5:16 PM
Waa Haa Haa
Oct 23, 4:41 AM EDT
YANGON, Myanmar
(AP) -- Fresh clashes between Muslims and Buddhists have broken out
in volatile western Myanmar, leaving at least three people dead and
hundreds of homes burned to the ground, authorities said Tuesday.
The
unrest, which erupted Sunday night, is some of the worst reported
between Rohingya Muslims and ethnic Rakhine Buddhists since skirmishes
swept the region in June, leaving around 70,000 people displaced.
Rakhine
state Attorney-General Hla Thein said the latest violence took place in
Minbyar township, about 25 kilometers (15 miles) north of the coastal
state capital, Sittwe. It later spread farther north to Mrauk-U
township. Both areas are remote, reachable only by foot, Hla Thein said.
Sunday's
riots took the lives of one Buddhist man and two Muslim women, he said.
More than 340 homes, most made of wood, were also destroyed in arson
attacks.
Authorities imposed a dusk-to-dawn curfew in the townships on Monday and both areas were calm Tuesday, Hla Thein said.
The
unrest comes four months after the two communities turned on one
another across Rakhine state in June after the alleged rape and murder
of a Buddhist woman by three Muslim men in late May.
That
violence left at least 90 people dead and more than 3,000 homes
destroyed, along with dozens of mosques and monasteries. The two
communities are almost now completely segregated in towns like Sittwe,
where the Rakhine are able to roam freely while the Rohingya live mostly
confined to a series of displaced camps outside the city center.
The
last serious clashes in Rakhine state took place in August, when
government officials said seven people were killed in the town of
Kyauktaw. The United Nations said 600 homes were also burned at the
time.
The crisis in Myanmar's west goes back
decades and is rooted in a highly controversial dispute over where the
region's Muslim inhabitants are really from. Although many Rohingya have
lived in Myanmar for generations, they are widely denigrated here as
foreigners - intruders who came from neighboring Bangladesh to steal
scarce land.
The U.N. estimates their number
at 800,000. But the government does not count them as one of the
country's 135 ethnic groups, and so - like Bangladesh - denies them
citizenship. Human rights groups say racism also plays a role: Many
Rohingya, who speak a distinct Bengali dialect and resemble Muslim
Bangladeshis, have darker skin and are heavily discriminated against.
The
conflict has proven to be a major challenge for the government of
President Thein Sein, which has embarked on a year of democratic reforms
after half a century of military rule ended in 2011.
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