantry Battalion No. 79 under the Myanmar military's Light Infantry Division No. 99 before being sent to a frontline military outpost near Nat Yay Kan Village.

Another soldier who defected to the AA, Aung Thet Htun, was also forcibly detained by a ward administrator and sent to a military training school before being sent to the front lines.

He said he was arrested during his first escape, held for more than two months, and then sent back to the Nat Yay Kan military camp.

"Some of the conscripts who knew they couldn't escape shot themselves and were injured. Military doctors did not treat the wounded conscripts. Military officers told the conscripts who shot themselves that they would be imprisoned if they did not die," said the defector Aung Thet Htun in a video clip released by the AA.

The military regime is making a concerted effort to prevent the Nat Yay Kan hilltop camp from falling into the hands of the revolutionary forces, but junta deserters say that many people have been killed and many have fled due to the Arakan Army's blockade.

The regime recruits nearly 5,000 young people for each military training batch and is believed to have conscripted around 70,000 men since activating the Conscription Law in February 2024.