The Mandalay People’s Defence Force (PDF) captured a Junta camp in Nawngkio Township, northern Shan State, and killed over enemy soldiers, as well as seizing over 40 guns, according to the PDF’s own estimates.

The army group reported ambushing two columns of soldiers dispatched to aid fellow soldiers while they were being attacked by the PDF in Thayet Kon, a village in Nawngkio Township only eight miles from Pyin Oo Lwin, where the regime maintains its defence academy. After sustaining numerous casualties, the columns were forced to retreat.

The PDF collected the bodies of 21 enemy soldiers and over 40 guns, along with 2 60mm mortars, a drone jammer, ammunition, and other military equipment while capturing the village on April 15. Some PDF soldiers also were killed, but the group didn’t provide numbers in its report.

“I heard a Buddhist monastery, school, and many houses were damaged by the clash in our village. I’m afraid to return,” a local man told SHAN. Thousands of people from the Thapet Kon, Zar Li, and other villages nearby were displaced by the clashes.

According to the PDF, the regime force has been staying in religious buildings and schools in Thapet Kon where it built bunkers, and sleeping in the other villages and towns where it has occupied.

“We attacked Junta force’s heartland town of Pyin Oo Lwin, and our troops also captured a military camp from the Junta force during the New Year period. This is a New Year’s present for our people,” the PDF wrote in its report.

Pyin Oo Lwin was attacked with rockets on the evening of April 14 when State Administration Council leader Min Aung Hlaing and his military generals were resting in the town.