At least 18 people, most of them students, have been killed in an air strike on two private schools by Myanmar’s military in a village in the country’s western Rakhine state, according to an armed group and the local media.

Khaing Thukha, spokesperson for the Arakan Army (AA) that controls the area, told The Associated Press late on Friday that a jet fighter dropped two bombs on Pyinnyar Pan Khinn and A Myin Thit Private High School in the Thayet Thapin village in Kyauktaw township.

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He said most of the victims were “17- to 18-year-old students from the private schools”. The situation in the village could not be independently confirmed, with access to the internet and cellphone service in the area mostly cut off.

“We feel as sad as the victims’ families for the death of the innocent students,” said the AA in a statement on Telegram, blaming the military for the strike.

The AA is the military wing of the Rakhine ethnic minority movement, which seeks autonomy from Myanmar’s central government. It began its offensive in Rakhine in November 2023 and has since gained control of a strategically important regional army headquarters and 14 of Rakhine’s 17 townships.

Kyauktaw, 250km (150 miles) southwest of Mandalay, the country’s second-largest city, was captured by the AA last February.

Myanmar has been in turmoil since the army seized power from the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi on February 1, 2021, triggering widespread popular opposition. After peaceful demonstrations were put down with lethal force, many opponents of the military rule took up arms, and large parts of the country are now embroiled in conflict.

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More than 7,200 people are estimated to have been killed by security forces since then, according to figures compiled by nongovernment organisations.

The military government has recently stepped up air strikes against the armed pro-democracy People’s Defence Force. The resistance forces have no effective defence against air attacks.

Wai Hun Aung, who directs relief work in Rakhine, told AP that those killed in the air strike were among 30 to 40 boarders from the schools. He said at least six houses near the schools were damaged, and 21 people were injured, including six who were in critical condition.

Local news outlets reported that a military warplane dropped two 500lb bombs on a high school as students slept. They also posted photos and videos online showing debris and damaged buildings.

In a statement on Saturday, the UNICEF condemned the “brutal attack”, which it said “adds to a pattern of increasingly devastating violence in Rakhine State, with children and families paying the ultimate price”.

Rakhine, formerly known as Arakan, was the site of a brutal army counterinsurgency operation in 2017 that drove about 740,000 mainly Muslim Rohingya minority to seek safety across the border in Bangladesh.