Myanmar military plane crashes at Mizoram airport; 6 injured

A military aircraft belonging to the Myanmar military veered off the runway at  Mizoram's Lengpui Airport on Tuesday, injuring six people. The aircraft was said to be carrying Myanmar army personnel who were being repatriated after seeking refugee in India.

According to Mizoram DGP, 14 people were on board the plane, including the pilot. The injured were admitted to Lengpui Hospital, reported ANI.

Footage from Mizoram showed the crashed plane near the airport. Lengpiu is said to have a challenging tabletop runway. More details are awaited.

This comes as India sent 184 Myanmarese soldiers to their own country after they fled to Mizoram last week following gunfights with an ethnic insurgent group. As per an Assam Rifles official, as many as 276 Myanmarese soldiers had entered Mizoram last week. On Monday, over 184 were flown back on Myanmar Air Force planes from the Lengpui airport near Aizawl to Sittwe in Myanmar's  Rakhine state.

The plane that crashed on Tuesday is said to be carrying the remaining soldiers.

After Arakan Army fighters, an armed ethnic group fighting as part of an alliance against the Myanmar military, outran their camps, a batch of Myanmarese soldiers entered Bandukbanga village, located at the India-Myanmar-Bangladesh trijunction, in southernmost Mizoram's Lawngtlai district with arms and ammunition on January 17.

The soldiers were taken to the nearby Assam Rifles camp at Parva, and later the majority of them were shifted to Lunglei, the official said. They have been under the supervision of the Assam Rifles since then, the official told PTI. The group is headed by a colonel, and has 36 officers and 240 lower-rank personnel, officials said.

So far, over 635 Myanmar soldiers have fled to Mizoram after their camps were overrun and captured by ethnic armed organisations. Of them, 359 soldiers have already been sent back to their country.

Mizoram shares a 510-km-long border with Myanmar.