Fourteen people, all described as elderly, were killed when military aircraft struck a monastery in Myaung township, central Sagaing, officials and rescuers said, a blow to noncombatants in a region long caught in Myanmar’s civil war.
Opposition fighters and a local rescue worker reported the attack, and AFP says it occurred at about 09:00 local time, 02:30 GMT, roughly 70km west of Mandalay. The rescue worker told BBC Burmese the site was hit twice, and several monks were wounded as civilians had gathered there for a meditation retreat to mark Buddhist Lent.
Pro-democracy rebel Nway Oo Myaung told AFP the dead included 11 men and three women. He said five victims were from one village and nine from a neighbouring township, and he described their ages as between 50 and 70. "Older people had entered the meditation centres," he added.
An unnamed opposition fighter who said he had been among those searching for survivors described a second strike while rescuers were on site. "While we were trying to rescue people, the aircraft came to bomb a second time," he said.
Myanmar has been in open conflict since the military removed Aung San Suu Kyi in the 2021 coup and imposed martial law. The armed forces are frequently accused of carrying out strikes on public buildings, though the military has previously maintained it only targets legitimate military objectives. In this case, the military has not commented.
The death of so many older civilians at a religious retreat will increase pressure on aid groups and political actors in central Sagaing, where civilians have repeatedly been caught between junta operations and insurgent activity. With no response from the military and reports of a follow-up strike on rescuers, questions about accountability and the safety of humanitarian responders remain unresolved. Local authorities and international monitors will now face the immediate task of verifying the incident and documenting casualties amid restricted access and ongoing violence.
