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Four people were killed when hundreds of Rohingya Muslims rioted in a Buddhist community in Myanmar on Friday, a government official said, as communal tensions boil over in troubled Rakhine state.
A curfew was imposed in the state's Muangdaw township after Rohingyas, who are mostly stateless Muslims of South Asian descent and subjected to tight restrictions by the authorities, went on the rampage following Friday prayers at a mosque.
They hurled rocks and torched houses and buildings, witnesses told Reuters by telephone.
Hmu Zaw, a senior official in President Thein Sein's office, said on his Facebook page four Buddhists, among them a doctor and an elderly man, had died of multiple knife wounds. A Muangdaw hospital official said one was killed and four wounded.
The escalating unrest in Rakhine state, in the west, presents a major challenge to Thein Sein's reformist government, which replaced a military junta last year and says it wants to forge national unity among all ethnicities and religions in Myanmar, one of Asia's most ethnically diverse countries.
However, unless it spirals out of control, it is unlikely to deter Western governments who are keen push reforms and improve ties with the country long isolated by international sanctions.
A Rohingya politician and an activist, citing local sources, said the riots erupted after security forces had opened fire on Rohingyas and several of them were killed.
The accounts provided by sources contacted by Reuters could not be immediately verified.
State MRTV made no mention of the unrest in its nighttime news bulletin but reported a curfew had been imposed in Maungdaw and Buthidaung in Rakhine state. Both are dominated by Rohingyas.
The riots came five days after 10 Muslims, who were not Rohingyas, were killed by Buddhist vigilantes who intercepted the bus they were travelling on in Rakhine's Taunggoke town, an incident that angered Muslims and led to a rare protest in Myanmar's biggest city, Yangon.
The attack followed the distribution of leaflets in Rakhine calling for retribution for the gang rape and killing of a young Buddhist woman several days earlier.
Resentment of Rohingyas runs deep among Myanmar's predominantly Buddhist, ethnic Burman majority. The government and many Burmese refuse to recognize them as "Rohingyas" - how they are known outside Myanmar - instead referring to them as "Bengalis".
MRTV reported three men had gone on trial for the rape and murder of the woman on Friday, referring to them as Bengalis.
SITUATION "CRITICAL"
The U.N. refugee agency estimates members of the minority group number some 800,000 in three districts of Rakhine state bordering Bangladesh.
Most Rohingyas are stateless, recognized by neither Myanmar nor Bangladesh, and thousands flee each year on small boats, to work illegally in Thailand and Malaysia.
Abu Tahay, chairman of the National Democratic Party for Development, a Rohingya political party, said Buddhists hurled stones at the mosque in Muangdaw and five Rohingyas were shot dead after an argument with security forces. The details could not be independently confirmed.
He said nearby Buthidaung was braced for trouble. "The situation is now very critical and unstable," he said by phone from Yangon. "Violence hasn't started yet, but it might soon."
What has triggered the unrest in Rakhine state remains a mystery and prior to Friday's riots, some prominent Burmese, including Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, had suggested the violence could have been instigated intentionally, but have not said why, or by whom.
The government on Thursday announced it had appointed a minister and police chief to head an investigation into the "organized lawless and anarchic acts" in Rakhine state.
It took the unusual step of announcing the probe on the front pages of official newspapers on Thursday and quickly removed from news websites references to Muslims as "kalar", a derogatory term for Muslims of South Asian descent in Myanmar.
Prominent Muslims distanced themselves from Friday's unrest.
"We're talking, to work together with the authorities and our national brethren to control the situation," said Soe Myint, a Muslim elder in Yangon, referring to the escalating tensions.
"We're worried that what these Bengalis are doing will make our brethren misunderstand us."
In fiery comments, prominent activist and former political prisoner Ko Ko Gyi blamed the conflict on Rohingyas and said the violence was not being fuelled by religion.
"Rohingyas are not a Myanmar ethnic race," he told reporters. "It has become a national concern infringing on our sovereignty."
As Myanmar opens up the Rohingyas issue will start to come out.
