Aid workers assisting Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in Myanmar told DVB that survivors of massacres, attacks, and human rights violations, committed by pro-regime forces since the 2021 military coup, need psychosocial support for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

“The wife of one of [a man killed by the military] told us that she could not sleep and felt insecure because she witnessed her husband killed in front of her,” an aid worker from Myinmu Township, providing psychosocial support to IDPs in Sagaing Region, told DVB on the condition of anonymity. 

A 50-year-old resident of Lethtoketaw village in Myinmu Township told DVB that he now lives with a disability due to the injuries, both internal and external, he sustained on May 11, 2024 when military personnel killed 34 male residents of Lethtoketaw village, including the elderly and children, who had hidden in a monastery. 

Six of his relatives were among those killed. “They [regime soldiers] told us to step out from the monastery. They forced young men to sit together and killed them. We were ordered to watch,” he told DVB on the condition of anonymity.

Lethtoketaw village has 700 homes and is located at the junction of Myaung-Mandalay and Monywa-Mandalay roads. More than 500 homes there were destroyed by arson attacks conducted by the military on May 6, 2023. Myinmu is located 36 miles (57 km) southeast of the Sagaing Region capital Monywa.     

The military killed six men during an offensive on Sipa village of Butalin Township, Sagaing Region, on Oct. 17. When the victims’ bodies were recovered, residents found them burned, decapitated and dismembered. Butalin is located 23 miles (37 km) north of Monywa. 

“I looked for my uncle once the military left the village. He was left behind when we fled our home. My body was shaken when I found the bodies. I don’t ever want to recall that scene,” said the niece of Kyaung Po, 60, who was killed and decapitated by regime soldiers. 

Kyaw Zaw, the National Unity Government (NUG) President’s Office spokesperson, told DVB that the NUG Ministry of Defense and Ministry of Health provide on-site consultations and online telehealth services with professional psychologists. 

“We provide counseling for the victims affected by [military attacks],” he said. “These [massacres] will end if the dictatorship fails, and that’s why we are trying to achieve that goal.”  

A total of 293 massacres have occurred across Myanmar from Feb. 1, 2021 up to Jan. 20. This is when five or more people are killed in one attack. DVB data states that 3,188 people, including 288 children, have been killed in massacres committed by pro-military forces in Myanmar since the 2021 coup.