Eight people have been killed and six others wounded in a mine attack by an anti-government ethnic armed group on a passenger bus in northeastern Kayin state, the official newspaper New Light of Myanmar reported Thursday.
About seven members of the Kayin National Union (KNU) detonated the mine and fired small arms on Tuesday at a passenger bus on its way to Myawaddy from Kawkareik in the border area with Thailand. The local army units are in hot pursuit of the mine attackers, the report said.
The report charged the KNU with constantly committing all destructive acts such as undermining stability of the state, community peace and tranquility and prevalence of law and order.
A mine, planted in bushes in a village of Loikaw, eastern Myanmar's Kayah state, also exploded, killing eight villagers while they were clearing the bushes near the base of a tower, according to the paper's earlier report.
More earlier official reports said, in June this year, a total of 27 people were killed and 11 others wounded in two shooting sprees on passenger buses by unidentified insurgent groups in Myanmar's Kayin and Kayah states in two consecutive days.
Again in October, three villagers were killed and four others injured as they stepped on mines allegedly planted by insurgents in Ye township in southeastern Mon state and Kyaukkyi township in the Kayin state.
Since the government adopted a policy of national reconciliation in 1989, 17 main anti-government armed groups have made peace with the government under respective cease-fire agreements and leaving the largest of them, the KNU, out of the legal fold.
Source: Xinhua
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