An eruption in religious tensions in Myanmar has exposed the deep divisions between the majority Buddhists and the country's Muslims, considered foreigners despite a decades-long presence.
The violence threatens to overshadow reconciliation efforts in the country formerly known as Burma, where there has been a series of dramatic political reforms since almost half a century of military rule ended last year.
The trigger for the latest surge in sectarian tensions was the rape and murder of a woman in western Rakhine state, which borders Bangladesh, for which three Muslim men have been detained, according to state media.
On Sunday a mob of hundreds of people attacked a bus, believing the perpetrators were on board, and beat 10 Muslims to death.
"These innocent people have been killed like animals," said Abu Tahay, of the National Democratic Party for Development, which represents the country's much-persecuted stateless Muslim Rohingya community.
"If the police cannot control the situation, maybe the (unrest) is going to spread," he said, adding that the biggest fear was for Rakhine state, where there is a large Muslim minority population including the Rohingya.
In Myanmar's main city Yangon, dozens of Muslims protested on Tuesday calling for justice.
Muslims entered Myanmar en masse for the first time as indentured labourers from the Indian subcontinent during British colonial rule, which ended in 1948.
But despite their long history, they have never fully been integrated into the country.
"For many people, a Burmese is a Buddhist by definition. Buddhism forms an essential part of their identity," said Jacques Leider, a historian at the French School of the Far East based in northern Thailand.
"The situation is explosive and from friction to the clashes is only a matter of lighting the fuse," he told AFP shortly before the latest violence.
Myanmar's Muslims -- of Indian, Chinese and Bangladeshi descent -- account for an estimated four percent of the roughly 60 million population, although the country has not conducted a census in three decades.
Pockets of sectarian unrest have occasionally broken out in the past across the country, with Rakhine state a flashpoint for tensions.
In February 2001, the then-ruling junta declared a curfew in the state capital Sittwe after clashes between Muslims and Buddhists.
The authorities this week warned against "anarchic acts" after the mob killings and an attack on a police station by an angry crowd in Sittwe.
But violence is only the most visible expression of a pervasive discrimination, according to Muslim groups.
Ko Aung Aung, of the exiled Burmese Muslim Association (BMA), said travel, justice and access to education and employment were all affected.
"The daily relationship with Buddhists is good as long as you know your limited ground and do not cross it," he said.
For the majority of people "any crime is a crime", but when a Muslim is suspected "it could be a good reason to riot against them," added Ko Aung Aung, who fled Myanmar in 2004 fearing for his safety because of his activism.
"Riots are always possible at any place and any time. So we must be very careful," he said.
Sittwe has a Muslim population of around 100,000 and dozens of mosques.
But a Muslim leader in the town, who asked not to be named, told AFP there was "no religious freedom", adding that authorities rarely granted permission for new mosques to be built, or repairs to be carried out.
Rights violations also affect other religious groups in Myanmar, including Buddhist monks who participated in a failed uprising in 2007 and who continue to be arrested and harassed, according to Amnesty International.
Myanmar's community of 750,000 Rohingyas, who are confined to the north of Rakhine and considered by the UN to be one of the most persecuted minorities in the world, are singled out for particular disdain.
In Sittwe even pronouncing the word Rohingya can ignite passions among people who view them at best as unwanted immigrants from Bangladesh and at worst "invaders".
"They are fighting to own the land, occupy the entire state," said Khaing Kaung San, a local activist in education and other areas. "They don't need weapons, just by their numbers they can cover the entire land."
It is a sentiment echoed by Shwe Maung, of the Rakhine Nationalities Development Party, which represents the ethnic Rakhine people.
Talking about hostility to Muslims in general, he said: "One day it will be a serious problem, they caused trouble in Thailand, Europe, USA. They try to make trouble in Rakhine State."
Despite decades of isolation, Muslims have also suffered from the images of violence associated with radical Islam, according to a foreign researcher, who asked not to be identified.
He said Myanmar's devout Buddhists had been particularly shocked by the destruction of the giant Buddhas of Bamiyan by Afghanistan's Taliban regime.
