At least 24 people were killed and 47 were injured after a paramotor attack hit a festival gathering in central Myanmar’s Chaung U township on Monday evening. The attack took place during celebrations for the Thadingyut festival, a Buddhist holiday marked with candles and lights.

According to BBC Burmese, around 100 people had gathered for the event, which also doubled as a candlelight vigil against the military junta. Suddenly, a motorised paraglider dropped two bombs onto the crowd, a local official from the anti-junta People’s Defence Force (PDF) said.

“I was on the ground when the first bomb hit. It struck my knee, but I could hear people dying around me,” a PDF representative told BBC Burmese.
 Locals said the blast left the area in ruins, making it hard to identify victims. “Children were completely torn apart,” said a woman who helped organise the vigil, speaking to AFP. She added that people were still collecting body parts the next day during funerals.

The PDF said they had received warnings about a possible airstrike earlier that evening and had tried to end the gathering quickly. However, the paramotors arrived sooner than expected, and the bombing lasted only a few minutes.

Myanmar has been in civil unrest since the military coup in 2021, when the army seized power from the elected government. According to United Nations estimates, more than 5,000 civilians have been killed in the ongoing violence.

Amnesty International condemned the attack, calling the use of paramotors part of a “disturbing pattern” by the military. Reports suggest the junta has increasingly relied on such methods, as international sanctions have made it difficult to acquire aircraft and helicopters.

During the vigil, participants had been protesting against the military’s conscription policy and demanding the release of Aung San Suu Kyi and other detained leaders.
Myanmar is expected to hold general elections in December, the first since the coup. However, many critics believe the polls will be tightly controlled by the junta, leaving little room for genuine democracy.