I. War Crimes 50 feel it. … When the shelling stopped … we walked around to check on our neighbors … I realized it wasn’t just my house that was hit … everything around us was destroyed. Houses were in pieces. … We saw that almost the whole village was destroyed. … [W]e wouldn’t be able to stay in the village anymore as there was nothing left, and it was no longer safe.83 A 39-year-old aid worker who lives a mile away from Munglai Hkyet told Fortify Rights he felt the impact of the attack’s initial explosion at his house: I have lived in Laiza since 1992. The experience that I had on October 9, 2023, is the first deadly attack that I have ever experienced in the 31 years that I have lived in Laiza. This was the most destructive attack. … I felt this “graaa-wone” [rumbling] from the ground. … I felt and heard a deafening explosion. … Before, usually, we heard the “whoosh,” and then came the explosion sound. This time, it felt like it came from the ground as if it were a landmine explosion. …It felt like the hit would destroy an entire village, and in reality, it did.84 Responding to the attack on Munglai Hkyet, the aid worker and his friend drove to the village. He told Fortify Rights: I left my home around 11:35 p.m. … I was aware that I could get hurt…whether I go or not, many people would be dying. When I got there … I saw the physical destruction and the mental destruction that was taking a toll on the people. Some were screaming and crying in pain from their injuries. … People were delirious. Some couldn’t even speak. They just stood, shell-shocked in the middle of the chaos. … At the site of the attack, everything was gone. It [the attack] even created a crater. I saw bodies in pieces. I saw a woman whose entire lower body was gone.85 The aid worker told Fortify Rights that he and his friend tried to rescue survivors and rush them to Laiza Hospital: I did two trips that night. … When I arrived, I screamed at the people on the road to get in the car. But they were not hearing me at all, so I got out of the car and dragged those who were injured and children into my car, as many as my car could fit. … One house was completely destroyed to the point of being unrecognizable. A husband, his pregnant wife, five children, and elderly grandmother lived in that house. I carried the grandmother into my car and then carried one of their sons on my right and another one on my left, rescued the rest, and drove straight to Laiza Hospital. … Those who were not injured, we drove them to my church to set up a temporary shelter in the hall.86 The 45-year-old displaced Kachin woman quoted above also went to Laiza Hospital to help and identify victims soon after she fled Munglai Hkyet. She told Fortify Rights: “I saw many injured people in the hospital. I didn’t realize there would be so many people who died. While I was at the hospital, I saw many cars bringing dead bodies until the early hours of the morning. We were all trying to identify who was who.”87 She told Fortify Rights that she lost family and friends in the attack: It was like the world was falling apart. People that I have seen on a regular basis, my friends and relatives, all of them were either injured or gone. My relatives from my mom’s side were gone. I don’t even know how to feel. I couldn’t feel anything. I don’t know what I can do except cry. I saw bodies with many injuries on their faces and body parts gone. … I saw bodies with their stomachs open, a gaping hole in their chest, and broken parts. Until now, I can’t close my eyes without seeing them.88 83 Ibid. 84 Fortify Rights interview with F.B., Laiza, Waingmaw Township, Kachin State, Myanmar, October 20, 2023. 85 Ibid. 86 Ibid. 87 Fortify Rights interview with B.F., Laiza, Waingmaw Township, Kachin State, Myanmar, October 12, 2023. 88 Fortify Rights interview with F.B., Laiza, Waingmaw Township, Kachin State, Myanmar, October 12, 2023.