"There is a feeling, a fear among the country's Buddhists about being invaded," he added.
Any solutions to this problem.
A curfew was imposed in the state's Muangdaw township after Rohingyas, who are mostly stateless Muslims of South Asian descent and subjected to tight restrictions by the authorities, went on the rampage following Friday prayers at a mosque.
They hurled rocks and torched houses and buildings, witnesses told Reuters by telephone.
Hmu Zaw, a senior official in President Thein Sein's office, said on his Facebook page four Buddhists, among them a doctor and an elderly man, had died of multiple knife wounds. A Muangdaw hospital official said one was killed and four wounded.
The escalating unrest in Rakhine state, in the west, presents a major challenge to Thein Sein's reformist government, which replaced a military junta last year and says it wants to forge national unity among all ethnicities and religions in Myanmar, one of Asia's most ethnically diverse countries.
However, unless it spirals out of control, it is unlikely to deter Western governments who are keen push reforms and improve ties with the country long isolated by international sanctions.
A Rohingya politician and an activist, citing local sources, said the riots erupted after security forces had opened fire on Rohingyas and several of them were killed.
The accounts provided by sources contacted by Reuters could not be immediately verified.
State MRTV made no mention of the unrest in its nighttime news bulletin but reported a curfew had been imposed in Maungdaw and Buthidaung in Rakhine state. Both are dominated by Rohingyas.
The riots came five days after 10 Muslims, who were not Rohingyas, were killed by Buddhist vigilantes who intercepted the bus they were travelling on in Rakhine's Taunggoke town, an incident that angered Muslims and led to a rare protest in Myanmar's biggest city, Yangon.
The attack followed the distribution of leaflets in Rakhine calling for retribution for the gang rape and killing of a young Buddhist woman several days earlier.
Resentment of Rohingyas runs deep among Myanmar's predominantly Buddhist, ethnic Burman majority. The government and many Burmese refuse to recognize them as "Rohingyas" - how they are known outside Myanmar - instead referring to them as "Bengalis".
MRTV reported three men had gone on trial for the rape and murder of the woman on Friday, referring to them as Bengalis.
SITUATION "CRITICAL"
The U.N. refugee agency estimates members of the minority group number some 800,000 in three districts of Rakhine state bordering Bangladesh.
Most Rohingyas are stateless, recognized by neither Myanmar nor Bangladesh, and thousands flee each year on small boats, to work illegally in Thailand and Malaysia.
Abu Tahay, chairman of the National Democratic Party for Development, a Rohingya political party, said Buddhists hurled stones at the mosque in Muangdaw and five Rohingyas were shot dead after an argument with security forces. The details could not be independently confirmed.
He said nearby Buthidaung was braced for trouble. "The situation is now very critical and unstable," he said by phone from Yangon. "Violence hasn't started yet, but it might soon."
What has triggered the unrest in Rakhine state remains a mystery and prior to Friday's riots, some prominent Burmese, including Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, had suggested the violence could have been instigated intentionally, but have not said why, or by whom.
The government on Thursday announced it had appointed a minister and police chief to head an investigation into the "organized lawless and anarchic acts" in Rakhine state.
It took the unusual step of announcing the probe on the front pages of official newspapers on Thursday and quickly removed from news websites references to Muslims as "kalar", a derogatory term for Muslims of South Asian descent in Myanmar.
Prominent Muslims distanced themselves from Friday's unrest.
"We're talking, to work together with the authorities and our national brethren to control the situation," said Soe Myint, a Muslim elder in Yangon, referring to the escalating tensions.
"We're worried that what these Bengalis are doing will make our brethren misunderstand us."
In fiery comments, prominent activist and former political prisoner Ko Ko Gyi blamed the conflict on Rohingyas and said the violence was not being fuelled by religion.
"Rohingyas are not a Myanmar ethnic race," he told reporters. "It has become a national concern infringing on our sovereignty."
As Myanmar opens up the Rohingyas issue will start to come out.
An eruption in religious tensions in Myanmar has exposed the deep divisions between the majority Buddhists and the country's Muslims, considered foreigners despite a decades-long presence.
