The People’s Defense Force (PDF) in Sagaing Region, along with its allied resistance forces, reported they had seized Indaw town, which borders Kachin State, after capturing the remaining regime outpost on a hill locally known as Japan Cave in Indaw Township on Monday.
“There were fatalities on both sides,” a PDF member told DVB. But the exact number of casualties wasn’t shared. It added that resistance forces launched an assault on a regime column emerging from the cave on April 1, which eventually led to the fall of the outpost seven days later.
The Myanmar Air Force carried out at least 60 retaliatory airstrikes during the battle with aerial attacks still ongoing, the PDF claimed. The PDF-led offensive on Indaw began in August, with the assault on the outpost starting on Dec. 11.
Another PDF member in Indaw told DVB that two residents were killed and at least eight others were injured by airstrikes on April 1–2. Indaw is located 209 miles (336 km) north of the region’s capital Monywa.
The Japan Cave stretches east to west and provides a strategic vantage point over the Shwebo–Myitkyina road—a route linking Sagaing Region in central Myanmar to the Kachin State capital Myitkyina further north.
The National Unity Government (NUG) announced a two-week halt to PDF offensives against regime forces, unless in self-defence, on March 30. The regime in Naypyidaw announced a ceasefire to facilitate earthquake relief April 2-22. DVB data states that since April 2, the regime has carried out at least 52 attacks.
