YANGON: Despite the looming threat from the Covid-19 virus, struggling to stay alive is nothing new for those in conflict zones who have little time to worry about anything else amid intensified clashes between government forces and ethnic groups.
According to reports in The Myanmar Times, death is not alien to these tens of thousands of residents, having seen people killed or wounded during the clashes.
However, state counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi has assured everyone that the government would not leave anyone behind in the fight against Covid-19.
She urged the people to adhere to the Ministry of Health and Sports’ instructions, which would be circulated five times a day in the community and warned that anyone who flouted the rules would face action.
But this has little meaning to people in conflict zones, who are on the run every day to escape bullets and artillery shells. They have no time to wash their hands, worry about social distancing, or even worry about fever, cough or shortness of breath. Their main concern is to stay alive.
“The government asked us to stay at home, but we are running away from our houses to keep us safe,” said U Sar Doe Aung, a resident of Kyauk Seik village in Rakhine’s Ponnagyun township, one of the epicentres of the clashes between the Arakan Army and Tatmadaw (military) forces.
“How can we stay at home during the fighting?”
On April 13, three of U Sar Doe Aung’s relatives were among eight civilians killed in clashes between the Arakan Army and the Tatmadaw.
Due to the fighting, more than 2,000 civilians fled their homes. U Sar Doe Aung is staying with 40 men in a village near Nat Chaung village, in Myebon township.
“Villagers laugh when we say Covid-19 has spread in Myanmar,” U San Kyaw Hla, speaker of the Rakhine Parliament, told The Myanmar Times.
“For them, there is nothing more worrisome that being blown to pieces when the next artillery shell explodes.”
He said there were Covid-19 awareness signboards in every village, in every IDP camp in conflict areas, “but people are too weary, tired and desensitised to have a second look at it”.
The Karen Peace Support Network issued a statement on April 16 lambasting the government and the military for refusing to heed the ceasefire call.
“Sadly in ethnic states, the government and its security forces are drastically increasing the vulnerability of the people to the deadly virus because of the military’s brutal offensive on communities without heeding calls for ceasefire from ethnic armed organisations, ethnic political parties, civil society, and the United Nations,” it said.