The violence threatens to overshadow reconciliation efforts in the country formerly known as Burma, where there has been a series of dramatic political reforms since almost half a century of military rule ended last year.
The trigger for the latest surge in sectarian tensions was the rape and murder of a woman in western Rakhine state, which borders Bangladesh, for which three Muslim men have been detained, according to state media.
On Sunday a mob of hundreds of people attacked a bus, believing the perpetrators were on board, and beat 10 Muslims to death.
"These innocent people have been killed like animals," said Abu Tahay, of the National Democratic Party for Development, which represents the country's much-persecuted stateless Muslim Rohingya community.
"If the police cannot control the situation, maybe the (unrest) is going to spread," he said, adding that the biggest fear was for Rakhine state, where there is a large Muslim minority population including the Rohingya.
In Myanmar's main city Yangon, dozens of Muslims protested on Tuesday calling for justice.
Muslims entered Myanmar en masse for the first time as indentured labourers from the Indian subcontinent during British colonial rule, which ended in 1948.
But despite their long history, they have never fully been integrated into the country.
"For many people, a Burmese is a Buddhist by definition. Buddhism forms an essential part of their identity," said Jacques Leider, a historian at the French School of the Far East based in northern Thailand.
"The situation is explosive and from friction to the clashes is only a matter of lighting the fuse," he told AFP shortly before the latest violence.
Myanmar's Muslims -- of Indian, Chinese and Bangladeshi descent -- account for an estimated four percent of the roughly 60 million population, although the country has not conducted a census in three decades.
Pockets of sectarian unrest have occasionally broken out in the past across the country, with Rakhine state a flashpoint for tensions.
In February 2001, the then-ruling junta declared a curfew in the state capital Sittwe after clashes between Muslims and Buddhists.
The authorities this week warned against "anarchic acts" after the mob killings and an attack on a police station by an angry crowd in Sittwe.
But violence is only the most visible expression of a pervasive discrimination, according to Muslim groups.
Ko Aung Aung, of the exiled Burmese Muslim Association (BMA), said travel, justice and access to education and employment were all affected.
"The daily relationship with Buddhists is good as long as you know your limited ground and do not cross it," he said.
For the majority of people "any crime is a crime", but when a Muslim is suspected "it could be a good reason to riot against them," added Ko Aung Aung, who fled Myanmar in 2004 fearing for his safety because of his activism.
"Riots are always possible at any place and any time. So we must be very careful," he said.
Sittwe has a Muslim population of around 100,000 and dozens of mosques.
But a Muslim leader in the town, who asked not to be named, told AFP there was "no religious freedom", adding that authorities rarely granted permission for new mosques to be built, or repairs to be carried out.
Rights violations also affect other religious groups in Myanmar, including Buddhist monks who participated in a failed uprising in 2007 and who continue to be arrested and harassed, according to Amnesty International.
Myanmar's community of 750,000 Rohingyas, who are confined to the north of Rakhine and considered by the UN to be one of the most persecuted minorities in the world, are singled out for particular disdain.
In Sittwe even pronouncing the word Rohingya can ignite passions among people who view them at best as unwanted immigrants from Bangladesh and at worst "invaders".
"They are fighting to own the land, occupy the entire state," said Khaing Kaung San, a local activist in education and other areas. "They don't need weapons, just by their numbers they can cover the entire land."
It is a sentiment echoed by Shwe Maung, of the Rakhine Nationalities Development Party, which represents the ethnic Rakhine people.
Talking about hostility to Muslims in general, he said: "One day it will be a serious problem, they caused trouble in Thailand, Europe, USA. They try to make trouble in Rakhine State."
Despite decades of isolation, Muslims have also suffered from the images of violence associated with radical Islam, according to a foreign researcher, who asked not to be identified.
He said Myanmar's devout Buddhists had been particularly shocked by the destruction of the giant Buddhas of Bamiyan by Afghanistan's Taliban regime.
"There is a feeling, a fear among the country's Buddhists about being invaded," he added.
Any solutions to this problem.
