It was a day in May, approaching noon, yet the sun’s heat felt strangely subdued. A gentle breeze stirred the silence, and now and then, the faint chirping of wild birds echoed from a distance. On any other day, the soft wind and calm air might have soothed the soul. But here, with the crumbling shell of a small school and a pile of ownerless backpacks in a nearby field, the scene told a different story — one that broke the hearts of those who knew what had happened.
This was the scene at around 10:00 a.m. on May 12 in Oe Htein Kwin Village, Tabayin Township, Shwebo District, in Myanmar’s Sagaing Region. It was the aftermath of a brutal airstrike launched by a Military Council aircraft — targeting a school while children were in class. More than 20 backpacks lay in the pile, now without owners. Among them were small, bloodstained clothes — a heartbreaking testament to the young lives lost.
More than 20 children and 2 teachers were killed inside the school they once loved, struck down by an inhumane airstrike carried out by the coup regime. According to aid workers helping displaced communities in the area, more than 100 others — many of them children — are being treated for serious injuries.
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“That was a direct hit on the school. Some parents didn’t just lose one child… they lost two in the same attack,” a villager said quietly.
Some villagers were preparing to lower the flag in front of the school to half-mast.
“They’re lowering the flag to half-mast, in mourning for the souls of the teachers and students who were killed,” said Daw Yati Ohn, her voice trembling with grief and disbelief. Daw Yati Ohn was once a teacher at the Government Technical High School in (Kalay) Town, Sagaing Region, before she joined the anti-coup Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM). She actively engaged in humanitarian work, community-based healthcare education, and on-the-ground healthcare activities in Sagaing Region throughout the Spring Revolution, which emerged as a response to the coup. When the school was struck by the Military Council’s airstrike, she was one of the first to rush to the site to offer help.
She recorded the aftermath of the bombing on her phone, capturing the ruins of the school.Standing in a
shattered classroom, she gently touched the blackboard and mimicked the posture of a teacher mid-lesson.
“That’s all we ever did — just taught our children. Is that a sin? Were we wrong—just for teaching?” she cried out, her voice breaking, as if speaking for the fellow teachers who had been killed.
She pointed to a hole in the cement slab of the classroom floor, made by a bomb dropped from the aircraft. “Look, there’s a bloodstain here. And look up, too,” she said. When the phone camera followed her gesture, it revealed the school’s roof was completely gone, exposing the sky above. “Everything was torn apart,” she said.
In one spot, a small pencil case lay covered in blood, near a large pool of it.
A trail of blood ran along the wall.
“Here… a child tried to walk. Desperate and tottering,” she said, pointing to the blood trail.
The adjacent classroom was in even worse condition. The roof had been ripped off, and jagged pieces of metal roofing were strewn about, hanging in disarray. In another building made of palm thatch, the walls had been completely blown away. Blood had pooled beneath the desks, now darkening as it dried.
“This spot used to be where a student, Myat Noe Maung, sat,” Daw Yati Ohn recalled. The name belonged to a Grade 9 student who died from severe injuries.
In other damaged buildings, children’s fingers and strands of tangled hair were found — a sight that crushed the soul.
There were so many casualties that assigning individual burial spots was impossible. In many cases, two to five bodies had to be buried together in a single grave.
Daw Yati Ohn had been in Monywa City, Sagaing Region, assisting with earthquake relief when she heard about the school bombing. She rushed to the site without hesitation.
“I recorded it because it’s important. People need to see these crimes — the inhumanity, the cruelty, the brutality of the Military Council. It was devastating to witness,” she said.
After the airstrike, the entire village of Oe Htein Kwin was forced to flee. The school targeted by the attack had been run by the Ministry of Education under the National Unity Government (NUG), the revolutionary pro-democracy government. The NUG has provided education for local children through an interim system.
This was not the first attack on a school in the area. In the same township, Tabayin, on September 16, 2022, the Military Council launched a heavy airstrike on a school in Let Yet Kone Village, killing 13 people, including 6 students, and injuring 27.
“How many of our children have to be sacrificed before the international community speaks out?” Daw Yati Ohn asked, her voice breaking with sorrow.
