Myanmar’s ruling junta stated in October 2025 that it had recaptured from an ethnic armed group a city on a commerce freeway to China. On-line posts that surfaced in the course of the preventing falsely claimed a serious bridge had been severely broken. Nevertheless, the image they shared depicts a crossing destroyed a 12 months in the past in a state a whole lot of kilometres (miles) away.
“The TNLA group detonated and destroyed the Moe Tay Bridge, which connects Hsipaw with Namtu and Namsang townships, and fled,” reads a Burmese-language Fb submit on October 8, 2025, utilizing the acronym for the ethnic armed group Ta’ang Nationwide Liberation Military and mentioning three cities in Myanmar’s war-wrecked Shan state.
The accompanying picture reveals a collapsed bridge.
Screenshot of false Fb submit taken October 13, 2025, with a crimson X added by AFP
Comparable posts additionally circulated on X and TikTok because the ruling junta and the TNLA battled for management over Hsipaw city, the place a freeway to China’s Yunnan province passes by way of. In line with the state-run International New Gentle of Myanmar newspaper, the navy reoccupied Hsipaw utterly on October 16 (archived hyperlink).
There have been no official studies the Moe Tay Bridge had been destroyed in the course of the clashes.
Native information outlet Shan Information earlier reported the crossing collapsed however later retracted its article (archived hyperlink). “A re-examination of the Moe Tay Bridge, situated in Hsipaw Township, Shan state, revealed that it was not truly broken,” it stated on October 8.
AFP reached out to a resident of Hsipaw who noticed no harm to the bridge as of October 13.
A reverse picture search on Google was not in a position to hint the supply of the circulating image however a key phrase search discovered it corresponds to a photograph printed by the Irrawaddy newspaper on October 8, 2024 (archived hyperlink).
The report identifies the construction because the Kyeintali Chaung Bridge in western Rakhine state — situated over 600 kilometres (370 miles) away from Moe Tay Bridge. It stated the bridge was destroyed by junta troops.
Myanmar has been mired in civil warfare since a 2021 coup deposed the civilian authorities, with the navy battling a myriad of pro-democracy guerrillas and ethnic armed organisations.
Screenshot comparability of the false submit (left) and movie printed on the Irrawaddy web site
The Irrawaddy credit the picture to AA information desk — a web site affiliated with the Arakan Military, a predominantly Buddhist ethnic armed group that fights the junta (archived hyperlink).
AFP was in a position to verify the situation of the bridge by evaluating it to geotagged photos of the Kyeintali Chaung Bridge on Google Maps (archived hyperlink).
Screenshot comparability of the false Fb submit (left) and an image of the Kyeintali Chaung Bridge on Google Maps, with corresponding parts highlighted by AFP
AFP has fact-checked extra misinformation associated to the Myanmar unrest right here.
