An airport serving Myanmar's top beach resort has been taken over by a formidable ethnic minority group, which has been fighting the country's military administration. This is the first time that resistance groups have taken over a facility of this kind. 

The main city in Myanmar, Yangon, is located around 260 kilometers (160 miles) northwest of Thandwe Airport, also known as Ma Zin Airport. Residents and media outlets in the southern part of Rakhine state reported the airport's capture. 

This development is yet another serious setback for the military government, which took over in 2021 following the overthrow of Aung San Suu Kyi's elected government. Widespread violent opposition has gripped the country, led by guerrilla groups from ethnic minorities and pro-democracy activists.

The powerful ethnic armed organization known as the Arakan Army announced on the messaging app Telegram on Sunday night that it had found the corpses of over 400 troops from recent fighting in the region and had taken control of a sizable ammunition cache. The Associated Press was unable to independently verify these assertions, though.

The Arakan Army may be able to secure Rakhine's coastline region and strengthen their hold on the state's northern regions if they manage to seize Thandwe Airport, one of the state's six airports. The military wing of the Buddhist Rakhine minority, the Arakan Army, wants independence for Rakhine state from the government of Myanmar. Recently, the gang has also referred to themselves as the Arakha Army. 

The Arakan Army has been on the attack since November of last year, taking possession of nine out of the seventeen townships, including one in the adjacent state of Chin. They are a component of a larger ethnic armed coalition that carried out a significant offensive in October of last year, seizing key regions in the northeast of the nation close to the Chinese border.

A 7-kilometer (4-mile) stretch of Ngapali Beach on the Bay of Bengal had been attracting foreign visitors until the COVID-19 outbreak and the war that followed the military takeover put a stop to development. 
The majority of the 46 hotels and guest houses in the vicinity have closed as a result of flights to the resort's serving airport being suspended since April due to intermittent fighting in the communities surrounding Ngapali Beach. 

The Associated Press was informed on Monday by a Ngapali hotel executive who had recently left the area that his employees had left the resort. Comparably, a tourist agent in Thandwe, which is roughly 5 kilometers (3 miles) east of Ngapali, reported hearing gunfire outside the town, even though the surrounding area was quiet and devoid of guerilla activity. Due to worries about their safety, both people asked to remain anonymous.